#but it has found a home now

[megamixter]

Trick or treat 🎃

AHHHHHH!

Oh, sorry. Here's a treat:

[floccinaucinihilipilificationa]

[starry-bi-sky]

don't you want to be a cult leader? - danyal al ghul au

this is mostly a joke post but i thought it was funny and had to share so--

his first mistake was, obviously, inheriting his father's inability to see an injustice and stand still. -- actually, danyal's first mistake was his lair being so big. a mountainous island with a large temple in the center resembling his old home in Nanda Parbat? With sprawling foliage and rivers and streams and waterfalls galore? What was he going to do with all that space? Let it go to waste? He had plants there! Native trees of the ghost zone growing from the soil! He couldn't let it all be left unchecked!

So naturally after helping a fellow teenage assassin ghost -- who he later learns is named Akihiko, -- from Walker of all people, he sent them over to hang low at his lair until it was safe enough for them to wander around the Zone. Walker couldn't get through Danyal's astrofield if his life depended on it, and trust him -- he's tried. Danny was clearing out debris from his stupid transport vans for weeks.

Honestly it wasn't so bad, he and Aki really quickly became fast friends and Danny loves having a sparring partner close to his level again -- he hasn't had this much fun fighting since he left the League. Aki was very dedicated and levelheaded, the both of them clicked really well because of it.

Nonono, the real trouble began after Danyal met some long-passed League members and allowed them to come join his island as well. Apparently they had made a few enemies of the zone, and maybe Danyal still felt some loyalty to the League. He couldn't just let them be left to rot. Their zealotry could be overlooked so long as they kept it contained and helped him take care of his island.

And it.. snowballs from there? He meets a teen squire aptly calling himself Ambroise -- whether that was his living name or not is yet to be seen -- who died during feudal france, who is just about as dramatic and passionate as every french stereotype makes them out to be. He calls Danyal "my moon and great muse" -- which is both flattering and little uncomfortable, but Danyal's grown up in the League as the Grandson of the Demon Head, he is used to mild worship. he passes it off as nothing more, nothing less. -- and while his energy is overwhelming on the worst of days, he helps Danny draw out of his shell more in ways that Sam and Tucker still struggle with.

Him and Aki butt heads a lot, but the two seem to hold the other in at least some positive regard, so Danny doesn't worry too much about them fighting while he's gone. It only becomes a mild issue when Aki also begins calling Danny "my moon". It's a little sweet, so Danyal brushes it off.

Then he takes in a troupe of ghosts some time after he defeats Pariah Dark and they begin calling him "great one" just as the yetis do in the far frozen. This is where he meets the twins -- a pair of sibling ghosts who call themselves Trixie and Missy (short for Trick and Mislead) -- who aren't quite as passionate as Ambroise but more energetic than Aki. Eventually they also start calling Danyal "my moon" and attach themselves to his hip, even within the living. They like to hide in his shadow and cause trouble for the rest of the students. He makes sure they don't hurt anyone.

He's pretty sure Aki is jealous, same with Ambroise, but he can't be too certain other than the fact that they become much more lingering (re: clingy) whenever he visits the island.. Something he's trying to do much more often these days due to the increasing amount of people living there now. Since when did he become so popular?

Then there's Pēnelópeia from the Greater Athens, who ran away from home and joined his Island after he ran into her while she was being chased by Skulker -- and he's pretty sure the reason was because of her chimeric appearance. Her strange eyes and mismatched wings and lion's tail and talons. She assimilates into his friend group very easily, she gets along well with Ambroise and Trixie and Danny usually finds the three of them climbing the trees to pluck the most fruit from the top. They can fly and he knows it, but they prefer to climb.

Then finally there's silent poet Akkara who comes from ancient mesopotamia, who gets along most with Aki -- which is no surprise there considering their similar personality dispositions. he watches Aki and Danyal fight each other and leaves comments on this or that that he notices. He writes Danyal poems on clay tablets and leaves them by his room.

They're one big mismatched group of outcasts, and Danny's got the other ghosts on his island to tend to, because they're living on his island and he wants to be hospitable even if he struggles with that. But he spends the most of his time with them.

Sam and Tucker are making fun of him. Tucker jokingly tells him 'careful Danny, at this rate you're gonna start a cult'. Danny really wishes he had taken that joke more seriously.

He just. keeps. collecting people. Wayward souls lost in the zone, looking for shelter or refuge from something or other -- whether that be another hostile ghost, or a past afterlife, or just a purpose. Danyal finds them, he takes them in, offers them a place on his island until they are ready to leave. Many seldom do. He's not complaining -- he has the space, and it feels like it's only ever growing.

His close friends, his "inner circle" as he's heard the others call them, keep insistently calling him "my moon". He starts calling them his stars, because then it only feels fair. They're his stars, this is his constellation. It becomes a thing; little star halos begin forming behind their heads, picking them out from the rest. He loves them so much, it's hard to place. Sam and Tucker are also his stars, but they reside in the living realm, they're his tie to Life. Meanwhile, his friends here know what it's like to be dead, and sometimes its nice to relate.

Those living on his island keep calling him "Great One" and he's beginning to notice zealotry in their care for his island. He really, deeply appreciates it. His close friends gain nicknames -- as his stars, it's only natural for him to pick them out from the cluster in the skies. Akihiko, his Sirius and bright star. Trix and Missy, Castor and Pollux, the twins and troublemakers. Ambroise, his zealous Antares and close friend. Penelopeia, chimeric and loyal Vega. And Akkara, his Arcturus and strength.

It's ridiculous how long it takes for him to notice; he is, of course, a deadly trained assassin. He is meant to be observant -- and normally he is! But somehow this becomes a blind spot. One that becomes too big to be dealt with by the time he realizes it.

He should've noticed when Aki, his Sirius, stood beside him one day while Danyal looked over his island and saw the sprawling spirits carrying on about their afterlife and bowing to him as they saw him, and said: "I looked down into the depths when I met you; I couldn't measure it." They aren't one for flowing prose, it took him so off guard he was silent for over a minute before he finally spoke.

Danyal should've recognized devotion for what it is, and yet he didn't. He should've recognized it when Antares began spouting praises about him, crowing about his radiance and resplendence to the heavens. He just brushed it off as Ambroise being Ambroise. He should've recognized it when Trix and Missy nearly broke Dash's leg after he knocked Danyal's books out of his hands, he excused it as them being protective. Of them coming from times where such violence may have been customary -- after all, that's what he used to be like. What he was still like, sometimes, when his emotions nearly got the better of him.

He should've noticed it when the people living on his island followed his word like gospel, looked at him like he hung the stars in the sky. When his friends gifted him a shawl with the moon phases delicately embroidered into it, with silver, shimmering thread and moving stars lovingly stitched into it. Their constellations seen clear as day in the dark fabric. When he found small shrines dedicated to him -- but they lacked any image of him beyond stones carved to look like moons, so he ignored it. When the religious imagery began popping up.

He really, really should've noticed it when a bunch of cultists accidentally summoned Antares, and Antares had turned to him when he arrived and called them heretics. But he was so centered on the fact that they had kidnapped one of his stars, that he hadn't paid much attention to what Ambroise had said.

Sages say that faith is blind, they should also say faith in you is even blinder.

It really only hits him one afternoon while he's sitting in Sam's room studying with Tucker, Missy and Trixie lounging at his feet, Aki sat on his right, Penelopeia braiding his hair, Ambroise draped against him, and Akkara lurking over him. Its one of the rare few times they're all in one room together.

It hits him like a bolt of lightning. He looks up from his textbook. "Oh Ancients," he says in no amounting shock. Everyone looks up to him.

"I've become my grandfather."

[puppetmaster13u]

Prompt 81

Danny blinked at the small children Ellie was holding the hand of, looking quite proud of herself. The small children- between ten and twelve so somewhere similar to Ellie’s age- who both practically stank of magic and Gods. 

He took a deep breath, pinching the bridge of his nose even as Dan cackled while opening the door more to let them inside. “Alright, what’s your name, kids?”

“B-billy…um, Billy Batson...” “‘m Percy! Percy Jackson.” 

“Nice to meet you two- any idea where in your family you have a god or two, because one of you definitely smells like Zeus and I’m pretty sure Poseidon and I am not dealing with either of my half-brothers.” 

[nelkcats]

The Return of the Speedster

Years had passed since Wally's death. Years since the Young Justice team had split up because of it, none of them could move on, as much as they liked to pretend about it, Nightwing was the one who had taken it the worst.

While the years passed on the hero's dimension, Danny was exploring Clockwork's haunt in the Infinite Realms, something that took him a long time as his mentor was hard to convince; while he was at it he found something strange. Clocky had told him it was the "Speedforce" although the halfa had no idea what that meant. He frowned wanting to explore it but his mentor stopped him every time, telling him it wasn't safe.

Unfortunately that wasn't enough to stop the teenager, who slipped into the crack in time. Danny was quite lucky, as the watch that had merged with him long ago from the "Dark Dan" incident had left him somewhat immune to the effects the site had, not that he knew it.

When he stepped inside, all he saw was an incomprehensible place. Since he wasn't seeing something interesting he was about to leave when he noticed a boy in a weird suit running. He raised an eyebrow in confusion, didn't Clocky tell him the place was off limits?

The boy noticed him too and explained in panic that the place was dangerous and could kill him. To which Danny rolled his eyes.

"I don't think you can kill something dead" he scoffed showing his ghostly tail. The boy didn't take that revelation very well, as he started muttering about being dead and in the afterlife. Danny, seeing that the boy had gotten distracted and stopped running, pulled him out of the place and guided him towards Clockwork's haunt. He had to ask his mentor about the weird kid and the best way was well, kidnap him from the strange place.

Both ghosts watched the speedster (Wally?) continue to mumble about having passed into the afterlife while having an existential crisis on the couch. Danny was tempted to tell him he was alive and everything was a misunderstanding but he had to get information first. And maybe get him back home if it was all a mistake.

[radioroxx]

hey guys 🤲 spare nille thoughts? s’il vous plaît???

[chickenstilldancing]

How his eyes are saying "I have a place here, I think I'll be fine"

[discount--dracula]

today i'm saying farewell to my darlings (only for a short while, but it hurts nonetheless)

see you in our new home lovelies

[they-didnt-last]

anyone interested in talking about the iconic 2000's middle-grade-bordering-on-ya book series gallagher girls??

[companion-showdown]

Who had the worst time aboard the TARDIS?

TOURNAMENT MASTERPOST

[swordmaid]

i am wide awake thinking about that post canon jb au again when I should be sleeping …!!! such is the nature of the jbrainrot…

[best-bro-ben]

Uh

What do you do when you find out some of your friends are actually not very nice

And your brother and cousin are leaving with the rest of their friends so you have to go with them

Even though you still don't know if your parents are going with you

But you..

You still want to know why they did it and why they didn't say sooner

Um

I want to know for a friend

Not one of the people I'm talking about though

[twst-mer]

マレレオ union birthday

[metaphorfordeath]

Dream Home

No one knows how it chooses, only that it does. 

It is smart. It knows you. It has preferences. Maybe your mother has died, or you’re an alcoholic. Things like that. It likes people for whom the veil is thin. People who want to go home, even when they already are. It knows you want to go home, and is more than happy to oblige.

When it has decided on you, you won’t know it. But it may start to appear to you. You may, some dark evening, be standing at your sink, washing the dishes. You may look out of the window over the sink and see there in your yard a lone window, staring into your home like a great glass eye. When you go to the door, it will be gone. But it is not really gone. It is simply waiting for the right moment.

You will see it more and more. Unless you already know what it is, you will not understand. It will come a bit closer. In pieces, at first. Perhaps you will come home from work and at the edges of your mind be aware that the birdbath on your lawn is not yours. Perhaps there will be an extra step up to your porch, the wrong color, which will be gone when you turn around. 

This is the manner in which it chews its food. 

It will madden you. It will remind you, at all times, of the things about you which helped it to decide. You will lie awake and miss your mother, or miss the bottle, or miss the way the world used to make sense, and it will use that to hurt you. The more you hurt, the closer it can get to you.

Your life will slowly begin to show signs of stress. Hairline cracks will form, in your job, your relationships, your well-being. You will feel the urge to run, or hide, or both. You will want, more deeply than you thought possible, to go home. Home is not home anymore. Home is something else now.

Other people may start to notice. Your partner may ask you about those long, late walks you keep taking, and you will not have a good answer. Your boss may tell you to take it easy with all those late nights working, or he may dismiss you for your absences. You may be waiting for the bus some sunny afternoon and realize that the one of the windows in the building across the street is different. It is familiar. It is looking at you. When the bus comes, the other people waiting will board, glancing nervously over their shoulders at you, hoping you do not follow.

When you take those long walks around your neighborhood, pay attention to the houses. Are they all the same as they were yesterday? Did the portico on the corner always look like that? You may begin to notice the pattern. It likes you to notice. It’s a lot of effort, doing all this to you. Everyone likes a little recognition, from time to time.

But by the time it starts to get close, you may not even realize that you are being acted upon. You internalize it. You are the crazy one. You are the problem. The room where you wake up is not the one you fell asleep in—the ceiling too high, the windows all wrong—and then you blink, and it’s right again. Just a trick of the light, you will think, and dismiss that irrational bit of your mind that tells you something is very wrong. Ignore it, and go about your life. Enjoy that feeling while you can. 

At night, lay awake in your bed and listen to the sounds of your home. The settling foundations don’t sound like they used to. Now they sound like breathing.

Eventually, you will not be able to take it anymore. You will break. You will scream at your surviving parent, or you will empty a bottle into yourself, or you will, all alone, take actions that you hope will make the world make sense again. Home is not home anymore. You cannot stay here anymore. And when you step outside, there it will be, in its entirety. Showing itself to you at last. You will see it, and your thoughts will instantly calm. You will forget the way things used to be. You will think, how did I never notice that house there before? What a handsome house. How well-designed a house this is. I wonder if anyone is home?

And then the porch light will click on.

Like the light on an anglerfish.

And the house will say, so quietly that you will think the thought is yours,

welcome home.

And then you will go home.

And it will be so happy to have you.

Listen to this story narrated by Heather Thomas on the Creepy podcast Patreon.

[carefulfears]

thinking about scully sitting on the floor of mulder’s apartment just holding him as he wept after his mother’s death and after she told him through tears that it’s time to stop. it’s time to stop looking for his sister.

and how she had already told him that once, seven years earlier, a month into their partnership, when she chased him out of a police station and told him to stop running after his sister because it won’t bring her back.

she called after him to just stop, because she’s the scientist, and that’s the logical conclusion that she had reached.

except later that night, he told her why he does it. that he’s been closing his eyes and walking into that room, thinking maybe, when he opens them, his sister will be there, since he was 12 years old. “every day” of his life.

and she never told him to stop again.

until seven years later, when she rocked him on the floor, and then the next day was asked “why do you want to bring all this back up now?” and answered, “someone owes it to mulder.”

so she started looking. she reopened files, she tracked down records, she went to his mother’s house to dig through the trash. she confronted CSM about what he knew, she flew to california, she held hands and prayed.

she looked at mulder and said “it hurts me to tell you this” and stayed steady in the truth anyway. she listened to him read to her about a 14-year-old girl’s pain, held his hand and told him to get some sleep. she stayed up, kept looking, and found it. “i got it, mulder. i couldn’t believe it when i saw it. it was like it was looking for me.”

the police report from when samantha ran away.

she read the hospital records, went to the home of the nurse who signed the intake report, asked him if he wanted her to go herself.

she left him by the car and walked up and knocked, asked about a patient in 1979. she listened as the nurse described how “you couldn’t forget her or how frightened she was. scared for her sweet life.” and the man who came for her, who wouldn’t put out his cigarette.

earlier the day before, she had been told to just stop. “word of advice, me to you: let it be. you know, there’s some wounds that are just too painful ever to be reopened.”

and she had responded, “this particular wound has never healed. and mulder deserves closure.”

after seven years, she knows now, that you can’t just stop chasing. she knows how heavy grief is, and she‘s seen the effects of carrying it alone. of walking into the worst night of your life every day, eyes closed, hopeful.

you can’t just stop, and you can’t really have closure, but you can help someone carry it.

and ultimately, that’s what made this the end of the road. sometimes the heaviest burden of grief is feeling that pain is all there is left of someone, and that alleviating it would be to abandon them.

scully’s right, this wound has never closed, but there’s freedom in shared remembrance and shared dedication. she doesn’t ask him to stop until he’s ready to know the truth, and she’s willing to find it. she doesn’t ask him to rest until it’s safe for him to, because it’s not forgetting samantha. she knows and she remembers.

[2manyflannels]

Got excited for the travel banter and then got hit with the:

Olberic: “You pray for the lizardman?”

Ophelia: “Yes. To the townspeople, they are fearsome monsters….but they are just creatures for all that and I would hope that they rest in peace”

Olberic:“Just so”

..

Olberic: “Ophilia I have a favor to ask.”

Ophilia: “What is it?”

Olberic: “Would you also pray for me?”

Ophilia: “Why of course”