#birds writing snippets

[oh-no-its-bird]

8k words on uchiha houhua au ch 1,,, so fucking close,,,

[petvampire]

✂️✂️✂️WIP snippet! tagged by the inimitable @300foxholecourtt

since I’m always working on multiple things, y’all get a couple little bits and pieces!

kinky coupon book snippet

the shifter/mer!au rescue mission continues

the promised return of the Really Awful Hawaiian Shirt

a teeny little glimpse of the original piece I’m working on!

no-pressure tags: @anything-thats-rock-and-roll @heerotheshiro

[psychicthepsychic-daily]

bird and his trusted master

[theanonymousninja247]

Birds

A small project dedicated to @sophiacloud28 and her story “A Shot in The Dark.” And inspired by this comment I was able to snag from her

I had so many thoughts and feelings working on this project, but the symbolism behind just birds and freedom in particular wouldn’t leave me alone. And you know what they say about a picture is worth a thousand words? Well here’s my attempt of a thousand words. So I present Miss Estrella as the Twite Bird

Flower meanings in Floriography

Iris: Valor, Wisdom, Faith

Ivy: Fidelity and Attachment

Picture progress because without fail, I always like the “before’” the actual final 😆

[aalinaaaaaa]

Proud of Tag

Thank you @karkkidoeswriting for the tag!

Premise: Post a snippet you've written that you're proud of/pleased by and tag some people!

This snippet derives from a certain angsty pining scene that exists in my files and in splinters on my blog 😅

—

He took another step backwards, his resolve ebbing. “I assure you that’s not the case, at all.” She swallowed a lump in her throat. “Then why wish for things to be switched? You should be fortunate to have emerged unscathed.” “Unscathed?” He scoffed. “Do you know how it felt like being forced to watch you have that wretched poison shoved down your throat? Watching as you shivered, screamed and convulsed on the ground, eventually knocked cold to the point you went still? I thought I lost you. Of all the ways, it had to go like this.” “Don’t remind me.” “Eshani Faison,” His voice took a harsher tone, yet wavered. “You have easily got to be the most impulsive, reckless, self-sacrificial person that I have ever met. You are stubborn beyond words, your interference infuriates me, I-“

—

Sending tags to @jev-urisk @space-writes @winterandwords @frostedlemonwriter @bardic-tales @inkednotebook @illarian-rambling @tryingtimi @thecomfywriter plus an open tag to share your favourite lines!

Obsidian Sapphires plus General taglist (ask, comment, message me if you'd like to be added or removed): @mr-orion @the-ellia-west @guessillcallitart @thereadingfoz @glassstardust22124 @honeybewrites @ashirisu @drowsy-quill @oliolioxenfreewrites @theglitchywriterboi @did-i-do-this-write @threeking @seastarblue @gioiaalbanoart @midnight-and-his-melodiverse @outpost51

[prince-liest]

I needed a break from radiostatic, so instead I bring you: a different flavor of trainwreck waiting to happen!

[tracle0]

Snippet Sunday X

babes we reached 10 of them!!!! Here is a snippet to celebrate wahoo!

Wow,” he said. “That’s incredible. Why didn’t we notice anything was weird?”

“We did. We found the gods. But statistic wise… well, when did people realise you were a prophet?”

His steadily growing grin faltered. It was a hard question to answer - there was no one moment when anyone had known, least of all him. When he had been very young, both him and Cain had boldly assumed that some dreams would simply come true, which had resulted in a joint terror of coming home to find their parents replaced by overly zealous frilled lizards after Cain had had a nightmare about it. Perhaps his parents had begun to suspect when he had asked them about grand historical events or for clarity on complex, upcoming social issues he had no right to know about as a six year old. Or perhaps it had been when he had been seven, and had been able to repeat, word for word, the story his grandmother would tell at her upcoming birthday. It had been finally, quietly accepted when he was eight, after he pinpointed the exact grief his father had experienced when his uncle had died, and discussed obscure details of the time his mother had been bed-bound for two months with an aggressive strand of the flu with her, and when the cancer he had predicted three years prior had finally struck their cousin. 

“After every option has been exhausted,” he said instead. He was acutely aware of his hands. Why did they feel so present, so awkward? What did he usually do with them? Try the pockets. Hide them away. 

[crab-crab]

Scoop

I wrote sad now I present Happy. This is 100% based off the cutscene from Star Wars where Han just picks up Leia and sets her down while walking

The argument brewing between Time and Twilight had been days in the making. 

They had stopped in a town in Legend’s Hyrule, everyone happy to finally be off their feet when everything went downhill. There was shouting from down the hall and Warriors had left to go make sure everything was alright. 

Everything was evidently not alright Sky thought as he heard a door slam open and then closed, heavy steps pounding down the hallway followed by the door opening again with a strained Twilight!

Ever the peacekeeper, Sky stood and hurried away from the rest of the chain. He had just rounded the corner and caught sight of the Rancher storming towards him when he was scooped up under the arms.

Sky barely got out a muffed squeak before he was set back down to the side, out of Twilight’s way, and was greeted by the sight of the Rancher’s retreating figure.

“He moved you like a sack of feed” Wild hummed as he reached Sky’s side and watched along with the Chosen as Twilight finally disappeared outside of the inn. Legend appeared on the other side of Sky with a slow whistle and a glance back at where the Rancher had come from

“Best not get in his way anymore, he’ll just move you.”

—---------

Sky was getting very tired of being moved.

The argument between Twilight and Time had been one thing, Twilight was one of -if not- the strongest among them so it made sense that he could easily lift the smaller members.

Warriors, however, looked like a stiff breeze on Skyloft could blow him over some days.

Sky had tried to stop the Captain from storming out of the academy, saying that he could instead go to one of the other areas where it was safer but no!

Just as Sky had stepped forward to try to placate the Captain he had been scooped up under the arms again and set aside while the older man had disappeared around the corner. 

It was suspiciously quiet behind him

“Oh Golden Goddesses even the Captain can move you”

Sky turned to see Legend looking as if he’d seen the Master sword suddenly talk. Eyebrows hidden in his hair, eyes wide, and mouth dropped open. The other Links were in similar states of surprise.

“Sky come here I wanna see if I can lift you too!” Wild shot up and started heading for the Chosen.

“No!” Sky screeched when Wild dove for him and he jumped back, keeping away from the Champion’s hands.

Legend was wheezing, head planted on the table, and fist banging on the wood as he cackled. Wind had joined in on chasing Sky around and Four seemed to be looking between Sky and Legend with an intense expression, eyes flashing violet.

Another screech made Sky stop long enough to see Legend held up by Four, the Smithy grinning.

“Looks like your lightness runs in the family” He hummed as Legend thrashed about and spit curses.

Sky had enough time to laugh before being scooped up again and glaring down at a smiling Champion.

“You’re so scoopable!” He cackled and Sky heaved a sigh as the realisation settled on his shoulders.

This would not be the last time that he would be bodily moved out of the way.

[corviiids]

For the director's cut fanfic thing: ⭐⭐⭐ (these are THREE stars valid for whatever. I'm giving you blank checks)

thank you again <3

blank check 2/3 goes back to as you like it again! but this time i want to talk about my shadow designs for the akechi bossfights we've encountered in the preceding chapters >:3 there are five - the Puppet, the Singer, the Bard, the Dancer, and the Magician.

but this got really ABSURDLY long this time so ill stick to mostly the Puppet, and just do a brief ("brief") overview of the others for now.......

(for context: this is my palace au and akechi's keywords are akechi goro, the world, theatre.)

the Puppet (photos of giant puppets below if that freaks you out!)

the first Wing the thieves encounter is the puppet show, and the boss shadow is a giant marionette:

For one thing, it’s huge—maybe three or four times the size of a human being. It’s also gleaming, carefully polished and buffed, reflecting light more viciously in the areas where it seems the wood might be chipped or worn. The polish throws the lines of joints and pieces into sharp relief, giving the puppet the general impression of something whole that had been cut up and pieced slowly together with hinges and nails. Behind it, mostly concealed by its limp bulk, is a door. As they might have gleaned from the chatter of the audience, the show does not yet seem to have begun. As such, the puppet on stage is limp on its strings. Most disturbingly, it’s draped backward, not forward, snapped unnaturally at the spine and giving it the extremely uncanny look of a corpse on uneven ceiling hooks. They can just make out the side of the thing’s eyes from where they’re standing. Gravity has not been kind to them: the puppet’s eyelids are dropped open, bulging eyes left wide and staring up as far back as the build will let them. They haven’t rolled all the way into the wooden skull, presumably because they can’t. Instead, the unseeing yellow eyes remain fixed on the back corner of the stage. The puppet is entirely still. “I think I’m going to be sick,” Makoto says faintly.

i think the Puppet is my favourite of the five because he's so disturbing. i imagine he looks a bit like the giant marionettes by the french street theatre show royal de luxe:

but i really love these guys, so i think it's uncharitable to say akechi's shadow looks exactly like them. i know giant puppets are always a little freaky but i genuinely love the royal de luxe puppets and i think the workmanship on these does genuinely do a ton of work to dispel that uncanny vibe.

puppet akechi on the other hand is absolutely drenched in uncanny valley, so i guess imagine these puppets but much scarier. the main thing is those places where different pieces of wood are joined, in the joints / on the limbs / etc, because that's very key to puppet akechi's look in my mind, hence "something whole that had been cut up and pieced slowly together with hinges and nails". the Puppet is a marionette, but the way he's been constructed and set up on stage almost calls to mind the imagery of a corpse that's been reconstructed to perform. the way he moves is really unnatural:

Ren is beginning to think they might be able to get past and slip through that door without a fight when the whole creature rears up, back strings going taut, and lashes wildly out at him with a horrible clack of its arms—he leaps back and crashes directly into Haru, who catches and dips him like a princess before twirling him frantically into Ryuji and the puppet gouges a deep gash in the stage floor.    As they watch it screeches, howls an unnatural shriek, eyes suddenly wide and bulging larger. They ‘blink’ a few times, eyelids flipping, then the puppet Akechi goes limp on its strings again, though decidedly more upright than before, like whoever’s pulling the strings is now on guard. Its eyes stay open this time, bright gold and piercing.

very much not like something exercising its own agency, but like a body on strings being operated by someone who did not care to practice in the artistry of operating a puppet to make it look like a live thing - the puppet is literally just a tool to be flailed about.

this also shows in the way the puppet sits when it's at rest. guys do you know how god damn hard it is to find normal pictures of puppets? when you google marionette it just comes up with a bunch of fnaf shit. anyway check this guy out

at rest, they usually just kind of dangle innocently, or might slouch forward if given too much slack, right? it was important to me that puppet akechi look very wrong at rest, as if he's not "at rest" so much as he's just been left to hang. hence: "it’s draped backward, not forward, snapped unnaturally at the spine and giving it the extremely uncanny look of a corpse on uneven ceiling hooks." i'm basically imagining meat hooks, like, in a slaughterhouse or something you know? like he's just dangling from those.

that imagery was inspired by persona 5 dancing, actually - akechi's finishing pose in his dance is this:

this is just such an unnatural pose. when i saw it for the first time, i just couldn't get the image out of my head of a string puppet who'd been hung up and left to dangle without any regard for how it might look or feel (lol). not to mention that blank look in his eyes. i think a lot of the Puppet was born from this dance because the dance itself is so dynamic and silly but then the lead-up to the end suddenly gets very jerky and puppet-like. i really like his dance!

the Puppet's battle mechanic is that the applause will continue as long as the Puppet is either acting or getting hurt (kind of like the mettaton fight in undertale actually?). if the applause stops, then the Puppet will be inflicted with Despair - in p5 the Despair effect means you lose SP for each turn and then instantly die on the third turn. makoto ends up healing the Puppet and yusuke mercy-kills it before it can commit suicide:

Fox silently raises his gun. The Thieves collectively flinch as the Puppet dissipates. The applause starts back up. “If we’d left things silent,” Yusuke says, “it would have only happened again.”

because this is the first shadow bossfight the thieves encounter in the Theatre, i needed it to have some broader implications (vs some of the later shadows who have more specific interactions). so obviously the analogue for akechi is that the performance needs to continue and he needs to continue receiving acknowledgement from the public / from shido / etc because if he's not useful and entertaining and noticeable and such, then he's nothing - his life doesn't mean anything. obviously, if he doesnt perform for shido (perform in the sense of working, but also in the sense of showmanship) he'll probably be killed. but also, akechi really externalises his sense of self to an insane degree. the conceit of the palace is essentially that his entire internal world is the show, it's just this shallow performance, the backstage is empty. if he stops existing in the cognition of the masses, he essentially "stops existing".

i think a lot about third semester akechi in royal and how completely he's faded from public awareness. he doesn't care because he's a dead man walking and has locked into nihilism at that point. but if you look at what akechi says in the engine room:

his voice when he says this says a lot to me. akechi's envisioning the world as it will look when he has to return and face the consequences of the world discovering what's behind the curtain and realising his credibility was all a show. to be honest, i think this also plays a role in his decision to sacrifice himself in this scene. i don't think he wanted to die, but i think he did realise that the post-thieves, post-truth world wasn't a place that held anything for him anymore, and his desire to return to that reality was dramatically weakened, so it was an easier decision for him to choose to make that sacrifice than it otherwise might have been.

um, i had a point. okay, so, i was saying that once the applause stops, the Puppet begins to despair. the Puppet also is the most direct representation of akechi as someone who is being used. all the shadow bosses correlate to some aspect of akechi's need to perform and to the varying reasons why they all have that sense of desperation:

“Kinda feels like they’re just defendin’ themselves, you know,” [Ryuji] says. “Or somethin’. Look too much like him. It’s weird they can’t talk, cos it’s like fighting a dumb animal. Don’t they all seem real scared to you?” None of Akechi’s Shadows have delivered grand speeches about conquering the world. Even Futaba’s Shadow had given them a fairly strong indication of what was going on with her, that overwhelming guilt which had given birth to a resolve to lock herself up in her mind and die. Akechi’s Shadows have lashed out, tried to destroy them, sure. But it feels different in a way that’s growing more and more impossible to ignore. Desperate to fend them off, more than anything, like each one is the final bastion standing for a world that could crumble at any moment.

that's why once you figure out how to stop each shadow's "show" from going on, they instantly die:

ripping the Singer's mask off causes him to cease to exist (see below)

silencing the Bard, who relies on the power of his words to manipulate others, removes his power and reveals that he's pretty easy to take down

the Dancer's feet are always bleeding because he can't stop moving. he's hard to catch, but the moment he stops dancing, he's revealed to have extremely low defence and can be taken out very easily

but the Puppet is literally being manipulated by a puppetmaster. because he no longer has any use when the applause stops, he no longer has a reason to exist. i also just thought this would be a fun effect to start on because it's so drastic as an introduction to akc's psyche and really gives the thieves a sense of what they're working with by throwing them directly into the deep end.

ok let's leave the puppet behind for now. im gonna be more brief with the others i promise (maybe)

the Singer

LET'S TALK about. beneath the mask. a song about ren. but it's also a song about goro.

I'm a shape-shifter at Poe's masquerade Hiding both face and mind All free for you to draw

the fic goes over some of my meta about this:

[Yusuke] I have done some research. [Makoto] Oh? [Yusuke] I believe when the Opera Shadow sang of “Poe’s Masquerade”, he was referring to a short story by Edgar Allan Poe, entitled “The Masque of the Red Death”.

eternally grateful for the scene during the pyramid arc where yusuke loredumps about egyptian mythology so i have precedent to do this

yusuke summarises the story in this chapter (chapter 4), but basically: the story is about rich people abandoning the common folk to a plague, until a personification of the plague wearing a red mask enters the castle. when his mask is removed, it's revealed there is nothing underneath. everyone in the castle then succumbs to the plague.

the superficial connections to akechi are pretty obvious - red mask, plague doctor. etc. but this song is really, really telling for both ren and goro. i briefly went over this in my last dvd commentary post about the palace fic, but this relates to my meta around both of them as mask wearers. the line "all free for you to draw" is a big one - ren is "all free for you," the player, "to draw" - he becomes who you need him to be, and because you need to max out your confidants, he becomes (via you) who his friends need him to be.

goro is similar on a different scale because he moulds his personality to what the public expects him to be. he takes it one step further, because it's less utility for him and more foundational - as i said, to an extent the performance is the substance of his personality, which is the core of the distortion. so both ren and goro are wearing the mask, malleable in character, their actual personality being somewhat questionable, but that emptiness is only true for goro. ren's definitely got something underneath it, but goro feels like he doesn't.

brief cw for suicidal ideation, but i also generally take it as a given that goro doesn't really expect to live past 18 after defeating shido. not that he's actively suicidal, but i think literally or figuratively he knows after shido's downfall, his own life will pretty much be over, and that's part of what drives the emptiness. the show really only needs to go on until that point, and after that there's no need to build a real thing underneath to return to. he's very much living for that goal.

anyway: so the Singer starts out singing the Phantom of the Opera - the Shadow is very much modelled after the phantom - but swaps to beneath the mask and begins to connect with ren. the Singer wears a red mask. i really like this mask! i envision it as looking like someone pouring blood over his face and then the blood freezing in place, so it just looks very molten and liquid but fixed over half his face.

ren defeats the Singer by ripping his mask off:

[Ren] Please don’t take off my mask, revealing dark [Ann] OMG!! [Ann] THAT’S WHAT HAPPENED WHEN WE TOOK OFF HIS MASK!! [Ann] HE REVEALED DARK!!!! [Ann] HE DISAPPEARED!!!!!!!!!!

(i love the thieves because i dont have to be subtle about my symbolism i can just make them say it)

anyway, just like the figure in the Masque of the Red Death, ripping off the Singer's mask reveals "dark" underneath - he ceases to exist.

Just a cage of bones There's nothing inside

the Bard and the Dancer

when i was first plotting this fic, i was actually designing the palace not as a written environment but as though it would be a playable place. so a lot of it is informed by me picturing what this palace would be like to play through and explore, building it out as a video game environment in my mind's eye and then trying to describe it from that point. i took the same approach to the bossfights, so they're all designed around central gameplay mechanics which are largely based on status effects and how the player would strategise around them. (to that end, a lot of the design stuff in my doc never made it into the fic...)

the conceit of the bard was a shadow who can manifest abstract concepts into being by manipulating reality with his words. so the status effects he uses are brainwash and sleep, mostly. his monologues are modified versions of shakespeare's works.

part of the reason why i started writing this fic was specifically to challenge myself in aras of writing im not very confident in: so longform planning, progression of plot, environment description, and action scenes being major ones. writing all the boss fights was and continues to be a real challenge. the chapter that the bard shows up in (chapter 5) ended up taking ages and ages in part because i kept putting off writing this fight. now that it's done, though, the bard fight is actually maybe my favourite fight scene i've written lol. it always turns out that way!!! the reason i like it is because i realised the physical action wasn't the fun part of writing a fight like this. since it was focused on status effects, it meant i got to crawl into ren's headspace when he got brainwashed, which i really really enjoyed doing because i got to drag out some trauma that joker has lovingly repressed.

   to set my fellows, phantoms in the wings    in deadly hate the one against the other…    This isn’t the Casino. This is somewhere else entirely. The Casino, and everything that came with it, that was months ago. How did he forget? The cottonwool that had crept so slowly into his blood dissipates in a mad rush that leaves him dizzy with disbelief. His hands, now that he can feel them again, are trembling. The knife between his fingers, trembling. The cool floor beneath him, the air in his lungs. How close had he come to never feeling that again?    Had he really just been feeling safe about that plan? Had he really felt everything was going to be okay? If anything had gone wrong—anything at all—he’d have been gone. He’d have been dead. How had they made it so he felt okay with that?    A trick? A ruse?    How blasé they’d all been, when it was his life they were gambling with like a worthless set of poker chips! And they’re here—all around him. Safe? He’s never been in more danger.    “Joker!”    Surrounded. He’s surrounded by the ones who left him for dead.

the Dancer doesn't get as much attention in text because i didn't want to slow down the pacing of the story every few minutes to do another huge scene tgat doesn't really serve a purpose, just like the exploration of the Globe Wing didn't. all that mattered was that he was shown to be adaptable, agile, and resilient - the Dancer needs to be in top condition at all times and ready to dodge any threat. the imagery that came through to me the strongest was the idea that his feet are always bleeding, so he leaves bloodstains all over the floor.

the Magician

this was another scene i adored writing. i think environment-wise, the House of Cards is my favourite Wing in the palace because it's the most unique structure. it's not a styled theatre like the others, it's more on-theme to the Magician, like he's set up his own performance environment. so it's just a huge house of cards made of crumbling playing cards which is really difficult to navigate and which joker kind of blends into.

the premise for the Magician was someone who needs to perform miracles and present impossible illusions as reality with a flair for drama. the Magician fools the Thieves over and over and over again, because they are good-hearted people who want to save him.

did you ever see that unused mementos request in royal where akechi tells the thieves about a target to save someone, and doesn't tell them that the someone in question is dodgy themself, and watches to see how quickly the Thieves immediately trust them?

i don't think i based this fight off this request because im pretty sure i had it planned out before i ever saw this, but i was really pleased to see it because it's very much the same idea. even in the engine room, akechi calls the thieves idiots for inviting him back into the team. of course, this isn't a good or healthy worldview lol and it's something he has to unlearn because he literally trusts no one and that's not an extreme anyone should be endorsing, but he also has a point in that the thieves are willing to throw their faith into things way too easily and don't look critically at people or situations. so the magician fools them, victimises them, tricks them into considering him a victim, fools them again, traumatises them, but they all continue to feel empathy for him and try to save him when he's in trouble. akc's cynicism vs the thieves' faith is a big theme of this one i think and the question is like, when to doubt vs when to trust even when you have evidence to the opposition. i think the right position is somewhere between thesis and antithesis (which iirc is not actually the wording hegel used when describing dialectics? lol... i might be wrong. i never studied hegel so my knowledge is pretty superficial. but i think this was a translation thing anyway because allegedly goro doesnt refer directly to hegel in jp? someone can confirm or deny idk)

anyway those are the bossfights we've had so far!!! just the VIP Box to go now......................... :3

[embers-writes]

Trick or treat!

You get a snip of the sore must be the storm sequel that I will one day make enough progress on to start posting. The WIP title in my docs is, in keeping with the theme, that could abash the little bird Trick or Treat Fic Game

“Dick,” Bruce breathes. “I thought – but how is this possible?”

The chance that Dick can keep this secret for any serious length of time is near zero. But Bruce’s face is alight with a wonder, a naked happiness for Dick that has been absent since – he doesn’t know. Since before Jason died, at least. Maybe since Dick was Robin.

He can’t spoil that with the truth. Not now.

“Well, it wasn’t any medication or treatment I tried, that much I can tell you,” Dick says, letting a grin tug at the corners of his mouth. “I gave up on those years ago.”

“But then when... who?”

The art of lying to Bruce isn’t carefully crafted statements. Most of the time, it’s not saying anything at all.

Dick lets his body do what it wants. His expression shutters, his shoulders hunch, everything becoming closed off. Letting it be made plain how much he doesn’t want to answer that question.

He can smell in the worry and care that enters Bruce’s scent that Bruce is filling in the blanks on his own.

[oh-no-its-bird]

Beautiful things happening in my corner of the world (aka my wip pile)

No one ask me how my other wips are going. Or ask if slash when I'll finish this one.

[nostomannia]

"You're leaving?"

There wasn't a reply. 

"You… You're not, right?"

Silence. 

Solita’s mouth felt like it was full of cotton. She couldn't swallow. She couldn't breathe. Her body shook uncontrollably. Deity wouldn't look at her. 

"But-"

"It's not over, is it?" 

"I thought that was the fate you wanted?" The question they gave her made her feel ill. "It means you're free now." 

"Can- can you stay a little longer..?"

"The other night. When you completed that job, that was the final push I needed. I waited already. I waited until you recovered some, and that you were out of any consequences. I cannot linger any longer. I stayed because our… partnership deserves a proper departure." 

She wanted to cry but the tears wouldn't come. "Not like this. Please." Her voice was barely above a whisper. "I thought you'd never let me be alone."

They were silent for a moment. It was a moment that felt like an eternity. They then reached out, brushing a hand over her hair. Solita felt a sob growing in her chest.

"All promises come to an end, Solita." Her chest hurt. She couldn't stop the shaking. Wordless babble came from her mouth as she reached up and grabbed Deity's hand with both of her own. Tears finally coming as she lost the words to be able to beg for them to stay.

She could have sworn she saw the grimace, then their face soften. They reached with their other hand to wipe tears off her face. "However, I'll leave you with a gift. As a final piece of gratitude, and a farewell. It will help you find peace. Possibly more, eventually."

"What-?" She squeaked out, barely able to finish her sentence before their hand moved from her cheek downwards, meeting her collarbone before it sank into her body.

She froze. They've done this before. When her body was slowly dying, they did this to deal with the problem within her souls. But somehow this felt different.  Then, came the deep agonizing pain. It felt beyond her own body. She wanted to scream. But it wouldn't leave her throat. What left instead was a torrent of blood. 

"Oh dear." Was all Deity said at first, using the hand that Solita was holding to keep her in place as she attempted to struggle away. "Apologies. I'm not used to my full power. I'll be gentler." 

She could only respond by sputtering and choking on blood. 

"This should do. I do not believe I can do more. It will eventually blossom on its own." As they let go of her, she collapsed, gasping and coughing out blood. They sighed with some disappointment. "Perhaps I should have practiced some before attempting this. I must get used to working with minute details again." 

They crouched down to touch her face, brushing stray hairs away. "One day you may come to appreciate this present. However, I cannot stay by your side to personally witness the day when you do." Her eyes were drooping, an exhaustion from whatever Deity had done taking over her senses. But she made one final attempt to beg for them to stay, grabbing the hand that touched her face. 

"Do not fret, child." Their voice was uncharacteristically soft. "I will still be keeping an eye on you. I may not be with you, but I will not forget." Their hand slipped from her grip, and she faded into unconsciousness before she could see them disappear.

[triscribe]

Birds of Legend Intro ficlets 👀?

(Got the first two posted over here, working on a third installment now)

Goshawk and Kestrel found Tyra far faster than the time she’d put in trying to locate them. Granted, she wasn’t making any particular effort to hide, which certainly made a difference.

Two sets of boots thumped down onto the rooftop behind her. Tyra idly flipped her cards from one hand to the other, checking the last as it went. Two of Wands, contemplation, assessing the direction of one’s life. “::Say we might be interested in your offer::” Goshawk’s electronic voice rolled across the roof. “::What more can you tell us about being part of the Coalition?::”

“Plenty,” Tyra said, turning to lean back against the railing and look over the Birds. In daylight, no less. Their armored suits appeared no less intimidating when brought out of the shadows. “Musketeer could tell you our organization started out as an agreement between superpowered entities to put their commitment to saving lives higher than any national loyalty - mitigation of harm remains our number one priority, wherever in the world that takes us. Some members remain almost entirely based in their home territories; others travel extensively, going where emergencies require their help with no true homebase other than our Titans.”

Kestrel’s head tipped a little to one side. “::Titans?::”

“That’s what we call our submersed deployment centers. Two occupy the northern and southern halves of the Atlantic Ocean, four circle the Pacific, and six others occupy various other bodies of water. They’re all linked up in one teletransport loop, making it easier to instantaneously get around the planet and respond to threats as they happen.” And for the kicker- “I’m authorized to offer you both a tour of one, if you’d like to see.”

[dragoninabottle]

     When the Prince was a child, he took a part of his heart from out of his chest and buried it somewhere in the earth, never to see it again. 

     Or, at least, that’s what the stories say. The truth is much the same, and yet nothing at all alike. It goes like this: 

     The Prince was a child. And he felt too much, his father said. Too soft-spoken with the servants, too restrained in his strikes in training, too transfixed on watching blue skies and dancing stars, too many melodies spilling from his songbird lips, too much willingness to laugh, too much grief to hold in when his mother left died. 

     It’ll be better this way, his father had said. It will be easier. 

     It goes like this: 

     The Prince is a child. His father hands him the knife- His father holds the knife- His father holds him down- The Prince makes the cut- His father takes- 

     No one knows. No one speaks. Not where ears can hear. There are only whispered promises into children’s hair when they fall asleep and parents hold them close. There are only shared looks of muted horror between spouses while they sing their dear ones to sleep. 

     The Prince is not sung to sleep. He is not a child. (He does not sing anymore either, a black bird without a song.) 

     It goes like this: 

     The Prince is gentle–as gentle as one can be in a den of snakes–and then he isn’t. He isn’t cruel, exactly. But one day the Prince is heavy with grief yet soft, and the next he is heavy like stone and just as cold and hard. (No one speaks of the haunted cry that echoed in the night in between. No one speaks at all; they only clutch their children closer and beg for forgiveness like it’s a prayer.) 

     He grows the way only someone missing a part of their heart can. He grows cold and detached, feral in the wild untamed anger and pride and shame, but chained in plain disinterest and self-imposed isolation. No one can touch something that isn’t there, but nor can loneliness be felt when there’s nothing to feel it. There is only emptiness. 

     (But here is a truth the story leaves out: the Prince only lost part of his heart, and the half that remains screams in agony calls out in silence.) 

     It goes like this: 

     The Prince grows up and he is cold and dark. This is what some pain will do–turn you loud and quiet, turn you raging and still. But he grows all the same. He isn’t cruel, exactly. But he doesn’t sing, doesn’t watch the sky, doesn’t soften his words. The servants see his father in his eyes and he doesn’t change that. 

     Time moves on. 

---

     When Éabha was a child, she kept her heart in her chest time after time, cut after cut, and stitched it up by herself. 

     This isn’t a story that anyone tells. And so, there’s no saying whether it’s true or not.

[transslycanthropy]

Brainrot so severe I gave a pair of my oc’s one of those cutesy shipping names that would trip up someone not familiar with them just because it fit them so well I start giggling and kicking my feet when I think about it

[fountainpenguin]

😔 I split the chapter again... They just keep talking and I can't stop them... I keep prying words from their mouths but they keep finding new things in the room to look at and making new ones. Skeleton Train scrap series might be getting fed tonight /jk

For context, MumboDrone told Mumbo he was planning to propose to TrueSymmetry back in One and a Half Birds Chapter 10. Martyn and Mumbo were married during that story. The wedding took place before Mumbo's hiatus from Season 9, so the Ahasbands were still together and Martyn definitely showed up for it.

Here's a snippet from the upcoming September chapter of Martyn looking at the photo spread in Cleo's room... [Implied biting]

Their portal lies across from the door, the bed tucked right beside it. Tiny froglights decorate the space above, alongside additional printscreens of friends and their twin (HumanCleo). Lots of Bdubs pictures. A few dragons. New Star in its early days? Lots of Joe, Scott, Lizzie, Pearl, Hermitcraft events, and a few people Martyn doesn’t even recognize. Two from TrueSymmetry and MumboDrone’s wedding a couple years ago. Martyn lingers for a moment to get a close look. He and Mumbo were still married when that wedding happened. There he is, dressed fancy with False on the ends of the rows: two matching phantoms gesturing dramatically as the happy couple sprints towards each other for a traditional li’l slap session. Gotta break it in, you know (Marriage).

Martyn can feel Cleo’s eyes on his back, the weight of her jacket still wrapped around his neck. He doesn’t touch the printscreen, even though he really wants to. He probably shouldn’t be touching the lovely walls. He’s staring way too long; this is really weird. Cleo’s got the other end of his leash. She lets him stand there, though, for this little sliver of time.

Ask him why he’s staring at the wedding pictures and he wouldn’t have an answer. Happy then. Married then. Martyn rubs his ring finger. He and Mumbo didn’t have a ceremony. It started with on-server roleplay, mostly as a joke, and incredibly ambiguous. Mumbo offered to let Martyn nibble on his soul at nights so he’d last longer when night fell and brought phantom hybrid narcolepsy with it. They never really stopped. Started sharing the bed. Hung out a lot in Between. Never had a wedding. Never signed any paperwork beyond the standard for sharing an AFK; Etho still shooed him from the room when Mumbo had his cross-contamination check-ups. He clenches his fingers in a squeeze.

Netty showed him the ring when it came in. It had his name engraved in tiny letters, but they agreed they wouldn’t tell anyone until they figured out what they were gonna do about it. It was November, a few years ago, when they agreed to date. All under the radar, again- Didn’t want any break-up to be messy.

He did her final logout with his own teeth. Do you think Netty knew, even then, that she wouldn’t be waking up again?

They didn’t have a betrothal ceremony. No wedding. Which is fine, really.

- Dog's Life Chapter 51 - "True and Faults"

Also known as the arc where Cleo spends 40k words trying to get Martyn to sit down and focus... RIP undead nonbinary zombie who planned a roleplay scene that involves the phantom hybrid she's fake dating to bite her, but he's too annoyed about getting divorced over text last night to stay in character <3

I feel like I'm trying to scoop water from a sinking boat... A few days ago I cut 7k words of Martyn-Cleo interactions with a plan to move them to a later arc in the story, and then today I reread a scene I finished a week ago, wanted to add a small detail, and it caused a whole spiral that's veering direction because they. won't. stop. talking.

I hope y'all like long chapters full of Martyn & Cleo talking, because I sure have a lot of that.