Aftermath - Tumblr Posts
When Gia got his text, it took everything in her not to shoot back with a thousand worried texts. She had known, of course, that he was meeting with the vampire queen. Why, she could not say, but the knowledge alone had been cause of anxiety enough - his text only served to heighten it. Yet, he said he was coming over. This was clearly a face-to-face matter so Gia (just barely) managed to restrain herself and instead merely replied, I’ll be here. She heard his truck when he was still a little ways away and headed to her bar in the kitchen to make him (and herself) a stiff drink. She had a feeling they’d need it. As he pulled up to her house, Gia went to the window peering down below. She watched him talk to Devon and then she watched him walk away, Devon’s eyes following. Gia bit her lip in concern and went to meet him. It was the urgency in his eyes that made her chest constrict, placing the drinks hurriedly on the nearest surface, she was enveloped gratefully in his arms. He pulled her close and she wrapped her limbs around him, resting her head on his shoulder. She breathed him in - a fresh cacophony of musk and death and anxiety. So, it was the vampire queen. Gia pressed a kiss to his shoulder before pulling back ever so slightly to look at him when he spoke. Her lips parted ever so slightly. It felt as though her lungs were burning, seared from the inside out, to see him so tortured. She reached up to touch his face, shaking her head. “I already know you did what you had to,” she said softly, brushing back his hair lovingly. Uncharacteristic anger sparked in her chest and ignited her heart as she watched his tormented eyes. Gia wanted to drive away the pain but there was a part of her that wished to see whoever had done this repent of ever having hurt him, too. Everett had enough to deal with without some vampire forcing his hand towards something he so clearly did not appreciate. “What did that bitch want?”
Aftermath || Gia & Everett (closed)
After seeing and speaking with Ariella, Everett didn’t know if he’d done the right thing or not. He’d always done what he thought was right and what was best for the pack, but sometimes he couldn’t help but doubt whether he deserved to be in his position. Was he good enough for the pack? Did they deserve better? Times like this, it certainly seemed so. All he wanted was peace; but with vampires around, that seemed near impossible.
He pulled out his phone and texted Gia, Hey, I need to talk. I’ll be at your house in a few. He tucked his phone away in the pocket of his jeans as he dropped into his truck. And as he drove, he mentally kicked himself. What the hell had he agreed to? He sighed. He’d known that taking hold of the pack and cleansing it of the V problem would be hard, but he’d never even imagined that it would come to this.
As he pulled up to Gia’s home, he put his truck in park and smiled as Devon came running to the car from her place on the grass in the lawn. He climbed out of the car and hugged Devon tightly. “Hey, baby girl,” he kissed the top of her head and combed his fingers through her hair. “I need to talk to Momma, ‘kay? Stay out here, but only in your lawn. You hear me?”
Devon groaned a bit before nodding and trudging off and dropping back into the grass. He smiled. He’d never had a child of his own; and at this rate doubted he ever would. But that girl was a daughter to him. He didn’t care how odd it might be to others.
He made his way into Gia’s house, closing the door behind him. It didn’t take long for him to find the brunette, and he practically ran to her, gathering her up in his arms and holding her close to him. He let out a breath into her hair. “I think I just made the worst mistake of my life, Momma,” he sighed into her hair. Even with how shitty he’d felt before… Just having Gia in his arms made him feel so much better.
Isn’t that a good thing? she was on the verge of asking, when he said Ariella was going to release the wolves. The words were on her tongue, ready to be breathed into existence when he continued. She could feel the blood draining from her face when he continued, her fingertips felt cold. For a moment, even Gia Desstrin was lost for words. It had hardly faded from Gia’s mind that she had once been one of those wolves, she had shared the addiction with them, the thrill, the lust. She’d been spared the worse ramifications - being held by vamps and subject to whatever horrors they might choose to inflict. Gia had escaped that, but Everett had not. Gia knew that sacrifice had weighed on his conscience since the very day he’d turned them over and she could see that reflected back tenfold now. Gia’s throat felt dry, dry and raw. Swallowing was like breathing in sand. “Oh, Everett,” she shook her head. “I’m sorry, I’m so, so sorry.” She’d been such a fool. All those years ago, she could have spared everyone a little pain through the rest of their lives, if she’d just swallowed a little then. But she’d been weak instead, they’d all been weak, save Everett. If there was anything she wished she could take back, it was that. Clearing her throat, she shook her head, trying to process everything he was telling her. She couldn’t look at him when she asked the next question. “Any wolf?” Hesitantly, she met his eye, again. She had to know how far this went, if Everett might be forced to kill Tristan or herself, or if it was those who had succumbed to the V all those years ago, poor devils. Gia could picture each of their faces and wondered how she’d been snatched from their terrible fate. Gia let out a long breath before turning to him, cupping his face in her hands, she tilted her forehead to touch his. His skin was soft, his breath warm. His face was a mask of misery and Gia felt as if there were hands wrapped around her delicate throat, strangling the air from her lungs to see him suffering. “I know it can’t feel like it,” she whispered. “But what you’ve done is a mercy.” She pulled back slightly to brush the hair from his face. “God only knows what the vampires would do. Now it’s their choice to live and to breathe free air. I imagine they’d agree it’s worth the risk.” She pressed a tender kiss to his poor creased brow. “Everett, listen to me. You’ve do e better than stand up to some ancient vampire queen, you’ve stood up for us. What Pack could possibly ask more?”
Aftermath || Gia & Everett (closed)
He let out a breath, closing his eyes and leaning his head into her hand. It was scary how comfortable she made him feel. He’d been all but ready to surrender his role as packmaster, but seeing her and the way she so fiercely believed in him - like he did in her - made him pause. He knew he was a good leader most of the time; but the decision he’d been forced to make… It wasn’t easy.
"Let’s go sit down, babe," he said, his deep voice low as he spoke. He combed his fingers through her long, brown, silky hair. He let her hand him the drink she’d made before they walked over and sat down. He let out a long breath before taking a sip off of the drink she’d made him. It was nice and strong, just like he needed it. Gia always knew exactly how to take care of him.
"She told me that she was gonna release those wolves," he told her, looking over at her. When he’d first become packmaster, Ariella had come to him and said that the vampire community was volatile towards the pack; and to appease the angered crowds, she asked for the three wolves that Everett had abjured for choosing to continue using instead of get clean. Everett had sworn to himself when he became packmaster that he would always choose pack. And even though he’d grown up with those three wolves; they were no longer part of the pack. And in order to protect the pack, he’d agreed that she could have them.
"But she…" he looked over at Gia; knowing this next part would hit home, "She said she tried to get them to relapse and they didn’t. So she got the vampire community to agree to let them go… On my word that I would kill any who relapsed.” Guilt and self-loathing washed over him. His whole frame seemed to collapse from the burden of this. His head dropped, and he shook his head. “All I could think was that I’d rather do it myself and know they didn’t suffer than let them be at the hands of vampires who might torture them.”
Everett - a man who’d probably only cried once or twice in his entire life - was close to tears. “What kind of leader agrees to kill his own kind? What will the pack think of me?” he whispered, a hand coming to his face and running down it, “The pack deserves better than me. I… I can’t even stand up to a fucking fanger.”
Gia swallowed a breath. It felt like saltwater in her lungs. She'd done this, she knew deep down, she done this to him. Ariella was only a conduit, demanding justice for their sins, but Ariella hadn't committed those sins: Gia had. Even at the time, she'd known it was a bad idea, she'd known she should do better, be better...but instead she'd given in. That was what she'd feared. "Ev, I-" she shook her head, but she found, quickly, she didn't have to say anything all at once as he pulled her into his arms, onto his lap. Gia didn't say anything at first, as he buried his head in her neck, but rather wrapped her arms around him, fingers running through his silky hair. She felt as if her heart were imploding, collapsing in on itself, ripping itself apart as fell in shred to sink deep beneath her ribcage. "You deserve better, Ev," she whispered, "So much better." His breath was hot against her skin as he spoke. She glanced up at nothing, feeling a tear drop down onto her face, running down her cheek. Hastily, she wiped it away before he could see and nodded. She couldn't begin to fathom why, sometimes, but he always had placed such deep trust in her and the last thing she had ever wanted to was to betray that - especially now, given what it would mean for him. She swallowed, waited till she felt sure of her voice - that it would not waver, would not crack, and answered. "I know we'll be ok," she said, slowly. "Because you're here." His fingers were tender against her skin, closing her eyes, she focused on the sensation, leaning into his touch as her eyes opened to meet his again. Her brow creased as he spoke and she reached up to place a hand over his. "Devon makes it easy," she said with a small smile, through it all, at the thought of their daughter. The tears she'd fought back started to enter her eyes again as he spoke, as he went so far as to declare pride in her, but she did not cry. It was a small victory, and hard won. "Everett, don't you see? All of that, all of it...Came from you. I never could have done it, any of it at all, before you came along and saved us all." Her eyes lowered as he spoke of the released vampires. She bit her lip, softly. "I don't know what we can do for them," she began. "Except maybe some anonymous tip to one of those v-rehab charity places that've been springing up lately. Maybe the humans can help," she suggested with a shrug. They'd been abjured and that was absolute; it had to be. Gia couldn't see a better answer. "Or perhaps we could chase them out of town, somehow." She wasn't sure that would actually help them, but it'd get Everett off the hook, at least. Gia bowed her head when he spoke of Tristan. "I'll call him tomorrow," she promised. "We can work it out, I'm sure. Having a strong support system, and realizing the ramifications on others beyond yourself, that people count on you...it's a big part of moving on," she added. "I'd know. And I know we can help him, too. He's one of us and he's stronger than he seems. We can save him." Gia tilted her head forward, resting her forehead against his. "You are not their lackey," she assured him. "You belong to nobody outside this Pack." Cupping his face in her hands, she pulled away just enough to look into his deep brown eyes. "Everett, listen to me. We'll save you, too. That fanger can't touch you, can't make you do anything you don't want to, you hear me? I won't let her." She paused, gazing at him, caressing his cheek before smiling softly. "That's the beauty of being a Pack: we're never really apart, not ever. We're gonna get through this, together," she whispered. "And in the mean time, Everett, we're gonna be safe to do that because of what you did. You gave us this chance, and no one else."
Aftermath || Gia & Everett (closed)
He let out a breath, “I got the feelin’ that she meant any wolf in my pack who relapsed; and the three that I abjured…” He sighed again, placing his drink on her coffee table then reached out, pulling Gia into his lap and leaning back into the couch. He felt best when he held her like this, so completely surrounded by the smell and feel of her.
Everett buried his face in her neck for a moment, just trying to get himself together. He knew how empathetic Gia was, especially with him, the last thing she needed was to suffer because he was suffering. “I believe in all of you,” he finally spoke against her skin. “Tristan… and especially you,” he said, pulling back to look at her.
A hand came up to cup her face, “I mean, look at you. Look how far you’ve come from those days. You’ve come to befriend the very source of your former addiction. You’re the best mom I’ve ever seen to that beautiful girl outside…” He let his fingers come up to brush her hair back from her face, “Goddamn, I’m so proud of you, Gia.” Tears nearly filled his eyes again but he fought them back.
"But what about those three I abjured? They don’t have the pack anymore to keep ‘em strong; and Tristan. He has the pack, sure… But I’ve seen the struggle in him everytime the topic is brought up or a vamper goes by. It’s with him every second of the day… And there ain’t a damn thing I can do," he said, a bit of anger in his last few words.
He gripped Gia and pulled her to him again, his thick and muscular arms enveloping her as he fought back the urge to cry - or scream. “I feel so powerless, so useless to those who depend on me most,” he whispered into her hair, “I can’t defend us against our biggest threat. And now… I feel like their damn lackey; carryin’ out their orders just to keep them from slaughterin’ the whole lot of us.”
A soft smile broke against Gia's features as he laid them down, kissing her. His fingers felt good, sliding through her hair and, reaching up, Gia touched his face. she listened to his words and the meaning behind them carefully and nodded softly. "I know," she responded, softly. "It's how I get through the day." She ran her fingers through his beard, and added, "You're the only family I've ever needed." Gia thought of her family, thought of the way her father had last looked at her...She'd felt so horribly broken, then, but now looking back, he'd never supported her, never been there for her. She was stronger for having left that behind: she was stronger for having someone in her life who would always have her back, always tell her truth, and never turn his back on her. She'd never really needed what she'd had, to begin with, but she'd needed Everett all along. "And that goes both ways," she assured him. "I'll never leave you. If you need me, I'll always be there, I promise you." She shifted slightly. "Challenges just make us appreciate when things are easy all the more, that's all," she murmured. "And soon we're gonna see just how good we have it."
Aftermath || Gia & Everett (closed)
Everett let out a breath as she pressed her forehead to his. He hated himself for everything that had happened. But, hearing Gia’s words, he had to believe her that everything would be okay. It would be the only way to get through this. Just like he’d gotten Gia through her addiction, she and he would support each other through this new challenge to come.
Knowing that she didn’t hate him for what he’d done, that she believed he’d only done the best with what had been offered to him, he felt better. “I dunno what I did to deserve a woman in my life like you, Gia, but I thank my lucky stars every day,” he said thorough a sigh. He wrapped his arms around her and leaned in, pressing his lips to hers before pulling her with him as he laid back on the couch.
He held her close as they laid there, and his fingers twisted the ends of her hair absent-mindedly. “You and Tristan ain’t goin’ through this alone, babe,” he whispered, “I mean it. After all I’ve done, I’ll do anythin’ to help the both of ya. Make sure to keep that in mind, okay?”
queer girl starter pack
A long time ago,this creature was created by my imagination...which was probably in the 6th grade or something.Idk.Anyway,a vampire sonic of!
goddddd motel scene time. i have a lot of thoughts on it and hopefully i'll be able to put them into some kind of order.
ELLE: After he shot me, he reached into my wound so he could write on the wall in my blood. I was barely conscious, but I...I could feel his hand in there. And sometimes it's like I can still feel it. REID: Elle, he's dead. You're...You're right here. You won.
obviously this is an unhelpful thing to say. i dont think that makes reid evil, or a bad friend, i think it makes him a twenty-four-year-old who's struggling to understand a situation he's never been in.
i dont think elle resents him for it. im sure there's frustration, deservedly so, but i dont think it's targeted at reid, more at the general sense of Nobody Is Getting Me. especially this expression here:
in the moment, this doesnt read to me as anger. it's certainly not a happy smile; she's not comforted by what reid says because it's not a comforting thing to say, and i think it sort of develops into anger later, but in the moment, she doesn't resent him for not being able to say the right thing. again, there's frustration, because he doesn't get it. he can't (not yet, anyway). a part of her wishes he did, a part of her wishes somebody did, and yet a different part of her hopes none of them ever do, because it's an awful, awful thing to understand.
i headcanon that reid and elle stay in contact after elle leaves, but i dont think its immediate. i flipflop between two reasons
reid doesnt reach out because he feels guilty, like if he had just said the right words in the right order in that motel room, she would have stayed. i think this is generally how reid responds to abandonment (and sometimes just conflict in general). if i had just said the right thing, done that differently, been better, i could have fixed it. boy is...a little emotionally stunted. if he was a stage of grief he would be bargaining. do you get me.
reid does reach out, but elle doesn't respond. maybe she's still angry about him not being able to Get It, maybe she wants to distance herself from the bau in general, maybe him not Getting It hurts in particular because they were quite close, etc.
either way, they get back in contact post s02e15, when reid texts her a barely coherent rambling apology for that night, how it was an unsympathetic and unhelpful thing to say, and he does get it now, and he's sorry, there is no winning—
she calls him.
GARCIA: Dayon, Ohio, you're on the air. MORGAN: I'd like to make a request. GARCIA: With that sultry voice? You name it. MORGAN: (laughs) Alright, listen. It's a marketing firm by the name of First Hand Media. I want you to see if they have any connection to the colleges from the first set of victims. (computer magic ensues) GARCIA: Behold. First Hand Media processes all the freshman orientation questionnaires. MORGAN: That's a beautiful thing. Oh, one last favour. Look up the words "sexy" and "brilliant" in that computer of yours (all the women in the waiting room turn to look at him, confused) and tell me what you come up with. GARCIA: Look at that. It's me. MORGAN: You are a goddess, woman. Good job. (hangs up)
i love morgan and garcia's relationship i look forward to their nonsense every episode
anyway: i think hotch lets elle blame him for her shooting, and more broadly considers being the de facto scapegoat as part of his job.
granted, there isn't much time for him to respond to this before gideon takes elle out of the room, but i dont get the sense that he was going to defend himself. he could, easily. he could say "the only reason randall garner knew where you lived is because garcia compromised our system by playing an online game on our wifi" or "the only reason randall garner went to shoot you is because gideon chose to hold a press conference and break the one rule he gave us" or "the only reason you got shot is because anderson left after taking you home." (please note: i am not saying "silly elle! blaming hotch when all these other people are at fault!" i am saying "hotch has several people he can deflect blame onto, but he doesn't)
i didnt think to get a sc of it, but after her shooting, he even says "i should have been clearer with anderson," pulling blame away from anderson and onto himself even though his immediate reaction to elle's shooting is to be angry with anderson.
i think that contrasts him pretty interestingly with gideon, whose reaction to elle's shooting is to reassure himself that the press conference was the right decision, and that "elle will understand."
(disclaimer: i'm going to rewatch s02e06 the boogeyman tomorrow, which i havent watched in a while. there might be stuff in that episode that adds to or detracts from this analysis. i'll update if that episode changes my feelings)
GODDDDD. can we talk about hotch cleaning elle's blood off the wall himself. he could so easily have had anyone else do it but he does it himself and he does it alone. because he feels singularly guilty. can we talk about it. godddd. im going to come back to this (to his guilt specifically) when it becomes relevant again but for now just lay on the floor with me
hey do you ever think that the reason reid knocks "shave and a haircut" on elle's door is because post-fisher king elle gets nervous when someone knocks on her door because she doesn't know who it is, so reid (or even the whole team) start knocking a pattern. do you ever think about elle checking the peephole anyway. i do.
hey do you ever think that the reason reid knocks "shave and a haircut" on elle's door is because post-fisher king elle gets nervous when someone knocks on her door because she doesn't know who it is, so reid (or even the whole team) start knocking a pattern. do you ever think about elle checking the peephole anyway. i do.
i miss elle © @hirohamada
goddddd motel scene time. i have a lot of thoughts on it and hopefully i'll be able to put them into some kind of order.
ELLE: After he shot me, he reached into my wound so he could write on the wall in my blood. I was barely conscious, but I...I could feel his hand in there. And sometimes it's like I can still feel it. REID: Elle, he's dead. You're...You're right here. You won.
obviously this is an unhelpful thing to say. i dont think that makes reid evil, or a bad friend, i think it makes him a twenty-four-year-old who's struggling to understand a situation he's never been in.
i dont think elle resents him for it. im sure there's frustration, deservedly so, but i dont think it's targeted at reid, more at the general sense of Nobody Is Getting Me. especially this expression here:
in the moment, this doesnt read to me as anger. it's certainly not a happy smile; she's not comforted by what reid says because it's not a comforting thing to say, and i think it sort of develops into anger later, but in the moment, she doesn't resent him for not being able to say the right thing. again, there's frustration, because he doesn't get it. he can't (not yet, anyway). a part of her wishes he did, a part of her wishes somebody did, and yet a different part of her hopes none of them ever do, because it's an awful, awful thing to understand.
i headcanon that reid and elle stay in contact after elle leaves, but i dont think its immediate. i flipflop between two reasons
reid doesnt reach out because he feels guilty, like if he had just said the right words in the right order in that motel room, she would have stayed. i think this is generally how reid responds to abandonment (and sometimes just conflict in general). if i had just said the right thing, done that differently, been better, i could have fixed it. boy is...a little emotionally stunted. if he was a stage of grief he would be bargaining. do you get me.
reid does reach out, but elle doesn't respond. maybe she's still angry about him not being able to Get It, maybe she wants to distance herself from the bau in general, maybe him not Getting It hurts in particular because they were quite close, etc.
either way, they get back in contact post s02e15, when reid texts her a barely coherent rambling apology for that night, how it was an unsympathetic and unhelpful thing to say, and he does get it now, and he's sorry, there is no winning—
she calls him.
hey do you ever think that the reason reid knocks "shave and a haircut" on elle's door is because post-fisher king elle gets nervous when someone knocks on her door because she doesn't know who it is, so reid (or even the whole team) start knocking a pattern. do you ever think about elle checking the peephole anyway. i do.
Wait. Wait. Spoilers below about Elle’s exit and the Hotch/Foyet arc because I AM SO CONFUSED.
I’ve seen people say before how angry they are with how the Elle situation was handled because in later seasons, other characters do the exact same things and aren’t treated the same. I’ve always wondered what they were talking about, as I couldn’t figure out who they meant.
Just read a post that they mean Hotch killing Foyet???? (And then subsequently lost said post because I was so shocked)
IN WHAT WORLD IS THAT THE SAME THING????
Look, I LOVE Elle. I wish Lola had loved LA and stayed on the show forever.
But Elle tracked down a rapist, alone, without telling anyone, and murdered him. Then she lied about it, and claimed it was self defense. That means she also had to plant evidence on the man - to say he had a gun when it was never shown that he did (at that moment at least). IF he did have a gun on him, she had to physically move it from wherever it was and put it in his hand. She had never been physically harmed by this man. (We won’t get into the whole “he mentally harmed her by triggering her” debate). Was he an absolute scum bag? Without a doubt.
Aaron Hotchner elected to arrest George Foyet because that was his job. The man escaped, stabbed him repeatedly, and then as if that wasn’t enough, killed his (ex)wife. THEN, when fighting with Hotch, stated he was going to go kill his son. Hotch didn’t lie about anything during the investigation- he stated the truth - if Foyet managed to get up, he was going to find and kill Jack. Should Hotch have maybe just handcuffed him once he had the upper hand? Possibly. But the man had already escaped once - he memorized every prison in his state. Plus it was a literal dirty fist fight - Hotch had the upper hand at the moment, who knows if he would have if he stopped to get the cuffs out.
SOMEONE TELL ME HOW THESE SITUATIONS ARE EVEN REMOTELY SIMILAR. (Besides both killing someone. If that’s the similarity, every single member of the BAU has done that, excluding Penelope - although she does shoot someone so!!)
I have never related more to anything in my entire life...
Ugh. I learned a very valuable lesson after last night’s drunken attempt at writing. Actually, I learned two things.
The first is that the more people who participate, the less writing I get done (so I am going to be playing some serious catch up today). Totally worth it, though, because not only was that super fun, but I made a new friend.
The second, and much more important lesson, is that I should not drink more than four alcoholic beverages. Its not because I got super drunk or anything; I learned last year that I have a better tolerance for alcohol than I was expecting, considering how rarely I drink. No, I went off and forgot the caution to limit my drinking while on my anxiety meds (not that I drink often, or much, so it’s not been an issue).
I was warned, “alcohol makes the side effects worse, so be careful”, and I’ve mostly erred on the side of caution and just not drank at all. I don’t really deal with any side effects now, aside from restless sleep, so I forgot about the dizziness and nausea. Until I hit the end of drink five, that is (I think it was five, at any rate. I wasn’t fall down drunk, but I was most definitely intoxicated). I wound up having to lay down on the floor for a while. The whole restless sleep thing was also worse than usual. We went to bed at maybe 2:30, it took me a while to fall asleep, and then I woke up about three hours later and haven’t been able to get back to sleep, which isn’t normally a problem. Whoops.
Now I am awake and hungover and trying to convince myself I should be using this extra time to start making up that word count deficit I have.
Trigger Finger
Can we talk?
Please?
“Aftermath” 2019
Hi there!
I'm Shalo, I am an axolotl
I am neurodivergent
I'm also a minor so please don't be weird
I've come here from wattpad so if you recognise me that's why!
I'm sorry if I don't draw/write/post that much.
I'm into wordbuilding, fandoms, music and just being alive
Fandom list
PVZ
Inscryption
Hollow knight
JSAB
COTL
DST
TADC
TBOI
HNK/LOTL
OFF
Rainworld
ULTRAKILL
Murder drones
Welcome to hell I make alot of worldbuilding for a world I created stuff so be warned, I'll tag it #Aftermath