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#I JUST LIKE IT WHEN THEY KILL EACH OTHER WITH SWORDS!!!
ma1dita · 1 day
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when the curtains close
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a 'partners in crime' installment - luke castellan x dionysus!reader
words: 5.3k
summary: (post-tlt) The one where you lose two people in the Labyrinth that day. All strings are cut. (Pollux, Annabeth, Percy, and Mr. D find out the biggest difference between you and Luke.) (Luke Castellan x fem!Dionysus!reader)
a/n: yeah to me this fic sounds and feels like that tiktok of the girl humming to her microwave. split povs: pollux, annabeth, your depictions of the titular battle of the labyrinth at CHB, some blood/gore, death & grief. the usual. you forced me to by lizzy mcalpine. references to cat on a hot tin roof by tennessee williams if you squint
(posted 5/14/24, semi edited—def coming back to this)
The first time Pollux has a panic attack, time seems to stop and the world keeps moving on without him.
He’s reminded of a time when you rambled on about how anxiety takes possession of the senses like a moment frozen in a snapshot meant for you to identify. In the memory, you had your feet kicked up on the dash flipping through a DSM-5 while he and Castor took turns speeding up and down Farm Road (totally normal older sister behavior from you, and when a cop pulled you over, the three of you narrowly escaped a ticket by talking in riddles and godly smoke that smelled like grapes). Pollux still remembers the sound of laughter in the car blending like three different chords to an archaic melody (or squawking crows in the strawberry fields)— the bond between you three laid out before time knew limits and was always meant to be.
It’s still his favorite song. You’re their favorite (and only) sister, they love to joke. These are facts that will never change.
“You two have each other, and well, I’ve got this,” you had said, the Zippo flicking open and closed against your thumb in the blossoming darkness of the car. Pink and purple rays of waning light blanketed the old hatchback as it steadily made its way back towards Half-Blood Hill, comfortable silence shared in the way only siblings can stand to be quiet—when there are no words needed to get a point across. But you’ve always set yourself apart from the pack, not needing anyone like how they need each other.
Not since Luke left, at least. The growing distance between you three since your untimely resignation from camp was proof enough. Pollux’s eyes met Castor’s in the rearview mirror as they both noticed your sad smile. His brother’s voice broke through the silence then, having always been the one blunt enough to say what was on his mind, “You’ve got us too if you let us see you more often.” Your fidgeting stops.
“It’s not you two, it’s just hard to be back here sometimes. I see things for what they used to be instead of how they really are now. Now it’s just… it has to be all business.”
Pollux cracked a smile, “S’what you get for growing up. Soon we’ll just be annoying voices in your head like you are to us.” Shutting your textbook, you turned to look at them from the passenger seat, eyes that match theirs darting between their blond heads, “All of us have to grow up eventually. Except maybe you two— I prefer you in my nightmares like the kids from The Shining. Whenever you get sick of Dad, come see me. Gods know that camp deserves a break from the two of you too.” Your knuckles knocked against both of their heads affectionately as he put the car in park, “My built-in bodyguards, huh? Always looking out for me.”
All words and meaning escape Pollux now as he stands in the greenery of the North Woods with battle gear ill-fitted to his large frame. It’s the first siege he’s ever taken part in, the first time he’s had to use battle strategies outside of Capture the Flag and the first time he’s slashed his way through monsters and demigods with the intent to try and kill or be killed. Sword and Shield could have never prepared any of them for this—as his eyes meet Castor’s and then yours with all of you thinking the same thing, the three of you join the sea of iridescent orange through mind-numbing black moving like a sharp three-pronged sword.
This type of stuff isn’t typical for him, he thinks. He and Castor are used to being comedic relief— being the source of laughs and juice boxes for pesky little campers instead of facing the real world outside the boundaries of the Mist. Perhaps your father babied them to make up for the time he lost with you, but there’s a moment where he wonders how being kept soft will keep him alive in a world as harsh as this one.
Childlike innocence is ripped away from them in the bubble they’ve inhabited until this moment. Home is now a warzone and like lambs set up for slaughter, the twins both turn to look at you as a shuddering gasp leaves your mouth at the carnage in your surroundings, monster blood and fallen friends and enemies at your feet. Breaking away from formation to take a deep breath, he looks at the sky and wonders where your father is, but smoke and soot fill his lungs and he coughs desperately for a breath of fresh air.
Pollux thinks he must have stopped breathing before Castor took his last breath. It wasn’t supposed to be a competition, but sometimes life was just funny like that.
5, 4, 3, 2, 1.
Just like you told him.
Castor was always the more manic one while Pollux knew how to endure. Children of Dionysus are forced to befriend insanity before it makes an enemy out of them—twisting the ugly into what’s real and creating something beautiful out of the deranged. You’ve shown the boys how you detach from emotion by recognizing the details—separating fact and fiction, a methodical process only describable by the blood that runs through your veins. Pollux doesn’t know where to start—everything happens so fast but it plays out in front of him like someone put the pieces together to a stop-motion animation.
He sees Castor’s sword fall to the ground when he gets slashed on the forearm and sees him get clubbed over the head with a metal weapon he’s only seen bad renditions forged for theater practices and hanging on the walls of the armory. Castor falls first to his knees, and then into the dirt with a thud. He never knew there could be that much blood coming out of a person, much less a mirror image of himself. Pollux sees your face come into his line of vision, deep maroon splatters on your face glittering with hints of ichor and then you’re moving because he can’t. The enemy is coming back for him now, and for a moment he wonders if Castor will be mad if he lets him. He sees you turn in an instant, swinging your sword down on the neck of the aggressor, a teenager not much older than he and his brother are—were. It’s funny how his brain immediately makes the switch to past tense, and how he can’t stop thinking about how he’ll now and forever be older than his twin. Pollux then sees you catch the body of the boy you just killed as life seeps out of him slower than it did for Castor.
It doesn’t make him feel any better, though.
His knees hit the ground next to his twin, touching the sludge of dirt soft like quicksand and moist with what he hopes is not blood, but Pollux is not quite sure of what else there is to hope for. His fist is wrapped around Castor’s shirtsleeve, touching faded orange and sweat as he holds on for dear life. Maybe if he tries hard enough his soul will still be intertwined with his. Your hand touches his shoulder, five fingers reaching out to brush the back of his neck and the feeling of your skin helps him refocus a bit, even if you’re saying something he can’t make out. Then the metal of your Zippo lighter feels cool to the touch within his palm and he knows what he needs to do.
The battle isn’t over, but for the three of you, everything stops here. There is no going forward without your brother. You were never meant to be children of war.
Pollux hears the sound of his heartbeat thundering through his ears, blood rushing through his veins and can’t help but notice the silence amid the chaos. There are no words fit for this—and even if there were, Castor and you were always the more talkative ones. He hears the spark of the purple flame between his fingers, blowing the smoke over him and his brother’s body, and their father’s powers blanket them like how you used to tuck them into bed, warm and safe. This is what your family is—unconventional and unending even in different realms of existence. And then Grover’s scream of panic echoes through the air and everyone hears that. Hysteria ensues as monsters and demigods alike run amok, and Pollux realizes he’s stopped shaking. In his father’s domain, he will always find comfort.
You stand above him now directing campers calmly with a free hand—a brewing storm crackling underneath your skin that he now understands. Hidden by the illusion of smoke, Pollux’s tired bones rest alongside his brother’s dead ones— together as they always were meant to be.
The three of you together, his little family—that is a fact he hoped would never change.
The smell of grapes envelops him as he leans his forehead against your muddy leg… when did the battle end? It almost masks the scent of death that rips through the air as your hand brushes through his sandy hair. Pollux stinks of sweat and you stifle a laugh as you see him smell his armpit. You three were always the same type of fucked up. He doesn’t look down at Castor laid across his lap but knows he would’ve found it funny too. Ignorance of reality even for a moment serves as a comfort. Purple meets purple as he looks up at you with a smile that doesn’t fit his face anymore and he croaks, “Wonder what dad would say about our first battle…”
Glory was never meant to be this bittersweet—it tastes like blood in his mouth until he wipes it away from his cheek and realizes it’s Castor’s. In a way, it’s his too, everything about him and within him is exactly the same down to the star stuff the fates wove them from.
“I’ll be the one to tell him. You take care of Castor,” you answer, as if there’s anything else he would want to do and then he realizes you’re crying— and he’s seeing all of the pieces put together in front of him in this photograph in his mind.
Pollux blinks slowly.
Suddenly the image he has of you is more defined— there is new meaning to the sadness you could never shake off all these years, and he is too young to lose his greatest love, which makes him realize then that so were you.
How long does this have to go on? he wonders, grabbing onto your hand with an eagerness only comparable to the feeling he got when you and Luke whisked him and Castor away from Florida all those years ago. This punishment of living while half of his soul does not—what is he supposed to do next? This was supposed to be the safe place. There is nowhere left to run. His thumb rubs circles into the back of your shaking blood-soaked hand, a secret within the smoke.
Pollux thinks there will always be a part of him frozen in time now, a memory of this day hung up in his mind like a portrait as he holds Castor’s cold hand in his warm one.
Annabeth finds you in the middle of the strawberry fields before the sun sets. She knows you won’t be sleeping tonight, not if you can fight it— not when there’s so much to do. You’ve long grown out of your ripped-up and tie-dyed camp shirts, and the one slung on your frame is newly pressed and starchy from the storage room of the Big House, still stiff against your freshly washed skin. When she’s close enough to touch you, you’ve been scrubbed clean of today.
She doesn’t have to be a daughter of Athena to know that you know that she’s there even if you can’t see her, but for once she feels like she has to hide. For once, Annabeth Chase doesn’t know what to say. How can she explain the feeling of guilt that coils around her brain like barbed wire—how can she even begin to apologize for the thing wearing her brother’s skin, knowing that it killed yours? For once, her hubris is crushed by the sinking feeling of humiliation.
“Was your first quest all you thought it would be, Annie?”
As she takes her navy cap off, silver braided strands around her face wave in the wind as a reminder of what Luke put her through. Though as she looks at you now with your berry-stained fingers plucking at stems one by one instead of using your powers, she thinks that your mind is elsewhere—anywhere but here, where everything is a painful reminder of your five years as a camper.
Five years with Luke.
Mourning him isn’t a new feeling for either of you, even though he comes in and out of your lives like a poltergeist you want to bash across the head, just always out of reach. But he’s a constant, even when he’s not here and he’s what binds you two together as you huddle hidden away from the rest of camp.
“He did this for you.”
It’s not a question, more so a fact out of Annie’s mouth when you finally meet her eyes and sigh, “Luke’s always had a way going about things. The most stubborn man to ever live.” You toss another strawberry into the crate at your feet. No one’s working right now, trying to tend to the injured and the dead. Everyone’s doing their best to chase away the nightmares that are bound to come, and she knows you’ll be making rounds with her on the night shift to ease everyone’s anxieties. But there’s a thought so strong it makes her head hurt, bursting at the seams until she can’t stop with her last-ditch effort to fix her found family.
“Maybe if we find him, we can save—”
“He’s been out of time for a while now, Annabeth. We both knew that,” you say, voice firm and unwavering. You’ve never sounded so monotone before, and it hits her as her mouth falls agape, “You’re giving up on him? Why…why would you give up on him?” Anger courses through her veins like fire and she’s mad that she’s at the center of this prophecy, of Hermes’s anger for his doomed son who will love you until the ends of the earth.
And what of her?
What of the hope she has in happy endings, how is it that you’re so damn calm? Annabeth kicks at the crate, strawberries rolling out in different directions and your jaw tightens as you let her be petulant, let her scream and yell until her inner child can catch up with the reality of the world around you.
“How could you?”
Your name echoes as she repeats it, grabbing at your shoulders and she’s as desperate as the truth that shakes her when you cup her face in your hands and wipe her tears.
“You’ve carried the weight of the world Annabeth– you know what it feels like to let it go. It’s time to let him go. There’s nothing I can do or say to fix this.”
Then it hits her that you knew of his fate and yet this was still the outcome. There was nothing else to do but watch him be puppeteered by a Titan and have to fight evil while it wears his face.
“He came to you after he saw me, didn’t he? Why didn’t you tell me? Why don’t you love him anymore?”
Because it wouldn’t have changed a thing, your eyes say. Instead, you grimace as you say, “Wouldn’t that be funny if it were true?” You lean down and pick up the fallen berries, some bruised and covered in dirt, and then you look at her again with teary eyes.
“Some prophecy huh? To lose a love to worse than death. What could we have done besides love him until the end?”
“He’s still in there. I know you know that too. Don’t talk about him like he’s not,” Annabeth insists, and a sad smile settles upon your face. It’s as gentle as the kiss of the breeze on your cheeks.
“I lost a brother today, Annie.”
“Me too.”
The funny thing about planning funerals is that with all the fuss it takes to organize one, you still find extra time on your hands. Barely getting any sleep and dragging yourself out of your dad’s bed, Pollux snores loudly next to you after hours of working on Castor’s shroud. Sleep wasn’t expected for either of you, but being unconscious was the only way of giving your brains a reprieve. The both of you have been busy doubling down on the preparations, even if it means Mr. D won’t be back in time while he’s out rallying gods for war.
The faster Castor’s earthly body is reconnected with his soul, the easier his trip will be into the Underworld, Nico says, and it’s funny how comforting the little emo pipsqueak can be when it comes to matters of death.
Perhaps this is the solace you bring to others with things you’re able to control—keeping camp afloat is something you were always good at, and helping every traumatized child that comes up to you for a juice box or a lullaby eases the guilt that follows you. Walking around Camp Half-Blood for more than a weekend made you feel like a judge, jury, and executioner. Though most of the campers from almost five years ago have either aged out, defected, or died—the ones that remain still look at you like you’re trouble.
Perhaps you always will be.
You even found yourself with the time to pray to Hermes last night for your brother’s safe passage into the afterlife, though if he’s angry at Annabeth, he must hate you for letting Luke go. Dinner didn’t seem appetizing enough anyway, so your whole plate was tossed into the hearth. You hope he likes chicken and rice.
But if a god can’t fight fate, what did he expect you to do?
The Iris Message to your dad last night was difficult, to say the least. Pollux’s hands shook as he continued to paint grape vines onto the silk cloth and the both of you didn’t say anything when your father started to cry. He out of all of the gods knows what it’s like to be tested to the limits—to endure pain and it’s a gift you and your brother are grateful for in times like these. Watching the god display the human emotion that either of you couldn’t as freely made it more real though.
There was also the interesting predicament of Chris Rodriguez being locked up in the basement of the Big House. Replacing screaming fits with serenity was almost second nature, and your gentle hands were what got Clarisse to truly respect you again for the first time in years. You could hear her sneak downstairs and talk to him while he slept (and the look in her eyes when you’d greet her with a cup of coffee made it known to you that she finally understands what it means to love someone who’s lost—two demigod daughters filled with a lot of rage and hurt were more alike than they think).
So the morning of your little brother’s funeral, you found yourself on the shoreline of Canoe Lake, setting your Redbull against the post of the dock and looking out onto the water.
You needed to do something with your hands. In the past few days, if your fingers were not occupied by pen and paper, a guitar, supply crates, or anything else that was helpful to others and all the more distracting for you, it’s been so easy to pick at any little thing. Perhaps it was your subconscious trying to reflect the damage on the inside, but today, your nail polish was chipped beyond belief. A small price to pay to not lose it without a signature boyish smile to ease your worries and amber eyes that could help you escape from the routine.
Running camp was always easier back then with your runaway boy and his scarred cheek.
How pathetic.
Crouched over in the sand, you plucked stones and filled your pockets with them. They knocked against each other — weighing your pockets down as you walked closer to the dock. Swinging your feet off the side and chucking them into the water, you could barely achieve a ripple.
It’s so quiet that you end up wondering if the rocks in your pockets would weigh you down to the bottom of the lake. It must be nice down there, to exist away from everything.
Bubbles surface slowly in front of you, then Percy’s head bobs in the water as he squints at you through sunlight.
“You chucked a rock at my head!”
A smile tugs at your lips, almost indiscernible but definitely there, “I was trying to skip them. Didn’t know you were doing water tricks in there, kid.” His grin gleams like freshwater pearls, pulling himself up onto the dock as his hand clasps yours. Shaking his sopping hair, Percy’s gangly frame sits next to yours like a wet bag of sand—all wrinkly and misshapen and sprinkling you with lakewater.
“Maybe next time don’t pick rocks the size of your fist. How many have you got in there? Your aim is scarily accurate,” he laughs and you huff and shake your head when his hand sticks into your pocket and takes out a few smooth ones to roll around in his hand. You mirror him, watching him skip a few stones into the water that reach a good distance before sinking into the depths of the lake.
There’s something sad about feeling comfortable to trauma dump on the teenage son of Poseidon, but with the way he grabs your arm at your third unsuccessful toss of a rock, you can’t do anything else but sigh.
“Why didn’t any of you call me, Percy?”
He was waiting for this question—it’s been banging around in his head since the beginning of Annabeth’s quest, and perhaps her talk with you yesterday didn’t go as expected so once again he’s left with the difficult part.
Things happen to turn out pretty difficult for him a lot, he's noticed.
Many things could have been made easier in the past few weeks: Ariadne being your stepmother and her blessing to you would’ve made the Labyrinth easier to navigate, and having another demigod to fight alongside him instead of a mortal girl would’ve been a plus too. But he looks at you with ocean eyes and a smaller smile that reminds you of how he looked at you when you dropped him off in Montauk the summer you met him and quit your head counselor job.
“You’ve already made a lot of difficult decisions. We weren’t sure if…”
The rotten wood beneath you creaks under your shifting weight as you turn to him, tucking your legs underneath your bottom.
“Didn’t think I could handle it?”
He shakes his head, “The opposite, actually. Annabeth has this notion that you’re the only one that can save him. You know, back on my first quest I met Luke’s dad and he told me something…”
You swallow instead of answering. There’s no way Percy is giving you Hermes’s advice right now. Somehow this feels like karmic retribution after years of spiting that asshole, and what he tells you next is more of a sign that it must be true.
“He said, ‘Do you know what that feels like? To be so close to someone you love knowing neither of you has any choice but to keep hurting each other?’ I didn’t get it then, but I do now.”
“With Luke and his mom?” you ask, picking at the remaining slivers of varnish on your thumbnail.
“With you and Luke. I didn’t call you, because… why would I want to see you hurt after everything?” Percy says this like it’s something he would do for everyone.
Perhaps it is, but the knot that forms in your throat feels as heavy as the boulder you almost sunk into his skull. He’s tall enough to lean your head against now, and you don’t mind the water spots that will form along the side of your funeral outfit. The shape of him it leaves will remind you of the little brother you gained through so much loss.
“Plus he has a new girlfriend. Absolute horse of a girl,” he jokes. It slips over your head but you still giggle, “I could’ve taken her.”
“I know, that was Grover’s worry. You’re prettier anyway…” Percy pauses, and then clears his throat, “You’ve always taken care of this place, y’know? Even after….I just think someone ought to take care of you.”
Your shoulder bumps against his as you finally skip a rock. It only bounces across the water twice and you think Percy might have had something to do with it, but you’re not bothered by the help this time around.
You wake up in the dark of night to see your dad looming in the doorway to his office. With drool and a post-it stuck to your cheek, he comes over to ruffle your hair in amicable silence.
“Hard at work or hardly working?” he chuckles, leaning over your shoulder to scan over the paperwork sorted into piles for him to sign from his absence.
“Hm. You wish,” you scoff, leaning against your arm as you look at him. He’s not in his usual eyesore of attire, wearing a clean-pressed suit with his hair slightly slicked back.
“You look good. The meeting went okay?”
“Grover will be. The Council of Cloven Elders? Not so much. Neither are the gods ready to take sides. Putting out little fires everywhere as we speak.”
The wheels of the office chair roll as you swing your feet, and if you both listen closely enough you can hear Pollux snoring upstairs. Chiron loved the earplugs you gave him.
Your father’s face smooths out a bit at the sight of you and the sound of his son’s breathing upstairs and he asks, “Are you? Good?”
A shrug slides off your shoulders, “How does one be good in a world like this one?”
A startling scream echoes off the walls of the Big House, rattling the floorboards from below as your father grimaces.
The work is never done for you two.
“Don’t look at me like that. It was worse when he first came here.”
“Don’t doubt it,” he mumbles, brushing lint off your shirt before he notices you’re donning neon orange. “Didn’t do laundry, princess?”
“Pollux and I haven’t gone back to our cabin since... I can wake him up if you—”
Mr. D shakes his head and goes to toss his body onto the couch against the window, shutting his eyes and taking a deep breath.
“Dad? Do you think Chris is a bad person?”
A beat passes and you think he may have fallen asleep, but then his voice sounds like gravel scraping up his throat.
“I don’t think anyone can be bad, kid. I think it is more often that people get lost. What Rodriguez needs is someone to take hold of him gently, and hand his life back to him—you…Clarisse… that’s what we’re giving him.”
Now you’re silent, staring at the dust on his name placard at the edge of the desk.
“Do you think otherwise?”
He calls your name again, and you look up like you’re about to lie to him but don’t have the energy to.
“Princess, do you think you’re a bad person?”
He stands up and walks around to your side of the desk, sitting on the edge so you have to look at him.
“I killed someone. During the battle. Didn’t even think twice about it, slashed his neck as soon as Castor went down and…” you sniff. “I kill monsters, not children, Dad. How does that make me any different?”
The last time blood was on your hands like this it was Luke’s in the Garden of Hesperides. All these years later you ended up being right— the only person you vowed to get bloody for is Luke Castellan, and now in a twisted turn of fate, you’ve bloodied your hands because of him.
“Because you did it for your brother. There are no other explanations needed.”
He sees the exhaustion in your eyes, the drop in your shoulders, but your dad also sees the strength in your bones that spans generations and he knows you and Pollux are strong because you are both his.
“Humans believe in life everlasting—glory, as some call it, but they’re too focused on achieving it on earth instead of enjoying what life has to offer,” he scoffs, “Everyone has the guts to die, but no one has the guts to truly live. How sad.”
“His name was Rowan. Son of Hecate. I taught him how to whistle the summer I left. This is all my fault, Dad,” you say shakily as he comes near and pulls you into his side. He shushes you but you relent.
“Luke’s killing all these people to fulfill a promise he made for me. I’m just fucking disgusted with myself for being the cause of it all. What good life can I deserve when wherever I go I leave a trail of blood?”
Love and addiction must be so alike; to know that to be sober you can’t indulge in the vice ever again—not only does it hurt you, but others around you. But through the years you’ve always kept the taste of his name in your mouth, the feeling of his skin under your fingertips, and the knowledge of why he’s destroying the world so he can make you a better one. Insanity stems from fighting for so long that you embrace the pain; feeling something so intensely that when it consumes you you’re able to walk out the other side and wear it as armor.
Not everyone is hardwired to persevere. There are moments like a night like these where it would be easy to give up. Instead, you pour two glasses of whiskey you’ve conjured and hand one to your dad. You both sip on your drinks slowly, embracing the crawling feeling of the burn.
“Liquor is one way out and death is another,” your dad sighs blissfully. He almost looks rejuvenated by the alcohol he knows he’ll hear about from Zeus later, but perhaps the death of his son is a good enough pardon.
“For some of us, we don’t have to think about the answer.”
Mr. D grabs a pen off the desk and starts signing papers to do something with his hands, and then you speak again, “I think I’d rather die than for people I love,” and your dad’s attention whips to your blank face staring at the moon outside the window. “Instead of killing for them. I’ve never been a good soldier, Dad.”
Mr. D looks at you thoughtfully and wonders where all the time has gone that you sit there in front of him with more knowledge than him at your mortal age before saying, “You’re my daughter. You’re a fighter. Death is for chumps anyway.”
He lifts you by the arm to try to usher you up the stairs but you stay in his office chair swatting his hands away.
“Got work to do, you and I. Not getting rid of me until it’s done.”
“When are you going home?” he asks, pulling up a chair next to yours.
“I am home.”
You don’t look up from the papers you were filing, stubbornness leaking through your voice.
“If there is a war coming, I want to be home as much as I can. I’m finishing my last semester and I’ll be here before and after classes. You can’t stop me, dad.”
And he knows that too.
There is no such thing as leaving Camp Half-Blood for you.
Never for too long. Your love for it is scattered everywhere campers can see.
In all these years, you never believed I loved you. And I did. I did so much. I did love you. I even loved your hate and your hardness. - Tennessee Williams
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skitskatdacat63 · 14 hours
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Happy 5/14!!!!
Aaaaahh not sure if this is my best work 😭 I just really wanted to draw smth for vettonso day but my brain hasn't really been functioning well LOL so I kept dreading working on this, especially bcs its so important to me, y'know? I hope it's good????? I'm happy with the concept, but I was just so unsure on so many of the angles and it was killing me. I did the color thing bcs I thought it'd add something interesting to it :) since I didn't paint it as I usually would
Anyways! Process!
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Now I will explain all of them:
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Boy king au is where it all starts of course. I think their relationship is the most developed in this compared to the others, but at the same point, they just start from such a different point, especially affection-wise. All of these kinda have a power dynamic, except the last one, and this is the most imbalanced. Fernando is being subservient, the only part of Seb he may kiss(in public lol) is his hand.
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Matador au next. They hurt themselves when they try to be affectionate, because they live in the culture of a sport of violence and death. The sword separates them, their love for the sport keeps them apart, in fear that they hurt each other. Seb, yet again, looks down upon Fernando. Seb haunts Fernando's whole career, the constant overhanging presence. Also aside from that, shame that you can't see his three musketeers look bcs of the black background 😔
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2012 core!!! I think this one is pretty easy to understand. Both of them often kiss their trophies, more so than any driver. So they're both trying to claim the wdc trophy by kissing it. Maybe you guys should just get rid of the trophy altogether and claim each other! But yes, just like the sword in the matador au one, the trophy and their ambitions divides, keeps them from ever bridging the vast gap between them, at least at that point in time.
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The conclusion! Aka what I wish we will get at Imola 2024- kidding kidding. But it is 2024. Finally there is no conflict between them, there's no big thing keeping them in conflict, they can finally come together. Finally they can touch, there is no gap to bridge, they can appreciate each other, and appreciate what they failed to in years past.
The thesis is basically that they always have their aspirations between them, and their aspirations happen to be basically the same thing. Until those are resolved, the gap between them is too vast for them to recognize and/or find any commonality. How do you get along with someone when you're both fighting for the same thing? How do you get along when it feels like one of you is winning more? How do you get along when there's such a vast gap?
In boy king au, it's going to take a while before they both feel settled about the issue of the throne. That's what makes that au interesting, they're trapped in this state of non-closure and they have to actually solve their issues without the matter of one of them simply removing themselves from the equation. They have to find a way to get over themselves and their aspirations, because like it or not they're stuck with each other. I think with the hand kissing, it represents how Fernando, at that point, is only willing to play along with the game if it's tradition, and he often won't budge in other ways. Yes, I will show subservience, but only in this detached, formal way that I don't connect personally to. He's still holding his own bitterness over meaningfully appreciating Seb. Though it's not like Seb isn't at fault. It takes a while for him to not hold things over Fernando, and constantly humiliate him. One day they will meaningfully show affection, and it won't be some sort of power play.
I think matador au is pretty similar to real life, and the 2010s era(it's basically just their actual plot line but in the context of bullfighting.) They're forever going to have this big elephant in the room, and it only really gets resolved when one of them leaves the sport. Once they're not fighting directly against each other, they realize what they've been missing out on and what they were not appreciating for so many years beforehand. They finally come together because they can't just rely anymore on the sport keeping them together. They actually have to make that step to be in each other's lives, rather than just taking their presence for granted.
Also the text on the comic. "We keep missing, and missing, and missing, and finally kissing." It's basically: we keep missing the point of it all, we keep failing to appreciate each other presence in our lives and in our own individual grand stories. But when we're not forced together anymore, we have to make the choice to come together again ourselves. We keep missing what we actually need to do. Missing each other in favor of our aspirations. Etc etc. One day we will finally embrace and there will be nothing keeping us apart.
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So I sent this message to @findingcrow
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And I ended up explaining literally all of the emojis. Here they are (in order of explained, not order of how they were put). I spent 3 hours explaining this and it's a LONG post, so, sorry lol
👯‍♀️-The twins are just a pair of dancers, and I love the vibes of Scar and Grian dancing together in the desert
🫧-The bubbles are because their love has the same vibes as the way a child loves bubbles. The child thinks bubbles are pretty and fun, but often pops them due to a lack of understanding of their fragility
⚖️- The scale is a symbol for justice, something that Grian had the intention of bringing to the server, and yet, in the end, he hated following through with it (killing Scar)
🪬- The hand is called a hamsa, as far as I'm aware, and is a symbol for protection and guidance, something that Grian offered to Scar throughout the entire time they knew each other
✨️- The sparkles are about how attractive and nice their love seemed to Grian, how shiny the prospect of loving Scar was
💌- Well, to me, it feels like keeping his love hidden inside him, leaving only hints of its existence. You cannot read what's inside the envelope until you open it, but the heart implies it was sealed with love. He hides his feelings in the envelope like a letter never meant to be read
💃- Ok, so, the dancing one is the same as the pair dancing
🌌- The galaxy is about his home, as I like to think the Watchers live in sorta in space-ish. I think a lot about Grian routinely going up on the roof in any season of the series and just, staring at the stars. "Oh wow," he'll say, "it's so much more beautiful looking up than down"
🫀- I tend to use the real heart for situations when my love feels, well, *real*, more so than the typical cartoons heart can express. When it feels almost as if the other person is less of a loved one, more of a part of me, like we've become so very intertwined that I can never forget them. I think you can guess why that applies to Scar and Grian
🎭- The drama masks are, once again, about how he hid his feelings. "No," he said, "I'm not in love. He's just my partner in crime." It's also about how he acted out a personality that fit his needs, too. He always wanted to win, and Scar was a part of that. "I made a deal, I have to live up on it" while he's actively helping kill people, knocking down the number of who he'll have to kill once he's red. In the end, all his actions were for his own gain, but slowly the facade he put on them of being for Scar became real, the mask became his face
🕯- And the candles, well, "the light of the server." A candle in the dark. A fire, something so fierce and destructive, becoming passive and helpful. Something so necessary for some. Plus, they're often associated with magic and rituals, a tool for manifestation and summoning and communication. But a fallen candle, a flame forgotten before bed, it can become destructive again. That's what burns down houses, what takes lives. And if it doesn't lose control, it burns, and burns, and keeps burning until all of itself has melted, until it's nothing
⚔️- For the swords, I thought mostly of when Grian attacked him. Y'know, "YOU TRAITOR!". #1, I like to think of it as him putting his sword to Scars throat, so swords are obvious there. #2, he also was guarding himself! He trusted Scar, showed him parts of himself he never showed anyone else (maybe even revealed he's a watcher?????), and then Scar KILLED HIM! As part of a stupid game! (Yes I'm aware of the irony there it drives me insane I can rant about that themes about that for so so so so long and the guilt Grian feels for being the cause the games Rzaurskr74us4s4ua). So, obviously, he started to guard his heart, like swords across an entrance
⚰️- Coffin is 2 things, first, the way their love died as Scar did. I like to think that Grian tried to bury him a little, Scars final resting place was also the resting place of their love (at least, the final resting place of SCARS love). The second thing is that Scar would sell coffins, remember? But he never got one. He never got what he gave, but he did get everything Grian had
🎠- So, the horse isn't JUST a horse, it's a merry-go-round horse. Y'know, from a carousel? So, in all the seasons, their relationship kinda follows the same main story-beats, right?
•Early betrayal/beginning of a grudge
•They're forced to make up, even if just briefly
•Help each other out with something
•They fall out again
•They die (sometimes being the CAUSE of the others death, even if indirect)
It happens again and again.... like how a carousel goes around and around and around. You CHOSE to get on the carousel, Grian, and you can't get off until it's over, you know that, Grian
🏜- Anywas, for the desert, well, they're the desert duo
🦙- For the Llama, don't tell me you forgot about Pizza!
🌓- Ok the half moon, Let's see how effectively we can put this into words. So it's 2 sides of the moon, right? It's the same thing at its core, the moon, but two entirely separate appearances, light and dark. It's the same thing at its core, a game, but two entirely separate experiences, the player and the creator. 2 sides of the same coin sorta deal, yeah? They both play the game, too, and in my mind, Scar sorta creates the game, too, in his own way. Would Grian have ever stuck around the game the way he did if Scar weren't there? Scar kept things interesting for him, kept him from getting bored. Grian bent and created new rules to make sure Scar had fun, the game was created just as much for Scar as it was for Grian. And again, Grian plays too! Grian has plans blow up in his face, Grian faces punishments of breaking the rules, and despite what the other players may say, Grian lost, too. It's the same thing at its core, a game, unwinnable, but malleable
❤️‍🩹- The bandaged heart is a bit more on the nose,
I like to think both Grian and Scar were, in some way, hurt when they met. Maybe Grian had become used to the ultimately selfish love of the watchers, and had trouble believing that any other sort of love could exist. Maybe Scar hated his namesake, and wished he could hide it. (Examples, I can't quite decide on what I wanna do with it, lol. But as they grew closer, that changed. Grian began to believe in selflessness, and Scar began to find beauty in every part of him. They bandaged each others wounds and healed each others hearts
🧨- So, the dynamite is also pretty obvious, I feel like, like it's Grian. Now I COULD do some sort of deep meaning, pretty easily in fact (blowing up in the emotional way instead of the physical way, losing control of his emotions, once again circling back to "YOU TRAITOR"), but that's really not what I had in mind when I put it there
🏳️‍🌈- The queer flag.... do I need to explain that
🕰- So, the clock is a really cool one, because Grian knew from the very beginning that this would never last. Somewhere, in the back of his mind, he had a timer in the back of his mind, constantly ticking, for when it was all gonna end. It was only ever a matter of time, but he pretended it wasn't. He pretended it would last forever. Maybe, if he hoped for long enough, the clock would stop ticking, but it didn't
⏳️- Now, the sand timer has, once again, a very similar meaning. It's a timer till the end of it all, the knowledge that it will always run out, *always*. But he still joins the games, over and over again. He flips the hourglass over and restarts the timer. The sand will keep pouring, it will never change, it will end the same, always
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ladystoneboobs · 1 day
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when it comes to jaime's fatherhood, yeah, it's somewhat unreasonable for cersei to have the kids be almost 100% hers, thinking they don't need a dad and it would be too risky for jaime to get too close, only to expect jaime to turn paternal mode on like a switch to help her avenge joffrey--even though they were not even close as uncle/nephew and disliked each other, BUT it is a bit more understandable when considering the example of fatherhood cersei grew up with. tywin had a more involved role in his children's lives as their publicly known father, but it was never a particularly warm and loving role with any of them. yet even so, that guy set all the riverlands on fire to avenge the capture of his least favorite child. a son he actually cared so little for that when tyrion did return to him alive and relatively unharmed, he wasted little time putting tyrion in a battle position where he could expect to actually be killed. caring about tyrion's safety or potentially permanant loss was never the impetus for starting his war, what mattered was that tyrion was a lannister and his kidnapping was an insult to all of them that had to be avenged. that's the kind of anger cersei wanted from jaime. she thought a woman's weakness meant mothers had to love their children, but fathers needing to spend time with their kids just to care for them and form a strong bond would be more of a foreign concept.
even without that avenging anger, i do wonder how jaime would have reacted had the true culprits in joff's murder been known or had cersei accused anyone except tyrion, accused one of their actual enemies, bc he did see his role in life as the family attack dog, cersei's sword arm. and when he first heard of the regicide and made a final race for kl, he was thinking that she'd need him for both comfort and revenge. thing is, even without that anger, he does display a bit of that possessive thinking, of joffrey not as a person in his own right but as just as his (secret) belonging. he didn't want to believe tyrion could have done it bc kinslaying was even worse than simple kingslaying, focusing not on how tyrion was already the boy's uncle through cersei but on the fact tyrion knew he was jaime's son too. it's not that tyrion wouldn't do that bc he couldn't be a kinslayer no matter what, or that violently poisoning a 13yo at his wedding was wrong, the real crime would be in the personal betrayal to jaime even if joffrey's death was no real loss to him at all. jaime could tell himself that joff was no more to him than a squirt of seed inside cersei, but it still made all the difference that the seed was his.
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britneyshakespeare · 4 months
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You know what. Despite it being against my doctor's orders I think I should rewatch Jane Howell's Wars of the Roses tetralogy
#the extent to which i enjoy shakespeare's history plays is condemnable.#especially the henry vi plays. ppl talk about those plays like they're the lowest thing shakespeare ever wrote#can't say i agree with that at all tbh. they're messy yes but they're GREAT#they are riotously entertaining and the conflicts are very engaging.#I JUST LIKE IT WHEN THEY KILL EACH OTHER WITH SWORDS!!!#SWORDS!!! SWORDS!!!!! KILLING!!!!!!! HEADS ON PIKES!!!!!!!!#like that's good old fashion entertainment to be honest. i can totally picture myself as an elizabethan commoner#losing my absolute marbles watching one of these in london#tales from diana#jane howell has so much power over me#i am so obsessed w her having directed the wars of the roses tetralogy AND titus andronicus.#some of the most patriarchal plays in shakespeare's oeuvre or at least the least-discussed-by-feminists.#im not really sure why when it comes to the wars of the roses plays tho. the female characters are so fascinating to me#joan of arc. margaret of anjou. anne neville. elizabeth woodville#altho i guess in terms of the real history those women tend not to be discussed as much as the men around them#(excluding joan of arc whose image is often stripped of historical context)#but shakespeare's treatment of them is well well well worth discussing more. idk#maybe it's just the problem of ppl's degradation of those plays! idk idk#me why me i can never be accused of not loving the wars of the roses tetralogy enough#me diana britneyshakespeare tumblr's no. 1 wars of the roses tetralogy stan#i also love circus (2008) most of all of britney's albums. im ok disagreeing w other ppl's fan favorites
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spacedace · 5 months
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Fuck whatever DC is doing with the al Ghul's characterizations and story lines, I've decided that from now on the al Ghul's are gonna be DC's version of the Addams Family instead.
Now I don't mean just give the various al Ghul's the exact personalities of the various Addams and call it a day. That's boring, that erases all the interesting parts of the al Ghuls, that's just using "find & replace" and not actually adding anything. I mean give them the vibes of the Addams Family.
Keep the al Ghul's as the al Ghul's with all their scheming and machinations and world domination attempts but give them all the unhinged energy, the casually insane view of the world, the deranged levels of love and devotion for family. Make them that group where objectively they are batshit insane but also you cannot argue with the fact that they are indisputably the most stable and functional family in the entire universe.
They're creepy, they're kooky, they're mysterious and spooky. Ra's many opulent homes and impenetrable fortresses are a museum and the al Ghul's really are a screa-um whenever people come to see-um (or when they lay waste upon their enemies in a surprise attack that has been planned for months and is just the first domino in a series that will ultimately lead to achieving a far greater goal).
They all love each other and want each other to be happy, they express this primarily with stabbing and murder attempts (its fine, death is a thing that happens to other people).
And forget the League of Assassins being a cult. Just make the whole vast globe spanning organization a collection of cousins/aunts/uncles/dear old friends ect. No one (not even the al Ghuls, if they cared to keep track of such things) is sure who is actually related to them and who just got absorbed into the ever expanding family tree based on their vibes being right.
(Is Sensei Ra's father you ask? Well he's certainly someone's father - probably.
Anyway have you heard about Cousin Cheshire? Despicable poisoner of a young woman, capable of the most horrific things imaginable - yes she is the sweetest dear. Like I was saying though, she just had a baby!
Everyone in the family is just so excited to throw a baby shower to celebrate! Ubu has really gone all out with the spike traps, he does so love getting to welcome a new addition to the family.
Talia of course has cultivated a brand new strain of the most toxic plants imaginable to make a brand new kind of necrotizing poison. You know, as a nice little romantic gift for Cousin Cheshire and that young man of hers. It really is so important to make sure you take time for you and your partner to go on dates and have a few pitched battles to the death on dark rooftops in the pounding rain when you have children.
Now there is some to-do about it all of course, you know how family get together can be. Everyone is arguing over who should get to give little Lian her first weapon and what it should be. Nyssa is pushing for grenades but Ra's is insisting on a sword - he's traditional like that you know - but Dusan has the vote so far on throwing knives. You know the kind that have the little divots along the edges of the blades them to make it easier to get the poison you dip them in to stick.)
I'm just saying that the al Ghuls should be a delightful cross between the Bond Villains they were originally conceived as and the lovingly unhinged Addams Family. It just feels correct in my heart.
(Again keep the interesting aspects of the characters and the nuances of who each of them are like their drive to save the world through destroying humanity and their strong environmentalist leanings and their constantly playing 5D chess and everything, but like, take away the racism and the cartoonishly evil for no reason bullshit and give them some fun feral energy to go along with it).
#batman#ra's al ghul#al ghul family#talia al ghul#nyssa raatko#cheshire dc#sensei dc#no more racism and fucked up dark family dynamics#the al ghuls aggressively adore each other#violence and schemes is their love language#in the full au version of all of this i'd like to imagine how canon plot points change with the al ghuls having these vibes#Just imagine Damian still trying to kill Tim when he first ends up in Bruce's care#but instead of it being a ploy to get rid of a threat its because he's just so excited to meet one of his big brothers#and attempted murder is just how you tell someone in your family that you love them#Tim just SO CONFUSED because Damian is talking so animatedly about how happy he is to get to have some brotherly bonding with Tim#while ACTIVELY trying to run him through with a sword#idk how things change with Cass exactly but i feel like they would in this#like either David Cain isn't an absolute monster or the al ghuls catch wind of what he's doing & are like#This is NOT how al ghuls treat family! what is this shameful behavior! She can't even insult you while you fight!#fighting and violence is a perfectly healthy way to express your love but only if there's actually LOVE involved!#The Heretic & other Damian clones still get made but only because Talia just misses her son so much that she makes more of him#Nyssa has just been bopping around the world for a few centuries & pops up every now and then to have a death match with her baby sister#i just have a lot of strong feelings about the al ghuls deserving better and combined that with the vibes of my favorite unhinged family#Dick still hates Talia but Talia takes all his insults as her darling step son telling her how much he loves her#which only drives Dick even crazier#Tim rocks up to the League of Assassins during his whole trying to prove Bruce is alive thing already seen as an al ghul#Oh yeah that's Cousin Timothy he's one of Talia's kids - never met a truer al ghul in your life#You see how he blew up all those bases? Ra's cried he was so proud#Ra's spoils his grandkids absolutely rotten which is giving Bruce SO MANY gray hairs
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healpimp · 6 months
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If you are ever in doubt wether my posts with demo and soldier interacting are boots n bombs or not i promise you it is intended to be fully and utterly homosexual
#They might not always be balls-slapping-the-taint deep in each other when i draw them#but i assure you its boots n bombs#i draw them like how masashi kishimoto draws naruto and sasuke#never not thinking abt the other when drawing them#like do i have to draw them cumming in every hole before you are convinced its gay. look at them barbara.#do you think its galpal time when i use the half-zatoichi as the sword that kills soldier.#do u think i chose the katna cus i thought it was the coolest sword. or my fav sword to use.#no. im a bottle bitch.#you think i use THE gayest sword in tf2. the one that can oneshot 2 specific classes if they also carry the sword.#just so you can assume its a best friend thing.#i use the half-zatoichi bc that shit is gayer than gay sex#like wydm they can kill each other in one shot. homosexual behavior.#theyve killed each other so many times now that they have intimate knowledge of each others bodies#they know what to aim for to kill them. how to ngle the sword just so.#cross faction icons.#the blood and gore and violence is a hyper masculine way of them baring themselves to each other without having to commit#the danger and pain and betrayal that awaits when theyre openly and unapologetically friendly and close w each other#the fact when they WERE open abt it they were punished#they had to choose between their job and their friend and without the staged betrayal#without the lies fed to them they would have chosen friend#and you know the job is important to both of them#enjoyable even#bnb CAN be loveydovey picnic at the park#but its not all it is#its the war where they tear each other apart thinking the other is in the wrong#its their fear of committing again#its their festering image of what the other did and the inability to even attempt to clear it up till its too late#and its the way they can bounce back from it#because theyre gay barbara theyre homosexual
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call-of-the-ocean · 2 years
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A Knight's Oath
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hauntingblue · 24 days
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Stampede aka another episode of luffy turning haters into dick riders just with his kind and big heart
#i might understand all the robin law fanfare... its been 26 minutes of stampede......#frobin reigns supreme imo still.....#VICEADMIRAL MOMONGA TOCAME LA PORONGA??? HELLO#THE LOG POSE TO LAUGH TALE???? and hancock arrived ❤️❤️#usopp saving luffh omg.....#blonde buggy..... why are we doing this to out beautiful women...#fujitora is on his own frequency... here you go a meteorite.. whatever happens to all of you and our troops happens goodbye#mihawk intervened bc zoro couldn't do it omg.... nami keep watch he is going to end it all tonight jesus#also persona following mihaw for a second movie ajdjaks.... i love them together honestly#brosalino is the kuma guy's uncle????? nepotism......#calling this guy the heir of the demon.... taking blame off ace akdjsksn.... you know whats funny in movies garp is very like thoughtful and#comprehensive of others peoples issues and then you get to how he raised luffy and like.... wouldn't that have been good there....#and with ace too lmao.... i mean he didnt have abandonment issues but just wait and see to a 10yo asking if he is worthy of living idk...#i get the meaning of it and what he meant but we all know ace didnt get that at the time until luffy got there#usopp.... see how when oda writes the movies it feels different.... first steong world with namo and now stampede with usopp...#the relationship moments really hit.. i was gonna comment about zoro and the cursed sword but that was just focusing on him#well this one wasnt written by oda but supervised i will take it....#hina taking the kids aldjakskal...... smoker and hina best straight ship behind frobin imo..... baby 5 x sai number 3 spot#sabo....... actually thank you bc smoker thinks he can take anybody#hancock and buggy AJSJAKAKLQQ omg usopp dont cry....... luffy will KILL that guy for making usopp feel like that lmao YEAAAH!!!!!#law smoker sabo the luffy lover squad..... each in their own way lmao#hancock its been so long how are you <3 omg law what are you doing here <3 my brother sabo hello.#crocodile made the plan of course.... luffy lover member too#usopps bullets omg....#sanji and zoro against lucci omg..... YEAAAHHHH#wait a second straw hat crew costume by uniqlo design team??? THE DRIP!!!#luffy seeing ace beside luffy with the fire goodbye.... he is EVERYWHERE#talking tag#watching one piece#watching one piece movies
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immamapletreekid · 4 months
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i am the most predictable person with the most predictably pathetic tastes in the history of predictable pathetic taste
#give me a character that is just in it for a good time. problem and conflict free#living their best life unbothered. moisturized. thriving and absolutely glowing#but is also like an actual big deal. has a reputation making them equal parts feared and admired#and give them the weirdest most incredibel fashion choices. bonus points id they are goth#and give off vampire wine aunt vibes#sprinkle in a pinch of middle aged man who somehow ends up the adoptive father of 2 and#pls he is so unserjous. he is living his best life in that fucking tiny ass boat. great unit of a black bejeweled sword on his back#lace sleeves and high heels sailing across the ocean chasing a pirate fleet bc he wanted to kill some time#he is peak gothic wine aunt malewife energy to me#HE LIVES IN A FUCKING CASTLE???? ? HIS FAVOURTIE FOOD IS RED WINE HE LIKES TO READ HE ONLY WEARS A SHIRT WHEN HES NOT WORKING#wheb i started this series i did not know who he was#and my predictions for top 3 favorhite characters were in no particular order zoro law and ace#now two od those i have not met yet. but for now#the tentative big 3 are mihawk nami and usopp#nami bc i care about her i adore her i cherish her i fuckijg love her she is so silly#usopp bc the vibes are immaculate#mihawk bc. actuslly no explanation needed im not foing to embarras myself further#but also i love all the strawhats ive met so far#they are one big happy family and they love each other and would die& kill for each other and they have a place to belong next to each other#and i think thats beautiful.#rambling about stuff
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kurozu501 · 2 years
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the difference in pvp for dark souls 1 vs bloodborne is so noticeable to me. 
In dark souls 1, while i did have some fun fights every now and then, the vast majority of them were just “both of us hide behind our shields and endlessly try to circle around for a cheap backstab and thanks to the lag its anyones guess which of us will get it.” Whole thing just kind of sucked.
In bloodborne no one has shields to hide behind and you can only backstab if you land a fully charged slow attack to their back. This means no one bothers trying to backstab and fights are now a ridiculously fun high adrenaline burst of dashes and bullets as we both dance around each other, its so great. 
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misttiddies · 2 years
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id: second mizukage gengetsu sitting at his desk saying “hehe YES! FINALLY some IMPORTANT LEGISLATION! then a picture of the document on the desk, which says “bill of illegalize assigned gender at birth,” which he signs with a pen with a clam at the top. the third image is a photo of a chicken with overlayed text that says ‘by interacting with this post you agree every trans person deserves respect, human rights, and $500,000′ /end id
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leatherbookmark · 1 year
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mother is watching the last episode of miss the dragon and mannnnn zanzan is Acting, he’s shaking, he’s making Panicked Eyes, he’s doing it all! even with the uhhh moderately complex material he was given! but ycly is like 😐 you killed the love of my life whom i protected for three lifetimes. it hurt a lot. i will now. give this pain back to you a fuckton of times. while zanzan goes from gfjhgkjshfkj emperor please save me i don’t want to die!! to just plain out AAAAAAAAAAAAAA (tortured screaming) like there’s Emotion! meanwhile our no 1 romantic interest: 😐
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bluerosefox · 9 months
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Assassin Heir? Crime Fighting Furry? NOPE NO THANK YOU!
"Danyal, its time to end this game and return with me."
Danny should had known Clockwork had something in mind when he sent him on this mission. He knew he should had been suspicious of the time keeper when he noticed the little 'this is going to be fun' smile on his face when he sent Danny off into the portal.
"Get back here you demon spawn 2.0!"
But how was he supposed to know that he'd wake up in this world version of himself in a pit full of corrupted (AND NASTY) ectoplasim at the tender age of five or that when he swam up to the surface he'd be meeting face to face with what was apparently a cult.
"-O just spotted him a block away! I'll try to cut itty bitty bridie off!"
An Assassins Cult his, new to him, loving yet a little insane mother was in charge of (though during the few months he stayed in the compound he heard rumors and gossip from maids and others alike that if his grandfather returned from the dead he'll take over once again, no doubt punish Talia for creating another heir after the failure of the last one, most likely was going to kill Danny and that... that was can of worms Danny didn't wanna deal with yet)
"Ten bucks says they try to stab RR when we get the feral thing home"
"...Losers bet...."
Danny had lived with his mother for a while after being brought back from the 'dead' for apparently the first time, it turned out training a five year old with an actual sword and a dumbass hidden revenge seeking teacher was a terrible idea.
"I swear if this one tries to murder me like the others I'm asking Zatanna if there is a curse on me."
He dealt with her high demands of perfection, the endless training, and the constant comparisons to his apparent older brother Damain... Who didn't know Danny, or rather Danyal existed.
Nor did his father (when Danny, using his powers he's kept hidden since 'waking' up in this Realm, he sneaked his way around the base and discovered how he came into the world. And tbh he couldn't blame his mom how she made him, she was an assassin first and foremost, being naturally pregnant would had painted a target on her for to long... but he also felt it was unfair and an asshole move on his unsuspecting father as well)
"As your elder brother I demand you to stop running!"
Now don't get him wrong, he did like his new mother (total badass assassin lady and all that) and he knew she loved him in her own... deadly way. But yeah, she really shouldn't be taking care of kids. He could tell she struggled with wanting to be a normal mother but her first instinct after so many years was to be an assassin first.
Something she was trying to engrave into Danny with as well.
"Ah, hello Beloved. I see you've learned of our Danyal."
"Talia. Back away from him and leave Gotham now."
"I can not do that. The League needs an heir and since Damian refuses to return... I have decided to create a new one and I shall not be leaving until he returns with me."
"Talia."
Hence why when Danny, or rather Danyal al Ghul had gotten decent control over his powers he decided to leave the League. Again nothing wrong with the life his mom leads, to each their own, but he... really, really didnt want to be an assassin. Or an assassin heir.
So here he was, after almost a year on the run, using his powers and training to out smart and out maneuver his mother and her many band of Assassins, in Gotham. One of the last places he ever wanted to run to cause he knew his father and brother lived here.
It was just his luck that his mother had managed to intercept his train ride that passed into Gotham for a few hours and forced him to run into the city...
Add her assassins into the mix and running into Robin, who heard from Oracle his mother had been spotted chasing a young boy across the city, that same night.
After that it became a full on "catch me if you can" chase for not only his mother but for the batclan as well.
And after two whole days of chase, it seemed like the final showdown was about to begin because everyone was on top of this rooftop, his mother and her assassins on one side, his father and the batclan on the other and Danny well... he was right in the middle of all of it.
He just had to hope no one would notice him once the fighting started...
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alienzil · 6 months
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Okay so I saw this post and you know the types of fics where adult Danny moves to Gotham and winds up emotionally adopting one or more of bat kids or accidentally coparenting with Bruce (with or without a relationship between them)? I had the thought, what if Danny parented the bat kids but he started doing it out of spite?
Like, Danny moves to Gotham and runs into Batman and Robin one night while out for a late night flight and drops down to the rooftop to say hi.
Bruce sees this 5'6" twink that looks like a stiff breeze could knock him over and is so obviously new in town and thinks Gotham is going to eat him alive, he needs to leave before he gets killed.
Batman: Looming menacingly and in his deepest scariest Batman voice, "Leave. Metas aren't allowed in Gotham."
Danny: Offend! Excuse?! Who does this guy think he is?! 😡 Danny was trying to be polite here! "First of all, I'm not a meta. Second of all, rude much?!"
Batman: Does scariest bat glare. "Leave." Swoops off into the night.
Robin (Damian): "My father is correct. You should leave the city for your own safety."
Danny sees this tiny vigilante child with fierce expression and a sword and is just like awww, so cute! 😍 Then he noticed Robin had a small cut on his arm and his inner gremlin activates. If the rude flying furry can't take care of his own kid properly, Danny will do it better!
He bandages up Damian's arm, gives him a cookie and teaches him a neat sword trick before sending him on his way with a hug telling him he needs his sleep.
Danny goes out of his way to run into the bat kids and be the absolute best dad.
He takes Nightwing flying and throws him in the air so Nightwing can do all the fanciest acrobatic tricks.
He tracks down Red Hood and starts a book club with him (Danny may or may not have used his connection with Ghost Writer to get ahold of some rare books).
He eats waffles with Spoiler and trys out weird topping combinations that make them both make faces and laugh.
He makes new gadgets for Red Robin but carefully breaks them just a little bit and takes them to the teen so they can fix them together (it's enrichment!). He always insists RR keep them as a reward.
He follows Signal around during the day invisibly, making faces and doing tricks only Signal can see (he made him laugh in front of the police at a crime scene twice!).
All of the kids get his attention and love and Danny smugly thinks how Batman must be absolutely seething about his kids bonding with Danny and Batman missing out on all of it.
Danny started it out of spite but he does wind up genuinely loving the bat kids.
Batman definetly hates it when the kids are bonding with Danny and is extremely jealous (sulky Batman brooding in his cave about it).
Bruce's repeated attempts to intimidate Danny into leaving Gotham don't work and him telling his kids to stay away from Danny had zero effect (the terrible children don't listen to him at all).
So Bruce starts spending more time with the kids to compete against Danny. The bat kids love it and (little gremlins that they are) use the two of them against each other constantly.
Bruce:"Sorry Tim, I can't make it to your photography exhibit this weekend, there's a meeting with the Justice League."
Tim:"Oh that's fine... I'll just ask Danny to come." 😏
Bruce: Narrows his eyes and grits his teeth, "Actually, the Justice League needs to have contingencies in place to manage without my input. This would be a good time to test their capabilities. I'll skip the meeting and come to your exhibit."
With both of them competing to spend more time with the kids it leads to the two of them spending time with each other to be around the kids more.
After Damian catches a terrible flu bug, Danny spends an entire weekend at the manor babying him. This is when Bruce finds out Danny has known their secret identities for months and tries to get mad about it but Alfred puts his foot down, raises a judgmental eyebrow in Bruce's direction that puts a stop to that nonsense and sets up Danny with his own room in the family wing.
Eventually, Danny gets to the point where he spends most of his nights at the manor and he and Bruce consult each other on all major household decisions.
The whole family is at the manor one morning including Danny. Bruce has a meeting at WE and he and Danny are absently discussing their plans for the day at the breakfast table.
Bruce: " The meeting should take most of the morning and then I have paperwork this afternoon and a scheduled walk through on one of the new engineering projects. I probably won't be done by the time school let's out. Can you pick up Damian today?"
Danny: "That shouldn't be a problem. Would you mind swinging by the bookstore on the way home and getting my preorder? Jay and I just finished rereading the first book and we were wanting to start the second tonight before you all go on patrol. I'd rather not try to make it to the bookstore in school rush hour traffic"
Bruce: "Sure."
Stephanie watches Danny reach out and absently straighten Bruce's tie as they both get up to leave. Bruce grabs Danny's coffee thermos and hands it to him while they walk out the door.
Stephanie: "Sooo, bets on how long until they realize they're basically married?"
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hyperfixating-rn-brb · 6 months
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The Good Omens Fandom has had a lot of fun recently with the knowledge of Aziraphale and Crowley holding hands on the bus at the end of season 1.
Soo here's everything that went through my head as I learned of it for the first time.
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For that entire scene, Aziraphale is really far gone. He's dissociating so hard he can't even realize he's been sitting on a sword. Crowley is probably the only thing keeping him grounded.
They just narrowly stopped Armageddon after a showdown with literally Satan, and still can't let their guard down. For the first time ever, they're completely on their own side. Now they have to orchestrate a body swap to save both of them. They wouldn't just be killed, they'd be completely destroyed. Everything must go exactly according to plan, but how often does that actually happen?
And on top of that, his bookshop, his home, his safe place with the demon he has to pretend not to love is burned and gone.
Crowley is so incredibly gentle and reassuring this entire scene. He's been through so much trauma himself and has spent a lot of his existence shielding the angel from it, hoping to protect some of his innocence and naivete. Crowley is absolutely familiar with every symptom of PTSD and anxiety.
Now he has to see his sweet angel see such a small bit of the horrors of heaven and hell and start to crumble inside. He's going to do his dam best to try and help Aziraphale through it. Speaking softly, ("the bookshop burned down... remember?) slowly and carefully, gradually helping to pull the angel back to reality, reminding him that he's there and will help ground him.
They get on the bus, and sit next to each other. 11 years ago, they sat nearby but separated while Crowley begs Aziraphale to help him prevent the Apocalypse. Now they are sitting together. Both an act of reassurance and unity.
Crowley sits first, Aziraphale could so easily just sit across from him, behind or in front. But he chooses to sit right next to him. And hold his hand. Aziraphale desperately needs to be near to the *former* demon he loves, to hold him, to make sure they won't be separated.
In the book, their famous lines of "none of this would have worked out if you weren't, deep down, just a bit of a good person" and "just enough of a b*stard to be worth liking" came as Satan rose from the earth, as a goodbye in case they were destroyed.
Luckily, that didn't happen and they survived. Armaggedon was stopped. But the angel is still so anxious of losing Crowley. So he chooses to reach out, to anchor himself and reassure himself that Crowley is still there beside him and that they are okay, at least for a few minutes.
And Crowley let him. He knows how badly Aziraphale needs him, he needs the angel just as much. He knows how badly he craved an anchor and support system as he was first abused and traumatized by his Fall, then further by Hell. So he's going to continue being there for Aziraphale, doing everything he can to make his angel feel safe and comfortable.
Over the next few years, Aziraphale would become so much more comfortable reaching out and touching Crowley. Leaning into him, resting a hand on his shoulder or briefly touching his chest. Somehow both reassuring himself that the former demon was still there, and reminding Crowley that he's still there for him at the same time.
Then Crowley becomes more comfortable with the touch, leaning into the angel by himself. No longer flinching at a sudden graze of a hand or reassuring squeeze.
That one moment of the two holding hands on the bus cemented so much of their relationship. "The last few years, not really..." all started on that bus the moment Aziraphale chose to sit down next to Crowley.
edited: at first this said "new knowledge" because I just found out about this all the other day, and wrote this up at 3 AM, and didn't really fact check when this knowledge became well known. I've only really been a GO fan since maybe 2021, and only really started being active in the fandom during the last few months, so a lot of info that is fairly well known is still generally new to me. soo yeah this was edited :)
source for anyone asking for it!
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