#Altered Perceptions

[inevitablemoment]

June of Doom Day 12 - "It's No Use" (Locked Door)

For @juneofdoom

Word Count: 525

Warnings: False imprisonment, kidnapping, mentions of drugging and physical assault, praying

Fandom: The Frighteners

Pairings: Frank Bannister/Lucy Lynskey

Yet another sneak peek of the whumpy Frighteners fic. I finished this at 11 pm on Sunday night, so I might tweak it a bit when I actually get to writing the fic.

————————

"Seth? Seth?!"

Lucy's eyes were burning with tears as she looked at the now-empty crib.

She didn't know how this could have happened.

She remembered laying Seth down in the crib before-- before whatever Amy and Charlie had done to knock her out this time.

They had taken her baby boy from her while she slept, and she had no idea if he was dead or alive.

And if he was alive, where did they take him?

She was certain that they wouldn't have just dropped him off on her and Frank's doorstep. Her brain began to run through various scenarios, ranging from least to most horrifying.

Left at a safe haven, like a firehouse or the medical center?

Given to baby brokers so he could be sold to some wealthy, childless couple?

Dumped under the bridge leading to the freeway, like an unwanted litter of kittens?

Lucy reached towards her bed for one of Seth's blankets that their captors had snatched from the house before they had brought them to this place. She held it to her nose, finding it a poor substitute for really holding her son in her arms.

When she looked down at her hands, she realized that she was trembling. But it wasn't from fear. It was anger.

Her blood was boiling as if the sun had finally gotten to the point that it would engulf the Earth. The tears in her eyes felt the same, burning as they fell down her face, she wouldn't have been surprised if there were burn marks to mark them long after they evaporated.

With the blanket still in her hand, she charged towards the door. First, she braced her foot against the wall and pulled at the doorknob, even though logic told her that it was locked. Then, she tried pushing at the door.

Then she repeatedly slammed her shoulder into the door in a feeble attempt to break it down.

"Amy! Charlie! Whoever's there! Where's my son?!" she cried out as she banged her fists against the door. "What have you done with my son?! Amy!"

Violent sobs began to take over her body, compounded by whatever substance that they had given her and the injuries that they had inflicted on her over the past couple of days.

"Please," she sobbed. "Please... What have you done with my baby?"

It's no use, a voice in her head spoke.

She slid down against the door, clutching the blanket to her chest even though she was unable to pretend that her little Seth was in her arms.

"My baby..."

I just wanna go home, she thought helplessly, unable to think of anything else. I wanna see my babies... I wanna see Julia and Seth... I want Frank...

"Dear God..." she was able to say, though her throat was thick with tears. "Dear God, please... please watch over Seth. Please don't let them hurt him."

There was something else that she wanted to add... but it was useless.

She was a lost cause, even for God, so why should she even say it?

And please help me get home to my babies and my husband...

[heph]

BEAUTIFUL SHADE OF FORDTRAMARINE!

[syn0vial]

yes, yes, boba fett finds it strange and uncomfortable when people can see his face and this is one of the major reasons he almost never removes his helmet (in the expanded universe anyway), but another factor that i think isn't explored nearly enough is just how much his helmet shapes how he sees the world. it grants him 360° vision, lets him interface with his weapon systems and slave I, and automatically dampens loud noises and dims bright lights. imagine going through the vast majority of your life seeing the world through that lens and then suddenly taking it away. removing his helmet for any significant length of time likely isn't just uncomfortable for him but downright disorienting.

[ryllen]

x

[uncanny-tranny]

I think it would really benefit people to internalize that mental illnesses are often chronic and not acute. Some of us will never be able to jump the hurdle of managing illness, much less sustaining a sense of normalcy. Many of us will never "recover," will never manage symptoms, will never even come close to appearing normal - and this is for any condition, even the ones labeled as "simple" disorders or "easy-to-manage" disorders.

It isn't a failure if you cannot manage your symptoms. It isn't a moral failure, and you aren't an awful person. You are human. There's only so much you can do before recognizing that you cannot lift the world. Give yourself the space to be ill because, functionally, you are.

[gayofthefae]

Was going through the Willelmike triangle Little Women parallels in my head again and realized how deep they go because they literally MADE Will and El siblings!!

So let's do this.

Jo and Amy are siblings. Amy is a painter. Jo desires independence from men. Laurie believes the only way he can be happy is by being with Jo romantically.

Amy has loved Laurie since she was a child but never interfered with his interest for Jo, but was still visibly upset by things like them skating together ahead without her (yes, really). She did not make a move on him and was sympathetic towards him when he was sad about her. Jo loves having Laurie in her life. But she also later says that what she desired from him romantically was validation and, in that way, to provide her a feeling of value, not romance itself. Laurie overcame the feeling that he could not be happy without Jo's romantic love and fell in love with her sibling, Amy, when they, by happenstance, are in the same place without Jo or anyone else together for an extended period of time. Amy has idolized Laurie since loving him as a child but he makes her angry and she calls him out for these things. This humanizes him and makes their love more mature and equal that it would have been with her previous crush. But Amy has distanced herself from the idea of ever hoping he could love her back after all these years and at the idea of a romance with him, she pushes him away.

They match it beat for beat. One would expect them to continue to

So good news for season 5...

Jo is sad for a moment, logically. But she has a happy ending and she is completely okay. Beat for beat.

[katakaluptastrophy]

OK, so we've discussed Jod's apparent faux concern when Harrow comes to him desperately begging to be protected from G1deon:

"Harrowhark, when was the last time you slept?"

We later learn that he asked G1deon to "fix or put down Harrow". He thought putting her in desperate circumstances would somehow activate her Lyctoral powers.

It all feels particularly awful because elsewhere we've seen him imagine Harrow as his daughter: "You’d make a hell of a daughter, Harrowhark."

And yes, this is Jod's love of being perceived as a nice man and his tendency to make everything about him. But also...

They’d all expected me to go nuts. A— kept saying, Are you sleeping, are you okay, are you taking any Class As, you know you can tell me.

I wasn’t trying to be a dick. I think I hadn’t slept for two days.

I wasn’t operating on a lot of food or sleep.

I’d stopped sleeping and I wasn’t eating much, I was keeping my body going just by fiddling with the processes.

That last one is John 1:20. You know, the chapter where Jod finally unlocks the full potential of what he can do (with just a little help from a planet and 10 billion deaths) and becomes god?

Jod sees himself in Harrow. And he knows being hounded and sleep deprived was what worked for him.

[maikhiwi00]

transformers + fave ships [x] [x]

[ovenproofowl]

bad blood is one hell of an episode. it literally opens with mulder straight-up murdering a regular teenager via stake-through-the-heart and he and scully are like pretty sure the FBI is going to be sued and they're going to be doing some serious jail time. except both of them remember the story differently. scully's story is predictably logical and straight-forward. the killer was drugging his victims before bleeding them out, mimicking a vampire attack by wearing fake fangs (which are proven to be fake. this is crucial. this kid was wearing plastic fangs when mulder stabbed him. in the chest. with a wooden stake.) what is also crucial is that mulder was a victim of this murderer's attack and so he was tripping hard when scully intercepts the killer. mulder - whilst tripping balls - is convinced that the killer has glowing eyes and flew across the room before running out the door. and so - whilst tripping balls - he gives chase and ends up stabbing the kid through the heart with a wooden stake.

and of course this is the x files and so while scully and mulder are arguing over who gave who the hardest time in their percieved series of events, it turns out that mulder was right. the kid was a vampire and the stake didn't actually kill him. the fangs were fake because he was copying the sorts of vampires that you see in books and on tv. he was a real vampire.

and it's not just the kid. there are bunches of vampires, including the sheriff. the whole town are just. vampires. the lot of 'em. and the second they're found out, they just up and leave without a trace.

sometimes the extent to which mulder turns out to be right in this show is borderline ludicrous, it's amazing, I love it. but what was even better was that the biggest point of contention between scully and mulder's stories wasn't even the vampire thing, it was whether or not the sheriff was actually hot.

[fishwolfcrow]

I don't really know how this one happened

doodling benrey turned into entire colored drawing

[nesih3art]

Sketch of Kai/The Shogun from the fanfic ‘In The End’ by CassandraCainBB on AO3

Highkey my favorite fanfic from this fandom

[wonderhorror-sys]

we dont usually get the "i have no idea at all who anyone is" sort of forgetting people but we do have the "i know i know you, i know my relationship with you, i know a decent bit of things about you, i know some things we've done together, but i dont remember you." sort of forgetting people.

not just as in remmebering but feeling like someone else did it (though, that too). moreso, just, logically knowing things that have entered some sort of "collective memory" but nothing beyond that. not remembering individual instances of talking together, jsut knowing that we have before. you know wha i mean?

[woman-respecter]

not to be mean or anything but every antisemite on here is like “(insert every race here) / marxist - leninist / maoist / commie / transfem / nonbinary / pro landback / black and brown people matter / indigenous rights matter / death to imperialism / arab nationalist / anti zionist / i hate jews)” and i’m not supposed to laugh???

smh u forgot the self-dx mental illnesses in bio 😤

[taddymason]

the whole argument "jay was always an incel pre s6" its so fucking annoying at this point. i'm not joking, i want it to stop

[sysmedsaresexist]

I wrote an entire book of triggered rambling, I'm not going to post it, but, here I am with a much more simple post and point

Please don't forget that introjecting others can be a tool of abuse and, speaking from experience on both sides of the fence, is often the result of a toxic relationship

Please just keep this in mind when you're making sweeping generalizations about whether you NEED to tell the person and whether it's a good or bad thing

It's neither, it's not good or bad, it's not black or white, it's not healthy or unhealthy, it can be a compliment and a sign of an unhealthy attachment, and it may be appropriate to tell some people and inappropriate to tell others

Telling and/or being told is not a need

It's circumstantial and nuanced

But please keep the dangers in mind when discussing this, it's a huge part of the reason we kept going back to our abuser and how our abuser kept a hold on us for so long

I actually can't count on one hand how many times I've been in a situation where this-- either introjecting someone or someone introjecting us, has caused us incredible amounts of trauma, including brushing against the concept of abuse and system hopping in my early twenties (I actually wrote about this experience once)

I can't tell you what it feels like to be trying to set a boundary and have someone reply, "you're making x/yourself cry, why are you doing this, this isn't you, this isn't what you want", and hell, I have so little concept of my own wants and needs that I'll just nod along, or to have an introject that whispers in your ear that you should go back because you overreacted and the person definitely wouldn't do it again, of course they know that for sure

No post has addressed this aspect yet, so... just a polite reminder to consider it

[n00b-vegas]

I guess I only draw bowling now

Anyway

Some of The Chairmen bowling team