I am become Death
Arrowsbane
"I am become Death, Destroyer of Worlds." – Oppenheimer.
The human born Tom Marvolo Riddle, known as Lord Voldemort is an abomination. Death sees this.
The Balance of souls passing between life and un-life has been upset in a most grievous fashion. The world goes through cycles: Populations rise and fall, Empires are built and destroyed. Humans are such fickle creatures, Death knows this and accepts it. But what Death does not, will not, cannot accept is a mass-murdering megalomaniac upsetting the balance.
When a power-hungry asshole of a Wizard creates the Black Death, leaving billions dead in its wake, Death ensures that the Wizard in question meets a very nasty end, a slow and painful death that makes the Plague look merciful in comparison.
When a petty woman - spurned by the man she loved in favor of another - incites the Witch Trials by accusing her romantic rival of evil magic that leads to her, and thousands of others, being burnt at the stake, Death takes his vengeance by depriving the woman of everything she took joy in – the man she loved hangs himself, the man she eventually marries is a lazy drunk who whores about and ignores their children, all of whom die of cholera. [Although in Death's defense, the cholera had been intended for the mother, not the children.]
When Hitler rises to power, with Grindelwald standing as his magical counterpart, Death maneuvers Churchill and Dumbledore into place. When Tom Riddle gathers his followers and begins a reign of terror, Death himself stands as an invisible shield to little Harry Potter – the child is heralded a hero, for lack of a better reasoning. Mortals cannot be expected to know that a soul-severing curse would bounce off of the entity known as Death.
Yet somehow the spirit of Tom Riddle does what the others who challenged Death could not, it survives, clinging to the realm of the living by the proverbial skin of its teeth – or perhaps a more apt description would be: by the edges of its presence.
Furious with the wraith's defiance, Death reaches out into the ether beyond time and space, in order to exert his will. Death takes human form for the first time in over a millennium, and his Avatar is born.
In the womb of Pandora Lovegood, more than a year before the fall of Lord Voldemort, a second life begins to grow alongside its twin, and nine months later Luna Lovegood comes into the world with an unexpected companion: her little sister Astra.
Had Death ever taken Biology, he would have failed the genetics module. XX is not the same as XY.
Oops.
Astra is a strange child, and coming from the mouth of Xenophilius Lovegood, that is saying something. His youngest is even more spacy than her older sister, is prone to sitting still for hours at a time staring up at the cosmos and then making vague comments on how the stars are wrong or something in that vein of thought.
["Perseus is not looking very happy," Astra had mumbled during one particularly memorable incident when she was four, "I must fix that someday." Xeno had not been entirely sure how to respond to that, and so had patted her on the head and smiled lovingly and not said a word about how strange she was. Beside her, Luna had squealed happily and snuggled up next to her twin.
"Do the Percy story Asta," Luna begged, "Pwease."
And so Astra had sighed, corrected the pronunciation of her name, and indulged her twin with the tale of Perseus and the Minotaur. Something that confused Xeno as Astra's version sounds very different to the one he has in a book on Greek mythology that is tucked away somewhere – most likely in the top of an airing cupboard or under the kitchen sink.]
In an unusual dynamic that the Lovegoods could never have anticipated, it is the younger twin who is more dominant and mature – also outrageously vicious and dangerously devious when it comes to defending her more innocent sister.
But then, Death has never had a sibling before.
Death is not really quite sure how to deal with his – no, her mortality.
She had expected to be an only child in an average family that blazed ahead with a genius track record – how else would he - she - create distance between himself – herself – and the family he – she, dammit – was born to. Remembering which gender pronoun to use is so frustrating. She had forgotten that mortal bodies had limits – sleep for example is very frustrating. The tiny body she is wrapped up in, bound to with every last scrap of her essence requires a good eight to ten hours of sleep, almost half of her current lifespan is currently being wasted instead of being put to good use.
What time she is able to stay awake and coherent in, is usually filled with her sister's cheerful face and insistence on grand adventures. The dynamic between the two of them shifts when social interactions are required, in which Luna becomes the outgoing and dominant twin and Death, no Astra (Remembering which name to introduce oneself with is important. Who calls themselves 'Death' with a straight face nowadays?), is the one who trails behind not making eye contact.
Luna takes to wearing bright colors, her smile is like the dawn, the first rays of pure sunlight stretching over the horizon and bathing whatever it touches in a warm radiance. She tucks yellow primroses into her many tiny braids, weaves daisy chains and delights in finding robes and dresses in yellow, orange, pink, peach and maroon.
By contrast, Astra is the dusk. She does not smile as often as her sister, tends to wear vacant and distracted expressions more while she contemplates the universe and her place in it. Her pale blonde hair is twisted back into a single braid that falls down her back with numerous little objects woven in, tiny silver beads, slender glass tubes, an ashwinder's fang tied in with fine string amongst others; even a few threads of unicorn hair glints in the light, woven in among her own. She chooses jeans over dresses and skirts, likes to wear robes in darker colors than her sister; deep purple and blue, silver and black.
When people come to visit, Luna bounds forwards cheerfully and engages. By contrast, Astra stares blankly at those who try to converse with her until their words peter off into an uncomfortable silence, and they awkwardly edge away from her.
Where Luna is the sun (and the irony is very much noted), Astra is the moon. Their parents joke that they must have mixed up the names at birth whenever this is remarked on.
Luna has a new friend.
The little red-haired girl called Ginny is from across the village, the youngest of seven children – including a pair of identical twins who take great joy in finding another set of twins so close – has taken to following Astra's sister around like an unkempt puppy. It's frustrating, Astra is so used to being her sister's only companion, only confident is suddenly being pushed aside in favor of the Weasley girl.
"Mum, I'm going out to play with Ginny," has become a common thing to hear Luna say in the morning, and every time it happens, Astra finds herself tensing up.
More than once she's been invited to join, but she doesn't like the way Ginny looks at her, as if she's been weighed, and measured, and found very much wanting. Her, the embodiment of Death, keeper of the Balance, has been found wanting by a mere mortal child. It's insulting, is ridiculous, is infuriating.
The brat is clearly trying to steal her sister.
Astra doesn't like her.
Not one bit.
When Astra is nine, Pandora dies.
Luna sees a spell backfire, sees Mummy crumpling to the floor and struggling to breathe.
Astra sees the soul struggling to remain attached to the mortal coil.
Luna cries and holds Mummy's hand, and begs her to stay.
Astra watches with a sense of detachment, not really sure what to do.
To nine-year-old Luna, Death is a horrible nasty thing that steals away people from their families.
To Astra, who has the being that has Death for a soul, dying is a part of life, is as natural as being born, breathing and being afraid of the dark.
Then Pandora is gone, and Astra watches her family being to collapse in on itself like a dying star without a heart. The funeral is painful to sit though, the gossipy whispers of various older woman who cannot quite believe she has not yet cried.
Xeno takes the hands of his daughters and apparates them home to the Rookery, which seems so much colder and darker without the perpetual sunshine that was Pandora.
That night, Xeno sits staring blankly at the wall and Luna cries herself to sleep in Astra's arms.
And for the first time in four hundred years, the entity that is Death feels guilt.
Things get a little easier.
Not by much, but they do. Luna is the one who encourages Daddy to remember to get dressed in the morning and Astra takes over the cooking for a while. Until they realize just how terrible Astra's idea of food is, and Luna makes her switch roles. Because apparently pickles and peanut butter just do not go together in a sandwich.
But none of them will every really get back to how they were before they lost their center. Luna's long silver-blonde hair streams out behind her in a tangled mess that nobody quite has the has the heart to tame, Astra' jeans are constantly splattered in paint splashes from helping Luna with her art and Xeno's eyes get a little wilder with each passing month – oh, he's not as badly detached as before, but his sanity has certainly taken a downward incline.
Then one day not long before the twin's eleventh birthday, a rather pretty Barn Owl carries two heavy parchment envelopes embossed with a startling sapphire blue ink to the window. Luna smiles dreamily as she reads through the letter addressed to Luna S. Lovegood, while Astra stares at the envelope in front of her.
Astra A. Lovegood,
Third floor, The Rookery.
Ottery St. Catchpole.
Devon.
Xeno watches with a strange sense of amusement as his youngest eyes the stark white parchment with an expression of impending doom upon her face, as if she is faced with a rather confusing puzzle and is not sure whether it is worth solving.
"How do you feel about home schooling?" She asks, looking up at him with a resigned expression.
Xeno laughs. For all that his daughter pouts, he knows she's already made the decision, because Luna wants to go, and where Luna goes, Astra does too.
For Tsume Yuki. Somewhat prodded into existence/inspired by her "Redundant" and "Knock 'em Dead". Which is why Astra braids strange objects into her hair.
Luna and Astra are fraternal twins born February 13th, 1981. Luna has silver eyes; Astra has blue eyes. Luna's middle name is Selene (Elizabeth in Canon), Astra's is Apolline.
You can roll with either of these two options, depending on whatever is easier for you.
Death manipulated time and space so that his Avatar was born before Voldie attacked the Potters and only infused a small portion of himself into it until after November 1981, when the rest of him joined with the physical form. This is sort-of a Paradox, but Death is beyond human limitations.
OR Death manipulated time and space so that when his Avatar came into existence, it's family would just assume it had been there all along. Like how Dawn was created in Buffy.
It should be noted that Astra's name was chosen as a counterpart for Luna. Sun and Moon. One could argue that the latin word for Sun is Sol, but remember, the Sun is just a Star that happens to be the center of the Solar System.
No, I don't know for certain when anything will be updated. I have a full-time job (if I still have it after Saturday) and have been sick frequently lately. Hence why I worry about my job. Hopefully the blood tests will clear some stuff up, but honestly, I wouldn't blame my boss for firing me considering how many days I've had to take off work – but in all seriousness, I work in a café and have no clue what is causing the need to, ah, well vomit. If it's a virus, I could wind up passing it on, which would be just plain mean because this sucks.