#there was. so much more in terms of weird but funny/interesting detail in it but part of writing it up and posting to the vent blog

[izzy-b-hands]

i thought writing up the stupidly realistic dream i had would make me feel better abt it not being real. it both did and didn't and I've been telling myself to get my laptop open and start getting some shit done but. i keep thinking abt it. this stupid fuckin dream lmao

[epiicaricacy-arts]

oh we’re still so young, desperate for attention

this was super experimental so i will talk about my process (+ clearer version) under the cut

i’ve been looking at a lot of “messier” or more textured painting styles recently and an artist that stuck out to me is clariondeluna ! they posted a self-portrait recently that i really liked and i was super interested in the brushwork seen in their work. i love all the textures and how the shapes feel so loose yet everything is so detailed.

that’s not a method for me at all!!!! i cannot paint like that at all and the stuff i like to paint is very different to theirs. which is okay!!!! i had no intention to copy this artists style so closely like with what i tried to do in my raiden painting, i just wanted to try this style out :^)

it’s been a goal of mine to avoid over-rendering like i tend to do a lot, and i think i’ve been doing good with that recently! the mindset i’ve got going on right now is that if i find myself staring at it too hard for too long, i have to leave it and move on. if there’s still something wrong with it, i can fix it later once ive got a fresh view!

i’ve been trying a lot of things with my art this year. i always try to challenge myself with each piece, and to end the year off i wanted to be as uncomfortable as i possibly could be with this painting. i let myself draw whatever i wanted because i still wanted to enjoy it, but everything i did in this process was new, including parts of the subject matter.

i’ve never drawn a head at an angle like this, and i struggle with drawing mouths open. i don’t do bold lighting like this, and if i do, it’s not fire. i’ve never drawn fire! i also rarely work with warm colours and i hate using green, so i combined those to be my colour palette. i like working cleanly so instead of having a dozen different layers for one section, each section only had 1-2 layers for rendering. instead of clipping masks i would simply paint over things loosely and clean it up later. i never like having limbs cut off in a drawing so i had his other arm go GOD knows where. i don’t like weird patterned backgrounds so i made myself figure out how to like it!

IS THIS MY FAVOURITE PIECE OF ALL TIME. no. absolutely not. but i’m very proud of how this came out with all the challenges i put on myself. i WANTED to get better at these things and be more broad with my art, both in terms of the styles and subjects i portray.

okay let’s talk about wtf this drawing is

for those who don’t know, the design in this painting is my fatui/“Father” lyney fan design (read the design post here). the concept isnt super complicated and i don’t really have much explanation for it, but i wanted to combine the story of how lyney wanted a delusion before getting his vision, fire eating circus acts and how olympic medalists will bite their medal to prove it’s real??? don’t quote me on that i’m like 75% sure that’s a thing that happens. i don’t watch sports though so im just believing someone i heard on the internet ages ago.

anyways. i think fire eating acts are cool. and i think the fact that lyney wanted a delusion is very interesting to me. scratches my brain in the right places. and yk as a magician lyneys character revolves a lot around fooling people and creating illusions so i guess what im saying here is that lyney is trying to prove to himself that this power he’s been bestowed is real. bc his whole life his only constant has been lynette so he is trying to see if he can trust this new power. cause i guess this is an alternate universe where lyney does eventually become “Father” but he never got his vision ??? idk im not making lore for this i just wanted to dress up this funny little guy.

ok i’m done

thanks for reading

here’s my dog

[imagining-in-the-margins]

Father Figure (S.R.)

Summary: Spencer discusses daddy issues. His boss, who is also his girlfriend’s father, has a question. Request: Reader is hotch's daughter and after hotch learns that they are dating their interactions are kind of weird in a funny way Couple: Spencer Reid/Fem!Reader Category: Fluff Content Warning: Mild awkwardness Word Count: 900

MASTERLIST

The jet ride to a crime scene is rarely a pleasant experience. Each team member holds their folders filled with horrors, and they display an abject apathy. After all, they are quite familiar with the worst side of humanity. Some days, though, when the worst crimes are still hypothetical and the victims are alive, the team can maintain some semblance of their usual personality.

Spencer is usually the first one to share something interesting about the theoretical or identified unsub. This is because he has a broad knowledge on, well, most things, and he also manages to read through the stack of papers much quicker and with a greater detail than the others.

This day, however, Spencer is silent. And everyone knows why.

Because just one measly week ago, Unit Chief Aaron Hotchner found out that Spencer Reid was dating his daughter.

Beyond the initial, incredibly uncomfortable conversation, Hotch had barely spoken a word about it. A fool might think that meant he has no qualms with it, but Spencer knows him better than that.

No, it is infinitely more likely that Hotch is stewing in his rage about his daughter’s Freudian taste in men. Hotch is just too smart to strike without the possibility of maximal damage.

So, Spencer knows to keep his guard up.

But he never could keep a thought to himself, could he?

Derek lets out a deep breath with a soft whistle before he tosses his folder onto the desk beside him. As the others peek up at him, he shakes his head with an enthused but horrified expression.

“Talk about ‘daddy issues,’” Derek mutters.

The others smirk in response, but they say nothing else.

Until, inevitably, Spencer does.

“The correct term would be ‘father complex,’” he says with an attempt to sound disinterested in one of his favorite philosophers, “It was a shared theory between Freud and Jung, and it’s actually very interesting.”

No one says a word. Spencer does not notice the warnings flashing in their eyes because he is too afraid to accidentally look at Hotch.

They all know what’s coming.

He continues, anyway.

“While Freud was more interested in how men might become distrusting or intimidated by older male authorities, Jung extended his analysis to women with emotionally or physically absent fathers.”

Despite the roaring engines and the full cabin, the jet is silent. If Spencer had looked up then, he would have seen how everyone immediately glances over at Hotch.

Hotch, however, maintains his stoic stare. He is looking directly at Spencer, who is still staring at the document in the folder he has already read several times over.

“There’s a more contemporary term for the phenomenon that would probably be more fitting,” Spencer announces.

“Really?” Emily asks. The rhetorical question is dripping with sarcasm in a final attempt to stop him. 

Spencer is so lost in thought at this point that he does not even notice. Instead, he marches on to his downfall.

“It’s called ‘Father hunger,’” he explains coolly, “and it explains the over-trust in authority figures and the search for an older man that reminds them of the father they never had.”

“Are you talking about yourself or my daughter?”

Every muscle in Spencer’s body seizes at the question. Quickly, he raises his head to find himself trapped in the paralyzing, disapproving stare of Aaron Hotchner.

“What?” he squeaks.

The man does not answer.

“N-No! No, I was just explaining the origins of the term,” he insists.

He tries—but fails—not to think about you. Just one remark, one casual reminder of your existence makes his skin ripple with goosebumps. Overcome with guilt—but never regret—his mind tugs forward every memory shared between the two of you.

The smell of your perfume, the softness of your lips, the comfort he finds in your arms.

His life is flashing before his eyes and every part of it looks like you.

He raises his hands in surrender before he sputters, “I would never—!”

“Reid,” your father commands.

Your boyfriend flinches.

“It’s a joke,” Hotch says just before he smiles.

Immediately, Spencer is surrounded by familiar smiles. He feels the visceral pain of a joke made at his expense while at the same time, he is cloaked with relief.

“Funny joke,” he says under his breath.

Hotch detects the sarcasm but decides to let it go.

He had won the exchange, after all.

Spencer also tries to let it go. Because if this was the height of Hotch’s rage over the ultimate violation of his home life, he’d basically gotten away with murder.

Still, he can’t shake the burning red blush. That and the trembling from the adrenaline felt almost permanent.

Just as the thought occurs to him, Derek takes a seat beside him.

He leans closer even as Spencer leans away.

Then, in the quietest whisper, he asks, “Which one of you does she call daddy?”

Yes, Spencer realizes. The blush is going to be permanent.

“Stop talking,” he orders with a startlingly amount of finality.

From across the table, Emily provides Derek with the audience he wanted. Her giggles alone assuage his desire to make Spencer’s day just a little bit more chaotic.

The two relent. Spencer is alone with his thoughts again, and he wonders whether he will ever feel at home in his new position.

But then he thinks of you, and he knows that he is exactly where he is meant to be.

(Tell me what you thought about this fic here!)

If you're looking for more to read, check out my full-length smut story "My Boss's Daughter," where Reader is Hotch's daughter that is in love with Spencer!

Thanks for reading!

[lancrewizzard]

Please tell me you’re not a gaiman fan because it seems like you have issues with him and goddd me too

Okay this is a complicated question to answer and has got both more and less so in the last couple of weeks. Since there's still information coming out about the sexual assault allegations, I don't want to say too much now and then have to backtrack hugely, but even the very best case scenario makes his behaviour scummy as all hell. And I don't believe it will turn out to have been the best case scenario. So we'll just bundle the whole thing up with "yikes" and move on to things I've had a long enough time to think about and put proper thoughts around.

A month ago I'd have said that he seems like a decent bloke, but seems to have real trouble understanding experiences he can't relate to. The foreword to his short story collection Trigger Warning is a great example of this. He spent a while wittering on about his misgivings about trigger warnings as a concept, then remembered he knew someone with a severe phobia of tentacles and conceded that they had their place. He then proceeded to give a very dumb non-warning which completely failed to mention how something like one in three of the collected stories involved sexual violence. Great job Neil.

I already mentioned in the tags of that previous post my issues with his obvious lies to TV Omens fans who don't know any better. It's just annoying and stupid to lie about something that unimportant, unless it was actually an attempt to get disillusioned Book Omens fans back on side (in which case, wow that failed spectacularly).

And now I realise that everything else is about specific works of his, so I've stuck it under a cut if you don't want to see me bitch about Good Omens adaptational changes changes for the umpteenth time or go on a short heartfelt ramble about what was almost a perfectly crafted short story.

I'll be blunt, I only saw S1 of Good Omens, and while I enjoyed it, it was an incompetent adaptation. The fucking radio play managed to tell the same story with greater faithfulness and more elegance without a 3rd person narrator (and had the brilliant idea of having the opening and closing credits performed by Agnes Nutter's voice actress). Compare and contrast the show making God the 3rd person narrator and exposition dump, and how that changes the whole story from a humanist tale where people are all people and whose choices matter, where God's grand plan night not even exist, to a story where everything implicitly or explicitly is going to God's plan under God's watchful eye.

And I will never comprehend how Gaiman successfully argued to have a whole set built to film Agnes Nutter's death, but then said that for practical reasons they couldn't have Crowley revive the dove. The angel accidentally killed a dove and the demon intentionally revived it! It's so thematically important! Neil why are you like this? Do you understand your own works or was Pterry the only one of you who put actual thought into things' meanings?! HOW DO YOU FUCK THIS UP NEIL? I UNDERSTOOD ITS IMPORTANCE WHEN I WAS 15 NEIL!

Ahem. Moving on.

Neverwhere is the most recent Gaiman book I've read and it's a good showcase of all the issues I have with his writing. The protagonists are dragged along by the plot, they're Special TM by birth or fate, not by the choices they make. The world they inhabit is wonderful, detailed, and vibrant, but I found that far more interesting than the protagonists inhabiting it. We got a random rape backstory for a girl whose main role was to die so the male protagonist feels bad. The way Gaiman described every female character bar one in terms of their attractiveness made me unsure if it was him or the protagonist who was weird about women (although I guess I have the answer to that now). Funny how Gaiman didn't shy away from things and people smelling bad right up until a hot woman who had been fighting, running, and falling over in a swamp apparently smelled not of sweat and stagnant water, but "musk". Really normal, that. There were wonderful descriptions and great moments, but after that first SA moment I couldn't relax and enjoy the ride because I was always on edge waiting for the next time Neil felt the need to be Like That.

Then there's my beloved, hated The Truth is a Cave in the Black Mountains. It's almost the perfect neat fairy-fable where every little detail is paid off later. It's a story of grief and vengeance and greed. It's about the price of fairy magic. And it has a pointless scene stuck in of marital rape. It has no purpose. It does nothing for the pacing or themes or characters. It never comes up again. I hate it.

Stuff can be horny or harrowing or both, I don't care, but Gaiman just drops SA into things for no clear reason as a generic Bad Thing Happen, Make Tone Dark. It's distasteful and inelegant. It cheapens the rest of the writing by its presence.

The simple truth is that Neil Gaiman seems to have a near pathological urge to shove sexual violence into places it has no need or right to be. It's disgusting but sadly not shocking that this apparently includes his personal life.

[mahitosmalnourishedmanhood]

Something Domestic Pt.2 18+

Summary: Her entire life, Kimiko had been convinced she was crazy. By her parents, her sister, doctors, everybody. So, she’s thankful to meet someone who assures her, her hallucinations aren’t just her mind messing with her. Too bad the messenger is a curse.

Tw: smut smut smut it got dirty quick (since this was meant to be the first chapter but i figured giving some of kimiko’s backstory first would be better) Mahito is his own warning, author is only halfway into season 1 so any conflicting details will be edited at a later date, mc can see curses and doesnt know wtf they are, idle transfiguration on Mahito during sex, stitches licking, neck biting, fear play (fantasy), dubcon I think? (kimiko is intoxicated and mahito has no idea what sex is), hair pulling, maybe ooc, creampie

Word Count: 1.7k

Part One Part Three

The two had introduced themselves, and talked for a bit before Kimiko began leading Mahito to her apartment. She isn’t entirely sure how exactly she managed to convince a stranger to come home with her, but she knows better than to question a good thing. She is fairly anxious, and his gaze doesn’t make things any better, and he knows as much, almost as though he’s trying to frighten her. She glances at Mahito occasionally as she fidgets with her nails. He can sense her fear, and it makes him feel delighted, especially considering how she’s ignoring it and her instincts for the sake of getting him home. He still isn’t exactly sure what she has planned for when they get there, though he doesn’t mind, either way he’ll learn a bit more about humans and then use idle transfiguration on her. Simple.

“You are quite nervous. Any particular reason?” He asks, stepping a bit closer and putting an arm around her waist, a slight shiver creeping up her spine at the touch. He is a bit tempted to use his idle transfiguration on her now, but she is interesting, if a little weird, enough to wait a little bit more before trying to do so.

“Oh— I just haven’t brought anybody home for a hookup before, much less a complete stranger.” Kimiko explains, her face bright pink and her muscles slightly tense under his touch, though she didn’t mind enough to move his hand. 

Mahito does look confused at the term hookup, but knows he’ll find out what it is once they got to where she was leading him. He keeps his eyes on her, and can tell she knows something is wrong, but she doesn’t try to move away or get him to leave, so he assumes she doesn’t know what he is exactly.

Soon, they reach her apartment and she steps in front of her door and unlocks it, the hairs on the back of her neck standing up as Mahito stands directly behind her, close enough that he’s breathing down her neck. She steps inside with him, and once he is inside he’s caught a little off guard by her suddenly tossing her arms over his shoulders and pressing her lips to his. He knows only a little about these kinds of behaviors, only enough to know she isn’t trying to attack him in any way. He’s unsure what to do with his hands at first, but soon he just puts them on her waist as she presses her chest to his and carefully walks him backwards until he hits the couch. 

He lets out a little grunt as she pushes him down onto the cushions and climbs into his lap, straddling his hips. She then pulls back from the kiss, her pupils blown wide, nearly consuming the blue of her eyes. “I’m sorry— I probably um- should’ve asked first.” He looks at her a little funny before he puts his hands on the sides of her jaw. 

He feels the urge to change the shape of her soul again, but is distracted by a new feeling pooling in his stomach and between his legs. This he has never experienced before, though he welcomes the feeling with open arms. He pulls her forward by the jaw and presses his lips to hers again in an almost desperate manner. She runs a hand through his hair and lightly nips his bottom lip, hearing him make a small noise of surprise in response. 

Her tongue slips into his mouth, and she uses her free hand to sneak under his shirt and feel over his chest. He slightly arches his back, leaning into the feeling of her warm hand touching his icy skin. She feels his tongue push past her lips, further into her mouth to an abnormal point, his tongue flicking against the back of her throat and making her gag for a moment. He realizes that might alert her to the fact he’s not a human, but surprisingly she doesn’t seem to notice it. If she does notice, she doesn’t care enough to dwell on it. He’s unsure if he’s thankful about that or not. He wonders if she’d still be the one leading if she knew he was a curse. He imagines her squirming and shivering under him with the knowledge he could kill her with a couple of words, and it makes him that much more aroused and needy.

Mahito puts his hands on her waist and squeezes as she pulls back from the kiss enough so she can properly start to undress him, slightly panting as she strips him of his top. She stops for a moment, and stares at the stitches across his neck before leaning down and trailing her tongue over them. She’s a little clumsy, but Mahito thankfully has no way of knowing as he tilts his head back instinctively and uses a hand to push her face further against his neck. She mouths over the stitches for a moment longer before leaving bites across his neck and starting to undo his pants. He mirrors her motions from a moment prior, removing her shirt and tossing it aside, staring blankly at her chest for a moment. She had something else under her shirt? Tedious. 

He moves to get her skirt off, deciding to let her deal with the rest. She soon stands up and removes her undergarments before tugging his pants down to below his knees. She looks down at him for a moment, seeming to be thinking about something or other before she settles in his lap again, his dick pressing firm against her thigh. It feels warmer than the rest of him, but still fairly cold. Mahito is nearly convinced he’s going to melt as their skin meets. He presses further against her until he’s pressing the side of his face against her chest.

He feels one of her arms snake around his head, likely to support herself and stay balanced while her other hand wraps around his shaft. Only a moment passes before she’s slowly sinking down on him and he’s suddenly overwhelmed with her warmth, though it still feels like it’s not nearly enough, nothing compared to what he believes lies ahead. He lets out a small sigh into her skin, his hands resting on her hips as she moves them slowly. It feels like agony, and he only gives her a second before he’s experimentally moving her hips for her, his large fingers digging into her hips hard enough for bruises to show the next morning. 

Kimiko runs a hair through Mahito’s hair, and curiously tugs on one of his ponytails, forcing his head back until he has no choice but to stare up at her. She gives him a little grin, and the sight makes him throb inside of her. She leans her head down and rests her forehead against his, shutting her eyes as she rocks her hips in the fast pace he’s chosen for them. She adds a bit more force into it, and lets out low moans, close enough that Mahito can feel her breath fanning across his face with every sound she makes for him. He keeps staring at her, and again mirrors her actions, moving his hips up into hers, and he feels excitement rush through his body at the bolt of pleasure the action brings. One hand slides up Kimiko’s back, pressing on her spine just hard enough to get her to arch it for him, seeming to get him even deeper than before.

“Oh, this has to be the best night of my life.” She tells him softly, almost quiet enough that he doesn’t catch it at first. Almost. Mahito can hear a buzzing suddenly, but he pays no mind to it, simply just continuing to thrust up into the pretty little human on his lap. He sprouts another arm, his third hand forcing her hand from his hair and making its way into her own. He tugs her hair like she had done to him, only now it’s to force her head down, rather than up.

“Yeah? Mind telling me why that is, hm?” Mahito grins as he thrusts into what seems to be a particularly sensitive spot for her, as both of her hands reach for his shoulders and she lets out a noise louder than before. He hits that spot again, and again, wanting to continue to draw those pretty sounds from her, even if it means she likely won’t answer his question. He’d rather listen to this anyway. She still does her best to answer, but ultimately crumbles, holding onto his shoulder as her thighs tense and tremble. 

Mahito is suddenly all too aware of the growing heat in the pit of his stomach, and he leans back against the couch, fucking up into her with far more force now as the tension in his stomach feels like it’s about to snap. “Oh, I feel like I’m going to burst.” He practically whimpers to her as he leans in to kiss her again, and she merely nods in agreement, her own orgasm only seconds away. He can’t focus on anything aside from how impossibly warm he feels and the bliss coursing through his veins as the pressure in him finally bursts. He stills, and Kimiko rocks her hips into him desperately, the feeling of him filling her up sending her straight over the edge. She grows nearly impossibly tight around him before she leans into his chest, staying still while they both take a moment to come down from their highs. 

After a few moments, Kimiko gets up, not wanting to get that intimate with her new friend by snuggling with him during a mere one night stand. She tugs on her underwear and her shirt, looking at Mahito in her half dressed state. “My bathroom is the first door on the left in the hallway, if you want to shower. I am going to go lay down though, my legs feel like jelly.” Kimiko sighs with a small giggle. “My bedroom is straight down the hallway if you want to stay the night, or you can sleep out here, either works.” And with that, she leaves Mahito to himself as she goes to lay down for the night. 

[crescentrivers]

Remembered I still like Sanders Sides (seriously though it’s a great webseries) but the Hatchetfeild brainworms are consuming anything else (downside of a special interest) so here’s which lord in black each side would be associated with/which lord in black would mess with them/maybe even which lord in black they’d follow in a crossover au + overly detailed explanations

Under the cut cause this got long

Roman- funny how both my previous and my current special interest have a Roman in them. Roman Sanders is a much better person though fuck you Roman Murray /hj. Anyway I think this Roman would be associated with Pokotho. More in a “Roman would get tricked into following him way” than in a “Pokey would want to mess with him” way. In terms of punching bags Pokers seems to go for the people who hate his deal the most and Roman is a theatre kid so. Already not one of the people who hate his deal the most. Okay but actual reason Pokotho has a big thing with conformity, mind control, giving up your real indentity to one singular voice and Roman is known to conform. Trying to be the perfect “good” creativity and turning against Janus mostly because his friends didn’t trust him. Also again, theater kid. So yeah in this hypothetical crossover au there’s probably a timeline where Roman becomes a Pokotho prophet. I can also see him swinging Wiggly though, wanting to be adored kinda like Linda in Black Friday. But I think he’s closer to Pokey in most ways.

Logan- Bliklotep or Pokotho. Okay so most obvious thing for Blinky is eyes, Blinky has a lot of them and Logan either is the orange side or is dealing with the orange side, the mysterious unrevealed character that made his eyes go orange that one time. But on a deeper level in Watcher World Blinky uses Alice and Bills’ conflict against them, trying to make them angrier so he can watch them fight. I can see a similar situation with Logan playing out in this au where the gang goes to Watcher World and Logan’s anger over being ignored is used against him. And if Orange and Logan end up not being the same person (which I stand by that theory) Orange using Logan’s anger against him to cause conflict within the light sides is actually just something I can see happening in the show.

For Pokotho it’s well, if you asked me to make a TGWDLM SaSi crossover Logan would be Paul. He’s the side with the least interest in theatre (I’m not sure if it’s really a dislike though) and while he lacks the panic Paul has for most of TGWDLM and isn’t as much of a normal guy tm I think he fits very well. Let It Out is SUCH a Logan song you don’t even get it like imagine that song but with him and Orange hshshgshshshshshsh I NEED TO MAKE AN ANIMATIC OF IT. Also like back to the ignoring thing can you imagine like “Aren’t you tired of being ignored Logan? Don’t you want to be the star of the show?” I’m going insane. If we’re just putting Logan in the Hatchetfeild universe I think he’s still more Blinky leaning but a SaSi x TGWDLM au with him as Paul would go very hard.

Patton- probably the one in the least sure on so luckily he doesn’t need as long of a paragraph. He’s just so nice I can’t really see him being singled out by any of them but he also isn’t nice in a way where he has Webby vibes so I’m just lost with him. I think either Blinky cause I can see him in a similar situation to Bill in Watcher World or Tinky cause I feel like out of all the sides Patton is the most likely to try to time travel to change or revisit the past and than get boxed because of it.

Virgil- none of them!!! Well at least none of them in particular. Why you ask? Well I think he’d be associated with Webby. Okay listen, if I had a nickel for every time my special interest involved a character associated with spiders that either left or was abandoned by the main antagonist group depending on your theories and became a good guy, I’d have two nickels. Which isn’t a lot but it’s weird that it happened twice. Do I need to explain further than that? Obviously Virgil’s situation isn’t nearly as severe as Webby’s and the dark sides are much more redeemable sympathetic villains compared to the lords in bright ass neons black, but my point still stands. Virgil works with Webby which means various horrors have it out for him instead of any specific one!!! Yayyyyyy

Janus- another hard one to place. I’d say he’d work with Wiggly most likely. Basically capitalism/greed (though the greed thing could also have him going more on the Nibbly route with like selfishness desire stuff or even like unrelated he could work for Pokey cause like mind control/manipulation isn’t that much of a stretch from his character, it is a stretch I’m lying to myself) and idk he has the vibes where I feel like he’d work with the lord in black himself and not just one of his brothers. Idk he has Wilbur Cross vibes kind of not really? (it’s the green apples) The thing is Janus still doesn’t hit quite the same level of evil as most antagonistic Hatchetfeild characters do but there’s no way this guy wouldn’t be caught up in something in a crossover au, so maybe he made a deal with them but doesn’t fully worship them. Idek what this post is anymore.

Remus- Hard to place because he’s just such a freak (derogatory) that he kind of just has general cultist vibes (I know there are plenty of freaks in Hatchetfeild completely unconnected to the lords but Remus would be the kind of freak that is connected imo) but if I had to pick I’d say either Wiggly or Nibbly. Wiggly doesn’t have much reason, they just both insane people associated with the color green, royalty, and tentacles. Nibbly does have an explanation kind of. He’s like the god of desire kind of and I think in analysis of how he’s connected to stuff (think Grace in NPMD) that kind of leads to lust associations? Which yeah fits Remus. I can see him working for Nibbly or going insane cause of him (does Nibbly even do that? Does he do things that don’t involve eating people? What even is this post) honestly I don’t really know for him I’m just saying words, would really depend on his role in this hypothetical au

Bonus: c!Thomas- honestly I don’t know for him but dare I say Pokotho. Cause A. Him and Paul don’t really act alike but they both have that panicking normal guy tm energy as protagonists. B. He’s a theatre kid. C. Idk I think it would be screwed up if the guy who the entire show centers around the mind of lost control of his mind and had his entire being warped (infection) 👍

[lucky-clover-gazette]

captive prince book 1 highlights & annotations

chapter 3

indented text is from the book. some quotes have commentary, some do not. some comments are serious, and some are definitely not. most of them will only make sense to people who have read the series. and, like, there are spoilers. so please read the books first if you're interested!

also: part of the reason i'm doing such a close reading is to study cs pacat's style, especially in terms of how she does romance and erotica. there are "craft notes" that might seem weird, like i'm being redundant or restating something rather than analyzing, but those are things that i want to remember/take away from the writing!

i'm going to tag these longer posts with "sam reads capri" in case anyone wants to read them all at once.

this is a google doc i wrote with overall content warnings for the captive prince series. it's not perfect, but i do think it's important to include.

The Regent keeps him around. No idea how the Prince got him in the ring, but that one would do anything to piss off his uncle.

context: laurent wanted damen to lose—we know this because of the drugging. but i suppose that annoying the regent with govart's loss was a consolation prize? and he would have been... equally annoyed, if govart won? laurent cannot possibly think that the regent cares about govart's well-being, but maybe govart is a reflection of his authority. honestly, not too sure about this one.

craft note: “piss off” is a great anachronism here

Laurent might talk like he’d been raised on the floor of a brothel, but he had a Veretian courtier’s mind, used to deception and double dealing.

maybe try to make it sound like less of a compliment

‘I wouldn’t have thought of that. He has a mind for details.’ ‘Yes, I’m learning that,’ said Damen.

Maybe he just wanted another chance to fight something. Preferably an insufferable yellow-haired princeling.

‘Today, in the baths, you will serve.’ ‘Serve?’ said Damen.

he is technically serving cunt. a cunt named laurent

Laurent reclined against the tiled wall, settling his shoulders flat against it.

laurent lean #2

Laurent rearranged himself against the wall into a position that looked even more indolently comfortable than the one before.

laurent lean #3. also, this line is very funny

Those sweet blue eyes gazed at him.

normal reaction to an implied death threat

'Your little speech about fair play fooled me about as much as your show of obedience.'

context: laurent can’t conceive of damen being a decent person without an ulterior motive. given the fact that he's spent the past seven years in the regent's court, i can't really blame him

For Laurent was all of a piece: his body had the same impossible grace as his face. He was lighter built than Damen, but his body wasn’t boyish. Instead, he possessed the beautifully proportioned musculature of a young man on the new cusp of adulthood, made for athletics, or statuary.

damen has no idea how much it would probably mean to laurent to be seen as definitively non-boyish

The water was hot when it pulsed up from the ground, and hot when he poured it from the silver pitcher. The air was hot. He was conscious of it. He was conscious of the rise and fall of his chest, of his breathing, of more than that.

craft note: awareness of non-sexual physical sensation (heat, breathing, etc.) helps to build up tension. also, the repetition here is neat.

He remembered that in Akielos he had been washed by a slave with yellow hair. Her colouring had matched Laurent’s so closely they might have been twinned. She had been far less disagreeable.

damen likes blondes mention #3. another favorable comparison towards laurent, although he does get points off for being a bitch

‘Don’t be presumptuous,’ said Laurent, coldly. ‘Too late, sweetheart,’ said Damen. Laurent turned, and with calm precision unleashed a backhanded blow that had easily enough force to bloody a mouth, but Damen had had quite enough of being hit, and he caught Laurent’s wrist before the blow connected.

the girls are fightingggggg

craft note: i really like “damen had had quite enough of being hit.” it’s a massive understatement, which for damen’s characterization and the book’s sense of humor works perfectly.

He felt the tension hit Laurent’s body, though the tone didn’t change overmuch from its usual drawl. ‘But my voice has broken. That was the only prerequisite, wasn’t it?’ Damen released his grip, as though burned. A moment later, the blow he had thwarted landed, harder than he could have imagined, smashing across his mouth. ‘Get him out of here,’ said Laurent.

the amount of times i had to re-read this conversation and previous dialogue, to understand what the hell was going on between the lines...

context: damen previously made a flippant comment about not assaulting people whose voices haven’t dropped. it was meant as a dig towards the court of vere, which enables csa.

laurent wants an excuse to torture and/or kill damen while his uncle is away—knows that the court would see this retribution as justifiable if damen were to attempt an assault of the veretian prince.

laurent brings damen to the baths in order to essentially make his case for his revenge. he needs to create circumstances in which retribution is justified, and since sex = power to laurent—just another strategy—he sees a way to make that happen by teasing damen. he does not expect to feel anything while enacting this plan, as he is very used to dissociating during these kinds of situations.

laurent: “don’t be presumptuous” = “stop assuming we’re going to have sex, even though it was my plan to put us both in this intentionally erotic situation. i’m more uncomfortable than i thought i would be with this and i’m deflecting.” 

damen: “too late, sweetheart” = “i am smug about the fact that this is making you uncomfortable. also, you’re hot, and i might as well enjoy the view.” 

laurent: “but my voice is broken, that was the only prerequisite” = “by your own joking admission, i now have every reason to assume you’re going to assault me—and your obvious arousal does not help your case.” 

damen, who has absolutely no intention to sexually assault laurent, is shocked by this and pulls away.

He had resisted the provocation to violence exactly because he had known he would end up suffering consequences. And now here he was, for no better reason than that Laurent, possessing a pleasing shape, had left off talking just long enough for Damen’s body to forget his disposition.

i love the implication that laurent is only attractive as long as he isn’t talking. damen is great at backhanded insults too!

‘I should have done this to you the day you arrived,’ said Laurent. ‘It’s exactly what you deserve.’

context: damen is not just some random akielion to laurent. laurent knows that he is damianos, and that damianos killed auguste, leading to seven years of abuse, sexual assault, and isolation for laurent within the regent's court. what he does here—having damen flogged to near-death—is still bad, but at least there’s more depth to the badness than damen or a first-time reader would understand.

from damen's pov, and for a first-time reader, this entire situation is sadistic and impersonal. but with full awareness of laurent's perspective, i can understand that it is essentially cathartic revenge. losing auguste to damen's blade forced laurent to experience the kind of trauma that changes a person forever. the person he has become is a reflection of that trauma, and damen is the ultimate scapegoat.

also, flogging is not exactly cruel or unusual punishment in this world—in fact, damen mentions that he's done it himself to akielion soldiers. it's notable that instances of damen's subtle hypocrisy appear in these earlier chapters: the flogging, parallels between kastor's rule and the regency, and akielion slavery. pacat is methodically building a house of cards with damen's unreliable narration from the start.

(when i call damen an unreliable narrator, it's not because i think he's a bad person or protagonist. he's an unreliable narrator in the same way that holden caulfield is an unreliable narrator: heartbreakingly earnest, ignorant due to inexperience, and within the ethos of the novel, ultimately Good.)

‘You are cold-blooded and honourless. What held back someone like you?’ It was the wrong thing to say. ‘I’m not sure,’ said Laurent, in a detached voice. ‘I was curious what kind of man you were. I see we have stopped too early. Again.’

this first book really is just the two of them playing a high-stakes game of “are you a good person” chicken

‘I was on the field at Marlas,’ said Laurent. As the words penetrated, Damen felt the world reshape itself around him. ‘They wouldn’t let me near the front. I never had the chance to face him. I used to wonder what I’d say to him if I did. What I’d do. How dare any one of you speak the word honour? I know your kind. A Veretian who treats honourably with an Akielon will be gutted with his own sword. It’s your countryman who taught me that. You can thank him for the lesson.’ ‘Thank who?’ Damen pushed the words out, somehow, past the pain, but he knew. He knew. ‘Damianos, the dead Prince of Akielos,’ said Laurent. ‘The man who killed my brother.’

i went into the context for this already, but i do just think it's insane that laurent is both torturing and gaslighting the person who ruined his life. like, remember the guy from the princess bride? "my name is inigo montoya, you killed my father, prepare to die." laurent is essentially doing the same thing with damen here—cathartic and premeditated revenge killing, karma's a bitch, an eye for an eye—but instead he's like "my name is laurent of vere, you were present in the battle where someone else murdered my brother (i know that you know you actually did it), prepare to be tortured and possibly killed based on my own unpredictable and sadistic whims. whore."

[soshadysoquiet]

TUA S4 Concerns *some spoilers for what's been teased so far*

So I'm concerned about Season 4. I want to be hopeful, but I am concerned. C o n c e r n e d.

It's short. There's bits in TUA that I don't personally enjoy as much and skip, there's bits that could have been taken out and nothing would have changed... but I like having that bit of room for more: did we need the Ikea Mafia's viking foot funeral? No. But did we need it? Yes.

The ball pit. The ball pit concerns me on a number of levels, and I'm sure it will be funny, I hope it will be funny, I just hope it's relevant enough why they're in that setting to not be too gimmicky, e.g. it made sense they ended up in the bowling alley; they probably snuck out there as kids and so it was one location they would all know, but man that ball pit worries me like a sleep paralysis demon.

The potential for germaphobe Klaus (sorry that's probs not the correct term but I can't think of what it might be). I can see why he'd be afraid of death now, but is it germ/cleanliness specific? If so why? Klaus has been one of the least concerned about hygiene up to this point so they're laying a whole new framework that I hope they give sufficient depth to. I'm an OCD sufferer myself, about death anxiety in fact, and I haven't resonated OCD with Klaus before if that is what they go for - I'm open to it, just not a cheap OCD gimmick. There's So Much trauma in all these characters at this point, my worry isn't them exploring new avenues as much as not bothering to look into the trauma they've already heaped on and doing something new for the sake of it. If it's done well, I'm all for it, but there's some previous with trauma getting forgotten on TUA so...

The Jennifer Incident. Please, please let this be more interesting than a romance story.

Lila's baby. I love Lila, I don't have a problem with her being preggo etc, I worry a little that TUA tends to speed run life so what is this actually going to look like? Parenthood is such a big life changing deal that I'm curious / cautious about what they'll have done with the characters here.

Viktor. His schtick is that He's Mr Apocalypse, sadly that limits his character coming to a place of peace in some ways. But mostly just let him have an actual conversation? Please? He'll have had 6 years this time skip, if they bullshit that 'oh no one's really seen each other in 6 years' lazy ass nonsense I'll be fuming.

As above, there's been 6 YEARS here, I want to watch the characters and feel that time has passed, that they've interacted, have in jokes now, shared history, maybe not all of them but that makes it even better; have Diego and Klaus have a cleaning routine together to help Diego understand Klaus and trying to be supportive if brusque, but then defending this to his other siblings. Have Luther share some actually positive moments with his other siblings and not just have been in Sloane-hunting solitude, make him always be trying to host awkward family BBQs that the others force (or pretend to force) themselves to go to. Have literally any of the siblings be on the look out or Five's triggers for him - and better yet actually give him some now that he's had time for the PTSD to swell. I want the small nitty gritty details, I want the filling, I want to feel the expanse of time not just 'oh shit another week and there's an apocalypse and we haven't seen each other hey ho oh look a ball pit!'

Anyway, I'm hopeful, but concerned, and I'm sure I'll love it and don't intend to be negative, it just helps me to voice them. Either way, I pray for the fan fiction that follows the series most of all, the rising of the crowd to give us more of what the series does deliver and flesh out what it does not. Is it weird to almost be more excited for that?

[txttletale]

shadowrun: hong kong is one of my favorite games! what do you like most about it?

oh thank you for asking me this there is so much to like about it! first of all i really really love how much the game accomodates for build diversity. for a game that is ultimately still very much focused on combat, they make every skill incredibly rewarding -- biotech unlocks some of the best and most interesting quest resolutions in the game. you really feel able to roleplay as a decker or an adept when making these character choices unlock not only the obvious combat advantages but also really cool dialogue options and ways to entirely circumvent problems. it just rewards you for building and playing a character in the way the best CRPGs do

oh, and the characters are incredible. each party member's arc is so easy to get invested in and their personal questline rule so much. racter is (in my opinion) a really wonderfully nuanced and careful depiction of someone with low empathy. i saw a lot of the ways i thought and felt in him, i like how the game really doesn't judge him for it but presents him on his own terms. gobbet and is0bel are so fucking cool and interesting and i love their dynamic--i love in CRPGs when you can tell that some party members have a long history together. they should have kissed. two of my favourite video game characters ever written. although gaichu unfortunately falls victim to the very overwhelming and specific weirdness that cyberpunk has about japan specifically in, like, his whole concept, he's still otherwise a really well-written and likeable character--he's charming, he's funny, he has a quiet melancholy to him that's really moving.

not to mention the side characters! jomo, auntie cheng, crafty, fucking. MAXIMUM LAW--all really memorable. duncan is there

the player character, too, gets to be interesting--i really like the way that the game threads the needle between having a prewritten plot to slot your character into while also still letting you decide who they are. the broad strokes of your backstory are painted for you but you get handed the brush to fill in all the details inside that--the flashback scene where you get different dialogue options to tell duncan why you're leaving and some of them are identical except for the indication that one is honest and the other is a lie is incredible storytelling work. it's a really really good compromise between the CRPG blank slate tradition and the desire to integrate the PC's past into the plot in a way that is Cool and not Dumb (i'm looking at you fnv dlcs).

i also find it really really refreshing for a piece of cyberpunk media to ditch the weird fetishised Yellow Peril 'oh what if the usa became more scary and asian' shit, cut the middleman, and just actually set itself in asia and be about asian characters. obviously i can't personally speak to whether or not it provides an accurate representation of hong kong, but it definitely feels like it's interested in engaging with hong kong as a setting and what makes it unique as a place and culture rather than just as set dressing.

and finally i like that you can go on the computer and read BBS posts. nice time on the computer simulator :)

[triangle-strategy-notes]

what do you think happens with Avlora in the non conviction endings?

Words cannot describe how excited I got when I saw this ask!! I think SO MUCH about what Avlora does in all of the different endings hahaha. Thanks for the question! <3

In general, my personal thoughts are that the Liberty/Benedict ending would eventually play out similarly to the Golden/Serenoa ending, Morality/Frederica would involve Avlora getting involved in Svarog's civil war, and Utility/Roland would probably have Avlora considering a rebellion of some type for a while but ultimately putting her sword away to focus on rebuilding the Aesfrosti community.

But if you're interested in more details/reasoning, I wrote up some of that as well! Don't worry about the readmore I wrote a normal amount about it :) it's a normal amount I promise. I only wrote a normal amount. I promise it's just a norma

Liberty/Benedict Ending

With Liberty ending, tbh I feel like story-wise it really feels weird that Avlora doesn't come back, given how it's essentially the Golden/Serenoa route except Aesfrost and Glenbrook are on good terms, which seems like it'd be a point in Avlora's favor.

But as far as looking at her reasons for staying away, here are a few possibilities:

— She didn't feel Cordelia needed her as badly since Glenbrook was now fighting a war on only one front (vs. the three in the Golden/Serenoa route) and she wasn't willing to risk her life by returning to face Glenbrook's judgment.

— She felt betrayed/demoralized by how Cordelia handed over her throne and went along with the whole alliance to Gustadolph. (Some reasoning along the lines of "Why exactly was I risking my life to stage a coup d'etat if Cordelia was just going to hand her power over as soon as things got inconvenient?")

— She didn't trust Serenoa and Benedict after they suddenly usurped Roland and allied with Aesfrost. She also canonically isn't a fan of Benedict's morals to begin with, so there's that.

— Or, (most likely explanation in my mind) she saw that Glenbrook was trying to secure an alliance with Aesfrost and felt that publicly swearing fealty to Cordelia would aggravate tensions between the two.

Depending on what you think her reasons were, there are a lot of different explanations for what she's up to during the time period between the Chapter 17 decision and the end of the game. Theoretically she might just be hiding out somewhere, or if you want to imagine her doing something more interesting it's possible that she'd quietly reach out to Cordelia and/or would try to track down Roland in order to make sure he's safe for Cordelia's sake.

Either way, I do think Avlora would eventually come around and rejoin Glenbrook once the war cools down and the alliance becomes less strategically important.

Benedict's treatment of Cordelia does kinda suck, and I think Avlora's worry for her would outweigh any other doubts she might have. Roland's absence from the castle would probably make the decision easier too, since Avlora a) doesn't have to worry about Roland's grudge against her and b) knows that Cordelia doesn't have Roland to protect her.

Morality/Frederica Ending

I like thinking about this one a lot :) I take a lot of my headcanons from Little Queen of All Things Forsaken on Ao3. I don't want to spoil the fic a ton for anyone who hasn't read it and wants to, but the basic premise centers around the question of "what if Cordelia stayed behind to rule Glenbrook when Roland and everyone else ran off to Centralia?" Which if that's the case, I would definitely assume Avlora would eventually decide to return and serve at Cordelia's side.

I'd imagine Avlora would essentially become the Dawnspear of Cordelia's reign, where she serves as both a political figure and the head of Cordelia's Kingsguard.

(^^ also this conversation would be really funny to me in the context of her literally taking his job)

BUT, if we're assuming Cordelia is recruited and goes along to Centralia with everyone, I think Avlora would wander around for a long while trying to figure out what she should do. Tracking down where Cordelia went is technically an option, but Avlora was never directly informed about Centralia. To add to that, rumors for sure would slowly filter in from Hyzante about the explosion that killed Idore, and it'd be easy to assume others died in the blast as well.

And even if Cordelia did manage to survive the escape, how much time is Avlora willing to spend looking? How far might the Roselle have fled? Since Avlora's not currently serving as Aesfrost's general, she doesn't have a boat, or supplies, or really any resources whatsoever. Is she really willing to throw her life away to search for someone who might very well already be dead?

I think eventually she'd catch wind of Svarog starting a civil war against Gustadolph and would join Svarog in that effort. Given Benedict serving as an advisor to Gustadolph, it seems possible-to-likely she'd lose the fight like she lost against Wolffort, and at that point would either be killed or would run off again and just try to live a normal life somewhere.

Or maybe she'd finally go "welp. guess I've officially got nothing to lose!" and go try and track down Cordelia. Another fic I really love is somewhere, beyond the sea which is Serenoa/Frederica-focused but also has a really cool bit about Avlora coming to Centralia.

Utility/Roland Ending

I think Avlora would be absolutely horrified at what Glenbrook + Hyzante do to Aesfrost. Like her entire nation is just. Gone. She was willing to oust Gustadolph, willing to join Cordelia, willing to take up a sword against people she once knew and worked with, but I don't think she ever expected the consequences to be the literal destruction of Aesfrost in its entirety.

The image of Avlora (or really ANY Aesfrosti) going back to Ironstone and finding the entire city buried beneath an impenetrable layer of blackened slag is haunting.

And given the history of conflict between Hyzante and Aesfrost, watching Hyzante take over all of Norzelia has gotta be. a whole thing for Avlora. However she felt about the Saintly Seven before, she definitely hates them now. I also can't see her ever wanting to associate again with Roland or Serenoa after hearing about their role in what happened.

(Though honestly I think the person she'd be the most furious toward would be Svarog. His duty, like hers, was to protect Aesfrost, and instead he completely destroyed what little they might have had left.)

I feel like she'd spend a good while thinking about revenge against Hyzante in a "as the last semblance of anything like a leader that Aesfrost has, I'm obligated to avenge that which was destroyed" type of way. Possibly even to the point of actually trying to put together a resistance. But with the way Hyzante crushes people's spirits and manipulates resources to encourage 100% obedience, I feel like she would really struggle to gain ground in that respect.

You could also imagine that she runs into Frederica at some point in all this, since both of them would likely be on the outskirts of society and/or wanted criminals. I don't know for sure whether I could see them fully joining forces (mostly just think they'd butt heads over specific goals and methods for fighting back against Hyzante), but they'd for sure have a lot to talk about.

As far as Cordelia goes, I think Avlora wouldn't really want to blame her for everything that happened. Like Avlora would be aware that Cordelia wasn't innocent in it, but on some level I think she would just sort of mentally go "it cannot be Cordelia's fault because if it was her fault then it was also my fault. We were both just following orders. We were both doing what our nations demanded of us." And also I think she likely would consider Cordelia to be the closest thing to a friend she has left, and as a result would have a hard time giving that relationship up.

Their dynamic in the Wolffort Wedding extra story cracks me up and I also think it would be in-character for Cordelia to hunt Avlora down as soon as she hears rumors that Avlora is still alive. If that happens then I wholeheartedly believe Cordelia would take one look at Avlora (wearing the same clothing she had on when she fell into the Norzelia River more than a year ago) (hasn't eaten in a week because she's avoiding the Hyzantian ration handouts and won't accept any from other displaced Aesfrosti) (generally stressed out of her mind and regularly daydreams about throwing her life away on an assassination attempt on Idore) and Cordelia would just go "okay yeah no I'm going to nurse you back to health and you're going to like it."

Roland would probably catch onto this at some point and I do imagine he'd try to attack or otherwise apprehend Avlora (he might feel a little bad about it because Cordelia obviously cares about her, but he's also tied himself inexorably to Hyzante at this point and not apprehending the last bastion of the Aesfrosti army would go against everything he's committed himself to). But assuming Cordelia's a little older and has had time to recover from the war, I think she'd put up a fight to the point that he'd back off and turn a blind eye to Avlora so long as she doesn't try anything too aggressive.

Getting deeper into "this is just me writing fanfiction" territory, I'm a sucker for "veteran gets to lay down their sword" arcs and I think it'd be nice to see Avlora eventually distance herself from plans of revenge and instead focus her energy on supporting the remaining people of Aesfrost as a sort of community leader, possibly with Cordelia's help.

I also really love the idea that Avlora would run an orphanage at some point. Working with orphans would be a good way of satisfying Avlora's desire to protect those who are otherwise alone, and it's also just funny/sweet to imagine General "There is nothing more agonizing than a child glaring at you through tears" Avlora trying to, for example, get a three-year-old to do something they don't want to do. Her personality and values as a character lend to her being a pretty big pushover with kids while simultaneously not having any frame of reference for "how to gently coax a child to do something" and I think it'd be a good and humbling experience for her :)

[quietbluejay]

Solar War 2

I'm here for Layak stalking Abaddon, this is beautiful

layak pulls a "we're not so different" and needles abaddon about killing the loyalist sons of horus at isstvan iii

and layak pulls a batman lmao on the one hand, he's an incredibly irritating coworker on the other hand, i think it would be funny to stick these two in the pear wiggler together, and i think canon will give me what I want there i'm really hoping the people reading this are familiar with that meme otherwise I sound like a lunatic Boreas is dying one of Sigismund's comrades in his fight

yeah he's kind of…haunted by that

Mersadie is kind of grim, lol

depressing lol but she's had a bleak seven years

honestly i kinda…want to drop this book this is just…it's like trying to bite a windshield there isn't anything in here that really compels me to see what happens next

does my bestie andromeda show up more search says no boo!!!!

ok im giving it another shot Mersadie's subplot is at least somewhat gripping and now, over to the Emperor and Malcador there's a planetary conjunction and the time is at the turning of the year which has significance but like, the winter solstice is when things start getting lighter

also i can't believe there's been so much about wolves and winter in a book where I'm pretty sure Russ never shows up

IGNIS HES HERE and Menkaura is slowly transforming into what we see him as in the Ahriman series

okay i guess i am a bit curious as to where this is going and also how French writes pre-Rubric Ahriman man Mersadie is picking up a whole group I'm really hoping the kids survive this I thought they were dead for sure

i…what what

are you serious

So just…lock them all in a room???

DORN

I'm going to leave bite marks on every stone in your walls

things are not going so well on earth

FINALLY we're getting a human face on things (got to see this guy's nightmare of his undead mother) ah time for malcador to go hard men doing hard things (loken's mad at him)

he's going after Mersadie

aah Forrix POV even Space Marrines get fatigued after a while hm

ominous forrix also really doesn't think highly of the EC and the NL which is especially funny for the NL

man, no matter what, French always writes Ahriman as a sad wet beast, a poor little meow meow i mean okay i guess McNeill did it too this bit was a little funny to me

like Ahriman of all people thinking something is ridiculously pretentious ah tension between the WB and the TS

there have been some shreds of what could have been an actually good book buried in here I'm sorry I haven't really been doing a detailed breakdown lol

that one review was right (about a different John French novel, lol) "John French takes an overly verbose axe to anything resembling a cohesive plot in this book."

I'm not sure how I'd fix this one aside from getting rid of half the descriptions lol I know 40k as a setting is about armies and not individuals but this is a book I swear a good chunk of this stuff read a lot like it was taken from campaign fluff not sure that's the correct term I finally got around to reading most of the TGS fluff and it clarified a lot of things for me in terms of wtf Thorpe was doing and why his writing was so weird in Ghost Warrior

hm I think I'd cut all the stuff that happens on Terra, it belongs in a different book or do it as a short story

I'm not sure about the Mersadie subplot tbh but honestly I think that one deserved to be a novella it's one of the best parts of this book ah Mersadie and Loken are reunited!

French, seeing my aggravation, immediately decided to attack my weak points

that's what this book is trying to be about, isn't it it's not doing a great job but the parts that hit, do it well ah classic ahriman

yeah this whole thing has been a word bearers teamup which has been…interesting, for ahriman, lol

Mersadie accomplished something!

oh yeah she also has a lot of flashbacks and at this point I'm wondering if it's not just the trauma oh ok the memories didn't actually happen yeah I'm worrying about something spooky

visual representation of the traitor command centre before the battle

hah it's actually really funny, I was reading about this recently and thinking about it w.r.t. to what Haley was trying to pull off with Wolfsbane

so the traitor forces were only doing all this to get this planetary alignment

you know things have finally been picking up …starting at the 70% mark

im also sitting on my hands to not quote TS Eliot's Four Quartets, I know I overquote it agh I'm weak, I give in

Garlic and sapphires in the mud Clot the bedded axle-tree. The trilling wire in the blood Sings below inveterate scars Appeasing long forgotten wars. The dance along the artery The circulation of the lymph Are figured in the drift of stars Ascend to summer in the tree We move above the moving tree In light upon the figured leaf And hear upon the sodden floor Below, the boarhound and the boar Pursue their pattern as before But reconciled among the stars.

At the still point of the turning world. Neither flesh nor fleshless; Neither from nor towards; at the still point, there the dance is, But neither arrest nor movement. And do not call it fixity, Where past and future are gathered. Neither movement from nor towards, Neither ascent nor decline. Except for the point, the still point, There would be no dance, and there is only the dance. I can only say, there we have been: but I cannot say where. And I cannot say, how long, for that is to place it in time. The inner freedom from the practical desire, The release from action and suffering, release from the inner And the outer compulsion, yet surrounded By a grace of sense, a white light still and moving, Erhebung without motion, concentration Without elimination, both a new world And the old made explicit, understood In the completion of its partial ecstasy, The resolution of its partial horror. Yet the enchainment of past and future Woven in the weakness of the changing body, Protects mankind from heaven and damnation Which flesh cannot endure.

back to book

(i thought dorn had lighter eyes lol)

anyways i guess i should actually finish Flight of the Eisenstein at some point it can't be more tedious than 75% of this book ugh samus is here ah so that's the twist in the mersadie plot

i know she's being controlled or possessed or something but that's a fun image so the "keeler" in the visions was…Samus I think

so back on the vengeful spirit maloghurst did a sorcery to turn Mersadie into a sleeper agent uh huh [press x to doubt] Mersadie left right before Isstvan III!!!!! unless this is trying to tell me that idk Erebus was secretly tutoring Mal in dark magic, something that makes absolutely zero sense in the time frame we're looking at i can't believe it yeah okay some of the elements in here are fun horror stuff but I can't focus on that because I'm too irritated to quote that one reviewer "Samus is here and I wish he wasn't"

[eziojensenthe3rd]

Midnight Gaming: A tale of Horny Furries

So I played The Crown Of Leaves past midnight, checked socials to find... Silksong confirmed to NOT appear in tuesdays games onl.

So Geoff Keighley cleared the air on twitter, letting hollow knight fans know not to hold thier breath for silksong this tuesday.

I havent played hollow knight myself but im aware that a lot of people enjoyed it and were waiting for the dlc-that-got-changed-to-a-sequel game. Send a prayer and hug to any hollow knight fans you see, y'aint all back quite yet.

So heres a lil story, I started following an artist few years back when I first saw their artwork and it enchanted me. Thier artwork contained characters in scenes just looking fantastic, different little details that were enjoyable to search, you know the term a picture is worth a thousand words? Theirs were worth a whole novel each. All of it wrapped in a world that you only get a glimpse of with each picture, accompanied with a description that tells a very short story. You know how dark souls had a lot of its lore within item and weapon descriptions? Same vibe and I loved them. It was the kind of world I wished there was some media, like a book, an animation, a game perhaps, where I could explore that world more.

So I followed this artist for a while, got excited for every new bit of art they posted, and over time they changed some things. About their characters, about the world. It was gradual so I paid no mind at first but eventually it got to the point where I realised I enjoyed their art less than I did before. The art was still good, the quality was still fantastic, I just dont feel as interested in them as I did before. They changed their characters and world so much, it just didn't do it for me. I could show you two images of what looked like two characters and hear me explain to you that they're infact the same character, ones just a more recent characterisation.

Now let me make this clear here, this is purely my personal opinion here. If the artist is happy with thier changes, then thats fine, more power to them. Its their world and characters to do with, my thoughts do not override that. I am not demanding they revert those changes just to suit my taste, i'd rather they didnt do that and just do what appeals to them. To make art for themselves. And if you happen to figure out who I'm talking about, please keep it to yourself. I do not want this artist harrassed on my behalf so please dont, this is a me problem.

Now as I said, I loved the look of their world that I wanted something like a game to explore it. So one day as I browsed the steam store, I managed to stumble across this game that had me shook. The screenshots, the characters, the enviroments. It looked a tad similar to the artist I followed but it was an entirely different world, tho it carried the spirit of what drew me in with that previous artists work in the first place and I checked to be sure, that artist's name was nowhere in the credits so they werent involved at all in this. Needless to say I picked it up just on that principle alone and... didnt play it until last night. Funny how that works.

So The Crown Of Leaves is a visual novel/point and click hybrid with following different routes and talking to folks like a visual novel and collecting items, solving puzzles like a point and click. Your just following a simple day as roui, trying to get by until some weird shit happens. And thats all im gonna say on the story without spoiling it. Listen, when I started playing, it had me hooked. The art just gut punched me right in the very place I felt was missing. It drew me in like the art I used to study with that old artist. Clicking on various objects just to hear little snippets, grabbing lil pieces of lore about the world I was in, seeing the characters and hearing them talk, their personalities just fleshed out and fascinating. Man, I was practically in love all over again.

In fact, im just gonna fill the rest of this post with some of this games art just so you can see what I mean.

Now, I do recommend this game but there is one thing you should know. The game isnt done, so far theres only two chapters with chapter three in progress but bare in mind it is a small indie team so take my recommendation with a grain of salt. Regardless you should definatly pick it up.

Maybe 18th century furries that live in a fantasy world that have a sort of gothic/mystical vibe do be one of my favourite genders.

See you all tomorrow. Feel free to leave game suggestions and feedback. Anons are currently on.

[gellavonhamster]

random thoughts on Nightbreed after reading Cabal and watching the Cabal Cut of the movie:

okay, first of all, the Cabal cut is not the version of this movie that I would recommend to, like, a random person who just wants to casually enjoy some movie. It's made of bits of the theatrical cut and various unused footage/deleted scenes some of which don't even have any sound. It is, however, a much more accurate adaptation of the novella than the theatrical cut, not just in terms of what was included or omitted, but in spirit. It also is available on Youtube, by the way

I feel like the main difference between the book and the movie is that the movie presents a much kinder view of the "naturals" than the book. Decker's victims are paid more attention so that their horrifying deaths hit harder (that family at the beginning of the movie is really sweet), the old guy that Decker tries to extract information about the Nightbreed from clearly knows about them but doesn't want any harm to come to them, and, of course, there is one (1) good cop. I cannot help but think, cynically, that the latter is in order to make the movie appeal to a wider audience (not that I didn't like the character)

the character designs Fuck Severely - even more than I remembered from the theatrical cut, probably because the extended cut has even more background characters. I want films about fairies that make them look like that - weird and off-putting and sensual (Rachel is beautiful but strange, Peloquin and Shuna are not beautiful but they are sexy). The book's ambiguity of what some of them are supposed to look like is even better, especially in case of Baphomet - he doesn't even look the way a human mind can truly comprehend - but that is, obviously, not an option for cinema

Boone's story, allegorically, is about finally becoming a happier and more fulfilled person after coming to terms with your sexuality and surrounding yourself with people who really get you. Father Ashbery's story is about internalized homophobia/transphobia, and in the movie specifically, about not being able to overcome it, I guess? At the end of the book, he wants to find the Breed because "he wanted the [God's] touch again"; at the end of the film, he hates Baphomet and the Breed for transforming him. But then again, the movie avoids direct mentions of his queerness (I was pleasantly surprised by how overt it is in the book). Lori's story is about becoming an ally to your local queer community after your partner comes out and then realizing you might not be cishet after all

I don't remember the theatrical cut in all detail - it's been years since I watched it - but I can tell it definitely doesn't let Lori shine as much as the novella, much of which is told from her POV, and the extended cut. I didn't really like her in the theatrical cut, but now I'm like Lori my best friend Lori

the sex scenes in the novella are, hmm, pretty funny at times, but I've read some Stephen King and it could have always been worse

I think the blue guy with horns and the pale guy with tentacles (?) in his stomach are dating

also, pretty sure the theatrical cut didn't have Narcisse flirting with Ohnaka, hehe.

speaking of, I really liked the interactions between Narcisse and Lori in the book when they drive to break Boone out of the police station. In general, he's a fun character, annoying but in a loveable way.

Peloquin is a less prominent character in the book, and iirc he doesn't interact with Lori at all, while in the movie he kind of threateningly flirts with her several times. I wonder if that, like adding the good cop and making the theatrical cut more of a slasher movie, is part of making the movie follow a more traditional pattern, in a way. Here's a heroine and a man she loves and here's another guy who's not quite a love interest for her but lowkey a possibility of one. Which is interesting considering the whole queer allegory and that Peloquin was the one who bit Boone

I love the scene in the book where Babette lets Lori see her secret hideaway and there's a handmade doll and her collection of stones and other children's treasures 🥺 I think her animal form is the only case where the book description ("a wild cat of some kind, perhaps, but that the skin resembled deer hide rather than fur") is less weird that her movie appearance. If I was Lori, I would've probably been scared to pick that creature up.

might look up some supplemental materials that provide more information about the lore/the characters later - this is such a fascinating universe, and while the book reads like a complete thing, the movie feels like just the tip of the iceberg.

[volcanocraft]

cw: night terrors, distressed language, and post-traumatic stress

These posts may not be very interesting or informative but i like writing them. I haven’t ruminated on this part of my life in that much detail before the last post on it. I don’t know many people with night terrors so heres my personal experience with them.

I am unable to pinpoint when it started. maybe two years ago and it has gotten more volatile since then. i would wake up in a cold sweat (literally drenched) feeling afraid of something, my body kicked into hypervigilance, but not being able to figure out what im even scared of. Its a weird feeling because you feel simultaneously silly and exasperated and shocked no one is doing something all at once. i can recall some parts of my terrors as soon as i wake up but lose the thread hours later. i know that the theme of these dreams usually repeat in different scenarios but i legitimately don’t think it should cause me the distress it does. my dreams do not resemble the flashbacks i experience when im awake and thats where i’m like whats going on dude

I was not the one who found out about these terrors. looking back, i probably had some sort of idea but was never sold on it. I regularly share a bed with a friend and they’re the one who told me that I was very distressed in my sleep.

Often I will scream or cry-yell, unfortunately loud enough that I wake up my friend and my dog. Other times i’m upset but coherent. I legitimately don’t know what I say in these instances and have to be told them. That’s probably the most embarrassing part of this whole thing because it's always stuff like "fuck off! get off of me! I'm scared." or "get away from me. please just stop" or "why can’t you just listen?” and even typing this out makes me feel so fucking lame HAHA because i really am okay the morning after

This has never personally concerned me. The only time I’ve seriously considered it as a problem is when it becomes physical. I flail, toss and turn, and all that good stuff in my sleep. On occasion I will have a violent dream that causes me to start kicking or punching or jump out of bed. sometimes i will not recognize whose beside me and start freaking out and try to defend myself. Other times I’ll bang my head on the wall or kick it and have been known to punch or fight the wall, which is kind of funny, but i do end up having a sore foot or hand because of it

i think it comes in waves. for a while I had them track me and have been doing really well. three weeks ago I suddenly started again, and it’s been happening practically every night since then, save one or two days. I’m not medicated for my parasomnia specifically, my doctors don’t take it seriously and I’m tired of pushing it. Again, I do not think it’s that big of a deal. I have been waking up distressed for a long time now and I’ve come to terms with having the same sorts of dreams over and over again. It sucks but it doesnt impact me in noticeable ways other than getting consistent rest. It very much sounds worse on paper and I’ve been doing mentally very well recently. it’s probably a side effect of my mental disorder and the symptom i care about the least. My friend has encouraged me to speak to the professional i see weekly (I don’t know how to describe her, she does social work by trade). if this goes anywhere ill be very surprised and then whatever man I suppose owe you 50 bucks. the end

[colourful-void]

OKAY I GOT DISTRACTED FOR A BIT BY GETTING IN THE ZONE BUT AITSF UDPATE:

1: finished the komeji and shoma ending! i! okay ill be honestly i wasn't super thrilled. I REALLY like the set up stuff in terms of simulation reality, and beleiving its all fake bcs you can't cope, im MASSIVELY INTO THAT. But. I don't. like. Komeji I'm so sorry his just. he's so cube. and he annoys me. I feel like a usually have a pretty high tolerance for this kinda stuff but I just. On paper i get it but in practice I really dont like him. was very happy to see date n co tho. i think it's RIDICULOUSSSS how they explain date's interest in porn like that did not need to be explained. however. its such a stupid explanation it kinda loops back around to being funny to me. sure. why not.

2: ollowing finishing that route i tried to get back to Tokiko to see if i could use that elevator code, bcs she'd been mentioning frayers and i thought i knew what that was but i did not. but no thats only 6 digits so still not right f=/. dang. i also tried to get onto mizuki's half i miss my baby, but i found i needed two names. i know Dahlia is one, but the other is 4 letters so. Currently its probably either for Mame, Lien, or Naix. I suspect Naix the most as an answer.

3: started onto the other route from komeji's somnium. I maintain that these are too easy. It's not like they're like. the problem is that I feel like i'm being treated like I'm an idiot. ryuki and tama talk everything out in such detail, and theres often not a lot of stuff to interact with at all, a lot of which doesn't even let you make the choices like from the last game. like, proper timie usage was SO important to me last game and in this one I've never even racked up 3. i also feel like there's less dream logic, and it's a little disappointing. like, oh tape the cardboard back together. turn on the tv. =( the whimsy. it did improve some in the back half though, and i'll take it!!!

4: liking this dead komeji route WAY MORE than the other one. its not that i hate him that much but i do like the way the plots moving here. what does mame know? whats the masked womans deal? has anyone seen shoma. WHAT IS WRONGGGG WITH RYUKI <33. what is wrong with ryuki is by far my favourite mystery. im more interested in that than i am in the half body killings honestly. (part of that is teh victims i think. we dont really know jin, chikara was annoying at best but the more i learn about him the more i hate him, komeji was annoying, so. honestly i havent really been that upset about any of them dying. tokiko i did love and i am sad she's gone, but also these murders are a little bland following the first game. i just watched a guys head explode could there at least be a little blood? just a little? i know its probably for plot reasons but ive never missed gore so bad. im not even that into gore.

5: somewhere on the dead komeji route i finally figured out what that little green thing in the menu was so i've activated my tamagotchi thingy!! very fun i love it. mines an iris-y one or something? its cuteee!!

6: in terms of the wider mystery: im just really curious how far they're gonna commit to being meta.they did start with asking ME what i knew about the last game so.... looking forward to ryuki's whole deal, actually getting to play as my darling mizuki again, finding out what is UPP with date. i really like the weird videos series i just think they're neat. if the endgame doesn't have a somnium based on those thigns i will be disappointed, surely thats what we're building to.

i left off right before starting mame's somniumin the gameshow room. i don't think shes' actually involved in the killings, but doing that would be REALLY NEAT as a sequel thing, imo. i'd like it. i think shes just hiding stuff bcs she was threatened. assumably i've still got a good chunk of the game to paly! i havent done much if any of the extra eyeballs either, just whats on the way so. i'll get those guys. have been picking up some costumes n stuff tho. you can put tama <33 in pants <3333333333.

[emmersreads]

Foreign Bodies: Pandemics, Vaccines, and the Health of Nations by Simon Schama 3.5/5 stars

bear with me lads, this is an Extremely special interest book review

Foreign Bodies: Pandemics, Vaccines, and the Health of Nations is a generally good book marred by a few incidents of absolutely deranged framing. I liked a lot about it, but it lacks focus. While it is an in depth look at an interesting subject for a popular audience, it doesn’t always hold up on an academic level. Ultimately, for me it worked better as a companion read to Seth Dickinson’s The Masquerade, which also deals with colonial medicine and hygiene, but in a fictional setting. Foreign Bodies covers a lot but it doesn’t stand up on its own.

The elephant in the room was, for me, that Simon Schama is an art historian, not a historian of science or medicine, and you can tell.

Or, well, I could tell, because I am a historian of science; I have two very expensive degrees about it. That’s why I have so much to say about the minor things that are wrong with this book.

First, the good. Foreign Bodies is a fun and eclectic look at the unfortunately not widely popularized niche of medical history: colonial medicine. I would actually highly recommend it as an anti-colonial read to flesh out one’s understanding of British occupation of India and China. The exploration of the racialized and colonial politics of hygiene and cleanliness — and how the principles of sanitation formed a cornerstone of the ideology of empire — is perhaps this book’s best contribution. As I mentioned above, I read this book directly after The Masquerade series. The series uses a fictional setting to explore the ethics of resistance to colonization. The most complete resistance to colonization includes refusing to adopt colonial practises of sanitation and medicine which do save lives. Is this a necessary sacrifice? Medicine is the poisoned fruit of empire; access to it is used to as both carrot and stick to ensure colonial obedience. The Masquerade is very thoroughly researched and incorporates a dizzying array of historical influences, and Foreign Bodies serves as an exploration of many of them. It contextualizes the fictional constructions in our real history.

I also, personally, loved the verbose literary style. This book is way way more complicated than it needs to be, but I found it fun and funny. My favourite example was the use of ‘conurbation;, rather than ‘city’ or even ‘metropolis’. What the fuck. If you prefer clarity and directness, you might not enjoy wading through this book’s extremely languorous prose, but for me it had a certain academia-camp charm. And I can appreciate the compulsion to explain and clarify that leads to long-windedness like this. I feel #seen.

What I appreciated less were the weird quirks of framing. Foreign Bodies is pretty aggressively anti-colonial. I’ve read a lot of books where the author is reluctant to explicitly ascribe responsibility for the cruel and unusual behaviours of colonial regimes — all of which were ultimately perpetrated by individual human beings — and this is not one of them. But it exclusively uses the 19th century European terms to refer to Asian locations. That was the detail that tipped me off that this was Schama’s first foray into the field. Unless the context is extremely specific to the 19th century geography or regime, I’m used to seeing Myanmar, not Burma. The 19th century names are technically not incorrect, it’s just not the sort of thing I’d expect to see in an academic work.

The other thing I wouldn’t expect to see, and to my mind the far more egregious error, is the continuous framing of inoculation as new and scientific while previous regimes of sanitization were superstitious and religious. Actual historians of science simply do not think like this.

I think it’s absolutely accurate to say that the Europeans, and especially the British, approached protocols of carbolic sanitization with a fanatical zeal, but to suggest that this was the religion of carbolic to the science of inoculation is misguided and ultimately distracts from the book’s more interesting questions. First, let’s quickly dispense with the idea that science and religion are two opposite poles of knowledge, as diametrically opposed as black and white. It’s especially out of place in a book that is otherwise attempting empathy towards non-western traditions of medicine, culture, and belief. Science is just another belief system grounded on very specific verification procedures (as opposed to faith, or criticism of certain texts, etc). The sooner we understand that science is a system of belief rather than a privileged access to The Truth, the better we will be at handling the times that science is wrong.

Because science is wrong all the time. Our understanding of our reality is is constantly changing as we refine pre-existing theories and discover new ones. Carbolic was exactly such a case. Fifty years previous, sanitization was the scientific doctrine bravely fighting the superstition of doctor’s honour and the religion of laudable pus.

I found it especially deranged that Schama frames inoculation as part of the vanguard science of bacteriology in opposition to sterilization. Sterilization is grounded in bacteriology just as much as inoculation, if not more (the evidence for the effectiveness of inoculation was exclusively statistical in this period, not microbial). Disease is caused by germs. To treat the disease, use carbolic to kill the germs. The germ are invisible and everywhere, so carbolic your shrivelled British heart out. This is mixed, of course, with the colonizers’ fundamental lack of respect for the personhood of the colonized, and you get the so-called religion of carbolic. It’s just out-dated science strained through a conservative and slow to adapt colonial bureaucracy.

This framing of inoculation and sanitization as two opposite poles of scientificness obfuscates the fact that inoculation was was just as much a part of western science, the western culture and technologies that were steam-rolling their way over Ayurvedic and Chinese medical systems. Does it make it better than this fruit of empire fulfils its promise? Schama isn’t interested in asking, and treats inoculation as unambiguously good, free from the colonial baggage of the rest of medicine. I get that the exploration of this question would be limited by the extreme paucity of non-European sources, but the execution here was still disappointing.

Ultimately, while Foreign Bodies is informative and interesting, it works best as a companion read because it doesn’t really come together by itself. It addresses the obvious, but fails to move any deeper. I have a distinct memory of being struck by the realization, a third of the way through the book, that I didn’t know what it was actually about. Schama draws a connection between viruses and bacteria as foreign bodies causing disease (this is the detail that separates germ theory from humoural theory), to suspicion of inoculation being grounded in fear of injection with foreign bodies, to key figures in the history of inoculation as foreign bodies both within the Asian countries where they worked and within the Western European empires that employed them. It’s a tantalizing idea, but Schama never explains what this connection is (beyond a literary image) or what it might mean. There is meat on that bone. What is the meaning of native and foreign in medicine? How does it interact with our ideas of sanitariness and cleanliness? How can we use this information to decolonize medicine and hygiene in the future? Foreign Bodies pivots so hard from wrapping up its many historical tangents to bemoaning COVID vaccine denialism that it never has time to address them. (This is putting it charitably; put uncharitably, one might suspect that this sort of thing never occurred to Schama at all).

I think the book is an admirable effort for a non-historian of science. It hits the mark way more than it misses. I just did find myself wishing that it had a little more of an understanding of the history and philosophy of science as a field. We’ve been over this sort of thing, but if that work never gets picked up but outsiders, we’ll keep spinning in circles.