Archive of Our Own ^beta

Chapter Text

"Bhadra, what the hell are you doing?"

"It's a video camera!" Bhadra said, lifting the frame up to where Ajay, Sabal and Amita stood. 

"Better not have any other bullshit in that thing," Amita muttered, looking back at Sabal.

"What could you be looking at me for?" Sabal asked, offended. 

"I didn't do anything." Amita said with a shrug. Sabal scowled back at her and Amita stuck her tongue at him. Bhadra looked at the camera, and zoomed in on Ajay.

"Bhadra, I want to die." Ajay said, frowning.

"You're already dead!" Bhadra retorted, playing with the zoom effect to constantly zoom in on Ajay's face. 

"Fuck this," Ajay said, throwing off his jacket now that he couldn't feel anything. He took off his gloves and found himself looking to chase a squirrel. 

"Are you a fucking dog?!" Bhadra called out, running after him. 

"Well, with how your parents treat me? DUH." Ajay caught the squirrel by his mouth and bit it on the head, ripping it off. He ate the twitching body before regretting it immediately, but as soon as Sabal and Amita had made eye contact he continued. 

"Bhadra, wanna join?" Ajay asked. Amita and Sabal looked at each other, then glared back at Bhadra. Bhadra rolled her eyes before proceeding to squat next to Ajay.

"Not hungry, but I'll just keep watch of you." She said, zooming in on the squirrel's remains. "So powerful. Beautiful, even." 

"AJAY!" Someone called out in the distance. Bhadra zoomed in; there came an unfamiliar woman.

"Mom?!" Ajay choked out, spitting out the squirrel and throwing it away. "Mom!"

"AJAY!" Ajay's mother ran to him, stumbling through the grass.

"MOM!" Ajay cried out, running to her. 

As Ajay's mother ran, though, she took her slipper from her raised foot and charged. "AJAY!"

"Oh-- Oh FUCK, MOM!" Ajay stopped, then ran back to Bhadra, "TURN OFF THE CAMERA!" 

"NO WAY!" Bhadra yelped, running away further just as Ajay tripped forward and fell face down. Ajay's mother hit him square in the head, catching the slipper back and putting it back on. 

"Did you miss me, Ajay?" She asked.

"I shouldn't have gone to Kyrat." Ajay muttered. Bhadra zoomed in on his grassy face, then panned the camera out to his mother.

She threw the slipper at the camera too. 

Chapter Text

"--I love men-- y'know, I wish they just loved me back." Ajay rambled as Bhadra walked along the plane of reality. Everything was shattered into buildings and mountains corroding into each other, bouncing from one platform to another, and they walked along seamlessly as if having to jump around was normal. After that debacle with Ajay's mom, she disappeared into the air and Bhadra had woken up to Ajay looming over her, holding the camera to her face before she smacked him away. 

"I'm sure the men in your life loved you," Bhadra said, taking Ajay's hand with her as they walked onto the broken streets together. This place looked like Chicago, or at least that's what Bhadra was assuming; she didn't even know where Chicago was or how it looked like. It must be Ajay's thoughts and memories, mixing in with her own as they hung out through the void of space. 

"BHADRA!" Amita yelled from afar, trying to chase after them and failing accordingly. "COME BACK!"

Bhadra recoiled and hissed, hopping on Ajay's back unsolicited as they made a break for it. "YOU'LL NEVER TAKE ME ALIVE!"

"YOU'RE NOT EVEN ALIVE!"

"NONE OF US AAAAARE!" Bhadra yelled back, throwing her arms up, and as Ajay missed a step they plunged down into the dark. 

Or, they would have, considering how they ended up floating in the dark. Ajay swam to Bhadra.

"So how's never reaching puberty?" Ajay said, wiggling his arms to try and still himself midair.

"I fucking hate being short." Bhadra replied, then looked above her as Amita tried to dive down to get them. Instead, as she did, Bhadra stuck her leg out and kicked Amita like a soccer ball, and she ended up back where she started. 

"HAH!" Ajay shouted, before realizing that he was also slipping away into whatever was pulling them down. "NOT HAH-- Bhadra, HELP ME!"

"SORRY, AJAY, BUT ONE OF US HAS TO LIVE!" Bhadra yelled out, kicking desperately away from his vicinity.

"I HOPE YOU GET SHORTER!" And then, Ajay sunk back in scrambling like a drowning dog before he completely disappeared.

Bhadra was alone, floating in the dark, and then she laid back and suddenly fell back against the ground. 

Sabal was looming over her and she whacked him in the head instinctively.

"MY NOSE!" Sabal yelped, curling into a ball like a centipede.

"IT BETTER BE!" Bhadra barked, scrambling upwards and pulling her fists up just in case she needed to smack Sabal again.

"Oh, dear," Pagan said, buttoning his shirt up. "It seems as though she broke your nose, Sabal." 

"She fucking did--" Sabal snarled, looking back at Bhadra. 

"Pagan Min?!" Bhadra's eyes widened. Pagan fixed his belt, "Oh, it's you, dear. You're the," Pagan flicked his index finger and thought about it, "Tarun Matara? Correct?"

"Bhadra, I have a name."

"You didn't tell me she had a name," Pagan looked at Sabal. Sabal wiped the blood from his nose. 

"I didn't think it would matter if you've forgotten it anyway--" Sabal blocked one of Bhadra's swings and got up, showing that he hadn't had his shirt on despite wearing his jacket. 

What the hell was so important about that now? She looked around, squinting and trying to recognize where she was, but then she realized there was a temple. "Jalendu," she concluded, then recoiled in disgust before throwing her hands into a fighting stance again. "If you think--"

"No, he doesn't think," Pagan said, fisting a handful of Sabal's hair to pull him with him, "Feel free to hang around, my dear, you'll probably disappear into thin air when you do anyway." 

Bhadra decided not to question them, then. As she walked, she tripped on her own feet and clipped through the air, landing face first into city streets. 

Chapter Text

"Ow. Mom-- OW!" Ajay snapped his head back to place, reeling away from Ishwari's hand to rub at the pinched spot of his ear. 

"I didn't say that we were going to stay. I'm very particular with my words, Ajay." Ishwari said, and Ajay looked at her in disbelief.

"And I'm particular with the fact that I'm AUTISTIC! MOM!" Ajay raised his arms up, right before dropping them back down and rubbing his temples. "Not important. But at least I got you back to Lakshmana."

"Did you have to disobey Pagan's orders, Ajay?" Ishwari sighed, "You should've just eaten the Crab Rangoon."

"I fucking hate crabs, mom."

"Language."

"Oh, sorry, I fucking hate fucking eating crabs, mom." 

Ishwari blinked. "Okay, that was my fault. My point is, Ajay."

"Your point is, Mom?"

"You didn't have to make it hard."

"Well, how was I supposed to know that, you never told me because you literally DIED!"

Ishwari put her hands on her hips. "And now you're dead too. Congratulations."

Ajay looked around. The place was an abandoned temple, probably from one of Ishwari's memories of the place. It looked like that especially with how blurry the edges of the walls were. 

"Where is my sister anyway?" 

"I don't know." Ishwari sat down on her knees. "This afterlife thing, it's a strange place."

"This place looks like I dreamed of it."

"That's precisely it. I don't know if what this is should even be considered real," Ishwari looked at Ajay up and down, "or if I'm still dreaming in my death bed."

"Well, I know I'm dead. I got myself shot." Ajay said.

"You shot yourself." Ishwari corrected. 

"It was an accident!"

"And was nuking Montana also an accident?!"

"No, I just hated Montana!" 

Ishwari frowned. Ajay also frowned. 

"Come on, sit down." She said, patting the patch of grass next to him. Ajay sat down. Ishwari rolled a manifested newspaper and whacked him up the head.

"What about the little girl?" Ishwari asked. 

"Who? Bhadra?" Ajay asked. 

"No, the other little girl," Ishwari rolled her eyes. 

"Moooom." Ajay groaned.

"Yes, Bhadra," Ishwari said, "How did she die?"

Ajay opened his mouth, then shut it, trying to think. "I'm pretty sure I was dead by then." he lied. 

"Poor thing. She had a life ahead of her."

"I'd say I was spared," Bhadra's voice made the Ghales turn their heads to her direction. She was holding a baby in her arms and Ajay realized it was his sister. 

"Don't drop the baby." Ajay warned, getting up. Bhadra looked at him in disbelief.

"You think I would?!"

"Bhadra, you're literally malnourished." 

"And now I'm not!"

"Yeah, because you're DEAD!"

"Ajay, quiet!" Ishwari said, reaching out to hold Lakshmana in her arms as the baby started to cry. 

Ajay sighed. Ishwari rocked the baby and shushed her. 

"Having a hard time controlling your volume, Ajay?" Bhadra said with a snort. Ajay flipped her off, and Bhadra flipped him off back. 

"You were the new Tarun Matara." Ishwari said, reaching out to put her lifted hand down and squeezing it.

Bhadra looked at her with a smile. "And you were his mother. Nice to meet you."

"I'm sure my son took great care of you?" Ishwari asked. 

Bhadra looked at Ajay, then nodded. "He did until he couldn't." she lied with a smile. 

"Ay-jay!" Ajay swiveled around, and his eyes went wide. He caught Noore in his arms and they spun for momentum before finally settling down. 

"N-Noore," Ajay stammered, eyes wide and arms drifting down to her waist. He took a quick glance at the other girls before hugging her again. "Hi. Hi, how are you?"

Bhadra cringed and looked back at Ishwari. 

"I could use a drink right about now," and then as she blinked a glass of Raksi appeared in her hand. "Oh. OH!" 

"You drink?" Ishwari asked. 

"I drink and smoke." Bhadra said with a shrug, "Before you judge me, it was all we had in Kyrat."

"No wonder you're malnourished. You poor thing." Ishwari muttered as she cupped Bhadra's face. As Bhadra turned back to Ajay and Noore, they shared a quick kiss before Noore had run off to where her family was. 

"Bhadra!" Amita yelled from afar. "BHADRA!"

"Oh, FUCK!" Bhadra yelped. She chugged the entire glass down before throwing it Amita's direction, then ran off. "Nice meeting you, Miss Ghale!"

Chapter Text

"Oh, Kyra, seeing families get together ruins my day." Bhadra scoffed, drinking another bottle of Raksi before throwing the bottle into the void. 

"I was just wondering, but is it underage if you're dead?" Rabi asked, "I always wondered what the age factors would be when time passes by when you die. Like if you were thirteen in the real world does that carry over eight years later even though nothing changed except your brain? Or do you like, I dunno, stay perpetually underage so it doesn't count. Should we come up with an age for drinking thing in the afterlife? Like if you died a child you will remain a child for the rest of fucking eternity or something like that? If so then that would probably suck if you're a kid and you wanna drink. But hey, Bhadra, you weren't underage when you died, but I still think you should stop drinking!"

(Bhadra thinks the funniest part is that there are people that think she died at 18. Did she really grow without noticing?) 

"Did I ever tell you how nice you are to me, Rabi?" Bhadra said instead of replying to him, "I haven't had a conversation with anybody in a long while." 

Rabi lifted a brow and tilted his shades down, "You're really sure about that? Because I'm pretty sure I saw you having a conversation with Ajay awhile back before he disappeared into the void and landed face down, having a holy vertical with a tree." 

"Well," she didn't want to know what a holy vertical was, "Ajay's terrible at talking, but you like to switch topic after topic whenever you want to. That's what you're good at."

"Oh-- I'm flattered! Yeah, that's totally my thing, I'm a radio show host after all!" Rabi said triumphantly.

Bhadra sipped on the Raksi as she looked him straight in the eyes. "Were."

"Were," Rabi echoed, "I can't wrap this pronouns thing around my head!"

"That's not a pronoun, that's a verb!" 

"I don't care about English, I just rant in it so that it's accessible to everyone who speaks like three to a thousand dialects in all of Kyrat." 

"Fair, but we still use that in every language ever."

"Not if I can help it."

Bhadra stayed silent, then piped up. "I like you, Rabi."

Rabi patted her on the head. "Sure thing, kid. Anyway! Speaking of being dead, you think we could work some secret afterlife sets of cables and sound systems so that people could tune into a radio show in the after life? Like can we watch TV in the afterlife or can we make and invent some shit in the afterlife to keep up, I dunno, morale or whatever if we end up in the same person's vicinity all the time?" 

"No fucking idea." Bhadra said with a grin, flopping down on her back as Rabi continued to yammer on. He would keep talking until his sudden movement caused him to disappear, and Bhadra found herself alone under a sky of nothing and the dark slowly creeping on her body ever, ever so slightly. She turned to her side and shut her eyes, opening it next as she woke up in a cozy, warm bed. The frames were familiar, the mattress more so. She wasn't used to sleeping this comfortably, especially next to Sabal, but since Sabal wasn't there she was allowed to relax. 

When she sat up because nothing had happened, though, she looked around to find herself in the middle of a temple, something like Jalendu Temple but not quite. The once shared bed with her was out of place and so was she, and Bhadra walked to the balcony and took a look at the outside world. The lake was massive, spreading infinitely, and the island the temple stood on was slowly starting to sink in the water, but Bhadra didn't care. The afterlife was a strange place where time and space couldn't do anything but collide, and maybe that was the best because it meant that there was nothing waiting for them in the afterlife but a dream. And maybe there were people waiting for her, but she had no family to begin with, so what was ever the point of having to deal with finding your family if you didn't even remember how they looked? 

Whatever. 

She had bottles to drink, some drugs to manifest and try out, and she was perpetually 14. That was more than fine with her. 

But gods, did families coming together ruin her day.

She sat on the railing of the balcony and nearly threw her bottle in the direction of a man with a strange mullet and a black daurwa suruwal, someone so familiar but so, so weirdly unfamiliar too. Her eyes went wide. 

"What are you doing in my house?!" Mohan Ghale himself, cried out, right before Bhadra manifested another bottle to hit him on the head with. 

Chapter Text

"You ever think about how the first guy to get a blow job must've like, been so scared?"

"Is that what you think about when you're fucking high?" Amita asked. 

"Shut up, Amita," Bhadra said, dragging Mohan by the foot and pushing him so that his unconscious body was placed onto the bed. "I like what he thinks about." 

"You're not supposed to be taking these drugs, Bhadra."

"I told you," Bhadra said, glaring back at Amita for the first time in a long time, "I'm not doing them. Yet."

"Wait until you're 18."

"I'M DEAD, AMITA!" Bhadra snapped. Amita had her arms bound behind her back, Rabi lounging on his side next to her as he rambled on about whatever the fuck. 

"You sure are a loud girl, Bhadra, keep it up!" Rabi said with a thumbs up, then continued onto his tangent. 

"Nice house." Ajay piped up, walking in from a floating rock and nearly tripping on his feet the moment he saw what was happening. "Bhadra, what the hell are you doing? Rabi- IS THAT MY DAD?"

Bhadra's eyes went wide, "Ajay, it's not what you think--"

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING TO MY DAD!?" Ajay asked. 

"I said it's not what you think!" Bhadra said, pushing Mohan into the bed. 

"THAT'S MY DAD?!" Ajay said in disbelief, hopping over the balcony railing. 

"That's your dad?" Rabi asked.

"Yes, that's his dad!" Amita remarked. 

"WHY IS AMITA TIED UP?" Ajay asked. 

"Ajay, shut the FUCK up! I'm trying to think!" Bhadra said, rubbing her temples. It seemed as though he noticed the cigarette and lighter on the nightstand.

"It's exactly what you think it looks like, Ajay." Amita said. "She's trying to kill us."

"Well, that's your fault, isn't it?" Ajay said, hands on his hips.

"Rabi, help me pour the gas on her," Bhadra said, dragging the tank of gas and the man got up, lighting up another weed blunt.

"Right on, Bhadra!" 

"Rabi, what the hell happened to you?" Ajay asked. 

"I got old." Rabi said with a shrug, right before helping Bhadra push the gas tank onto the floor around Amita and Mohan.

"Fair point."

As soon as the gas was spilt, Bhadra lit the match. 

"What is this?!" Mohan suddenly shouted. 

"That's our queue to go!" Bhadra said, sprinting over the balcony. Rabi spun around and disappeared, and Ajay was left with his hands on his hair. 

"DAD!" Ajay shouted, just as the building caught on fire. 

"Who the-- AJAY?!" Mohan's eyes flew open, but as soon as he got up he disappeared. Amita sat still, staring back at Ajay as he simply sighed and jumped off the building. 

"SEE YOU SOON, AJAY!" Amita shouted out. 

Chapter Text

Ajay found himself alone in the dark. For whatever reason, the dark wasn't transporting him anywhere. He sighed and sat down, only to end up falling right into the next dream and stumbling face first onto the ground. 

"Brother!" Sabal said, scrambling to sit in front of him. He pulled his jacket over his body and leaned over. "What are you doing here?!"

"Sabal, just leave me alone, I don't need to hear you again." Ajay muttered, before pressing his face against the cold floor. Wherever this place was, he didn't care, and he was already tired. He manifested a gun and tucked it into his jeans. 

"That's much better," Ajay said, then he looked up to see Sabal kicking something and coming back onto his feet.

He decided not to question it.

"Ugh." Amita appeared behind him, walking past as she took out a small flame teetering in a lock of her hair. 

"How was being cooked alive, Amita?" Ajay asked, dodging from a punch Amita threw before she pulled back to show the burn scars still singing her flesh. 

"You smell like pork." Sabal remarked, before Amita manifested a pan and hit him with it. Ajay held back his laugh with a crooked line on his mouth.

"DID YOU JUST CALL ME A PIG?!" 

"I SAID YOU SMELLED LIKE PORK!"

Another whack and Ajay looked away to laugh. 

"YOU CALLED ME A PIG, YOU FUCKING PIG!" 

"BULLSHIT, YOU BITCH, THAT'S WHAT IT SMELLS LIKE, DOESN'T IT, AJAY?!"

"Not saying anything, man, I don't wanna die twice," Ajay turned on his heels to leave, "Happy head trauma, you two!" 

Chapter Text

"You taste like gasoline." Pagan remarked, wiping his mouth in disgust. 

"How do you know what gasoline tastes like?" Sabal asked, unbuttoning his shirt. 

"I know what it smells like, I didn't think I'd have to taste it until now." Pagan pulled Sabal to his lap, pushing his legs open as he mouthed on his neck. "I'd rather take body shots of it than have it from your mouth."

"You want to lick all over my body?" Sabal asked, grinding down on Pagan. 

"And I'll do more than just that--" Pagan said with a smirk, right before Ishwari from behind let out a scream.

"PAGAN?!" she yelped, and Pagan knocked Sabal right off him. 

"ISHWARI?" 

"WHAT ARE YOU DOING WITH THAT COCKROACH!?" she said as she took her slipper and threw it at Sabal's head. 

"NOTHING!" Pagan sputtered. As Ishwari was about to come over, he whipped his arm backward and disappeared, leaving an unconscious Sabal on the floor. Ishwari picked him up like a kitten. 

"What is this manthing?" 

She looked around.

She was in the void again.