#but i am open to critique

[bizawa-art]

not pictured: sakura absolutely showing naruto and sasuke up post chunin exams with her new big sword skills she learned from the big sword master himself

[aimfor-theheart]

on the death of skirt chasers

a small think piece on how media has been stripped of romance, sex appeal, and charm over the last 20 years using trigun and trigun stampede as an example—specifically looking at this through wolfwood and vash as a tangible way to track this evolution.

it’s interesting and also unsurprising to me that trigun stampede stripped vash and wolfwood of some of their biggest personality traits from the 98 anime, which were their love of women. to be frank— they were both dogs lol

but vash was this sort of forlorn man who, meryl, upon meeting him, adequately describes him by asking, “are you the type of man to fall in love right away and get your heart broken?” or something to that effect. and he says what, no way! and then proceeds to fall in love with the next beautiful woman he sees and gets his heart broken by the end of the episode. and we were seeing this constantly throughout the show, then even in the later movie of the early 2010s badlands rumble.

and the 2000s are notorious for dubious, sexist comments from men who are women-obsessed. our action movies are packed with sexy female characters only existing for romance, etc. etc. we’re sort of at the tail end of it in 2010. so arguably, vash is almost worse here to me? he’s really pushy and borderline inappropriate with how stubborn he is. in a way that, while persistent in the 98 anime, he had a little more boyish charm to him and they never made him so forceful.

and then the middle and later 2010s happen where marvel takes over our action movies and romance and sex and womanizers are all but killed—originally, in reaction to the sexism. it’s important to note that the me too movement picks up in the middle and later 2010s too and becomes well-known by the end of this decade. and in response, i think we nosedive into puritanical ideas and sentiments by the end of the decade.

now we must always remember when a movement (ie feminism in this case) has a critique or reaction that catches on (the me too movement, men being pushy and overly flirtatious in our media, treating women in action movies only as sexy romance options, or showcasing toxic dynamics that subconsciously tell men to keep chasing her, even if she’s not interested) then the oppressive force (patriarchy in this case) will always transform as a way to take control again (bringing puritanical ideals back—we shouldn’t be showing sex or romance in our movies. we should not be consuming any dark content, ever. etc etc.)

i believe we killed romance and sex in the later 2010s because of an over correction of our sex-obsessed media of the 2000s—or rather, the patriarchy over corrected in order to maintain control. there were critiques of the 2000s that were valid, but like i said, the oppressive force will always transform to maintain power, so we hit puritanical beliefs again. “political correctness” if you will.

(capitalism surely has something to do with this too and it’s definitely along the lines of—be more beautiful and even hotter, but your body is not a sexual one, but a visual or capitalistic one. etc. etc. another topic, another time.)

and so here we are and we don’t really have any flirty or womanizing characters like we used to. and we see this very plainly in 2023s trigun stampede, where they have completely stripped vash and wolfwood of any of those traits.

and i sort of miss them? i think a 2023 forlorn vash who loves great and hard and gets his heartbroken would not be a bad thing—one who is effected and charmed by women, maybe rather than nearly stalking them like in the 2010 movie. i think it shows another piece of vash and that is quite literally that he wears his heart on his sleeve. and he gets hurt for it, endlessly. more than that there is a little more whimsy to him? and aching. he’s this lonely man who wants love so, so badly.

now, wolfwood in 98 version was less this forlorn chaser and more this suave womanizer. many jokes are made where vash is chasing a girl that wolfwood sorta already has if he wants her. but he’s this lone wolf who leaves everyone a little high and dry. (of course until the end—with milly —where, in a very classic lone-man way, he dies after leaving a woman with his child. the tragedy being that when he was ready to stop roaming and settle down with her and meryl and vash, he dies, thus still leaving everyone). and i mean even his appearance in the 98 version—big chested with low-buttoned shirt, shaggy hair and stubble. he looks like a 90s rockstar. he looks like your lone cowboy. he’s reminiscent of spike from cowboy bebop who has a similar charming air to him that never leads anywhere because he’s destined to be solo. the unintentional, intentional womanizer.

then the later 2010s hit and we kill the charming womanizer. (tony stark kills the womanizer. another topic, another time.)

and now in 2023, wolfwood is completely stripped of any of his sex appeal and suave personality that the 98 and even 2010 version of him oozed naturally. gone is the cool, tough, lone wolf. replaced with a sort of boy-bandish, squeaky-clean, semi villain, semi hero. he’s crass and he’s snarky and he’s supposed to be rough around the edges. but he doesn’t look it? and he lacks the charm that 98 wolfwood naturally had. which aided him when he talked to kids—he was softer. charming. people liked wolfwood, even when he was being crass. he knew how to talk to people, maybe even how to con them when he wanted.

2023’s wolfwood is tough to get along with. and while fun sometimes, i think it does lose this…romanticism to him? there is a softness in wolfwood that is sorta lost in 2023s version. while we get a fuller and better written backstory, we sort of lose this other aspect of him. we’re supposed to infer from his backstory and his relationship to his brother that he is a good man, just one put in a horrible situation, always had bad luck. whereas the 98 version, we saw that wolfwood was good with kids. gentle. women loved him—he charmed rowdy men, even swindled when he needed to. we saw that there was something good in wolfwood, even if he remained mysterious.

all this to say i do miss the romanticism? i do miss these men being…romantic? flirty? charming? and not even in a fangirl way but in a…humans are romantic creatures way? we are sexual beings? and romance and sex can tell us a lot about characters and their personalities.

and i think looking at vash and wolfwood in particular is a good way to track how we lost this romanticism in our media over the last 20 years—we literally see it in them, in their remaking in 2023, where they are stripped of it.

i think the mid and later 2020s will continue to return to it in some way—we already see this with the resurgence in romance novels (or these dark fantasy romance novels gaining popularity) and even fandom spaces being more “mainstream” on social media. but in late stage capitalism (and thus late stage patriarchy, racism, etc.) it looks a little like a carnival mirror of romance and sex to me.

another topic, another time. etc. etc.

[placeholder-mcd]

(Obligatory "I sound like I'm speaking objectively from authority but this is just my opinion and it's okay for you to like media I dislike for whatever reasons you may have")

Okay so like. while "the minecraft move trailer is so bad that it makes minecraft story mode look good in comparison" is both true and funny, can we please not start pretending that story mode is a well-crafted piece of media. as someone who has played through it multiple times (first when it originally came out and I was 12 and thought it was awesome, then later as an interactive Netflix experience with friends for so-bad-it's-good reasons) I feel pretty qualified to say it blows

Like, yes. There are so many things that MCSM got right that the movie apparently got wrong. But, like, they're all extremely common-sense things to get right -- like having the whole thing be animated, and maintaining a visual style that feels consistent with minecraft, and spending time with individual aspects of the minecraft experience that have their own communities (like redstone contraptions). that sense seems a little less common now that the movie trailer exists, but still, these are all bare minimum expectations of a piece of narrative-driven media set in Minecraft.

MCSM still completely fails, however, to have any compelling characters (RIP Reuben you were just as annoying as everyone else) or non-grating dialogue. The universe they depict isn't even well thought out! Like, okay, example:

Right off the bat, they make a big decision about how they're going to handle MCSM: they are not telling a story about people playing Minecraft the video game, but are instead depicting a universe where Minecraft is inhabited by a civilization of NPCs that have identical abilities to a player (aside from like, pausing the game or changing settings or what have you). This, in itself, is not a bad decision, but it puts the writers in a position where they need to conceptualize what is effectively a Minecraft AU. You're not playing survival mode or creative mode, you're playing Story mode. In this AU, humans exist in the minecraft world and have for a long time (centuries, at least?), they've built cities, they have language, etc. Imagine you're Jesse. Imagine you've grown up inside of Minecraft. Everyone is playing on hardcore, there is no respawning, and you live in a world filled with strange and dangerous creatures that seem hell-bent on killing you. Why the Fuck does anyone go out at night. Why isn't literally everyone combat-trained. Why is Jesse acting like he's never seen a Creeper before. Why is Petra the only member of the main party who knows how to craft a pickaxe.

At the build competition, the party is surprised that the reigning building team has a beacon. But nobody takes a second to actually investigate what that means. Did their team intentionally spawn and defeat a Wither? Doesn't that make them more badass and legendary than the order of the stone? Is there a black market for nether stars? (I think Petra is probably the one who gave them the beacon since she also trades Ivan a Wither skull. But like. Why isn't literally anyone else just going and doing what Petra does. Why aren't they impressed)

Ivan having access to a Command Block is also insane. Like, it has potential to be an extremely cool choice -- did Ivan find a way to break the fourth wall? Did he find an exploit in Minecrafts code that allowed him to obtain this? The command block has the power to just generate resources out of thin air. Ivan could actually use it to become a god and give himself creative mode. But okay, we can assume that the command block is just... Different, in the AU. Fine. It's a computing center / power core for the Wither Storm. Sure

But, like. I, even as an 11 year old, knew everything there was to know about minecraft when I played story mode (and, unlike the Movie, MCSM was actually attempting to appeal to the existing fanbase), so watching these characters who have lived for DECADES within the Minecraft universe just. Be helpless and completely clueless as to how the universe works? It makes me hate like all of them. I don't care about Jesse or Gabriel and if I actually had the freedom to perform the basic actions I could perform in Minecraft -- mining, building, and crafting -- I could use my game knowledge to pretty swiftly end the entire conflict at like any point in the story. And I'm not very good at video games. But I would expect a character who's been LIVING IN THE MINECRAFT WORLD TO BE ABLE TO DO THAT. BECAUSE THEY'D BE BETTER AT MINECRAFT THAN ANY OF US.

The whole thing is a contrived and buggy mess that feels like it was written by a Hollywood CEO who watched someone play the game for 30 minutes, looked up some basic information like how to beat the game and whether there's any in-game lore, and then riffed on that until a script outline was finished. The programmers, visual artists, and composers clearly did a ton of work to make MCSM feel like minecraft. And they did a good job -- clearly, a much better job than the Movie is going to do. But that doesn't change the fact that the Story -- the focal element advertised in the title -- completely misses the fucking mark and centers around a group of characters who are largely incompetent and stupid in an unfunny and uninteresting way. MCSM was a shitty cashgrab by telltale games and I am not apologizing to it.

[apollos-boyfriend]

jack doodle bc i’m trying to get used to dealing with his long ass limbs

[ratcandy]

Big Huge Irritated Rant About The Latest COTL Update's Story Choices and the Implications

So the lore drop in the new Cult of the Lamb update, Unholy Alliance, pisses me off. The writer's confirmation of what that lore drop means pisses me off more.

Why? Because it's unnecessary recontextualization that was made pretty obviously in favor in one character in particular, and somehow in that process makes that very same character way less interesting. I think it's incredibly detrimental to the story and I will Explain Why in a second.

But before I do, I just want to put this out there: Prior to this update, my opinions on the Bishops and Narinder and that entire plotline were pretty neutral. I'm an NPC enjoyer, I spend my time thinking about that moth with two lines of dialogue. I did not previously have strong opinions on Narinder or Shamura outside of mild dislike for fandom treatment. So I'm not coming from a place of bias here (or at the very least I'm not trying to be). I genuinely, wholeheartedly, 100% believe this writing decision was unnecessary and the Wrong one to make, and I think it severely undercuts the original plotline because this was a retcon and one that sucks pretty bad.

Ok we're on the same page here? Ok awesome. Long rant ahead, and obvs spoilers for the Unholy Alliance update

So first, what the hell am I talking about? What part of the update do I not like? Let's clarify that first.

It's Shamura's dialogue. Like, all of it. For ease of understanding, here is all the dialogue I will be talking about:

"Ah... we gathered here, the four of us, a council of war and I the general. I have not forgot. I did not tell them that chains to bind a God must be forged of Godly matters. What matter of Gods? What matters of Gods? I have not forgot. The betrayal of kin, the breaking of spirits, blood spilled, his and ours. ...the sacrifice of what we had sacrificed so much for... ...shaped into shackles for our own brother. And our wounds always to weep. Such sharp claws..."

--

"He sought to break nature's own laws. Death was his, yet he placed his sacred duty in peril. His experiments... Experiments I encouraged. I am not... blameless. My soul, stained... yet I do not... Ah, The story. Yes the story... He wanted to open the doors between Life and Death, to... to allow their return. Those mere... mortals. Even though he knew their sacrifices, their faith, their fears sustain us. Death must be the end. Otherwise, what use would they have for Gods? They began to flock to him. What he promised, we could not match. He swelled with devotion... while we waned. Would he have let us perish? I could not take... the risk... the hunger... You are lucky there are none left to force such a choice on you. Hail, Lamb. Last God... lonely God... Ah... I feel... unburdened..."

And for fun, before anyone tells me I'm misinterpreting any of this or that it's left up to interpretation or is intentionally vague, Word of God (the writer of CoTL):

And it's this being Word of God that's spurred me into making this post to begin with. Because prior to this, I just seethed about this dialogue's implications in my server and hoped I was wrong. But now it's been confirmed what this means, and I'm . Disgruntled, to say the least!

And since I've started writing this post, there's been another addition made to further clarify parts of this. But I'm going to go over that addition more towards the end, because it also irritates me for separate reasons.

So, let's get this straight.

Prior to this update, the specifics of what happens between Narinder and the Bishops were pretty vague. We were told Narinder was "gluttonous in his ambition," per Shamura's previous dialogue, and that they "introduced him to ideas of change" but "Death cannot flow backward." Heket somewhat elaborates on this by saying he preached "heresy" and "noxious ideals" that would not be tolerated. Heket also notably refers to Narinder as a flat-out "monster." Narinder attacked his siblings and left them each with a big, symbolic wound. Then he was chained by the four of them, with Shamura the one to lead it (in their own words).

There's a lot of talk of betrayal, but before this update, it was unclear if the betrayal was meant to just be Narinder's experimenting with death (which even then was pretty heavily suggested to be resurrections) or the wounds inflicted upon his siblings. There's also a lot of talk of sacrifice, i.e. from Leshy if you kill Heket before him: "After everything we did. After everything we sacrificed. He will not be satiated."

Regardless, the picture this painted was of Narinder being this ambitious, evil, violent God that even his fellow Gods (Kallamar) feared and felt needed controlling. The idea that the wounds could have been in the nail in the coffin to this entire ordeal made sense; as they were obviously planned by Narinder to some extent (otherwise why be so intentional about who got what wound?) and a fair reaction to Being Mutilated would of course be to chain him.

Then of course there's the idea that the wounds were given while he was being chained and in self-defense, which only seems possible if you think Narinder could take on all four of his siblings at once like that and only manage to lose his claws in the ordeal (which was only revealed in this update to be something he's implied to have lost thru the relic). I thought this at first too, but realized it seems pretty impractical for that to have been the case if the wounds were also purposeful in who got what. I mean, sure, they could all be coincidentally symbolically appropriate for each Bishop, but I have doouuubts?

but now we're here, with this update, and all has been revealed.

And what's been revealed exactly?

Narinder's thing he was doing was indeed resurrections (we knew that)

Shamura encouraged him to do it (we also already knew this)

It seems like he did literally nothing else outside of that

His siblings got pissy about this because it made their domains purposeless and got all their followers to flock to him

"Would he let us perish? I could not take the risk" - Implies they literally did not even ask him

Shamura knew that in order to forge chains that could keep Narinder down, it would require a sacrifice of their bonds AND their flesh

They DID NOT tell the other Bishops this

Their wounds were requirements to chain him. They had to get the wounds they bear now in order to chain him. ONLY Shamura knew this. That means they allowed their siblings (and themself) to get attacked knowing full well what would happen. They may have even encouraged it, perhaps provoked Narinder into it, seeing as they knew the wounds were necessary to have him chained. (Or they just knew he would retaliate. Which, like. Yeah. They're condemning him after he went down a path they encouraged and, as far as we can tell, nothing else.)

And for... what?

In this version of the story, Narinder was experimenting with resurrections, and Shamura told him to keep doing that. Then he was successful, mortals turned to him, and his siblings (including Shamura, the one who told him to do it) got mad. That's it. That's their reasoning for chaining him. There's nothing else given. "Would they perish?" We have no idea. Is that how it works? Seems like Shamura doesn't know either. Or at the very least doesn't know if Narinder intended for that at all. Gives the vibe that literally no effort was made to talk to him and figure this out. They don't even really go down the "it puts nature out of balance!" path, which would at least have some merit, maybe. It's literally just "we are no longer sustained. What's the point of Gods in this world?" <- idk babe you had all the other ones slaughtered. So you tell me

And then Shamura just took it into their own hands, leading their siblings to their shared wounds (WITHOUT consulting them) and their inevitable destruction because of........... reasons, I guess. (I mean, if you think about it really hard, they probably also already knew what would happen following all this. With the lamb genocide and Narinder's resurfacing and etc. And they had their siblings wounded anyway. For no god damn reason)

And now why does this make me mad?

Because, honestly, in and of itself, there's not anything necessarily wrong with this added context. It's not contradicting anything in the main game. Shamura knowing what was needed makes sense, after all.

But it's... unnecessary. It screws up the motives and makes them more shallow, less nuanced, more... petty. Making gods petty is cool and all, I love doing that honestly, but in this case it just feels like a waste of potential.

But beyond all that. But most importantly.

This entire recontextualization of events REEKS of being made specifically to absolve Narinder.

I mean, come on. He's made out to be the victim, here. Shamura knew what he would do, knew what he would become, and knew exactly what would happen to their siblings if they sought to chain him (without doing so much as talking to him beforehand), and yet they encouraged it.

All blame is being shifted on Shamura. All Narinder did specifically against his siblings was inflict the wounds, which at this point seems to be hinted as self defense or a retaliation against threat or insult (assuming he was provoked into attacking, somehow). Because the wounds were part of the process.

And almost equally irritating, this seeks to arbitrarily absolve Leshy, Kallamar, and Heket as well, as they had no idea what the plan was and were just strung along. Which is just kinda worse, right? As far as they are aware, Narinder did just randomly attack them for no reason, and this wasn't foreseen, and surely couldn't have been stopped. All because Shamura didn't tell them any of it.

Shamura is being made into the big bad. Shamura is at fault for everything, for all of it. Narinder is a victim of Shamura encouraging him down a path they later condemn him for, their siblings are victims of Shamura and Narinder both (the latter of which could have been resolved at any point prior), and now any possible intrigue about Narinder being this big bad guy who tore apart his siblings due to his own ambition getting the best of him is ERASED.

It's GONE. All in favor of making him more sympathetic.

And sure, about a million different excuses could be made for Shamura, or could be used to headcanon whatever you want about exactly what happened. But with what we're given right now, just from the source, no attempt as made to stop Narinder before it got to this point. It is literally suggested they didn't even talk to him.

"Maybe they were too scared" - For the other three, maybe. Shamura is the eldest and clearly the most respected one, by Narinder as well (he holds some amount of respect for them even STILL. After EVERYTHING). They at any point could have stopped this.

"Narinder could still have been a bad guy outside of the attacks" - Sure, but we're given little to nothing on that front. In the old dialogue, literally all that's mentioned is the resurrection stuff and the wounds. Shamura is the one who said his ambition made a glutton of him, by the way. And hell, this isn't even touching the very real possibility that all of the Bishops (Narinder included!) are unreliable as hell.

"But Kallamar feared him even before his chaining, that suggests he was still a bad guy beforehand" - Sure, it could! But that's about all we get! And hell, in this new update, Kallamar's fears are fucked with, too. He states:

"Once, long ago, Followers would worship at my altar just to glimpse the beauty of my temple… of course, it could not last forever. Perhaps my siblings did not understand this, but I have always known. It did not make me less afraid. Cowardly Kallamar, ha…"

Here, it seems Kallamar's fears have been changed to be more about the decline of his temple and the loss of his followers, which was happening because of Narinder. He refers to Narinder's plans as "foolish" as opposed to... idk, horrifying, or threatening, or whatever. He also fully takes on the 'cowardly' title, giving the impression that his fears were somehow unfounded, which wouldn't make a lick of sense if Narinder indeed sucked ass outside of the wounds.

Not to mention he "didn't want to hear it" when Shamura "revealed the plan," but we know because of Shamura that they didn't mention anything about the wounds, so Kallamar didn't want to hear that they... had to chain Narinder? That's literally all he could've been told about the plan. Why wouldn't he want to chain Narinder if he was scared of him up until that point?? Doesn't make any sense!!! EDIT AFTER I POSTED: On reconsideration this might just be referring the lamb genocide plan, but that's hardly better, because now this update absolves Narinder, Leshy, AND Kallamar by making them blameless in everything (both Leshy and Kallamar expressed not fully understanding the plan for the slaughter or, in this case, not wanting part in it). What's up with THAT. Why is Shamura getting the blame for LITERALLY EVERYTHING.

Anyway, my point is

This was a story decision made to make Narinder sympathetic. It's so blatant. And it's so, so irritating. It gets rid of so many potential cool flaws of Narinder and replaces it with "Actually, Shamura was the bad guy the whole time! Huzzah!"

And honestly, had the entire game come out like this to begin with, released at the start how it is right now, I don't think I'd care this much. But being added now, as an afterthought, after the fandom and devs alike have grown to favor Narinder above all others, it just...

It reeks of favoritism. It smells of revising the story to make Narinder more likeable. It's just erasure.

And for what. Like, I don't want to be That Guy, but I cannot help but notice that one of two nonbinary characters (outside of the Lamb/Goat themselves) is being this heavily demonized in favor of absolving a Man of his crimes. What's, uh. What's up with that.

Oh, and that addition by the writer I mentioned was made while I was writing this.

This was made after Jojo was questioned whether this was a retcon as to who caused the wounds, as this whole thing could also certainly be read as Shamura being the one to directly wound their siblings (which I didn't think was the case, but still).

"I don't know if they thought it would be so severe" - How do I put this in a nice way. This feels like a weaseling out answer. This feels like giving Shamura an out only after being questioned on this writing choice. How could they possibly not know how severe it would be. This spider is Knowledge. This spider has Foresight of some kind. And how do you not know what they thought. You are the Writer. If you want to clarify something like this you gotta say it with your full chest.

Not to mention a good portion of the fandom probably won't even see these tweets, so this context is all missing from the story presented in the game. This is Tacked On Context on top of already Tacked On Context. It's unnecessary retconning all the way down.

Anyway. I realize the fandom at large will not care about this, because (and I mean this in the nicest way I can manage) the Narinder favoritism in this fandom is already impenetrable, but for me personally? This retconning that was so clearly done out of that favoritism?

It ruined Narinder's character for me. More than the fandom possibly could have. I mean, if it's fanon, it can be ignored. But this was canonized. Because Narinder is the dev team's favorite guy.

And I can't stand it.

[creaturefeaster]

which character/s in colorquest is currently getting a redesign?

Gary is still getting tweaked here and there, it's a slow and on-going process.

While I don't plan on changing much else about him, recently I've decided to give Chickenstab's host a tail. (See: my latest doodle page from a handful of days ago)

I've been debating changing Hannah's initial outfit lately as well. She's from a part of Stolla that is much warmer year-round, but having moved much higher up, starting the story in mid-late October, it's rather chilly for her to be wearing thin shorts, flip-flops and a tank top. But, I've not thought too much into exactly what this new outfit would be, and I'd still hold on to this outfit for a different, warmer part of the story because I love it too much to ever fully part ways with it.

I've been fiddling with April's bangs lately too. I don't have a picture on hand at the moment but I'll try to tack it onto this post later when I do, but I've always been a little iffy about her bangs. Especially with Elliot's being similar, I feel like the bang style fits his hair more than it fits April.

Nobody has gotten a huge overhaul design change yet, but I definitely feel something bubbling within me to give a huge makeover to a character or two. I just have to figure out if there's a design I'm not happy with that I've just been suppressing. Because I tend to do that from time to time lol.

[palmofafreezinghand]

ships passing

Carlisle and Esme briefly share their grief over the life they will only ever witness from afar. on ao3 here.

January 2007. 

“Good morning, love,” Carlisle said to his wife who was turning into the upstairs hall. He closed their bedroom door behind him as he began walking to meet her. 

“Hello.” 

They paused in the middle of the hall. “Where are you heading?” He asked. 

“My studio,” she answered. The clipped answers were unusual for the woman who he often teased for her incessant chatter.

“Are you alri—” She put her finger over his lips to tell him to stop talking. He raised a brow in question and she motioned to the floor with her head. Below them, he could hear their family loudly talking and laughing, even the quiet sound of a page being moved. Which meant their family could also hear the conversation occurring above them. 

He nodded in understanding and she pulled her hand back to her body. They had learned American Sign Language decades ago after Alice and Jasper moved in and the new roommates meant there was very little space for private conversations. 

“Are you okay?” He signed, eyebrows raised. 

She blinked once, twice, three times before shaking her head ever so slightly it could have been misinterpreted by anyone else as a flinch. He moved to say something but was cut off by her arms wrapping around his waist, her head hitting his chest with a force that threatened to knock him over. His arm instinctively cradled around her head, fingers threading through her hair, the other around her shoulders. 

“I love you,” he whispered into her hair, quiet enough that it would be no more than a buzz to the other people in the house. 

They stood in the hall like that for a long while. When their granddaughter’s muffled childish laughter drifted up from downstairs her grasp around him tightened. He was thankful for the unspoken explanation of the embrace. 

It was difficult for him too. Their granddaughter’s presence was a miracle that served as a stark reminder of the life he would never have. His wife had taken the situation in stride, mostly, she built a nursery and defended the child to its father, and grandfather. It was yet another example of her strength he admired but failed to completely understand. He could not fathom how she was able to operate with such grace when a painful symbol of the life stolen from her ran through her house, as she had to watch their ‘son’ — who had not wanted the child — get an opportunity to parent, a life she was only able to experience for three short days. 

The couple had only discussed the topic a handful of times and very briefly. They had not indulged in the what-ifs they used to dream of, thinking it was impossible. She had not spoken about the nuance of the situation, only how heart-aching happy she was for Edward. He did know this conversation had occurred in some form with Emmett of all people. 

He presumed the current embrace and rare show of emotion was due to January being a historically difficult month for her, the anniversary of her son’s birth and death. 

Heavy footsteps started up the stairs, keeping one arm around her Carlisle walked them backward, opening their bedroom door without looking. He shut the door behind them. 

She pulled away after another minute behind closed doors. 

“Do you want to talk about it?” Carlisle signed.

She shook her head, wiping at her eyes with the back of her hand as if wiping away tears. “I’m fine,” she eventually signed, lacking any of the facial grammar that would make the statement believable or true. 

“You’re lying,” he signed with a slight smile. 

She nodded with a shrug and half-hearted lopsided smile. 

“How can I help?” 

She shrugged once again. 

“Maybe take a shower, the warm water might help?” His proclivity to offering solutions had been a sore spot throughout their marriage but this was not a solution, a shower would not erase decades-long grief but had helped her feel more in tune with her body and feelings on prior occasions.  

“Want to join?” Her eyebrows raised with a sly smile. 

Before he could enthusiastically accept he was cut off by a shout in the hall. “Carlisle, let’s go!” Emmett’s voice boomed. 

Carlisle’s face fell, remembering the reason he was upstairs, to change his clothes to accompany Emmett on one of his ‘vampire sport’ experiments. “I’ll be right there!” He called. 

“What are you two doing now?” 

“He wants to try a new experiment,” he signed exasperatedly. 

“Have fun,” she signed, beginning to walk towards their bathroom. 

He caught her arm, causing her to glance back at him. “We will be talking about this, later.” 

“Later,” she signed with an intensifier, meaning she would attempt to delay their conversation for a long while. 

He shook his head fondly. “I love you,” he said aloud, opening their bedroom door. 

“I love you too.”

[mostunwantedfbi]

Couldn't sleep right away last night so I was stewing over some potential perk ideas for Mulder's DBD verse:

No One Down Here/FBI's Most Unwanted: A perk that allows you to remain undetectable in/around the basement, including removal of scratch marks, blood stains, and silencing an injured player.

"No one down here but FBI's Most Unwanted." -Agent Fox "Spooky" Mulder

Plausible Deniability: A gen perk that gives the illusion that a skill check has been missed, causing a distraction. (Or something of the sort).

"DECEIVE INVEIGLE OBFUSCATE"

Criminal Profiling/Cryptozoology: An aura perk that works sort of like Stake Out where if you're within the killer's terror radius for a certain amount of time you can get tokens to use at any point to see where the killer is.

"Do you believe in the existence of extraterrestrials?" -Agent Fox "Spooky" Mulder

[florida3exclamationpoints]

My family has such a special ability to stress me out so bad

[wrylywriting]

comments on any Polin fic I write post season 3 are driving me to not write these anymore like... I know I keep harking on this but it keeps happening lmao

[coquelicoq]

me: how about...natori contracting some kind of youkai illness & matoba finding out about it & showing up to his set & natori dragging him off to his trailer bc it would be bad for his sparkly reputation to make the angry faces he feels coming on in front of his coworkers & matoba offering to help but in that smarmy condescending way that raises natori's hackles so he refuses but unfortunately he doesn't know how to cure it so matoba just keeps showing up every day & natori keeps carting him off to the trailer every time & being suuuuper cagey when people ask him who his visitor is & what if his coworkers get the wrong idea & matoba is fully aware of this & what if one day in the trailer natori reluctantly agrees to let matoba help him & matoba's like okay fine off with your shirt i gotta paint this spell circle on your bare chest & what if he's in the middle of doing that when they hear somebody opening the door to the trailer & obviously they don't want anyone to know what they're actually doing in there bc youkai-exorcist confidentiality so matoba's like no worries i got this & he KISSES NATORI omg classic kiss-as-misdirection trope & the person at the door is like whoops my b carry on gentlemen & after they've left natori is like wtf matoba????? & matoba's like well it's what they all thought we were doing anyway & your mouth was right there & it allowed me to cover the writing on your chest with my body & also you kiss people for a living so i figured it wouldn't be too complex for you & your part-time exorcist training to handle & natori recovers admirably quickly & is like WELL for your information that was a TERRIBLE kiss & no one is gonna buy that i professional makeout artist natori shuuichi would be swapping saliva with somebody on the reg without any of my considerable skill rubbing off on them & matoba's like so what do you propose we do about it & natori's like obviously i have to teach you how to kiss in case they come back -

the bedtime story fairy who thought this was gonna be an easy assignment: please just go to sleep im begging u have mercy ur brain cells are dying

[biracy]

Basically I think we need "transsexual fagdyke" posting that doesn't rely on the unspoken idea that the "dyke" part comes from being born with a vagina

[chompe-diem]

slightly out of left field concept but zac and caldwell in some d&d/ttrpg game playing as a cowboy duo. is this anything.

[starriva]

Do you guys think one of Alfred’s dealers is the White House doctor, very serious question. If so is this the doctor that supplies him with cocaine or just adderall. Who do you think he get’s his cocaine from when he’s in one of his moods. If nations were publicly known about do you think his dealer would brag about supplying THEE world power?? Do you think that the CIA would know about this dealer but be unable to stop them because that’s AL’s ‘Freind’?

I want serious answers to these very obviously serious questions in this Olive Gargen tonight.

[echoes-lighthouse]

Christ alive, just woke up to someone picking a fight with me over the concept of adopting fictional kids, in a very aggressive way: someone who didn't even follow me and thought my fictional f/os were OCs despite their clear sources in my bio.

If anyone actually wants to have a productive and private discussion about how that's handled in my familial selfships and my personal feelings on adoption as a kid who spent years getting bounced around other families (and as a person who's considering being a foster parent in a financially stable future), then that's cool and fine.

For the moment, if I accidentally blocked that person's sideblog and they're still interacting with my blog with a different username but I can't see them anymore, please let me know. I've had that happen before and I'm not 100% sure if tumblr has fixed that ridiculous feature but I would appreciate the help from anyone who sees this post <3

[mueritos]

(different anon) u don’t see how it’s inappropriate be drawing western usa “cowboys and indians” genre romance art?? and with the fake polynesian tattoo on the white guy,,,,,

i understand being detribalized as so am i, but we still have to be careful about how we’re interacting w current native communities especially those to whom we are outsiders

thank you for clarifying you're a different anon and this one i'll respond to with care, and thank you for sending this because it is a genuine critique. I drew that header after finding a western/cowboy artist that I liked, and I wanted to draw something t4t centered. After finding the artist again (linked above), yes he is not indigenous, but in the article he describes his work with the Wampanoag community in MA. But you're right; there is a fine line between depicting western/cowboy culture that doesn't negate the colonization/manifest destiny of its time. I believed I made the image more "contemporary" (both have punk/lgbtq patches in the full image), but if that's not clear because the man on the left's patches are cut off from the header, then that's on me.

as for the white dude, I wasn't clear on either of their races, but both of the men in the photo are drawn from the indigenous people in my life. When i think of dark haired dark skins indigenous folks, I think of my long time best friend who is Nahuatl and detribalized, and for the "white man", I based him off myself and other detribalized/mixed folks who are paler and look "less native". Obviously none of this is clear because the image is just there, but these were the thoughts that went into that drawing. It was all based on the Mexican culture around me in terms of vaquero, because I associate the masculinity that I am comforted by with vaquero culture.

as for the tattoo, I made it up on the spot. but you're right, it does look similar to indigenous communities' like the maori or polynesian/samoa. I'll be more careful about that and I have not drawn any tribal like tattoos on anyone else since that drawing (the drawing is from 2019).

and you're right about your last point. I have been thinking of changing the header, but it has also been there for several years so I don't know what to change it to and I have had many folks in my inbox say they were comforted/affirmed by the header. at the same time, I don't want to drive off any folks who don't know im detribalized and may think i'm just randomly drawing indigenous people because I am like, fascinated with them.

i'll be more careful from now on, but thank you for sending this and feel free to lmk anything else, or if any indigenous folks want to add any other points feel free to do that in the notes!