The Chat Chat

[freedom]

@keilah-h thx! I use Copilot AI from Microsoft 😉

✨ who the Son sets free is free indeed ✨

[Keilah H.]

@freed_and_redeemed Scars are rarely cool to get lol.

Where'd I get ya this time? The liver? The kidney? I'm runnin' outta places to put holes in ya.

[Keilah H.]

I think I’ve had that AI draw some dragons and stuff. It does a halfway decent job if you don’t ask for lettering….lol

Where'd I get ya this time? The liver? The kidney? I'm runnin' outta places to put holes in ya.

[freedom]

@keilah-h Fair 😂

✨ who the Son sets free is free indeed ✨

[RAE]

@freed_and_redeemed

HANS!!!!!!!

Those are so great!

 

Leo looks nothing like my drawing, sorry.

 

"You need French Toast."

[freedom]

@rae

Thank youuuuuuuu 💖💖

 

don’t apologize!! I love your drawing of Leo <3

Plus, I’ve changed the way Leo looks a bit since then….several times😂

✨ who the Son sets free is free indeed ✨

[freedom]

@rae and your signature!!!

#HugRikerandHanssquad
#HugLeontoo

🥹🥹

✨ who the Son sets free is free indeed ✨

[-GRCR-]

@freed_and_reedemed

Very interesting! Riker looks pretty cool… but I think Wolfgang’s pic is my favorite!! 💛💛💛

🤍 Ira | Jara | Evelyn | Flaz | Blaine 🤍

[-GRCR-]

@freed_and_redeemed

haha I messed up your taggg… ^^^ 😅

🤍 Ira | Jara | Evelyn | Flaz | Blaine 🤍

[The Ducktator]

@freed_and_redeemed

Awww, Isaiah is such an adorable old man.🩷

There are two types of people in this world. Those who can extrapolate from incomplete data

[Koshka]

@freed_and_redeemed

Ahhhh! His backstories have come to the scene!!

Great job…have you finished the scene yet, and are you willing to share?

*GASPETH* she’s using AI.

I once tried to generate a character face claim for Raphael once. I don’t think it understood me. It was….uh… interesting.

First Grand Historian of Arreth and the Lesser Realms (aka Kitty)
Fork the Gork

[freedom]

@koshka I did finish it, but I think I may add more; idk, seems too short 😂 but idk what else to add tbh lollll

 

but anywhoooo

@lightoverdarkness6 @godlyfantasy12 @koshka @rae @savannah_grace2009 @keilah-h @loopylin @mineralizedwritings @grcr @theducktator @esther-c @anyone-else-idk-lol-XD

here’s the continuation of the Riker scene AND a Leon scene for y’all 👀

(and Broken Shackles is over 46k now and almost 300 pages!!!🥳)

 

He wouldn’t stop. He didn’t want to stop.

He didn’t want to dwell on things he’d rather forget.

He didn’t want to think about why his father had never loved him.

He didn’t want to remind himself of the ever-constant fact that he had always been, could only be, and would forever be nothing more than the mistake his father never wanted.

“I don’t see what anyone else sees in you. I wanted a son that would be the greatest gift I could ever have. I wanted a son that would make me proud. I wanted a son I could love. Instead, all I got…was you.”

Except now he knew. Now he knew that his father once had a son that had been all of that. And Riker…Riker had been the replacement that could never replace.

The child that could never take away the pain of the loss of the first child.

The son that could never be what the other son would have been.

The mistake that should have never been born.

~*~

A dry cough carried through the air and a gentle whimper followed. Leon gently flipped the cloth atop Isabel’s forehead and gently stroked her blonde curls, pushing them away from her face covered in small red spots.

Isabel’s chest slowly rose and fell; quiet footsteps echoed through the still room. Leon slowly rose his head to meet Louisa’s gentle, concerned gaze.

Louisa smiled softly and whispered, “I will watch over her for a little while. Go get some rest, child.”

“Can’t sleep.”

“I know,” Louisa crossed the room, slightly adjusted the blankets atop Isabel, and set a gentle hand on Leon’s shoulder, “but at least try to get a little bit of rest. You’re no good to Isabel or to any of us if you haven’t even rested once.”

“I don’t want to leave her bedside.”

Louisa’s gentle hands squeezed Leon’s shoulders; she sighed and planted a kiss atop Leon’s curls. “I know, but please go rest, dear. I understand your hesitancy and your fear, but we can’t have you getting sick too.”

Isabel laid sick, and he was with her, unlike he’d been able to do so with his Ema…Aadelheide—Leon slowly and gently kissed the cloth on Isabel’s forehead and rose to his feet, motioning Louisa into the chair.

Louisa sat, whispered something Leon couldn’t discern, and met Leon’s gaze again. “Oh, and child, Isaiah is here if you wish to speak with him.”

Leon nodded and stepped out of the room, leaving the door only slightly ajar. He didn’t wish to speak to anyone, much less Isaiah.

When would everyone just leave him alone? When would he just be left to handle his own problems? When would he be allowed to just be silent and numb?

Leon stepped into the kitchen; Isaiah stood and slightly adjusted his rounded glasses, offering a soft, concerned smile. “How is Isabel, Leon?”

Leon bit the inside of his cheek. How did he answer such a question? She wasn’t fine. She wasn’t recovering. She only seemed to be getting worse…and worse…and worse. “She’s…she’s not…”

Isaiah slowly nodded. “I understand.”

Leon shrugged and shouldered past Isaiah, opening an upper cabinet, shoving aside boxes and food supplies. “Is there any reason you’re here?”

“To check on all of you. Are you feeling alright, Leon?”

“I’m not the one that’s sick, Isaiah,” Leon retorted; he pulled a glass bottle out of the cabinet and popped off the top, “of course I’m fine.”

Isaiah raised a single eyebrow. “How long has that been going on?”

Leon took a long sip, savoring the burn within his throat. “What? How long has what been-?”

“The alcohol, Leon. I thought you gave it up.”

“If you’re here to condemn me, Isaiah, then you can go somewhere else.” Leon retorted, sinking into a chair at the table.

Isaiah slowly shook his head. “I’m never here to condemn you, Leon, I’m here to help you.”

“Go help someone that wants and deserves it.”

“Leon—”

“Go on,” Leon took another long sip, “go help someone that needs help and wants whatever lies you want to sell about God.”

He was tired of lies. He was tired of false promises. He was sick and tired of people saying God would come through only for God to never even come close to doing so.

“God doesn’t love me like so many claim. Maybe no one does. Maybe no one should.”

“Riker believes the same.”

Leon’s grip tightened around the bottle. Riker the murderer? Good. He deserved to feel ashamed—he deserved to feel guilty.

“You both seem to think I should give up, but I’m not going to give up. I’m not going to give up on either one of you. God loves and wants you both, just as he loves all of humanity. God never wishes suffering upon us—”

“If he didn’t want me to suffer, he should have allowed me to die with Aadelheide—”

“Enough, Leon,” Isaiah ordered in a tone that brooked zero argument, quickly prying the glass from Leon’s fingers and setting the alcohol out of Leon’s reach, “I can listen to cursing, to anger at God, to bitterness, to sadness, and almost anything else, but I will not put up with you talking like that. Look at me and look at me right now.”

What was he, five? But something in Isaiah’s tone, something within Isaiah’s strained voice, something about Isaiah’s demeanor left Leon unable to disobey. His eyes slowly met Isaiah’s.

“I don’t want to ever hear you say something like that again. There is a reason you survived, Leon. God has a purpose for you. I don’t understand why Aadelheide died, but what I do know is that you were kept alive for a purpose you just can’t see yet. You are alive, Leon. You’re alive for your kids. You’re alive for a reason. You could have died the moment you stepped foot in the camp. You could have died any of those times you got ill inside the camp. You could have died when you were whipped, when you were beaten. You could have died at any moment. But you’re alive, Leon. And I don’t want to hear you saying that you wish you were dead.”

“That’s not what—”

Isaiah slowly shook his head, his eyes kind yet firm. “Don’t you say that. That is exactly what you meant by what you said.”

Something within Leon—perhaps a bit of childish protest—wanted to argue, to insist that wasn’t what he meant.

But no argument…no protest…no disagreement…could change the truth that there were nights where Leon gave in to such thoughts.

There were nights he missed Aadelheide more than anything.

There were hard days he wanted Aadelheide beside him every minute.

There were nights he thought about—even wanted—to be with Aadelheide…to be gone, to be away from the world just as she had been for over a year.

“So much pain is in you, Leon, I know…but I need you to know this: you are alive for a reason, and though you may not believe it, God is good, Leon…always.”

President Hindenburg was dead. There was no election; his chancellor had seized the presidency.

  “That man is a lunatic. Germany will not stand for him being president.”

“Abraham, don’t speak so rashly. We should wait and see how this unfolds—”

“Wait? Israel, are you insane?” Abraham cried, facing his oldest brother.

  “Abraham, Israel, this is not the time to argue.”

Abraham and Israel both faced Josef, their middle brother. Slowly, Abraham nodded. “You’re right, Josef…I apologize.”

Israel soon offered an apology of his own, and the two men disappeared around the corner to join the aunts and cousins.

     Leon leaned further into his father’s embrace, seated on a simple couch. “Abba, will this man being in charge change things for us?”

      Josef smiled softly, running his fingers through Leon’s black curls. “I cannot be certain, Leon, but what I do know is that God is more powerful than this man named Hitler.”

Leon nodded. His father was right—he had to be. His father was the wisest man he knew, even more than the reverend, although he knew Josef disagreed with such a statement.

   Josef’s fingers gently clasped Leon’s chin; slowly, gently, he turned Leon’s head. Their eyes met; Josef pressed his forehead to Leon’s. “If you remember nothing else that I have ever told you, Leon, I need you to remember these four words, my son: God is good…always.”

His father was a wise man, a learned man, a man who made watches for a living but could have easily been a doctor or a lawyer if he had desired to do so; Isaiah reminded Leon of Josef more than anyone else did or ever had or likely ever would.

But even though his father believed, even though Isaiah believed, even though so many people he knew believed, Leon just…he couldn’t. Not anymore. He couldn’t trust God.

How could he ever just sit around and wait for God to abandon him again?

Leon’s fingers curled and uncurled, and his pulse quickened. His blood surged with anger, and his eyes burned with tears. “He’s not, Isaiah. He’s not good. Not when he let Aadelheide die.”

Isaiah sank into another wooden chair at the table. He slowly rested his hands overtop of Leon’s and smiled softly. “Leon, listen to me—”

“No, Isaiah, no,” Leon shook his head and pulled from Isaiah’s touch, “he’s not good.”

Perhaps it was stubbornness—perhaps it was childish.

But Leon couldn’t—wouldn’t—believe in something that had been taught to him his entire life that only ended up being a lie all along.

Where was a good God in a dark world?

Where was a good God in the depravity of war?

Where was a good God in sickness?

Where was a good God in death?

Where was a good God in suffering?

Where was a good God in genocide?

Where was a good God in the trials?

Where was a good God in the agonizing pain so deep you wanted to die?

Where was a good God in grief?

Where was, where had there been, a good God in Leon’s life?

“Where was he, Isaiah? Where was he in the camp? Where was he when I was starved, beaten, tortured, and treated as if I was worth less than dirt? Where was he when Aadelheide died? Where was he when I cried out to him and never got an answer?”

“I think the better question is: where was he not? You didn’t see him, you still don’t see him, but Leon, he has never let you out of his sight for even a second.”

“He sat on his throne and did nothing?”

“I don’t know why God allowed Aadelheide to die. I don’t know why God allowed the Nazis to do what they did. I don’t know why God allows what he sometimes allows. But where I don’t know the path, I know the one who created the path. Where I don’t know the answers, I know the one who has the answers. When I don’t know where hope is, I know the one who is hope.”

Leon stood; the chair clattered against the floor with a dull thud. He stepped over to the counter and tipped up his glass. He downed the alcohol in three seconds flat.

His head spun and his heart pounded behind his ribcage.

He faced Isaiah, utilized the bitterness, the anger, coursing through his veins, and whispered, “Save your lies for someone else, Isaiah. A good God is a lie, and I’m sorry I ever believed it in the first place.”

He turned on his heel and marched out of the kitchen, deafening his ears to Isaiah’s gentle yet firm protests.

Just as he’d failed to do before, God wouldn’t save Isabel even if Leon asked.

Leon didn’t care what anyone said anymore.

All Leon Wagner wanted was to be numb.

✨ who the Son sets free is free indeed ✨

[freedom]

My bois *sniff sniff*

Leon’s thirst for numbness (coming from alcohol, of course) spells trouble, y’all 😅

Wish Riker the best of luck, because he’s going to need it😬

✨ who the Son sets free is free indeed ✨

[The Ducktator]

@freed_and_redeemed

I love Isaiah so much.🥰 Leon, listen to him already!

There are two types of people in this world. Those who can extrapolate from incomplete data

[HighScribe]

@freed_and_redeemed

 (and Broken Shackles is over 46k now and almost 300 pages!!!🥳)

Whooooo 🥳👏👏

Also…

LEON! NOOOOOOOOOO JUST LISTEN TO ISAIAH! 😭

😣

Wish Riker the best of luck, because he’s going to need it😬

Freedom, WHAT are you planning NOW?

Good luck, Riker!

Any noun can become a verb if you don't care enough.

[Author]

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