#I'm sure there's typos in here

[hummingbird-games]

Five Things You Never Get Tired of Writing

Tagged by @crescencestudio your answers were GOLD!!! now I gotta string  some words together and hope they make sense lol 🤧

sibling relationships - I’m sorry, but as someone who is a sibling and grew UP with siblings, I can smell a fake interaction a mile away LOL. It’s always been a pet peeve of mine to read books or watch movies and it’s painfully obvious that the writer has no idea what a real sibling interaction looks like oh my goodness. So I’ve taken it upon myself to write good rep LOL and now it’s in everything I make.

teenagers! (the drama, the mundane, the absurd, all of it!!) - Teens can be terrifying, confusing, immature, a hassle, etc. etc. But I feel like on top of the general disrespect and neglect demonstrated, (American) society just doesn’t give a shit about its kids and not-quite-yet-adults?? And in many instances there’s this huge rush to for kids to grow up mature? It’s disgusting. YA as a genre is still ridiculed in a lot of spaces, there’s a serious decline in teen movies being made right now (though there’s a few that cropped up recently, that doesn’t account for how many more could be made), and I personally feel like there’s quite a few experiences I missed out on just for being a Black girl 🤷🏾‍♀️. I love this age group and writing about it because it’s a period of firsts: all the things and experiences that adults have already done or have no interest in revisiting are such a Big Deal for those 13-19 year olds in my opinion and it’s just fun. 

 high maintenance girlies aka “Why do you do the most???” 💅🏾 I actually read this more than I write it, but when I DO write it??? I feel so powerful lol. Maybe it’s cause most people in my real life see me one way, but 90% of the time I’m just harboring gremlin energy and I get a special vindication when I see women/girls/femme who are stubborn beyond belief, angry, or type A personalities. The problem is most people don’t like reading about these type of characters so most times I’m writing for myself aha...

dialogue (specifically conversations) - I love any kind of banter, I love goofy, random conversations, I love quoting cartoons and movies unironically, and I gobble that ish up when others do it!! I feel like you learn a lot of about characters through their dialogue, especially with what they don’t say sometimes. 

grief - So I was running out of things for the list and decided to pull out my old wips and completed stuff, and this was a common thing that came up???? Like a lot of writers, I have to put the words to paper to process what’s going on, and the thing about grief is that you can process it all you want, but a lot of times it doesn’t make sense?? And it’s treated as something to ‘get over’ when the reality it grief this natural thing. And it doesn’t even have to be the physical death of a loved one (though it’s a thing I write about) but it can be the death of a situation, the end of a non-romantic relationship, whatever. It’s painful but I find myself exploring it anyway. 

(tagging @tuffmallowinteractive @jaunefleurwrites @jelpiparade @robobarbie @lovebirdgames @velvetfoxgames @rieindiegames @twincovesgame but feel free to ignore!!)

[louismoncher]

You said your methodology for getting into the character of Armand was to listen to music. So, the question on everybody's lips is: What's on the Armand playlist?

Assad: I can't tell you. It's extremely private. Mainly because it's quite embarrassing, some of the things on there. — Watch the full interview

[shoshiwrites]

I shall join you in the trash can my dear. For Jo & Bucky from the NSFW prompts (because I am unhinged about this):

[ UNZIP ] sender unzips/unbuttons receiver’s dress/shirt - s l o w l y 🫠

Emaaaaa! Thank you so much for this prompt, and for entertaining my Jo/Bucky ramblings at any time of day. It means so much that you're in the trash can with me on board. This was......... supposed to be a smut prompt and we ended up with............3200 words of Scenes I Really Needed To Write For Them Actually, comma mildly spicy 🙈 Bucky Egan x War correspondent OC. Also on Ao3!

leading with my heart again

She’s read the same page three times.

The coffee’s drained, and the cup of tea, and maybe she ought to stop now, now that her hand is shaking a bit holding the pencil, from the caffeine or everything she hardly knows. 

A hotel bar with a hole in it. When she blinks she can still see the smoke. A few stragglers at the end of the night. Even though the nights don’t end here, they haven’t for years. Local drinkers. Society usuals. A handful of correspondents. Al Stern, a friend of Marian’s. She’d broken out a fresh bottle of gin in his honor. Blanche Aurand, narrowly escaped from Marseilles, her photographer friend. Salim? Jo’s met them all. 

You’re scared, she wants to say. Like it’s not her own self sitting here, the ticking of the clock and the tap of her foot, her toes in her shoes. She reaches up to fidget with the tiny gold hoop in her ear.

The bar is gone now, and so are they.

She hasn’t heard much by way of Thorpe Abbotts lately. She’s trying not to let that bother her. 

If Kay were here, she'd tell her to sit up straight and quit looking like a gargoyle. If-

“Thought I’d find you here.”

His voice is a momentary shock, and still familiar, like a sun-drenched room. He leans against the bar, nods at the man polishing glasses to let him know about an order — the bartender who looks too similar to the last. If she closes her eyes, she sees a white jacket covered in brick-dust, or blood. 

She smells the major’s aftershave, through the smoke of the bar and the bitter coffee. 

He dips his head, an explanation to what she imagines is her still-bewildered face. “Rang your office.”

She really does try to sit up straight, now. Suddenly ashamed, or something like it, of herself next to his freshly-cleaned uniform. Her slacks with a broken crease, a blouse with a wrinkle or two. Her hair’s a mess, or feels like it. “Oh.”

She blinks again, sees that he’s holding a metal tin in his hand — barley sweets, nestled in waxed paper — and a small bunch of torn green stems attached to white-petaled flowers. 

“No cherry,” he says. He looks fondly annoyed, almost. “I told them a few packs of smokes oughta change their tune, but I think they were really out.” 

He surveys the space in front of her, the rings of coffee and the scattered pages and the folded newspaper, the front splash of the dead. Her people, his people, their people. Everyone belonging to someone. She hears him clear his throat. Like he already knows the answer to the question, the one he doesn’t ask. Did you know them? Yes. 

The barkeep’s looking at the two of them expectantly. “What can I get for you?”

She replaces the cup on its saucer, places the little spoon next to it and slides the whole operation towards him. “I’m alright, thanks, Louie.”

The major orders a whiskey, doesn’t let her put it on her tab. He’s not too insulted about it though, he knows her. The question’s silent again, when he’s got his glass, the nod of his chin. Who’re we drinking to tonight?

But she knows now, she knows you don’t ask. His eyes are dark here, in the fading light. The mask-marks, the circles under his eyes. The stray curl always out of place.

“So,” he says, gathering himself, setting the glass back on the bar with a dull thud. “How much time do you need?”

“Time?”

“To get all…” he gestures with his hand. “Unless you’d rather we sit around here all night.”

She taps her fingers on the bar, watches her watch and chain catch the light. Looks up at Major Egan standing there, wondering just how much Kay will kill her if she walks back out of this hotel in a plain black dress. “Depends if you like a girl’s hair with only a few knots or none.”

He makes a noise of dismissal. “I hope Kay won’t be too sore about me whisking you away.”

A remark about Captain Demarco takes shape on her tongue, but she swallows it. “Make it twenty, but I’ll be quick.” 

Upstairs, she does what she can with her curls, washes her face and tries to shape her brows, reapplies her lipstick. The deep cherry color is hardly forgiving, and she has to concentrate to be careful enough with the lines of her cupid’s bow. For a brief moment she thinks of it smudged, on her teeth, on his mouth.

The dress she’d brought over is indeed black, cocktail-length, collared, with a little piped pocket, a bit of detailing. Maybe it’s a little dated, she’ll acknowledge that, but she’s tried to keep it tailored to the current style, fitted, hemmed shorter. Kay would try to send her out in something bright, rose-colored or teal, never mind that it’s October in London. She admires Kay’s boldness. Loves it, in fact, but it’s not for her. 

The bracelet stays, the watch, her earrings, her mother’s medallion beneath the collar of the dress. Heels with thin ties wrapped ‘round her ankles, and her coat. 

Hastily, she’d put the flowers in an empty bottle of Fernet-Branca, figuring Kay wouldn’t mind. He’d had less of an explanation for them than the tin of sweets, something about passing them on his way, something like a boyish smile.  Just as quickly she plucks one, laces it into the back of her updo. It’s already been cut, anyway. She wonders where he’d got them, wonders if she’ll ask. She remembers the florist down the street from her apartment in Philadelphia, the spring flowers outside Pittsburgh. She can’t see it, but he will, standing above her. 

Back down in the lobby, the tips of her fingers brush his shoulder at the low armchair, the last of his drink still in front of him. 

“Now, aren’t you a sight.” It’s not the same voice as usual — quieter. Like he’s drinking her in, like the whiskey at the bottom of the glass. “Too pretty to be out with me, that’s for damn sure.”  

She smiles, and she doesn’t even have to try, sure that her cheeks are a little pink. “Kay won’t be sore about me leaving, but she might have my head about this dress.”

He looks truly confused. “Why?”

Her hand gestures without thinking at the simple sweep of the skirt; she’s suddenly very aware of her legs. “Too boring.”

He makes a face. “Hell with that.” A small sniff, as he reconsiders. “Sorry.”

For the first time, she laughs. “I won’t tell her you said that.”

“Tell her whatever you want, you still look too good to be true.”

Now she’s really blushing. “A sight for sore eyes, huh?” The pendant rests in the dip of her collarbone, beneath the neckline of her dress. She feels it, feels the clasp at the back of her neck and the chain. 

“You don’t know the half of it.” He stands, taking the glass, polishes the last sip of his drink.

She lets herself put a hand on his jacket. “Let me buy your next one?”

He reaches for her hand, for her wrist under the sleeve of her coat. “Now, I’ll have no more of that talk, Josephine.” 

The streets are dark outside, an excuse to stay close to him. A door materializes, a small place with small tables, glowing candles and bottles of liquor and wine. It’s all very respectable, the twirl they take around the floor, and then the next, his hands at her waist, hers up around his neck. A bead of sweat works its way down the back of her neck, between her shoulderblades. He dips his head to ask if she’d like to sit, his temple damp and tacky before her mouth, in the warm room. They do, after another dance, sit and watch the couples sway from a table on the side, listen to the jukebox. I need no soft lights to enchant me- 

She lets him buy her one drink, and then two, the dark rum color catching the candlelight at the bottom of the glass. She doesn’t feel under watch here like she does at the base. Though, there’d been plenty of moments there that maybe they shouldn’t have been allowed. They. She doesn’t know what that means, here in this war. You dance one night and find an empty space the next. Or someone else. His ankle nestles against hers under the table. She wants to kiss him.

What’s stopping her?

His eyes are so blue, and she knows she’s staring. “Got something for you. If- if you want it.” It snaps her out of it a moment, her brow furrowing as he reaches into his pocket. A small gold pin in his palm, the Air Corps insignia. The kind he wears on his collar. “Since I made off with that scarf of yours.”  

The white one, he means, with flowers and Swiss dots. She’d worn it up. He’d taken it as a joke afterwards, smiling, a crack about it being prettier than the one he’d got, but not as pretty as Major Cleven’s. Buck’s. A joke, or so she’d thought. Her mistake to think a pilot’s lucky charms weren’t the most deadly serious things of all. She knows, now. Maybe she hadn’t wanted to think he meant it. 

She could wear it, here in London. His pin. A person would know she had someone. Someone. She doesn’t know how to explain him, for all her words. Brave, like all of them. Brave and funny and flirting, the fiery death or the pretty girl. A heart she wants to curl up inside of. And he’s here in front of her, fidgeting, waiting for her to say something. Here, hands and shoulders and knees. It hurts to think of anything else. She would know who she had.

“See,” she says softly, meeting his eyes. She feels like a schoolgirl, watching him. “Knew what I was doing, wearing black and gold.” She reaches to touch his palm, about to take it and pin it on. He moves to do it himself, leaning forward. She shivers, the touch of his fingers at her throat, under the collar of her dress.

If you would only grant me the right-To hold you ever so tight-

Maybe it’s the light, or the drinks, or the music, or the fact that staying ten minutes past last call could have put her on the front page of that newspaper too. Every mission, the odds go down.

Maybe it’s the way he’s looking at her, like he’s hoping she’ll ask him for something he can give. 

He’s so close to her now. Maybe-

“Mmph-” He tastes like spice and alcohol, the sweat of his upper lip pressed to hers. He releases the pinch of fabric in his hands, the pin now fastened to her lapel. It hardly takes a second for his hands to find her jaw. His touch loosens the tension of her shoulders, sparks warm and firelit in her belly. She stays, lets the kiss grow sloppier until her tongue is pressing against his teeth.

They only stop because she needs a second to catch her breath, to watch him smile at her like she’s somehow surprised him.

“Why are you smiling?”

He doesn’t stop. “I’ll give you one guess, Josephine.”

She thinks better of a retort, lets her cheeks go red and leans forward again, a noisy kiss against his mouth. 

A voice in the back of her head sounds a warning, something distorted, through the sound of the music and the smoky haze. The singer’s own shines through, the brassy big band music that always makes her think of him. There I go, leading with my heart again- She ought to head back to the hotel now, before the night calls for another bar, another drink or three, a bed. And there I go, acting not-so-smart again-

She stands, smooths her skirt, adjusts the soles of her feet inside her shoes. “One more spin?” 

Something falls out of his eyes; he looks like he wants to argue with her, but he doesn’t. A few seconds before he answers. “Early morning?”

She nods, and it feels like the worst lie. Even though it isn’t, she’s got a briefing with the Ministry of Information tomorrow, and plans to meet another source for coffee. Probably more drinks, she thinks. It would hardly be the first time someone showed up for a meeting hungover.

But though it’s unwise, I can’t disguise my love-

Afterwards, they walk back out into the cold night, the smell of his aftershave still in her nose. He touches the flower at the back of her hair. “You got your last dance, can I get a last kiss?”

It surprises her, the forlorn note in her voice. “Where did I use the word last, Major?”

He sighs, or something like it. “Don’t have to, it’s written all over your face.”

Her fingertips find his lapels, the top of her head nuzzled under his chin. “I would hope I’m less readable than that.”

A laugh escapes him, though it’s hardly full of humor. “You’re really not.”

Like you, right? “A shitty pokerface, remember?” 

“‘Cept this time it’s not about the coffee.”

“What’s it about, then?”

He doesn’t answer, leans down and kisses her and steadies her with his hands, what she imagines is her own lipstick tacky against the sides of her mouth. He doesn’t stop, and neither does she. His hand burrows between her coat and her dress, hugging her waist. She presses against it.

They should be walking, or ducked under an eave, not out here like this after dark. This corner. 

Her back automatically straightens when they hear a bicyclist go past, a little huff from his lips and hers as she breaks away. 

“I can still bring you back-” he says belatedly, “if-”

He’s offering her this. Maybe she can admit it to herself now, wanting it too much to refuse.

She shakes her head. “It’s alright, John.”

There’s something in his eyes at that, no Major, just John. “I’m glad.” His voice is heavy when he answers her. Low. His fingertips press against her waist. “I’ve been thinking about this damn dress all night.”

“The dress?”

He smiles, the scratch of his mustache against her cheek. “Alright, the zipper.” He laughs softly, what he imagines her face must look like in the dark, under the cloud-filled sky. “Just bein’ honest.”

Her mouth hovers at the corner of his jaw. “I’d expect nothing less.”

“What else do you expect?” Her chest feels like it’s full of butterflies, when he asks.

“That…you won’t stop talking.” She kisses the spot under his ear. “Please.”

He snorts. Maybe she’s imagining it, the slightest breathiness to his voice. “Now tell me what you really think of me, Josephine.”

Can I? she thinks. “Well, what do you expect?”

He pauses, considering. “That you’ll keep kissing me. Makin’ me blush.”

“I make you blush?”

“Like a tomato, Josephine. ‘Least it feels like it. One flash of those knees and-” She smacks him lightly across the lapel. “Hey.”

“I guess I told you not to stop talking.”

“Yes, you did. Now where was I-”

“My knees.”

“Right.”

A few more couples make their way outside, swirls of perfume and rum and sweat, almost bumping into them. She knows what she’s asking, now. “Maybe we should, uh-”

“Maybe you’re right.”

His hotel is closer, they’d walked by it on the way. She tries not to duck her head in the lobby. He kisses her on the landing of the stairs and again outside the door, forehead lingering against hers.

It’s a large room, larger than she expected, certainly not the little thing she and Kay share at the Highgate, the wallpaper peeling by the radiator. There’s not much of him here besides a bed that’s half-made, a garment bag by the front leg of the desk.

“It’s a nice room,” she says, trying to banish the wobble in her stomach. 

He makes a noise that sounds almost like a laugh. “They know how to charge officers around here.”

“Still.” She reaches back to fidget with the clasp of her necklace. “I uh-”

“Something wrong?”

No. “It’s been-” She’s suddenly embarrassed, left ignorant as to how this is supposed to go. Not ignorant, just-

“Can I get you a drink? We could get something sent up.”

“No, thank you.” It’s probably too late, anyway. He takes off his jacket, drapes it over the back of the small chair at the desk. She takes a deep breath. “I suppose you should kiss me again.”

He smiles, deep and wolfish. “You suppose, huh?”

“Yes.” He does, lets her thread her fingers in his hair. “Suppose I should let you sit, too,” she says. 

“However you want, sweetheart.”

She wants to slap herself for what comes out next. “Really?” 

He looks at her like she’s a little bit crazy. His eyes are gleaming in the low light, dulled against the closed curtains. “You say jump, I say how high.”

She shakes her head before she can stop herself. Her voice is small, and wanting, and she feels suddenly like she’ll fall apart if he doesn’t keep holding her. “Please, just kiss me.” 

Don’t make me think. Let me forget everything except you. 

“Just say the word,” he says, but he’s already got his mouth on hers. 

She’d stopped caring about her lipstick hours ago, and to hell with everything else now. She’s in his lap, here in a locked room, his hand high up her thigh and her own pressed on top of it.

Soon, her dress is around her hips, and he’s got his hands on the top of the zipper, stopping when it catches. He presses a sloppy kiss to her neck, the dip of her collarbone, exposed. She helps him open the rest of the dress, awkwardly, twisting an elbow. He stops, and looks at her with a hazy stare; two kisses, one above each breast, and one to St. Christopher between them. She undoes his tie, not quite an easy task when he’s lavishing kisses on her shoulders. Keeping his promise. She ought to, too. She presses her mouth to the freckles dotting his chest, and one for his crucifix, another for the medallion. Maybe, she thinks, they should use the rest of the bed.

“I’m glad I stopped by,” he says, quiet and rasping and a little bit breathless, his cheeks a shade of coral in the light. 

“You found me,” she says, and it sounds like thank you.

He seems to consider this, his hands stilled under her dress. She can feel him, underneath her. It sends a rush of sparks through her chest, her stomach, her hips. “I did.”

“You did.”

I trust you, she wants to say. But she doesn’t, doesn’t know what to say next. Only brings a hand to his cheek, and his curls, only kisses him again.

[maeryuu]

As someone with issues recognizing my self, listening to the whole SELF-iSH album it's a religious experience.

[thoseyoulove]

I usually just reblog here and don't speak much, but I've been reading too many different takes on this and wanted to say this. This is a Gothic horror about monsters, yes. You can't watch this show thinking is a Disney animation and they'll be basically perfect all the time. There's murder, physical assault, sexual assault, there will probably be incest at some point and more. Everyone that decides to still watch the show is willingly signing up for it. Nobody is forcing them to watch it, it's their call and they should recognize that. And, yes, the show isn't about moral codes and punitivism. It's about exploring the depths of existence and immortality, how high and deep down they can go, if they're condemned to suffer forever or if they can evolve, forgive each other, forgive themselves and find some sense of peace. If you want characters to be condemned and die for their crimes and mistakes, there wouldn't be anyone left to tell the story. Sure, you can still watch it anyway, because the writing, the acting, the score etc are phenomenal, but know that's not happening and that's never been a promise the cast or crew has ever made. Know that certain wishes for yours won't be granted. You can still have a lot of fun, but you know what to expect and that you'll never be fully satisfied.

That said, this doesn't mean the characters should always get a free pass to do whatever the hell they want and everyone should always accept it either. Even on the show, their actions have consequences, the characters get disappointed, hurt, angry, remorseful etc. They break up. They need to make up for each other and gain their trust back. Yes, they're vampires and their bodies and minds work differently, but they still have pretty human feelings and that conflict is one of the premises of the show. Not to mention how a lot of their problems are pretty human too, and stuff that hit close to home for a lot of individuals, so their audience made of real people will react in different ways. If somebody isn't counting the days to see rape, sexual exploitation, incest or any of these heavy topics, it's their right. They may even have traumas with it and, honestly, they shouldn't reveal their personal stories so people learn how to be sensitive and stop calling them weak or mocking them. But if people don't have problems watching that kind of content, or even like some characters known for such actions (focus on some because I don't know how they'll adapt them and if/how they'll be redeemable), that doesn't necessarily mean they support or do that in real life themselves. Perhaps don't make assumptions about strangers without having a pretty good reason to.

People have their own tastes, experiences, triggers and boundaries and they know what's good for them or not, when they can keep watching something or when they should drop it. And that counts for people of color, women, people who are queer, disabled, neurodivergent, part of any minority and/or have a history of being abused. You may be in one of more of those categories, but other people may react different and have different opinions too. People aren't a monolith. We can talk about it and this should be a healthy place for anybody that feels safe to talk and share their opinions and experiences. But if you ever have an impasse, you can mute, blacklist, block words and people. There's nothing wrong in respecting your own personal boundaries and you should never risk your own peace of mind for something that is supposed to be entertainment. Just don't go to people's Twitter/Tumblr accounts to bother them, change their minds or make insensitive jokes, maybe? It's really not that hard.

[topsyturvy-turtely]

about love - an essay

(really, it's a rant)

what the actual fuck is love about? i mean how freaking RANDOM is love??? "hey yeah remember this person you have met ONCE in your entire life? yeah they are your soulmate, only one, love of your life etc etc" or like "yeah so i know you have KNOWN this person for your entire life but... they are actually you know... THE ONE you wanna MARRY"????

how the fuck are those two talking about the same goddamn fuckin thing???

and like... you know why it's called "falling" in love?! BECAUSE IT IS SO RANDOM AND COULD LITERALLY MEAN ANYTHING. you fell and broke your leg -> oh yeah they are your forever crush where nothing ever happens, leaving a pain behind that makes you think of that incident. oh woops you just stumbled it's all good -> a passing crush. you fell hard and hit your head, probably got rolled over by a car -> it's a toxic relationship. you fell and got caught -> the love of your life was waiting for you to fall for them and caught you (WHAT?). you fall and take them with you and you end up giggling on the ground -> congrats, idiots!

or like whom you fall for??? for the person of the same sex, the opposite? another one entirely? you think you have a type and then this ONE person comes along and you're like "wait what". HUH??? HOW DOES THAT WORK. and like maybe there's a age gap, or a social status difference, or IDK WHAT and then people start being all weird about it???

WHEN THEY HAVE TOLD YOU YOUR ENTIRE LIFE TO FIND THEM?

and then you might fall for multiple people but want to be in a monogamous relationship??? WHAT DO YOU DO THEN???!

and then there are POLYAMOROUS people which are like... i mean you go but... HOW DO YOU GET MORE THAN ONE PERSON WHILE SO MANY PEOPLE STRUGGLE TO HAVE ONLY ONE???

and then there are aromantics, which is like a whole different liga...

it's so fucking RANDOM. i'm definitely not having a tiny whom do i love crisis... do i even love someone? do i WANT TO? could i change it if i wanted to?? OMF!!!!

[fuckedupcleric]

Triggers

I love suffering, don't you? Inspired by this art by @sarathrwizard

---

Donnie stared at the screen with a slack jaw, eyes glued to the You died! message that had popped up. His latest Minecraft build was absolutely destroyed. He could see the remains in the background of the death screen. He'd been almost finished! Just the last few bits of decoration had been left! And now… hours upon hours of work. Gone in an instant.

A long, frustrated groan escaped him and he tossed the controller to the side, prompting Leo to glance up from his phone and take in the words on the screen, as well.

“Wait,” Leo said. “What happened?” 

Donnie pursed his lips. “...Nothing.”

Leo smirked, putting away his phone and leaning closer. “Oooooh it’s embarrassing, isn’t it? Tell me. Tell meeeeeeeee.” 

Ugh. Here we go. “Drop it, Nardo.” 

“Come on, Don-Tron.” The amusement in his tone made Donnie cluck his tongue, and he pointedly ignored his brother. Leo leaned closer, practically draping himself across Donnie’s right side before he was irritably shoved away, only to start repeating “tell me” over and over, poking Donnie in his side with each utterance of the phrase. Donnie reached for his tech bo just to have something to squeeze that wasn’t Leo’s neck and shot him the nastiest look he could manage. It did nothing whatsoever to deter Leo, though, who was still smirking and poking and being an annoying goddamn menace. “Tell me, tell me, tell me, tell me, t-”

“Oh would you - Kassinove! Fine!” 

Leo sat back, giving Donnie a smile that somehow managed to look both completely innocent and infuriatingly smug at the same time. Donnie sighed and looked at the screen again. You died! still stared back at him. He shook his head, looking anywhere but at Leo, his mouth twisting into a grimace as a noticeable blush crept up his neck. “I was trying to fix the lighting system and… I placed down a block of TNT instead of a block of redstone… and…”

He glanced back at Leo, whose eyes widened. “Wait, so you killed yourself AND blew up your house? With your own TNT?”

“...I forgot it was in my hotbar.”

Leo was still for a moment, and then he burst into hysterical laughter, bending forward and clutching at his stomach. “PFFFFFFFT oh my GOD!”

Donnie just scowled, watching with growing self-consciousness as Leo continued to lose his absolute shit at what was apparently the funniest thing he'd heard all week. He waited for the laughter to die down, but each time he thought it would, Leo suddenly dissolved into renewed giggles once more. 

As the laughter dragged, on and on and on, Donnie found himself getting more and more annoyed. He'd put a lot of time and effort into this stupid build. Leo knew that - he'd been hanging out here a lot over the last two weeks, just chilling while Donnie worked, so he'd actually seen most of the progress in real-time. 

Donnie heaved an enormous sigh as Leo continued laughing, smacking his knee obnoxiously. 

Okay, enough. It wasn’t that funny.

Leo swiped a finger under his eye before wheezing out, “Donnie, that was so dumb of you!”

Donnie bristled, feeling the embarrassment and annoyance spill over. He let out a harsh breath, snarling, “Oh just- wipe that grin off your face!”

A sudden choking sound had ice shooting through Donnie's veins, his irritation instantly disappearing. Leo was still as stone, his expression of mirth replaced by wide-eyed terror. His eyes held a faraway look, and for a long, terrible moment it seemed like he couldn’t quite manage to inhale. 

Donnie felt his brows furrow. He reached out but left his hand hovering in the air between them, hesitant. “Leo?”

Leo didn’t answer, but he did finally start to breathe. Short, rasping breaths stuttered out of him, and he blinked rapidly a few times, clutching at the fabric of his hoodie over his chest. Leo was shaking, Donnie realized, and then Leo let out a high-pitched whine and Donnie started to panic.

“Leo, what’s wrong? How can I help?”

He still didn’t answer. 

Donnie clenched and unclenched his fists uselessly, floundering. Not wanting to make things worse and unsure what he could do to make things better. He didn’t know what was even - didn’t know what had - maybe a scan would tell him? - but when Donnie lowered his goggles, Leo jerked away from him so hard he fell onto the floor. Donnie watched, horrified, as Leo scrambled backward until his shell hit the wall hard, his eyes never leaving Donnie’s face. His entire body was trembling, little, terrified sounds slipping out of him that made Donnie’s chest tighten and his stomach drop, and now Donnie was really fucking panicking. 

He stood and took a step toward Leo, but that made Leo flinch violently again, his hand raising as if to shield himself and his shell making an unpleasant scraping noise as he pressed himself further against the wall. Donnie stayed still. Unsure and panicking and useless useless useless.

An agonized sound clawed out of Leo’s throat. There was a slight shake of his head, his eyes still glued to Donnie, before he started to whimper. “No, no, no. No, I - I escaped from - this isn’t - you’re not real, you’re not-”

A box popped up in the interface of his goggles, pulling Donnie’s focus. NO MEDICAL ANOMALIES IDENTIFIED. PHYSICAL SYMPTOMS CORRELATE WITH EMOTIONAL DISTRESS. PRIMARY CONCLUSION: PANIC ATTACK.

Fuck. Fuck. Okay. 

Donnie swallowed and licked his lips, thinking. Should he call Mikey or Raph? Would more people make it worse? What was he supposed to do? He pushed his goggles back up, still trying to think think think, and Leo’s babbling abruptly cut off. 

For a long moment, both brothers were frozen. Staring at one another. And then something in Leo’s eyes changed and he took in a sudden, shuddering breath before lowering his arm and clutching at his hoodie again with a trembling hand. He swiped his other hand across his face, and when it dropped he was no longer looking at Donnie. He stared at the floor, his face perfectly, completely blank, and the silence was so, so loud. 

Donnie wrung his hands and watched his twin, still afraid to advance. “Leo? Are you-”

“I’m fine,” he said flatly.

That was very much a fucking lie, but before Donnie could say anything Leo pushed himself unsteadily to his feet and stumbled out of the room. Donnie blinked in shock, his mouth hanging open and his brows furrowed. He watched Leo retreat until he disappeared around the corner, then pressed his lips into a thin line.

He should go after him. Right? He should… find out what the fuck just happened. And why. And whether it had happened before. 

Donnie sat down, twisting his fingers in his lap and trying to keep his breaths steady. He needed to go talk to Leo. He needed to go talk to Leo. He needed to go talk to Leo.

Why wasn’t he moving?

…Donnie would go to him. He would. He just… needed to do some research first. He needed to be prepared. In case it happened again. Just some research. Some preparation. And then they would… talk.

(Right?)

[dyed-red]

What are your thoughts on how much time Sam’s soul spent in The Cage? If we go by established time lines in the show, 18 months = approx 180 years. But Lucifer is an arch angel and we know angels can manipulate time so I think it could have been longer, or least made to feel longer. I also believe that Sam would have been fluent in Enochian after spending that much time with Lucifer and Micheal. Thank you for answering if you have time! And I hope you enjoy and holiday time you have :)

welp - you did it.

you asked a question i’ve been thinking about for over a decade and unleashed the full fury of my brainworms in action. this is the type of meta i expect like 4 people total to be interested in, but i’m going to spend days working on because I Have Thoughts.

the short answer: somewhere between 180 - 5000 years, with my personal headcanon landing just over 700 years, or 1400 for maximum whump.

The behemoth long answer is under a cut because long and math and meta. Skip to the end if you just want the math. The tl;dr is that SPN canon implies that hell has layers and that time distorts more the deeper that you go, and we can build an equation for that distortion and get to basically whatever number suits our purposes depending on what assumptions we make going in.

Time Distortion in Hell

The length of time Sam’s soul felt/experienced the cage is a function of two factors: how long he spent there in earth terms, and the degree of temporal distortion hell creates.

The first piece is easy if we assume Sam’s soul spent 18 months in the cage* (footnotes at the end).

The second piece... Dean spent 4 months dead (time in earth terms) which was 40 years on the rack in terms of his experience/perception. If we take this assumption that 1 month = 1 decade, we get to use some very simple math to say that Sam spent 180 years in the cage.

But.

I’ve always personally interpreted Hell’s time distortion to run a bit different than a static 1 month = 1 decade. This headcanon derives from some hints in canon (or at least, this headcanon is not actively contradicted by moments in canon) and from other pieces of media.

I believe that the deeper you go into hell, the greater the temporal distortion is.

This is basically like the move Inception, I’m not even gonna try to pretend otherwise. There, the deeper you go into the dream within a dream, the more time dilation there is. It makes sense to me that SPN’s Hell canon works the same for several reasons.

For starters, when Sam's wall is breaking in s6, he has flashbacks where 2-3 minutes is equated with what feels like a week in the cage (episode 6x14). We can take this at perfect face value (meaning that Sam’s soul experienced about 5000 years in the Cage). Or we can interpret this to be a function of the episode he is experiencing, where temporal dilation is exaggerated because of the nature of his flashback, or we can say he is speaking in hyperbole.

I think it makes sense for the truth to be somewhere in the middle - Sam is speaking off the cuff, not entirely literal or exact about how long those 2-3 minutes felt like, but nonetheless honestly that they felt like days, felt much longer than our formula of 1 month = 1 decade allows. And I take that as a realistic reflection of his time spent in the pit.

Another, and far more overt piece of evidence comes in Season 11 when Sam visits ‘the Cage’. In 11x09 (O Brother Where Art Thou), we see Rowena, Crowley and Sam in Hell whereas Dean is on Earth, and there appears to be little to no temporal distortion occurring between the events below and the events above. This remains true in the following episode (11x10, the Devil in the Details) when Crowley phones Dean and when Dean comes down to join them in Hell (and Cas as well shortly after).

So - what gives? Is there temporal distortion occurring in Hell or not? Did they retcon that, forget about it, what?

Well, Crowley explicitly refers to this area of Hell as ‘Limbo’, which brings us to an understanding of Hell’s temporal distortion through the lens of the circles presented in Dante’s Inferno.

Circles of Hell

It’s fair and frustrating to say that canon doesn’t give us much in the way of understanding the structure and hierarchies of Hell. That gives us a lot of leeway, but I like to anchor my headcanons to canon if and when I can.

Thankfully, there is at least some reason to believe that Hell in this universe is structured at least somewhat similarly to Hell in other popular works of fiction that derive their conceptions of it from Dante’s Inferno (which itself is the popular mainstream view of hell that even a lot of Christian/Catholics have adopted, often without realizing at this point).

Dante’s Inferno provides a view of hell that has 9 circles, or layers, each one deeper into Hell than the last. SPN implies the same.

We get this from the use of Limbo, as stated above, since this is the term in the Inferno for the first circle. Crowley refers to Limbo as the “furthest reaches” of Hell, whereas in Dante’s Inferno, it’s the top layer. SPN plays fast and loose with what it takes vs. leaves from real-world mythos, but I take this to mean that “far” or “furthest” not in the sense of depth, but as a place which may be vast and largely empty, and which few demons can enter (since, as per the Inferno, it’s not a place where guilty souls actually end up, so possibly has quite restricted access to demons).

We also get evidence of these circles from Word of God through Sera Gamble, who has apparently said that the Cage is “At the bottom of the lowest depths of the ninth circle of the worst bit of Hell.” That’s pure Dante’s Inferno, ba-bey. (/mcelroy voice)

More evidence comes from Season 8 when Sam rescues Bobby’s soul from Hell, since he goes through Purgatory as a sort of back door to Hell, being told that Purgatory is “Hell adjacent”, which is true as well in the Inferno.

Another within-canon indirect hint of this is the association between Lucifer and ice. Dante’s Inferno keeps that the ninth circle of Hell, reserved for treachery, is a large frozen lake. And in the Inferno and in SPN canon, this is where the Devil is kept, in the Center of Hell, in the deepest frozen depths of the pit, the frozen lake in the ninth circle.

Also remembering that in early seasons, Lucifer and his Cage were buried so deep in Hell that most demons weren’t sure if he even existed. His existence was a matter of faith, no different than humans believing in God, according to 3x04 (Sin City).

Based on all this, I think it’s perfectly reasonable to surmise that Hell is vast, but potentially its vastness manifesting in the way in which it is layered, and that there are regions, planes, or depths that most demons do not or cannot tread to.

But okay, even if you’re on board so far, why do I believe that time works differently at different layers? And what circles have we seen in canon?

Situating Each Circle

My fundamental argument here is that temporal distortion in Hell is more extreme at the deeper depths, in a mathematically determinable way.

If we accept that Hell has nine circles (or planes or layers), then we can assume that we’ve seen three - probably five - of them. There is Limbo, as per season 11 and stated above, in which there seems to be little to no time dilation. This makes some sense if we accept that it’s the surface-most plane*, the first circle.

We have also established what’s in the ninth circle, titled Treachery, which is the Center of Hell and The Cage. Given its depth and the lines from season 3 Sin City, we can assume that, much like Limbo, this is an off-limits zone for most demons. If we accept my argument that times moves differently at the different layers, this is where time distortion - really, time dilation - should be the most extreme. It is the furthest removed from the material plane and the deepest well (do not call it a gravity well do not call it a gravity well do not call it a - )*, dilating time and everything around it at its depths.

In between, we have seen The Rack (where Dean was tortured), we have the Throne (where Rowena sat and kept court, since many of Crowley’s ruling scenes are implied to be on the surface rather than in Hell proper, although any of Crowley’s ruling scenes would be on this same level, I imagine), we have The Dungeon (from which Sam rescued Bobby’s soul as part of the Trials), and we have the glimpse we caught of how Crowley restructured the place into endless lines as a method of torment. There’s also the space where Lilith’s horn is kept, as per the Belphegor and Cas scenes in the early episodes of Season 15. I take that to be the same level as the Throne level, since it seems to be where ruling demons would both preside and reside.

Based on the seeming lack of time distortion we tend to see (in late seasons...) when we get scenes relating the Throne level, my headcanon is that this is the second circle of Hell (Lust). In the Inferno, incoming souls are judged here and then sent to which circle their sins have them belong, so I think it’s at least somewhat fitting for this to be where the Throne is. Keeping it closer to the surface world / material plane also has some advantages if doing so minimizes time distortion, since keeping closer time with Earth allows easier monitoring of Earth and tracking of things like deals etc. It also means that higher ranking aka more powerful demons who preside here are closer to Gates of Hell and therefore have less far to travel when slipping out and onto Earth.

In contrast, I think that The Rack is pretty damn deep. There is a lot of time distortion going on to get to 1 month = 1 decade (especially if we allow that a very small amount of dilation is happening at the topmost circles, even including Limbo). This makes sense to me in that The Rack is a place of exceeding misery and horror, literally the center of Hell’s most violent and excruciating tortures.

For that reason, I place The Rack as circle seven, aptly titled Violence. This is not to be confused with the sin of Wrath, which is actually the fifth circle. Rather, the seventh circle (to quote wikipedia at least), “houses the violent”. What better way to re-interpret that in the world of SPN than that circle hosting the torturers and their tortured? Within the seventh circle are those who committed violence against neighbors, against self, and against God. What better place for someone who sold his own soul (violence against self and against God), who killed?

Of course I don’t think it’s so straightforward that violent souls get sent to The Rack. I think any damned soul can be called there for a torture session. But Dean spent his entire time in Hell on The Rack, and that can’t be standard. Bobby spent plenty of his time in hell in a cell, as per 8x19 (Taxi Driver), and demons come here to torture him.

I don’t think it’s a huge leap for me to infer that Dean was special and spent his entire time on The Rack because they were so determined to use him to break the First Seal, and that most damned souls only do short stints on there, either due to limited real estate or so that souls don’t become numb to the violence (since let’s face it, most demonic torturers probably can’t keep them in anticipation of further horror as well as Alistair can, after a few days or months being cut into.) They’re probably returned to their cells to marinate in the memory and anticipation with only minor tortures until they’re brought down again. This is what we see with Bobby and probably with the endless lineups in Crowley’s redesigned Hell.

So - without too much to go on, I’m going to tentatively place the Dungeon with Bobby and other damned souls as being in the sixth circle, Heresy. It’s a circle described as hosting souls in flaming tombs, which I think fits this notion of a dungeon with cells holding on to souls, and keeps those souls close at hand and ready for another go in the seventh circle where The Rack is held. 

And this allows me to place the endless line as actually being either in the fourth circle, Greed, or the fifth circle, Wrath. The fourth involves a nation of lost souls who, in this pit of hell, lose their individuality and become sort of empty, which fits what we see in that brief clip of the Hell line. The fifth includes a “savage self-frustration” that seems fitting of the concept of that awful endless line, with sullen and angry souls fighting each other in muck and slime.

Regardless of fourth or fifth (I have no strong sense of which fits better), I see that line as being meaningful outside (above) the sixth circle, in a torment that is less acute, as souls that are less unique and differentiated, less violent, less worthy of turning into black-eyed demons.

Because in the Inferno, there’s this critical division between the fifth vs. sixth circles as the transition between the two being the transition into “Lower Hell” and the sixth being behind guarded walls, with another steep drop from the sixth to the seventh, and so on. This makes sense to me as Lower Hell being a place where they keep the Dungeon and guard the doomed souls, whereas that place outside those walls hosting the damned but less special, less differentiated, the more generically doomed... yeah, it just makes sense to me (your mileage, as always, may vary).

This distinction is important also because of that drop down. If distance and depth are important to temporal distortion, then it matters if the first few circles of Hell involve less of a steep drop one to the next. Here we should note that the seventh circle involves three rings, and the eighth circle (Fraud, aka Malebolge, another very strong contender for the location of The Rack since it’s essentially an amphitheater for torture, so I’ll do the math both ways below)*, well the eighth is basically a funnel with 10 separate rings or steps downward.

Why does this matter? So glad you asked!

Increasing Temporal Distortion at Each Level

If you’re following the hints I’m dropping, what I’m implying about getting deeper into Hell and the further drops down at the later levels is that the time distortion in Hell does not increase linearly. It increases exponentially.

Limbo has temporal distortion that is so minor as to be barely perceptible, if perceptible at all. The Rack gives us an explicit (if fuzzy) estimate of 1 month = 1 decade in terms of perception. The Cage is implied to be much, much more than that, at the extreme end up to 2-3 minutes = 1 week in terms of perception.

If the time distortion was linear, meaning that from circle 1 to circle 2, and circle 2 to 3, and 3 to 4 and so on, we should expect that the amount of time distortion from Limbo (circle 1) to the Rack (circle 7 or 8) to be a much, much wider gap than the amount of time distortion from the Rack (circle 7 or 8) to the Cage (circle 9). Like... it should be 7-8x as much distortion.

And I mean, you could take a linear headcanon approach to it. If we accept that SPN Hell has circles or layers as is Word of God and overtly implied by the narrative time and again, you could say that there’s x amount of distortion at circle 1, and 2x at circle 2, and 3x at circle 3, etc, and this would works okay when we got the math right, but like... it’s not my preference given the way canon works.

What I mean (especially for those who hate math so might not be automatically sussing what I’m saying), is that, for example, if 10 seconds in Limbo = 1 second on Earth (sure why not) then if the time distortion increases the same way (”linearly”) at each new circle of hell, then on the Rack we get 70 seconds = 1 Earth second (or 80 seconds = 1 Earth second, if the Rack is in the eighth circle).

That specific math doesn’t check out (it equates to 23.3 years on the Rack instead of 40, or 26.7 if the Rack is the eighth circle instead of the seventh), but to figure this out we should of course work backwards starting from the 4 months = 40 years. Which tells us that each second on Earth feels like 120seconds (2 minutes) on The Rack. If that’s happening at the seventh circle, then a linear difference between each circle of hell means that the time distortion in Limbo is roughly 17 seconds for every Earth second. This math works out a little prettier if the Rack is the eighth circle because that’s an even 15 seconds for every Earth second.

To me, that’s stretching how much time distortion is implied to occur at Limbo and vastly exaggerating what we see with Sam rescuing Bobby from Hell. If Bobby is actually kept in the 6th circle, that’s 102 (7th circle) or 190 (8th circle) seconds in Hell for every second on Earth. It just didn’t seem that Sam was spending a minute and a half in Hell for every second that Dean was spending on the surface in Taxi Driver, but then again, I haven’t rewatched that episode so I’d have to double check to know for sure.

Between those implications about time distortion in Limbo and Bobby’s rescue and even the Throne room when they visit Rowena to the way Dante’s Inferno (which SPN canon clearly drew from) funnels more extremely downward the deeper you go in the circles, to what Sam’s episode of Hell memories could imply about his experience of time dilation in the Cage (assuming we accept his statement about his episode “feeling like a week” even if we don’t take that number at exactly face value)... an exponential increase just makes more sense, mathematically?

And again, for anyone who doesn’t like math or doesn’t know what that means and why I keep using this word “exponentially,” what it means is that the difference between the first circle and the second circle is not as big as the difference between the second circle and the third circle. At each depth, the intensity of the time dilation increases. So that you might not even notice the difference in time dilation between circle 1 and 2, but the difference between circle 5 and 6 is massively noticeable, and the difference between circle 8 and circle 9 is like several times even that big. Like Inception!

So let’s run some final calculations and get you your answer(s), Anon!

Some Final Math and Estimates*

Assumption 1: Equivalent Dilation

If we assume that there is no difference in time dilation from one region of Hell to another, then the ratio that Dean gives us in Season 4 is accurate for all of Hell, and 1 month (30 days) in the pit feels like 10 years. That’s 120 seconds below to every second above.

This would mean that in 18 months in the Cage, Sam experiences 180 years worth of torture.

Assumption 2: Linear Dilation Circle 7

Assuming The Rack is in the seventh circle, then a linear difference at each level means that 120 seconds on the Rack equates to 154 seconds in the Cage at the ninth level. That would mean that in 18 months topside, Sam’s soul spent 231.5 years in the Cage.

Assumption 3: Linear Dilation Circle 8

Assuming the Rack is in the eighth circle (which, tbh, I kind of thing makes more sense even though I argued differently above, but shhh let’s pretend otherwise), then a linear difference at each level means that 120 seconds there equates to only 202.5 years for Sam’s soul in the Cage. Slightly less awful! 

Assumption 4: Exponential Dilation Circle 7

The simple way I’m doing this is that instead of taking the time distortion at Limbo and making it x2 at the second circle, x3 at the third, and so on, I’m taking the time distortion at Limbo and making it to the power of 2 at the second circle, to the power of 3 at the third, and so on. I still have to start with The Rack being 120seconds on Earth time and work backwards to get that initial Limbo starting point before I apply the exponent, but otherwise that’s all I’m doing. There are definitely more sophisticated ways we could approach it since that’s a pretty simple linear increase in the exponent, and we could instead make the exponent itself an equation we’d derive through more complex means but... I’m really not about to do that.

So.

If we start from The Rack = 120seconds (2mins), using the exponent assumptions above, then Limbo time dilation is roughly 2 seconds (actually 1.98167 or so) in Limbo for every Earth second (works beautifully for what we see in canon, basically imperceptible), and time dilation in the ninth circle is 471 seconds (7.85 mins) per Earth second. Yes, that big of a difference, because that’s how exponents work.

This would mean that Sam’s soul spent approximately 707 years in the Cage.

What a great number! What a reasonable number, and a pretty damn canon-compliant number to headcanon. I like this number.

Assumption 5: Exponential Dilation Circle 8

As above in terms of the exponent assumptions, if the Rack is actually in the 8th circle of Hell, that much closer to the Cage, then here the math works out so that 120 seconds on the 8th circle being... roughly 2 seconds in Limbo. Because that’s how exponential functions work. It’s actually 1.81928 in Limbo vs. the previous 1.98167, but that rounds to the same thing (2 seconds) in terms of human experience, even if it makes a big difference when we take it out to the difference it makes in months, years, etc.

(But like, this is why I think it’s exponential, because this works so much better for what canon implies about the time dilation there*.) 

Anyway, here, this would mean that Sam’s soul spent roughly 327.5 years in the Cage instead of the 707 from above. That’s a big difference.

Assumption 6: Off the Rails

We can also take Sam’s statement about 2-3 minutes on Earth (having a Hell flashback) feeling like a week in the pit. If we estimate conservatively and go with every 3 Earth minutes = 1 week in Hell, depending on how we approach it (depending on if you go with minutes in a week vs. a month and which way you get to a year), you get somewhere around 5000 years (in my present calculation it’s 4984, but I also calculated it another way to get to just over 5000).

Assumption 7: 9th Circle vs. The Cage

Dante’s Inferno distinguishes between the 9th Circle on its own vs. the Center of Hell as the place where Lucifer resides, right at the deepest depths. The Cage itself is remote in Hell, distant from all other demons, enough so as to be a matter of faith to many of them. If we allow the possibility that this all means that the Cage is deeper than the ninth circle itself*, we can add another linear layer or else another exponent (take our equation to the 10 instead of to the 9).

This works out to be:

Rack 7th Circle, Linear: 257 years

Rack 8th Circle, Linear: 225 years

Rack 7th Circle, Exponential: 1400 years

Rack 8th Circle, Exponential: 596 years

Meaning this is a good place to note that... depending on the final number you want to get to, you can use whichever assumptions you want to get there and justify it by math. Remember kids, there are lies, damn lies, and statistics.

TL;DR!!!!!

How much time did Sam’s soul spend in the Cage? My headcanon is that he spent probably either 600 or 700 years there, on the assumption that it was 18 months between Swan Song and Appointment in Samarra, and assuming time dilation gets more extreme the deeper that you go in Hell.

For people who want to make more conservative estimates but still embed some complexity to Hell’s time dilation and/or who be more canon-compliant to other glimpses we’ve seen of Hell’s time distortion (Limbo, etc), I think anywhere from about 200 years to 330 years is perfectly reasonable.

For people who want to go with maximum whump, the sky (5000) is the limit, but you can mathematically point to up to 1400 being pretty reasonable.

*Footnotes

1. Because canon plays fast and loose with how many months exactly have gone by, and some people headcanon that only about 4 months have passed in Season 6 before Appointment in Samarra when Death pulls his soul out. I personally read it as more like 6 months having gone by and think this is the more standard headcanon, so your 180 years is the most common interpretation, and definitely the most easy to defend. I also made calculations for Sam having spent 16 months in the Cage instead of 18 months there though, if anyone is interested.

2. There is also the Vestibule in the Inferno as the opening to Hell, before the first circle, and this requires passage from Charon to cross over and into Hell proper. This is where the quote “Abandon All Hope, Ye Who Enter Here” is from at the Gate of Hell, which of course is evoked in season 5 as the episode in which Jo and Ellen die.

I like to think of the Vestibule in the world of SPN as being any and all of the many Hellgates implied by canon, including the one that opens in AHBL2. No time dilation occurs within the Vestibule(s), as a person has to enter into Hell’s circles to properly separate themselves from the material plane.

3. Not getting into it here but if I ever get around to writing an original piece of fiction about angels and demons etc like I kind of want to, some of my worldbuilding will explicitly connect/relate angels to celestial bodies, like literally to stars, with the depth of hell essentially being a black hole, hence why the closer one gets to it, the greater the time dilation there is. Gravity and heat increase near the center of hell in this unbearable way, and then at the very center, like within the black hole itself, it becomes unbearably incredibly cold, like that frozen lake in which Lucifer is half-submerged in Dante’s Inferno. Lucifer existing impossibly both within and outside the event horizon. But I digress.

4. When you think about how many angels are implied to have died in order to rescue Dean’s soul, compared to how simply Sam snuck into Hell to rescue Bobby, I think the circles of Hell interpretation becomes quite important. If Dean was in the seventh or eighth circle, like especially that eighth circle, that’s so much deeper in than the Dungeon. The angels also couldn’t infiltrate subtly, methinks, and had to storm the walled and heavily guarded gates at the sixth circle, through that dungeon, then fight their way down the three rings of the seventh circle and possibly down into the amphitheater of the eighth. We know that their powers alone can’t kill a demon as powerful as Alistair even on Earth, so on their home turf in Hell, it makes sense that demons would have put up a really solid fight against the angels. This helps resolve some of my own frustration at what seems to be discrepancies in the abilities of angels and how dangerous they are to demons in canon.

5. Please be aware that all maths above involve some rounding, since I didn’t think anyone wanted the detailed decimals. I also calculated months as being 30 days and for simplicity, calculated years as being 12 months. I could rework the math into weeks with 52 weeks being a year instead, which gives slightly different numbers, but it’s work so I’m just going to go with these approximations. Also noting that I used calculated everything using excel to save myself a headache. I’m sorry if there are any errors, especially when it comes to the exponents, my brain got very tired. Please let me know if you find any.

6. When it comes to the exponential ones, if The Rack is in the 7th circle of hell, then if the Dungeon where Bobby was kept was in the 6th circle, then each Earth second is 60 seconds (1 minute) in the Dungeon. That’s more time dilation than I think canon implies, because 60 minutes (1hr) in the Dungeon is only a minute on Earth? In contrast if The Rack is in the 8th circle, then 1 Earth second is 36 seconds in the Dungeon. I honestly think both of these are more extreme than canon implies, but again, it’s been a million years since I watched that episode because it’s written by Bucklemming and I cannot stand their writing. But as a count in favor of the exponential argument instead of linear, if time dilation increases the same amount at each circle then 1 Earth second translates to 103 seconds in the Dungeon (Rack in 7th) or 90 seconds (Rack in 8th), both of which are a lot more dilation than our exponential account.

7. For simplicity, I’ve also ignored the different rings which occur at the 7th and 8th circles. Those would, of course, change the math here as well, and we could add another linear or exponential step for each of those rings. That would lead to some crazy numbers because we’re talking about 13 additional steps. Linearly we’d add a few thousand years, but exponentially we’re starting to talk about a geological timescale. I don’t think it’s productive to make that extreme of an assumption about those rings, but I think we could comfortably stretch the distance between the 7th circle and the pit in which Lucifer’s cage sits at the deepest depths of hell if we wanted to, if you wanted to reasonably get closer to that 5000 years estimate.

8. Since your ask mentioned it, Anon, I realize I don’t touch on Enochian in this post but I have two tag-rambles about my thoughts on enochian and I thought I had a proper post on it somewhere but can’t find it. I could/should probably make a post with a tumblr ficlet about that, since I started drafting a canon-divergent post-Hell fic with Sam and Enochian and there’s like... no chance I’ll ever finish it. But anyway.

Thanks for reading this far, to anyone who did.

[codacheetah]

The spreadsheet is my timeloop

[who-is-muses]

anonymous | Misc. Asks

could you please explain more about why you don't think sinestro is a fa.scist?

[ let me preface this with two things; 1) I know you specifically said fa.scist (which I put the period in to try and avoid showing up in any searches) but in each of the instances I'm complaining about there's also a stupid Hi.tler comparison so they're connected, and 2) I don't know how to tag this while still avoiding being in any search results, so take a look at this opening blurb before deciding whether or not to hit the read more ]

[ First and foremost, let me get the personal, sort-of-subjective-but-not-really part out of the way. I'm a Jew, a queer, neurodivergent, and what Na.zism would define as an "impure" white. Besides myself, a number of the people I deeply care about are also people that would've been targeted (and run the risk of being targeted by the various oh so lovely neo na.zi movements.) I think that speaks for itself on why I might take issue with using Na.zism or comparisons to such for fictionalized shock value, accurately or not. ]

[ Now for the more objective part of things; fas.cism is notoriously difficult to craft a succinct, reliable definition for. However, historically speaking, many fas.cist leaders and movements have shared similar aspects- and while knowing this similarities can help keep the people aware, the problem of using them as a strict definition is that fa.scism isn't the only ideology that employs them. It's close to the squares and rectangles thing; most if not all fa.scists are dictators, but not all dictators are fas.cists. And furthermore, not all fa.scists are genocidal whi.te supre.macists like Hi.tler. Fa.scism is very bad, but there are other kinds of evils wrapped up in the ideology that can sneak under the radar if the major thing associated with it is conc.entration camps and holo.causts. I'm not usually a hard ass about proper usage of words, synonyms, hyperbole, and all that- but there are words like geno.cide and fa.scist I think shouldn't be used with any degree of humor or exaggeration. ]

[ With that being said, and going back to something I mentioned before, I- and a lot of other people- take issue with fictionalizing great human tragedies. It's one thing to employ an unfortunate recurring piece of human history, like the effects of racism and xenophobia- but an entirely different thing to copy a specific event for a plot point in a fiction piece. Not every ter.rorist needs to be Bin L.aden lite, not every natio.nalist needs to dress like Hit.ler, not every egomaniacal oppressive ruler needs to look like Kim J.ong Un. Turning horrific events and the people responsible for them into tropes trivializes all the suffering and death they caused- and jokingly comparing someone or something to them is even worse. My controversial take of the day is it's fine (within reason) to make fun of these great human evils, as long as you're making fun of the individual themself rather than the effects of their actions or someone else. ]

[ Going back to the original question at hand; even in his earliest incarnations, Sinestro didn't display a lot of the ideologies and doctrines employed by fa.scism. He's absolutely always been a dictator, imperialist, and overall autocratic control freak- but he's missing things like nationalist extremism, using racial/ethnic discrimination in the form of blame for the nation's failing as a major talking point, outright vilification of any and all liberal ideals, a strong focus on the economy, etc. Though Sinestro absolutely has a major interest in his own people, he's rarely shown to genuinely look down on another for their species- and even then it's exclusively the humans, which seem to be generally looked down on, and the Guardians, which has more to do with with their organization than their race. And Sinestro's ultimate goal is control of the universe- not one singular nation, but everything and everyone- by fear rather than mass extermination and ethn.ic clea.nsing (the arguable exceptions being the original Guardians and their Green Lantern Corps, but this is again a matter of hatred for their organization {a political stance} than any individual species {a xenophobic and racist stance.}) ]

[esteemed-excellency]

@eddie-dearest I had to add your tags because that's exactly what I asked myself when I started thinking about the character. I didn't plan a backstory or characterisation, I started playing because the alternative history concept of the game seemed intriguing and I wanted to explore what it had to offer in terms of writing. I played a lot of storylines just to see how the plot would proceed and I was immediately hooked by the mystery (this was around 2013). Hiram's characterisation is mainly based on the choices I made in game, and he turned out to be quite a mess, but in a fun chaotic way.

The rest of the post is under the cut because it got a little long.

After some years I started thinking about what kind of character would have made those choices and I elaborated a first concept for an oc, but I never thought that much about it. Around 2017 I deleted my old mail, completely forgetting it was linked to my game account so I had to start everything again, which was kind of a relief given all the new game dynamics that were added to the early game, and this time I had the character ready. I got some of my friends into the game too and we made a group chat (The Paramount Polycule started as the chat name lol) and that was the starting point for headcanons and characterisation development.

I love history and the 19th century is particularly interesting to me in terms of societal changes, a hyphen between the ancient regime and the contemporary 20th century ideologies (with all the good and bad implications that this entails), and technological advances. The process of change and how people react and adapt to it is what really intrigues me, and it's what got me into the game in the first place, and what prompted the background for the character. Hiram is fascinated by change and he loves to keep up with the times, I don't think he ever felt left behind by history. If he feels there's something he can't understand he dives head first into it until he figures it out. He approaches challenges like puzzles or games and he's still capable of wonder, even after a good dose of corruption arc.

Speaking of corruption arcs, I'm a tragedy enjoyer, other than a chaotic shenanigans appreciator, and I like when the narrative borders on horror. Gothic fiction with its specific motifs is one of my favourite genres, and another reason I started playing the game. I especially appreciate the theme of a place being haunted by itself and its history and/or moving through history haunted by what it was/what it is/what it could be, so you can see why Fallen London is so compelling to me. I also like themes of faustian bargains and that's why my character is Like That.

In terms of general vibes and aesthetic I love late 19th and early 20th century fashion, and I wanted Hiram to have the look of some actor from the 20s/30s interpreting a late 19th century character as an excuse to mix up multiple decades of fashion. The devils are anachronistic and fashion in Fallen London is so interesting to speculate. Pre code Hollywood and and pre nazi european cinema have the perfect aesthetic for me, and I got particularly inspired by the drama of austrian operetta films, hence the Anton Walbrook and Ronal Colman faceclaims. On a more personal note, I just projected some gender as I always do when I design a character. I like earlier 19th century fashion too, and that's why I made him so dandyish.

To end the post, here's a non-comprehensive list of medias that inspired Hiram's vibes and aesthetic:

the general concept of penny dreadfuls

À Rebours by Joris-Karl Huysmans: not the protagonist, but the circling pointlessness of the plot, the aesthetic of the house, and the spiralling

whatever happens when you mix the late wave of english Romanticism with the Decadent movement

Doctor Faustus by Thomas Marlowe: that's like, thee bluebrint, and Hiram appreciates the irony

Tales from the Vienna Woods by Johann Strauss II

Delirium Waltz by Josef Strauss

Enemies to Lovers by Joshua Kyan Aalampour

Mr. Malum by The Dear Hunter: mandatory dramatic song, this is Hiram's playlist if anyone wants more music

Maskerade (1933): main faceclaim movie, the promo pics with Paula Wessely and Anton Walbrook dancing are inspo for the Quiet Deviless and Hiram (plot is extremely melodramatic if anyone is interested)

Gaslight (1940) and The Red Shoes (1948): Anton Walbrook goes insane with expressions

The Devil to Pay (1930): Ronald Colman is the other faceclaim actor, he has a funny dog in this movies, inspo for Sugarplum

The man who broke the bank at Monte Carlo (1935): just the general fancy vibes, a suitcase full of money, and the iconic moustache look

[disdaidal]

Sometimes I really kind of envy you native English speakers who make writing and posting fics seem so fucking easy. With near perfect grammar and hardly any typos. Or those of you who are capable of writing & updating your fics whenever the muse hits you just right... and not like, once in six months. Actually, try two years lol.

Whereas me, a non-native speaker, who occasionally struggles even with basic English grammar:

I'm fine. Totally.

[a-s-levynn]

Uhh.. today is so slow..

[army-of-bee-assassins]

so a year ago i made a big discord server for my cohort and i always make a new channel for every class we take (so discussions and resources are better organized). there's an autism class this semester so there's a channel called #autism-spectrum-disorder. one of my classmates just shared a video from her dropbox in that channel and asked if it was working for us and when i said yes she literally responded "yippee!"

[spinoff-antithesis]

[@distinguished-turtle-enjoyer ]

i actually have not stopped thinkin bout your bb!edit like,,,, its so good and scratches my brain right

how long have you been doin edits for? do have any tips for someone, who hypothetically, wants to start doin edits too? what programs do you use? how did you do the cool animated bits?

im so sorry for all the qustions 😭😭 i just think youre very talented and inspirational and i hope you have a good day ^_^

hi firstly oh my gosh you're literally so sweet i am gently shaking you i love you so much /p. secondly, i apologize for the long answer! (it's all under the cut. this got away from me. i'm so sorry apparently i have a lot to say.) (also you're so good about the questions i would constantly be asking one of my professors questions during class to the point where she said i didn't have to go "i have a question" every time i approached her)

i've been editing since 2016! around march/april, i think? loved it so much i went into film & video production in college as a major so i could do editing for a living. (i have done more motion graphics for my classmates than i have done edits outside of class assignments, BUT!)

the program i use is after effects - i started learning it when covid first hit the united states because i had nothing better to do with my time (other than music theory but i failed that bc my professor focused more on the history aspects than the actual theory soooo) and my ipad kept giving me the "no more storage" whenever i tried to use videostar lmao. (vs has, apparently, gotten a LOT of good updates, so if you're looking to start editing and have an ios system, i'd look into it! only downside is you have to pay for some of the cool stuff).

also the program i use for masking (i think i explain this later dwdw) is superimpose. i've been using it since 2014 and it's SO nice bc i can use my fingers to erase backgrounds & stuff instead of hoping i can get it to work correctly in ae or photoshop (photoshop my DETESTED i'll use it but i'll complain the entire time).

for people who want to start editing: tutorials on how your program works and how to do specific transitions are gonna be your best friend when you're first figuring things out! i forced a friend to literally walk me through how after effects worked when i was first figuring it out, and when i had swapped to videostar back in 2017/2018(?) i had watched a Lot of tutorials. that and played around a lot and figured things out on my own - which is also always a good way to start!! it's also totally valid to look at other people's edits for inspiration - most editors don't really care, as long as you don't flat-out remake their edit (some people don't like that!). i have a style insp folder on instagram where i save edits that i like so if i need transition ideas or i'm doing a different style, i can look there for inspiration. at the end of the day, as long as you're having fun with it that's all that matters!

also, starting simple is always okay!! my edits for a year were just me slapping gifs & video segments together on a timeline in cute cut pro bc imovie didn't load them lol & it'd crash every time i breathed. ++ it never hurts to ask people for feedback/constructive(!!!) criticism/etc! (also not to sound like everyone else but practice? good. it's so good. if i showed my 14/15y/o self some of the edits i can make now they would've passed out on the spot bc i was still trying to figure out transitions back then. programs can also sometimes make a difference in edits, but usually it's not super noticeable until you start getting to the Complicated Shit.)

a lot of popular programs i've seen are ones like video star (ios only), alight motion (android only), after effects (i recommend 🏴‍☠️ing it tbh, i only use it legally bc i had to use adobe programs for school), capcut, and i think some people still use sony vegas pro & maybe cute cut pro (i've heard it may have actually gotten better since i last used it in 2018)? i have no idea. programs also depend on whatever device you're using to edit on! since i've been using my laptop, i'm able to use after effects (it's computer-only), but when i used my phone/ipad to edit i used ccp & vs.

for the animation - it's a lot of cutting up the image and masking! more complex animations, like the one i had of leo walking down that red 'hallway' have several different layers that have been masked. (i removed the background & filled in the spot where leo originally was in two different apps - superimpose (taking leo out) & photoshop (filling in the bg)) in after effects, the way i've done this was mask out the specific thing i wanted to move (like an eye) and then put that mask on what i've called a "base" (not animated), and then stick a solid behind the base to match the color of the object. (some of my layers are not named appropriately; base 2 is the left arm & the four "SIX_[...]" layers are the mask/bandana tails)

an example of this would be for any of the eye blink animations i did! this (above) is the same shot, with and without the eye - since it's masked out and i have the background solid behind it, it doesn't look too unnatural/have a black outline/mass where his eye should be.

what it looks like without the solid layer behind it ^ (the red lines are from the null layers - ignore that)

this is what my timeline looks like if it's a more simplistic animation - the only five things being animated here are leo & raph's eyes. (there's only this many layers bc it's two characters in one shot & i was also animating their pupils - typically, an eye-blink animation is about 4-6 layers for me (solid, base, mask, & null to animate with, 6 if i'm animating both eyes & 4 if just one))

in after effects, there's this really cool tool called the puppet pin that one of my friends (lovingly) yelled at me for not knowing about - which. yeah fair she wasn't wrong it's SUPER useful in animating, provided you chop up your image first. if you don't it's a mess.

(separated by layer vs i should've really put the mask tails & leo's head on separate layers and didn't bc that was the 2nd to last animation i had to do and i was losing my mind bc i wanted to be done with the edit lmao)

the way people animate depends all on their style (there's two common ways to do blinking animation - having the anchor point at the bottom of the eye, or the middle of it) and the program they use. it's been a while, but i could probably tell you how to do some basic animations on videostar still even though i've been doing them in after effects for about 2-3years now. ALSO the best way to have an animation be noticeable is to over-exaggerate it/make them Big - which, yes, can mean 'breaking bones' and having the limbs be a little wonky at the start. (if you want it to be realistic though go Just to the point where it looks uncomfortable lmao)

uhm. again i am so sorry that this is so long i THINK this is everything? if not: my inbox/dms are always open if you ever want to ask more questions, wanna follow up on something, etc etc!! (also if you ever start editing please send me your edits!!! i'd love to see them <3)

[orangetintedglasses]

( 'I wonder what Sketti's like when she's not suffering the social anxiety and is comfortable around people' no one here has had to experience this yet but I am in fact a fuckin gremlin and the living embodiment of the 'was the grink there' tweet when I'm no longer scared I'll upset you just by existing )