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Thinking about how naturally Aang and Zuko fall into a dynamic in the Firebending Masters.

Like, Zuko joined them just a few days ago, yet their interactions are those of people who've been friends long enough to trust the other but also be sick of the other's bullshit. There's a familiarity with them where Zuko's life changing field trips with Sokka and Katara are him establishing a dynamic and friendship with them (which are also great don't get me wrong)

And I was thinking abt it and the meta I did an amount of days ago I can't remember where Zuko, despite his number one goal through books one and two being Aang's downfall finds himself helping Aang again and again. It's part of those subtle primers that Zuko's antagonism of the gaang is driven by an idea his father forced on him, but that Zuko subconsciously understands on some level that his place is by Aang's side, not against him.

And so you get to the Firebending Masters and nobody second guesses their familiarity. They do not act like people who only a few days ago went from being mortal enemies to allies. They act like they know eachother, are familiar with eachother, and we easily accept that because the entire show has been subtly telling us THIS is their natural state. THIS is what they were supposed to be all along. THIS is that unspoken thing we saw in the Blue Spirit.

Zuko never feels the need to please or prove himself to Aang. In fact, he actively still antagonizes him (but in a friend way now) like when Aang says the thing about an upbeat attitude and Zuko's like "fuck this shit". Aang asks for some of his fire and Zuko refuses which, was dumb to begin with, but the fact that he feels solid enough in his friendship with Aang despite, again, only being actual friends for a few days, that he picks pettiness over helping Aang, is a testament to their friendship.

Zuko is perfectly fine with grumbling at Aang and being petty and doesn't feel the need to prove anything to Aang because he already knows Aang accepts him, that Aang's opinion of him isn't going to suddenly sour, that Aang considers him a friend. Because, on some level, Aang's probably considered him a lost friend ever since the Blue Spirit.

The Firebending masters is the resolution of the Blue Spirit conflict. They were always meant to be friends, Aang knew it, and on some level Zuko did too, so as SOON as Zuko lets go of his father's ideas and Aang knows that Zuko has changed, they are friends, naturally, as though they've always been.

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Let’s compare some different weights of bow!

As always, you can find more stuff here

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Kataango

By sheepnishly on ig | lovieaang on twitter. Reposted with permission from the artist.

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enduring

Written for @flashfictionfridayofficial Prompt 314: Half Awake

[Summary: a man's last thoughts before falling into an induced slumber]

Henri’s breath is warm against the side of his neck, a summer’s cloud drifting over a blue sky, vignetted at the edges. His eyelashes flutter, inevitable it is that they fall, there’s no other choice in the matter. His lungs start to slow, find a new tempo below his usual. That’s to be expected, they told him. The solution will work its way through his body with every beat, until his eyes don’t open again, and the next time they manage it he’ll be on a whole new planet.

Without Henri, of course.

The hardest thing about this is lying here, hands prone and refusing the idea of fighting the solution’s magic just a little to reach for Henri’s fingers. He’s pat them plenty enough this morning alone, soothing strokes across battered knuckles, every one a bitter reminder that it was a countdown to zero. That time’s come and passed, the last time he’ll touch Henri’s hand, and it’s a hundred times easier for him probably than Henri. He gets to fall asleep with the man he loves watching him; he gets to wake up and know that even if he pined for Henri all his life, it’d be pointless because by that point, Henri would be just scraps of bone and dust, a melody intwined with the rest of the universe. It’ll be acceptance he’ll feel more than anything else, knowing that nothing he could do would change it, and knowing he’ll imagine whatever fate he wants for Henri and they’d be no way to prove otherwise.

Unlike Henri. The hardest thing for Henri, well that just keeps mounting. Watching him walk into the assessment centre. Watching him sign the consent form. Supporting him as he’d followed the exercise regime, prepared solely for this. Driving him to the centre to meet others bound on the same voyage. Driving him here and complying with his last request, to stay until it’s over. He’s probably being selfish, adding to Henri’s struggle. But isn’t that his problem all over?

It's selfish to go, but it’d be selfish to stay, and when it’d come down to it, leaving is the thing that made the most collective sense. He’ll lose Henri, Henri will lose him, but they’ll always have the memories. If he’d chosen to stay – keep awake, stay in this world with Henri, forged against the greater good for each other – then it’d just be the memories soon enough anyway. The way Henri had looked at him last night, he’s thinking Henri believes it’d be worth it. To scrape those last few years to add to all the rest, a little more to top everything up. Dark in the dim, Henri’s eyes heavier than his eyelids are now, but he’d turned off the bedside lamp before any words could follow.

He's feeling how quiet his chest is now. How quiet his skull is, his thoughts on Henri but a calmness for them to swim inside. It’s not like dangling over a cliff’s edge, tottering over a fall, it’s a gentle pillow into soft grass and just sinking further and further down. The black of his eyes is eternal, the whole universe sighing so gentle. Henri’s knee had been brushing his, he knows, but the feeling is so far away now. Tipping on the scale, he’ll be away soon enough. Going on the trip, and is his eyes shutting, his brain shutting off, like the train doors sliding shut? Him in the carriage, about to embark upon his newest adventure. Henri on the platform, kept out, about to watch him.

Henri will be painfully aware of any faults that crop up with the journey – monitoring of the vessel will last long enough for that, to stretch a chunk of Henri’s life. Henri can spend the rest of the years they might have spent together basking in the nerve-wrenching horror of knowing a loved one is hurtling away in a can that might not survive. The last bit of selfishness then, the way he’s doing this anyway and leaving Henri with the burden. The letters and videos he made in preparation, stored away in case Henri might get lonely, that might just weigh those scales worse. A baked anxiety of a gift.

But it’d have been selfish for Henri to ask him to stay too, not that he’s ever really given much of a choice in that way.

It’s muffled. It’s murmured, the way his mind is starting to let go of its chains, succumb to sleep. It’s as peaceful as he’d wanted, beside Henri, comforted and cared. He can’t quite feel Henri anymore, just a whisper of a weight. The same way he’ll feel Henri for the rest of his life, somewhere out among the stars. Never alone; never together.

He breathes so slight, and cuts the last chains.

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i know i've said this before but i'm going to say it again because the more i work with geriatric women the stronger i feel about the fact that the only anti-aging that women in their 20s/30s should be obsessed with is building strong bones and muscle mass. that's like the most important thing you can you can do right now to lay a good foundation for healthy aging. you can botox the shit out of your face but that's not going to do anything to save you from dying prematurely from a fatal hip fracture that you can't bounce back from because you didn't do anything to prevent yourself from becoming frail and breakable. like i know that sounds harsh but that is reality for a lot of older women and i don't want that to be you.

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This kills fandoms, by the way.

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"Not everything's changed" -Mai, Going Home Again

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I believe I haven't posted this on Tumblr : Mai's greed knows no bounds

Also, I hate how easy warm/golden hour lighting is. I don't even have to try! Meanwhile, night time lighting always looks whacky

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THIS IS TOO GREAT XD

Do you think Katara would be Tuxedo Mask? o.o 

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They are still singing🎶🎶

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If wishes were.

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Twitter / Bsky / Shop / INPRNT / Patreon

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BOOM！！！！💥💥💥

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lagged

Written for @flashfictionfridayofficial, prompt 313: Afterthought

They always remember her last.

She should be used to it. Accept it, really – it’s not a fact that’ll change any time soon. That is just the way of her world, ever since she stumbled into the wrong temple, said the wrong thing and worse, doubled down on it. They will all go out on the mission, she in their footsteps, behind them as the physical demonstration of her reality, but it never matters even if she’s in the middle of them. They will look to everyone else before they look at her. It hurts just as much when it’s a run to the coffee shop or a hard battle, her stomach leaking red and everyone’s eyes glazing over.

It's a consequence, but honestly it’s not one she earned knowingly so that makes it sting all that much more.

The leaves crunch underfoot – autumn. It’d been autumn when she’d stumbled into that temple. It’s her second time around, and the leaves make her scowl just as hard. It’s meant to burn her down, her curse, break her into a few hundred pieces until she’s on her knees at the closest altar begging for relief. But there’s the fact she doubled down because she’s never given in to anyone before, and even with the horrid pain of all of this she suffers, she���s not going to give in now.

They’ve picked up another traveller, another blade for the fight, another set of eyes for the aftermath. She eyes the new one’s back, wondering if it’ll ache less with it being a stranger. Or if it’ll be worse because this is a person who’ll eventually become a close friend of the group, and friendships are easier when the person acknowledges you at their own pace. Likely, it’ll make everything worse. Likely, it’s another architected moment of despair. Her friends, moving closer with a person who never knew her fresh. Her friends, who care still for her of course, otherwise what would be the point of staying with them and simmering from it, yet also think of her last. They’ll invite the new one out. Tag her on at the end. They’ll fuss over the new one. Remember a beat late that she might be dying.

Laughter – the new one’s comedic, she sees, throwing back their hair and enriching the trees with a glitter of the throat. The others laugh too; one glances back at her a moment late to see if she heard the joke. Her returned smile is weak, still out of place as the moment’s already fading. Always out of sync with things, she is now. A step behind, so that’s why she tends to walk behind. At least then she can remind herself of her reality. At least then she can pretend it’s a choice, that she’s choosing solitude willingly as she used to like.

She sighs – quiet, overlooked.

Maybe she’s just a masochist. Clinging to the dregs of what was: wouldn’t another person seclude themselves from the torture, devote themselves wholly to breaking it, seclude so no one can hurt them? The thing is, she likes the travelling, the adventures, the things they do and the people they help. The thing is, even with the way eyes only slide to her when every other thought’s gone through, she still likes them all enough to bear it.

Anyway. The chances of breaking a god’s consequence don’t seem too high. Her best chance is to frustrate the guy into removing it by never letting it change her routine. Live her life like her chest doesn’t shrivel every time they notice her last; gods are prideful, easily put out if their games don’t go as hoped. Their magic far from infinite, so eventually he’ll find another person who’ll play along better and she can get her life back. That’s the hope, at least.

The path forks ahead. She’s a step too many behind, doesn’t look where the next is in her hurry to catch up before she really is left behind, doesn’t see the scattered stone. Her ankle twists, she trips, she stops. The others go on, feet trampling, and she’s got dirt in the heels of her palms and it’ll be minutes until they even notice she’s not with them. She huffs, a fiercer scowl to her brow, a cruse against that stupid god under her tongue, and goes to shove herself up when-

“Here.” Someone offers their hand, a light laugh to their voice. “You should be more careful.”

She looks up, blinks, a little dumbfounded. And there’s the new one, sparkling down at her, hand held out, eyes on her. The others are walking away in the distance, her far from their thoughts for the moment. The new one’s here, the first thought in their extended hand.

“You going to take it?” they say, arching a playful eyebrow, and she’s reaching out, grasping it before it can be ripped away, their heart throbbing, something strange in their gut.

“Thanks.” Two years. Two years, and no-one’s looked at her in anything but afterthought.

“They’ve gotten a bit away from us,” they remark, looking over their shoulder before returning to her with still interested eyes. “Oh well. This gives us some time to get to know each other!”

She knows what that strangeness crystallising in her gut is. Something she hasn’t felt for a while now.

It’s hope. Real hope, not just sitting and trusting for the best. This is small, a glimmering flame, but she’s going to hold it and see if it’ll grow.

“Sounds great,” she says, a tentative smile, and gets another flicker to that flame in the smile she gets in return.

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The inconspicuous sedge warbler is singing everywhere in the reeds here at the moment – ​​loudly, variedly and with enormous persistence.

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something something devotion and immortality

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hey bro can i open up ur rib cage and rummage around in there until im up to my elbows in blood and then hold ur heart in my hands? no bro i promise it wont look gay i swear.

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A little rest in the park