bakerstreet | we belong way down below

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[meme] shipping

we belong way down below

Down Below
the orpheus & eurydice meme

You've lost someone dear. An important piece. By surprise or not, the loss rips you to your core. You'd do anything to get them back, buy a one way ticket to drag them from the pits. So here comes the devil with an offer you can't refuse. Are you willing to pay the price? Can you keep your word on the conditions?

Down below
Six-feet-under-the-ground below
Course there is another way
But nah, I ain't supposed to say

Join us on a journey to the river Styx. Look for your heart and bring them back. It seems like a simple set-up- But there's a catch (there always is). A trial to face, an impossible caveat. You're willing to risk it all for them. Will you succeed or does your shot slip through your fingers right at the last moment. And will that weight crush you?

With all your heart?
Well, that's a start

This is a meme based on the Myth of Orpheus and Eurydice, a tale from Greek mythology about a musician who lost his wife. All he had to do to bring her back from the after life was lead her out with out turning back to look at her. Unfortunately her silence unnerved him. Right as they were at freedom, he looked back and saw her as she faded back to nothing.

There's the basic prompt, feel free to play from there. Whether your character succeeds or not, what their trial is, and who they bring back is up to you.

_ POST with your character
_ LIST your preferred role if you want
_ PAY the toll
_ GO down below

hokyoung kim

Flat | Top-Level Comments Only | Expand All

( either role is gucci for me )

Edited 2021-02-13 21:51 (UTC)

[ Sheik is Male and a separate character from Zelda. He’d definitely be the one to pay the price. ]

( totally the Eurydice in this situation )

It was his fault.

In retrospect, after seeing fourteen million futures, he hadn’t thought there was any other way. When you watch people die, fail, die worse, fail worse, you latch onto the one chance you get and you go with it. To Stephen, the chance of saving an entire universe of billions of people over the life of one man—it shouldn’t have been a hard choice. It shouldn’t have been the wrong one.

Yet, when you stand at a funeral, when you’re faced with the tears of the entire world, the choice doesn’t seem any better than the others. He had thought that he made the right choice sacrificing Tony Stark for the universe, but the world seemed to turn into an even darker place without him. Riots, angry people, waterfalls of tears, broken hearts. There was a very select few people who knew that Stephen saw the future, saw the man's death, and those that did definitely were not happy with him.

How did he make the wrong choice, did he make the wrong choice? It felt odd for him to question himself. He died, thousands of times over, fighting Dormammu. He felt himself die, fourteen million times, when looking into the future. He died, repeatedly, and the death of the single man bothered him now.

There had to be a right answer here but Stephen was so out of depth with this. He almost felt like he was losing his mind trying to understand this.

Then, somehow, an answer presented itself to him. An older book, one that was definitely Asgardian magic. He flipped through the book a few times, tried to see if there was any other option, but found himself empty handed. He didn’t want to use the time stone again to see the outcome of using this, it wasn’t right and that type of magic was dangerous to the universe. He just—he should just do it. At the very least, if he failed, it said Stark would just be lost to the after life, no second chance.

One risk, one sacrifice, one that he wouldn’t see the answer to until he did this.

He should do it.

Stephen sat in a circle and placed the book in front of him, hands hovering over the pages. He placed them down on top of it, focused on the sigils needed, and then formed the hand signs needed to. The magic kicked in, a portal formed beneath him that he didn’t create, and Stephen was dropped down into a dark world.

The place was ice cold, dark shadows stretching across it and swallowing him up. The cloak was gone, clearly not having come with him, and the chill that ran through his body froze his hands. He rubbed them together, feeling the tremors increase, and breathed out a cold breath. Looking around his gaze fell onto a shadow of a creature, human shaped but unable to be seen. Stephen didn’t dare walk closer.

“So you wish to save the life of Tony Stark.” He didn’t reply, they didn’t seem to be expecting him to. “The life of a man like that, the sacrifice needed to be paid is grave.” His heart skipped in his chest, constricting. “You’ve already lost the use of your hands, your life as a surgeon. In payment for this, you will lose more. If you fail your task of leading him from this place, his soul will be lost forever.”

The thing paused here and Stephen’s hands clenched at his side, the pain that ran through him ground him to this. “The price for Tony Stark’s life is the Time Stone. You gave it up for him once, in exchange for his life, knowing you’d get it back. Will you risk it again, knowing you will lose it to gain him, Stephen Strange?” His heart picked up and he barely restrained himself from reaching for the Time Stone. The creature powered on. “Lead him from this place on your own means, without the use of your magic. If you do, if you use it even to defend him, you fail.”

The world shifted, a screaming sound ringing through his head that made him flinch. Stephen reached up and placed his hands over his ears, eyes shutting tightly against the pain. Then, it all stopped, suddenly and without reason. Slowly he removed his hands, blinking his eyes open and lifted his head.

There, less than a few feet from him, stood a dead man. “Stark?”

Edited 2021-02-13 23:26 (UTC)

[ either role. ]

Edited 2021-02-14 00:11 (UTC)

[Eurydice.]

It had come to pass as he'd foreseen. But foreseen was not forearmed in this case... Even though Guangyao reassured him he would be fine, the angry spirit of Nie Mingjue had dragged him down into hell with him leaving the goblin powerless to stop it. Again, he'd lost someone close to him and been unable to do anything about it.

But this time would be different. Too many years - centuries, even - he'd spent lamenting the fate of those he couldn't save but this world, this place, all of it was different. Here they tamed the dead and in the case of a certain cultivator had even brought him back.

Guangyao would not be left to rot in the underworld or made into a fierce corpse.

After consulting with a heartbroken Lan Xichen and doing a fair bit of research on his own, Kim Shin eventually discovered a way down into the afterlife, the underworld, a place no mortal was supposed to go. Fortunately for him, he was a god and even the lord of the underworld would have trouble turning away such a request from someone such as him. Especially when all he was asking for (at least for now) was to simply see his friend.

And so he journeyed down after performing the proper ritual, descending into the underscape that was the place where he should have gone to his final rest, down in search of Jin Guangyao.

Jin Guangyao crouched, hidden, looking smaller than he usually did looking for any sign of Mingjue's shadow. He was intact today and not wandering the darkness with one arm, but that usually just meant that the next time he was torn apart it would be worse. Hell, it appeared, was repetition. How many times had Da Ge killed him now? He'd lost count. One would think he would feel avenged by now. In the first days Guangyao fought. Then tiring of that, he hid. That was almost as bad as the pain: being exhausted all of the time. His last days, even years had not exactly been anxiety free, but it was nothing to this.

Should have drank more wine, should have told Er-Ge the truth earlier, should have spent more time with him and my goblin friend, should have not involved poor Mishan, should not have obeyed my father, should never have become chief cultivator, why was I so ambitious and chose this insane path?

His mind these days (could it be called days? What was time here?) was an endless revolving lantern of regrets and though he knew it was useless, he couldn't stop them from weighing on him.

He flinched, broken from his thoughts as he heard Nie Mingjue's threats in the distance again. If, in honesty, this thing he had turned him into could be called Nie Mingjue anymore. The irony, was that Jin Guanyao had made him thus. He'd created his own punishment indeed. He got up and stumbled blindly, hoping he was running away and not towards another violent fight. This place had a way of shifting on him, keeping him disoriented.

Edited 2021-02-23 22:37 (UTC)

What a horrid place.

So these were the souls of those who died poorly. Xue Yang was here, as were Jin Guangyao and Nie Mingjue. Kim Shin supposed he would have ended up here as well given his death and its circumstances. Still, he had no time to dwell on these sorts of thoughts, especially in a place as terrible as this. He couldn't stand the thought of Guangyao being down here any longer than he already had. "Alright laoshi. Time to get you out of this place," he murmured under his breath, dismissing a passing shade with a flash of blue flame. Focusing his mind's eye for a moment, he scanned through the souls languishing down here in this hell.

No, not that one, not that one either... Ah, there he was. His aura was riddled with fear and it pained the goblin to sense him like this. Making haste, he hurried to where he sensed his friend, careful to not disturb any shades or anguished dead on his way.

"A-Yao," he called when he neared him, announcing his presence. "It's me, A-Shin." Surely there would be questions, but there were more important things at hand right now, such as calming the other's nerves and making sure he was safe. And he, too, heard the threats from the angry spirit. "Don't worry, I won't let you come to harm. I won't fail you again..." His voice was heavy with sadness and regret, once again he'd been unable to protect someone close to him, but down here he wouldn't let anything else happen.

Especially not when his plan was to return him aboveground.

Edited 2021-02-23 23:18 (UTC)