#untitled thoughts

[cj-the-random-artist]

Ok hear me out: Narilamb but they're both aroace and in a qpr.

I've been rolling around in my head for like a long long time this idea that Narinder and Lambert could both be aroace and (after like. A couple of centuries or so) end up in this like very comfortable very close relationship that neither of them define as anything specific other than calling it a "companionship". But on the other hand most of the cult thinks that they're dating in secret or something despite the fact that both of them have said they don't take lovers, because they are clearly very tight but maybe not super openly so, so maybe the cultists thing they're being secretive and hiding something or something like that. Idk but my aroace brain loves thinking about extremely close (mostly) platonic relationships and for some reason my brain decided hmm. I'm going to take this and throw it at Narilamb and see how I like it.

So then I decided to make a ridiculous joke comic about Narinder asking Lambert's hand in marriage specifically because he wants to get out of paying taxes. Because like, I know that spouse followers do actually still have to pay taxes in the actual game but. Hey Narinder and Lambert have presumably never married so they probably don't know that...? Honestly the only reason I made this was because the concept tickled me and I spent too much time on this for no one to see it, so. This comic and all it's absolute ridiculousness be upon ye.

While there's a tiny part of me that's been thinking about making this into an AU (which I'd probably call something like the "Strictly Platonic AU" or something), I know for a fact that I would blatantly not do anything legitimate with it so. It's an unofficial AU I guess?? But. Anyways. I thought this would be funny. Enjoy my ramblings and I hope you enjoy this thing that I spent. Actual time on. Lol

[artbyblastweave]

One thing I've hit on while tinkering with this zombie setting is that a situation in which being bitten by a zombie sometimes but not always turns you into a zombie introduces some entertainingly fucked group dynamics compared to a situation where being bitten by a zombie is guaranteed to turn you into a zombie

[simply-eno-again]

I wish I could forgive the silence the same way it has forgiven me; filled with captivating cold, or wondrous warmth, it has breathed death like a plague into me. And I wish I could forgive it for its boundless existence the same way it has pitied mine.

[supersonic1994]

thinking big thoughts

[sodaneko]

people who type entire fics on their phones… i get it now……..

[canisalbus]

This is kind of an odd thing, but your art made me realized that I wasn't aromantic. I've never had a bunch of romantic inclinations and assumed it just wasn't for me, but your art made me realized that it's definitely more complicated than just an across-the-board disinterest in romance!

That's nice to hear, I'm happy for you!

I'm not an expert but to my understanding it's also entirely possible to be aromantic and interested in romantic themes, while rarely experiencing romantic attraction in practice, or something like that. The lines are sort of blurry and I guess in the end it comes down to what labels one feels most comfortable using.

[wanderingaldecaldo]

An accidental first date under the stars...

V stretches out, crossing her ankles and twitching her feet as she stares up at the sky. “Really is beautiful out here,” she says. “Yeah, really is,” Mitch says as he leans back on his hands and gazes at the heavens. “Even prettier than usual tonight.” He doesn’t look over, but her cheeks flush all the same. Flirting with you, V. Thanks, managed to catch that one.

Happy Valentine's to these two who continue to inspire me. Love you like the stars. 💖

Couple more that I liked. Photomode with mods... just like riding a bike, if that bike were actually three bikes.

[catkin-morgs-kookaburralover]

This story, for which there are seven parts, is dedicated to everyone affected by Hurricane Helene. It was not written because of that, but a water-based natural disaster is part of the plot. It does not focus on it, but is a story of hope. The text of section one is under the cut. I hope to post all sections before the end of the Inklings Challenge. Despite this being my third year, this is the first I've actually posted anything other than snippets, so I hope I'm doing this right. I haven't yet written more than this, but I do have an outline for the other six parts, so hopefully that will work. @inklings-challenge

One: Admonish the Sinner

First of all it must be understood that every world is connected, as every village is. Some are just further away.

This is not a story of Earth; this is a story of a world nobody bothered to name, in a village nobody called anything other than the village. But that does not make it any less beloved—by people or by God. Sometime, a long time before this story is set, someone from Earth came to this nameless world and gave them the greatest gift of all, truth: but that is another tale entirely.

The night sky of this world is strikingly different from ours. Most prominently, two moons watch the world below, and every forty-seven years or so, flooding hits the island. They call it Big Tide, for it is the pull of the two moons combined that does this. It is regular enough, and has enough warning signs, that everyone should be perfectly ready for it.

As is common in humans (and these are humans like us, though the world is different), not everyone believes the evidence laid out in the world.

This is a story of Big Tide, specifically the one of the year three thousand, two hundred and twenty by their reckoning. This is a story of Paula McArthur.

%%%%%%%

The wattles were flowering, and it was Paula’s favourite time of year. There were several different wattles, but this was the deep gold ones she loved the best, the ones she gathered by the armful and adorned her home with. Now she only held a single sprig and enjoyed it to the full. It was too close to Big Tide to unnecessarily damage the wattle trees; they could be badly damaged by the rushing waters, and might need everything they had to survive. But one twig wasn’t going to hurt it.

The sky was a clear pale blue shot with fine clouds, a mass of them shining near the horizon with the sun gentle on them. Paula raised her face to the sunlight and closed her eyes, smiling. It was spring, and she never felt more alive than in springtime. 

She had been working all morning to prepare for Big Tide, largely transport. Her hands were tired of the precise positions needed to be held in order to hover exactly enough to transfer items in mid-air between hoverboards rather than landing to do it, which would waste time. Tide waited on no man, but Paula was skilled enough to know when she could be sloppy about hoverboarding, and enjoyed hoverboarding in a more slapdash manner than most people she knew. She had graduated earlier than most of her classmates from a controller to haptics. Tomorrow, though, she might use the controller again to make sure she was fresh enough to hover efficiently overnight during Big Tide itself. 

Presently she took out her lunch, and ate it while walking. In the distance a kookaburra laughed; Paula came to an abrupt halt as a green-blue iridescent flash clued her into the presence of a river dragon nearby. It turned and looked at her, bright blue eyes wise and calm. After a moment of silence and mutual respect, the dragon moved properly into her view and arched its sinuous back, raising its crest. Paula lifted her chin and brushed back the dark fringe to look more intimidating. The only sign the dragon gave of seeing any change was to raise its scales in a largely vain attempt to inflate its size. Abruptly it put down its scales and ran in a blaze of colour, uttering a high keening cry that faded as it retreated.

Paula turned to see who had disturbed her, smiling as she recognised the intruder. “What brings you here, Martha?”

Her friend grinned in response, lighting up her tanned sombre face. “You, actually. I came in search of you.”

Paula half gestured to herself, merrily. “Why trouble yourself?”

Martha grew serious at once. “I care about you. Aren't I allowed to?”

“Certainly, as I do.” 

Martha smiled a little incredulously. “Anyway, surely it's time to go back now?”

Paula raised a single eyebrow, then tilted her head back and assessed the position of the sun. “I guess. Why did you come to find me, Mar?”

“Oh, you know, I hardly see you now.” Her manner was evasive, which baffled Paula. “You're always out walking.”

“It's spring.” Paula waved the sprig of wattle at her. “The best time of the year. What's your favourite season?”

“Winter,” said Martha definitively. “Cold and empty and bleak.”

“Why do you like it that way?” she asked in surprise. Last time they'd talked about the seasons, she thought Martha had waxed poetic about the dying fire of autumn. 

“It's silent,” was Martha's quiet response. “Nobody bothers you.”

Paula paused to assess the time, decided they had to go back and led the way; Martha trailed her. “I thought you liked people.”

There was a short silence. “People don't tend to like me.”

“That's nonsense,” she responded immediately. Martha smiled, sad and sarcastic. 

“I don't tend to like me.”

Her calmness bothered Paula, and she sped up slightly. “Well, I do. You're fun, conversational and well read.”

“Which is why you disappear alone for hours.” She caught up and shot Paula a sidelong look, as if to say, I know your secrets. Except there were no secrets to know. 

“I like spring. It feels so alive and fresh, like all the past year's mistakes are washed away and there's new growth instead.”

“Very poetic.” Instead of amusement, Martha's tone was sour. She dodged past Paula and trotted quickstep the whole way back.

%%%%%%%

“I don't know what I did wrong,” finished Paula, twisting her hands nervously. “She got mad and I don't know why.”

Her mother glanced hurriedly across to check the next load wasn't ready, then turned to Paula again. “When people aren't happy it can be a temptation to take it out on others, especially those who are.”

“She said she was worried, and then she just changed and didn't want to talk to me.”

“Rebecca!” The shout made her mother focus on her own work; Paula moved her hoverboard closer to her father so he could load it up. This one was three bags of flour, heavy on the back and requiring stabilisation, which Paula remained still for while her father adjusted the controls. When it was done, he gave her a thumbs up and she gestured with her gloves, rising away from the site and on the journey to higher ground. It wasn't as easy to handle the unbalanced board; she would have done a lot more, and easier, with a transport hoverboard rather than the jury-rigged family board, but it was more economical and the decree had been that fuel, not time, was of the essence, since they'd planned well in advance. Indeed, today being the day before Big Tide, they had expected to have no more transport to do apart from the people, but someone had been digging too enthusiastically in their garden and cracked an underground storage container, so all of that had to be moved. 

She was most of the way there, wind in her face, when a fast personal hoverboard raced up beside her, village elder crouched to stave off the wind. He matched her speed, then unwound and said, “I'll take over from here. Take my board and go back—we need you to persuade people to go.”

“What?” She was already moving, assessing how to swap boards without any risk of either of them tumbling into the trees below while stepping across. “Why?”

He grimaced. “Turns out there are people who haven't prepared and don't want elders coming to help. Your dad suggested you could try and help instead.”

She started to shuck the gloves, then changed her mind and pressed buttons, keying them to the elder's hoverboard instead. As ownership switched, both boards lurched violently, and Paula barely held her position. The elder was wearing magnetic boots and so didn't run the risk of falling. Once she had stabilised it, she said, “So where do I start?”

“Ask your dad when you get back.” His expression was calm and focused as he adjusted the settings to accommodate for his weight. “For now, just get going. Time is of the essence. Big Tide waits for no man.”

[greengoddesssmoothie]

I've joined the "Viktor uses Dr. Bronner's" agenda. The man uses 18-in-1 soap.

[crmsnmth]

Untitled #129

I couldn’t tell you how many times that I’ve said “I love you” as words just to get something I want Or to cast off loneliness in the long, dark nights I’ve said it so much that it feels like it’s lost it’s meaning Just three words that hang like broken promises

I’ve meant it too With four different people and only one of those three was 100%

Love is a currency we trade it for room and board we trade it so we’re not left alone we trade it for everything we thought was an identity we sell it to the cheapest bid we sell it for drug money at the pawn shop we sell it out

and just like your dirty laundry we hang out for the whole world to see Because it’s such a nice day outside as the violent thunderheads roll over us a bright sky to the night sky Love is for the attention

It feeds on it until it’s gorged belly bloats and you can see the skin tearing Let the glutton feed until it’s gut bursts

We’ll ring it’s remains out over open mouths so we can get a taste all we need is just a taste just a bit on the tongue

Hurry up and help me make my time worthwhile

[cj-the-random-artist]

I let them get friendship married so Narinder can get his tax benefits lol

But legitimately. I mulled this one over repeatedly for literal months. Like. Do I want them to get married in front of the cult? Should they even get married? It would be hilarious if the Goat married them and then cried at the altar the whole time, but also... that doesn't feel right, so maybe I won't do that. And then once I decided it should be a personal friendship-marriage ritual where it's just the pair of them making vows to each other, I wrote four different scripts and hated them all and ended up just pulling this one out of thin air pretty much on the spot and that was that. At one point, I wanted Lambert to basically suggest this idea and then have them get friend-married on the spot, but that didn't feel right (and it was also gonna be unreasonably long) so that's why there's no context going into this one. And the actual friend-marriage ritual is... maybe not the best designed one ever? I wanted it to in some ways be similar to like, the way I imagine a romantic marriage happening in the cult- the parties exchange vows and do rings and stuff...? (If it's not obvious, I haven't been to many weddings...) But I figured they wouldn't want an audience, or to party with the whole cult afterwards, or anything like that. I also had them kiss each other's rings as opposed to like... faces... because one of the fights I had with myself in deciding how I would want this to go was whether it would make sense for them to kiss or not. And I ultimately decided that in this AU at least they just wouldn't want to. They're also wearing the rings on their not ring fingers cuz. Honestly it just felt right that way. Based on vibes. But basically I just wanted them to exchange a vow of eternal partnership in a very casual, chill setting, because I don't picture QPR AU Narilamb doing... anything other than that.

Also this is the rest of Lambert's office, which I actually had a pretty clear vision for after my last doodle but I didn't really bother to draw before starting this comic. Maybe I should've but eh it looks good enough. Interior backgrounds are hard......

Anyways. I think I'm happy with this one? I was enamored by the concept of a chill friendship marriage, so I definitely leaned into it here. As per usual, it's not perfect, I think I could've done a lot of stuff better / differently, but honestly?? If I were to ever get friend-married I would want it to go about like this, it makes my little aroace heart happy, and I spent too long on it to not show it to anybody. Thus. Enjoy, and also happy new year cuz I totally forgot to make a post individually about that...

[artbyblastweave]

Thanks for the compliment on the map. It's definitely a "what if fucked up shit happened?" kind of setting and I consider you an incisive connoisseur of such media in a way I am not. Anything in particular catch your eyes?

Off the top of my head -

The cursed lands is fun; throwing the evil overlord a territorial holding as a sop because it's either not worth it or not possible to have it out definitively is always a favored worldbuilding beat of mine, a great litmus test for the underlying moral logic of the powers that be and the setting as a whole.

Unspeakable desert's also great- love a good black box torture zone. In fiction also!

I like the moon-elf republic- "Morally palatable liberal-democracy but nothing is ever fucking open when you're awake" is such a great monkey's paw bit. I'm picturing human expats going insane and doing I Am Legend bullshit with mannequins in a mostly empty city, except it's not the apocalypse everyone is just asleep inside. Which actually is also what the twist was with I Am Legend so never mind

Zones F, G and H make me think you would enjoy, at a minimum, the aesthetic of Sunless Sea, Fallen London, and the rest of the games in that shared universe, if not necessarily the gameplay.

One thing I'm a little unclear on is where the humans are- is this just the quote-unquote "weird hemisphere?"

To briefly toot my own horn, The Perfection caught my eye because it's basically the exact opposite of how I handled Evil Mushroom Land in the Fallout pastiche setting I've been fucking around with for about twelve years. There's a superintelligent, psychic mycological supercomputer that's infested and subverted the entire ecosystem of the American Southeast; but rather than an inscrutable, inexorable hyperoptimizer, its desires are actually completely politically legible to humans. It's an anarchist-bending towards-anarchoprimitivist, and it sanctimoniously touts that it's created the world's first practical anarchy.... because it's big-brothering everyone who "voluntarily" imbibed its spores and connected to the network, and it can psionically cook their brains at a distance if it decides that they aren't being good enough anarchists. Or if it needs a favor and they won't "pull their weight." Or if their version of anarchy isn't aesthetically compatible with it's gaian edenic pastoralism thing. If you don't "voluntarily" join the network it doesn't actively try to kill you, that would be unjustified initiation of force. No, it just doesn't stop all the jacked-up mutant gators from doing what they'd naturally do if it wasn't inhibiting them. The other North American powers put up with this because it's genuinely the least belligerent and expansionist of its type of hive mind, and they export some really great drugs (all of which are a backdoor for further psychic snooping.)

[simply-eno-again]

I think it’s time I ran, full sprinting and gasping breath; I need to feel that burning and stinging air in my lungs to tell me that I am still alive. Blood rushing and pumping through my veins as every step takes me further and further away; I need to be somewhere that feels like home.

I have tried to walk and crawl over these mounding hills, pounding the dirt with my bare and bleeding feet; it’s time I flee. Bruises aching and swelling around my ankles and knees; I need to run freely in the valley and mountain range.

[kpoppunk]

I think it's obvious GD has been smoking way too much over the last 10 years and his throat is very damaged. now that he's back to performing I think he's still trying to figure out what sounds good on stage. but power at yb's concert was not it 😶‍🌫️

[dailysylvesterashling]

Day thirty two

Feel like out of everyone in the EE cast, Sylvie is the most susceptible to geese attacks, Molly would give them space and walk around them, Giovanni would feed them in respect to how villainous they are and Sylvie would be the one finding out why it’s a bad idea to feed geese

he ignored them and walked right by them while thinking about what to get for lunch and they would NOT let that slide

So sylvie gets chased out of the park by pissed off waterfowl and pecked at a few dozen times

[sharpjay217]

Ok, I'm curious about the GIGGS Phasmo, but I make it sad thing you got going on for your WIP ask game. What kind of sad are we talking about here?

(Asks are about this tag game!)

So a bit of context on me, is that I am a huge fan of stories about grief, death, and finding peace with it. One of my favorite games is Spiritfarer. I actively seek out stories that are going make me feel some kind of melancholy.

My GIGGS AU is also a sort of a Hermitcraft Ensemble AU, just with GIGGS at its core. Along the way, between regular Phasmo-style ghost hunts, the crew occasionally encounter standouts. The ghosts of people who would have been their friends in another life, or maybe even once were.

I imagine this as a series of oneshots, each a kind of character piece for a non-GIGGS hermit, as GIGGS tries to figure out who they were and how to help them.

Basically, GIGGS Phasmo but the hermits are ghosts. Because I like to make myself sad. :)