#i lost horribly but it was worth it

[calico-kiwi]

me: *spends a little less than a month going to bed pretty early so they can wake up in time to catch streams* my sleep schedule is being fixed! i am no longer a total degenerate!

me: *didn't go to bed till roughly 6 in the morning two days ago, midnight yesterday, and is currently up at 1:20 a.m.* I can feel myself turning back into me from a year ago.

[nerosdayinanime]

"BECAUSE YOURE WORTH SOMETHING!" "THEN I DONT WANT TO BE WORTH SOMETHING! AND ESPECIALLY NOT TO YOU!" "WHATS THAT SUPPOSED TO MEAN!?" "EXACTLY WHAT I FUCKING SAID!" Giyuu stared down at him, contempt rising in his expression- but Sabito could feel the hurt behind the anger, both boiling over into a moment of shock. Pain bloomed on his cheek as his head was knocked sideways, he snarled and struck back- yelling vaguely filled his ears aside the pounding of his own heart. His throat hurt though he couldnt hear his own screaming over the adrenaline and tension, it-  ..it hurt. His cheek, forehead, he could taste blood- but what hurt the most was seeing the same on Giyuu. That he was inflicting. The same pain in his eyes he knew his own echoed. All of it a desperate plea, their bared teeth and glares wavering for a moment.

--

"What happened to Tomioka-san and Urokodaki-san?" "They got in a fight." "They did..? Why are they holding hands?" "They get upset when they fight." "Uwaa.... Thats so cute!" "I dont think Urokodaki-san's busted lip is very cute, nor Tomioka's black eye, Kanroji-san." "Ah!! I didn't mean it like that!-" 

(Sabito gently smoothed his thumb over previously bloodied knuckles, since patched up and cleaned. He felt Giyuu's hand tighten around his own, resolved and firm. He huffed a sigh and rested his head in his other hand, the ache subsiding.)

[spacedlexi]

Hi Lexi

What do you think of partially blinded Vi? You never seem to draw her that way, and I kind of just wanted to know what do you think of it as a certified Vi lover.

I personally think that while something like this can be "cool" (as in, being beneficial to the character design), it's handled quite poor for Vi and it just looks a bit... ungrateful. Simply doesn't look good, doesn't fit her personality or character (am I missing something?) and it doesn't seem to fit or suit her...unlike Kenny's iconic eyepatch. To me, it has become a pivotal thing in his design to a degree in which Kenny with both eyes seems a bit odd looking. I see it as a symbol which stands for Ken being a martyr and all he's lost and sacrificed. He is all about family and helping those he loved, his loved ones truly were the "apple of his eye". It all makes sense, doesn't it?

But for Vi, it's excatly the opposite. I'm just so sorry to see her like this. 😭😭😭 I don't think it makes sense in any way. Louis losing his tongue because he's so talkative and "won't shut up" does kind of make sense, but I cant help but see Violet losing sight as kind of lazy writing. "We need something bad happening to her!!! suffer the children!!!'- the writers exclaimed.

i think vi losing her eyesight is incredibly impactful on her character and i honestly dont understand why some people say its lazy writing. especially since it was foreshadowed multiple times. vi losing her eyesight i think is even more impactful on her character than louis losing his tongue because at least louis still has his music to express himself and uplift spirits through (and its not like he cant communicate At All. his note still makes clem laugh). the reason i dont draw blind vi very often is because of how sad it is to me. for multiple reasons

violets whole thing is wanting to be able to protect the people she cares about, and feels immense grief and guilt about the times she feels shes failed them (thinks if she had been there with the twins that day that she couldve done something to save them. feels she failed everyone taken by the raiders. is scared of failing clem too "if something happened to you because of me? i cant lose you too. i wont". its why she cant leave minnie after shooting her. and a kidnapped vi attacks clem because she doesnt want anyone else to get hurt. hell it even ties back to her grandma and feeling guilty about not doing anything for her)

so for her to lose her eyesight? she took pride in her ability to fight and now she cant do that anymore. cant protect the people she loves. and as someone who started the season as an isolated loner, it forces her to rely on those around her for help, stripping her of her independence (and her independence is what allowed her to stand up against the group for clem when it came to the marlon situation in ep2). a blinded vi is forced into accepting community, whereas a saved violet accepts it on her own. her and clem turn ericsons into the home violet could never see it as

the other reason blind vi makes me so sad is that it is Directly a result of clems actions. kidnapped vi had nothing and wanted nothing to do with the bomb, and yet shes the ONLY ONE who gets hurt by it. clem choosing to let vi be taken means clem both breaks her heart, and then burns out her eyes. louis and his tongue is between him and lilly and was a choice THEY each made outside of clems direct influence (even if it was clem who inspired him to speak up, it is ultimately his choice to keep talking, and lilly hurts him for it. its sad he gets punished for a character moment, but clem had no direct hand in him losing his tongue. its why hes not angry to see her in the cell. he doesnt blame clem for what happened), but the way vi is feeling in that cell is DIRECTLY due to clems actions. vi feels like clem abandoned her after she had put herself on the line for her multiple times. she always had clems back but clem didnt have hers. clem is the one who planted the bomb and vi gets caught in the blast. clem hurts her emotionally And physically. and vi apologizes for getting upset (she tries to apologize on the beach too before theyre forced out in the cart, so she felt wrong for those actions immediately even tho they were understandable. lilly and minnie used her moment of weakness to get in her head. she just wanted everyone to be safe)

kidnapped blinded vi is just so incredibly sad to me, especially when you compare her to a fully realized violet. a violet who has come into herself, has confidence, has opened up, has stopped pushing people away out of fear and lets herself love again. shes a leader. a fighter. a protector. and those are all things a blinded violet loses

neither vi losing her eyes or louis losing his tongue is supposed to add anything to their characters. its about what theyve lost. both of them have important parts of their identity stripped away from them after being taken by the delta. its supposed to be sad. heartbreaking. regrettable. unfortunate. they have not gained anything by their time at the delta, only lost important parts of themselves to it

[brainman1987]

@all my Gideon Coal lovers (hello hi nice to meet ya howyado) how about This Prompt

Gideon loses to gricko when he tries to hit the man with the weird bowtie but misses, and ends up giving an iou to Gricko instead! Yes normal plot we stan yes? Anyways the Sow Pig the strange not frog not human but something worse and the tall moon faced woman all meet him, Sow Pig goes "you don't have your TickEt" yadda yadda yadda and instead of someone important to him Gideons Manacles get taken away from him

Because y'know. It's something of equal value they have to take yeah? And Gideon doesn't consider himself a very materialistic man, only owning a two maybe three shirts two pairs of pants, it was always easier to forget and leave behind things that had emotional value because then it was easier to run or fight without abandon because what did he have to come back to? So when the Sow Pig came he thought he wouldn't have anything, nothing it (not she that thing is some horrible not human at best) until it reached out to him and took his Manacles. Idk just. Y'know hehe

Gideon stumbling and feeling... maybe... unprotected? Useless? Suddenly Very Much not con-fi-dant and boisterous as we all know him to be! Maybe a little empty! Anxious! Idk I might just be going crazy! anyways toodles ✨✨✨

[blackh0letempest]

To the kids currently going through abuse from their parents, keep pushing forward. You will get out. You will. It feels huge, it's a lot to think about. You will probably make mistakes. But there is not a single living independent adult that hasn't made mistakes in handling their finances, taking care of themselves, etc. The sooner you get out, the sooner you can start to learn who you are when you aren't being abused, and that self is deeply worth knowing. You are worth the effort.

[lunian]

I thought in BG3 evil playthrough me and my friend would feel like shit after killing everyone in Grove and nothing worse can happen

but then Act 2 with Dark Urge killing Isobel and Dark Justiciar!Shadowheart path happened

[darkwizart]

the boy. listen, i HAD TO as soon as i saw the announcements, and finally had time today! tried to imitate the art style on the character sheet, but only got semi-far. ah, well XD

[snowe-zolynn-rogers]

Officially up to December 24th on the incorrect quotes I've written out to be posted. Progress! Only about 3 more months worth left to write out to post! I got past the hard part for my brain to write out (which was apparently August through November) I guess.

[cyanomys]

Nobody ever talks about gaining or losing weight being kind of disturbing in an existential sense. Like sure there’s all kinds of societal layers here but also my brain was used to looking into the mirror and seeing me one size, now I am a different size and it doesn’t quite feel like my body because my brain isn’t used to it yet. Now my body moves different and has different abilities than I’m used to. It happens gradually yet somehow it feels all at once.

[aria0fgold]

Honestly my headcanoning for The Cursing of Chateau Castle lore continues cooking in my brain like I got more for it but it's all in the microwave for now. Like I got a whole ass storyline for Pierre and Lady Irene. With how hardcore hc-ing I am bout these characters, it makes it seem like they're my OCs but no they're like-- my half-children I think? isat is the other parent of course. I got nothing else to go off of in regards to the chateau trio but the small crumbs and a dream.

[dancedance-resolution]

on one hand i do want to travel and see the world etc. on the other hand we are going to be 4.5 hours away from home for four whole days and i’ve already had multiple anxiety episodes about it

[shikai-the-storyteller]

You wonder if Cell told Pac he could choose which leg he'd lose knowing damn well it was almost worse than not giving him a choice at all? Knowing if he made Pac see himself as complicit in his own mutilation, he'd be scarring Pac's mind almost as badly as the attack itself?

[tv-eater]

.

[aggravatedanarchy]

Favorite mode of transportation?

Honestly, I've only ever walked and been driven places before (cars and buses, but like, school buses- not public transport. I think you have to call people about that here if it's something you need/want.) In theory, it's trains though. I just think they're neat and I would probably enjoy myself on one.

OH WAIT. I have been on boats before- like, small ones. I get kinda nervous on them though. And seasick, depending on stuff. So trains still take the lead.

[inkskinned]

probably time for this story i guess but when i was a kid there was a summer that my brother was really into making smoothies and milkshakes. part of this was that we didn't have AC and couldn't afford to run fans all day so it was kind of important to get good at making Cool Down Concoctions.

we also had a patch of mint, and he had two impressionable little sisters who had the attitude of "fuck it, might as well."

at one point, for fun, this 16 year old boy with a dream in his eye and scientific fervor in heart just wanted to see how far one could push the idea of "vanilla mint smoothie". how much vanilla extract and how much mint can go into a blender before it truly is inedible.

the answer is 3 cups of vanilla extract, 1/2 cup milk alternative, and about 50 sprigs (not leaves, whole spring) of mint. add ice and the courage of a child. idk, it was summer and we were bored.

the word i would use to describe the feeling of drinking it would maybe be "violent" or perhaps, like. "triangular." my nose felt pristine. inhaling following the first sip was like trying to sculpt a new face. i was ensconced in a mesh of horror. it was something beyond taste. for years after, i assumed those commercials that said "this is how it feels to chew five gum" were referencing the exact experience of this singular viscous smoothie.

what's worse is that we knew our mother would hate that we wasted so much vanilla extract. so we had to make it worth it. we had to actually finish the drink. it wasn't "wasting" it if we actually drank it, right? we huddled around outside in the blistering sun, gagging and passing around a single green potion, shivering with disgust. each sip was transcendent, but in a sort of non-euclidean way. i think this is where i lost my binary gender. it eroded certain parts of me in an acidic gut ecology collapse.

here's the thing about love and trust: the next day my brother made a different shake, and i drank it without complaint. it's been like 15 years. he's now a genuinely skilled cook. sometimes one of the three of us will fuck up in the kitchen or find something horrible or make a terrible smoothie mistake and then we pass it to each other, single potion bottle, and we say try it it's delicious. it always smells disgusting. and then, cerimonious, we drink it together. because that's what family does.

[foldingfittedsheets]

Here’s a story about the time I almost lost my virginity. This is of course a social construct and by a broader understanding had already been lost years earlier at a sleepover with my best friend. But I digress.

I was dating a boy in high school. I shall call him Drama Boy. DB was big into theater, he made home movies and did stage performances at his high school.

Now. I must make this notation here, because the ending to this story will be savage otherwise, but DB put entirely too much of his mental well-being on my shoulders. He was often depressed and it was my job to constantly be helping him to regulate that.

The night our story took place we had been dating for eight months. During those months had been a ludicrous amount of making out and groping, even one lusty fumble that almost ended in penetration I vetoed on the grounds of not having a condom. It’s worth noting the first time we made out I felt physically sick to my stomach but I assumed that was normal.

But our parents didn’t give us much opportunity to really do anything like we imagined real sex to be. Until he came over for a movie night and my parents left on a date.

Scandalous, some might say, of my parents to leave us unchaperoned. But my parents were very blasé about sexual topics. They knew I was well educated and careful. Their leaving was possibly a gift of privacy rather than carelessness.

So when DB arrived for our movie night, we both knew This Was The Night. The night we’d lose our virginity.

We were both nervous and excited. The weight of societal pressure blanketed both of us, convincing us that this was the most momentous night of sex either of us could ever have.

DB chose a wretched movie. We sat through the first part dutifully before we started making out sloppy style. As I’d said previously, we’d done plenty of making out and hand stuff. Which is why I noticed that DB did not seem to be as… rigid as he had on other occasions.

A kinder more mature lens has softened my perspective. He was so nervous. But at the time I was a bit offended that I wasn’t arousing enough to have him standing at full mast. Still, we forged ahead.

I sat patiently while he tried to unhook my bra, boredly watching the terrible movie in the background as he soldiered manfully toward defeating the two clasps containing the bounty of my bosom while insisting he didn’t need my help. It took about five minutes.

That out of the way we made out some more. Then DB pulled out his pièce de résistance. A condom. This was a big get for him. His family, unlike mine, were horribly conservative and of the opinion that marriage was worth waiting for. So his opportunity to secure this vital piece of equipment had been slim.

In fact, it had been so slim, that what he pulled out was an:

Unlubricated

Glow in the dark

Novelty condom

From a vending machine

At the bowling alley.

I wasn’t terribly enthused about any of those qualifiers, but I held my tongue.

Then came the worst part. DB couldn’t admit that the stress of performance had unmanned him. He continued to pretend his wobbly erection could facilitate the rigorous activity of putting on a condom. He attempted to force the dry clinging rubber down his dick as it softened like pudding under his fumbling hands.

I butted in and made with more kissing, certain that seeing me naked had been such a let down that he was going limp because of me. Surely the sight of my boobies should have been enough! Because they weren’t, I was convinced he wasn’t really into this deflowering at all.

It didn’t help that my enthusiasm for this activity was fueled purely by teen hormones rather than actual sexual attraction. Perhaps he felt the same. It was one thing to watch his penis with clinical curiosity but another to think that my young boobs didn’t excite the same lust I felt toward boobs.

Nevertheless. The condom was more or less on. With momentous energy he tried to jam our anatomy together and rolled a critical failure. His penis lost all rigidity and oozed away from insertion.

Panicking and embarrassed he exclaimed, “I think I put this on wrong!”

To my horror he began trying to remove the condom and put it back on the other way. Health instructors of ages past screamed in my head that the condom had now been stretched and unrolled.

Trying to jam it back on was certainly not safe, especially given the slackness of the anatomy in question. It would certainly tear- if he could even get it back on.

I broke out in a sweat watching him attempt the magic trick of convincing a flaccid penis that it really wanted to get better acquainted with a desiccated rubber tube prison.

“I just remembered!” I exclaimed.

He looked up at me, wretched with despair.

“I promised my parents I wouldn’t have sex tonight. I just remembered! Sorry!”

This could go down in history as one of the most bold faced and terrible lies ever told, a blatant falsehood on par with declaring the sky was green. But his face broke out in a terrible relief.

He disposed of the abused condom and I resecured my bra and we resumed watching the horrible movie, both of us relieved in our own way to set down the burden of Losing Virginity.

The next day I broke up with him.

This remains to this day one of the most savage things I’ve ever done, breaking up with someone the night after impotence.

But remember, dear reader! It wasn’t just the sex! His depression had already worn away my patience and our communication. The foibles of the night before had just illuminated the gaps where we couldn’t talk to each other properly. I was constantly comforting him over something, shoring up his brain chemistry with my relentless positivity.

I’d like to say that’s all it was, and look more charitably on my young self. But truthfully my tender pride had also been badly stung that I wasn’t worth rising to the occasion for. Comforting him over this latest mishap when my feelings were hurt was more than I could swallow.

DB took the breakup very poorly. About two weeks later he lost his virginity with the new girl he was dating. He called me to brag, sniffing through the airwaves for hints that he’d hurt me back.

When I congratulated him with utter sincerity and not a whiff of jealousy he was furious.

We stopped speaking for years, except on our mutual birthday when we’d wish each other a cordial “Happy birthday.”

He messaged me out of the blue one day years later to catch up. He was working in food service now. Was it true I was a lesbian? Yes, I assured him, that was true. He thought that was pretty cool.

Then he told me about this bisexual girl he worked with who was interested in a threesome. Did I want to have a threesome with him and his bisexual coworker?

The audacity. I couldn’t believe it. My mind filled with savage retorts like, if you understand I’m a lesbian why do you think I’d want you to be part of that? Why wouldn’t I just sleep with her without you?

But I remembered the utterly ruthless way I’d dumped him and as penance I swallowed all of the things I wanted to say and instead politely told him I was seeing someone, but thanks for the offer.

And that was it. He’d managed to shoot his shot not once, not twice, but three times, and never managed a home run. He struck out that last time, and we never spoke again.