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2015-03-18
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Progressive Infection of the Mind

Summary:

Fusing with a human is much like inheriting the personal effects of the dead--including who they once loved.

Notes:

Quick pronoun note: Though initially this is about fem!Robin, Grima is an immortal dragon deity and therefore has no need for gender even when inhabiting a woman's body so they pronouns are used. This is the NB Grima agenda at work.

Work Text:

She hadn't 'become' Grima right away, nothing ever truly worked like that. There was a process to it; a progressive infection of the mind, a darkness stirring behind her (many, many) eyes.

No one actually ever found out that Robin had been the one to kill Chrom. The barrier separating them from the rest of their troops had just been too thick to see the source of any cries beyond it, so in the end that sin had been posthumously passed onto Validar. Instead, she was declared to have just barely escaped with her life as Chrom took on a fatal blast in her stead. It was a very convenient story and one that quickly circulated around a camp desperate to come up with a reason for why their leader was dead.

But Robin knew what had happened, even with all the increasingly foggy explanations. There was no clear sequence of events running through her memory, but the truth made itself known to her in every splitting headache, every time her skin felt as if it was about to split itself open into scales and pupils. Of course, those symptoms were all attributed to side-effects of Validar's magic. No one could bear to believe anything different.

Robin remembered the bits and pieces of theology that her mother had recounted to her before her death. In the past, so many of her stories had been vague and contradictory to the point where Robin had disregarded it all as fantasy, but a single name picked out from her memory, ringing throughout the back of her mind, now told her all she needed to know. Grima. The fell dragon.

What she had been bred for, the future she could not escape.

Gaius claimed to love her regardless. No wife of his was about to become...whatever she was. A dragon. A goddess. An abomination. Morgan seemed to notice no difference either, though there were only so many ways to tell with sloppy toddler kisses.

However, as her thoughts on the subject grew into something she could no longer control, she realized that Gaius had never thought of her as his wife, the human being, in the first place—only ever as Robin, the woman whom he long ago had put on a pedestal of divinity, as he had no gods of his own to worship. He could not fall to his knees before Grima when he was already on them.

Neither woman, nor deity, whichever half was which, particularly minded this distinction.


 

Grima supposed it was possible that they maintained their human form far more often than was entirely necessary, but sometimes being a gigantic fell dragon honestly just didn't suit their needs. True, being this small made it difficult to cause any sort of large scale destruction, but it appealed to the sort of human sentimentality that still survived somewhere inside them—left over from their fusion into a being who was not quite the dragon wearing human skin that had been originally intended. It had been as if they'd occupied the home of a dead woman, only all her things left behind were still there, warm and ready to be used.

Gaius was such a thing. Grima had never quite been able to come to a conclusion about whether or not he was aware that his wife was no longer technically his wife, but if he'd noticed any significant change, he never showed it—though it was a stretch to say that he was even completely lucid all the time after being subject to so much of Grima's mental...persuasion.

It was a bit of a hobby that the dragon had taken up. Back when they'd first impressed their will upon Gaius and commanded him to take Robin's weakened body to Plegia in the middle of the night, they'd noticed in his eyes this awfully pleasant look, one that was unfocused, yet devoted. Loving, if they had to give it one word (though they were sure there had been no thoughts to begin with going through his head at the time).

He'd obeyed, of course. No one ever said no to Grima. They couldn't.

But it was the fact that, while they'd done this to countless humans across centuries—wrapped their voice around a brain and smoothed out its creases—Grima had never enjoyed any human's compliance quite as much as Gaius'. Not Morgan's, who needed no extra encouragement to listen to his beloved mother, nor that of Validar or any other of their most fervent believers. In all their years of existence, matrimonial worship was something Grima had never thought to harness.

Even now, with Gaius's head cradled in their lap; the tips of their blackened fingernails absently raking over the contours of his face, they still wondered why they bothered staying human to do it. He would have been much more attractive smothered in the coils of a tail, small enough to take apart piece by piece and then gullible enough to believe he loved it when they told him he did. But their human form was a sight that Gaius was used to, something in their relationship that still gave him unfiltered pleasure. And they supposed it was only fair that he be allowed to control his own affection towards his wife from time to time. It was a option Grima themself had not had upon inheriting Robin's family. After all, they certainly hadn't chosen to be so beholden to these two red haired humans.

Still, Grima grinned around the misshapen teeth that sprouted from their mouth; scattered and irregular like the makeshift tombstones of a battlefield. Though 'Robin' now had countless eyes spotting up and down her face, all were fixed on the single image before them. In exchange, Gaius stared back up with no particular intent other than love, but that was alright. A predator needed prey.

“Be a dear, and worship me.”

Without any change in expression—“I love you, Robin. I love you so much, more than anyone else out there.”

The response had slipped out of his mouth as if he was not the one taking the time to compose it. Which, to be fair, he really wasn't.

“Go on.”

“Your eyes are beautiful...all of them. Your skin. Your teeth, your fingers...everything about you. You're so beautiful, so amazing, so—” A shudder and deep breath as Grima put a hand over Gaius' mouth mid-speech; nails digging into his skin.

“That's right. And you don't deserve any of it.” Gaius nodded desperately, just like the puppet on strings he'd been so lovingly molded into. “I should just leave you, like the worthless thief you are. You've betrayed everyone you've ever fought with, haven't you? You're not trustworthy." Tiny pinpricks of blood began to pool at the intersection of nail and skin, but Grima did not retract their hand from its spot. "Give me one reason you're worth my time.”

They spent one last moment on top of Gaius' lips, and then at last let up to see what he had to say, wide-eyed and frantic.

“I-I'd do anything for you. You have to believe me, all I want is to make you the happiest woman in the world!”

“And how do you intend to accomplish that?” He was getting surprisingly serious about this. What a good boy.

“...if anyone ever gets in your way, I'll kill them. Whoever you say.”

“Even your own flesh and blood?”

“The only flesh that matters is yours.”

They stroked Gaius along the cheek. “That's right.”

Enough of this. Placing their hands behind Gaius' head, Grima propped him up from their lap into a kiss; as always, full of teeth. They could feel his tongue creeping into their mouth and subsequently bit down, drawing blood. With his mouth otherwise occupied, Gaius could not moan in response, but they could feel the vibrations of his reaction resonate throughout his chest.

Letting go of his tongue for a moment, Grima moved just far enough apart from his lips to speak.

“I'm going to make you regret the day you ever made me love you.”

And though they immediately then prevented Gaius from being able to respond by latching onto his mouth yet again, the words floated through the few thoughts he had left prominently enough for Grima to be able to hear them.

“I look forward to it.”

How cute.