#Lovecraftian gods? It's too complicated

[zombinafonfrankenstein]

Christian goth culture is to have a complex system for measuring the demonicity of fictional monsters to choose which ones you can include in your aesthetic.

[autumnalwalker]

7 Snippets 7 People (Part 2)

Thank you for the tag, @blind-the-winds.

I've actually had two of this tag game sitting in my Drafts for a while now, and given what I just wrote last night for Chapter 21 of Empty Names I thought it might be fun to combine them a bit. This most recently written bit was basically one long sequence of Eris tripping out and losing her sense of self due to exposure to a Lovecraftian eldritch entity and experiencing warped hallucinatory versions of old memories that have either happened or been referenced earlier in the story.

So I thought it would be fun to put all those scenes back-to-back with the earlier parts that they're referencing.

But before I get started, softly passing the tag to @sarahlizziewrites, @writernopal, @nettleandthorne, @void-botanist, @sleepyowlwrites, @the-down-upside-finch, @kaiusvnoir, and the usual open tag for anyone else who wants it.

(And here's the link to Part 1. The first snippet in that one gets referenced multiple times throughout here.)

(Content Warning for some violence and mild body horror.)

Now then, let us pick up where this hallucinatory nightmare left off, with a warped version of Eris's character introduction from Chapter 3...

Moonlight reflects off the lake and into the whispering of the trees that brushes against her cheek to welcome her home with the scent of blood in her mouth.  Smell and taste blur together as her senses begin feeding into one another until the whole world seems more.  Was she really even alive before this?

Her oldest dance partner rises from the lake to greet her on the shore.  The one who tried to hunt her and in failing to do so taught her the joy of being the predator rather than prey.  Their dance begins again.  As it always has.  As it ever will.  Her dance partner is a gaunt and stretched out figure of tongues and teeth that still resembles a man.  Her dance partner is a beast of scale and shell with jaws that bite and claws that catch.  Her dance partner is a cacophonous evolution of forms between as the two of them drive one another to learn and adapt with each dance.

Her dance partner is a mere shadow, frozen in a block of ice and thrown into the back of her van to be stowed away and forgotten.  She has long since grown beyond it.  She slams the rear doors of the van shut.

And yet still the hunt always cycles anew.  She is always hunting.

Do you recall a certain encounter with a spider in Chapter 14?

The spider gives her an eightfold eyeing up and down, takes a tentative step forward, and then begins tapping out a pattern on the ground.

“I don’t know what that means, but…” Eris crouches down and raps on the cavern floor with a curled fist, imitating the pattern as best she can. 

The spider stops abruptly in what Eris can only assume is surprise, and then taps out another pattern that she once again copies.

“I probably sound like a real idiot to you right now, just repeating back whatever you say, huh?”  Can they even hear her, Eris wonders?  Spiders don’t have ears after all.  She makes a mental note to look that up later.  For now though, she sits back down in what she hopes will come across as a sign of nonaggression and watches the spider retrieve a small cocooned offering from one of their baskets and place it on the shrine’s altar dish.  This offering too is devoured by the fungus.  Perhaps it was not so forgotten a god as she thought.

Local deity appeased, the spider begins extruding thread from their spinnerets and curling up on themself in a complicated motion that spills one of the candles from its basket.  

Eris lunges forward and catches the errant candle before it can roll into the lake.  Walking over to the suddenly-still spider, Eris offers the candle back.

After a moment’s hesitation, the spider uncurls, rights themself, and leans to one side to tilt the candle basket toward Eris.  Taking the final step closer, Eris returns the candle and sees that the spider’s been attempting unsuccessfully and messily to bandage their own leg.

Slowly, and keeping her hands in view the whole time, Eris unzips another pouch and retrieves a compressed roll of elastic bandage.  She points once at the spider’s wound leg and then at her own arm before wrapping herself up by way of demonstration.  After a moment of holding the pose, she unwraps the bandage and stretches it out, proffering it toward the spider.  When the spider turns themself to expose the injured leg, Eris takes that as permission and begins wrapping.  Once that’s secure she scoops a palmful of cold, clear water from the lake and sprinkles it over the bandage to activate the infused alchemical agents, stiffening it enough to alleviate the need for a splint and accelerating the healing process.  If it works anywhere near as well on giant spiders as it does humans, they should be better in several hours.

“There you go, all better” Eris says, flicking the last bits of water and misapplied webbing from her hands.  “Now, on the off chance that you’re psychic or something and can understand what I’m saying, I’m gonna put it out there that the thing I’m hunting is probably the same thing that did that to you.  Don’t suppose you can lead me back to it?”

The spider taps out another pattern in response.

“Still can’t understand you,” Eris replies with a shrug, but copies the pattern of taps once more anyway.

If you don't, that's fine. Eris doesn't seem to be remembering it correctly either.

The air in the candlelit cavern smothers like a damp blanket.  A drop of blood trails down the back of her hand, catches on the tiny hairs, leaves bits of itself gathered in the pores and creases, and falls from her fingertip into the crystal clear pool the same as any other drop from the cavern’s stalactites.  It seems the shadow of her old dance partner left her with a final parting gift.

She approaches the cavern’s shrine and the wounded shadow praying at its moldy offering plate skitters away.  She weighs whether it is worth pursuing but is distracted by a shambling pile of bones.  The bones snap and crunch so pleasingly and the soft shadow beneath rips apart so delightfully.  But when the bones are ground to dust and the shadow they failed to protect are gone she is still hungry.

The wounded shadow taps a pattern on the ground.  Its eight eyes are not human at all but they hold fear all the same.

There’s a kindness Eris should offer at this part.  She doesn’t, but what does it matter?  It’s just a beast.

Still not satisfied, she turns her attention to the shrine and the small, forgotten god it venerates.  

Blood and hearts and bones and stone and ichor and mold.  What would a god taste like?

A memory from Chapter 18 that was lost and then came back all at once...

Sun hot enough to cook eggs on the dashboard.  An Arizona truck stop.  Rumors of a big cat prowling the desert and attacking truckers and tourists who stop there too late at night.  Killing time waiting for nightfall by practicing along with a language learning CD snagged from a clearance bin.  An empty parking lot beneath a moonless night sky.  Climbing out of the cab and watching the desert.  Feeling the temperature drop.  The feeling of being the only person on Earth.  Lingering in a space only ever meant to be passed through.  The howl of an almost-human voice that almost sounds like a song.  The weight of a tire iron in her hand.  Stepping out beyond the edge of the pavement.   Stopping just at the edge of the furthest lamplight.  The twilight border between known and unknown.  A whistled tune to announce her presence.  Eyes in the dark.  A growl that almost sounds like words.  Circling.  Blurring the line between predator and prey.  Claws and teeth.  The crack of a tire iron against a skull that almost looks human.  A whipcord whistling sound through the air.  A step too slow.  Blooming pain.  The feeling of veins replaced by rose vines with vibrating thorns.  An inhuman growl from a human throat.  Hands preventing a tail from ripping a stinger free.  A slow extraction from a chest.  A quick insertion into a neck.  The loss of a tire iron.  Seven minutes slumped against a door, trying to work up the strength to open it.  Three days in the bed in the back of a truck cabin.  Angry voicemails threatening unemployment.  Coughing up blood.  Engine noise going quiet.  AC cutting out.  Sips of hot water.  Knocking on the door from a concerned stranger.  A declined offer of a ride to the hospital.  A request to siphon gas.  The passing of years.  An impossible city.  A new job.  A kindred spirit.  A wonderfully wicked smile beneath golden eyes.  The feeling of another’s hands tracing a familiar shape.  The comparison to a flower.

Now recalled and reprised in a different key...

The air in the desert tries and fails to sap the moisture from her body.  Neither the heat of day nor the chill of night can touch her through the craving.

Feeling like the only person in the world, she lingers in a space only ever meant to be passed through until she hears the howl of an almost-human voice that almost sounds like a song.  Feeling the weight of her spear fall from her hand, she steps out beyond the edge of the parking lot pavement to the edge of the edge of the furthest lamplight, that twilight border between known and unknown.  Feeling no need to announce her presence, she locks eyes in the dark with a shadow and utters a growl that almost sounds like words as she circles her prey and blurs the line between beast and self.  

There are only claws and teeth for the thing whose face is almost human.  A stinger strikes through the air with a whipcord whistling but is a step too slow.  An inhuman growl from a once-human throat accompanies the tearing sound of a sting ripped free from its tail and plunged into its owner’s neck.    Deed done, she retrieves her spear and walks back to the truck whose cargo has been her excuse to travel the land’s liminal spaces for prey like this.

She opens the door to the sleeper cab and finds herself face to face with a squawking peacock.  

The avian incongruity leaves Eris shocked enough for the bird to shuffle out past her and take to the wing.  She blinks.  Waking up to find a peacock in her cab wasn’t even the same year as hunting the manticore. That happened in Vermont and this was in Arizona.  Why are those two memories mixed together?

Wait.  Memories?

Cautiously, she climbs into the cab.  Something about it feels too small, but otherwise all is as it should be.  Neatly made bed in the back, movie poster from her old bedroom on the ceiling, glowing dreamcatcher hanging from the rearview mirror…  The mirror!  Her reflection!  Her eyes!  She turns and flees into the dark tunnel in the back of the cab until she can no longer feel that awful piece of glass staring at her.

No.  This isn’t right.  She’s not…

In Chapter 15, Eris saved Ashan from an explosion conjured by another wizard. While she's since repressed the memory of what came after, Ashan bore witness:

The first thing Ashan hears upon regaining a tenuous consciousness is a repeating heavy, wet, crunching sound.

The ground he is lying on is warm and slightly damp, and after a struggle to open leaden eyelids he sees vapor rising up from the earth around him.  A white flake floats down and lands on the back of his hand.  He forces a blink, trying to focus.  It is ash.

There is a voice accompanying those wet, thudding, crunches.  He cannot quite make out the words.  Or is it only growling?

He tries to shift his position but finds the calf of one cold, numb, and immovable.  Oh right, the spear.  He stretches out an arm to find that the ground mere inches further away from where the hand had lain is intolerably hot.  The reflex of jerking his hand back is enough to tire him.

The sound continues.  He smells something burning.

Pushing himself up onto his elbows is a trial that he surprises himself in passing.  Lifting his head enough to look forward while keeping his fully unbound hair out of his eyes is hardly easier.  The urge to go back to sleep is treacherous and so he quashes it.

He is lying at the edge of a small crater, maybe about as wide across as he is tall.  Hard to judge with the smoke, ash, dust, and steam all swirling together in and around it.  On the other side of that blasted pit a hulking, demonic figure with fire for hair that flows down over the black-and-red carapace of its shoulders and back is repeatedly stomping something obscured by the low-hanging steam.  Its lips are pulled back nearly to its ears is what might just as easily be a snarl or a grin but either way is all teeth.

Amidst the creature’s slew of invectives and vocalizations more beast than human, Ashan manages to pick out the phrase “slaving piece of human garbage,” as one of the few intelligible mutterings directed at whatever it is crushing.

Unfortunately, this is not a place where she is allowed to forget...

Rage.  

There has ever been constant knowledge of how good the climax of the hunt feels.  Has felt.  Will feel next time.  And few things have had are having will have a death so sweet as the pile of garbage before her that calls itself a man.  It is not even fit to be prey, but the righteousness of ending it will more than make up for that.  It has captured, enslaved, and sold the innocent.  It has hurt one of her own.  It has arrogantly tried to summon the sun itself.

She swallows that sun.  Lets it burn away that which is not needed and bring light to what remains.  Its fire erupts from her scalp to become her hair and tumble down past her shoulders.  Its core melts down the flimsy scraps of armor and becomes her carapace.  Its hunger welds with hers and becomes yet more fuel for the hunt.

Her charred lips pull back nearly to her ears in what is both a snarl and a grin and in any case is all teeth.

The flash of her brilliant metamorphosis alone was nearly enough to dispose of the garbage, but not quite.  What is left of it continues to cough and twitch on the steaming ground.  She walks over to it and raises a foot in anticipation of a heavy, wet, crunching sound repeating over and over.

No!

This is not her!

This has never been her!

This can never be her!

[margridarnauds]

top five characters/moments/things from irish mythology you wish had more pop culture traction?

Thank you! 

One thing I’m going to say, off the bat, is that I know that my idea of what has pop culture traction is going to be very different than what the general public sees -- When you spend a solid chunk of your life looking....and looking...and looking at pop culture retellings, that’s pretty much all you see, but I’m aware that what might be relatively common in depictions of this stuff might still be relatively obscure to the general public. (Especially if it’s not, say, banshees, selkies, or, God help us all, leprechauns. Even though those are all folklore, I know I’m never going to win that fight.)

1. The Tuatha Dé being dicks in general. Like, with all respect to the Professor, he did possibly the worst possible thing to Irish material (and that’s including when he dissed “Celtic materials” as being like shattered stained glass) that he could have done by sheer accident when he created Lord of the Rings. Because, since that series was published, every single low quality fantasy writer has been trying to shove the Tuatha Dé into Tolkien’s elves (and a specifically bowdlerized version of them.) And the TD are...they’re fascinating to me. I love them very dearly, I’ve been going back to them for years because they’re this group of superhumans who are also petty and spiteful and sometimes rigid in upholding distinctions. They haven’t always forgiven the Milesians for taking Ireland from them, they will do everything they possibly can to screw people over, they are sometimes only loosely tolerant of the mortals (and, on Samhain, for example, they sometimes lose even that loose tolerance.) 

Like, I want the Tuatha Dé to be complicated and hypocritical and petty and spiteful while also being capable of being the best of humanity as well while ALSO being distinctly Off. I want Lovecraftian Tuatha Dé who are always just beneath the surface, I want comic relief Tuatha Dé who are still in denial over having lost Ireland and refuse to adapt to the modern world at any cost to truly ridiculous standards, I want the Tuatha Dé to be a big, high stakes family drama/reality show/soap opera with the entirety of Ireland having to deal with the fallout, I want tragic Tuatha Dé who are these kind of living artifacts in a world that’s more or less outgrown them. (I am obviously aware that they have modern worshippers -- I am saying that the TDD are drama queens and will still be mopey after having lost the entire island. Unless you have Brehon law actively being around still, they are still going to be mopey.)

2. Related to that, bruighean tales. This is not a term you hear very often outside of Celticist circles, and part of the reason for that is that these tales often haven’t been translated yet into English (though some of them have been translated from modern Irish), even though they had a wide currency in the folk tradition. What these are is, essentially...a story in which the Fianna are tricked by the Tuatha Dé to go into a magical fort, where the Tuatha Dé proceed to attack them throughout the night with a series of spells, illusions, and the odd monster or two. (The most famous of these is probably Laoi na Con Duibhe -- The Lay of the Black Dog.) Like, I feel like there’s a lot that a modern audience could appreciate about this, from the perspective of horror and the gothic. I think you could do a lot with the claustrophobia and the tension of it, with this group of legendary heroes possibly, for the very first time, being in over their head. 

3. The Fir Bolg! It is so ridiculously easy for these guys to get adapted out of depictions of the battle between the Fomoire and the Tuatha Dé, but they’re so important! (Also, more Fir Bolg who are accurate to how they’re presented in Lebor Gabála Érenn -- so many pop culture references, when we do get them, have so much....uncomfortable baggage. Like, I don’t want to say too much because there are some papers coming out on this, and it’s like...I don’t know how much I can say, but it’s just...please can we toss away the idea of them somehow being these primal “primitive” people who are associated with the earth? Can’t we let them be competent and clever and strong settlers of Ireland who established the kingship?) Especially my boy Sreng who is quietly one of the single most fascinating and complex characters in the entirety of the medieval and early modern Irish literary tradition. 

4. I firmly believe that we have never gotten enough Bres as a character, which is a little shocking when you consider how important he is to the Tuatha Dé -- so many central figures are related to him (the Morrígan is his aunt), he has a fairly interesting arc in Cath Maige Tuired (which is just a text that...I can never have enough adaptations of), and he gets a relatively large number of appearances across medieval and early modern Ireland. And, like with the TD, I’d really like to see him be done....well. Like, don’t settle for “he’s evil because he’s evil”; I want to see him get a large amount of interiority, I want to see him be complex, I want the audience to sympathize with him even as they realize that if he succeeds...it all goes down. Authors almost seem...intimidated by him, and I think part of it’s that heroes like Lugh are easy, especially when you remove the inconvenient little bits about them that might make them unpalatable. Villains like Bres, though...it’s like they’re having to hold up a mirror. We want to be like Lugh, we want to be that kind of superhuman, hypercompetent master of all crafts who is beloved and is able to conquer all the enemy. In reality, though, I feel like Bres is more...realistic. More human. And that’s why people struggle with him in adaptations, whether they excise him entirely or make him a caricature of himself. People don’t want the reminder of their own flaws.  (Also I believe that he should kiss men.) 

(On the mouth.)

(With both parties consenting to it.) 

5. Relating to #2, I feel like there’s a thick pseudo-Gothic (pre-Gothic?) vein in a lot of the Irish material that could be a lot of fun to work with. @effervescentdragon once compared Crimson Peak to Togail Briudne Dá Derga, I personally love the incident with the dead men and the Morrígan from the Boyhood Deeds of Cú Chulainn, I was recently rereading the plot summary of the short story “Don’t Wake the Dead” and was reminded of the story of Sín in Aided Muirchertaig meic Erca, the Dead Man in Echtra Nerai, this one description of a bruighean tale...I think it was Eochaid Bhig Dearg, where every single one of the Tuatha Dé is described as having a smile on their faces as they surround the fort....waiting....while the Fianna can only look on in horror and dread whatever nightmares they summon next...Medieval Irish material is often likened to fantasy and, for what it’s worth, I do understand it, especially since all the great fantasy writers were very well in-tune with world mythology and Irish is an Indo European literary tradition (albeit one that, as of the time of it being written down, had intertwined itself tightly with Christianity.) Still, I would really like to see more of that Gothic element being teased out, because a lot of my roots are in the gothic tradition and I would love to combine my two favorite things.  

In general, I suppose my tl;dr is that I would like, in general, for more nuance, more complexity, I’d like more writers to have fun with the material and to think outside the box that this stuff gets put into, I’d like to see less bowdlerization, less need to apply a Nationalistic brush to these things that hasn’t really been necessary since the 1930s. (Also, give me more Cath Maige Tuired adaptations.)

 It’s funny a lot of the time, when I see, say, arguments about Arthuriana or Greek Mythological adaptations where people will be saying “I HATE when adaptations--” and I’m just kind of in this perpetual state of “What do you mean ‘adaptations?’ Y’all get your favorite works adapted more than one time?” Don’t get me wrong, I can sympathize with seeing your favorite material butchered, but I’ve had to read a LOT of really bad self published novels, Wattpad fiction, and MySpace RPGs from back in the day in order to get *anything* for my favorite characters. And if I was ever really, deeply personally offended by seeing my favorite characters done badly....I think I’d have gone insane at this point. I think people often expect me to be very strict but the truth is that I’ve never had the luxury of being very strict. Our most accurate representation of the material thus far’s been an animated film where the day is partially saved by a spirit cat attacking a Viking warlord. Our second most accurate representation’s been Assassin’s Creed: Valhalla, where there’s an evil cult of human-sacrificing druids in 9th century Ireland that ends up spurring an Irish Inquisition and the 50 foot tall Lia Fáil, which is an alien artifact, exploding into smithereens. And I think that it’s fascinating to see what the public is really interested in and what authors and creatives are putting into their stuff VS the material as we understand it. So, a part of me’s a little sad all the time, but a part of me’s also always interested in seeing how these trends play out. 

But, anyway, I hope this answers the question! Thank you again for the ask! 

[entitycreation]

Waddup with the 😈👶📘

Oh god I know the one you are talking about bvcbcv Okay so, this fic went from a simple cute mpreg fic to like.... Lovecraftian horror with far more twists and turns then I could keep track of, and I changed up how I wanted it to go each time! I often think about this along with my dragon AU so much so that they ended up merging together because if I'm to make baby OC's they might as well be dragon demon baby ocs because Marry Sueing characters is fun fuck anyone who says otherwise lmao ...Anyways yea the fic got too complicated and I constantly go back to revise it again and again and cant seem to find the story going the way I like. I figured I start with the dragon AU to at least establish Mephistos and Shiros relationship in that universe before I make them have a kid... or two... or three.. Okay on to actually explaining the plot of... Both? We'll start with the first part, DRAGONS. This AU is set in a world where dragons are separate magical beings that are born from condensed Assian magic. This magic is not at all associated with demons, so dragons, elementals and things made from Assian magic are not bound to any demon king or demons in general, they are their own thing. I hope this made sense (I don't have a way of explaining it just yet) Dragon magic is incredibly powerful too, it can reach world ending levels of power even... However, dragon magic specifically needs a host. Similar to demons, the magic is more so parasitic in that it needs a body that can contain it. The thing is, while demons are picky with their hosts. Dragon magic is not so much. The magic will spend a long time hopping from host to host until something lands and lasts long enough for the host to begin turning into a dragon. Dragon magic, like most magic coming from Assiah, will fade away overtime if its just floating around without a body. No body, no magic container. For that reason this magic will body hop around. It can go into anything. Animals, humans, and in very interesting cases... It will often even buddy up with already possessed bodies too. Which brings us to our good friends Mephisto, Shiro and Yuri! Upon investigating an "anomaly" located in a remote ruins somewhere (don't know exactly where yet) The trio gets into a fight with an enraged and injured dragon. While fighting the dragon, Shiro nearly gets killed trying to take it on by himself mostly, which prompts Mephisto to stop time just as he almost got squashed by the palm of the dragons hand. However, the dragon begins to move slowly on its own, resisting Mephistos magic. Shiro gets out of the way on Mephistos call, knowing he cant freeze it for long... But then just as Mephisto resumes time again, the dragon very quickly switched from what it was doing to lunge at Mephisto, catching him between its teeth. Mephisto ends the fight by summoning a bunch of clock hands to spear the dragon to a nearby hill. The dragons jaw slackened after a minute of being speared and slowly dies... Mephisto gets out of the beasts maw with severe injuries to his abdomen and pelvis. After that battle Mephisto suffers from recovering the injury, apparently demon healing doesn't extend to this type of wound. So he heals at a very slow rate compared to even human standards, which is odd and prompts the order to send in specialists to take a look at him. From there its all a bit blurry as the scenes all changed up a lot and I never have a coherent idea for anything beyond this point. I just know that Mephisto then gains a dragon form that he cannot control and often turns into a dragon either out of stress, anger, or not venting out the magic enough so it builds up until his body cant take it and he goes berserk. Now, the mpreg fic actually was written before but I abandoned it because I lost interest with that one in favor of the new version of it. The new version has been redone over and over because unfortunately I'm indecisive and cant decide how I want it to go lol. I just wanna explore Mephiro with their own little fuck ups- I mean, cute children... That definitely wont eat them alive or anything.. No no >.> its all fluff I swear ^^ I cant get too far talking about this because I cant think of any specifics or how far along it is since its very different from the old one. Best I can do is mention it but uh... If you have specific questions I will do my best to answer those!

[selamat-linting]

i've been trying so hard at making a list of things i like so people could give me media reccomendations. at this point i give up. here's a list of things most commonly found on my favorite junks, so if the media you like had some of these things, do tell.

-religious symbolism (esp islamic mysticism or prebysterian christianity) and a complicated relationship to god

-criticism or deconstruction on hero figures / messiahs / great man-ism / individuality that are not just textual. fuck off if your fantasy book said systemic change and worldwide collaboration is important in changing the world but the meaningful victories are won by a plucky gang of protagonists. just fuck off.

-the protag disassociates and forget a lot of things about themselves but its not treated as an uwu mental health matters way. bonus if the protagonist also has attachment issues and copes with it in a highly destructive way.

-shitty people doing shitty things. dysfunctional dynamic that reminds you of your parents marriage.

-themes of hope and the indomitable nature of the human spirit. compassion and small kindness despite unimaginable amount of suffering in the world. but not too much ofc

-working class protagonist

-the inherent tragedy of youths inheriting the sins and the destruction caused by their parents and ancestors.

-polyamory

-or alternatively, an exploration alien gender or non-nuclear family. not just in an emotional sense but also in an anthropological worldbuilding sort of way

-scares the living shit out of you

-has a cool classification system. idc what it is, be it fantasy animal taxonomy, factions specializing in different magical disciplines, power classifications, i LOVE it when i can sort things.

-surreal, dreamlike imagery

-is somewhere in the lovecraftian spectrum. their existence is fragile. there is a godlike being but its indifferent and it doesnt care if their existence wipes us out.

-if the protagonist is a teenager, theyre unaware of how scary they can be. might act cocky or too serious and its totally not a trauma response (lie)

-there was a fucked up place/realm/town and its looks cool.

[quixotic-gray]

I went on a rant, cut bc I don't like my tangents bulking up my blog

So I was talking to somebody last night and I just got to thinking about it again, but I was telling somebody a couple places where she could (legally) get books very cheap if not free and as an example I was like My most expensive book I got is a $430-something neuropsych textbook for less than 30 bucks so you can find pretty much anything and this guy overheard and he's like 1. He paid full price for the textbook bc his degree requires a neuropsych credit and 2. He learned pretty much nothing from the class. So like, also consider how much it costs to even be in a class, forget about the textbook, it can be thousands of bucks just for a goddamn plastic chair.

Okay now this guy is so positive, I love his energy and attitude toward things but he's like "the professor was just too smart" okay babe. I gotta stop him right there because if you are too smart to teach new people the basic foundations of your field and they come away from your class with nothing but debt then bitch u better get smarter. I obviously didn't go into one of my full tangents with this guy, just gave him like a 2 sentence ghost of it since the soapbox shits saved for my blog and friends bc its either anonymous or accepted but the point is still there.

You should be able to teach a 6 year old how ion channels work because your understanding of it is strong enough you can simplify it without losing value, your knowledge should be so full it spills over to other people. You can't just dump it all on them. I mean, you learned this shit right? You oughtta know how damn complicated it gets, in neuropsychology you must have had at least one bad learning experience where everything went over your head and you wanted to quit? How did you learn? Did you find what made learning it easier? You should know (just from having gone to school in the first place) especially since you teach neuropsychology that brains can only take so much at a time because learning acts a lot like a muscle- you overdo it, you cram or pull something, and you've screwed yourself out of a lot of progress because your brain, just as much as your muscles, needs rest.

This is bs, just think of how far neuropsychology (among other fields) could be by now if the way we go about teaching it was different- how many great scientists missed the spark of passion that comes from realizing how incredible and beautiful neural function is either because they couldn't afford it in the first place or bc once they get in the plastic chair its too incredible, it's too big-- you're a professor sending knowledge to students like you're god sending a lovecraftian ass angel to a prophet saying "be not afraid" like bitch??? Just don't be scary? You go throwing shit like whats the difference between sodium, potassium, or calcium channels before they understand the difference in charge between the inside and outside of the cell and why ion channels are important to that, you go throwing shit about basal ganglia at them before they even know that a ganglion is a group of neuron bodies. You can't. This is why so many people who were fascinated by neurons get overwhelmed and decide its not for them. Everybody is a scientist from the beginning, science is the second greatest thing we've evolved to do and what's the 1st? teach. I'll not go into it here but look into the evolutionary importance of shared knowledge. We wouldn't have our large body of science, art, philosophy blah blah blah if we didn't teach each other shit. We all want to learn and we explore by nature, teaching takes more effort than learning but sharing what you have effectively is how we further science as a whole and I think if you're teaching anything but especially neuropsychology you should know this. I just can't get over how frequently mishandled neuropsychology is.

[prurientpuddlejumper]

Don’t Look! [Part 4]

<- Part 3 | Part 5 ->

Frederick Chilton x Reader

@we-are-all-just-a-bit-crazy’s lovecraftian horror AU, with a bit of my own twist on the origin story. Emotional hurt/comfort. Body horror. Hugging your body-horror monster boyfriend. 

3,386 words

Once upon a time, there lived a man who had everything: great wealth (built on the backs of exploited workers), a grand estate, a beautiful wife, and many mistresses waiting in the wings. Yet after years of trying, he failed to produce an heir. Determined that his money could buy anything, the man scoured the world, searching for a solution. One day, his extensive resources brought him to an ancient castle in Lithuania, where the last descendants of a noble bloodline offered him a devil’s bargain—a book, a summoning ritual. He did not ask questions. His wife was finally with child.

The Chilton legacy was secure.

The moment Frederick was born, the life was sucked from his mother—a human sacrifice for his soul crossing into this world. That was what his father told him, at least. Frederick had no memory of clawing his way through the veil between worlds, of being anything other than an ordinary child with a distant father, a young, blonde stepmother, and nannies instead of friends. Until the changes began. Allison (or was it Kayla at the time?) fainted in the living room when he staggered in, screaming as smoke boiled from his skin, begging for help. His father only wrinkled his nose with disgust and calmly explained what he was.

“You must learn to hide this, Frederick. Never let anyone see you this way, or it will destroy the family name.”

And so, he learned the transformation’s schedule. Prepared for it. Knew how to hide it away and never let anyone get close enough to see the real him. But it wasn’t good enough. Try as he might, nothing Frederick ever did met his father’s expectations for the perfect son he had gone through so much trouble to produce.

Frederick grew into a bitter and lonely man with no one to care about, or who cared about him. He kept the world at a distance, hiding his shame behind expensive suits and lavish decoration.

Never once did he consider that he was not alone in this world at all.

 ***

I see him as one of those pitiful things sometimes born in hospitals. They feed it, keep it warm, but they don’t put it on the machines. They let it die. But he doesn’t die. He looks normal. Nobody can tell what he is.

This is how Will Graham describes the Chesapeake Ripper.

Every therapy session with Graham, every conversation overhead, the puzzle became clearer. At first, Chilton merely believed that Dr. Lecter was guilty of unethical practices—manipulating Mr. Graham in the same way he had manipulated Gideon. He felt such kinship with Hannibal. Learning a bit of dirt on him brought the ever-so-superior doctor down to his level, gave him something to lord over him—a little implied blackmail to strengthen their friendship.

They both had secrets to hide.

Dr. Chilton never would have guessed the final puzzle piece to convince him fully that Hannibal was the Chesapeake Ripper would be the one everyone else laughed at.

“I brought you here to bear witness,” Graham said to Gideon through their adjoining cells.

“To tell Jack Crawford that I sat in Hannibal Lecter’s cobalt blue dining room? An ostentatious herb garden, Leda and the Swan over the fireplace. And you, having a fit in the corner.”

Chilton perked up and quickly shared the audio feed to one of the junior therapists assisting him. You were reliable at editing his audio files, clipping and exporting segments he wanted to keep, but he was avoiding you at the moment. This was proof—irrefutable proof that Gideon had met Hannibal Lecter the night he went searching for the Ripper.

After his conversation with Graham concluded, an assistant was sent down to coax more information from him while Chilton’s research team listened in, keenly taking notes.

Gideon was not finished dropping bombshells.

With a casual lilt to his voice as if talking to a friend over dinner, he began to describe the Chesapeake Ripper. Skin like volcanic ash, reflecting no light. A red glow to his eyes. Black claws as long as steak knives. Antlers breaking through the inside of his skull, punching through the skin. All black as night—a form that shifted in the shadows, ever tricking the eye, unwilling to be known.

He’s the Devil, Mr. Graham. He’s smoke.

“Great. Gideon is delusional,” one therapist snorted. “On the bright side, this completely undercuts his malpractice case against you.” She patted Chilton’s shoulder. Chilton flinched.

“We should start him on antipsychotics. What do you think? Doctor?”

Chilton’s face turned ashen white. “Y-yes, certainly,” he muttered, staggering to his feet.

He moved for the door, but crumbled halfway there, pain ripping through his leg as sharp thorns grew beneath the skin. It was daylight. No. No! The transformation should not be starting for hours—he had plenty of time! He gasped out as another shock tore through him, barely containing a cry. His body convulsed.

“Doctor!” A therapist and a guard rushed in to help him to his feet. “Where does it hurt? If this is a complication from your surgery, we need to get you into intensive care right away.”

“No,” he brushed them off. “Only… psychosomatic. I need to— ah!” He gritted his teeth, mind racing to the one person he did not want to turn to, but the only one he could, and barked, “Get my secretary!”

 ***

Smoke was rising off of his burning skin by the time you rushed into Chilton’s vacated office. His eyes were wide with panic, but greeted you when you entered with—not relief, perhaps, because he was every bit as terrified as before, but with the anticipation of being rescued. His eyes pleaded.

“H-help. I cannot make it stop.”

You managed to get him into your car. The sun’s orange rays seemed to chase the beast away, clearing his skin and stopping his wracking convulsions long enough to cross the employee parking lot without drawing stares. He insisted on taking the back seat so he could hide—and to put more distance between you in case he lost control.

His chest rose and fell like a rabbit in a cat’s mouth.

“The way he described Dr. Lecter—anyone would think it was a metaphor! That he was crazy!” Chilton’s breath was raspy as you drove, glancing back at him through the rearview mirror. He kept trembling, small patches of scaly skin appearing at random then swirling back inside. One pupil was a pinprick. His tongue occasionally became serpentine and got in the way as he frantically spoke. “But it was too specific, the details. Familiar. I always knew there was a connection between Dr. Lecter and me—a reason we were friends. It all makes sense now!”

“Hey, it’s OK,” you said, trying to sound soothing, though you had no idea what he was talking about.

“Don’t you understand? Lecter is like me!”

“That’s good, isn’t it? That means you’re not alone.”

“Hannibal Lecter is the Chesapeake Ripper!” he shouted, and a spine tore through a seat cushion. “A cannibal, if Will Graham is to be believed, and loathe as I am to admit it, Graham is an excellent profiler. If the Ripper and I are the same… then that means I—”

“You are nothing like that!” Forgetting the damage his demonic tantrum was doing to your faux-leather interior, you had faith in him. He was a little withdrawn and more than a little vain, and it had garnered him an icy reputation around the hospital, but now you understood why. He wasn’t evil or malicious. He was frightened.

“God help me,” he murmured.

 ***

As soon as the garage door closed behind you, he scrambled from the car (scratching the handle), and retreated inside. He didn’t invite you to follow him home. But he didn’t forbid it, either, and you wanted to be there. All you had were panic-scrambled memories from the first time that made his transformation worse in hindsight than it was. Or maybe better. You didn’t know, and you wouldn’t know until you saw it again with clear eyes.

The electric kettle rumbled on its stand, hissing steam as you searched through Frederick Chilton’s surprisingly extensive tea collection for something herbal and soothing. Chamomile, you thought. With honey. Surely that must be good for demon-monster-werewolf things?

The sun was about to set and he was still reeling over Hannibal, and just as much from the premature transformation the revelation had triggered. And every time he cried, “This is not possible. How can this be possible?” the next convulsion was more intense.

He would probably just burn himself on tea.

A painful whimper came from somewhere in the house, and you followed it to a tiny panic room that opened behind a bookshelf. It was only about seven by nine feet with concrete walls and floors, bare except for deep scratches of varying age, like an animal trying to escape. The few chairs inside were metal. Difficult to break. Frederick faced away from you, staring at a hand that was too large for the rest of his body, capped with long black claws.

“Oh no, this will not do at all,” you tutted, shaking your head at the barren space. “How about I bring in some blankets? Let’s get you comfortable.”

His whole body shook. “You should go.”

“No. No way, not after seeing this prison cell. I am not leaving you like this.”

“I do not want to hurt you.” His shoulder jerked. A spike tore through his shirt.

“You won’t.”

“Seeing it again… will not be therapeutic for you,” he hissed, another spike breaking through. “Go before it is too late.”

“No!”

“Damn it! I am a monster—there is proof of that now! The FBI has no idea what it is dealing with!” Chilton began to pace the small cell, thoughts racing, features morphing into something grotesque and alien. “Does Hannibal know about me? Can he sense it? Is that why he confided in me? I always thought it was professional respect—hah! God, what if he…” A painful convulsion halted his pacing and brought him to one knee, gripping his side. His attention snapped back to you. “This is… dangerous,” he warned, then hacked violently. Fleshy, snake-like projections spewed from his mouth, and he quickly turned away again, hiding his face. “You should… you should be nowhere near all of this! You should not be here! Why did I let you inside?!”

A roar of anguish ripped through the air with enough force to push you back through the panic room door, just in time to avoid being impaled on half a dozen spines as they shot from Chilton’s body like lances. Chips of concrete clattered to the ground as they penetrated the walls. He screamed again, writhing to get free, but found himself trapped by his own violent transformation. Like an animal, he struggled and clawed at himself as if his rational mind had been overtaken by raw, volatile emotion.

“Take it easy. You’re going to hurt yourself,” you tried to calm him, but you couldn’t stop your voice from shaking.

This was worse than last time. You were sure his spines weren’t half as long when you saw him in his office—even Chilton seemed surprised to be pinned.

You lifted your hands, palms toward him in a steadying gesture, and took a step back into the concrete room.

“Stay back!” he howled, thrashing. “Get away!”

It was tempting. Every muscle in your body wanted to follow his advice and run far away from the indescribable horror before you. But his eyes were still green. Were still terrified. And you had an inkling of why it was worse this time. Maybe he would hate you later for imposing, but it seemed more important right now not to leave him feeling… like a monster.

“It’s OK.” You took another step closer.

“No!”

“You’re not going to hurt me. I trust you. Shh, shh… I’m not afraid, see?”

Rigid spines sprayed from his back and shoulders in a 180-degree arc, leaving only his front accessible. You ducked under one and followed its trajectory to where it met the wall. It wasn’t just pinned by pressure—it had struck the wall with enough force to dig into it like an iron rod. Sawing through might be the only option for getting him unstuck. You wondered if that would hurt. Were there nerves in his spines? You stepped over the next one as you drew nearer.

“You should be afraid! I am just like him!” Chilton tried to turn his head away as you traversed his network of thorns and stood in front of him.

His face was almost entirely inhuman. Tentacles cascaded down from where a nose should have been, and when he opened his mouth in a snarl, they parted like wriggling eels—each with a life of its own—to reveal a jaw that split his face open vertically, crowded with rows of sharp white teeth. The more agitated Chilton became, the more dramatic the effect. Each time he spoke, you caught a flash of teeth that sent shivers racing down your spine. But you continued to move closer anyway, within snapping range.

“Hannibal and I… we are the same. Please—I do not want to become him. Do not let me hurt you!”

“You are not the same. You’re not a killer.”

Chilton let out a choking cry that was all too human. “I killed that nurse,” he said. Concrete groaned as his spines grew longer. A crooked horn sprouted from his head. “I killed Elizabeth Shell.”

“You… you didn’t kill her.”

His breath quickened again. Tentacles sprouted and died and resprouted from his face in a constant fevered motion. “I knew Gideon would kill! I lowered security! I knew what would happen—what I needed to happen to prove that he was the Ripper! I may as well have plucked her eyes out with my own hands and… and feasted on her organs. God… I am the Ripper,” he wailed.

“No…” It never occurred to you that Dr. Chilton would have done such a thing knowingly. Maybe there was something dark inside him that this creature was reflecting. It hurt to acknowledge, and yet maybe you both needed to. “You made a mistake. You did a bad thing, but… Gideon was already a killer. It wasn’t your fault.”

“I drove him to it, manipulated him… I am just as responsible as he is. I am a monster.”

“A monster wouldn’t feel this guilty! You made a mistake, but you won’t make it again, will you?”

Tentacles and spines stopped sprouting. His form stabilized as his wet eyes looked off thoughtfully. He seemed so pathetic… so innocent, almost. Despite the intimating spines and claws that added danger and height to his appearance, his body had the same mass—leaving his frame gaunt and frail, with ribs sticking out prominently. Hollow.

You wanted to protect him.

You knew that was your job at BSHCI. You knew that was why Dr. Chilton suddenly needed a personal secretary when he never had before. Someone to sit outside his door, take his calls, and warn him when visitors wanted to see him. You’d never met the doctor before he was attacked by one of his patients, but you recognized the signs of trauma—the way he flinched easily, avoided contact at first, then the way he clung to you when you earned his trust. The awkward little smiles. The way his cheeks turned bright red when his fingers brushed yours as you delivered his coffee. You couldn’t help feeling protective. Falling in love, even.

Though it was closed for the moment, his mouth was a dangerous black hole with alien arms ready to pull prey inside. It seemed impossible to get close without being dragged into its teeth by instinct. You couldn’t imagine putting your face anywhere near it.

Another step, and your forehead touched his.

“I... I do not want to hurt you,” he pleaded.

“You won’t.”

You leaned into his arms, a hand reaching up to stroke the side of his face. It was covered in fine scales that glistened as if they should be slimy, but were smooth to the touch, like a snake. Sharper thorns sprouting from his skin seemed to retreat before your caress.

He trembled with inner turmoil, hot breath puffing against your chin. Your eyes darted toward the motion of one of his claws rising behind you, and all you could focus on were the way each sharp talon caught the light. You couldn’t be sure what he was thinking—if he was going to return your embrace, or prove to you that he was a monster. Would he slash you just to drive you away?

“I smell your fear,” his voice hissed accusingly.

For some reason, of all the reactions you could have had, you started to laugh. It was nervous and tight at first, but then building in confidence at the ridiculousness of the situation.

“You’ve got giant claws! Of course I’m afraid! But I’m not running, am I?”

You slid your hand from his cheek and trailed it over his bony neck and the ridges and spines of his shoulders, finding a path for your arms to twine around him. Cuddling closer, you nuzzled into the crook of his neck, hardly bothered by the writhing tentacles that draped down over you.

“I know you would never hurt me. You’re just going to have to keep showing me there’s nothing to be afraid of.”

Shuddering, he breathed in your scent. All his senses were heightened by this form, and he was surrounded by you—your pheromones, your electric field, the radiant heat of your skin. It was like sinking into a warm bath with a glass of fine wine in his hand. He opened his palm and let his predator’s hand sweep harmlessly down your back, holding you close. He could sense the fluttering of your heart in his embrace. It was slower than a creature in terror—slowing the longer he held you. You were not afraid. And he could not imagine hurting you. Whatever he had been worried might happen, whatever awful things he might be capable of, he could never imagine hurting you. You were right. You didn’t have anything to fear.

He exhaled a long, steady breath of surrender. The long spines retracted, pulling out of the walls as they returned to their usual size. He could move again, but didn’t. Not for a long time.

“It’s OK. It’s OK,” you sighed. The scent of your hair was intoxicating.

Eventually, you had to part. Chilton’s eyes darted away as you did—the inky scales on his face emitted a soft bluish starlight, which you were certain was blushing. You could not coax him to leave his concrete prison cell, but he told you where to find some blankets he could live with damaging—linen closet, second floor, third door on the right—and let you make a cozy nest on the bare floors. You made tea, and only cringed a little at his attempts to drink it. It was late, then. You were sleepy, and he was exhausted. Emotionally drained. His mind still raced over everything, still not certain of your presence and inexplicable kindness. You sat in the pile of blankets and had him rest his head in your lap.

“Give me your hand,” you asked, extending yours.

A clawed, scaly hand slid tentatively along the floor. You took it. Held it gently, first observing the long talons protruding like daggers from each finger before slotting yours between them—nothing sharp there. You let out a long sigh and leaned back against the concrete wall. His breath hitched.

He’d never had his hand held in this form, you assumed.

He’d never had his hand held at all, in fact. Not in many years.

It had to be a trap, he thought. No one had ever loved him before. No one could—not like this. Yet, as he fell asleep to your fingers massaging his temple and the soft murmuring of your voice, he let himself believe it. You were always there, protecting him. Smiling at him in the morning.

When you woke up, Frederick was human again, still fast asleep in your arms.

[roseapprentice]

TERFs and inclusionists, screaming at each other:

"Why do you believe in gender so hard?"

TERFs, thinking at inclusionists:

Why do you believe in gender so hard? Gender has been shoved down my throat my whole life.

How dare you participate in that? I don't have any gender but the one forced on me. I'm sure that's everyone else's experience too.

I was born, I was assigned female, and I've been scraped down into the mud for it ever since. I looked like I might be pregnant one day and that made me a commodity. I'm sure that's everyone else's experience too.

Other people were born, were assigned male, and have been spoiled ever since. Taught from the cradle to use me. I'm sure that's everyone else's experience too.

"Man" means "trained to exploit." I love and admire the men who transcend that training. "Woman" means "trained to be exploited." I love and admire the women who transcend that training.

Now you come here and tell me that being one of the exploiters or being one of the exploited is some fundamental part of your identity, is some deep and meaningful truth in your soul.

How could you? How could you take a system used to brutalize me all my life, and treat it like it's made of bright colors and daffodils, like it's sacred, like I am a monster for wanting to defy it? Can't you understand that gender is the monster, not the god?

Inclusionists, thinking at TERFs:

Why do you believe in gender so hard? Gender has been a cell I've been locked in my whole life.

I was born looking a certain way, and people decided so much about me. Decided what I would play with and how I would stand and talk and find meaning. Decided who I would feel at home with and who I would urinate next to and when and how I would get to feel right in my body and my blood. I'm sure other people have their own experience.

Gender is a million things to a billion people. Some of us were raised female, and told we could do anything. Could give birth or be a physicist or both. Could make our own bold way or get a man to provide for us. Could feel sad or angry or neither or both.

Some of us were raised male, and told we could do half of anything. Could feel angry but not sad. Could make our own way in the world and provide for our family. Failing to be the hero of our own life story was not an option.

Some of us were raised to a cosmology of gender I don't recognize, but to them it's the ordinary default. The boys could do anything but chores. The girls could do half of anything, as long as the chores somehow got done.

I'm sure other people have their own experience.

Gender is a word. A social construct built from biology and tradition and love and hatred. I don’t know all of which parts of gender come from which, and the answer is probably too complicated to ever learn completely.

I know that being grouped in with some people makes me feel uneasy and afraid, and being grouped in with other people makes me feel comfortable and seen. I know that some parts of my body and mind feel like me, and some parts feel other and wrong and it hurts.

I know some of my feelings about my gender and body change over time, and some feelings stay the same. I know that people who claim to know which feelings will do which are usually wrong.

Gender is a huge sprawling idea that’s wormed its way into every part of life. If you try to tear the gender out of every person you meet, you will tear out the hearts that have grown up fused to its roots.

Our plan is to make gender stop being a prison, so that we can all discover for ourselves which parts of this huge chaotic idea are made of patriarchy and hatred, and which parts are actually just pieces of love and bone that have been categorized strangely.

But you? You shut gender up into two airtight boxes like you're containing Lovecraftian gods, and you worship those boxes. You are the devoted acolytes of binary gender.

Please just stop. All we want is to live and be human. Humans are messy and resist categories, because we're alive. We find the friends and clothes and labels and bodies that fit best, and we make due because life is short and hard and beautiful.

Stop cutting off pieces of us to make us fit in your precious gender boxes. Just let us be alive.

TERFs and inclusionists, screaming at each other louder:

“WHY DO YOU BELIEVE IN GENDER SO HARD?!”

[talk-to-the-mercs]

Audio From R.E.D Base #7

Engineer: Medic? Buddy...

Medic: I am not a dog nor a child.

Engineer: Okay, doc, we gotta talk. This isn’t like you. And right now, when everythin’ is fallin’ apart, we gotta put everything out in the open, whether you like it or not.

Medic: I’m sorry my change of mood is such an inconvenience.

Engineer: That’s not what I said, and you ain’t gonna convince me otherwise. That’s part of workin’ so close. I know you, and you know me. If we both use all our tricks, we’re just gonna end up with a bunch of wasted time.

Medic: [chuckles] Ve have spent too much time together.

Engineer: You’re hidin’ in your work. Know how I know that? ‘Cause I do the same thing. When I’m at my wit’s end, I gotta work. I gotta put my hands on somethin’. The difference is that I face my problem eventually. You never do. You just keep on goin’ until I find ya in passed out with a scalpel in one hand and a heart in another.

Medic: I have lost many specimens that vay...

Engineer: You’re exhausted, Medic. If we’re ever gonna get Spy and Scout and Sniper back together, we’ve gotta have you. You’re the only person that can troubleshoot exactly what we need to do. We can explore this stuff all you want after this is all said and done. But we have what we need right now. You don’t have to do any more. This is enough.

Medic: Enough for you and enough for me are two very different things.

Engineer: That’s the question you need to ask: when is it enough for you?

Medic: Vhen I acqvire all human knowledge, escape death indefinitely, explore the multiverse visout complications, acqvire all existing knowledge, then use said accumulation to rule all of creation like a Lovecraftian god.

Engineer: [sarcastically] Is that all?

Medic: If I have time to write a cookbook in betveen the conquering of all vorlds, that vould be nice. But it’s more of a passion project.

Engineer: So you’re really never gonna be done? That ain’t any sorta healthy. With you bein’ a doctor and all, I thought you knew. Haven’t ya ever heard of burnout?

Medic: Burnout is an excuse for the lazy and the entitled. It isn’t the sound medical condition everyone treats it as.

Engineer: ...

Medic: Vhat is that look for?

Engineer: You know what? I think you’ve been livin’ in a burnout cycle. It’s the same thing every time. Ya get excited about a project, you work on it all day and all night, you forget everything else, and you start getting tired. You don’t sleep until you have to, and then you start shuttin’ yourself in your lab ‘cause you can’t stand to be around any of us. You work and work and work, and work some more, and you practically try to murder anyone that comes in. Sometimes a walk by your lab, and I hear you cryin’ or cursing or even yellin’ at a dove! I don’t speak great German, but I know that things your sayin’ are horrible!

Medic: I...thought the walls were soundproof.

Engineer: Yeah, but the door sure ain’t!

Medic: Engie, I-

Engineer: Let me finish! I don’t give a damn if the devil himself wants this experiment done, I want you to go out there and play checkers with Heavy! Your job is done! Now leave the rest to me.

Medic: But-

Engineer: Read my lips. Your. Job. Is. Done. And if ya can’t understand that, you’ll understand this - if you don’t take your gloves off right this instant, I will tell Miss Pauling that you’ve been mixing your anxiety medication with cocaine!

Medic: You vouldn’t!

Engineer: Like hell I wouldn’t! And when The Administrator puts you through the meat grinder, I’ll turn your lab into a workshop. First day? I will bend every instrument you left behind. Leave ‘em in a pile right next to the door. Second day? I’ll pour oil all over your slab ‘til it’s black!

Medic: You monster!

Engineer: Aw, wait ‘til the third day! I’ll pluck every single one of your doves and use the feathers to fill my pillow!

Medic: ICH HASSE DICH! My doves don’t deserve such grubby hands ending their life! And if you so much as look at my eqvipment, I’ll cross you vis a pufferfish and cut off all your spikes vis a rusty hatchet!

Engineer: [snickering] Yeah?

Medic: And...stop laughing! I’m trying to...[snorts]...yell at you...

Engineer: [laughing] You just get so dramatic when you’re angry. I shouldn’t be laughin’, I’m sorry, I’ll stop...

Medic: I am not a force to be trifled vis! I vill...[tries to keep back laughter] Qvit looking at me like that! Du Bastard!

Engineer: [snickering] I can’t help it!

Medic: [laughing] S-stop! Stop it now!

Engineer: [howling] You sounded like...Marvin the Martian!

Medic: [snorting and laughing] SHUT UP!

[Unintelligable talking and laughter, banging on table, clinking of beakers]

Engineer: [coughing and laughing] I’m sorry, doc, I don’t know why I’m so giggly all of a sudden.

Medic: [sniffing and giggling] Maybe...maybe I could use a break. Ach, that hurt my ribs...

Engineer: We’re both dog tired, Medic. And sometimes, when two men are dog tired, they just...laugh.

Medic: Vait...did you do that on purpose?

Engineer: [coyly] Maybe.

Medic: [snorting] Don’t you get me started again!

Engineer: Okay, okay. Let’s go play a round of checkers. Who knows, maybe there are a few questions for us. Unless ya scared ‘em off.

[END OF TRANSMISSION]

[seaweedbrain-wisegirl-andasatyr]

What a Live-Action Tartarus would look like: or, the complexities of Cosmic Horror in Middle Grade Fiction

I've always been really interested in film- it's my dream to work in this field in the future. So of course with news of an adaptation of this series so close on the horizon, of course I had to think about how, if for some absurd reason, I was personally hired to direct/design an episode, how some of my favorite scenes in this series would they look in live action form.

Some context: This is after Percy and Annabeth's fall in Tartarus. I think the scenery of this place is very interesting, yet extremely complicated to replicate in live action form. Tartarus, at least Rick's version of Tartarus, is horrifying when you think too hard about it, especially in a middle grade fiction series where characters can't even say the word "dam" properly, and monsters dissolve in a dust of sand. I think Tartarus is very similar to Lovecraftian horror. It's like, the idea that something is so terrifying that a human mind can’t even perceive it. You can't accept it because it's just too horrifying. You can’t even describe it because there are no words for it or things to compare it to in our world.

I made some personal rules for myself. Firstly, I think obvert violence thrown in your face is overrated. Any PJO or HoO series would be rated PG, at most, PG-13. Using these guidelines, I tried to construct a version of Tartarus that isn't fueled on gore or blood, but more this dark, deep nothingness.You know how, in many YA movies/tv shows, especially those trying too hard to be "edgy", we always make fun of how dimly lit the scenes are? Well, these scenes in Tartarus should, for once, actually be like that- so dark it almost makes our(as an audience) eyes hurt. Everything around our main characters are dark and hazy. Fog swims around them.

But we don't see much of this environment, no matter how dark it is. Everything is filmed so up close, the camera sticking so close to the characters it's uncomfortable. We are stuck with Percy and Annabeth in this huge, intangebly huge space. Two small ants in this great, unescapable landscape. Have y'all watched Stranger Things? you know that strangely filmed darkness we see when Eleven goes into the upside down? Tartarus should be filmed very similar to that. Everything except for Annabeth and Percy should be engulfed in black, pure darkness all around, when the two first enter this place. It's only when Annabeth and Percy stay too long, finally perceive this landscape for what it is, the body of Tarturas himself, that we as an audience sees this too. It's not abrupt or sudden. It's a gradual, uncomfortable recognization. The music that has always been in the background gets a little louder, pounding a little too similar to the beat of a human heart. We hear wet, sloshing, horrible sounds every time Percy puts his foot down. Dark liquid and goop drips from all around, and the camera stays just a little bit longer on these elements. The darkness slowly lifts, just a bit.

The Arai curses fight scene is, for me personally, the scariest scene in everything Rick wrote. It's utterly horrifying to think too long about. Again, I don't think it needs to be overtly graphic or visual.When you really think about it, there is so much death and killing in every one of the PJO and HoO books. But this sort of murder is made child-friendly in every way- monsters resolve into dust only to be reborn, death is written off in a few paragraphs, kids get shoot, cut, burned, maned, and we just ignore it. This scene really brings us to the reality that these monsters are still beings, about the sheer numbers of monsters just Percy and Annabeth themselves have brought to death. In a live-action adaption, this realization and horror should be replicated.

(more under read more ↓↓↓↓↓↓) 

At first, we think this is just a normal fight. Percy and Annabeth have went through plenty of those already- this is HoH, by now the audience has watched 12 year old Percy fight a god, 15 year old Percy become almost invincible- a little run-in with some winged monsters is just another Tuesday. The music increases, but it's still just regular, action-movie fight scene music (behind it is a heavy dropping beat. Again, just like a heartbeat. Is it Percy's heartbeat? Is it Tartarus's heartbeat? we can't tell). But as soon as Percy takes that first swing, we know something is wrong. think this scene would be interesting if the camera switches jarringly from Annabeth's pespective to Percy's. When Annabeth strikes down the arai that curses her with blindness, we are suddenly plunged into darkness too. Sudden, startling darkness. It is quiet, too. too quiet. We are engulfed in pure nothingness. It's so sudden and holds out for so long that the audience must think something is wrong. They get uncomfortable, squirming in their seats. Is their tv broken? Did they accidentally click mute? We see dim flashes of light, waving like somebody stumbling around in the dark, with a dim flashlight,but they are too gone so suddenly.

The camera swings, and now we see this scene from Percy's perspective, but everything is all wrong. The music is not this dramatic, action music we are use to, but instead, while the beat is the same as before, we are only left with this uncomfortable, startling heartbeat. It goes: dun, dun, dun. Percy is in pain: you know when you're in so much pain everything is fuzzy at the edges and you don't know if what you're percieving is real or just a halluciation? This scene is that feeling times a thousand. The techincal term is called a dolly zoom, but more casually a "Vertigo shot" the camera pulls back sudden at the same time it zooms in. It is often used by Hitchcock, espeically in the movie Jaws. You can google it, but what we get is this effect where the subject (Percy, here) not quite moving, but the background shifting around him so quickly it almost gives you motion sickness. The camera then spins jarringly around him, again, so quickly it's dizzying. we don't get to see too much. There are so many of these creatures, coming from all sides. It's too much. Behind this still pumping heartbeat, there is RINGING. God, so much ringing, in your ear. Because of all this action happening on screen, again it takes the audience a moment to even perceive this sound. But when they perceive it, they can't unheard it. it's so loud, it comes from everywhere, it's getting higher in pitch, it's uncomfortable, you're about to throw up, yet just like Percy you're pinned to the spot, unsure what to do, as everything goes out of your control.

Olf. That was a long one. But for a little TL;DR, undershowing is often scarier. There is a quote, I'm not too sure where it first came from since it sounds much too smart for me to think up myself, but to paraphrase, it goes something like: "The scariest thing in the world is what our imaginations can conjure up." Here's a simpler one for you:  "The most frightening monsters are the ones that exist in our minds." I've had the personally experience of laying awake too many nights, stuck in a mind loop, scaring myself half to death with my own thoughts. Let me repeat this again: A story, even a horror one, doesn't need excessive blood, guts and sexy stuff thrown at it to make it dark and horrifying. A lot of this post was inspired by talking with a lot of fellow PJO fans, you know who you are :), while also being influenced by this great video: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=8OTO7Rqln9Q. It talks about the complexities of writing comic horror. I highly recommend watching it. Also, for a few examples of this kind of horror done well, I recommend Birdbox, and also, strangely the ending fight of Spiderman Far From Home. I won't spoil it, but it was a very well directed scene that really made me feel jarred and uncomfortable as I watched it. I've also heard The Thing is good at this, but I really do scare myself too much, and can't watch truly scary horror movies without freaking myself out. Anyway, if you've made it this far, I hope you all have a nice day/ night and comment if you want me to write out any other scenes from PJO or any Rick books. Film, whether that's in screenwriting/cinematography/set/costume design, or, most of all directing, is both my dream and plan, so this is good practice.

[dlkardenal]

A new project! Lovecraftian gothic horror sold as adult dark fantasy

Hey there, traveler!

Dar here with exciting news: we started a new project! First, let’s see if I can entice you, then we’ll do a deeper dive into the how’s and why’s.

A lovecraftian horror / adult dark fantasy in a land that sunk beneath the Earth’s surface around 1000 A.D., and a curse turned half the people into vampires. The order of the day is gloom and despair, human kingdoms are stuck in a perpetual war while the vampire clans toy with powers they barely understand, threatening to unearth an ancient eldritch entity hell bent on consuming the world. 

Are you on board? Good, here we go!

I. Prelude (skip forward if you’re only interested in the WIP) The story of this WIP starts back in 2015, when me and a good friend of mine we shall call Niel got out of high school and into two distant universities. We still wanted to keep in touch somehow, so instead of chatting on facebook like normal people, we created a play-by-post roleplay forum in a dark fantasy setting. This was a land of many races, among these the aforementioned vampires and human kingdoms, but also elves, dark elves, half-angels and more. We created our characters and invited many other players through various channels, and in a few months, we got ourselves a quite populated internet playground. For a fun fact, this was how I met Lory for the first time and we fell in love through roleplaying and chatting on this forum. Years went by, we played many characters but eventually had a falling out with the players, so last fall we left. However we had a really fascinating story cut in half basically with three vampires and the world was just too good to be left alone. After months of trying to recapture the same feeling elsewhere, we just bit the bullet and decided to make it into a grandiose adult fiction novel. Yupp, this is a co-production of three indie writers sticking their heads together to write three distinct point of views around the same conflict. So, what’s this about exactly?

II. The vampires There’s a thing I want to nail down at the beginning. Our vampires are different from most fiction, they do not reproduce by biting people nor do they need blood for survival. They are a new species born from the descendants of an almost forgotten army that tried to invade a new, fertile land but got into such a bloody conflict God punished them with two things. First the very earth broke asunder under them, sinking the land under the Earth’s surface and at the same time a curse struck, making sunlight harmful for them. They hid in caves or perished in the open, only coming out at night, but over centuries they created an entirely nocturnal society and separated from their old enemy, the humans who missed the curse by praying really hard (it’s a bit more complicated, but that’s for a later time). They created the Towers and the Families, colonies of vampires picked by their profession, resulting in entire clans of only hunters, soldiers, physicians and mages. Yes, mages. Because after a while they realized their Curse can tap into a dark power source, creating grotesque magic effects like manipulating living flesh, sewing shadows into solid objects or creating living creatures out of stone – but this came at a price. And that price was blood. The Curse would only lend them magic if they drank blood, so they started enslaving humans to use as a source for magic, forever condemning themselves in the eyes of the southernmost human kingdom and their Church.

III. The characters So, the story follows three characters. 

Aura is a half-blood with a vampire mother but human father, now serving as a low-ranking member in the Thesantei Tower, a family dedicated to maintaining social relationships. She deals with the previously mentioned human slaves and tries to form a bridge between the humans and the accursed, all the while trying to prove herself to be a rightful member of the Thesantei. 

Laetitia, on the other hand is as pure as vampires come. The youngest daughter of the lord of Nerinai, a feared vampire clan of physicians capable of manipulating blood and tissue at will, she arrives at the Thesantei Tower to learn about the only organ her family knows little about: the mind. Only her research doesn’t only tears down the borders of sanity, but her curiosity leads her to dark paths.

Arion is fully vampire, yet far from pure. He’s the bastard son of the Nerinai head dissector – a servant of much higher lords – but his mother is a prestigious Ataris noblewoman, from the family of vampire mages. He left the Nerinai tower when they denied him the right to practice as a physician, now he tries to treat the outlaws and lowlifes of Eschatia, a human kingdom that tolerates him. However his mission to heal requires deeds much more dire than he’d first imagine.

That’s the main three. Their story starts off separate, but after a shocking event that turns the already dark and hopeless land even worse, their fate intertwines in a desperate attempt to save what’s left to be saved.

IV. Where’s Lovecraft in that? I mentioned there’s a Church. We based it on the real life orthodox beliefs, mainly to mix up the usual Spanish inquisition style fantasy religions with something creepier and less known, but also because it has a strong focus on angels.And let me tell you, if you read the Bible literally, angels are anything but pretty. Most angels are many-dimensional horrid monstrosities, with maddening shapes and mind-bending voices – which means they are perfect for cosmic horror feel. I think it isn’t much of a spoiler if I tell you we focus heavily on these eldritch-looking angels, not just as antagonists but all over the spectrum. As I said, this will be a clearly adult fantasy, so it will be chonky. Like really chonky. Drama, politics, horror effects, family bloodlines and dark secrets are a-plenty, and there isn’t enough space in a blog post to touch everything. And if I did, where would be the fun in that? If you’re interested in more details, feel free to comment, I’ll try to address every question!Until then, stay sharp!

Dar

[cherrycoveredpythia]

Extended thoughts on Brave the Tempest

2017’s Ride the Storm closed out the four-book arc that also included Hunt the Moon, Tempt the Stars, and Reap the Wind.  In these books, Cassie battled Ares and his minions while drawing closer to Pritkin and eventually hunting him through time and space. She learns more about her abilities while trying to save his life, and also becomes a reluctant power player in supernatural (and inter-dimensional) politics. Without her faithful companion by her side, she becomes more confident in her own powers and resourcefulness. Of course, she’s still Cassie, so all her discoveries and victories are slapdash and hard-won. But they are still victories. She’s a daughter of Chaos, give her a break.

Brave the Tempest focuses on Cassie’s political duties and her complicated feelings about being a leader and a “hero”. She’s now slain two gods (with help), but that doesn’t result in easy respect from the witches or the vampires. The witches see her as a tool of the Silver Circle, while the vampires see her as an extension of Mircea. They are all so wrong.

Cassie has to demonstrate her full strength to convince these factions to cooperate with her. It works, but nothing is ever simple. In the long run, who will love her and who will fear her? 

She’s becoming more like her mother every day.

Overall feelings

There are some amazing, joyful moments here. Please understand that I adore these books and characters, so I say this with love…

… but the book felt disjointed to me. We buzz back and forth from the witches to the vampires to the demons, and then go to Faerie and Victorian England. We get emotional scenes with Mircea, Pritkin, Marco, Rhea, and Rico. Augustine brings home a kidnapped fae. Tami needs to hire some staff but no one will take the job. Fred is a spy. Cassie is exhausted. I felt kind of exhausted too.

Important plotlines: Cassie’s growing pains with her powers, the political trouble with the witches and vampires, and the imminent invasion of Faerie. And then there was the timeline rupture. The rupture was terrifying and the fight with Jo in Victorian London was a full-on horror show. Cassie learned more about Pythian spells and then linked up her powers with Pritkin through the Lover’s Knot spell.  She’ll probably need these tools for the coming showdown. She and Pritkin are even more powerful together than they are apart. And they are both forces for good. But will everyone see them that way?

I think Karen is just laying out all the pieces for the next arc. It’s a little messy right now, but it will all fit together soon. I’m glad that Shatter the Earth is coming in December. If I had to wait another two years for the next book, I would be upset.

Favorite moments

Pritkin flirting and Cassie retaliating during S’mores night. Especially the marshmallow at the end. Goddamn.

The Dickening.

Everything related to Saffy and Vi, and seeing Saffy and Rhea becoming friends. I think she is a great influence on Rhea.

Pritkin and Cassie’s meeting with Adra. I high-key love Adra. He’s a really interesting foil for Caedmon, who leads their alliance with the “heavenly” planes. Caedmon is manic and charming, while Adra is pleasant and even-keeled. Except when he forgets to animate his glamourie. I reallllllly want to know what Adra looks like under there, but I figure he’s a Lovecraftian monster that would drive us insane.  

Adra shading Pritkin for never attending demon council meetings like other “heirs apparent.” 

Cassie nonchalantly offering to bring Adra to the vampire council.

Gertie nonchalantly easing Pritkin out of the room and shifting him to the depot.

Cassie borrowing Pritkin’s powers to suck the energy out of Jo.

Big events and revelations

Pritkin is not shy and neither is Cassie. I thought we would get some pussy-footing about their relationship, but we DID NOT. Pritkin came on strong and Cassie reciprocated. I wish I had a chance to read Siren’s Song first. They had some time to let the tension build and I *do* love a slow burn… torture me, baby!

Ancient Horrors! Children of Tiamat/Tethys! Pritkin is 1/16th divine! Kind of a watered-down Ancient Horror, if you will. Minus the tentacles.

Lover’s Knot

Fucking Jonathan

Invasion of Faerie needs to happen ASAP

Jo is more dangerous as a ghost because ghosts can absorb infinite power. (Can we turn Billy Joe into a super soldier???)

MIRCEA THE BOLD!

Cassie agreed to go find Elena because she’s afraid that Mircea will do it himself. And she doesn’t want to kill him.

Fred is a spy working for MARLOWE! And I guess his master power is camouflaging his aura.

Rico is from Napoli (this explains a lot, because I was confused when he said putanas instead of putane. Dialect!)

NEW PYTHIAN SPELLS: Shards and Chimera!

Young Agnes is a real bitch.  

The pros

I said this in a separate post, but I’ll say it here too. Cassie and Pritkin are back together and their relationship is so healthy and mutually supportive that it makes my heart ache. This is real #relationshipgoals. They are confidants and protectors and cheerleaders for each other. They don’t keep secrets or manipulate or gaslight. We need more of this sci-fi/fantasy and romance. There are too many dark, brooding male love interests who are borderline abusive. (Ahem, Mircea.)

MORE LGBT REPRESENTATION! 

The emergence of Mircea the Bold. I like Mircea as a character, but not as a love interest for Cassie. I’m happy to see him going through this transformation. He’s becoming more open and genuine. He’s not going to win Cassie’s affections, but I do think that he’s going to redeem himself in Dory’s eyes.

GERTIE IS BACK! And *not* as a roadblock. She’s a powerful woman who helps other women, and I am all. about. that. mood.

The cons

 TOO. MUCH. RECAP. Especially recap that broke up highly emotional moments. I don’t care if you are trying to explain things for new readers. Fuck ‘em. Anyone who buys a book, discovers it is part 1000 of an ongoing series, and tries to read it anyways… is a psychopath.

Too many plot-lines

 I miss Rosier.

We all knew that something was up with Fred, but I don’t think that his revelation as a spy got as much weight and screen-time as it deserved.

 I feel like the “wrap-up” with Jonathan felt rushed. He’s supposed to be terrifying but I’m like “meh, whatever, Jonathan, small fry compared to Apollo and Ares.” But I think she’ll get back to it in greater depth in the next book, so I can deal.

Can we PLEASE have some consistency about Agnes’s age? We see her as a teenager in late 19th-century London, for god’s sake. She must have been *at least* 130 years old when she died, and that’s being charitable. Previously, Cassie has said that Agnes was about 80. Lies. 

The questions

1.       My BIGGEST question. Cassie is changing. Not just maturing, but changing on a metaphysical level. The coldness, the hunger… I’m frightened for her. It’s not withdrawal from the Tears of Apollo and it’s not normal exhaustion. I have some theories.  

 Her divine side is becoming stronger and she’s beginning to require life energy in the same way that her human side needs food, water, and sleep. Why is this happening now? Maybe the Tears of Apollo are part of the equation, albeit indirectly. She’s been using more and more Pythian power thanks to the potion, and perhaps that has awakened her divine side more strongly. This is a little worrisome because she may have to feed on a regular basis to stay functional. Can she get all the energy she needs from incubus sex or from the Lover’s Knot? What are the moral considerations here? 

Less likely, but she might really be pregnant. I’m not a huge fan of this idea, but Rosier does mention in Reap the Wind or Ride the Storm that the incubus-child feeds on the life energy of the mother as it grows. That’s why his attempts at procreation failed until he impregnated Morgaine, who was part royal fae and part divine. If this is the case, Cassie might be having life-energy cravings instead of food cravings. Or maybe this is the divine/demon/fey version of morning sickness? Pritkin, please start using birth control.

2. What happened with Pritkin in Siren’s Song? Does Jonas know his true identity now?

3. So who is Pritkin’s divine great-great grandmother? Any speculation?

4. Cassie begins to wonder if any of the gods might be open to diplomacy. This must go somewhere. And it’s true, there are a number of gods in the pantheon who are traditionally friendlier towards humans than others. Athena is the first that comes to mind. There’s also the mythic trope of the Trickster/Fire-Bringer who helps humanity: Prometheus, Anansi, etc.  And there’s Loki, who doesn’t so much love humans as he loves to trouble the other gods.

MVPs

Ok, Cassie is the real MVP, as always. But barring her, I’m awarding this prize to the no-nonsense, sisterly duo of our hearts: Gertie and Hilde. They are officious and annoying, but that’s because they tell you what you don’t want to hear, and they are RIGHT. They are so right.

[helenarlett-rex]

Want to use an eldritch horror in your D&D game? Why not Shub-Niggurath?

Let’s face it. Lovecraftian horror exists in D&D. You got someone playing a warlock? One of the pacts they can make at first level is to the Great Old Ones... If you didn’t realize it, that means Lovecraft monsters... And when people think Lovecraft monsters, they tend to think Cthulhu. But why would you want to use Cthulhu? That’s kind of boring and overdone. There are a lot of other creatures you could use in your game that are way more freaky and interesting. And if you are using Lovecraftian stuff in your game, then you want freaky. That’s the whole point. So... what to use? Have you considered Shub-Niggurath?

Just as a quick reminder, Shub-Niggurath, like pretty much every other eldritch horror, does not have official stats in 5th edition D&D, which is what I am gearing this towards. So instead we are going to have to homebrew. But that’s not a problem. I’m about to collect all the info you need right here.

Shub-Niggurath, affectionately known as The Black Goat of the Woods with a Thousand Young, is sometimes described as an Outer God and sometimes described as a Great Old One, depending on the source. So honestly you could use it as either. And frankly, does it really make any difference? Either way it’s going to fuck your day up...

Although actually, calling Shub-Niggurath an Outer God isn’t quite correct. She’s would actually be an Outer Goddess. You know... Considering she’s a woman and all... Couldn’t you tell?

Shub-Niggurath is a perverse fertility deity, said to appear as an "evil cloud-like entity". An enormous mass which extrudes black tentacles, slime-dripping mouths, and short, writhing goat legs. So picture this massive cloud, but instead of being made of whatever clouds are actually made of... it’s made of slimy tentacles and mouths. It’s probably the size of a mountain... and it’s walking towards you on little goat legs...

You may be thinking, okay... It WAS scary... until you got to the goat legs... Now it’s just kind of comical... But wait, there’s more! As this thing goes about her business, smaller creatures are continually spat forth out of her. These creatures are essentially just smaller versions of Shub-Niggurath herself. Known as The Dark Young of Shub-Niggurath.

And when I say smaller... I mean they are about the size of trees... perhaps between twelve and twenty feet tall.

So these nasty bastards are just constantly being spit out of her and have to scurry out of the way as soon as they hit the ground. And the ones that don’t get out of the way in time are consumed back into Shub-Niggurath’s miasmatic form. So before you laugh at this giant beast walking around on little goat legs, just remember that she is constantly giving birth and then eating her own young.

Shub-Niggurath also gets around a bit. In the world of eldritch horrors, she’s one hot piece of ass. There’s more than one nightmarish monstrosity with eyes for her so she’s got two husbands. The Not-to-be-Named One, otherwise known as Hastur, because fuck it, we’re going to name him anyways... You know Hastur, right? The King in Yellow...? He’s kind of a big deal... And Yog-Sothoth, who is also a pretty big deal. And with these two, Shub-Niggurath has had many, many children. Through mating with Hastur, because yes, they had nasty monster sex, she has birthed Ithaqua, Zhar, J'Zahar, and the "Thousand Young", otherwise known as The Dark Young of Shub-Niggurath I mentioned above... That must have been some sex if she’s still popping those little things out even now... And Yog-Sothoth is the father of the twins, Nug and Yeb. (Some speculated that Hastur may be their father instead of Yog-Sothoth, but that makes no sense when you look at the family tree. But who am I to say what does and doesn’t make sense when you are dealing with creatures that will drive you insane if you even look at them?)

But enough about Shub-Niggurath’s sex life. She’s the hot polyamorous MILF of the eldritch world. We get it... You know what else she has going for her? Cults.

Of all the eldritch deities, Shub-Niggurath is probably the most extensively worshiped. But can you blame her? Who wouldn’t want to worship that hot little number? Her worshipers include the Hyperboreans, the Muvians, T'yog of K'naa, and the people of Sarnath (although that didn’t go so well for Sarnath) as well as any number of druidic and barbaric cults. And if that’s not enough she’s also worshiped by non-human species on other planets such as the "Fungi from Yuggoth", otherwise known as the Mi-Go, and the Nug-Soth of Yaddith. So if you ever need a cult worshiping an eldritch deity in your game and you aren’t sure what eldritch deity to use, just remember, pretty much everyone worships Shub-Niggurath. You can go to other planets and still find people worshiping Shub-Niggurath...

And do you know what’s cool about worshiping Shub-Niggurath? With the proper occult paraphernalia, Shub-Niggurath can be summoned to any woodlands at the time of the new moon. Summoning other gods is a bunch of complicated bullshit that may not even work because they are fucking gods and can just decide, nah... I’m not interested in showing up for you... But Shub-Niggurath is a people pleaser. All you need are the right components, say a little chant, give a little blood offering... And just like that you’ve got an actual goddess in front of you.

Although I should note that the place from whence she comes is not known. One possibility is that she dwells at the court of Azathoth at the center of the universe. She may also live beneath the planet Yaddith, where she is served by the Dholes. Those are huge, slimy worm creatures that are at least several hundred feet long... It is also possible that she lives in another dimension altogether. So even though she’s a reliable goddess who will actually pop in when you call her, she probably has quite a long ways to travel to get to you, so I wouldn’t go summoning her needlessly. Anyone would be grumpy after making a commute like that...

The Dark Young can also be summoned. They are usually called upon to preside over cult ceremonies. One means for summoning them requires a blood offering. The ritual may only be performed in the deep of the woodlands at the darkest of the moon, and the victim must be sacrificed over a stone altar. Dark young act as proxies for Shub-Niggurath in the accepting of sacrifices, the worship of cultists, in the devouring of non-cultists, and in the spreading of their mother's faith across the world. So unless it’s something big and you just have to have Shub-Niggurath herself, I would probably recommend summoning one of these things instead.

And that’s all well and great for your cultists... but what about a Warlock PC? What’s he going to get out of taking Shub-Niggurath as his patron? Well this is where things start to get a little freakier... and a little kinkier... But what did you expect? Shub-Niggurath is a kinky girl.

For starters, let’s talk about the Milk of Shub Niggurath. That’s right... I said milk... Remember, I did say that Shub Niggurath was a fertility goddess. Her milk has properties that mutate those who drink it into a monstrous hybrid creature. And you may be thinking, hold on... Why would I want to be turned into a tentacle monster? Well there’s a plus side to it too... The tentacle thing is just a side effect. But her purple milk (yeah, it’s purple) cures the drinker of all non-magical diseases and physical damage and status effects. The drinker also gains a +4 bonus to Strength and Constitution for 1d4 weeks.

So think of it a sort of a cure all. Get all you hit points back, fix up any scrapes you may have taken, wipe out any (non-magical) diseases you may have picked up, and removes status effects while granting you a +4 to Strength and Constitution? You show me one potion that can do all of that... That’s a pretty fantastic potion. And all you have to do to get it is summon a gigantic mass of tentacles, who happens to be your goddess, and ask her to let you milk her... No big deal, right?

I mean, aside from the mental image you are trying to burn out of your mind now, it shouldn’t be that bad. This is Shub-Niggurath we’re talking about. She’d probably be into it.

And yes... there is a down side to it... Unless the drinker succeeds at a DC 20 Constitution saving throw, it transforms into an insane outer mutant at the end of that 1d4 weeks. A second dose of this milk accelerates the process, causing the drinker’s mutations to become more prominent and stranger and doubling the speed of the transformation. By the third drink, the drinker goes insane, and becomes a monster on the following round. But it’s not all bad. The milk is a curse and a poison, so anything that will cure poison or remove a curse will end its effects before the transformation is complete. Just not more of the Milk... I know I said the milk cures status effects but the DM shouldn’t allow it to cure status effects caused by the milk itself. That’s like trying to cure poison by drinking more poison.

After complete transformation, only a wish can undo the effect.

As for what an Outer Mutant looks like if the player doesn’t cure himself, there are any number of things you could come up with, but a good suggestion is to just borrow the Aboleth disease from the Aboleth‘s tentacle attack in the monster manual, minus the cure since we already established that only a wish can cure it... and maybe throw on a few tentacles or something. Or since this is The Black Goat of the Woods we are talking about, you could always modify the Aboleth disease and say instead of having to be in water, the player has to be in the forest or something like that.

Just whatever you do, make sure becoming an Outer Mutant is a big enough inconvenience for the player that they won’t want to willingly become one.

But if Shub-Niggurath’s milk isn’t disturbing enough, (and let’s face it, if you are using a Lovecraftian horror in your game, you WANT the people at the table to be disturbed) let’s talk about the Gof'nn hupadgh Shub-Niggurath.

"Gof'nn hupadgh Shub-Niggurath" is the name given to the favored, once-human worshipers of Shub-Niggurath. When the deity deems a worshiper to be most worthy, a special ceremony is held in which the Black Goat of the Woods swallows the initiate through her womb and then rebirths the cultist as a transformed satyr-like being. A changed worshiper is also endowed with immortal life.

That’s right... I just brought unbirthing to the table. Now you are making everyone uncomfortable. Except that one guy who happens to have an unbirthing fetish... But everyone else is feeling really uncomfortable. And that one guy is probably pretending to be uncomfortable so no one realizes he’s into unbirthing... (It’s cool dude. I feel ya.)

But other than making everyone at the table squirm in their seats at the thought of someone getting shoved up Shub-Niggurath’s hoo-hah and deposited inside her womb to become her child, look at the befits a warlock would gain from such a thing.

First change the character’s race to Satyr. Do not recalculate its stats, but give the character the Satyr’s Magic Resistance as well as its Ram attack and Panpipe ability. Also the character is now immortal. As a DM the way I would run this is, the character can still die if he drops to 0 hit points, but I wouldn’t allow for permadeath outside of being eaten by another eldritch horror, like Shub-Niggurath herself... or by a tarrasque... Because those things stomachs can destroy anything... But if the character does drop to 0 hit points and dies I would have him auto resurrect the following day.

And finally, the character is now one of Shub-Niggurath’s favorites so I would give the character one at-will use of Divine Intervention per week. Maybe as many as two or three uses per week at higher levels. But that would be up to each individual DM.

All in all that’s a pretty good trade off in exchange for the unpleasantness of being shoved up Shub-Niggurath’s lady parts and having to call her Mommy... and the strong chance of being killed instantly after...

Oh yeah, did I forget to mention that? Remember what I said before? Shub-Niggurath eats her own young. Anything that doesn’t get away in time after being born just gets eaten back up. That’s going to include a gof'nn hupadgh Shub-Niggurath. If a character decides to become one, he’s only her favorite providing he can get away in time... So I’d make the player make a very high Dex save to get out of the way as soon as he is reborn or be eaten by Shub-Niggurath and permakilled.

Being an immortal satyr with free at-will uses of Divine Intervention would make a character kind of OP, so make the risk involved pretty high. Don’t just give it to your players. Make them complete some kind of task for Shub-Niggurath to even be considered worthy of becoming a gof'nn hupadgh Shub-Niggurath. And not a simple task either... And then once Shub-Niggurath has finally agreed to go through with it, hit them with that insane Dex save right there at the end. Maybe a DC 25 Dex save or something like that... Make sure it’s something that the character can actually roll, but has a slim chance of getting. This is one of those things where you either become very OP or die trying. There is no in between. And if it proves to be too hard and your player’s character dies... oh well... This is what happens when you deal with Great Old Ones...

But enough about what a warlock can do with Shub-Niggurath. Let’s get back to what the DM can do with her. One thing the DM should keep in mind is that Shub-Niggurath has many avatars. I mean, she doesn’t become the most worshiped Outer Goddess/Great Old One in the universe by using only one face... So the DM should remember that he can have her appear any number of ways.

We already walked about her true form, but you could also use The Black Goat. The avatar of the goat is the figurehead through which Shub-Niggurath is worshiped. The most common depiction of the Black Goat is as a male. That’s right. We’re talking about the devil here.

Who knew that Satan was just an avatar for Shub-Niggurath...?

But she doesn’t have to appear as male. She’s Shub-Niggurath. She can appear however she wants. So the Black Goat can just as easily be female too. Whatever works best for the situation because this earthly form of Shub-Niggurath is an incarnation she assumes to copulate with her worshipers.

Because, oh yeah... that’s a thing too... That little eldritch slut is totally down for banging her worshipers. Which may explain why she has so many... Who else can say, oh yeah... my god is also my lover? Well... I guess some of the worshipers of Zeus... But we aren’t talking about him.

Oh but speaking of the Greek Pantheon, that brings us to another avatar of Shub-Niggurath. Did you know she’s also in the Greek Pantheon in your player’s handbook? I’ll bet you didn’t... That’s because she’s a deceitful little bitch who has had you fooled. Turns out, another avatar of Shub-Niggurath is none other than... Pan!

Yeah, turns out all those people worshiping pan have actually been deceived into worshiping Shub-Niggurath all along. But what did you honestly expect from a woman who also happens to be Satan in one of her other forms?

But wait, you may be saying... If Pan is in the Greek Pantheon in the player’s handbook, and Pan is just an avatar of Shub-Niggurath, does that mean that we now know Shub-Niggurath’s alignment by looking at Pan’s alignment? Is Shub-Niggurath Chaotic Neutral?

I’d say yes. Shub-Niggurath is neither evil nor good. She simply is. Questions surrounding the morality of her actions can not be answered because they are not comprehendable by human minds. Just like the eldritch horrors themselves. To try to understand them is to know madness. So Chaotic Neutral is actually the perfect alignment for her. But that’s really going to be up to the DM to decide how they want to play her. Remember, I’m just collecting all the info from as many different sources as I can find and compiling it here in one place so you can homebrew her. I’ll be sharing the homebrew I use in connection with this info here at the end, but that doesn’t mean anything I say should be set in stone. Feel free to use this info to tweak your own Shub-Niggurath however you would like.

But moving on, there’s one more avatar of Shub-Niggurath I’ve been able to find. The Magna Mater, or the Great Mother, is a goddess worshiped since before Roman times. I unfortunately don’t know much about this particular avatar of Shub-Niggurath other than that she was mentioned in Lovecraft’s “Rats in the Walls” and “The Horror at Red Hook”. But that is another avatar of Shub-Niggurath.

There’s one more bit of info about our girl Shub that the DM may want to have just in case it ever comes up so let’s talk about that before I get to the fun part. The family tree. Because these eldritch horrors have a family tree almost as bad as the Greek gods.

Shub-Niggurath was born from The Unnamed Darkness, who is one of the three children of Azathoth, the very first god. So Azathoth, the big boy himself, is Shub-Niggurath’s grandfather. This also makes The Nameless Mist and the great Nyarlathotep Shub-Niggurath’s uncles. Or aunts? It’s hard to tell the gender with some of these unknowable horrors. If they even have gender at all... (The early ones all seem to just reproduce asexually.) Now, The Nameless Mist gave birth to Yog-Sothoth, making him Shub-Niggurath’s cousin, who she also married... Eldritch horrors seem to do a lot of keeping it in the family... Officially (as in not counting the speculations some people have) Yog-Sothoth and Shub-Niggurath mated and Shub-Niggurath gave birth to the twins, Nug and Yep. Yep gave birth to Tsathoggua, and Nug gave birth to the only one anyone really cares about, Cthulhu himself. So this makes Shub-Niggurath the grandmother of Cthulhu. And also Tsathoggua but no one cares about him...

Now here’s where things start to get a bit more inbred... Yog-Sothoth mated with it’s parent, The Nameless Mist, and Yog-Sothoth gave birth to Hastur, The King in Yellow. So this makes Hastur Cthulhu‘s half brother, but more importantly, Shub-Niggurath’s step-son (as well as her cousin at the same time). Shub-Niggurath then took her step-son/cousin, Hastur, as her second husband and through mating with him, gave birth to Ithaqua, Zhar, J'Zahar, and The Thousand Young. Which incidentally makes Shub-Niggurath their mother, step-grandmother, and second cousin all at the same time... (And before you start singing “I’m my own Grandpa”, that title is reserved for Cthulhu.)

But now that you know the more immediate parts of the twisted family tree, let’s get to the fun part. What if a DM wants to actually use Shub-Niggurath as an actual monster you can fight in his game?

For creating Shub-Niggurath as a combat monster I use a slightly modified version of stats created by enworld.org contributor, Mike Myler. (Who made a really great Shub-Niggurath but it just wasn’t quite what I wanted.)

Shub-Niggurath

Colossal aberration (great old one or outer god), chaotic neutral

Armor Class 27 (natural armor) Hit Points 682 (35d20+315) Speed 30 ft., fly 80 ft. (hover) 

STR​  27 (+8)​ DEX​  18 (+4)​ CON​  28 (+9)​ INT​  21 (+5)​ WIS​  23 (+6)​ CHA​  24 (+7)​ 

Skills Arcana +14, Insight +15, Nature +14, Religion +14, Stealth +13 Damage Resistances cold, necrotic; bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing from magical or cold iron weapons Damage Immunities acid, fire, lightning, poison; bludgeoning, piercing, and slashing from nonmagical weapons not made from cold iron Condition Immunities charmed, diseased, frightened, paralyzed, petrified, poisoned Senses darkvision 120 ft., truesight, passive Perception 16 Languages Deep Speech; telepathy 300 ft. Challenge 30 (155,000 XP) 

Immortality. When Shub-Niggurath is slain, her form shrivels and compresses in on itself before exploding in a wave of milky fluid in a 200-foot radius. Any creature that comes into contact with the milky fluid makes a DC 25 Constitution saving throw. On a failed save, it is transformed into a random creature of an equal or lower CR, or a creature with a CR no higher than its level. A transformed creature makes a DC 24 Wisdom saving throw, keeping its intelligence and memories on a success. When all of the creatures transformed by the milky fluid have died, Shub-Niggurath is resurrected. 

Innate Spellcasting. Shub-Niggurath’s innate spellcasting ability is Charisma (spell save DC 24; spell attack +16). She can innately cast the following spells, requiring no material components: 

Constant: freedom of movement, true seeing At will: hunger of hadar, dispel magic, dream, project image, sending 3/day: suggestion, feeblemind, symbol, weird​

Insanity. Any creature that attempts to interact directly with Shub-Niggurath’s thoughts (such as via detect thoughts or telepathy) must succeed at DC 24 Wisdom saving throw or gain a long-term madness. When using her telepathy to communicate Shub-Niggurath doesn't activate this feature unless she spends an action to focus her mind on one opponent.

Legendary Resistance (3/Day). If Shub-Niggurath fails a saving throw, she can choose to succeed instead.

Magic Resistance. Shub-Niggurath has advantage on saving throws against spells and other magical effects.

Regeneration. Shub-Niggurath regains 20 hit points at the start of her turn if she has at least 1 hit point. Shub-Niggurath dies only if she starts her turn with 0 hit points.

ACTIONS

Multiattack. Shub-Niggurath can use her Endless Spawn and Frightful Presence. She then makes seven attacks: one with her bite and six with her tentacles.

Bite. Melee Weapon Attack: +17 to hit, reach 20 ft., one target. Hit: 26 (4d8+8) piercing damage. If the target is a creature it is grappled (escape DC 25). Until this grapple ends, the creature is restrained, and Shub-Niggurath can't use her bite to grapple another target. 

Consume. If a creature starts its turn grappled by the Bite attack, it must make another DC 25 strength save to escape. On a failed save the creature is swallowed whole. A swallowed creature is blinded and restrained and has total cover against attacks and other effects outside of Shub-Niggurath. It takes 21 (6d6) acid damage at the start of each of Shub-Niggurath’s turns. Shub-Niggurath can have as many creatures swallowed at a time as it wants. A swallowed creature can only escape if Shub-Niggurath is killed. If a swallowed creature drops to 0 hit points while inside Shub-Niggurath’s stomach it does not make death saving throws and its body is dissolved. The soul of a digested creature does not pass on to the afterlife and remains imprisoned inside Shub-Niggurath’s stomach until it too is digested and becomes nothing. Souls inside Shub-Niggurath’s stomach take 1d20 years to digest and can not be brought back through any means of resurrection while trapped inside Shub-Niggurath. If Shub-Niggurath is killed before the soul is digested the soul is freed and instantly passes on to the afterlife.

Tentacle. Melee Weapon Attack: +17 to hit, reach 25 ft., one target. Hit: 22 (4d6+8) bludgeoning damage. If the target is a creature it is grappled (escape DC 25). Until this grapple ends, the creature is restrained, and Shub-Niggurath can't use the tentacle to grapple another target (although Shub-Niggurath has an endless number of tentacles).

Frightful Presence. Each creature of Shub-Niggurath’s choice that is within 120 feet of her and aware of her must succeed on a DC 24 Wisdom saving throw or become frightened for 1 minute. A creature can repeat the saving throw at the end of each of its turns, ending the effect on itself on a success. If a creature’s saving throw is successful or the effect ends for it, the creature is immune to Shub-Niggurath’s Frightful Presence for the next minute.

Endless Spawn (Recharge 4-6). Shub-Niggurath births Dark Young that she can mentally command. These Dark Young are loyal to her and defend Shub-Niggurath with their lives. Roll 2d6 to determine the amount of Dark Young she births per turn.

Dark Young (Produced Endless Spawn)

Huge aberration, chaotic neutral 

Armor Class 16 (natural armor) Hit Points 168 (16d12 + 24) Speed 40 ft., swim 30 ft. 

STR ​ 22 (+6) DEX​ 10 (+0) CON​ 18 (+4) INT​ 10 (+0) WIS​ 16 (+3) CHA​ 7 (-2)

Condition Immunities blinded Senses blindsight 60 ft., passive Perception 13 Languages Deep Speech; telepathy 100 ft. Challenge 8 (3,900 XP) 

False Appearance. While the dark young remains motionless, it is indistinguishable from a mangrove tree while in the dark.

Trample. When the dark young moves at least 20 feet in a straight line, all creatures within 5 feet its path have to make a successful DC 15 Strength saving throw or fall prone. The dark young can make a stomp attack against one prone target as a bonus action.

ACTIONS 

Multiattack. The dark young makes two attacks: one with its tentacle and one with its bite. 

Tentacle. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 15 ft., one target. Hit: 15 (2d8 + 6) bludgeoning damage. The target is grappled (escape DC 17). If the target is Large or smaller, it is also restrained until this grapple ends. While grappling the target, the dark young has advantage on attack rolls against it. The dark young has four tentacles, each of which can grapple only one target. When the dark young moves, any Large or smaller target it is grappling moves with it.

Bite. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 5 ft., one target. Hit: 19 (3d8 + 6) piercing damage. 

Stomp. Melee Weapon Attack: +9 to hit, reach 5 ft., one prone creature. Hit: 24 (4d8 + 6) bludgeoning damage.

And there you have it. Shub-Niggurath in all her glory. Give that beautiful girl a try in your game next time you need an eldritch beasty and see how it goes. And remember, Shub-Niggurath wants you to use her in your game. There’s a reason she’s the most accessible Goddess in the eldritch pantheon. She wants to be summoned and ushered into our world. So don’t keep her waiting.

[thenightling]

I am not a fan of H. P. Lovecraft.   It's okay if you like him.  I won't belittle or judge you if you do but please do not insult or judge me as a horror fan for not liking him. On a Facebook group that I had liked (Super Scifi Saturday club), an admin asked everyone what popular horror property does everyone seem to love and you don't and I made the mistake of saying Lovecraft.  He started to belittle me and treat me like an idiot and claimed I "Didn't get" Lovecraft and repeatedly pointed out that he was this first to do this and that.   He kept being condescending.   He wouldn't respect my opinion and out right ignored my responses to him where I told him I have read far more complicated works of literature and no, it's not the language, and I have read similar authors.   He even tried to accuse me of being a non-reader and said if I read other authors I'd understand the importance of Lovecraft.  He even abruptly blocked me from the group without warning. I DO understand the significance of Lovecraft and how he's influenced others.  I even remember when Real Ghostbusters had the episode "Collect call of Cthulhu." I even like the youtube video "Lil Cthulhu."  I like Hellboy, and Sandman: Overture and other works of fiction that reference Lovecraft and Lovecraftian themes. I'm just not a fan of Lovecraft himself.   I'm not a fan of his writing style.  Not because I "don't get it" but because it's not my cup of tea.  I realize he has imitators and he popularized certain ideas.   I acknowledge this.   But he didn't invent the idea of Old Ones or pre-Human Gods.  In fact Goethe brings up the idea in Faust Part 2 when Faust is forced to encounter "The Mothers" in order to invoke Helen of Troy's ghost (before he later goes to the Greek Underworld to raise her from the dead).  Faust Part 2 is from 1831. One might even argue the norse Jotun (Giants) and the Greek Titans are precursors or inspirations to Lovecraft's Old Ones.   I also don't care for Lovecraft's anti-semitism.   It was considered extreme even by the standards of his American contemporaries.   So one can't really blame the era. As I said, it's okay if you like him.  I don't mind if you talk about him or post about him.  But please don't treat me like an idiot just because I don't.   Just because I'm not a fan of something doesn't mean I don't understand it, or that the language is "too complex" for me, or that I don't read similar stories or authors who were inspired by him.   No.  I can be thoroughly familiar with something and understand it and just not like it.   Not liking something isn't always the result of having "Not tried it yet."

[whiskeyworen]

Adventures in Arkham

Definitely putting a ‘Keep Reading’ fold for this one. It’s a long story, but pretty funny. So a while back, when I actually had spare time and my schedule matched up fairly well with my friends’ schedules, we used to get together for Game Day/Night. It’s exactly like you’d expect; one big table, 3-5 people, a shit ton of drinks, snacks, E-drinks, etc, and one really big, really complicated, really LONG game. In our case, it was Arkham Horror. We’re all sci-fi/fantasy buffs, but out of our group, only me and one other guy knew the Lovecraftian mythos backwards and forwards. So basically, when it came to monsters, skills, and locations, we had the inside track. Thing is, luck is a very, very fickle thing. The very first game we played, the Big Bad of the day was none other than the Big C himself. Which automatically put ALL of us at a disadvantage by depleting a bunch of our natural sanities, increasing the number of monsters and the actions of monsters on the board itself, as well as setting up an actual DOOM counter. We had until the counter reached 10 before Cthulhu literally ended the world. Most of the other big-bads didn’t END things; they just made the game intensely hard when they were summoned. Big C is a hard-crash for the game. Do not Pass Go.

Naturally, when we were setting things up, we were assholes to each other, all for the sake of fun. One friend chose to become the Antiquarian/historian character. Basically, his character was the one who ALWAYS investigated ruins, mystical items, etc, and tended to be fairly prone to using magic. He also tended to ‘research’ things which let someone reroll a failed roll, or something like that. (that saved our butts a few times). Another chose to be the team Muscle. Character was a mafia gunslinger, with almost no imagination, but plenty of fighting skill. My friend chose the Assistant, which was like an intern for the Historian. More inclined towards magic, but far more stable mentally. I forget the bonus they got as that character. I decided to be the comic relief, so I chose Journalist. Basically a nothing character with no leanings one way or the other. Figured I’d be the one screaming most of the time. But things didn’t go precisely as planned. The Muscle ended up mostly going around the streets of Arkham dual-wielding friggin’ Tommyguns and wiping out any mortal monsters he could find...which oddly enough included one hapless Cthulhu spawn that thought that it could occupy the avenue on the south end of town. Apparently whatever Muscle used for ammo, it shredded that thing. The only thing he couldn’t kill were ghosts and vampires and other spirits. The Historian ended up holed up in the south end of town, unable to leave his location since the streets were being patrolled by a HOST of aerial monsters that would instantly take him down. So he spent most of the game just using that Reroll ‘research’ skill to keep the rest of us from making errors in judgement. He also lost his sanity a LOT, but always recovered one point some how. My friend, the Assistant, had an interesting time. Early on they had acquired one of the Sigils of the Elder Gods, used normally to seal Gates. But to seal a gate you had to go INTO the gate, then make your way through whatever alternate universe/dimension/hellscape it sent him. Upon leaving that zone, he’d close the gate with the seal, permanently locking it. (each Turn, the Big C would cause X number of gates to open, and if too many open, the game ended even earlier than the 10 count). At one point he fell no less than THREE times into one particular universe. Me? Well, my Journalist had shit luck, but that turned out to be FANTASTIC luck for him. For one, he had a Retainer; story goes that the Journalist had witnessed something really fucked up and weird, and that he had started obsessing on the Occult and weird crap. Thanks to this, some unknown benefactor Retained his services to go investigate Arkham’s mysteries. Every turn I would get a ton of cash, where everyone else would get a mediocre amount. As such, I could afford everything in every shop, if I needed it. Sufficed to say, I ended up being a bit of an armory for the others. Buy what they needed, trade it for things I wanted from them. That’s how Muscle got his second Tommygun. So while everyone was off lost in alternate universes, going insane, or fighting monsters in the streets, my clueless loser was wandering a desert island off shore on a ‘hint’. Didn’t find shit all. So I got another ‘lead on a story’ and went to investigate the cemetery. Ended up getting attacked when I disturbed a vampire that was waking up. Now...this should have been where my Journalist dies. But, see, some of the items I’d traded for to give me some bite in a fight (should I get in one) were...remarkably perfect for the scenario. I literally had a magic sword from the beginning of the game, a gift of the benefactor, a magical DAGGER I’d acquired from the Assistant, and a few other handy dandy things...like a spell that summoned Azathoth for a moment to carpet bomb the area with nuclear death. (I traded that to Assistant, to give him TWO, along with the sigils he kept acquiring that did the same thing. LOL) So combat begins, and everyone expects me to miss and die pretty fast. I roll my dice. ..... How to properly describe this?... I needed ONE hit to kill the vampire. Out of I think it was 7 or 8 die I had, I rolled ALL hits. The first hit killed the vampire before it could counter attack. Every other attack was superfluous. I immediately started laughing. It was the funniest thing to me. All I could picture was my clueless, moron Journalist tripping over a waking vampire, screaming, and then doing a Berzerker Barrage with both blade weapons on it, screaming the entire time. It wasn’t that I hit with all those attacks. That wasn’t the funny part. The funny part was imagining the scenario that I hit with ONLY that first strike, which insta-gibbed the bloodsucker, and that every other attack whiffed empty air because my guy was attacking out of pure empty panic and didn’t realize his opponent was possibly in several pieces on the ground. Envision this: Journalist: “Man, this place is boring. They said there’d be monsters here!” *kicks a rock which falls into an open grave* Vampire: *sits up in open grave* “Bla!” Journalist: “OH FUCKING SHIT! *insert JJBA impersonation of your choice here* Vampire: “*Dies instantly*” Journalist: *still attacking blindly, whiffing empty air for like, 2 minutes* AAAAHHHHH!!!!!!......*blinks. Looks around. Realizes he left the vampire 10 steps behind him in several pieces* Whoa. Shit... He died like, really quick.” Journalist: *wanders over to hamburger-ized vampire. Roots through the remains with a stick* “Oh hey, cool. An amulet! I wonder what it does?” (I forget what it did. But it made it even harder to kill me apparently.) That was just one hilarious moment of the Journalist-who-missed-everything. While everyone was busy saving the world, I was fucking around. At one point, my friend was pulled into the dimension The City of the Great Race, and ended up stuck there fighting resident after resident horror. The Journalist wandered over to where the Gate to this location was, and wandered in willingly. Cuz he was an idiot who saw a shiny hole in the air and went ‘Ooh, shiny!’ He proceeded to wander unopposed and uncontested for three full turns before leaving with a trinket. At no point did I draw an encounter card that WORKED in that place. Apparently he’d merely wandered around the empty buildings, admiring the architecture, while my friend fought for his life in another area of it. I picture him just casually walking through the streets, calling out for anyone, before shrugging his shoulders, picking something up from a storefront, pocketing it, and walking out through the portal while whistling a jaunty tune. In the end, we all survived and actually continued our characters in the expansion; the Journalist was still as clueless as ever, but he lost his Retainer. Apparently the benefactor was displeased with his results and cancelled his contract. LoL.

[zekethegm]

Fun With Lovecraftian Things- A Thate Valentine’s Day Special

What happens when an otherworldly creature with almost limitless powers discovers Valentine’s Day? I guess Kate is about to find out.

If you want to see everything else with these characters and my other works with strange creatures and characters then my masterlist is here

About 1000 words below so if you got that time, click on through for cuteness.

           Kate tosses her keys in their usual basket as she enters the familiar apartment. She locks the door and wrenches her shoes off still half laced. She turns to walk into the kitchen.

           “Gah!” She hollers, falling backward onto the tattered door mat. “Don’t do that!” She commands, slowly rising to her feet with a hand over her chest.

           Thain slides over and helps her to her feet. “Sorry, I wanted to announce myself but didn’t want to startle you.”

           “So instead you hovered silently just in my peripheral, the most normal of alternatives.”

           “Well, I—”

           “Don’t worry.” Kate says waving her hand dismissively before leaning in to hug Thain. “Just clear your thro-er, make a coughing noise. A quiet coughing noise.”

           Thain nodded and embraced her with one pair of arms and gently brushed the hair away from her face with the other. “How was your day?”

           “Better now.” Kate says smiling up at Thain, she kisses his chest. “Have I ever told you I’m glad you don’t wear shirts.”

           Thain gestures with one pair of arms to the other. “Human shirts tend to lack the required sleeves, so...”

           “What a happy accident that is.” Kate says kissing Thain’s chest again before turning back to go to the kitchen again. “And what has my star forger been up to?” She asks over her shoulder.

           Thain follows slowly. “Well, actually I learned that today is a customary day of celebration in most cultures. Valentine’s day! So I—”

           “Ugh.” Kate groans.

           “Something the matter?”

           “No.” Kate says insincerely. “Not unless you think something is the matter with big companies playing on the expectations of women for profit. Not unless you think something is wrong with celebrating some guys execution by pressuring guys to buy a bunch of flowers that won’t last the week just because it’s become a social obligation. Not unless you think something is the matter with further ostracizing and alienating those who are alone or don’t desire romance and thusly damage their self worth as people for not being able to participate in the ‘normal’ thing to do. So unless you think there is something the matter with that then no there is nothing the matter.” Kate breathes heavy from her rapid fire tirade.

           “Oh.” Thain says quietly. “I did not know those parts of it.”

           Kate hangs her head. “Oh god. Did you already get me something?” She asks, looking over her shoulder at her inhuman love.

           “No.” Thain replies sheepishly. His tentacles curl up beneath him, coiling away from Kate and the faint glowing lines beneath his skin fade. Arcane symbols trail down two arms, which he tucks behind his back.

           “Hey! Stop that, I know that one, that’s the disappearing stuff one, you stop that!” She says pointing behind his Thain’s back. Thain quickly puts his arms front and center and ceases the magic.

Kate buries her face in her hands and slowly slides down the wall into a ball. “Ughhhhh, I’m such a bonehead. I didn’t mean all that, well I did but not like how it sounded.”

Thain glides over to her, sinking low to the floor, his tentacles splaying out to allow him to sink low to the floor. He touches her knee while nervously tenting the fingers on his other pair of arms. “It’s fine. I should have asked. I know humans are all different, if you were all the same then you wouldn’t be so special to me, just another human. I should have asked if you celebrated it before I did anything. I just got too excited with the idea. Was so much fun for me I never guessed it wouldn’t be for you. Sorry.”

Kate puts a hand on his, feeling the familiar warmth of her otherworldly lover and the tingling spark of his existence reconciling with reality. “No need to apologize, I’ve just been bitter about this whole thing for awhile. Guess it’s a hard habit to break. I actually really like chocolate.”

“I know.” Thain says warmly, the room seems a touch brighter somehow.

Kate looks to Thain, tracing the glowing green veins that snake across his smooth face with her eyes. “Did you get me any?”

The glow pulses then fades. “No.”

“Oh.”

“I actually made you something.”

“Oh!” Kate says excitedly. “What is it? It’s not something worldbreaking is it? You didn’t rearrange a constellation or something, because that could really mess with astronomers and set back a lot of our study of space to—”

“It’s a mug.” Thain says. Energies swirl between his hands as a large mug of polished black appears as though it were smoke blown in by an errant wind. The entire spectacle causes a dull throbbing pain where Kate’s brain comprehends the impossible.

Thain slowly turns it around to reveal a series of disjointed glyphs and unnatural icons. “It, uh, it says ‘My boyfriend is out of this world’ in the language of the nomadic star stalkers. It’s funny because I am.” Thain scratches the back of his head and makes a sighing sound. “You already knew that, though.”

Kate takes the mug and runs her hands over it, the surface seems almost unsettlingly smooth and vibrates at an almost imperceptible frequency making it feel electric to the touch. “What did you make this from?” She asks, turning it over and examining the inside and bottom.

“Mostly compressed asteroid dust from a belt that orbits a binary star that is actually a pair of outworld beings entrapped in burning radiation for the safety of every other living thing. Oh, uhm, it’s not microwave safe.” Thain watches Kate’s expression carefully. “Do you like it?”

Kate throws her arms around the silvery shoulders of her love and kisses its neck. “I love it. This is the sweetest gift I’ve ever received. Thank you so much.”

“We should try it out.” Thain says one pair of hands helping Kate to hold it upright as the other pair sit folded behind his back.

Kate nods happily. “Yeah, I could go for some—what are you doing?” She asks suspiciously as Thain begins pouring a liquid from a small swirling vortex he conjured up.

“It’s evening. You always have coffee in the morning, never after 10 am, so I am pouring tea.” Thain says plainly.

“Oh that part is obvious.” Kate rolls her eyes. “I mean where is it literally coming from?”

“It’s complicated.”

“I just received a mug made from dust irradiated by two creatures I don’t even want to ask about, engraved in words of a language that we will talk about another time from, essentially, a god who just hangs out in my apartment sometimes. I think I can handle it.” Kate says.

Thain nods. “That’s fair. Some of my offerings were of fragrant leaves and spices. And while bringing them in their entirety would cause them to age, I can fuse their essence into water and it will carry the properties of the substances in their state from my realm to here without aging.”

“So this is millennia old ceremonial sacrificial tea?”

“Yes.” Thain says, sitting back, finishing the pour.

“Nice.” Kate takes a drink. “Oh damn, that’s good.” She cradles the warm mug and hovering lights trace the lettering on the outside.

“Happy Valentine’s day.” Thain says caressing Kate’s cheek.

She nuzzles into it. “Happy Valentine’s day.”

Tag List

Tag time @sincerestaffect @typeaadventures @hypnocutiegypsy@raiswanson @creativityflows @cogwrites @paper-shield-and-wooden-sword @siarven @asttralhell @my-words-are-light @beautifulimposter25 @ravenpuffwriter @delusioninabox @tundra-tiger @thespooniewrites

If you want on or off the tag list just let me know and as always if you want to see me do anything with eldritch creatures just shoot me a message or ask or whatever with a genre or setting you want me to play around with and I’ll see what I can do.