#it rarely rains here

[that-nerd-who-writes-fanfiction]

Remember that one scene where Arthur is training with Merlin and Merlin is fighting for his life while Arthur repeatedly knocks him on his arse? I can’t remember what episode but it was early in season 1.

I like to imagine Merlin starts being sarcastic with every hit in hopes it’ll piss Arthur off enough to storm off and leave him alone. It backfires when Arthur starts replying and it turns into a venting session.

Like, Uther said some dumb shit about Arthur? Merlin starts a fight about it.

The knights can’t follow orders? Merlin is disobedient enough that Arthur starts yelling about how dangerous it is when his men don’t follow orders.

Arthur’s feeling bad about someone he couldn’t save? Merlin makes him see why he’s doing enough by arguing with him about it and reminding him that he’s only human.

And Arthur knows what he’s doing, he catches on eventually and will occasionally walk up to Merlin, push his shoulder only enough to be annoying until Merlin stops whatever he’s doing, then Arthur will just say “Fight me.” and Merlin will either say something he knows will get Arthur angry or he’ll throw a punch he knows Arthur will block and they’ll start sparring. (Merlin learns to fight eventually, neither of them realise it’s happening until he sucker punches a bandit and he’s out cold)

Anyway, it becomes something they do to help Arthur vent his frustrations.

The best part? It works.

So Arthur sees Merlin upset. It goes on for about a week when Arthur realises what’s going on. He sits down next to Merlin on the floor one night, nudges his shoulder like he would if he wanted to fight, and says, “why are you upset? It’s not like you’ve got anything to worry about.” In a purposefully taunting way.

Merlin scowls and keeps working, and Arthur tries again, “Really. All you do is follow orders. It’s not hard.”

And so Merlin looks up, clearly angry until he sees what Arthur is trying to do, so he puts down what he’s doing and starts fighting back, “no, just exhausting when those orders are given by a prat.” Or “Maybe if I had a day off once in a while.” I don’t know, I suck at dialogue.

It goes on for a while, until they get too close to the issue, Merlin snaps, tells Arthur he’s a dick and sobs, yelling about magic, and the great dragon being manipulative, loosing his father, loosing Freya, Gaius lying to him about his father and thinking Uther is a good king and a good man, and literally everything else that’s gone wrong.

Arthur pulls him in and hugs him, then tells Merlin they’re fighting together from here on out. It takes a while, but they work it out.

There’s plenty of “fights” about Arthur feeling betrayed by Merlin keeping secrets and Merlin being mad at his situation in Camelot and then being frustrated that he can’t get himself to feel angry at Arthur (I’ve got a half baked character analysis for Merlin and Arthur’s codependency somewhere in my drafts. I’ll come back to it eventually.) but they’re okay and they figure it out and end up stronger for it.

I’m holding back on sharing the major character death/dark!Arthur angsty alternate ending for this, but let me know if you want to see it :)

Edit: Part 2 - (the angsty alternate ending)

[druidshollow]

YEAHHHHH I LOVE LONGTAIL.... show me ur lopgtail pls i need him. yto hold

hehehe here he is...... hes always a bit different when i draw him but those funky cheek stripes stay consistent

best cat..... ive still got the snow from last night on my mind

[ID: A drawing of Longtail from Warrior Cats. He is a yellow tabby with dark brown stripes and blue eyes. He is watching snowflakes fall with a bit of curiousity. Behind him is a sky gently snowing, and he stands in a patch of grass. End ID]

[swordheld]

hi! your blog is one of my favourites and i absolutely adore reading your thoughts. my grandfather recently passed away and it feels like i lost myself with him. how do i continue living after this? there is this constant weight on my chest and it feels like an emptiness has made a home inside of me. how do i go on when it feels like the world crashed on my shoulders?

hello, love! this is so very sweet and kind of you, and i hope you're treating yourself gently and kindly right now - there aren't words for a loss like this. that heaviness is difficult, and hard, and painful. it's okay if things don't feel okay, right now, or even soon - i think that's something that a lot of the people i know that have gone through similar grief feel: like they should be able to get back to a relative 'normal' in a [insert far too short period of time].

but it's okay if it hurts. that's where i'd like to start. you're allowed to feel that emptiness, that world-crashed feeling that goes beyond words, beyond time. don't feel like you have to rush this to feel some sort of better. things get easier with time, i promise you this, but sometimes painful feelings are important to feel, too. cry, scream, feel your emotions. they're a part of you. grieve.

it's perhaps a little silly, but when i think about death i always think about a couple of space songs: mainly drops of jupiter by train and saturn by sleeping at last. there are perhaps others that speak to the emotions better, but these two have always hit something a little deeper for me, and are popular for a wide-reaching reason.

and while personally i don't know much about grief like this, i do know a lot about love; and i think they're a lot of the same thing.

the people we love are a part of us, and this is why it takes from us so deeply when we lose them, because it does feel like we've lost a part of ourselves in the wake of it. but it's because they were so central to our experiences of living - our lives, that the separation introduces a hollowness - a place where they used to be. a home that now goes unlived in.

an emptiness, like you said.

but just because they're not here physically, doesn't mean he's not still there, in your heart, in your life, your memory. you can hold him close in smaller ways, as well: steal a sweater, or cologne/scent for something a little more physical and long lasting for remembering. hold onto the memories you cherish, the things that made you laugh, the ease of slow mornings and gentle nights. write them all down, slide a few photographs in there, go through it and add more when you miss him. keep them all close, keep them in your heart.

you're not alone, in this. he's still there, with you, it's just - in the little things.

he's with you in the way you see and go about your daily life, in doing what he liked to do, in the ways he interacted with the world that you shared with him. the memories you recall fondly when the night is late or the moment is right and something calls it into you like a melody, an old bell, laughter you'd recognize anywhere.

but i think, perhaps most importantly above all others - talk about him. with your family, your friends, his friends, strangers; stories are how we keep the people we love alive. the connections they've made, the legacies and experiences they've left behind, and so, so many stories.

how lucky, we are - to love so much it takes a piece of us when they go. grief is the other side of the coin, but it does not mean our love goes away. it lives in you. it lives in everyone who knew him, in the smallest pieces of our lives.

the people we love never really leave us, like this: they're in how we cook and the way we fold our newspapers, our laundry, in the radio stations we tune in to and the way we decorate our walls, our photo albums. they're in the way we store our mail, organize our closets, the scribbled notes in the indexes of our books. the meals we love and the drinks we mix, the way we spend time with one another. they've been passed down for generations, for longer than history - and we are all the luckier for it.

think about what you shared with him, and do it intentionally. bring him into your life, like this, again. whether it's crosswords or poetry or sports or anything else. if one doesn't help, try another. something might click.

i hope things feel a little easier for you, as they tend to do only with time. i hope you find joy in your grief, even if it is small and hard to grasp at first. know that your hurt stems from so much love that there isn't a place to put it properly, and that it is something so meaningful and hurting poets and storytellers have been struggling to put it into words and sounds that feel like the fit right for eons, and that it is also just simply yours. sometimes things don't have to make sense. sometimes they just are - unable to be put into words or neat little sentiments, as unfair and tragic as they come.

but i promise it will not feel like this forever. your love is real. and perhaps, on where to begin on from here - i think it's less on finding where to begin and just beginning. and you've already started. you've taken the most important and crucial step: the first one. wherever you go, after that, from here? you'll figure it out. you always have, and you always do. it'll come, as things always do. love leads us, as does light - and you're never alone in your hurt. in your grief, your missing something dear to you. i think if you talk about it with others, you'll find they have ways of helping you cope as well - and they have so much love of their own to spare, too.

as an aside, here is the song (northern star by dom fera) i was listening to when i wrote this, for no other reason more than it makes me think of connections, and love, and how we hold onto the people we love and how they change us, wonderfully and intrinsically. it's a little more joyous than the others i've mentioned, and plays like a story, and it made me think of what is at the core of this, love and stories and i am here with you, and maybe it'll bring you some joy, if you'd like it. wishing you all my love and ease 💛

[wishmemel]

it’s raining right now and i hope the droplets reach every single one of my moots

[monotone-artist]

the sillies

[id: two images of digital drawings of some rain world slugcat ocs. the first image features the scrapper and the hideaway. scrapper is a brown slugcat with a dewlap and round ears, and a darker face, tail, and a heart-shaped marking on his chest. he has scarred hands and is wearing green goggles with red lenses atop his head. the hideaway is a dark red slugpup with a lighter torso, face, and tail, and a heart-shaped marking on her chest. she has a large cut in her right ear.

in the first image, there are a few drawings of the hideaway: one of her on all fours, leaning very far backward with a scrunched up face; sitting on her haunches and gazing at nowhere, looking haunted; and standing up with her arms outstretched, her face bright and happy. the last drawing is of the scrapper walking along, glancing back over their shoulder. the hideaway is perched on their back and is also glancing backward.

in the second image are colorless sketches of the scrapper and the hideaway, as well as the current and the monarch. the current is a lanky slugcat with several antenna on his body, and the monarch is a scarred slugcat with a torn ear and frills on her cheeks and underside. there are sketches of: an upper body of the monarch winking and doing a thumbs up with an uncannily realistic human hand; scrapper intensely examining the hideaway's cut ear, gently holding her head in their hands, looking worried; and current laying on the ground, his head in one hand and looking grumpy, while the monarch is flopped over his back and is peering at him innocently. end id]

[twotales]

Chuck absolutely loves Astronomy, especially Astrometry and Astrogeology. You wanna talk exoplanets and star systems? You wanna know all the names?

He's your guy.

He even founded the Exoplanetology club on Atlantis.

Yup, totally canon.

[pixelatedraindrops]

5 Favorite Characters ✨

Okay I guess I’ll play too. Thanks for the tag @draconicsparkle. I’ll pick a few of my recent favorites.

5 of my current favorite characters, and I’ll see who everyone’s favorite ends up being

Not tagging anyone, but if you wanna play go for it c:

[orcelito]

Happy pride month :]

[plant-ago]

Sitting out around the campfire on a late summer evening, singing old songs

@worldsbeyondpod

[moomoorare]

if u like also reblog, ty :v

(16. darkness) the lights go out at the puffychu household, mari immediately takes her chance to annoy poor rain

[spiritedhamlet]

One of my favourite pastimes is finding the most beautiful unreviewed annotations on genius lyrics. Offical notes that provide factual context on the artists are nice. But someone’s personal interpretation and emotional response to the words written purely out of love for the music? That’s where it’s at.

[shadowvalkyrie]

I'm glad it's cooling down after a week of oppressive heat and humidity, but that is an unexpected shittonne of rain. Like, it's been pouring steadily over the side of the raingutter for over an hour. I didn't think it was even possible to get this amount of water airborne outside the tropics. 😧

[klirk-hammurton]

No thoughts, just Cliff Burton

[ivym1st]

doing rainworld art month but everything is late

I’m a slow artist *sobbing crying

Here’s day 1 and 2! I loved drawin the memory conflux, it was a nice way to work with perspective and study rainworld’s backgrounds

[please-picturemeintheweeds]

tw: abuse discussion, intimate partner violence, grooming discussion, power and control. Trying to be vague here and not fly too close to the muse Sun

Re: red tv and the manuscript discourse, I wonder if people realize that it is actually possible to have abusive/toxic/harmful relationships with people your own age, too? Like even if Taylor and jg were 2 years apart, harm still could’ve occurred….? Like it was obviously not grooming bc that is a very specific set of experiences usually involving a child and a person in a position of trust/power like a parent or teacher or coach etc (I know this bc I lived it!!!). But like… that is not the only kind of harm that can happen to young people???? Her youth/naivety was definitely a factor in how fucked up the situation was but it was not the only element. Power dynamics do not begin and end at age. Adults can fuck each other up, too…

[wereh0gz]

I'm sick and my brain is going haywire and not letting me sleep so I'm thinking abt Sonic and Vanilla interacting to make myself feel better