#it feels like the universe is against me

[perfectly-uncapable]

randomly saw your tags and you sound like you could use a hug, friend 🫂

awww thank you! i was being really dramatic, honestly. i literally had to go "what did i post that was so worrying???" and then an "ohhh bike got stolen"

really appreciate this tho :)))

[ominous-horse-noises]

main takeaway from certain fan reactions to the finale is this:

the final scene with ankarna was so meaningful to the bad kids' arcs and how they made peace with being wronged by people they loved, and if all you can focus on is that the rat grinders didn't get much screentime, then you don't love dimension20 and you don't love this world: you want to be playing your own hs themed dnd campaign and you're mad the oc versions of the rat grinders you made up in your head acted ooc. these are not your characters and this is not their story.

[onlyswan]

[bonzoobel]

duo to contend with the Horrors ever!

[broken-clover]

It's eternally a little funny whenever I see someone say something along the lines of 'everyone in Strive is so happy now! Everyone's stories are getting resolved! It'll be hard to make a new game when everyone's retired and living peacefully and resolved their problems' and then there's a haunted semi-sentient mecha corpse in the corner constantly screaming from being trapped in limbo

[aq2003]

it IS weird that the general consensus on twelve is that peter capaldi is an excellent actor but his episodes are bad (esp in comparison to the general consensus on series 5 being that it's some of the best the show gets) bc i am overall really enjoying series 8, a lot more than the last 3

[tradingjack]

These were the concept pages I drew for my original writer in the @vashwoodbigbang event! Unfortunately they have disappeared on me 😅 and also bc god hates me I guess, the day I was supposed to post these, yesterday, saw me dealing with first a wifi outage and then a whole electricity outage so. That was fun lmao

Details about the drawings below since. I don't know if my writer will ever post the story, unfortunately 😔

So this was originally coined as a stardust au! I believe it was primarily based on the movie that came out in the 2000s (?), though I believe my writer was familiar with both the movie and the book it was based on. Honestly, it doesn't pull much at all from the story itself, just the general concepts of stars.

In this version, Vash is a star, and he decides to try and find his long-lost siblings (Knives and Tessla). In his search, he comes across a planet he hasn't visited before, and while he's descending to it, he's shot down by something mysterious that causes him rather permanent injury (not new; I believe he'd already lost his arm previously and he has all his scarring from travels to previous planets, this specific technology is just new to him).

He manages to crawl some distance from the resulting crater and is rescued by the odd pair of anthropologist Milly and journalist Meryl, who are tracking fallen stars on their planet in order to research them. Vash is horrified to learn that stars on this planet are rather brutally searched for and used for their power, so he tries his best to keep his real identity as a star secret.

In the next town, he learns about Star Cultists, who are the leading experts on stars. Our dear Wolfwood is one of them, and though he's a priest under the head of Chapel, he seems pretty jaded about the whole thing. He also spends some time poking fun at their visitor Vash when he stumbles on the doorstep of the church.

Unbeknownst to all, Chapel is the one who shot Vash down, and he suspects Vash is his target. When Vash, Milly, and Meryl skip town, Wolfwood is ordered to tag along with them against his will, and he begrudgingly forces himself into the group with his usual grace lol.

Through some shenanigans, including an interesting fight with Livio/Razlo who is a martyr (a human who ate at least part of a star and became consumed by it), the group all grows closer to each other. Naturally, Wolfwood and Vash hit it off with their usual ideology clashing and homoerotic team fighting. The tension comes to a head when both of the boys are drunk and attempting to stumble somewhere after getting kicked out of the bar, and with the help of liquid courage, Wolfwood admits to Vash that he's what's known as a "Star Eater:" a human that has consumed part of a star, and by some genetic luck, isn't consumed by it and instead gains some superhuman abilities so long as the magical tattoo (i forget what it's called off the top of my head fuck) that forms around the presenting star isn't broken.

Vash is understandably horrified. Wolfwood is confused by Vash's rejection bc he isn't aware Vash is a star; he's under the impression Vash is just some very talented guy Chapel really wants to feed a star shard in the hopes he becomes part of their superhuman cult.

Vash sobers up and manages to drag a very drunk and eepy Wolfwood to their hotel.

The next day is the turning point; the star cultists, including Chapel, catch up to them and confront Vash. Wolfwood has to learn very quickly that he'd been Wrong and Vash, in his panic, flies to where it feels most safe; the city's Star (storage area?? Idk). He ends up cornered there and, in his panic, accidentally goes nuclear trying to escape and blows up half the city in a column of flame. While he's barreling across the desert in an attempt to get away, he's trapped by a net the star cultists set up, made of the same shit used to shoot him down at the start, and he can't escape it on his own.

Luckily he's found by Wolfwood first, who's decided he owes it to Vash to try and fix his fuck up, and using his superhuman healing, he manages to free Vash. Both are exhausted and ultimately rescued by LR, who's been tailing them.

Tbh my memory's kinda foggy... my writer only managed to share up to that first LR fight, so I don't remember exactly what's supposed to happen between here and the fight at the orphanage?? I remember Vash somehow finds out what happened to his siblings (a hella long time ago, Tessla was consumed by the people of the planet and Knives, in his rage, fuckin just annihilated everything, turning it into a desert planet, and has been laying dormant for the most part since then) and also we learn that martyrs gain better control of themselves, and the crystal growth consuming them stops, when in proximity to enough additional star power. Vash, as a star himself, allows LR to easily think as they did before they ate a star shard when in close enough proximity.

Anyway, fight for the orphanage, Vash shows up in time to see Wolfwood getting his shit rocked and his magical tattoo (I'm so annoyed I can't remember what it's called. My mind is supplying sharingan and i know that aint it) shattered by Chapel, who accomplishes this by running Wolfwood through with his cane. Vash, believing Wolfwood's dead (bc like. Lmao it's pretty hard to live getting impaled, like, fully), loses his temper and basically obliterates Chapel. He moves on from Wolfwood's body to try and dismantle the entire Star church so Wolfwood's orphanage can stay safe. In this process, he confronts a Doctor Conrad, who was behind the whole thing, the remains of Tessla, and somehow Knives?? I think Knives, sensing Vash's anguish, just tried to fuckin nuke everyone, and Vash stops that. I feel like Knives dies in this process somehow... I think it was by saving Vash from something Conrad made??

By the end of it, Vash is wounded and exhausted, and ends up being saved by Milly and Meryl, I think.

When he recovers, it's to find he's lost his ability to leave the planet; while still functionally a star, his power has greatly diminished, his hair is black, and he can't even hide his wings anymore. Last I knew, my writer was actually merciful and let Wolfwood live! Albeit as a martyr (thus the wolf form with the uncontrolled star shard bursting out of the hole in his chest you can see on Wolfwood's page lol). Luckily he's got Vash around, so he gets to keep his mind, if not his human form.

With Knives dead and the star cultists mostly dispersed and no longer able to fuck with the planet, the story ends with our characters getting to experience rainfall on the planet for the first time in centuries.

.......

I like the story :P I imagine it'd be a lot better written out in actual novel form by the person who'd actually thought it up than my shitass, too-long summary lol.

Honestly my writer was communicating up until like, a month ago?? And then they just.... disappeared :/ which is weird bc I checked with my mod for this event (shout out to mod sana, @pushclouds, you're an amazing mod and I appreciate the heck out of you) and they submitted literally every check-in. Honestly I'm more worried for them than anything, if anyone knows what happened to @lohikaar I'd appreciate anything you can tell me. I hope they'll publish this story whenever they can, I'd still love to read it in its entirety.

Additional shout-out to @priellan for beta-ing the story they shared with us, and for overall being a super supportive team member :D

Also they did assign me a pinch hitter writer since we have no idea wtf happened to my original writer, so I'll be doing more drawings :D priellan agreed to beta for them too, which I'm super happy about! And thanks again to mod sana for your hard work and arranging that so quickly!

An admittedly strange first big bang experience, but I don't think it was overall bad, and I'm excited to work on more stuff with my new writer :D if you read this far goddamn. Thanks lol. See you again for sure on January 1st! (I'll try to post other shit between then and now hopefully)

[dhmis-autism]

ID LOVE TO SEE YOUR HUMAN RED GUY BTW

well gosh if you're gonna be so enthusiastic about it sure. here's a drawing i did of him a while back. if you really want i'll show you the others but ah, im shy.

[hekatiane]

A doddle I did back then about one of my favorite moments from the 2022 Star Guardian VN

[elucubrare]

tor.com published an 'article' that took about 500 words to say "I don't like ice world settings....but maybe i should be a little more open-minded" & i'll take all the ice worlds he doesn't want

[therichantsim]

I swear to god everything that could go wrong with trying to update this new season is absolutely going wrong!!! I teleport a sim and this happens. She looks normal in CAS but not live.

[uncanny-tranny]

I'm still thinking about how I witnessed somebody say a younger thirty-something was "aging gracefully," and it really just hit me over the head.

There's this element to things like aging and beauty, where it is seen as shallow and vulgar only insofar as it is used as a means for control or exercising power. The beauty-obsessed mindset is vain and superficial until the obsession for beauty is done in service, I've noticed. It's not lost on me that they said that to a woman, either, a trans woman - and it's not lost on me that especially marginalized women are held to twice the standard as anybody else, and that's framed as a good thing, something that "proves your womanhood." There's this twisting of the knife where proving that you're "just as much a woman" is what will liberate you from the clutches of the hatred you face - it places responsibility for your own subjugation (even in a small part) upon your shoulders so that the system is absolved of any wrongdoing on its end.

I just noticed this whenever people say or do things that subtly reinforce this idea that these power structures complement you. There's such a perverse nature to the fear of aging to attach "gracefulness" onto this natural process, and not only that, but applying it with such scrutiny that a thirty-something-year-old is "aging gracefully."

[thyfggfy]

Me after creating a mental list of my favourite characters from certain medias :.... I may have a type

Female characters that constantly have to prove themselves cuz no one believes in them and there is always someone who surpasses them get behind me.

[gxlden-angels]

Do not stop talking about Palestine. Do not forget about Palestine. This is not a battle of religion and I do not think it should be treated as such. From the river to the sea, they will be free 🇵🇸

Disclaimer: I am not an expert. I am just some guy in the US. I am not a direct source of information. Please listen to Palestinians. Please help them directly. Please help with protests if your country is supplying Israel with weapons like the US.

[birdinabowl]

Steven in SUF is so hit or miss for me. I genuinely do like his entire struggle of trying to figure out who he is outside of helping people. I love his struggle to connect with other humans, how alienated he feels from them compared to the gems. The first half of SUF was something i actually enjoyed because of this.

[raymondshields]

Man, knowing that I'm less than two weeks from my last final is really shaking me because I have so many things I said I'd do after I graduate and they're very close now!!!

One of them is going to be leaving all the discord servers I don't talk in and also pruning following / friends lists like hell and back. This will allow me to finally come off invisible on discord, and it'll be nice to have discord statuses available to me again ;~;