LOST PROMPT : @shadowcovcn ( Claudia ) For Madeleine You Took Those Bastards Down Like It Was Nothing.

🪐 — LOST PROMPT : @shadowcovcn ( claudia ) for madeleine ▶ ❝ you took those bastards down like it was nothing. it…was amazing. ❞

IT WAS ALREADY TOO LATE to save her blouse. the fine fibers had absorbed the blood of her victims she just as ravenously as she had, turning from ivory to red down to her waist. killing the humans was easy now — they moved so slowly — but feeding without ruining her clothing proved to be more difficult. but madeleine shrugged it off as easily as the final man's crumpled body. it was nothing to be concerned about. claudia had assured her that her skills would sharpen with time. & there would be time enough for practice, & for purchasing more fabric ; time enough for everything, now.

as the last heartbeat in the pile of bodies at her feel fell silent, her companion's voice called her from her red-tinted haze. & madeleine returned to her without hesitation, stepping out of the carnage & moving to claudia's side. ❝ i had a good teacher, ❞ she replied simply, wiping at her chin with the back of her hand. her companion had fed too, of course, but unlike madeleine, she had managed to keep her yellow dress unstained, a bright spot in the grimy, blood-stained alley. ❝ & besides, no one will miss this trash. ❞ & she glanced back at the bodies they had left behind with contempt. the ability to read the mortals' thoughts had been quite overwhelming shortly after her transformation, but it had made it a simple matter to find deserving victims, no matter where she & claudia traveled.

so anyway i'm thinking about this interview where jacob says of louis dpdl :

"My feeling about Louis is that he is the most vampire of all of them. He has the highest drive and jonesing for blood, I think he really wants blood, I think he hates human beings. I think everything he says he is, I think he is the opposite. […] I think that's he feels the need to overcompensate for a really deep blood lust, like he really wants to be a vampire. […] He's the reticent vampire because he is reticent to embrace what he is."

& i think that this is really on base, & says a lot about... well, everything tbh. louis tries so hard to be empathetic because he is afraid that he's actually not. &... he's not. this could be a whole other post, but he pretty much never actually acts to help other people. even the act of saving claudia was admittedly more about his own sense of redemption than helping her. & he is a vampire, he does kill. & sometimes he does kill violently, 'theatrically.' & sometimes often, he does enjoy it. he represses those instincts because they are so strong, & because he fears that he cannot separate himself from them any more, & because he has come to believe that they are bad & inherently wrong.

& i'm thinking about how louis, a Black queer creole man living in pre-civil-rights-act era louisiana, was well practiced at suppressing his rage & hatred for other humans, even when he was human. & i think that because he spent his human life trying to advance in his unjust society, & he tried so hard to be "one of the good ones" ( thinking here about his 'exceptional negro' speech in 1.02 ) who would be allowed to live in their world only if he suppressed his true feelings ( his "true nature" if you will ) hard enough. & how this narrative also ties to & compounds with his queerness, & his shame over & suppression of his desires for other men.

& of course, vampirism can be seen as a direct continuation of these themes, & we can see louis modeling the exact same behaviors of repression & self-loathing as it relates to his vampiric nature. he has convinced himself that what he is is inherently wrong & shameful. & i genuinely believe that the only way forward for louis is complete & total acceptance of himself. he is a queer man. he is a Black man — yes, even one who is often ( rightly! ) angry. & he is a vampire who needs to ( & likes to ) feed on humans. these things are all inherent to what & who he is, core elements of his identity that shape how he moves through this world. & he has to learn to be ok with those things... or he will ( continue to ) go insane.

🪐 — BLACK SAILS : @anquenin for louis ▶ ❝ am I crazy? tell me. i’m asking. ❞

IT'S A RIDICULOUS QUESTION, & the absurdity of it almost makes louis laugh. almost, but not quite. instead there's only a slight twitch of his brow as they wander like mortals through the city, a slight curve of his lips as he stops to look at the other vampire in the orange streetlight glow. ❝ you're asking me ? ❞ his voice is tight, uncertain of everything — including his own sanity.

but astarion seems to want a real answer, looking to him as if for some kind of reassurance that louis doesn't know if he can provide. palpable tension rolls off of astarion, his thoughts a bleakly fatalistic mirror of louis' own. but after a moment, he shrugs, brushing away the other's concern. ❝ look, man, we're all crazy. all of us. it's our way, our kind. we all lose our minds eventually. ❞ & if astarion hadn't figured that out yet, then he should be prepared for it to happen soon. the price of immortality was insanity; louis had seen the truth of that firsthand. & yet, somehow, he felt as if his mind was sharper, more lucid while walking with a relative stranger than it was with his companion of these last 30-some years. louis found himself in no hurry to return to the suite he shared with armand. & knowing what he did of astarion's maker, it seemed the strange pale vampire felt the same. ❝ but i think keeping the right company helps. at least a little. ❞

🪐 — COWBOY CARTER : @immobiliter ( daniel ) for louis ▶ ❝ let me make myself clear. ❞

THIS WASN'T HOW the interview was supposed to go. there had been a plan in place — call the boy ( who was no longer a boy ) out to dubai for a second attempt, & do it right this time. make sure that he told only the story that louis wanted told. that was what he & armand had discussed ; it was why they had together carefully curated which materials daniel would have access to & which he wouldn't. it was one of the conditions of louis doing this at all. but now daniel wasn't following the script, & the timeline had begun to splinter & break wherever he touched it.

❝ you don't make things clear. you never make things clear. in fact, you seem to revel in doing the exact opposite. ❞ his voice was harsh, & even he could hear how petulant it sounded, like a child caught in a lie. but wasn't this what louis had wanted : to remember ? wasn't this why he had needed daniel instead of someone younger, someone new, to write his story ? ❝ i don't know, ok ? so stop asking. why does it matter if it was raining or not ? ❞

🪐 — OUR FLAG MEANS DEATH : @baldursgoons ( aurora ) for birdie ▶ ❝ we’re friends. friends tell each other these kind of things. ❞

IT'S BEEN AWHILE since birdie has had a real friend, & she pauses in her work at mending a heavy winter cloak to look up at aurora in surprise. ❝ oh. they do ? ❞ of course, birdie considers almost everyone to be her friend, even those she hasn't met yet. but it's hard to keep friends when you don't stay in one place for very long, & birdie tends to wander on her own more often than not. so to hear the assertion being directed at her brings a broad smile to her face, her pale feathered wings giving a giddy flutter. ❝ i didn't know. i guess i've never had one stick around for long enough to ask. ❞

she hesitates, but aurora seems genuinely curious. & though birdie hasn't had anyone ask for awhile, the story hasn't faded from her memory. her eyes drop to her stitching as she begins. ❝ my father was a mortal — i never met my mother, but he thought her an angel when they first met, on account of her wings. he said they were so great they could almost touch the ground. when she left him, she left me, too. i didn't have my wings when i was a baby, so i guess she thought i was a mortal, & that i should be with my own kind. but when they came in ... ❞ she pauses, glancing back up to catch aurora's eyes, her wings settling close against her back. ❝ my father didn't enjoy having the reminder of her. so i left. i've been on my own ever since. ❞ & birdie smiles then, shrugging. it isn't a sad story ; not to her. after all, it ends with her being set free.

❝ & you ? what of your family ? ❞

in some fantasy verses with fantasy species (like d&d/bg/etc), birdie is half fae. her mother was a unique subtype of fae that have massive feathered wings, & her father was a human. birdie herself never met her mother, & appeared like any other human child when she was born. but at around age 13, her own wings began to come in.

unlike her mothers', birdie's wings are fairly small, with her wingspan even shorter than her armspan. they are made of pale white-blonde feathers, & while she can fly for short bursts in an emergency situation, they are really not strong enough to carry her long distances.