#i really want to write for the game

[tonberry-yoda]

Take a Break - Asra

notes - IM BACK FROM THE DEAD AND WITH A FIC?!?!?! Hi guys! <3 I've been in a bit of a block feeling like my writing is meh, but I wanted to pump this out to get out of said block. I'm finally on a short break for school, but I'll be working then, but now, I had time to write and wanted to give you all something, even if it's short and sweet. I also wanted to thank you all for the support even as I've been on my hiatus. I nearly have 200 followers, and I just can't thank everyone enough for being so loving! Sorry this note was kinda long, but I really want you all to know how much I love you <3 word count - 941

“Hi Asra.” You smile, giving the boy goo-goo eyes as he walks into the shop that the two of you owned.

“Hello, y/n.” he says, not once looking at you. He was too busy looking down at a list of some sort to notice you staring at him while you stood behind the counter.

“Busy?” you asked.

“Mhm.” was all he let out before walking up to his office.

You sighed and ran your fingers through your hair. Another busy day that clouded both you and Asra. You were used to it by now, but a break sounded nice every once in a while. So instead of that break, you played with a bottle full of tea leaves that you were proud to say you made yourself. You didn't hate your job, if anything, you loved it more than any job you’ve had before. The problem was Asra. He looked constantly stressed and beyond tired. You hated that he was starting to look like he was the one who hated his job. He had so much passion years ago, but now he just looked swamped.

“Good evening, y/n!” you heard a familiar voice say as the bell rang above the door. Your ears perked up and a smile spread across your face as you saw one of your regular customers walk in.

“Evening, Mr. Bennet! How are you?” You set down the little bottle and walked over to the man, shaking his hand.

“Fine, fine,” he said. “Busy as always. You?” He hung his coat on a rack next to the door and started browsing.

“I'm all right,” you admitted. “Bout to close up shop, so that’s nice.”

“I won't be too long.” He looked at some of the tea you had made, carefully reading the instructions. “Where’s Asra, if you don't mind me asking?”

“Oh, he's upstairs. Probably working as always.” You rested your cheek on your hand.

“Go figure. Poor man needs to catch a break.”

“Tell me about it.” you chuckled.

“Well, when you see him again,” Mr. Bennet said, walking to the counter with a box of tea leaves. “Tell him that he has to get that break, for me, of course.”

You laughed and took the money from the man, locking the door behind him as he left.

“Was that Mr. Bennet?” you heard Asra ask, making you nearly jump out of your skin.

“Yeah,” you said nonchalantly as you began to clean up for the night. “He just got some tea, that’s all.”

“Dammit,” Asra groaned, leaning against the wall. “I had to ask him something.”

“You know he’ll be back. He’s in here all the time. Plus, he told me to tell you to take a damn break.”

Asra ran his fingers through his white hair while his other hand clutched some tarot cards. “You know I can't do that.” he sighed.

“Whatever you say.” You finished sweeping up the rest of the shop and walked past Asra.

“Where are you going?” he asked.

“To my room. To take a break.” So, you did. You walked straight to your room and laid on your bed. It was soft, as always, and all of your stuffed animals gave you soft smiles.

Through your window, you could see the moon peeking over some mountains behind the town and a smile spread across your face. You quickly jumped out of bed to open your window to bring in some cool night air. It smelled fresh. You saw crows fly overhead and could see the lights from the rest of the village turning on as the night market began overflowing with people. You’ve been needing this relaxation for weeks, and finally, it was a weekend where you had time for it.

At your door, you heard Asra clear his throat. When you turned around, he had Faust wrapped around his bicep and the tarot cards were still in his hand.

“Need something?” you asked.

“Not really.” he said quietly.

“You look tired.” Your voice was softer than his.

Asra chuckled. “I am tired.”

“Then take a break. Please.”

Faust slid her way off of Asra’s arm and slid over to you. You picked her up and she wrapped herself around your wrist. “Break!” she said to Asra.

“There’s so much to do before the weekend is over though.” Asra sighed and leaned against the frame of your door.

“Like what?” you asked.

He thought for a minute. You assumed that he was going to try to make some excuse to keep himself busy. There were probably things he had to do over the weekend, but you also knew that Asra was the kind of guy who always felt the need to be productive.

You walked over to him and put your hand on his shoulder. “Asra, I'm serious, you need a break. Those eyebags don't look good on you.” You ran your thumb underneath his eye over the dark spots there.

He softened to your touch, leaning his cheek on your warm hand. “What if everything falls apart because of me?” he asked.

“I think you’re just making excuses.” you giggled.

He took your hand in his own and smiled softly at you. Faust, you noticed, had disappeared, but you didn't mind, especially when you just saw her curling up in a little cage you had made for her.

“Do you want some hot cocoa?” you asked Asra as he took a seat on your bed.

“That would be wonderful, y/n, thank you.”

You pressed a kiss to his forehead and pushed him so that he was laying down. “I'll be right back.” You winked.

~~~~~

the arcana masterlist | pinned post | ko-fi

2023 @tonberry-yoda – do not repost or claim ANY of my work as your own! likes, reblogs, and comments are not only welcome, but appreciated

~~~~~

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Happy Birthday to Fallen London; My favourite British people beefing it with bats simulator.

[dykedvonte]

Killing Daisuke’s parents but also like feeling so bad for them.

Imagine your kid absolutely devastated to have to be sent away to some shitty internship but you think it’s for the best. You don’t hear back from the company for a while and just think it’s gonna take a while. It’s a long trip after all. Then those long weeks turn to long months and then you get news they haven’t had contact with the crew in a long time. You don’t know if you’re ever gonna see your kid again.

You don’t know if he’s coming back from a trip he didn’t want to even go on. That you made him go on. I’d never forgive myself.

[kiwiaok]

writing about neil josten is so hard because he’s such a multidimensional character. there you have a man who has no problem being a murderer but is terrified of being a monster. a man who finds others’ humanity interesting as a foreign concept and simultaneously crumbles at a kind touch. a man who made peace with death yet fights so violently to survive. a man who is still almost a kid even though he never really had a chance to be one. how am I supposed to accurately portray a man who’s been everywhere and seen everything yet still knows so little?

[acrylcii]

(yap incoming 💥💥💥)

I don't think we as a fandom talk enough about how both Kim AND Harry both had dreams of working in fields related to the Pale as children and how that interest carried on through both their lives.

As stated, Kim wanted to become an aerostatic pilot before becoming an RCM officer. Aerostatics were specifically designed to traverse the Pale, and in game Kim wears an aerostatic pilot jacket, despite not being a pilot.

On the merch website, (which, would not recommend supporting, but I'm putting this in as a little tidbit anyways-) we can see the actual stats + description for Kim's jacket.

It's clear that Kim still holds onto this dream and admires the pilots and the revolutionary brigade. He's also a huge torque dork, so I think it's safe to assume he's carried the fascination with aerostatics and machinery well into his adulthood. (also, Airman Kitsuragi.... I'm going to burst into tears. I'm so serious)

Now, as for Harry, I don't have that much info on. HOWEVER,

So, entroponetics is the study of the Pale. At some point when Harry was a child, before becoming a gym teacher, Harry wanted to be a Pale scientist.

(also, writing poetry is a tactic used before traversing the Pale to keep a stable mind. AKA: Volta do Mar.)

And just like Kim, that interest carried on as an adult.

NOW. Okay stay with me. I've just been thinking of the possibility of Kim and Harry meeting, except Kim is an aerostatics pilot, and Harry is a entroponologist. I have no idea if this is an original idea or if this is even coherent but. There are so many worms in my brain

[bunnieswithknives]

Why does your sam design have a cleft lip if i may ask? It's a very unique feature and it's very fun to draw I'm just curious.

I just thought it would be fitting for a game that's basically about not judging people for how they look.

Also because I thought it would be really fun to give Sam a recognizable feature that could stick around even after they transformed. For that of all things to ultimately be their visual connection back to their humanity. Not that I've actually got around to finalizing a Failed Ritual design like I first imagined it for, but I put a little nod to it in my animatic! I thought it was cute to imply that the Visitor noticed and found it pleasant enough to think about

[author-morgan]

Title: A Dove and a Hound Rating: T Pairing: Sandor Clegane x fem!Reader Summary: A little dove with broken wings must save her wounded Hound. Or in which Sandor Clegane finds something sweeter than killing. Word count: ~3.7k Warnings: Injury/blood and typical Westerosi shenanigans.

ARYA STARK LOOKS at the bleak landscape around where they had made camp for the night in the northern Riverlands—almost in the Vale. It’s all craggy with sharp boulders, high patches of land, and hardly any trees. The names roll off her tongue as they do every night. The Mountain, The Hound, Cersei, Illyn Payne, Meryn Trant...she doesn’t make it to the next name after hearing the scraping of boots on rock nearby. Quiet as a shadow. Fear cuts deeper than swords. Quick as a snake. Calm as still water. Syrio Forel’s words are burnt into her memory. 

"What’re you going on about now, girl?" The rasp of the Hound's voice makes her jump, and she curses him, looking up at the night sky, watching for shadows when she hears the soft noise again.

“We’re being watched,” she tells him, turning on her bedroll to face the Hound, her hand resting on the hilt of Needle.

His laugh cuts through the air—a rough sound that hurts her ears in a strange way. A man like the Hound should never laugh. "Here, in the middle of fucking nowhere?" His scarred face looks all the more hideous with the light of the fire licking at his skin. "Finish your little list, girl, then go the fuck to sleep." Arya frowns and looks around again at the land but sees nothing but boulders and empty plains, but she knows someone is out there. 

Sandor Clegane won’t admit it, but the Stark girl’s warning is the reason he stays up for over half the night. Then, when he’s certain Arya is asleep, he rises from his bedroll and unsheathes his sword, setting off to search between boulders and in the shadows cast by their dwindling campfire. But there’s nothing there. The Hound moves to return to his bedroll, but that’s when he hears quiet cursing and soft crying. And then he finds a woman huddled between two rocks, trying to nurse an injured leg. 

You see the hulking shadow approach too late to muffle your grunts and groans of pain. “Come any closer and I’ll put a fucking arrow through your eye!” You shout. But Sandor Clegane can see the bow in your hand is broken, even if you try to hold the two wooden pieces together to make it seem whole. Then he sees the broken arrow shaft sticking out of your swollen calf, too—the reason for your caterwauling. 

“With a broken bow and the only arrow you got stuck in your leg?” The Hound asks, laughing. “Pay a couple of hundred silver stags to see that done.” Sandor drives his sword into the dirt and awkwardly kneels near you, looking over the wound. He can feel your eyes on him, gaze nigh burning. But the soft white light of the moon softens the sight of his half-burned face. He looks familiar. Like you’ve seen him in passing somewhere—or maybe on the parchments nailed outside taverns noting bounties and the enemies of the Crown. 

You swallow the knot in your throat and look up at him—you might not be able to place who he is, but you know he’s dangerous, a killer. “Well, go on,” you snap, tears stinging in your eyes. “Kill me and get it over with.”

The Hound recoils as though stung by the words—he knows he’s put a lot of people in the ground, but for some damn reason, he can’t stomach the thought of landing the mercy blow now. You close your eyes and wait—no longer fearing death or pain. But the cold bite of steel never comes. Instead, Sandor Clegane lifts you into his burly arms and heads back toward the dying campfire.

Arya’s surprised when the Hound returns and lets you down to rest against the boulder nearest the fire. The girl’s quick on her feet, bringing a half-filled skin of water, and you greedily drink. "Think I'll end up losing it?" You ask the girl—wiping your mouth with a torn sleeve—a glint of humor shining through as you pat your thigh, ignoring the sharp jolt of pain that shoots down to your calf and makes your toes curl. 

“If you’ve gone this long” —Sandor crouches down and looks closer at your injury— “it’ll take more than an arrow to kill you,” he says. It earns him a dry and humorless laugh with a surprising grimness. Given enough time, he thinks he could come to enjoy the company, but right now, he and Arya Stark are already pressed for time, luck, and coin. Neither of them needs the liability of an injured woman—another mouth to feed—on the path to the Eyrie. Be best to leave her come the morning, he thinks, but now that he’s brought you back here, he knows the Stark girl won’t let that happen.

“May I have your name, good ser?” You finally ask—it only seemed proper to know the name of your white knight.  

Sandor Clegane looks at you, and the firelight paints the tangled and twisted mass of scars on his face red—pocking the flesh with craters and cracks. “Not a fucking knight,” he bites back.

And then you can piece everything together—his brute size, the burned half of his face, the posters scattered around the Riverlands. The rumors people whispered are true then, you think. Joffrey’s dog tucked tail and ran while the Blackwater burned. “You’re The Hound.” He grunts. You glance at the girl staring down at you with wide ice-grey eyes. If he’s the Hound then... “You’re Arya Stark.” The girl nods.

The silence that grows between the three of you is heavy and tense. You shift and grimace again. Then your gaze flits back over to the Hound. “Well, are you going to help me get this arrow out my fucking leg or not?” You ask, not understanding why he hauled you back here if he didn’t mean to do something about your current state. “'Cause if you aren’t, I’d sooner you cut the damn thing off or put me out of my misery.”

Sandor moves to you after that and cuts away the fabric of your britches from the arrow, then calls Arya over to set his dagger in the flames—unwilling to go closer. She does as he says, pushing the blade into the hot coals, but then Arya Stark leaps to her feet when she sees Sandor’s hand grip the shaft of the arrow—like he means to tear it from flesh. She knocks his hand away then pushes back on his shoulder, almost hard enough to knock him off balance from where he sits on his haunches. 

“We can’t just pull it out!” She tells the Hound like it should be obvious. But he’s not the one who grew up with a maester in Winterfell or spent time reading any books.  

“Then how you gone get it out, girl?” He asks, gruff and impatient. You glance between the odd pair, wondering how they haven’t killed one another by now. Arya crouches down and prods the swollen and bloody flesh, then without warning, she grips the arrow shaft and breaks off the fletching. Seven hells, you think, biting down on the inside of your cheek to keep a wail of pain at bay, I am going to lose my leg. 

“Push it through,” Arya says, remembering the time she watched Maester Luwin remove an arrow from a hunter's shoulder. The Hound grunts and draws a second, smaller dagger, starting to whittle away at the splintered end of the broken arrow shaft. 

Arya goes to fetch more water and brings back a cloth with her before settling down to watch with wide, curious eyes. Blood starts to seep down your calf around the entry and exit of the arrow shaft from being handled so roughly. Satisfied with his woodwork, the Hound steadies your leg against his trunk and starts to pull on the iron-forged arrowhead. 

You grit your teeth together, fingers digging into the soft earth below, as he begins to ease the wooden shaft through gently and quickly as he can. Arya watches your face twist in pain, but somehow, you don’t cry out. It feels like an eternity. Sandor sets the arrow aside and takes the waterskin from the Stark girl, dumping the cool water over your leg to wash away the blood—there’s a cool but welcome sting.

Sandor tosses the empty skin back to Arya. "More water, girl,” he rasps. 

“Bring wine too,” you insist, and the Hound howls with laughter.

“Seven hells,” Arya remarks. You’re just like him. The girl heads off, then comes back with more water and looks at the open wound on your leg with a scrunched-up nose. 

“Needs to be sealed with fire,” Sandor says, sitting back on his haunches, that’s why he already had Arya put a dagger into the flames. They don’t have salves and ointments and teas and brews to keep infection at bay, and despite his fear and hatred of the fire, he knows it’s the best way to clean and seal a wound like this.

“I’ll do it,” Arya offers. Her hands are steady, and the fire and heat don’t bother her like it does the Hound. He nods, and the girl goes to fetch the hot knife. They give you a strip of leather to bite down on, and then the Hound looks away when the girl presses the flat of the blade against your flesh—you do scream then. He knows that pain—that scream—and the putrid scent of burning flesh that jumps into the air. Black dots and white stars dance around in your vision. It hurts worse the second time. But you fight through it. 

Your gaze settles on Arya after a while, struggling to stay awake. “Where are you taking her?” You ask, eyes flitting to Sandor Clegane. The two are an odd traveling party that much is certain—a Hound and a wolf—made even stranger by your sudden arrival. 

“The Vale,” he tells you, “she has an aunt there.” You hadn’t expected a man with his reputation to do something so kind, not even if heavy coin purses were offered as rewards. A hush falls over you, but then the Hound rises and picks up a threadbare blanket from his bedroll. He drapes it over your shoulders, not ungently. “Best get some rest,” he says. “It’ll hurt worse tomorrow.”

THE DAYS ARE both quick and slow to pass, and soon, you’ve lost track of the time since meeting Arya Stark and the Hound—it could have been a few weeks or maybe months. But since that fateful night, your wounds have healed cleanly, and the only reminders of them are a fading scar and the limp in your stride after long days or over strenuous terrain. You remember the first time you insisted on walking instead of riding Stranger—a great black, unruly destrier. When you slowed, Sandor Clegane slung you over his shoulder like a sack of flour before depositing you back on the horse and complaining about the slow pace. Arya Stark was particularly amused by it all. 

Disappointment is all that awaits you all at the Bloody Gate of the Vale. Lysa Arryn is dead, and her young son and named protector, Petyr Baelish, will not accept visitors—not even one of Lysa’s own kin. So at the point of arrowheads and tips of steel blades, the Hound turns back, and you and Arya follow, trekking through the Vale and back to the Riverlands, unsure of what to do and where to go. Arya says they should go north, to the Wall—she has a brother in the Night’s Watch—or across the Narrow Sea.

There’s a small village not far, and you take a handful of silver stags and copper stars in hopes of replenishing your stock of ointments and bandages—especially with the now festering wound on Sandor’s neck, a nasty bite from a rogue—and maybe a decent bottle of wine or ale too. But by the time the sun is beginning to set and you return to Sandor and Arya, they’re not to be found. 

The campsite is empty. The fire still burning. The bedrolls laid out for the coming evening. You look around the craggy landscape, feeling panic seize your heart and stomach—mind racing. “Arya!” You shout, but there is no response from the girl. “Sandor!” And again, there is nothing but silence.

If not for the fading evening sun glinting off tarnished pieces of silver armor, you think you might not have found him. You stumble over to him, kneeling at his side, fearing the worst. But his chest still rises and falls, and he starts when you touch his cheek, hand wrapping around your wrist, leaving a thick smearing of blood. 

There’s something in your eyes, not pity, but he’s not seen that look before —almost doesn’t want to think of what it could be, could mean. Sandor’s grip goes slack, and he grimaces, each breath a ragged rasp. You look over his mangled shoulder, the bruises and scrapes on his face, the muscle-deep cuts on his palm, and his lame leg. These wounds are beyond your skills, and there are not like to be any travelers on this path for days.

The Hound tugs free a dagger from his belt and places it in your hand. "Go on,” he rasps, nodding toward the knife, resigned to his new fate. “Get on with it." The Stark girl wouldn’t put him out of his misery for the hatred she still bore toward him, but maybe you would. 

Your fingers curl around the hilt of the blade, grip tightening, but frozen in place—unwilling and unable to move. "I can't," you breathe, fervidly shaking your head. I won’t. He curses you when you drive the blade into the hard earth and not his heart. Sandor Clegane saved you from certain death, and now you’ve a chance to return the favor.

You wet a strip of cloth and dab it over his bloodied face until he turns his head to look at you. "If you think I'm some wounded pup you can redeem, you're stupider than I thought, woman,” he snarls like an aggrieved dog. 

But you don’t pay any mind to his hateful words. “Be still,” you chide, gently, going to collect the pack of supplies from Stranger’s saddle. The Dornish strongwine eases the pain, and he lets you clean the rest of the cuts and bruises to the best of your abilities —his broken leg, though. You aren’t sure what to do, but you know if something isn’t done soon, Sandor Clegane won’t be using that leg again in this lifetime. You lose track of how many times you have to wander down to the nearby stream. All you know is the limp in your step has come back. By nightfall, the wine and pain claim him, and you’ve said your prayers to the Seven, asking them to spare your poor wounded Hound.

There’s a dim lantern on the dark horizon, steadily drawing nearer and brighter, and then you can hear the rattling of a cart and the braying of a mule. You rise from your post and go to intercept the rickety cart thumping along the winding trail. The mule comes to a halt—the path forward blocked. 

The driver has a kind face, rounded from smiles and wrinkled with wisdom, and eyes that are deep and thoughtful but speak of the horrors of the world. “A lady and her knight,” he muses, sparing a glance at the makeshift medicinal supplies illuminated by faint firelight and the state of the brutish man sleeping—half-dead more like.

“Can you help us?” You ask. “Please.” And the broken plea strikes something deep down in the man’s heart.  

He thinks on it for a moment. “Aye,” the man says, “I can try.” If he couldn’t, the others on the Quiet Isle could—especially the Elder Brother. His dusty brown robes dust across the rocky ground as he goes to the Hound’s side. It takes all your strength combined to lift Sandor Clegane into the cart—even with the weight of his armor gone. Then you clamber to the front of the cart next to Sandor, letting his head rest in your lap, and with a snap of the reins, the mule walks on again, heading south along the bumpy road—it would be a long night.

Weary and exhausted, you look between the Hound and the driver. “Who are you?” 

“You can call me Ray,” the kindly man says. “I’ll take you both to the Quiet Isle. The Elder Brother can help.” You’ve heard tales of the isle—where men go to atone for their sins and take vows of silence. Some even say those who reside in the Bay of Crabs live in a world unlike the one ravished by war and pain. Brother Ray can see the growing trepidation on your expression. It’s nigh common knowledge women are not allowed to dwell on the Quiet Isle. “Won’t force you and your knight to be parted,” he tells you. 

“He’s not a knight,” you murmur, eyes trailing from the road ahead to Sandor, knowing he doesn’t like being called a knight—and for good reason. 

“No, but it seems he’s your knight,” Ray says with a chuckle, sparing a wayward glance back at you and the Hound. You flush at the thought and turn your gaze to Sandor, his head resting on your thigh.

A FEW MONTHS pass and Sandor is as well as he’ll ever be. The damage done to his leg makes him limp after long distances or strenuous tasks, but no one would be able to say such injuries made the Hound a feeble man. Even now, you’ve never seen a man split firewood with so much power and anger. Sometimes, you wonder if he hates you for not ending it when he pleaded for the blade’s mercy. But on the day when the brothers let you see him again, he wore a fleeting smile, soft and weak—the first time you’d seen such a sight. 

Storms roll in for the night, and lightning flashes through the window—thunder rattling your featherbed. You pull the covers tighter, squeezing your eyes shut, praying for sleep to come. It feels childish to be afeared of a storm, but it’s a reminder of the night the Lannister men destroyed your home and family and put an arrow in your leg. Rousing from the uneasy rest, you pull on your dressing robe and wrap the wool and linen blanket around your shoulders before setting off in search of company. 

His bed is empty, and you frown. Disheartened, you turn back only to bump into a solid wall of flesh and muscle. No man his size had a right to move around so quietly. “What are you doing awake, little dove?” Sandor asks, and you’re unable to meet his gaze with your flushed cheeks as you search for a valid answer. “Can’t sleep?” He surmises, and grateful he spake first, you nod sheepishly. The hand that wraps around your wrist is warm and calloused, yet his touch is light—as though you’re some bird with a broken wing. But wordless, you climb onto the bed next to Sandor, still huddled under your blanket, but not alone, and even with the storm raging outside, within these walls with him, you’re safe. 

The morning light breaks through the small window—only glowing embers remain in the hearth, not enough to chase away the chill in the air. You wake to find yourself alone, and it sends a strange pang of sadness through your heart. Making your way back to your chambers, you change into a plane shift and stride from the cottage to find him—the wet grass tickling the soles of your feet as you head down a winding path toward the water’s edge.

Sandor is sitting down on the rocky shore of the island, his dusty brown cloak fluttering in the wind. You go to him and sit on the weathered rock next to him. The morning is cool, and the spray of waves breaking against rocks in the bay kisses your cheeks. Wordlessly, the Hound pulls his cloak free and drapes it around your shoulders. In comfortable silence, you pull the coarse material tight and rest your head against his arm, looking out over the water and the clear blue sky—as though the Old Gods had not unleashed their wrath upon the land last night.

After a long while, Sandor rises, knowing it’ll be time to head to the Sept and see what tasks the Brothers need help with today. You’re quick to follow after him, but before he can start up the rocky path again, you brush your hand against his with all the timidness of a mouse, daring to have a lingering touch as you gather the nerve to ask something that’s been festering in the pit of your stomach, in the darkest parts of your mind and the deepest parts of your heart. You take both his hands—rough and twice the size of your own—and look up at the Hound. "Sandor,” you breathe, his name like a birdsong in your voice, “will you kiss me?"

He laughs—thinking you are playing him for a fool. No sane woman would ever wish to have his touch or his kiss. “With this ruined mouth?” He mocks. But the next jape dies on the tip of his tongue when you fist your hand into his woolen tunic, hauling him down with all your strength to just the right height where if you stand on the tips of your toes, you can kiss him. And you do. Sandor is surprised at first, but his hard exterior fades, and then a strong arm curls around your middle, hoisting you up and then off the ground entirely. You pull back for only a quick second and smile for him.

“Little dove,” he rasps when you move your hands to hold his face, thumbs stroking over his cheeks—one marred by the flame—and down into his thick, wiry beard. He half expects to find a shred of fear or disgust in your eyes, but there isn’t any. There never had been. You kiss him again, softer and sweeter this time, and he returns it in full. 

Reluctant to part, he places you back on the ground but is quick to pull you into his side and hold you close in the golden hour of the morning. And for the first time since he can remember, Sandor Clegane has a handful of happy memories, and perhaps, in the end, he's found something even sweeter than killing.

[Game of Thrones taglist: @certifiedlittleshit / @erzsebetrosztoczy / @hereforreadandwrite / @hc-geralt-23 / @holysmokesblog / @Idkjj04 / @lady-stark-winter-rose / @mikariell95 / @misskatiewrites / @mrsragnarlodbrok / @nyotamalfoy / @rigshak / @savagemickey03 / @xinyourdreamsx ] if your name is italicized, tumblr would not let me tag you. if you’d like to be added to my Game of Thrones taglist, or any other taglist, just let me know with this Google Form!

[clerk427]

Fishing in the Void

[koipalm]

in the myth of eros and psyche, her last task is go to the underworld and retrieve some of persephone's beauty. so here's her in hades, where zagreus hasn't found his mother yet. the 'beauty of persephone' she brings back are gifts from zagreus, as he's the last of his mother's beauty in the underworld

[loveandleases]

(ಥ﹏ಥ)

If you were sober, you would see the war within them. So many unspoken questions linger - why you showed up drunk at their door, why their bed became the one you choose to fall into, why your scent now lingers on their sheets.

Maybe tomorrow.

"Please," G whispers, their voice barely audible and laced with pain. So much pain that you don't notice. Nor do you catch the way their fingers hesitate, aching to cup your face. "Just one... just one-"

Sip, they want to say, only for the word to be lost, the glass of water in their hand forgotten. Their lips hover near yours, close enough for their breath to graze your skin. Green tea, you think in the haze of your mind. G.

Why would you be smelling green tea if you're home in bed? It must be a dream - it has to be. And if it's a dream, then what you do next is alright.

Your hands slip around their neck, fingers threading into their dark hair. G's breath hitches, and you pull them closer. Soft pliable lips, brush yours. Their gasp dissolves into the kiss, followed by a soft moan. The sound sending a shiver through you.

[seventeendeer]

my lifelong special interest in sonic the hedgehog has both a very sincere side (those little animal characters are so cute! these games are fun! yay bright colors and the power of friendship!) and a side I can only describe as "morbid fascination with all the ways a long-running franchise can try to do a million different things and none of them are good or right or nourishing to the human spirit"

today, I would like to take you all on a special journey through the latter !

did you know that, at a conservative estimate, there have been attempts to create a recurring love interest for the blue man himself no less than FIVE SEPARATE TIMES. MORE IF YOU COUNT THE ONES THAT WERE NOT SUPPOSED TO LAST

below is Madonna (left) and Breezie (right). Madonna was a damsel in distress type character Sonic would've been saving in an early draft of the OG 1991 game. Breezie was a temporary love interest in the 90's cartoon, Adventures of Sonic the Hedgehog, who seems to be inspired by the scrapped Madonna concept.

another scrapped love interest was Tiara Boobowski, who was at one point in development going to be a playable character in Sonic X-treme, a game intended for release in the 90's, though it never materialized. it seems her story went through a few different iterations before development ceased. she has the dubious honor of being the first "princess" character created for the purpose of being Sonic's love interest, which would be revisited at least two more times in other contexts.

the first love interest to stick around for a while was Princess Sally Acorn, developed from the squirrel critter design in the early games into a major supporting character in the 90's cartoon Sonic SatAM (left), then kept around in various iterations in the comic book spin-off series published by Archie Comics (middle + right) until the series' end in the mid-10's. she was in an on-and-off relationship with Sonic over those decades, for better or for worse, and they had by far the longest running romance arc out of all of Sonic's love interests to date. after suffering every romantic melodrama plotline imaginable, she was unceremoniously booted from the franchise when the rights to Sonic comic books were moved over to IDW Publishing. rest in peace, Sally, you didn't deserve any of that. at the very least for five minutes towards the end, she stopped dating Sonic and it was implied she started dating her long-time gal pal, Nicole, so she had that going for her for a little bit. counting our blessings

speaking of romantic melodrama, the Archie comics also gave Sonic a temporary love interest in Mina Mongoose because they wanted to write in a love triangle. there was a "main characters all grown up and starting nuclear families" future story at one point where they married Mina off to Tails instead, which somehow felt deeply cruel to both Mina and Tails. "hand-me-down love interest" is a bad, bad vibe for everyone involved

a few years on, in the mid 00's, the games were having their own weird little time giving Sonic a short-lived romance arc with new addition to the cast, Princess Elise the Third, who only showed up in the game Sonic the Hedgehog (2006) and managed to lay one singular smooch on Sonic's corpse to bring him back from the dead, disney style, before she was banished from the franchise due to a monumental amount of backlash (against both her character and the game as a whole). I'm beaming hostile psychic waves into sega's headquarters until they bring her back with better writing and none of that stupid shit. they did it with Silver, they have no excuse

and of course we finally have the one. the only. the most persistent girly of all time who's been trying to marry Sonic since 1993 and is still truckin' on in the year of our lord 2025 even though he's slippery as an eel and he "don't wanna" and there's kind of an uncomfortable age difference and reciprocated romance has over time become more or less outlawed by Sega because it never really pans out for them for some inexplicable mysterious reason. everybody's favorite hyper violent child psychic AMY ROSE !!!!

great character!! has always had so much potential to do her own cool thing if only they'd let her!! if they don't drop the stupid "kinda love interest, kinda not" aspect of her character soon, I'm going to start CRYING BLOOD!! FREE HER <3

anyway honorary mention also goes to Blaze the Cat (left, game continuity, still active), Bunnie Rabbot (center, Sonic SatAM + Archie comics, goners with the Archie series cancellation) and Fiona Fox (right, Archie comics, also goners, same deal), who, while not introduced as love interests, have all been put into some kind of romantic context with Sonic at one point or another just because

(and also while not really relevant to the topic at hand, I would be remiss not to give a special shout-out to the multitude of male characters who were most likely never intended to have any romantic connection to Sonic, but because this series is shonen anime inspired and the rivalries get crazy, our boy still has to hear shit like this on the regular)

and like, you know I've probably forgotten some more girlies out there, too. Sonic the Hedgehog has been pelted with potential romance arcs since the day he was created, and I'm sure there are more out there lost to time/my shoddy memory.

and it's just ... so profoundly morbidly funny to me. unstoppable force (heteronormativity) VS immovable object (misogyny). countless futile attempts to convince kids across the world that a cool guy like Sonic TOTALLY GETS GIRLS, DAMN IT, HE IS FULFILLING HIS HETEROSEXUALITY QUOTA, WE PROMISE, combined with this utter disinterest in sufficiently developing female characters who can effectively fill that role. even Sally Acorn, who was put through hell in the spin-off comics for DECADES serving as the designated narrative romantic punching bag, would eventually go gentle into that good night without fanfare because porting her into a new continuity would just be so much worrrrrk ughhh she's not even Sonic's girlfriend anymore so whateverrrrr

though as much as a massive L as this is for women, at the very least these poor girls are taking the obligatory main character romantic subplot down with them. taking one for the team here. Sonic is so fast and so smooth, those cringey romance plots just slide right off the wind screen of his character and I at least love that part. I love that it never works out and our protagonist remains utterly unpairable. and I hope nothing ever sticks. and I hope the current staff continue to get better at writing female characters just for the sake of having some cool girls around who are interesting in their own right. and may a thousand more cynical, sexist, half-assed attempts to awkwardly shoehorn romance into stories where it doesn't belong wither and die just as spectacularly, booyah

[sarcosmiiic]

no cause i think one of the reasons any life series ship with grian is automatically so ironically stingingly tragic is that it's /his game/.

like putting aside the watchers for a second, grian created the life series. this is /his/ death game, his circus his monkeys. sure, when the person closest to him inevitably dies some gruesome death at his own hands, the pain in his chest still makes him want to jump off a cliff, run face first into a warden, fall a couple hundred blocks and splat, but...

it's still. /his game/.

when other players lose their teammate, it's tragic for them because their friend got ripped from them in an instant and there's nothing they can do. when grian loses someone close to him, it's all /his fault./ he made this game, he wrote the code, he said "if this then that if player gets ripped to shreds in a cactus pit, falls off a bridge in the sky, blows up in our own tower, then they die".

he just. never thinks he's gonna be the one to do it.

he knows it's just a game, he knows he can just hop back on hermitcraft and see his friends alive and well and not shredded splatted blown to pieces.

he just.

his game. his friends. his hands.

gets him every time.

[corseque]

one of my new year's resolutions was to stop thinking about how DA4 sucks, and I failed within a week because I was thinking about how good Emet-Selch is and I started mentally comparing them and getting So Mad. The BioWare devs played FFXIV!! They had the exact framework of how to conclude a complicated antagonist's story. Why was it so fucking difficult? Almost every single element was the same, it just fell on its face because the world and Solas were simplified and stupid. Poor Solas. I'm actually so glad that Emet gave me Solas closure years ago, but I'm surprised at how bad the re-opened wounds hurt me.

I made a Spotify playlist of all the canon FFXIV music that is related to Emet-Selch in my mind, and the playlist is literally 3 hours and 45 minutes long. Imagine if Veilguard had music!! Imagine if Solas had that much music after two video games. Imagine if the music related every character under a beautiful overarching theme. ARGHH I tear my hair out. We were so close to greatness. It really was within reach. It didn't even need to be AS good as Emet-Selch, it just needed to be at least one step of complication in a way I couldn't predict. I'm just frustrated that there was not even a SINGLE further step than what I had already thought about. There wasn't any kind of complication. It was exactly what I thought, and then it was over as soon as everything I already knew about for 10 years was finally revealed to everyone. The key to the story was Solas saying "oh my bad." What kind of simple and easy story is that?? I hate everything so much always forever ahhh I can't even type coherently. Filled with a baby rage about it months later.

Emet-Selch, please give me closure again

oh well, I'll just go back to trying not to think about it now

[deadliestpieceontheboard]

Abby's House

Based on all descriptions from TFC to TSC, here we have the two-cars-driveway one-storey-tall Fox-HQ/home of our dear Abby Winfield.

I had to reroute what I had first imagined to fit both a realistic floor plan for the early 2000s and descriptions, but I really like the end result.

Close to the front door is the kitchen, and from its door one can easily slip down to the hallway to the bedrooms, as Andrew does in Neil's first visit.

They all eat in the kitchen itself, and the table can fit all the monsters plus Abby and Wymack, so I guess they had to squeeze in an extra chair for Neil.

There is a separate TV room where they watch the Thanksgiving parade, and I also added a sunken sitting room and an office.

The piano in the sitting room is from this HC I have that Abby and Wymack get Kevin one for Christmas so he can get a new hobby (and justify to himself that it'll help his fine motors skills he still has trouble with from the injury). In the office, the couch is a pull-out so more people can be housed if necessary.

The private area is fairly simple: the guest bedroom has enough space to fit extra mattresses on the floor, and the bathroom is one door down the left from Abby's bedroom, just as Jean notes in TSC.

Abby's room is where Jean stays in, since he notes jewellery sitting on the dresser. It also has a TV and an extra chair where his visitors sit, and the side tables lay low (or maybe Jean is just too tall). While he was there, Abby covered the window with a thick blanket.

[aliennachos]

The main reason I adore the prototype fanbase is as follows

You cannot make up anything that seems "too far from the source material" to a prototype fan

This is prototype mother fucker, there is no level of "out there" that is too far for a prototype fan

You can say whatever the fuck you want and stick some dark scifi terminology in there and literally nobody will complain about it

You wanna write a prototype fic but don't wanna stick to the lore? Well in this fandom the lore is the instructions on the back of a popcorn bag that tells you not to use the popcorn button, nobody has ever followed those fucking instructions

That unstable anemic emo twunk cheated his way out of a nuke. Law, reason, and believability went out the window a long time ago in this wild West of a fandom

[turtleblogatlast]

Small but significant character moments that I actually really adore are from both the times we see the boys as tots. There is a reoccurrence that happens in both of them that I find so incredibly interesting.

For the turtle tot short, Splinter leaves the boys with weapons. In the short, Raph is the one who suggests they do “what Lou Jitsu would do” and Leo is the one who takes point when Splinter comes back to reprimand them. Leo, in taking point, is the one to defend them and get Splinter off their tails.

And then, in the flashback regarding the Kuroi Yōroi helmet, Raph is the one who grabs and throws “Skully” as a way to replace their missing ball which breaks it into pieces, but Leo is the one who speaks for the group and rushes into action to fix the teapot.

I love this for multiple reasons, but the biggest are how it shows that Raph has always been inclined toward the bold and fun and making the plans to include his brothers in what he loves and believes they’d love, whereas Leo has always been inclined to be the “Face” of the group and shoulder the attention even if it’s potentially negative all while coming up with on the spot attempts to fix the situation.