#anyways so sorry for lack of art.. its mainly lack of art i think you guys would care about

[crackscreen101]

CW: EYESTRAIN AND BRIGHT COLORS

Be alll careful and whatnot

[burinazar]

what motivates you artistically? :3

well right now blelaf mainly. no ok hang on. alright. so.

when i was really young i had this feeling like if we could all just understand one another, if there was a perfect way to beam your thoughts and feelings into someone's head, it would fix almost everything re conflicts and human suffering. (naive obviously but this was what i thought lol.) when i started to be aware of what it was to read good books and look at good art it felt like in some ways the closest we could come to fully articulating an idea, a moment, a feeling, and placing it in its entirety into someone's mind. relatedly, uh, bad stories/art that didn't seem to respect their audience pissed me off at the squandered opportunity (sorry the snobbery came out sorry) and made me think, dammit, the audience and types of people evoked within this deserve better and i'm gonna try. with the combo of these two things it was like ..okay i'm going to start writing and drawing. it was all about stories ideas concepts. oh and also i really liked rodents and wanted to draw them as often as possible lol. i drew so fucking many rodents. gah. these concepts were no joke deeply linked for me because as a child i genuinely felt like the bad rap rodents get from people unthinkingly condemning them via stereotypes was a symptom of a societal lack of empathy and consideration. (possibly terry pratchett's fault)

(could not locate early rat art at this moment but here's relevant scribbling. i was nine i think.)

 tl;dr plunging themes and concepts i find interesting; communicating them to other people. (sometimes the concept is admittedly not highbrow. sometimes it is very silly. sometimes it is 'hey ! it would be hot if this happened to b*laf'.) it can be hard to reconcile the desire to 'communicate' via art/writing with some of my work just not having much of an audience or even feeling like i don't want to share it for various reasons lol, but in those cases i frame it to myself as, the effort of presenting the idea was enjoyable in and of itself, an act of personal communication between me and the subject or content of the work even if the thing itself will never be shown to another soul : v anyway fanwork can be a neat way to do that because it's like shared muses or canvases where what you see in them or love about them is already partially pre-communicated to people and you can hit the ground running on evoking emotions, concepts and narratives using the shared frame of reference, as well as skewing and transforming said frame as needed. btw i found another drawing of me and the sages that i didnt use in the other post so here it is

there have been many periods of my life when i was making more original work, though. (i'm sure i've said this many times now but before the sages i had a very comparable attachment to a couple of my OCs.) i also had a pretty terrible experience with fandom around middle school that sort of drove me away from heavily engaging for a long time; i was still in fandoms but basically never shared my writing outside of like PMs and servers. that's part of why my current abyss bullshit is so precious to me and also why i can get protective over it; it pretty much singlehandedly brought me back to the Blessings and Curses of being directly engaged in sharing a lot of fan content publicly. (man for a person who doesnt like bondrewd i do quote him a lot unfortunately.)

so anyway. yes. uhh sorry that was really long. i sort of just like blogging haha thank you very much for the ask! < 3

[live-love-laugh-lesbian]

hiii!! me again akjsdhkjashd

ELECTRIC SAXOPHONES ARE A THING?!?? WHATTTTT THATS SOO COOL OMG AKSJDHJSDH

omg i think i am 'people' (the type of person who has patience for the latter : visual novel and not the former : working w children askjdhakjsh) i think i just dont have the capability to be able to handle children i cant even handle myself asjdhajsldh

wait thats so cool that your mum works with kids as well! its relatable for me to bc i do computer science and my sister did and her bff does and my bff does its crazy akjsdhkasjh its like a domino affect from person to person lmaooo

oh yeahh i totally get the thing w poorly trained dogs i mainly talk about those tiny harmless ones ir if they are big those sweet chill oness!! ur uncles' dog sounds adorablee!! and so do your cats omg! and thank you <3 i know not alll cats are like that and if i see a cat i will try to pet it ajlsdhalsjhd unless its scared of me ofc

omg i know you mentioned before that your hobbies are sewing and stuff and that you were sewing a trouser but like i didnt know you MADE trousers!! thats soo coolll youre basically a fashion designer!! and lilac trousers i would sooo wear those omg SEQUINED HEARTS AHHHHHHHHH this sounds soo cute

im a sagittarius! one of my best friends is a scorpio!! so whenever i see her now ill think of you!!!! asdaslkdjasld so real w atla lmaooo and also so real w swimming asdjhjasdh

oh yeah i love art too! and spending time w your sister sounds so cute and fun!! and then a date w your gf sounds soo adorable this sounds like such a comfy classic cozy day! i would spend my day probably by playing guitar, art and for the majority sleeping or going on my phone ajksdhkd if its a rainy day id go for a nice hot chocolate and a brownie coated in whipped cream bc who doesnt love whipped cream asdhsaj stardew valleyyy!! my childhoodd!! i like playing games but its mainly like yansim (i swear im not crazy askdjaslkdj i just find it too addictingggg) AKLSHDJKASHD competitive i sooo get that i get really competitive in games as well lmaoo to the point its unhealthy ahhhh

they sound like awesome compliments! for me any compliment is my fav ajksdhkjs i love compliments on my singing, intelligence and this is lowkey weird but my hair ajkshdjsd my hair never looks good for some reason so if someone says it does one day then i will be beaming and happy for the rest of the day ahhh i also love compliments in my art and my coding! and yes professional compliments ESPECIALLY from children are the best validation ever akjshdjksadh

my question for you: what's something about the modern-day world that bothers you, and what’s something about it that brings you joy?

byee! have a lovely dayy!

-swiftie spring exchange anon idek askldhalsjd

Hello again! Apologies if my answer is short, I am ill and very tired but I wanna reply.

Computer science is so cool!! What sort of stuff do you do with that? Programming or uhhh...here's where I show my lack of computer science knowledge...anyways I'm curious XD (Saw you said coding later!! That's so cool!!!)

I getcha XD My other uncle has dogs too! Ex racing greyhounds, he likes to give them a happy retirement. They can be chaotic but I can't blame them too much, they were trained to chase small things after all! As a kid I accidentally stepped on one of their tails...I felt so guilty!! But the dog was chill and I gave him a treat to say sorry XD

I've been making a lot of trousers recently cause I realised I owned like...2. Except then I get more and more ideas and have to narrow them down XD The current pair are...sort of almost done. Made, fabric hearts sewn on, the sequins will go around the edges of them, but it's gonna take a while. Wearing them anyways in the mean time XD

Your day sounds good too!! Brownies my beloved...I have such a sweet tooth it's unreal XD And nah I've played Yansim too. Not for a while, but no judgement! And look if one isn't playing to WIN then what's the point in playing XD (I say that, in games like Stardew Valley I'm more relaxed, but that's not pvp soooo)

Sounds like good compliments!! I used to get compliments on my hair back when it was longer (I was like 18 at the time). It was so long it was inconvenient, I had to move it to sit down lol. And now it's super short XD Complete 180. I'm sure your hair is lovely however!!

Modern day world...tbh how often you need to call people. Like some places don't have emails anymore?? Or require calls anyways?? don't do phone calls really and I HATE the trend of "phone or nothing".

Does government stuff count too? If so like. Governments. They're run so poorly I swear to god. I don't think that's new to the modern world however XD What about you?

Adding to that topic: what's something you hope to see in the next five years? :)

[tendermiasma]

i’m not even into overwatch anymore but i just wanted to say I ADORE your art style and hope to develop my own into a similar semi-realism leaning...have you made a post about your art journey? I’m assuming I just need to buckle down and do anatomy studies but any tips are very welcome!! Ty for your time <3

Oh man thank you! I’ve never made a comprehensive post about how I got to *gestures* whatever this point in my art this is, and I definitely sat here wondering what “art journey” means for me since I always feel like I’m stumbling around so I’ll answer as completely as I can. But a great way to develop a realism-minded eye is to draw from photos and life. Everyone in the world has said it over and over but it really gets it done, it’s not any more complicated than that. It’s how I started when I was little and it’s not something I planned, but the Legolas posters were right there so how could I not? Your own non-realism “stylistic” touch will bubble up whether you want it to or not and that’s a beautiful thing. It’s not something you need to look for because it happens on its own, whether it’s you seeing something another artist is doing that you like and assimilating it into your work, or it’s your own unique way that you absorb information from the world and use it to solve problems in the drawing in front of you. Some new artists also still have the idea that using references is cheating-- I’m not blaming them, sometimes this weird thing is circulated by more established people as well-- but this is a very small minority. Please use references. I’d be lost without them. The Castlevania team has a giant collection of references for faces of every character from every angle, props, etc. and I always have a second screen up with 10 different sheets of whoever I’m drawing. Feeding yourself info is essential to getting better. Look at how other artists handle something you’re having a problem with too. If they’re doing a similar pose or something, study their drawing and ask yourself what specifically, extremely technically about that drawing is convincing-- what marks are where, and what is the quality or direction of the strokes? Try it out on your own drawing. If you’re stuck, become aware of if you’re holding on too tightly to what you think something should look like. I have to remind myself this as well. Really try to let go of the idea you have in your head about how something works and simply try instead to draw what you see, even if it feels weird. The results are often pleasantly surprising. 

I have a funny relationship with studies. You seem to be looking at them like a chore and I feel the same way. It’s impossible for me to sit down and just draw something over and over, disconnected from emotion or a larger narrative. I think a wonderful way to “study” is to incorporate those studies into a project that you wanted to do anyway. I’ve used my minicomics to get better at background painting or specific figure poses that I needed for the story but wasn’t sure how to do. I’m a very “oops I need it now better learn TODAY” kind of artist, if that suits you better than buckling down and doing anatomy studies for hours. Both are great ways to improve, but you have options for how to get there. 

In terms of how much time I spend drawing.. well lol it’s a lot. I almost typed “but I don’t do it every day” but yes, my jobs have made sure that I do (I tend to separate personal drawing and job drawing). But the truth is, to get better, a lot of very focused drawing time is important; how much of it is up to you and your schedule. You can sit down for 6 hours and doodle or you can sit down for 3 with an extremely critical eye. It’s about the volume of time as well as focus and I don’t have a clear answer for it, but I can point to one specific year in my life where I made artistic progress like I’ve never seen from myself since. I drew a comic with regular updates during that time and, looking back, the art was not good. But the point was, I was drawing for 7 hours a day after work, at least 5 days a week, and actively looking to draw things that I hadn’t done before or knew that I wasn’t good at, and the result was that every single update was almost like it was drawn by a different person-- readers noticed and commented on the progress as well. It was very much an art bootcamp and I wouldn’t have the skills I do at this point if I hadn’t done it. It’s important that you’re loving what you do if you do it for yourself! That’s how you get through big projects and continue to be excited with where you are. Love is one of the most important motivators and discipline-keepers in art, in my experience. Draw what sets your brain on fire and attack it wholeheartedly even if it’s really weird or niche, not what you think you should be drawing, and you’ll improve a million times faster.

Art journey in terms of what I’ve done with my life (if this is what you meant from the beginning I’M SORRY I’m just trying everything you might have meant) uhhh I haven’t been to art school. I have no idea what my relationship with art would be like now if I’d had any formal training and I don’t really dwell on it. I could either be a testament to being able to get by without it or an example of someone who has no idea what she’s doing at all and lacks many basic foundational art skills. I have an architecture degree. I love architecture, I love the language of space we build for ourselves, and I’m truly, deeply glad for that eye-opening and often grueling experience, but I think my current field is a much better fit. Before animation I worked as a graphic designer mainly drawing storyboards for commercials and internal-industry stuff-- lots and lots of quick colored sketches (one of our main clients was a big glass company and my god I never thought I’d draw so much glass in my life). I was able to do that job due to the skills I developed through personal work. Maybe I’d be a hundred times more powerful if I went to art school! Maybe I’d be completely burned out and bitter and not drawing anymore at all! I just don’t know. I have friends who have had both experiences. Whether you choose art school or not it’s best to keep tabs on if the art you’re currently making brings you joy. Joy and struggle aren’t mutually exclusive. Oftentimes I’m drawing something I care deeply about but it’s VERY FUCKING HARD and I’m frustrated but it’s worth it.

I also do everything while being very scared of the thing. I have a lot of deep-seated anxiety that I’m constantly trying to root out and my brain compulsively twists things around into why I can’t do something, why people secretly know I’m below-par and are just too nice to tell me, how I’m “tricking” people into thinking I’m better than I am, etc. It’s so bad that my first thought when I was initially offered the art test for my current job was to say no; not because I didn’t want it so badly it hurt, but because I thought I’d be too much of a disappointment.  After completing the test I spent an hour figuring out the most gracious way to apologize for not being enough. It’s common, but not something to accept and we’re all working on it. I just thought it was important to mention because art is also a mental journey and forces you to do all this navel-gazey shit in order to advance, and feeling like you are Not Enough is rife in the creative community. The work feels entangled with my value as a person because art is a massive part of my life. Something I’m learning is that I don’t have to be confident or sure of myself all the time. This ensures that the process is usually painful and frightening. Often there’s no way to make it less painful or frightening, and I just have to hold my breath and do it. An oddly comforting thing to me the past couple years is to remind myself that the scary thing I’m about to do won’t be the scariest thing I’ll ever do. I implies both that this isn’t the pinnacle of my progress and also that I will inevitably get over it. If you continue with art you’re going to run into things like this and I guess if it was me it would’ve been helpful to know I’m not alone in it.

I hope that maybe answered some of your questions, maybe? If you have some specific questions feel free and I’ll try my best. Hope you have a good day/night!

[thefandom-casserole]

Hi, yes, hello my favorite walrus. Do you have any headcanons for a media that you love (specifically nonbinary/neogender/bigender themed) i just wanted to ask you something cuz you always have elite headcanons

(I had a whole fucking essay typed out but it got deleted so yeah sorry)

Hi Ghost!!

Thank you for the ask I have a ton of headcanons lol. It’s for BNHA, KNY, and one person from TPN.

This might get lengthy so… good luck lol

Denki:

I’ve said it once I’ll say it again: BIGENDER ICON!! (switches between demiboy and nonbinary). They were born AFAB.

It took his parents a while to come to terms with it but around the time they decided to move from Alaska they excepted it. (Still are iffy with the neoprouns though and mainly just use the he/they ones :/ )

Uses they/them, he/him, xe/xem, ey/em, spark/sparks/sparkself pronouns.

He came out to Aizawa when Aizawa came to meet him with the dorm things. Of course Aizawa was okay with it and made sure he was comfortable with everything.

He did get top surgery, but it was during his 3rd year at UA.

Sero:

Xe are the gender king!

Like literally.

Getting big genderqueer or xenogender (leaning more towards xeno).

Basically they were always out to their family. They never were constrained by the gender constraints and xer family excepted that.

They/them, it/its, ey/em, xe/xem (literally any pronouns but she or he)

Specifically for AFAB:

Would wear a binder so much that they had to go to the hospital once. That’s why xer costume looks like it does now though, so it flattens its chest better.

Xey’d wear skirts. They’d wear suits. Ey’d wear sweatpants and a tank top. It’d wear a gorgeous gown.

Seriously just depends on the day.

100% bonds with Denki and Mina about having pronouns that are “too difficult for people to use”

Mina:

(this seems to just be the BakuSquad lol)

Man does this alien hoard pronouns (respect, Mina, respect)

She/her, space/spaces/spaceself, star/stars/starself, alien/aliens/alienself, acid/acids/acidself

And most definitely more but I don’t feel like typing them all out again-

I’m thinking demigirl or genderfae.

Was 100% the person who showed up to prom wearing both a dress and a tux.

Star’s parents didn’t particularly…care. I mean, when you have two moms (which Mina most definitely has ;) ) you tend to except everything identity-related that occurs with your children.

As much as space likes ranting with Sero and Denki about the lack of xeno/neopronoun usage, she likes complaining to Tsu more.

Which leads me to my next one: Tsu

Tsu:

CALL ME TSU GOD DAMNIT (I’m sorry it just reminds me of Celeste)

So I know I said that Sero ate all the genders but have you looked at Tsu?? They’re LITERALLY the definition of neurodivergent and no gender.

Actually I take that back. Tsu didn’t eat all the gender they threw it all up and Sero slurped it.

Anyways.

Agender king (king as in genderneutruel obviously)

Was born amab and turned out presenting more feminine, which they were fine with, but still thought that agender fit them better.

They prefer they/them, but they’ll use all but it/it’s and she/her and he/him.

On some days they do like frop/froppy’s/fropself and rib/ribbit’s/ribbitself though

Being called Tsuyu makes them feel dysphoric and that’s why they ask people to just call them Tsu.

They’re parents don’t support, but let Tsu do what they wish.

I suppose they would wear skirts sometimes, but wouldn’t a ton. Also wouldn’t wear a suit. They like more “casual” things.

Obviously was an art student so they’d make little bracelets and pins saying everyone’s pronouns and cute things for everyone (Bakugou and Deku got matching ones, and frop swears it wasn’t planned).

Oh I’ve been forgetting about coming out to teachers.

Hm. Tsu I think wouldn’t really say anything. I feel like they’d be fine with changing in the girls room and none of the girls cared so they just did that. The teachers figured it out at some point lol.

No binder or surgery for Tsu. They are fine with their body the way it is and doesn’t want anything like that (which is completely valid and awesome 👏🏼)

Oboro:

(I’m sorry of course he makes the list though he’s my favorite)

100% boyflux

Also I think they xe was intersex (but I’m not completely sure how this would work so I apologize if I get something wrong and please correct me. I’m not trying to insult it’d just be ignorance). But, he got surgery, and took the medicines and stuff that rain would have to take.

Also if they were the same age Mina and Oboro would COMPETE to have the most pronouns in their dragon hoard DEAR LORD

How Hizashi, Aizawa, and Nemuri managed to remember EVERY SINGLE one and use them correctly for cloud is astounding.

Anyways I’ll only do a couple because yes

Mainly, almost 24:7, he used he/him and xe/xem. 5:7 days sky used cloud/cloud’s/cloudself, sky/sky’s/skyself, roof/roof’s/roofself, rain/rain’s/rainself, (and more). And then rarely they/them.

He has the best friends <3

The four of them would go out and get like, bracelets and crafty things and shit with pronouns and stuff because cute and fluff :D

Would wear skirts. Would wear tux. Would wear a parachute. Really just depends on the day for him.

Parents were excepting from the very beginning.

Didn’t really “come out” as it was written on his papers and stuff. For some reason this didn’t happen for the modern generations of heroes so they all had to come out instead.

Hatsume:

Well I cannot forget about Hatsume now can I!?

I at first was looking through neurogenderd because honestly I was thinking “well this seems like it would fit Hatsume swimmingly!” But then I stopped because my internet died so that’s great :)

Anyways

Yeah I think Hatsume’s gender would be affected due to neurodivergency (look me in the eye and tell me Mei is not neurodivergent I dare you), but I’m not sure what one.

For pronouns Mei most likely wouldn’t give two shits what you use for her so long as you “LEAVE ME BE I’M WORKING ON MY BABIES!!!!!”

But if they were to ever sit down and talk about it it’d probably be something like “she/her, they/them, it/it’s, invent/invent’s/inventself, mach/machine’s/machineself, sup/support’s/supportself. Just use whatever I don’t care. Let me go back to building Power Loader Sensei”

Would 100% make little accommodations for peoples preferred gender and stuff when creating their support items.

Of course, Hatsume’s family has lived with Mei for like, 15 years so they’re used to it and they honestly could care less so long as their child is happy.

Hehe I’m done with BNHA, but I am not done with them all! Thank you for asking me to ramble about this, it’s making me very happy!

Muchiro:

Look at this child! They are gender turned inside out, thrown up, and then reinjected, only in a wrong way!

They are gender recreated and then disposed of!

They are all genders and no genders! :)

Okay but they’re like my one friend. Pangender-only the way that they feel it is all of the genders or none of the genders.

They/them pronouns.

I don’t really know much about them because I haven’t read the manga so I apologize about that.

But they seem like the type of person that would “yes I’ll wear a skirt.

Yes I’ll wear a suit.

Yes I’ll wear that sweat shirt.

Yes I’ll- ”

You get the picture.

Makomo:

Why is she so prettttttyyyyy. It’s not fair :/ /lh

Anyways

Genderqueer vibes from this amazing person. Or genderfluid. Or genderflux.

Ooooo genderflux fits well

Anyways

Pronouns: They/them, she/her, he/him flow/flower’s/flowerself

Afab and would wear a self made binder until Urokodaki got flow one.

They actually came out to him on accident when he was trying to bind.

Afterwards came a lot of fluff and stuff <3

Would you like to try to force this one into a suit? Or a dress? Me neither. But that’s exactly what Giyuu and Sabito would have tried to do. They are stupid.

(AKA Makomo doesn’t like dresses or suits. Instead give her some jeans and a shirt, they’re better that way).

And now for my favorite one. The one in which I got my namesake from! Drumroll pleaseeeeee

Leslie:

So one day I was talking to my irl friend at soccer and xey said to me “so who’s your favorite character from TPN?”

And I said “Leslie”

And xey said “oh sweet. What pronouns do you use for them? Mainly I use xeno/neo pronouns and they/them ones”

And I went “THAT’S BRILLIANT”

And so it has been that way ever since.

(So basically they/them, xey/xem, ey/em, it/it’s, etc.)

Annnnnnyways…

Probably associates themself with the term genderfluid, but like, in the way Alex Fierro does. (Was born with a male body but mainly identified as a female and rarely as a male)

Amab and would fight dysphoria everyday from being forced to wear the male uniform everyday.

Came out to Isabella and obviously she didn’t care at all because “it’s still the same Leslie that it’s always been. I still love you just the same” /p.

A lot of fluff <3

Depending on the day (modern universe now) might wear a suit. Would definitely wear skirts and dresses though.

Isabella got xem a gutair for xer birthday with the genderfluid flag painted on it.

Most definitely cried.

Alrighty then I’m done! I hope these are up to your standards Ghost! I hope you enjoyed!

Okay but seriously thanks for sending in the ask. I’m sick and it took my mind off of it so thanks!! I hope you’re well!

[pxncakefluff]

Tommy’s Memory Book

word count: 1.1k

warnings: death (sort of), angst, doesn’t follow exact canon events.

parings: none, but this can be a platonic Tommy/Ghostbur

authors note: This is based off art I saw on shmeckart on instagram. I felt really inspired to make something out of it, lol. I know some aspects of the writing are a bit iffy, mainly because of the recent stream (I started this a day ago), but I hope you enjoy it anyway!

His vision had come first.

The sunlight hit his eyelids, inflicting a soft groan from him as he opened his tired eyes. It was bright, very bright. The sun sat in the dark blue sky, watching the land above the clouds. His eyes shifted downwards finally taking in his surroundings. The tall grass around him limited his sight, however.

He didn’t know where he was.

Eventually, he began to inhale the scent of wet grass, dirt prevalent from what he could smell. And was that, lilac? The smell of lilacs surrounded him, as he took a large inhale through his body.

His sense of touch came third, as he finally began to feel the tall grass tickling his limbs, and the damp floor beneath him. The pain. It was all gone? He didn’t feel the bruises that were littered upon his body anymore, or where they had gone, but, he couldn’t remember what had inflicted them either.

The sounds of the birds chirping flooded his ears at last. The wind howled around him, making the tall grass sway in any which direction it blew. Slowly, but surely, he stood up from his spot on the ground.

Where he looked, miles of grassland covered the land, with a few trees that stood peacefully. There he spotted it, in the far distance, the silhouette of a cottage.

Not knowing where to go, he made his trek towards the cottage, with every intent for answers. It was the only logical place to go. The closer he got, the more details he began to see of the cottage. The little chimney that protrudes out of the roof, the lanterns that hung from the roof, and the door that seemed oddly welcoming. He’d seen this place before, no, he’d been here before. It felt familiar, but he couldn’t quite recall where from. It was all still hazy.

He hadn’t noticed it before, but he felt small. It didn’t feel right. He felt short, though somewhere deep in his mind, he knew that he wasn’t supposed to be. Everything felt bigger, towering over him.

After what seemed like hours, he, at last, stood in front of the building before him. It seemed homey. Stepping stones shone through the grass leading up the big wooden door, beckoning him to make his way across. Cautiously, his small feet padded his way to the door.

Who lived here? Did they even know why he was here? Taking a deep breath, he raised his hand to knock on the large door.

Knock, knock.

He could hear the sound of a chair screeching back, and footsteps making its approach. He braced himself for whatever stood behind the door, taking a few steps back. The door opened, and there stood someone he’d never expected to see.

“Wilbur?” he squeaked out shakily towards the tall man. Ghostbur’s smile grew graciously, as he made his way out of the cottage. Sunlight hit his face, making him look ever so welcoming.

“Tommy, it’s good to see you!” he spoke with warmth. Ghostbur leaned down to Tommy’s eye level, lightly patting Tommy on his shoulder. “Why don’t we go inside?”

Tommy nodded his head shyly, Ghostbur gesturing to follow him inside.

Entering the cottage had given Tommy a rush of nostalgia. Memories rushed through his mind all at once. It all made sense. This was his home once.

“Here, have a seat.”

Sitting down in his seat, Ghostbur made his way to the other chair before sitting in it as well. Tommy looked around the cottage once more, “Where are we, Wilbur?” Ghostbur looked at him confused, struck by Tommy’s lack of memory, “We’re home.”

“No, I mean-”

“Have some blue, Tommy,” He interrupted, pulling a handful of the blue out of his pocket. “I think you need it.” Tommy took the blue from Ghostbur’s hand, holding it tightly against his chest. He felt a huge weight being lifted from him. Standing up from his seat, Ghostbur made his way to the wall adorned with picture frames, ones that he saw had him in it. Back turned away from him, Ghostbur spoke again, “Where do you think we are?”

Tommy paused for a second, his form shrinking into the chair. “I don’t know,” Tommy said softly. “I just remember waking up in the middle of the field.” His voice began to waver, he felt like dropping to the floor and crumbling right there. Ghostbur turned towards him, walking over to him slowly. Kneeling in front of Tommy, he looked him in the eyes. “It’s going to be alright,” Ghostbur cooed to him. “You’re in a safe place now.”

In all honesty, Ghostbur was just as shocked to find Tommy in his safe haven, more conflicted by the fact that Dream had been behind Tommy’s death. Tommy had come to him in the form of a small child. The form he remembered 6-year-old Tommy used to be when he came running to his older brother Wilbur when he got a scraped knee, or when he needed a shoulder to cry on.

Ghostbur doesn’t remember much about Tommy, but he does know that Wilbur cared a lot about him. He knew that he had to make things right.

Taking a deep breath, he sighed. “What do you remember?” Walking off to a different corner of the house, Ghostbur picked up a book with a pencil that sat snug in it. “Hold on, why don’t we write this down..” Ghostbur took a seat at the chair next to Tommy’s, looking up at him to signal him to speak. Tommy cleared his throat, “Well...I remember you.” Ghostbur hummed, writing down what he had said. “I remember the revolution...the blowing up of L’manberg…”

“But I also remember being in this house...being with you and Technoblade..”

Ghostbur continued to hastily write the words out, listening intently to Tommy’s trailing thoughts.

“And I remember Tubbo.” Ghostbur stopped his focus, pencil going slack in his grasp.

“Wilbur, do you know where Tubbo is?”

“Of course I do, he’s somewhere safe.”

“Can we visit him? I don’t remember the last time I’ve seen him..”

“Yes, but I don’t think that will be for a while, Tommy.”

Tommy shook his head in disagreement, “But I want to see him now.” Ghostbur looked at him sadly, “With time.”

Tommy quieted down. Closing the book, Ghostbur gazed at the child. “Is that all you remember right now?”

“Sorry, it just comes in bits and pieces..”

“No need to apologize, most of it will come back soon.”

“We’ll call this Tommy’s Memory Book.”

[matchamorphosis]

𝑀𝐸𝐿𝐿𝐼𝐿𝐿𝐴 𝐶𝐴𝑅𝑅𝐼𝑆𝐼𝑀𝐴

𝑙𝑖𝑡𝑡𝑙𝑒 ℎ𝑜𝑛𝑒𝑦 𝑑𝑒𝑎𝑟𝑒𝑠𝑡, 𝑦𝑜𝑢’𝑟𝑒 𝑠𝑤𝑒𝑒𝑡𝑛𝑒𝑠𝑠 𝑖𝑠 𝑎𝑑𝑑𝑖𝑐𝑡𝑖𝑛𝑔.

𝑠𝑢𝑚𝑚𝑎𝑟𝑦 || our beloved and sweet Steve Rogers tries to boost his sweethearts mood with music, pasta and art.

𝑔𝑒𝑛𝑟𝑒 || fluffiest fluffy fluff

𝑝𝑎𝑖𝑟𝑖𝑛𝑔 || avenger!steve rogers × black!fem!reader

𝓌𝑜𝓇𝒹 𝒸𝑜𝓊𝓃𝓉 | 3.1K

𝑤𝑎𝑟𝑛𝑖𝑛𝑔𝑠 || 18+ sfw, depression mention, anxiety mention, a little bit of crying, red pasta sauce on white shirts, a lot of kissing, steamy scenes hinting smut but not detailing it any further, cringe poetry at the end. — minors do interact —

𝑠𝑜𝑛𝑔 𝑝𝑟𝑜𝑚𝑝𝑡𝑠 || be my baby by the ronnettes . man on the moon by zella day . adore you by harry styles

𝑤. 𝑛𝑜𝑡𝑒 || i’ve been meaning to get this idea out and I finally managed to do so! pretty please like, reblog, and comment what you guys think and if you like my content follow me to see more of my future works! anyways, enjoy reading cherubs!

he notices the shift in the air.

the lack of your smiles and sweet giggles around the house. the house always silent now without you passionately speaking about a novel or book your obsessed with.

an absence of blasting music you would usually play when you’re experimenting with a new recipe. the soft music of your soothing humming as you take care of the vegetable and flower garden. or simply just openly talking about your plans that you’ve planned to him.

instead of being enveloped in the virtuous sunshine that you were. spreading your rich buttery rays— a grey cloud has formed. for you wake in silence, cook in silence, just breathe in silence.

it’s not good silence… it’s a grey silence that sets a dreary fog in the sunny Brooklyn brownstone. Steve has been wanting to know what’s upsetting you so sorrowfully yet the move to confront you about it isn’t the touch up he really wants.

the night before when you tucked yourself in bed his thoughts instantly knew that tomorrow was going to be your day. all for you and specially catered for you and only you to give your heart whatever it needed.

anything to see his sweetheart smile again and to hear the symphony of her laughter.

the morning comes and Steven wakes before you, showers and prepares a breakfast in bed meal fit for a fairy queen in those mystic fairy tales. bringing it to you when you stretch your arms and legs on the crisp cotton sheets of your shared bed.

♡ naked you are from the precious love making from the night before, your eyes widen at the tray in Steve’s hands and he smirks when your eyes gaze to his bare chest that isn’t covered by the white button up

♡ “good morning sweetheart,” he says steadily placing the tray to your sheet covered lap, you quirk and eyebrow to him, it’s mainly you who makes the breakfast because he always makes the pancakes lumpy with unsifted flour and eggs crunchy with shells

♡ waiting eyes filled with adoration he’s looking down on you just waiting or you to take a bite of his self made meal and you look down with a shaking laugh before taking the fork besides the plate of pancakes and taking a bite in them

♡ as you expected you bit into a lump of raw batter yet you forced the swallow the bite down, covering the thick taste of pancake batter with a fresh bite of a strawberry

♡ “they weren’t any good were they? try the eggs- and I promise no egg shells this time!” he explains taking the plate of pancakes and moves the steaming small plate in front of you, and you’re surprised as you notice the eggs weren’t abnormally dry and cold or runny with excess butter and milk

♡ the eggs go into a yellow contrast against the colorful colors of red peppers, chives, and mushrooms with little pieces of bacon here and there you were willing to actually enjoy this

♡ lifting your fork you look up at his eager eyes as you take a bite of his eggs and your utmost surprised to find them delicious, your mouth watery for another bite

♡ and with that other bite steve smiles and internally praises the aggressive five step Gordon Ramsey YouTube video he watched

♡ sure he wasted eight eggs and a ton of your garden vegetables in making the perfect scrambled eggs for you but it was worth it seeing you finishing the last bits of fluffy egg

♡ you wash it down with a cup of coffee steve prepared for you, humming in delight, one of the many things steve rogers can get right and not overthink is the right amount of sugar and cream in your coffee

♡ the soft sips between you two as you both enjoy your cooling cups, steve opens the rest of the soft curtains of the large windows letting the sunlight fill the room you keep the cool white sheet against your chest

♡ finally feeling like today is going to be a good day you find that it couldn’t get better when you lightly gasp as steve trips on the small persian rug, spilling some of the lukewarm bitter liquid from his daisy yellow mug onto his white button up

♡ the laugh that exerts you is untamable but the playful glare of steve’s stare also is as he takes of the button up and throws it into the woven laundry basket in the corner of the room, taking a slight advantage as you gaze upon his muscled structure

♡ the jump from his position to the bed is heavy enough on the mattress that you bounce up, causing the coffee in your mug to spill on you

♡ the gasp that follows steves laugh is return by your piercing glare as you settle the coffee mug down on the night dresser besides you

♡ smacking steve’s shoulder away as he attempts to draw closer and closer to your exposed chest, having you soaked the white sheets with the brown liquid your neck and upper chest are sticky with coffee and smelt like it to

♡ “go away, i’m mad at you,” you murmur but you don’t even attempt to push steves face away from your neck, his tongue licking the sweet coffee from your skin

♡ “c’mon sweetheart, even when I made you breakfast and fucked you good last night,” he says, the same devious tongue sliding down from your collarbones dips to the space between your cleavage and steve snuggles his face in the warm of it

♡ the sun's glare streaming from the open windows shine on you two as you feel steve’s muscled arms wrap around your waist, “steven?” you quirk although those strong arms are swift enough to carry you over his shoulder, a giggle leaves your mouth as you’re carried from your bed to the bathroom

♡ steve starting the shower, the steaming water and gentle soap foam scrubs cleanse the sticky coffee from both your skin but it seemed the coffee wasn’t the only sticky warm essence that needed to be cleaned from both your skin

♡ the afternoon rolled by, the steamy interactions of you and steve in the shower ended hours ago however the same teasing is still persisting as you two prepare your lunch

♡ you and him have loved the pasta in that one restaurant he took you on a date months ago, and it was like a single sparking magnet as you two both said that pasta would be great this evening

♡ so immediately, you jumped from your side of the couch forgetting the remote in your hands as you surfed through the channels and he followed you after dog earring his current page of his book

♡ and for once in a short while cooking in your own kitchen is bringing you joy again, the chopping board in front of you presenting the sliced tomatoes fresh from your garden, you’re thrilled that this summer beared more than last years crop

♡ turning your head over your shoulder you see steve hovering over the stove, stirring the minced garlic and onions that soak and simmer in the olive oil in the large pot, slightly moving his shoulders and hips to the upbeat temple of The Ronettes

♡ you shake your hips turning and walking by his side, his eyes never leaving yours he stirs the mixture as you place the tomatoes in the steaming pot the delicious hiss of the juicy redness basking in the garlicky onion oil has you both hovering your noses over the pot and taking a deep inhale, giggling as you two let the pot come to a heavy simmer

♡ you refill your empty glass with wine again, noticing steves is empty as well you refill his as you savor in the open mouthed neck kisses, teasfully scolding steve as he bites

♡ the music coming from the small tiny stereo is impossible for it to flood the thoughts in your mind but it seems to do its lyrical magic as steve takes you by the hand and twirls, hands at your hips and yours on his broad shoulders you dance and waltz around the grand white marble kitchen

♡ the misplaced steps eased with wine soaked giggles and chuckles, the smell of the ready tomato sauce, shredded parmesan, and homemade flour pasta dough transport you two to that lovely date you two had at the italian restaurant months ago

♡ even though you two can dance forever, both your tired feet hurry to complete your homemade meal; the sight of the red sauce drenching the thick noodles with the shredded pieces of cheese on top and the buttered bread basket have you both hurrying to prepare the lunch outdoors

♡ dressing the backyard table handsomely, the checkered red and white table cloth covers the rusty ancient metal the scene beautiful around the vast flowers and green vegetation

♡ white china plates along with the companying wine glass, shiny forks and napkins go atop; the bottle of red wine and pot of pasta in the middle you complete the table with a vase of fresh plucked flowers

♡ steve grabs your waist from behind, you lace your fingers with his as you find your both swaying side by side, you move your head to see steves eighth glass empty softly smiling as his lips reach down to kiss your cheek

♡ it only makes him wrap his arms around you tighter; “dear?” interrupting his trail of kisses he only hums a response, continue to dance while adorning your neck with his wine-suckled lips

♡ “what are you doing?” the deep giggle from your lips is replaced with a moan once you feel his fingers rub your cunt through your blue gingham sundress

♡ “i’m sorry darling but I can’t think when you’re around, you drive me,” he whispers and that makes you smirk, “you can’t get drunk steven, may I remind you that dreaded blessing doesn’t grace you,”

♡ that remark is disregarded as you moan yet again when his hand creeps under the hem of the dress, trailing his fingers to rub the wetness of your underwear

♡ “I get drunk off your love, you are indeed a blessing in disguise,” he hums in your ear

♡ “and what would the disguise be? dreaded?” your voice slightly weak although you keep your best to respond in the same teaseful manner

♡ “when I get drunk off your love, I understand more and more that anything dreaded about you is how addicting your love is.”

♡ that helps ease the uneasiness in your belly a little but your quietness isn’t so reassuring so he twirls you in the spot, he will not have you unhappy on this special day

♡ “let’s eat baby, I hate to waste our meal to only dig into the one in front of me,” his words reel a bashful smile from you and you two find your way to your table, finally forking the cheesy pasta into your mouths it goes excellent along with the buttered rolls and glasses of wine

♡ forceful after forkful, glass after glass you two talk just how you two used to and the feeling fills the anxiety riddled hole in your chest, he enjoys the strong smiles and giggles from you as you both childishly slurp your pasta and wine

♡ a loud drunken snicker spills from your mouth when his forkful of pasta lands on his white button up again and again, the poor white article stained with red pasta sauce and red splotches of wine, his second one of the day

♡ “steven I fear for the next white button up in your closet,” you giggle and he rolls his eyes at you however a smug smirk forms as he shrugs his shoulders

♡ “you’re right dear, I wouldn’t want to add onto our laundry,” he says and you smile while taking a sip of your wine and he disguards the stained article of clothing to the empty chair besides him

♡ the white wifebeater showcasing his thick arms and toned chest, the yellow sun rays seem to fully bask his body, creating a golden glow against his skin

♡ even when you could unashamedly stare at him forever you feel your face heating up as his smirk and sexually provoking stare meets your eyes

♡ you roll your eyes at his handsome smug face, looking down at your plate, your forkful of pasta in one hand and glass in the other

♡ steve goes back to his pasta however his wandering hands rest on your knee and you aren’t surprised how you practically melt just from that action

♡ “try to not make a mess of yourself steven, you’re doing the laundry this week,” you slyly smirk giggling when he keeps attempting to slip his fingers in between your tightly shut thighs

♡ “don’t worry about me doll, but I can smell your mess from here,” he smirks and you’re breathless as you open your legs and allow his fingers dip into your mess

♡ pure loveliness that’s what you embodied, lying upon the crisp white sheets of cotton the sunlight creates a glowing aura around you

♡ a pencil in his hand he does his best to captivate and illustrate the hills and bends, the dips and curves of your smooth bare skin

♡ the colors are vivid and bright in the cerulean rises of his eyes, the shiny green grass beneath the thin white sheet, your rich skin in the peachy pink sheer drape, the golden rays shining down against the apples of your cheek

♡ how is steve capable of capturing all of this?

♡ there is a twinkle in your eyes, a smile pulling on your shiny lips, the perplexed uncertainty displayed on your lover's face is humorous; the way his fist is under his jaw as he looks in pure concentration at his sketch

♡ you eyeing his bare chested physic is ironic, that now you are mentally sketching your lover as he sits unknowingly mistaken as to what to do to improve his sketch of you, it seems like the universe has planned you two to be parallels

♡ steve looks like the white marble statues those genius architectures long ago spent decades trying to perfect, to make the boulder of marble into something someone could worship

♡ the warm cloud buzzing in your chest is truly youthful and pure knowing this carved marble Adonis is yours, the truth has you smiling to yourself, the sweet sight he’d see all the time despite the few days you were in your sad blue

♡ the joyful beam so pearly white and charming it reminds steve of the beautiful women who covered his mother’s makeup tins, he seems to keep marveling at your beauty instead of sketching

♡ “dear?” your voice soft and smooth it awakens him and moves his eyes from your bare thighs to your eyes, and that’s what he has gone wrong, your eyes; he was never good with drawing eyes and it be an insult trying to draw yours

♡ “yes dear?” his voice coming off an octave deeper the angel he has his head makes a few blond hairs fall from his hairline to his eyes and you giggle

♡ gliding your fingers through the golden locks moving them away to see his blue irises digging into yours, but yours are down to the pink plumpness of his mouth

♡ it’s a tell on the neediness although the sharp features he possesses makes you bat away shy and steve laughs this time

♡ one of his hands softly grabbed your turning face, the smile you both share individually is childish and pure like young school children sharing a kiss at recess

♡ although you two aren’t children the way steve smirks at your state and how your hands touch all the right spots on steve chest is making you guys feel young

♡ if only the sun didn’t have to set you two can bask in the yellow sunlight and enjoy your session of naked body sketches, baskets of strawberries and diamond glasses of rosè

♡ but when your lips touch, the sun doesn’t set nor does it rise for the feel of your mouth against his makes all of humanity reset, the blissful seconds of the warm sunlight leaving your skin you have one another to keep you warm

♡ when your lips part the sun is disappearing in the sky and the moon begins to show herself, the honey bees not swarming the flowers they will return tomorrow morning

♡ the shadow presenting itself in the brick ground and grassy patch garden steve carries you in his arms into the house

♡ as you lay your head on his chest you know that blue feeling in your chest is slowly passing but as someone as patient as steve is to you and the kindness you give to yourself and to him you know

♡ tomorrow will be the different yet hold the same adoration as today, forever

♡ the poem steve has planned for reader that he will read to her before she goes to bed ♡

DEAREST LITTLE HONEY you are a gift for the mind and soul, your sweet remarks and actions are like the buzzing bees of spring. collecting and gathering the yellow pollen, you gently pluck the saturation just from a touch. a shoulder, hand, cheekbone you collect all the sweet smelling pollen from me, yet you give it back.

but how? you may ask, a bumble bee does not give back the pollen it took from a flower! but it does, it returns the pollen from the flower, from time to time in quick seconds with devoted speed, time and amity.

it passes the pollen from flower to flower, till it’s love sprouts thousands more. and the flower the bee started with does not grow old but it eventually releases its seeds of opportunity. for the act of one simple flower, one kind favor sprouted the love and devotion of a thousand. and we should know that I am not a small flower fearing the love of the bumble bees anymore but a field of flowers that continue growing passionately. I am a product, the very nature of the aftermath of your sweetness, my dearest little honey

[ahsxual]

Perfect Day

Pairing: Arthur Fleck x Reader

Summary: You and Arthur are excited for your first date, since it's an essencial key for your relationship.

Genre: Fluff

Warning: sexual harassment (literally one sentence, nothing too serious)

Word count: 2,7k

A/N: I don't know how to feel about this one... I wanted it to be romantic and cute, yet I feel this isn't enough to express my feelings for him... anyways, I really hope your opinion is different! :)

Gif Credits: @arthurflecc <33

Today is the day I will finally find true happiness, Arthur thought. Last day, you invited him to have dinner at your place, since none of you could afford an actual date, and that way you could spend some time alone. You work with him as female clown for a couple weeks now and that's where you met him: he, besides Gary, was the only one who's truly kind and respectful, not some jerk like Randall who would always make some unwanted comments on how pretty you are. With that, Arthur got the courage to defend you, a gesture you noticed and really appreciated. That's when you decided to invite him as a thank you gift for what he has done (and maybe because you thought he was really cute and a real gentleman).

To Arthur, that morning seemed brighter than any other he had lived: he could swear that the birds were singing to him, like it was a sign from nature and destiny telling everything was going to finally be ok... as long as he was by your side. This time, the sky wasn't covered by depressive and heavy gray clouds like every other day: instead, it was replaced by the sweet scalding yellow sun and the gorgeous shade of baby-blue. Even the stairs weren't painful to walk anymore and the runs to the bus weren't as stressed and tiring as they used to be. He came down the stairs bouncing with joy, like he was a kid who just got his favorite ice-cream flavor for free. People even looked at him awkwardly, but he couldn't care less. Nothing could ruin this day to him.

Once he entered Haha's, his heart started to beat way too fast once he realized he would see you in a matter of seconds. He couldn't wait any longer, so he quickly ran to the room of clowns, hoping for you to be the first thing he would lay his eyes on once he got there.

"Hi, Arthur!" you happily said as soon as you saw him, realizing that he had been standing there for a while, staring sweetly at you. However you didn't mind: you knew his intentions were utterly good.

"H-hi Y/n! You... you are very... b-beautiful today." he finally got the courage to praise you, to speak his mind out loud, even if he stuttered meanwhile. He was with his red waistcoat and pants, and a white social shirt, an outfit that suits him just perfectly.

"Oh, thank you, you look really good too! And I'm glad you liked it, I want to look good for our tonight's date." you teased him, just to see his cheeks turn redder than they already were. You were with your date's outfit on, because you were planning to go home right after you left Haha's. You wanted to surprise him, however he arrived sooner than you expected, so you didn't have the time to change into your clown's work outfit.

"A date??" he seemed surprised for you considering your meeting an actually date.

"Yeah, sure. Don't you want to call it that way?"

"Yes!! I mean, i-if you want to..." he correct himself, after realizing he sounded too excited than he should.

"Ok, great! Can't wait for tonight." you said gladly, earning a sweet tooth wide smile from him.

"Me too Y/n, me too..." after sharing an intense and intimate exchange of glances, you decided to break the reconforting silence between you. That silence told and shared way more emotions than any possible spoken word, but you couldn't risk any other coworker complain about you two to Hoyt.

"Well, I'm going to get ready now. Talk to you later, ok?"

"Uh... sure." he understood, giving you once again a thin, shy smile.

You both did your work for the rest of the day, not wanting your secret love to interfere and prejudice your professional life. Both of you knew how demanding your boss could be, so you better not test his limits.

The day was finally near to its end, so you went to your locker to collect your belongings and then change into your clothes, before joining Arthur who was already waiting for you outside.

"Are you ready?" you asked once you got near him.

"Absolutely." he calmly, yet enthusiastic answered. You wanted to overcome your shyness, so you slowly interlocked your arms with his. You could tell that he was a little hesitant by the sudden affectionate gesture and seemed to paralyzed, looking intensely at the spot where your arms found each other.

"Arthur? Are you ok?" you were scared that you crossed the line without meaning it.

"Y-yeah! I'm sorry, I'm just... not used to being touched..." he got upset, remembering how miserable and lonely his life was... but not anymore. That's the past, and now you are more then willing to change radically his and your future as well, putting all that suffering and intense pain far far away behind him.

"It's ok Art, you are safe with me, I promise you that. But if I do something that makes you uncomfortable, please let me know." before your lovely night started, you needed to make sure that he would be comfortable: you wouldn't forgive yourself if anything bad happened to the man who supported you and made you feel like the only beautiful woman alive, and you being the responsible for it.

"Thank you, Y/n. That's really nice of you... I really appreciate that." he made that sweet stare towards you, one that makes you melt right away every time.

"Come on Art, my stomach is already complaining." he happily laughed, and you acknowledged his smile.

When you arrived home, it was impossible for you not to notice: he was quiet, yet so observant with everything: sometimes he would even touch so softly your belongings, and you would just smile, feeling nothing but comfort and acceptance. How can anyone consider me as someone so essential and special in their lives?, you deeply thought. But that's just how Arthur was: he always manages to feel like it's only you and him against the world, the rest being irrelevant.

"What do you want to eat? I can make your favorite plate... or at least I can try." you softly laughed, feeling a little nervous by your kitchen skills. You really wanted to impress Arthur... especially on your first of many dates. He then looked at you with wide eyes, swallowing his dry throat from growing anxiety. "What's the matter? Did I do anything wrong?" you started to get even more nervous than you already were, now being you having your mouth and throat dry.

"No, no, you didn't do anything wrong! I-I just..." he paused for a moment, not being able to look at you since he felt very ashamed. "I'm not hungry... I'm sorry..." he said slowly with a low voice, derived from his embarrassment.

"Oh..." you felt a little sad if you were honest: you bought a bunch of food so he could choose freely what he wanted to eat and make this day special by making him a surprise... but you couldn't blame him: you knew about the secondary effects from the meds he takes, the lack of hunger being one of them. "It's fine, don't worry about it." you tried to relax him, which you did since he offered you a kind smile right after, just like his big, yet fragile heart. You tried to think of something else: you couldn't miss this opportunity to be with him, both of you being so busy with your lives that the time you spend together is absolutely rare and precious, being as valuable as gold, or diamonds, or even more. "I got an idea!" a cliche, yet romantic idea came to your mind. "What about... seeing a movie? Or a tv show that you really like? While eating popcorn, obviously." you winked at him.

"Sounds like fun." he smiled. "But... I-I never... ate popcorn. Never had the chance to try it..." he shyly said. You felt bad for him... in our childhood, it's the most delicious thing to eat, a sweet that brings us joy, happiness and even peace, for some. But now, him being in his middle 30's, how has he never eaten or at least tried it?

"Then seems like you're going to have this delicious experience with me instead!" you gently laughed, trying to make him more comfortable. This time he gave you a toothy grin, staring at you like he was in heaven and you were the only pure angel in it. You blushed at his staring, so you decided to look away and do the popcorns instead. "Make yourself at home! You can sit on the sofa if you want." you offered while pointing to the most comfortable furniture you had. He instantly obeyed you, sitting on it awkwardly since he was afraid of doing something wrong that could annoy you. Yup, that was definitely the last thing he wanted to do... mainly on this special day.

Once you finish the popcorn, you sat right next to him, being way closer than he expected. Not that he minded, no no, not at all, but he couldn't help but to shake unstoppably by the complex emotions he was feeling from the warm and soft human contact... from the most perfect human being in his eyes.

"Before we watch it, I want you to prove this delight first. But you have to close your eyes! It will taste better, I promise." you grabbed one popcorn kernel and signaled him to open his mouth. He instantly felt tenser and his frail heart started to beat furiously because of your gesture. If someone had told him when he first saw you, that he would come to your house and spend these moments with you, he would've laughed by the immense unlikelyhood. But here he is: in your house, with you. He shakingly opened his mouth, slowly closing his big ocean eyes right after. When he tasted it, it was like he was 7 again, living his lost happy childhood: it was sweet, crunchy and tasted like happiness, this feeling amplified with you by his side. "How is it?" you curiously asked while smiling by his reaction.

"This is so... wow." that's all he could say.

"You want more? This bowl can be just for you, I will do more for myself." the moment you got up, you felt your arm being gently, yet firmly grabbed.

"Wait!" he suddenly said, removing his hand from your arm right after, not wanting to scare you away. "I-I'd rather share them with you... i-if that's ok..." His shyness was something you could never be tired of: it's one of the words that describe him the best, making him look immensely cute to your eyes. You felt genuinely happy because he was making a move on you: as little or even insignificant that gesture was to everyone else, it meant the world to you.

"Sure, sharing is always better, right?" you shared a glare that spoke the untold love for each other, yet not unknown. "So... what do you want to see?" you finally asked.

"I don't know... maybe-" suddenly he noticed the tv, that was already on, presented the Murray Franklin show, catching immediately his attention. "Murray!!" once he saw it, it was like his shyness was never there: the carefree and excited Arthur who you never had the chance to meet, was now shown. You even felt jealous for a moment, seeing all his attention was now in the show.

"Oh, you like Murray? I watch him from time to time, the show is really funny." he turned his attention to you again, seeming surprised by your answer.

"You do...?" his grin shined even more once he discovered you had more things in common, one of them being something he admires and even considers as a dream, the main goal in his professional life.

"Of course! Who doesn't like to laugh and relax after a tiring day of work? Laughing is the best medicine for happiness." his smile broke, slowly decreasing into nothing. "I mean, when you really want to laugh, not when you have to." you remembered his condition, so you corrected yourself.

"I heard that my whole life, so I guess you're right..." he seemed mindful, looking and playing with his own worn hands. You gently grabbed his hand into yours.

"Don't worry Arthur, I'll make sure you really laugh, not just because you can't control it or because you forcely have to. I promise you... I will do my best to make you happy everyday." these moments and words were unforgettable to him. He couldn't see his life without you anymore: the only way he could be truly happy is by your side, the only way he could survive... is only by your side.

"Thank you, Y/n. I... I-I really enjoy these moments I spend with you. They're the only thing that make me feel happy and alive. You make me feel like... like I'm real and seen... and you have no idea how much that is important to me." you felt so proud of him for being able to speak from his mind and heart without hesitance, and utterly special for being the only one who entirely owned his trust.

"You don't need to thank me, Art. It's my pleasure to be with you, a man who's so kind and respectful like you. If others can't see it, it's not your fault. Like I use to say, it's their loss for not seeing someone so good in front of them. But I can see it... and we all only need the ones who really care about us in our lives, the rest is just the rest. They don't matter." now was your turn to speak the honest truth. He didn't have to say anything for you to understand how right and perfect he thought you were: it was like destiny was telling him to not let you escape... because you are his soulmate, his one and only person who came to this world with the purpose of filling him, to fill his heart with pure love, compassion and comprehension. "Oh, the show has already started!" both of you were so distracted or, should I say, so concentrated on each other, that you didn't even notice what was happening around you: the world always stops when you are together.

Once you decided to see the show, you shared the made popcorn and some laughs, Arthur always making sure you would laugh when he would. Every time Murray made a joke, Arthur looked at you, concentrated on your expressions while admiring your beauty. It was an incredible spent night: you laughed, ate popcorn together, supported each other... with time, you even hugged him softly, only for him to gladly return it, yet shyly, as predicted. If you two were honest, you would admit that you wanted so badly to share a sweet, passionate and meaningful first kiss... but that has to be preserved for your future dates, since the respect you have for one another it's incomparable to any other: you want things to happen naturally, without hurry, because what begins fast... ends quickly as well, and that's the last thing you want to happen, for sure.

This was the last piece of the puzzle that was needed to finally go forward your relationship: you belong to each other, like your hearts are attached and only function correctly when you are together, like the universe had and still has wonderful plans for you... and both of you are so glad to finally be able to be by your soulmate's side... forever.

[mochuelovelli]

GAAAAHHH OKAY

Let's talk about the Timephoon Episodes

This is such an old topic of discourse but after reading many fanfics, videos, and some posts on the subject I have found little divergent takes on the whole subject.

While commentators are of the mind that, for the most part, the punishment and execution of said punishment for Louie's actions were partially if not fully justified but how she went about it was wrong.

Some fanfic writers and some subsects of the fandom but they are much more critical and often in a more black and white interpretation. Which is valid for vent art. However, I find both these portrayals to be lacking in some nuance.

Specifically when it it comes to who's to blame for the next 3 episodes, and to me, its more than just Della (and Louie but there really isn't much discourse here).

Let's start with Timephoon:

This pretty much solidifies their relationship throughout the episode[Also sorry for no captions]. Multiple times Della is shown to have a very laissez faire style of parenting as she primarily wants her kids to enjoy being kids and having fun. This is probably in part to her personality in general - which is probably what Beakley assumes here - however it is also her want to be loved by her children and even more critically, she doesn't ever want them to suffer like she did. Above all else, she wants them to be happy and feel confident in themselves. We see this in all the previous episode with her and her kids - From Dewey and reassuring him that he doesn't need to prove himself to her [notably in this episode she only shows concern when Dewey himself is in danger, she doesn't give a shit when he almost kills her] to Huey and helping him to have the most fun he possibly can, to even Webby and making sure that she also feels confident in herself regardless in how she goes about things.

Bringing up all these adventures does raise some pretty damning hypocrisy. Della encourage Dewey's reckless behavior in his episode. The lesson at the end wasn't, okay maybe we shouldn't be going on dangerous adventures, it was its okay to be afraid and you don't need to prove to me that you're great I already know you are. Huey's message was similar, albeit more low stakes. Webby's lesson wasn't even that she shouldn't be trying to take such risks to find adventure in the future, it was just a lesson in not being disappointed when things don't work the way you want.

So why wasn't Louie's adventure treated the same? Well... let's look at some more examples of Beakley V Della this episode before we answer that -

This is right before the kids find Bubba, Beakley's reaction is what most people would consider to be parental as she is concerned for the safety of the kids running out in a hurricane. Again we see Della acting casual.

Once Bubba is inside and Huey geeks out about him, Beakley actually smiles bc she knows that something like this means a lot to Huey [keep this in mind for l8r]. She only gets serious after Della says it's neat without much after thought so she gives the lesson of the episode - "Small problems become big problems later if not prevented early."

Next we have Della's faux attempt at being strict with her kids. Letting the irresponsible thing happen as long as they are "safe". While also harkening back to her previous episodes where she also is shown to have this attitude that "the kids can do anything as long as they are safe with ME or Scrooge or another SAFE adult", it is also good to note SCROOGE'S expression here to her patting herself on the back for her parenting. Now he could just be confused as to why Della is taking this "lesson" as a win, but he could be noticing that she really doesn't know what she is doing but unlike Beakley doesn't make any attempts to correct this.

Another scene that people often forget when reviewing this episode, just like with all her other kids she at first takes LOUIE'S side and decides they should just roll with the punches like always. Which honestly is sort if valid because that's kinda Scrooge's whole MO; though he also had others to there to keep him afloat but we all know someone like Scrooge, Della, and the kids hardly see that. I also want to hammer home that, just like with the other boys, she doesn't shy away from displaying that she loves them ALL. A few seconds later, it's subtle but she is shown smiling and patting Louie on the head because like the other kids she just wants him to feel supported. If I was to be critical, I would say this is possibly because she likes the IDEA of her boys more than them but I mean - this is pretty much everyone's attitude towards kids. It might be amplified bc of her trauma but it's not unusual. But even still I would argue that she mainly does love the boys for who they are as she is excited to get to know them.

After Della figures that they are looking for a "master thief", Scrooge and Beakley immediately know it's one of the kids. Shocking her since she later states she is of the belief that her kids are too "good" to do something like this. I also want to bring attention, again, to Beakley smiling (ik im putting a lot of stock into expressions but animation tends to do stuff like this for a reason). She is smiling at whom she expects is Dewey for messing with time and space. Bc even if she planned to scold him, she knows it's just their normal. Scrooge seems to also be of the same mind. Later Beakley gives a really good line about "Even good kids can do dumb things. We got to make sure those dumb things don't turn into bad things like destroying all of existence!".

Mrs. B exists stage right

All jokes aside, this must have been a nightmare for all of them but especially Della. She had just finally admitted that she was out of her depth and made another mistake in parenting. But now it seems like she lost her chance to rectify that. Because for all she knows, Mrs. B will never come back. This is import-ALLRIGHTWEGETIT

Della is then shown explicitly worried about her family. Emotions, insecurities and fear obviously getting the best of her. We don't know exactly what she is thinking but we know she is terrified of the possibility of losing one of her kids. When she asks about Louie, she probably thinks he must have disappeared without her knowing. That she might have already failed more than she could know, because she wasn't there to protect him. She doesn't know - she is "Della Duck" and she doesn't know how to fix this. She didn't expect everything to go so horribly wrong, but that's her theme isn't it?

She is both relieved and understandably PISSED when finding that Louie was responsible for almost destroying the fabric of reality (let me say this again, nearly destroying the fabric of reality). She goes scold both herself and her son about the danger he put them in. Later we see Della, the last one leave and seeing almost everyone she loves vanish. We don't know how long each of the characters who left were in the past but we can assume it was long enough to have to change clothes. Yeah this was probably more of a visual gag but like, the other past characters didn't change their outfits when they came to the present so - (also Launchpad was specific about knowing how the world ends so he had to be there enough for him to understand it). Side note someones gotta write fanfic of these characters time misadventures. I wonder if Dewey and Webby ran into Agent 22.

[Last picture of the infamous scene, side note did anyone notice Launchpad NODDING his head when Della mentioned his time schemes could've cost them their future? He's the only one who knows what happened so maybe Louie's misadventure has more impact than we think-]

Anyways, yeah we know what was said here. But I think it's important to see the reaction the other adults (sorry LP, and Gryo i GUESS) have here BC this is basically why I made this post. What Della decided to do was unquestionably the wrong decision, at least her way of going about it and I will not absolve her of her many MANY mistakes. However, let's remember she wasn't alone in any of this. She was with other parental figures who KNOW more about her kids than she does.

After Louie leaves, why did they think it was good to encourage this course of action? Why did they think giving full parental control to a PTSD, trauma survivor who barely got back less than a month ago was a good idea? Sure it's one thing to not want to overstep your boundaries but are you telling me they wouldn't want to guide her in the right direction at least? We KNOW both Beakley AND Scrooge have their grievences towards Della's parenting strategy or lack there of. Beakley so far doing the most to try and put her in the right direction (which speaks volumes to the problems Scrooge has).

So why wouldn't they explain that, hey, maybe taking away the one thing your kid thinks he is good at ISNT a great idea? Why didn't either say anything about their two day vacation? Something that came up presumingly on a whim and might of prevented (although i doubt it) Louie from trying to steal w/ time? He might have considered pushing back time schemes at least 3 days later. While Mrs. Beakley might be less aware of Louie's insecurities and ambitions, Scrooge definitely isn't. He should have talked to her, and hey we don't see what happens before they leave so maybe MAYBE they did. But again, I doubt it. Seeing as how they all agreed with her at the end, I don't see them trying to meddle with her.

But they should've. They are both experienced guardians and they have nothing to say to her? Plus Donald (goddamn it i almost finished a post w/o him) have THEM responsibility to take care of the kids NOT Della. So they are obligated to help her. Really, the other option other than just well negligence would be not thinking this punishment was a big deal. I wish this aspect was also scrutinized just as much as Della and Louies role in this arc.

Beakley and Scrooge (more so Scrooge) are just as much to blame in what happens as Della if not MORE since they know of her situation in only a way that an experience adult can. There is no excuse for their negligence.

[spacehologramcollection]

Hello! Im a big fan of your MK posts. So, I have an idea (albiet cliché, lmao.) Anyway, I had to help my snake shed the other day. It gave me an idea, could you include some of the pets the MKCrew may have? Of course they wouldn't be cannon, but some creatures you could see them having. If you do decide to do it, please include Johnny Cage and Erron. Thank you!

Hi! I’m glad you enjoy my posts! :) And of course! I wrote this on the bus whilst a storm was happening! Rain, Raiden and Fujin must have been arguing! I loved this idea, it was so cute!!! Thank you for the request!I put a cut in because it was a bit long and didn’t want to clog the tags!Warnings; Mentions of Kano but it is a shitpost, when isn’t it? When I die, I want that on my grave ‘Shitposted about Kano a lot’

·        Sub-Zero (Kuai Liang); 110% a penguin. He fucking yeets an ice one at people in Injustice. He thinks their adorable. Plus, they mate for life, loyalty and sweet as fuck. They can live in cold temperatures (well most of them) So that’s perfect for him! And did he mention they are cute as fuck? I have some art of Sub feeding some penguins. Best thing I’ve ever bought.

·        Bi-Han; As Bi-Han he'd want a polar bear. Their soft and fluffy. But also, terrifying. Like, can you picture one of them, with Bi-Han on the back. Magical. Very scenic, enough to be on a card you send your aunt at Christmas. That and it’s better than Kuai’s fucking penguin. Fuck the penguins.

·        Noob; Is Saibot a pet? Potentially. He does lift him up and they do look ready to drop the hottest mix tape of 2019. But on a serious note. A bat. Cliché as fuck. But they like the dark, they hang upside down. Feared but oddly loveable. And they fit his new edgy "It’s not a phase Kuai!!!” aesthetic.

·        Smoke; A snake. Why? Low-key chilled. I imagine something like a ball python. Something that’s going to be chilled. That, and their perceived as scary as fuck, but are actually adorable. Just like he is! Will boop the snoot. It’s called Noodle and you cannot tell me otherwise. Sir Noodle of Noodleton. Would be his full title, has made him a little crown.  Will often bitch about people to it. Mainly about Bi-Han.

·        Kabal; A dog. He 110% has a dog. I agree with the general consensus he adopted a dog. He probably has a staffie. A fat, happy, rescue Staffie. It’s chilled, laidback but can be energetic. Just like him. This’ll only apply to Post-Burn Kabal. Pre-burn wants a dog. But knows he has no time... unless he’s got a cute neighbour who doesn’t mind dog sitting when he’s away. Now I want to write fluff about this HC.

·        Erron Black; either a horse or a deer.  A horse is an obvious shout. But like I don’t know why I’m saying deer. I can just imagine him explaining it to Kabal like “their majestic as fuck” and that’s probably the reason why I say deer. I imagine he’s the type of person to take people camping. Just to look at the fucking deer. He’d be like that vine, were someone sneezes and scars the deer off. “Oh, nice one Kano"

·        Cassie Cage; Going out on a limb here to say, she has a dog. And not a small dog either. I imagine she’s got a German Shepherd, but she gave it a really soft name. Just to psych people out. Like “Oh you wanna meet Snuzzles?” and it’s just this hulking ex-military dog she rescued. Scary on the outside. Soft on the inside.

·        Johnny Cat; Yeah, he’s got a Sphynx Cat. Where did it come from? It was A cat that was used on set for one of his movies. It was meant to be one of the baddies cats, but he could not stop fawning over it. And that’s how Beerus Snagglepuss came to be. He loves that fucking cat. It’s his mascot now. Matching sunglasses as well. Tweets about it loads.

·        Kano; Is an animal himself so doesn’t really have a pet.  I would not trust him with anything. Because I’m pretty sure in one of his taunts, he stabs and eats a lizard. Him and Baraka are similar on that field, but you know, Baraka is more of a gentleman and probably smells better.

·        Takeda; He wanted a rabbit. But Hanzo wasn’t having it. So, Jacqui being the absolute good-hearted princess she is, got him one to keep on the farm. Hoppy the bunny is its name. And it is so fucking soft. He loves it. Best gift ever. Just don’t tell Hanzo… Jax cannot believe he’s been saddled with a fucking rabbit. But he loves it too.

·        Havik; No pets but moths flock to him. Why? Because they are chaotic as fuck too. He is their lamp. Before opening Hotaru’s wardrobe and letting them in, so they can chew holes in his clothes. Chaossss.

·        Scorpion (Hanzo Hasashi); Does not own pets. But he has a soft spot for dogs and cats. He doesn’t have time for himself, let alone a pet. But like, when he spies a cat or dog. He kinda sneak pets it. He’ll make sure nobody is looking and BAM pets. Even if anyone saw him petting the cat, are they going to tell someone? No. Because nobody would fucking believe them.

·        Geras; Kronika is the type of person to say ‘I’m allergic to animal hair’ when she’s not. Just so nobody can have their pets around her. Sorry, not fucking sorry. So poor Geras has been lacking in the pet department. His eternal loneliness would be made a lot easier if she allowed him to have a pet. I honestly think he’d like cats, more specifically a quirky looking rescue cat. He’s alone and thinks he needs an equally as quirky companion.

·        Skarlet; I think she’d have a snake. Not a small one either. Like a massive python or a constrictor. She’d be the type to lounge around with her snake. She gives me major villainess vibes, but on a Dark Queen level. And I fucking love it. So yeah, I think a snake fits her aesthetically and personality wise. Scary on the outside but loveable. That is a running theme for most of the Kombat Krew, to be honest.

·        Raiden; He. Is. A. Cat. Person. He loves them. Oh my god look at their lil ears twitching. Legend says Sky Temple is a safe haven for strays. He just loves them. They are calming, cute and little sweethearts. He will never be caught fawning over them in front of others. But, showing him a cute cat is one sure way to get out of trouble. It’s why Kung Lao will bring the cutest one with him, when Raiden has requested a meeting. He can’t shout at him if he’s holding a purring bundle of joy.

·        Fujin; Whilst Fujin likes cats. I imagine he has a pet bird. Something like a Falcon, it’s not really a pet, but more of a wild friend. He respects nature too much. This bird will come constantly to see him, bring him messages and it’s a friendship that was built up over time. He likes birds because they need the wind to fly. They are also free to go anywhere they want and see everything and anything they want. Something he sort of envies. Plus, he loves the sound of them. The Dawn Chorus is the perfect meditation music.

·        Rain; Totally has a tiger or some exotic big cat. He is literally a Disney Princess to me at this point. Something that is intimidating to others but soft and sweet to him. I always imagine rich people have exotic pets and well this is it. I do not promote keeping them as pets. But if we are talking what they would canonically keep, it would be something like a big cat. Or maybe a peacock. Something flamboyant.

·        Jade; Even before the Kotal ship set sail. I always imagined Jade having an affinity with big cats. But unlike Rain, I kind of pictured Jade having more of an alliance and understanding with them. Rather than having one as a pet. Maybe one she rescued as a cub, raised up, set free and it comes and aids her from time to time. She is so perfect and has a heart of gold. It would be hard not to see this. I am getting all soft and fluffy imagining this now.

[kaoarika]

I rarely do written posts in Tumblr anymore because I am still figuring out how this new UI works in general (and there might be still be some bugs about writing posts + leaving them on drafts + publishing them accidentally as well), and tbh, between the past two months have been sorta chaotic and very mentally draining (besides some work I have been doing) and me attempting to think around some of my few active fandoms... well, haven’t had an eureka moment where I sit and write what I think about stuff.

So, let’s talk about some “stuff”.

Some days ago, I accidentally noticed by PURE CHANCE that some of the completed webtoons I was going to “eventually read” in LINE were going to get “locked”/converted  for Daily Pass. I mean, tbf, I knew that they were going to stick to this plan since past October, but it seems they really went full force this month (they only “locked” like a couple of series back then). And it’s exactly how I thought they would do so - popular series that have been already completed, old and recent.

I’m not going to complain about “Daily Pass” because I do have some thoughts about that and the fact they could use another model than just readers farming/buying coins, but, what do you do, especially since lots of these series are PRETTY long (140+ chapters long)?

My complaint does come from that, as a web user, I found this by pure chance, despite them saying they would announce what series would be locked in a 30-day advance notice. Because there’s no apparent indicator in the main page about THIS (The only Notice/News detail you see down below the page is about Canvas creators). Heck, I don’t think they even tell you about it in their mail newsletter, which kinda suck :))).

So, anyway.

I checked and, yes, a couple of VERY old series I was interested in reading were/are going to get locked. Problem, like I mentioned? THEY are pretty long! I know I can binge read as much as I want, but I cannot make miracles like reading over 100 chapters (if one series, try thinking about 2 or 3 -  I WAS NOT GOING TO DO THIS) in less than 12 hours! ESPECIALLY if those series were going to get locked THIS WEEK.

FML.

...anyway crisis was averted when I had to let go some interesting series that I may would get my way to read them (if there is a new buying/rental model they would apply) in the future... BUT I did read stuff I was curious or wanted to read... and mainly old stuff that I was willing to eventually finish one day.

Opinions on those series?

Okay, as brief and spoiler free as possible:

Untouchable: A story about modern-day vampires that instead of drinking blood, they have evolved to absorb the energy of their preys. This one is a romantic series about Sia, a vampire model and this human guy who has a very deep microphobia, and she puts her eyes on him when she realizes that his energy is like none she has tasted before. But, again, dude has microphobia (that is more or less controlled as time goes on).

I stopped reading this one for a while because  I was sorta smelling love triangle from a jealous friend of hers that OBVIOUSLY didn’t want to be looked as “just a friend”, lol. Like “how would this get solved”, kind of thing in your typical romance stuff. But then, last week I retook it... and it wasn’t as bad... but it leaks typical shoujo stuff/problems that become a newer obstacle as time goes on and on (misscomunication, lack of trust, overprotective family ANNOYINGLY hurting their own offspring, sudden deux ex machina...?). So, I think it finished fine... But man, I was so pissed off in how some stuff was managed at the end, lmao. Especially the way a “villain” was redeemed? I know that they say “karma is a b*tch”, but, DUDE KILLED PEOPLE BEFORE!? and you redeem him in a “lol, you will find out how love will make you feel” LIKe, DUDE, WHAT THE HELL. DON’T REDEEM HIM LIKE THAT.

Ghost Wife: I started reading this series in an unofficial manner a long while ago, but I supposed that the first chapters are pretty slow and it didn’t catch me on in the first place. It’s about a girl that starts seeing ghosts/spirits, and there’s this one that becomes WAY too attached to her, that offers her two options: either been eaten/killed or agreeing to be his wife. Given the title of thise series, you might wonder she accepted the second one

My lesson? Should have kept reading. The story picks up when other ghostly creatures are introduced and they start interacting with the main female character and her “ghost husband”, especially since this ghost cannot really imitate human interaction and his solution is “hypnotizing” everyone so he can “normally” fit. And the interaction between those two becomes more gracious and natural. You can feel that she likes being with him, despite the dangers of attracting ghosts that might kill her and all that. Heh.

Other lesson I had is that: the artist isn’t EXACTLY well into action scenes and some other details (but their ghostly creatures’ designs are TERRIFYING), so, I thought “well, I know there are other artists like this in the webcomic/webtoon environment, I shouldnt be too worried about my art once I get done with mine, right?

Also, some details started to make sense later on. And I cried like a baby in some moments, as well. Don’t have too many complaints, though. Perhaps more obvious “falling in love” moments... but then I realized that some actions speak lots better than words.

About Death: And speaking of “crying like a baby”, this one. This is a very old work, and it’s a gem, and it’s short, to top! And HECK, the art was AMAZING. Very touchy, and it makes you think. There’s quite a lot of South Korean webtoons that have made me cry because... they really make you think a LOT about stuff... especially about life and death.

Oh! Holy: Story about a shy and lonely loveable dork that is in love of his childhood friend, and that they eventually find each other in high school. Said childhood friend is idolized in school (but she is... hmmm... a dork as, well). Oh, he sees ghosts. OH, and she dies within the first three chapters accidentally :3. Shenanigans happen.

I HAD A LOT OF FUN WITH THIS ONE. SURE, it’s another shoujo but WAY less dramatic than Untouchable, because this was comedy (so, a rom-com!). And this one made me want more and more to read it. The characters all had an amazing personality, chemistry and their interactions were FUN AS HELL. The author seems to have my my sense of (dumb) humor, and the art was too attractive and knew where it should bright.

I don’t think I have too many complaints about this one. I may have felt unsatisfied in some minor stuff, but everything else felt “okay” to me, in general. 

A couple of things, though: localization and some quality stuff relating to translation in this series. I cannot judge the translation, but I do think it could have handled more quality checking on this one or proofreading, I’m not sure. I know that these (licensed and translated) series come in a weekly basis, but they REALLY need to pay more $$$ to their own staff to not let this stuff happen THAT frequent.

Localization is a bit of an issue I do HAVE though, and it is the same as in “Ghost Wife” and some other recent Korean series they have licensed in the recent past: Why using English-localized names, though? SURE, they retain their original last Korean names... but... why don’t keep their FULL NAMES, I wonder? I mean, weren’t we supposed to be over that kind of stuff already (videogames, JPN anime, manga other foregin stuff)? Is it because marketability? And/or because some names are “puns” that couldn’t easily be translateable in other languages? 

If it’s the latter, I think the same is applied in other regional language localization, like, in Spanish, original English language “Axed” is called “Natacha la del Hacha” and you cannot wonder how it crawls over my skin. I know this series is BUILT ON and is full of puns (as I am following it)... but... “Axelia” is a much more cooler name than “Natacha”... :I or so I THINK? Don’t take me too seriously...

In “Ghost Wife” I get it, you have spiritual creatures... their “human” names are puns of what they really are, and these words MAYBE don’t have too much meaning in English or Spanish or whatever... but... its a bit... glaring... when the main cast has English first names... and then you have a side character called... I dunno, “Soyeon” :I. or Haetae (a creature that didn’t have a human character name...) or, heck, characters that never appear again like... there was this “Damien” dude that for some reason, his name is slipped a couple of times as “Suho” (I wonder, his original name). But, then, you have people named “Liz”, “Drake”, “Sarah”, “Nathan” ????

I suppose that in “Oh! Holy” that might be the case, too. The original Korean name of the series is “오!주예수여” that is translated as “Oh! Lord Jesus”, because Holy in Korean is named “Yesu”. And, *sigh* I think that says enough. The pun STILL works... but :’))

But at the same time, I think my thing with the English localized names in “Oh! Holy” is that they are... blatantly boring and I don’t think they fit their faces. At all. But, maybe that’s me? (I mean, the “ultimate” reaper is called Norman. NORMAN.) Like I said, they still keep their original Korean last names... but... ugh.

(this is coming from someone who gave two of her characters very not obvious Spanish names given that they are Mexican, but I do have some valid cultural and VERY obvious explanations about those...)

Also - I don’t get LINE Webtoon’s selectiveness in this localization decision. Some of the South Korean series they bring, they do KEEP their original full names (see “A Good Day to be a Dog”, “Ghost Teller”, heck, the afforementioned “Untouchable”), but then you have stuff like “Oh! Holy”, “Ghost Wife”, “Scorching Romance”, “Mom, I’m Sorry!” or “Lookism”... ?????

And, this is very blatant annoying because a) K-Pop is HUGELY global mainstream nowadays and you can hear/read fans screaming their NAMES?! And 2) K-dramas are also pretty popular these days??? 

?????? 

*LONG SIGH*

There’s a few series that I want to check out, but I still have some more days for that to happen (heck, even a bit of more than a week). But, it SURE DOES suck that most of the interesting series I had my eyes on all were going to get locked this WEEK. :))))

[theartofmedia]

The Art of Review: YIIK: A Postmodern RPG

I have been sitting here for about two hours with this tab open, trying to find out how to properly introduce this. At the time of writing this (May 7, 2019, 10:02 PM), I have just finished watching YIIK several hours ago. However, I have been doing just about everything to avoid actually writing about it, because I have no idea how to ease the reader into this.

YIIK is so reprehensible that I created this segment--”The Art of Review”--because I needed to talk about this game. I needed to explain just why this game fails on every single account, and is so blatantly offensive. Initially, I was going to do a piece on something creator Andrew Allanson had said about games and his protagonist, Alex. It had to do with character development, and a common criticism was Alex’s sheer lack of it; naturally, I decided to watch a walkthrough online in order to see this for myself first-hand.

I was not prepared for what I saw. I have never had to take as many breaks from any media before due to sheer anger at what I was witnessing. I have never seen a game that fails in every single sense, that is regarded as such high art by its developers. Except maybe David Cage, but he’s a topic for another day.

YIIK: A Postmodern RPG is one of the worst pieces of media I have ever had the displeasure of viewing... probably in my entire life. I wish I was exaggerating.

Before I go any further, I would like give immense credit to GrandmaParty and the others at the Something Awful forums for doing an LP of the game with commentary and cutting out the fights. GrandmaParty graciously linked the thread to me--which is full of sources that I will also be linking to throughout this piece--and made the entire game tolerable enough for me to power through. It wouldn’t have happened without you guys, so thank you very much for extending a hand to a small creator trying to get her footing in the world. <3

I will also be linking to the various episodes of GrandmaParty’s LP with timestamped links to show particular scenes or dialogue. I’ve heard that one Andrew Allanson likes to say that people doctored screenshots of his game to make him look bad. Sorry, but I don’t like being accused of forgery, so I’m going to just preemptively strike that claim down.

Now then. This is going to be a big, long review. Allow me to tell you how we’ll be separating this.

We’re going to have two main sections: a non-spoiler review, and a spoiler review. This is mainly due to the fact that a lot of the game’s issues come from its mess of a story, one that can only be understood fully if you’ve seen it through to the end (and its multiple endings).

But let me be clear here.

DO NOT BUY THIS GAME.

Don’t buy it for a laugh. Don’t buy it to see how bad it is. It’s broken, it’s offensive, and the creators and proven themselves time and time again to be genuinely awful and prejudiced people. Do not give these people money.

The non-spoiler and spoiler sections will be divided into subsections, which may also have subsections of their own.

With that said... let’s begin my review of YIIK: A Postmodern RPG.

Non-Spoiler Review

Plot:

The plot of YIIK (it’s pronounced like Y2K, but I’m going to pronounce it as ‘yick’ personally) follows Alex, a freshly-graduated college student, and the strange events that begin to occur once he returns to his hometown of Frankton. He follows a cat to an old factory/hotel, where he meets Sammy, a young woman who appears to live there. When she is taken by some mysterious creatures in front of Alex, he begins a journey to try and find out what happened to her, and begins to make discoveries that could endanger the very fabric of the universe. In theory, at least. In reality, the story is an absolute clusterfuck of vague metaphysics, and the rules of the world were never clearly established, so everything just becomes an incoherent mess.

Characters:

The characters are bare-bones at best and absolutely insufferable at worst. Alex especially is infamous among critics and detractors of the game for his arrogance, ignorance, underlying racism/sexism we’ll get to that, and lack of properly-written development. I’m not going to go into full detail with Alex just yet--there will be an entirely separate post on him. Something also to keep in mind that general consensus appears to be that Alex is an author-insert for Andrew Allanson. Whether that is or isn’t true is frankly up to the viewer, but there’s no definitive proof of it.

(Oh!!! Quick thing!! This image here keeps circulating around--this person is not Andrew! That is someone named Cr33pyDude on both Twitter and Reddit! He just so happens to look like the main character. Don’t rag on this guy, everyone, he doesn’t have anything to do with this shitshow. <3)

Most of the other characters are bland and underdeveloped, but all have potential to be better (Rory especially, in my personal opinion) if they were in the hands of a better writer. The female characters, though... either they are fawning over Alex, being written as nagging and overbearing, or having so little significance that taking them out entirely would change nothing. Don’t worry, we’ll get to that. Other NPCs are forgettable, and enemies are out-of-place monsters that hold no consequence to the story.

Writing:

And the writing--dear god the writing. The writers don’t know the phrase “show, don’t tell.” So frequently would Alex monologue about nothing. Upon coming back from seeing a woman get taken by supernatural creatures, he goes home and reflects--only to go on a tangent about his mother. Immediately after that, he goes on a rant about p/o/r/n/ when sent an email and how girls that he used to go to school with wouldn’t be doing “particularly unladylike” things. And the entire game is like this. Alex will go on pseudo-philosophical rants to himself, and they reveal nothing about his character except that he thinks he’s better than everyone else. He’ll also frequently describe things as though talking to someone--while this does get explained later, it still is completely frustrating when the narrative says “I said this and she said that” instead of just having dialogue or actions between characters. A lot of the dialogue doesn’t exactly... sound like anything a human would say. It’s stilted and unnatural.

Graphics:

The graphics are... bad. Really bad. The style is supposed to be a throwback to old-school, very polygonal games, but environments lack any and all actual texture, making them incredibly flat and uninteresting at best and painful for the eyes at worst. Everything is extremely colorful, but in the sense of neon colors. Everything is so bright and vibrant, and there is barely a place where someone’s eyes can rest--it’s balance in art. Brightness like this needs to be contrasted with darker, more muted shades, or else it just hurts to look at. The viewer’s eyes need places to rest, and the muted shades allow them that reprieve. You don’t get that with YIIK. It’s just a constant bombardment of colors and lights, to the point where if you are sensitive to these kinds of things, you may not want to look even at game footage unless you’re prepared. The character portraits are fine, even if some expressions are odd, but the in-game chibi-esque models are... bad. Really bad. They’re so uncanny and unsettling, and their expressions almost never change. (Also Alex has detailed teeth and it’s just as horrifying as you might think.)

Music/Audio:

The music is. Awful? It’s awful. It’s genuinely really bad. Case in point: one of the boss battle themes. You can hear this poor guy trying so hard to put power behind his voice, but it just sounds unnatural and strained. (Also he clips the mic at some points, and the balancing in general is. Bad.) He’s out-of-tune and occasionally off-beat, and it just makes for a very unpleasant listening experience. And a lot of the music is like this, being just an assault on the ears. The one real exception to this is the track “Into the Mind” made by one Toby Fox, presumably before he made Undertale and was doing freelance work. (He has since deleted his tweet promoting it. Screenshot of the tweet here, courtesy of @GameTheoryRejects.) The audio in general is poor, with irritating sound effects, occasional distorted audio that’s supposed to be scary but is so poorly done that it just hurts to listen to, and voice acting that’s lackluster at best and utterly emotionless at worst.

Gameplay:

Full disclosure: I did not personally play the game. But just looking at it shows how irritating, slow, clunky, and repetitive it is. Each character has a minigame that you play in order to attack, defend, use special attacks, and even run away. These minigames, unlike in something like the Mario & Luigi series, are slow, drawn-out, and completely break up the flow of the fight. And none of the other characters matter then anyway, because turns out if you max out your LUK stat, you can use a particular move that hits all enemies and completely one-shot them from critical damage. (And this move can even glitch out the game in some cases!) The menus are crowded and visually uninteresting, making everything sort of meld together. (Another minor criticism: YIIK has a tendency to put the player in unwinnable fights. You are never aware of what fights are winnable and which fights are designed to kill you. More on this later.)

Speaking of gameplay, the leveling system is... bizarre and tedious. You get EXP, but you don’t gain the ability to level up (yes that is an ability you have to gain) until a couple hours into the game. Leveling up is done in the Mind Dungeon, which you access from save points, and you have to go through doors that increase the stats you assign it. There are four doors per floor, and when you go to the next floor, you and all of your teammates (even if you haven’t met them in-game) level up. Sounds simple, right? Well. It’s slow and repetitive, and NOTHING HAPPENS. You walk in a door. You walk out the door. Rinse and repeat for 70 floors. (280 doors, by the way.) Here’s GrandmaParty doing this for an hour to get an idea of the tedium that this induces. You get to play a minigame when you banish certain enemies, but that serves less as ‘spicing up the gameplay’ and more of ‘adding more steps to this already-boring section.’

So to recap: Flat characters, word-salad plot, painful prose flat-out ugly graphics, backwards gameplay and leveling system.

Tl;dr: Game bad. Don’t buy it.

... This ends the non-spoiler portion of the review. And also the section where we start to talk about some... sensitive topics.

As such, I am going to issue a legitimate trigger warning: the following pieces talk about suicide/depression in detail, as well as physical & domestic abuse situations.

And a small content warning for those who aren’t legitimately triggered by these subjects but still feel uncomfortable reading about the following: homophobia/transphobia; sexism; racism; and the actual use of a real-life woman’s death as a plot device. No I am not fucking kidding about that last one.

So. Let’s get into the real shit about YIIK.

Spoiler Review

Plot:

Let’s start with the plot. There isn’t really a driving force for this plot; initially, it’s finding Semi “Sammy” Pak (well, everyone except Rory says “Park,” even though all of the written lines say “Pak,” so that’s great) after she is taken by mysterious figures. However, as the game progresses, the search becomes less about finding Sammy until she’s just a footnote, and becomes more about... meandering around the world going from one goal to another while fighting things. (The game points this out, but self-awareness doesn’t excuse the fact that it happens. Especially considering the upcoming plot points...)

Then the metaphysics start--people have been trying to decipher this world’s rules for a while with little success, so bear with me, I’m going to try to make as much sense of what we’re given as possible.

There exists a “place between places“ known as the Soul Space. It exists between parallel realities. A person can actually will themself into the Soul Space via... depression? One character, Vella, says that another character, Rory, left his body when he “surrendered himself to his misery” following the death of his younger sister, and explained herself that she fell into a deep depression as well before entering the Soul Space... but it’s not dying? Or it can be? Here Rory asks The Essentia 2000 oh we’ll get to her don’t you worry if dying means you enter the Soul Space. She says that it’s complicated. Her explanation boils down to, “if you care only about material goods and not about your bonds, when you die, you will cease to exist. If you don’t care about materialistic goods when you die, then ehhhhh???”

Also, if your reality is destroyed but you go into the Soul Space, you can become a Soul Survivor (aka the not-Starmen, seen in the cutscene with Vella and Rory linked above) and get stuck in other’s realities as you try to find a physical body. Also, people share a Soul across parallel realities--meaning, parallel versions of yourself would share the same Soul. But they’re not the same people. They have different lives, races, genders, names, but they share the same “Soul.” Only one person with that “Soul” can exist in a reality at a time, hence the form that the Soul Survivors take if they enter a reality where another person with that “Soul” lives. If, however, that person with your “Soul” is no longer in that reality, you can retake physical form and essentially take their place--though not as them, but as you.

And if you go into the Soul Space you apparently understand the secrets of the universe and are beyond normal human follies.

Confused yet? Me too, and I wrote this damn thing. The worldbuilding is so vague, and the players aren’t given set rules that the world plays by. Even when the more surrealist elements of the game start to appear, there should still be rules. Perhaps nonsensical rules, but rules nonetheless. Instead we get talk about Souls and parallel realities, scenes of bright colors and strange imagery that never gets explained or really acknowledged (other than a mention of them being “breaks in reality” like, once), and some plot twists that imply... a lot.

Let’s talk about the characters before we get to the ending.

Characters

Besides Alex, there are five major characters in YIIK:

Michael, who is Alex’s childhood friend and who doesn’t really have much relevance between the beginning and the end of the game. No, really, for the middle portion of the game, he doesn’t really do anything. He hangs around, that’s about it. He gains relevance again during the end of the game where he goes into the Soul Space and becomes Proto-Michael, and that... happens, I guess. I think it contributes to the revelation later on about reality breaking.

Vella is... a strange character. A strange character forced to contradict herself because the plot demands it. She’s shown to be a character who takes no shit, but also bends at the first flimsy apology Alex gives her. She is compassionate to someone like Rory, but spends most of her time calling out Alex. (And yet, somehow, they fall in love???) These notes I took previously on Vella’s first appearance show how what kind of walking contradiction that Vella is as a character:

”Stop creeping on me while i’m at work”

”Okay I’ll go to the house of two strangers who i just accused of perving on me, in the middle of my work shift, to look at these pictures of me on this website i’ve never heard of that can’t go wrong”

”So let me tell you about this traumatizing experience i had with a supernatural creature, saying how emotional and painful it was without any emotion in my voice”

”also i’m not going to tell you how I got to where the supernatural creature was because it’s very personal and I don’t know you and revealing that would make me vulnerable”

”By the way I’m going to give you my number as well as this other number for a training dungeon basically because I like you two”

... yeah,

Rory is probably my favorite character out of this dreck, and he deserves so, so much better than being in this shit. He’s a quiet scene kid who initially gets roped into the plot with the disappearance of his 12-year-old sister--turns out, however, that she killed herself, and Rory struggles with the resulting grief, trauma, and depression that follows. He’s a sweet kid who’s a pacifist, is teaching himself how to make games, knows a lot of random bits of information about many things, and overall deserves so much better than this game. Sorry Allansons you’ve lost your Rory privileges he is My son now

Claudio and Chondra... are just kind of there? Claudio’s a stereotypical weeb. Chondra is the “sassy black girl”/little sister type (which is later revealed to be even stranger, because she’s apparently a graduate student). They don’t have much outside of that, and that’s a shame, since they had a lot of potential to be really good. However, they also seem a bit... tacked on and included for diversity’s sake, as both of them mention racism at some point, and... yeah. The game isn’t very graceful with that topic, as I’ll soon get into.

There is also the character of Panda, who appears out of nowhere in the factory/hotel and is never questioned. It becomes very clear that he’s a figment of Alex’s imagination, and is Alex personifying him as his sort of “conscious“ when he is, in reality, only a stuffed bear. He only talks when Alex is alone. A lot of people really don’t like him, but I will admit that I got mildly emotional when he drifted away in space near the end--but only because I myself make stuffed animals and dolls, so nearly any stuffed animal holds a place in my heart. However, I can very much see why people wouldn’t like him at all.

Anyway.

The Fucking Ending:

So everyone just kind of meanders around for the middle portion of the game until surprise! On New Years’ Eve the world is going to be destroyed. Not just the world--the entire reality. And it’s going to be Alex’s fault, somehow. Also Sammy--who Alex becomes obsessed with--Vella--who is an explicit love interest for Alex--and an android--the previously-mentioned The Essentia 2000, who Alex has a dream about and immediately becomes infatuated--with all turn out to be the same person! Why pick between love interests when they can all just turn out to be the same person?! Also, Sammy was taken by apparent demons because her Soul was in the process of going into the Soul Space, and the creatures the took her were actually the other 2/3rds of her Soul that had already gone into the Soul Space and they were just collecting the last piece. I think.

The game turns into a watered-down version of Persona 3, where you have about a month--from Thanksgiving until New Years’ Eve--to train and get strong enough to stop whatever is going to destroy reality. (The actual Y2K thing is mentioned about halfway through and serves little relevance other than to mark when the end of the world is, since Y2K isn’t actually the cause of the world ending). Then there are some weird plot twists about how reality has been breaking for a long while (this was briefly foreshadowed in Alex going to Michael’s house only to be told that Michael doesn’t live there, and then going to another house where Michael is) and it makes a lot of things really confusing?? And then New Years’ Eve comes where everything is really breaking. Turns out the end of this reality is caused by a meteor with Alex’s face on it a la the moon from Majora’s Mask, no I am not fucking kidding. And it moves around like an inflatable arm-flailing tube man, no I am not fucking kidding.

And then everyone dies. No, really, this is an unwinnable fight. You die. Your entire party dies. Their reality is destroyed.

Alex wanders around the Soul Space for a while until he finds other versions of himself, and various “dark versions” merge together to create the Proto-Comet (’proto’ being the suffix to describe the end product of parallel selves merging together to form one entity). Alex follows the comet around as it destroys reality after reality until...

He finds one that hasn’t been attacked.

And gueeeeeeess what?

You, the player, are a parallel version of Alex. So he enlists you and another party of parallels (using the names you were supposed to input in the beginning) to destroy Proto-Alex. Here, you meet a spectre who is very obviously Sammy Pak, and she says that she’s sorry that Essentia “used her to get to you,” and you hug her.

Eventually you do get to Proto-Alex, as well as a different form of Essentia. Turns out that Essentia lied to you about Sammy and Vella--turns out, Essentia IS you. Well, Essentia is part of Alex, and she tricked Alex into destroying Proto-Alex in order to free herself from the “Soul” that they share. So you can choose to fight Proto-Alex, and if you do, you lose. Again. The boss fight in unwinnable.

And then this... really weird section happens with the character of Roy from Two Brothers, Ackk Studios’ previous game that got pulled from Steam due to bugginess and crashing. Roy basically says that people were “trying to stop his quest” (aka critics) and that Alex shouldn’t give up. (Note that this is a complete non-sequitur to anyone who doesn’t know who Roy is, where he came from, or the story behind the game being pulled.)

After that, you control both the player avatar given and Alex in order to “unplug” Proto-Alex and Essentia, which will make them “whole”? It basically means that all the versions of Alex will merge together into you, the player.

Then the game ends.

At least. Kind of. There’s more than one ending.

But... we’ll get back to that in a bit.

There are many questions the game raises without answers. Why was Sammy bleeding and screaming for the Soul Survivors not to take her because “you promised you wouldn’t move me again!”? Who actually is Vella? Why did no one question Essentia and Vella being in the same space if it was already said that they couldn’t be? Who actually is Sammy? Why is she a ghost and not a Soul Survivor? Why were Proto-Alex and the other “dark Alex”-es trying to destroy realities? Why does Proto-Alex look different than the other Alex-es, who look relatively similar? Who actually was the voice on the phone--it was implied to be Proto-Michael, but he didn’t exist when those phone calls were made? Is Claudio and Chondra’s missing younger brother actually a version of Alex, as this clip implies (esp. w/ the anime shirt)?

Good luck getting answers, because we sure as hell don’t get any.

Also--glad to know that the entire month of training that you spent the latter half of the game doing was all for naught, since the last two major fights you’re in are unwinnable. There are four minibosses to fight, so it isn’t all for nothing, but still. You don’t even get the satisfaction of killing the final boss. You pull a lever and he and Essentia get weirdly electrocuted.

One more thing: the twist of “Essentia lied to you” made a metric fuckton of exposition in her Mind Dungeon utterly pointless, and also feels like a flimsy excuse to absolve Alex of blame for the shitty actions of his parallel selves--more on that later.

So let’s touch on some controversy now that we have gone over the rest of this incoherent mess of a plot.

Elisa Lam

One of the most famous controversies of YIIK is the use of Elisa Lam’s death to propel the story. This is true--the creator admits that he “was very moved” by Lam’s death.

For those not in the know, let me give you a brief summary of the case of Elisa Lam. (Yes this is going to be primarily from Wikipedia but it also has news sources cited for it.) Elisa Lam was a 21-year-old Chinese-Canadian student who was reported missing at the beginning of February 2013. On February 17th, the workers at the Cecil Hotel in Los Angeles (where Lam was visiting) discovered her nude body in one of the hotel’s water tanks after guests complained about the taste of the water. The police released footage of Lam, from the day of her disappearance, acting strangely in an elevator, appearing to be hiding from something, pressing elevator buttons, and gesturing and talking to no one. There was controversy surrounding her death, as people wondered how she could have locked herself in the water tank, and how the police could rule her death as accidental. People have suspected that it was due to paranormal activity that she was acting like that, or others said that she could have been having hallucinations (as Lam was diagnosed with bipolar and depression). Her death was quickly spread through internet circles as some paranormal myth.

YIIK incorporates this as a huge part of its starting plot.

Semi “Sammy” Pak is very clearly inspired by Elisa Lam. The two bear striking resemblance to one another, being young Asian women in their early twenties with straight black hair (even parted in the same place)--and this photo from the LA Times shows that Lam wore rounded glasses, like the ones Sammy wears. (Lam is Chinese-Canadian, while Sammy is stated to be Koren-American. Sammy is also 23 when Lam was 21.)

This photoset from JamJamJamJamuel shows the biggest criticism of YIIK: the recreation of the elevator video. It’s obvious by the angle and some of Sammy’s movements that this was, in fact, meant to emulate the elevator video of Lam. The game also shows that people are less concerned about Sammy as a person and more about the mystery of the elevator, like the internet stopped caring about Lam as a person and more of a supernatural myth.

However, there’s more than just this.

There’s a weird... almost fetishistic nature when the in-game protagonist talks about Sammy. Alex describes his meeting with her as “intimate” (they met for like. an hour), calls her “my Sammy” when comparing his story to the story of the news, says that he “misse[s] her. I didn’t know her really, but I felt like I did.” And the very next line is uh. “In the unreal twilight hours, in-between sleep and waking, she slipped into my dreams, got tangled in my thoughts, like the blankets tangled between my legs, her brain melting with mine.”

... Gross, to say the least.

And yes, by the way, Sammy basically becomes a love interest. That’s not completely disrespectful and disgusting to the actual human woman that the devs never met or anything at aaaaaaaall.

BUT WAIT, THERE’S MORE.

Rory basically goes on to describe a “creepy urban myth” about the water tower near his town. You can imagine what that leads to. It’s a beat-by-beat retelling of the finding of Elisa Lam’s body, except they make it a “nameless girl,” and the writers basically insert their opinions of how it was definitely a murder and the police called it an accident.

More tasteless than a fucking saltine.

OH BUT WAIT THERE’S EVEN MORE.

Near the end of the game, you find the ghost of Sammy Pak. Since she’s not a part of Essentia, it seems that Essentia used her form to get to Alex. She says that she’s sorry and that she’s going to go back ‘home’ now, and you hug her.

But that’s not even the worst of it.

Allow me to tell you about the second ending.

Second Ending:

YIIK has more than one ending--both are considered canon. Ending 1 is the one described above.

Ending 2, however...

Just before leaving the house for the last time, in order to get this second ending, you have to look at the computer in Alex’s house and read this post. It implies that you need to go find Sammy. (It also has some things to say about postmodernism but that’s for another day.)

You go outside... and she’s hiding behind a tree outside your house. No I’m not kidding. (Granted, this is the part of the game where reality is beginning to break apart, so.) She also says “I love you” which, given her “inspiration” by Elisa Lam... yeah. That’s not creepy and tasteless at all. And it also doesn’t make any FUCKING SENSE BECAUSE ALEX KNEW HER FOR AN HOUR AND NEVER SAW HER AGAIN.

Okay, okay, anyway, if you go back into the house and leave through the back entrance, you’ll be taken to the world map. Your destination is the KNN--the Korean News Network, where Sammy had been employed before she vanished. The faceless NPCs only refer to Alex as the name you put in at the beginning of the game, so presumably, everyone from this point forward is now talking to you, the player. (Also everything is pink. Really pink. For no real reason unless it’s “””symbolic””” of something?) You wander around for a bit, doing menial tasks, until you finally get to a pink version of the room you first met Sammy in. She calls you on a phone and tells you that she’s sorry for dragging you into this mess (because Alex/the player went looking for Sammy in the first place), and that she “has a solution” to prevent Essentia from using Alex any more.

You find yourself in front of an elevator, the same elevator that you rode with Sammy when she disappeared. She calls you on the phone again and says that if you go through the elevator doors, there’s no turning back. If you step through, you see the spectre of Sammy again, and she wants to show you where she’s been. You hug her, and she says that she’s so glad that she met you, “even if it was just a game. We’ll be together in your waking reality one day, I’m sure of it. For all I know, we may already be.”

... Roll credits!

No. Seriously. That’s the second ending. You, the player, (presumably) go into the Soul Space with Sammy for eternity, and Sammy basically gives you a love confession (after all she says “I love you” before anyway).

Need I remind you all that she is based off of a REAL-LIFE WOMAN WHO DIED THAT NEITHER OF THE ALLANSONS KNEW?!

Hi, yes, sorry, I’m fucking livid about this. Not just because of the disgusting use of a real-life woman’s death in your game, not just because they fetishized her and turned her into a love interest, not just one of the endings--which is a canon ending--had her telling you she loves you and having you go off with her...

... but because this game has been in development since 2013.

Elisa Lam wasn’t even dead for a fucking year.

Yes, other media has cropped up about Lam’s death, and I think it’s just as tacky and tasteless as this. But these guys had so much time to change it, to have someone say “hey maybe you shouldn’t do that,” and it happened anyway. The sheer lack of respect that the Allansons have for not just Lam but also her still-grieving family is astonishing, and it genuinely makes me sick. My thoughts and condolences to the family of Elisa Lam, having to deal with the press, internet conspirators, and people like this. I hope that they all can still find some sense of peace, even with all of this going on.

Racism:

So this game can be really, really fucking racist sometimes. Let’s start with the more explicit dialogue.

In the very beginning, Sammy calls Alex a ginger, and he says “that’s our word.” He’s equating “ginger” to a derogatory slur.

Here’s the next instance, with Alex referring to Vella--an Asian woman--as “vaguely ethnic” and “exotic.” (He doesn’t face consequences for this, either. Just a slap on the wrist of “don’t talk about race.”)

Later on, Chondra talks about race in an actually not that bad rant about how “I bet if [my brother] had been a beautiful white woman, everyone would have cared that he vanished.” This actually is somewhat insightful, as... well, it’s rather true. POC, when it comes to investigations, are often pushed aside, ignored, or given the least amount of effort. And then Chondra also calls out Alex’s lowkey racist fantasy of “being the white knight swooping in and saving the exotic Korean girl.” However... that’s it. Alex doesn’t get any insight from that, or rethink his reasons on why he wants to save Sammy.

And that’s where we get into Claudio and Chondra and the more implicit racism in the game. Neither of them have much in terms of personality--Claudio likes anime, Chondra is there for quips. Neither of them have any significant arcs, nor do they serve much story purpose beyond being extra party members and talking about race--which feels racist in and of itself, just to have characters of color there to talk about race. (Claudio even goes into an extensive rant about how it’d be racist to think that he knows how to pick locks, but he does know how to pick locks, just not the type that they need open. It comes out of nowhere, is utterly unwarranted, and is completely against the rather chill persona that Claudio has had up until then.) Their characters had a lot of potential to be good! However, much like every other character, they’re very underdeveloped.

(Also, if you have either Claudio or Chondra in your party when you get attacked by cop enemies, they will only shoot at either of them, you know, the only black characters in the main party, and my god I wish I was kidding.)

And then... the love interests.

Sammy is a Korean woman. Vella is an Asian woman of unknown descent. The Essentia 2000 has shown that many of her parallel lives are women of color. All of them are love interests for Alex, the white hero. Yeah. And the game calls it out, but no actual repercussions are given!

Speaking of these ladies...

Sexism

This game is really fucking sexist. Like, genuinely, it’s really sexist.

I think a lot of Vella’s contradictory character comes from this sexism and seeing her as a love interest rather than a character. Though she calls out Alex and is upset with him most of the time, she still accepts his weak apologies very easily--apologies that seem very manipulative and insincere when almost immediately after, Alex tries to convince her to let him into her Mind Dungeon, and if you take that as a metaphor than it gets even worse.

As well, Vella’s backstory includes her being used by a much-older man. What can you do after she tells this traumatic story about her being used by a man? Kiss her. And she doesn’t even get upset or angry with you; she just blushes and says to head back to the others. Because that’s not gross and manipulative or anything. That’s not taking advantage of a vulnerable woman at ALL.

The only female characters of importance that aren’t lusting after Alex are his mom and Chondra--I’ve already mentioned that Chondra has little story importance and personality, and Alex sees his mom as nagging for asking him to get groceries, gets angry at her when she says that she lost her job and asks him to get one to support the house (please note that she paid for his and his sister’s college educations in full, including semesters she didn’t plan for), and gets annoyed with her freaking out when he went missing for five days.

So yeah. The game doesn’t have the highest view of women.

But let’s talk specifically about Essentia. Essentia mentions that Alex has hurt her in parallel realities--but it’s okay, because they’re parallel versions, not actually him! And Essentia reveals that Alex’s parallel was the person who hurt Vella! But it’s okay, because she’ll love him unconditionally no matter how much he hurts her. It’s... really reminiscent of domestic abuse. And it frankly doesn’t matter that Essentia turns out to be a part of Alex and that any of the story of Vella or Sammy isn’t true; the game frames it as perfectly okay that it might have happened. It’s okay that parallel versions of Alex have hurt parallel versions of Essentia, because she loves him. It’s incredibly twisted, and it’s honestly a dangerous message to be sending.

(Also, in a very weird instance of sexism against men, out of all of the parallel selves that Essentia shows Alex, the only man is extremely hostile and violent towards Alex. It’s... kind of weird, honestly.)

Depression/Suicide:

Oh boy. Oh fucking boy.

A little background on myself.

I’m two years into my undergrad for a Psychology/Criminology double major. Classes I have taken include classes about pathologies of the mind and mental health (Psychopathology of Childhood, Developmental Psychology, Personality Psychology, Seminar on Positive Psychology, and of course Basic Psychology to be specific). I have also been clinically diagnosed with anxiety/depression, and both of these are genetically based, meaning that I have lived with them my whole life and will continue to live with them. (I am medicated, for anyone wondering. The meds are the only way I can function at a normal level.) I have felt suicidal before, I have had friends who have been suicidal before, and I have talked others down from self-harm or suicide. I’m not an expert, but I know a thing or two about mental health, depression, and suicide.

This game... this game doesn’t fucking get it at all.

(Just a quick thing: the game makes an OCD joke. Obsessive-Compulsive Disorder jokes aren’t funny, folks, since people who have it are affected by it all the time to the point of it often being debilitating. Just wanted to mention it a) to give you an idea on how the game handles mental health and b) because it really doesn’t fit anywhere else.)

Most of this surrounds the character of Rory, as he clearly suffers from depression and suicidal thoughts, as well as feeling grief surrounding his sister’s own suicide. When this is revealed, you know what Vella says to “comfort” him? “Pain is inevitable. Suffering is optional. I understand what you were feeling. 'This depression is unbearable.' 'I can't take it anymore.' The 'depression/pain' part is an unavoidable reality, but whether or not you can overcome it is up to you. You decide if you're going to keep going. Your sister is dead. Nothing can change that. [...] You can't help but feel the pain, but you can get through the suffering. That will go away. Look, I understand that it's easy for me to say. I'm not the one whose sister is dead. But you have to understand that I am telling you the true reality of the situation. You're playing with some otherworldly dangers here!“

Let me break this down to show you why this is not something to say to someone who is traumatized and in a deep depression due to the loss of a loved one.

“[W]hether or not you can overcome it is up to you.” This puts full responsibility of overcoming grief and depression onto the person suffering from it, which is not okay, and not true. Rory lost his 12-year-old sister to suicide! Very recently in the game’s timeline, as well!

Vella is basically telling him “it’s your job to get over your grief and depression.” Putting full responsibility on someone for feeling depression and grief is disgusting. If someone is grieving, what they should do is reach out. If they aren’t, reach out to them. Don’t let them suffer alone. Suffering like this is not a choice. People don’t choose to suffer.

By saying that suffering is “optional,” it subtly blames the person suffering for their own suffering, which makes their chances of getting better plummet. So frequently will people suffering from mental disorders put the blame on themselves for “not trying hard enough” or “being broken” or “not being good enough” because they think that this is all their own fault, and they won’t seek help, because “it’s all my fault.”

Now, when someone is in recovery? Yes, they should definitely try--even if it’s in small bits at a time--to to learn to cope with their disorders in healthy ways. However, when in recovery, the person is assisted by therapists, friends, family, and possibly medications. They aren’t alone. They aren’t alone, and are often guided by those who know how to help them and want to help them. The responsibility isn’t pushed solely onto them. One doesn’t “get over” being depressed. They learn to cope. They learn to accept it as a part of them, rather than all of them, and learn that they are more than their depression. The suffering never truly goes away; it can lessen, though, and a person can learn to live with it.

Some people may defend this by saying that the Allansons lost their mother very recently, and this is how they handle their grief. I lost my father in February of last year. I know this type of grief. And just because that’s how they handle their grief, that doesn’t mean it’s a healthy way of coping, nor the type of coping mechanism you should promote in your game. (I will admit that my own methods of coping weren’t great, and that I’m trying to improve on that now.) There’s a quote that I heard somewhere that goes something like, “grief never really goes away. We just learn to live with it.” That suffering doesn’t ‘go away.’ It ebbs and flows, some days being bearable, and other days not.

But that’s not the end, friends. Oh, far from it.

At one point, you can flat-out tell Rory to “stop being depressed. Being depressed is a choice.” It is noted to be the “wrong” choice, however, Rory barely reacts to it, making it not seem like the wrong decision. I don’t feel like I need to explain why “depression is a choice” is a take colder than the depths of space. Depression’s not a choice, folks. Hell, I would love it if it was, I would love to stop the fatigue, the emptiness, the lethargy, the lack of motivation, the irritability, the messed-up appetite, the fucked-up sleep patterns, the fits of crying. That would be fucking great. But I can’t. BECAUSE IT’S NOT A CHOICE, YOU WALNUT.

Okay, okay, sorry, back on topic. So let’s say you’re mean to Rory. You wanna know what happens?

He kills himself. And according to this user, the story doesn’t change and barely acknowledges Rory after his death. (Obviously there’s not footage out there of the characters mentioning that Rory committed suicide. However, the developers themselves commented on the previously-linked Steam forum post confirming its legitimacy. This is so unbelievably fucked up. Suicide is already a topic that should be handled with care, but having a main character commit suicide and have that death have no impact on the story? I don’t even have words for how deplorable that is. (Doesn’t help that the game basically pushes whether Rory lives or dies onto the player, which is also disgusting, because I don’t think the developers had the insight into suicidal ideation to know that it’s a multitude of factors that lead to suicide, and not just one person being )

(Sidenote: here are the links to the National Suicide Prevention Line and the Crisis Text Line in case anyone needs them. Please take care, friends. <3)

[Addendum: as I was working on this review and listened to the podcast linked a little further down, Andrew Allanson had this to say at 2:08:47: "When you make an unlikable character, people expect Sherlock Holmes or Dr. House. They want flawed heroes, but only to the extent that they’re beautiful and intelligent and slightly Asperger-y."

Thank you for basically saying that having Asperger’s Syndrome is an unlikable trait or makes people unlikable.]

Anti-LGBTQ+

So let’s talk about the prejudice against non-straight and non-cis people!

Andrew Allanson has been rather fucking clear about his prejudice against trans people and non-straight people. In the “The Dick Show” podcast, starting at 1:45:45, Andrew Allanson was interviewed by the commentators. I will be providing timestamps of quotes since I can’t directly link to them.

(Sidenote: I was listening to this podcast and waiting for Andrew’s pa rt to start, and one of the commentators was talking about Women’s History Month, and saying “If a woman doesn’t have a man, she’s going to expect the government to be her man. That’s just the way they’re wired.” [1:44:24 - 1:44:31].  Yeah. That tells you the type of people who run this podcast and the type of people that Andrew decides to associate himself with.)

[1:52:15 - 1:52:] “... we made the mistake of asking the player, ‘what name did your parents give you?’ And it turns out that that is a very offensive question. Because some people, um, are trans, and don’t use the name their parents gave them. So immediately the game is targeted as being transphobic. [...] So we wanted to basically create a character off of the player in the game, the first thing we ask you ‘are you a boy or a girl,’ ‘what’s your name’, and people were so bent out of shape over this. Look, I’m sympathetic to trans people, I understand why it upset them. But the problem was when we apologized, that wasn’t good enough. People then took it and said ‘what else can we find in this game to prove that it’s offensive?’”

So here’s the thing: that... is lowkey transphobic? Because it’s like you said, these people don’t use the names that their parents gave them. You’re asking them, intentionally or not, to deadname themselves. There’s a reason they call it a “deadname.”

Later on they ask, “which of these do you identify with?” and show a male figure and a female figure. Which frankly, is alright.

And then they changed it in an update to “what do you look like?” which feels like a very direct jab at trans people, especially the ones who were upset by the initial question relating to names.

Oh, and then there’s this part (I only know DIck and Andrew’s voices, I’m afraid I don’t know the third, sorry m8).

[1:54:35 - 1:55:10]

Andrew: So you play as this guy, Alex, you just come home from [college, audio cut out here], you’re an entitled asshole--

Dick: You get points for stomping queers, as I understand it, that’s the game, right? You go around and--

Andrew: The goal is to establish the white ethnostate.

[unintelligible as others laugh and talk over each other]

Dick: --you have a little ‘gaydar’ in the corner and it points you to the nearest homosexual, and then you go, y‘know, “Hammer [X]”

Andrew: It’s - it’s - yeah, it’s a hack-and-slash.

Dick: If you buy the game they send you a special overlay you can put on your controller that turns all the buttons into ‘K.’ So it’s not ‘A’--

Andrew: Yes!

Dick: --Just ‘K,’ ‘K,’ and ‘K.’

Andrew: Just ‘K,’ ‘K’--yeah, exactly, exactly.

So we not only have the mockery of gay folk, but also mention of murdering them (whether in a joking fashion or not, this still isn’t fucking funny and not something to joke about, especially if you are not LGBTQ+ yourself. And to my knowledge, none of these men are).

And that’s just from the creator himself, as well as the first few minutes of the game.

Let’s talk bout The Scene.

What is The Scene? Well, it’s the scene where Alex and Rory talk, where you can tell Rory that “depression is a choice.” Should you be kind and supportive to him, you know what you can do? “Try to kiss [him.]” And there’s art for it. There is literally no reason for this to be here other than “haha it’s a guy trying to kiss another guy, gay people are funny!” It seems to be an attempt at humor, but it fails... rather miserably.

The Legendary Third Ending

I call it “legendary” because no one knows if it actually exists or not, because people can’t find it, regardless of the hints given by the developers.

Andrew, while doing “The Dick Show” interview, mentions that he put DIck Masterson (the host of the show) into the game in the third update [1:45:56] , and that you have to give Dick a pair of aviator glasses, where he will give you a red pill [1:47:15 - 1:47:33]. Dick is also found in Chapter 4 of the game [1:47:40].

The devs also tease it on Twitter, saying that it’s “sad and challenging to complete”, and they give vague and unclear hints that don’t seem to help even the fans of the game--after all, no one has found it, apparently. Even the YIIK Discord (though this is just hearsay) has been losing steam in trying to find this ending.

I think it’s a testament to the quality of the game when one of your major three endings is nigh-impossible to find. (For the record, I feel the same way about how PT went about its ending, and how arbitrary it felt to do these very specific things that the game barely tells you about.)

Miscellaneous Other Things That Don’t Fit In The Above

There are a couple other things that irk me about this game, so time for a rapid-fire round!

You can kiss Rory, who’s implied to be a senior in high school (due to this talk of college). So he’s, at best, 18. Alex had 5 and a half years of college (the game says “five and a quarter” but unless I’m mistaken colleges work in semesters not quarters,), so he’s probably 23-24. Yeah. (There’s also the issue of consent--when you kiss Vella she just blushes and acts more docile, while with Rory, he rather vehemently rejects it. So women just accept an unwanted kiss? Hm.)

You fight a flasher as a miniboss. Because sexual harassment is hilarious. (And if neither Michael nor Rory are 18 yet, then there’s the possibility of minors being involved. YEAH.)

The title card is intentionally glitchy af and it hurts the eyes, honestly.

If you go through New Game+ and go to the 70th floor of the Mind Dungeon, Alex will basically talk to himself about some things:

It mentions that “crows are ugly.” You fool. You absolute buffoon. Crows? Excellent. Very intelligent birbs.

This is basically “hey we suck, but so does everyone around us, it’s fine”

This game unironically uses Wonderwall lyrics in an emotional scene, like I know it was popular and not a meme in the 90s but my guy, you gotta think about the connotations with the audience you’re releasing this for,

“I sighed as the elevator began to shake, vibrating with motion.” Thank you for using three words to describe the elevator shaking,

The One Thing That I Liked

Surprisingly, there is something I liked about this game. Not solely in concept, not in its potential, but in its actual execution.

It starts on the day of New Years’ Eve. It’s dark outside and inside. Alex suddenly starts getting many random calls, some from people he knows, others he doesn’t. Some voices are distorted, some aren’t. Some are talking to him, some aren’t. And they’re quick little calls before they hang up, and Alex barely says a word. He can’t leave the house, and keeps getting phone calls that get more and more distorted as time goes on.

That? I think that actually really works.

It’s a more subtle way of showing reality breaking: getting calls from people, both friends and strangers, that are slowly getting more and more broken, and you can’t do anything. You’re trapped in your house, you can’t see outside, you don’t know what’s going on. You can’t help your friends, even when Michael screams for your help. The slowly deteriorating stability of the calls are your only indication of what’s going on outside.

And for me, that works. It was the one section of the game that I felt legitimately invested in. So, kudos to the devs for that one.

Conclusion

YIIK isn’t just bad. It’s offensive. It’s ignorant, it handles serious topics incredibly clumsily, and the worst of it is that Andrew Allanson considers it to be ‘art.’ (If you’re wondering why I didn’t talk about the “video games aren’t art” quote, don’t worry. That’s going to be its own essay.)

YIIK fails on every level, from technical to storytelling. Please, I beg of you, don’t give this game money. Just go watch the LP.

You may have noticed that I didn’t talk much about the “postmodern” aspect of the game, nor much about Alex as a protagonist.

Both of those are going to be their own separate essays.

This wild ride still ain’t over, folks. Hang on.

[suck-on-a-fire-ball]

Painting

Word Count: 1729 Pairing: Cullen X trevelyan!inquisitor Prompt: Cullen sees how the Inquisitor feels… less motivated than usual. While her daily routines are done with vigour and a precision he had never seen before, he can see in her eyes that she is not happy. So, he decides to help her.

“What is this?”

A sheepish smile appeared on his lips, unsure hazel eyes flickering between the Inquisitor and the items Cullen had collected.

As much information as Leliana had on… everyone, it was extremely difficult to get her to tell any of it unless there was an obvious reason for it. Cullen had had an obvious reason for it, but had originally refused to tell the true reasoning behind his consistent inquiries. Leliana could tell just as well as Cullen that the Inquisitor was feeling stressed, so he had found it annoying that she would not comply even after he explained he wanted to help the Inquisitor feel better. Now that he thought back on it, Cullen wondered whether Leliana had withheld the information from him on purpose so that she could hear the confession she had assumed he was withholding from her come from his own lips. He assumed this mainly because the moment he had confessed it, Leliana had pulled out the piece of paper he needed from her back pocket.

He did not regret telling the Spymaster though. Because the look on Adelaide’s face now made everything worth it. She entered the room, otherwise used for nothing but storage, and let her fingers trail over the easels, the pieces of paper Cullen had prepared and the pencils he had found. The information Leliana had on Adelaide had revealed to him that she used to paint. Of course she was an artist. The way she twirled her magic around, sometimes intentionally creating swirls of colour that would hit the enemy with a brutal force they were not expecting, all pointed to her having an eye for aesthetics.

Closing the door behind them to give them some privacy, Cullen’s hand found its way to the back of his neck. “I assumed you might enjoy it.”

“I do. Cullen… This is amazing.” The tiredness he had seen for the past couple of weeks slowly disappeared and a hint of joy twinkled there instead. He smiled at that, hand lowering as he felt at peace with having done the right thing.

“I’ll leave you to it then.”

“Wait.”

He stopped, turned back to her and gave her a questioning look.

“Do you have to?”

Quite honestly, he had a lot to do that day. But the way she looked at him…

“No.”

Relief flooded over her face, and Cullen took a few steps towards her. He would not deny the fact that skipping his duties was stressing him out, because his duties were what distracted him from the pains of the missing lyrium. But, seeing Adelaide so relieved to have his presence a little longer made up for it all. And perhaps it was a more suitable distraction for him as well, seeing as his neck was starting to hurt from continuously reading report after report.

“Do you know how to paint?”

“Maker no.” His reply came out in almost a snort, to which he quickly composed himself and cleared his throat. “I was trained purely in the arts of swordsmanship and keeping mages at bay. No art.”

“Who is to say not everything we do is art?” Adelaide’s green eyes twinkled over at Cullen, a mischief in them that Cullen could not for the life of him understand why it was there. “Sometimes when I see you train with the recruits, I can see art in the way you move, the way you use your sword.”

“Y-You watch me…?” Maker’s Breath. Why had he closed that door? It was rather hot in the room…

She nodded her head with a hum of a ‘yes’ before biting her lip, gesturing towards one of the easels. “Try.”

“I really can’t,” he stuttered.

“Of course you can. Everyone can.”

“Well, in that case I can’t do it well. At all.”

“I don’t mind.”

“Uh…”

“Go ahead. I’ll do one too.” She moved over to an easel positioned opposite of his, the object shielding his view of her lips. Though it did nothing to keep him from knowing when she was smiling at him. He recognized it merely by the way the corners of her eyes wrinkled and from the way her eyes lit up.

Grasping a pencil rather clumsily with his gloved fingers, he momentarily held it as though he was brandishing a sword before awkwardly shifting it in his fingers to hold as though he was about to write with a quill. Neither positions worked very well. But the last one seemed to do the trick well enough. He imagined her hands were moving over the paper with the same grace he had witnessed when she wrote reports, or when she opened doors, or when she pointed at the maps and her fingers trailed along the road she would take, or when –

His mind stopped thinking about her hands when he heard her ask a question. “I don’t know,” he replied.

“I’ll paint you. You can paint me.”

“Maker, you ask a lot of me.”

She chuckled, the sound like a lovely melody to him that made his lips unwillingly curl up into a smile.

A lot of time passed, but Cullen could not notice it any other way than from the fact that the sunlight shining in from one of the small windows was turning less bright. He focused as best as he could, but ultimately got too distracted by the fact that Adelaide kept looking over at him to take in his features.

“Why did you do this for me?” Her voice nearly startled him. For so long now they had been spending time in pure silence, which Cullen normally was not a fan of. Though being near her made up for the lack of humming lyrium whispering in his ears. Her mere presence made everything feel better, even the silence.

“I…” He faltered a bit, unsure of whether this would come out wrong. No, why would it? He was the Commander of the Inquisition, someone who saw Adelaide – the Inquisitor – every day. Surely it was not strange for him to have noticed she was not feeling herself? “You seemed stressed.”

Her gaze lowered, the previous light of joy fading away at his words. It made him regret his words immediately, thinking he had said something wrong. Had he?

“I am. The title of Inquisitor is on me now. As the so-called Herald of Andraste I could pull things off as me simply wanting to help. Yes, people calling me... that made things scarier… more real… But now I’m an Inquisitor. People look at me differently. They expect things from me constantly. To be a leader, to be strong, to be perfect. Each decision is on my shoulders and I – I have nothing to hide behind. No pretence of me helping out a good cause anymore, because I am the good cause now.”

“Adelaide…” he said in a breathless voice. “You are not alone.”

“I feel alone.”

“But you are not.” He put his pencil down, done with his attempt at perfecting her beauty anyway, before he began walking over to her. But, she raised a hand, hindering him from coming too close.

Her walls were back up again, and she gave him a smile. “I have not finished yet.”

Slightly miffed by her rejection of continuing to open up about something that was clearly bothering her, Cullen remained standing right there on alert. Whenever she put that pencil down, he would march over to her and continue talking.

But when the time came and she did put her pencil down, Cullen found his courage gone again. And he remained standing there ‘till she turned to him. “Yours first.”

“Ah… I’m afraid it’s… not an accurate representation of how I view you.”

Adelaide moved over to his easel and smiled. “I like it.”  

“It looks nothing like you.”

“But it’s made by you. So I like it.”

Slightly taken aback by her comment, Cullen gave a nervous chuckle, hand once more reaching up to the back of his neck. “That’s… very kind of you to say.”

“I mean it,” she reassured him with a smile before moving over to her easel, beckoning him over. “I tried to make it as accurate as possible, but I’m afraid it got a bit subjective towards the end.”

“Isn’t all art subjective?”

“Well, look who has an eye for art after all,” joked Adelaide.

“I do not, as you’ve witness. It just makes sense. We paint what we see, even if some of us paint horrendously.”

She chuckled at his comment. 

Continuing to beckon him over, Adelaide smiled. Though he noticed the faint hint of red on her cheeks as he neared her piece of art. “Maker’s Breath…” he breathed out once his eyes landed on what she had painted. There, upon a mere piece of paper, was an exact representation of, well, Cullen. “I… look rather handsome.” The words had left his mouth before he could stop them, and he blushed. Especially when she laughed.

“It’s how I see you… I mean…” For the first time, her flirting caused her to blush as well. Her green eyes looked away, and Cullen found himself smiling.

“Well, I can reassure you that what I see is nothing near what I painted.”

She looked up at him. 

“What I see… it’s… beautiful.”

“Beautiful?”

Cullen frowned at her lack of a smile and the pure bewilderment that he saw. “It shouldn’t surprise you if you have mirrors in your quarters.”

At his comment, Adelaide did let a soft smile break through. Yet, the same bewilderment came right back to her. “I just thought that when you look at me, you see the Inquisitor.”

“I do.” His heart ached when she looked saddened at that, and so he quickly continued. “The Inquisitor, a beautiful woman who I have great respect for. Your title is only of importance to me when we are on duty though. We aren’t now. And I still think you’re a beautiful, admirable woman. My attempt at art did you no credit. What I see… nobody can put that down on paper.”

“Cullen…” she breathed with a smile, a blush evident on her cheeks.

“I’m sorry. I thought you should know.” Glancing away awkwardly, he shifted on his feet.

“Don’t apologize. I don’t mind…”

Their eyes met. Both stared.

And then both smiled, fingers finding each other as they intertwined.

“We should do this more often,” said Adelaide.

“I’d like that.”

[toma400]

New Insomnium reminds me of what I loved in latest Solitary Experiments... this sounds like old friend coming back, sitting with me in my shelter and talking hours about what once was. And it’s hard not to quote my beloved Breathe song: “I’m searching for memory without any pain I’m searching for memory without any tears I’m searching for memory without any fear I’m searching for memory which never hurts me“ Also it reminds me of Sirus song’s lyrics “its the pain we know, for the people we've lost / made manifest”. Industrial always blends greatly with feelings, even if this music doesn’t sound emotionally at first glance.

But maybe it’s something that I just never recognised. When I first broke up with S., I was listening to Necro Facility, DWIFH, and in the most numb time, Godflesh (industrial metal - in the end); it greatly fitted broken heart, then nostalgia, then numbness.

This year I’m almost always listening to old school EBM, to give me power dealing with my fears and ‘everyday difficulties’. Like, I try to avoid things that gave me traumas, so EBM works great and it’s refreshing to exchange depressive black metal with such genre. I guess I would go insane, having another year on ‘depressive bm’ pills in such moments. So, let’s say, 2019 is kind of detox from all bad things I experienced before: mainly people leaving me without any reasonable causes, but also things that made my soul tired to death.

Unluckily, escaping from most humanity is destroying me as well: though I became even more calm than ever, I lack something, and I see this in times when I more than ever become irritated. Loneliness also doesn’t make me stronger, so I have times when I desperately search for inner soul. I can’t find it - and then become irritated. At least I’m not having too many flashbacks, yet I can’t deny that I still miss the times when all my friends - mainly M., but also dead friendship like I., and dear S. - had enough time to talk, to discuss about things for hours.

As of lately I seen S. finally found someone (doesn’t matter if it’s broken relationship or not, matter that it happened) it kinda broke my heart and made me feel even more lonely. Like.. I know that I was naive thinking “I will leave her and don’t fight this time, it’s her turn to fight for me”; I was sure that it’s dead relationship after almost 1,5 year of silence (except my little “hearted” post and her follow in March); yet I’m sad and kinda uneasy after this. Like... hope was still here, somehow, and now is probably dead.

So if I can sum up what’s been lately, I would say that September is kinda confusing and different than my “calm to death” more than half of 2019. But I’m not happy that my heart ache again as well... like, I long for pain and love, but when I don’t remember love, and feel only pain, it’s useless. I’m strongly against numbness, as it always means pain in the end, but being in contrasts is good only when you feel both good and bad feelings.

I don’t know. Sometimes I wish I can die. Which was never the thing before my first love, and I kinda regret my feelings back then for sake of such extreme thoughts today. Sometimes I wish I can back. But as any person, we all know “you can’t turn back time”. We can only come back to things we left and try again - but it will never be the same. We can also try to remember things exactly as we left them - so new memories won’t change the old ones. Like I assumed with S.’ words that she doesn’t love me - I guessed this as a lie because it’s often that our brain reject something that make us suffer. Like Wisława Szymborska also wrote “I’m sorry for my first love, that my next love is called first”; this is why I hate Szymborska for telling painful truth. And anyone knowing me a bit better know that I see “being first” as a important symbol. Also that I miss for love being first for both souls, and uniting as one. So.. yeah, that’s one of reasons why I suffer from paragraph 7 of my post. Even if my love is probably dead or almost dead, because this time I wasn’t trying to save it. As well as fight for person I loved. It’s not like I lost my patience. This was destroying me, and I want to live a bit more than 21 years. Just this. (and for latest paragraph, both for rejecting memories and my not-fighting, fits so much first verse and chorus of Cranberries “Wake Me When It’s Over”, which I shared lately.... ah, this song’s connotations) So, what can I say in the end. Times kinda changed, and now when I’m more open and less afraid for meeting people, I just fear meeting people - not because I can’t talk, but because I fear rejection. I have some people close to me, and God bless them for being here; but it doesn’t make up for loneliness I feel anyway.

At least I try to sacrifice myself for art, but even here I see there’s much to bear before I reach quality I would like to see. With poems, I needed years. So I’m frustrated that I wasted so many years on other things. And therefore art is just a small part that recovers me. Sometimes pain is more than art can hold. Or maybe even more often than “sometimes”.

Heh, so what can I say. Life is endless run, and now I know why I was afraid ending one of my poems with “i drogi wciąż przede mną wiele” [and there’s much road before me]. And this poem was about finding peace in mind...

I just ache, ache for times I was happy. Lord, give me back, please give me back my innocence.

[virovac]

Still thinking on that Godzilla and She-Ra: Princesses of Power crossover idea

The North Pole might get a bit of focus, so Frosta will probably get a bigger role than I expected. (Besides her castle being destroyed and King Ghidorah and Shadow Weaver flying off with her runestone. Sorry Frosta, you are almost certainly getting the worst damage to buildings out of all the kingdoms. Perfuma is getting the least since Plumeria’s runestone can’t be moved without uprooting the tree, and King Ghidorah lacks gardening experience to be trusted doing that. So Shadow Weaver will instead take over Plumeria)

Anyway, back on topic.

I’ve been looking at the old show for monsters for Godzilla to fight (I’m using the smaller original 50m size of Godzilla, because the idea of him being able hide in the Whispering Woods amuses me.)

The two largest monsters from the old show I can find info on that aren’t Beast island are from: an icy region, or [according to production materials as She-Ra and her friends are sent there by teleportation] a jungle behind icy mountains ala the Savage Lands in Marvel comics

So Godzilla obviously will be fighting a tag team match against

King Liz

and a Snow Beast (From the He-Man and She-Ra Christmas special)

They may be smaller than Godzilla, but together I think they can put up a fight. (Of course they’re being forced to fight Godzilla because they fear King Ghidora and Shadow Weaver a whole lot more.)

Keep reading for more monsters.

I feel I should give Mermista and Perfuma stuff to do as well though, because of Godzilla’s connection to the Sea and the Godzilla Earth Trilogy.

What I need though, is a reason for some of these kaiju lying in wait to be awoken. Etheria in the new coninuity is an artificial planet, you’d have to be insane to bring giant monsters!

Though there are already sea monsters and sirens, so apparently thing went south probably pretty early on. For the monsters prowling the icy wilderness I’m gonna blame escaped exotic pets shipped in illegally from other planets after terraforming, personally,and having unexpected growth in their non-native environment.. Works with the Snow Beast being a larger version of the Eternian Ice Hacker due to art reuse.

King Liz I’m thinking could have been the prize attraction of the Etherian equivalent of Jurassic park centuries ago. 

For some good robot vs monster action , I could have Entrapta awaken some Monstroids from storage.

 Why would Hordak not use giant robots if he has them? Could deem them inefficient since they only have a few, or lacking a suitable power source . But with Entrapta, or Entrapta and Shadow Weaver channeling King Ghidorah’s power, energy concerns aren’t a problem, and Godzilla necessitates 

Also, if the fact they seemed to be independent villains and enemies of the Horde in their first appearance, they may have a problem of going rogue. The ones seen working for the Horde later are much dumber.

edit: Yeah I’m gonna think the issue is mainly going to be rebellion. I can have their leader even try to convince Glimmer to come to their side, saying Hordak is small potatoes and their is bigger fish to fry, and with Ghidorah’s help they can take out the entire Horde galactic empire.

Heck even the original Monstroid from the toyline who lent them their namesake was a rogue automaton originally in the sea of Eternia; Hordak gained control over using magic.

...You know what? I’m gonna have this guy menace Salineas maybe. Have Hordak surprised this old model is on Etheria, and perhaps indicate the Horde’s Monstroids are stolen/reverse engineered by the original monstroids of another civilization.

Entrapta could also invent the Waspoids to harass Godzilla, being more maneuverable than skiffs. Works well as Godzilla in the storybooks I’m drawing on for inspiration referred to Earth airplanes as “stinging bugs that looked like birds”. 

edit

Also found the Giant Spider of Crystal, with the fact it must be buried to go dormant, its a good way to show of Godzilla’s intelligence.

Edit

Also thinking that after Shadow Weaver takes over Mystacor, she could create giant Magic Knights 

(minus the, horse of course)

And possibly a large skeleton monster homaging the Dark-Riders 80s Shadow Weaver once conjured up.

Too nonstanda as foes for Godzilla?

Gekido-Jin from the Dark Horse comics says otherwise

[notreblogs]

I'm a bit outdated on how things are supposed to look but I swear Oblivion looks pretty dang beautiful. back then i had to play at minimum quality to have some decent fps (i even had to activate light brite at points) but now on full quality it really looks amazing at times. Makes me forget I'm playing without any graphics mod.