#...would you like another one

[corishadowfang]

            I’m not sure I’m cut out for this.

            The thought came quiet as Brain, very carefully, held his newborn daughter to his chest.  She was…so much smaller than he’d expected her to be.  She was still awake, only making a few quiet noises of protest as she stared up at her father, and it felt like something was cracking through the barriers he’d been so careful to put up.

            He didn’t know if he knew how to be a father.  He knew how to navigate Scalan politics, now—knew the right things to say at the right times, the people to argue with and the people who would be more willing to help if he agreed with them, the people to make connections with outside Scalan’s inner circle to help keep the higher ups off his back.  He knew how to fight Heartless, and discretely keep an eye out for Darkness, and utilize his sources to try and figure out how and when disaster would strike next.  (Because it would.  He knew it would.  Daybreak Town had never been enough for it—and he wouldn’t let himself fail a second time.)

            But this was—this was new.  This was something he’d never spent time cultivating the skills for—something he’d never planned on.  Something that felt…strangely terrifying, and reminded him, painfully, of the other kids he’d never been able to keep safe.  (He wondered, distantly, if things would’ve been different if Daybreak Town hadn’t fallen—if he and his friends had managed to hold onto each other, and build lives together outside the Keyblade War.  It was a painful thought, though, and he brushed it off as not worth thinking about, even if it left a lump in his throat.)

            A quiet noise of protest drew his attention, and he blinked out of his thoughts.  His daughter waved her hands up at him, making a face that looked distinctly like a pout, and despite himself, he found his expression softening.  “You’d probably be happier if you went to sleep,” he whispered.  “Suppose you get that from me.”

            Another whine, like she was offended, and he huffed a quiet laugh.  “Right.  Sorry.”  He shifted her a bit, and wasn’t even entirely sure if he was holding her right, but she seemed more content with the new position, her quiet protests dying away.  Hope you don’t take after me too much, he thought, painfully bittersweet.  Don’t think we need two of us.

            His daughter quieted, finally slipping into sleep, and Brain’s throat tightened a bit.  “I don’t really know what I’m doing, kid,” he whispered, “but I’ll…try my best not to fuck you up too much.  Alright?”

            He’d just…have to hope that was enough.

[swan2swan]

Whoever conceived and animated this moment, I hope they're doing well and thriving. This is S-rank romance stuff here.

[icewindandboringhorror]

(also feel free in the tags to clarify Why you made the choice you made!! :0c)

[lazylittledragon]

some domestic shadowlachs <33

[soapbbox]

You know how in TFP Optimus can’t really remember what happened during his time without the matrix. Yeah. The sad version of this what if Optimus met cogless Megatron.

Cont from this, and this

[humming-fly]

He was feeling left out

and the higher rez stills, since gifs always export as if you're sending messages through a metal can~

[soosoosoup]

✨💖Pop👊Pop👊 Poppy💖✨✨

[starcurtain]

Teyvat's "Most Down Bad" Award Goes to Alhaitham for a Second Year Running

Seeing everyone making fun of Alhaitham for his "stalkerish" tendencies in this event is funny, because I feel like a lot of people missed that "Be literally everywhere Kaveh is" has been Alhaitham's MO from the day Kaveh appeared in the game.

From only grabbing his house keys after Kaveh returned from the desert (he couldn't have had both sets of keys at the end of the Archon Quest unless he went home and got Kaveh's copy) to ditching conversations to get back to his house only after Kaveh came home, to showing up without any warning or explanation in Kaveh's hangout with some ridiculous excuse about hearing his voice through noise-cancelling headphones... Refusing to offer any help in the Temple of Silence story quest other than staying in the library with Kaveh...

Since when does Alhaitham willingly cover anyone else's duties?

But this trend of "Be everywhere Kaveh is" didn't start when they were adults. It was already in place when they were still Akademiya students--and it's a trend that didn't end even when they had their fight.

Even when they weren't speaking, Alhaitham dogged Kaveh's every step through published responses to Kaveh's research articles in academic journals. He insisted on keeping a line of communication between himself and Kaveh open, even if the only way to do that was through very public ideological clashes. Pulling Kaveh's pigtails to get his attention lolol. It's implied that, for at least the few years between their fight and Kaveh moving in, this was the only communication between them--Alhaitham's refusal to allow their connection to entirely fade away. (And the fact that this is revealed in Kaveh's character stories--through his precious journal that records the moments of his life that had the most impact on him--shows just how deeply he values the fact that Alhaitham didn't give up.)

Another relevant side note: Alhaitham never asked Kaveh to give up his half of their house. Knowing half of it belonged to Kaveh, knowing that Kaveh may one day want to reclaim his part of it, knowing that it was listed as theirs, Alhaitham moved into the house and made zero effort to change its ownership. He was completely fine with living in "his and Kaveh's house." The stories suggest it was only months later (or even longer) that Kaveh even noticed he had the house, and he transferred away ownership of his portion without Alhaitham ever asking him (or even seemingly wanting him) to do so.

Please, let that sink in. Alhaitham actively left his grandmother's (presumably comfortable) house to move into "his and Kaveh's house," with no apparent explanation for why, and after doing so, he made no attempt to change that "his and Kaveh's" label. He moved into the house with no promise that Kaveh wouldn't show up on the doorstep the very next day and move in too. It almost feels like another deliberate provocation--I've moved into our house, are you going to come stop me? LBR, if Alhaitham had had his way, Kaveh would have been living there with him from Day 1...

There's also the fact that Kaveh literally can't write on a single message board anywhere in the entire nation of Sumeru without Alhaitham hunting his messages down and responding to them (which absolutely no one else does, by the way).

"NUH-UH!" "UH-HUH." "NUH-UH!"

Alhaitham's own character stories tell us explicitly that one of Alhaitham's defining character traits is "He is never where you need him to be," yet somehow...

Shot, and chaser:

Any time Kaveh is in the slightest bit of need or danger or just wants Alhaitham near, Alhaitham is "coincidentally" exactly where Kaveh needs him to be, whenever Kaveh needs him to be there.

Alhaitham didn't just "happen" to run into Kaveh in Port Ormos, an entirely different city from where he was supposed to be working. He didn't just "happen" to read the same terrible book as Kaveh when we know he otherwise would not waste a moment of his time on poorly-written literature...

He didn't just "happen" to appear when Kaveh was upset and needed a distraction in the House of Daena during Kaveh's hangout. He didn't just "happen" to be sitting around waiting when Kaveh needed answers after the Archon Quest. He didn't just "happen" to find Kaveh's academic publications and every single message board posting and respond to them at length and in public.

Which is exactly what Kaveh's mother told Kaveh he needed.

What level of down bad is "Abusing your powers as an Akademiya employee to keep tabs on your crush's library loans"? Just asking for a friend.

The only person for whom Alhaitham just "happens" to be available is Kaveh, over and over and over again--because he is very deliberately making himself a constant presence in Kaveh's life.

(Like, out of all things, I think people really underestimate the devs deliberately paralleling the romantic relationship between Kaveh's mother and father with Kaveh and Alhaitham's relationship. If you want to point to one thing that says "These two characters are intentionally queer-coded," it doesn't get any more obvious than this.)

Alhaitham, are you not embarrassed to be this transparent??? 🫣

[thekaiserroll]

Hug

It's nearly impossible to have a quiet and peaceful day with the crew, like the strawhats. Nami is mostly used to the noise on Going Merry but one day she gets fed up with Zoro and Sanji arguing. Not only are they extremely loud, but they've also already broken way too many things during their fights.

She decides that If they want to act like brats, then she's going to treat them as such. So she makes them apologize and hug each other in silence for an hour. None of them are happy about this punishment, but Nami threatened to raise Zoro's debt, and Sanji couldn't say no to her. It could be worse.

It's awkward enough for them to not incite any fight for a long time and Nami is quite proud of herself. She knows it won't last forever but at least now she knows how to handle them. It inevitably happens again. And again. And again.

Much to her surprise, those fights became more and more frequent. And what's even weirder is that she could see the way both Zoro and Sanji occasionally glanced at her to make sure she was nearby. It's almost as if they wanted someone to make them hug each other. As if they needed an excuse.... these idiots.

Soon, they don't even need Nami's help. When they aren't busy training, cooking or fighting, they cuddle together. Sometimes Luffy or Chopper would join them, but most of the crew knew it was their time.

After two years spent separately, they became extremely clingy. It's no surprise when they start sleeping in the same bed. What is surprising is that despite them behaving like a lovey-dovey couple, those oblivious idiots are STILL unaware of each other's feelings.

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Maybe we never had a chance.

[First] Prev <–-> Next

[lazylittledragon]

oke it's 5pm and i've been day drinking but come closer. listen to me

i get asked for character writing advice quite a lot and i really don't feel qualified to give any but i have 1 (one) hack for relationship dynamics that hasn't failed me yet and it's the Ikea Test

if you're figuring out how to characterise a relationship (platonic or romantic) and you're struggling: just imagine them having to put together an ikea flatpack and write how it would go

[skullfacedlady]

[devilledminion]

#intricate rituals

[stars-obsession-pit]

Not Quite his Twin

Danny Fenton is not Danyal al Ghul. They’d wanted him to be, but he wasn’t.

He still remembers when he first woke up, his whole body feeling raw and ill-fitted. Even his mind felt wrong, his memories not quite his own.

Which, he supposes, they weren’t.

Because Danyal is still dead. Executed on the orders of the Demon’s Head for failing to live up to his twin.

But the spurned heir would make a perfect figurehead to build legitimacy for a coup, so a splinter sect of the League stole away some of his remains before they could be disposed of. They may not have had permission to access the Lazarus Pits, but they could still turn to some more unorthodox methods of attempting resurrection. A combination of cloning, a few stolen and processed samples of Lazarus Water, and pieces of necromantic rituals.

And it almost worked.

Almost.

The body they constructed did indeed come to life, and clearly possessed at least some of Danyal’s memories, but it wasn’t him. The memories were locked behind a barrier, present in abstract but not felt. This thing they created could never pass for the deceased heir, and thus could never be the figurehead they wanted. So they decided to dispose of him.

But the clone’s memories had shown him this sort of betrayal before, and he did still have some of the original’s skills. He struck first, killing several of their agents and managing to escape the lab.

He had no idea what to do next, but at least he was free. Free to form his own life, to become someone unique rather than just not-quite-Danyal.

[psychicbby]

imagine being one of dan’s flatmates in his first yr of uni lmfaoo??? like ok here comes this guy and like the first day he shuts himself in his room to play video games. ok cool whatever maybe he’s nervous. most of the time you never see him bc apparently he has an older friend nearby that he’s always with. when he is in the hall he’s burning pasta bc he’s cooking inept and staring down the washer bc he doesn’t understand how to do his own laundry. oh and he makes videos for youtube where he talks to himself (again this is like 2010). so after barely seeing this man the entire term you find out he’s dropped out of uni. ok whatever you never really think about him again until you’re on youtube and you see his face on the homepage. his video has like millions of views and thousands of likes. oh, there’s the friend he was spending all that time with. somehow he’s become some sort of an internet celebrity??? lmfaooooo. what a serve on dan’s part.

[siflooping]

my fav Concept is loop traveling w the party post-loops and yes all that entails but also. itd be really funny if the familiarity and closeness they have w sif for multiple reasons made the family just a lil jealous. not enough to be a problem or anything but like. they see sif napping in loops lap fully relaxed and unstressed and theyre like man.......... i wish that were me...................