Ash kom Azgeda

The water hears and understands. The ice does not forgive.

[gonpleiga]

@immortaelis​ continued from here!

her lips curl up at the barkeep’s thick drawl. the sound is something she expects to find more in the american south than the canadian midwest, even if she’s been around enough to know that rural is rural. all small towns have their secrets. especially, it seems, in purgatory.

“in that case, how about you pour me another glass and fill me in on who’s who in this quaint little town?”

[gonpleiga]

@skysplita​ gets a new starter because yes

she wakes warm. in a bunker of concrete and steel and threadbare blankets, heat is as hard to come by as rations, carefully measured out to ensure survival over comfort. but here, wrapped in muscled arms that drape soft and cautious around her body, echo feels the heat sink deep into her bones and lets her eyes stay closed just a moment longer to revel in it.

it doesn’t take long for the pain to awaken. for her side to light up with a fiery vengeance and her muscles to protest their overwork after nothing but calculated sparring matches for months on end. with a low breath blown out through her teeth, echo wills her eyelids to open and finds herself only inches awake from octavia’s soft, still near-sleeping face.

“os sonop,” she says, voice graveled with sleep and disuse as she wishes her a good morning. awareness of her own hands seems to come to her then, the way one is slung over octavia’s middle, fingers brushing the skin of her back where her shirt has ridden up in her sleep.

she remembers the previous evening with heat flaring up her neck, in her cheeks. heart ticking out a steady staccato, she calculates her choices -- the possibility of thanking blodreina for her help and resettling the distance that they’d always remained between them. when the thought settles like hot metal in the pit of her stomach, echo’s mind chooses for her, her thumb brushing along octavia’s spine in something she hopes come off as casual.

[sunrisesongs]

Now, do not misunderstand me; when I call myself a shell I mean–a used up bullet casing. As in, the aftermath of something lethal.  As in, an echo of inflicted evil.

Amrita C. (via sunrisesongs)

[gonpleiga]

skysplita​:

The certainty in Echo’s admission, like the honeyed brown of her eyes, pulled at something fragile and loose in Octavia’s chest, frayed like the roughly torn edge of the cloak she’d unclipped from her shoulders —– her assertion soft, sure, seemingly unswayed by anything she’d been forced to endure in the arena that night in accordance with her red queen’s unbending decree.

Omon gon oson.   

En kom folau oso na gyon op.

“ Nia was a coward, ” Octavia stated, a bitter thread of scorn resting low in the base of her throat.  “ She would have let you burn. ”

The ice queen had been strong, that much was true.  Like the dictators of ancient Rome, she’d been ruthless, cunning, a master tactician;  but her armies had been stronger, her only son a ruler who’d succeeded her with more integrity and honour than she’d ever had.  Echo, regardless of her place in her Azplana’s court, had proven herself a thousand times more courageous a hundred times over.  Feared as she was, Queen Nia would never have stepped up to fight for her people’s place in the bunker.

Not that it mattered.

Caligula or Blodreina, enemy or leader, Octavia’s fight to save the human race had still culminated in massacre after massacre, in the insurgence of uprising and starvation.  Even if Wonkru lost dozens more in the fighting pits ( even hundreds, depending on the viability of the hydrofarm’s crops in the coming months and years ), she’d continue to do what had to be done.  She’d save them, whatever the cost.

Turning her attention from Echo’s retreating figure, her weary gaze instead finding the opening of her closet door, Octavia began the task of searching through it, the pads of her fingers abstractedly ascending the inside of her injured arm all the while.

“ ———-This is yours, ” she extended, and tugged a shirt free of its wire hanger, tossing it onto the right side of her mattress:  a charcoal tank left left untouched since their first days underground, along with the rest of Osleya’s things, still more Skaikru in design than anything worn by those on the ground.  She wouldn’t need it anymore.  Not like Echo did.  “ You can have either side of the bed, ” she offered,  the breath she let out betraying her exhaustion and her unwillingness to bow to it all at once.  No matter how she tried, relieving her subconscious of the blood on her hands ( a remissible price to pay, all things considered ) would never be easy.  “ I’ll sleep when the farm’s feeding us again. ”

blinking, slowly, echo stays rooted to the spot while octavia rifles through her belongings. whether the world spins slightly from her injuries and exhaustion, or the because of the way octavia condemns the azplaina so easily -- as if her words are merely truth of fact rather than the highest treason -- she isn’t sure, but she’s willing to blame the blood loss rather than swallow down a notion she’s not yet ready to accept.

“ mochof, “ she says, thanking octavia with a nod, before committing herself to the arduous task of cleaning up her own blood and donning new clothes. there’s no second thought in stripping out of her ruined garments, carefully setting them aside on the cement floor, before she moves to wash as much of the blood off herself around the bandages as possible. 

for the first time in over a year, echo yearns for a bath. even knowing she shouldn’t submerge her wounds -- having grown used to the old world showers down here in the bunker -- as she wipes at her abdomen with a filthy cloth and cold, recycled water, echo yearns with an ache that fills her chest for the baths she used to know. deep, hot basins of water, with fragrant oils if she was lucky enough to have some extra game or coin for trade that week.

she finds herself so lost in the memory, almost smelling the spring-like floral scent of her favorite old soap bar, that it’s only when the repetitive movements of her hand on her skin move too close to the wound and tug on the freshly placed stitches that echo jumps back to the present with a hiss, blinking fast and rinsing out the rag before she moves to rinse off her arms and face.

as clean as she can hope to be, and dressed in clean clothes that smell entirely of rust and the harsh chemical detergent they use, echo helps herself into the closest side of the bed almost out of a matter of need, rather than choice. her muscles mold into the mattress, even worn thin as it is. she’s barely got her legs under the covers before she can feel the weight settling into her spine and head.

“ you cannot take care of wonkru unless you first take care of yourself, “ echo says, her voice softer than the firm directive she intends it to be. holding out a hand, almost pleading, she asks, “ join me? “

carefully, echo maneuvers herself onto her uninjured side, scooting toward the center of the bed to make room for octavia. perhaps in the morning, she will find herself regretting the boldness of her choice, but for now, it feels nice to pull octavia’s arm underneath her own, tucking it up under her chin. 

( she reflects, briefly, on how long it’s been since she was last held, but the thought is gone just as quickly as it comes. )

“ you can be blodreina again in the morning, “ she says, barely more than a whisper as her lips brush their entwined knuckles. “ right now, you’re just octavia. “

[gonpleiga]

herover​:

random starter for @gonpleiga​ bc it just came to me, OOP.

                    “ —Figure I don’t bother you all that much since you haven’t tried killing me yet. …That’s kind of your thing, right? ” It’s an unnecessary retort, uttered dryly, antagonizing, if not for the vague lack of vehemence. He just can’t help himself. And there Murphy stands, painting a long precarious shadow by the viewport, his back to the wall. 

Not that he’d admit it, but he’d given Echo more than one reason to do so out in that forest. Vitality slowly leeched from her in the irradiated wilderness, with only one literal car-wreck of an out in front of her. And he’d been willing to take that fleeting hope of survival from Echo in a heartbeat. Ready to leave her among the rest of the snow-soaked carnage that littered the roadside, if it meant getting the chosen few to the Island. To some sort of salvation.

the sound of his voice grates across her eardrums, in the same way that the constant sound of the air filtration system, and the water recycling system, and the heating system all seem to buzz and hum and grind her to the brink of exhaustion at all hours of the non-existent day. when bellamy told her that space would test them, echo did not know he meant this. she is trying to embrace the familiar motto of one more day and ignoring the way that she now knows how to work the airlock, that her sword has been sharpened so many times out of boredom that she didn’t even feel it the last time that she sliced her finger during the process.

that she knows monty kept a sample of the algae that nearly killed the man in front of her, and an extra swallow would be enough to ----- 

“ bold words for a man who just woke up, “ she retorts, tongue flicking on the words to volley back the way that his anchor into her rib cage and dig in. space has left her plenty of time to get reacquainted with every one of her ghosts. “ maybe you haven’t had enough time to bother me yet. “

[gonpleiga]

@damnmechanic​ gets a starter

“ ------ so niylah gave it her approval, “ echo says, opening her hand over raven’s workstation to drop a dried, green bud on her desk. where the rest of them had given up transcendence for a life of farming and fishing, sunny beach days and peaceful nights by the fire, raven had given up the potential of a pain-free, limitless existence to return back here with them. to struggle through the day to day toils of their primitive life by the beach with a limp and stiff, aching muscles. 

after a few cups of moonshine, echo might have more than a few words to say about the mighty judge who left them here.

“ we’re gonna try it tonight, ” she tells her, eyes scouring raven’s face as she watches her. “ i thought if you wanted to join us... maybe you might find it relaxing. “ her eyes flicked briefly to the brace around raven’s affected leg.

[gonpleiga]

Like for a short starter from everyone’s favorite murder queen!

[gonpleiga]

@redemptioninterlude​ -- continued from here

in over a decade’s service to the throne of azgeda, bashfulness was never an emotion that graced echo’s lexicon with any regularity. yet somehow now, she finds herself blinking at the smaller woman, her cheeks flushed as she processes the meaning behind her words, the smirk at the corner of her too-pink lips. surely she didn’t mean...

--- but clearly she did.

“ ---- i just meant that while skaikru preserved more knowledge of the old world, we had ours, too, “ she said, a lifetime of practice the only thing that kept her voice neutral. “ the god of war was common in azgedan bedtime stories. ”

she’s heard the others -- murphy, most commonly -- draw out the full version of her name as a tease, but echo knows mars is the girl’s preferred title. she knows the power that names hold, even when they aren’t necessarily the ones presented at birth.

mars might be smaller than echo, with little visible muscle to take down her enemies, but echo is well aware that brawn isn’t the only way to win on a battlefield. 

with her heartrate a little more under her control, echo clears her throat, letting the vibration rumble as she brings her gaze up to the bright blue of mars’ eyes. 

“ yelling isn’t exactly my style,” she says, letting her eyes drift down the curve of the woman’s nose, the bow of her lips. “ unless you’re up for a challenge. “

[gonpleiga]

skysplita​:

With Abby’s domain almost a quarter mile’s walk and three cold, sparsely inhabited cinderblock levels behind them, the frigid air and the smell of death that’d drifted from the rotunda seemed to ebb away, like soil under rain or blood pirouetting down a drain, blockaded by the lock and click of Octavia’s chamber door.

Inside, the cold stayed, clinging to her bones and aching, worn out muscle despite the shell of her armor holding her in the infallible shape of a champion:  a lingering remnant of everything outside the walls of her private compartment, from a med bay full of the injured, starving and sick to the mess, its trestle tables and ever increasing numbers of vacant seats —– its glaring strip-lights and hungry armed guards, and uniformly barren stainless steel trays bearing the fruits of their misery.  

Their sacrifice.

In here, there was nothing but silence;  emptiness, dressed in warm blankets and chrome, and bathed in shadow —– enough space for the countless demons she’d lured in, with the knowledge that she’d only be able to slay them when everything she’d done ( everything she’d had to do ) was justified.

There was nothing clinical or unfeeling about the mess of glass she’d left on the ledge beneath her broken mirror, or the candle wax dripping onto her desk, or the countless unread letters she’d written Bellamy hidden away underneath the frame of her bed.  Nothing neatly, carefully composed about the rumpled sheets strewn across it, nor the instantaneity of her outward exhaustion beginning to break through the spaces in her armor, or the presence of blood collecting in the bowl of her sink, and drying on her towels.

Indra had never mentioned it, though she’d been one of the few privy to Octavia’s private quarters.  Neither had Kane.

But Echo, a trained mercenary and spy accustomed to the darkness that comprised of the bunker’s perennial and all consuming shadow, always seemed to see more than any of their allies combined.

Turning from the foot of her bed, where she’d dropped the scabbard buckled to her belt and shed the outer layers of her fighting leathers, Octavia met the tenderness of Echo’s outreach with a shiver, and the stroke of the dampened cloth across her cheek with the dry, hesitant part of her lips;  a defenseless cant of her head —– an unspoken yes, in hungry, quiet concession to the kind of touch she hadn’t felt in years.

“ Six months, ” she supplied, her voice a low, quiet rasp.  “ Maybe longer. ”

With the wealth of Echo’s focus fixed on her, each gentle graze of her attentive touch seemed to ignite an instantaneous itch under the bandage she’d affixed just that morning, across the line of every measured, deliberate incision she’d made since the dark year had swallowed them all alive — every scar gracing the plane of her forearm, unnoticed and unexplained, tracking every arduous moment in which she’d needed more strength than she could summon without her mask of royal red.

If the blood of her enemies had been the catalyst for Wonkru’s unity at the start of their long, arduous bout of confinement underground, then it’d more than certainly work now, when they needed it most.  

“ This isn’t just war paint, ” Octavia whispered.  It was her penance.  Her shield.  A manifestation of her sacrifice.  Her forbearance for Wonkru’s stalwart avowal that from the ashes, they would rise.   “ ———-It’s armor.  Gaia was right about that. ”

the rough edge of octavia’s voice abrades at echo’s eardrums, but it’s the implication of her words that cracks open the wound at echo’s chest, pries it open until the ache leaves her trembling. her teeth grit in her skull as she wipes more of the dried blood -- octavia’s own blood -- from her cheekbone, leaving pink streaks as she reveals the pale skin underneath.

she steps away to rinse the cloth, giving them both a moment to compose themselves while she rings her hands under the cold, cold water.

“ she was right about the blood of your enemies, perhaps, “ echo allows, returning to octavia’s side to clean the rest of her face with gentle passes of the worn rag, index finger curled under the sharp jut of her chin. she remembers that conversation too well, the moments after the massacre outside the hydrofarm that led to the ascent of blodreina and the arena and the hardening of octavia’s eyes.

“ but oren was wrong. “

she lowers the cloth, making certain she has the other woman’s full attention, using her given name rather than her title as she tries to meet the shimmering aqua of her eyes. 

“ you are not the enemy, “ she says, a resolute strength underlying her words even as her body begs for rest. “ do you think queen nia ever spilled her own blood after asking me to kill for her? we may fight like in rome, but you are not caligula, octavia. “

by the time she’s done speaking, octavia’s face is no longer covered in red. cleaned, she looks younger, her true age and innocence shining through the rust and death that covers them all in this place. with cautious steps, echo moves to give the cloth another rinse, getting it as clean as she can before she hangs it to dry over the edge of the sink.

as though occurring to her for the first time, echo blinks at her own distorted reflection in the shattered mirror before her gaze drops down to the shirt that’s now stiff with her own dried blood, nearly shredded in half from the deep slice of the sangedakru’s sword. 

“ i don’t have anything to change into, “ she says, the words out before she can think to stop them. the haze must be the blood loss, the exhaustion, she realizes, before letting out a sigh and carefully working one of her arms out of the sleeve. the motion tugs at her fresh stitches, heat flaring up her side and she grits her teeth to contain a wince.

“ i’m going to clean up and then.... “ she pauses, a warning nagging at the back of her neck before she forges on anyway. “ ----we should rest. no one will be looking for you tonight. sha? “

[gonpleiga]

open to mutuals

the small yellow and red striped globes are still sun-kissed and warm where they sit in her palm, finally gifted with just enough give in their skins to tell her that they’re perfectly ripe and ready to eat. it’s just a few for now; the rest of the fruits are still green and hard, sour and not yet sweetened by the sun.

she can’t keep the smile from creeping into her cheeks as she sits down, hand held out to offer her gift.

“ earth’s first tomatoes in over a century. want one? “

[lukas-musings]

         “Don’t bring a knife to a gunfight” is stupid. 

                                                           I’ll bring a knife to any fight                                                                       And I’ll ᴡɪɴ                                                                   Fuck all of you

[gonpleiga]

hiiiiiiii i’m cleaning out some ancient drafts and getting ready to be back here properly. will be putting up memes and a starter call sooon. :)

[gonpleiga]

skysplita​:

Following the completion of the painstaking task at hand, and having finally forsaken the tools Abby had left by the side of her unwilling patient’s bed, Octavia found that the blood on her hands no longer offered any distinction between the repercussions of a routine wound-closure and the violent aftermath of war.

One way or another, surviving had always been its own kind of battle.  

Echo’s evisceration of the Sangedakru rebels in the pit had been a testament to the fact, her narrow victory proof enough to Wonkru’s red queen that their relentless fight to evade the grip of death’s cold, spectral hand was far from over.  

In the end, this was a battlefield, not the sanctuary their people needed.  And the pain etched into Echo’s face ( the tremors that had wracked her bones and the creaking frame of her hospital bed until Octavia had felt every sign of her suffering pinch the back of her throat and burrow deep into the mangled mess inside her chest ), was no less wearying, no less crushing than any other wound she’d promised to bear.

Withdrawing her hand, the solemn, lightless shift of her eyeline tracking the bloody finger marks left behind, Octavia rose to height from her post, taking Echo’s hand with her —- and as helpless as she’d been to stop her defenses from crumbling, slipped just as fluidly back into the dark.

“ You’re with me, Echo.  I’m not leaving you here, ”  she murmured.  Come dawn, their microscopic world would be as it was —- but for tonight, the arena’s latest ( and by no means last ) champion had earned her respite in seclusion from her bunk.  Though Blodreina’s quarters were vastly larger than the rest of her people’s lodgings, the lavish expanse of her bed spacious enough to accommodate her nightly tossing and turning, it’d never stopped feeling like the hole in the floor.  

The broken, blood speckled mirror hanging from her bedroom wall had never stopped reminding her of what she’d become.

“ Gyon op, ” Octavia charged.   “ Tonight you rest.  Tomorrow ——- you are Wonkru. ”

on weary feet, echo follows her unflinchingly. her legs feel jellied as the sweet preserves that used to fill her belly, spread over warm bread during the cold, barren months of the azgedan winter. for a moment she can almost taste the tangy burst of saccharine fruit, of red and blue berries and orange marmalades so vivid and real on her lips that her tongue darts out to wet them. now, the only taste to be found is copper, iron, the metallic tang of blood from their enemies, of the fallen wonkru, of their brethren rationed carefully to ensure their survival through the cold, barren months of the farm’s fungal isolation.

echo clings to octavia’s hand as blodreina leads them through the back hallways. perhaps tomorrow, she’ll regret the desperate fervor with which she’s determined to not let go. tonight, she keeps her fingers -- drying blood still sticky between them -- wrapped tight around her anchor to this moment.

their cause.

omon gon oson.

it takes longer than it should for a spy to realize that octavia has led them to her personal chambers, but echo’s lips stay shut, her voice quiet while her heart hammers in her chest. 

“ -----mochof, “ she says again, finally releasing octavia’s hand to step carefully toward the sink, desperate to wash the grim of the fight from her skin. as the water runs cold over her already-numb fingers, echo looks up from the rivulets of red that she scrubs from her palms to the shattered glass of the mirror, refracting her face back at her. pieces of the broken glass litter the sink’s small shelf, unmistakable rust stains at the sharpest edges and echo’s heart slams like a freight train into the back of her sternum.

how many times has octavia stared in this mirror and believe the reflected distortion was her truest self? 

when her skin tingles and the water runs cold, echo splashes a cool palmful onto her face, scrubbing the fight away. reaching for the folded piece of towel next to the sink -- brown rusted blood stains obvious even through the most thorough washings -- echo wets the rag and carefully rings it out. 

her steps are cautious as she approaches octavia, the cloth held out in front of her. 

“ may i? “ she asks, her other hand coming up to hold a finger at octavia’s jaw, barely there in fear that the other woman might feel the stutter of her own heart as echo lifts the wet cloth to her temple, gently rubbing at the dried lines of red. she swallows hard against the lump that rises in her throat, suddenly back in abby’s hospital ward on the edge of losing her breath and her cool, but with quick blinks and an unsteady breath, she manages to regain herself, focusing on the task at hand.

removing blodreina from her throne for just one night. 

“ how long ago did you run out of warpaint? “ she asks softly, eyes fixed on the softening red at octavia’s cheek rather than meeting her gaze. it takes willpower gained only through a lifetime of practice not to glance down at her arms, searching.

[ltnsingh-deactivated20251220]

𝐎𝐂𝐓𝐀𝐕𝐈𝐀 𝐀𝐄𝐒. – 𝐟𝐞𝐚𝐭. 𝐞𝐜𝐡𝐨 𝐤𝐨𝐦 𝐚𝐳𝐠𝐞𝐝𝐚  ( @gonpleiga​ )

[gonpleiga]

skysplita​:

Below the slick scarlet drawn across her skin, a mask from her hairline to the bridge of her nose, just as vibrant in the clinical glow of medbay’s overhead lights as the blood on her hands, Octavia held the initial weight of Echo’s revelation in the unwavering line of her gaze, in the span of her palm, compressing gauze against the wound beneath it —- in the slight part of her lips, a hungry home to a beat of farsighted quiet.

They’d all had their secrets and their burdens to bear.  Demons, drowned in more darkness than any corner of the impenetrable fortress they’d inhabited only two and a half years ago could hope to contain.  

Like those belonging to every Wonkru trapped on the same path descending toward Hades, Blodreina’s demons were many and restless,  tethered inside the cage of her ribs by the strength of her stubborn, unforgiving will and the scars drawing a handful of lines up the inside of her forearm alone.  

She’d come know more than her fair share about regret, about losing oneself in a tidal wave of violence that couldn’t be taken back, about the enduring affliction of having no good choices—— or any choice at all.  But not once, not since before the conclave, before praimfaya had brought Echo to stand by her side and eradicated every second of vitriolic contention that’d once existed between them, had she witnessed her carry herself with anything at all like disgrace.

“ We both know that’s not true. ”  Readjusting her grip, in part to accommodate for the dressing she’d pulled from the surgical cart standing beside Echo’s makeshift bed, Octavia brought one hand to a tentative repose around the ashen contour of her cheek, lifted the other to smooth out the starched covering of the bandage she’d unravelled across her side, and slid her thumb, still slick with blood, slowly across the ridge of her cheekbone.  

“ You honor us all by fighting for Wonkru, ”  she supplied, her voice like glass, roughened into grit in the blaze of an inferno that’d begun to singe almost everything inside her into kindling.  “ You honor your friend by ensuring that we survive praimfaya.  You’re strong. ” she pressed on, quieter still, as though her every whispered word belonged in the same chest beneath her bed in which she’d locked every unread letter she’d written her brother since they’d retreated underground.  “ Yu sou laik stanop.  And I’m glad you’re alive. ”

as warm fingers, slick with the sticky sap of her own blood come up to touch at her cheek, echo’s fingers curl around the edge of the hospital bed, fingers digging into the metal and sleek-covered cushion in an attempt to ground herself. her head floats, the dizziness part blood-loss and the wild of the fight, part motion sickness from finding herself lost out at sea in the deep blue-green swirl of octavia’s eyes.

yu sou laik stanop. 

pride laces blodreina’s words until not even echo herself can hide from the truth of them. in a matter of seconds, their commander takes the former azgedan warrior -- already stripped bare by the trials of the bunker, the arena, of trust -- and turns her back into a child of only eight years old, stood trembling and terrified in front of her queen knowing only of loss and the sudden, burning, aching desire to be useful to her people.

her face crumbles just as it did then, and there is no stopping it. no lifetime of lessons in willpower can curb the way echo’s brow crumples, the way her eyes water and sting. her lip trembles and she break’s octavia’s gaze, sniffling once, as quiet as possible, as she draws a shaking breath in an effort to steady herself. to keep the walls together just a little bit

“ ------mochof, ” she whispers, the words barely making a sound beyond the movement of her lips.

“ could---- could we go somewhere else?” she asks, the word we slipping in before she has a chance to convince herself otherwise. one way or another, the weariness is catching up with her. the pain and the soothing softness of octavia’s hand, the way her chest has been ripped open with just a few words despite the fondness she’s tried so hard to bury beneath steel and rust and grit. the notion of her cold bunk where she’d been arrested just this morning races like ice water down her spine. “ i’m ----- “

she doesn’t want to break down in abby’s hospital bed, with patients sleeping on the other side of cotton walls. “ not here. beja. “

[gonpleiga]

LISTEN like i know i’ve been terrible and haven’t been here but tl;dr they’ve switched my migraine meds around until i’m a mushy brain mess trying to adjust, the election, blah blah. i’m finally getting my act together so like. expect me to post some of these nearly-finished drafts tonight/tomorrow and love me, okay?

[gonpleiga]

GET WRECKED, WE WON