#hope this is okayyyy

[thesongbiird]

plotted starter with @autopsified

Beth slumps down a little further in her hard, plastic seat. As if somehow it makes her invisible, unable to be called upon. Her first time at this group she was asked about her 'story'. She'd always hated hearing it described like that. As if it was her entire life and not simply one terrible thing that happened to her. And in her mind it's no story. No handsome prince raced in to save her. No happy endings. What kind of a story is that? She'd broken down in floods of tears before she even reached the bad part. She's barely spoken since. But being around people helps, it's better than being at home with her family, treating her like she's an old vase, about to shatter.

So she slides down a little, wrapping her arms around herself, another attempt to make herself invisible. Beth takes a glance around the circle and sees him sitting opposite her. The man. She isn't sure of his name or anything else about him really. He's quieter than her. Saying things on occasion but nothing that she can really understand. It's all just snippets of his experiences. Maybe that's how he remembers them and she feels a pang of envy at the thought. Beth would do anything to erase every gory detail from her mind. The stifling darkness, the clumsy, roaming hands, the stench of his sweat. The memory alone causes bile to rise in the back of her throat.

He's always opposite her for some reason. It's distracting. She'd rather watch him than listen sometimes. Sometimes, it's all too much. And when she watches him, she sees nothing. He gives nothing away. The others act and react, smiling sometimes, giving encouraging little nods when everyone speaks. Sometimes, they even cry. He does nothing. But Beth is convinced that he's sad. He's got a sweet face, almost baby faced but still handsome. And soft, puppy dog eyes that she's certain conceal any manner of trauma. She wonders about him a lot. Probably more than is normal.

Finally, after weeks of watching Beth decides to approach him. Maybe he found the group intimidating and would manage better just talking to one person. Maybe she could help him, do something useful instead of just sitting around feeling like nothing more than a victim. She helps herself to a weak coffee and heads over toward him, hands shaking a little. She's surprised with how nervous she is. Beth takes a seat in the little chair next to him, clearing her throat awkwardly as she does. "Hi. We've never really talked before. I'm Beth."

[calamarispiderart]

you really are pathetic.

[blood-and-breath]

black and bloody, rotten and perfect.

the lovers, nin / tetsuo the iron man (1989) / crash (1996)

[fuure01]

request of Mel Medarda from Arcane for @inoctavo !! thank you💙

insta · patreon 🌻 reblogs are loved~

[upperranktwo]

☆Shinazugawa Sanemi - The Wind Hashira☆

[ghostorbz]

original prompt

Hank J Wimbleton WANTED for: Crimes. Many crimes

[backformores]

230313 ✶ happy beomgyu day!

[the-gayest-tree-you-ever-did-see]

finally caved and started reading all for the game. two chapters into the foxhole court and what kind of gay fucking shit is this! also did not know there were sports in here

[macskasbacsi]

oh reminds me the babies started leaving the the sparrow nest next to my window

lookie

[queenlucythevaliant]

Northern Lights

.

I heard a voice that cried, “Balder the Beautiful is dead, is dead!” 

.

Who knows what to call the lonely exhilaration of gazing out into a bright Northern sky? Who can name it? 

Jill could.

It was the same feeling that came to her at the teetering edge of a cliff at the end of the world. The same feeling as when she said her goodbyes to Puddleglum and Scrubb before they freed the prince. It was the same feeling that engulfed her now, sitting in the professor’s library with a volume of poetry before her. 

.

The wild northern wastes were well named: utterly wild, perfectly desolate, and terribly Northern. 

It was lonely there and often cold, but the sky was an endless whorl of gales and gray clouds. The stones were indigo under the pale winter sunlight, and at sunset they glowed a soft gold, as though lit from within. The gorges and moors lay before her, and Jill loved them for their vastness and their distance. Little grew in that country, but that which did was full of vigor. The grass was short and coarse. Every tree was victorious. 

On a still, deep breathing winter night, Jill lay on her back beneath a covering sky. It seemed beautiful to her, rich and strong and glorious. Her eyes drank in the breadth of it until her tears began to blind her. Yet even then, she still couldn’t look away.

She felt bigger here in the wastes, like the landscape. Stronger, wider. The further she walked, the more she felt herself stretch out. One of these days, maybe, she would catch hold of herself at the edge and tug, and Jill Pole would open up clear as the Northern sky. 

.

And through the misty air passed the mournful cry of sunward sailing cranes.

.

The thing that surprised Jill most about the battle with the serpent was this: there wasn’t any yelling. Always, it seemed, whenever she read stories about people fighting with swords, the combatants would let loose some guttural yell before their blows fell. They would scream and writhe in pain as they died. They would shout instructions to their fellows, “Look out!” or “Hit him there!” But the whole affair with the serpent passed with very little noise. 

The poison-green coil constricted around the prince; he raised his arms and got clear, struck the serpent hard, and then Scrubb and Puddleglum dispatched the creature with heavy, hacking blows. The monster died writhing, but not screaming. And then it was over. 

The thing that surprised Jill most about the moments before battle was, of course, the noise. She could hear her own heartbeat in her ears. She couldn’t stop listening to her own breathing. Every footstep rang out like a gong, and any words exchanged rang with a kind of finality that made them sound louder than anything. 

“You are of high courage,” Rilian told her when it was over. 

Yet the thing in Jill’s chest just then didn’t feel like courage. It was a deep breath, a plunge, and a release. It was loud and quiet all at once, till she was standing, blinking in the night air as snowballs whizzed round her, and maybe that was something like courage after all. 

.

And now, there was a stirring in her chest as she reread the words on the page. Sing no more / O ye bards of the North / Of Vikings and of Jarls! / Of the days of the Eld / preserve the freedom only / nor the deeds of blood! 

She thought of grief. Of freedom. 

The lonely ache in her belly grew stronger. She felt herself uplifted into the huge regions of sky that were just beyond those cliffs, weightless as the breath beneath her buoyed her up, further, further…

.

When she saw Caspian up close, Jill thought that he looked like the sort of person who was meant to live in a castle. A silly thought, perhaps, since she knew he was a king– only she wasn’t thinking of Cair Paravel. No, Jill was picturing the ruins of an old British castle she’d visited once on holiday. She still remembered how the stonework had loomed over her, all towering arches and crumbling walls. That was where Caspian seemed to belong. He had an air of ancient tragedy about him. 

When Rilian disappeared, all things had wept but one. The serpent coiled beneath the earth and flicked its forked tongue, spewing poison. 

Now, the king half rose to bless his son. He whispered a few words as he caressed Rilian’s cheek, words meant only for those beloved ears. Jill saw Caspian’s lips move and wondered what a man like that could possibly say, when time ran so short. 

.

They laid him in his ship, with horse and harness, as on a funeral pyre. Odin placed a ring upon his finger, and whispered in his ear.

.

Jill furtively took Myths of the Northmen and held it up to the professor with a question in her eyes. She was still shy around him and Miss Plummer, though she wished she wasn’t. 

“Would you like to take that with you?”

“...Please.”

.

It takes a certain kind of person to be exhilarated by the heights. You’ve got to love vastness more than you fear falling. 

.

They walked to the train station with an autumn wind blowing hard, and though Jill couldn’t fathom why, she turned and saw Lucy grinning, fierce and joyful– grinning and reaching a hand out towards her friend.

Jill reached back and grabbed it. “What will you do, once we’re back in Narnia?” she asked. 

The wind blew harder. The feeling of anticipation grew and grew, until it felt so big that she couldn’t dream of containing it. And there was Lucy, holding Jill’s hand and laughing like it was easy.

.

Preserve the freedom only, not the deeds of blood!

.

The second time Jill went to Narnia, she found herself not at its edge, but at its end. 

The thing about the Norse apocalypse is: it feels believable. It doesn’t reach beyond earth’s horizon to pull down hope beyond hope. It’s only the kind of courage that hopeless humans have: you are going to die, so you might as well die bravely. 

They found the last king of Narnia bound to a tree. His eyes were faintly red from crying, and his wrists and ankles red from the coarseness of his fetters. 

In the Norse myths, Loki broke free of his fetters at the end of the world. He escaped to the helm of a ship made from the fingernails of the dead.

The last king of Narnia fell forward onto the ground when Eustace cut his bonds. Jill crouched down beside him and watched as he rubbed feeling back into his legs. He wasn’t so much older than her, she thought. Jill was sixteen years old; the last king of Narnia could not be older than twenty-two. 

In the myths, the gods were ancient, hewn from the bodies of giants old as the earth. 

Jill put out a hand and helped the last king of Narnia to his feet. Not for the last time, she shivered. Something deep inside her (deeper than her chest, than her heart, than the marrow of her bones, deep as her soul, deeper) was singing an elegy and she didn’t know why, or how, or where it had come from. The king clutching her hand, who could have been her older brother, would have no heir.

Yet when he asked, “Will you come with me?” Jill could only smile. 

“Of course,” she said. “It’s you we’ve come to help.”

.

And the voice forever cried, "Balder the Beautiful is dead, is dead!"

.

“This really is Narnia at last,” murmured Jill. The springtime wood had little in common with the wintry lands she had traveled the last time she was here– but it awakened the same feelings of Northernness in her chest. 

Their party may as well have been the only people in the world, for how isolated their little wooden path seemed. Yet it wasn’t lonely, really, cocooned in all that green with the wind in the leaves and the primroses nodding and blue of the sky peeking through above. 

Jewel told stories about what ordinary life was like when there was peace here. As he spoke, Jill could almost hear the trees' voices speaking out of the living past, whispering, stay, stay. She was caught up to a great height, looking down across a rich, lovely plain full of woods and waters and cornfields, which spread away and away till it got thin and misty from distance. 

“Oh Jewel–” Jill said with a dreamy sigh, “wouldn’t it be lovely if Narnia just went on and on– like what you say it has been?”

She needn’t be a queen, as Susan and Lucy had been, but Jill would’ve liked to stay. She would've liked it all to stay, if it could. She might have been a woodmaid in a place like this: with the turn of the seasons, the swaying trees, swords into plowshares. Oh, if only she could stay!

Ahead, the last king of Narnia was softly singing a marching song. Jill tilted her head back and let warm shafts of sun caress her face. 

.

I saw the pallid corpse of the dead sun borne through the Northern sky.

.

“So,” said the last king of Narnia, “Narnia is no more.”

He tried to send them back. Jill shook her head. It was very loud and very quiet. “No, no, no, we won’t. I don’t care what you say. We’re going to stick by you whatever happens, aren’t we Eustace?”

They couldn’t go back anyway. Neither would they flee, not south across the mountains nor North into the great wide wastes. No, they would stay. They slept in a holly grove on the edge of ruin, waiting for the bonfires to light.

Jill slept fitfully, but in between she dreamed. She was high up in the air, buffeted by clouds and pierced by shafts of silver sunlight. 

.

They all died, in the myths. Jill knew that. It seemed beautiful and brave when she read it in her book, tucked away safe in the Professor’s library. It was terrifying now– and yet it was beautiful and brave still.

The dogs came bounding up, every one of them, running up to the king and his men with their tails wagging. One of them leapt at Jill and licked her face, tongue roughly lapping up the sweat and tears that had dried on her cheeks. 

“Show us how to help, show us how, how, how!” the dogs were barking, almost ebullient in their enthusiasm. Jill bit back a sob. How lovely, she thought. How terribly beautiful. How dreadfully brave. 

.

So perish the old Gods!

.

The white rock gleamed like a moon in the darkness when Jill finally reached it. She ran back to it alone, her hands shaking, while her friends stayed forward with their gleaming swords and Jewel’s indigo horn.

The while rock gleamed like the moon. Jill’s first shot flew wide and landed in the soft grass. But she had another arrow on her string the next instant. It was speed that mattered, not aim. Speed, and turning aside when she cried, so as not to drip tears on her bowstring.

The white rock gleamed. In the myths, a wolf devoured the moon. Peter’s wolf, slain many thousand years ago in this world, opened his jaw wide and darkness fell over everything.

Her next arrow found its mark. After that, she lost track. She pulled, and she prayed that her hands kept still another minute. 

The unique thing–maybe the appealing thing–about the Norse myths, was that they told men to serve gods who were admittedly fighting with their backs to the wall and would certainly be defeated in the end. Jill let loose another arrow, felt the white rock at her back, and she knew that the clawing fear–beauty–bravery deep in her gut was the same feeling that she felt on the heights. The same feeling, but a different face. You’ve got to love vastness more than you fear falling. 

.

“I feel in my bones,” said Poggin, “that we shall all, one by one, pass through that dark door before morning. I can think of a hundred deaths that I would rather have died.”

“It is indeed a grim door,” said Tirian. “It is more like a mouth.” 

“Oh, can’t we do anything to stop it,” said Jill. Better to be dashed to the ground than it was to be devoured. 

“Nay, fair friend,” said Jewel. “It may be for us the door to Aslan’s country and we sup at his table tonight.”

A hand tangled itself in her hair and started to pull. Jill braced herself hard, for a moment, until her strength gave out. She was standing on the edge of a high, Northern cliff. She took another step, and fell.

.

Perhaps when the moment comes, our bite will prove better than our howls. If not, we shall have to confess that two millennia of Christianity have not yet brought us to the level of the Stoics and Vikings. For the worst (according to the flesh) that a Christian need face is to die in Christ and rise in Christ; some were content to die, and not to rise, with Father Odin.

.

The world inside the stable was beautiful. It made Jill’s chest ache in all the loveliest ways. 

.

Build it again, O ye bards, fairer than before!

[t4tails]

i finished beware the batman THAT SHOW WAS SUCH DOOOGSHIIITTTT AUGHHH the first half was boring as sin, with standouts being their HORRIBLE characterizations of alfred and anarky. the 2nd half had a terrible incarnation of harvey dent, but it also had the funniest fucking deathstroke origin ive ever seen so i think it evens out. the show tries to do something new with batman mythos but fails miserably in understanding how it all fit together in the first place. if you want a much better attempt at that, watch the batman 2004. if you want an ugly 3d dc cartoon, watch green lantern the animated series - at least that had some fun writing.

best episode (singular): choices, because it was completely barbara focused and i do genuinely like her

[shkika]

All, any, and every drop of Pebbles & Suns content adds +5 years to my lifespan. Every word from you about them is double that. Thank you for your service

I'm really charmed you like my rambles though oh gosh. Let's try to do a small Suns and by extension Pebbles ramble.

A warning from me is that this will be a VERY headcanon-y, because we know so little about Suns. I'll still reference the game, but I will also fill any holes I see fitting.

Which means btw that this will be very LONG I am sorry hehe.

I'm gonna pick apart their natural conversation they have in the deep green pearl. I think it's unfair to craft an idea of how they interacted when Suns was worried about Pebbles literally dying WHILE killing his sister.

WHICH HOLLY SUNS. I think they have ISSUES! Because god you are MEAN to someone who is being genuinely vulnerable to you. And sometimes that means you yourself are scared of being vulnerable.

Even after Pebbles tells them to ease down, because he's genuinely looking for advice, Suns doesn't miss out on implying he's stupid.

We also know Pebbles really looked up to Suns as well, with them acknowledging this in their conversation with NSH and with Pebbles himself referring to them as mentor-like.

In my interpretation of Suns' character, they were made by a very religious colony. As in they were kind cultish in their way of treating Suns. You've seen vague(?) hints on my blog pointing towards this with Moon saying they have political power over their own colony and with the entire deal of that one Sunstone comic I made (x). (and even here (x) "Blesseth be my name" as a little joke that people probably use their name to exclaim.

I don't think they ever wanted that attention or responsibility. I think things were messy and words were often put in their mouth by various houses. Pushed to make decisions they wouldn't have really made. Their fluffy over the top garments didn't really fit at first until they grew to play the god they were made to be. They played being an all knowing god and they hated it, but they grew into that persona until it became an undeniable part of their character.

They LOOK really put together. And they LOOK like they have a lot of power and are revered by the ancients with no drawbacks.

At least that's how it looked to Pebbles at first.

Not only was he referred to as an abomination from before being even built. With some ancients on Moon REFUSING TO MOVE on him, because they don't want him.

Now we have Suns who by all means is kind of the opposite in every way of the person who Pebbles is constantly compared to (Moon) and is STILL adored, even worshiped.

And you get the idea of how maybe they became someone who he really looked up to. And they had very similar interests too!

(Time for canon lmao)

Moon about the music pearl (riv campaign) states that there were those that loved cultural archiving. Obviously Pebbles is one of those iterators and given he and SRS were close friends I don't doubt they enjoyed being art nerds together. <3

So they clicked. They were genuine friends, but there was some sort of dynamic there. Suns was probably kind of condescending all the time as we see in the conversation. They tried their best to be good influence, but I cannot tell you if they succeeded.. eeh

They also didn't spare him any harsh truths, despite of what Pebbles might need to actually hear. Which ironically I think perhaps made Pebbles feel more respected. Aside the fact they showed genuine interest in his research and theories and so on.

I also think Suns really enjoyed Pebbles' company, despite the fact I can't tell you how healthy it was for them to have yet another person look up to them so much.

In conclusion those two are a complicated mess to me I think!!!! They care and they left each other deeply hurt and it's sad they never got to reconcile.

[mudstoneabyss]

guys im gonna be honest im a fake women's wrongs enjoyer im so sorry i do value my fagwife first and foremost

[hardrockshrimp]

Found a copy of Head On (Samson) from 1980 and look at this picture of Bruce from the insert :3

[amourcheol]

lord save me i read the great war after having it on my TBR for YEARSSSSSS!!!! i tried reblogging but for some reason it wasnt working 😭 probably because its 41k words and tumblr was acting up omg. but i loved it so bad, i had work at like 10 a.m but stayed up till 4am reading it LMAOO..

i also was looking at your about me and saw we're the same age... in short i was gagged BECUASE YOUR WRITING IS BEYOND YOUR YEARS LIKE WHAT.

consider me a fan so if you see me liking all your works at like 2 in the morning... just don't mind me hehehhehehehe

omg first of all so so sorry for such a late reply 😭😭😭 uni had sucked the chronically online life of mine 💔💔

second PLEASE ????? ur so sweet HELLO???? staying up till 4am to read it all I AM HONOUREDDDDD and don’t even SAYGG THINGS LIKE THATGG I am just a girl 💔💔 in love with a guy 💔💔💔 who happens to be wearing 500 year old general armour 💔💔

[harriertail]

seeing pics of the zine out in the wild *giggles and kicks my feet*