#in a way?

[andillwriteyouatragedy]

fruitful use of half an hour of my fifteen-hour train ride

[coro-sg]

Water the Roses Nightshades

[abraxo-official]

I want to be the sacrificial lamb. I want to lie on the altar, the stone soaked in the premonitions of my final moments, and I want him to look into my eyes and be disgusted by the beauty he finds there. I want him to ache when he cuts my throat; to hate the cascade of pity that threatens to drown him when my blood dries on his hands. He sees my frail, lifeless body in his dreams and feels no remorse, just a lust-like hunger for the crimson stains upon my white wool. And when he wakes, he is more afraid than I ever was.

[ko-seiya]

I heard that the scrapped idea for the cancelled third Sonic Storybook Game was supposedly going to be Greek Mythology themed, so I propose this: A Hades and Persephone Retelling.

Here’s some key points that I’ve come up with and will tweak or modify as I come up with them. I hope to make this into a full-fledged comic at some point and will get some concept art out hopefully in the next few days.

Synopsis: Sonic is summoned by Demeter to rescue Persephone, her daughter, from the dreadful God of the Dead, Hades, who has kidnapped her and is holding her hostage in the Underworld. However, as Sonic meets the rest of the Pantheon, he begins to suspect that there is more to the situation. His suspicions further arise as he travels within the Underworld, finding that things are not quite as the stories, and Demeter, claim.

Character assignments below the cut

The Pantheon

Eggman as Zeus (Side note: Hilariously he’s the only one to actually call Sonic a hedgehog as they were there in Ancient Greece. Apparently as pest control or weather predictors. Also: Eggman.)

Agent Stone as Hera

Sage as Athena

Metal Sonic as Hephaestus

Tails as Hermes

Mephiles as Poseidon

Vector as Dionysus “More wi-juice! I mean… juice! Yep!”

Knuckles as Ares

Rouge as Aphrodite

Espio as Artemis

Blaze as Hestia “I tend to stay out of these affairs…”

Silver as Helios

Charmy as Apollo

Cthonic Deities

Big as Cerberus “I warned yah buddy. You should turn back now while you have the chance.”

Omega as Hypnos “IT IS IMPORTANT FOR INFERIOR ORGANIC LIFEFORMS TO GET THE ALLOTTED EIGHT HOURS OF SLEEP IN ORDER TO REMAIN FUNCTIONAL.”

Shadow as Thanatos

Amy as Hecate

Sticks as Styx

Cream as Charon “Welcome to the Underworld! Please step aboard my boat and I’ll take you wherever you need to be- but first: obol please!”

Babylon Rogues as the Furies “Lord Hades said that you’re a slippery one and wants us to take you in alive. But he didn’t say anything about not making it hurt.”

Tom and Maddie (cameo?) as Odysseus and Penelope (note: Demeter has attempted to kidnap Persephone back many many times, hence why they are there now despite the original myth taking place before The Odyssey)

Maybe Tangle, Whisper, and Lanolin as the Fates

Hades and Persephone are both “humans” like Demeter.

Demeter has fiery red hair/auburn hair like a maple leaf. She is very fall/autumn themed. Something something if I had a nickel for every red head who betrayed me I’d have 15 cents and that’s a lot actually what the fuck

Her final form (boss mode) is winter themed.

Ascalaphus - one of Hades’ orchardists, turned into a screech owl and enslaved by Demeter. She sends them to go with Hermes and Sonic to the Underworld to ensure that Hermes won’t stray from the mission. May turn on her as the story progresses?

[yeoenby]

I think it's kinda funny how most of the apples being mentioned are not always directly, but in some capacity huge problem causers for the "protagonist" of each respective story

[awpollar]

POV: Megatron from G1 holding you semi gently as he decides whether or not to squish u or see how far he can throw you

[rosemaryreality]

[dying-marshmallo]

☆ guhhh and uhh and if siffrin somehow found a way to stop the loops but he has to erase himself from the narrative completely, from the moment he meets them he has to remove himself completely cause if he never met them then he'd never loop and its like like like spiderman situation where he wants to get back into their lives so bad but he can't bring himself to do it cause he's terrified of getting them trapped in this endless cycle over and over again and--

[character-obsessed-fem]

listen. hear me out. shadow not being able to talk properly and just mispronouncing/mumbling EVERYTHING when gerald first created them. i'm talking toddler/infant speaking level despite being like. above six years old when they first came out of that tube.

the adults who didn't like shadow using this as an excuse to ignore whatever the hedgehog has to say under the pretense of 'not being able to understand them', and not listening when shadow says they're hungry or that an experiment hurts.

maria teaching shadow how to speak and pronounce things right - it takes them a while, but eventually, shadow is the most well-spoken being on that ARK.

the adults hating maria for this because now they actually have to listen to what shadow has to say now because they can longer dismiss them due to them being unintelligible. they actually have to listen when shadow says 'that hurts!' or 'i want professor robotnik.' or 'i need water.'

and if they don't - well, shadow tells everything to maria, and maria brings up every little issue regarding shadow up to gerald, the lead scientist, who does everything to make sure maria is happy - which means making sure shadow is happy.

[mantequillamcwhoremick]

I'LL DO ANYTHING BRO 🙏🙏🙏🙏 I'M BEGGING 😭😭😭😭😭 PLEASE RAMBLE

Alright, so.

First thing about it is the setup of the scenes; the chapter could've been easily split into two because it's LONG and either scene has plenty of content on its own to make up for the lack of the other, but I really didn't wanna split it because the tragedy in it all was enhanced so well by them playing together.

In the first scene we have flashbacks of Butters as Kenny knew him; the true heart of their relationship, an in-depth exploration of WHY Butters was so important to him. Why he wasn't just any friend, why none of Kenny's other friends can even remotely fill the hole he left behind— not even Tweek, even though he believes Kenny about his curse too. We see Butters as he is in the show; a chipper kid, soft and caring, someone who comforts those who need it without thinking about it twice.

"Butters moved Heaven and Hell to get to him so he wasn’t alone" means that Butters would often break his parents' rules, sneak out when he was supposed to do chores, study, be grounded— he risked everything to be there for Kenny. This hasn't been explicitly mentioned in the fic but it will, and it plays into why Kenny feels so guilty about Butters' disappearance and everything that went downhill in the Stotch house.

Then we have the second scene, and— dare I say— the first real introduction to Vic Chaos. Butters and Chaos have haunted the narrative since the first chapter, and now we finally see them as one in the flesh, and it's a violent contrast to the soft and chipper Butters we saw just now: Butters, as Kenny knew him five years ago, vs. Vic Chaos, an impulsive man who shoots careless bullets around the room and hammers in on Kenny's head with a metal chair.

I wish I could've done a better job at it still, but in a way, what I'm trying to recreate in Chaos Plan is this feeling I got when I saw Vic Chaos in "Post Covid: The Return Of Covid" for the first time. This man, who is so unmistakably Butters (Matt & Trey really did a great job aging up all the boys honestly, they're all perfectly recognizable), and yet so distant it's chilling. Kyle's attempted warning to Cartman in that same special is a perfect representation of the chilling reality of who Butters has become:

Kyle: Cartman, listen to me very carefully. Butters has some kind of power over people. You guys aren't safe. Cartman: Uh, yes, about 12:30. Kyle: [stunned] Did you hear what I said? Butters is extremely dangerous!

He leaves behind a trail of literal death and destruction, then "waltzes out like nothing happened" (actual quote from the fireman in this scene), in the same upbeat way we know Butters is usually like. In s16's "Butterballs" this is what Butters says to his grandma after his violent outburst on live TV:

I got real mean and I beat the snot outta Dr. Oz. I can't lie, it felt kind of good. At first. But since then all I have is just... a kind of dark, empty feeling. Then I realized... that's how you must feel. All the time.

In both Chaos Plan as well as Post Covid (the bad ending), Butters has embraced this side of himself. This careless, built-up rage from years and years of the world beating down on him and then leaving him trapped alone, to his own devices. There is an endless "dark, empty feeling" inside him that he has been both forced to and let himself succumb to, distant from everything he used to be— even his own name.

And he keeps the mask up perfectly throughout the whole fight with Mysterion. At first they banter, flirt a little, even. Does he realize what he's doing when he says things like "Couldn't let him take the cake, could I?" or "Oh, you’ll sign your name, all right. All after I’m done with you"? I doubt it; Butters is notorious for being oblivious to obvious innuendo. It's all a game to him, he's stuck somewhere between being a kid playing the villain with a flair for the dramatic, and someone who's gotten desensitized and numb to the horrors of life.

So what snaps him out of it?

Bodily harm. Or the threat of it.

Cartman: Godammit Butters, stop playing games! My entire family is in danger of being wiped out and I swear to God if you don't help me, Butters, I will rip your fucking balls off with my bare hands! Vic Chaos: Ohh hamburgers.

Suddenly he isn't Chaos anymore. He isn't Vic, he isn't a mastermind scammer, hacker, he is none of the masks he wears to desperately smother whoever is below. He is just Butters, a kid who is afraid of pain.

[nohoperadio]

somehow I've had the eminem super mario "now does that sound fair to you?" song from that one post stuck in my head for the last like 20 minutes, despite this song not existing even a little bit

[shizunitis]

Luo Binghe & Tianlang-Jun: Origins. And a Bit of Projection.

Disclaimer: This is basically just a collection of quotes from The Scum Villain's Self-Saving System, Volume 3, accompanied by (adjective) thoughts, and then even more relevant quotes listed at the end. If I could, I’d paste the entirety of Chapter 18.

“As expected, I can’t bring myself to hate humans.” — Vol. 3, Chapter 21: Always Together

I will always be conflicted on the topic of Tianlang-jun, and it annoys me. There is so much I could say about him, and so little I can successfully articulate. He is, to me, more confounding, complex and tragic than Shen Jiu.

He’s pitiful and awe-inspiring, wicked and affable, cunning and wide-eyed in his curiousity. He is a compelling, heartbreaking character. He alternates between emotionless wisdom and mournful apathy. I admire how his knees don’t buckle under the weight of his grief, but how he crumbles at the barest hint of hope. How rage claws at him and, still, he can’t figure out how to make it stick.

I empathise with him. I understand him.

But then, in the distance, Luo Binghe's indifferent voice disturbs the silence, causing me to drop my drink onto the floor and this post onto your screen:

“He’s not my father.”

It’s an interesting exercise, exploring their relationship in reconciliation fics. To see them interact (semi-)honestly, watch them take turns filling up the chasm between them. It’s wonderful. Every fic I’ve read centred around them was a delightful read that I still think about.

However. I cannot see Tianlang-Jun, as I understand him, as Luo Binghe’s father. And not just because of the 3rd Novel’s events.

But because Binghe had hoped for something; he did have that wide-eyed wonder. He did hold one last window open, for the sake of an improbability he couldn’t quite, just yet, dismiss.

It’s what (most) orphaned and/or adopted childred do.

Though Luo Binghe had never said a word about it before, Shen Qingqiu knew that he harbored some fantasies about his birth parents. […] In fact, he’d always secretly fantasized about whether his parents might still be alive, and how well they’d treat him, and how they’d never let him suffer the mildest slight. — Vol. 3, Chapter 17: Tianlang

It is the most human thing; to want to be helped, accepted, invited by those given to you. A family is given to you. Whether you believe it an act of the divine, of nature, of coincidence, it isn’t something you fight for. It’s the first and, arguably, only thing you don’t have to fight for in life.

Depending on a multitude of factors, that can be a blessing or a curse; but where there is room for interpretation, questions left unanswered, most childred—Binghe included—will turn to their imagination, and try to make sense of it. Usually, to comfort themselves, to reassure themselves that surely, if their family could, they would have.

And, yeah. Most likely, if the Palace Master had gotten punted into the Sun like he fucking deserved, they would have. But does it matter?

In the face of a bleak reality, what comfort is a could-have-been?

He liked to call Luo Binghe “that son of mine,” but he didn’t seem to possess any concept of fatherly affection. […] Luo Binghe was in fact…someone who was unloved by even his own parents. — Vol. 3, Chapter 15: Holy Mausoleum

What use are good intentions to an abandoned child? What consolation is it, to say, They gave birth to you, when that child has seen no evidence of their care? Does it dry their tears, that their mother can’t be here, but she surely would have wished to be? That their father would protect them, if only he knew of them?

(And don’t make me tell you about the visceral horror I felt reading the Origins chapter. I’ve yet to make my peace with it. MXTX, Airplane, whoever: you’ve ruined me.)

The washerwoman was and continues to be, to Binghe, his only mother. And I would argue, that’s healthy. Even independent of his other traumas (Abyss, Shizun’s betrayal, Xin Mo’s influence, living on the streets, etc, holy shit Binghe) Luo Binghe will not accept anyone else as his mother.

“Who is this Su Xiyan?” Luo Binghe asked coldly. “My mother was a mere washerwoman.” — Vol. 3, Chapter 18: Origins.

It may seem callous. It probably even is! But it is a healthy line he’d drawn by his own initiative. It’s what helps him, what he feels he needs to do in order to do right by his mother, and his own heart.

And! Tianlang-Jun doesn’t seem to give much of a shit, either!

Won’t, probably, even in the future, once the dust will have settled. He is exhausted, weary with carrying the corpse of his love, the loss of his nephew. Whatever goodwill he shows, it’s a perfunctory sort, because he can’t afford more.

So. Uhh.

Tianlang-Jun is not a character I can love, nor one I can hate. Usually, I can’t help but be inclined to love complex characters. Like them, too—though that’s more of an action-based thing rather than just said character’s personality.

But with Tianlang-Jun, I’m stuck whichever way I turn. If I want to love/like him, I’m drawn back by Binghe’s pain and disappointment. If I try to hate/dislike him, I’m drawn back by his own history and grief.

In conclusion:

I don't know! I'm not really trying to, like, prove anything. I still love the aforementioned TLJ & LBH fics, I still love their dynamic. I started walking and ended up exactly in the same space. This, perhaps, could be considered a Heavenly Demon Family Mobius Strip!

I'm not really trying to say anything. It just… makes me feel conflicted, and angry, and whenever I allow myself to think about it a bit more, sad.

But.

However!

Alas.

Nonetheless, even.

As a reader and—on my better days—a writer, all I can say is:

As promised/threatened: some selected passages, for your reading pleasure:

So, it looked like neither the father nor the cousin had any intention of acknowledging Luo Binghe. — Chapter 15: Holy Mausoleum

He liked to call Luo Binghe “that son of mine,” but he didn’t seem to possess any concept of fatherly affection. — Chapter 15: Holy Mausoleum

Tianlang-Jun lifted his hand, took a look at Luo Binghe’s snow-pale face, and commented indifferently, “He looks like his mother.” “His eyes look like yours,” came a chill voice from the side. — Chapter 15: Holy Mausoleum

The faint hopes and dreams Luo Binghe had held in his heart for many years had been mercilessly pulverized into so much dust. […] [Tianlang-Jun] refused to speak a single word of their relationship and had been utterly ruthless back in the Holy Mausoleum. […] To his parents, Luo Binghe was an unwanted child. — Chapter 18: Origins

“If he was my father, why didn’t he bring it up earlier? Why not tell me?” The most Tianlang-Jun had said was that single line he offered while beating up Luo Binghe, devoid of either praise or criticism: “He looks like his mother.” He looks like his mother. What of it? But that was all. There was nothing more. — Chapter 18: Origins

Luo Binghe was indifferent. “He’s not my father.” […] Luo Binghe shook his head. It was unclear what he was stubbornly clinging to, but he repeated, “He’s not my father.” — Chapter 18: Origins

Luo Binghe raised his smiling face, his eyes shining brightly. “Mother was the kindest person in all the world to me.” — Chapter 19: Shen Jiu

[millkywite]

Pijamas.

[creativity-deficient]

I’ll never quite understand the discourse around whether or not Tweek is a part of Craig’s group

He may not appear as frequently as the other members but he still is pretty consistently associated with them, and has been even before he and Craig started dating

Even South Park studios lists him as a part of the group

[blueberryspacemagic]

At the end of last month my dear dog Mika passed away of old age. I've been really busy with new work during this time but I finally found a moment to draw a little tribute. You were the best, doggie. Love you, Mika 💖