#just once is all I'm asking for

[fandomcringebucket]

TONGUES & TEETH - THE CRANE WIVES (THE FOOL IN HER WEDDING GOWN)

[hussyknee]

I know some dickheads have now decided that Judaism is the "bad, violent, terrorist religion" and Islam is the "good, peaceful" one, which is only to be expected of white people, but how much of an issue is it currently? Like I've seen some USAmericans sharing how the Islamic faith shapes Gazans values and perseverance (good) except with that distinct white hippie "I'm about to imprint on this like the world's most racist duck" vibe (bad), but I didn't think they're already turning on Judaism in numbers.

Do they realize that Christianity is also the same kind of comfort to Christian minorities in Asia and Africa? That it was Buddhists that genocided the Rohingyas in Myanmar and Tamils in Sri Lanka? That Hindu fundamentalists are even now trying to ethnically cleanse Muslims in India? How Hindus and Christians are terrorized and persecuted in Pakistan? That Muslims have a history of persecuting and ethnically cleansing Jews too?

Really tired of asking y'all to be normal about people's religions man. There's no religion that's inherently violent or exceptionally peaceful. It's just like any other ideology that becomes a weapon in the hands of ethnic power. Interrogate power, not religion, and respect people's belief systems insofar as they aren't in your business.

Edit: I've amended the "long history" of Muslim persecution of Jews because it might be misleading in the current political climate. Zionism and antisemitic Arab nationalism are twin births resulting directly from Christian colonization, and Islamic empires tended to actually be more tolerant of other religions compared to Christianity, especially Judaism, which was considered a sibling religion. Antisemitism wasn't ideologically entrenched in Islamic tradition. It's simply that ethno-religious power will lead to ethno religious domination and intermittent cleansing of minorities, and Islam is no exception. Humans be humaning always.

[crimeronan]

i've seen a couple people in the notes of this very good post about fictional polyamory by @thebibliosphere say things along the lines of "oh, i've been doing it wrong :(" or "how do i know if i did this right??" or "i should probably give up and start over, i wrote this badly :(" and. no!!!!

(i AM seeing far MORE people say "oh, this clarified and helped me so much, i think i know how to fix issues i've been having with my own story" which. YES!!!!)

listen. if you're a monogamous person who's writing a polyamorous relationship, and you've been focusing mainly on The Triad and All Three Together All The Time as the endgame, that's literally fine. that's a perfectly acceptable and strong starting point for your plotting, imo. you do not need to give up on a story that you've started like this.

but the things discussed in the post Can and Should improve your execution!

you can keep the same plot beats and overall relationship arc 100%. polyamorous relationships are infinite in their formations, every one is unique. "basically a monogamous romance but with three people" Does exist, as a relationship type. you're not hashtag Misrepresenting (TM) poly people with it

BUT i do think it will help to read up on some poly people talking about how their relationships Differ from monogamous ones.

so i have outlined some basic important concepts about polyamory.

MORE IMPORTANTLY though, i've broken down some questions that you can answer throughout the writing process to strengthen your individual dyad relationships, your individual characterization, & your characters' individual feelings/experiences. this is a writing resource have fun

future kitkat butting in to say i spent over two hours writing this and it definitely needs a readmore. it is also NOT comprehensive. but everything should be pretty simple to follow! feel free to reblog if you find it helpful yourself or just want to reward me for how gotdan long this took KSLDKFJKDL.

i've grabbed quick links for a couple of the important concepts, some have SEO pitches in them but the info largely seems to be good. (if i missed anything Egregiously Gross on these sites i should be able to update the links with better ones later, since they're under the readmore.)

sidenote: this is NOT meant to be overwhelming, despite the length. if you can't read all of this, that's Okay. you do not need to give up on your writing.

here we go:

compersion!

compersion is a BIG thing in a lot of polyamorous relationships. it's joy derived from seeing two (or more) of your partners happy together, or joy derived from seeing your partner happy with someone else.

compersion is really important as a concept because it highlights that every individual relationship within a polycule is different -- and that that's a GOOD thing. it's sort of the inverse of jealousy.

by the "inverse of jealousy," i mean that instead of feeling left out and upset and possessive, you feel happy/joyous/content.

i can use personal experience as an example: it's a Relief for me when my partners receive joy/support/sex/romance/etc that i can't (or prefer not to) give them. and i love seeing my partners make each other laugh and be silly together.

it's 100% okay for a poly triad not to be together 100% of the time, it doesn't mean that the third member is being left out or not treated equally when two people do things alone together.

(i have individual dates with my partners all the time! PLUS larger 3-and-4-person date nights.)

if the third member DOES feel jealous or left out, then the polycule can have a conversation to figure out what needs/wants aren't being met, and solve that. this happens semi-regularly in my polycule, as it will happen in any relationship (including monogamous ones)! it's just part of being an adult, sometimes you have to talk about feelings.

metamours!

a metamour is someone who is dating your partner, but ISN'T dating you. this may not be relevant for people writing closed three-person romantic sexual triads, but it's a super helpful term to know.

the linked article also lists different types of metamour relationships with some fun phrasing i hadn't heard before. the tl;dr is: sometimes you'll be domestic cohabitation friends, sometimes you'll be buddies with your own friendship, sometimes you might not interact much outside of parties, every relationship is different.

there's no one-size-fits-all requirement for metamour relationships. sometimes polyamorous people will end up dating their metamour after a while (has happened to me), sometimes polyamorous people will break up with one partner for normal life reasons, but remain friendly metamours.

the goal of polyamory is NOT for EVERYONE to fall in love. it is 100% okay if this happens in your story, it happens in real life too! but it is also 100% okay for characters to be metamours without ever becoming "more than friends."

(sidenote: try to kill any internalized "more than" that you have when it comes to friendship. friends are just as important and special and vital as partners.)

of course there are a million ways for messiness to occur with metamours within a complex polycule, exactly like with close-knit platonic friend groups. however this post is not about that! there's enough "here's how polyamory can go wrong" stuff out there already, so i'm focusing on the positives here :)

open versus closed polyamorous relationships!

i'm struggling to find an online article that reflects my experience without directly contradicting at least SOME stuff. so i'll give a quick rundown

google has a bunch of conflicting definitions of open relationships and whether open relationships are different from polyamory. the general consensus seems to be that an open relationship prioritizes one partnership (often a marriage), but that each partner can have extraneous flings or long-term commitments (most often sexual in nature).

this is not typically how i use the term wrt polyamory. the poly concept is pretty simple. a closed polyamorous relationship is one with boundaries like a monogamous one. there are multiple partners in the polycule, but they are not interested in having anybody new join said polycule.

an open polyamorous relationship tends to be more flexible -- it just means that IF someone in the polycule develops mutual feelings for a new person, it's fine for them to become part of said polycule if they want to! the relationship/person is open to newcomers.

some groups will need to negotiate this all together, others will just go "haha, you kids have fun." just depends on the individuals!

with open AND closed polyamorous relationships, the most important thing is making sure that there's respectful communication and that everyone is on the same page. but there's no one-size-fits-all way to do that.

i wish i could give you guys a prescriptive "You Must Do It This Way" guide, but that's.... basically the opposite of what polyamory is about, HAHA.

feelings for multiple people!

i was gonna tack this on to the previous section but decided it warranted its own lil bit.

a defining feature (....i'm told?) of monogamous relationships is that a monogamous person only has feelings for One individual at a time. they only want a relationship with one individual at a time. or, if they DO have feelings for multiple people simultaneously, they're still only comfortable dating one person at a time & being exclusive with that one person.

this is perfectly fine!

the poly experience is generally different from this. but once again..... polyamorous people all have different individual perspectives on this.

for me, i have never been able to draw hard boxes around romantic vs sexual vs platonic relationships, & i love many people at once. my personal polycule lacks many strict definitions beyond "these are my chosen people, i want to forge a life with them indefinitely, whatever shape that life takes"

some poly people feel explicit romantic or sexual attraction to multiple people at once, some poly people feel almost no romantic or sexual attraction at all. i'd say that MOST poly people feel different things for different partners, which is not a bad thing!

some poly people are even monogamous-leaning -- they have just chosen one romantic partner who is themselves part of a larger polycule. (so this monogamous-leaning person has at least one metamour!)

or alternatively, they might have one romantic partner AND a qpr, or other ways of defining relationships. (this is a factor in my own polycule!)

i made this its own point because if you're writing a straightforward triad, this is unlikely to come up in the story itself -- but it's worth thinking about how your characters develop/handle feelings outside of their partnerships.

like, is this sort of a soulmateship, 'these are the only ones for me' type deal? in which they won't fall in love with anyone else, and can be fairly certain of that?

that's pretty close to typical monogamous standards but you Can make it work. just be thoughtful with it

alternatively, can you see any of these characters falling in love Again after the happily-ever-after? and how would the triad approach it, if so? what would they all need to talk about beforehand, and what feelings would everybody have about the situation?

it's worth considering these questions even if the hypothetical will never feature in your actual canon, because knowing the answers to these questions will help you understand all of the individuals & their relationship(s) MUCH better.

i've been typing this for nearly two hours and there's a lot more i COULD say because... there's just a lot to say. i'll close out with some quick questions that you can ask yourself when developing the dyad dynamics within your triad

first, take a page and create a separate section for each individual dyad. then answer these questions for every pair:

how does each pair act when alone?

how do they act differently alone compared to when they're with their third partner?

are there any elements of this dyad (romantic, sexual, financial, domestic, etc) that these two people DON'T have with the third partner?

if so, what are they?

are there any boundaries or hard limits within this dyad that aren't shared with the third partner?

if so, what are they?

partner 3 goes out of town alone for a few weeks. what are the remaining two doing in their absence?

(doesn't have to be anything special, it's just to get a sense of how the two interact on a day-by-day basis without the third there)

what is something that each partner in the dyad admires about the other -- that they DON'T necessarily see in the third partner?

what problem do These Two Specifically need to solve in the story before their relationship will work?

how is that problem DIFFERENT from the problems being solved within the other two dyads?

doing this for ALL THREE dyads is VITAL imo. that way, you develop complex and nuanced and different relationships that all have unique dynamics.

those questions should be enough to get you started, i hope

then After you've charted the differences in relationships, you can start to jot down similarities in the overarching triad. what does one person admire in Both of their partners? what are activities that all three like to do together? what are boundaries or discussions that all three share?

but the main goal is to figure out how to Differentiate each relationship!

a polycule is only as strong as the individual relationships within it. if two people are struggling with their own relationship, adding a third person won't fix that.

(UNLESS the third person is the catalyst for those two to, like, Actually Communicate And Work Their Shit Out. i just mean that the old adage of "maybe if we just add a third-" works about as well to fix a miserable non-communicative marriage as, uh, "maybe if we have a baby-")

AND FINALLY.

if you're not sure whether your poly romance reads organically to poly people, you can hire a sensitivity reader with poly experience. if you can't afford that, you can read up on polyamorous resources like a glossary of terms & articles actually written by poly people. (and stories written by poly people!)

you can also just.... ask poly people questions, if they're open to it. i like talking about polyamory and my own relationships so you're welcome to send asks if u want, i just can't guarantee i'll answer bc my energy levels fluctuate a lot and i don't always have time.

polyamorous people are in an uphill battle for positive representation right now & so the LAST thing i want to see is authors giving up on their stories bc they're worried about getting things Wrong. well-meaning and positive stories that treat this kind of love as normal, healthy, & aspirational are So So So Needed. even if you guys end up with some funky-feeling details.

seriously, if you're monogamous then you probably don't have a full idea of Just How Nasty a lot of people can get about polyamory. i wish it DIDN'T mean so much for you guys to want to write nice stories about us, but it does mean a lot. and it means a lot that you want to do it WELL.

in conclusion. this is not a prescriptive guide, it's just a way to raise questions. and also, you all are doing FINE.

[knifearo]

ultimately when it comes to shipping and fandom space treatment of aspec characters i just don't accept "aro/ace people can still date/have sex" as an answer from nonaspecs. like yeah. mhm. okay. now i think we both know that you're not saying that out of real interest in the diversity of aspec experiences. so you can turn in your seventeen-page essay on why and how you plan to examine this character's aspec identity within the context of a romantic or sexual relationship complete with evidence from canon and peer reviews from multiple aspec people within the next week or i'm putting you in the pit from the edgar allen poe story

[gentlebeard]

If I could hold you for a minute, Darling, I’d go through it again

For @edsbacktattoo & @stedesearring 💕 Show: Our Flag Means Death - Season 1 & 2 Music: Francesca by Hozier YouTube

[kandismon]

totally lore-accurate swanqueen screencap redraws 4/∞

they're on their first date :3c

[floccinaucinihilipilificationa]

Hello may 31th anon! Look at that, another year behind us and a new one to come. Have a nice day! ₍՞◌′ᵕ‵ू◌₎♡

[uncanny-tranny]

Important tip for trans men/transmascs/whoever needs the reminder: Even if you pass as a man to cis people, you still need to have either some form of self-protection on you (e.g., mace, knives (if you can use them effectively), ect.) or know some form of self-defense. Please take it from me, you don't know what will happen out there at any given time.

You might assume that if you pass as a cis man to cis people, you will be safe from any harm. While I wish that were true, it simply isn't the world most of us live in. Please do whatever you can to protect yourself out there.

[minty364]

DPXDC Prompt 58 Part 7

The long dining room that held the ornate old dining table that seated way too many people already held  most of the family. Bruce was missing and Damian informed them he was at work, the only other person missing was Jason but it was typical for him to skip out as he didn’t live there and didn’t have the best track record with the rest of the family. That left Damian, Tim, Cass, Duke, and Dick seated.

Damian sat next to the chair that Bruce normally sat in at the head of the table. Tim sat across from Damian followed by Dick, Duke, and Cass. Danny sat next to Damian and Jazz sat next to Danny. 

“So, how was school?” Dick asked his elbows on the table with his head on his hands and a smile. He was the only adult in their life besides Bruce that actually cared about their schooling. 

Danny had actually forgotten that all of this had happened in just one day. The thought was a little jarring if Danny was being honest with himself. He wasn’t sure what to tell Dick, on one hand he was just asking about school on the other… no he wasn’t going to think about what happened right now. Just the thought caused phantom volts to go through his body like he was reliving the accident. He felt a nudge to his foot from the right and looked up to see Damian giving him a quizzical look. He cleared his throat and looked back over to Dick who was giving him the same kind of look. 

“I-I’m, uh… school was fine, didn’t learn much since school just started,” He eventually decided to say after stumbling on his words a little. 

“Dash isn’t picking on you again this year is he?” Dick asked with a concerned look on his face. 

Danny wished it was just Dash, the pain he felt from the portal was a thousand times worse than anything the bullying blond could pull. If it was just Dash, Danny could have just laughed it off and forgotten it probably, but it wasn’t just Dash and Danny couldn’t help but take a deep breath trying to gather his thoughts and calm himself.

He startled as he felt a hand on his knee, he looked to his left to see Jazz giving him a look of sympathy as she rubs her thumb comfortingly on his knee. She then spoke, “Danny you don’t have to talk about it if you don’t want to, Okay?”

Danny gave her a small nod, a small smile on his face. 

Before a new topic could be discussed Alfred arrived with their food and began serving them. Danny loved the food the old butler cooked especially since he was able to do so in a kitchen that wasn’t contaminated. Alfred did his best to make sure everyone was served food to their liking, as long as it was a balanced meal at the end of the day the elderly butler would serve just about anything you’d request.

Danny picked up his fork to begin on his salad, however when he tried to push the fork into the lettuce his hand felt a cooling sensation with pins and needles and his fork went through his hand. He stared at his hand for a moment wondering what just happened. He then picked up his fork to try again and was able to get a mouth full, but when he went for a second bite it happened again, his fork clanging against the bowl again.

“Something wrong Danny? You're staring at your hand weird,” Danny heard Dick speaking and looked up to see Dick staring at him giving him an odd look. 

Danny couldn’t help but rub his neck nervously with his other hand, he hoped to get ahold of whatever this was so no one noticed. Though knowing his luck everyone probably did notice, over the years he and Jazz both noticed that the Wayne family was much more observant than their media persona’s showed. 

Dinner continued and Danny struggled to eat anything as anything he tried to hold fell through his hand frustratingly and Danny couldn’t help but get agitated. 

Eventually his glass he was holding slipped through his hand and tumbled onto the floor shattering into a thousand pieces. Danny let out a frustrated sigh as he stared at the mess he made. 

Before he could stand to clean up Alfred appeared by his side with a dustpan and broom and began cleaning it up, “are you still feeling unwell Master Daniel? Perhaps you should retire for the evening, I will attend to this mess.” Danny begrudgingly nodded his head and made his way out of the room.

He wasn’t alone for long as Damian and Jazz tailed him out of the room. 

“What was that? It looked like your spoon was going through your hand,” Jazz asked after they were a ways from the dinning room.

“Jazz, honestly I don’t know, it felt cold and then anything I tried holding fell through my hand.” Danny brushed his bangs away from his forehead and they dropped back into his face as he dropped his hands back down to his side.

The walk went silent after that, although it didn’t stay for long as Danny felt the cooling sensation again but this time through his whole body, he let out a yelp as he felt his body sink into the floor.

Damian and Jazz looked at him with panic but as they grabbed at his arms or his hands to pull him back up they went through him just as the spoon and apparently the ground now. 

He let out a panicked yell as the floor swallowed him whole, so now he was sinking further down further into the earth. What was going to happen to him? Would he ever find his way back up?

Thankfully he didn’t have to wait long as the cooling sensation left and as gravity took hold of him again he fell. Apparently there was a cave under the manor and he was able to turn back into solid as he felt air again. There was no way he was surviving this, even with new weird powers now was when he’d get impaled by spikes right?

The cave was too dark to make out much but Danny thought he might have seen a computer with several monitors. That didn’t matter now as he finally landed, and he grunted as he landed on a person who also grunted as having a teen land on you couldn’t be the most comfortable.

He knew he was in big trouble when he realized who he landed on, “Batman??”

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

More MDZS and Hollow Knight! The cool bugs I found in my backyard have started to unionize.

Part 1 - Part 3

[fuwaprince]

👉👈 Hi friends! I have a long, serious post made just for you(!) that isn't full of spoilers, smut or mooning lawn gnomes. Please read if you can, this is a 💥 mutual aid request 💥

It has been a horribly painful and long while as most people following/keeping up with me know. and in a few days I'm going to be down $1500, which is basically all my fucking $

I can't afford Christmas for anybody, which sucks and I'm very sorry. I can't even take care of myself and haven't been, which also sucks and I'm very sorry

Landlords spontaneously raised rent on me more than halfway through this month as punishment for not getting to my house chores and not communicating, to be totally honest with you. I feel ashamed and awful about it but I didn't want to clean the place while multiple ppl living here had tested positive for COVID and kept walking around unmasked... I am not fully vaxxed because I've been too depressed to get any kind of necessary medical care done and I didn't want to catch COVID in the middle of my finals week for the semester. I woke up to being angrily and rudely bitched at first thing after the last of my finals (I passed at least). It wasn't a humanizing text. Fuck the mistreatment though. Rent is now almost doubled and it won't be lowered

There was no room for negotiation and I truly believe they've resorted to pricing me out of living here because the group of renters psychologically tormenting me wasn't effective (actually- putting a picture of my rapist on the fridge rly was super effective in getting me to isolate myself in my room all day and so was outing me as trans to the transphobic ass neighbors.... But I didn't and still don't have any place better to move out to, like the way they were hoping I would. Yes, I have looked and BEGGED btw)

I want out of here NOW, but I can't leave. I tried and had to come back because it was the best option. I can't afford to stay in a motel/hotel/BnB just to get away from them for a day or two during Christmas. I don't have any friends who I can spend the holiday with either. During the semester, I resorted to convincing classmates with keys to locked buildings to let me crash in them while they worked at night and I would leave before anybody showed up. Now that school is out, I can't do that. I don't have any family I can reach out to for support or friends who I can depend on for immediate help. I have been crying day in and day out for weeks. I have records of it posted throughout my blog. Literally crying for days on end. I'm being so fucking transparent

All that lump of text is to explain to whoever is out there, who might be listening and willing and able, to please consider helping me, if and ONLY IF able. I know times are tough and if you'd rather use your $ for other reasons or just don't have any to spare, don't sweat it and take care! 🫂

I've thought about what I could do for a long time and have helped myself how I can. It isn't enough. I've applied for so much assistance. Been approved and been sabotaged by my inhumane mom (who does not love me) via stealing my legal documents and letters and hiding them for months. My mind jumps to grim places but I'm clinging for dear life to whatever hope I have left that says things will get better. I wish I knew somebody with a business that I could work for. Part of me feels so fucking terrible for asking for help because I feel like a waste of all your resources. I feel like I shouldn't ask, like I really do not fucking deserve help, but there are friends online who care, who I know mentioned being interested in helping in whatever ways they can

So to the people who care to seriously me, I'm ready to accept it: please send me nice words to get through this and feel less alone. It feels pathetic to ask but I would love a nice letter. A nice card even. Kind words of any kind would go a long way. It means more to me than food. I have felt so broken and every day feels like a test to figure out how badly I actually want to live

I'm also leaving my cash app and paypal here in case anybody would like to do more than what I'm comfortable asking but probably very likely will inevitably need very very soon. I will be left with fucking nothing and I will have no idea what to do once rent is paid

Thank you to those of you who have sent love, offered to listen and heard me out. I really wish it wasn't so hard to survive. I'm trying to feel better knowing there are people out there who are also without help and hoping the best, but it doesn't make me feel any better or comforted tbh. I just wish the help was there for us. I wish there was a place to go for spare love, care, compassion, empathy, kindness, humanity, generosity... I need that more than I need $. Call me stupid but that's what I live for. I don't live for paying to survive in terrible conditions. I live for love and to smile with friends

I hope to write back to the friends who have already been so kind as to message me soon btw. I'm sorry for not replying sooner. Your overwhelming support is sincerely sweet and sometimes I cry because I can't believe people are so nice (to me???). It'll give me something to do that doesn't make me feel like dying! :') so thank you thank you thank you *fist bump*

Hope you're all doing as well as you can and that somehow things get better. Hope anybody else struggling like me doesn't make the mistake of isolating like a sick and dying animal. You deserve love. You deserve support. Don't be like me. Have the courage to reach out to the people who care about you for help as early on into your emergency as possible. Don't let your situation snowball because you spend so long trying to figure out if you're worth it!!! This Random Tumblr user is here to tell you that YOU ARE. Sending my infinite everlasting unconditional love. Be nice to yourselves. Be nice to each other. Fuck the hateful assholes who wish I would just kill myself already. Tell your friends you love them. Happy Holidays!!!

And here's a single picture of a mooning lawn gnome at the very end, as a treat! I told you this post wasn't full of it.... It just ended with it 👉👉

[gxtzeizm]

i truly hate to rant about my current situation rn but

ngl i can feel that this whole period of this semester will be the thoughest one for me in terms of my self financial stability, or honestly saying that this is literally in my lowest point ever rn since it's involving money and it's the most crucial time for me to need it :(((((((

thanks to all you guys, i was able to cover up for my last month's expenses. but right now, i'm still struggling financially to pay for my study fees for this semester and i'm trying to get enough money as possible before january next year, or else i can't able to register for my courses next semester.

i mean i'm trying to looking for some jobs inside my campus but i truly afraid that it might losing my focus on my studies. also i want to consider to find some side income online but ngl i found that almost of it is untrustworthy plus my dad also not very keen about me to do all this kind of jobs 😔😔.

i mean idk but this whole entire thing rn is being fucked off for me personally 💔

[pointycorgiears]

I really REALLY want Cross Guild to team up with the Straw Hats at some point in the final arc.

Just so I can hear Mihawk frustratingly and exasperatedly yell "LUFFY!" at least once.

[72graves]

I've been wracking my brain trying to find out who exactly Detective Noel might be and I think I have a vague hand wavy idea.

I know people want it to be Parker, Kayne, or even the KIY but I think Arthur would have recognized Parker's voice even if John struggled to recognize him, Kayne was pointed out to have never known about the lighter, and the King seems like a long shot, but not altogether impossible. However!

Way back in season 1 we learned that the book that had once held John was actually addressed to Roland Cummings, a retired private investigator who owned 13 Mosby Avenue (Arthur and Parker's office) and as of now is MIA after the police found the body of his wife in the freezer and the neighbors suspected he fled to Canada (Part Two: The Missing Girl). He's also the father of Amanda Cummings, one of the missing girls who was later killed by the King (because of Arthur, whoops). Now, his office was leased out to Elijah Strong and his partner, Teddy Caine before being taken over by Arthur and Parker. Elijah had committed suicide in prison and we later find out that the Butcher was the one who actually killed him. As of right now we have no definitive answer as to what became of Teddy Caine.

Arthur's engraved lighter came from the desk of their office.

My reach is that Detective Noel is either Roland Cummings or (less so) Teddy Cain. I'm leaning more towards Cummings simply because he had seemed the most knowledgeable about The Horrors™️ and was in fact sort of the catalyst to the entire series being the original receiver for John's book. And it's also possible he and Arthur never really met. It would also make sense as to why he's working under a different name because he would still be under suspicion after what happened with his family near Arkham. Teddy Caine I'm less sure about because all we know is that he worked at the office for a time and had a run-in with the Butcher.

Detective Noel could also literally be none of these people or someone else entirely and I'm just thinking too hard. But ooh the possibilities! They make me [stick figure gore]

[johnslittlespoon]

hii happy pride month, have a little 'you're a dog (i'm your man)' chapter four snippet as an apology for radio silence <33

“Did I wake you?” Gale asks, glancing at John apologetically, but John looks up from his effort to avoid muddy puddles to shake his head. Gale supposes it’s a silly question; John sleeps like a rock, dead to disturbances made by anything other than his own brain.

“Just my sixth sense,” John says, shrugging and shooting him a small smile. Gale snorts.

“You got a radar for me?” He teases, and John smiles wider, eyes crinkling.

“Built in,” he answers matter–of–factly, raising a hand and making a fist over the center of his chest before dropping it, returning his vigilant gaze to the uneven ground. Gale stares for a moment longer, floored not for the first time by John’s apparent obliviousness to the weight of his sentimentality.

Even knowing John how he does, it’s always unexpected coming from someone who a stranger might assume to be brazen and surface–level; John’s loud mouth and wandering hands do him no favours in that regard.

But Gale does know John, like an extension of himself half the time, and still he manages to render him speechless. The way his heart flutters as the sentiment hangs in the air makes Gale want to reach down his throat and squeeze it until it never beats again.

[astorkes]

a dream too big