#I beat the game but this is the first time I’m doing any summoning

[starogeorgina]

Broken bonds

Paring: Ser Harwin Strong/reader

Warnings: None

Notes: I’m excited to share my first Harwin fic!

1.01

“Vaella!” Rhaenyra runs towards you, her arms extended. “How are you?”

Excited to see her, you hug her tightly. Since being married, you’ve missed spending time with your older sister; after all, she was your closest companion. The other half of you. No poet could describe the depths of your love for her.

You step back from the hug and notice a knight standing patiently behind her. You remember the day your sister picked Ser Cristion as part of your father's royal guard. Ser Harrold seemed impressed by her decision-making, while Otto Hightower was furious.

You smile at him and say, “I hope you are well, Ser Cristion.”

He bows his head and says, “Princess.”

Rhaenyra links her arm with yours as she leads you through the gardens. You notice the sudden displeased look on her face. Lightheartedly, you nudge her with your shoulder and say, “I’m sure there are worse things than having a sworn protector that looks like Ser Criston Cole.” You giggle. “Now tell me everything so we can eat cake and ride our dragons for the rest of the day, once I’ve said hello to Father.”

“And the queen.”

“Ahh, yes, Alicent.” You roll your eyes at the thought of seeing her; you have no love for any Hightower. “I am excited to meet our newest sibling, though. Has Aegon still got chubby round cheeks?”

Out of the corner of your eye, you spot Ser Harwin Strong talking to his father, and you feel your heart speed up. You hadn’t seen him since your wedding, when he attended alongside his father. You were so distracted by him that you missed what Rhaenyra was saying to you.

An action that didn’t go unnoticed

“See something you like?” She whispers.

“No, not at all,” you shake your head. “When do you leave for your tour for a suitor?”

She looks at you unimpressed. “Tomorrow morning, I’m dreading it.”

“You are beloved by many; the realms delight. The lords and knights will be fighting for your hand.”

“They want my blood, not me. The whole thing seems barbaric—that I will pick a husband based on what fleet or castle he can offer me.”

“Believe me, dear sister, you're lucky to be the one who gets to choose.”

She gives you a sympathetic smile. It was no secret that you hated the Lannisters, and being married to one made you nothing but miserable. You often asked the gods what you did to deserve such punishment, but they never answered.

You did resent your father for forcing you to at first, but you soon realized he wasn’t the problem, but the snake who had been whispering in his ear was. Otto Hightower. He had convinced your father, the king, that it was the best way to keep you safe.

“Sorry,” she squeezes your hand. “So, how long will you be staying this time?”

—

You sit in tense silence as the men in the king's small council look at each other. You were summoned to meet with them before dawn, much to your distaste, to discuss who would be your ‘sworn protector’ while you stayed in kings landing.

“It’s been three hours,” your father sighs. “What are you waiting for?”

You look at the dirt underneath your nails and then back up at him, “I am not the heir to the throne; I do not need watching over.”

“Heir or not, you are still my child,” your father rubs at his face. You wanted him to admit out loud why he really wanted someone to watch over you, but he knows this and refuses. It’s an unspoken war between the two of you. He shakes his head and laughs. “You share the same stubbornness as my mother once did. Why else do you think we had this meeting so early?”

The fact your father anticipated your refusal caused heat to rise in your body; you wanted to beat him at this game. Ever since you were a child, he seemed to know what you were thinking before you did.

“The list of names you have suggested is regrettable. I doubt any of these men have ever been in a fight, let alone been fit enough to protect a Targaryen princess,” you point out.

“Perhaps the princess would like to choose someone else,” Lord Lyonel suggests. “Someone more suited to her.”

Your father glares at him; he fears who you might pick, given the choice.

“He’s right,” you smile, knowing he was panicking internally. You could go for the obvious choice and pick Daemon, but you decided to pick someone more sensible. You look directly at Lord Lyonel Strong and ask, “Do you think a knight such as your son would be willing to protect a princess?”

He glances between you and the king before nervously answering, “Yes, of course. He is traveling at the moment, but I will send word for him to come back right away.”

“Very well, then,” you smile sweetly at your father. “It’s been decided.”

Everyone stands as the king walks around the table. He pats Lord Lyonel on the shoulder, chuckling, “Rest assured, Ser Harwin won’t have a moment of peace from now on.”

—

You don’t lift your head when hearing footsteps approach; you're too focused on the letter you're writing to Daemon, asking for his help.

𝒟𝑒𝒶𝓇 𝓊𝓃𝒸𝓁𝑒

𝐼 𝒶𝓂 𝓁𝑜𝓈𝓉. 𝒲𝒽𝒾𝓁𝑒 𝒷𝑒𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝒻𝑜𝓇𝒸𝑒𝒹 𝓉𝑜 𝓌𝑒𝒶𝓇 𝒸𝓇𝒾𝓂𝓈𝑜𝓃 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝑔𝑜𝓁𝒹 𝑒𝒶𝒸𝒽 𝒹𝒶𝓎, 𝐼 𝒽𝒶𝓋𝑒 𝓁𝑒𝒶𝓇𝓃𝑒𝒹 𝓉𝒽𝒶𝓉 𝓂𝓎 𝒽𝓊𝓈𝒷𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝒾𝓈 𝒶 𝓉𝒽𝓇𝑒𝒶𝓉 𝓉𝑜 𝑜𝓊𝓇 𝓀𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝒶𝓃𝒹 𝓂𝓎 𝓈𝒾𝓈𝓉𝑒𝓇, 𝓌𝒽𝑜𝓂 𝓌𝑒 𝒷𝑜𝓉𝒽 𝓁𝑜𝓋𝑒 𝒹𝑒𝒶𝓇𝓁𝓎. 𝐼 𝒹𝑜 𝓃𝑜𝓉 𝓌𝒾𝓈𝒽 𝓉𝑜 𝓈𝒽𝒶𝓇𝑒 𝓂𝓎 𝒷𝓊𝓇𝒹𝑒𝓃 𝓌𝒾𝓉𝒽 𝑅𝒽𝒶𝑒𝓃𝓎𝓇𝒶 𝑜𝓇 𝓈𝓉𝒶𝓇𝓉 𝒶𝓃 𝒶𝓁𝓁-𝑜𝓊𝓉 𝓌𝒶𝓇 𝒷𝓎 𝓉𝑒𝓁𝓁𝒾𝓃𝑔 𝐹𝒶𝓉𝒽𝑒𝓇, 𝓈𝑜 𝐼 𝓈𝑒𝑒𝓀 𝒸𝑜𝓊𝓃𝓈𝑒𝓁 𝓌𝒾𝓉𝒽 𝓎𝑜𝓊. 𝒲𝑒 𝓂𝓊𝓈𝓉 𝓅𝓇𝑜𝓉𝑒𝒸𝓉 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝒷𝓁𝑜𝑜𝒹 𝑜𝒻 𝓉𝒽𝑒 𝒹𝓇𝒶𝑔𝑜𝓃.

𝒫𝓇𝒾𝓃𝒸𝑒𝓈𝓈 𝒱𝒶𝑒𝓁𝓁𝒶 𝒯𝒶𝓇𝑔𝒶𝓇𝓎𝑒𝓃

You roll the letter up before tying string around it; you will send a Raven later on in the day. Finally, you look up and are surprised to see it was Ser Hawin, whom you hadn’t expected to arrive for another couple of days.

“You honor me, princess,” Ser Harwin says, bowing his head. “My father informs me that you suggested me personally for the job.”

“You are the strongest knight in the seven kingdoms. I doubt being a royal minder is the highlight of your career.”

“It’s still an honor, and I will do my best to protect and serve you, princess.”

You raise your brows, trying to read his facial expression underneath his armored body. His fierce reputation is why you chose him, but mainly because you wanted a guard who wasn’t intimidated by your family name or reputation. “And it’s an honor to be protected by someone so…strong.”

You can see the ghost of a grin pulling on his lips underneath his helmet. “Can I speak freely?”

You motion for Harwin to join you on the balcony, where you are currently enjoying the sunshine. “You are always free to speak your mind with me.”

He sits across from you and smiles, “When my father told me I was to be a guard for one of the king's daughters, I’d assumed it was princess Rhaenyra.”

“Why is that?”

“I found it hard to believe a fierce warrior such as yourself would need a protector.”

“I’m just a dragonrider.”

“I have a feeling you are much more than that princess.”

You press your lips together, trying to hold back a laugh. Harwin removes his helmet, and the smile on his face is contagious, causing you to blush. He clears his throat. His expression changes into a serious one as his gaze lingers on the scar on the back of your hand. Feeling self-conscious, you pull the sleeve of your dress down and place your hands on your lap. You think of the pain you endured...

“One day, I hope to hear how you fought at the War for the Stepstones.”

His voice brings you back to reality, “And I hope to hear how you earned the name Ser Harwin breakbones.”

[talltoontales]

// Kung Fu Panda 4 Rewrite \\

PROMPT: Kung Fu Panda 4 felt a little lacking, wanted to try my hand at maybe making it better.

PROMPT BY: Me (ToonMan)

STARTED WRITING: 03/29/2024

Alright, Ground Rules:

Jack Black’s cover of “One More Time” by Britany Spears is amazing, and I will not argue otherwise.

This rewrite is coming from my enjoyment of the series, not just bashing a “bad movie” for the sake of bashing. So, if you’re just here to hate, you’re in the wrong place.

I’m not a professional writer. I only started writing semi-consistently this year. So, take this rewrite with a massive grain of salt.

To make this whole process easier on me, no world-shattering changes.

Zhen’s still gonna be chosen to be Po’s successor

No Furious Five for most of the movie

No killing or reviving characters that don’t originally die or return.

We good? Good. Now, let’s get this party started!

/////

So, the opening fight doesn’t need to change much, save for one thing. Tigress fights alongside Po. Seeing that she’s the only member of the Furious Five to get any development in these movies and has the most chemistry with Po, it makes sense. The two beat…whoever Po fought in the intro (I think it was a stingray that could fly) and have a short dialog after explaining that Tigress, along with the rest of The Five, have moved on from being warriors and transitioned into being teachers/masters of their respective styles.

SIDE NOTE #1: I know that Po and The Five are already masters, but in my head, master sounds like a better term for “teacher” than sensei.

I like this better than having The Five be “on a mission” or whatever excuse was used to keep them from helping Po in this movie. Also, seeing that the main lesson Po needs to learn by the end is to move on from being a warrior, having The Five, his long-time heroes, retire around him helps get that ball rolling.

Po is honestly excited for Tigress and offers to support her however she needs it, just like he does with the rest of The Five. However, Tigress uses this moment to, not so subtly, ask if Po has any plans on doing the same. Po gives a vague, jokey answer before the two walk off into the title screen.

\\\\\

Back in the Valley of Peace, everybody’s celebrating Po at his dads’ noodle shop, but the celebration is interrupted by Shifu summoning Po to the Jade Place.

SIDE NOTE #2: Let me just take this moment to say that while their scenes in the movie do basically nothing for the plot, Ping and Li deserve a short or web series or something. They were seriously a joy to watch every time they were on screen together. #CoParentingGoals

First major change is why Po needs to become a master:

“As the world moves on, so must we. As to stand still is to be left and lost to time.”

Right now, Po is at the top of his game. He’s mastered Kung Fu, led and kinda trained The Five, found inner peace, beaten General Kai, and mastered Ki. However, there will come a day when Po faces a foe he cannot beat, a foe that can challenge Po in a way that he can’t adapt to, as Tai Lung did to Shifu or Kai to Master Ooguay.

Those who become Masters don’t do so because they’re past their prime; they do so because they know the world in which they thrived is coming to an end, and in the new world that follows, their wisdom becomes more needed than their fists. To lose such wisdom could be detrimental to the next generation of heroes. Of course, Po denies that he has any real wisdom to give (aside from food), only seeing his value as the Dragon Warrior. However, Shifu has never been a patient man.

The next day, Po is just messing around the palace when four warriors (No Mr. Beast Pig) attack him. During the fight, Po mocks his would-be assassins by pointing out all their errors. Shifu then stops the fight, explaining that this was a test to prove that Po is more than ready to be a master and to introduce Shifu’s candidates for the new Dragon Warrior.

Still firmly in denial, Po and Shifu go through the Peach Tree Scene the exact same way. The only difference being that when Po notices Zhen breaking in, he thinks she’s another candidate who was late or something.

A broad change I’d make that I can’t really put in writing is just to put a pinch more focus on the fight scene. KFP4 had the most out of the series at seven, but they all felt like an afterthought.

To make Zhen a bit more unique, she’s more of a “fight your surroundings” kind of fighter. She’s never standing still, never uses the same weapon more than twice, and never really fights head-on. Po can claim that she’s not fighting fair, which she’ll laugh at before he locks in and captures her. This fight being short is expected because Po is a Kung Fu legend and should have no problem taking down a random thief.

SIDE NOTE #3: Totally a personal opinion, but did bother anyone else that they named the fox Zhen? Not that the name was bad or anything, but we already have Lord Shen and those names are waaaay too similar…You know what, here’s another change. Zhen is now Vox.

Fast-forward a bit, and the two are now traveling together. Po explains how the Staff of Wisdom can’t be stolen; it must be given, and Po shows Vox genuine kindness and generosity. Vox thinks it’s some kind of long con but accepts it anyway.

The Friendly Bunny goes about the same as it did with Vox being the loot goblin she is, but I don’t want this to be an actual fight. It’s more like Po trying to keep the situation under control. Keep Vox from stealing, protect Vox, protect the helmsman, protect the bunnies, and keep the entire restaurant from falling over.

Instead of getting knocked out of the restaurant like a fool, Po uses his weight to force the patrons away from the exit, and with a mighty leap, Po exits the Friendly Bunny with Vox, the Helmsman, and the bunnies and lands on the boat like a boss. While sailing to Juniper City, Po talks about his dads, but Vox doesn’t share her backstory. Instead, mentioning how the Bunnies were safer at the restaurant.

Introducing the Chameleon and Entering Juniper City goes about the same except that Po and Vox get caught because Vox keeps casually stealing, which she does undetected, but the police only notice when Po is trying to return the stolen goods.

In the Thieves’ Den, Vox isn’t hated, but the vibe is still the same. Everyone casually messing with/ stealing from/ hurting everyone else. They find Han, who says something to the effect of “never thought I’d be seeing you again,” gives them a map of the chameleon’s temple and the scene goes on as usual from there.

/////

Alright, time for a BIG change: The Chameleon’s Motivation/ Plan/ New Name

Every other villain in the Kung Fu Panda movies has an actual name, and if I had the power, Chameleon would be named Tai Zhi for reasons that are probably obvious now but will be explained later.

Tai Zhi’s new backstory is that she was bullied, and all she could do was hide, just camouflage, no shapeshifting yet. Until one day, she learned about Kung Fu. Tai Zhi would find a master, they’d train her for a little bit, then they’d sense how evil she was and kick her out before she could learn anything actually dangerous. She then found a dark master in hopes their similar moral alignment would convince him to train her. Instead, he was the first master who refused her outright, verbally destroying her before threatening her to leave.

Tai Zhi then turned to sorcery for her claim to power but could never let go of Kung Fu. So, she found a way to open a door to the spirit realm, but there was a catch. Equivalent exchange, she’d kidnap citizens of Juniper City and sacrifice them to the spirit realm and get a D+ spirit at best in return. To get around this, she’d need the Staff of Wisdom, and she could get anyone she wanted, no matter how strong.

SIDE NOTE #4: Tai Zhi isn’t collecting the money from the mob bosses for any particular reason. It’s just a power flex. I assume she needed the gold and stuff for her cages, but they never made that clear in the original move. Plus, why would she buy the metal when she can just steal it.

\\\\\

Vox finds Po practicing Kung Fu, and Po offers to teach her. Vox doesn’t believe him, but Po reassures her he’s being 100% honest. He teaches her some basic stuff, and she picks it up pretty fast, and when she doesn’t, Po incorporates what he’s seen Vox do into his lesson. This all leads to a short spar where Vox almost beats Po but gets cocky and loses to a good ole’ fashion belly gong.

Vox questions why Po does what he does: He offers a thief a cookie, saves those who want to kill him, and teaches a thief his own moves. Po opens up about how Oogway chosing him to be the Dragon Warrior changed his life for the better. He’s made friends across all of China, found his biological dad and his people, and saved China at least three times—all just because of one moment.

Because of that, Po believes everyone deserves the same chance, no matter who they are. Those words visibly touch Vox as she almost reveals her big secret before the two are kicked out of the Thieves Den. Po and Vox sneak into Tai Zhi’s lair, and things go about the same. Now for how Tai Zhi met Vox…

Vox had been a thief well into her adult years, and a really good one, but she was tired of stealing, tired of watching over her back every second, tired of not being able to walk the city streets without seeing her face on a wanted poster. Vox wanted a new start where no one would know who she was. The problem was that most people in Juniper City were pretty poor, even the mob bosses, and Vox didn’t feel comfortable forcing someone else into poverty. So, the choice was simple: steal from Tai Zhi. Even one gemstone from her temple would set her up for life.

At the same time, Tai Zhi needed to steal the Staff of Wisdom from the Dragon Warrior, but due to all the stories she’d heard during her research, she didn’t want to risk taking him head-on. She needed a thief, and it just so happens that she knows about the best thief in the city. Tai Zhi sets up a fancy trap to bait Vox, who sees it, knows it’s a trap, but falls for it anyway. However, Vox manages to escape without a scratch until the artifact she stole is revealed to be Tai Zhi in disguise.

Tai Zhi marks Vox with a tracking spell, and while Tai Zhi could care less about Vox, there’s a pretty big bounty on her head. Not to mention, she’s stolen from some pretty powerful people who don’t really care about the reward. All Vox had to do was bring the Dragon Warrior to Tai Zhi, and she’d not only lift the curse but also let Vox take whatever she needed to disappear.

SIDE NOTE #5: I’d have Vox always scratching her neck because that’s where Tai Zhi marked her. She’d just play it off as if she had a flea problem.

Now, I don’t hate the “Villain raises a child to betray the hero” thing. It just doesn’t hit the same in the movie. We’re not given enough time to feel Vox and Po bond in the original movie. Also, if you’re like me and are unable to not analyze movies while watching them, you noticed almost immediately the aztech-esq earring Vox wore and figured out the twist.

Plus, I feel like having Vox be a reluctant thief just trying to get out of the game makes it a little easier to explain how she can betray the Tai Zhi in the end.

Now, I obviously cut the amazing Ping and Li scenes so how does Po not fall to his Death? The answer is simple: watch the Po vs Tai Lung fight again.

Seriously, go watch it. I’ll wait.

…

Done? Pretty awesome, right?!

Anyway, we can have Po swing from tree branches while fighting the lizard soldiers until he hits solid ground, or we can re-do KFP2 and have him fall into a river or large body of water. Back at the temple, Tai Zhi and Vox go through with the ceremony, and we’re keeping the bit about the blood moon—it’s honestly the funniest joke in the entire movie! Now, for the big reveal I set up a while back.

/////

Tai Zhi summons Tai Lung from the spirit realm and calls him “Master.” Before he was freed in KFP1, Zhi broke into Chorn-Gom Prison to free Tai Lung in exchange for training. Instead, Tai Lung verbally destroys her, insulted that Zhi would ever believe he needed her help. Maybe even have him almost brute force his way through his restraints just to scare her.

After Tai Lung’s death, Zhi took the “Tai” part of his name to never forget how weak and powerless Tai Lung made her feel. She steals Tai Lung’s skills and proceeds to wail on the guy, maybe even paying homage to the end of the Tai Lung vs Shifu fight, before throwing him into a cage.

Tai Zhi then releases Vox from the tracking spell and gives her a choice:

“Stay by my side and witness my rule or help yourself to however much treasure you can hold, find the farthest, darkest corner of the planet, and pray I overlook you.”

Then we cut back to Po at the bottom of the temple for the Po vs Vox scene. The only change I’d make here is just making the fight longer, showing off how much Vox has learned on this journey as well as how outclassed she is compared to Po.

Vox reveals that she is gonna to run away, and wants Po to come with her to help save as many people as they can. Po refuses but is proud of Vox and her mission, saying that if he can’t beat Tai Zhi, he’ll buy as much time as he can for Vox to escape with her people.

While Po goes Assassin’s Creed on the temple guards, Vox returns to the thieves' den and tries to convince the criminals to do the right thing because “it’s the right thing to do.” When that fails, she reminds them that if Tai Zhi is taken down, they can loot all the treasure stored in her temple.

\\\\\

As the army of thieves goes to war with the temple guards, Vox sneaks in after Po. Inside, Po sneaks around as Tai Zhi fights General Kai, noticing other warriors and Lord Shen. He’s then stopped by Tai Lung, who’s disappointed in Po and remarks how Oogway may have been wrong in the end.

Kai loses and is thrown in a cage as Po makes his dramatic entrance. Tai Zhi gives the staff back and does her “you and I aren’t so different” monolog, which Po acknowledges. There’s a possibility he could have ended up like Tai Zhi if he never became the dragon warrior (Throw in one of his villains laughing in disbelief), so he offers Tai Zhi a chance to be better than the villain she is now, to learn from him.

Tai Zhi then proceeds to mock Lord Shen, General Kai, and Tai Lung about how Po stopped all of them from achieving their goals. The mocks Po, claiming that for all the good he did, for all his adventures, no one in Juniper City and beyond has ever heard about him and that once she’s done with him, Po will become what he was always meant to be, nothing.

-OR-

Have Tai Zhi call Po weak because he needed a master to make him the Dragon Warrior. Just to have the line, “Alone I mastered magic, took over the entire criminal empire of Juniper City, defeated all of your greatest enemy and treasured masters, I am my own master!”

Now, something about the original Po vs Tai Zhi fight bothered me. Across three movies, over and over again, there’s always a moment where Po gets to nerd out over Kung Fu legends and flex his knowledge. He even figured out the Wuxi Finger Hold on his own. Yet, he’s going one on one with the ultimate echo fighter of those same warriors and his knowledge does nothing to help him. Let’s fix that.

Here’s how this fight could have gone: Tai Zhi changes into a warrior, Po does his nerd bit while caught off guard, but he then picks up on the fighting style and proceeds to body Tai Zhi in record time. Rinse and repeat that a few times and then Tai Zhi tries to use Po’s old villains which backfires horribly. Eventually, she runs out of warriors and must repeat, and with transformations getting predictable, Po starts winning the fight. Until…

Tai Zhi's frustrated that she has the forms and skills of at least one hundred kung fu legends, but she can’t beat one dorky panda. In that frustration, she loses control of her shapeshifting and mixes two forms together, catching Po off guard. Tai Zhi then starts using chimera forms to gain the advantage, but before she can deal the finishing blow, Vox swoops in and saves Po.

The two hatch a plan to make Tai Zhi so mad that she loses control long enough for Po to use the Staff of Wisdom to return the stolen skills. The plan starts to work as Tai Zhi turns into that chimera dragon form, but before Po can use his staff, Tai Zhi grabs Vox, forcing Po to save her by making Tai Zhi crash.

In the aftermath, Vox finds Tai Zhi transformed into Po, and we could have a short chase before the real Po saves Vox. Po has Vox find and bring him the staff while he fights himself, which does not go well at all. Tai Zhi traps Po in a cage before Vox can get the staff back to him.

Vox is now the only one who can stop Tai Zhi. Vox tries to fight Tai Zhi head-on like Po but fails miserably. However, Vox notices that the entire temple is fit to collapse. So, Vox sticks to the shadows, taking potshots at Tai Zhi, and every time she transforms, whoever she transforms into tells her their weakness/ tell from their cage. This continues until the temple starts to collapse, and as Tai Zhi tries to escape, Vox fights her head-on again to keep her inside (this is where she’d scream, “You fool! You’ll kill us both!”).

As the dust settles, Po stands up from under the rubble and helps Vox up, noting that he could have escaped earlier but she was doing such a good job and didn’t want to interrupt. The other spirit warriors get from under the rubble and thank Po for freeing them. As Po prepares to open a portal to the spirit realm, let’s say Master Wolf tries to sneak attack Po from behind but gets decked by Tai Lung, transforming back into Tai Zhi.

Tai Lung mocks his wannabe successor by saying; “first lesson, know when to quit.” Tai Lung then steps out of the way, and Po returns all of the skills to the spirit warriors. As they return to the spirit realm, Tai Lung acknowledges Po and what he’s become and also recognizes his “pupil,” referring to Vox. Not wanting to be outshined, though, he takes Tai Zhi with him into the spirit world, finally taking her on as his student, whether she likes it or not.

And the story ends basically the same: Vox and Po return to the Valley of Peace, Po offers to train Vox at the Jade Palace to Shifu’s frustration, and credits.

/////

Wait! One more change…

Shifu meditates under the peach tree with Po joining him shortly after that. Po can’t meditate to save his life, so Shifu questions why he’s here. Po admits that Shifu was right, that it’s time for Po to pass the torch, but also thanks Shifu. Po knows it wasn’t easy for Shifu to train someone like him, but he did, and because of Shifu, Po has never been happier with his life.

I don’t know if this will be the last Kung Fu Panda movie, but if it is, I’d like a nice moment between Shifu and Po and maybe ghost Oogway. Just wrap a nice bow on it.

///// The End \\\\\

And that’s it—that’s the rewrite. Wow! That’s a lot of words (3,573, to be exact). Like I said, I’m not a scriptwriter. I’m just a guy with a little too much time on his hands. Kung Fu Panda 4 was, and still is, a solid movie that I’ll definitely watch again, along with the other three, and so should you.

I had a total blast writing this, and I hope you enjoyed reading it.

[just-here-with-my-thoughts]

Day 7: Suffering in Silence / Chronic Illness

@febuwhump prompt: Suffering in Silence @badthingshappenbingo prompt: Chronic Illness

Fandom: The Bad Batch Characters: Wrecker, Omega, Echo This story is inspired by this post by @nobody-expects-the-inquisitorius. This was one of the first Bad Batch posts I ever saw on Tumblr, back before it was my fandom, back when it was my mutual's fandom and kept cluttering my dash and I was wondering what it was all about. The consideration of the downsides of the Batch's mutations is what what got me interested in the characters and really stuck with me. Anyway this fic imagines Wrecker as a chronic pain sufferer. Enjoy. Word Count: ~640 Click here to read on AO3

Synopsis: Omega wants to play, but all Wrecker wants is rest.

It was one of those days when everything hurt. Hurt if he moved. Hurt if he didn’t. Hurt if he curled up, or stretched out, hurt if he was touched, hurt if he wasn’t. Hurt despite cold or heat or massage and hurt despite the painkillers Tech had passed him without comment.

It felt so futile. He knew his body was strong. The strongest of them all. Knew as well there was nothing wrong with his joints. That had been closely monitored. No, nothing physically wrong. Just agonising pain that danced through his senses, radiating out from each joint and leaving his muscles feeling like lead.

He could still do his job. Could push through, clear his mind, remind himself there wasn’t actually any damage to his body, that he could push past this imagined discomfort and come through for his brothers when they needed him.

But today there was no mission. Today was downtime, stuck on the Marauder, and that almost made it harder. Nothing else to focus on. Nothing to take his mind off the all-consuming, ever-present pain.

He lay in his rack, wincing with every small shift of position. Nothing to do but watch a holo on the small data-pad screen and pretend he was paying attention to the story, not to each niggling ache in his body.

“Hey Wrecker-”

Those were Omega’s chirpy tones,

“Want a game of dejarik?”

Wrecker dragged his thoughts away from his own misery to look at the blonde clone girl, bobbing on her toes beside his bunk with a smile on her face.

He didn’t want a game. He wanted to be left alone.

With a groan he painted on a smile that he hoped she believed. “Sure kid. Gimme a minute and I’ll be there.”

Closing the holo and discarding the datapad, he took his time sitting up in the bunk. He swung his legs over the side, planting his feet on the floor. Rolled his neck and his shoulders to ease the imaginary stiffness that wasn’t stiffness at all, just pain, just a signal along his nerves with no origin that felt like it should be accompanied by stiffness, even though he had full range of movement.

Pushing to his feet, he couldn’t hide the pained expression that fleetingly crossed his face as his body protested the movement. But then, his body protested all the time. That was the problem.

He caught Echo’s sympathetic look from the bunk opposite. The disabled reg was reading, also on downtime. He was the one who was closest to understanding.

“Need anything, Wrecker?” offered Echo quietly.

Wrecker summoned his usual grin, throwing a thumbs-up at his team-mate. “Nah,” he said, in a much stronger voice than he was feeling. “I’m fine. Jus’ needed a minute, an’ now I’m all rested up. Ready for action!”

Echo gave him a knowing look, and Wrecker’s smile turned strained. It was easier to say everything was fine. No point complaining. It wouldn’t get him anywhere. There wasn’t anything the others could do to help.

“All set up, Wrecker!” chimed Omega’s enthusiastic voice.

“On my way!”

Wrecker held his arm out, and Echo tapped forearms. It hurt just a little, more than a gentle touch should. A gentle touch shouldn’t hurt at all. But it was nicer to feel connected by those touches than it was to avoid the pain, so he endured.

Seeing Omega’s delight as she beat him at the game – again – didn’t relieve the constant low-grade ache in his body. But it was a distraction. He could concentrate on her dazzling smile, and push away the uncertainty of his situation a while longer.

Omega didn’t know about the phantom pain. She didn’t need to. He was her brother, and he would ignore all the discomfort in the world if it meant seeing her smile.

[olivyh]

Not a Monster- Floyd Leech

A/N: I'm not sure if it's stated if Jade ever used his UM on his brother, but I did it anyways whoopsies. Also Floyd just has so much depth as a character?? that just?? goes unexplored in game?? so here’s my interpretation of him as he was growing up

TW: Bullying, fights, thoughts of self worth, self harm, family issues, panic attacks, anxiety, mental health issues, slight descriptions of blood, ppl don’t know how to handle floyd so they ignore him :(

Floyd Leech was not a monster.

He was not an animal, or an uncontrollable force of nature.

People would forget that, scurrying away at the sight of him when he was in one of his moods, chaining his heart and body down with lead that made him drag his feet against the soft grass, or would render him completely immobile during practice.

In the back of his mind, he begs for someone, anyone to save him from himself and the poison that constricted his entire being every second he was awake.

It wasn't his fault that he was born like this, it wasn't his fault that he had a hard time controlling emotions that thrashed against his brain like waves during a storm, the sparks of anger like lightning against the calm, dark depths of the sea that his twin held. The crashing of thunder like the uncontrollable waves of sorrow that would hold onto his heart and the overwhelming sense of dread that would overcome him when he was alone in his shared room, his heart constricting and the cavern of his chest feeling as though it were being filled with magma that would spill at any second into the crevices of his lungs and threatened to take him with it if he gave in to it fully; a bitter sirens song that taunted him and danced in the corners of his vision.

Or the solemn dullness that would often follow these outbursts, like a sudden, uneasy calm of the sea. There was no crashing of the waves, there was no current or undertow. Just ultimate stillness in which he couldn't muster the energy to stand straight- or even the energy to stand at all. It was as though he'd lost control of his limbs- whether legs or tail- and would be doomed to lie in bed all day.

The kind of stillness that made his hands itch to do anything but hang limply at his sides, the kind of stillness that allowed his thought to creep back into the spaces of his mind that he so desperately defended against the bitter comments that many so carelessly toss in his direction. The kinds of words stuck like thorns in his heart and often left him to isolate himself in fear of what he would do should he allow this monster raging within him to take control.

Floyd Leech had been this way since he was a child.

He had been called an animal, and he had been called a monster. Even when he was so young he could barely swim in a straight line, even when he would look up at those around him with his wide eyes and meet their annoyed gazes when he once more swam off and broke something or got into something. Even when he was a young elver, no knowledge of the world aside from the love he held for his family- especially the love he held for his twin and the little voice in the back of his mind nagging at him to protect the other elver. 

He could even see the unspoken words in his parent's eyes when they would be summoned to his elementary school for fighting another child, talking back to the teacher, or refusing to do anything at all. How could he?

Nobody would listen when he told them what had really happened. Nobody would ever believe him when he explained why he did what he did, that he was in full control of his actions and they were not just a result of the fog that hung around him since he first hatched.

He was labeled as destructive since he had first hatched, and he would be stuck with that label for the rest of his life.

That day, a larger mer had stolen something from his twin and then berated and beat the small eel when he tried to get it back, teasing him with an evil sneer painted on his face. Seeing Jade's teary face, the way his lip wobbled and his wide eyes went watery as he sniffled and sobbed in the corner of the small classroom, wiping at his face and too scared to tell his brother what had happened.

"Floyd, please-"

Jade knew what he would do. And Jade knew that his brother would get in trouble- or he would get in trouble, having been mistaken for his twin countless times.

"Floyd, they're gonna think I'm you! Stop it!" His twin wailed. “You’re gonna get hurt!”

But Floyd didn't care. Floyd had never seen his brother cry so earnestly in response to something someone did to him, seen the boy curled up so tightly in on himself, shoulders shaking and gills flaring with every pained breath he dared to take.

Where Floyd was often over-reactive, Jade was under-reactive.

They were two sides of the same storm.

Jade was the quiet warning- harsh winds and small rain droplets, the sound of the boats rocking the dock and slamming against the wooden structure, the creaking of the sails and the flags, the whipping of fabrics.

And Floyd, the thunder that shook houses and knocked things off shelves, the lightning that struck and struck and struck until people cowered away, curled in the comfort of their houses and fireplaces, waiting for the storm to be over.

The other mer had taken his warning away, a mistake he would soon come to regret.

The next thing Floyd knew, he was in the principal's office with his parents and the other boy, now bandaged and shaking, sobbing into his mother's arms while she glares daggers at the eel who sits between his parents, not a scratch present aside from the long claw marks that raked down his arm from when the other boy had tried grabbing at him. His brother sat beside him, bandages on his cheek and along his gills from when the larger boy had hit and scratched him.

Fights in the Coral Sea did not mean a simple scuffle. One does not bleed and swim away. Floyd and the other boy's wounds spewed crimson into the classroom in their fight, and the whole school had to go into lockdown due to the threat of sharks and other predators, and all the other parents were called to collect their children after they left wailing from the sight of such violence breaking out.

His teacher turned to him, a pained look across her face as she looked down at the bleeding eel, hands still shaking from the scuffle. She stared down at him with pity, shaking her head softly as she sighed after escorting the smallest boy out of the classroom.

"Why do you have to cause so much trouble all the time?"

He paused, staring down at his still bloody hands as he watched the rest of them leave, the other boy being taken away by the school nurse and a couple of other teachers, who all looked at him in the same way.

"That boy is an animal."

"How could a child do such a thing?"

"He's uncontrollable."

"A monster."

But Floyd was indifferent to those comments. He, in his short lifetime, had grown used to them. The sting they once held had died, and with it, the power those words held.  

His parents were not indifferent. His parents were patient, yes, they would have to be with their son's explosive personality. He remembers their countless apologies, his mother's worried gaze down at him, and his father's angry one. He remembers swimming past their room at night to tell them goodnight, and hearing their hushed whispers about what they should do with him. Even then he remembers the way his heart sank and his eyes welled up with tears when his parents talked about putting him in a separate school, with children who were "like him"; when his father spoke out to his weeping mother about how their son was abnormal.

Even worse was his mother's reply.

"Why can't he be more like Jade?"

He swam back to his room sobbing that night, burying himself in his clamshell bed and hiding beneath every blanket he could find. He considered running away so he wouldn't bring his parents down even further and embarrass the family so that Jade could have a better life without him.

Floyd did not like this new feeling toward his twin. It danced along the thin border between jealousy and malice, anger at how he, being the louder twin, always seemed to get the short end of the stick. It wrapped around his heart and squeezed until he squirmed in discomfort in his bed, weeping softly, quietly so as to not wake his brother who slept on the other side of the room.

"Floyd?" His brother quietly whispered, floating over to the pile of blankets that the other twin was buried under, sniffling.

"Go away," Floyd whines, tail flicking in annoyance as it peeked out from under the blankets. Floyd could feel the slight tug as his twin rested beside him, atop the blankets that he was hidden under.

"Please come out," Jade had taken on the same tone that he always does when Floyd gets into one of his moods- caring, persuasive, and, as Floyd now saw it as, condescending. It was as though he were coaxing his younger brother out rather than his twin. Floyd takes a deep breath as his fins flare out in annoyance, feeling the familiar tendrils of wrath constrict around his heart as he shot up and out of bed, gills pulsing with every shaky breath he took in.

"Just go away!"

"Floyd," Jade's tone held a silent warning within it, and that made the boy even more enraged.

"Shut up!" He snarled. "Just shut up! I don't care!" He began to thrash, trying to escape from his blankets so he could run before he hurt his brother.

"If you didn't care, then why were you crying?" Jade asks matter-of-factly. Floyd narrows his eyes and clenches his fists at his sides.

And he did what he always does- he shut down.

Floyd grits his teeth and swims out the door, wiping away angry tears that spilled from his eyes as he raced as fast as he could out of his family's mansion, swimming until he was out of breath and had to relax against one of the large rock structures that bordered his neighborhood.

He had run away.

He didn't have to bother his family anymore.

The adrenaline of his previous angry outburst had calmed down, his heart now racing with stomach-twisting anxiety the more the boy looked around and thought; along with the grief that came with realizing that he could not go home, that he would never see his brother, or his parents, or his grandmother again.

Floyd rested his head against the rock, curling as tightly in on himself as possible and sobbing when he thinks that it would be better for them this way.

Jade could take over the business, and they don't have to worry about Floyd getting in the way.

And so he sobbed, he sobbed until his lungs hurt and his tail cramped from being curled up for so long. He sobbed until unsuspecting creatures living within that rock crawled on his skin and pinched or rubbed against him, beckoning him into their home.

He spent that night on the rock.

And the next in a shipwreck.

And the next in a cave near the Deep.

Floyd had been declared a missing person for three weeks when he was found, stealing from a market a few towns over. The elderly merwoman who had taken him had arrived with scratches and bite marks along her frail body, battle scars from trying to wrangle this child and take him to the local guards' station.

Nobody knew how he survived that long on his own. Even he didn't know how.

All he knew was that he was tired, scared, and hungry, and he so desperately wanted to crawl into his mother's arms and sob but simultaneously swim out of the station and never return as the uneasiness twisted in his gut and his jaw quivered the longer he sat in the uncomfortable station. They had given him a small room to stay in until his family came, scattered with toys that were for children much younger than he was, and plain walls.

The window was barred off from the outside, and Floyd could only reach his arm out and wave to the people passing by from there quietly.

He was a caged animal.

When his parents came to pick him up, he noticed that his twin was nowhere to be seen. While his mother wept and held him close to her chest, patting down his hair and occasionally pulling back to cup his small, scratched face and look deep into his tired eyes.

He did not cry like he thought he would.

He felt numb, which was worse than anything else he could have experienced. He felt as though he didn't deserve his mother's attention, or his father's light scoldings to cover his worry for his son. Floyd felt as though he didn't deserve to cry.

So he bottled it away and replaced it with indifference.

Floyd didn't speak a single word for the next two years; not when his parents would beg him to say something, anything; not when his twin would shoot him a sad gaze in school or while they were getting ready for bed; not when he was having a nightmare; not when he just needed someone to hold him like the scared and confused child that he was. His mind was like a maze even he couldn't navigate- it was a separate entity to him; an alien in his own skull. He couldn't bring himself to speak, or to smile.

And people were more tolerant of the way he was when he didn't speak.

Nobody called him a monster or compared him to his brother. He was tamed. The beast inside him still thrashed about in its confines, boiling over until he could lock himself in a closet in their mansion and scream into his pillow- chewing the edges and gnawing and scratching at it until it was a pile of string on the ground.

The beast would fight, and Floyd would fight back. His outbursts had died down to the point where his family and teachers became concerned for him- but he could see their underlying relief when he was no longer having weekly meetings in the principal's office.

He believed that if he fought the beast, he would lose as he always had. So he did what he thought would be best- he destroyed the beast's cage; slamming his head into walls, pulling at his scalp; purposefully breaking his claws and tearing his fins; pushing his magic to the limit just to watch the ink of blot float in the water around him as delicate tendrils that wrapped around him and feel the sting of its acidity eating away at his body.

Nobody but his brother had noticed.

And Jade had pleaded for him to stop, to tell him what was wrong, to let him hold him as they did when they were kids and Floyd was having a hard time communicating what he needed.

But Floyd would not.

He tried to run away a few times after that- much faster now that he'd reached his early teens. Sometimes he'd succeeded, other times he gave up a mile down the road and would swim back in defeat. His family stopped looking for him, knowing he would come back eventually. Jade always knew where to find him, and would sometimes stay with him for a few nights until they would both swim home together.

He disappeared for another month and a half the summer before their second year of middle school. He considered never returning to his home. Of course, he ended up getting bored and coming back home, only to be met with the same annoyed stares and forlorn silence he was used to.

"Floyd?" His brother peeks into the room, carrying a stack of books in his still scrawny webbed arms. "Did you have fun?"

The other twin offers a noncommital hum before he sits on the edge of his clamshell bed, laying back against the inside and staring at the ceiling. The urge to do more and utter boredom claws at his heart until it's nearly unbearable and he finds himself clawing at his chest, leaving long, angry red scratches that seep into the water around him. He feels another cold hand rest against his own, and he resists the urge to look up at his brother.

"Enough of that," Jade mumbles quietly. Floyd scowls.

"Fuck off."

"Tell me what's wrong... please," Jade sits beside him, and Floyd fights against the anger that swells in his heart. "You've been like this since that day... it's been years so, please," Jade's mismatched eyes meet his twin's, and Floyd scoffs, pushing down the surge of sadness that builds within his chest and the lump that forms in his throat "Talk to me.". After a few more moments of silence, their eyes meet and Floyd gasps, feeling the familiar surge of Jade's unique magic flow through his veins- hotter than the openings of the underwater vents and just as relaxing as the soft swell of a wave. Floyd's mind goes blank.

"I hate myself," The words spilled from his lips and, with them, the tears that welled in his eyes. It had finally happened- his heart was on display after being so carefully hidden away. The beast had finally seen the light.

"How so?"

"Everyone wants me to be you. Nobody wants me to be me," He takes a breath, gills flaring as the magic weakens, but Floyd can still feel the words tumbling from his mouth, getting caught on his shaky breaths as he curls in on himself, hugging his tail close to his chest. "I'm a monster."

"And I'm less so?"

Floyd lets out an annoyed huff, tucking his chin down so it touches his chest as he bites down the growl that crawls up his throat. "You don't get it! Mama and Papa wish they never had me! If you went missing, everyone would look for you! They don't care about me!"

"Floyd..."

"Shut up! Shut up!" Floyd sobs, grabbing the sides of his head and wailing into his bed. "I don't want to be like this anymore! I just wanna be normal!"

"Floyd please!"

"No! No!" The other twin can only wail, claws digging into his scalp as he sobs hopelessly, screams shaking his entire body as his gills flare open, trying to capture every small bubble that would happen to float his way, desperate for oxygen. "Just leave!"

His jaw trembles as he continues to sob, squirming away from his brother when the young boy holds out his hand, placing it on his shoulder. He felt too hot, like his mind was twisting painfully to reach the end goal- even if it didn't even know if there was an end goal. His heart felt too full. His brain felt too full. Floyd wanted to rip them out and tear away at them until they were piles of mush on the ground, and even more until they floated to the surface and he never had to feel this way again.

Floyd's heartbeat raced in his ears as his vision got blurry, his sobs turning into pained gasps as he scratched at his throat, claw catching on a gill and tearing through the flesh painfully as he took a deep breath followed by a scream that tore at his throat as he thrashed. Panic filled his chest as he found himself unable to do anything but wail, vision spinning as his entire body tensed painfully and he writhed on the bed, throat burning painfully as red seeped into the water.

He heard Jade screaming for him, he was sure of it. But his brother sounded so far away from the prison he was trapped in, as though Floyd was slowly sinking into the Deep to be eaten by predators much larger than he. He remembers screaming Jade's name over and over again, slamming his eyes shut as his entire body trembled.

He vaguely felt the soft touches of his mother, her voice lost in the haze before he sobbed into the water, grasping at his throat.

"I can't breathe!" He choked out painfully. "Mama! I can't breathe!" He tries to grasp for her, but he can't seem to have any control over his tense limbs.

He didn't have time to catch his mother's response before his eyes rolled back and he fell unconscious.

Floyd awoke in a hospital bed, entire body sore as he winced from the movements and the scratchiness of the bandages against his throat. He stares at his hands in front of him, trembling as he tries to call out for someone, the words drying out before they can escape past his lips.

"J-Jade?" His voice is raspy, and it drags painfully against his sore throat. He's alone in the hospital, he realizes with a shaky sigh as he looks back down to his lap. Nobody came for him.

He can only make out the quiet chatter outside the door before it's pushed open and his eyes meet Jade's.

For the first time since they were children, Jade smiles and Floyd smiles back.

He'd learned to tame his emotions- much better than he could when he was young, despite knowing all too well that he cannot quell the surges that would come and shift by the hour. He'd patched things with his brother, after years and years of quiet, tear-filled nights as he slowly tried to put his feelings into words. It worked sometimes- and other times he cold only sit in silence as tears streamed down his face and he shook in terror- terror caused by his own mind- as Jade held him gently, tail curled in his own protectively.

The mood swings would never go away, Floyd knew that much. Nobody could take them away, or make them better. Nobody could help him out of his slumps, no matter how desperately they tried. His family learned early on that letting him burn out- as they always had before- was the worst they could do for him.

They finally listened. They sat as Floyd explained, in a flurry of stammers and curses, what he felt. He put the beast on display for them to see, to poke at and to try to tame. It was still within him, after all these years. He despised the fact, but he learned that he could live with it.  And now, five years later, he stares at the ceiling of he and his brother's shared dorm room, listening to the soft snoring of his twin on the other side.

Floyd takes a breath, sitting up in bed and rubbing at his eye with the back of his hand and clumsily walking towards Jade's side of the room, cursing quietly to himself as he trips over the shoes and books strewn about on the floor, barely illuminated by the soft blue light of the tank in their room. He grumbles and pushes Jade over a bit, the other boy taking a deep breath and frowning in his sleep, stirring before he falls silent once more.

Floyd rests on his knee as he climbs into bed, peeling the blanket back and slipping beneath it, wrapping his long limbs around his brother and resting his head on the pillow, watching Jade's face twist as he dreams silently.

Floyd smiles to himself, allowing his eyes to fall closed as he joins his brother in dreamland.

Floyd Leech was not a monster.

He never was.

[satashiiwrites]

Snippet Sunday/Summer Fic Preview

Wasn’t tagged but getting some writing done now that my social calendar is more open on this lovely Sunday morning. If you’d liked to be tagged when I post/update this fic, please like, comment or reblog and I’ll take that as permission to add you to the tag list for updates.

Happy Pride!

Title: Welcome to the Jungle

Fandom: 911, Jumanji

Pairings: Evan Buckley/Eddie Diaz, Robbie Nash/Danny Buckley, past Eddie Diaz/Shannon Diaz mentioned

Fic Summary:  From the concrete jungle to the actual jungle, five players will be summoned to Jumanji to save it from the wicked Van Pelt.

Rating: Explicit (sex, stereotyped villain, implied/mentioned child neglect) 

Tags/warnings: explicit sex, canon-typical violence, Jumanji AU, time travel fix it, slow burn, long fic, pod fic welcome, deviating from canon where it suits the story, canon timeline is a mess and we’re just not going to stress about it, author doesn’t do straight up adaptations, eventual happy ending, mention of divorce and canon character deaths, aged up Robbie and Brook, mentions of child neglect/abuse from the Buckley parents,

Mom is off somewhere, supposedly talking to his doctors, when the play therapist Tiffany stops by, announcing her presence with a happy little series of knocks and a smile. “Danny! How are you doing today?”

Danny likes Tiffany—she always remembers to call him Danny instead of Daniel, like Mom insists everyone call him because she detests nicknames. Tiffany also always has a smile for him when he’s having bad treatment days. She’s the one who snuck him in his favorite stuffed animal, a golden eagle he’d dubbed Aquila after one of his early babysitters had read him a book about constellations. Aquila is currently standing guard over Evan’s crib since Danny can’t be there, which is more important than being with Danny while he’s in the hospital. 

“Hey, Tiffany. I’m doing okay.”

Tiffany’s blue eyes narrow as she inspects him playfully before she breaks and winks at him, and the smile returns. “Just okay?”

Danny shrugs. He’s stuck here, and they’d had the first hint of spring weather this week. He can’t wait to make a flower crown for Evan like Maddie had made for him last year. 

“Aw, buddy, I get it. Hopefully, the doctors will let you fly the coop soon.”

“Mom’s talking to them.”

“Well, I got a great selection of things to keep you busy while they talk. We even got a donation of a few of the new Game Boys yesterday. How’d you like one of those?”

“What? Really?” Danny perks up. “Which games do you have?”

Tiffany hands him a brand new Game Boy. “We’ve got a few games. Zelda, Mario, Kirby,” she says idly as she sorts through the cartridges. “We’ve got multiples of those but only one of this jungle adventure game, so it’s the only one if you want that one.”

“Jungle game?”

“Ju…man…ji? I’m not sure if I’m saying that right.”

“Let me see it. You said it’s an adventure game?”

“I think so? The label looks adventurous.”

“Give me that one and Zelda.”

“Here ya go. I’ll be back tomorrow to switch you out if you beat both of them by then. Stay out of trouble, kiddo.”

Rolling his eyes at Tiffany’s playful admonition, Danny puts Zelda in first as he’s heard a lot about it. Soon, he’s joyfully adventuring as Link and spends a few hours running around Hyrule. Mom comes back and leaves again, which she’s been doing more and more. She’s spending a lot of time with that one doctor—Dr. Barnes. 

Dr. Barnes is young and has been the biggest advocate for Danny getting a stem cell transplant. He also has the same blue eyes as Evan. 

Danny’s heard the nurses say that more than once. 

Link’s adventures prove to be preoccupying through the dinner hour, and Danny manages to eat a few chicken nuggets before refusing more food (hospital food is generally gross, but even they can’t screw up chicken nuggets). Mom checks in on him briefly before saying something about going to call Dad and then disappears again, leaving him alone.  

There aren’t any good cartoons at night, so he picks up the Game Boy again and decides to try the other game—Jumanji. The screen blinks, and drums echo through his room, startling Danny. It sounds like it’s coming from the walls, not the game in his hands, which vibrates synchronously with the increasing tempo as if the drums are coming closer. 

“Wow,” he says as the drumbeat climaxes and abruptly cuts off, the room silent around him. “This game is wicked.”

Text scrolls across the screen, and he reads it aloud, faking a British accent as it seems to fit the game’s mood. “For those who seek to find a way to leave their world behind, choose your avatar.”

[duskspring]

A Hobby and Late Night - Rain/Aurora

Domestic December - Day 17

Summary: Rain and Aurora share a gaming hobby and accidentally stay up til 3 at which point a nice convo happens

Content (do let me know if I forgot anything!): Talks of self discovery, introspection, cuddling

Word count: ~900

“Yes! Get fucked!” Aurora cheered, her arms flying into the air.

For a moment she got to ignore the cramp in her hands, while Rain’s defeat was only worsened by his awareness of his aching back. The two had been fully immersed in the video game they played together all night. Rain had spent most of that time leaning over his own lap, arms resting on his knees, while Aurora hadn’t stopped aggressively clutching her controller in excitement for even a minute.

The water ghoul was happy she enjoyed video games as much as he did. Copia had introduced them to him when he was first summoned and now he got to pass that proverbial torch to her.

He smiled when he saw Aurora yawn, “Tired already? It’s only…” He grabbed his phone to check the time, eye widening in realization. He turned the screen around so she could see, “3am.”

“What?!” Aurora sat up in a hurry, suddenly not as tired. Rain quickly motioned for her to keep it down, causing her to cover her mouth with her hands, “Did we really play that long?”

“Did it really take you that long to beat me?” He teased, referencing how she had wanted to keep playing until she beat him in a match. Unfortunately for her, Rain had much more experience with the levels, hence why it had indeed taken forever.

“You’re rude.” She jokingly pouted, crossing her arms over her chest.

“But you did it eventually. Congratulations.” He held out his hand for a friendly shake, but she harshly high fived him instead before yawning again, “Do you want to go to bed?”

“No, I wanna stay with you a little longer.” Aurora crawled over, snuggling into Rain’s side with her arm around his waist.

“That’s alright,” One of his arms came around her shoulders, “I assume you liked that game?”

She nodded excitedly, “I think this one’s my favorite. No offence to Copia, but a lot of the games he plays aren’t nearly as thrilling.”

Rain nodded, “I get that. But relaxing games can be fun. I think you’d like some cozy games with a lot of customization.”

“Oh, that sounds fun.” She sounded overjoyed, regardless of how sleepy she was, “I love character customization. Making yourself look cool in a game is so much easier than changing stuff in real life.”

“Is there anything you would want to change?”

She shrugged, burying her face a little farther into Rain’s side, “Sometimes I see people in outfits or with styles that look so pretty, but I don’t know if they would be fit for me.”

“That makes sense. I feel the same way sometimes when I see Dew or you. You guys look so cool all the time, but I know if I dressed up like that I wouldn’t be true to myself.”

“But how do you know? Have you ever tried?”

“In the case of Dew, yes. I’ve let him make me over before. It didn’t really work,” Rain smiled at the memory, “But for the most part, I don’t know. Well, I know, but I don’t know how I know. That’s just a matter of knowing yourself.”

Aurora took a second to process the words, “That must be nice. Knowing who you are.”

Rain’s smile softened further, brushing a hand through her colored locks, “You’ll get there. You’re still young, still adjusting to topside culture. One of them, at least. It will come.”

“How long will that take?”

“I don’t know,” Rain laughed lightheartedly, “That’s different for everyone.”

The ghoulette stayed quiet for just long enough that Rain thought she may have fallen asleep, “I like who you are.” She suddenly admitted.

“And who am I to you?” He inquired curiously.

“You’re… Rain. You’re considerate and true to your feelings. You love anything waterrelated, it so obviously makes you super happy. You can be shy, but never hide any part of yourself. I never feel like you’re putting up a front to me. Like, I’m always talking to the real you, if that makes sense.”

Rain nodded along, “Thank you. That’s really kind and you are actually making sense to me. If I had to describe you in return, I’d say joyous. You get so excited about even the smallest things and it brings everyone else’s mood up as well. You don’t try to subvert people’s expectations of you, but you still manage to do so. You’re…” Finding the words proved more difficult than expected, “very unique. Even if I don’t always understand, it's clear that you look at the world and other people in such a way that even if it only makes sense to you, it's still something new. That’s a compliment, by the way.” He looked down at his subject of analysis, not getting any reaction. Looking a little closer, he soon realized she had, at last, fallen asleep.

His smile was loving. He carefully peeled her arm from around him so he could stand up. She whined softly at the loss and before she managed to wake herself again, he picked her up to carry her off to bed.

Looking back down at her one more time, Rain saw someone familiar. It was like he understood everything about her even if he really didn’t. It didn’t matter if Aurora didn’t know exactly who she was yet, he knew she’d get there soon. And he could only hope she’d love herself as much as he did.

[My Main Masterlist | Domestic December Masterlist]

[mysticmistral]

After 97 (98 counting the wolf from the beginning) deaths, I can say that I FINALLY BEAT MY FIRST (90 percent) BLIND BLOODBORNE RUN. DID IT. SPOILERS FOR ENDING.

And so, this is the last Bloodborne Run update and I know I skipped much. Last update, I defeated Rom. Killed Master Logarious after learning you can just visceral attack him to stop him from going into his second phase, Alligned myself with the Vilebloods, gave Alfred the Summons and was shocked yet not shocked to see him going crazy (I didn’t expect him to turn the Queen to mush) and then turns out he just… dies at the altar. I was so sad to see that, my only friendly person just dead, probably by offing himself.

Played a game of tag with Micolash and died once to the people on the stairs, and found a glitch that he just stands right by the cell door when I was fighting off the skeletons and hit it, so I did not kill him the intended way but I did not want to play tag anymore it was 4am. Gained access to Upper Cathedral Ward, lost a lot of Insight by the brain suckers and fought the blue alien people in the Lumenflower Gardens, defeated Mergo’s Wet Nurse and went to check on the lady in white who peaced out after the boss.

The Dream’s on fire, went to the handicapped old man Gehrman at the tree and refused his offer, of which cured his kneecaps and slaughtered me throughly right before I would reach his Second Phase. Since it was endgame, I decided to explore more. Found the Altar of Despair and with the help of NPC acting as a distraction and the fact I was over leveled by this point, killed the Daughter of Cosmos and accidentally revived Queen Annalise making Alfred surely turn beyond the ‘grave’, I’m sorry man. Found the Darkbeast Paarl who by this point, was easily bodied and made peace with Djura, the man with the machine gun until I realized it is endgame, and me probably has loot. So I killed him, then the guy in the Forbidden Woods, and the other guy who came cause I killed the other guy and got a whistle out of it and forgot to kill the Ward man.

DLC was on sale and I am not counting those deaths literally, the hunters in the first arena wrecked me and their weapons have unfair range, Ludwig wrecked me, got a glow stick out of it, the two guys in the hall wrecked me. Got to the Research Hall and gave a woman some brain fluid, died many times to the Living Failures until I realized that the doors are a safe spot from the meteors. Then I met Lady Maria, she can fist my chest any day but wow was she easy with the Augur and just sticking close. Gascoigne does not teach you parrying, she does. Got lost in the Fishing Hamlet and called on online hunter to help me kill the fish giants, Orphan of Kos and Laurence.

With the DLC tackled along with my sanity slain over how damn hard it was, Gehrman was less tough and just when I thought I won, a creature appears as the Moon Presence and smashes me to pulp since I had barely any items left. I defeated it, and became a Black Leech and the Plain Doll is now the mother figure of a new Great One.

The End!

Game is maginificent and now that I can finally search up everything I missed a lot but I did a lot too. 10 out of 10, great music, hate/love gameplay and fun weapons. A wonderful first soulsborne experience. Hunter Hat, Cainhurst Armor, Hunter trousers, Knight Gloves and armed with my Threaded Cane and Holy Moonlight Sword. Currently in NG+, just beat Gascoigne and loving how you can sweep, but not without challenge still. Do I understand the lore? Probably not. But I am to get the refuse ending this time, and with the help of searching finally, try and get anything I missed. 57 Hours well spent!

[theeflowerofcarnage]

Now that I’m done I can rank hardest to easiest fights in act 3 of the game based on my build ((I had Astarion, Gale, n shadowheart plus my warlock tav who uses counterspell- that helps SO much)

-1. Raphael - his health bar is 666 more than any boss I’ve ever fought - I was maxed out level wise n he still beat my ass🤦‍♀️ - u have to pick dialogue options that piss him off before the fight begins and make sure someone on ur team has Artistry of War spell use it on two of the soul pillars then have someone else knock out the other 2 w magic missile and summon an elemental!! U really need more than 5 people to help u here 😓 longest fight 4 me in the whole game and i kept making stupid choices like making shadowheart use sanctuary on everyone before the fight she really doesnt need to do that also depleted her spell slots- id only use that one on Hope she can die very easily here

- 2. The High Hall Courtyard - im putting this one under Raphael cuz it didn’t take me as long once I got use to the layout of the place but it was very hard on my computer you’ll be facing like 50 enemies they just keep coming up 😕 use the layout to ur advantage stay on the tops of the walls and have the enemies come to u I used edvards black tentacles on the center of the courtyard which slowed everyone down then used the emperors dominate spell with the absolute cultists make sure someone can cast freedom of movement here btw- I wouldn’t summon ur allies here they’re way more useful in the final battle

- 3. Cazador - use the rune powdered bomb u got from helping wulbrin it was the only way I kept astarion alive bc it caused him not to get pulled out of the fight by cazador (imo if u don’t use it here its not worth using until u reach the crown of karsus final battle ) very very easy to get blown off a platform here AND if u decided to let astarion ascend u will have another battle aftwards w (redacted's redacteds)

- 4. Crown of Karsus battle/netherbrain- I nat 20 my way successfully when I encountered the brain the first time that helps cuz the crown was basically already dead when I got there I just needed the emperor to use the nether stones on it! Don’t try to focus on defeating the dragon or other enemies just slow them down put them to sleep or summon allies to distract cuz ur on a time limit. Once the portal was opened I had Gale n the emperor kill the brain very quickly again w the Artistry of War Spell once the brain is done the battle ends n u don’t need to kill the dragon or the others

-5. Gortash. Fucking bombs guy has way too much time on his hands as the archduke whole place was littered w explosives- i had to fight my way to the top of the watchtower n that took foreverrr was also very bad at trying to use the bombs to my advantage cuz I tried to sneak into the place so I just kept running into boobytraps. Very nearly killed myself and astarion here. U need gloves of teleportation, silence spell and use the glyph spells and sleep on Gortash

-6. House of Grief- incredibly easy!! Cuz radiance of dawn and 2 teleport or misty step the place u battle in is very spread out so I just kept teleporting away from others when they got too close. Also will help to have an elemental on ur side! I accidentally revived Viconia after the battle then killed her again n stole her clothes! Lmaooo

-7. Murder Trial and Orin - this was like a walk in the park compared to everything else. I sided w Orin over Gortash so I didn’t need to battle my way down to the Bhaal temple. Everyone is very susceptible to radiance of dawn I used the detonation glyph to push others off the platform. It felt like it took me 20 minutes or less

[theminecraftbee]

I’m so interested in the persona au but SO confused,, if you haven’t already, would you mind doing a quick little summary of what persona even is??? is it a game???

i think if you go through the tag i have also already answered some terminology questions, but yes, i can explain on a higher level what persona is! (this post is now under a cut because i use way too many words here, whoops.)

persona, the game series, is a spinoff of SMT. it uses the same demon designs, general affinity/element system, and "one-more" turn-based combat system as the SMT games. SMT isn't that important in this conversation other than that they're known for being relatively difficult RPGs that like talking about philosophical ideas of order and chaos and humanity and also jack frost is there, hee ho.

(note to self: this is my reminder to actually beat SMT V, i was having so much fun with it then i did the thing that's always a risk when i play long RPGs, which is that i got distracted and the fact it was no longer the cart that was in my switch meant that it no longer existed to my poor ADHD brain. i was only like, two bosses in i think, and only like one MAIN boss, i need to. pick that back up. anyway if you want vague thoughts on "designs that inspire my monster designs", SMT demons, actually. like some of them ARE just fairly standard but some of them are really weird. also when i was writing stuffed bird i was playing SMT III on and off so. there you have it.)

anyway, persona is a spinoff of SMT, so like SMT, it has a battle system that heavily focuses on knowing your opponent's elemental weaknesses, using buffs and debuffs to take down bosses, and of course, as mentioned, jack frost is there, hee ho. however, it is set apart from SMT both by the fact you have a defined party (as opposed to recruiting demons to be your party members, sort of except for the protagonist we'll get to that) and by various plot aspects. in addition, "modern" persona games (so persona 3 though 5) have a social simulator aspect along with the RPG that sets those games apart from other RPGs and is one of the most interesting parts of the game.

generally, this au is based on 3 through 5, not persona 1 or 2. i need to... actually play or watch those at some point but stuff about 3-5 is more accessible and more of the vibes i'm going for. (this au is like, ESPECIALLY persona 4 influenced, because i really love persona 4 golden, even given all of its flaws. probably less inane anime bullshit than takes place in persona 4 but listen it's about the VIBES.)

so, what typically happens in a persona game? well, your protagonist, for some reason or another, is moving to a new town, where a supernatural phenomenon is happening. in three its the dark hour, in four its mysterious unsolved serial murders, and in five its the mental shutdowns. there, relatively quickly, your protagonist gets roped into the supernatural phenomena by discovering the other world that shadows live in, and forms a team to fight those shadows and eventually prevent Bad Things from happening. also at the end you fight god. it's been a different god each time! but like. you know. this is an SMT game at the end you fight god,

(persona 5 being my first SMT game left an impression given that it's a game that ends with your persona evolving into literal satan, it giving you a giant gun, and then you SHOOT GOD IN THE HEAD. say what you will about persona 5 the style points here are off the charts.)

the party members in persona games have a "persona". this, like any SMT demon, is a mythological or literary figure. this "persona" gives the party member wielding it magic powers while they're in the other world they do their fighting in. to fight, a persona user summons their persona to use its powers. all of the party members but the protagonist have a single persona that can learn up to eight moves. the protagonist, however, has a special ability - the protagonist can get new personas by recruiting shadows. in 3 and 4, this is done via a minigame involving tarot cards, and in 5, they use SMT's demon negotiation system. the protagonist can switch between these personas on the fly, gaining that persona's skills, strengths, and weaknesses.

in addition, there is the velvet room - a mysterious place only the protagonist can enter, manned by a guy called igor and an attendant. with this, the protagonist can "fuse" two personas to get a new, stronger persona, which inherits skills from its predecessors. the fusion system is complicated and there are many spreadsheets about it online! for our purposes the important thing here is "the velvet room exists".

however, this rpg half is not the only part of persona gameplay. persona, at its heart, is actually a time management game. see, each persona game takes place over a single year. every day that isn't a day you do some plot event, you're given the ability to choose what to do with your day. while "go to the dungeon and fight things" is an option, it shouldn't be what you do most days. most days, you are doing the protagonist's high school life. this is because, to become strong in a persona game, you must form bonds with the people around you by spending time with them. this is known as the social links (or confidants in p5).

each "social link" has its own story with ten ranks, during which the protagonist gets to know them and their deal better. in order to do this, however, the protagonist needs to have high enough "social stats" to do this, which are also raised through activities in the game. (for example, a particular confidant rank may require your character to have high enough "guts", so you go to do activities that raise your "guts".) getting fully ranked-up with a social link gives you benefits in the actual rpg part of the game, but is also important to get the full story out of the game!

all of these activities take time, and you can normally only do like, two activities that pass time during a day. plus, there are additional time-passing activities in the real world that do things like create healing items, raise your stats, or get things that will give you good gear. so one of the key game mechanics of persona is normally "there are a lot of things you want to be doing, and you need to manage your time well to get as many of them as possible done". certain confidants or activities are only available at certain days, but on rainy days you study better, so which do you do?

persona as a story is normally both about the supernatural phenomenon and the demons you fight and about the protagonist and their friends growing up in the real world as well. both the real world and the supernatural world affect the story and the "vibes" of a persona game, to me, have a lot to do with the real-world setting - almost more than the supernatural setting that you do most of the RPG gameplay in, honestly!

(part of why i love persona 4 so much is very directly "inaba feels like a real, specific place to me, and i care for it".)

anyway, if any of this sounds appealing to you, persona 5 royal is now out on PC and basically every console, and persona 4 golden is now out on PC! additionally, persona 4 golden and persona 3 portable have been announced to be out for console and PC this january, if i remember the date right. honestly do highly recommend persona 5 - you'll see a lot of arguments over it being "overrated", but it has so much style and is very, very good at being highly playable even if you don't normally like its style of turn-based RPG gameplay. there's a reason it became so immediately popular. also, as stated, i love persona 4, but that one's a bit less flashy/polished if you don't already like long RPGs. if you DO already like them however... i highly recommend it it's a fun game.

so yeah hopefully this helps!

[angelofthepage]

Things you might want to know before BATDR releases (in terms of lore)

I've had a lot of conversations in different corners of the fandom about the Bendy books, Boris and the Dark Survival, and now the BATDR trailer, and I think I've got a pretty solid grip on what those pieces of media tried to do to set the stage for this next story. So today I'm gonna go through the pieces and put together a guide with all the details I think you'll want to know for BATDR. We'll see how this holds up on November 15th.

Warning, spoilers for BATIM, Boris and the Dark Survival (BATDS), The Employee Handbook, Dreams Come to Life (DCTL), The Illusion of Living (TIOL), The Lost Ones (TLO), and Crack Up Comics ahead.

Our story begins at the end of Bendy and the Ink Machine. Henry makes it to the machine, he plays a tape that says "The End" after a brutal fight with the inky beast and a monologue from Joey about how he can fix everything. When the boss fight ends and the screen erupts in light, we see Henry enter Joey Drew's apartment. A calendar on the kitchen wall indicates that the year is 1963, the month is August (the calendar date actually changes randomly per playthrough to show it's any day in August except the 31st, you cannot get the 31st to load).

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=SgWN7R4-wPw&t=298s

The bulletin boards are where I want to draw your attention. I'm going to focus on Allison's letter, because it gives us this nugget: she's working for Arch Gate. This was the first time we'd ever heard of Arch Gate, and it didn't have much meaning then, but now it does.

We get a few more disconnected pieces in Boris and the Dark Survival. BATDS is a game where you play as Boris (or a Lost One or Sammy) walking through the studio to collect a set list of supplies for the safehouse. There are other collectibles hiding in lockers, Boris corpses' chests, etc, that give us a number of things to think on. The Milla Legna tapes give us an interesting story that I believe might be tied to Susie Campbell's backstory, but nothing is confirmed. What I'm going to focus on are Wally and Sammy's details. By collecting hidden pieces of pipes, we can assemble a mini game that has a high score set by Wally Franks. If we manage to beat his score, we can an audio log from Joey where he sounds extremely nervous. He begs his friend Nathan to help him out with financial trouble. This was the first time we heard of Nathan, but it won't be the last. https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=2savP-5Y4BY

Additionally, once we've unlocked Sammy (by finding his candles and mask to summon him), we can play as him, and he has two unique abilities. One is that he can teleport through cracks in the walls (which is necessary given he's the only character who can't run), the other is that he can play instruments in the hallway. There's a code for the instruments above where you place his mask (fun Easter egg, it's the same code that originally got us his secret lines in the pre-update version of Chapter 3), and if you play instruments throughout the level, you'll get an audio log from the Unknown Voice to tease Dark Revival.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=K7UG4H4XVng

The Unknown Voice has also appeared on the JDS YouTube page with this mysterious audio log.

https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=dFpgqSnE7zQ&list=PL5adzFCvE4-8cJXkyv9eqp0pOLQPmEamN

If this voice sounds familiar, it's because we've heard him in both of the BATDR trailers, and now we have a face for him. Many suspected this was Sammy, the Ink Demon, or Nathan before this point, but it looks like this fellow might be named Wilson (assuming the guy on the posters and this dude are meant to be the same, I would not be surprised if there's something impostor-y happening). His voice actor is still being kept a secret at this time.

Turning to the books, there's not a lot for me to note from DCTL at this time. This book takes place in summer of 1946 and follows protagonist Buddy Lewek as he becomes a gofer for the studio and ultimately ends up falling into Joey's schemes. The big things we get in this one do more to further our understanding of BATIM, such as telling us why Henry left the studio ala Norman (to spend more time with his wife, Linda). We learn that Sammy got addicted to drinking ink and starting sacrificing people once enough of it was in his system, hearing voices, we get Norman's death off-screen along with most of the art department (save for Abby, we'll talk about Abby in a bit), we find out Joey purchased a theater to expand the JDS building, and we learn part of what the machine is for. Joey wants to bring his characters to life, in part to have meet-able mascots at Bendyland, the upcoming project he pitches to investors (and the scene where he refers to Bertrum as Bertie and pisses him off, we actually get to see it happening in real time!). We also get a cryptic mention from Allison at the party to not forget what happened to Susie when talking to Buddy, to which he responds "who's Susie?" This is important, we know Buddy has never met Susie within this year and that Allison is the voice of Alice Angel by this point.

We know thanks to the Crack Up Comics’ introduction that by 1972, Joey Drew is believed to be dead, and Nathan Arch, head of Arch Gate Studios (a location we see mentioned a few times in the background of the BATDR trailer) has purchased the rights and assets for Bendy. Nathan is a steel and oil tycoon, never having shown a real interest in cartoons before, so why would he do this? Thanks to the JDS website’s press archives, he tells us it’s to keep Joey’s legacy alive, but is that the full truth?

https://www.joeydrewstudios.com/archive

We assume he wants it for the ink machine, it’s an invaluable piece of technology. But we also see several things in the trailer and on the JDS website that point to media preservation. A museum dedicated to Bendy’s history, a banner advertising “Joey Drew The Man and The Demon,” which sounds like a documentary. Even the animation cell we see Audrey working on is taken from the cartoon Cheap Seats, the first time we as fans got to see Alice speak in a cartoon. TIOL and the Crack Up Comics are framed as being projects that archive Joey’s legacy with the way that they’re released, and while Nathan tells us that he hasn’t messed with The Illusion of Living (which was originally released as Joey’s memoir in 1942 in-universe, right as Bendyland was being conceptualized and Joey got into contact with Bertrum), we don’t know how truthful it is. His anecdotes and annotations within Joey’s memoir do leave you wondering just how good of friends they really were. It begs a lot of questions, what is Arch Gate up to? I get the sense the motivation is a little bit of wanting the machine for a greater purpose and another piece achieving Joey’s dream where he could not, bringing cartoons to life. But we can’t be sure. There’s a lot we have questions on for BATDR, but I suspect it’ll be an exciting ride going into it. The one question I have is will we see Abby Lambert.

For those who don’t know, Abby is a very important character to the books. She’s a friend of Joey’s in the late 20s, an artist who’s not super traditional (she wears a lot of men’s suits and I believe was described as having short hair?), and she’s responsible for connecting Joey and Henry. Upon going to an art show where Henry’s work was on display with Abby, Joey started getting ideas about producing cartoons. Then he tried to come up with main character’s concept, and Abby tried to draw it but missed the mark. So she invited Henry over to help, which Joey was a little miffed about since he didn’t want a lot of people to know yet, but with a little back and forth and critique, Bendy was born (and apparently he’s named after a dead photographer from the detective story in this memoir, but that’s a rabbit hole I’m not ready to go down). After that, Joey and Henry start JDS together, and after Henry’s left, Abby is finally available to come on and works as the head of the art department (according to Joey). He talks to highly of her in TIOL, but when we see her in DCTL, she’s exhausted, frustrated, and he’s kind of dismissive of her when Buddy’s caught stealing from the department. Abby is important to the history of some of our central characters, and while I don’t think we should need the books to understand BATDR, I do hope she makes an appearance with some context. Bendy exists because of three people, it feels like she should be there. That’s all I have for now for details you might have missed from the books and spinoffs that I suspect will be relevant to this game. Here’s wishing you all a fun time with BATDR tomorrow (2 AM EST on Steam to be exact), beware the ink demon!

[greetings-inferiors]

You mentioned KH asks?

What’s your hot take on something KH related?

My hottest kingdom hearts take is probably that kh3 is better than kh2 in nearly every way. Both of them are incredible games and in my top 3 (with the original too), but to me I think kh3 is much better.

To me the only things that kh2 even has a chance at beating kh3 at are the combat (which is fucking excellent) and the story (but it has some caveats I’ll get to)

First, the combat: it’s flawless, I won’t even lie. My only complaints are that in critical the early game is wayyyy more difficult than the rest of the game. Yes I know that I’m complaining about the hardest difficulty being too difficult, but what I mean is that before you get enough options and get going Sora’s kind of a sitting duck to every enemy except literal shadows. Every single thing one shots or two shots him, and enemies are difficult because you don’t have to proper abilities to crowd control or do single target damage yet. But once you get going then the combat is excellent. The other problem is that it doesn’t explain summons, and to a lesser extent limits, very well. I think almost every casual player has this same problem, being they hardly use limits and summons and mainly only use drive forms, which are much more intuitive. Once you know how to use them they’re insane, but still.

Kh3, however, ALSO has excellent combat. It basically does all that kh2 does well, with drive forms being replaced by formchanges (which while maybe not as fun are definitely more balanced, they’re still really fun though), summons being replaced by links (which I personally prefer, apart from like Ralph they seem more intuitive), and the long combos are back. The only problem I have is that kh3 doesn’t have as many reaction commands. They’re still there, but they’re fewer and far between compared to kh2 where most enemies and practically every single boss had a reaction command, with most of them being unique.

So if kh3 does better the one thing that kh2 unquestionably does perfectly (which is my opinion, apparently Sora feels too “floaty” in kh3 and honestly I don’t even know what that means he feels great to control to me, my favourite combos in kh2 were the ones were sora takes an enemy to the skies, I enjoyed grinding mushroom no.8), how does the other boon of kh2, the story, fare?

Well let me just say that the beginning, middle, and end are ALL incredible. The Roxas prologue might be the best opening to any game ever, the battle of a thousand heartless will never stop being awesome, and the ending is just *chef’s kiss*. But a story has more to it, you can’t have a banger opening then go missing for ten to twenty hours then come back then go missing again for another ten hours. You have to be there throughout. I’m obviously referring to the Disney worlds. They’re honestly chain of memories in terms of story, they’re just lucky that they have incredible combat to back it up. Kh2 started the trend of “just do the movie with sora Donald and goofy in the background” and it’s particularly heinous. Either the original or revisit is just the movie’s plot, and the one I enjoyed more is ALWAYS the one which tells a new story. It’s not necessarily a bad thing, but 99% of the time a unique scenario is better.

To use kh3 as an example, we have two worlds whose stories are just “movie but with sdg”, and that’s arendelle and kingdom of corona. In arendelle yeah it’s awful but in kingdom of corona the tangled story is actually really fun I think it’s the 1% that get it right imo. And the toy box and monstropolis scenarios are so cool that it’s actually possible to say that they are canon TO THE MOVIES because they work so well. Also, ALL worlds tie into the game’s plot and they ALL tell you how they relate to the themes of the game. And if you think that Arendelle is just frozen but with sdg if you agree with game theory (which I do) there’s evidence that the story was going to be an original one, about Elsa being tempted by the organisation into being a villain, but sdg convince her not to and that her powers don’t make her evil. But Frozen 2 was coming out soon and disney probably just made them do the first movie almost as a promotion. Anyway, kh3 also puts a little bit of story inbetween each Disney world, so even if you didn’t enjoy the Disney world’s story, you get some story as a reward every time you finish one! A lot of people have problems with the story but personally I don’t see it, I think a lot of that either stems from not being familiar with every game so they have no idea what’s happening, or just not being keen on the cheesy dialogue (newsflash it’s always been this cheesy). Personally I love Kh3’s story and feel it’s a great wrap up on the dark seeker saga, and a great Segway into the lost masters arc.

Now, the biggest thing that kh2 does poorly is world design. It’s been said a million times but kh2 is essentially a bunch of flat corridors between fights. Which is all well and good since the game’s combat is so damn good, but compared to kh1 and kh3 it’s honestly quite sad. Kh1 does it the best, it almost feels like a 3D metroidvania, and you can interact with everything, and kh3 is similarly packed with interactions, but on a massive scale. Kh2 is small scale and you can hardly do anything. Chests are just placed around with little thought to hide them in interesting or hard to reach places, and the only reason to EVER use your movement options outside of combat and getting places faster is to collect puzzle pieces, which umm suck sorry not sorry.

Anyway now time for small things - the gummi ship in kh3 is the only time I don’t want to die while playing the gummi ship, the magic feels SO GOOD in kh3 whereas unless you’re in a drive form it just feels clunky and stiff in kh2, the chemistry between Sora Donald and Goofy feels so much better in kh3 than in kh2, switching between three keyblades is the best thing ever honestly it’s so cool and works really well with formchanges, the three arrows building up to give you formchanges or magical finishers or whatever is way better than the drive gauge, shotlocks are really cool and really fun to use (my only problem is that focus is really hard to build up), flowmotion is so fun to traverse with and can be used to extend combos, the game is just more charming, aaand that’s all I can think of off the top of my head.

Honestly I literally just finished kh2 and haven’t played kh3 in a year or two, but still. I really really like kh2 but I just think that kh3 does everything it does badly well and everything it does well at least good or sometimes even better. My personal ranking of the games is 312, but idk it’s so close between all of them. I probably had more fun with kh2, but 1 and 3 was more fun at all times, y’know?

[tadpole-apocalypse]

Ask meme questions for Morgan: 16, 17, and 32!

16. Which of the companions does your Tav trust most? - 17. Which of the companions does your Tav distrust most?

Well we’ll just answer these together :3 I’m gonna go with like, her Act 1 impressions, since by the end of the game she trusts them all.

Ok this is a fun question. First I want to go into something about Morgan; she is always in people’s heads, trying to read their thoughts. This is how I role play her high charisma score; she’s not actually charismatic, she is just practiced at picking out what will get her what she wants from people’s minds. In this game she has two methods; detect thoughts and now this new tadpole mindlink. But the mind link is not sneaky at all, the other tadpoled companions can feel her digging around with it pretty easily, so she doesn’t really use it that way unless both are agreeing to share something. But I do imagine they all still get psychic impressions from one another…man I wish the game went into the tadpole connections more.

Sticking with the origin companions, the ones she trusts right away - Lae’zel, Wyll and Karlach.

Lae’zel has strong mental defenses but with a bit of effort Morgan can tell right away she’s panicked and honest in that she believes the creche will offer them a cure. Wyll and Karlach are also honest in what they say and what they think; more importantly she confirms they all share the desire to avoid ceromorphosis. Morgan is very excited when they recruit Wyll, she can tell right away he’s Noble (though she doesn’t pick up he’s the duke’s son) and expects him to take over as party leader….until he gets bedeviled. Curses.

Distrusts the most - Shadowheart, Gale and Astarion.

As soon as Shadowheart refuses to say who she worships, Morgan figures its one of the evil ones, and sure enough, she picks up on Shar all over her mind. Does she know anything about Shar? No. But it’s enough to make her extremely wary around the cleric and they proceed to have a rocky first act. She doesn’t trust Gale because he’s a wizard, he’s kind of pompous, and because he keeps catching her digging around into her mind, and NO she won’t apologize because for all she knows they have devious intentions and she has every right to protect herself considering their circumstances, and also there is something deeply, tightly guarded inside him that she cannot penetrate that frightens her.

Astarion is silent, except for the tadpole. She uses it once on him; when he goes to bite her for the first time. Once she understands he’s undead, it makes sense. Detect thoughts won’t work. Her trust levels even out when she realizes he just really, really wants blood, to the point of pathetically begging for it.

32. How did your Tav get their scars, if they have any?

Her facial scar was caused by a pissed off pixie with a needle that her wild magic summoned once. There’s a reason she didn’t free the one from the moon lantern 🤭

She also has some scars on her back/shoulders from old childhood beatings. Probably a few burn marks from the times she’s randomly burst into flames.

_____

From this ask meme

[sunnyrosewritesstuff]

Day 9: Rainstorms, for Fotfictober!! 🧡🧡🧡

Thank you, Razzy! As I'm starting late...(this is my first one of these😬) I'm going to write each of these from a different fic universe of mine. This is one of 3, if you want me to do anymore throughout the month, please check out the prompt list and shoot me an ask!

Fic Universe: Unnamed Cop/Mafia AU to replace A Walk on the Other Side

Warnings: Mature Content in the form of sexual implications

Word Count: 1309 (I mean...I tried to keep it under 1K)

A Storm is Coming

The pounding rain didn’t even phase Bilbo anymore. He was already soaked to the bone as it was, even as he huddled deeper in his trenchcoat. No, it was the fact that his one single lead seemed to have disappeared in the cold October air.

“I’m sorry, Baggins.” One of the uniformed officers approached. “If there was any paint on that wall, it’s completely gone now. There’s not even drip stains on the ground. Almost like someone took a power washer to it, and used the rain to cover their tracks.”

Bilbo grit his teeth to keep from snapping out of anger. That seemed to be his luck. Just when he thought he might actually gain a foothold on freeing Erebor from gangs holding it hostage, he found himself trapped in a never-ending storm of…His eyes turned up to the gray clouds that showed no sign of clearing.

“Bilbo.” 

He turned to his partner, Theo, who had concern written across his face. Bilbo kind of wanted to deck him for it, but couldn’t even summon up the energy.

“Go home. Get some sleep. You’ve been at this for 36 hours straight.”

Bilbo heaved a large put-on sigh. Theo had a point, damn him. Bilbo just hated that after all that work…it all amounted to nothing. As if reading his mind, Theo gripped his shoulder tightly.

“We can’t win them all, Rook. It’s okay. Come back ready to save the day tomorrow.”

That did pull a small smile to his face. 

“Don’t I need to stay and help with clean up?”

“No! Get out of here!” Theo grumbled with a slap to his butt.

Bilbo tried to dance out of the way, laughing the whole time. However, the good mood, brief though it was, didn’t last past getting into his beat-up Civic. Bilbo sat there in the silent car, keys no where close to the ignition, wiping the rainwater from his face and planning out his next move. He had nothing. For the first time since coming to Erebor, he had no plan B, no ideas for how to make this better…he just felt defeated.

Numbly, he started the car and pulled out into traffic. He didn’t really have a destination in mind, but the rising visage of the mountain-shaped hotel amongst the other skyscrapers solidified just where he was going. The Lonely Mountain.

“Well aren’t you looking like a bit of a drowned rat, if’n you don’t mind me saying so.” Bofur teased as soon as he eased through the back.

“Where’s Thorin?” Bilbo asked bluntly in no mood to play games even if he did enjoy the other man’s company under normal circumstances.

“On the casino floor.” Bofur answered. “I’ll call ahead and have him meet you in your usual corner of the bar.”

Bilbo sighed in relief. “Thanks.”

***

Thorin hadn’t been expecting his little detective to be making a rainy day call, but he definitely wouldn’t say he was disappointed. Even looking soaked and miserable while nursing a beer, Thorin found himself wanting to pin those unruly curls under his hand and plunder his mouth.

“Mr. Baggins, this is certainly a surprise. You have heard of an umbrella before, right?”

Looking up at him, Thorin was able to make out the dark circles hanging low under his eyes and the haggard expression that usually came from a lack of sleep. It was a sight that sobered Thorin up immediately.

“He got away.” Bilbo spat bitterly. “Covered his trail and then let the rain do the rest.”

Thorin winced in sympathy. “I mean, I warned you that going after the Goblin King wasn’t going to be easy.”

“I know. And I…blew your favor anyways. So thanks anyways, but…you were right.”

Thorin didn’t like seeing his detective like this. Bilbo always had this fire about him and a refusal to give up. It’s what made playing with him so much fun. He couldn’t let him give-up now.

“Eh, you’ll get him eventually. You’re too smart for him.”

Bilbo perked up in surprise, and Thorin grinned seeing the warmth return to his hazel eyes. He let his hand slide across the table, playing with the fine hairs on Bilbo’s arm.

“And as for getting another favor back from me…”

He raised an eyebrow, and Bilbo slumped backwards in his seat pulling himself out of Thorin’s reach.

“I’m cold, I’m miserable, and I’m exhausted. I wouldn’t make the best bed partner right now.”

“You know what would warm you up…?”

“Thorin.” Bilbo commanded in that tone that sent a thrill straight to Thorin’s dick. 

This man had no idea what kind of power he had over him. Not even stopping to think about it, Thorin slid his card key across the table.

“Okay, I have to work for another couple of hours. How about you go up to the penthouse, take a shower, order room service, take a nap if you want it…and then if it happens, great. If not, so be it.”

Bilbo raised an eyebrow, the suspicion written clearly on his face.

“I mean, what’s the alternative? Drive half an hour to your crappy apartment, hoping the water heater hasn’t gone out on you again?”

“Okay, first off: stop spying on me. And secondly, what’s the catch here?”

“The catch is that I’m either getting laid or getting you in my debt once more. It’s a win-win for me.”

Bilbo did not seem to think favorably on this response, and Thorin thought he might end up declining after all. With a sigh, Bilbo accepted the card key, and Thorin felt his heart speed up at the gesture.

“Fine. But just so we’re clear, I’m doing this for the incredibly tender steak and not for you. Also, I really hope you don’t try to wake me up, because I have a tendency to kick people in the balls when they try.”

Thorin raised an eyebrow and Bilbo shrugged.

“Ask my cousin, Siggy, if you don’t believe me.”

“Rest assured, I won’t wake you. Or if I do I’ll make sure I’m far out of the range of your feet.”

Bilbo humphed in response, throwing back the rest of his beer before standing up. 

“In any case, regardless of your motives…thank you for this.”

Thorin returned his meekness with a bright grin. “You’re quite welcome. And you can really thank me by taking my cock in your mouth and…”

Bilbo didn’t even let him finish as he rolled his eyes and stomped his way out of the bar. Thorin sat there a moment longer, a ridiculous smile on his face as he watched the soggy detective’s backside. He almost felt downright chipper as he moved to head back out to the main floor when Balin caught him with that knowing look of his.

Thorin groaned. “Can we not today?”

“I don’t know Thorin, are you actually going to listen to me about the cop this time?”

“Nope.” Thorin remarked, already irritated.

Balin wasn’t having it as he put his hand out on Thorin’s arm. 

“A storm is coming, and you don’t need your enemies knowing the ends and outs of this relationship. For your sake…and Mr. Baggins.”

Thorin shrugged him off.

“Then I suggest you do your job, and they’ll never have to know.”

Thorin ignored the long suffering sigh behind him as he continued towards his office. The moment he got there, he plopped down into the chair, staring up at the ceiling. He hated when Balin was right, because he most certainly had a point. Thorin didn’t need Azog or the dragon knowing he was screwing a cop. The flip side was, he really didn’t want to give up what he had with Bilbo. Not yet anyways. Watching the rain race down the skylight, he allowed himself a compromise. He had time.

[firstknightvulion]

No other gaming moment really hit me like the fight against Gwyn in the first Dark Souls.

I was a NEET at the time so I just pushed through the game, day in and day out. Barely any guides, no idea what I was doing. Lost in Darkroot for days because I didn’t know I needed to go in a different direction.

Zweihander build. Eventually.

Beating Ornstein and Smough by myself because I didn’t know about the Humanity mechanic that allowed me to summon help.

Killing Solaire…

They I pull up into the final boss room. I’m expecting a bombastic score. Real end of the world shit.

Then the piano hits.

I wanted to scream. Gwyn. The fucker. This self-serving prick. Keeping the world alive because he doesn’t want to admit that his world is at an end. Like a family member not letting a relative pass because they can’t accept that they’re at the end of their life. Prolonging suffering.

The catharsis of parrying his giant, fuck-off, flaming sword and smashing his ass with a Zweihander. I remember shaking.

A lot of games have come close but Darks Souls will always hold a special place in my heart with how it evoked an emotional reaction.

[glapplebloom]

It hurts...

Have you ever heard of Zero Punctuation? I’m pretty sure you have but if you haven’t it is a Video Game Review series hosted by Ben “Yahtzee” Croshaw. What you may not know is that he also made some games of his own. Four of these games are part of a Quadrality known as the Chzo Mythos. These games are 5 Days a Stranger, 7 Days a Skeptic, Trilby's Notes, and 6 Days a Sacrifice. 5 Days introduce us to the series. 7 Days takes place FAR into the future, but it is Trilby’s Notes that really brings in the main Antagonist of the series: Cabadath.

Also known as the Arrogant Man, Cabadath’s story takes place in 55 BCE (Before Common Era). He was once an ordinary druid who sought power to defeat the Roman General Suetonius Paulinus and his forces. So on the day where the Realms of Magick and Technology barriers were weakened, he sought to summon a demon called Chzo and capture him for his power. But Chzo was bigger than the Arrogant Man expected. So to punish this fool, Chzo took him into the realm of Magick to punish him. 

This led to Chzo imprisoning the arrogant fool’s soul into an oak sapling where his home once stood. So for over 500 years he was trapped, being tortured for all that time to the point that he was no longer the Arrogant Man he once was. He has become the Prince, the ultimate servant of Chzo in the Realm of Technology. And when a poor Lumberjack cut down the tree, The Prince known as Cabadath was born. And his mission is to ensure that everyone knows the name of the King. And for many years, he has served his Pain God well.

In 1501, the Norseman Woodcutter became the first victim of Cabadath. His son was spared so that he could spread the story to others. And wherever that wood goes, so does horror and someone to tell the tale. When it was used to build an Inn, it killed anyone who was foolish enough to stay in. When that wood was made into a harpsichord, Cabadath made the person who bought it kill his lover and would have killed him if he didn’t promise to spread the name of Chzo. And that person would create a cult known as the Order of the Blessed Agonies. And when that wood was turned into a crate, a young kid turned it into an idol originally to represent good fortune. And it resulted in the death of everyone on board.

That Idol would eventually become something important as it was the catalyst to the events of 5 Days a Stranger. For when Sir Roderick DeFoe bought it, he used it to beat his deformed son to near death. This in turn split the poor child into three forms: the Mind, the Body and the Soul. By destroying the three at precise time, he would become the Bridge for Chzo to enter into the World of Technology. And Cabadath thought that was the original intention of his master. 

Sometime before 6 Days a Sacrifice, Cabadath found out the true intentions for Chzo’s Bridge, to replace him with the New Prince. So his goal is to destroy the Mind of the poor DeFoe Child before the bridge could be opened. But by doing so, he actually gave the New Prince the Blessing of the Three Sacred Agonies and giving him everything he needed to become the New Prince: Cabadath’s Power, the Sacred Agonies, and a clone of a particular person to torment until the Body of DeFoe is destroyed in the far future. And with that Cabadath became the Arrogant Man once more and was killed off by the New Prince. And he knew the Name of the King. 

It is such a fascinating story. And you can see how this inspired a particular creepy pasta known as Slenderman. With his ability to teleport and seemingly kill with inhuman strength, he could be a match for any ghoul. So if you ever need an idea for a Halloween Vs fight, might I recommend the Tall Man, the Arrogant Man, the Former Prince, Cabadath... It hurts... It hurts... It hurts... It hurts... It hurts... It hurts... It hurts... It hurts... It hurts... It hurts... It hurts... It hurts... It hurts... 

[eri-blogs-life]

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fucking uninstalled. i’ve tried so goddamn hard to keep coming back to elden ring time and again and trying to finish it but it’s alweays something

and then i finally make progress and tell my friend who’s been teasing me for months about not finishing th egame when i’m so close

and he just goes all ‘lol that’s literally the easiest boss in the game how’s you have to summon for that?’ and i just

i fucking finally got anything done

and this game ain’t even goodJ??JGSJDLK>?

like, fuck. okay. coherent thoughts time. elden ring is probably the worst soulsborne game. that’s my thought. why? well it’s complicated but basically because open world games suck.

okay, that’s not fully it but the open world format does not feel like it lends itself well to a game in which you are presented with seemingly insurmountable challenges and then have to figure out how to beat them. sometimes it works - there were moments in my playthrough where i left and went to another part of the world and leveled up or found some cool new item that helped me beat the boss in question - but usually doing so just left me slightly stronger but still unable to beat anything

also i apparently fucked everything up with my character build because every endgame enemy is resistant to holy damage i guess, so my faith build literally fucks me over making this even more frustrating

none of this is coherent thoughts, i’m so sorry i said that. well, not sorry. i was trying to be coherent. but i’m so fucking frustrated right now i don’t even know what i’m saying.

i finally made any amount of progress and now my friend’s being all mean to me and i just wanna jfu=adsfjklf;jajgahl;gkjasdfl;aksdaghal;gshkjjsdf;a

i fucking hate this game

plus with the long-ass length of elden ring the story is incomprehensible to me. what the fuck is even going on? At least in previous soulsborne games the 40 to 50 ish playtime was long and difficult but you were learning things and getting some semblance of what is going on in the world. In Elden Ring, with playtimes around double that (my playthrough is at 87 hours with me giving up right before the final boss) i’m not picking up information and understanding jack shit about what’s going on

fucking final boss is some kind of giant goo dragon?? how the FUCK does that make any sense? I guess cause it’s kind of got a space-y motif and there’s also some beasts that come from meteors that maybe the story has something to do with space eldritch horrors corrupting the people of this world? In which case, hey, that’s... fine. but how am i supposed to get any of that?

and hey, in its defense, it’s been a long time since i played any other soulsborne game for the first time. i may just not remember not understanding what was going on with those games as well.

hell, maybe the only thing that makes a difference here is i’m playing elden ring alone

at least with dark souls 1 i had my roommate in college. ds2 he was there, but later also my friend jon. ds3 i was able to play with mike. bloodborne i think i was mostly alone in the actual playthrough but at least i had friends who were familiar with it and i could talk to about it

and i had one friend who also has played elden ring. and they’re bullying me for being bad at it.

it just makes me feel like shit

i miss the days i had people i could play with where i could enjoy playing with them. where i could enjoy talking with them about it and enjoy victories.

also i miss when soulsborne games were easier

anyway i’m done my ranting for now. elden ring is uninstalled and i’m fucking done. i’m not gonna touch it again for years.