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#Still figuring out what to tag original posts
getvalentined · 2 days
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I've never done a full breakdown of everything that happened to my version of Vincent while he was under the knife (although there is a partial breakdown from like 12 years ago on Ask Vincent Valentine), but @spinejackel tagged my recent Vincent doodle gushing about autopsy scar (Vincent Has a Y-Incision headcanon supremacy!) so I figured it was probably a good time. This is also probably the best method, since I can apply the right tags and trigger warnings to hopefully keep it from hitting the people who would be disturbed.
For anyone who doesn't know, figuring out the fucked up physiology of victims of science is like my entire jam. I think this is what happens when you let a chronically ill child watch Akira and the original Bubblegum Crisis OVA and most of the works of Masamune Shirow. All that before FF7 even existed. This means that the explanation under the cut may seem excessive, and this post is very long. I've been building it over over a quarter century, I don't think there's any avoiding it at this point.
Warnings for body horror, nonconsensual body modification, medical horror and torture. Basically, if there's anything you can think of related to becoming a victim of science under the rule of an unethical sci-fantasy oligarchy, it's probably in here to some degree. It's explained plainly and simply, in clinical but not visceral detail.
My headcanons for what Hojo did to Vincent are pretty specific, albeit not precisely comprehensive; 27 years later I still don't really have a particularly solid concept for how he turned Vincent into a shapeshifter, although at least we know it's not something entirely specific to Vincent—Hojo repeated that facet of the experiment in Azul, but not in any other SOLDIER operative even in DeepGround, implying that it's only possible if very specific physiological conditions are met. The minimal concept I do have involves a twisted application of the concept of incarnate summoning as it appears in FFXIII-2, but it's very vague and also not the topic of this post. Maybe later.
Regarding the Y-incision/autopsy scar, my headcanon is that once Hojo tweaked Vincent into being able to regenerate from any injury—an enhancement that is confirmed to be entirely Hojo's work in Dirge—the professor of course felt it necessary to run various tests quantify the usefulness of his handiwork. He did this first by inflicting various surface injuries, then by causing more extreme bodily trauma, which eventually culminated in Hojo removing the majority of Vincent's internal organs in order to measure how long it took them to grow back and, assuming they did grow back, how the new ones compared to Vincent's original parts.
To be able to observe this as closely as possible, Hojo kept Vincent's torso open for the entire process—which he repeated twice more in order to check the weight, size and structure of the newly-grown organs in comparison to the originals. This study proved that most of them did grow back, but the majority of them stopped developing much earlier than was appropriate for Vincent's age and size. The difference was consistent, Hojo just never figured out why most of them grew back smaller and less-developed.
The reason this happened is based the fact that most of the organs in the human trunk are used in digestion and other related processes, and Vincent's regeneration means he doesn't need to eat or drink anymore. His body only expended as much energy as was completely necessary to develop those organs to the point of being functional rather than normal, because they're not really necessary. Vincent is glad he still has them, though, because he does still occasionally eat (usually in social situations) and also he'd be really sad if he couldn't even have coffee.
Vincent's brain activity remained normal during the entire process, although that may have something to do with Hojo driving a bunch of fluid lines into his head and flooding the inside of his skull with mako to keep him awake the whole time even while deprived of oxygen. (Rebirth spoilers, but seeing the bit in the Nibelheim Protorelic questline where Hojo does something super similar to this, after this has been my headcanon for decades, was a trip.)
Two organs didn't grow back at all: Vincent's appendix and one kidney. This was also the result of efficient energy expenditure, as the human appendix isn't necessary for survival, and only one kidney is really required. (Each time Hojo removed the new kidney, the one that grew back would be on the opposite side, which bothered Hojo to no end.)
His lungs grew back a little larger, possibly because his skeletal structure never quite recovered after his first transformation into Galian—his arms and legs are noticeably too long for his body, although not to the point of looking impossible, and likewise his ribcage settled to breadth that would allow for larger lungs. He doesn't really need these anymore either, related to his brain being exposed to so much mako during the process that it can now operate without oxygen if necessary, but switching himself over from aerobic to anaerobic respiration is really unpleasant and Vincent tries to avoid it when he can.
His heart was pretty normal by the time Hojo was done with him, although his heartrate had dropped to like 20bpm even when elevated. Again, if respiration isn't necessary, there's not much reason for the system to be active. (By the time Lucrecia was done this had dropped to around 5bpm on average, although it's completely arrhythmic and jumps all over the place when he's not either particularly active or on the verge of a transformation.)
This was the experiment that left Vincent susceptible to degradation, which Hojo didn't realize until after finally closing him back up. Upon realizing that Vincent's body wasn't responding properly to a different test (a repetition of an earlier experiment related to the regeneration of external tissues and features), Hojo just kinda threw him in a tube to be disposed of at a later date, kinda like that scene in Arrested Development where there's that dead dove in a bag in the fridge. The incision healed at some point during the period that Lucrecia was working on him, but early enough in her work that the tissue couldn't flawlessly regenerate (like it does in the present), leaving him with one more gnarly scar on top of all the rest.
Vincent is self-conscious about all the physiological changes brought on by what was done to him, often to the point of loathing. His left arm is the worst—it rotted off while he was in the throes of degradation and grew back as something that he hesitates to call his arm—but Vincent hates that Y-incision scar almost as much. Some days they tie.
(It has come up in appropriately horrified conversation with Shalua that, considering how his regeneration works, Vincent could probably get rid of all the scars on his chest if he somehow peeled the skin off his torso in a single swath. He will not be doing that. Besides, it might grow back the wrong color/texture/etc, like his left arm. Not worth the risk, much less the suffering.)
Also I gotta finish off this entry with the extremely stupid headcanon reveal that Vincent's (honestly fairly impressive) dick was cut off during the first round of bodily trauma regeneration tests—and Hojo has never felt the sort of rage he experienced upon discovering that it grew back bigger than before. This occurred early enough in the experiments that Vincent was not awake for it, and thus has no idea how the fuck this happened, and does not want to talk about it ever thank you very much. I've never mentioned it in public anywhere because it is extremely stupid, but I hope someone out there finds it as funny a concept as I do.
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blackbird-brewster · 2 days
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Meta: Jemily Queerbaiting
With the huge influx of posts saying 'Jemily is gonna be canon', I really appreciated seeing this post because OP was completely correct. I didn't want to write an entire dissertation as a reply, so I'm making my own post with my personal opinion on this. (All sources are noted in footnotes)
Before I began this rant, for anyone who thinks this is anti-Jemily. It is not. I have shipped Jemily for 18 friggin years and that's never going to change. This post is specifically my thoughts about queer baiting.
First off, I need to note that the showrunners (and the cast members who use social media) KNOW what a huge queer following this show has and that's why we got pansexual Tara Lewis in S16 [1]. Which, in itself, was SOOOOOOO important!!! Our first canonically queer main in SIXTEEN seasons was a middle-aged Black woman!!! That's phenomenal. (The fact it was horrible rep, because they instantly ruined her relationships once her queerness served it's plot point is a whole other post entirely)
In my opinion, the 'big Jemily moment' Paget posted about on Twitter [2] (and AJ hinted at during a recent IG live) is simply queerbaiting to get people to watch S17. I know a lot of you are newer to the fandom and I love your enthusiasm, I really do, ship and let ship, but listen, let's be real, Jemily is not going to be made canon. The showrunners aren't going to suddenly say (after 17 seasons) 'Surprise, Jemily is endgame'. This show has never cared about queer rep and now that CBS/Paramount have already ticked their queer rep box with Tara, they won't be in any rush to add any other characters to it.
Please buckle in, I've got a lot of thoughts on this matter --
What is Queerbaiting?
If you aren't aware of what queerbaiting is, here's a good definition:
Historically, queerbaiting has carried two meanings: the first is an act of aggressive heterosexuality to shut down queer subtext on screen while still teasing and catering to the queer audience in advertising, public relations, and fan engagement strategies; the second is an existing homoerotic tension between two characters played up on screen while met with derision by the professionals behind the scenes. [3]
The Medium article quoted here is from 2017, a time when parasocial relationships were really starting to take over social media. In 2024, actors are now only a mention or tag away online, they have direct conversations with fans, and this process has allowed for an even deeper form of queerbaiting.
Oftentimes online, actors are asked directly about certain ships and while some ignore these questions (usually to avoid breaking their contracts or other repercussions), others (looking at you, Paget) choose to instead tease fans about queer ships. She's done this for years upon years and if I've learned anything in the past twenty-years of existing in fandom spaces it's this -- don't hold your breath. In it's original meaning, for something to be deemed as queerbaiting there had to be malicious, or at least, purposeful intent to string queer fans along by teasing them with suggestive content about the ship in question, while knowing this ship will never come to fruition in canon.
The thing to remember is, Paget and AJ aren't the only ones who know about Jemily shippers -- the network and showrunners are well aware of this ship too. When networks/showrunners figure out they have a strong sapphic fanbase, they love to use that to their advantage to get more viewers and higher ratings. Queerbaiting is a goldmine to keep fans watching long running shows, look at Rizzoli and Isles, Supergirl, and OUAT for examples of this.
Jemily and Queerbaiting:
Ever since Emily joined the BAU in S2 (2006), there have always been fans who ship JJ/Emily (shoutout to the old LJ forums!). Way before celebs were just a tweet away from fans, back when all our fics began with disclaimers so we wouldn't get sued by networks, we went to great lengths to keep our fanworks far removed from actors/showrunners attention.
As far as Jemily goes, this reply from Paget in a 2009 interview with TVGuide.com [4] (which has now been deleted from their site unfortunately, but there are quotes on Tumblr still [4.a]) confirmed some fans' worst fear -- the actors had found our fanworks online.
TVGuide.com: Of course, a band of fans want her to hook up with Hotch.
Brewster: I know! I didn't realize that fans make these videos on YouTube? A.J. Cook sent me a hilarious one that made it look like Prentiss and J.J. were having a secret lesbian affair. You know, when Hotch was blown up in the SUV, we shot this scene where he's in the hospital and I'm standing next to him, looking at his bleeding ear. Our director came in and said, "Paget, you're looking at Hotch like you're in love with him. It looks really weird." So now, every day, Thomas [Gibson] and I flutter our eyelids at each other.
This was the first time I recall anyone acknowledging Jemily shippers publicly and at the time (Jan 2009), the show was still in Season Four (just before CBS fired both AJ and Paget [5]). Paget genuinely said it's 'hilarious' that fans shipped JJ/Emily. Even now, I'll see people say 'We know Paget and AJ have seen Jemily fanvids, so they obviously ship it too' -- but those same people rarely acknowledge the full context of the original answer. Paget not only thought JJ/Emily were 'hilarious', but then she doubled down and turned her reply back to how she and Thomas liked to play up the chemistry between Emily/Hotch.
While no one can say for sure which video it was that AJ sent Paget, just knowing they were watching JJ/Emily fanvids sent a bit of a shockwave through the femslash side of the fandom. To some it felt like an invasion of privacy, fanworks are by fans for fans -- knowing the cast were poking around in fandom spaces added an extra layer of worry around what we fans were posting online. Fifteen years ago, it used to be quite taboo for actors to outwardly discuss shipping or other fanon for whatever show they were in, and we fans were usually comfortably removed from the actors altogether.
Of course, now it's the norm for fans and actors/showrunners to co-exist online and interact with one another. This connection has opened new ways for shows to queerbait their fans. Pretty much every show has some form of social media account now and there is no doubt that the people running those accounts keep up with the most popular ships and hashtags. Not to mention that actors are constantly barraged with questions about whether they ship their character with x,y,z, or whether they think a ship should be made canon, etc. These interactions only serve to benefit the shows themselves, because whether the conversation is for or against a certain ship, it's all just free publicity (Why do you think CM now has a TikTok account?)
Every time AJ or Paget say anything about Jemily, the queer side of the fandom loses their minds. But this has been going on for YEARS now and every single time, it turns out to be nothing but social media hype and queerbaiting. Remember this AJ post? [6] Or what about the notorious reply by Paget to a fan, where she talks about how she and AJ held hands under the table 'for the shippers' [7] I've seen this cycle over and over again, so perhaps I am cynical, but I'm not getting my hopes up that Jemily will ever seriously be canon.
It's widely known now, after both Kirsten [8] and Paget [9] have talked about it, that there was an early idea where Prentiss was supposed to be queer, but that was ultimately scraped before it ever made it on screen. For context, please remember, this show has been airing for nearly twenty years. It began in 2005, during the highly conservative Bush administration. Queer people didn't have rights in the US, we couldn't get married, we were rarely protected under discrimination laws, and we could even be fired for simply being queer (in some states). Diverse queer representation on screen was extremely limited to things like 'The L Word' and 'Queer as Folk' (both aired on Showtime, so they were behind a paywall. And as far as tLw goes, that show was extremely male-gaze focused and is horrible in nearly all regards if you try to rewatch it now). As far as prime time shows went, queer rep was even more rare. Which is why Emily wasn't queer from the get-go.
Yes, things have changed since 2006 in terms of queer rep on TV. We have a myriad of queer identities represented in TV and film nowadays, which is why I think it's so easy for newer fans to say 'lf she was supposed to be gay anyway, they should just make Emily queer in canon!' I know this is what fuels most fans' demands for Emily being confirmed queer, and I get it, I DO. I would be all for it! However, I do not, in one hundred years, actually believe that is going to happen after they already canonically queer confirmed Tara in S16. The fact we even got ONE queer character is ground-breaking for this show.
It's also worth noting, that in the time between Paget's departure in 2012 and her return in 2016, she became very active on Twitter. This was when more and more fans began asking her about Jemily and after Kirsten's AfterEllen interview, fans also pushed for Paget to address the possibility of Emily being gay. 'Pushed' is actually an understatement for some of the outright harassment she would receive. (AJ received some of this harassment too, but less so because she doesn't use social media ass often) Back then, neither of them replied to these things directly. Yet, no matter what either woman posted, the replies were full of Jemily stans begging for her acknowledgement. (Did you know 'stan' is literally a term coined for stalker fans?) I remember one time AJ's friend was missing and she posted info on her IG about it, you know what the replies were? People asking her about Jemily. It was genuinely sickening.
Within this context, it was no surprise to fans when Emily came back in S12 , she and JJ's friendship was seemingly erased. The two women were rarely on screen together in the late seasons, plus the writers saw fit to even give Emily not only one (Mark in London, but two, on-screen boyfriends for the first time in the entire series. I personally do not think these changes to Emily's character were coincidence, I saw the hellscape of what people would say to AJ and Paget online and I fully believe that upon Paget's return to the show, the showrunners purposely tried to distance JJ and Emily to dissuade the more abusive side of the fanbase.
Can I prove that, no. But it is the only reason I can think of as to why Emily S12+ seemingly didn't care about JJ anymore, despite their deep and meaningful friendship. I mean, they both CROSSED THE WORLD to go rescue each other in prior canon -- but when Emily comes back, they acted like they barely knew each other. This was even more prevalent in S16, when JJ's main storylines all revolved around Will, and Emily barely looked at JJ in the entirety of ten episodes. (Remember how Prentiss didn't even hug JJ after bomb, but she did go hug Luke?)
So, do Paget and AJ earnestly ship Jemily, or are they continuing the long tradition of queerbaiting us? Who fucking knows, not me. But based on the history of this fandom, I think I can make a safe bet. (Interestingly, if you search all of Paget's twitter for the word 'Jemily' [10] she only has 3 direct tweets mentioning the ship. I don't think it's a coincidence that two are within the past few months since they started filming S17 (the other one was a RT of Kirsten (who tagged something Jemily)
This is all to say --
Just because Paget and AJ have publicly talked about Jemily,, this doesn't mean it's ever going to happen on screen. And you know what, THAT'S OKAY!! There has been this constant outcry (after Tara became queer confirmed) of 'Do Emily next' or 'Why wasn't it Emily with a girlfriend!?' and 'Jemily needs to be canon in S17!' -- as if people believe their ships aren't worth anything unless they are canon.
That couldn't be further from the truth! Fandom is built on headcanons and fan interpretations and rare pairs and all types of shippers. Your ship does NOT need to be canon for you to enjoy it. I will ship Jemily forever, no matter what. I don't think there will be some magical queer plot in S17, at best, we might actually get to see Emily/JJ on screen together again and after the train wreck that was S16 -- I'll take whatever I can get.
And hey -- if I am completely wrong, if Erica Messer pulls a Korrasami out of her hat, I will be ecstatic. I will be happy to be proved wrong, but at the same time, I'm not going to lose sleep over it and I'm DEFINITELY not going to go hound the actors about it on social media.
Sources:
[1] 2022 Digital Spy article about the importance of Tara's coming out
[2] 04/18/24 Paget Tweet
[3] 2017 Queerbaiting article from medium.com
[4] 2009 Broken TVGuide link
[4.a] Tumblr quote from the above TVGuide Interview
[5] 2010 Kirsten interview screenrant.com
[6] 2019 AJ Instagram Post
[7] 2020 Paget video on Twitter (via @karasluthqr)
[8] 2015 Kirsten interview AfterEllen.com
[9] 2016 Paget Interview CriminalMindsFans.com
[10] @PagetPaget search 'Jemily'
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gammija · 3 days
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that annoying ai RDJ-jon is still on top of every tma related tag, unmarked as ai. so i have to talk about this other post.
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putting aside weird anatomy (why are there pits in her shoulder), the lack of anything approaching a character design aside from 'pretty white woman', how she's half undressed for some reason, and any number of other things - look closer at the background. we're being watched
what's... what are these
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these eyes are genuinely so funny to me. they can't be by the same entity that made the original: a human artist would draw them in a style matching the portrait, and an image generator would either do that, or generate something more photorealistic
so im trying to figure out the thought process here. was it an artistic flair to feel like they 'made' the art? to try and beat the ai allegations? or just to make it more 'tma'-y? did op truly not see the vast difference in style between them and the rest of the image?
or did they just not care, said, 'Meh, im not gonna spend more than 10 mins on this - What am i, an artist?'
and hit post
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rejectedfables · 10 months
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Headcanoning [villainous character] with [stigmatized neurodivergence] but like. Not like that. Not to villainize the disorder but to humanize the villain. It makes them relatable to me. Not to "explain" their violent behavior (which is irrelevant), but to acknowledge their trauma. The author gave them trauma and said "their response makes them evil" and I say "that's the least interesting take a person could have. I want to dig my claws into how trauma affects people. I want meat."
If I tell yall which character and which disorder though, somebody is gonna clown too close to the sun about it. Can't have SHIT in this villain loving house
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good-beansdraws · 4 months
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Mutual left this tag on one of my Fuuta analyses and yeah...
Part two of "Fuuta’s central theme is invasion of privacy and he has extreme anxiety over being watched, so it's interesting that we get to pick him apart and see all his worst, most private thoughts" :(
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bowenoke · 2 months
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forgot how long it takes to boil characters, so some of them are a little undercooked
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raiiny-bay · 4 months
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my favorite edits - 2023 edition 1 / 2 / 3 / 4 / 5 / 6 / 7 / 8 / 9
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singsweetmelodies · 2 months
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watching the alpines qualify dead last... my immediate thought was "oh it's going to be sympathy kisses+ for Pierre all season long in the your lips, my lips (apocalypse) universe" 💀
oh my gosh, HI 🤭😍 well this ask made me grin far too fondly down at my phone screen... it just means SO much that people are still thinking of this fic universe even though it hasn't been updated in forever. 🥺 i am really SO touched!
and i also agree COMPLETELY! sympathy kisses all night long, for sure... perhaps even a sympathy blowjob or two... or even (since charles has once again reminded us that he's not sensitive to bottoming) a sympathy fuck 😏 but whatever the case might be, you can bet your ass that they'll definitely be in each other's beds in the 2023 kisses fic 'verse <3333 😘
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void-chara · 1 year
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first finished piece of lifesteal fanart yaayyy!! I. I started this during the second round of the mcytblr sexyman contest. Why does art take me so long. I finished most of it a while ago but the scythe just took forever because I couldn’t figure it out and kept redoing it. I think it turned out good though!
#clownpierce#mcyt#lifesteal smp#lifesteal#btw I am Ssoooo normal about lives being represented with red hearts and white stars. <- is not normal and is constantly thinking about#undertale and deltarune. I am the opposite of normal I see my little video games everywhere.#also I actually finished this a day or two ago I just couldn’t figure out what to caption it. Me when the Issues#Oh wait. Uhhh. Should I tag for blood. Probably#cw blood#That’s probably good. I’m sure it’s fine#actually technically I drew this for someone bc they voted clown in the polls. But I said Id draw anyone and they said to just draw whoever#I wanted and so I just picked a sketch id doodled a while ago. And now it’s been a while since the event. And they didn’t really even#request this piece so I’d feel weird tagging them. I’ll still send it to them tho but like I’d feel weird mentioning it in the body of the#post Since while this was technically a request it was really mostly a thing for me that someone else gave me an excuse to draw#also no ID this time I’m having a certified Written Language Learning Disorder-Austin crossover event combo attack#so I am doing these sentences ok but description sentances will Not go well probably. If someone else writes an ID I’ll credit you and add#it to the original post. Honestly even if someone writes like the script for an ID o the start of one I’d be able to elaborate on it I just#can’t start one and do it entirely myself right now#chara makes things
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viscerah · 8 months
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COCK ?? yes please !
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reneesbooks · 2 months
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snippet saturday
still not a thing but this is my blog and i make the rules and i'm THINKING about birdie and fabin. i swear i'll get back to jack and arthur in a second just let me scream about birdie and fabin for a minute
Emilia tucks her wings against her back, settling in the grass next to Birdie. “When do you think we’ll have to return to Morbhard?”
Birdie stares out over the fields, her pulse quickening. Emilia senses that she’s asked a question that Birdie doesn’t want to answer. Birdie lets out a long breath. “I’m not sure.”
A lie, but Emilia doesn’t question it.
Birdie glances at the sky. “The sun will go down soon. I should make preparations. It’s the full silver moon tonight.”
Emilia shrinks into her human form and sets her hand on Birdie’s shoulder. “I can make the tea if you’d like.”
Birdie smiles. “Thank you. That would be nice.”
Emilia returns to the cottage and puts the kettle on the fire, digging her toe into the floor as she mixes the herbs. As much as she trusts them, as much as they’ve all grown closer over the weeks and months at the cottage, Birdie is still hiding things.
The kettle finally starts to whistle and Emilia pours a cup of tea. She heads back out to the garden. Birdie is standing next to Fabin, clearly just arrived from the forest, smiling up at him as he complains that the deer are getting better at hiding. Her laughter dies abruptly as the silver moon’s light hits her, her preparations forgotten in the grass a few steps away.
Fabin backs away as Birdie’s silver light explodes outward, a pulse of magic flattening the grass in a circle around her. Her tripled voice shrieks, her hair lifting off her shoulders. The entire whites of her eyes burn silver.
Blood starts to run from her nose. Fabin shrinks and tries to step closer, shouting her name. Emilia grabs a washcloth and grips it tightly behind her back, the fabric straining as she twists it nervously.
Birdie’s eyes begin to bleed as well, silver light pulsing from her. Fabin grits his teeth and takes three more shaking steps through the waves to reach Birdie. He grabs her shoulders and Emilia hears him shout her name.
Blood is streaming from her eyes and ears now, the third recitation barely begun. Fabin winces as silver magic lashes out at him, cuts opening on his cheeks. He keeps hold of Birdie, shaking her shoulders, trying to wake her up.
The silver light fades and Birdie’s eyes roll back. She collapses and Fabin catches her, lowering her slowly to the grass.
“Shit.” Jack and Arthur freeze in the doorway of the cottage. “Is she okay?”
“Does she fucking look okay?” Fabin growls, glaring at them. He snatches Birdie’s handkerchief from where she’d left it in the grass and starts to gently wipe the blood from her face. Emilia picks up the cup of tea again and moves cautiously. Birdie’s eyelids are fluttering, though she is limp in Fabin’s arms.
“The tea for her throat,” Emilia says quietly, when Fabin looks up at her with another growl. “I’ll look at those cuts.”
“I’m fine.” He holds the teacup to Birdie’s lips and Emilia flinches at the audibly painful gulps. “Birdie, can you hear me?”
Her silver eyes flick up to his face before fluttering closed again. She tucks her face into his chest.
Fabin leans down to murmur something to her that Emilia doesn’t hear. He presses his cheek to the side of Birdie’s head and Emilia stifles a gasp, averting her eyes.
Fabin stands with Birdie in his arms. “She needs to rest,” he says, not looking at any of them. He winces as he adjust his hold on her and Emilia wonders what other damage Birdie’s backlash did.
He says nothing else as he carries her into the house. Emilia bites her lip as Jack and Arthur turn to her with wide eyes. “I’ll make some more tea.”
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thefaestolemyname · 11 months
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Internet Archive just sent me an email reminding me they have tons of free audiobooks and uh I figured I should pass the message along.
The Internet Archive has tons of free audiobooks
Universal Access to All Knowledge for the win!
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tracle0 · 1 year
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I want to talk about magic systems in The Spiders Song (and it’s sequel) and explain ideas I have that may or may not make it into the actual book.
Let’s start with sigils.
Sigils are the common name given to magic in written form. They are a manifestation of the Squids magic, and it’s servants are able to tap into its abilities to write their own sigils. It is, however, a lot more complicated than that.
See, the Squid is the god of writing. That’s pretty much it. It’s magic is manifesting other magic in written form, for communicating ideas to later generations or giving you an experience or warning strangers of something. Inflicting an ill will on them. Whatever! Sigils are versatile as a result. They can communicate a wide range of things, channel a wide range of magics. Every single strand of these magics has a source, and not a single one of those sources is the Squid itself.
Basically, sigils have their own language you need to learn in order to channel magic correctly. The language is not random; it could be called the gods tongue, if gods had their own physical form and spoke. You make a sigil by writing down the god in question who’s magic you want to channel, and then twitching and tweaking it to fit the specifications best.
Mmmm say you wanted a sigil for encouraging strawberry growth in your garden. Why wouldn’t you? Strawberries are delicious. To do this, you’d want to channel the Deer - god of nature - and then tweak the name, so rather than the full force of nature coming down on your little garden, you have the magic target strawberries specifically. How this is done is a matter of opinion. Maybe you’d have it target red plants, and accept blooming roses into your life as well. Maybe you’d target the shape of the leaves, the abundance of seeds, the creeping vines… whatever. More complicated sigils may target multiple factors, to narrow it down to a strawberry.
So Deer + specification of a strawberry - and hey, you’re good to go!
Well - provided the Deer doesn’t notice.
Gods have servants, see. People who, from birth, gods sponsor and give them use of their magic. So they do share magic… but only with certain people. Servants to the Squid are at risk of a god noticing their magic going somewhere they don’t intend it to go, and unleashing their wrath on the unlucky bugger who caught their eye. In this example, the servant would very likely be fine - the Deer has a lot of servants, and so doesn’t notice when a stray hand may be pulling magic in another direction. But there’s always that risk, and more private or attentive gods would likely notice if their magic is drifting in places it doesn’t like.
You may be wondering why anyone wants to be any other servant if a servant to the Squid can just use any magic. Beyond the two stated reasons why - servants being chosen from birth with no input from them, and the risk they run using their magic - there’s also the factor of weaker magic being channeled through sigils. It’s not as pure, not as perfect, not as direct as a servant using magic. Like.
God —> servant is how it works for a typical servant. Direct flow of magic.
God —> Squid/sigil —> servant is how it’d work for sigils. Less direct, interference in the middle. The magic is still, yknow, magic… just a bit more patchy.
So sure, you get a wider range of magic, but there’s a constant risk to using it, plus the less direct results, plus limitations by what you can write and tweak… mmm
What else. Mmm. The study. You have to know a gods name to be able to use its magic, and it is a very exact science. You have to write it exactly, no room for unique handwriting or whatever - and that’s not even mentioning the fact that a lot of gods names aren’t even known! Or that you’ll want the tweak the sigil to your desired effect! You have to get the exact shapes and depth and size of the sigil perfectly exact, and figure out what can be tweaked in order to make your sigil work how you want. It’s laborious work compared to servants who look as if they just “poof!” And make a thing happen.
(they do not just “poof!” And make a thing happen, all servants have to study various things to various degrees, but servants to the Squid often have a poorer deal).
I do think it’s worth mentioning that you can have multiple gods in one sigil. Moth (warmth) plus Axolotl (biology) could give your body a boost of warmth in a cold environment, or something similar to that.
A lot of servants to the Squid often have tattoos of useful and frequently used sigils. This does require the sigil being made for repeated uses - some are one-use only.
Oh, obviously you also have to write out the sigil you want to use. You can do it Luz-style, where you pre-write a bunch and activate them later, or you can do them on the fly.
Any servant to the Squid can activate any sigil, unless specified otherwise in the sigil. They can also specify that non-magical folk, or non-Squid servants can activate or deactivate a sigil. A common example of this is locking sigils, to keep doors locked - a cheap one may just lock a place, and the more advanced ones specify that X and Y can unlock it, and only those two people.
I think that’s all I’ve got for you today. Peace
#TSS#TCD#Worldbuilding#writing#original writing#I spent about ten minutes trying to find a good Toh gif of magic being used but alas could not find any#Also I was lying I have more to say in the tags teehee#Atlas pretended to be able to use sigils on tss a lot. This is because their magic and god are not believed to exist#And they would rather not be labelled as such#This secret does not last through all of TSS but they give it a good go#In TCD there was an idea for a while that they would revert back to their old lie of being a servant to the squid#But claim that they had figured out the Spiders name - hence being able to use illusions still#This would also be found out to be a lie except on a bigger scale this time and they would be labelled as a spiders servant#Which - amongst other things - would contribute to them leaving their home for a while and joining a circus#This would be post-plot originally. Just my idea of what happened. Atlas runs away and joins a circus#And then when they feel healed and ready - come back home again and work in the local library#Primarily taking over the duty of reading to the children who come#Which would be awesome in terms of them learning to read Better as well AND in terms of the cool lil illusion shows#They’d put on. Learning to use their magic for something good and kind rather than. Fear and terror haha#That’s a lot of rambles for not sigils on a post about sigils. What else.#There’s likely going to be a very powerful sigil involved in TCD which I am excited for#I also do not know what any sigils look like at all. RIP to that#Next post I might do about healing maybe because I like the Axolotl. It’s a fun god. Oh maybe I should talk about some gods attitudes too#We’ll see!#Trade-marked
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chibishortdeath · 4 months
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Yay rpg maker stuff :3. I should make more updates that aren’t just little concept doodles cause I have gotten a couple rooms to work, but eh. The game itself is still in like the getting the whole map figured out stage, then I’ll have to go through and plan where story specific events will happen, what characters appear where, major puzzles, whether or not there will be a battle system, etc etc. but I do have a lot of things down and have figured out how the program works for the most part! You guys get to see the map planning page early hehe, also the little girl character (who I still need to figure out the name of whoops—)
Anyway, these two are some main characters, Layne and Reid. I don’t wanna spoil too much about them, but they are also med school students and test subjects like Miran. Layne is the one with their hair to their right and spiky ends, Reid is the one with their hair over their left eye and a rounder style.
Ok yeah that’s it bye—
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transfemzedaph · 8 months
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sorry im having vintagebeef brainrot.
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sy5starplaty · 8 months
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Tobert the Tevil
Mise-en-scène: Set Design & Shot Composition
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