#//don't worry about being late!!

[starry-bi-sky]

don't you want to be a cult leader? - danyal al ghul au

this is mostly a joke post but i thought it was funny and had to share so--

his first mistake was, obviously, inheriting his father's inability to see an injustice and stand still. -- actually, danyal's first mistake was his lair being so big. a mountainous island with a large temple in the center resembling his old home in Nanda Parbat? With sprawling foliage and rivers and streams and waterfalls galore? What was he going to do with all that space? Let it go to waste? He had plants there! Native trees of the ghost zone growing from the soil! He couldn't let it all be left unchecked!

So naturally after helping a fellow teenage assassin ghost -- who he later learns is named Akihiko, -- from Walker of all people, he sent them over to hang low at his lair until it was safe enough for them to wander around the Zone. Walker couldn't get through Danyal's astrofield if his life depended on it, and trust him -- he's tried. Danny was clearing out debris from his stupid transport vans for weeks.

Honestly it wasn't so bad, he and Aki really quickly became fast friends and Danny loves having a sparring partner close to his level again -- he hasn't had this much fun fighting since he left the League. Aki was very dedicated and levelheaded, the both of them clicked really well because of it.

Nonono, the real trouble began after Danyal met some long-passed League members and allowed them to come join his island as well. Apparently they had made a few enemies of the zone, and maybe Danyal still felt some loyalty to the League. He couldn't just let them be left to rot. Their zealotry could be overlooked so long as they kept it contained and helped him take care of his island.

And it.. snowballs from there? He meets a teen squire aptly calling himself Ambroise -- whether that was his living name or not is yet to be seen -- who died during feudal france, who is just about as dramatic and passionate as every french stereotype makes them out to be. He calls Danyal "my moon and great muse" -- which is both flattering and little uncomfortable, but Danyal's grown up in the League as the Grandson of the Demon Head, he is used to mild worship. he passes it off as nothing more, nothing less. -- and while his energy is overwhelming on the worst of days, he helps Danny draw out of his shell more in ways that Sam and Tucker still struggle with.

Him and Aki butt heads a lot, but the two seem to hold the other in at least some positive regard, so Danny doesn't worry too much about them fighting while he's gone. It only becomes a mild issue when Aki also begins calling Danny "my moon". It's a little sweet, so Danyal brushes it off.

Then he takes in a troupe of ghosts some time after he defeats Pariah Dark and they begin calling him "great one" just as the yetis do in the far frozen. This is where he meets the twins -- a pair of sibling ghosts who call themselves Trixie and Missy (short for Trick and Mislead) -- who aren't quite as passionate as Ambroise but more energetic than Aki. Eventually they also start calling Danyal "my moon" and attach themselves to his hip, even within the living. They like to hide in his shadow and cause trouble for the rest of the students. He makes sure they don't hurt anyone.

He's pretty sure Aki is jealous, same with Ambroise, but he can't be too certain other than the fact that they become much more lingering (re: clingy) whenever he visits the island.. Something he's trying to do much more often these days due to the increasing amount of people living there now. Since when did he become so popular?

Then there's Pēnelópeia from the Greater Athens, who ran away from home and joined his Island after he ran into her while she was being chased by Skulker -- and he's pretty sure the reason was because of her chimeric appearance. Her strange eyes and mismatched wings and lion's tail and talons. She assimilates into his friend group very easily, she gets along well with Ambroise and Trixie and Danny usually finds the three of them climbing the trees to pluck the most fruit from the top. They can fly and he knows it, but they prefer to climb.

Then finally there's silent poet Akkara who comes from ancient mesopotamia, who gets along most with Aki -- which is no surprise there considering their similar personality dispositions. he watches Aki and Danyal fight each other and leaves comments on this or that that he notices. He writes Danyal poems on clay tablets and leaves them by his room.

They're one big mismatched group of outcasts, and Danny's got the other ghosts on his island to tend to, because they're living on his island and he wants to be hospitable even if he struggles with that. But he spends the most of his time with them.

Sam and Tucker are making fun of him. Tucker jokingly tells him 'careful Danny, at this rate you're gonna start a cult'. Danny really wishes he had taken that joke more seriously.

He just. keeps. collecting people. Wayward souls lost in the zone, looking for shelter or refuge from something or other -- whether that be another hostile ghost, or a past afterlife, or just a purpose. Danyal finds them, he takes them in, offers them a place on his island until they are ready to leave. Many seldom do. He's not complaining -- he has the space, and it feels like it's only ever growing.

His close friends, his "inner circle" as he's heard the others call them, keep insistently calling him "my moon". He starts calling them his stars, because then it only feels fair. They're his stars, this is his constellation. It becomes a thing; little star halos begin forming behind their heads, picking them out from the rest. He loves them so much, it's hard to place. Sam and Tucker are also his stars, but they reside in the living realm, they're his tie to Life. Meanwhile, his friends here know what it's like to be dead, and sometimes its nice to relate.

Those living on his island keep calling him "Great One" and he's beginning to notice zealotry in their care for his island. He really, deeply appreciates it. His close friends gain nicknames -- as his stars, it's only natural for him to pick them out from the cluster in the skies. Akihiko, his Sirius and bright star. Trix and Missy, Castor and Pollux, the twins and troublemakers. Ambroise, his zealous Antares and close friend. Penelopeia, chimeric and loyal Vega. And Akkara, his Arcturus and strength.

It's ridiculous how long it takes for him to notice; he is, of course, a deadly trained assassin. He is meant to be observant -- and normally he is! But somehow this becomes a blind spot. One that becomes too big to be dealt with by the time he realizes it.

He should've noticed when Aki, his Sirius, stood beside him one day while Danyal looked over his island and saw the sprawling spirits carrying on about their afterlife and bowing to him as they saw him, and said: "I looked down into the depths when I met you; I couldn't measure it." They aren't one for flowing prose, it took him so off guard he was silent for over a minute before he finally spoke.

Danyal should've recognized devotion for what it is, and yet he didn't. He should've recognized it when Antares began spouting praises about him, crowing about his radiance and resplendence to the heavens. He just brushed it off as Ambroise being Ambroise. He should've recognized it when Trix and Missy nearly broke Dash's leg after he knocked Danyal's books out of his hands, he excused it as them being protective. Of them coming from times where such violence may have been customary -- after all, that's what he used to be like. What he was still like, sometimes, when his emotions nearly got the better of him.

He should've noticed it when the people living on his island followed his word like gospel, looked at him like he hung the stars in the sky. When his friends gifted him a shawl with the moon phases delicately embroidered into it, with silver, shimmering thread and moving stars lovingly stitched into it. Their constellations seen clear as day in the dark fabric. When he found small shrines dedicated to him -- but they lacked any image of him beyond stones carved to look like moons, so he ignored it. When the religious imagery began popping up.

He really, really should've noticed it when a bunch of cultists accidentally summoned Antares, and Antares had turned to him when he arrived and called them heretics. But he was so centered on the fact that they had kidnapped one of his stars, that he hadn't paid much attention to what Ambroise had said.

Sages say that faith is blind, they should also say faith in you is even blinder.

It really only hits him one afternoon while he's sitting in Sam's room studying with Tucker, Missy and Trixie lounging at his feet, Aki sat on his right, Penelopeia braiding his hair, Ambroise draped against him, and Akkara lurking over him. Its one of the rare few times they're all in one room together.

It hits him like a bolt of lightning. He looks up from his textbook. "Oh Ancients," he says in no amounting shock. Everyone looks up to him.

"I've become my grandfather."

[pseudophan]

Dan has been more touchy with Phil since their comeback, but I specifically feel like in the last few videos he’s been EXTREMELY touchy! The door is opening more and more🚪👀

yeah........ dan is soooo calculated is the thing. phil is more likely to be touchy without thinking about it too much, but dan is like... he's so hyper aware. when he's getting extra touchy you know it's on purpose, it's deliberate, they are Up To Something

[luckycharms1701]

💙 He wakes up slowly.

This is a surprise. Normally there is sleeping and then there is awakening, nothing in between. He lingers in the middle, confused but also… content.

It feels like meditating, he thinks, and without thought Leo’s breath slips into that familiar pattern. He allows his awareness to spread out.

Almost immediately he finds you. You are sprawled across his plastron, one arm flung across his waist and the other under your head over his heart. The softest snores are coming out of your mouth.

He has to remind himself to breathe, to slip back into his meditative state. It is harder than he thinks it should be.

At one point that had been a very sore subject for him, the way you disturbed his calm without even thinking about it. Now, though. Now he understands that some emotions are too strong to be fully curbed, that love is meant to disturb as often as it calms.

Now, he curves slightly into you even as he continues to meditate, breathing in your scent. There. That's the source of his contentment. You are the source of his contentment.

He meditates for some time, reflecting on you and on love. The highs and the lows, the agonies and the ecstasies. His quiet contemplation is interrupted by you, causing a smile to cross his face at the irony.

You nuzzle into his plastron slightly as you slowly start to wake. He opens his eyes and looks down to find that you've turned your head and opened your own eyes, a sleepy smile on your face.

He reaches out and brushes his thumb gently across your lips, cupping your cheek. You turn into his palm, giving it a small kiss as you stretch.

"Good morning princess," he whispers, and you mumble back as you curl farther into him.

His heart is full as the two of you prepare to begin your day together.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

head bonks: @yorshie @avery73 @justalotoffanfiction @thejudiciousneurotic

[uniiiquehecrt]

Voice actors are NOT the same as actors.

It takes a specific kind of skill-set and training to be able to warp and meld the voice. It takes a certain kind of talent and dedication to hone that talent into the ability to meld the voice and invoke emotion with one's voice alone. Actors are used to using their voice secondarily to their body language and their facial expressions. It's all mirrored back on camera. They do have nuance. But it's a different kind of nuance and a different kind of training to produce that nuance.

Voice actors might get their likeness transposed on their character's design, and maybe their mannerisms might seep into the character's animation. But when it's all said and done: their presence is in their voice. They are bringing a character to life, showing that emotion in their voice, trying to keep a specific accent, drawl, pitch, tone in that voice and keep it consistent for their recording sessions.

The voice actor is like a classically trained musician who can play first chair in a competitive, world-renown orchestra. The actor (who fills the voice actor's role) is like a moot who played violin in beginner and intermediate high school orchestra and thinks they can get into Juilliard with that 2-4 years of experience.

This doesn't mean that the HS orchestra moot can't play. They can even be really good at it. Maybe they won competitions and sat first chair. But they are not in the same league as the person who's been training their whole lives and lives and breathes to hone their craft using the instrument and all of the training they've ever acquired to perfect it. They are not meant for the same roles. They are not in the same caliber. You do not hire the HS equivalent when you want to play complex music in a competitive orchestra.

Actors are not the same as voice actors.

And furthermore, actors - especially big name actors - taking the roles of animated characters for big budget films or TV pilots makes no sense anyways when - at least in the case of TV pilots - there's not a point to hiring a big budget actors anyways. That money could be used elsewhere (like paying your animators), and the talent that is brought onto the screen for X character could then be hired on to voice said character no recasting required.

I wouldn't say voice acting as a profession is in danger exactly, but it's certainly being disrespected and overlooked for celebrity clout, and this has ALWAYS been an issue. Shoot, even Robin Williams knew that much - which is why he tried so hard not to be used as a marketing chess piece for Aladdin and got royally pissed off when it happened anyways. People shouldn't go to any movie (but especially not animated films) because "oh famous actor is in it". People should go because it's a good movie and the voice acting is good.

People who honest to god think that voice actors are replaceable because "oh well anyone can voice act" or "I like xyz celebrity so naturally it'll be good" ... Honestly I just wish you'd reassess your priorities because you're missing the point and are part of the problem.

Voice Actors ≠ Actors.

[dazais-guardian-angel]

kinda wild to me that one of the most compelling aspects of both Chuuya and Kunikida's characters to me, that I never really see talked about, is how they're heavily set on a doomed crash course towards complete and utter destruction, and how I am so, so worried for them both.....

[moghedien]

I'm still betting on this being the Forsaken line up:

Ishamael (obviously)

Lanfear (obviously)

Moghedien (mentioned)

Graendal (mentioned)

Asmodean (basically confirmed)

Sammael

Demandred

Semirhage

[peachyhoneyadventures]

EDOLISSE AND VARRICK

These Hands, If Not Gods by Natalie Diaz | Still from When A Man Loves (1927) | Snippet from Richard Siken's "Crush" | Still from Lodger (???) | Poem from Margaret Atwood's "You are Happy"

[randomnameless]

Probably the reason Scarlett is more concerned about her duty to serve Alain than the people of Albion because it's a higher calling. I don't remember whether or not it's literally divinely mandated, but she chose to serve the world and not just Albion.

Didn't Scarlett choose to join the party when we free her, and from her side it's more in the lines of "I'll follow Alain" and none of that saviour thing ?

Divinely mandated ? Wdym ?

I thought Arant asked her 8 years old self to find and guide the "saviour" but once again, this is only revealed in the Albion exposition dumps. Maybe it's an issue of localised scripts or something, but when Scarlett says to her feathered friends she always thought about them when reuniting in Albion...

That was not the image of her I had in mind when her only scene of importance in Drakengard, aka before reaching Albion, is her shopping, and while I know supports are locked to regions for plot purposes, but her last convo with Alain is locked in Elheim and we have zilch about the "saviour" subplot or even Albion and its people.

Heck that subplot could have been alluded to there :

Scarlett could have told him why she was sent away at this precise moment but... No.

Fwiw her last Chloe convo treats her past in Albion a bit, but thing is, Scarlett being Arant's daughter and the princess who will come to rule/govern/oversee Albion, its people and the Orthodoxy is completely ignored before reaching, well, Albion.

Hell, the only mentions are in the Alain checking up on her convo where her "princess" status is brought up because she was a brat and complained the random church she was sheltered in was not as magnificent as the palace she was raised up in...

I really wanted to like Scarlett, but damn if her writing makes it hard to do so and doesn't reek of "Quick let's cook some plot reason to make her plot important to make her the main love interest because writing her so far as the ojou type feels kind of flat !"

[possessable]

yo u know the captain underpants brainrot is Getting Severe when you're like "i should make a jasper fan design

[toyybox]

Spiderwebs #24: Heather Performs A Lobotomy

Masterlist

content: lab whump, captivity, immortal whumpee, organ stuff, drugging, needles/injections

· • —– ٠ ✤ ٠ —– • ·

Heather knew he was asleep, one afternoon, barely moving to breathe and curled up tightly under the blanket. She shook him, but he didn’t stir. She had given him the drug a few minutes earlier under the guise of another painkiller. When she shone a light in his eyes, he did not react at all, and she was certain she could proceed with her work.

Keeping him awake, while effective in sending a message, was inconvenient for dissections she actually needed to have done. Heather had mostly worked on cadavers during her education. Cadavers did not plead or beg and, most importantly, they kept perfectly still. For this, she wanted to be precise. 

She placed him on the dining table, with a tarp underneath, then tied her hair back and pulled on her gloves. She was curious to see what was under that skull of his—the brain, that is. It would be a difficult procedure to enact. Permanent damage was possible, of course, and she simply didn’t know how to go about it. Saw through bone or dig through the back of the eye? It would be good to have samples of brain tissue, but cutting through a skull was much more complicated than simply pushing under the soft parts of the face. And, anyways, it was better to start with something small before she got ahead of herself.

Heather steadied the needle over his face, as she pried his eyelids open with her other hand. She wasn’t exactly sure how quickly an injury like this would heal. He had recovered nearly instantly from the bullets. He didn’t seem to change much after burning to death, either.

The needle slid easily behind the curve of the eye. She remembered the way her psychology professor had described it: severing a connection of nerves, and therefore severing some part of the self that acted and was able to feel. It blunted a part of the soul. Although this was not the time to be superstitious; such theological concepts would be of no use to her. She was getting distracted.

She hesitated, then pushed the needle in.

Something gave way underneath it. She winced. I definitely hit something… Something wet and yielding had been punctured. Or cut. And that was all she needed to do. She slid the needle out, watching as a thin line of blood pulled off its underside like spit from teeth. To ensure the effect would last, she pushed the needle into his other eye.

Jackie shifted. She nearly dropped the needle.

He was tensing up, moving, waking up. I must have given an incorrect dosage. It was always a risk, when some drugs did nothing at all for him, and others would only work in lethal amounts. He opened his other eye. His gaze moved slowly, unfocused as it passed over her.

She pried the needle out. A bit of blood speckled his face, but he didn’t react. 

“I have a headache,” he said, slurring the words.  

“How much does it hurt? One to ten.”

He shrugged. He tried to get up from the table.

She clicked her tongue and gently pressed him onto his back. “No. Stay there. There’s something I need to do. You won’t move, right?”

He didn’t look pleased, but he didn’t move either.

Luckily, she had guessed this might happen, so she had already prepared lidocaine to administer local anaesthesia. It wouldn’t put him to sleep, but it would numb him. She placed the injection above the side of his neck, below the jaw.

“What’s your favourite colour?” she asked as she pressed down on the injection. 

“I don’t have one.”

“Really? I thought you would.” She removed the injection. He’s coherent, she thought, and he’s answering my questions, but he doesn’t seem to be reacting appropriately to the situation. Jackie usually didn’t like the idea of surgery. Either it was the drugs, or she truly had damaged some part of his brain. That’s still a minor cut, though. I want to see how a fatal injury would heal.

While the anaesthetic took effect, she prepared her scalpel, the drill, and the electrical bone saw. Jackie stayed quiet and still for his part, which she was happy to see. When she cut the skin open and drilled through the skull, eventually cutting it away, he didn’t even wince.

She reached into the inward valley of his skull and inserted the saw into the centre of the frontal lobe. It was incredibly difficult to cut out. The knotted pink flesh healed almost immediately. Nevertheless, she managed with some time and a lot of splattered blood, after which she placed the halved organ into a large glass jar.

Even cut out of him, pressed against the glass, it was reforming, albeit not as well as it should have been—becoming misshapen against the walls of its container, running out of space to mold with and soon slowing down its growth. She set the jar down on the kitchen counter and shook her wrist out. Her arm felt sore already.

The tarp shifted and crackled behind her. 

Heather spun around to see Jackie sitting upright, touching his newly-healed head and glancing at his unbloodied palm with mild curiosity.

“Don’t—” She marched over and seized both his hands. “You’re a terrible patient. I told you to stay still.”

“Sorry. You shoulda tied me down, doc.” He still seemed to be mostly out of it. It was a fairly powerful concoction of drugs, after all. He gave her a loopy, puppy-dog grin, smiling despite the severe head wound like the big idiot he was…

She smiled back—then she immediately turned away from him. I can’t give him the wrong idea! Ruining my work the first chance he gets. He thinks he’s hilarious, doesn’t he?  “I was being nice by forgoing the restraints, but I’ll keep that in mind for the next experiment.”

“What’s that jar on the counter?” he asked, leaning forwards. “Wait, I’ll guess—”

“It's none of your concern.” She picked up her notebook and pen and wrote a few things down. “Now, Jackie, I know you might not be in your right senses after all that. I need you to listen to me carefully and answer my questions to the best of your ability. I cut out a significant part of your frontal lobe. In a typical human being, this would result in death, or at least unconsciousness.”

“But I’m special.”

“Don’t flatter yourself. We don’t know if the damage is permanent yet. I’ll start with testing your memory and such. What’s your last name?”

“What’s a last name?” he asked innocently. 

“Don’t play games with me.”

He batted his eyelashes.

She sighed. “If you behave, I’ll give you a lollipop.”

“My name is Jackie Rockwell,” he said. “Twenty-one, born and raised in the States, about five-foot-seven. There are eighteen groups in the periodic table. The smallest land animal is the Etruscan shrew. Level, racecar, and radar are all examples of common palindromes.”

“Smartass.”

“Chienne.”

“Cabrón.” 

“I’m still waiting for my lollipop, doc.”

Pequeña comadreja. Silently, she pulled out a lollipop from her pocket and handed it to him.

“Thanks,” he said, tearing the plastic off. “You were saying?”

“Right. As I was saying, I think it’s safe to assume the removal of brain matter did not affect your memory or speech. Your nervous system doesn’t change when it heals. I was afraid—” She stopped herself. Heather knew he would be fine. He always recovered. She had already set him on fire, and he had survived even that unscathed. It was just a shallow worry, nothing worth putting words to. “In any case, I’m glad that went over without any complications.”

“And what if something went wrong? Would you not care?” 

“Nothing would…” She glanced at him. He had stopped smiling. This wasn’t a joke, apparently. “You don’t seriously think I would have let that happen, right?”

He shook his head, and his voice was sunny again. “No, you’re right. You’re completely incapable of making mistakes. I should have known. Why did I even bother to ask?” He sat up and got off the table. “What’s the time?”

“It’s half-past eight.” 

“Well, I’m exhausted from doing nothing all day.” He held the lollipop like a cigarette between his teeth. “See you tomorrow?”

“Yes. I’ll take you to your room.”

Still, she was a little put-off by his sudden distrust towards her. There was something almost caustic in his cheerfulness. Maybe she was overthinking that. He was probably just acting out to get attention, the same as always. She decided to push it out of her mind and focus on other, more immediate issues. 

· • —– ٠ ✤ ٠ —– • ·

Taglist:

@theelvishcowgirl

@lthrboy

@whumpy-wyrms

@yassifiedinformation

[smalltimidbean]

I really really like the pumpkin clone and I wanted to draw them meeting my little fake peppino guy 🕺

(my sincerest apologies if I got their personality wrong)

GJFDSLK THE TUMMY IS ANGY!!! Or just hungry? Probably the latter, but who knows jkdfk

Thank you for this, it made me laugh very much kgdfk, and your Fakie is very cool too!!!

[maretriarch]

turns out how not to be deficient in fat in your diet is to stop eating only low fat versions of foods

[naamahdarling]

.

[occasionaltouhou]

BETTER LATE THAN NEVER... it’s yukari time

[minakoaiinos]

Twitter getting obsessed with conspiracy theories about where redacted is makes me feel so fucking terrible when there is so much worse going on that people are literally begging you to pay attention to but instead you want to focus on scenarios you made up in your head and play true crime detective

[skrunksthatwunk]

household enemy to the yyh watchthrough number one is the olympics. it's taken us a week to get two episodes into the gamemaster fight