#oh you can interpret this as /p or /r if you want idc

[thetomorrowshow]

cold, empty, lonely

have a short little fic about death and disconnection :)

cw: canonical character death, description of dead body

~

He finds her body on the side of the hill, crumpled upon itself, red hair dulled against the cold, yellow grass.

Bdubs doesn't touch her, at first. He just watches, waits for some kind of movement.

In the weak light of the moon, the chill wind that blows almost makes it look like her chest is slowly rising and falling. Her hair flicks up a bit, blown like the grass around, and her clothes shift a little, and if Bdubs squints his eyes almost shut and stares at one spot long enough, he could swear that she was just sleeping.

They aren't actually breathing, though. And when he opens his eyes wide, lashes not blurring his vision, he can see again the red that shines against her grey shirt.

They had brought him her armor. It was cheap stuff, iron, held together by whatever leftover straps she'd been able to scrounge up after her good set of armor had been claimed as loot by the Red Army. They hadn't wanted the new set, and had brought it, bloodstained, as proof of their conquest.

Bdubs had pleaded with them for what felt like hours for the location of her body.

He needn't have. He could have looked out a back window and seen it, if he hadn't been so distracted with everything going on.

Their body lies just above the little river that feeds into the Crastle's moat. The river has begun to freeze at the edges, little broken-off sheets of ice forming from the rocky shore, frost touching the red-spattered stones and pebbles. And their body is just beyond that, where the stones and grey dirt turn to dying grass and bare shrubs as the slope climbs upward into a squat hill, alone in the darkness of the night.

He stands there, at a distance, watching their body for probably ten minutes.

Her body looks so lonely.

Cold. Empty.

Lonely.

Bdubs sighs (his breath puffs out in a mist before him—winter really is coming, isn't it?) before crossing the distance between them, crouching down beside the body.

Their flower crown—the one that Bdubs had collected the flowers for—has come apart, a crushed halo of daisies, partially obscured by their hair, a petal weaved in here and there.

Her hair is long, tangled, spilling out around her head like the rays from the sun, curling around her throat and caught under her body.

With a gentle touch, Bdubs brushes their hair away from their grey lips, where some strands have stuck.

Her cheeks are almost colorless, the few stubborn freckles faded. Their lashes are long, soft, forehead unwrinkled and face expressionless.

There's no twist of her mouth, no scrunch of their eyes, no desperation in their brows to denounce pain. There's nothing else, either, though—no peaceful relaxation, no joyful grin, no angry glower.

She's simply blank. It's as if she never lived, never felt.

Her face is cold. Empty. Lonely.

There's still sticky blood on her shirt, her chest slick with it, the ground stained. A lucky stab, straight to the heart. A cleaving of lifeless flesh, right through their chest, somehow missing the bone frame that once held the body together.

Bdubs pulls her shirt a little bit, rearranging it to cover the ugly, open wound. He's not quite sure why he does it. He'll just bury her, anyways.

But he does. He touches the shirt, stiff and sticky with blood, and tugs it over the wound. He pulls more of her hair away, where it's become plastered to her body with blood. He arranges her body so that it isn't half curled on its side, but fully on its back.

They look almost as they always did. Just missing everything that made her alive.

She wasn't supposed to die first. It was always supposed to be him, everyone knew it. Not her.

They probably worked so well together because of how reasonable she was. Bdubs doesn't like being reasonable, likes to kill first and ask questions later—or, if he feels like it, let them sell him a coffin first and ask questions later. She preferred to observe, keep track of enemies and allies, sneak around quietly behind the scenes and make chaos of her own kind.

Which is why Bdubs should have died first. He's so publicly provocative of the Reds, so eager to spill blood.

If anything, she was fairly peaceful. Not genuinely, but she always chose to take a step back from conflict and find a way to profit from it.

It was their Red blood that got to them, Bdubs thinks idly. They hadn't been Red for long enough to let the bloodlust acclimate, and had just gone on the hunt rather than let it simmer.

And now they're dead.

He needs to bury the body. Preferably now, when it's night yet and the battles haven't resumed.

He doesn't wait any longer.

He gets to work, picking up the shovel that he'd brought with him and stabbing it into the earth. Again. Again. Again.

The rough wood of the handle pokes into his palms, but he doesn't stop. The pain reminds him that he needs to keep going.

Every so often he pauses, wipes the sweat off his forehead, looks over at the body.

Then he keeps shoveling.

The world has lightened by the time he finishes, bathing the hill in grey. Bdubs shakes some clumps of dirt off his shovel, whacking it against the ground a couple of times.

Without further ado, he hops out of the shabby hole he's dug and tosses the shovel to the side. He gets on his knees, back creaking, and looks down at his hands.

He should wash them before he touches her, probably. Dirt is packed into every crease of his palm, his nails torn and muddy, grit between his fingers. A couple of splinters sticking out of his skin here and there.

Not that there's any point to washing them. Dirt goes to dirt and whatnot.

So, gently, Bdubs gathers up the body in his arms. He slowly turns, scooting a little on his knees, until he's facing the shallow grave.

Bdubs sets the body down, carefully, supporting the neck so their head doesn't loll. He moves their arms over their body, one limp hand placed over the other.

They wouldn't have liked this. They didn't like being touched.

He doesn't touch her any more, then.

Bdubs grasps the first handful of dirt, holds his closed fist over the grave. A couple of grains of dirt spill out, running down her shirt.

He holds it there, for longer than he should. Long enough that his arm grows weary. Long enough that somewhere, a bird starts chirping its wake-up call.

He needs to let go.

Probably, the worst part of all this is that he's doing it alone, he thinks absently. It's always been the two of them.

And there are others who could be here. Other friends. Other allies. Enemies, even. He shouldn't be alone in this. He shouldn't have to bury her alone.

It still looks like her.

He drops the dirt. It lands on her face, on her grey lips, on her bloodless cheeks.

Then he picks his shovel back up and gets to work, heaving load after load of dirt back into the grave.

And when Bdubs returns in the windy morning, the impromptu occupants that he'd left in the Crastle the previous night are all gone. It's just him, in a small castle that used to belong to two.

And Bdubs is cold.

Empty.

Lonely.

[7v0iz]

FAQs: Re-uploading, Tagging, and Referencing my Art

I’ve been getting some questions lately- I know a lot of artists have ‘rules’ and whatever to follow when interacting with their art. Re-uploading, what to tag, what not to tag, referencing, etc. Which is understandably cool.

H O W E V E R

Personally with myself and my art: I don’t mind what anyone does for the most part lol. I’m really chill with a lot of things most artists aren’t.

(THIS DOES NOT APPLY TO COMMISSIONS.)

The client is the only one with any freedom of their commission. (Other than likes and shares/reblogs.)

Keep reading for specifics!

To other artists:

New to the beautiful world of art and want to experiment be it referencing, or hecc even tracing over something I did line from line? Go ahead I’m honored to play a small part in your journey.

Wanna upload that photo? Do it and tag me so I can see fam I get heckin’ blushy and warm when stuff like that happens to me. (Please credit if it’s really close to a trace! Light references, just tag me in the comments so I can see. :P)

See something in my style that catches your eye and you want to adapt it in your own style? Good! Again, I’m honored. That’s how we learn. Experimenting and learning from one another is a great way to grow as an artist. (This doesn’t need crediting.)

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To those who may interact with my art:

Wanna re-upload something of mine? That’s fine just leave credit, please! This usually brings in some new followers so it does personally make me happy if anything.

Wanna make it your profile picture or add it to a profile? Aaa I’m honored! Just leave credit, please.

Wanna add a filter or frame to said drawing? Idc lol just credit please.

Don’t like my ship but it’s a group picture, my ship are just merely holding hands or something meanwhile your OTP are subtly looking at each other regardless? Go ahead and slap your ship tag on it.

To add to the previous bullet: (Now this is rare since I don’t typically gravitate towards ships caught in this situation since I’m a sucker for that sweet like-a-sibling trope) But if I drew something (in a platonicly debatable set of poses,) between two characters a large clump of the fandom considers ‘like siblings’ but you CANNOT stand the ship? Still like the art though because you see it platonicly even if I, the artist, did not intend it that way? Share it and tag it with the brotp version of their combined names. (Unless they’re kissing or whatever… I’m sorry but please don’t tag romantically obvious drawings as ‘siblings’…) but I don’t see that being an issue here lol. I don’t have any ships like that so… But same goes vice versa.

Maybe I drew a character with intentions of the character as their assigned sex but you have a Headcanon that the character is another gender. Pick a headcanon any headcanon and tag that shit up. Chances are if I see the tag I’ll see how you could see that in my drawing even if it’s not what I intended.

Man, tag any headcanon you see fits.

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Basically…

I’m not here to judge and I’m definitely not here to deal with petty ‘fandom drama.’ We all interpret art differently and have a right to do so. Do I have opinions on certain ships or characters? Certainly. Buuuut I talk about my opinions with my girlfriend most of the time lol. I’m not going to post it on here where I post art. Why? It’s not necessary and my opinion on something as silly as fictional ships doesn’t matter to everyone. I’ll express my opinion through a drawing. (ie ships I like obviously.) but I don’t want to rain on a parade where people are just having a good time liking whatever it is they like.

And yes there are controversial things with ships (ie abusive characters, wild age gaps, possible relations, etc.) Look… The ships I generally go for are rivals-to-lovers like Klance or best-friends-to-something-more like Promptis so I don’t condone that. Not going into details. If someone tags my art as a ship like that because they got that vibe from my drawing… like I said, not here for drama. It’s pointless because we’re not going to change each other’s opinion. I’ll be confused as to how they saw it in the drawing probably but in the end, I appreciate that you liked it nonetheless.

All in all: Not everyone is going to see things the same way as myself. I respect artists wishes when it comes to them asking for others not to specifically tag certain things, but for my own art I mean… A lot of ships we have in our fandoms weren’t the creators intention either. Yet, we still managed to see it so when it comes to my art I just look at it that way. I’m just not into getting into controversial stuff in fiction. I get why some have very strong opinions to avoid certain things. Just personally, I’m not here to argue or fight. I don’t draw to do that either so please keep all of that at bay.

Pretty much my only rule is if you reupload anything of mine or whatever:

Leave credit.

The only things I’m not cool with is using my art in a hateful way (ie ship bashing) and blatantly just taking my art and saying you drew it but I haven’t had that issue lol.

Oh and uh this one goes without saying but I'ma say it anyway…ahem. DON’T SELL MY ART OR HEAVILY REFERENCE ANYTHING FOR A COMMISSION. The first one’s obvious but the commission portion is mostly for your commissioner’s sake. They commissioned you for a reason and I’m not sure they’d appreciate buying a copy. (Unless the commissioner knows then hell by all means go for it as long as it’s not a straight up traced since there’s pay involved lol.)

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But man. I appreciate anyone who even just simply looks at my art lol it means a lot to me. Every little comment makes me feel amazing about myself so that’s why I’m making this post. I want people to feel good doing what they want too.

I may not agree with everything BUT I’m too tired all the time to care. :P

This was WAY longer than I planned… but I wanted to make my own “rule” list.

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PLEASE KEEP IN MIND***

Not all artists are cool with these things. Everyone has their own comfort zones when it comes to their art. Please be respectful of each and every artist’s personal rules!