#i need it. it’s free therapy for me

[flowercrowngods]

yearning hours (b-side) — in which being in love can feel like the greatest tragedy of all until you learn that you’re not alone (or: bravery, despite everything)

🤍 also on ao3

Steve comes to the quarry when he needs to think. He comes to the quarry when he needs to not think. When he needs to feel this rush of adrenaline that feels so much like monsters are real and the world has turned upside down. Except he isn’t going to die here, sitting on the cold ground, legs dangling over the abyss.

He’s not going to die, but life stops for a moment all the same. 

And Steve relearns how to breathe. How to think. How to not think. While the darkness below him swallows it all. The pale light of the moon is not enough to reach the ground hundreds of feet below, or to chase away the complete and total darkness that meets his eyes when he looks down there. 

It’s all-encompassing, this darkness, the vastness of it; Steve sometimes feels like he becomes part of it. Just for an hour or two. Just for the night. 

The cold air that hits his face makes him shiver for a second, and reminds him that he used to think the darkness at the bottom of the quarry had a life of its own. Hell, maybe it does. With what they’ve seen, what they’ve fought, who’s to say there’s nothing down there? Maybe that’s what draws him here so often. 

Does the living darkness know his secrets like the darkness in his room does? Does it listen to him, does it care? They’re stupid questions, Steve knows. But they carry a hopefulness he wants to preserve. Something that survived the Upside Down, that survives the nightmares and the flashbacks and the post-traumatic stress, as Hopper and Owens call it. 

There’s something primal about sitting on the edge of such vastness, so much so that it makes his heart beat faster, his breath come shallower, like he is just a second away from falling. Like he has to savour this; this second, this moment, this life, because beyond it, around it, below it, there is only darkness. 

He takes a deep, shuddering breath and lets it all out until his lungs ache. The silence is absolute. He feels like the only person on the planet — but not in the bad, painful way that’s been hiding in the back of his mind for as long as he can remember. 

If he only breathes like this for a while longer, lets the feeling settle, lets the thoughts come and bring emotions with them, he knows that soon the tears will fall.

Tears, because he shouldn’t have to sit at the edge of the quarry in the dark of night just to be able to feel. Tears, because he forgot how to be a boy, how to be a person, about three years ago. Almost to the day. Tears, because they all did; but he’s Steve. He can’t let them see. Wouldn’t know how even if he wanted to. 

And tears, tonight, because just hours earlier, Eddie fell asleep while Steve made dinner. His arms were curled around the pillow Steve had leaned against all afternoon, and Steve just stood there in the doorway to Eddie’s room, the smell of fresh pasta mixing with that of leather, paperback books, tobacco and laundry detergent that is so purely and wonderfully Eddie that Steve just wants to catch it in a mason jar and open it whenever he needs a dose. 

Eddie had fallen asleep, and all Steve could do was look at him. Smile on his lips, ache in his heart that only grew in ferocity until all he could do was leave. Because friends don’t watch their friends sleep. Not like this. Not with their hands twitching by their sides, curled into fists to stop them from reaching out and trailing over soft, warm skin. Friends don’t… They don’t. 

So Steve left, pasta untouched. Heart unravelled. Words unspoken. 

He left and sped off until he reached the quarry, a safe place to piece himself back together again — but he doesn’t have the heart to leave out Eddie. So every time he comes here and puts the pieces of himself back together, he puts Eddie in the centre. He always does. It’s what keeps getting him in this mess. 

But it’s still the closest he’ll get to bravery after the Upside Down; admitting, if only to himself, that he likes a boy. Allowing himself to cry about it. To breathe in and breathe out and have the truth unchanged, unchallenged, undoubted.

He’s still breathing when the all-encompassing silence is interrupted, joined by the unmistakeable sound of tires on gravel. Seconds later, headlights illuminate the night, his arms, the edge of the quarry, but still not reaching beyond that. The car comes to a stop but Steve still doesn’t move, doesn’t turn around, just hopes that whoever it is will just leave him alone. 

Lights go out, the engine is killed, followed by the sound of a car door opening and being closed far too gently. 

Steve isn’t too surprised when steps approach him slowly, nor when they come to a stop beside him, chasing away some of the cold that’s been resting over him like a blanket.

Instinctively, he knows it’s Eddie. He just doesn’t know why. 

“How’d you know I’m here?” he asks into the void, still unmoving. 

“Just knew,” comes the reply, and it sounds so soft, so gentle, so understanding that Steve fears he might fall apart and have to rebuild himself once more. Twice in one night. Wouldn’t be the first time. Won’t be the last. “Why’d you leave?” 

Because otherwise I’d have crossed the distance and fallen to my knees, brushed a kiss to your forehead and told you dinner was ready. Because otherwise I’d have slid down the doorframe and watched over you, watched you, and the firework of a person that you are even in your sleep. I’d have fallen in love and I’d have fallen, fallen, fallen. So I needed to go where falling is not an option. 

Instead of saying any of that, Steve only shrugs. “Just did.” 

It’s lame and unfair, he knows, but talking to the darkness is so much easier when there’s not an audience, and Eddie just… he can’t know. Any of that. 

“Can I join you?” Eddie asks then, and Steve can hear it in his voice that he would leave if Steve said no. 

Maybe that’s why he doesn’t; just nods and scoots to the side a bit even though there’s enough room for Eddie to sit just anywhere. 

But he doesn’t sit just anywhere, no. He sits down rather clumsily — for which Steve can’t blame him, it is a little scary in the dark, and one wrong move could be your very last — and ends up with his arm and shoulder pressed to Steve‘s, their legs so close he can feel Eddie‘s warmth through the denim.

It’s too much. It’s not enough. It’s dangerous, so close to falling, and Steve scoots to the side, breaking contact. Breathing carefully.

Eddie‘s eyes are on him, he can feel it. He doesn’t react. It hurts, his entire body aches with how close he wants to be. But it’s too much, even for himself to bear. Putting all that on Eddie would be enough to take them both down to the bottom of the quarry, and lower still.

So he swallows. All the words he cannot say, all the thoughts that lump together and clog his throat.

“Are you okay, Stevie?” Eddie asks, and Steve just shrugs again.

“Sure.”

“Right,” Eddie whispers, then sighs. It’s not a heavy sigh or a judgmental one, but it makes Steve flinch all the same.

Too much. Too fucking much even unknown.

Silence falls over them, the quarry working its magic — or its curse — even on Eddie Munson. Steve wonders if it suffocates or liberates him, but he doesn’t dare to ask. It would take too much explaining for the question to make sense, too much revealing himself, too much of… Just too much.

He wants to ask. To say something. To scoot back over again, closer to Eddie, and lay his head on his shoulder, bask in his warmth and withstand the magic, the curse, the darkness.

Withstand it, because that’s what Eddie does. He is brave, despite everything.

And Steve is just the boy who sits with darkness at night because he doesn’t know how to be brave anymore, not when there’s no question of life or death. He forgot all about everyday-bravery.

But Eddie didn’t. He’s still there, still smiling and laughing and teasing his way through life and into Steve’s heart and soul.

And Steve doesn’t know what to do with it. Doesn’t know what he can do with it. Doesn’t know how to ask.

It’s no surprise, then, that it’s Eddie who does.

“What are we doing, Steve?” He sounds a bit resigned about it, and it makes Steve hide away in himself even more, focusing on the darkness beneath him rather than the light beside him — they both leave him blinded at equal measure, but one of them doesn’t ask him questions to which he doesn’t know the answer.

“What do you mean?” he asks after a while, his voice a little off. He doesn’t know what he’s feeling. Apprehension, maybe. Caught. Uncovered. Exposed.

Beside him, Eddie sighs again, just a little bit, but Steve has always hated that he keeps making people sigh. Makes him feel so fucking small, so incredibly useless.

He raises one leg from the abyss to rest his chin on his knee, because suddenly he feels so heavy that he needs the physical reminder that he’s not about to fall. One foot on the ground. Steady, secure, a great illusion for now.

“Sorry,” he whispers at last, because Eddie hasn’t said anything, has only sighed and created a silence that’s so loud it can probably be heard at the bottom of the quarry, and Steve feels like the silence is his fault this time.

“What for?”

“Dunno,” he confesses, lies, concedes as his house of cards begins to crumble for some reason. The heaviness wanders from his throat down to his heart and settles there, making a home for itself, casting out all the lightness that usually comes when he’s around Eddie.

But it seems he’s reached his breaking point. It seems he can only pretend to be okay for so long, pretend not to yearn and ache and long for intimacy and tenderness. It seems he can only put himself together again, rebuilding himself around Eddie at his centre, until it would break apart for good. Burst out of his heart, dismantle him piece by broken piece until all that’s left is a broken boy, yearning.

And so he can’t stop the tears even if he wanted to. They’re kind in their silence, streaming down his face without demand for sobs or sniffles. Just breaking free, a simple displacement reaction. Following the physics of emotions.

“Hey,” Eddie whispers, reaching out to wrap an arm around Steve’s shoulders, pulling him into his side. There’s that warmth, that touch, that gentleness he’s been craving — and there’s that sob he’s been suppressing. “Hey, Stevie, it’s okay. You’re okay. You can talk to me, you know that, right?”

He shakes his head into the warmth of Eddie’s neck, wiping dejectedly at his tears.

“No?”

“No,” he whines, sighs, groans, annoyed with himself.

“Don’t want to? Or can’t?”

Both. Neither. All at once.

He shrugs again, still leaning against Eddie.

Eddie, who turns his head slightly and brushes his lips over Steve’s hair in what can only be described as a kiss. Except, it can’t. It couldn’t. It isn’t.

Steve begins to shiver against him — maybe he’s cold, maybe he’s overwhelmed, maybe he’s both and neither and everything all at once.

“I’ve got you, Stevie.”

And then Eddie kisses his head again, and he stills.

“You can’t kiss me, Eddie,” he says, voice still thick, but steadier this time. No more sobbing, no more whining. Just a broken boy, yearning. Always, always that.

Eddie freezes where he’s holding Steve, only his arm still moves in soothing, rubbing motions — warming him, holding him, saving him. Always, always that.

“Sorry,” Eddie says this time. Except it’s wrong. It’s so wrong, and Steve leans back to look at him. It’s impossible to make out his expression in the darkness, but he tries nonetheless.

“Don’t be sorry,” he whispers. “Just…” He gestures vaguely, not quite sure what the just entails. Just mean it. Just do it right. Just don’t do it out of pity. Just leave me alone until I’m over you even though we both know I never really will be.

“Just?”

Steve shrugs. Whispers, “I don’t know.”

“Don’t hide, Stevie.” Be brave, Stevie. Be brave like me.

God, how he wishes. How he longs. How he aches.

“You don’t have to hide, not from me.”

Steve huffs and says, before he can stop himself, “Especially from you.”

Eddie pauses and Steve freaks out a little bit, even before Eddie asks, “Why?” He sounds wounded. Small. He shouldn’t sound like that. Never.

“Because you’re gonna see otherwise.”

“See what?”

That I’m completely and utterly in love with you. Besotted. Enamoured. All the big words you like to make fun of. All of them and more.

“Me.”

There’s a beat where nothing happens. Maybe time stops, maybe reality resets itself, settling in more comfortably in anticipation of vulnerability’s fallout.

And then Eddie takes his hands, reaching for them in the darkness and finding them with ease. Like he’s done it many times before. Because he has. Just never like this.

“Steve,” he begins, and Steve wants to run again. To hide, to confess to another void, and make Eddie forget this conversation ever happened. “I think I already do.”

What? No. No, you can’t.

When Steve doesn’t respond, Eddie continues, seemingly gathering himself and his thoughts as he goes. Always so much stronger, so much braver than Steve.

“I already do see you. The way you smile at me, light up the whole room with it. The way you hug me, always a little too long, but never long enough if you ask me. I see you blushing, I see you going out of your way for me, and… And I think, if you knew how to look, you’d see the same in me. Because, uh. Because I like seeing you. And I like… I like you. Not in a friends kinda way. In a way where I wanna sit beside you all night and talk about deep shit, but I wanna run my fingers through your hair when we do. I wanna play with your fingers when we do. I wanna kiss you when we do, because there’s deep, heavy, traumatic shit everywhere, but there’s also you. And I don’t want one without the other. I want you. In that exact way that I see you looking at me, wanting me, too.”

Eddie swallows, a little breathless beside him like Steve’s not choking on emotion himself.

“Tell me I’m wrong,” Eddie whispers then, pressing and desperate and knowing. “Tell me you don’t like me in a way you think you shouldn’t. Tell me I don’t see you.”

He shakes his head, slowly, frantically. “I can’t.”

“Because it’s true?”

Steve’s nodding now, just as frantic, leaving him disoriented and falling, only anchored to Eddie who’s still holding his hands.

“Yeah,” Steve gasps, rasps, whispers. “It… I’m. I don’t.” It’s he who swallows heavily now, needing a second or an eternity to process Eddie’s words. “You really mean that?”

Eddie nods. He can feel it, somehow.

“I don’t know what has you so scared,” Eddie begins. “Except the obvious, of course, but I feel like that’s only a small chunk of it. But you gotta believe me when I say that I mean it. I like you. So much it makes me stupid sometimes.”

Steve huffs, but it’s a smile this time. A real one. Tinged with sadness and heaviness and disbelief still, but a real one nonetheless.

“I wanna tell you. All of that. Everything, in my own words. And I will, but… Eddie, I’m—“ Steve starts with a quivering voice but shuts himself up before he can ruin this.

I’m broken. I’m not sure if I can let you. I’m just Steve. I’m bullshit. I’m…

“I’m tired.”

It has a double meaning, here at the quarry — but he doesn’t mean it like that. He wouldn’t. He couldn’t. He won’t.

“Can you just hold me?” It is perhaps the closest to bravery he’s going to get. Tonight, or always. But it’s enough. It can be enough.

Eddie hums and Steve can hear the smile, can feel how some of the heaviness inside him dissipates with it.

“Of course, sweetheart.”

Steve shivers again as he shifts, lying back so it’s only his legs, bent at the knee, that dangle over the abyss now. Eddie joins him, wrapping his arms around Steve’s middle and rearranging them so Steve rests half on top of him. It can’t be comfortable, but Steve doesn’t mention it.

They lie there in silence, and Steve allows himself to let go of the tension in his bones as he feels Eddie’s hands travelling across his back in a tender caress. He doesn’t quite believe it’s real, doesn’t believe he’ll get to keep it beyond this moment, and can’t quite savour it the way he wants to because surely he will lose this, too. Surely Eddie will realise and come to his senses and—

“Do you really mean it?”

“Yeah,” Eddie says, leaning up slightly to brush his lips over Steve’s temple. “Yeah, Stevie. I really, really mean it.” And then, after a while, “Will you come back home now?”

Back home. Home to Eddie and Wayne. Home, because Eddie cares and wants and bravely, bravely asks.

“Yeah,” Steve says.

Another kiss to his forehead. “And will you stay?”

It is Steve now who leans up, hovering above Eddie to meet his eyes through the dark. “I will. I do.” And then he slowly, carefully captures Eddie’s lips with his own, sealing the promise and receiving one in return.

Kissing Eddie is a lot like falling, he realises. But there are arms wrapped around him, holding him, never wanting to let him go — so maybe it isn’t falling after all. Maybe it’s flying.

At home in his bed, Eddie holds him some more, running fingers through his hair long after Steve has fallen asleep.

They’ll make it work.

[myokk]

Sebastian had a few days leave from duty so he visited Eloise😇😇

[minty364]

DPXDC Promp#58 Part 5

When he came too he was in the basement.

A soft hum came from the now activated portal, Danny couldn’t help but stare at it, the swirling green was mesmerizing and something in him felt a little different. He thought about what that might be for a moment but he was unable to tear his eyes away from the swirling patterns that called to him, beckoning him. 

“D-Danny?” Jazz said from behind him her voice was small and quiet, Danny almost didn’t hear her. 

He was sitting so he let himself fall onto his back and looked up at her.

She was right behind Damian and Tim who were watching him apprehensively, their hands held up in a defensive position. Jazz had a look of confusion and dread on her face while Damian also seemed confused but there was an anger there that Danny couldn’t quite place. Tim meanwhile looked like he was preparing to steal his emotions, probably because he was the eldest of the group. 

He wasn’t sure what was going on but he looked around the lab for the sink he knew had a mirror over it and when he found it he got up and walked over to see his reflection. Or well he tried, his body started floating as soon as he stood, he somehow was able to get to the mirror and looked at his reflection.

He was paler than before, almost as white as a sheet, but that wasn’t what caught his attention. His once blue eyes were a vibrant neon green, his hair once black is now white as snow. Even his hazmat suit inverted colors. White boots and gloves and a black suit. 

He fell back from the mirror onto his back as he shifted away from his reflection. It was terrifying that he could see Jazz, Tim, and Damian watching through him, he was transparent like he wasn’t really there.

He had really died, he was a ghost, the very thing his parents ranted on and on about every time he or Jazz was in ear shot. They’d rant about how evil they were and how they’d find one to dissect after the portal was completed. If that wasn’t enough he realized he couldn’t feel his pulse and he hadn’t been breathing this entire time.

He was panicking now, what exactly did this mean for him? Was his parents going to find him in the basement and try to dissect him? Should he go into the portal? If it did go to the ‘ghost zone’ as his parents called it shouldn’t he live there now? 

He could feel himself start to break as silent sobs wracked his body, he still wasn’t breathing but that probably didn’t matter if he was a ghost. 

If his parents were right about ghosts that meant he was a monster now, he probably wouldn’t be allowed near anyone again. He’d never be able to feel the warm embraces of his sisters hugs again. He desperately wanted to feel that warm again. It was the only feeling he could cling onto, and it was then that something happened. 

A bright light flashed around him, a ring around his center that split in two, one going up and the other going down.

When it was done, Danny was back in his white hazmat suit with black accents. He scrambled back up to see his reflection and he was indeed back to normal somehow and he was again tied to earth's gravity.

He could feel tears well up in his eyes again as he turned around to Jazz and their friends, “I-I’m alive?” he couldn’t stop his voice from trembling, his entire body felt chilly and he couldn’t stop himself from crying, sobbing as he struggled from air that he apparently needed again.

Damian and Tim shared a glance but Jazz ran past them as she pulled Danny into a hug. His sister was so warm and he couldn’t help but melt into it as the two cried sobbing and clinging onto each other. 

Danny was here and he was somehow alive, he was sure being a ghost was permanent but somehow he was alive and he could hold, hug, and protect those he loved. A warmth spread from his chest. 

He could tell he was indeed different now, but he wasn’t going to dwell on it at the moment. His sister was here and he was hugging her.

Damian and Tim approached slowly like they couldn’t believe Danny was here alive and well either. Damian scowled at Danny, he rarely got frustrated at him but here was and Danny didn’t get why, “why did you sacrifice yourself like that?!” Damian shouted.

Danny took a few calming breaths before speaking, “I-I tripped, I saw you and figured it was too late for me…”

Jazz and Tim looked at him terrified before Tim spoke up, “you mean they built the damn ‘on’ button on the inside?” 

Before either Danny or Jazz could speak up the door leading to the kitchen opened up, “kids? Are you still down there?” Their mom called before heading down the stairs. When she got to the bottom they could see the elegant green dress she wore that hugged her figure. She gasped as she dropped her purse, staring at the portal. “JACK!!” she shouted up the stairs before running over to the lockers to put her hazmat suit back on.

Jack walked down the stairs sullenly but once he too saw the now activated portal he rushed to put on his suit as well. 

“I thought you guys had left?” Jazz asked, pushing Danny behind her protectively, Danny wasn’t sure if she realized what happened yet but keeping him away from them until they had a better grasp over what happened was probably a good call.

Maddie shrugged as she put her goggles on her head letting it snap against her forehead with a little snap, “I forgot my Fenton-lipstick.” The reply was nonchalant.

The four friends found themselves getting pushed out of the lab as the scientists busied themselves measuring and taking readings from their new portal.

They quickly got out of the suits and gathered whatever they needed for the sleepover over at Wayne manor. Danny didn’t really care what he was packing, just shoving things into his book bag. Whatever had just occurred rattled him a little. He couldn’t help but worry that this was just the beginning. 

“That was quite some time you all took,” Alfred noted once they were seated in the back with Tim in the front and Danny in the middle in the back. Everyone kept glancing at Danny to make sure he was okay but he felt fine at the moment. 

“Uh, well,” Jazz started, “something happened to Danny,” she struggled to say. None of them were quite sure exactly what was happening but the sooner they got to a quiet space to discuss they were going too. 

Alfred glanced at Danny from the rearview mirror as he drove, “will we need to take Master Daniel to the hospital?”

Tim cut in before anyone else could, “that’s quite alright Alfred, we aren’t exactly sure what happened but we might have a code lazarus on our hands.”

Danny and Jazz shared a look, they were both equally confused having no clue what code lazarus meant. Tim normally wasn’t this serious although Danny figured the circumstances weren’t normal either.

They'd discuss thing’s later when they had privacy at Wayne manor.

[mueritos]

quick lil post about coming back to art full-time while also being a full time MSW student….it can be possible 0.0

anyway ty to everyone who has supported me over the years i wouldnt be able to go back to art without you all

[deoidesign]

.

[passiveagressivepoet]

buddie season eight this buddie season eight that

eDDIE DOING LONG TERM INTENSIVE THERAPY SEASON EIGHT WHEN

[an-eldritch-peredhel]

I’d love to hear your thoughts on what Eldritch peredhel entail

-@@outofangband

Sorry this took so long @outofangband and thank you for asking this I am! Delighted! And am preemptively putting a read more down because I cannot shut up about they <3

alright I'm just gonna put stuff and headcanons down as they occur to me so expect low-moderate levels of coherency

shapeshifting is an obvious one (gets weaker down the generations) but because my brain is Like This I have caveats!

thanks to my whole peredhil things=gender allegory that my brain spit out without my permission I've long struggled against my inherent feeling that while they can shapeshift they don't like it

but because I'm now aware of my brain's reasoning I can say it's because of ✨fantasy dysphoria✨

that's oversimplifying, obviously, but peredhil already have so much issues with working through who and what they are and compromising between body and mind and spirit that actively choosing to change into/present as something/someone who They Are Not is. Not usually their cup of tea.

As a whole they tend to have specific forms that they prefer as being closer to themselves, and distinct enough that it doesn't feel like they're faking something they're not

(changing to look like a different person, or a edited version of themself is Very Very not fun unless either explicitly for disguise or shenanigans)

(the exception to this is that Luthien can make herself look almost perfectly human without any real issue. she doesn't do it often but especially as she ages she likes to catch glimpses of her reflection and get both excited and sappy. this is in contrast to making herself look almost perfectly like an elf which makes her feel like her skin is on fire.)

(Also I'm pretty sure all of them can flip their agab presentation while only feeling varying degrees of off, and even then it's a different feeling than the shapeshifting dysphoria. Dior and Elwing are the two who I think mind it the most)

They all have the (agonizing to write) trait of feeling very distinct relationships to their species in their body vs soul/mind vs spirit/fea and they all feel it very differently! This isn't exclusive to Luthien's line but the maia blood does make it worse.

Oh! This is a new headcanon of mine actually but!

They all have faces that are very very hard to capture in image. They are the bane of portrait artists (and, to a degree, sculptors) everywhere because the art never looks accurate to life

It's not blatantly off it's just. missing something? Or something was added? maybe it's a little too wide, or narrow, or long, or short, in one place or another

It's not unrecognizable but if you've ever seen the subject in real life you can just tell

It's especially bad with Luthien (and Daeron) and Dior (to a lesser extent) because everyone literally sees them differently, as in their features will be slightly different depending on what each person finds attractive/aesthetically appealing and beautiful

(not a lot, again, it's not unrecognizable, but there has never and will never be any accurate depiction of Luthien as she was as a person)

(as a concept, though, as the most beautiful creature to have ever existed in Arda, a little of her image exists in every portrait lovingly made of a beloved spouse, every child's drawing of their family, in biological sketches of songbirds and field mice, in a sculpture of a stranger's face. Daeron remembers his sister perfectly, but he collects these regardless)

(Arwen, Luthien come again, isn't described as such by her grandparents. Galadriel and Celeborn both knew Luthien, and while Arwen and her father both look as closely to her as genetically possible, to those who actually know them both it's nothing more than uncanny family resemblance. Luthien was to most a concept personified, Arwen is a person with concepts imposed on her.)

The list of people who have seen Luthien how she actually, physically, defaultly is, essentially consists of Melian, Daeron, Beren, and Dior

Beren doesn't see her as she is right away because he doesn't know her right away, but they learn about each other and she shows herself and he sees her and by the time she rescues him from Tol-im-Gaurhoth there are no echoes on her face

(He's always a little bit haunted that he nearly died without realizing he'd never quite seen the truth of her before)

Neither Thingol or Beren can quite see their own features on their children's faces. They clearly take after their mothers, after all!

(This leads to much affectionate eye-rolling on Melian and Luthien's part)

Hair stuff!

It's alive! kinda! it's definitely not normal hair!

It moves a lot on its own. Sometimes like a breeze is blowing where there isn't one. Sometimes more like tentacles. It depends on its mood.

They've got some very pretty traditional cosmic horror vibes swirling around on their heads. It's very sparkly and colorful but in a Forbidden Shrimp Colors that your brain is unable to comprehend way so it reads as iridescent black mostly, or holographic white, where applicable

Luthien's hair actually is a glimpse into space, Daeron's is a glance at a star

(Luthien's magic hair cloak survives, I think, into the 4th age and beyond, though if anyone/anything has found it they certainly don't know the origins of the beautifully intricate living star map. It has seen the reign of countless north stars, yet the lines always point to the same coordinates- where the ancient, sunken, ruined remains of what once was Tol-im-Gaurhoth lay)

Speed round!

Fangs and talons and horns oh my! Are they tooth and keratin and bone, or are they petrified wood and gem and stone? Yes!

They all smell a little like ozone and a lot like petrichor, flowers, and Green. If you've smelled green you know what I'm talking about. Also, unfortunately, like bird. Birds don't smell great, especially wet bird.

Weird Foresight Powers++

(Most of them don't have actual foresight, but all of them are more in-tune with the Song than is natural for an incarnate)

Their eyes glow, most notably in the dark, unless the irises turn black as they sometimes do. They are also all unnaturally bright versions of the less-spooky parent's- Dior's are gold, Elwing's are blue-green like a tropical sea (Elured and Elurin split the color between them- ultramarine and emerald), Elrond and Elros have pale star-gold, Elladan, Elrohir, and Arwen all have silver.

(Daeron and Luthien being the exception again, because I decided they have Melian's eyes before I decided this, and I don't know what color eyes Thingol has. Watsonianly: Melian's spooky genes overwrite a lot. Luthien's genotype is probably much closer to his than her magically overwritten phenotype)

Their sclerae turn black and their pupils white, on occasion, usually when using powers

They don't bleed right. It's a little too red for an elf, a little too light for a human, and it shines strange as it beads like quicksilver on the skin

They have very shiny, cool skin. Luthien looked like her's was silver plate under a stretched stocking, the rest toned it down from there but it's still noticeable.

The Song is. Attached to them. They are all very much Main Characters. Their lives have a clear story arc with symbolism and narrative parallels. They are all subconsciously aware that their lives are a fairytale, whether tragic or no, and yes this has many Implications and affects. They are not the only ones like this, but they are the only ones who, to some level, know they are in a story.

This is the fundamental separation between them and everyone else.

The difference in how they perceive themselves between heart soul and spirit is very difficult to explain and understand, but not impossible to someone who knows them and is willing to put in the work.

The life-long knowledge that they are Important to the Song and their every choice and event they experience and their mere existence serves a greater purpose in a way that most other people simply do not- that's very, very isolating.

No one else can understand how they see the world. Very very few people are willing to try, and even fewer in a way that's not frustrating. There is a reason most of them find only one person to latch on to outside of their family, and a reason they hold on through hell and high water.

(This is about being neurodivergent)

[cloudyvulpine]

sometimes i get upset when ppl analyze Blitzø like pls i kin him HARD have MERCY on me 😭😭💀

[loganloggins]

My one desire for this event is that I want the characters to have ptsd from it afterwards. I want to see how Jaiden and Charlie always seem to get a little more nervous with any ex-Soulfire members. I want to see how Phil’s trust in his friends falls after they conform to the Ruling Entities Wishes, I want to see how each member is a little more tense with people who were not on their team. I want to see any repercussions of bad’s bloodlust.

GIVE ME THAT SHIT AND I WILL EAT IT UP

[zsbrainrot]

Kaoru does, in fact, love his Clingy Gorilla.

[figofswords]

the post grad why did i get an art degree what am i even doing what do i want in life where am i going crisis has finally hit i want to. lie down in the dirt. or something

[aloneinentropy]

people are in love with me in my head and i think that means something ✨🩵🍓

[pierregaslays]

:(

[guhroovi]

My brain wasn't going to be satiated until I drew this stinky lil man (affectionate).

[tiriansrambles]

I just finished my very first watch through of lord of the rings —

Dear god

Who do I bill for therapy ??

[the-converse-high-top]

this is going to sound really fucked up but i just need to say it i think.

I never realized that people could actually care. I always thought that the depictions of friendship in movies and TV shows were over-the-top portrayals, and weren't things that actually happened. This was then exacerbated by the fact that my entire life I always wanted people to just Know How I Was Feeling like they do on TV and I found out that that's Not How It Works. I always thought I was naive for caring so much about my friends and for doing nice things for them out of the blue, and I always resented myself for resenting my parents for not doing more for me as a child.

So when I got to uni, and my friends started caring about me and asking if I was ok when I looked sad and doing nice things for me, I didn't know what to do with myself. It was the nicest thing anyone had ever done for me in a long time. When I was staying with a friend, and she said that she left the window open in the room I was going to be staying in because I liked it to be cold when i sleep, I bluescreened. I didn't know how to respond. It is quite literally one of the nicest things anyone had ever done for me. No one had ever paid that much attention to the things I liked. Every year on my birthday it was either a gamble if I would get something I actually wanted from my parents (spoiler alert: I was often disappointed) or I would just have to straight up tell them what I wanted. I got accustomed to the latter, and now I don't mind, but receiving two gifts from friends about languages this year made me realize that I could have it so much better.

And don't even get me started on online friends. I sort of thought that everyone was lying about them? Or that it was something unattainable, and reserved only for God's Chosen Favorites or something. But no, there are little people in my phone who care about me. They legitimately care about me as much as I care about them. I've been nervous to ask them about their well-being because I'm still nervous about being naive and getting a wake-up call that no one cares again, but after being told that they were worried about me when I overslept, I think i should know that I'm in the clear. And that's not even including all the times they tell me to go to bed when it's late, and when they ping me about things I may enjoy or things I was involved in.

All this is to say I guess that I'm touched that people remember my existence. It makes me feel good to be wanted. I will be eternally grateful to both my irl and online friends who made me realize that just because my parents or my friends from home didn't care enough to remember what I like or to go out of their way to do nice things for me, it doesn't mean that no one will. I need to step up and do more for you guys. I trained myself to push down my desire to help and check in with people because I thought I was betting on something that I'd never get in return, but now I know I can.

Thank you all, and I love you 💚