#and now someone died in my family

[hxhhasmysoul]

wouldn't it be nice if the author of the fics finished them. the author is me.

[lassieposting]

Concept:

Post-tadpole, Tav offers to help Astarion find a way to walk in the sun again, and she starts by going to different libraries and repositories and archives around the city to look for books that might be relevant. Astarion, obviously, has to stay in the rental room with the shutters closed during the daytime, so he can't come with her.

At some point, this takes her up to the posh part of the city, where the fancy ✨ scholarly ✨ archive is. She remembers most of the walk - it's not too far from the graveyard Astarion took her to, in the neighbourhood where he once used to live.

And like, it's never actually occurred to her that he could still have Actual Blood Relatives still living? It's not a topic she's ever thought to raise with him. But she has to sign in and out of the archive, and she just happens to notice the name three or four lines above hers: an initial and a surname she recognises.

Ancunín.

The same name from Astarion's gravestone.

A parent? A sibling?

A niece or nephew Astarion has never even met?

Thus begins a secondary quest of trying to reunite a broken family. Astarion is willing enough to talk about the few memories he still has of the thirty-nine years he had with his family before turning - a drop in the ocean compared to the 200 years spent suffering under Cazador - but he shuts down when she nudges him towards the likelihood that Mr & Mrs Ancunín are still alive. He retreats back behind the selfish, catty survivalist he was when she first met him and claims he has no interest in ever reconnecting. The pain in every clipped syllable says drop it, so she does.

But then he asks her, very quietly, several days later, what the initial was. He doesn't really react when she tells him - there's no obvious recognition, and he doesn't ask any follow-up questions or try to discuss it further. He just goes back to his book. She watches him out of the corner of her eye though, as she skim-reads her own giant tome of magical artifacts. A very long time goes by before she sees him turn a page.

For a good long while, the family issue gets put firmly on the back burner. They have other shit going on. Sometimes, it's following promising leads on a possible workaround for Astarion's sunlight allergy. Other times, it's the kind of ugly, ragged-edged breakdown that so often follows a period of relative safety and stability after a major trauma. He's been running in survival mode for two centuries, and now he's finally starting to feel secure enough for the rest of his mind to come back online, and all the trauma he couldn't handle at the time, all the pain and fear and tangled emotions survival mode was protecting him from, is catching up to him. During those sporadic episodes, trying to keep him from falling apart is her top priority and, well, time gets away from them and by the time he brings up his parents again, months or more have gone by, and they have a fairly good idea of what artifact of daywalking they need to find.

By the time it comes to actually meeting with them, still more months have passed, and they have already found it.

It's horrible, and heartwarming, and heartbreaking, and healing, and hurting, and so many other conflicting things that for a while - a long while - Tav doesn't know whether she actually did the right thing encouraging him to reach out to long-lost loved ones. It's a mess of moments that makes her heart ache for a dozen reasons. She finds out that Astarion looks most like his mother, but has his father's nose. She holds him for hours while he shakes and sobs into her shoulder because they never even left the city, they were here the whole time, and they never found him - and he's so angry and full of grief he doesn't know what to do with himself. She accompanies him to the home he was raised in, and the once-familiar surroundings jog memories he thought lost for good - he's glassy-eyed, recounting them to her, but she's fairly sure it's the good kind of glassy-eyed, so she doesn't mention it. She tries to make conversation at family dinner while he stares at his hands in his lap, dissociated, looking even more uncomfortable than she feels, utterly lost in a world that once fit him like a glove. There are a lot of feelings to try and mediate. They are all hurt, all damaged, all afraid, all looking for the ghost of a loved one in the face of a stranger.

But, eventually, there is a day where she overhears Astarion having a conversation with his father, and he sounds like himself - not the persona he puts on in public - and his father laughs at something he says in a way that's entertained rather than awkward. There is a day where his mother reaches out and he doesn't shake his head or step away - he lets her hug him goodbye. They have not slipped back into the graves they crawled out of in each other's lives - they are all very different people now - but they are learning new ways to fit together, and he seems to be pleased about it.

So she thinks, yeah, it was worth it.

[moveslikekeithrichards]

its so hard to talk about how traumatic it is to watch somebody be claimed by dementia without going "well i cant complain because at least i wasnt the one losing my mind (for now)" but that shit fucks you up so much. that ghost is going to haunt me for the rest of my life and all i can do is hope it Stays a ghost

[fregget-frou]

@autisticempathydaemon said they loved my Angel listener (along with everything else it was SO SWEETTT OMLLL<333) so here’s a doodle for you! They’re also one of my favorites!

Look at that face.

Full of mischief.

Some fun facts about them: they’re native! Specifically they could be from the Salishan (but I don’t know too much so I leave it ambiguous) and are half Filipino, born and raised in British Columbia, Canada around Vancouver. They were raised by their mom and brothers, then moving to dahlia for college.

They originally planned to secure a high end job in Vancouver just going to California for school but they met David. They still visit their family as often as they can.

They’re 5’4, the shortest listener! Aklag is still beefy and could definitely throw David over their head. Their callouses are from being raised on a farm, and they’re starting to fade now.

I took them out of another story I made a while ago so I’m still trying to tweak them seamlessly so I’ll actually maybe probably not but make a backstory sheet for my listeners?

Thank you sm for your words and I hope you like it!

[thaliasthunder]

whatever u do don't think about nico & piper bonding over their trauma of losing people they love. don't think of nico giving piper advices to overcome the pain. don't think of nico & piper having a teary hug over jason. don't think of nico & piper giving each other comfort. don't think of nico & piper starting to genuinely care for each other. and whatever, whatever you do don't think of nico & piper being friends.

[opens-up-4-nobody]

...

[hearts4juzi]

"Of course the moment you left, you died. You know I'm alone now, right? To pick up YOUR mess. And knowing you, you're not coming back as one of those freaks. you're leaving me to deal with this. It should've been you to go, Afton. Your brother would've had more sense."

[jovoy]

i am like the least superstitious oerson ever about some things like ill go to an estate sale and wear a dead persons jewelry idgaf im giving it new life!!!! like if i were selling it perhaps i woukd feel a bit haunted and evil about it like the hope diamond or something but i am breathing new meaning and lifeblood into these things so like the ghosts or poltergeists or whatever can all go away. thats how i feel about it!! ill wear this deceased old ladys necklace every day and not feel weird idk like i respect the dead but also things are just things kindof earthly possessions mean nothing

[inkykeiji]

.

[stinkrascal]

when life gets hard my cope is making paladins in bg3 and now ive made 3 new paladins in the span of a day i simply cannot be stopped

[theminecraftgay]

Lord Dianite, god of chaos!!!

✩ ☆ Commission Me! ☆ ✩

[bijoumikhawal]

ngl maybe I'm cracked but when I hear about a tragedy where 100~ Assyrians died because of infrastructural neglect I do not think "we should be talking about how the bride is 18 and the groom is 27" even though I think that's gross

[alchemiclee]

been looking in tags for a few days now to see if anyone else found the whole high cloud quintet and related story to be a bit.....poorly written, nonsensical, contradictory, full of plot holes and loose ends, etc. apparently i'm not the only one. (and i'm not even talking about shipping stuff, because any time I saw someone mad about bad writing, someone always replies to be homophobic and laugh about failed ships. weirdos.) it could have been so good but was thrown into the garbage for the most part (IF you noticed all the plot holes and contradiction. if not, then it's a fine enough story tbh. I expect most people to see it on surface level and not read all the little hidden lore bits and try to piece it together like my autistic brain did. which is ok! enjoy it if you liked it and ignore me 😆)

[monstriiss]

.

[dragons-and-yellow-roses]

Just found out my two siblings are in my mom's will, but not me. Also my grandpa has told the entire family about his engagement. Except for me. Also my dad told my siblings that he and my mom bought a plot of land. Can you guess who they haven't told?

[flufflecat]

Really not feelin it this week. Tag rant incoming