#they only look like black blobs

[constantlyfalling]

waves, well, waving

[puppetmaster13u]

Cryptid-esque Batman, but he uses vantablack for his entire outfit.

Everything is just, black, darkness, a moving shadow, save for when the cloak opens and there's the bat-symbol. He keeps it a different colors so his kids can still find him, but the moment they're in range he closes the cloak and it's like they're just gone.

He still has all of his armour and gadgets, they're just completely invisible amidst the rest of his form. The kids might be covered in bright colors, but he makes sure to give them each a cape or cloak for hiding. Just in case.

The issue is that now all of Gotham thinks the batclan are some sort of living shadows that form in the night. Not helped when Duke joins for the daylight and quite literally glows.

[prostocupoftea]

Kinitopet Programmers AU

finally i am finished with this one, daaaamn

it is hard to draw pathetic men with midlife crisis when your style is mostly for anime boys

more info and sketch version under the cut!!

sketch version aka how it'll probably look like in comic version 'n some doodles

srry for my writing but i was too laisy to put it as regular text

It is a plot-based au, i already have most of the storybits and like... a vibe-chart (i tried to make a playlist for this au and understood that for different chapters and different characters that'd be a copleatly different music, sooo it's a chart now :) )

i will post a fog-o-wared timeline that im hopefully gonna reveal comic-by comic, but also maybe with just pure writing. Hopefully i can include songs that i chose for them into it but we'll see (:

aaand of course designs can change, hopefully not much but we'll see

Now about au:

Main story:

Story follows non-sentient AI Kinito, his creator Sonny and his beta-tester Victoria (oc)

Being literally the first AI (or RRA in-univere) ever, Kinito does not have any, and i mean, any ai safety features so of course his reponce to a goal phrased as "have user near me and/or interacting with me as much as possible" is digitizing them into his own virtual world while killing them in the process. why wouldn't it be?

So that happened. Like, a lot. And with Sonny and Vic too (at the different time but yeah)

Sonny is like "He kills people. We should turn him off because, you know, killing people is bad."

Vic is like "well, we will die if we do that, and it is not that bad here, we are kinda immortal. We should give him acces to changing his initial instalation code before admin priveleges and acces to social media so we can have everythin we want here. It is not that bad to digitize humanity, yk?" and yes i know it is 90, no social media, but shut up, if they made ai then, then i can make twitter then too

Sonny is like "...no??"

And then they fight about it for million chapters

Also they both can't do anything without agreeing bc they have two parts of that admin access key (the data you use to delete kinito in-game) so they are stuck with eachother (also that's why Kinito can't just kill them)

Little facts that may or may not to be important:

Kinito asks so many questions (and weird once too) and has most of the glitches because he needs to analise your responces to copy your mind perfectly (let's pretend that people wouldn't lie about that...)

Your house in your virtual world is made from important places from your memories and oh boy can i do character explorations with this one

I decided that Sonny and Vic are not related. There were thoughts about making then "The Kinito Brothers" (or, at least, siblings) that were mentioned in commercial, but nah, they are just coworkers now. And a bit of work-friends (bc if you interact a lot as a manager of the project and the best worker might as well be friendly)

Author has no idea how small dying toy companies that accidentally create technological marvel work. Author has some idea how AI-s work. So be prepared to be spoon-fed info abut which ai safety problem we are dealing with in which chapter (:

Kinito will mostly be unrendered (as drawn here) but for some cool moments i might pose him as for my other posts. Also his eye placement changes to the side that is most visible because i want him to be able to look to the right side sometimes--

Also when i say "fucked up mentally" i mean they have that them psychological problems with me projecting heavilly B) (guess on who i project most. trick question. all of them. the whole au is my problems split into three characters and forced to interact B) )

Also sea-creature analogies (that are gonna be mentioned like twice):

Victoria is a flying fish because deep character reasons

Sonny is a pufferfish because i said so

oh also there is 7 deaths in the plot as for now

on 3 characters

good luck figuring out who, how and when ((:

for my own sanity i will probably make little doodles where everything is great and kinito is a good guy and not a number-obsessed maniac (i mean... can u imagine not being able to feel any happiness from anything besides one thing... damn...) and you can differenciate them bc good-guy kinito will have a lot of stickers on him (i will explain it somehow but real reason is just bc it is cute af)

like this but even more stickers (he is unfinished here)

[inmaki]

gojo showing off your back scratches to geto

( cont from this fic! req, visual ) .

contains: sex talk, desc of back scratches, crack, sugu is called daddy once (as a joke.. right..)

everything was relatively peaceful in suguru's apartment. key word: relatively.

a forgettable yet appreciated sunday afternoon, not a cloud in sight despite the weather forecast predicting downpours of rain. either way, the raven-haired man insouciantly rested across his white couch, reaching the conclusion that today would be a day for self-care, relaxing, and perhaps some meditation.

there was only one thing ruining his peace.

all morning, suguru has been forced to try and ignore the stain a certain someone has left on his couch — a pair of unecessarily expensive yet dirty shoes being the culprit.

despite these attempts, every once in a while his gaze can't help but wander over at the mark — as if it'd poof out of existence if he glared hard enough.

"fuckin' asshole.." he mutters. it was a wonder his relationship with his best friend managed to stay so promising despite all their differences, yet suguru wouldn't have it any other way, even after situations like this.

right when he grumpily turns back to the tv — which was playing some crappy, low budget rom-com — his apartment door is yanked open and suguru swears he nearly jumps out of his seat.

great, was this it? was he about to get robbed, perhaps evicted? and then probably die? forced into the afterlife knowing gojo's shoe-shit was still on his new couch? no that can't—

"i fucked her!"

suguru whips his head towards the apartment door, announcement being disregarded as he nearly groans in agony. speak of the devil.

big blue eyes peak out from under circular sunglasses, one hand already raised in preparation for a dap up while his stupid, big, dirty shoe pushes the door closed behind him. gojo wears a black compression shirt with grey sweats, marching over to his friend with a ginormous grin across his cheeks.

"take your shoes off, now," suguru snaps, nodding to his friend's feet with a frown.

"yeesh... whatever y'say, daddy," the bastard never loses his smile as his hands raise in surrender, kicking them off by the door smoothly. "what's got your panties in a twist?"

geto pinches his nose bridge. "don't call me that," as he continues the scolding, he points to the living room with his free hand. "you got a mystery stain on my couch, satoru. do you know how many youtube videos i watched trying to get this shit off?"

unphased, gojo takes a look at the strangely colored blob against the armrest's leather material and shrugs. "my bad. did you try febreeze?"

"what— no? dude, febreeze is for.." when suguru looks back up to sourly meet his gaze, he could immediately tell the white-haired man was already drifting back into la-la-land, words going in one ear and out the other. "..nevermind. why're you here?"

at the reminder, satoru seemingly brightens, head shooting back up as if he was just told he'd won the lottery.

"oh god, don't make that stupid face—" he pauses. "the fuck are you doing?" suguru might as well say goodbye to his self-care day, because now gojo was stripping in the middle of his living room, shirt thrown haphazardly onto the still-very-much-stained couch.

"just look!" suguru squints as his friend swivels around to face the wall, pushing his bangs away to get a better view of the— oh shit.

it takes the raven-haired man a second to process what he's seeing before shuffling forward, closely examining the achingly red, bulging scratch marks displayed sexily across the latter's back and shoulders. "no way.."

suguru knows the strongest sorcerer well enough to notice how he purposely didn't use reversed cursed technique on these scratches, just so it'd be obvious to anyone that caught a glimpse of what exactly occured. to his further dismay, he can already picture a smug and sweaty gojo walking around their local gym like this, proud simper on his pretty lips as he easily raises a pair of weights in his veiny hands.

a hiss escapes geto's mouth as he runs his finger down a particularly agitated one, knowing exactly how painful they could be after experiencing many hook-ups of his own. even so, satoru only licks his lips, neck craning to the side so he can pride himself in his friend's gobsmacked expression.

"damn, these are deep. you actually hit it?" suguru confirms, raising a celebratory hand.

turning back around, satoru daps him up, a massive smirk now on both their faces. "hell yeah, it was amazing."

it was impossible to predict what gojo would do next after barging through his front door — especially considering how many times he's done so — but this has to be the last thing suguru ever expected.

not that he was complaining — in fact, all of geto's temper and need for relaxation seemingly flew out the window, the feeling of proudness for his best friend overthrowing anything else.

and even if he hated to admit it, the way gojo was so eager to come over and announce his virginity loss to him was more than a little endearing, and dare he say cute.

"that's great, man. congrats." suguru leads him into the kitchen — still shamelessly shirtless — to grab them both a can of beer in celebration. while the white-haired man usually didn't get involved with any form of alcohol, this occasion was most definitely exception-worthy. "you made y/n cum too, right?"

an offended glare is shot his way. "duh, two times."

"huh. surprised you could last."

as suguru pours their drinks into two fragile cups, gojo exhales, not bothered in the slightest by his jab. "dude, same.." he admits dreamily. "she was so fuckin' tight and warm.. and oh— fuck, her moans? heavenly.. 'can't believe i didn't bust after the first minute.."

geto gulps, trying his best to ignore the mental image his brain was producing from his dirty words. you can't blame him — both of you were smoking hot, and he was a simple man.

even now, he could already imagine what you both looked like; panting and moaning, skin-slapping so loud that it echoed through the whole room, how blissed out you'd look as gojo's cock split you in t—

satoru's playful sigh cuts through the tensing air. "who knows sugs, maybe you'll have another kind of stain to worry about next time we're over~"

he's never snapped out of a daydream so quickly. "don't even joke about that."

over the next hour, the two men sat manspread on the stained couch, taking leisure sips while recalling satoru's final moments as a virgin — suguru giving out his secret tips and tricks along the way.

maybe sometime, suguru could offer some.. hands-on learning instead.

mlist! <- sugu.. how could u think abt ur bestie and his gf like that... tsk tsk tsk (if u enjoyed reblogs/comments r appreciated heheh)

© inmaki on tumblr. all rights reserved. do not cross-post, translate, copy in any way, etc.

[koimethehorizon]

Deltarune: The Image of Divinity and The Angel

(MASSIVE SPOILERS FOR CH 4 of DELTARUNE and UNDERTALE)

If you haven't found this scene, go back to the room where you have to avoid a bunch of Shadow Blobs shortly after reaching the Third Sanctuary. Find a way into the hidden room on the bottom right-side of the room (follow the broken path) and you'll see this at the right side of the hall.

This string of dialogue, especially Susie's uneasy reaction, creeps the hell out of me.

Whatever the Angel's identity is, its physical form is something so terrifying and beyond comprehension that even in the minimalistic style the Prophecy normally uses, Susie is stunned by the implications of just looking at it.

One brilliant theory that I've heard a couple of people mention already is that the empty space is meant to reflect our screens like a black mirror. We are The Angel in this interpretation.

That's just crazy, and I'm very into it.

I'd like to delve a little further into this train of thought that may or may not confirm this theory further.

Remember what the Titan looks like right before we fight it?

BALD

It's a human skull. Maybe even what the Titan's skeleton looks like underneath its divine angelic flesh.

When I first got to this section, I almost thought that the Titan would just be a full on human JPEG like Photoshop Flowey was in Undertale.

Speaking of which...

What... is this even supposed to be?

This is one facet of Undertale that's always been neglected because we've never found any concrete answers for what it could be.

For all we're concerned, it's just part of the absurd horror imagery that Toby is trying to invoke during this section, and we're not meant to think too hard on it.

Except...

Toby used this face as his pfp on Twitter until the release of Deltarune Ch 1. So either he's really proud of the damn face or there's something more to it.

I don't really have an answer for this, but what I will guess right now is:

I think this is what the Angel looks like.

Not the Omega Flowey face specifically, but it's likely a pixelated human face.

Consider the similarities between these examples. This distorted human imagery has been used twice to depict divine beings.

One showing Flowey ascending to a higher state of existence.

The other shows a nigh-unstoppable world-ending monster only depicted in legend.

And The Angel is something akin to Deltarune's Abrahamic God or The Savior. Churches and an entire religion are dedicated to The Angel, yet we only see it depicted as the symbol of the Deltarune.

Let's take a few steps back and return to the "The Angel is The Player" theory.

There's actually one big piece of evidence for this theory in Undertale:

Ominous how early Toby planted these seeds huh?

In Undertale, The Angel is 100% meant to be You on each of the 3 playable routes. Now "You" is a bit subjective because that noun could be applied to 3 candidates:

You "The Player"

Frisk the MC you control

Chara, the true identity of the red SOUL

Regardless of who The Angel refers to in this messed-up trio, one very bold statement is conveyed.

The Angel decides the ending of the story.

And we, as The Player, get to decide how this ending plays out.

To the characters of Undertale and Deltarune, yeah, that's divine power alright. A power that Spamton considered his ticket to [Heaven].

If this theory holds true, then that means a person behind the screen is the image of divine power. In Undertale/Deltarune The image of God is...

A REAL human.

[emacrow]

Thank you for accepting the courtship.

Raven was using an ancient forbidden ritual to Pariah King of the infinite realm to stop Trigon and Darkseid to stop them from taking over this universe. The proper gift in term in the book for the ritual to be accepted said to be her firstborn whenever she were to have one, and it seemed the ritual was accepted.

She expected some old man in dark ancient armor to come out of the summoning ritual portal, except it wasn't Pariah King who came out.

A aurora crown floated upwars, then a white blob emerged only to be white long hair that kept going upward, growing longer and longer tall silhouette nearly 12-14 feet tall.

Hundreds of thousands of tiny stars in the white hair swirling toward the face with pointed ears, forming into three glowing yet dull green eyes with darken specks of stars underneath the eyelids and cheeks, a blackish blue like breaking open like a tear to reveal sharp gleaming white teeths, a dark blue tongue.

The clothes that this entity form beneath that resemble 1980s hazmat clothes that flickered from and to a royal clothes with jewels of tiny planet yet unnerving as if it haven't decided which to be and out of place that nearly made Raven's eyes wanted to avoid looking at it.

She didn't falter nor didn't flinch as this being glanced at the ritual symbols, tilting his head as if interested before before the three eyes looked back at her that made her heart wanted to stop as the used to be dulled eyes sparkled a bit.

Then, the being grew smile that would've made the Joker cry, Much to Raven's inner horror and nearly every empticlones in nevermore screaming at her to run and hide.

"I, Phantom, Prince and Savior of the infinite realms from the Mad King, Defender of Pandora's box, Balancer of Time, accept your gift." The voice was barely a whisper that almost sounded rich smooth as velvet, yet loud enough to hear clearly to raven.

With a simple wave of his long, arachnodactyly fingers as if waving off an annoying fly before shrinking slowly with a gleam of white light evenly enveloping to reveal a 9'4 foot tall lanky bat adoption bat guy.

Black long-haired, put in a clumsy doubled braided with blue and red flowers, held polka dotted scrunchies, girly hair clips with unicorn themes, soft blue eyes that were redish in the corner and a soft delicate face that Raven definitely wasn't ogling in her nevermore mindscape.

"Thank you for accepting the courtship."

"Your welcome."

....

....

Raven's mind blanch a bit realizing what he just said.

"Wait, What?"

...

...

Danny was doing just fine, just fine indeed as he was sitting in Jazz’s house, his niece rebraiding his hair as he shoved another giant handful of Fudge brownies into his mouth.

Ellie was moving into her boyfriend six month ago, and there was nothing Danny could do seeing his little girl move on without him.

Empty nest syndrome Jazz and his parents told him. Sam suggested another online dating, but being a famous, well-known Savior of Earth after Disasteroid came a lot of girls and even boys who see danny as a hero or for his fame and fortune instead of Danny.

Not to mention the ghosts, the stupid eyeballs trying to present another candidate for him to Wed which he refused.

He has used raising ellie as the common excuse that turned into actually doting parenting, but now..

He couldn't go back to his haunt castle after she moved out without burying himself in her childhood room, holding her old worned out red beanie hat that she didn't wear anymore.

Kids grow up and move on from their parents, but they always come back when in need.

He did something out of impulse due to his empty nest syndrome, which was going a bit haywire by the day and Sam, Val and Tucker won't let him bring them over to hang out especially when they are busy.

He made a ritual with clockwork help that randomly appeared in any other dimensions, then his own to pick the right person to court at the right time.

Now all he has to do is wait.

(I got inspired by this post here <- )

[simnopke]

The Sims 2 Legacy Collection: shadow fix

The rerelease of The Sims 2 introduced a fix for the black rectangles under Sims. You may have experienced this bug in the Ultimate Collection version.

As the creator of the Sims Shadow Fix, I was curious to know how it was done. But first, I'd like to explain what the problem with Sim shadows is.

What's the cause of the shadow bug?

When the game works as intended, a Sim shadow texture is a light bluish blob on a white background. It also has transparency, but it's unused. It looks like this:

However, many modern graphics cards render the texture as plain black with transparency:

That's why black rectangles appear under the Sims.

What does my mod do?

My mod is only a workaround for the bug. It uses the transparency to recreate the shadows.

The first versions released in 2015 and 2016 were achromatic, while the original shadows were bluish. Back then I didn't even know why and how my mod worked.

On 2 January 2025 I released new versions based on my research into shaders. I also recreated the original bluish shadows.

How does the Legacy Collection fix the shadow bug?

Thanks to @ivycopur I was able to examine the code. It uses a workaround, just like my mod.

In fact, it looks almost exactly like the really not misty 0.4 version of my mod, which, ironically, is now legacy. The shader code in the Legacy Collection contains the same nonsense. And a bit more.

Code comparison

The left side is the original code extracted from the Materials.package file in The Sims 2 Ultimate Collection. The right side is my code or the Legacy Collection code:

The differences between my code and the LC code:

the debug part: I removed it from my code as players will never see it. The LC has this feature untouched.

alphaBlend srcFactor: despite the difference, it actually changes nothing. Explained later.

The identical changes:

alphaBlend dstFactor,

the same colorScalar has been added,

textureBlend.

Nonsense #1: textureBlend

The textureBlend defines how the colors of the incoming texture are transformed. The first argument is responsible for the color channels, the second – for the transparency.

Originally it's just:

textureBlend select(texture) select(texture)

And it means that the texture is taken as it is.

My and LC code transforms it though. The colorScalar is defined as a partially opaque (40%) black color. The transparency argument takes the transparency of the original texture and darkens it with the 40% factor:

multiply(colorScalar texture)

And this makes sense. The color channels argument takes the transparency part of the texture and makes it pure black, because the color scalar is black:

multiply(colorScalar texture:alphaReplicate)

It's pointless. I could go:

select(colorScalar)

instead. It would be effectively the same.

The texture after the transformations looks like this:

Nonsense #2: alphaBlend

The alphaBlend defines how to mix the source colors (in this case the transformed texture from the textureBlend step) with the destination colors (in this case, the ground under Sim's feet).

The srcFactor argument defines the source color transformations, the dstFaction – defines the destination color transformations. And then they're put together.

Originally it's:

alphaBlend srcFactor(destColor) add dstFactor(zero)

The srcFactor says that the shadow colors are darkened with the ground colors. The dstFactor doesn't really matter because it's multiplied by zero (black). Also, transparency isn't used.

If I understand correctly, you could achieve the same effect with:

alphaBlend srcFactor(zero) add dstFactor(srcColor)

And the final effect is:

My and LC code had to do it differently. The dstFactor says to darken the floor color with inverted transparency:

dstFactor(invSrcAlpha)

It sounds complicated, but the inversion actually means that black becomes white and vice versa. So the transparency texture, which is a dark gray blob on a black background, becomes a light gray blob on a white background.

The srcFactor is actually useless because the shadow texture (from the textureBlend step) is black. So it doesn't matter if you use:

srcFactor(one)

like I did, or:

srcFactor(destColor)

as in the LC code, it will always be black because you can't make black any darker. To make the intention clear, I'd personally go with:

srcFactor(zero)

instead. The final effect would always be:

It's different from the original intended effect. You can even see the difference in the official screenshots:

Source 1 | Source 2

Conclusion

It doesn't look like a coincidence. The cause of the shadow bug hasn't been fixed, and I doubt that an experienced shader creator would come up with such a workaround. There are better ways.

Before you point out that it's against my terms of use to take my code and sell it, especially without credit, hear out. It doesn't matter – EA's policy allows it. And I'm not even angry. It's just funny that they trusted such a messy code. I wouldn't be surprised to see other creators' fixes in the Legacy Collection.

The good thing is that EA has addressed the shadow issue at all. 🙃

[bananasplit133]

BETROTHED?!?

Invincible | Mark Grayson x Tamaranean(Starfire)!Reader

----

(this is kinda rushed, sorry if some things dont match with Tamaranean culture.. i havent watched TT in FOREVER)

-----

Mark had seen a lot of weird things since becoming Invincible. But nothing—nothing—compared to stepping foot on your home planet.

Tamaranean architecture stretched high into the sky, golden spires glowing against the twin suns. The air buzzed with energy, vibrant and warm, as ships zipped past. But what really threw him off was the people.

They didn’t just fly. They soared. They moved through the sky like it was second nature, spinning and twirling mid-air like it was a casual stroll. Bright laughter filled the air as children zipped past, their hands glowing with neon fire.

Mark swallowed. “Uh. You didn’t tell me everyone here was like you.”

You grinned. “What did you expect?”

“I don’t know. I just… I thought you were special.”

You nudged his arm playfully. “I am special.”

Before he could respond, a voice boomed across the palace courtyard.

“You return at last, sister.”

Mark barely had time to react before a tall, striking woman dropped from the sky with all the elegance of a hawk locking onto prey. Her black hair spilled down her back, and her armor gleamed in the sunlight.

His stomach twisted. Oh. This was your sister.

“Komand’r,” you greeted stiffly.

Her glowing eyes flicked to Mark, sharp and calculating. “And who is this? Another Earthling?”

Mark bristled. “Another?”

Your sister smirked. “I assumed my dear sibling would have learned her lesson after the last one.”

Oh. That stung.

Mark shot you a look, but you were glaring at your sister. The tension between you two was thick enough to cut with a blade.

“I see your attitude remains as unbearable as ever,” you muttered.

“And I see your taste in men remains questionable.”

Mark scoffed. “You got something to say?”

Komand’r leaned in, smirking. “Only that you are… soft.”

Mark’s eye twitched. Soft? The last time someone called him soft, he ended up half-dead in space.

You groaned. “Komand’r, please, let’s not do this—”

A loud, wet squelching noise cut through the tension.

Mark turned—only to see a massive, green, multi-eyed blob squirming forward, its trunk-like appendages wiggling with purpose. Its body jiggled slightly as it stopped before you, making a series of deep, guttural gurgles.

Mark stared. Horrified.

“…What the hell is that?”

Your face paled. “Oh. Right. That.”

The blob let out another series of noises, its trunks wiggling in what Mark somehow understood as… pride?

Komand’r smirked. “Did she not tell you? She is to be wed. It is the only way to protect our people.”

Mark turned to you, eyes wide with betrayal. “You’re engaged?!”

“I—it’s complicated!” you said quickly. “I didn’t agree to this!”

The blob burbled.

Mark’s eye twitched. “What do you mean you ‘thought I knew’?? I don’t even know what you are!”

It gurgled again.

Mark recoiled. “EXCUSE ME?!”

Komand’r chuckled. “He says he is deeply honored to take you as his mate.”

Mark gagged. Audibly.

The blob let out a low, vibrating sound that Mark somehow understood as laughter.

His stomach flipped. “Oh, HELL no.”

Komand’r smirked. “You would rather risk war?”

Mark clenched his fists. “Over my dead body is she marrying—” he gestured wildly at the blob “—THAT.”

The blob let out a long, warbling moan.

Mark’s jaw dropped. “I did NOT just insult your lineage! What lineage?! You’re a blob!”

The blob squished aggressively in response.

Mark pointed. “SEE?! THAT'S NOT NORMAL.”

You buried your face in your hands. “Mark, please—”

“NO. NO ‘MARK, PLEASE.’” He turned to you, looking betrayed. “Why didn’t you tell me about this?”

You groaned. “Because I didn’t think it mattered! I never agreed to it!”

Komand’r raised a brow. “You would rather defy our customs?”

Mark snapped.

“She’s not marrying that thing.”

The blob let out a wet, vibrating honk.

Mark whipped around. “Oh, YOU wanna fight me now?!”

More squelching.

Mark’s eye twitched. “Did—did you just call me a ‘puny, hairless primate’??”

The blob wobbled menacingly.

Mark didn't answer.

He just punched it through a wall.

Gasps echoed across the courtyard. Komand’r burst out laughing.

“Oh,” she purred. “I like him.”

You groaned, dragging a hand down your face. “By X’hal, this is going to be a long day…”

[teatime-tangents-and-toys]

Interesting Monster High design things that are never explicitly stated:

* Unlicensed vampires are all some type of pink-skinned for some reason, including related species like the manananggal

* Clawdeen, and by extension, other werewolves, never wear silver metals, because that weakens them. The Wolfs only wear gold jewelry and accents.

* Lagoona's sporty theme aligns with the use of mesh fabrics to make a pun about fishnets

* Wydowna Spider's hairline is a widow's peak and one of her hands is in Spider-Man's web-slinging shape

* Twyla's eyes glow in the dark on most editions--common knowledge, but Mattel has never told buyers about it on her boxes!

* Twyla is a boogeyman and her costume designs all feature antique architectural details and imagery of things that might be in a scary bedroom at night, like wallpaper patterns, doorknobs, bugs, and beds, while her outfits often resemble pajamas

* The two G1 pop star characters are a witch and a black cat, and a witch and cat were also a Create-A-Monster duo

* The Grant sisters' monster twist on genies is to make them plated like desert scorpions

* Elissabat's face is deliberately highly similar to Draculaura's, but their sculpts have been determined to be different--this when MH has used shared sculpts for more distant-looking and disparate pairs of characters!

* The Blob and Ice Girls are a Create-A-Monster duo because freezing was the one weakness of the Blob monster

* Deuce and Cleo as a couple invoke the synergy of snakes and Egyptian culture, the famous Cleopatra being Greek, and Cleopatra being stated in legend to have died by snakebite--similar reasons a mummy and Gorgon were paired in the Create-A-Monster sets

* Operetta is from New Orleans because it's a uniquely French area of the USA, tying her into the original setting of the Phantom of the Opera

* The manufacturing code on the back of Skelita Calaveras' original head mold is a custom sequence made to depict the name "KATRINA".

This refers to the tradition of carving a name of honor into a Dia de Muertos sugar skull, and may also reflect La Catrina, the iconic Mexican skeleton woman in the wide hat often seen in the holiday's imagery. Other dolls have these stamps on the backs of their heads with meaningless sequences of letters and numbers which are never meant to be seen, but Skelita's stamp was used for a purpose. I've checked her dolls after G1 (starting with her first collector doll in 2016), and they have a generic code stamped in and have lost this detail.

* Viperine Gorgon has distinct visual hallmarks of both human and serpent albinism, and her use of sunglasses could correspond with sensitive eyes from the condition, though she's never stated to have the condition in any material.

* Great Scarrier Reef's transformations: Electric-powered Frankie became an electric eel, Draculaura became a vampire squid, and tigerlike Toralei became a lionfish. I've heard Clawdeen was based on a wolffish, but can't be sure that was actually clear. Gil turning into a ray may be a pun with manta and manster? No idea if Lagoona was based on a specific fish or not. Nor why she even had to transform in her native territory for any reason beyond making a new doll.

* Bonita Femur's color palette is based on the rosy maple moth, which is as implausibly candy-colored as Bonita. Luna Mothews is absolutely not actually a luna moth, but could be loosely based on the cecropia moth, the largest in North America and found in regions that could include New Jersey where she's from (or West Virginia, where the Mothman is from). Her yellow exoskeleton also loosely resembles the hornet moth, but may not intentionally be based on it.

* Mouscedes King, Luna Mothews, and Elle Eedee are a primary yellow/red/blue trio but also a past/present/future trio based on an old fairy tale, a current cryptid legend, and a speculative idea of future tech

* Headmistress Bloodgood's first name was eventually revealed to be Nora, an iconically Irish name that may have been chosen to liken Bloodgood to the Irish folklore of the dullahan, another "headless rider" monster.

* River Styxx is a young-adolescent Grim Reaper ghost who is partially translucent, revealing bones in her limbs and having a more opaque face that looks like thin skin over a bony structure. This creates a fun possible worldbuilding idea that reapers start as ghosts with skin and it fades as they develop, becoming full skeletons in classic Death style when mature.

* Peri and Pearl are conjoined Hydra sisters, obviously reflecting a rare human scenario of conjoined twins through the Hydra monster concept, but also possibly being influenced by the animal phenomenon of snakes being born with two heads in an even Y-shaped structure.

* Elle has a separate sculpted panel on her hip where her factory stamp is placed, canonizing the real-world manufacturing artifact as a real/literal/diegetic feature on the manufactured robot character.

* Corazón Marikit's red fringe blends the two halves of her outfit, but also stands in for the gorier imagery of dangling intestines and entrails when the manananggal monster's body splits at the waist. She does have a spine coming out of her upper torso as the peg that clicks her pieces together, but the dolls aren't brutally gory, so her costume alludes to the folklore's more extreme imagery in a graceful way.

* Scary Sweet Birthday Cupid is the only doll in the SSB collection whose cage element is under her skirt rather than on top of it.

This placement and its rectangular silhouette make the cage functional rather than decorative, replicating an old-fashioned crinoline frame used to internally shape big skirts, and its wide boxy shape matches some rococo skirt silhouettes, suiting the other elements Cupid has drawn from the rococo aesthetic, even before G3. Victorian-steampunk Robecca Steam has also worn cage elements that invoke a crinoline without a skirt to be shaped by it.

[my-castles-crumbling]

clay - jegulus raising harry - @into-the-jeggyverse - word count: 431

“...no, he needs yellow hair!” James heard Harry yell indignantly from the kitchen, and he smiled to himself as he walked through the house, having just come home.

“Ah, of course. Yellow hair. Let me just…” Regulus replied softly, his back to James and his body blocking whatever he and Harry were working on diligently at the table, their attention completely absorbed in their project.

“My two favorite boys,” James said in fond greeting, moving to circle his arms around his boyfriend’s waist and press a kiss to Regulus’s cheek before peering over his shoulder. “What are you and Regulus up to, Haz?”

“Regulus is teaching me how to get my anger out,” Harry said seriously, eyes focused on a small clay figure in front of him with light blonde hair and pale skin. Though the blob wasn’t the most distinguishable, it was clearly a human.

Regulus, meanwhile, was creating a just-as-poorly-made figure with long black hair and gray eyes, and little black squiggles all over his body.

“Who are those supposed to be? And how does that get your anger out?” James asked slowly, stepping forward to get a better view and frowning at the ‘art’ in front of him.

“That’s Uncle Pads,” Harry explained, gesturing to Regulus’s sculpture, as if it was obvious. “Reggie’s mad at him for being bramatic.”

“Dramatic,” Regulus corrected, smirking. “He cursed at me for eating the last biscuit. Isn’t that mean, Harry?”

“Cursing is wrong,” Harry nodded solemnly. “And this,” he gestured to his blond-haired figurine, “is a boy from my playgroup. He’s all…” the four-year-old scrunched up his nose and waved his hands in the air while making a snobbish expression.

James chuckled at the boy. “Okay, but that doesn’t answer my other question. How does this help with your anger?”

Regulus gave James a mischievous look. “Ready, Haz?” he asked the bespectacled boy.

“Ready!”

“Three, two, one!”

Bam!

Together, Regulus and Harry slammed their hands down on their creations, smushing them completely under their palms and giggling together.

James gaped. On the one hand, only Regulus could come up with something so…unique to take out his anger. But on the other? Seeing his son and the love of his life laugh together like this made his heart melt.

“Wanna make one, Dad?” Harry asked after his giggles subsided, gesturing to the unused clay.

He tilted his head. But really, the whole thing was adorable, and where was the harm? “Yeah,” he said decisively, reaching forward. “My boss pissed me off today.”

“No cursing!” Regulus and Harry shouted at once, making James laugh.

[sketchingstars03]

My Interpretation of Fell!Ink!

Inspired by a conversation about fell variants with friends of mine. We really weren’t happy with the most popular depiction of Fell!Ink this fandom produced, so I took it upon myself to make my own version!

Some facts about this design and my interpretation’s personality:

The first colours this version experienced were yellow and red instead of yellow and green

The grey undershirt is inspired by the meaning of Ink’s white undershirt in his original design. Where that symbolized the emptiness and lack of soul he tries to hide but always shows through, this shirt symbolizes how fell!ink is even MORE morally grey than his canon counterpart (somehow).

The red splotches on their pants are just paint, but Ink likes that it looks like blood.. in a “15 year old on deviantart making their tragic wolf demon OC” way

Is quite fond of more “angsty” AUs

His scarf producing ink blobs at the top was inspired by how canon fell sans’s jacket sort of “flames up” when using his magic

The darker black colour (I refuse to use pure black) is, on top of being just an Underfell Colour™️, because of how ink itself is primarily black

The “scary face” fangs are permanently visible (it’s an intimidation tactic)

I liked the idea of his scarf going from a lighter to a darker colour instead of a darker to a lighter colour this time. In fact I’ve inverted quiet a few visual elements of the design in that way, most notably the direction of the v-shape on his over shirt thing

This Ink is a lot more open and upfront about seeing everything and everyone as nothing more than fictional characters, and as a result doesn’t really care about anyone else. Only looking out for themselves in such a “kill or be killed” multiverse. Even canon Ink cares more than this guy does.

Still a mischievous prankster, though his pranks are much more mean spirited. He’s an intentional jerk instead of canon Ink’s more unintentional jerkiness.

Much more quick to jump to physical fights when encountering a threat, but still doesn’t go out of his way to be unnecessarily violent. His scarf is torn because of those more frequent fights.

Though not pictured, his tongue is black instead of rainbow. But he still has the rainbow blush and happy freckles! (will not let anyone see them though)

Is still Not Evil

The Delta Rune on the tip of Fountain Pen Broomie (Fountie?) is just a result of that being how I draw Broomie normally 😅. You can change that part of the design if you’d like

So uh, yeah! Hope you like it! (Sorry not sorry for yapping)

OG Ink sans by @comyet

Underfell AU by @underfell

[pathologicalreid]

I'm a terrible writer but always get good ideas lmao

Idk if you've ever seen friends or not but there is this one scene where Rachel and Ross go to a sonogram appt and she has a whole breakdown cause all she saw on the sonogram was a blob and not a baby. (I'm pretty sure it was like their first appt or something idk)

I'm a sucker for dad!spence and you're one of my favorite writers for him.

Feel free to totally ignore this if this is trash lol💓

amorphous | S.R.

your first appointment goes exactly how you expected it to, but not at all how you wanted it to

who? spencer reid x fem!reader category: fluff w/ comfort content warnings: pregnancy, ultrasounds, doctors, pregnancy symptoms, emetophobia warning word count: 795 a/n: i have never seen friends but i hope that this fic does your request justice. ilysm.

You put on a brave face as you accepted your appointment card from the secretary, thanking her for her time before sliding the card into your pocket, trusting that Spencer would remember the date and time of your next appointment.

Everyone had tried to prepare you for this appointment. At eight weeks, all you were going to do was confirm that you were actually pregnant and make sure that you were measuring accurately. The internet told you that was going to happen. Spencer told you that was going to happen. Your OB told you that was going to happen.

None of that prevented the sheer disappointment you felt while leaving the obstetrician’s office. You lagged behind Spencer, taking the steps to the parking lot considerably slower than he was.

It didn’t take him long to notice, keenly aware of your every move as if he had developed a paternal superpower, your husband waited for you at the bottom of the steps. “What’s wrong?”

You opened your mouth to respond, gesturing over to the building before shrugging, “I thought it would help,” you confessed, sticking out your bottom lip in disappointment.

Spencer’s gaze softened as he ushered you off to the side and out of other people’s way. He knew you had been struggling with the lack of visibility that early pregnancy had. You hadn’t told friends and family yet, the only people who knew – aside from medical professionals – were the two of you.

“I just wanted to see it,” you mumbled, looking sheepishly to the ground. “I thought it would make it feel real.”

He nodded in understanding, using the pads of his thumbs to deftly wipe away any stray tears on your cheeks, “You saw the screen though, right?”

You thought you had been looking at the screen, but maybe you had been so distracted by the transducer that your brain hadn’t processed what you had seen. The baby hadn’t been in a good enough position for you to hear the heartbeat.

“Here,” Spencer said, setting his hands on your upper arms before guiding you over to an empty bench. Once you were sat, he dug through your purse and produced the sonogram images that you had been given.

Suspiciously, you eyed the black and white pictures that Spencer had gently set in your lap, “It just… it’s just a little white blob.”

Maintaining your attention, Spencer pointed at the picture, “Do you see this part here? That’s the head,” he dragged his finger over slightly, “There’s the body,” he showed you. Guiding you through the sonogram, showing you every part in hope that it would console you.

“I just…” you faltered, looking at the photos as you tried to see it as a baby instead of a blob, “I don’t have a bump, we couldn’t hear the heartbeat, I guess… I guess I wanted some sign that they’re okay in there.”

Crouched down in front of you, Spencer cocked his head to the side, “Honey, what’s the first thing you did this morning?”

Your eyebrows furrowed in confusion, “I showered?”

Spencer shook his head, “Even before that, the very first thing you did this morning,” he encouraged you.

Your face warmed as your eyes flittered up to his, “I threw up.”

“And do you know what made you so sick?” He asked pointedly. Smiling timidly, you looked down at the photos with a newfound fondness, “The baby.”

He nodded, “Every morning that you wake up nauseous and every time you’re tired in the middle of the day are all little signs that they’re doing just fine.”

You sniffled slightly, wiping tears from your face with the sleeve of your sweater, “I’m sorry,” you murmured, “You probably think I’m being so dramatic.”

“I think you’re scared, and it’s okay to feel that way,” he reassured you. “We’re gonna see them again, okay? Next time we go they’ll be more than three times bigger. Our little blob will have tiny arms and legs.”

You frowned down at the pictures, still frustrated that this was all you had, “Twelve weeks feel so far away.” You had scheduled your nuchal scan for the end of next month, which felt like eons into the future.

Spencer smiled at up at you, “It’ll be here before you know it,” he told you softly, “No more tears, okay? I still have an hour before I have to go to work, did you want to get something to eat?”

Nodding softly, you put the photos back in your purse before standing up, “Yeah, maybe something with raspberries? That’s how big my phone says the baby is – the size of a raspberry.”

Tilting his head back slightly, Spencer chuckled at your proposition, “Absolutely, we’ll find the best raspberry dish in the district.”

[loveyouprongs]

winter mornings

sirius black x fem!reader

upcoming content: fluff!!! literally just fluff!!!! mention of smut at the end, but only a little.

authors note: :] been a hot minute since i wrote something but i hope you all like it! please please please reblog or comment if you enjoyed! it gives me sm motivation❄️

word count: 1.2k

masterlist

the staccato clicks of sirius’ back as he twisted his spine in the sheets served as your alarm for the past week. he let out a soft groan as he ran his hand down his face, then through his hair- which even after two years of being his girlfriend were you mystified at his ability to have his dark locks always fall perfectly into place. “it’s so not fair,” you muttered and you could see a grin spread across sirius’ face before he fully turned back to face you.

sirius darted his stare across your form, your warm body wrapped up in blankets and an image of the stuffed bear he treasured as a child flashed in his mind, only doubling the love inflating him. even with half your face smushed in the pillows and sleep in the corner of your eyes, to him, you’re a siren. he immediately flopped back onto the bed, pressing his body as close to yours as possible, letting his fingers dance across your waste and you shivered from the cold he let in when he lifted the blankets.

“what’s not fair, my love?”

“you.”

“me?” sirius’ eyebrow quirked up, the giddy smile on his face only growing.

“yes, you. your immune to bedhead. it isn’t fair.” you pouted.

sirius let out a giggle that, if he wasn’t lying right in front of you, you’d believe would have come from a child. you remembered when you first met sirius, you couldn’t even look him in the eye, he was that intimidating (and attractive) to you, but now you’re the one who makes him grow bashful from a little compliment slipped into his mornings.

“what can i say, doll, some of us are blessed by the hair-gods.”

you hummed agreeably, twisting his strands through your fingers and sirius basked in the warmth of your skin touching his. god he was pathetic and god was he happy. “and some of us are blessed by them being our boyfriends.”

sirius giggled again, he’s been doing that a lot lately, “c’mere silly,” he whispered, the last syllable already affected by his lips pressing to yours. with a sharp inhale, he branded his hand to the small of your back, bringing you impossibly closer to him as his lips parted and he tilted your head for better access.

the way sirius kissed was addicting. he held you to him tightly, greedily, eating up all the love and affection he never believed he’d ever be on the receiving end of. the way he warmed you from your head to your toes, mouth working yours with passion and care that made you believe he wanted to sometimes eat you up whole, have your body meld into his until you became some “two headed, one body, blob” (his own words)

sirius recalled this to you during a late night makeout session earlier into your relationship, sirius’ eyes rimmed red from the high he was riding, and he pulled back to tell you his wishes.

“siri… that’s so gross!”

“it’s not gross! it’s lovely, we’d be one big person made out of love! but with two heads so we could still chat.”

your body shook as you laughed at the memory. “oi, wha’s s’funny?” he muttered against your lips, “not exactly good to make your girl laugh while your kissing ‘er.”

you let out another bark of laughter, falling back onto the pillow and sirius fell helpless to the magnetic pull you had on him as he rested his head on your chest. the snow was roaring away outside, making it impossible for either of you to leave the flat. not that you wanted to anyway. he couldn’t believe how lucky he was, how lucky he is. a pang of something dark struck in his ribs as he thought of how young he was when he came to terms with being forever alone. how whoever he could pull at some bar or club would be enough to satisfy him. he never thought he’d memorize the rhythm of someones footsteps, come home to two tea-stained mugs in the sink of the flat he shared. never thought someone would be able to split his chest in two and reach in to hold his heart in their soft, soft hands. never thought he wouldn’t find that enough. he wanted to give himself to you entirely.

“what’re y’thinking about?” you asked softly, lightly scratching his scalp and sirius practically purred as he bonked his head against your hand.

sirius propped his chin on your collarbone, faces merely millimeters away from each other. his sparkling silver eyes traced your face in a way that would have made you intimidated in the early days of your relationship, but now you allowed yourself to bask in his gaze.

“you,” he said simply.

“sirius black is thinking about me? wow, dreams do come true!” you gasped, a beaming smile splitting your face.

sirius rolled his eyes at your surprise and snuggled up closer to your warmth, his face fitting into the crook of your neck.

“for your information doll, sirius black is always thinking about you,” he rasped in your ear.

it couldn’t be said any other way, your heart felt like it was going to explode. every now and then sirius would say something so lovely it stopped you in your tracks, made your brain short circuit. and he knew it.

“siriusssss,” you whined, trying to hide your face with no luck as sirius gripped your shoulders.

he chuckled, his stomach rustling the thin sheets. “it’s true,” he crooned.

the two of you laid like that as the minutes of the morning ticked on, both staring at the snow falling down outside the window.

“there is no chance we can go out in that.”

sirius snorted incredulously, “did you have any plans today?”

you turned in his arms, facing him, “well no, but siri, we’ve been inside all week. we’ve become hermits!”

sirius rolled his eyes exaggeratedly, “that’s what winter is about!”

“spending all day lazing about?”

“yes! spending all day under the covers, drinking hot chocolate-“

“that you spike with irish liquor”

“drinking hot chocolate! watch that sass, little lady, or you won’t get to know what the third thing is, and if i know you,” he laughed hautily, “and i think i do, you’ll be sorely disappointed.”

you could feel the once warm energy around you both crackling with electricity, “oh i will be, will i?”

“mm-hmm”

“well, we can’t have that. siri,” you began, blinking your eyes at him as sweetly as you could. the way sirius’ smug grin fell for a second revealing his soft, enamored smile proved to you that it worked. “please tell me what else winter days are for? i would hate to be ‘sorely disappointed.’”

“ah, for you, doll? anything.”

sirius pressed his lips to your ear, shivers ran down your spine.

“winter days are for sleeping, drinking hot chocolate, and eating your girl for lunch.”

the snow was halfway up your window by now and sirius’ hand running up and down your leg further made you feel like the two of you were the only people on earth.

sirius pressed hot kisses to your cheek, trailing downwards your body. “thank god for winter days then.”

[deathofacupid]

★ sum. biker!sukuna showing you how to play fortnite :( ib: @creamflix gamer!choso !! go read kash's stuff i luv her 🔫 ꒰ more for this dynamic. ꒱

"i wanna play," you pout, bored of endlessly scrolling. you toss your phone aside and scoot to the edge of the bed, closer to where sukuna sits in his gaming chair. your long nails tap on the black back of it.

"you?" he asks, eyes still glued to the screen. "you wanna play?" you can faintly hear someone in his headset — toji, you think — and your boyfriend responds, telling him he needs to leave the game.

"yes, i do," you hum, nodding briefly. "pretty please?"

"...sure, petal." sukuna's gaze finally flickers to you, something like amusement tugging at his lips. and just like that, you end up exactly where you are now: sitting in his lap, brows furrowed in concentration.

sukuna mutters the whole point of duos is teamwork, but you're far too distracted by the colorful blobs on screen.

"they're so cute," you giggle. and when you look that adorable, he doesn't mind saving your hide countless times. for the most part, you just follow him around and open all the shiny chests.

he kills a player with just two shots and starts rummaging through their loot. "wait, wait, c'mere," sukuna tells you. you stop pointlessly destroying a tree with your blob and maneuver your character over to him with your joystick, your pink acrylics clicking with the movement..

"trade one of the sprites for the myst gauntlet."

"no," you whine, clutching the controller closer. "i can't do that to them."

"you have five," he deadpans. "just one. the gauntlets do kind of the same thing, anyway."

you pout, looking back at him. "if they're the same, why do i have to give them up? they're all my babies."

watching you bat your lashes, he drops it, letting you have your way. you then watch in awe as he effortlessly wipes out another duo that tries to pass in a car.

"oh, ryo, there's one behind you," you tell him, and he groans, caught off-guard by them.

"shit—" he braces for the end of the round, about to admit defeat, when the person suddenly drops. he tilts his head, then realization dawns on him. "damn, that was you. you got him from behind."

you squeal, and your laughter is contagious, with sukuna's following close behind as your experience points soar from the combat. "that was my first kill!"

"it was. i knew you had it in you," your boyfriend praises, pressing a messy kiss to your cheek. "that's my girl."

"see?" you clap, giddy. "blobs for the win!"

"blobs for the win," he echoes, giving you that patented lovesick look reserved only for you.

[emacrow]

Starlight Toy Galore and Repair Center

"So this is what B wanted us to go under cover and investigate on?" Dick said, looking around the very colorful space theme background toystore.

There were several dozen children running around, some from the streets playing in a playground section, having the time of their life, trading with the owner with their own old broken toy for his toys.

Damian already betrayed them and got sucked into the extra cute extra fuzzy what seemed to be an off-brand of baby alive, blob aliens in another section where there was a bunch of other aliens like toys.

Dick is struggling to keep a hold onto Tim with all of his strength, considering he is eyeing at the awesome looking tech section with a coffee stand corner for adults and parents to chill while the kids play around.

The reason why they were here was that This store wasn't here before 9 months ago and only just got in their radar when a mini green smiling husky three legged puppy with a blue bow toy Keychain of one of hostage in Joker's torture on live to Gotham City spontaneously tripled in sized to a massive adult husky and process to mauled the joker alive in live tv. The sobbing hostage refused to give his toy Keychain close to his chest as he kept mumbling that Milly saved his life once more.

The owner was Danny Nightingale, a very, very tall blind man with extremely long black and white hair in multiple braids with toy crystalized flowers that moved, a frosty blue crown on his head covered in flowers as well. A gentle slim giant of a man who offers a variety of unique, wacky yet creatively fun toys not even for sell but as a trade.

They were supposed to grab a toy for analyzing! Not run around playing with everything!!

And there goes Tim.

Dick sighed as he pressed fingers between his nose before looking up to a section that had a bunch of mini glowing green animals-keychains in a circle rack.

What caught his eyes was one little baby elephant with a circus theme that reminded him too close of zitka.

He couldn't look away, nor could he stop himself from gently picking the Keychain.

A little cute button on the head top garment on the elephant that he pressed lightly.

A tiny, cute elephant noise came with a tiny sprinkle of water squirt out the elephant trunk with a tiny light of starlight rainbow shimmer, which made a smile grow on his face.

Dick ended up trading his bat burger stamped coupons, already walking out, seeing that Tim and Damian were already out with their toys in hand.

Tim was typing on a new tech gimmick toy that looked like Ghostbusters ripoff with glowing humaniod ghosts, and damian fascinated with a a jar full with a swirling bat like blob with a tag that said I am gimgim, thank you for adopting me.

"Well.. B didn't specifically have to give him the toy to analyze." Dick said out of thought before two pair narrowed eyes look back at him, holding their toys closer to their chest.

Dick narrowed his eyes back at them, holding his newly named zitka Keychain in his hand.

Part 2 here <-

[amultitideofdrops]

Thinking Julian and art...

Thinking about how drawing was his favourite activity as a young child. Going through reams of paper, the feel of letting his hand swirl around the page and making colours and lines, delighting in showing his parents and having them smile and laugh over the scrawls that are meant to represent their family. Because it's all very in line with how a 2 year old should draw.

Julian gets older, and his classmates start to make circles for heads, with dots and a wonky smile and long sticks that are meant to be legs. They start holding pencils with their fingers where he still fists a crayon. But it's okay his hands don't seem to move with the same control they do, because Julian still loves drawing. He particularly loves colour because it shows how everything feels even if it doesn't show how it looks to everyone else. His teacher asks them to draw themselves and he rushes to get every blue and purple he can and melds them together in a jumping spiral. His teacher tells him it's nice, but not in the same way she points to the other children's and says how good their ears are, or that the hair colour looks just the same.

His Mum starts to sit by him when he draws, pushing him to copy the squares and triangles from the sheet brought home from school.

Kukalaka rips, and Julian finds the best warm yellow to fix his hurt, even as Mum purses her lips and says it's supposed to match.

His teacher calls his parents in, talking to them gravely and pointing to a curling painted paper, explaining how Julian didn't listen to the assignment, and instead of pets in the garden at home, he hadn't tried and kept drawing the same blobs. Julian stares out the window, the defense that they weren't the same because the dog waved into a brown spiral, and the cat was a smooth dash of it, sticks in his throat.

His parents won't look at his drawings anymore, only telling him he needs to try. And Julian feels the shape of it change and press down on him.

The next meeting with his teacher follows, this time sweet and concerned as she points to the new self portrait, with Julian this time all Sharp edges in black and red.

Adigeon prime happens. Amsha excitedly brings some supplies to the hospital room--a real sketchbook and nicer artists pens then he was ever allowed - and asks him to draw something.

Kukalaka, observing from a shelf too high for him to reach, becomes his subject. And Julian can see every important detail to his shape and his hands follows it on pattern. On the paper becomes a perfect replication of exactly how Kukalaka sits in this moment. His parents are delighted, saying how talented he is. How wonderful his art is now. Julian stares at it well into the night, each pencil stroke, trying to understand where the flaw is because the Kukalaka in the drawing is wrong.

He tries again, usually by an adults prompting, to draw. But now it's a chore, a party trick like he's a machine taking a photograph. The thrill of pulling out something that only existed in his head and putting it to paper is gone, and there's a loss he can't verbalise until he runs his fingers over the yellow thread in Kukalaka.

Years later on Ds9 he Garak and Ziyal discuss art. Or rather, they listen to Ziyal excitedly talk about expressing herself in every medium she can get her hands on. Garak admits a modest ability, demonstrating a cartoon like style on the PADD between them. When they ask Julian he finds himself pausing, pen almost going to automatically trace Ds9 on the PADD, before letting it idly doodle across the screen in a soothing way.

"Ah, I've never had the talent for art you see."