Rules: Take this quiz for one of your OCs
tagged by the lovely @spaceprincealenko !
tagging @that-wasnt-so-bad + @greencrusader13 + @elaphaemourra + @outcastcommander + @salavidze + @lyrishadow + @ma-sulevin + @roguescarlett <3
Kodelyn: ( you swallow pain & fold around it )
you have always hurt. you hold it carefully, and twisted in such a way that other people don't have to see it. you don't choke on it. you don't drown. you just have it, the way some people have freckles, this is a thing that lives in your bones. you fold instead of fighting because you know how to make yourself small, tuck away the places where they have clawed at, swallow the bruises so you seem clean. nobody needs to see it. you will live through this on your own. you know what you need, and relief isn't it. this doesn't mean you cannot reach out - it means it is not in your nature to do so. you should. hiding does not mean you won't be seen.
Kodelyn is a survivor. A ‘natural leader’ is what’s usually attached to most people’s opinion of her, someone that is meant to be admired for her talents and skills. That isn’t how it always feels though. Hard calls have to be made. Decisions she’s agonizes over years later. Lives lost that she can’t rewind and bring back. Missions she made it back from that others didn’t. She lives, they don’t, and that haunts her. Yet, others suffer more than she has. Her family is still intact. She is too. There’s no reason to complain, no reason to yank others down to her pity party when they’re already reeling over losses far greater than her own. Her job might be stressful, but her job is to keep pressing forward. She inspires others, even when the words choke her.
People need her in ways that she has to adapt to. Even as she begins to wear away, she can’t give up and cry when so many lives depend on her making the right calls. If her own sacrifice is needed, she isn’t afraid to give it. She gives and gives and gives until there’s nothing left to give, and even then, she scrapes away at parts of herself to make up the difference.
Kodelyn perseveres. No one deserves to see her in pieces. They don’t need to worry for her, and they shouldn’t. She’ll put herself back together by herself, again and again, until the puzzle pieces are so raw that they don’t ever quite fit together right.
Lyssa: ( you're choking on how much you have to try )
you have tried. you have carried the weight of the world on your shoulders and accepted more responsibilities than you have ever wanted, even intended to gain. it isn't crushing - you are strong enough to hold it - but you are choking. you don't know what to do with it. you don't know where it goes, how to move this weight everyone knows you can hold onto, and do you even want to get rid of it? Never. You would not give this to - force this on - anyone else. but you /can't/. but you are choking on it. your body will hold it up even when you lose all the air in your lungs, and your footing, and your courage. it does not mind choking you. it seems almost designed to do so. if you weren't wrung out you wouldn't be doing this thing properly.
Lyssa has never wanted anyone’s help. She’s determined to be the strongest and the one that people can look up to, and she’s not afraid of the responsibility that comes with being the pathfinder. No. She’s ok. She’s fine. She wants everyone to stop asking. She’s not a child, she’s a pathfinder. There’s a stark difference between the two, and she wants them to remember she doesn’t need to be coddled or hidden from the world. There’s a lot, she knows that. But there’s no reason to worry everyone else when this is her job, her responsibility. Forcing this onto someone else is an admission of weakness. What would her father say, if she balked under the pressure now? He made her better than that, and she intends to be just as strong as everyone needs her to be.
They all need her. And she needs to be there to provide, even through the late nights, the near-fatal missions. She may waver, but she can’t afford to give up. Not so close to finding home. She runs herself ragged but that’s fine, she can do this, she’s too damn determined, too damn stubborn. It hurts when she goes too far, but it’s another scar. She’ll heal.
She’ll heal until she can’t. Lyssa bleeds until its too much, but her shoulders are molded to take that responsibility. It’s her’s.
