CW: Pretty mild stuff really, it's got mentions of death/failed mission, allusions to PTSD and self hatred, just kinda angsty really. Not beta read, my friends.
Alright gang, this is the first thing I've written in like,,, a year, so if it's a big ol' pile of yikes then 🤷♀️
0200. The sickening green glare of the clock bounced off the bedside table, off the walls, and onto the still figure beside it. Soap had been awake for hours. He wasn’t entirely sure he had slept at all, seconds turned to minutes turned to hours, his stomach twisting all the while.
It hadn’t been a long mission, but it was a brutal one. The debrief lasted an eternity, the men getting more restless with each passing moment. Eventually, Simon had taken himself away to decompress alone. Johnny followed shortly after, an instinct driving him to get away. To protect himself. To hide. Each resurfacing memory burned like acid behind his eyes. Skin crawling with each naming of the dead. The last thing he remembered was his vision swimming, bricks finding their way into his chest as his lungs screamed for air. Legs boneless as he all but leapt from the room.
Johnny wasn’t a weak man. Ask anyone. They’ll tell you that he’s witty, cheeky, funny sometimes and a pain in the ass others. They’ll tell you he’s professional, efficient, strong. No one would ever go as far as to say ‘unaffected’. Usually, he could push it down. Compartmentalise the horrors and focus on the lives he saved. The terrorists he foiled. Hell, a day could be made great by something as small as teasing the shit out of his Lt.
Today wasn’t like today. Today he couldn’t get the choked sobs or pained screams out of his ears. The sound of suffering replaying over and over in his head until he couldn’t bear it. The smell of blood steeped so deeply into his flesh he was afraid it would never wash out. The sight of bodies upon bodies piled and left to rot. With every flutter of his eyelids a new horror played out before him. That’s how he ended up frozen in position, letting his eyes burn a whole in the ceiling. Unable to move, a vice holding his head in place. Johnny’s muscled ached, his skin crawled with every uneven breath. Feeling the blood and dirt drying on his skin – cracking where his knuckles flexed – sticking to him the way guilt does. The way regret and grief fill his lungs with every breath. This couldn’t be normal. This couldn’t be right. He’d felt the sting of a failed mission before, but there was no familiarity to this feeling. No way of navigating what he couldn’t understand.
Eventually, a new feeling overwhelmed the paralysis. Disgust. All the fear and resentment Soap had been holding within his suddenly washed out by a cold tidal wave of loathing. A detest for his body. It was nothing more to him tonight, just a vessel for the darkness that war brings. His body was no longer his. He had to get out. Had to separate all the parts that were him from all the parts that were monster.
“Fuckin’ hell, MacTavish. Get your shit together.”
Muttered in the darkness, no response came. The cold barracks air soaking up the distaste his words dripped with. Water. That was what he needed. He just had to will himself into the shower and then he would be okay. Would be able to wash away the smell of sweat and blood and dirt. Would be able to rid his skin of fingerprints of all the civvies he couldn’t save.
“Just another shower, just gotta wash ye body again. Just one more time. Then ye’ll be fine. Yeah, you’ll be right as rain.”
The icy torrent hit Johnny’s back, a harsh shiver dragged from his spine. He sighed into the water, drawn out and pained. Eyes squeezed shut to force out the visions that plagued him. Reaching for the shampoo, Soap shivered again. He could turn the water warm, of course he could, but why should he? Why should he deserve warmth and comfort and gentle touches when so many go without?
As Johnny stepped out into the dampened room, he braced himself on the wet tile. Fingers spread on the verdant wall. Tendons tensed as if to grip, as if to squeeze the life from towel before him.
Wrapping the towel around his waist, Johnny found himself before the mirror. Beads of water rested atop his broad shoulders, scars and speckled remnants of gunshot wounds on clear display. Who was this imposing figure? This man in the reflection, built for war but now reduced to a shadow of who he used to be. A demolitions expert who isn’t certain what he’s fighting for anymore. The lines were beginning to blur, and Sergeant MacTavish couldn’t stand it.
He couldn’t stand himself, couldn’t stand the body that contained him, couldn’t stand each and every element that culminated to his being. It was cumbersome. Heavy. Full of love and hate, satisfaction and regret, life and death. Eyes he wished he could set aside. Sights he wished he could unsee. Visions he’d beg to be released from. Johnny was fighting a body he’s grown tired of in a battle he could never hope to win.
His hands could go, you could take them from him and they’d understand. They know they’d be being pulled from a life of doing the unspeakable. Of holding guns, knives, enemies’ throats, and victims’ hands. You could take his heart. Rip it apart piece by piece and see the loyalty inside. He’d never ask why. He’d never ask you to stop. Soap could look to his brain, the parts that haven’t been charred by charges. The parts that haven’t been eviscerated by the ringing of gunshots and grenades. The parts of his brain that still recognises safety is the 141. Soap could look to what remains and throw it away with only a single tear.
You could take his tongue. Render him speechless. No more fun to be had for his quips or sass. No more words of encouragement or communication on the field. He doesn’t need that tongue, his words surely don’t hold any value? His ears... well, those Johnny is unsure of. He’s made for listening. His job is to take in the knowledge of others, follow tac advice and listen intently during debriefs. Without them, he’d be lost. On the other hand, if he had to listen to one more order that prioritised business over lives in the name of war... Joints you could have. Dull aches some days; electric shocks others. Stiffening with every passing year, Soap would certainly not miss them. He’d let his teeth be taken. Sick and tired of baring them, tired of chewing on his lips till they bleed at night, tired of the way they slice through anything in their path. Just dispose of it all. Take everything that makes him. Take it all away and leave it to rot somewhere it’ll never be found. Staring back at the stranger in the mirror, Soap thinks these thoughts again and again. Fine tuning the details of everything he’d miss and all that he wouldn’t. Imagining the way his body would fall apart, the way his bones would break and dreams would shatter. He thinks of all he’d leave behind and if it would even matter. If it ever mattered. Not fine, after all. Not right as rain. Not brave. Not even likely to be cleared for duty again. This Mactavish was not right, but he’d never allow anyone to know.
He looked at the clock once more. 0600. Time to move on. Time to put on a show.
everyone in the notes we are all holding hands. everyone who hasnt worked on a wip in weeks or months or years, its okay. we are going slow but we are going
Person A. "You're sick, you know that? Evil and twisted and-"
Person B. "I'm not evil, or cruel, I'm... Calculated. I know how to play the game, and I know that sometimes winning means sacrificing a player or two. I'd take a look at my place on the board if I were you. It seems rather precarious from where I'm standing."
There you go, based on a vision my brain conjoured up about me finally beating my deranged brother in law in a battle of wits and not having to face the consequences of it. One day I'll be able to tell him how much the family hates him, but for now we must all play along.
Person A. "You're sick, you know that? Evil and twisted and-"
Person B. "I'm not evil, or cruel, I'm... Calculated. I know how to play the game, and I know that sometimes winning means sacrificing a player or two. I'd take a look at my place on the board if I were you. It seems rather precarious from where I'm standing."
There you go, based on a vision my brain conjoured up about me finally beating my deranged brother in law in a battle of wits and not having to face the consequences of it. One day I'll be able to tell him how much the family hates him, but for now we must all play along.
Right, okay, so song *inspired* fics. I want to make it clear that these are not songfics in the conventional 'stick a line or two of song lyrics between each paragraph of storytelling' sense, but instead work with the lyrics to build new visions.
Songs obviously build stories, that is the nature of any (good) piece of music. I wanted to incorporate these into new settings to make something fun and unique.
Below the cut are the links for these works :)
Red is WIP, Blue is final touches, Green is posted.
Sleepwalk - Captain John Price has demons to face
Drunk on Pride - Price reflects on his career in the army.
Kleptomaniacrow - Ghoap Angst. Warnings for being kicked in the feels. I mean this so seriously. It will hurt.
Red - A darker take on the 141, the lines around what love really is begin to blur.
Haunted - Simon wonders if he'll ever be easy to love.
November - Ghoap have an argument after Simon starts to hide parts of himself again.
34. - I don't know how to describe this one
Human - A ghost fic
47 birds - Graves + Shepherd
Body - Soap has feels
Love? - Some kind of fucked up Ghoap thing
There are more songs! I just can't remember all my plans right now 😅
Droodles by Roger Price (from his 1953 book). Droodles (a blend of “doodle”, “drawing”, “riddle”) are simple drawings with a witty, often absurd, caption. The first one, as some of you may know, was used by Frank Zappa for his 1982 album, Ship Arriving Too Late to Save a Drowning Witch. (Zappa, a fan of Price's work, lived just a few miles from the artist and personally sought permission to use the image.)
Johnny Soap McTavish fic toniiiiiight -or tomorrow morning but I'm a determined girly - and hopefully it's going to be angstyyy. There should be a lil :) at the end, but he's been dealing with some inner demons lately. Stay tuned!
My first Stardew Valley original character! Mae has since escaped the realm of SDV, but she's yet to find her perfect story.
A small town baker with a love of pink, glitter, and more pink, Mae is certainly not easy to miss. Stubborn as all hell, and motivated almost exclusively by "Do it for the plot". She has been known to run her mouth in the wrong place at the wrong time, but she never means any harm. Truly she's as sweet as her bakes, but there's a little spice in there.
At 23, Mae is still waiting on her frontal lobe to be fully developed and that shows in her (somehow still endearing) lack of critical thinking skills. I'm gonna be real, she's dumb. She's so stupid but it's kind of why everyone loves her. She says what she thinks and she does what she wants. You gotta admire the commitment to the bit, surely?
Within the Stardew environment she was created for, her closest friends were an eclectic alchemist, a bird hybrid, and a small, slightly unsettling mad scientist. She was even frenemies with a ghost! The person she truly relied upon most however, was a doctor that had taken on a fatherly role in her life.
Her father had become badly injured and subsequently passed away as a result of an explosion in the mines, leading her and her mother to move away from the valley until she returned alone at 19. She still writes to her mother once a week, and they exchange recipes every time.
Mae needs some more emotional development, but I do adore many aspects of her simplicity. My other characters tend to have more... turbulent backgrounds. I'm actually quite jealous of her wardrobe too. Will update as she grows :) Art by @futura2001
