#so if u want any hmu

[reineydraws]

he's murdered, resurrected, live! ✨️✨️ catch six seven batkids as a sparkly tudor-style pop idol group in my six the musical au for the @batfam-au-zine

PRE-ORDERS open 'till May 19! get your copy here!!! ➡️➡️ https://batfamauzine.bigcartel.com/

[possibilistfanfiction]

wherever you want to go with this but i trust you -- prompt: blood

[uh @unicyclehippo & i are writing joan of arc themed lil fics bc … hello ava 👀 & mine is undoubtedly the more deranged of the two but ... here u go lol]

//

ava comes back gentle; ava comes back covered in blood. 

‘i came back,’ she says, in the middle of the night when neither of you can sleep, after she’d stood in the shower until the water ran cold, scrubbing red from her skin, in the middle of a beautiful valley in france that has crumbling wine caves and a slow river, covered in reeds, currents that remember its history, the rot and death and face-down bodies. 

‘i came back,’ she prays into your skin, her fingers tracing the curve of your ribcage like she’s remembering a church she worshipped at centuries ago, an organ and its pipes; your heart and ventricles and your own blood, faithful. ava touches you like she’s lived a thousand years; maybe she has. her eyes are the same brown as they were when you met, when she’d only been resurrected once, when she had cried at the marvel of the ocean and her own hands, and sometimes you wonder if you’re worthy of a strength like this — worthy of sacredness and consecration and your mother’s voice — i’d rather you take your own life than be gay — and maybe for so long you had taken your own life and shoved it down into the hollow of your throat, into the spaces between the bones of your wrists; you had discarded your want and offered up your slow-beating heart in its place.

ava kneels before you and scrapes her teeth along the inside of your thigh, the skin there pale and soft. it’s dark until she brings her mouth to your center and moans, and then the room glows: gold and blue — ava, ava, ava: life; some kind of god, some kind of — i am begging you to touch me; oh, i’m on fire, oh, i’m on fire; history and elegy are akin; you are my sweetest downfall, i loved you first. the holiness in ava is not of this earth — the metal, the burn — but she is, dirt under her fingernails when she came through the portal, blood coming out of her ears, covering her face. ava’s tongue is soft and she holds your body in the palms of her hands and the room is blue and gold, a room where you get what you want: crosses held before you while you die and eternal salvation and her name like a goddamn hymn and fuck, fuck, baby and your hips grinding down on her mouth and your hands tangled in her hair — hair that you had cut when you had wished for a home amidst the mountains and the tender press of her spine in the morning blue and hair that you had cut again a few days ago, trembling hands both times because she was beautiful, a blade at her neck and curls floating to the floor. she had asked you to, and now she asks you to do something for her again — to come, to come, to come. you hold your breath when you do, consecration.

the holy and the horror — the light comes in the name of the voice — and ava comes back ready to dance with you and laugh and ava comes back with enough power to detonate bombs with her hands. you kiss her and she tucks a flower behind your ear, waiting for your next battle at a convent in the countryside. ava eats without apology, whatever she wants, and drinks wine that stains her lips red, and kisses you in front of everyone; she is hot when you touch her, when her walls flutter and curl around your fingers and you touch her. sometimes you don’t know what to say so you just tell her what you know: primeval forests are so remote that humans don’t belong there, that people die when they go there, that there are wolves and moss and weather so cold humans can’t feel their hands. ‘what do you think our past lives were like?’ she asks, one day as you spar, divine powers aside, and you wonder: were you always her protector? have you always been by her side? have you watched her die, every time? ‘one,’ you say, like you remember it in your hands, ‘we were happy; we lived on a farm and we were poor, but we had milk and eggs and bread you knew how to make. i’d go out in the morning with the dog and you spun wool and it was quiet, and green.’ she sits against you, the halo and the divinium in her back against your front, enough to kill you, and her, many times over. ‘verde, que te quiero verde,’ she says, ‘we grew old. who died first?’

‘does it matter?’

‘no.’ she’s quiet; a ship slowly goes by. ‘we’d wake early, for breakfast and you rested your head in my lap when you were tired.’ 

‘i have loved you a long time.’

she traces a pattern along the lines of your hand, a scar straight across the passes right through them. 

the days move on and ava heals and ava bandages your cuts and bruises and a broken wrist when you don’t, when you are human and frail and strong; ava falls asleep, too wild and small and lonely and beautiful, her spine curled against your chest. she wakes you with coffee and once, after a particularly bad battle, where you can’t move the next morning, a blow to your head too hard, she stays with you all day in bed, reading and running her fingers through your hair. she wears a soft sweater and socks with little dogs on them and says you’re a miracle, you’re such a miracle, i would destroy the world before i lose you and it’s true; it’s scripture it’s sacred it’s heresy it’s a blessing. a promise from a god, while you feel woozy and nauseous and your neck aches — a promise from a god, weighty and beautiful and sighed into your skin in the afternoon rain.

ava comes back in love with you; ava comes back —

there’s an explosion inside the sepulchre and everything is on fire; you have not been scared for so long — forgive us, we lived happily during the war; but on the wild nights who can you call home? only the one who knows your name — and you wonder if ava died staring at a cross; you wonder if you will grieve in this life, as you had before. you wonder if ava knew, if ava has always known, if ava was tired. 

but then ava comes back — again, again — sooty and with torn armor and a gash across her face that hasn’t healed, blood streaming down. she walks through fire, unburnt, a smirk, even, on her face. ava comes back and kisses you and you taste blood and ash and dust to dust and the strawberry chapstick she had put on in the van before the battle, tucked in into her pocket with a wink. you have seen many miracles but this is one of an order you will never understand, one that will stop people from killing each other, one that is catastrophe and heaven.

‘let’s go home, bea,’ ava says, and you search her mouth for a sacrament and find it in the press of her tongue on the backs of your teeth. ‘let’s go home.’

and you do — the ocean, and in bed weeks later, the cut across her face red and shiny and healed, the edges pulled together taught, the burn on the palm of your hand a webbed scar right in the middle —

‘did you know,’ she says, in the moon and the quiet, ‘that joan of arc was put to death for wearing men’s clothing? she was so theologically clever that they could only order an execution if she relapsed into heresy; the guards at the prison she was at only gave her men’s clothes, which they eventually used to convict her.’

you kiss ava’s temple; her skin smells like lavender. she presses her lips to your pulse point. 

‘being a girl,’ she says, her brow furrowed, your bodies stretched and tangled under the sheets. ‘she burned at the stake for being a girl.’

‘do you — do you remember?’

she turns toward you, different than you remember but still the same, still exuberant about the sea and ice cream and books she loves, texting and movie theaters and petting every dog you pass on the street; ‘sometimes.’

‘okay.’

’there are days —‘ she laces your fingers together — ‘that i feel a call backward, in my palms, in my knees, in the back of my skull. to understand, to see. there are days when all i know of this life is to love you.’ she presses a kiss to the divinium tattoo on your forearm that glows blue in the dark when she’s near. ‘this is how i know you. you are what i know.’

‘i will never watch you die again.’

‘i’m not sure i can.’

‘well then i’ll join you, wherever we go next.’

‘yeah,’ she says, so sure, prophetic, ‘you will.’

ava comes back for you —

what did the voice tell you when you returned to your room? it told me that i should answer you bravely.

[everythingsinred]

Family and the Institution of Alice Academy

Was thinking about this ever since someone (I forgot specifically who, sorry) posed a question like this in the GA discord, asking about (I think) Natsume's extended family or something like that. It was a really interesting concept that I've been thinking a lot about since it was brought up, so here are the thoughts I've accumulated. I'll try to be concise but I have a LOT of thoughts and my brain is messy.

My general opinion at the end of all this thinking I did is that I don't think Academy students typically have very close familial ties after graduating.

I think the most apparent reason for that would be that students are expected to graduate when they are twenty years old. Our main four are exceptions to the rule, coming to the Academy pretty late in life. Most children are taken early, as toddlers or even babies. Natsume, Ruka, and Hotaru's families did all they could to avoid Academy scouting. Mikan was entirely accidental--if she had never met Hotaru, she might have never even found out she was an Alice to begin with. That being said, most kids were separated from their families at a very young age, only to be allowed to reunite with them once they're already adults. For many students, they've been away from their parents for close to two decades.

On top of that, the Academy doesn't allow visitations or phone calls and severely restricts letter communications. Only one child from each class is allowed to return home for one week each year, and that one week does not do much to make up for all the time spent at school.

My point is that by the time students are allowed to see their families again, that familial bond has already been severed, for all intents and purposes. That feeling of closeness and protection no longer exists. Students will feel more closeness and connection to their classmates and even to their teachers than to their parents or siblings, and as a result, I can imagine many graduates not even bothering to visit their families.

While I was pondering this, I made the connection between Academy students and the real life example of a similar situation with Janissaries from the Ottoman Empire. Basically, Janissaries were children stolen from the subjugated people under Ottoman rule. They were taken for the purpose of a "child levy", also known as a "blood tax." Some children were even willingly given by their families due to the possibility of socially advancing, and because the children were promised first class status (sound familiar?). Essentially the children were taken, forced to comply with Ottoman standards and traditions (including forced conversions and circumcisions), and then trained for military service. These soldiers would actually end up being incredibly loyal and efficient, despite likely never seeing their families again.

(Edit: forced circumcisions are particularly heinous when you consider that the children were typically at least 10 years old at the time they were taken.... so.... uh.... not pleasant.... But also interesting that the Janissaries were typically much older than the Alice children at the time of being taken.)

That level of separation doesn't endear ties; it severs them. These Janissaries--very often forcefully taken from their families--ended up growing up with very little connection to their parents or siblings. The feeling of belonging to their previous communities was gone. Absence does not always make the heart grow fonder. This was done as a means of creating a strong military force but also to disillusion subjugated communities and tear away their hope. Their children could always be taken; their communities could always be crushed, even without the use of physical force. It's a very effective tool to oppress a group of people.

(There's actually a lot of similarities between Academy children and Janissaries beside the separation of children from their families. They were also paid for their service and were high ranking; the Academy students are given an allowance and many of them, despite being stolen from their families, have a sense of superiority over non-Alices. They feel like they are treasures, and are of higher value and rank. Additionally, Academy students, especially in the DA class, are highly trained and efficient child soldiers, much like the Janissaries. Janissaries are actually a super interesting historical topic and are worth looking into!)

We can even see the effect of this distance when Yuka escapes the Academy and runs away to her family. Yuka was essentially sold to the Academy, with her parents trading her in exchange for money and status. She was very young, far too young to really understand that her parents had abandoned her. As a result, she romanticized her bond with them, and the longer she was separated from them, the more that bond became fantastical. She made many attempts to escape the school to reunite with her parents and she fantasized about seeing them again. When she finally is able to, it's nothing like she imagined. They're cold, and unfamiliar. They don't recognize her. She doesn't know her brothers. They're related, but there's no real connection.

"I shouldn't have come here."

Yuka's is an extreme example, but I'm sure she's not an exception. For most Academy students, the almost 20 years of separation from their parents would be too much to ignore. They would not recognize each other, or be close. I'm sure many parents did not sell their children like Yuka's family did, but the bond between child and family had not been nurtured the way it should have been, resulting in coldness and distance.

Because of that, I doubt most students even bother seeking their families out, or even if they do, it's to visit a few times before starting a new life with a career. That familial bond, now broken, is difficult to repair. The connections people often feel with their families or hometowns is something Academy students instead feel with each other. They are all Alices, all in the same boat together. That feeling of superiority that many kids feel means they view each other as on the same level, and I'm sure that could interfere with family connection as well.

Thus, I don't think there's many multigenerational Alice families out there with close bonds. I don't think families like Natsume's have strong ties with grandparents and aunts and uncles and cousins. Even the sibling bonds at the Academy are stunted, with the Imai and Shouda siblings being the prime examples of that.

The Imai siblings have a significant age difference, yes, but additionally the Imai parents had a very different approach to Hotaru after seeing what happened with Subaru. They refused to hand her over as easily, wanting to show her important things in life and build happy memories for as long as they could. Even when Hotaru does enter the school, it's more than six months before she even comes across her brother, since the high school and elementary school are not integrated with each other and they do not belong to the same ability class. Similarly, the Shouda siblings are in different ability classes but they have a much smaller age gap. Despite this, Sumire refers to her brother very respectfully, indicating that there isn't a particular closeness.

The Imais fight against this divide, and put in genuine effort into rebuilding their relationship, but it's a difficult process, and one they struggle to admit to for a long time and for various reasons. Familial closeness is not encouraged, not even within the Academy.

(Though Natsume's bond with Aoi is exploited and the school does rely on him caring for her to take advantage of him, but ultimately he is kept from seeing her. Thus, that bond is also severed despite being exploited.)

Additionally, it would make sense to me if many Alice graduates decided to, upon having children, avoid scouting, like Natsume's parents did, and thus ended up moving around a lot to escape Academy notice. Moving around like that and laying low means that you're not going to be hosting huge family reunions or inviting relatives over often, even if all the other points were moot.

Finally, I think all this creates further obstacles for Yuka's wish to "have a family." At some point she says that, for normal people, the desire to settle down with someone and start a family is a pretty modest goal, but for Alices it's almost impossible. Escaping from the school, or even graduating, is a struggle. And you can have a kid, but it's likely that child will be taken from you, just as you were taken, and by the time the child graduates, they will have no connection with you. Wanting to be a potential grandparent, for example, might seem like a definite impossibility, since being a real parent is impossible.

It's even more proof that the Academy exists as an institution to subjugate and undermine Alices, as children and then as parents. Ultimately, an Alice never has control, not as a child and not even as an adult. The pain doesn't end once you've graduated; in fact, it never does.

[acutecowboy]

The one good thing that came out of esc this year is so many people discovering Joost <3

[trigunbookclub]

I don't think it's okay to use nightow's artwork to make yourself some money selling stickers of it.

While funny edits and memes of official content are commonly made and sold by creators and I understand it is a topic of debate for many reasons, as I say in the post and on the page, it isn't about the money and I think I'd have to sell hundreds to even make much profit! I did a lot of calculations and the price is close to the supplies/costs/the size of the small print run/etc., and while I'm not the best at math, the cents leftover per sticker aren't adding up to much and--again, like I said in the post--will be spent getting leftovers in case of errors if it's enough. If someone chooses to leave a tip for running bookclub, I'm grateful, but a vast majority of people don't and that's fine and what I expect. The point is having fun and celebrating bookclub! The amount of people who wanted a sticker/badge of completion was enough that I really wanted to do something for you guys.

TL;DR: As I said in the original post, this was designed for fun, not money. Transparency is personally very important to me and I try to be as honest as I can whenever possible. Of course, I'm a stranger on the internet, you should take that with a grain of salt, but I do try to be clear about my intentions.

[shevr]

hey yesterday i got distracted until 5am into browsing lists of old animated movies on wikipedia and there's a bunch of stuff that i wanna get around to dig up & watch but i crave even more older, more obscure, more forgotten stuff

plz feel free to drop any obscure animated flick you know of so i can go check it ( extra bonus points if you're not american and it's a movie from your country )

[samipekoe]

I didn't know you had a bluesky account. Do you post your art there?

I doooo! Here it is

[sapphicgardensinmymind]

sat here kicking my feet and giggling writing possibly the most obscure fic of my career? i swear i say this every few months but the rarepairs just keep getting rarer

[crumbleclub]

Actually. Actually.

A Michael who flip-flops between avoiding any action that could conceivably be construed as obedience, and one who's noticably more suggestible than could possibly be healthy.

"Look at me, say okay, and do the task." It was drilled into his head.

Michael fights it until he has no energy left to do so.

[twinknote]

ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha i think i'm going to go. Actually insane

my brother's gf's parents just put in an offer on a house for them today and it was accepted! and anyone who is not deeply mentally ill and traumatized and disabled and stuck living with their shitty fucking parents in their shitty fucking moldy decrepit hoarder's house would be happy for them! and i'm Soooooooo not! i fear i need to be kept 1,000 feet away from their happy celebratory housewarming shit bc it makes me want to kill everyone and then myself! like my mom texted me that they got the house and i immediately just started having a mental fucking breakdown and laughing and crying hysterically!!!!!!!!

like wow that's awesome!!!!! that's so awesome that you have rich parents who can just. randomly decide to buy you a house!!!!! that's so cool and good for you!!!! it would be so cool if my parents even had a decent house that isn't full of mold and bugs and mice and probably asbestos and has no usable dining or living room because they're piled with random fucking shit!!!! it would be so cool if some evil rotting smell didn't waft through the vents regularly!!!! it would be so cool if they were functional and capable of cleaning!!!!! it would be so cool if they were able or willing to help me live literally anywhere else, or GOD forbid realize that maybe living here isn't good for me!!!! that would be SO awesome!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

but it's So cool that your parents bought you a 3 bedroom house on a whim 👍 it's so cool that my brother gets to live there without having to go through any of the barriers that come with buying a house. it's so cool that people are just able to make money and live in safe and comfortable places and both of those things feel entirely impossible for me to the point where i truly just feel like i'm not meant to be happy or even just safe and sane. it's so cool that people just magically get their basic needs met and i'm just over here like ha ha ha ha ha ha ha ha i'll never have that! that's awesome 👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍👍

[scleracentipede]

How does having a carer work and how would it work for the Scarecrow system in particular? Thank you!!

in general in case anyone doesn’t know a carer (don’t know if the terms different in the US) is someone whose paid either by an individual or a local authority (or a loved one sometimes who) to provide support to (typically) disabled or elderly people with things from house hold tasks (eg chores, making food) to personal care (eg. Physically helping someone take a bath) and other stuff (like taking you to appointments or shopping when u use a wheelchair)!

We actually have a carer (though it’s one of our partners who used to work as one) but with the Scarecrow system I’m referring to a paid professional helping (rather then the government pawning off its duty of care to disabled people on their loved ones 👀)

Here’s how it could for the Scarecrow System:

- The carer could help keep track of switches and tasks with deadlines for them.

- Help prepare and remind them to take any medications they need

- Help them prepare food and prompt them to eat (especially for Keeny who can’t cook or Jonathan who forgets to cook)

- Prompt any personal care (e.g brushing hair, brushing teeth etc) and assist them on getting in and out the tub or shower on days their legs are bad.

- Help keep their space clean and safe for them

- if they weren’t sectioned anymore (meaning in Arkham) take them to appointments and to social or fun activities

- Provide some limited reporting to people like Occupational Therapist to help them get access to adaptive equipment to prolong their health (eg a raising desk so they don’t have to bend as far).

- And so much more !

Basically carers can assist with any part of their life they may find difficult due to their health (both physical and mental) and improve they’re quality of life! Many disabled people across the world have carers and it makes so much difference to people’s lives!

[loaded-dice-enjoyer]

IM ON TOP OF THE WORLD BECAUSE OF YOU

ALL I WANTED TO DO WAS FOLLOW U

(not against school rules! i think. anyway it's my bday i think i deserve this)

((yes i did have a picnic up here. yes with somebody else. no i am not saying who. they don't want that rn.))

[seoafin]

I’m glad you’re safe in Japan!! Have a good time and please share your fun traveling stories if you gain any!! I hope to go next year with friends and I’m excited to hear about your experience!!!

Also pls avoid spending money on Genshin you’ll regret it in the end!! 😭😭 (speaking from a recovering Genshin addict. The first two year I played I spent maybe 200-300 usd overall??? But I don’t spend anymore thank god)

LMAOOOO every time I post about playing genshin I get like 5 asks in my askbox telling me NOT to do it 😭😭😭😭

[supercantaloupe]

finding a verdi opera that i will unambiguously love is like my holy grail. my white whale. my bigfoot. she's out there somewhere, probably

[searidings]

hi hello it's the end of june which means!!! half of the year is already gone!!! i love your book recs and was wondering if you have a list of everything you've read so far this year??? and your favourites. i need to buy some books!!! thanks <3333

thank you so much for the reminder that this year is half over <3 yes i have been reading A Lot to quiet the brain demons so here are my very long list & recs!!

italic = gay/queer

bold = so good. SO good

italic and bold = so good AND so gay

-

JANUARY

middlesex - jeffrey eugenides

the mountains sing - nguyên phan qué mai

the vegetarian - han kang

the galaxy and the ground within - becky chambers

to be taught, if fortunate - becky chambers

when we were orphans - kazuo ishiguro

americanah - chimamanda ngozi adichie

h of h playbook - anne carson

klara and the sun - kazuo ishiguro

the space between worlds - micaiah johnson

FEBRUARY

normal people - sally rooney

circe - madeline miller

blood of elves - andrzej sapkowski

gideon the ninth - tamsyn muir

time of contempt - andrzej sapkowski

baptism of fire - andrzej sapkowski

MARCH

the tower of the swallow - andrzej sapkowski

lady of the lake - andrzej sapkowski

harrow the ninth - tamsyn muir

the last wish - andrzej sapkowski

we should all be feminists - chimamanda ngozi adichie

a memory called empire - arkady martine

burnt sugar - avni doshi

a psalm for the wild built - becky chambers

APRIL

the alchemist - paul coelho

sword of destiny - andrzej sapkowski

oranges are not the only fruit - jeanette winterson

the colour purple - alice walker

the midnight library - matt haig

where the crawdads sing - delia owens

10 minutes 38 seconds in this strange world - elif shafak

the discomfort of evening - marieke lucas rijneveld

crying in h mart - michelle zauner

my year of rest and relaxation - ottessa moshfegh

the shadow king - maaza mengiste

the virgin suicides - jeffrey eugenides

sapiens - yuval noah harari

MAY

the manningtree witches - a. k. blakemore

parable of the sower - octavia butler

hot milk - deborah levy

an unkindness of ghosts - rivers solomon

the water dancer - ta-nehisi coates

pure colour - sheila heti

this is how you lose the time war - amal el-mohtar & max gladstone

five little indians - michelle good

JUNE

indian horse - richard wagamese

ducks, newburyport - lucy ellmann

the vanishing half - brit bennett

medicine walk - richard wagamese

crier's war - nina varela

a quality of light - richard wagamese

after the quake - haruki murakami

death in her hands - ottessa moshfegh

the school for good mothers - jessamine chan

bluets - maggie nelson

of women and salt - gabriela garcia

lapvona - ottessa moshfegh

mcglue - ottessa moshfegh

songbirds - christy lefteri

to paradise - hanya yanagihara

sankofa - chibundu onuzo

[medieval-canadian]

27.10.22

diss update: it is WILD how reframing the concept of writing a ~*~dissertation chapter~*~ (which froze me for months bc i wasn’t ready yet i hadn’t read enough and also i had no clue how to go about doing it) into merely writing the first of three related but separate essays (separate for now, anyway) has immediately unblocked something in my brain. like. yeah, i’ve written essays before. i can write an essay without having read every single text related to this topic in its entirety. i can figure out things i need to look at as i’m writing, etc. all of a sudden now i have ideas!!

on a slightly different note, i am also unbelievably frustrated about how difficult it is to find editions/versions of like.... ANY medieval medical text????? i am.... idk. am i looking in the wrong places? halp