#I don’t think that’s something in normal dnd right?

[ranger-crisis]

I know this is super weird to bring up, but why’re the feminine tiefling body type’s toe nails (claws?) so long. Like the masculine body type’s are also long, but not THAT long.

[queenie-ofthe-void]

Father's Day

Was going to post this for the steddie microfic June prompt, but decided it's probably not Steddie-centric. Still sticking to the reqs though, just for fun!

prompt: "stuff" || wc: 483 || rated: G || cw: none

~~~

Everyone knows Steve’s house is free reign for hangouts, yet the Party’s collectively designated Sundays as alone time for the new couple. So it’s a bit of a surprise that someone’s knocking. 

The fact someone’s knocking at all is weird.

“Hey sweetheart,” Eddie shouts from the living room, “can you grab that? I think someone’s here.”

Steve opens the door to find Dustin and Max looking slightly shy, if he had to put his finger on it. Odd, especially for them. They’re holding gift bags filled with colorful tissue paper, Max’s blue and Dustin’s red.

Before Steve can invite them in, they surge past him towards the living room. So not too far off from normal, he thinks.

He trails after them and finds Eddie right where he left him– sitting on the floor, surrounded by DnD books and a notebook perched in his lap.

“Babe, what are the sheepies doing here? It’s Sunday,” Eddie asks. He’s smiling up at them, despite the interruption.

Of course they’re happy to see the kids– always are, always will be– but only these two could get away with showing up on Eddie and Steve day.

“We brought you something,” Max says, thrusting the gift into Steve’s arms. Dustin drops his onto Eddie’s lap, scattering his loose notes.

Curious, Steve looks to catch Eddie’s expression to find him already tearing into the gift. Steve sets his on the coffee table and digs out the colorful paper.

Inside he finds a plain, white coffee mug, except it’s been hand-painted with colorful paint pens. On it he finds a basketball, baseball, and a crudely drawn version of his beloved beemer. But on the front, the word “Dingus” is written in Max’s bubble font underneath a bloody version of his nail bat. 

His eyes sting with warmth, and he looks up at Max, whose cheeks are flushed red. Steve finds Eddie holding a similar mug covered in what he assumes are DnD monsters, along with some dice, and his precious Warlock on the front with “Metalhead” underneath.

“What is this,” Steve asks, choking on the lump lodged in his throat.

“It’s all stuff you like,” Max replies, pointing at the mug, choosing the easy answer instead of the real one.

”No– why?” Steve feels like he can’t breathe, his eyes almost full, and his heart racing.

“It’s Father’s Day,” Dustin says, sniffling and wringing his hat in his hands “and me and Max, you know, we don’t–”

“You guys taught us how to play basketball, so we could practice with Lucas,” Max interrupts. “And how to play guitar. And all of the Upside-Down stuff. You’re always here.”

Steve wraps Max up in his arms, dragging her to the ground next to Dustin similarly draped over Eddie. It’s not the six little nuggets Steve asked for.

But these kids– their kids– are so much more than he ever could’ve hoped for.

~~~

To everyone out there who doesn't have a father, your father is absolute shit, or you mom was both parents -- I hope you have as good a Sunday as possible.

[leehaner]

Talk: Chapter 1

pairing: leehan taesan x fem!reader

genre: ANGST, love triangle, slowburn, eventual smut, fuckboy!leehan, college au, undecided ending + genre tbh im lit writing this on a whim bffs

word count: 2k

summary: find out

warnings: none for this chapter!

“Please tell me this is the last fucking box y/n” said your friend Jaehyun as he put down one of your many boxes of clothes for the semester.

He’d offered to help you move into your dorm at your newly transferred school, which he also attended.

“You maybe carried one box in here and it was the lightest one, if you were going to complain so much why'd you offer to help move me in? Sungho was going to come instead”, you said in between laughs and you’re sure he replied back with something equally as dramatic as what he’d said earlier but you were deep in thought thinking about whether or not you made the right choice to transfer here.

“Are you even listening to me?!” he says, snapping you out of your thoughts.

“Huh? oh. Sorry….what’d you say?”

“ I saiiiiiiiiid that one of my friends is having a party near campus tonight and you’re coming. It’ll be good for you to meet new people other than me and Sungho. I’ll come get you and everything!”, he says, leaving almost no room for you to say no and pleading with his hands for you to say yes. It was always really hard for you to say no to him because he’d been one of your closest friends since high school and he always knew what was best for you before you even knew it, so, you agree under one condition.

“Okay whatever just don’t leave me alone at the party because I will leave so fucking fast”

“Then how else will you learn to make friends”

“not going”

“OKAY DAMN I won't leave you alone…. it’s not like sungho won’t be there anyway and i'll introduce you to our roommates'' he says while putting your clothes on hangers in annoyance.

Roommates. That word unexpectedly makes you nervous because up to this point you’d heard crazy stories about Jaehyuns experience with them and the thought of meeting people is always out of your comfort zone. You wouldn’t call yourself shy, but you’re more closed off than you’d like to admit.

“ I should probably also warn you ...one of our roommates, he’s kind of an asshole. So don’t take anything he does too seriously”

Ugh, you’re already dreading this.

“Okay”

And with that you and Jaehyun spend the next two hours or so fixing up your single dorm bickering and fooling around for most of those two hours but you finished nonetheless.

“okay see you later y/n and take your phone off dnd, you’re not getting out of going to this party tonight” he says walking out of your dorm gathering his phone and hoodie from your freshly made bed.

“wasn't planning on it!” you lied. you were definitely planning to shower then sleep and blame the no response to his texts on dnd.

“yeah OKAY, bye~!” the boy says, taking one final stride out of the door and letting it slam behind him which makes you roll your eyes.

After roughly 20 minutes of mindlessly scrolling on your phone you decide it’s time to shower and get ready for the party you were dreading with every fiber of your being.

8:36pm

It's now been an hour since you started getting ready and you were now checking your outfit in your mirror. You were a bit unsatisfied but not enough to change for what would now be the third time of the night. You were dressed rather provocatively but you didn’t care, it made you feel good.Your makeup was already done and now all that was left was to spray perfume and check your phone to see when Jaehyun would be coming to pick you up.

You remembered that he’d probably be bringing his roommates and you were happy to see Sungho as you hadn’t seen him in a while but it was intimidating to meet the rest of them. Still, you were able to, for the most part, shake that feeling off.

myung: hey im like a min away rapunzel let down ur hairrrrrr

you: need you to b normal so bad

myung: HURRY TF UP im downstairs

You walked out of your dorm room and sprinted to the nearest elevator pressing the buttons urgently and waiting for it to come up for a few seconds but it felt like a thousand years were going by so you thought maybe it’d be quicker to take the stairs and slowly started to turn around.

beep

The elevator doors open and someone grabs your arm and turns you around gently. you had an immediate reaction to take your arm back but in an ever-so gentle manner.

“you don’t have to take the stairs” a husky voice says to you

you looked up at him and scanned his features for what felt like years to you but was only for a split second. He had long brown hair and even browner eyes that looked like the entire galaxy was in them.He ran his fingers through his hair with the hand that had just turned you around and put his phone in his back pocket with his other hand.

“Do you always grab strangers into elevators?” you ask him.

he took a few steps forward in order to hold the elevator open on one side

“technically you’re not in the elevator yet but this is my first time, hopefully I was easy enough on you” he replies cheekily with a smirk forming on his face.

You were shocked at how he could just make something so regular into a sex metaphor but somehow it worked. Still you rolled your eyes at the comment, making an automatic assumption about what kind of guy this stranger is.

“and a thank you would be nice”

“thanks” you respond making your way inside the elevator purposely avoiding the side he was evidently holding open for you. You notice he looks down, poking the side of his inner cheek with his tongue and smiling. He steps back into the elevator and you both reach to press buttons. You went for floor one while he went for floor two.

“Got a ride waiting for you or something?” he asks with what sounds like genuine curiosity.

“yeah, are you gonna follow me and kill me?” just as you say this jokingly the elevator doors open once more.

“Just curious but that does sound enticing” he smiles and faces you as he walks backwards out of the elevator trying not to break eye contact with you once.

You smiled to yourself at the small interaction knowing you’d never see him again as he was probably just heading to a hookup judging by the fact floor two of your dorm building was girls only. But ,still, you couldn’t help but feel butterflies from the chemistry filled banter you’d just had with a random stranger even if he was about to go fuck some random. It felt good.

myung: btw. you may or may not have to sit on someone’s lap because my car is not that big SORRYSORRYSORRYSOORY

you: bro im going back upstairs

myung: NO c'mon they’re excited to meet you and sungho has gummies in the glove compartment.. 😁

you: ….bribing me is crazy

myung: it’s the only way i fear🤦🏻‍♂️🤦🏻‍♂️

myung: i see you coming down the stairs just walk straight then turn left a little and you’ll see my car

you follow his instructions and see his red car looking absolutely packed with men whom amongst them you only see one familiar face, Sungho.

“Y/N!!!!!!!! I haven’t seen you in forever, i missed you” the tall long haired boy says to you as his passenger side window is rolling down.

“ I missed you too” you gave him a warm smile. Jaehyun then steps out of the car and opens the back door for you revealing 3 boys, one with pink hair, another with short brown hair and the very last with long dark hair and a streak of blonde in the back of it. damn you thought, he’s attractive.

“ So from left to right this is Riwoo, Woonhak, Taesan and obviously you all know this is y/n” , Jaehyun says smiling and gesturing to everyone then you.

There was a sudden flow of nice to meet yous after that coming from all of you and they all seemed rather nice, you felt instantly welcomed by them especially Riwoo who you felt you’d grow close to quickly, he reminded you a lot of Jaehyun in a way you couldn’t exactly pinpoint but was there nonetheless.

“ Now that you’ve met …any of you want to sit on each other's lap so that y/n can sit?” Jaehyun says while scratching his head.

“ I don’t mind," Woonhak says, smiling and shrugging. You smile at his kind gesture and you and Jaehyun walk over to the other side of the car, he gets back into the driver's seat while you stand at the backdoor. Taesan opens the door, steps out and Woonhak follows suit, you assume he’d be sitting on Taesans lap in the middle. However as Taesan stepped out of the car you were shocked at how tall he was, he didn’t seem all that tall from the view you had of him at the start of this interaction but there he was, standing at probably six feet tall at least.

He very clearly checked you out from head to toe and smiled at you politely as he waited for Woonhak to step out of the car, it was like he was going to say something to you but he himself didn’t know what to say first. He then went to sit in the middle of the backseat shuffling into place and tapping his lap with both hands gesturing for Woonhak to sit there.

“Don’t ever do that again” Woonhak says laughing which also makes you and Taesan laugh and you then take a seat next to them and finally close the car door. You all then take off to the party.

On your ride there everyone was mostly on their phones or having small conversations over the somewhat loud music Sungho had on aux. You were looking out of your window and could see Taesan from your peripheral vision occasionally doing the same. Whenever he wasn’t looking out of the window he was staring at you, it felt like he was piercing through your skin with his eyes and maybe that feeling rooted from the fact you wished you could look at him back in that moment but then he’d know you could see him looking at you that whole time.

“Nah man don’t worry about it, he'll probably just be at the party later anyway”,Jaehyun says. You were curious who he was referring to as you overheard bits of his and Sunghos' conversation.

“ I don’t get why he didn’t just come with us” Sungho responds.

“don’t think too much about it seriously , he's always weird like that”, Jaehyun reassures him and with that the conversation ends leaving you wondering who they were just talking about.Ignoring your curiosity you put one of your earbuds in so you could listen to music for a bit.

now playing: the smiths - there is a light that never goes out

“I love the *muffled speech*

“What?”, you take off your singular earbud to ask what Taesan had just said to you

“I said I love the smiths”, he says to you with a smile that was so contagious, you smiled without even noticing.

“Do you want to listen with me?” you ask sweetly, to which he nods. you hand him the other earbud and you listen to music the rest of the car ride there.

you couldn’t help but feel butterflies from how he’d somehow get a brand new smile for each song that played or tapped his foot along to the sound, signaling that he liked your taste in music.

He’s so endearing you thought.

[ms-scarletwings]

So there was a note under my post about Zim hovering a finger over the self destruct switch on his first day on Earth that just cracked open something in my mind.

Cause…Oh. Oh hecc you, @murhuedur. You actually touched on like, my favorite thing about this character, period. I really like this take, I do. It’s a good one. I ponder, still,

In my own opinion, it’s actually genuine confidence and arrogance, but Zim’s delusions of grandeur are as a thin rubber band. They can stretch out to wild lengths and remain malleable enough to bend around truth as he wills,

But there’s a hard limit out there eventually, and should reality require him to stretch his cognitive dissonance just too far, it’s a violent snap-back to full clarity. I don’t think he’s faking it or always lying to everyone else about what hot shit he is, because I think he fully believes those lies about as fast as he can speak them, even if he will later realize he was wrong after a cosmic punch to the face.

Like, Zim’s smart, but smart people aren’t inherently rational ones. Within Zim, the tallest, hell, maybe even Skoodge, there’s sometimes this very short-sighted flippancy about what is objectively true/false that peeks out every now and again in their psychology. I mean, humans sometimes do this too when it’s convenient to their interests, just, obviously not to goofy cartoon character levels if they want to function in society.

Zim has whatever this flaw is and cranked up to 11, maybe as a side effect of his PAK defects. Sometimes it gets him into DEEP shit, but it’s also his biggest mental shield. Zim has like no fortitude against spiraling into a full on depression or a justifiable panic attack over the smallest concession of being an absolute failure to his race. That weaponized denial that makes him so dangerous to himself and others also keeps him together and motivated forward. But it’s not largely a conscious lie he’s telling himself. It’s genuine faith he’s trying to manifest into matter through sheer force of his will.

His dogmatic mantra, “I am Zim” and what it means to him is a statement he holds on such conviction it overpowered and hijacked the ego of 3 control brains at once.

If I were inserting him into DnD he’d have the wisdom stat of a stale poptart and a 20+ thrown into charisma. He’s faking it without even understanding he’s faking it.

But were he completely detached from reality, he’d be WAY more likely than even now to accidentally get himself killed. While a narcissistic level of self esteem is what lets him ignore and selectively unhear inconvenient truths, the adrenaline of immediate life or death danger is what grounds him back in the real world. You notice over time that as self-sabotaging as he normally is, he seems to act his most rational and competent when he’s suddenly put against the grindstone and self preservation HAS to jump into the driver’s seat. He basically survives his day to day on a tightrope between a falsely glorious narrative of himself, and his perceptive anxiety both tugging him to land on either side of the fence when something big happens.

In “The Trial”, he wastes very little time on his expected bullshit or his confidence in being able to just win over the approval of his judges.. by virtue of being his awesome self. He spent most of that ordeal on the verge of a heart attack, squirmed to find an escape, and actually tried to DENY causing the death of two Almighty Tallests (reminder that he usually owns up to his atrocities with downright offensive pride). He understood the full gravity of an existence evaluation and how cooked his goose was. As soon as the situation resolves and he’s no longer in that danger, it’s right back to full trust of his status as an invader, and in Red and Purple as his biggest fans. When his disguise starts to slip in front of Skool kids he knows are dumb as a bag of rocks, he can silver tongue his way around that without skipping a beat. Losing his disguise in front of a bunch of alien-obsessed adults? Uh oh, pants-shitting terror, this is potentially game-over levels of bad, immediately gtfo of here. Stand there, chest beat, and scold the obviously rogue duty-mode Gir all day until the second it actually tries to kill you and you suddenly have to realize you’re not the one holding the cards anymore to save your own life.

The other way this quirk of his really shows through is in his selective memory. Zim has this skill to repress down and push away unpleasant experiences that I think some of us can only dream we had. I love it because it’s equal parts a comedic and analytical goldmine.

Tak, who actually posed a legit threat to his entire mission and tried herself to chip through that massive wall of denial he’s shielded in- same Tak who’s powerful af ship was stolen and desecrated by Zim’s arch nemesis… she’s not just an afterthought in his mind after that mess. He’s literally pushed that one out of his thoughts altogether in the comics. Like she, and Skoodge, who he can’t fucking stand, might as well have never even existed, even while GIR’s trying to remind him. That time he played around with time travel and it was one of the biggest clusterfucks he quickly lost control of? The bologna incident he stooped so low as to ask dib to help him with? You must be thinking of someone else. Nope. Not a thing. Lalala, can’t even hear you. This is also what makes it no wonder he deeply struggles with actually learning from certain mistakes.

From an outsider’s eye this behavior of his is baffling. It makes him look actually insane or at least obnoxiously obstinate. And I think both assumptions are half right, because this is clearly not the result of mere stupidity. Those truths are simply wayyyy too discordant with his view of himself to devote surface memory to, or too uncomfortable, unless and until, of course, you confront him with them in a fashion where that rubber band has to snap, that bubble pops, and he instantly sobers out of that complacency.

Literally god forbid he ever stops being defective in this way or is given the ability to reckon with the reality of his situation and his history all at once. I’m not even just talking about his job or banishment. I’m talking about his entire life. This chaotic, flexible, incoherent mindstate is the only branch he’s holding onto from dropping into a much more horrifying chasm beneath himself, the depth of which we can only guess. I straight up have no idea what he would do or what could happen to him if he could, even for a moment, rationally comprehend his every action, memory, and empirical truth all at the same time. Seriously, leave that Pak’s Gordian Knot be, or I imagine there could be an HP Lovecraft type of breakdown in the making.

#By the way this is probably one of the most important differences between him and Dib, and what makes Zib so… way he is.

[rainylana]

Eddie noticing you’re not okay

Eddie Munson x female reader

warnings: mentions of depression.

• eddie would notice that you weren’t acting normal, you weren’t as enthusiastic or as cheerful, you weren’t bubbly and your smiles didn’t seem as genuine. he didn’t know how to come about it. i think he’d ask a couple times to see if you were okay and get confused when you keep saying that you’re fine, because he knows something isn’t right.

• he thinks maybe it’s your friends or school, so he takes you to spend some one on one time together, hoping he could brighten you up. he’s shocked to see that you’re smile is still only half turned upward.

• when you keep saying that you’re fine, he asks wayne what to do, he’s concerned and he’s worried that maybe he did something to piss you off. he asks steve and robin if you’ve said anything.

• he’d bring you flowers through your bedroom window, bright and colorful daises in hopes to cheer you up.

• he’d invite you to dnd night and order everyone to be on their best behavior and to be nice to you.

• when it gets to the point when he’s worrying himself to death, he has an intervention. he sits you on the couch and asks what’s wrong and why you’re lying to him about it, that he’s sorry if he did something to hurt your feelings.

“i’m just worried about you, honey. you’re scaring me, I don’t know what I did! Please tell me,” he’d say.

• and when your eyes tears up and gloss over his heart frowns and he’s grabbing your hands.

“oh, sweetheart, i’m sorry!” he’d panic, thinking he hurt your feelings even more. “shit, i’m such an idiot, i’m sorry, baby, alright? i didn’t mean to upset you!”

• you’d tell him it was just the opposite and curl up into his chest, thanking him for being so gentle with you.

• i don’t think he’d really know what to say, or do, when it comes to you admitting that you’re in a depressive phase, a dark cloud that seemed to look over you. he’s afraid of saying the wrong thing and he doesn’t quite understand it.

• however, he would be as gentle as he could and listen as you dumped your feelings onto him. he’d stare at you with those big brown puppy eyes and rub his thumb against the palm of your hand.

[trickstarbrave]

Actually b4 I sleep:

I see in the bg3 arguments (carried over from ppl rules lawyering 5e too hard) that if a character wants to do something it is unethical or “gross” to use persuasion rolls to convince them out of it. Examples: that you should let Astarion ascend because he wants to, or let Shadowheart become a dark justiciar because “it’s all she’s ever wanted”

These arguments are stupid.

Normally I don’t go hard on the “this is a stupid argument” bc most of the time complex moral situations require nuance and you shouldn’t try and call ppl stupid for differing perspectives but. No this one is stupid.

Persuasion rolls are not magical mind control. They are literally using the force of charisma (whole other conversation but again it isn’t mind control) to talk about something to a character and have them see it from different perspectives. High rolls are not you overriding their will power or decision making—if they rly didn’t wanna, they wouldn’t do it. You can do this for objectively horrible end goals, but also good ones.

Not to gamify real life tragedies but IRL, talking someone down from a suicide attempt would be a charisma roll (I’ve been suicidal so I’m using this example). The person really “wants” to kill themselves—or at least, they really think they do. This isn’t a choice made in a vacuum. Ultimately people want to die when they think there is no way out of their problems be it bad mental health, abuse they’re constantly subjected to, insane amounts of debt they feel they’ll never be able to pay off, social isolation, grief, and so on. It can be a combination of factors, but really what they ACTUALLY want is a solution to the problems that are overwhelming them and making them feel like being alive is worse than being dead. Talking someone down from suicide is not a BAD thing to do. In fact it would be morally bad to go “well we have to let people do what they want. Go for it man here’s a loaded gun and some pills”. But you have to persuade them to help them. Because they’re in a really dark place and can’t see reason.

Shadowheart was raised in a cult. She doesn’t actually want to be a dark justiciar, she wants to feel accomplished and like she belongs. She has been punished, isolated, and hurt her whole childhood and had her suffering justified by those in power above her. She’s been abused and told being a dark justiciar is the best thing a sharran can be. That it is the height of Shar worship. And that Shar took her in and “loved” her when “no one else wanted her”. Her ideals and goals are built upon lies and abuse. You, as an outsider, can give her that perspective and tell her that no matter how hard it gets she is worthy of love and can uncover the lies used to cover up and erase her past. She is just so narrowed in on what she thinks is “right” based on what she’s grown up with that she is not thinking for herself, she’s falling back on cult doctrine to think for her.

Astarion “wants” to ascend because he wants to feel like no one can ever hurt him again. He wants to spite Cazador. He wants to feel safe. And not worry about burning in the sun too. But are those things worth your actual fucking soul and your ability to love and connect with other people? No. Astarion doesn’t actually want the power, he doesn’t actually want to rule the world, and this power will not actually keep him safe. He has mistaken power for freedom because of 200 years of abuse and also was almost killed via human sacrifice like a minute prior (turns in dnd are only 6 seconds). He isn’t exactly thinking rationally give he’s been free for a week and nearly died a few seconds prior. He’s running on base instincts. He’s leaning into the lies Cazador has drilled into his head: the weak suffer because they are weak and the only way to be safe is to be the strongest person around. But this is an ideology that isn’t true. Cazador wasn’t safe. He wouldn’t have been safe even ascended. Astarion won’t be either. It’s literally a Faustian bargain and the game hits you over the damn head with it multiple times. Talking him out of it means you to see Astarion for who he is: as a person beyond his abuse and what makes him useful or not.

Hell, on a smaller level, Wyll wanted to kill Karlach. You can find out very easily though that she’s not actually a bad person, it’s just a technicality of Wyll’s contract. Or are you gonna say Karlach is manipulative and immoral for telling the truth and pleading for her life??? Because it’s getting in the way of what Wyll wants to do! Mizora told him she’s heartless! He’ll suffer if he doesn’t! Gale wants to blow himself up and thinks it’s the right choice, better miss out on all of act 3 because why are you trying to convince him out of it???

You can still ofc make different choices in any storyline bc this is s video game I’m not here to tell you what you can and can’t do. Just arguing “actually it’s morally bad that I have to roll persuasion—“ is a dumb argument I need people to stop making.

[lovebugism]

hi babe hope this isn’t too personal but not having the greatest time right now. therapist did not answer any of my calls today so im kinda a mess 🥲🥲 if you’re willing to write any kind of comfort fic with any character that would be the best 💗💗💗

hi anon! i hope things are going better now! take this eddie munson comfort fic as my attempts to make you feel a wee bit better ily mwah <3

You were pretty good at taking care of yourself most of the time. Eddie always thought your innate sense of responsibility was extremely hot — mostly because it meant that you were even better at taking care of him.

He said it was a perk of being your boyfriend — “one of many,” he’d say, just before smacking a kiss to your cheek.

You were the yin to his yang in that way. Peace in all his chaos.

Eddie, himself, was a being who thrived on mayhem. There wasn’t a single thing he loved more than unpredictability — well, you, of course. Then maybe DnD. But spontaneity was a close third.

He isn’t quite sure how to live his life without the company of total disarray. He isn’t sure he would want to if he had the chance either. The unexpected makes things fun. At least, that’s what he always tells you. You’re not so sure.

When he makes you late to things because of his horrible time management skills, or he can’t find his keys because they’re hidden somewhere underneath a pile of clothes in the corner of his room, it feels a little like the end of the world.

And not just in the oh no, this thing is really stressing me out; good thing I know it’s illogical sort of way. But in the oh fuck, we’re gonna be ten minutes late to this get-together where there are zero consequences whether we show up or not, but it’s inducing so much panic that I’m not sure how long I’ll be able to function properly.

You’ve gotten pretty good at hiding your fear over the years. It’s just that Eddie’s so damn attuned to everything going on in your head that it makes it insanely difficult to wallow in your dread alone.

He knows when you start pacing and talking a million miles a minute that something’s working you up. He knows when you start getting snappy and don’t think his jokes are funny anymore that you’re close to your breaking point. He knows when you stop talking altogether that your entire world is caving in around you.

So Eddie takes great care in getting to things on time and tidying up his room when you're around. He doesn’t even care that he finds it all a bit irrational, he just wants to make things easier for you. Even if it means getting to Steve’s house an hour before everyone else or actually folding his clothes before putting them in drawers.

Eddie knows you use structure like a weapon rather than a shield. Organization isn't a way to keep your life together, it’s to keep it from falling apart. When something is out of order, when there’s one piece out of place, it’s not an easy fix — not for you. It’s more like a ticking tomb. 

You’re the ticking time bomb. And the faintest scent of disorder is bound to make you explode.

But maybe calling it a bomb isn’t the most accurate way to describe it. The way Eddie sees it, it’s a lot more like an avalanche.

It starts off small, a little rumble of uncertainty that jostles the comfort of your routine. You blink and suddenly the snowball weighs two tons and you’ve spiraled into a full-blown crisis that threatens to swallow you whole.

You don’t let anyone see any of it. Not even Eddie a lot of the time. You just bury yourself in the landslide until the heavy snow melts and you can function normally again — it may last a couple hours, maybe weeks.

So it’s a good thing Eddie can see all the warning signs before they start.

It’s all the little shit he notices first — the not showering as often, the not keeping things as tidy as usual, the closing yourself off. Eddie Munson knows a depression room when he sees one. It doesn’t take a rocket scientist to know you’re slipping.

But rather than acknowledge that boogeyman, he pretends like it isn’t there at all. He thinks if he acts like it doesn’t scare him, then it doesn’t have the power to hurt him. That’s exactly how he treats the funks you get into. He knows they’re there but doesn’t let them take over completely.

Eddie comes around whenever he gets the chance and helps you do your self-care routine — even though all you do is complain that you don’t need his help the entire time.

He coaxes you into the bath and tidies up your bedroom while you’re gone. He does all the steps of your skincare for you after because he knows you can’t do it yourself. You’re too tired to, but you feel like shit when you don’t. That’s the same bitter cycle that started this whole mess.

He doesn’t do anything crazy. He just takes care of the little things to make you feel less consumed by it all.

You’re a pouting mess in the middle of your bed after, freshly cleaned and drowning in a too big shirt that smells like the musk of Eddie’s cologne with a towel twisted up in your hair. It’s almost cartoonish, the way you cross your arms over your chest and scrunch your face in displeasure.

“I don’t want you to do all this stuff for me, Eds,” you gripe. “I’m a big girl, okay? I can do it myself.”

The boy shrugs from where he stands at the foot of your bed. “I know I don’t have to. I want to, though. I like doing this stuff for you.”

“You hate cleaning, Eddie.”

“Yeah. I do,” he affirms with a nod, all but flopping onto the mattress beside you. He rests his head on his fist and blinks up at you with wide, twinkling button eyes. A grin pulls at his pink lips as he asks you, “But you know what I don’t hate?”

You huff but entertain him anyway. “…What?”

“You,” he beams and taps the tip of your nose with his pointer finger.

You meet his smile with a grimace.

“Actually, I sort of love you, as it turns out,” he corrects himself in a lilt. “And when you love someone, you do the shit you hate to make them happy, right? Isn’t that what it’s all about?”

You don’t answer him, just shrug.

“Well, either way, I’m happy to do all the boring shit if it means there’s a chance I get to make you feel even a little bit better,” Eddie tells you, pinching his thumb and forefinger together and leaving just an inch or more of space to squint his eye through.

That hand flops down and lands on your thigh. His thumb absentmindedly rubs over the skin there. His smile turns sheepish.

“I will happily fold laundry and do taxes and wash dishes and… all that stupid, boring shit for you for the rest of my life, as long as I can look over and see you next to me…”

Your heart swells with a distant happiness you haven’t felt in weeks.

Eddie helps you until you feel better enough to do it yourself.

Needless to say, when he stops by your place and finds it completely spotless, he doesn’t bother to hide his excitement. He rushes to your room and finds you in bed, flipping through a book. The small radio on your bedside table plays something synth-y.

He realizes you’ve traded in The Smiths for The Psychedelic Furs and that your lavender candle is burning on your desk and that you’ve spritzed yourself in your vanilla perfume.

Those are all staples in your little routine that you borderline can’t live without. You always missed out on them when you got into your funks, but here they are again…

Eddie tries not to smile too wide.

“How’s it hangin’?” he sing-songs when he waltzes into your room.

“Fine...” you murmur, half-distracted by your novel. After a few long seconds, your eyes finally flit up to his. He’s doing a terrible job of hiding a grin. “…Why are you looking at me like that?”

Eddie shrugs as he takes off his leather jacket. He neatly lays the thing over the back of your desk chair and smooths out the wrinkles.

“‘Cause I love the shit out of you,” he answers like it’s nothing, like the words don’t mean everything to you. “And I’m really fucking proud of you.”

“Proud of me?” you echo in a scoff.

Because, to you, crawling out of a three week long funk is hardly something to be proud of. You don’t feel like you should be rewarded for being human, but Eddie knows that getting through the hard shit is a part of being human. And he’s so goddamn proud of you for it.

“Yep,” he nods with pink cheeks and a hopeful grin. “I’ve never been prouder of you, babe. And, like, I’m always proud of you, so that’s saying something.”

“Shut up,” you mutter under your breath. Your attention flits back to your book rather than focusing on the intense gaze Eddie looks at you with. You don’t get through a single sentence before he rips the thing from your hands. “Eddie!—”

You look at him again and find that he’s sterner now, but still so tender — chocolate eyes hardened but soft around the edges. There’s a kind grin on his and an air about him that tells you he’s serious. 

Eddie rounds your bed and plants himself at the edge of it. He keeps your book hostage in one hand and holds onto your calf with the other, running his thumb over the soft skin of your knee.

“I’m serious,” he tells you. “Like, I know shit gets hard for you sometimes, but... I don't know, watching you get through it is… really fucking cool, babe.”

He laughs when it makes you laugh.

“Seriously. It’s like you get stronger every day, and… not to be a total sap or whatever, but I feel really lucky that I get to see it.”

You’re not sure whether to duck away from his gaze or revel in its warmth. You manage somehow to do both with a distant pout on your face. 

Eddie’s grin widens until the dimple in his right cheek reveals itself.  “What?” he laughs. “What’s that look for?”

“‘Cause you’re nice to me,” you mumble like the cutest little storm cloud. “And it’s gross… And also I love you.”

“Well, get ready, babe. You got a whole lifetime of me being nice to you coming your way, so… Be prepared to be sick of me by the time we’re all old and wrinkly, alright? ‘Cause I’m still gonna love the shit outta you then.”

You grumble when he smacks a kiss to your knee.

You hope he keeps his promise.

[amysgiantbees]

I think all interpretations of Mystra in Baulder's Gate 3 are valid and I'm not trying to take any away from anyone. Especially since stories of abuse and abusers can obviously be incredibly personal. However, I see people often painting her as either actively villainous and malignant or as the victim of Gale. Again, I think that's valid, but I see her as not quite in the middle - I believe there's no ethical way for a god to have a relationship with a mortal, like a boss or professor is always going to have an unethical relationship with a worker or pupil so she's still in the wrong - but still somewhere between the two extremes.

(Side note: I wish the game had in game books or something with more of the lore from DND that it was sticking to. They play fast and loose with DND lore (valid it's quite frankly convoluted), but Mystra and Gale's dynamic can be really affected by that. It would just give a bit of clarity.)

Firstly, like I said a god can't have a romantic relationship with a mortal and that be healthy. They will always have more power, socially, physically, etc. They have followers they can turn against you; you've heard about them your whole life and likely worship them; they can smite you. It's like trying to date Jesus there's no way for that to be normal. People literally thought for a while that Gale was wearing a matching earring with Mystra until they realized he was wearing the equivalent of a cross. However, that is still a reminder he wears of how as a wizard he’s irrevocably linked to her. That's why Gale is so insecure in game. Why he wants to be more powerful to be worthy of you. Why if you're in a relationship he's always asking what you need, "how can I help?" "Is something on your mind, you can always unburden yourself with me?" "Anything I can do for you, consider it most enthusiastically done". Mystra set an impossible standard that he was literally incapable of meeting and is haunted by.

Mystra is tricky with relationship dynamics because she has a precedent of not leaving all her lovers’ mortals. "Gale's folly" as he calls it, to be her equal, is not so wild an idea with Mystra. She helped the god Azuth become a deity and he was initially one of her mortal lovers. Although, Azuth isn't one of her lovers now and, they technically did not even become equals he is her subordinate. You understand where he got the idea however, and how he thought it could work. So, Gale is ambitious and arrogant sometimes, but I would argue wanting to be equal with your lover, especially when she's done that before, is not totally unreasonable.

I don't know beyond the power dynamic, how you have a normal relationship with a god, a god who is your everything and you're temporary for them. She doesn't need to eat so his other skill isn't important and likely uninteresting to her. If he tried to give her a normal gift, there is nothing beyond something as big as the Karsus Weave that another lover or follower hasn't given her a million times over or she hasn't seen and experienced as she watches over mortals. Like he probably can't tell her about a book he's read without her already knowing all about it, depending on how omnipotent she is. By being with her everything else falls away, until there's just magic, just her.

Gale says "I sought to cross her boundaries" which is certainly a charged statement. He absolutely did cross her boundaries and should not have. Even if I believe Mystra is more in the wrong two wrongs don’t make a right. I also think Mystra's appearance plays into this feeling particularly violating to some people. People like to joke about her looking plain for a goddess, but she does look like a regular mortal woman. Women have a reputation as more often being the victims of things like boundary crossing and she looks like a typical victim, not an all-powerful goddess. For example, if she looked like Shar I feel like people would empathize with her less. Which is a clever mechanic to make Gale’s story opaquer both in the text and non-diegetic interpretations. Both the writers and Mystra could be using her form to make her more unassuming and less blatantly other from Gale. So, I really get how people see her as the victim here even if I disagree.

On the topic of charged statements Gale calls Mystra his "teacher". Mystra holds the keys to secret knowledge. She will literally always know more than him. In a way he will never stop being her student. He does use the past tense to refer to her being his teacher though. So, she isn’t actively teaching him, but it does add an extra uncomfortable element in the imbalance of power that already exists. I personally believe if the Spell Plague is a part of the BG3 timeline (although it’s dubious since no one mentions it) she most likely only started actively interacting and teaching him as an adult. So, she was more like his professor than teacher which does have less uncomfortable implications. Ex-student teacher relationships have a predatory feel to them due to the age of the student initially. Thus, ex-student professor feels less fraught. This grey area around the nature of their schooling relationship is one of the many reasons why giving up the crown is such a positive ending. He becomes a professor and protects his students like she didn't protect him. I think it's also telling that in the epilogue if you play as Gale, you get a letter from Elminster, another Chosen of Mystra's, who tells you he has been your teacher since you were eight. Which is certainly uncomfortable. Whether Mystra was his teacher as an adult or a child an agent of hers was his teacher then. Beyond worshipping her thus she had even more influence in his life from a young age, even if Elminster taught him of his own volition.

Another thing that reminds me of abuse dynamics is that Mystra gets Gale alone and away from you. In the Stormshore Tabernacle Mystra does not allow anyone to accompany Gale for support. It just reminds me of how abusers isolate you. I'm pretty sure Gale even has dialogue about how being her Chosen was isolating and did not make him popular. Which you could argue is not her fault how others react, or that it’s Gale’s personality, but I find it telling paired with everything else.

As I've said the power imbalance is severe. It is not necessarily quite as bad as people describe it though. From what Wikipedia tells me Mystra can't take Gale's magic away from him completely, a thing people often site as a threat she has over him and part of her abuse. "Mystryl had ultimate control over all magic and could shape it to her will, and she could withdraw a being's access to the Weave and prevent it from using spells of any sort, and in an even harsher restriction she could also prevent a being from using any sort of magic whatsoever if she so decreed. These conditions persisted until she removed them.

Mystryl could even deny deities access to the Weave, but she couldn't deny other gods the ability to grant their worshipers spells through prayer." She stopped this though as it says. Which admittedly isn't a firm reassurance that it won't happen again- it would still worry me - but apparently it just isn't a thing that she does anymore. Plus, it can be interpreted that she also isn't allowed to anymore because of Ao (the head god) banning it as it would count as interfering with her godly portfolio. Thus, she's not necessarily quite as tyrannical as people worry.

Mystra is attracted to great spellcasters, such as arch mages, like Gale and Elminster. She specifically seeks people who are ambitious and crave power. Everyone's met a gifted child that turns into a mentally ill, burnt-out, average person when they're older, I would say I'm one. I would argue that natural talent or being a child prodigy, like Gale, isn't enough to get her attention or at least keep her interest. Even sorcerers would have to work on control. You need a certain level of ambition and drive to keep being greater. So, this is kind of Mystra's folly. To keep finding ambitious young men, give them the ultimate confidence boost with your attention as well as the ultimate temptation of magical secrets you keep and then get surprised that not all of them fall neatly into line like Elminster. As Minsc says "Now I wonder if it was not done to hide them from Mystra, and the snares she sets for young prideful boys, hm?" This isn't to say it's okay that he crossed her boundaries but again like I said she shouldn't have sought him out in the first place. Also, I, a neurodivergent person, see Gale as one too. I can't imagine someone dangling everything there is to know about my special interest in front of me like a tease.

Gale being tempted by the magic that he couldn't use is understandably vexing because before this iteration of Mystra he would have been able to. Up until the fall of Neverall all powerful enough magic users were able to do the magic she now hides. As her wiki says, "she laid down new rules for all spellcasters, banning spells above “9th” level, limiting who had access to magic, limiting how many spells of each level could be held in the mind, increasing the time it took to cast spells, and forcing long periods of memorization or prayer each day to replace spells cast previously." Karsus essentially went and ruined it for everyone so I get why Gale would want to be an exception to the rule. Mystra loves him, why shouldn't she trust him? However, Karsus did kill her, so I understand why this is a hard boundary for her.

Mystra is a god. She has a certain amount of distance from all mortals. She knows that all mortals die. As seen in her dialogue if you play as Gale and talk to her in the Tabernacle, she must balance the weight of many lives over a few. When asked if she cares about lives you might take if you explode, she says, "Such eddies are unexceptional. Souls arrive and depart your plane with every tide, in circumstances just and unjust." As a god you must have a certain amount of distance from mortals, it'd drive you mad otherwise. It's also what you want from a god. They should understand the bigger picture and not get caught in the weeds. Gods should not experience empathy the way mortals do; they'd get overwhelmed or go crazy otherwise. I see this otherworldly attitude of hers in Elminster’s line "She would consider what she considers to be forgiveness." Implying that she feels things differently, more inhumanly. Mystra is a good goddess but incapable of being a good lover because of this. So, she entered a relationship with a mortal who worshiped her with the knowledge that she could never reciprocate those same feelings back, there would always be a distance. Which is an obviously toxic thing to do, and she should have known better, Gale isn't her first lover.

Mystra being bad at mortal emotions and empathy is seen in other dialogue of hers at the Tabernacle too. She tells Gale, "You were already worthy. What you lacked was patience". What is she trying to say with this? You were worthy of being my Chosen? He knows that he already was her Chosen so that wasn’t what he wanted. Is she saying he was worthy of godhood? I doubt she was contemplating making him a god. There's no deep sorrow coming from her like someone who was thinking of sharing everything with him - if Ao would even allow that. I believe it makes the most sense that she believes he just wanted more power. That would make the patience line coherent. She thinks he just rushed into finding something to make him more powerful instead of waiting for her to grant him more power. Her Chosen can use greater powers like Silver Flame after a while. However, this demonstrates her lack of understanding of his character. He didn’t entirely want more power; he was planning on giving the tome to her. I don’t even think he was even aware it was something he could use. He thought it was HER weave not a separate thing of its own. He mainly wanted to be her equal. Gale isn't hungry for power for the sake of it. He always wants it for a deeper reason. He wouldn't have been content just following in Elminster's footsteps, being an incredibly powerful ex of hers one day. He wants her to love him with all the devotion that he has for her. He isn't with her for power, or at least that's not the main reason. You see it with your TAV if you romance him, Gale falls madly and quickly in love with people, love is all encompassing for him. He’s strictly monogamous he isn’t interested in sharing someone with others. He's not content to just have a fraction of her heart and give her all his.

Mystra's distance from humanity and how toxic these relationships can be is seen in the story of her possession of Elué and their relationship with Dornal Silverhand. Done to create the Seven Sisters to preserve her legacy. Being Chosen is not some altruistic thing Mystra grants to the best magic users for a job well done, or at least it isn't just that. They also become her insurance if she gets killed again, which is what these children were for too. She loves her Chosen but they’re also tools to her. She possessed Elué to sleep with Dornal (assaulting him I would argue as they make a point to not tell him about the possession) which deteriorates Elué. Although, I've seen people say that she's had a lot of bad relationships with mortal men, I haven't read the books I'm just going by the wiki and Wikipedia, but admittedly I can't see anyone she's screwed up quite like Dornal and Gale. Although, like I've said I don't think any close relationship she has with a mortal would be healthy. The closest I got besides them was Sammaster. However, from what the wiki says it's unclear whether his downfall was Mystra's fault or if that was just Algashon's manipulation to get him to blame everyone but himself.  

I've seen people site that one way that their relationship is unhealthy is that Mystra is thousands of years older than Gale. Now depending on when and how she started interacting with him (this is where what I said about DND lore comes in, Mystra's death can change this whole timeline) this can absolutely be toxic. But an adult age gap, even thousands of years, isn't unhealthy I would argue. Once you reach maturity an adult's an adult. No one is up in arms about Astarion being 350. Also, Mystra maybe even tries to balance this. Her page on Wikipedia states that part of the power's her Chosen get is long lives, like Eliminster.  

Gale reports in the Tabernacle that he's never been nervous before but in Sharess' Caress he says that he's insecure and even gets Tara to leave the room when he changes. I think saying he never gets nervous might be a bit of postering on his part, but admittedly that's totally up for interpretation (as it all of this is). From Mystra's wiki "As a goddess, Mystra could shape change at will and mortals who saw her reported she changed constantly". So, a man with insecurities and a person who literally never needs to feel insecure could be fine but with all the other points is just another reason Mystra should never have instigated anything.

Mystra states in the Tabernacle that she has been feeding Gale's orb with herself. She is the Weave. She has been feeding herself to this void so Gale can live. Gale was feeding on the weave in the magical items he consumed, thus unbeknownst to him feeding on her. He then continues to do this through the spell Elminster performs just more directly. As people have pointed out she could have helped him anytime. But this comes as a massive sacrifice to her. He did unleash something that damages and threatens her. He also unleashed something that is likely traumatic to her. From the dev notes from her dialogue, she is still angry at Karsus for killing her. The crown of Karsus is what allows her to control the weave in him. It's a different type of magic as she states, like Shar's Shadow Weave, one she can't control without the crown only feed. So, she couldn't have stopped the orb before he got the crown. She could only help Gale feed it. Some people say she could have cured him right away, but I don't think that's the case.

The Karsite Weave is dangerous. As Mystra says "You've unleashed something that would consume all magic in existence". However, I've seen people compare Gale's fragment to the Spell Plague, which I think is a bit much. If he was allowed to live and keep feeding off her, especially with a Chosen's life span then it could be. But Mystra need only send someone to kill him or stop feeding the orb and he will erupt, and it will be all over. She continues to hold all the cards.

I do believe she maybe could have prevented this all in the first place. Gale states that reading the Karsus book was like a flare going up to her, also that she hears every spell (Another issue that Gale must feel watched and scrutinised every time he performs magic). I don't believe with this power that Gale could have easily researched and found the Tome of Gateways without Mystra knowing something about it. His research likely would have shot up flares like when researching Karsus. If she knows every portal that he creates or spell he makes she should have known something. Plus, Gale's fine with charisma but not great and it's not like he's proficient in deception. Either she was paying him ridiculously little attention (and in the final product of the game they are together until he finds the Karsite Weave so it's unlikely that she was ignoring him) or she had her own reasons for letting him go ahead. Which does seem unlikely considering how awful Karsus' Folly was for her but if it's true then it is obviously toxic to let someone you supposedly love risk themselves and then blame them for everything about it.

I don't believe Gale was likely a minor when Mystra started a sexual or romantic relationship with him. For one, she was probably kind of dead, depending on whether her DND lore is canon or if Larian have fudged the dates. Also, Gale states that he's had previous lovers before her. Which could imply that she never actively sexually groomed him as a youth. Or that he had lovers then her all as a teen. I don't think if she was grooming him, he would have taken lovers while it was happening though, as he states she's "a jealous goddess". Her reputation could have partially groomed him though, worship from a young age of this beautiful woman surely influenced him. She also could arguably have been not sexually grooming him but grooming him to be her Chosen. Furthermore, I know some people use the term grooming for all ages, but Oxford languages defines it as relating to minors. I think if you want to use the term grooming for any age because it fits better for you VALID! But I haven't been groomed so I feel more comfortable sticking to the dictionary definition and just using the term manipulation for when he's older.

Gale, like I've said is flawed. For one he's arrogant and ambitious. If you leave him unchecked, he will become a god of ambition. However, it is not that hard to turn him away from this. I love how all the characters deal with their circumstances differently. It makes them all feel unique and human. If you compare say Astarion who is also power hungry to Gale you see how power isn't that big of a deal to him truly, feeling enough is (power also isn't Astarion's true want, its freedom, but I digress). However, Astarion has multiple dialogue scenes where he argues his case for Ascension and disapproves if you tell him outright that it's a bad idea (or at least I'm pretty sure he used to, with every update I swear they change the characters approval/disapproval). Whereas Gale gets you to the bottom of the bookstore and is like Hey, sorry I've been depressed but what if I was God? There's no manipulation here, he's not trying very hard beyond hiding his intentions till then. He can be talked out of it easily too. He doesn't disapprove if you tell him outright no. I did neutral answers, including telling him to do what he wants, and it still ended with everyone reacting like I'd convinced him not to be a god. He brings it up again at the end. But there's no persuasion role to convince him. You're just like No Gale and he's like Cool. His blasé attitude certainly doesn't scream power hungry. He does need a good influence though. Left to his own devices with no help from you he would go through with godhood. But it’s not like he doesn’t try to surround himself with good people, like Tara, and do the right thing.

Furthermore, he doesn't want to become a god just for power. He wants to feel worthy, to feel in control. He wants to do good and help people. Which is an admittedly stupid thing to think. Gale is the one to tell you in act one that the gods can't interfere Ao won't allow them but under the bookstore he apparently believes now he's just built different. Gale bounces between moods. He can be suicidal then want to be immortal. Overconfident then anxious and insecure. Power hungry then chastising you for doing the same. I think it reflects how his quest is the least black and white, he's still figuring himself out. But he's not a sweet darling who has never done anything wrong (like bragging to Loroakan about his upcoming godhood) or truly power hungry. With the evil pixie lamp, he tells you that he did it for practical reasons and disapproves of you wanting to do it for power. Similarly, he doesn't want The Necromancy of Thay except to consume and destroy it. I think Gale stands on a precipice between extremes.

So, to wrap it all up. I don't think that Gale is some scheming abuser. He's certainly not a perfect victim but you don't have to be to deserve better. Mystra in turn I don't think is trying to hurt Gale. She likely doesn’t understand the extent of the damage she’s doing. I don't think she can properly empathize with him. She's a goddess first and a lover second as she always has been. Knowing this she should stop having close relationships with her followers. It's a lonely existence being a god but that's the price you pay for that kind of power. Mystra is absolutely the abuser and should have known better but she's certainly not evil. At least that's my two coppers about it.

[zenon-karr]

I been trying to make sense of the the hints the Duffers have been dishing out and making sense of these posters. And I think I have a theory that connects most of the hints. I’ve pieced together recently that I think s5 of stranger things will be inspired by things like Us, They Live, and Uncanny Valley!! Hence why it looks relatively normal right now. It will be normal but people start to believe people and children are replaced by imposters because things are slightly off that babies or other people are basically monsters from the upside down or like the ‘flayed’ aka maybe like a mimic from dnd but they look like people but ‘off’:

I think they will solve the stinger at the end of s4 and they think they’ve beat 001/upside down. When really revealed that the enemy is actually mind flayer but we aren’t introduced to its final form till s5. but he’s built an army that infiltrates the main world by pretending to be human and the end of s4-beginning of 5 they’re lured into again into false sense of security when the portal opening just allowed the shadow monsters/mimics in. They’re alternate dimension beings lead by Mind Flayer to invade the main world. They tried with Henry and also Will to open gates and let the creatures in.

I think maybe the thing with the hospital is not actually that someone is this seriously injured but actually that The mains will realize something is off in the hospital bc they’re visiting Max. Maybe they start to realize that people are replaced by shadow flayed whatever versions of children/people in general. Maybe this is the meaning of the pregnant lady poster. And then there’s this drawing that looks like a shadow person. Then there is a the pregnant smoking - smoke and life under the cloud in the poster maybe the smoke is actually like shadow like the shadow monster but they’re people that are uncanny:

All creatures welcome poster and they even comment does this mean demogorgans? It makes me think they invite the monsters in their homes because they think they are their own children when they’re born or they don’t know people they know have been replaced by monsters you know so maybe the hints to switched at birth actually mean switched not literally like a soapy like children being swapped at birth but like in the horror monster sense.

Look at Holly’s room. She has an Alf poster I think Alf is a hint of an alien or something Among the humans. And along with the shadow person concept or alien/mimic idea. Peter Pan has the living shadow and then Ross posts this this billboard of a family where one is like disfigured so maybe one in so many people have been replaced by a fake (mimic or an upside down monster) the billboard even says ‘new residence’

Here’s the plots of They Live and Us! They’re both movies about aliens or beings infiltrating among humans. I been watching the supernatural horror TikTok’s of people thinking they’ve had encounters with a mimic and also Uncanny Valley. So I pieced together a theory based off the clues in Ross’ posts!

[markerofthemidnight]

Abstracted Heart, Mind and Soul

Art I kinda pushed out of an AU/concept that I need someone to write for me because I have too many WIPs.

I call this the “Abstraction AU” (unrelated to the Amazing Digital Circus, but does share some similarities), and here’s how it works:

The Basics

Inspired by Core Suppressions from Lobotomy Corporation

Basically, whenever one of the three undergoes extreme stress, they “Abstract” into one of these forms

The Headspace basically stops working the way it’s supposed to until the transformation is reversed: the way it’s affected depends on who’s Abstracting

The transformation only wears off once the side passes out: which sounds like it would result in a big boss fight or something

BUT, luckily for them, since Abstracting is basically letting out all your emotions and strength and fighting with all you’ve got, it is EXHAUSTING

so once it’s happened they’re typically not conscious for any more than an hour

Contrary to what you might guess at first, the side is still “themselves” while Abstracting: it’s just difficult to tell since the stress that causes the transformation also makes them act irrational and overly violent

Despite this, post-transformation, the side typically doesn’t have memories of what happened during the fight… until a few hours after waking up

It can happen to the same person more than once, but to Abstract for the first time you have to be pushed PARTICULARLY far

After that it gets a bit easier for it to happen again, like you’ve given into your inner monster

To further emphasise that, they all get “battle scars” from their first time Abstracting that stay with them for the rest of their lives

And to go into what the first time abstracting was like for each individual:

Heart

Abstraction is usually caused by intense stress.

While this is still true in Heart’s case, since being emotional is his job description, he needs to be pushed further than the others in order to Abstract

(because if that wasn’t the case, he would Abstract all the time)

Anyways, his first time probably came after days on end of extreme trauma

Specifically, trauma that neither Mind nor Soul did anything to try and stop

He likely Abstracted out of view from the others, and they didn’t even notice until Soul was like “wait why isn’t my trident working”

As Heart is… the heart of the Headspace, when he Abstracts, magic stops working there

His design was obviously based off of biblically accurate angels, as well as a Beholder from DND but without eyes so it would look like a heart

You’d think he’d be biased towards Mind while like that, but no- he goes after Soul.

He expected Mind to ignore him, but Soul? It’s his job to make sure things are alright with him, so why’d he just abandon him?

Even without the benefit of the Trident, though, I imagine Abstracted Heart wouldn’t be all too difficult for them to take down if they really tried their best, so he goes down rather quickly

After he wakes up, his head’s basically just in one big blur for a while until the memories start to come back

Then he just starts shaking and hugging them while constantly muttering apologies (even though he still has EVERY RIGHT to be mad)

”Battle scars” take the form of purple(-er) wings, fangs and a halo

Mind

Mind’s is a pretty different case

While his was also caused by days of repeated trauma, as Abstractions tend to be, his problem is that he kept trying to bottle it up and only started to show even the tiniest cracks just before the transformation

(after all, I don’t think they’d take a chance like that again after what happened with Heart)

He likely Abstracted right in front of Heart and Soul

His design was based off of UFOs, obviously, as well as a brain and spine. The eyelashes are meant to look like the sun’s rays

When he Abstracts, all laws of physics in the Headspace basically stop working and the place gets even weirder than normal

Despite having the advantage of Soul’s trident this time, taking him down is a lot harder since he’s metal: the key is to tire him out

When he wakes up after the fact, he’s even more of an asshole than usual, but mainly because he’s still tired and stressed

He gets all quiet once the memories start to come back to him though, like he feels bad about attacking them so violently but doesn’t really know how to express it

”Battle scars” take the form of rhombus-shaped pupils and back spikes

Soul

If you’re a time loop fan, then Soul Abstracting is typically what restarts the loop

He was designed to be the most humanoid to show that he was the closest to Whole, with three heads because… you know why

When he Abstracts, he fuses with his trident, the Headspace becomes black and white, and starts slowly to fall apart

Heart and Mind do not stand a CHANCE in this fight, hence why his Abstraction is inevitably what restarts the loop

However, if by some chance they lasted long enough for things to go back to normal, I imagine Soul would be… surprisingly nice after going back to normal

It’s like finally letting it all out made him calm down a bit. He’s still pretty awkward around them, but better than you might think

Even when the memories come back, sure he kinda shuts himself in for a bit and avoids talking about it, but he’s not as closed off as Mind is

Battle scars take the form of his right eye becoming normal (as in not identical to his left eye as seen in the art), and the left side of his face being covered in black (to match his face in his Abstracted form)

[claritys-silly-things]

It’s my birthday woah

Anyways hcs

- Soda and Johnny dyslexia real?

- (Modern) Soda texts how blitzø does in helluva boss and pony had to translate for Darry a lot

- (Modern-ish to modern) Soda blasts tf outta Bruno mars when the Curtis boys are cleaning, and honestly they vibe with it. Him and twobit are such big Bruno mars fans. Steve hates Bruno mars but brushes it off bc soda likes his music

- (Modern) Rip pony and Johnny you would’ve loved Conan Gray and Mitski

- (Modern) Cherry and Marcia like Sabrina, Olivia, TS, artists like that but also Billie eilish, Renee rapp, and Chappell roan, etc. Cherry and Marcia kiss each other.

- (Modern) Marcia also listens to Midwest emo and shi. Also normal emo music. Johnny aswell.

- (Modern) Ponyboy LOVES tv girl

- (Modern) Sometimes cherry is just in the mood to listen to the most hardcore music ever and you’ll look at her and think she’s vibing to something sweet and girly and she takes her headphones out to hear you talk and it’s just screaming

- (Modern) Cherry and pony actually just have the most random assortment of music in their playlists I’ve decided. They have so many liked songs.

- (Modern) ponyboy would cry if he lost an account to something like Pinterest or Spotify, or just anything he’s had for a long time.

- (Modern) Pony leaves his phone on dnd (do not disturb) constantly. He never got Darry’s texts and Darry was like “dawg wtf” and made pony have it so Darry and soda go through the dnd. Johnny also goes through.

- (Modern) Johnny will just give himself piercings galore and his parents practically never notice because he’s either never at the house or they don’t care enough to perceive their son

- (Modern) Pony and Johnny have matching insta bios. They’re tv girl lyrics.

- (Modern) Ponyboy actually puts effort into choosing and editing pictures he takes, especially if he’s posting them, and even more especially if it’s johnny he’s posting. Johnny will just choose the goofiest possible pictures he has of anyone, ESPECIALLY pony, and post them. He literally has a picture of pony delirious and sick flipping him off as his lock screen

- Twobit taught his sister swear words and every time she says one their mom just glares at twobit

- Pony and johnny have matching earrings on opposite ears

- (Modern) Darry only lets pony get ear lobe piercings, but pony wanted an eyebrow piercing and got johnny to do it and when Darry noticed (immediately, mind you) he was grounded for two weeks. He was able to keep it though bc darry was scared it would get infected or heal weird

These next few I’ve had for a while but they were in another list for some reason?? On accident???? Oops

- Pony and Johnny would LOVE mitski and Conan gray in modern au

- Darry is really good at dancing, and before everything happened with his parents would do dance classes on his free time (which he didn’t have a lot of)

- Dally is aromantic.

Okay that’s it the rest I came up with in the past week

- Pony will draw or paint or whatever on anything around him. Don’t leave him alone with art supplies because one moment he’s painting a picture and the next his hand is painted blue. (me)

- Pony will get marked as rude a lot for not continuing conversations but it’s just because he doesn’t realize he’s supposed to say something back and gets anxiety when he doesn’t know how to continue a conversation (me)

- (Some parts of this are modern) Pony and johnny are like attached to each other. If pony is at his desk reading or drawing or doing schoolwork or smth, Johnny will pull up a chair and either rest his head on his shoulder from behind or hug his shoulders from behind to watch. If Johnny is just chilling on his phone, pony will appear next to him and immediately watch over his shoulder and curl up to Johnny. Johnny’s sleeping at the curtis house that night? You better move to the spare room soda, pony’s gonna sprawl out on the bed and Johnnys right up next to him. Pony hovers a lot around Johnny. It’s an anxiety thing

- (Modern-ish bc reasons I can specify) Pony will sometimes just mess with people’s hair without meaning too. He’s used to being able to fidget with and braid Johnny’s or soda’s hair so when he’s with someone it’s like a habit. He was chilling and yapping with Cherry and Marcia once and just reached for the ends of Cherry’s hair and started braiding. When she asked he was like “oh mb” and she’s like “nah, you’re fine girl” and now they all just do each other’s hair sometimes

- putting this here it’s not a hc but it was GONNA BE until I FORGOT (I am now mad)

- There’s gotta be a reason pony doesn’t like green yall…

- (Modern) pony uses gacha sometimes just to like come up with character designs or if he’s bored, but keeps that shit HIDDEN. if anyone around him (besides maybe Johnny) saw he would NEVER hear the end of it

- Soda likes sweets a lot and has like adhd executive dysfunction which just results in lots of cavities bc it physically pains him to brush his teeth sometimes (so me besides the cavities)

- Two bit kleptomaniac real

[luvsturniolo]

Hi do you think you could do a nick x male reader where the reader has been sad and nick surprises him with a date in the backyard and gives him a kiss as they just like lay under the moonlight

ー ★ !! starkissed

pairing : nick sturniolo x male!reader

synopsis : described in req ^^

a/n : okay i’m really hoping that this isn’t bad because i don’t want to portray these characters incorrectly. if u have any constructive criticism feel free to lmk !! also, i aplogize that it's kinda short.

wc : 0.9k

you've had a horrible week so far. well, nothing specific happened to make it shitty, but there hasn't been a single positive thought run through your head recently. every bone in your body feels exhausted and you're sick of it. you want to feel normal. you want to be happy. but you just cant like your mind is going agianst you – trying to make you upset. and if so, it's definitely working.

your boyfriend has noticed your change in demeanor and has been trying his hardest to cheer you up. he's gifted you with flowers ; snuck into your room at night for cuddles ; surprised you with your favorite snacks ; etc. but nothing's worked. and you feel even shittier knowing that your bad mood makes him feel responsible.

the last thing you want is for him to think it's his fault that you're upset. because it's not his fault! and you wish you could explain to him why you're sad, but you can't. you can't even explain to yourself why you're upset. god, you're so incredibly sick of feeling like this.

as you lay in your bed, trying to take a nap, slow music blares through your headphones. you're wearing your comfort hoodie – one that nick gave you on your guys' first date – with the hood pulled over your hair. under the fabric, you have speakers covering your ears to play music. you were hoping that if the singer's voice was loud enough, it would drown out your thoughts and you could focus on something other than being sad for once. but of course, it's not working.

just as you're about to fall alseep, you feel your phone vibrate with a message from nick. you know it's from him because he's the only contact you don't have on DND. you lazily grab and unlock your phone, opening snapchat where he texted you from.

babe !! what're u doing rn ?

js laying in bed .. why

bc i was wondering if u wanted to come over to my place for the night :)

sure <3

you turn off your phone and stuff it into the pocket of your hoodie before removing your headphones from your ears – a wave of sadness washing over you due to the lack of noise to distract you from all the shit going on in your life right now. you scoot over to the edge of your bed and put on the pair of shoes closest to you at the moment. your outfit looks like shit, to be honest. but whatever. at least it reflects what's going on in your life, right?

you and nick live in the same neighborhood so his house is only a few blocks away on foot. after leaving your house, your arrive at his about seven minutes later. you knock on the door and awkwardly stand on the porch for a moment before nick swings it open and pulls you into a tight embrace, hugging you happily. he pulls back and peppers your face with kisses, making you smile a tad.

"i have a surprise for you." he tells you, grabbing your hand and gently pulling you inro the house. you chuckle, shutting the door behind you as you're guided into the backward. in the center of the yard, you see a tent. you can tell nick put it up and decorated the inside to be pretty for you judging by the light shining through the fabric causing small shadows to splay across the grass. "i thought it'd be nice to lay under the stars tonight."

"under the stars?" you mimick, cocking your head to the side with a small and teasing smile grazing your lips. "how romantic, nicolas."

"well, matt and chris won't be here tonight. so i thought it'd be a good idea to do something with you. i can tell you've been in a shitty mood and even though you said i can't fix it, i hate seeing you like this." nick rambles, making your smile widen even more at the sound of his voice rushing out. "also, i know how much you love astronomy and stars and everything. so i thought it'd be nice to watch them together. y'know there's supposed to be an alignment tonight? i read on some website that mercury –"

you cut off his ranting by grabbing him by the cheeks and cupping his face in your hands. he instantly shuts up and you laugh before pressing your mouth to his. he smiles against your lips and your mood raises by a lot from that simple gesture.

you break the kiss and tell him that you love his idea. with that, you guys make your way down the yard to his tent. just as you'd thought, nick had decorated it to look comfy. there are about ten blankets on the floor and a few on top for warmth while you sleep. he also brought out a ton of pillows and a flashlight – which is what must have caused the shadows you saw. on the roof of the tent, there's a mesh netting so you can see the sky but also be inside.

you flop backward onto the blankets, making nick laugh at you. he reaches up and turns off the flashlight so you can see the stars better. then, he lays down beside you, resting his head on your chest to look up at the night sky peppered with little suns.

"they look like diamonds," you mutter in a whisper. "they're so little and there are so many. yet they never fail to take my breath away."

you feel nick sigh, "you're kinda like a star, then."

"what?" you ask.

"there are so many people in this world. and everyone is so small in comparison to the universe." he explains. "and yet, you're my favorite of them all. and you never fail to take my breath away."

tags : @kasqnxx @lvrsparadise @prettysturniolo @strniolo @urmyslxt @cupidsturniolo @opheliaofficial07 @thetriplets3 @sturn1olo-ffics @uhnanix @deadxrx @kitaysworld @lovelysturniolo @wilmalovegood @ladylokilaufeyson5 @sturniolopepsi @strnilolo @knowingnothingnoel @its-jennarose @lea0518 @slaysturniolo @sturnlover @tcvazq

[paradise-and-cola]

[Image description: three character profile cards for the Monster of the Week tabletop game system. Each card has a drawing of the character, their first name, their class name, their stats, and some descriptions. The last names are redacted with black ink strikes.

Card 1 shows Pause, of the Mundane class. Pause wears a short sleeved red shirt with blue highlights, beige shorts, as well as a red, white and blue bracelet. He has square glasses, and two small feathers are tucked behind his ear.

Pause’s stats are: Charm +2, Cool +1, Sharp +1, Tough 0 and Weird -1. His description reads:

- works a regular 9 to 5

- had a completely supernatural-free life until a woodland cryptid collided with his car

- now travels with Beef and Etho, solving paranormal mysteries all around Canada

- the designated driver

- is the only one in the group who can pass as a "normal" person. don't let appearances fool you, though, he's just as unhinged as the other two

End of card 1.

Card 2 shows ?????? (six question marks) also known as Etho, of the Monstrous class. Etho wears a green jacket over a grey shirt, grey jeans, black boots, as well as a headband and a scarf over the lower part of his face. The jacket has patches of the Canadian flag, the meme rabies pride flag, and a simplified cryptic creature. There is purple skin discoloration on the left side of his face and his left hand. In his right hand, Etho is holding a wrench.

Etho’s stats are: Charm 0, Cool -1, Sharp +2, Tough -1 and Weird +3. His description reads:

- a literal cryptid from the Canadian wilderness. normally a shapeshifter, Etho's been stuck with this half-human, half-monster appearance ever since Pause hit him with his car

- is weirdly good at car maintenance and engineering in general

- needs to feed on blood to survive. Beef, being a butcher, provides him with enough animal blood to sustain him for now... but ultimately, human blood is a much tastier snack

- immune to garlic, silver bullets etc, but is badly allergic to carbonated drinks

End of card 2.

Card 3 shows Beef, of the Flake class. Beef wears a blue baseball cap, a light brown coat, a black shirt, grey pants and black boots.

Beef’s stats are: Charm 0, Cool +1, Sharp +2, Tough 0 and Weird +1. His description reads:

- a butcher by day, a wannabe paranormal investigator by night

- (he's not very good at either)

- knows a lot about the supernatural in theory, but had little field experience - until an old friend called him about hitting something not quite human

- the others live with him for now, since Pause is from out of town and Etho never had a home to begin with

End of card 3. End description]

Here they are, the three heroes of the Monster of the Week Team Canada AU!  I’ve never played the game myself, but I think these three would make a pretty fun monster-hunting, mystery-solving team. I briefly considered making Beef an Expert class, but if you’ve consumed any Team Canada content, it makes it very hard to call them experts on anything...

This is technically for @shepscapades’ hermit redesign challenge, but I’ve deviated from the original prompt quite a bit (the prompt was DND characters and I’ve boldly chosen a different TTRPG system) so I don’t know if I even qualify for this week. Regardless, I’m very happy with this AU. Check out this little introductory comic I’ve made for it, if you haven’t yet.

[whineandcheese24]

so @erch0maii said in a post that i didn’t want to hijack that the reason that both screen adaptations of tmi didn’t feel quite right is because they were these dark gritty adaptations while the books are, at heart, campy and silly and comical. and i was thinking about this and how it relates to the other series in the tsc canon. when i first read tsc i thought that the reason they felt tmi felt different from tid, tda, and tlh is because they were her first books but it really all comes down to the character’s sense of humor and genre awareness. because all the other tsc series (and i’m betting twp too) take themselves so seriously, but timi doesn’t do that. 

with genre awareness, the characters are put in this dark edgy fantasy war series but they act like their in a satire or a comedy. my favorite parts of qoaad were when jace and clary were in these dangerous situations and were acting so nonchalant about it. and it wasn’t even like a fake confidence or something, they genuinely just are Like That. like at the war council they walked in casually with normal clothes and people didn’t even notice them until lily called them out. like, they could have changed, they could have made a big entrance, but no, why bother. and later in brocelind when manuel rips out the tent and they’re playing tic tac toe. they don’t acknowledge him at all, not even to make a joke about him ruining the tents they borrowed. they just sit there playing tic tac toe. and again on the imperishable fields, jace has a knife to manuel’s back and clary is holding the stanchion but emma describes them as walking as if they’re out for a morning stroll.

and like look at the parallels between the series. the tlh crew met one and a half princes of hell and barely made it out with their sanity. the tmi gang has collectively met 3 princes of hell and in literally every situation they’re on the same level. when emma and julian went to thule it was this dark scary traumatizing thing, this actual hell that wasn’t quite hell. and when james, matthew, lucie, and cordelia went to edom it was this terrible experience that both lucie and matthew spent literally dying. but when the tmi gang went to hell, what ever. yeah it was serious and traumatic and scarring but not in the same way. izzy and simon hooked up. clary and jace had sex. and alec made fun of all four of them for it after. jace got caught by a demon and clary scolded him like he left the fridge open. they literally snuck into sebastian’s elite fortress with a plan from simon’s dnd campaign. and diyu?  even when simon was having a mental breakdown he managed to flirt with izzy it took the tlh gang 3 long-ass books to defeat belial and christopher died in the process. the tmi gang beat sammael in a f*cking side book. if you go to the shadowhunter wiki and go to azazel’s history he’s said as being a part of team good. imagine how casual you have to be to get a prince of hell to join ‘team good’

and then there’s the angels. tessa’s contact with ithuriel almost killed her. emma and julian’s whole nephilim thing also almost killed them. and yeah, clary’s first encounter with raziel was very somber and serious. but in cols simon literally blackmailed raziel into giving him a magical sword. and with faerie, every encounter that the tda gang have with faeries or in faerie is this dangerous quest that could get everybody killed. the tmi gang don’t hesitaste to insult the seelie queen to her face

the thing that sets tmi apart from the rest of tsc is the characters’ refusal to take anything, themselves and everyone around them, seriously for very long

[twistedwonderlandsimps]

Hi! You can answer this whenever you like ^^

I want to ask if you could also make more scenarios for characters, other than Ace, having a mishap in Ramshackle’s weirdness (with ???!Yuu maybe coming to the rescue or not)

You could do the rest of the first years or the characters you think would have interesting interactions with the rules/creatures in Ramshackle ٩(^o^)۶

???!Yuu [ft. The First Years]

Ace Trappola and the 20-sided Dice

He found this peculiar little dice when he was walking around Ramshackle, looking for the Red Door again.

He was just really curious about the different versions of the Yuus that he saw from behind the Red Door and wanted to take a closer look.

No, not of them taking a bath! No!

He just wanted to talk to them and all that, alright?!

He was pretty sure he saw a Yuu that looked like Malleus Draconia so he was wondering what was up with that.

But Yuu didn’t help them find the door so now he was left with his own devices.

It didn’t take him long to find a room he was unfamiliar with and in the middle of the room was a glass case with a dice propped on top of a fancy pillow inside of it.

It was pretty easy to take and Ace assumed it was somewhat safe since Ramshackle didn’t do anything to stop him from taking it.

Ace looked at the dice, trying to see what kind of abilities it had since there was no way this thing was just a normal dice especially when he found it inside Ramshackle.

He turned it over with one hand before releasing it down to the floor and watching as it landed on the number 20.

The redhead waited patiently and looked around to see if there was anything dangerous coming after him. 

When he saw nothing, he shrugged and pocketed the dice and resolved to ask what was the dice’s purpose when he sees Yuu later.

Though oddly enough, throughout the day he seemed to find himself eerily… lucky?

There was a surprise pop quiz in class but that got canceled right as they were about to take it, his class got dismissed early so he was able to buy the delicious limited edition bread that was usually always sold out by the time he arrived in the cafeteria, and he even single-handedly carried his team in basketball practice earlier!

It was as if luck was on his side!

Of course Ace, the sharp man he was, immediately realized it was because of the dice’s influence.

He immediately verified this to Yuu but when the Ramshackle prefect heard that they had used the die, they gave him a pitiful look while Grim looked at him with an expression that said ‘are you stupid?’.

Ace: “W…What? Why are you looking at me like I’m a dead man? Shit, don’t tell me this dice is going to take my lifespan away?!”

Yuu: “Not your lifespan, per se… Also, it doesn’t take anything away. Eh, but you might want to buy yourself protective gears and be alert for tomorrow. You know what, it’s better if you don’t go to school tomorrow.”

Ace: “Oi…! What’s going to happen?!”

Grim: “Nyahaha! You’re gonna be extremely unlucky tomorrow! What a stupid human! Why would you use something you found in Ramshackle?”

Yuu: “...Didn’t you also–”

Grim: “THE GREAT GRIM DID NOT!”

Suffice to say, Ace had a really bad time the next day. He was forced to go to school because Riddle caught him trying to skip classes and collared him. And for some reason, things were falling from the sky out of nowhere and hitting him square in the head but good thing he had a helmet on or else he’d already have a concussion over his concussion. There were also surprise quizzes on his classes for topics he didn’t study for, ALL his classes! Even PE! Worst part was, he couldn’t do anything to stop this because he had to wait the whole day out!

The 20-sided Dice: Yes, it’s the DnD dice. Ultimately, it’s harmless when it’s not used. The higher the number one gets, the luckier they become. However, it’s not without its drawbacks because just as how lucky one may get, the more unlucky they become the next day. It’s like having a predetermined amount of luck assigned to you every day and other days ahead. The dice siphons your luck from tomorrow so you can use it at the present time but that means that tomorrow, you’re significantly less luckier. Normally it wouldn’t be noticeable but the higher the number someone gets, the more luck the dice takes from an individual’s tomorrow. It’s just unfortunate that Ace rolled a 20. Heh.

Deuce Spade and the Children’s Show

This happened earlier when he still didn’t know much of the true dangers in Ramshackle.

Although this man sometimes has small brain moments, he knows how to assess danger.

Sometimes, anyway. Because really, remember the Dwarf’s Mine? He really tried to try his luck and play russian roulette with the blot monster just to get a magic stone.

Anyway, this sense of danger mostly only applied to direct physical threats.

So stumbling into Ramshackle’s Lounge and seeing the television was on, he thought nothing of it. 

He assumed Yuu bought a new TV to entertain themselves. 

There didn’t seem to be anything much to do in Ramshackle aside from trying to escape with your life so he gets why Yuu would get a television.

Even if the television switched to a scene of a well with S*dako crawling out of it, Deuce was fairly confident in his ability to fight.

He decided to look and see what the show the television was showing and it was actually a children’s show!

Unfortunately there wasn’t a remote anywhere and the television oddly didn’t have buttons to change the channel so he had no choice but to watch the children’s show that was kind of similar to D*ra the Explorer.

When the cartoon character asked the viewers a question, Deuce would jokingly answer it, not knowing the entity he was luring in.

He didn’t find anything wrong until the television screen showed a cartoonized version of Ramshackle far in the distance. 

That was when Deuce began to feel that something was wrong. He tried to look for the TV’s power plug, only to find that it didn’t have any.

Finally realizing that this thing was an unknown entity, Deuce panicked and began talking to himself on what he should do and inadvertently giving indirect answers to it.

The cartoon character got closer and closer to Ramshackle with each scene, its face becoming more distorted and demented the more it got closer.

That was when Deuce realized that the show’s scene would change if he answered the character’s questions. 

Even joke answers, or any answer for that matter, counted.

So he closed his mouth shut before he could make anything worse for him but at this point it was already too late.

The character had already arrived at the cartoon version of Ramshackle’s front door.

They knocked on the door in the television, asking to be let in, and Deuce heard a series of knocks on Ramshackle’s front door in real life.

It had already arrived…

That was when a ball of flame suddenly headed towards the television and engulfed it in flames.

Deuce heard a high pitched shriek come from the outside as the cartoon character in the television show caught fire and screamed in agony.

He looked at the direction to where the ball of flame came from and saw a grumpy-looking Grim by the doorway.

“Fgnah! You almost tried to invite that thing inside! Be glad I was here before anything could happen!”

The Children’s Show: Yeah, it’s pretty much Am*nda the Adventurer except it’s a television show. Gotta love me some horror and children tropes. Anyway, no one knows the entity’s true form since they hide it behind the cutesy cartoon character in the television. Any type of answers given whenever the cartoon character addresses the viewers counts and it will continue to the next scene. That’s why staying silent is the best option but that doesn’t mean the cartoon character will let this slip by. When they inevitably realize that you find out their true purpose, they won’t hesitate to pull the punches. They’ll use any means to make you answer, whether by taunting you and picking on your insecurities or even creating a cartoon version of your loved ones getting hurt and screaming in pain. The only way to neutralize this entity is to destroy the television. It doesn’t mean it’s gone, just neutralized. It will be back again later with a different cartoon character…

Jack Howl and the… Thing?

He has a good head on his shoulders so he knew not to touch anything in Ramshackle or go into rooms he had never seen before.

Though, just because he’s careful doesn’t really stop the dangers from seeking him instead.

Unlucky for him, it seems that a murderous entity got impatient and forcefully took over control of Ramshackle's layout to trap Jack in a room with it.

Of course, such a crude way of taking control of Ramshackle’s layout definitely wouldn’t escape Yuu’s notice but it seems this entity was betting everything on its life that it would be able to harm Jack before either Yuu or Ramshackle could intervene and bring him out of danger.

Jack couldn’t do a thing but try to evade this… thing, whatever it was… since the door that he had just closed by itself and couldn’t be opened.

Then the room began to expand as Jack turned around to see whatever had just trapped him in the room.

The entity was a monstrous thing. It was disgusting to look at and even more disgusting to smell.

Even when Jack had a bit of distance from it, he could still smell the coppery smell of blood emanating from it.

The thing looked fleshy and had a lot of eyes of different colors and twitching limbs poking out of its body. 

Its flesh seemed to be made of human skin, if the vague shapes and figures of human faces stretched on the surface was anything to go by.

Jack had an ominous conjecture that those limbs and eyes came from the thing’s previous victim and he definitely didn’t want his face to be on there, no thank you.

So Jack did the best thing to do in a situation like this – Run away because he was sure as long as he could get out of this entity’s territory then it wouldn’t be able to chase after him anymore.

The only problem was that despite the entity looking all stout and plump from all the flesh it assimilated, it was still able to almost catch up to him!

Just as the entity was closing the gap between them, a wood beam suddenly burst out of the floor and hit the entity, throwing it out of Jack’s path as it hit the wall.

The door that was locked earlier opened and Jack could see that Yuu was holding the door open while reaching their hand out to him, screaming for him to take their hand.

It seemed that Yuu was struggling to force the door open, which was quite understandable since the entity didn’t want its prey to escape and they were technically playing a game of tug of war with the territory.

Still, looking over his shoulder, Jack could see more wooden beams bursting out from the walls, the floor, and the ceiling as it kept hitting the entity and breaking its momentum from catching up with Jack. This was the first time he had seen Ramshackle at work.

More beams burst out from the walls and created a barrier between the entity and Jack and Yuu.

Finally, Jack could reach out to Yuu and take their hand as he was pulled to safety. The door closed behind him and it disappeared from view. 

“I… huff… I’m so sorry…” Yuu panted, leaning on the wall. “We’ll make sure it… wheeze… won’t be able to… haa… to cause trouble ever again…”

“That’s… huff… great.” Jack replied, also out of breath.

The Thing: A malevolent entity obsessed with assimilating creatures into it. With the amount of mass it’s gained, it must have hunted in Ramshackle for a long, long time now. It actually has a second form where its flesh around its ‘stomach’ area splits open to show the seemingly alive and screaming heads of the previous victims still being digested and assimilated. Current status: pending elimination. :)

Epel Felmier and the Statue Room

Ah, the statue room. 

It’s a relatively harmless room. Relatively harmless unless the entities find you interesting enough to be a part of them, that is.

And that’s what exactly Epel is to them – a potential candidate for their ‘eternal paradise’.

He first stumbled upon the room when they were staying at Ramshackle for VDC practice.

At first he was curious about the statues that he was seeing littered all around Ramshackle when he and the rest of the NRC Tribe were moving in.

The statues were very detailed, like Greek sculptures.

Yuu seemed to have a strained expression on their face as they said, “Ah… Don’t mind them. They shouldn’t be out and about, trying to… recruit… new potentials for their cause.” 

Yuu said it loudly, as if purposely trying to let the statues hear their words.

The next day, the statues were still scattered around Ramshackle but this time their positions and poses changed. Additionally most of them were now inside of Ramshackle.

It was creepy but since Yuu reassured them that the statues were mostly harmless, it was no problem.

That was until Epel woke up in the middle of the night with a parched throat so he got up to get himself a glass of water.

As he opened the door, he was met with a statue pointing down the hallway.

It would be a lie if he said he wasn’t jumpscared to be met face-to-face with the statue but it would also be a lie if he said he wasn’t curious at what it was pointing at.

So he followed the direction down the hall where he saw another statue that was pointing down another hallway.

Realizing that the statues were actually leading him somewhere, he followed the directions they were leading him to and landed himself in the Statue Room.

Unlike the statues scattered outside, the ones inside the room were on pedestals that had plaques with description of the statue on it. 

Not only that but the depictions of the statues in the room were much more gorey as opposed to those scattered outside. 

The descriptions were all brief, something along the lines of: ‘Here lies Eveline, she who never stayed’, ‘Esmeralda, burned as a witch’, ‘L is for Larry who bled and bleed’ and the like.

It didn’t need much description when the emotions the statues exhibited were already telling.

Despite it all, the statues managed to look somehow elegant and beautiful even if the faces the statues expressed were of sadness, anger, or agony.

It was like a museum exhibit in the room and Epel actually enjoyed looking around.

It was all fine until Epel’s sight landed on an empty pedestal. He got curious why that lone pedestal had no statue on it so he looked at the plaque to see the missing statue’s description but…

EPEL FELMIER - Join us.

“Aw hell naw!”

His peewpaw and meemaw ain’t gonna be visiting his statue-fied body if he can help it, thank you very much!

Just as he was about to book it, he found himself surrounded by the statues that were on the pedestals earlier.

And that was how the story of Epel fistfighting the statues in the statue room happened.

The Statue Room: Despite the name and how they look, the entities inside of it weren’t really statues but they definitely act like one. They love passion, beauty, and eternity. They were once humans who wanted to stay as they were for eternity that they were willing to freeze themselves in time forever, whether they were on the brink of death or not. Now they’re just ‘statues’. Although not aggressive or hostile, it was best to stay away from them since they were persistent if they wanted to. It’s more of an minor annoyance for Yuu when they decide to break out of their assigned territory to scout for new people to join them. Still, they were ultimately harmless since the only way for them to successfully recruit people was if those people themselves willingly wanted to be a part of the Statue Room.

Sebek Zigvolt and the Boundary

Sebek didn’t really have any reason to visit Ramshackle but he had heard plenty of the odd things that happened in it.

But as he slowly got integrated into Yuu’s group of friends which mostly consisted of first years, visiting Ramshackle became more and more frequent.

In turn, him encountering whatever logic-defying thing that happened in the weird dorm became more common.

Of course, a sleepover was going to happen one of these days and it did.

And of course, just as Sebek closed his eyes and decided to go to sleep, he suddenly jolted awake and found himself in a white void, surrounded by cloudy smoke that lazily drifted all around.

Sebek was pretty sure he wasn’t the type to sleep-walk so he assumed it was just the Ramshackle shenanigans acting up again.

Still, being in the unknown place didn’t shake him a bit. He knew he could get out of the place, though he didn’t know how exactly.

Just as he was about to take a step forward, a hand landed on his shoulder and Sebek was alarmed but he calmed down when he saw that it was just Yuu, although they seemed to be looking at something past him.

An outburst was bubbling on his throat but Sebek paused when he saw the look on Yuu’s face. 

The pure and raw fear on Yuu’s face was concerning because if something can make Yuu that scared then whatever it was that scared them was very, very dangerous.

“Don’t…” Yuu said in a low voice, almost in a whisper, as they tugged Sebek back. “Don’t go there…”

Sebek let them, noticing the slight shaking of Yuu’s hand but he didn’t comment on it.

Yuu slid their hand down to Sebek’s own and intertwined their fingers as they began to walk backwards, Yuu never taking their eyes off what unseen things Sebek couldn’t see in front of them.

He didn’t say anything but he squeezed Yuu’s hand as a small reassurance to the Prefect.

Slowly, step by step, the surroundings transitioned to the wooden floor and moldy walls of Ramshackle and the two only stopped walking backwards when they couldn’t see the white expanse anymore.

Once they couldn’t see the white void, Yuu allowed themselves to collapse on their knees.

“Never,” They started as Sebek tried to help them up. “Never go past the boundary… please.”

The Boundary: It’s the boundary. Whatever happens outside of it is out of Ramshackle’s control. There are much more terrifying creatures outside than the ones within Ramshackle’s territory. More crueler, more inhumane. Had Sebek taken a step forward, Yuu wasn’t sure they would've been able to retrieve the half-fae’s body to mourn. Glad he didn’t, aye?

[pinkrifle]

hear me out

reader is a girl n she meets princess kenny and she knows it’s just kenny, a guy but she constantly battles her sexuality over it—but eventually giving in and asking princess kenny out on a date, disregarding gender,, :3c this is gnn be a series cuz “ i aint writing allat” and nobody’s gnna read an entire 3 pages worth of this (realistically)

— tags: @trevvylovesspence

— ✦ heart to heart ♡

i stepped up to kingdom Kupa Keep to meet the newfound princess, princess kenny—never expecting her to be so majestic, beautiful, stunning, adorable.. what other words could i possibly use to describe this girl? it only makes sense how she was selected princess. boy do these people have taste,,

i started to play this new game with my class and my best friends, stan, kyle, cartman and kenny. so far i find it nice! i mean it’s kind of a better DND. but not for super-nerds. just regular nerds.

walking up to the *very beautiful* majesty i bow my head down slightly towards her, making sure i never took my eyes off (who would want to anyway :3) “hello, dear princess kenny!!” i greet her, smiling at her—fixing my hair to make sure i don’t look like a bum in-front of this adorable babe. “huhu! hello! i understand you know my name, but yours is?”

“ooh! im [namey name ;3] im sure evryone has told you, but your so elegant!” i remind her, staring into her beautiful deep purple eyes. i notice her brush off her dress, scoff and a tiny blush spread across her hooded face. “wh- well thank you! i actually don’t get that a lot, so i appreciate that :)” she retorts in an even softer tone from her normal confident and wavy voice, cupping her left cheek with her left hand.

“[namey name], why don’t you come over to my palace for some tea, if you wish?” princess kenny proposes a brilliant idea, i assume that’s a regular thing <3 “of course! i would be more than happy to spend an afternoon with Kupa Keep’s princess. :3” i silently-shriek out loud, watching all the people of the fellow kingdom stare at me in envy. “well for now, why don’t we take a walk?”

her big eyes bat her eyelashes and before i can answer wit an exaggerated yes she carefully gets up off of her throne, taking my hand in her soft, gloved, hand. i stare at her in awe and start gliding my feet along with hers across the ol backyard we stood in, i feel amazing with princess kenny with me.

it’s something i havent felt before, is it a lovely envy? is it admiration? it can’t be love, no way,, i just met this girl! i remind myself. the word girl stains my mind… girl girl girl girl. why am i feeling like this if we’re both girls? you know what.. that’s the least of my concerns, as far as i know it’s just kenny, not a real girl.

but why am i upset that he isn’t a “real girl”? i thought that if i let myself realize princess kenny was really a boy, my worries would set aside, but i only got more and more upset, confused :( i stare at the ground as i feel my body tug—“[namey name] is everything alright? what was with that sudden stop is the weather too cold?” she questions me, cara mia! how i love hearing her say my name. it’s like angels have come down from heaven and had graced me with their voice.

“oh, yeah i’m alright!i just had to think about a little something for a sec, we can continue now &lt;3” i reassure her, telling her she had nothing to worry about and i was fine with walking with her, hell i knew so well i was more than fine walking with her. “well i hope that something wasn’t making you upset! we can always do something else if you wish, you are the guest after all :)” she stops me in the middle of the sidewalk, taking my forearms into her hands—staring at me with innocent eyes. “wha?! of course not! but i would be open to do anything you want to!” i bluff. it was practically love at first sight with this girl! i couldn’t tell her how i feel right now..

as we keep walking we chat up a storm, playfully grabbing each others hands, giggling, blushing, looking away.. <;3 “huhu— [namey name]! such a flirt! who would have known a lady like you could be so charming!” she’d compliment me from time to time, making my cheeks heat up. “well look at you! who wouldn’t wanna charm such an eye candy of a prin,,,,” i’d wanna retort, but get cut off by elves swarming infront of us. “GET THE PRINCESS FIRST” i hear one of them yell, without a thought in mind i swoop princess kenny off her feet, bridal style and begin darting down the way we came.

picking up the pace i take my wand out of a pocket in my cloak and cast some spell at the top of my head, it knocks the elves back and i keep running with the maiden. huffing and almost out of breath i get back to Kupa Keep and alert the people that elves were coming to wreak havoc. setting the princess down behind a rather large tree as i hide with her i assume someone’s keeping watch of the stick. i yell to everyone that sit infront of us, rather far away from our hiding spot that the elves are coming.

“oh thank you, thank you [namey name]! for i could have gotten much more than hurt back there,,” she clamors, very faintly shaking with some sort of fear. “we’re gonna be alright princess, i promise you. these slimy elves can do nothing to your glowing kingdom.” i hesitate to say your, as i want to say our. but how could i be thinking of love in a striking time like this? who wouldn’t wanna think of loving a beautiful princess in a striking time like this.

as i hear one final shriek before the backyard goes silent, i look at princess kenny as she looks back at me. i nod and smile as i hold her even tighter, emerging from the tree. watching as a final elf gets dragged out, i set princess kenny down and we cheer in unison as everyone else in the kingdom follows along. princess kenny settles everyone down as she takes a hand and places it in my direction.

“everyone, i don’t think we would have gotten this done as fast as we did without the help of my lovely mage, [namey name].” she announces, and everyone looks at me as i have a short smile on my face, waving out to the kingdom.

UHHH THSI IS PART 1 MUEHEHE… I HOPE UUY GUYS ENJOYED!! i am so excited i finally got yhis out YIPEEEE

update log (u can ignore idk)

pdate one [writing]: 11:38 pm 6/4/23

upd8 two [finishing, publishing] 1:47 pm 7/4/23