Tiny Virgil Sanders - Tumblr Posts
G/tober Day 3-Overgrown
Warnings: Brief mention of blood
This one is the first part to a story I’ve got quite a few ideas for. Inspired by the prompt list by @aaytaro-gt.
Logan huffed to himself as he trekked over the uneven terrain of the forest, focusing most of his attention to not tripping over. This was meant to be a ‘calming walk’, as suggested by his professor.
All Logan wanted to do was go back to the comfort of the lab and continue his work. He knew the theoretical benefit of going into nature: how it was good for your mental health, et cetera. In practice, however, nature was evil and evidently out to get him.
As if to prove his point, his foot caught on something and he scrambled to catch himself before he face-planted. Fumbling to his knees, Logan glanced over himself briefly.
While his palms were grazed, it was nothing major. What caught his attention more was what he’d tripped on.
At first glance, it looked like a pile of overgrown roots, interwoven by time but there was a glimmer of… something. A shimmer of gold that peeked through the roots, striking Logan instantly as something odd. Being a curious person at heart, he shuffled so he sat before the knot of roots.
From his backpack, he slid out a serrated pocketknife that he’d only started carrying for when he took these walks. The amount of times he’d found his ankles wrapped up in vines that had somehow snaked around without his notice was ridiculous.
Starting slowly, Logan started sawing away at the roots, doing only what he could see in case he damaged what he was looking for. It was an interesting and bizarre configuration that the roots had grown into and he wished he’d brought his phone to take photos. How did trees grow like that, with their roots in an almost purposeful build?
As he set aside another piece of hacked off root, Logan saw what had made the golden shine that had caught his eye.
It was a box. A box that was made of some kind of metal, weathered by age. The lid was detailed with gold, carved with motifs of flowers and vines with a central line of what Logan distantly recognised as Old English.
He’d studied it in a hyper fixation a few years ago and it was a short enough sentence he could translate the whole thing.
“The prince will sleep eternal,” Logan mumbled aloud, thumbing over the script thoughtfully. What did it mean? Obviously, it had to be old, considering the aged appearance of the metal and the inscription. Around the 7th century or so?
In his thoughtlessness, some sharp bit of the metal sliced into his thumb and Logan suppressed a yelp. The pain was swiftly ignored when he noticed the soft violet glow that emanated from the writing where his blood was smeared across the surface.
It became unbearably bright, forcing him to squeeze his eyes shut until the blinding light faded. When it did, he hesitantly blinked open his eyes, instinctively looking down at the box in his hands.
The lid was open, revealing the interior and Logan couldn’t bite back his gasp.
There was a tiny person, maybe 3 inches tall, curled up and asleep. From their back sprouted a set of luminous purple wings that were mesmerising, a kaleidoscope of colour.
Before Logan could even think what he was going to do, the person shifted, stretching out with a yawn. They sat up, rubbing at their eyes as their wings fluttered.
When they locked eyes with Logan, they let out a sharp yelp and he did the only thing he could think of. He slammed the box shut.
G/tober Day 6- Jars
Warnings: Mild dehumanising behaviour. Let me know if I missed any
A continuation of day 3’s ‘Overgrown’ prompt, featuring sassy Virgil. The prompt comes from @aaytaro-gt’s prompt list.
When Virgil came to, he’d expected to be in his bed with afternoon light streaming through the window.
So why, when he looked around after his abrupt awakening, was he faced with a human?
It instantly set off every alarm bell in his mind and he yelped, wings fluttering in preparation to dart past the human. He didn’t get the chance when the lid of the box he was trapped in was slammed shut.
Virgil was then jostled around as the human, presumably, started moving.
After a long few minutes of being tossed from wall to wall inside his prison, he finally settled at the bottom as the box was set down upright. The lid opened and while Virgil was blinded by the sudden onslaught of light, a shadow fell over him and the human snatched him up.
The grip was like that of a scientist, firm in keeping his wings pinned as well as his arms. A thumb was wedged under his chin as if Virgil was going to bite like some animal.
He was dumped into a glass container, barely avoiding landing on his wings. Scrambling to his feet, he swayed unsteadily as the human lifted the oddly shaped bottle to his face, distorted through the glass. He briefly debated if it was worth a bent wing to try and fly out before he squashed the idea.
“What are you?” he asked and Virgil hissed in response, bearing his teeth in an obvious threat. While he could instinctually understand any human language, the warped form of English coming from the human was unusual to him. How long had he been locked away?
“There’s hardly need for that.” The human said and Virgil couldn’t feel more patronised if he tried. Being stuck in a human’s presence was more than enough reason to be angry. It was easier to be angry than scared.
“Maybe when you summon the manners to have a civil conversation without trapping the other involved, I’ll have the respect to treat you civilly in return,” Virgil spat, wings flaring in indignation. The audacity to expect civility when the human had been such a terrible host was laughable.
Surprisingly, a bashful expression came over the man’s face and he looked chastised at Virgil’s words. “Ah, apologies, I wasn’t quite sure how to go about this. I’ve never seen one of your species before: what are you?” he asked and Virgil furrowed his brow.
“The question should be what my name is, but since you seem to be skipping pleasantries, I’ll start. Who are you?” Virgil leaned back against the glass, aiming for an air of casualness while his hands fidgeted with the fabric of his tunic. So far he was fine, nothing had been done to him.
Red crept across the man’s face and again he averted his eyes, “My name’s Logan.” He mumbled, “And you are?”
“Virgil,” he introduced curtly. “Are you going to let me out or continue gaping?”
——
Yes, there is a reason Virgil speaks so formally. In this, he would’ve been a prince and begrudgingly he would’ve learned the proper manner.
G/tober day 21- Candy
Warnings:None
Day 21 of G/tober, inspired by @aaytaro-gt’s prompt list. Sorry for the long absence but I got sick and it knocked me off my feet for a long while but I’m much better now. Today I got extra inspired so there’s a little drawing that accompanies this writing.
Roman loves Halloween!
The costumes, the decorations, the candy. It was all absolutely amazing and Roman loved this time of year, even as it started getting colder.
Despite all the fabric that he had access to during October, it was the candy that he was the most excited for. The humans just left it out in one massive bowl and of course Roman would take the chance to pilfer as much as he could. Generally, he went after hard candies and chocolate that would last longer so he could excuse the danger of it to Virgil as ‘legitimate borrowing’, whatever that meant.
Slinging his satchel over his shoulder, Roman checked the watch face hanging on the wall. 2:43 am. Perfect.
Clicking on his lamp, which was a red LED light, Roman started walking down the tunnels, carefully descending the nails embedded into the wooden beam. They’d tried their collective best to make the tunnels as safe as possible, but it was difficult when the tunnels needed to be at different levels in different rooms.
Coming up behind the wall socket in the living room, Roman wiggled it open and peered through, holding his breath as he listened for any sign of the humans. He didn’t see or hear anything and he quickly stepped into the open, repositioning the cover behind him.
Surveying the room once again, Roman couldn’t help being glad for the soft light of pumpkin themed lights strung around the room. When he locked eyes on the bowl of candy on the table, he grinned. It was out in the open, but it was the middle of the night and no humans were awake.
Jogging over, Roman squinted at the edge of the table, trying to gauge how to throw his hook. He took a few steps back and unspooled his hook, rearing back into a throw.
It hit the table and wedged in just fine. He gave it a few firm tugs and tested if it would take his weight only to fall flat on his rear and to narrowly miss a hook to the head.
With a mumbled curse, he stood back up and tossed his hook again. It took his weight and he clambered up the twine nimbly.
Heaving himself onto the table, Roman left his hook embedded into the table. There wasn’t a human around to see it so it didn’t matter and he was more distracted by the candy.
The bowl was an obnoxious shade of orange with black cursive writing that he can’t read in the darkness of the early morning, but he knew it said ‘Boo’. Running up to it, he hefted himself up on the edge to see what goodies were still left. The humans seemed to always take the chewy candy first, which was fine by him.
He grabbed a sour candy for Virgil and a few other pieces of cherry and grape candy for himself.
Just as he was about to push himself from where he balanced on the edge of the bowl, Roman spotted a lollipop. It was one of the few left and the only orange one.
Immediately, he reached for it, finding it just slightly too far out of his reach. But if he really stretched-
Roman squawked as he fell into the bowl, grasping the lollipop but crashing into the other candy with the sound of rustling plastic.
For a second, he froze, terrified that a human would come running in to see what had made all that noise. Roman had to chant internally to himself that it was the middle of the night, the sound he made would be minor at best to a human and no one was even awake to hear it.
Slowly clambering out of the sea of candy, Roman scanned the room, seeing that there were no humans. It soothed his thrumming heart and he hefted the orange lollipop like a trophy. He wound the strap of his bag around it so it was secured close to him and started his descent to the floor.
Spooling his rope back up, he headed back into the tunnels, completely unaware of the wide eyes that watched him leave.
——
While my art skills aren’t the best, I definitely enjoyed drawing this one. Perspective is my greatest enemy outside of my phone camera and for both I apologise.
Finally posted a new work on Ao3. Warnings are in the notes