#On the other...

[blue-rose-soul]

The Lucifer v Adam fight in the Raised Together AU would have to be insane. No silly banter from Lucifer for one, way more vicious and no patience or mercy.

And all for the extra constraint of a time limit due to Alastor's injury.

I think Lucifer might have been able to spare a second to stabilize him and put Alastor in a prone position next to Charlie, but he certainly couldn't heal him that fast if the process is so physically taxing and Alastor is already going into shock.

But then? Back to flaying the First Man. Big fiery kaboom, polyphonic "Get out of my house!" to the remaining exorcists and Lute, stand there menacingly just long enough to see the portal close and then Wham! Straight to doctor dad mode.

And Alastor would be so embarrassed if he were sensate enough to feel much of anything besides his wound.

Lucifer, still full devil, carefully picking up his son and princess carrying him to the least damaged part of the hotel. All while doing that one parent voice. "You're okay, you're okay. Barely a scratch. Get a bandaid on it and you'll be right as rain. Be brave a few more minutes for me, okay? I know. I know it hurts. Everything is okay."

To say nothing of whatever dialogue was spilling from Alastor in that state. I don't care what anyone says, if you're hurt that badly you want your people. In this case: Mom, Dad and Charlie.

Lucifer was basically spitting fire and brimstone from the moment he arrived on the scene in this one. While he was busy putting the fear of the Devil into Adam, Charlie was busy applying first aid, trying to keep Alastor from bleeding out while Lucifer was occupied.

The moment Adam cleaved the hotel in two was extremely tense for everyone.

I almost wonder if I want to have Adam actually survive in this AU. Because with Lucifer's ferocity, Adam was actually scared for his immortal life. Instead of an act of rave, him destroying the hotel in the Raised Together AU could have been a last ditch attempt to distract Lucifer so he could call a retreat and escape back through Heaven with his girls. Or maybe that still wasn't enough and Lucifer gave him the same treatment he gave Pentious right when he was two feet from the heavenly gate.

When all's said and done, the new hotel is underway and Alastor's on bedrest back at the palace until he's recovered, Charlie gently pokes fun at him for clinging to her while he was out and calling for their dad. Alastor hurls a pillow at her, but truthfully, this is the point at which he finally starts properly talking to Lucifer again. Things are still rocky, he's still slow to trust that this change in Lucifer is permanent, but it's a start.

[ceruleansonata]

I have a private hearing with Pandora tomorrow to decide whether or not I'll have to stand trial for my crimes as the Headhunter.

[blazichu]

[funtergeist]

whatever. go my susie

[grunklebongrip]

When a fic doesn’t fit my head canons but it’s well-written

[flogisto]

big fan of stories that, while undoubtedly being about the power of friendship, acknowledge that the power of incredible violence is just as important

the love was there. the love changed everything. the crowbar helped also

[indie-ttrpg-of-the-week]

Kill Credit card Companies

[ciderjacks]

this scene

[kyoukorpse]

based off this text post lul :]

[redstonedust]

may be a hot take but i think the fact minors can access 18+ content by just clicking a button that says 'yes im totally over 18 trust me' is like. totally fine tbh. its a non-issue. i dont care if curious teenagers are looking at porn. they've been doing that for as long as porn has existed. id rather teens explore their sexuality through images on the internet than rush into real life experiences when they're not ready for it yknow. the UK is trying to put stricter age verification in place (which in turn is becoming an online privacy nightmare) and like. for what. who is it helping. why is this a problem.

[apollos-boyfriend]

children are so fucking funny man. i just overheard a kid go “i just learned a new way to pinch, wanna see it? it hurts a lot more!” followed by a loud, notably pained scream

[redrook]

I spent a lot of time handcuffed and in a cage in high school, for a charity bit the grocery store I worked at would do

the bit was that I was "put in jail for having too big a heart" and customers could donate to my bail to get me out (and the money would go to a children's hospital or something)

now. I was very clearly a teenaged employee handcuffed inside a large cage. and I would honestly tell people that I had been in there for hours. and people would say, that's terrible! that's awful! and I would show them my wrists red from the tight handcuffs, and say but I'm sooooooo close to making bail.

and then they would dump some cash in the basket, I'd thank them, and they'd walk away.

and every so often, one of the managers would come by and collect some of the cash, so I could keep being soooooo close to making bail.

I was very good with this bit. Parents with small kids would pay $5-10 if I told their children I had been placed in jail for not cleaning my room/doing my homework, etc. For people in their 20s, I'd threaten that I was very bad at playing the harmonica, but I WOULD play it and we'd all suffer unless they paid me. and for the most amount of money, older men in suits would almost always pay $20s if I avoided eye contact and stammered a lot.

eventually, the managers started to feel bad because I was in the cage so fucking long and often, that I'd need someone to brace me when I got out because I'd have no feeling in my legs. wobbling like a newborn giraffe.

but I would also rake in at LEAST $100 an hour in charity.

so they were like, hey champ. can we, uh, give you a pillow to sit on. in the cage. would you like a pillow so you're not just sitting on a cold metal slab. can we give you a pillow.

and I had to explain to them that if they gave me a pillow, people would think I was more comfortable, so they wouldn't feel as bad, so I'd bring in less money.

the compromise was that they'd bring me a nice coffee every couple hours, which I would have to try to block with my body from the customers.

all this money went to charity. that's what the money was for. it's what was on the sign. but how much they were willing to pay was very contingent on how comfortable I looked, never mind the fact that I was still a teenaged employee handcuffed inside a cage.

and out of the dozens of shifts I did this on, not ONCE did ANYONE say, hey kid I'm going to go talk to your manager because what the fuck is going on here. they would just drop money in the basket, and I'd thank them and sip from my secret drink.

I actually had people get MAD at me that I told them I was far away from bail, they donated like $15, and then 20 minutes I got let out because my shift ended.

again. the money was for charity. it was on the sign that was very clearly placed on the upper half of my cage.

so yeah. even when people think they mean well. people can be really, really fucking stupid.

[jaiofalltrades]

i really enjoy that i’m experiencing dashcon 2 in the same way that my forefathers experienced the original dashcon: though sporadic bursts in chaotic photos. i have no damn clue what’s going on except the ball pit is tiny, strange aeons won the duel and ousted the muppet joker, there was a live in person kung pow penis, and someone cosplayed the children’s hospital

[marvelsmostwanted]

There are people – some in my own Party – who think that if you just give Donald Trump everything he wants, he’ll make an exception and spare you some of the harm. I’ll ignore the moral abdication of that position for just a second to say — almost none of those people have the experience with this President that I do. I once swallowed my pride to offer him what he values most — public praise on the Sunday news shows — in return for ventilators and N95 masks during the worst of the pandemic. We made a deal. And it turns out his promises were as broken as the BIPAP machines he sent us instead of ventilators. Going along to get along does not work – just ask the Trump-fearing red state Governors who are dealing with the same cuts that we are. I won’t be fooled twice.

I’ve been reflecting, these past four weeks, on two important parts of my life: my work helping to build the Illinois Holocaust Museum and the two times I’ve had the privilege of reciting the oath of office for Illinois Governor.

As some of you know, Skokie, Illinois once had one of the largest populations of Holocaust survivors anywhere in the world. In 1978, Nazis decided they wanted to march there.

The leaders of that march knew that the images of Swastika clad young men goose stepping down a peaceful suburban street would terrorize the local Jewish population – so many of whom had never recovered from their time in German concentration camps.

The prospect of that march sparked a legal fight that went all the way to the Supreme Court. It was a Jewish lawyer from the ACLU who argued the case for the Nazis – contending that even the most hateful of speech was protected under the first amendment.

As an American and a Jew, I find it difficult to resolve my feelings around that Supreme Court case – but I am grateful that the prospect of Nazis marching in their streets spurred the survivors and other Skokie residents to act. They joined together to form the Holocaust Memorial Foundation and built the first Illinois Holocaust Museum in a storefront in 1981 – a small but important forerunner to the one I helped build thirty years later.

I do not invoke the specter of Nazis lightly. But I know the history intimately — and have spent more time than probably anyone in this room with people who survived the Holocaust. Here’s what I’ve learned – the root that tears apart your house’s foundation begins as a seed – a seed of distrust and hate and blame.

The seed that grew into a dictatorship in Europe a lifetime ago didn’t arrive overnight. It started with everyday Germans mad about inflation and looking for someone to blame.

I’m watching with a foreboding dread what is happening in our country right now. A president who watches a plane go down in the Potomac – and suggests — without facts or findings — that a diversity hire is responsible for the crash. Or the Missouri Attorney General who just sued Starbucks – arguing that consumers pay higher prices for their coffee because the baristas are too “female” and “nonwhite.” The authoritarian playbook is laid bare here: They point to a group of people who don’t look like you and tell you to blame them for your problems.

I just have one question: What comes next? After we’ve discriminated against, deported or disparaged all the immigrants and the gay and lesbian and transgender people, the developmentally disabled, the women and the minorities – once we’ve ostracized our neighbors and betrayed our friends – After that, when the problems we started with are still there staring us in the face – what comes next.

All the atrocities of human history lurk in the answer to that question. And if we don’t want to repeat history – then for God’s sake in this moment we better be strong enough to learn from it.

I swore the following oath on Abraham Lincoln’s Bible: “I do solemnly swear that I will support the constitution of the United States, and the constitution of the state of Illinois, and that I will faithfully discharge the duties of the office of Governor .... according to the best of my ability.

My oath is to the Constitution of our state and of our country. We don’t have kings in America – and I don’t intend to bend the knee to one. I am not speaking up in service to my ambitions — but in deference to my obligations.

If you think I’m overreacting and sounding the alarm too soon, consider this:

It took the Nazis one month, three weeks, two days, eight hours and 40 minutes to dismantle a constitutional republic. All I’m saying is when the five-alarm fire starts to burn, every good person better be ready to man a post with a bucket of water if you want to stop it from raging out of control.

Those Illinois Nazis did end up holding their march in 1978 – just not in Skokie. After all the blowback from the case, they decided to march in Chicago instead. Only twenty of them showed up. But 2000 people came to counter protest. The Chicago Tribune reported that day that the “rally sputtered to an unspectacular end after ten minutes.” It was Illinoisans who smothered those embers before they could burn into a flame.

Tyranny requires your fear and your silence and your compliance. Democracy requires your courage. So gather your justice and humanity, Illinois, and do not let the “tragic spirit of despair” overcome us when our country needs us the most.

Sources:

• NBC Chicago & J.B. Pritzker, Democratic governor of Illinois, State of the State address 2025: Watch speech here | Full text

• Betches News on Instagram (screencaps)

[ariadne-mouse]

me, unloading a fitted sheet from the dryer: *squinting* what's that you've got in your mouth

fitted sheet: nothing :)))))))

me, prying open its twisted jaws: na-ah!!! give it to me RIGHT now!!

fitted sheet: *resentfully spits out a wad of 3 very damp dishtowels, a pillowcase, and a pathetically sodden washcloth*