bakerstreet | A giant cosmic screw up

Twin Soulmate Fuck-Up

According to more than a few traditions, the concept of a "soulmate" is not just about who you will end up romantically. It's about who you've begun with, across time and space, in many different lives, and who you'll be reincarnated again to meet once more.

But what if somehow, somewhere, wires got crossed and you ended up closer to the one you're destined for than most would think. In fact, you've been with them since your conception into this lifetime: they're your twin. Hardly anything could be more connecting than that, when you think about it. There's no one who understands you more or is more of your other half, and you entered this world together...but you can't be together, no matter how your souls are linked.

What sin did you commit in a past life? More to the point, will the two of you give in to a near-cosmic, ancient desire or become "platonic" soulmates, always first in each others' hearts, yet with something between you unspoken?

Inspired by Game of Thrones, Dune, and even a little Star Wars. Comment with your character, info, preferences, etc. AU it up if need be, because everyone's welcome. Reply. Thread.

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only

[ hey, here life's already needlessly complicated. let's obsficate her chances even more!

ship ideas, preferences, characters most wanted, and other goodies. ]

These days the boy-twin ventured out on his own more and more often, listening to the whispers carried across the sand by the wind, watching the stories stars dead and alive played out for him in the night sky. He could see the questions in Ghani's eyes, could her them reverberate inside his skull - they were the very same questions he was asking himself.

One of us is going to have to-

Turning his sight inside his soul, the answer was crystal clear. The path was laid out, clearly defined, crisp borders, no doubt, meandering through space and time, an eternity of nostalgia, loss and loneliness.

One of us-

Quiet footsteps carried the boy twin through the palace aimlessly. He was a familiar sight to the guards by now, familiar enough for them to ignore his lost wandering ways in the middle of the night.

[absolutely fine with platonic]

When Ghanima heard the term "soulmate" she never thought of it as something that might apply to herself and Leto. It implied duality, one separate entity finding its match, its mate.

Gazing across time, back through generation upon generation, finding Leto in her lovers, her fathers, her brothers, her mothers, her sisters, herself, there could be no duality. They were one and the same, not soulmates but one soul living in two bodies.

But he could do something that she could not, he could reach forward and find purchase in places that she could not yet see, choosing a path hidden from her. It frightened her, and made her jealous not of his gift but of all the unseen things that were creeping in between them to create distance where there had been none before.

So she crept through the palace corridors on bare feet to sneak into his bedroom and slide into his bed to share it with him like she had when they were young enough that a shared room raised no eyebrows.

Sleep remained elusive these days when there was a monster lurking behind Alia's ever watchful eyes. She'd cornered him again this afternoon, barely suppressing the quiver of Harkonnen's greed in her voice, trying to sell him on the advantages of undergoing the agony.

As he lay staring at the intricate patterns on the ceiling, Leto was pulled from his reverie by the sound of Ghani's footsteps, and his heart ached. Having awakened and come into this world together, they'd believe they'd stay together forever for the longest time, and for the longest time she was the only person who truly mattered to him. Lately, however, as she had noticed as well, they were drifting apart.

Leto stared into eternity so his beloved twin wouldn't have to. After all their family had endured, surely one of them deserved a normal life? Let it be her, then. Smart, witty, beautiful Ghani.

Lifting the blanket for her, he covered them both and pressed a tender kiss against her temple. An image of them standing back to back flashed before his inner eye, fingers entwined, both facing the world without fear.

"You will always have me and I you," the boy twin muttered into the night.

She could hear it in his words, that again he had looked into that future which she could not see, and again he had chosen not to tell her what it was that he saw there. She had never envied him his gift, it had never mattered which one of them had it before since all things between them were shared anyway.

Now a savage part of her wanted to be able to rip it out of his grasp and claim it for herself so that she could know, and it made her nails dig into his skin ever so slightly as she lay down next to him with a hand resting above his heart.

"Will I?"

She knew that her tone was petty and jealous, but she made no effort to change or soften it.

One soul in two bodies, sharing everything, since before they were born. This, however, was not something Leto would burden her with. This he was keeping for himself, the heavy weight that neither of them wanted but one of them had to carry.

Everything else, his heart, his life, all that belonged to her. Covering her hand on his chest with his own, he nodded in the dark, his cheek brushing against her hair.

"You know you will." She only needed to turn her gaze inward to see he was speaking the truth. "We will forever have each other's backs, Ghani. Unlike those other poor souls, we will never be lonely or vulnerable for as long as we live."

He wished to give her a normal life, but if he had told her so she would have answered that such a thing was not possible. Within her lay the memories of millions upon millions of such lives linked in a chain so long that it seemed to be without end, how could she ever slot such enormity into the narrow confines of "normal"?

The only life she wanted was one by his side, everything else would inevitably be less than, no matter how sweet it might be.

She kissed her brother's shoulder all the same, a gesture of acceptance. She believed him.

"A life without you would be worse than death."

She would go on, of course, she was strong enough for that. But oh, how empty she would be.