#Don't ask me what's going on here...

[the--other]

Poof, you have pretty henna tattoos on both of your arms now!! It'll last for 7 asks (bc usually henna tattoos lasts for a week depending on the ink!!)

--🧚‍♀️✨

[ Sorry Anon, this time I'll have to pass (Cuz idk how tf apply this considering the art style lmao)... But I found the concept interesting so I did this. Hope u like it!! ]

[inkskinned]

this is just my opinion but i think any good media needs obsession behind it. it needs passion, the kind of passion that's no longer "gentle scented candle" and is now "oh shit the house caught on fire". it needs a creator that's biting the floorboards and gnawing the story off their skin. creators are supposed to be wild animals. they are supposed to want to tell a story with the ferocity of eating a good stone fruit while standing over the sink. the same protective, strange instinct as being 7 and making mud potions in pink teacups: you gotta get weird with it.

good media needs unhinged, googling-at-midnight kind of energy. it needs "what kind of seams are invented on this planet" energy and "im just gonna trust the audience to roll with me about this" energy. it needs one person (at least) screaming into the void with so much drive and energy that it forces the story to be real.

sometimes people are baffled when fanfic has some stunning jaw-dropping tattoo-it-on-you lines. and i'm like - well, i don't go here, but that makes sense to me. of fucking course people who have this amount of passion are going to create something good. they moved from a place of genuine love and enjoyment.

so yeah, duh! saturday cartoons have banger lines. random street art is sometimes the most precious heart-wrenching shit you've ever seen. someone singing on tiktok ends up creating your next favorite song. youtubers are giving us 5 hours of carefully researched content. all of this is the impossible equation to latestage capitalism. like, you can't force something to be good. AI cannot make it good. no amount of focus-group testing or market research. what makes a story worth listening to is that someone cares so much about telling it - through dance, art, music, whatever it takes - that they are just a little unhinged about it.

one time my friend told me he stayed up all night researching how many ways there are to peel an orange. he wrote me a poem that made me cry on public transportation. the love came through it like pith, you know? the words all came apart in my hands. it tasted like breakfast.

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Hey now, Let her cook!

[lucabyte]

On autonomy, and what it means to be Obliged to Help.

Bonus:

[oneroomjestershow]

CHICKEN NUGGET!!!!!!!!!!!!

I deep fried him for you

[sunlight-shunlight]

i don't have an excuse for this. woe. young solas be upon ye.

[claraoswalds]

#mrs flood who are you: time lord edition

[lunarriviera]

"I just want to be one of you guys, I don't want to be left out. It feels really bad!" [Fei Du, imitating Lang Qiao except making it deliberate amateur-hour sajiao]

[puppetmaster13u]

The Au is Ra has been using the Lazarus pits for so long that causes him to see Danny like a human or his normal Phantom form Ra the only one that sees Danny like that

I love the idea of Deadly Decision getting together but Ra has no idea that Danny is no human he just thinks that Danny has his own Lazarus pit hidden somewhere away from him

Like Danny is full blown glowing white hair, green eyes, Sharp Fangs, an electrical being

Ra point at tall being of Life And Death it looks like he's about to rip you apart: This Is My Wife Danny.

Like sometimes people just ask him if he sees anything unhumanly about Danny and

Ra is like: What Are You Talking About ?

Danny's in the background forming Stars into his hand I'm trying to make himself a new sword

Talia and Dusan we're raised by Danny and Ra they just gotten used to also considering getting to be a normal human they find it hilarious to play along with their other two siblings Dan and Danielle that Mom is human

Slade: I've been meaning to ask what about that monster Ra has locked up back there

Talia: You Mean Mother

Slade: that's your mother I didn't know Ra al Ghul was attracted to on human beings

Dusan: what do you mean unhumanly our mother is perfectly normal he's not even assassin

Danielle walking out of his shadow: Maybe Your Mother Was The Weird One

Dan floating near Talia: Get the hell out how dare you disrespect our Mama

All of them are girlboss, gatekeep, and gaslight people into believe Danny is normal

Damien will give warning that his grandmother does not look like a Human they were all expecting meta not electric being

Danny got so used to Ra al Ghul no his Husban treating him like a normal person when he's like this that he forgot that everyone might not that treat him like that

Honestly? I love this.

And you know what? Danny might need someone like that, who even as his humanity slips away still treats him as human, as not an eldritch creature of Space, of everything Between. Someone who treats him as well, him. Is his and Ras relationship healthy? Well maybe not in human terms, but do either of them count as such anymore?

The idea of the kids playing along is also amazing lol. Especially that Jordan and Ellie? Definitely same hat as Danny. Sure their forms still look sort of human, but that just makes it very uncanny valley. So others and siblings who treat them the same? They need it just as much- if nothing else than to not become so arrogant and uncaring of humanity that they could watch the world end without a blink.

Which, Damian! I bet Danny absolutely adores the grandbaby. I bet he crafts little ice bats and miniature planets to swirl above his crib. I bet he has a literal strip of space and stars on his ceiling. And Damian isn't the only grandbaby too- Dusan has a daughter in some timelines too. Not to mention Ras' adoptive daughter Nyssa, who he gave one of the Lazarus Pits to.

But speaking of Damian, I have to know what that would mean for Jason. Who was practically completely braindead before being thrown into the Pit. Who would have probably met Danny while there because I can't see Danny not also gently doting on another grandson.

Gosh I honestly am just really enjoying this whole thing lol.

[asgardian--angels]

mage viktor discourse again on twitter and all i can say in my little corner over here once again is, I don't know why the entire fandom takes it as canon that mage Viktor failed to save every world he manipulated.

Canon does not provide evidence of this. This is fanon speculation. It's a fine headcanon to have, but everyone talks about it like it's canon when it isn't. Canon is ambiguous about the outcome of the timelines mage Viktor altered. The little nods we are given point, in my opinion, towards the opposite conclusion, that he successfully averted destruction.

I've written meta on this before but in summary:

1) 'In all timelines, in all possibilities' is worded precisely, it's not 'out of all timelines'; the implication is that every time, Jayce brings Viktor back from the brink, not just in our timeline. 'Only you' doesn't refer to our timeline's Jayce, it refers to all Jayces. Jayce always brings him home. If Viktor continuously put the fate of each timeline in Jayce's hands and Jayce failed over and over, I don't think he'd say those words. And the way he says them matters. His words are tinged with wonder, not sorrow. As if over and over again, he is shown that Jayce saves him, and it continues to amaze him. He doesn't sound defeated, like this is the next in a long line of Jayces he's sending off to die. The feeling is that Viktor's faith in Jayce has not been misplaced.

2) If mage Viktor doomed every timeline, there would be hundreds (or more) mage Viktors. All running around manipulating timelines. I highly doubt the writers wanted to get into that kind of sticky situation. The tragedy of mage Viktor is that he is singular. Alone. Burdened with the responsibility of the multiverse. The emotional gut punch of his fate is ruined if other timelines led to the same outcome, and from a practical standpoint, having multiple reality-bending omniscient mages would rip apart the fabric of the arcane.

There are other points, such as there being only one corrupted Mercury Hammer and our Jayce is the only one to receive it, and the fact that if mage Viktor is as omniscient as he is implied to be, he could easily step back into other timelines and correct course, because it's highly unlikely he could sit still and watch things go down in flames. But these things can be argued elsewhere.

While I love conversations about mage Viktor's motives and selfishness vs altruism, the writers & artbook have expressed that Jayce and Viktor care greatly about Runeterra and want to fix their mistakes to save it, and that their reconciliation is symbolic of Piltover and Zaun coming together as well. Yes, they make disastrous decisions towards each other, making choices for the other or without the other, which has negative consequences for their relationship and for Runeterra - but I think fandom pushes their selfishness even past what's canon sometimes, as if their entire goal hadn't always been to selflessly help the world around them. Their final reconciliation is about bridging the gap that grew between them - the pain and grief and secrets, betraying themselves and each other - to mutually choose each other openly and honestly. Part of the beauty of their story, as expressed by the creators, is that in their final moments, they chose each other and took responsibility for their actions by sacrificing themselves to end what they started, together - and that choosing each other saved the world. TPTB have stated this - that Jayce and Viktor are the glue holding civilization together, and when they come back to each other, they can restore balance. It's when they're apart, when they hurt each other and miscommunicate, when they abandon their commitment to each other and their dream, that the greater world suffers. Their strife is mirrored in the story-world at large.

Mage Viktor is framed as a solitary penitent figure, damned to an eternity of atoning for his mistakes. He paid the ultimate price and now is forced to live his personal nightmare of exactly what he was trying to avoid for himself with the glorious evolution. The narrative clues we're given point more in the direction that he saves timelines rather than dooms them. If Viktor's actions kept killing Jayce, the very boy he couldn't bear to not save each time, it would undermine these narrative choices. Yes, Viktor couldn't stand to live in a world where he never meets Jayce, so he ensures it keeps happening. But in that same breath, he couldn't bear to see a world where his actions continue to destroy Jayce and destroy Runeterra. His entire arc in s2 is born of his selfless desire to help humanity, help individual people. He would not lightly destroy entire worlds. That's his original grief multiplied a thousandfold, and narratively it would lessen the impact of the one, true loss he did suffer, his own Jayce. It wouldn't make sense for him to be alright with damning other timelines to suffer the same catastrophic tragedy that created him. I mean, maybe I'm delusional here, but is that not the entire point? Because that's what I took away when I watched the show.

As I said, I love discussions about mage Viktor, as there's a lot to play with. All I wish is that the fandom at large would not just assume or accept the Mage Viktor Dooms Every Timeline idea as canon, when there is nothing in the actual canon that confirms this. Maybe people need to just, go back and rewatch the actual episode, to recall how mage Viktor is presented to us, and what it's implied we're supposed to take away from his scenes, and separate that from the layers of headcanon the fandom has constructed.

[amarriageoftrueminds]

When you think about it it's actually so weird how every Cap movie is like 'so here is our protagonist Steve who wants to go to war to fight Nazis and here he is talking to his male soldier friend which could mean nothi-but he's only not dating a woman right now because he's an incel virgin, OKAY?? if he doesn't have a girl currently then it must be because he was trying and failing!! it was the disability cooties!! or maybe he's just a monk! those are the only two options!! and if all women want him, well- uhhh- he's too busy, alright??? He is not going to that museum to see Men it's because there's a Woman!! He's single because of Work! the passage of time!! not for any Other reasons!! all perfectly straight explanations!! he totally would be doing straight shit right now but he just can't because of COMPLETELY UNSUSPICIOUS REASONS!! OKAY???'

[cyanide-sippy-cup]

Been avoiding the show because FUCK Amazon but. I said I'd post it so I'm postin it.

[erinwantstowrite]

folks,,,, i can not possibly write every single thing that has ever happened to these fools in the comics, in LoF. that would be decades worth of content and decades worth of a headache that i'm not bothering with. i don't even know what all is canon to LoF, just things that aren't canon because it would hurt my brain (or my heart) to include it. like i do try to keep it coherent but i don't know everything. if you want to include specific arcs then please write your own fic. love you and hope you succeed, but LoF is already a monster of a work and i can't even imagine trying to keep all of that together

[lucabyte]

my order of the art book has been delayed because the system thought my house address was incomplete........ every american storefront hates me so bad for living a house with a name instead of a number..................

[inkskinned]

it is all chaos and entropy. the thing is that the chaos and entropy make it beautiful and lovely.

yes, it's true that nature and the universe are uncaring and unspecific, and that is terrifying. i have lived through some of the unfairness - i got born like this, with my body caving into itself, with this ironic love of dance when i sometimes can't stand up for longer than 15 minutes. i am a poet with hands that are slowly shutting down - i can't hold a pen some days. recently i found a dead bird on our front porch. she had no visible injuries. she had just died, the way things die sometimes.

it is also true that nature and the universe are uncaring and unspecific, and that is wonderful. the sheer happenstance that makes rain turn into a rainbow. the impossible coincidence of finding your best friend. i have made so many mistakes and i have let myself down and i have harmed other people by accident. nature moves anyway. on the worst day of my life she delivers me an orange juice sunset, as if she is saying try again tomorrow.

how vast and unknowing the universe! how small we are! isn't that lovely. the universe has given us flowers and harp strings and the shape of clouds. how massive our lives are in comparison to a grasshopper. the world so bright, still undiscovered. even after 30 years of being on this earth, i learned about a new type of animal today: the dhole.

chance echoing in my life like a harmony between two people talking. do you think you and i, living in different worlds but connected through the internet - do you think we've ever seen the same butterfly? they migrate thousands of miles. it's possible, right?

how beautiful the ways we fill the vastness of space. i love that when large amounts of people are applauding in a room, they all start clapping at the same time. i love that the ocean reminds us of our mother's heartbeat. i love that out of all the colors, chlorophyll chose green. i love the coincidences. i love the places where science says i don't know, but it just happens.

"the universe doesn't care about you!" oh, i know. that's okay. i care about the universe. i will put my big stupid heart out into it and watch the universe feast on it. it is not painful. it is strange - the more love you pour into the unfeeling world, the more it feels the world loves you in return. i know it's confirmation bias. i think i'm okay if my proof of kindness is just my own body and my own spirit.

i buried the bird from our porch deep in the woods. that same day, an old friend reaches out to me and says i miss you. wherever you go, no matter how bad it gets - you try to do good.

[fqolai]

thinking about the new avengers first fight. they have a million firsts together and a million fights. but i mean their first really big, really bad fight. like team is breaking up kind of fight. it’s bound to happen and probably already did in those fourteen months we skipped.

i’m not a fic writer at all but here’s how i think it would play out...

with no one taking them seriously as the new avengers, tensions are high. especially for valentina. she banked everything she had left, which was admittedly, not much, on this whole sham. everyone’s doubting them. no one believes they measure up to the old avengers. and to top it all off, sam wilson is threatening to sue.

feeling pressured to get them good publicity, valentina arranges — what should’ve been — a layup for them. some small community assignment. all they had to do was show up, smile for the cameras, shake a few hands, etc. but one thing led to another and boom: utter catastrophe.

the press is having a field day. fourteen year olds on tiktok are having the time of their lives. reddit users have never felt so employed.

everyone on the team is arguing. the worst in everyone is coming out. alexei is trying to keep the team positive but it’s only making things worse (and everyone more annoyed). it’s getting bad and bob is frightened.

yelena… who has finally got a taste of what walking in her sisters footsteps felt like — who finally had a shot at a real family, at belonging — can see it all crumbling. she’s trying to hold them together (maybe even trying too hard). it comes from a place of love, of desperation, but she can’t express that in the moment.

ava can see the end coming and she’s seen enough to know it’s better to leave than to be left behind. so she’s the first to throw in the towel.

john follows quickly after. he should’ve known this would never work out. alexei, confident that he can bring them back around, rushes after them.

bucky had been silent the whole time. and yelena, in her anger, lashes out at him. she accuses bucky of not really being a part of the team. of never really letting any of them in. of never getting to know them or letting them get to know him. oh, how he must be so relieved that he can go back to sam wilson now that the whole charade is over. no pesky complications getting in his way.

yelena storms out and bucky doesn’t bother to follow.

and mel? mel needs a raise. again. cleaning up valentina’s messes is never an easy task. but this might just be her toughest assignment yet.

in talking with bucky, mel realizes that they’re all still dealing with their traumas and regrets and that maybe they just need a push in the right direction.

and quickly. valentina is seriously considering creating a world-ending event to bring them all back together. that cannot happen.

so she goes to yelena first. makes it clear val didn’t send her and asks how she’s doing. yelena insists she’s fine. who needed the avengers anyway? not her. and what a relief to no longer have to worry about valentina or the public breathing down their necks and judging their every move.

mel asks after bob. how is he doing? it must’ve been hard on him with the team breaking up and all. yelena stops to realize that in her anger, she didn’t check in on him before leaving. she had promised him they would stick together. yet, she had broken promise.

she sets out to find him and make things right.

she finds bob in his room in the tower. the darkness creeping up on him. she pulls him back. they’re still a family. sometimes family fights. but it will work out in the end. yelena does her best to sound more confident than she feels. she thinks bob can probably see right through it though.

mel finds alexei after. he’s inconsolable. he’s lost yelena again. he couldn’t stop their team from breaking up. he had to watch the light slowly fade from yelena’s eyes as the arguments got louder and louder. mel points out that he hasn’t lost anyone yet. yelena or the team. but he could, if he doesn’t do something about it. alexei leaves, convinced that a grand gesture is the only way to bring the team back together and bring some light back to yelena's eyes.

next, mel goes to john, who is spiraling into new levels of self-hatred. she thinks she sees him arguing with a reddit user under a burner account before he manages to hide his phone screen from her.

mel asks about his ex-wife. how are the custody negotiations going? she heard he got visitation once a week. that olivia was finally starting to trust him again. though, being an avenger after all, it may be hard to keep to a regular schedule. but, hey, on the bright side, if the avengers are done, that means john has free time on his hands. he can go back home, make things right with olivia, get a regular 9-5, watch the rest of the action play out on social media like everyone else these days. maybe that would be enough?

john sees through what she’s trying to do, but he supposes that she’s not wrong. he wouldn’t be satisfied with that life. she leaves him with a lot to think about.

then mel goes to find ava. she asks her why she was the first one to walk out. mel understands. it’s scary to let people in and know that they’re the only ones with the power to hurt you as a result. but if ava recalls, no one had mentioned leaving until she had brought it up. it was only after ava had left, that the others had followed.

was she too ready to give up at the first sign of strive? to protect what was left of her already fragile heart. perhaps, she had been too hasty...

bucky goes to see sam. to tell him… he was right? it all blew up in their faces? it was never gonna work out? whatever he meant to say, he doesn’t get a chance.

you see, sam has some opinions on this so-calle d‘team’ if that’s what they still are. he doesn’t know them. not really. he only sees what anyone else on the outside does:

yelena, an assassin, who loves being an avenger and all the glory that comes with it. who’s never had to work to make up for the bad things she’s done. and didn’t she just try to kill clint last christmas?? (sam doesn’t know how much she regrets what she’s done. that being an avenger is how she begins to make up for it all. and the whole killing clint thing, well… bucky can’t really defend that and if he’s being honest, it’s the first he’s heard of it)

alexei, a former soviet asset, working for one of america’s biggest enemies for most his life, and seems to want nothing more than to go back to the good old days. (sam doesn’t know about alexei’s biggest mistakes. and maybe that’s a blessing in disguise. but he doesn’t know alexei’s regrets. of allowing natasha and yelena to be taken to the red room. of not being there for his daughter who died worlds away. of almost losing yelena right in front of him. of failing both his daughters, time and time again, and trying to get it right this time)

john walker, a murderer, an asshole, who killed a man with steve’s shield. who’s wife left him and took custody of his child with her. whose ego won’t allow him to admit that he’s a terrible person. (sam knows john more than the others, certainly, but he hasn’t seen what bucky has over the last year... sam doesn’t know that john hates himself more than anyone could ever hate him for all those reasons and more. and that’s not to say he’s absolved of his sins because he feels bad about them. but bucky had heard from yelena about john nearly walking straight off the edge of the elevator shaft when faced with those regrets… hard to argue about the asshole part though)

ava starr, who sam knows has some history with scott before going completely off the grid. she seems to have as much trouble playing with others and making nice as the rest of them. self-isolating. alone. doesn’t really spell ‘reliable teammate’ does it? (sam wasn’t there during the fight. he doesn’t know that she was the first to suggest going after yelena in the void. he doesn’t know that she’s the first one to throw herself into danger to protect the people she cares about. that she would always come back for them and never leave anyone behind in battle)

and who the hell is this bob guy anyway???

it was all wrong. they were never a real team. not to sam. not to the public either. they're not cut out to be heros and everyone knows it.

but bucky? bucky who was the winter soldier. who was a former asset, though, against his will. who's killed a lot more people than john walker ever could. who has trouble nurturing his friendships and is alone more times than not. who is lucky enough to be one of bob’s friends.

for the first time since this had happened to them all, bucky gets defensive. protective of this thing they had made their own. hearing sam speak about all the reasons why the others weren't good people and realizing how much he has in common with them really puts things into perspective.

sam doesn’t mean to offend bucky. bucky isn’t like them after all. he’s different. but bucky isn’t so sure that’s true.

defensive and faced with their differences, bucky decides to leave without telling sam that the team was done and goes for a long walk. he has a lot to think about.

back at avengers tower, ava, the first to come back, finds yelena and bob asleep on opposite ends of the couch. a movie still on the tv. she turns the volume down and settles into the reclining chair for the night.

the next morning they awake to john loudly complaining about the mess left out. bob volunteers to clean up and do the dishes.

ava and john quietly acknowledge the other came back. but they don’t make a big deal about it.

bucky returns to the tower next. yelena teases him. says that he looks awful. like he hasn’t slept. bucky knows it's her way of saying that it was good to have him back. her way of apologizing for how they’d left things. bucky keeps the mood light. jokes that this is where is bed was so of course he didn’t sleep. they don’t talk about it any further, just an unspoken agreement to let bygones be bygones.

this is when alexei returns. he teases yelena about how cute she and bob were, snoring away on the couch. sleeping like the dead. yelena tries to protest that she doesn’t snore but doesn’t get the chance — not that anyone would have believed her.

alexei ushers them into another room where he's set up a huge party while they were sleeping, with mel’s help, of course, to celebrate their 1 year anniversary as a team. it hasn't been one year yet technically, but alexei insists it’s close enough (and "happy anniversary" was the only cake topper left at the market so they’d just have to go with it).

alexei gets emotional about how much the team means to him. and about how much he knows it means to yelena. how they need to do better. to really be there for one another.

yelena, teary-eyed, accepts a hug from her dad. says she doesn’t blame anyone for their mistakes at valentina’s stupid publicity event. being honest, they never should’ve agreed to go to begin with.

bob repeats what yelena had told him the night before. that family fights but they always come back together.

ava apologizes for being the first to leave. she promises not to assume the worst anymore and to stick around, even when it gets tough.

john jokes that the team is better with him on it anyway. what with his practical skillset. no one is amused. but he admits that maybe, just maybe, he’s better with the team at his side too.

everyone turns to bucky. it’s his turn now.

it looks painful for him, but bucky opens up about how being open to friendships is a reoccurring issue for him, according to his therapit anyway. this is the first time he’s had people who truly understand the things he’s been though. who have been through some of those same things. this is all new to him: the whole letting people in thing. but he's making an effort to learn to trust them. they'll just need to be a little patient with him.

john commends him for the beautiful speech. bucky tells him to shut up. they enjoy alexei’s party.

mel calls valentina to let her know the crisis has been averted. and to cancel the attack she was planning for new york, for god's sake.