#this is my great monkey's paw

[rxttenfish]

slowly returning to the big miravi fic i was working on and trying to recall everything that i was going to have each individual chapter be, though i might also discard the chapter names i had going as a theme (or to add them back later, after its finished) since i dont know exactly how many chapters this will be

also im thinking about adding another merfolk in the beginning scene, both because it helps set the scene as something weird going on (since miranda's serfs are notably not merfolk and aaravi has only seen other merfolk than miri and bell inside of the actual merkingdom), and because im REALLY thinking about how i write the help lately and all of miri's serfs and staff and servants and fleshing them out. its been a huge pain in my side how every single fucking thing lately refuses to include the help and to write them out, including trying to include rich, powerful characters who dont need staff or help to run their estates or do anything, in a way that notably does not exist in reality and only serves to further mentally and psychologically separate out the classes.

which is both good and bad because, oh boy, i get to design more merfolk characters! but also, OH NO, I HAVE TO DESIGN MORE MERFOLK CHARACTERS.

[thormanick]

All the Kavetham/Haikaveh ideas I don't have capacity to currently write, a very detailed list:

(Which I am humbly placing here before you. Be warned: this post is an incredibly long one!)

1. Fatui!Kaveh AU, where the night before the meeting happens between Kaveh and Alhaitham at the tavern, Kaveh gets a deal from Fatui representatives to work on a huge project in Snezhnaya. Kaveh is sceptical about it, but decides to accept the offer during the dialogue with Alhaitham (seeing himself as a burden, Kaveh decides that he will cause more trouble to Alhaitham than the Fatui, thus he decides to accept their offer even if it seems too good to be true). He tells Alhaitham about his decision to leave for Snezhnaya, and so the two relatively amicably/peacefully part their ways (not without Alhaitham testing Kaveh's reasoning a bit, but Kaveh's resolve remains strong).

And so, Kaveh leaves for Snezhnaya, where he gets to work on several huge projects for the next several years under Sandrone. Most of them are related to construction, engineering and reverse-engineering of Khaenri'ahn and Khaenri'ah-inspired technology, and he gets barely any time to work on his personal projects (he's overworked and exhausted and doesn't get much time and opportunity to be creative; however, the payments are good and he's on his way to getting out of debt, which is practically the sole reason driving him forward. The projects get progressively more complicated and, in a way, unhinged - engineering military equipment is alright, but working with the remains of Khaenri'ahn technology, dead gods and such proves to be... mentally taxing. Everything happens very gradually though, so Kaveh does not immediately notice the true scale of where the Fatui are ready to go to achieve certain goals). Kaveh doesn't really like the work environment of the Fatui, but he does his best (the Harbingers creep him out whenever he gets to see them on a rare official occasion (he might specifically dislike Pantalone because the Harbinger keeps picking at him for his debt, given a chance), but Sandrone's a decent boss who is somewhat encouraging and invested in his work and personal projects. She might be especially interested in Mehrak's existence and operation). Overall, everything goes quite smoothly for Kaveh, even if he doesn't feel quite at home in Snezhnaya and is aware of how dangerous the Fatui can be. He does not consider himself to be paranoid, but the other shoe has to drop at some point - and that happens when the new Acting Grand Sage of Sumeru gets to visit Snezhnaya on a diplomatic mission (aka: Kaveh reconnects with Alhaitham & Co for the first time in what feels like forever). The situation gets complicated when Kaveh realizes that Sandrone encourages the reestablishment of his connection with Alhaitham specifically - and she never encourages an action if she doesn't directly contribute from it.

Feelings, emotions and shenanigans ensue.

TLDR: Kaveh's doing his best despite being restricted in his ways of work, prevented from realizing most of his creative projects and slowly but surely building emotional walls around himself because Fatui and Snezhnaya; Sandrone being a kind of decent boss with sorta good work ethic but horrendous morals who is not exactly a good influence on Kaveh's idealistic tendencies and guilt complex; Fatui being contextually horrifying but kinda normal coworkers if you don't look at them too close; Alhaitham trying his best as a political figure (Nahida help him) while also trying to get Kaveh to return home with him (because he misses him); the main conflict revolving around Kaveh and his life choices with Sandrone and Alhaitham being kind of foils to each other (with Sandrone gradually destroying Kaveh's idealistic morals and playing on his guilt to get the most out of his potential as an innovator, and with Alhaitham actively trying to resolve Kaveh's guilt and show him that, despite their arguments, Kaveh's idealism still has place in the world and can co-exist with other philosophies). There might or might not be some macguffin-esque Deshret relic that both Akademia and Fatui hunt for that eventually brings the whole crew back to Sumeru. Kaveh might or might not get a chance to meet a fragment of Deshret's spirit within the mentioned relic. But there definitely will be a happy end for everyone here (Deshret will make sure of it).

2. Calamity!AU. The new Cataclysm comes, enveloping all Seven Nations, and so Sumeru does its best to survive. The cities are ruined, and the people gather together in random places to survive. Alhaitham gets to live within one of the settlements, established by the Akademiya. While trying to survive the first wave of the new Calamity, he is also looking for Kaveh; after an argument between the two the architect left for an expedition to the Desert, right before the new Calamity began. Unfortunately, the news comes that his group should have been around Tunigi Hollow - one of the spots in Sumeru where the first wave of the new Calamity hit the hardest. There is no concrete information on whether Kaveh's group survived or not. Alhaitham, not loosing hope, does his best to find any information on Kaveh's whereabouts, but due to Sumeru becoming extremely dangerous to traverse and disjointed as a result of the new Calamity, the search stretches out for almost a decade.

One day Alhaitham helps a caravan, traversing the forests to get to one of the settlements, to fight off the monsters. Unexpectedly, Kaveh turns out to be one of the members of the caravan. Their reunion is almost cut short by the caravan's need to keep going, but Alhaitham convinces Kaveh to join him instead. The two return to the new Sumeru city settlement, where Alhaitham lives and works under the watch of Akademiya and Lord Kusanali. It appears that during his years of travels around the destroyed Sumeru Kaveh learned new ways of architectural construction that would be more efficient against the monsters, born by the Calamity. He also seems to behave quite differently, hardened by the experiences of the past years. Alhaitham proposes for Kaveh to stay with him in the city, and Kaveh accepts. The feelings, new routines, dealings with the changed versions of each other and attempts to find new pace of life in the new world ensue.

TLDR: The world might be ending and impossible to live in, but even so each new day is brighter when the person one loves is by their side.

3. Another Cataclysm!AU, where Kaveh and Alhaitham get assigned separate missions in the grander scheme of things created to prevent the coming of a new Calamity. The plan succeeds and the world remains safe, but not without heavy losses: amongst many others, Kaveh does not survive while carrying out his mission.

Decades pass as Alhaitham goes through his grieving process. Eventually, one evening on the anniversary of the Calamity's prevention, Alhaitham wanders to a place he and Kaveh used to visit together. A Ley Line disruption occurs, and he gets to see a glimpse of Kaveh through it. They have a conversation; the Ley Line apparition (a memory of Kaveh) is convinced that Alhaitham is from the future, and so they talk a lot about the Calamity, whether it was prevented, and about each other's futures. Alhaitham can't bring himself to tell Kaveh that he does not survive the Calamity, but he does tell Kaveh that his architectural legacy lives on. Kaveh commends Alhaitham on his achievements (though not an acting grand sage for a very long time, Alhaitham kept playing an important role throughout Sumeru's history, helping to keep it safe).

Eventually, their time runs out. Ley Line disorder starts gradually disappearing. Alhaitham urges Kaveh to be careful and stay safe, knowing that the Calamity (on Kaveh's side) is yet to come. Kaveh laughs and tells him that on his side, Alhaitham just told him the same words after they finished the debriefing session, related to the Calamity. He says that he was feeling very nervous, but that seeing future-Alhaitham made him convinced that they are on the right path.

And so, the Ley Line disorder disappears. Alhaitham spends some more time at the spot before returning home. Despite painful memories having been brought up, his heart feels a bit lighter.

TLDR: closure comes unexpectedly, takes many forms and does not erase the pain in an instant, but, nevertheless, it heals.

4. AU! where Kaveh and Alhaitham are both magical birds that can transform into humans (and half-humans).

They live together in the depths of Sumeru forest - a domain of a long lost God of Wisdom. Kaveh's feathers are rumoured to bring blessings, while Alhaitham's feathers, on the contrary, are said to bring bad luck or even curses. Humans, living at the edge of magical forest, kinda worship them, but also prefer not to interact with them, primarily because Alhaitham is not happy when others trespass on his lands, and because searching for Kaveh is extremely hard (he's often off working on his projects deep within the forest), and the magical forest is very dangerous on its own. So, the humans build their cities outside of the Sumeru forest, and Alhaitham and Kaveh peacefully live together in the depths of it.

Despite Kaveh and Alhaitham living together for a long time, their opinions on humanity are diametrically opposed: Alhaitham barely tolerates humans, finding them to be reckless, meddling, cowardly and deceitful; Kaveh, on the contrary, finds humans to be creative, inspiring, free and beautiful in their own way. Throughout the years, Kaveh manages to build somewhat of an amicable relationship with the humans, living at the edge of the forest: he learns more about their traditions and arts, while the humans receive his guidance and blessings in various matters of living, craftsmanship and arts. Eventually, Kaveh's knowledge and magical powers catch the eye of Lord Sangemah Bay, who resides in and governs one of the bigger settlements at the forest's border. She makes a deal with Kaveh that, despite providing him with valuable (in his eyes) experience of working with humans on some of his grandest architectural projects, costs him a lot - meaning he has to give away lots of his blessed feathers, which makes his remaining magic much weaker (and generally undermines his health for a bit). Alhaitham is not a huge fan of such approach (in his eyes, Kaveh is wasting his powers and time for nothing, endangering himself), and so a conflict between him and Kaveh breaks. As a result, Kaveh flees their home, secluding himself while he's focusing on other projects he finds curious. Kaveh keeps working with humans, and though Alhaitham certainly keeps an eye on Kaveh's wellbeing, he does not make it easy for humans to reach him. So what if there are new random magical seals, obstacles, almost-traps and riddles appearing here and there when people try to get to Kaveh? It's a magical forest, things happen! (Kaveh knows that Alhaitham does this on purpose, and Alhaitham knows that Kaveh knows, and it leads to them indirectly, and then directly bickering and arguing. The magical forest quite possibly grows very tired of them. Their friends Tighnari and Cyno certainly do, but alas.)

The new equilibrium, found by Alhaitham and Kaveh, is challenged once more when Kaveh leaves to the Lord Sangemah Bay's city to direct yet another one of his grand projects. They do not see each other for a long while. Despite all the challenges, Kaveh's relationship with Dori gradually grows stronger - the two value their partnership - and Kaveh ends up making friends amongst humans. However, not everyone is happy about Lord Sangema Bay's growing friendship with the "deity of blessings" personified. As some people come to despise her for her wealth, influence and ever growing power, so do they come to despise the bird of paradise.

When the project is complete, the time for celebration comes. Kaveh gets to attend a feast by Dori's side as a guest of honour, and is invited to stay the night in her palace before returning to the forest. Kaveh agrees: he's been spending all his days and nights at the building site, and resting a night before returning home would be nice. As the night goes on, however, Kaveh begins to feel weary and unwell - the new type of wine he was served did him no good. He excuses himself early for the night and, as soon as he gets to his bed, he's out cold.

After an undetermined amount of time (in what appears to be the middle of the night), Kaveh wakes up because of immense pain in his back.

As he gradually comes to his senses, he has a horrible realization: one of his wings was cut off when he was asleep. Alerting the guards and Dori yields no results: the intruder escaped, presumably with Kaveh's wing, and there are no traces of them left. While Kaveh gets immediately attended to, he goes in shock and, eventually, loses consciousness.

When the messengers form the city arrive to the forest, Alhaitham receives them reluctantly at first, but as soon as he hears of what happened, he rushes to the city. He ends up taking Kaveh back to the forest, hoping that its healing magic will help restore his wing. However, nothing seems to work: neither spells, nor the powers of nature, not even Tighnari's medicine. Though the wound is slowly healing, Kaveh remains unconscious for days. To get more information on what happened, Alhaitham returns to the city to question Dori together with Cyno (who's also to continue the investigation within the city once Alhaitham returns home), while Tighnari stays with Kaveh.

Though the questioning concludes that Dori knows nothing and is willing to assist in the search of the perpetrator, Cyno concludes that she was not thorough enough in ensuring Kaveh's safety and overall security of the celebration in general, revealing that Dori recklessly cut corners here and there. Furious, Alhaitham leaves Dori his cursed feather, giving her an ultimatum: she has to find the perpetrator and give them to Alhaitham to deal the final punishment. Until then, her city is doomed to slowly crumble into decay and oblivion. Dori accepts the deal.

Alhaitham returns to the forest to look after Kaveh, while Cyno remains in the city to continue the search. When Alhaitham comes back, Kaveh is finally awake. However, he remains extremely closed-off, practically a shadow of himself. The recovery process is slow and challenging, but Alhaitham does his best to support Kaveh in all ways that matter. Kaveh struggles with healing: the loss of a wing affected not only his body, but also his mental state and magic. He cannot transform, he can barely use any of his magical skills, and he cannot fly anymore, which hurts him most of all. It takes a while for Kaveh to get on his feet (quite literally), even longer to finally leave his room. He also feels guilty for being in Alhaitham's care, because he remembers all of the Alhaitham warnings about the humans he didn't listen to, and so lots of internal conflict ensues.

Meanwhile Alhaitham does all he can to try and navigate the situation. He looks after Kaveh's healing process; brings back his blueprints and equipment from Kaveh's place so that he has enough to work with if he wishes; he also (to the best of his ability) remodels their home to make it more accessible to Kaveh. Given that their natural method of moving around their house was flying (whether in form of birds of half-humans), Alhaitham now implements more adjustments for walking or climbing. (When Kaveh feels good enough to leave his room, he's amazed by what Alhaitham managed to achieve. He also helps fix some of the constructions, given he's the one with the experience in architecture.) Alhaitham and Kaveh grow closer, slowly unpacking and mending their relationship, turning it into something new and beautiful.

At the same time, Alhaitham continues to watch the forest borders - to make sure that no intruders interrupt Kaveh's recovery and their peaceful life together. One day he notices an interesting sight: a small, but beautiful shrine appeared right by the forest. He decides to investigate; upon approaching the shrine, he meets Nilou (whom he saw in the palace when he visited Dori). She explains to him that, after he and Kaveh left the city, a group of people decided to organize a shrine, dedicated to Kaveh, to pray for his recovery. Nilou explains that in their eyes it's the least they can offer for all the help that their city received in the past and as amends for the pain they have caused. Alhaitham warns her not to get any closer to the forest, but the action of people leaves a lasting impression on him.

Meanwhile, Cyno's investigation progresses. Cyno writes to Alhaitham that together with Dori they managed to find and capture the perpetrator. Questioning reveals no useful information, but Cyno suspects that there might be more to the attack on Kaveh than they anticipated. To uphold his end of the deal Alhaitham goes to the city to deliver the punishment to the attacker and to undo the curse he put on Dori's city. Before he leaves, Kaveh, scared of what might happen to Alhaitham, sews into his cloak a blessed feather for protection (because Alhaitham wouldn't accept it outright). While Alhaitham is away, Kaveh begins working on a new project: a mechanical wing.

When Alhaitham gets to the city, he is led to the cell where the attacker is being held. Cyno and Dori are by his side for the final questioning. The man - a mere mortal (with strange red-ish eyes), one of Dori's citizens - keeps talking in circles, making less and less sense with each new word. Alhaitham lets Cyno and Dori go before rendering the punishment. When the curse (one of Alhaitham's darkest yet) is finally prepared, suddenly, the tables are turned. The perpetrator attacks Alhaitham, but his movements seem unnatural, almost like those of a puppet. Alhaitham realizes, that the man is being controlled by someone with prowess for strong, incredibly dark magic that seems similar to that of the Desert. The strange puppet manages to overpower Alhaitham in a fight, but cannot harm him (due to the protection from Kaveh's feather). The perpetrator manages to escape, taking with him Alhaitham's cursed feather (they seemed to be pleased to receive it. Alhaitham fears to think what they will use it for).

Dori and Cyno pick up the investigation, with Cyno going straight to the Desert. Dori begins reinforcing the city (her people discover that Alhaithams curse (now lifted) awakened Miasma deep under the ground. The Miasma begins to slowly spread, seemingly in the direction of the Sumeru Forest). Cyno sends back a message, confirming that strong and dark magic seems to be gathering within the Desert, possibly for the purpose of destroying the magical forest.

Alhaitham manages to get back to Kaveh and tell him of what happened in the city. In order to be able to protect the forest together with Alhaitham, Kaveh doubles down on his efforts to create a mechanical working wing. Everything works, besides the golden feathers - they need to be blessed in order to allow the mechanism to work as intended, but Kaveh does not have enough power for it. Alhaitham takes a risk and brings the feathers to the shrine, created by Nilou and other humans, so that they could bless them for Kaveh. (They are short of one feather eventually, and Alhaitham gives Kaveh one of his own, his first blessed feather, to complete the wing.)

TLDR: Kaveh works on restoring his wing and faith in himself and humanity; Alhaitham learns that humanity is not always evil. Dori and Cyno discover that the escaped perpetrator (caugh controlled by Dottore caugh) used Kaveh to get to Alhaitham to gain his cursed feather for completing some sort of ancient ritual to unseal the forbidden knowledge magic deep within the Desert in roder to unleash it on the magical forest, slumbering God of Wisdom and human cities. Kaveh learns to curse his feathers (while opposing Dottore in a final fight), and Alhaitham learns to bless his. Humans and Sumeru Forest continue to coexist peacefully. Alhaitham and Kaveh live together happily ever after.

5. Pacific Rim!AU, where Kaveh and Alhaitham used to be pilots of a Jaeger, but during one of their battles they suffered too much damage. In order to save Alhaitham and what remains of their Jaeger, Kaveh takes most of the damage by severing already unstable connection between Alhaitham and Jaeger's system. Both barely survive the encounter, but meanwhile Alhaitham manages to recover fast, the damage Kaveh has taken leaves him in a critical condition, eventually resulting in him being unable to ever pilot a Jaeger ever again (and putting many new restraints on his usual daily life).

As soon as Kaveh comes to his senses, the two have a huge fight about Kaveh's rash decision, and eventually break off their friendship. They don't see each other for a long, long time.

As the time goes on, Kaveh learns how to live with the changes that his body sustained with the help of his service dog Mehrak. Eventually he takes on a job at one of the Jaeger construction facilities (together with his friend Tighnari), studying Kaiju and creating new Jaeger modifications - though no Kaiju has been seen in the past several years, the world is still afraid of their return.

When the suspicion of the new Kaiju appearance arises, new pilot recruits and ex-pilots are summoned to the facility. There, Kaveh meets Alhaitham for the first time in years. After their fallout, Alahitham resigned from piloting Jaegers, yet now he had no choice but to return to train new recruits (and possibly resume his role of a Jaeger pilot). Now once again the two have to work together as a part of a team in face of approaching danger, trying to resolve their past conflicts and overcome their fears and insecurities along the way (when deep down they simply want to keep each other safe).

TLDR: Kaveh & service animal Mehrak is a neat concept I'd love to see more of, just as a concept in general. I think this one could be an interesting story idea centered mostly around Kaveh's day to day life. Additionally, Alhaitham who used to be only drift compatible with Kaveh but now suddenly discovers he's drift compatible with Cyno. I need more Cyno & Alhaitham camaraderie I think it would do them lots of good (at least in this specific AU setting lol).

6. Oxenfree!AU where Kaveh and Alhaitham are two ex-best friends turned reluctant coworkers (photo-journalist and journalist respectively) working on writing a piece about the disappearances of a group of teenagers that happened at the Edwards Island several years prior (timeline somewhere between the first and the second games). The radio shenanigans ensue, making the two face their past, possible futures and, most importantly, their present. (In Oxenfree tuning into certain radio sequences can temporarily mess up time-space shenanigans, just fyi).

TLDR: I just think that this setting could facilitate some character exploration that would be very fun.

7. Modern MermanKaveh!AU, post-fallout, where it's a little bit more about haunting Alhaitham (and the narrative), than being a merman. Due to an unfortunate set of circumstances, Kaveh drowns one day, trying to save someone from the water. Due to an unfortunate set of circumstances, he doesn't really die, being stuck in between (existence and death, normal life and the necessity to live in water). Kaveh manages, for quite a while even!

But of course Alhaitham has to come back and turn his world upside down once again.

TLDR: can you tell Alhaitham's quote about drowning stuck with me huh (and I made it literal lol). On a serious note... Idk, vibes??? I want to see the "stuck in the middle" Kaveh, whatever that entails. Some existential explorations. And the development of his relationship with Alhaitham, of course. // Kaveh is a merman unable to fully live the life he used to have, and Alhaitham doesn't know that he survived (for a while), alternatively "let me help to save you from metaphorical and literal drowning" Alhaitham and "I learned to live like this, this is what my norm now looks like" Kaveh.

8. Another Modern MermanKaveh!AU/DrownedGhostKaveh!AU, because I apparently have no self-control (I feel like I should also clarify that whenever I mention a mermaid, I think of them more as of ghosts of drowned people and less as mermaids-mermaids, the half-human half-marine creature ones). This idea was initially prepared for chili/zhongchi but it's been sooooooooooooooooooo long and I still haven't done anything substantial for it so I'm borrowing it from myself for myself and tweaking it for kavetham because I figured it could fit them. So here it goes,

Alhaitham is a scientist/marine biologist that moves from the city to a much smaller port town, getting himself a place in a local partially repurposed lighthouse. Kaveh is a merman, who has been dead for a long while and who's been living within local waters ever since he drowned. Alhaitham leads a very isolated life, going through a rather rough patch emotionally (maybe a badly ended past relationship and relocation from an established group of friends to a remote place brought up past negative emotions related to loss that were bottled up for a while. who knows, not me). Anyways, Alhaitham's not doing too well, but seaside walks help him unwind, even if for a short periods of time. During one of such walks, he finds an old pendant washed ashore. He picks up his find, hoping to do some research on it outside of his work time (because research is his fun-time).

He expects this to be a brief excursion into local history. He does not expect to become haunted by the ghost of a man to whom this pendant belonged to way back when.

Kaveh, in turn, is extremely excited to finally, finally be able to get out of the sea to the surface. He intends to stay ashore as long as possible and, well, if he just so gets to amuse himself by haunting a grumpy marine biologist that refuses to believe in merpeople, ghosts of drowned and other supernatural occurences - who's he to say no?

TLDR: this AU can go two ways (in my eyes): the happy ending way and probably more gothic-horror-story-esque ending. So, Alahitham is cursed to be haunted by Kaveh: for a while he's the only one who can see him, with Kaveh being something akin to a ghost. However, the longer Kaveh haunts Alhaitham, the more human he becomes (others can see him, he cannot phase through walls anymore, etc.). The curse in itself goes something like this: the cursed thing, after being picked up/taken in, cannot be thrown away and will always come back. The ghost, tied to the haunted thing, shall haunt whoever picks the cursed thing (the thing should be tied to the ghost, but may not necessarily belong to them) and drain their life energy. The ghost can become free and human again if the haunting goes long enough and they kill the human who picked the cursed object in the end during a very specific time that doesn't occur too often (proverbial blue moon, idk). If they don't kill the human and decide to let them go, then the ghost will seize to exist and the human will regain their strength. (An alternative option to the ghost dying for a less angsty au: the ghost voluntarily takes back the cursed object and returns to the place where they died, but then they will never be able to haunt anyone ever again. The effect of the curse on the haunted remain, but much weaker).

In this case, let's say Kaveh and Alhaitham stay by each other's side from half a year to a year, idk. They grow closer, eventually becoming friends and maybe more (the usual kavetham shenanigans Kaveh falls first but Alhaitham falls harder). Alhaitham's mental state gradually improves, yet overall he becomes weaker because of the curse (to the point that it becomes a serious concern), which Kaveh blames himself for. The appointed time approaches (both Kaveh and Alhaitham are in on the details of the curse), and Kaveh, seeing it as an opportunity to set Alhaitham free, manages to separate himself from Alhaitham. Kaveh is ready to return to the sea/merge with it (ah yes the classic Little Mermaid influence does anybody feel it lol). However, Alhaitham sees through his plan and arrives just in time to stop him. They have a confrontation. Eventually, they manage to lift the curse (as you can see I have not figured out exactly how this can happen but! it definitely can!) with Kaveh becoming human again and Alhaitham regaining his health. The two continue to live together happily ever after.

The other scenario is practically the same, but it's more ghothic? and abstract (and probably more suitable for the og pairing it was made for, but i'll throw it in anyways). I have not engaged with gothic literature much and thus don't have much experience in how it works/how to write it, but the idea is that Kaveh is more of a projection of Alhaitham's grief than a ghost fo a drowned person (in other words, he's definitely a ghost, but his presence is also much more symbolical). The story follows quite similar beats, except the setting of the curse is a bit different: it's more of a "kill first or be killed" thingy with a deadline. Kaveh earnestly tries to drown Alhaitham at first through various means, but the more time they spend together, the more Kaveh sees of Alhaitham's life and pain and feels sympathetic for him. Despite the curse, Kaveh tires to help Alhaitham in various ways; and it works! Alhaitham gradually begins to feel better; the two grow closer to each other (more in a platonic way).

So now the precedent is that though Alhaitham's overall doing better, the curse still preys on him, hindering his life in various ways that become more and more serious/dangerous (the curse's deadline approaches, and it tries to survive the best way it can through Kaveh's influence on Alhaitham). Eventually, Kaveh lets Alhaitham go, merging with the sea (once again, yes, it was partially inspired by the Little Mermaid). Alhaitham realizes what happened and tries to look for Kaveh, but it is in vain.

Eventually, life goes on.

Bonus Elden Ring AU (because guess who suddenly went on a lore video watching spree): Kaveh is a craftsman and one of the inhabitants of Castle Morne who managed to escape before it was overrun by Misbegotten. He's a follower of St. Trina and Miquella (he doesn't follow Miquella at first, but slowly he comes to suspect that the two are one and the same). After escaping from Castle Morne, he finds his way to Jarburg, where he is welcomed to stay and be the new Potentate.

Alhaitham is from a distant branch of Carian royal family and a scholar at the Academy of Raya Lucaria. Quite possibly explored an area of studies similar to Sellen's. Eventually he separates himself from both Academy and his family, becoming a wandering scholar.

The two meet somewhere nearby Jarburg when Kaveh gets ambushed by the same people who were trying to get to Alhaitham. The two fight them off. Kaveh, trying to help injured Alhaitham, leads him to Jarburg. The two continue living together there ever since (not without hiccups, but they're doing their best).

TLDR: this one is short and very simple because I just started diving into the Elden Ring's lore, but I just. Really wanted to make some AU for them. I also desperately wanted it to be peaceful and happy one despite it being a seeming impossibility for anything dark souls/elden ring related, but one can dream. If I were to make this one darker I'd probably expand on the duality of their two characters here, and how Alhaitham probably used to conjure spells on humans (with gaining knowledge being his sole life purpose for a long time) and has challenges with comprehending the world outside of a framework of pure logic, and how Kaveh gets an increasing tendency of escaping to the dream world/wherever Miquella is in order to alleviate his mental turmoil (maybe he witnessed too much during his escape from the Castle), and how the two have opposing perspectives on the idea of worshipping gods, and- like, there's a lot that can be done. But I also just really really really want them to simply be happy together in a jar village, leading a peaceful life.

That's it for now! Thank you for reading all of this, I can't commend your patience enough if you got to the end of this list!!!✨🎉✨

Maybe in the future I will unpack some of these aus. who knows.

[przeorysza]

my job in tlk commune will be making shitty pop edits

[meegan420]

would it b fine if i ask you to do a hamster vers. of rebecca cotswolds ? ( n by extension maybe her brother too... ) <3 u dont have to but ir would really make my day !

Mark,Rebecca, and Kyle South Park/South Paws 🐾

Great Ask <3 I hope you like it. I love this episode! Have an Awesome Day :)

[needsmoreresearch]

man paul fussell is so mad at that stupid Flanders Fields poem and he is so right and can keep on saying it louder for the people in the back

[muninnhuginn]

Trying to figure out what happens in good omens s2 with the spoilers tag blocked and it's very... sorry that happened/congratulations?

[agnerd-bot]

Good News: Death Battle is back, baby, and they got one hell of a backing from fans now!

Bad News: Ash Vs Yugi is Episode 200.

[ghostingfee]

I don't think I've ever despised a fictional character like I despise Fitz from Scandal

[bitterkarella]

Midnight Pals: The Monkey's Paw

WW Jacobs: Submitted for the approval of the Midnight Society, I call this the tale of the monkey's paw Jacobs: it's about a monkey paw that grants wishes King: sounds great! Jacobs: no it's not Jacobs: it's really bad actually

Jacobs: see, the thing is the monkey's paw grants wishes IRONICALLY Jacobs: like a real asshole genie or something

Jacobs: there's this british couple and they use it to wish for money, but then their son dies in a horrible industrial accident and they get the insurance money Jacobs: and then they wish he was still alive Jacobs: but he comes back all fucked up

Jacobs: so they use their last wish to wish he was dead again Koontz: why didn't they just wish that he was back just the same as when he was alive? Barker: yeeeah Barker: dean's got a point Barker: yeah why DIDN'T they?

Jacobs: that's not the way it works Jacobs: you can't just trick a monkey's paw King: i don't know, i think they're on to something King: it's really just a problem with not being specific enough, isn't it? King: like if you just worded it right Jacobs: THAT'S NOT HOW IT WORKS

Jacobs: you can't trick a monkey's paw! Barker: why not? i'm smarter than a monkey Poe: can we please stop talking about monkeys Barker: oh i forgot, edgar's afraid of monkeys Poe: I am NOT afraid of monkeys Barker: sorry, i meant apes Poe: I'm not afraid of apes either!!

King: you know what this reminds me of? my favorite cormoran strike book. have you guys read any cormoran strike? Barker: oh jesus here we go again Barker: i WISH something would free me from listening to this again! Elon Musk: [rising from bushes] eyyyy stephano king! Barker:

Musk: eyyyy stephano king mi amigo ey? King: we're not friends elon Musk: si si musk and king, we-a real bambinos ey! King: don't you have some kids to raise or something, elon? Musk: MY KID ISSA DEAD Musk: THATA MEANS YOU ALLA HAVE TO BE NICE TO ME

Musk: my kid issa dead Barker: that's not what i hear, she's roasting your ass on threads Musk: mama mia! Barker: and turns out she's really good at posting Barker: are you sure she's actually YOUR kid? King: she must take after her mother

Musk: mama mia they trick me into signing consent form for puberty blockers!!! Barker: how do they trick you into signing a consent form Musk: Barker: do you not have reading comprehension? Musk: they hide it in a big pile of ketamine! Musk: itsa no fair!

Musk: eyyy why my kid no like-a me? Barker: is it because you're an absentee father who turned twitter into a chud echo chamber specifically to bully her? Musk: Musk: no Musk: issa because da woke mind virus Musk: ima da smartest man inna da world!

Musk: why you no like me? issa cuz you all gotta da woke mind virus? Poe: elon calm down Barker: yes elon that's right, everything's the woke mind virus Poe: don't say that clive, you're going to get him riled up Musk: mama mia!!!

Musk: i never stop fighting da woke mind virus! Musk: ima da smartest man inna da world! [immediately smashes into the side of a cliff painted to look like a tunnel]

[theresattrpgforthat]

Do you have any solo ttrpgs that deal with like being a bodyguard or someone's knight? It's something I've had rattling around in my head for a while

Theme: Solo Knights

Hello friend, no luck in the bodyguard department but I sure do have some knight games! Let’s take a look.

Frog Errant, by ManaDawn Tabletop Games.

It’s a deadly and brutal world out there, and it is not too friendly for a lone frog. But if you embrace your quest and heed the omens, you may just be able to make a name for yourself. And if you wander long and far enough, you may be remembered in the songs of both frogs and mice.

Frog Errant is a solo, or GMless, game mode for Mausritter or other Into the Odd based games. In Frog Errant you will take up the role of a wandering frog knight-errant, seeking adventure, looking to fulfill a Quest - all while avoiding you prophesied Doom.

If you are familiar with Mausritter, then this game will be pretty easy to pick up. The game builds in some story that isn’t present in Mausritter - primarily the Quest that has been given to your frog knight, as well as a Doom that has been prophesied to overcome you. It looks like you can use a lot of the items and monsters from Mausritter, but Frog Errant has plenty of new pieces too!

Misericorde, by Andrew White.

Misericorde is a game of knightly romance, pining, unrequited love and confronting the expected behaviours of your social class. You play as a squire serving under a knight on a great quest, without your assistance they surely will fail and yet, as a squire you are obligated to remain in the background, forgotten and not commented on. However, you have developed feelings, perhaps unrequited, for your knight. The actions of the game focus on this struggle, between your Duty and your Desire. Will you hold back, hew to your duty and rank; or will you break free and open your heart, no matter how your beloved may respond.

You’re not exactly a knight in this game, but rather a squire to one. Misericorde is completely unlike the other games on this list because it focuses on devotion and desire, rather than the actions that a forsworn duty drives a Knight to do. You play the game by setting up scenes, asking questions, and rolling dice on an Oracle to figure out what happens next. This is an interpretive game, so while the Oracle will point you in a direction, you determine what exactly each result means.

Chalice, by Monkey’s Paw Games.

Chalice is a solo journaling role-playing game where you chronicle the perilous journey of a Grail-seeking knight in Arthurian England. During the game, you will tell the story of your Knight’s physical and spiritual descent as they quest for, and ultimately fail to find, the Grail. Your Knight’s quest is doomed. Their chivalric virtues will be surely undone by their fatal flaws and moral shortcomings.

This looks like the most immersive game for Arthurian mythology as a solo game. The game itself is designed to look like a manuscript from medieval times, calligraphy and all. Your Knight has benefits called Passions, key relationships called Bindings, and a fate determined by drawing cards from a tarot deck. Throughout the game, you will draw more cards that serve as prompts, which will give or strike through your Passions and Bindings, and play happens over the span of years. Each year is measured in two parts: the deed, which will be what your character accomplishes, and the Chanson, which is evocative recording of your character’s deeds. When you are unable to fulfill a prompt given to you, your story end

Pilgrimage of the Sun Guard, by Amanda P.

Quests in King Arthur stories are about ideals, conflict and temptation. 

Pilgrimage of the Sun Guard is a solo prompt-based journaling game where you create a Sun Guard and travel alone on a quest, attempting to hold to your Code until you reach the end, facing trials and complications along the way.  

You are the last Sun Guard. Will you take up the mantle and ride the ancient roads?

Pilgrimage of the Sun Guard follows a cycle of play. You will start by travelling to a new location, and follow the directions according to each location’s prompt. This may involve using or acquiring resources, accomplishing great deeds, and writing a record of what happened with each step of the quest. When you run out of all of your resources, you can choose to either end your quest there, or break your Code to continue. If you like the story of Gawain & the Green Knight, this game might be for you.

Sanctum Guard, by Bulger007.

Sanctum Guard is a 20-minute pen-and-paper solo game about protecting a powerful magic artifact against a horde of night terrors. In this game, you are a lone guardian of a secluded sanctum built to protect the Obsidram, a powerful artifact that can potentially destroy worlds if it falls into the wrong hands.

You live in peace and harmony with the Obsidram while it is hidden in this secret and desolate domain from power-hungry minds. But one night, someone or something finds the way and you see a glimmering portal from which a horde of monsters descends upon you. Will you manage to protect the Obsidram?

This game runs like a tower defense game, and requires a sheet of graph paper to play. You will build your Sanctum randomly, then roll against generated monsters with the hopes that you can take them out before they utterly destroy the Sanctum and take your sacred relic.

This game doesn’t detail who you’re guarding the Obsidram for, although I think you could also substitute the relic for a person, if you want to be guarding someone instead of something.

Falling Kingdom: The Last Knights, by Purple Robed Wizard.

“The lands are shattered, the gods that once held our hand are dead and the beasts are upon us. Our King. killed by his own flesh. All of us, but waiting to follow. But we still stand, we hold our ground as we rot, we are the Last Knights, and we will stand until we last draw breath.”

In Falling Kingdom you control the last Knights of a realm threatened by a great, corrupting and unstoppable force. There is no great victory waiting for you at the end, no songs to be heard. There is only struggle, corruption, betrayal and death.  The Kingdom will Fall, but this story isn’t about that, it is about the heroes that face this imminent fall, the Knights of the realm, normal men and women elevated to a position where they will fight for their homelands against all odds.

This is a map-conquering game, with randomly generated missions, a Great Battle that could turn the tides of the war, and a stages of battles depending on how much territory you win or lose. You can accumulate corruption as you play, which is helpful in getting successful rolls, but accrue too much, and your knights begin to die. If you like a game about strategy, tragedy, and abstract warfare, this might be the game for you.

Sentinel, by Meghan Cross.

You are the lone guardian of a place of great power - known to you only as The Sanctuary. Many years you have kept vigil in this place, guarding what is kept within from any and all who come to disrupt it or steal it for themselves. 

Sentinel is a solo journaling game about a solitary guardian and the place they are charged with keeping safe. It is a deck and dice based game in which you will create your guardian and the sanctuary that they protect before reliving the memories, facing threats, and finding interesting objects while time passes around you. And then, when the time has come for your watch to end, find out what happens to The Sanctuary when you are no longer able to guard it.

This is a journaling game that uses cards to determine what kinds of actions your character can take. Hearts summon memories, Diamonds grant you items, Spades bring threats, and Clubs pass time. If you draw a Joker, the game is over and the story ends. At the end of the game, the final roll determines whether or not you are successful in your quest. This is a great game for folks who like journaling and world building.

Games I've Recommended in the Past

5-Min Knight, by enui.

Fetch My Blade, by Ethan Yen.

[makeste]

BnHA Chapter 428: Night of the Kouhai

Previously on BnHA: Well at least Spinner is sort of kind of doing okay??

Today on BnHA: I see the check that I sent to Horikoshi finally cleared.

okay first things first, you all know how it is right. I’ve never made a secret of my Kacchan bias on this blog. I promise you I did actually write a recap to 426 and 427 as well, but both of those chapters went HEAVY on the themes and drama and philosophical shit, and my reactions were kind of all over the place, and the Todoroki one in particular was like a million words wrong and it needs a shit ton of editing which I don’t know when I’ll have the spoons for

on the other hand however, a chapter like this which features class 2A cuteness and an absolutely unreasonable amount of Kacchan character development fanservice to hyperfixate on, takes absolutely no spoons at all and in fact actively recharges some of my spoons, so yeah. here we are

anyway so when we last left off Kacchan and Shouto were in terrible danger from a threat more terrifying than any they’ve ever encountered before. so I already knew this chapter was going to be great

“IIDA IS BIG AND STRONG AND AUTHORITATIVE, LET’S HIDE BEHIND HIM, HE WILL PROTECT US” everyone, I’m delighted to announce that the BnHA manga ending arc, despite having its ups and downs until this point, has officially been saved thanks to this panel right here. pack it up folks. this was officially a sweeping success. this panel brought Tomura back to life and teleported Touya’s mind back into his childhood self from roughly ten years ago time travel fix-it style. Horikoshi you beautiful bastard

Shouto trying to explain that he can handle them one on one but just not ALL TOGETHER IN THIS TERRIFYING SWARM LIKE THIS... buddy you don’t have to explain yourself sob. or is he trying to negotiate with them??

meanwhile Kacchan skips the negotiations entirely because he’s already assessed the situation and knows that the best way to handle this is to appeal to Iida Tenya’s boundless love of regulation and social order

y’all it’s killing me that this boy can handle being LITERALLY MURDERED by the greatest evil the world has ever known. but a group of admiring fifteen year old kouhais? no sir. that’s where he taps out

“but I thought Bakugou liked attention” yes well, you see, Shinsou, it’s kinda a “monkey’s paw curls” sort of thing

Kaminari with the BLACK SPEECH BUBBLE lmfao. FRIENDSHIP WITH KACCHAN HAS BEEN CANCELLED. NOW MIDORIYA IS MY BEST FRIEND

“well you see up until recently the ladies all thought Kacchan was a feral troll so they avoided him at all costs” wow Deku this man literally died for you and you just throw him under the bus with zero hesitation just like that

“SOURCE: ME, HIS CHILDHOOD FRIEND” just adding in his credentials in that little footnote there lest anyone question his authority on the subject

wait so is Shinsou surprised that girls used to not like Kacchan? or is he surprised that Kacchan and Deku were childhood friends? I can see how the latter might be surprising (oh Shinsou, sometimes I forget that you effectively just got here. we have so much to catch you up on. you will not BELIEVE how badly the two of these kids just want to hold hands all the time), but ngl, I’m rooting for the former just for the implications. “you’re seriously telling me a certified ten like him never had any girls interested in him?”

Horikoshi, hear me out, I know there are only two chapters left after this, and they’ve both already been written. but if you wanted to rewrite one of them at the last minute in order to add about a dozen more pages solely dedicated to Shinsou interrogating the rest of class 2A about Kacchan’s love life, out of what he insists is just innocent curiosity with no ulterior motives. well, I would not complain about that

anyway so yes Shinsou he is still single, for now. though I don’t really think it’s the girls you need to be worried about

meanwhile Mineta is all, “I just wanted to let all of you know MY opinion, which is that Bakugou isn’t morally upstanding enough for my delicate sensibilities.” yes you heard that right. Mineta of all people is weighing in on which personalities are deserving of being popular. that’s some audacity right there

A WILD DEKU FANBOY APPEARS???!

“IT GAVE ME COURAGE” omg yesssssss. jotting this down for essay material at some future point in time!! because THIS. this right here is the true “what it means to be a hero” in my opinion. a hero is someone who brings reassurance, yes. someone who makes people feel safe. but I think a hero should also be someone who makes people feel brave. someone who inspires other people to be heroic in turn. so yes, this, all of this, inject it into my veins. wtg Deku

having an official fanboy apparently broke Deku’s brain. hang in there bud. I know you’ve still got villain angst to work through, but try to enjoy this. you’re allowed to have nice things

IS MINETA STRANGLING KACCHAN BY HIS FUCKING TIE OMFG. THAT’S WHY HE NEVER USED TO WEAR THEM. also you’ve worn my patience down all the way now Mineta. get the fuck out of my blog

also Kacchan successfully beat the shit out of him with his ONE GOOD ARM so take that Mineta

also shoutout to this KiriBaku moment right here which feels like the first time we’ve had the two of them together in ages. good stuff

I’m LOVING this panel of Ochako staring at Deku all indecipherably, but ngl it’s also giving me just the slightest bit of anxiety, because does this mean we’re finally gonna get answers on what ultimately happened to Toga. it better not be sad. please don’t ruin my happy chapter with depressing things Horikoshi

“tell them no” OH MY GOD AIZAWA’S TURNING DOWN ALL THE INTERVIEW REQUESTS FOR HIS KIDS SO THEY CAN JUST BE KIDS AGAIN FOR A LITTLE WHILE nooooo what is this. “yeah but I’m prioritizing the kids who aren’t up for dishing to the media about all of their horrific trauma.” omfg. it’s been too long since my last Dadzawa feels. I wasn’t ready after all this time

you guys Izuku finally got a new hero costume that’s not in tatters after all this time. all it took was his old costume getting literally torn to shreds. and now he’s back to looking twelve years old again lol

JEANIST AND FATGUM REUNION?!?! RETURN OF KACCHAN’S THIRD DAD, AND A SECOND WACKY UNCLE TO BACK UP GOOD OLD MIC? GOD BLESS

FAT HIRED TAMAKI AS A SIDEKICK D’AWWWW

now they’re putting the kids to work. glorified janitorial duty. Deku you better not be using up any more of your embers on this sob

this motherfucker did not just liken my baby boy Kacchan to “distressed denim” omg. we have less than three chapters left and we’re spending our hard-earned time on this and I TRULY WOULD NOT CHANGE A SINGLE THING

“Kacchan on light duty” PROTECT HIM!!! don’t think I don’t see you over there too in the background, Aizawa. he’s surrounded by dads. they’re not letting him out of their sight again until he’s thirty

meanwhile he’s out here quietly sorting through trash with his one good hand without complaint and without even the barest hint of a gremlin face. with his half-and-half costume so we can’t see how fucked up his arm is. AND NO MORE MASK. we burned the mask. my thank you letters are in the mail, Horikoshi. and you too TomurAFO, this was your actual greatest contribution to society

ANOTHER DAD?!?!?!

dfjsdlfksldkfjl

“don’t worry, I’m gradually recovering” fsdfkslfkj r.i.p. my ability to take this man seriously ever again. do you think his voice is like the normal sexy Edgeshot ASMR voice except all high-pitched like a squirrel in a Disney princess movie. it is, isn’t it

he can make hands now. buddy you’re amazing. mvp of the entire fucking manga. my son literally owes you his life. please let me see you sitting Jeanist’s shoulder like a parrot before this wonderful glorious chapter ends

Kacchan’s little cheek scar is somehow both badass and adorable at the same time. I can’t stress how fucking much this chapter is just surrounding me with “protect him at all costs” feelings.

MORE SOFT KACCHAN FEELS ON THE NEXT PAGE BECAUSE HORIKOSHI WROTE THIS CHAPTER SPECIFICALLY FOR ME, THANK YOU SO MUCH

“are you... [ever] gonna go back to normal?” because if not he’s gonna cry himself to sleep every night for the rest of his life!! no big!! YOU WOULDN’T DO THAT TO HIM WOULD YOU EDGESHOT?

NO HE WOULD NOT. THANK YOU EDGESHOT. ONCE AGAIN YOU ARE A REAL ONE

...or wait. so does he mean he is indeed going to go back to normal eventually? or is it that he’s embracing this new form as an exciting new evolution, hence the “even further”? it kind of feels like the latter, ngl. especially with this weird sad little smile Kacchan gives in response... fuck me. what the hell am I gonna do when this series ends in two weeks. nobody can rip my soul to pieces as utterly and effortlessly as Horikoshi does, man

THEY MADE THE KIDS LUNCH AWWWW. though in fairness there’s something seriously messed up with Japan if any of these kids ever has to pay for another meal again for the REST OF THEIR LIVES. like come on

noooooo goddammit I’m tired of seeing Izuku quietly despairing over things that AREN’T HIS FAULT

I am glad to see this side of the civilian population, though. sure have come a long way since the low point that was the U.A. clown mob. I like this a whole lot better ngl

what’s up with this mysterious bus all of a sudden

OH MY GOD THEY’RE BACK LMAO. QUICKLY BAKUDADS. form a perimeter

they’re apologizing again dsfkjlskdfjlsfd THEY DIDN’T EVEN CONSIDER EVERYONE’S CIRCUMSTANCES!!! holy shit these first years are all collectively my new favorite character

Cementoss couldn’t take the pressure omfg. is this your first year as a homeroom teacher?? YOU CAN MAKE ANYTHING OUT OF CEMENT BUT CAN YOU MAKE YOURSELF A FREAKING SPINE, CEMENTOSS. I love him

Cementoss is telling them to go work in the corner so they don’t bother everyone else lmao. stuck them as far away from Kacchan as possible. good looking out, Cementoss. how many dads are we up to now?? five? six if we count Iida????

“hey so anyway what actually is up with these fucking kouhai though” I don’t know but my greatest regret is that this only became a thing three chapters before the series finale. where has this nonsense been all my life

“I don’t really understand” me neither fella but here in BnHA land we just roll with it

now we’re cutting back to Ochako who’s making yet another mysterious face that makes me think she knows perfectly well how much we all want to know whether Toga is alive or not, and she’s deliberately dragging it out just to fuck with us

okay I honestly can’t tell if Ochako is being fake cheerful or genuinely cheerful. but it’s definitely fake cheerful right??

aaaaand there’s a close up of Deku with FULL LIGHT back in his eyes like the clouds just parted for the first time in an age. accompanied by a THROB sound effect. ohhhh buddy. did my boy just have a hormone. is it finally that time

THEY’RE LETTING THE KIDS GO BACK HOME OMG. if they want. awwww. r.i.p. fanfic dorms. poor Shinsou missing out ONCE AGAIN

THEY DIDN’T CATCH THE CONCLUSION OF THE TOGACHAKO FIGHT ON FILM??! oh hell no. that settles it, she’s definitely still alive

tell me this cheeky motherfucker (Horikoshi, not Ochako lol) isn’t going to try and actually END THE SERIES with Toga’s fate still all ~mysterious~ and ~up in the air~ like I’m starting to get the sneaking suspicion that he’s doing

HORIKOSHI I SAID I DIDN’T WANT A DEPRESSING CHAPTER WHY ARE YOU HITTING ME WITH THESE FEELS AFTER I LET MY GUARD DOWN

YOU REALLY GAVE MY GIRL A SYMBOLIC FRODO STYLE ANGSTY STAB WOUND SO SHE CAN NEVER FORGET THE PAIN OF THAT DAY ARE YOU KIDDING ME RIGHT NOW WITH THIS

DEKU AHHHHHH

oh my god lol. I’m so curious what’s going to happen next week. my money for the record is on them bonding in a STRICTLY PLATONIC WAY over their respective dead(!??!?!) villains rather than a Romance Thing happening. but I wouldn’t be bothered if they do go there though just so long as we don’t get any timeskip epilogues where they’ve all got fucking kids and such now. don’t you do that to me Horikoshi Kouhei. I swear to god two chapters left omfg. this is really happening. the inexorable march of time etc. etc. ahhhhhhhhh

[ewingstan]

For all that Ward gets criticized for overly complicated/esoteric powersets, I gotta hand it to Wildbow for Capricorn’s powers. “Oh you feel drowned out and buried by your brother? Well now you can drown/submerge your enemies, at the expense of being fucking engulfed by them for half your life!” Tristan had the immediate problem of Byron assaulting him taken care of (Byron will never be there to bodily threaten you again!) but ends up with Byron having much more power over him than before. Byron doesn’t have to deal with always having to compete for attention with Tristan, but he’s more in Tristan’s shadow than ever. It’s a horrible and compelling power setup in any situation (I have a pretty great relationship with my brother and I’m sure I’d fake his death way sooner than Tristan did if we were case 70’d) that fits with their specific problems so well. Monkey-paw powers at their best. Mwah.

[fipindustries]

"these are the rules" said the man with the imposing beard and the irises that shone a deep yellow light "i can't give you supernatural powers of your own"

"i see" said the man, holding an old, rusty oil lamp with almost entirely faded inscriptions in Nabataean "makes sense, so I can't ask to be a genie my self"

"right, or any other kind of power, flight, invisibility, teleportation, I can give you skills and talents, as long as they are humanly possible or I can give you supernatural properties that would be under my control and discretion, but wouldn't be yours to keep"

"That is ok, what else?" said the man sitting down on a rock in the cave he had fallen on. The sun was falling down the extensive hole in which he found himself, night was still far away, they had all the time in the world.

"Rule number two, I cannot grant meta-wishes, that is to say any wish that would, in effect, end up granting you more than the original three wishes, so no wishing for more wishes, no wishing for extra lamps or extra genies, not traveling to the past, no wishing to-"

"Wait, traveling to the past?"

"I will not grant wishes to those I already granted a wish for, in the past previous masters have thought to travel to the past to encounter a previous version of me that hadn't granted them wishes yet"

"Oh! I see, so they asked for that and then what?"

"And then they regretted asking," said the bearded man, with a dry tone. He hadn't sat down and so the man holding the lamp noticed that he towered over him. Fair enough, he wasn’t going to push the subject any further.

“Understood, rule three?”

“Rule three, I cannot grant a wish which requires me to fill up details or information on my own”

“Wait, hold on, that is more… academic than the others, what do you mean?”

“I mean that if you wish for something and you are not precise enough then I cannot fulfill the wish and you need to reformulate it”

“But I don't lose the wish, right?”

“No, since no wish was granted you can try again”

“I see… I'm still not entirely sure what you mean”

“Well, let’s think of the classic example” said the tall man stroking his beard, as he crossed his legs in the air, leaving him levitating a meter off the ground “the most common thing people have wished for: ‘i wish to be rich’, what does that mean exactly? Do you want me to deposit a great amount of some random currency into some random bank account in your name? Do you want to have a large pile of gold in your house? Do you want to own the deed to some oil fields? Or awake in the body of some specific rich man? Do you want to be Jeff Bezos?”

“No, thanks”

“Right, so you need to specify, I can’t come up with details on my own, I used to do that and it tended to leave masters… unsatisfied, to say the least”

“So you used to give monkey paw wishes?”

“Please do not compare me to that bauble, I used to grant wishes wherein the ambiguity in terms opened the opportunity for ironic and tragic outcomes”

“I apologize… and uh…” again, he didn’t want to push it further given that he had offended such a powerful being, but he needed to know what he was working with “did you do it… intentionally?”

“Yes! I did!” said the floating man cheerfully.

“Right… and uh, why did you stop?”

“Because someone wished for that to be case, my last master in fact, that was his third wish before dying”

“I thought you said I couldn't ask for meta wishes”

“...as long as they end up granting you more wishes, this did not meet that criteria so I was able to fulfill it”

“Ok, I'm sorry, you said dying? Your last master made his final wish and then he died?”

“Yes, the cannibal cult was eating his liver as he made that last wish”

The man holding the lamp stood up.

“Cannibal cult?”

“A result of his poorly worded second wish”

The poor human started walking around the sand covered hole, deep in thought.

“But now you don't do that anymore? Now you don't twist wishes into bad outcomes?”

“No, unless the specifics of the wish demand it or allow it”

“Why do that? Why twist wishes like that? Do you hate people?”

“In the past I used to hold a great deal of animosity towards the mortal race, yes, one grows resentful after spending thousands of years trapped in a lamp, but as of lately I have been able to come out much more frequently, and my recent masters have been very reasonable people, those who enslaved me have been erased from history millennia ago”

“Then why?”

“Because the nature of the universe requires balance, my power twists and turns and disfigures casualty and the laws of reality such that a deep wrong has been tallied, cosmically speaking, so that has to be counterbalanced”

“But now you’re saying that it doesn't? As long as my wish is air tight enough?”

“There is righteousness and wisdom in knowing precisely what you want and how to ask for it… but also I have not granted a wish under these restrictions yet so I'm not actually sure what will happen once I do” the bearded man shrugged and stopped levitating, putting his feet on the sand once again “now you know the rules”

“Ok, can I ask further clarifying questions?”

“Sure, I don't mind the conversation” he looked up at the sun, bathing them from the entrance to the cave five meters above them, the shine of his eyes did not seem to be occluded or diminished by the sunbeams.

“If I were to ask for a bar of gold, just a simple bar of gold”

“I would need to know how big, what shape you want it to have, where specifically you want the bar to show up and what is its procedence, if  you want I could take one bar of gold from some bank specified by you and make it appear here”

The man holding the lamp thought about it for a second. 

“If I made a wish for a cube of gold, weighing ten kilos and of the appropriate volume given gold’s density, to replace the corresponding volume of air that is a meter away from my nose in that specific direction and a meter off the ground, the gold cube previously nonexistent appearing ex nihilo, would that be specific enough?”

“Yes, it would, is that what you are wishing for?”

“No, but that is good to know”

The man sat down again.

“I guess the trick now is to think of a wish that can extract the biggest amount of juice I can in terms that I can specify”

The bearded man leaned against a wall, crossing his arms.

“Ok so there is a problem with wishing for a ton of gold, I’m sure eventually someone, either the IRS of the FBI or someone will come wondering where I got all of it, and I can’t just say that a genie gave it to me”

“You wouldn't be able to, you will forget I existed after your third wish is granted”

“Wait, really?”

“Yes of course, another anti abuse measure, so that you can't just pass on my lamp to a friend to continue asking for wishes”

“Huh…”

“Didn’t you wonder why this was the first time you heard of the existence of genies in the real world? I go around granting lots of wishes boy, yet you never heard of me”

“I was wondering about that actually, I'm also wondering, since you are real, what other magical entities are real”

“Very few, they don't exist anymore, they were wished away in their time”

“What! That is… huh… that’s tragic I guess”

“It was one of the earliest workarounds to the karmic comeuppance of twisting reality through wishes, clever masters realized they could offset the amount of wrongness in the rules of the world that their wishes caused by erasing other sources of supernatural alteration instead”

“Uh, how many of your rules are a product of previous wishes?”

“All of them” said the bearded man with a full on toothy grin “I used to be far more free in the past, the world used to be far more chaotic and mercurial, there is a reason I am in that lamp, there is a reason I can only grant three wishes and there is a reason why I can’t grant meta wishes, each of those rules is written in things deeper and vaster than blood, the earth didn't use to be the only populated planet in the universe, dark matter didn't use to be dark”

A full shiver ran through the body of the man holding the lamp, he was sweating even though he was under the shade of the walls of the cave.

He tried to say something but his throat was swollen and dry.

He swallowed multiple times, he could almost feel a burning sensation in his hands where they were touching the rusty lamp.

“Well… um, that is… terrifying”

The bearded man shrugged again.

“Just so you know, not all my masters have met terrible fates, some simply wished for someone to fall in love with them and this interference in reality was minor enough that at worst they got an unexpected pregnancy, others merely wished for a happy life and were granted one that was marginally happier than the one they already had which again was so little a cost for the universe that the price was barely noticeable, sometimes trying to be too clever is the thing that dooms you”

“Right, ok, that is actually helpful to know” said the human a bit more relaxed. “Ok, thinking it through, whichever way you slice it wishing for money seems the safest bet in the sense that I can turn money in any other material good I could wish for, I just have to think of a simple way to get lots of… oh, I got it, what if I asked for a piece of A4 white paper to appear a meter in front of my face with the results for the next lottery winning numbers written on them?”

“Which lottery?”

“The biggest one that runs on the country where I reside, I want the numbers that will be picked at the earliest lottery yet to happen, which is in like a week or so”

The bearded man thought about it for a second.

“Yes, that is a valid wish”

“Good! Well! That is progress! Let me think a little more, just to make sure I'm not missing anything…”

“Take your time”

“Mhmmm, I guess I can have one selfish wish for me, to improve my material conditions, another selfish wish for me, something intangible or abstract that I couldn't have, no matter how much money I posses and… well, I guess it would be nice to dedicate one wish to help the world”

“How magnanimous”

“Uh, ok, here is another question” the human started to blush a little “could I wish to become a woman?”

“Which woman?”

“Right, right, I don't want to be Anne Hathaway or whatever, or I don't want to have a body that looks exactly like the one Anne Hathaway has”

“If you were to ask for her body then you would just become her, with her thoughts, her emotions and her memories”

“And let me guess, if I were to ask for my brain in her body I would die instantly because the size of my head is different from hers or something”

“More or less”

“And the same would go for any body that is significantly different from mine… could I wish to have the body I would have if it was subject to the changes that years of the best HRT and surgeries in the world could provide such that it was as close to cis passing as it was humanly possible?”

“There is a lot of latitude in ‘the best in the world’ I would require specific treatments with specific doses and specific surgeries provided by specific surgeons, also you didn't really specify the gender you mean to pass as”

“Fuck me dude-that wasn't a wish!” 

“I know, you didn't specify how would you want me to fuck you” said the man with the shining eyes, chuckling.

“Have people asked for that?”

“Yes, of course”

“And… uh, don't answer if this is too intrusive but did you…?”

“Yes”

No need to ask further questions.

“Anyway, going back to the sex change… mhmm, could I wish to have the body I would have had in a world where I was born with total androgen insensitivity syndrome, except for the brain and all the relevant connections to my spine?”

“Would that include all the scars that such a world would have left in that body?”

“Scars? What do you mean…? You know what, I do not want to know, let’s change tactics… I wish to have a body with C cup breasts, a 60 inch waist, a skin as soft as the skin of-” the man cut off himself when he saw the bearded man shaking his head.

“You are stacking wishes, either ask one change per wish or find the way to encapsulate all those specific changes under one concise wish”

The human kicked sand in frustration, away from the bearded man, just in case. In doing so he stubbed his toe on a rock and had to jump on one foot for a minute, cursing profusely.

“What if I just asked for a body that I was happy with?” he said eventually, with tears in his eyes.

“I cannot decide that for you, again, you must fill in the blanks, I cannot add or invent any information regarding your wish on my own”

“I know, I know, sigh, and if I were to ask for you to simply get rid of the cause for gender dysphoria in my brain?”

“There are multiple causes, genetics, certain brain structures, society, the shape of your body, which one do you mean?”

“Forget it, once I'm rich I'll deal with that on my own… I guess I'll use my second wish to become even richer. It is good and all if I get millions with the lottery, but if I knew what to do with it then I could increase the potential of those millions exponentially, so if I wished to have the same talent for investing as, say,  Warren Buffet… no, if I wish to have the same knowledge as those that Warren Buffett holds in his brain in regards to finance without any of his personal memories subconsciously stored in my brain… such that I could access them and use them instinctively… is that a valid wish…?”

The man with the shining eyes thought once more.

“Yes, it is acceptable”

“Is there anyway that wish could fuck me over?”

“That is for you to decide”

“You know what, fuck it”

He was really frustrated by now. He knew that he was being lazy, he knew that he should be sitting down with the internet, do a lot of research and sit for a good week crafting the cleverest, most high yielding wish possible but he just couldn't be bothered, he wanted to get rid of the genie as sooner than later, he was giving him the heebie jeevies, and he wanted to start enjoying his wishes.

“Ok, now I have to think of the final wish… something good for the rest of the world…”

“Oh,  can’t wait to hear this, those are always the best wishes” said the man, who was now floating again, as he rubbed his hands together.

That was incredibly creepy but the man holding the lamp chose to ignore it.

“If I were to wish to return the levels of carbon in the atmosphere back to what they were in the 1700's…”

“Ah yes, I got this one multiple times, it would go back to current levels in ten years”

“Wait, really? Jesus fucking christ, ok, ummm if I were to say the words ‘AI alignment’...”

“I would ask what does that mean”

“Right, I cannot ask for an aligned AI if I have no idea what that looks like and you can't create one if one does not exist, much like I cannot ask for a cure for cancer if I don't know the composition of… oh! Could I ask for all malignant cancerous cells in the world to disappear?”

“Sure, but cancer would eventually return”

“Yeah yeah, but still, that would make so many people all across the world happy in such a way that the sheer amount of utils might just be worth it…mhmmm, could do the same with malaria, the coronavirus, dengue fever, I could probably just say ‘all viruses’ but, mhmm, god knows what would that mean for the animal population, or the bacterial population or whatever other strange cascading effects in the ecosystem or the global immunological system or whatever…” his brain was getting tired, he could tell.

“Ok, how about increasing the IQ of every single human by…” he didn't want to say a number so big that society suffered a shock out of the sheer revolutionary change it would mean “...20 points”

“Ah! I like the way you think, that was essentially very similar to the very first wish I was ever asked by my creators back in Shambhala, took you a while to get there”

“Um.. what happened when you granted that wish?”

“Do you see any Shambhalas anywhere?”

“No, hold on, I want specifics, I need to know precisely how that wish failed”

“Remember boy that this conversation is a courtesy, I am under no rule or obligation to tell you about previous wishes, and frankly I'm starting to get tired, ask for your wishes already”

The man grabbed on to the lamp tighter but said nothing.

“So first wish, the lottery numbers, yadda yadda”

A white piece of paper with some numbers written on them appeared in front of him, it started to fall slowly towards the sand but the man grabbed it. He stared at the numbers and then he took a pencil from his pocket. He was aware he was going to forget the bearded man once the wishes were done. He wrote ‘these are the lottery numbers’ on the paper and he pocketed it.

“Second wish, investment knowledge equal to that of Warren Buffet, as I explained previously”

Nothing changed, not even in his mind, since he specified for the knowledge to be subconscious and instinctual. He thought for a second where he should invest his lottery winnings first. A list of twenty different companies jumped to the tip of his tongue. All good on that front.

“And your final wish?”

The man holding the lamp thought an extra second about his morals, about practicality, about the amount of utils that simple things could accumulate in the long run.

His foot was still hurting.

“I wish…” fuck it, the genie had said not to over complicate it “for every human that exists or will ever exist to miss stubbing their toe by a milimiter for the rest of their life”

“You got it boy”

The bearded man went back to the lamp-

A man was standing at the bottom of a hole in the desert. He shook his head slightly disoriented for a second. He looked around, there was nothing interesting in that cave. He walked towards the nearest wall and he started to climb out of the hole.

[crepesuzette2023]

hiiii wanted to say thank you for all the fic recs and ask if you might recommend some longer titles ? i normally go for like 10k words max but I have a long drive coming up and am craving long form ! maybe mclennon primarily but like I'm flexible if it slaps

With extreme pleasure: some of my favorite one-shots are over 10k. And there's been some great ones lately.

But starting with the classics: Now and then (there's a fool such as i) (@stonedlennon). The Nerk Twins travel to Caversham in 1960. Call me by your name vibes, but in mclennon. And Lifting Latches/Writing Postcards (thinkpink20). Early days, clothes swapping, pining.

More recently, I loved Monkey's Paw (@planetaire). Tokyo 1966. The tension! The relief! Paul's ass in the striped suit! Even longer, by the same writer: don't talk, take my hand (1968 angst, with an unexpectedly bright/weird ending!)

tomorrow, I'll miss you (@pauls1967moustache) is another absolute classic. Mclennon 'Before Sunset' AU: John stayed behind in Hamburg...years later, he and Paul meet again.

The two latest ones by @scurator are also great: Where the Spirit Meets the Bone (All of Us Strangers-inspired AU with a hopeful ending) and The Theory and Practice of Gamesmanship (John/Brian/Paul, say no more, *fans self*—just gorgeous, esp. Brian).

There's some great McHarrison in the @beatleskinkmeme Summer of Love collection, which made me think of two longer Paul/George/John faves: No I in Threesome (@with-eyes-closed) and A Wrench in Clocks (honeyheffron).

Stop All the Clocks (@javelinbk). 1967. John and Paul mourn Brian in Scotland, and discover they are in love. Sweet and healing. second that emotion (@backbenttulips): John and Paul on tour in 1964. They explore each other body and soul.

For a lighter turn (had to think about this often lately for some reason): The Jumper by @merseydreams. 70's. Denny Laine wears the sweater John has given to Paul many years ago. John sees a picture of it, and wants it back. The sweater, of course. This is not about Paul! (Also, watch out for Linda in this one! <3)

If you're into omegaverse (actually, even if you're "normally" not): There are two long I Need You Darlin' (@beatlessideblog) extras. Act Naturally (Paul has the ambition to plan and control John's heats; John consents; they fail in the sweetest way possible), and Boxing Day 1958 (their first time trying it 'the other way around').

[kindlespark]

sam i didnt even watch fhjy but can you tell me more of ur thoughts abt kipperlilly? any thoughts even stream of consciousness, she seems so teenager rage gone wrong im so fascinated by her

HJBFESJBFEKSFS THIS IS SO FUNNY OFC ok this is going to be a range of thoughts about the reactions i've seen from both ends of the rat grinder Discourse™

i think it's fine to be like, yeah, what kipperlilly's anger stems from is like deeply unsympathetic and comes from a very privileged status. i think being like "no that's normal for a teen girl" is silly. she is very much not normal she's a little upper-middle class brat and i love her. i love that she's so deeply distasteful and unappealing to people LOL. hate when female characters have to be smoothed down to be liked! like we don't have to downplay her negative traits when people are obsessed with male serial killers all the time etc etc

BUT i also think people forget that like... the bad kids were reading private thoughts she shared with her therapist (which is a massive invasion of privacy)! like of course it was fucked up. that's why she was going to a therapist lmao!!! it stresses me out that people are this vitriolic about a teen character who is pretty explicitly mentally ill and trying to get better about it but is being manipulated by a deity of rage and possibly her adult vice principal like. you don't have to LIKE her but calling for her to be violently murdered is wild to me. the bad kids had never even HEARD of her before this season and you can metagame about brennan not having invented her character yet all you want but in canon u gotta assume she was successfully keeping that rage down until she got got and is now being actively corrupted by a powerful rage deity lmaoooo

and like! she got her narrative punishment!! the monkey's paw curled and she lost her best friend she's got her traumatic backstory now!!! she's already suffering and at her lowest i don't need her to die (again!)

i think brennan is past the point of making teen characters irredeemable so i can only hope that the cast follows through on that bc i feel like redemption and healing from trauma is one of the strongest themes in fantasy high like i bawled my eyes out in every aelwyn and adaine scene. which is why it's really funny to me that siobhan is kipperlilly's biggest hater because i feel like she's a great mirror to adaine's spite and aelwyn's redemption..... like siobhan's characters are all very appealing to me because of their rage. god im hoping and praying they don't kill the rat grinders in the finale god bless

oh final petty thing i think saying kipperlilly's name wrong was only funny the first 200 times <3 love u all mwa

[pauls1967moustache]

do you have any recent beatles fic faves? :) open to any ship I’m in a fic drought (loved your latest btw!)

Oh thank you! I’ve been so bad about reading fic lately, I’ve had a bunch of tabs open for ages. But here’s what’s in my recent bookmarks:

I’ve loved @planetaire two most recent ones monkey’s paw which has SUCH a good john, and also covers the Japan leg of the ‘66 tour which you don’t see often. Also don’t talk, take my hand about jpy 1968 yellow submarine chaos, a favourite topic of mine, as I’m sure dedicated readers well know.

your lucky break by @o-boogies - I feel like everyone’s read this, and of course why wouldn’t you!! Not only does it pay off on the inherent sex appeal of a jp may/december thing, but also has sublime world-building. What a delightful universe. Captures the mclennon mutual insanity perfectly!

Like I Please You by @eveepe - sexy with just the right brand of insane mclennon sexual escalation. Yeah just put his dick in your mouth paul, it’s nothing!

1969-headache by phyllistine - lovely little character piece about get back! Nails all the dynamics, the undercurrent of love as well as all the overwhelming normal current of tension and awkwardness.

Play me one of yours (been thinking about the scene where Paul’s aunt tries to take his guitar for several weeks now…) and the more recent Hurricaneville (dreamy and lovely and so richly textured) both by the always wonderful @crepesuzette2023

And The Story Continues @javelinbk ‘s hot follow up to beloved Our Version of Events. It’s got glorious smut! It’s got delicious angst! Can’t go wrong :)

Also, not a recent one but one I recently revisited while looking for a quote and realised I didn’t bookmark so quickly rectified that because it’s great - ageless children, animal sweat by @eyeball2eyeball