#i mean it's not like i've forgotten

[minty364]

DPXDC Prompt #58 Part 3

Gotham Academy High School was the sort of school where almost everyone was elite in some way or another. Some of them were from old money like Damian who held himself up to a very high standard in his academics and was the top of the class. Others from new money like Dash and the rest of his cohorts became very hateful of somebody like Danny who was given a scholarship by Bruce Wayne, in their eyes Danny was taking advantage of Damian not even knowing that Damian approached Danny for companionship two years ago.

This also meant that everyone including the teachers would compare Danny and Damian to each other even though they weren’t brothers. That didn’t matter though as Danny was associated with them so that was all the reason they needed.

Danny groaned as he sunk into the seat next to Damian. The lunchroom was filled with chatting students and Danny was glad he shared the next class with Damian, which happened to be English. Dash never bothered Danny when Damian was around, probably because Damian had threatened the jock. How he was threatened Danny didn’t know, Damian never told him what happened and he was a little scared to ask. 

The guy hadn’t stopped harassing Danny since he and Jazz transferred a couple years ago. The school year had barely begun and Dash had made Danny his primary target like he was making up for lost time over the summer. Danny sighed as he dropped his paper bagged lunch on the table with a little plop. Jazz had packed for him this morning hopefully before his parents arrived and contaminated the entire kitchen.

“Dash again?” his sister asked across the table, she was seated next to Tim.

“I was paired against him in dodgeball again,” Danny lamented, his head resting on his arms that were crossed on the table.

“Danny, could you just talk to Mr. Lancer or something?” Jazz asked before she took a bite from her sandwich.

Danny sighed again and unpacked his lunch, “I have but no one will listen! They all act like I’m lying or something.” The teachers at this school probably wouldn’t listen to a charity case like him. Dash was a football player and had plans to become captain of the team. Everyone at the school loved Dash and it was precisely why everyone except maybe the four students at the table they were seated looked down and sometimes even bullied Danny.

Danny ignored it all eventually, it was better just to let the jock tire himself out. 

Once Danny and Damian finished eating they made their way to English. Luckily it was easy to carry the material for a class that only required a small binder and whatever book they were reading, in this case it was ‘gone with the wind’. Danny didn’t really care about reading old literature like this but he did what he had to maintain the grades he had. He’d endure anything, even Dash’s bullying, to become an astronaut.

Danny could hardly concentrate today through his afternoon classes. For some reason he had a bad feeling that something was going to happen. He tried his best to ignore it, he was probably just tired or something. Soon the school day was out and Danny packed up whatever homework he had for the day and headed outside to wait with Jazz. Damian and Tim were probably wrapping up their classes. Tim had an AP class that ran an extra 30 minutes and Damian’s last class was art, they were doing a painting and it wasn’t unusual for Damian to finish up what he was working on as he found out over the last few years that he enjoyed painting.

“… Do you think it’ll work?” Jazz asked a hint of hesitation in her voice. Danny knew she was talking about the portal, the both of them had talked about it before. Danny glanced over at his sister, he could tell she was having trouble sleeping lately, her face looked tired and her posture was stiff with her arms crossed in front of her. Both of them had anxiety about the possibilities the portal possessed, and they were especially worried that their parents wouldn’t take it well if the portal didn’t work. 

He was equally concerned that it would work. “I hope not…” he said eventually. It was something that brought the siblings closer as the whole of their family fell apart. How their parents managed to pull off getting the funding in the first place seemed to be a miracle. Everyone called their parents crazy and dismissed all of their science as ludicrous garbage.

Danny wondered how they even managed to stay under Batman's radar, he thought that something like this would be cause for the vigilante to look into it but maybe the thought of ghosts was just that outlandish that even the dark knight himself thought it to be crazy too. Danny himself didn’t believe in anything his parents published, some of the papers even seemed to be biased somehow, even though his parents hadn’t ever actually encountered a ghost. That last part was probably the reason no one bothered to actually investigate his parents, there wasn’t really much to investigate.

The siblings waited in silence and eventually Tim and Damian showed up after their classes and the four headed to Alfred waiting by the car. 

If anyone tried to start a conversation with Danny he wasn’t paying attention. If he was being honest, his parents' portal scared him a lot. He wasn’t sure why he felt so nervous about it, both him and Jazz renounced the thought that ghosts could exist. Something deep down in his guts told him that he should turn and run, that what his parents were attempting was taboo and that his parents were tampering with forces unimaginable. 

No one was going to listen to a fourteen year old though so Danny kept his feelings to himself and ignored them. 

Soon they were pulled in front of their apartment and true to their word, Damian and Tim asked Alfred to park nearby. Danny and Jazz took a hesitant glance at each other as they walked into the house. 

[bougiebutchbitch]

my Izzy playlist is just 'Heaven on Their Minds' and 'Damned for All Time' from Jesus Christ Superstar and 'Brutus' and 'Rex' by Buttress and 'Who Wants To Live Forever' and 'Show Must Go On' by Freddie Mercury and 'Labour' by Paloma Paris and you may be starting to sense certain themes

[writeouswriter]

You ever have a major breakthrough on your WIP and write it ALL down and then idk, just black out and completely forget it ever happened until you stumble across it however many months or whatever later and are like hey, wtf, this solves everything, when did I write this, I'm a genius, I'm an idiot, I've known this for ages, I've just learned this now, what is happening

[astarlightmonbebe]

i'm only at the beginning of li tongguang's descent into obsession (eps 17-18), but already it's both hurting and hitting. hurting, because we know li tongguang's capabilities, and his level headedness, and the potential he has, that he seems to throw out due to this obsession. hitting, because when you think about it, the obsession storyline and characterization does make perfect sense. obsession like that is a double edged blade, which can turn from love to hate, childish belief and joy to embittered rage in a second.

on one hand, it's painful to watch ltg's childlike desperation when faced with ruyi again. we want to grit our teeth and think of him as idiotic, unable to take a hint. but the reality is that it's a completely normal response to be expected from him. i mean, it's a dream come true, to see the person you 'love' the most in the world to be whole in front of you. it's probably what he could only dream about, especially being the one to apparently find her bones and bury them.

on a deeper level, ltg's initial reaction is very much a manifestation of his inner child, almost peter pan-like in the 'child that never became an adult/grew up' way. by that i mean to say the desperate urge to please, the constant worrying, and the oscillation between hot and cold moods are all so indicative of someone who grew up in an insecure/unstable environment, usually with volatile or simply unavailable authority figures. from what we can gather, he had no father, his mother wasn't in his life ("she doesn't want him around, nor can she bear for him to be away, so that's why he's like that" per empress zhaojie's words to ruyi). the one authority figure that entered his life to offer some semblance of guidance was ruyi, and even though it's clear that she held care for him, she was also a twenty year old assassin used to training subordinates, not children. her mentorship style is clearly so different when you hold ltg and yang ying side by side, and we know from ruyi's own mouth that she doesn't consider herself to have taught ltg well, and wants to remedy that through/with yang ying (i'll probably make a whole different post comparing this and the affects of this after watching some more episodes lol - there are bullet points in the drafts). so even though ruyi was his authority figure, she was still an emotionally unavailable one who couldn't meet ltg on the level he probably needed at that time in his life, and which no one probably ever did. hence his up and down reaction and actions.

it intrigues me, too, because i think, in a very subtle way, ltg is very much a character foil to ruyi in that he reflects some of her worst attributes, or more accurately represents the sort of person she was, or at least acted like (yuan lu's comment about how ltg has ruyi's gaze was meaningful outside of the jealousy arc - to me at least). i saw someone make a really interesting comment on how ltg's devotion to ruyi parallels ruyi's own devotion to empress zhaojie, which i'll also probably comment on more later.

obviously, ltg's obsession stems from an issue much larger than ruyi herself - she just happens to be the unfortunate target of it. and, clearly, i know his descent into it will be ugly, if understandable. i understand ruyi wanting to leave that part of her life behind, but also - to think that maybe many of the issues faced in future eps could have been avoidable if she'd been upfront with li tongguang about her identity early on.

[bookwyrminspiration]

i'm working on compiling a timeline of the keeper series and my GOD there are some busy days in here. did you remember that sophie searching prentice’s mind and then talking to lord cassius and searching candleshade and then going to the hideout she'd been kidnapped and tortured in and discovering that symbol on the floor all happened in one day? and that wasn't even the whole day? and that it was only the second day of the book?

[raiiny-bay]

they've come a long way

[brittlebutch]

it's actually so fascinating to me that Brennan has created a character that maintains a pretty relaxed and mild-mannered demeanor and has said multiple times that the absolute Core of her is "FEAR" and how often we see this Fear manifest specifically in Avoidance; it really nails a relationship to that mentality where your brain fully Stops recognizing the emotion properly out of like, sheer self-defense from the stress of having to carry it all the time

I think this is also perfectly showcased in the way we tend to see Tula swing so suddenly from 'level and steady' to 'snarling Panic' and then back again - Just because your brain has detached itself from the Conscious Recognition of the emotion doesn't mean it can Actually stop itself from experiencing it. So the Fear is always there and always acting as a stressor, but because of that inability to Identify it there's no way to recognize or address it before that final straw hits and your bodymind jumps Straight into Full Meltdown Mode; but then once again, once you drop even a Little bit below that Peak Terror your brain ceases to process the emotion; it's like the most exhausting form of Poor Object Permanence in the world

And even if Tula is aware of this happening to her, that doesn't really make it any easier to deal with / address. Even if you're able to spot the symptoms Around the emotion -- chest pain, irritation, nausea, whatever -- because the Emotion Itself is basically impossible to find, you can't really Successfully Pin Down what the problem is OR a way to cope with it. If you can't figure out That You Are Anxious, then figuring out What Is Making You Anxious is impossible, which makes Find A Way To Make Peace With That incomprehensible. That's where the Avoidance comes in: you can no longer identify what might be a Dangerous Situation, which means that Anything New has a big potential to be Really Bad in a variety of ways (ranging "I don't Feel Good" to "Fully Lashing Out bc you've entered Fight/Flight and can't get out of it" to "Actual Outside Danger This Time") and that means the Only Way you know how to be Safe is to just Avoid Doing Anything New and Only stick to Familiar Situations, because anything unfamiliar is a monster of a gamble you don't know how to prepare for or cope with

[sysig]

Nice healthy obsession you got there (Patreon)

[listenupcupcakes]

OOC: Hey yall! Sorry I haven't been active lately, depression has been kicking my ass all the way to sunday, I'm not doing to well in the headspace.

I'm still gonna answer asks, this isn't the end of Soldier Ask Blog, but I am taking a bit of a break, just for now

[blackjackkent]

Legitimately it really does frustrate me that I can knock out these drabble prompts and liveblogging posts here really quickly and, frankly, with pretty good quality, and meanwhile the longer stuff I want to write for AO3 sometimes feels like it's stuck in my head and has to be squeezed out like the bottom of a tube of toothpaste.

I know ultimately it's because I put more pressure on myself for the longer stuff and I'm hamstringing myself as a result, and I also know that ultimately it will all get written and in the end I will be proud of all of it. But it is annoying.

[cloudburst-ink]

IT'S HAPPENING

Chapter 18: Final draft

Chapter 19: Full first draft

Chapter 20: Mostly written, almost to first draft

Epilogue: ... in progress.

[kyouka-supremacy]

***

[theoriginalsapphic]

Why I Believe That Byler Is Endgame (based only on what we have seen on the show). Part 1

And by that, I mean: no color-coding analysis, no set props analysis, no actor interviews interpretation, no script analysis, no movies parallels analysis; nada. Only what we’ve seen on the show and nothing else.

This will use a lot of comparisons with m/leven because, despite the fact that some of you refuse to admit it, this is a love triangle.

the relationship between Mike and Will vs the relationship between Mike and El

Only in images.

determination vs passiveness

reliance vs independence

understanding vs lack of understanding

connection vs disconnection

responsibility vs shifting blame

will's art vs el's letters

choice vs 'dumb luck'

truth vs lies

I wonder if this is foreshadowing of how Mike might react when he finds out that Will lied about the painting or if he will react differently. Either way, that lie will be revealed in season 5. You can't have a show in which the characters keep repeating the phrase "friends don't lie", only for this lie to never be brought back again.

[bobombun]

Seere is basically immortal in that he'll die if he's killed, but he won't die to old age. And he's the Hierarch because of an innate ability of his (prophetic visions) that I have no clue how it manifests in people. How long do you think he'll be the Hierarch? Do you think he would be kept as the Hierarch even when he no longer wishes to stay as such? After all, who could replace someone who receives prophetic visions of the future, and who has seen such peculiar events? And whose form makes Goddesses more likely to trust him and feel more at ease and not do anything hasty like Garden of Light kinda mentioned-

[katya-goncharov]

i just finally got a library card and it's amazing, because!! i can just reserve any book i want in the world and take it home and read it?! for free?!!

[morningstargirl666]

FIC REC FRIDAY #4

ad aeternam. by darkness_shows_the_stars / @stars-and-darkness

His eyes are intent on her. They always are, but never so strong, never so scorching, as when he’s needling for information she’d rather not give.

“I want you to come and …” She sighs. This is more difficult than she had expected it to be, and that’s saying something. She’d expected it to be like pulling teeth, but the feeling is more akin to ripping off an arm. “I want you to come and pretendtodateme.”

There. Done. That wasn’t so hard, was it?

No, not at all.

Klaus’s face smooths over, washed of all emotion. “Would you mind repeating that?”

Guys. Listen. I don't go searching for fake dating AUs. Mostly because I'm not a fan of human AUs. When I'm reading klaroline fanfiction, I'm here for the fantasy element, the age old hybrid falling in love with the blonde baby vampire. Therefore, fake dating AUs just don't really blip up on my radar. But. Guys. Guys. THIS FIC ALRIGHT. THIS FIC HAS OVERHAULED MY ENTIRE BELIEF SYSTEM???? LIKE? IT'S POST-CANON DIVERGENCE???????? YET A FAKE DATING AU????????????? DO YOU SEE THE QUESTION MARKS HERE IT DIDN'T EVEN OCCUR TO ME THIS COULD BE A THING AND YET IT IS AND IT IS THE MOST BEAUTIFUL CREATION TO EVER EXIST?

Anyways. Yeah, go read it.

OR I AM DISOWNING ALL OF YOU