#but lightly

[bagog]

N7 Month, 2023 - Day 11: Crew

Post-war crew portrait.

++

No one wanted to be there, least of all Shepard, but it was a rare occasion where everyone was in one place again, and the air in the room reflected it. The artist was becoming panicked at how loosely the majority of the crew seemed to interpret her appointment time: Garrus was more than twenty minutes later, and entered impassive to his own tardiness. The artist tried several times to get everyone’s attention, but the old friends had taken to talking in a huddle nearby a refreshment table. She looked at Shepard helplessly.

“Alright everybody,” Shepard raised his voice over the cheerful din. “We’re all here to get this done, so let’s get started now that everybody’s here.”

“How do you want us?” Kaidan asked the artist, coming to stand beside Shepard.

It was for the official portrait—the Normandy crew—which was promised to the Smithsonian once it was completed. The majority of the crew had posed for a photograph earlier in the day, but for the Senior staff it was decided a massive painting was in order.

Hikka Haufika, the artist chosen by several planetary governments, busily arranged the reluctant aliens and humans into formation, explaining under her breath how she didn’t want to do the standard rugby line-up portrait, but wanted to create something dynamic, something that communicated more than simple likeness. All the while, a young intern stalked about the studio with a camera drone: recording the accompanying video which would be played beneath the portrait once it hung in the museum.

“I don’t understand,” Tali crossed her arms, tone threatening at boredom. “Couldn’t you just do a complete three dimensional scan of us? Then we won’t have to hold these poses for so long.”

“I’m an old fashioned painter,” Haufika declared, then quieter when the camera drone approached her face. “I’m not only trying to capture the look of your crew, but the energy.”

“Oh, you’ll get energy from this group,” Liara said cryptically as she was positioned standing at a computer console. The artist brought more laptops and data-pads and artfully strewn them about her.

“So how long is this going to take?” James asked, seeming to sink further into himself as he watched the crew members plucked out a lineup one by one to be placed in the scene

“Never thought I’d catch you afraid to hold a pose,” Steve chimed in.

“Very funny.” James rolled his eyes.

“You don’t have to stand completely still, James,” Kaidan was now standing in the scene, sleeves on his uniform rolled up, gripping a Valkyrie assault rifle awkwardly. “Nobody expects you up here holding your breath for two hours.”

“Two hours…” Javik groaned. He frowned at the artist and she returned the frown in kind, skipped over him to pose the next person instead.

“Yeah, Shepard’s not sweating about it.” Joker was seated on a stool to one side of the frame, the artist taking his hat on and off and on and off before finally leaving it on. “How many is this for you now, Shepard?”

“Two sculptures, fifteen holo-photos, but this is only my second painting.” Shepard stepped into the scene himself and took up a pose beside Kaidan.

“Commander Shepard,” Haufika tapped his shoulder. “Actually, I was hoping you would stand right over here.”

“Oh.” Shepard replied passively, but did not move. “Any way you can put me here instead?”

“I, um… it wasn’t really what I…” she stuttered as Shepard remained impassive. “Um. Sure. You can stand there. Whatever.”

This caused a chain reaction, however, that saw several people’s poses have to be recast and a few people moved around.

“You know,” Garrus droned, standing with one arm on James’ shoulder, a sniper rifle slung over his. “Whenever humans paint a turian, we always end up looking like monsters…” Haufika looked offended, but before she could speak up, Dr. Chakwas guffawed from her position.

“You’ve been on the extranet too much.”

“Miss Haufika recently opened a gallery in Cairo, and was a featured exhibit at the Volus neo-classicism museum last year.” Liara chimed in, and the artist seemed pleased. Took up sketching on her canvas again.

“Well, at least we know she knows how to paint an Evo suit,” Tali remarked dryly, a prop shotgun placed atop a fake console she was ‘reading.’

They continued to chat as Haufika set to work laying down the bones of the scene. A few people were shifted around. James was bored. Kaidan eventually leaned forward, whispered in Shepard’s ear:

“Well, is this about what you expected?”

“Javik hasn’t stormed out, yet, so it’s better than it could’ve been,” Shepard returned quietly.

“Hey there,” Tali’s voice rose, sparkling, above the rest of the chatter. “Shepard, Kaidan… if you two aren’t careful, the painting’s going to have you two whispering to each other.”

“Remember, this is for posterity,” Steve rejoined. “This is going to be the image of the Normandy crew to future generations.” His tone was tinged with irony, but Shepard smiled all the same.

He had never wanted to be the sort of person who was ‘remembered’ as a hero, or anything other than a friend. Whatever ‘energy’ it was Hikka Haufika captured, he hoped the image the future would remember would be one of him, surrounded by friends.

[allgremlinart]

au where Aang gets told he's the Avatar (and subsequently frozen) at 16 like he was supposed to.... I think it would change a lot honestly

[itsdabatt]

happy national impersonate your favorite vigilante day to those who celebrate

Part 2

[watmalik]

HE’S A GREAT WHAT—?

[hellspawnmotel]

intimacy between an evil spiteful building-sized supercomputer and the lone scientist left behind after everyone else ditched and forgot about her (in which computer wants to kill scientist really bad but her programming wont let her so she just attempts to make her as miserable as possible instead, which also doesn't work because scientist is a freak)

[indigo6f00ff]

need to share an experience i had 30 minutes ago

(edit: thanks to @walks-the-ages for providing and reminding me to put alt text, sorry it slips my mind alot lol)

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

but how did the walrus knock

[bishy437]

he won

bonus:

[salted15]

personally i think he should be given a really big hammer nothing wrong will happen i promise

(i very recently started commissions btw !! since this post has been so successful i thought i'd edit it and do a shameless plug dkjfghsdkfgh)

[sofiaruelle]

❄️☃️The SDV Girlies in their winter garb!☃️❄️

One side how i interpreted their lil avatars and then the other side is just me playing dress up lmao.

“Bois when?” Dunno. 🤷🏽‍♀️ I will if anyone donates screenshots.

[shiftythrifting]

free

[ahhrenata]

‘how quickly power can change hands’ | X |

[ryllen]

a small taste of magic casting

[losercore-lesbian]

They're the same picture

[olrinarts]

1/?

FINALLY, AFTER WRESTLING WITH THIS FOR AGES

have the first 5 pages of 'Fittings', which is a... 'short' comic that won't leave my brain

i have a lot of headcanons about the significance of fibrecraft and clothing and such for sheep, considering the whole wool thing, and while i'm working on other projects that go more in depth with that, this is just a fun little thing i wanted to do

i cannot emphasise how much it pained me to draw ill-fitting clothing though 😭

[devildaisies]

i have this npc named au'liver who runs a dimension-hopping magic shop that i put in every single campaign because I love him and logically it tracks that I can do that.

i named him au'liver because i'd been dogsitting my brother's dog oliver the week before i made him up on the spot while dming a game

a few sessions later, my player, teiani, pointed out that he was "au'liver the place" which was like. jawdrop. not intentional but so good. so he became au'liver l'place.

few years and a few campaigns later, that same friends talking to me about dnd and she refered to my games as the au'liverse. i cant stop thinking about that