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ashley has been moved!   if you’re still interested in plotting / interacting, like this and i’ll follow you from his new blog.

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ashley has been moved!   if you’re still interested in plotting / interacting, like this and i’ll follow you from his new blog.

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he’s here 😳

pray for me. i’m trying to make ashley a carrd.

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pray for me. i’m trying to make ashley a carrd.

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you know. maybe i will archive

every now and again i am struck by the malevolent urge to archive and write with only 9-10 people on a new blog

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every now and again i am struck by the malevolent urge to archive and write with only 9-10 people on a new blog

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GO SET A WATCHMAN — GENERAL AMBIENCE.   005.

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tuck everlasting taken from the 1975 natalie babbitt book.

you’re safe. forever.

i got a feeling this whole thing is going to come apart like wet bread.

here, child. hide your eyes.

you’ll get heat stroke out there on a day like this.

there, there, now. hear me out.

you resting easy, child?

i was too scared to do anything.

coffee, please.

but first we got to talk, and the pond’s the best place. the pond’s got answers.

come along, child.

so you may as well relax. there’s nothing you can do to stop me.

you’ll sleep first-rate on the sofa here.

i’m going outside now.

but things can come together in strange ways.

well, you never told me not to!

it’s no use having that dream. nothing’s going to change.

all right, but come in if it gets too hot, won’t you, dear?

you leave that child be.

it’s going to rain, i think.

don’t stay out here much longer.

you can’t have living without dying. so you can’t call it living, what we got. we just are, we just be, like rocks beside a road.

who’s that you’re talking to?

i’m tired of being looked at all the time. i want to be by myself for a change.

it was like pain, a dull pain on the fringes of the sky.

you’re too much of a worrier.

a toad? nasty things, toads.

so of course you know everyone, and everything that goes on.

big tree got hit by lightning, split right down the middle. caught fire and everything.

i have to help. if it wasn’t for me, there wouldn’t have been any trouble in the first place.

but dying’s part of the wheel, right there next to being born. you can’t pick out the pieces you like and leave the rest. being part of the whole thing, that’s the blessing.

they were wild, unbelievable stories, but i believed them.

i won’t go with you! i won’t!

life’s got to be lived, no how matter how long or short.

it’s my toad. so you’d better leave it alone. 

what a week this has been!

i have a great deal to say and very little time for saying it.

these are strange and breathless days, the dog days, when people are led to do things they are sure to be sorry for after.

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black water sister, pt. 1.

dialogue prompts from black water sister by zen cho.

patience doesn’t come naturally to me.

come on. focus.

it’s important for the family to be together.

you turned out okay.

who are we to judge?

i’m great at doing nothing.

don’t suffer in silence.

maybe you should talk to someone.

you’ve been carrying a lot.

what’s wrong with repression and denial?

never buy an old house. you never know what’s inside.

you looked through my phone?

you should talk less, listen more.

what happened to make you want to stay?

i don’t know as much about you as i should.

people will always put their own interests first.

if you want me to help you, i need to understand what’s going on.

i can’t die yet. i have things to do.

what’s there to be afraid of?

you think i don’t know what that means?

what happened last night?

better not talk about things you don’t understand.

you’re clever at being angry.

when you’re scared, you’ll pray to anybody.

gods don’t care about fair or unfair.

do i have to tell you everything?

shouldn’t speak ill of the dead.

what if you don’t believe me?

why are you crying?

you think i’m dangerous or something?

i need a cigarette.

you can’t listen to what people say, okay?

we don’t always know what our parents are capable of.

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if you’re over 6’ you can’t stand next to ashley. he’s 5’6. he’ll strain his neck.

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Timothy Olyphant NATIONAL CHAMPIONS (2021)

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that said — ashley training and winning against blackwood felt a little like winning against jeremiah.   in one of their training exercises, ashley was engaged in close quarters combat with blackwood.   after blackwood put him in a rear choke, ashley grabbed the knife from the sheathe on his belt, successfully breaking the choke as he cut blackwood’s thigh, then forearm.   the last draw of the knife caught blackwood’s face, scarring him from the corner of his jaw to the bridge of his nose, nearly mirroring the scar on ashley’s own face, which jeremiah had given him.

ashley’s scar had faded, just slightly, with the years.   blackwood still had stitches when he handed ashley his insignia at the ceremony that marked the end of the program.   

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blackwood is terrifying to ashley specifically not because of his legend or appearance, but because he’s a father.   and he is everything a father shouldn’t be.   

blackwood’s apathetic.   he possesses the ability to watch a slayer endure incredibly physical and psychological trauma and remain unmoved.   before they were subjected to the program that turned slayers into elite operators, one of their instructors spoke about mastering the fine art of detachment.   they would need to master it to survive.   during ashley’s six years in the corps, he hadn’t seen anyone master detachment as blackwood had.   he’s never seen anyone bounce back like blackwood had, from brutality to the formality that became him whenever he’d put on his dress blues.   blackwood’s tortured ashley.   blackwood’s tortured him in the training he endured before he became an elite operator.   and it genuinely distorted ashley’s perception of family and paternal figures because he was previously able to separate jeremiah, his biological father and an abusive alcoholic, from henri, his honorary uncle, through their voice, and tone, and actions.   jeremiah didn’t sound like a father to ashley.   he wasn’t fatherly.   henri was, however, and henri raised ashley as his own son.   he was nurturing, and patient, and he was a father to ashley when ashley needed it most.    blackwood rips that entire association apart.    he interrogates ashley during one of their training exercises when there are three fire teams left in the woods.   blackwood was asking for just one piece of intel, with that fatherly kindness, and he was making ashley bleed.   blackwood was able to bounce back from that.   ashley wasn’t.

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my favorite part of messaging someone to plot is staring at the flashing cursor before closing the lil window because i don’t know what to say.

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      #deputystakes — an independent and highly selective blog for deputy u.s. marshal ashley graves, an original character based in the neo-western genre.      affiliated with #deputyfangs.      by raylan.

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@lambflayed​​ said,   “ impressive. “

FIFTEEN ROUNDS ARE FIRED INTO THE TARGET, TEARING A HOLE CLEAN THROUGH THE HEART.   behind the safety glasses, ashley’s gaze is concentrated.   severe.   it was a nasty habit, but he always envisioned someone’s face on the target coming at him.   half of the time, it was his father.   half of the time, he didn’t talk about it.   

after the click of an empty magazine, he stares, dead ahead.   stares at the wounds in the paper.   the place where a face should be.   he’d fired fifteen shots and he always got what he was aiming for.   shepherd told him, the first time the older, wiser deputy took him shooting — that he needed to take it easy.   breathe a little.   three years later, ashley still hasn’t mastered his advice.   his gaze, severe and fucking sharp, softens, however, at the compliment.   with one hand, he pulls the electric muffs down from his ears, almost smiling.   his gaze follows scarlett’s to his target before returning to the other deputy.   his reply is terse.   ‘ thank you. ’