#a story for part 3

[simshousewindsor]

TENSION

[Buckingsim Palace, 9:57 AM WST]

Prince Rainier: I've been having the worst neck cramps. I woke up one morning and there it was. I must have cricked it during the course of the night.

Cmdr. Newton Hawkins, 3rd Viscount Hawkins: You should get that checked out. Small pains unchecked lead to bigger ones. I know a guy!

Prince Rainier: Nah, it'll be fine. It just needs a good, sharp... (crack)

Prince Rainier: (screaming in pain) OUCH!

Lord Cmdr. Hawkins: What happened?

- - - - - LATER - - - - -

[Appleton Medical Suite, 10:24 AM WST]

Lord Cmdr. Hawkins: He's an osteopath. He comes very highly recommended.

Prince Rainier: Mmm.

Lord Cmdr. Hawkins: Treats everyone. Diego Sandoval, Winstin Churchill, Lord Grantham. He also goes to the club.

- - - - - LATER - - - - -

Ezekiel Birch: (click)

Prince Rainier: (groans) Oh...

Ezekiel: (crack)

Prince Rainier: (groans) Oh...

Ezekiel: There. Seems to have been tension built up in your neck.

Prince Rainier: Oh, and how does one go about treating that?

Ezekiel: Identifying them, recognizing them, and not just treating the physical symptoms like the stiff neck but changing one's whole lifestyle.

Prince Rainier: I used to have an acquaintance look after me in that department, who made sure there wasn't too much tension in my life, but he retired.

Ezekiel: Marcus Pratt?

Prince Rainier: You don't know the old rat, too?

Ezekiel: (laughs) I do.

Prince Rainier: What is your name again?

Ezekiel: Ezekiel Birch. Marcus always talked about my getting you out for the weekend. You know? A party or two. I enjoy putting people together. Matter of fact, it'll be a rather fun group this weekend.

Prince Rainier: Who's this?

Ezekiel: Ah! Emily Wilson. She'll be there this weekend too.

Prince Rainier: You know, my neck's feeling better already!

Ezekiel: (laughs)

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[tariah23]

The manga industry, especially JUMP, needs to hurry up and do away with weekly scheduling for mangaka. There needs to better regulations put into place for their health and safety because this is pitiful. Two weeks - monthly updates should’ve already been the standard for the manga industry at this point. These money grabbers will only continue to put the lives of these artists at stake for the sake of capitalism unless some serious changes are implemented.

[egophiliac]

swipes everything else off of the table to yell about diasomnia flower bookmarks

(I gave Silver one too :D)

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Lan Wangji Goes To Lotus Pier AU: Part 1: Dread on Arrival

(Part 2)

[starrysharks]

splatoon twt just dropped this what the fuck?!?!!?!!!!!

[bluegiragi]

ghost gives konig a private lesson feat. soap as a very happy spectator.

read updates early on patreon

[surreal-duck]

Tuesday is chuu day! (x)

[novelconcepts]

I really think we as a society don't give enough credit to performers who thrive in an ensemble situation. It's always obvious when an actor is excellent front and center, and we're constantly rewarding that skill set with awards, but god, there's something to be said for the power of a true ensemble piece. People who are so good at reading one another and playing off what they're given, tossing the ball and knowing when to turn it into a grenade. As much fun as it is to watch a solid monologue or a solo show, I always find it so much more thrilling--and so much more authentically lived-in--when there's an ensemble just feeding one another in every single scene. Who do I look at? What is everyone else learning and deciding even from the background? This is what life looks like, and actors who really shine in that environment have really become my favorite to follow.

[howlsnteeth]

and are you really okay? are you really okay?

[erwinsvow]

you’re made of tougher stuff than rafe had realized.

he pampers you, of course, gives you the full princess treatment, even though you get all shy about it, trying to refuse him—which never works. he thinks you deserve it, because you deserve everything that he can give you, but he’s really trying to butter you up, get you ready for when you find out what kind of shit he’s really been up to. 

you’ve made a habit out of not questioning anything rafe says, following his instructions without a second guess. your boyfriend is overpoweringly dominant—it’s easy to do as he says and a part of you is convinced that you prefer it this way. you feel your shyness melt away when you’re with him, your real self bubbling to the surface, more sure of yourself now because rafe is sure of you. 

you don’t realize when it’s happened—only that it has. hand in hand with becoming more confident like rafe, because of rafe, you start being a little more observant.

rafe usually sends you away—gently murmuring in your ear to go get him another drink, or go say hi to someone for him, while he’s trying to conduct business. he sells coke only when you’re out of eyeshot or back at tannyhill waiting for him—he doesn’t need you knowing the details of what he’s doing to make money. the crap with the pogues is put on hold anytime you’re around since he knows your bleeding heart will only feel bad for them. more than that, rafe doesn’t need those idiots earning your sympathy and making him seem like the bad guy. he likes you as you are, all your emotions just for him. 

he thinks this is the way it needs to be to keep you with him, but you start to surprise him.

you come back with a beer for rafe and another lemonade seltzer for yourself, handing it to rafe with a smile and settling on his lap. people at the party might look at the two of you weirdly, but you don’t care anymore, even though the thought of something like that used to make you cry. you lock eyes with rafe, a hand resting on his shoulder while his own hands wrap around your waist.

“that guy over there told me to ask you if you had any coke on you,” you say, taking a sip of your drink and making yourself comfortable against rafe. he freezes for a second, tenses under your touch.

“he said that?” rafe shrugs, fist clenching around the beer bottle. “don’t know why he’d ask that.” you respond with a matching shrug.

“i don’t know. but he’s been talking to those two all night, i bet they’ll buy from you too.” he tries not to act surprised with your words—so comfortably talking about who he could sell drugs to tonight, like you’re discussing what you want for dessert. 

“yeah, kid?”

“mm-hmm. he seemed real nervous. you could probably upcharge, doubt he’d notice.” you take another sip of your drink, swinging your legs. “can we get ice cream on the way home?” rafe presses a wet kiss to your cheek, making you squirm and giggle. he gets up, setting you down on the couch. 

“yeah. let me go take care of business first.”

“okay. charge him double. then i can get a large.” 

“sure thing. you’re the boss.”

[bixels]

Splatoon 3: Side Order is good, but not great. I still highly recommend it, but if you care about the story, you're going to be disappointed. Quick review: spoilers ahead.

Side Order was the devs experimenting with Splatoon's gameplay loop. The campaign is a rogue-like, and it works amazingly well. Super fun, super challenging, building my deck and fighting through challenges with the stakes of resetting really scratched an itch in my brain. They did a great job with it.

Unfortunately, I feel like priority went to game design rather than story. Much of the mysterious artwork we saw in the first teaser trailer was completely unused; turns out, all of that was just concept art that never made it into the final product. Side Order failed to make me care about what was happening. I don't know why the protagonist had to be Agent 8; it could've been anyone else and the story would've worked the same.

Octo Expansion was the absolute peak of meshing story and gameplay. The campaign's hook is insanely strong; we immediately empathize with Agent 8 because we know from previous lore that octolings like her have been trapped underground for all their lives. We care about her fight to the surface because it's a fundamentally ideological fight for freedom. The plot stuff about Tartar and the Thangs is just nice set dressing; 8's fight for freedom is the real story.

There's none of that in Side Order. I don't particularly care about Marina's metaverse, even if it's tied to Octo Expansion's story. I don't know why Acht is there other than backstory stuff. It really feels like 8 is just told to do something and she does it because she's the protagonist; she has zero personal stakes or motivations in the conflict. This is a story blunder the devs did in Splatoon 3's default campaign––forgetting to give the protagonist a personal reason to fight––that I hoped would be fixed here, but alas.

What makes it worse is that the gameplay and story progression are completely out of sync. I beat the entire game on my third run in 4 hours. With each run, you get up to two keys to potentially unlock bits of story. That means you'll get about one piece of the story every two runs. There are twelve pieces of the story; I got the first and then beat the whole damn game. Now I have to go back and grind to see the remaining story when I've already beaten the final boss and resolved the conflict. I missed the entire story because I never had to reset because I blazed through the gameplay! It's just a real shame that I experienced everything without knowing... why it's happening. The final boss had me asking myself what the hell is going on because I don't know the backstory at all.

Again, I still really recommend. The devs did a great job, but Side Order remains in the shadow of Octo Expansion's incredible success. Like the default singleplayer campaign, there's just a lot of lost story potential here that, while not necessary, would have really elevated this DLC into something amazing.

[halfghostwriter]

When a true baby ghost is born— a ghost not born of dying, but rather through the desire of another ghost— they are little more than a core with wispy ectoplasm emanating from them for about a month. During said month, they take on influence from their surroundings in order to figure out the form they’ll take, hence why so many young ghosts look like their parents.

Because they aren’t fully formed until a month after their birth, the parent or parents will take on a far more aggressive, primal form in order to protect their child. The parent’s form will become incredibly monstrous, and their size will increase, with triple their normal size being most common among parents. Their mental state also becomes incredibly instinctual, higher intelligence temporarily being replaced by aggression towards anyone the ghost doesn’t consider family. They stay in this state until the baby is fully formed.

Of course, Danny “don’t worry about it” Phantom forgets to add this bit of trivia to his explanation to his fellow heroes as to why he was taking paternity leave. In his defense, he didn’t expect them to visit during that month.

And he definitely didn’t expect his brooding brain to latch onto most everyone who visited as “part of his brood.”

[elalalune]

Happy valentine's day 💖

here's two old men flirting infront of a mirror 🫶

(Wonderland au)

[triona-tribblescore]

AHSHAHAHDHD I ALREADY LOVE THIS NEW AU

but my one question is: what exactly are each of the brothers? mikey is clearly some kind of wanderer and raph a stone giant, donnie some kind of scholar/inventor, but leo is the one im most confused about. is he a nymph? a witch?

ty also @cococakeyum for the ask :D <3

(AND SPECIAL MENTION TO @scatterbrainedbot BECAUSE ILY YOUR TAGS ARE KILLING ME, GETTING ME SO HYPED FR :'D <3333)

[hensel-x]

finally finished my Vaguely 80s Zombie Boy 

[reunitedinterlude]

the 2019-2020 (dan and) phil secret project

april 2019 | july 2019 | august 2019 | january 2020 (1, 2) | february 2020 (1, 2) | april 2021