Ian McShane in Bolden (2019)

Is everything ok

nothing has been ok since i turned 12 but thank u for asking!

at some point i will figure out how to write the post-canon, post-empire edelgard autonomy fic of my dreams. it just feels like a very big task and maybe like with playing the dane, i’m simply not old and traumatized enough to manage it yet.

but my vision is thus: it’s set years (realistically, decades) after the end of crimson flower, when everything has gone as right as it can possibly go. fódlan is thriving. the social reforms have taken effect. the nobility system is nearly eliminated, if not entirely so, with titles made merely symbolic. social mobility, welfare, and prosperity are high. there’s an explosion in arts and culture and technology. brigid and duscur have gained independence; relations with sreng and almyra are much improved; heck, maybe they've even figured it out with dagda. in my most idealistic version, leicester and faerghus would eventually be ceded back to become autonomous regions, essentially disbanding the adrestian empire. rule is no longer hereditary, but merit-based. there's a roadmap for the future, and everything is on track—and more than that, people at all points on the power spectrum have already seen it bear fruit. with or without edelgard, it will be pursued. there's buy-in. they believe.

of course, it's not perfect—nothing can be—but edelgard's vision has been fulfilled. the people are empowered. humanity is free. fódlan has healed.

and somehow, she's had enough time to resolve her goals outside of politics, too. those who slither in the dark have been eradicated. edelgard and lysithea's second crests have been successfully removed, allowing them to live if not full lives, then substantially longer ones than they would have with their twin crests intact. who knows—maybe she finally gets around to having that wedding.

point for point, every item listed in edelgard's manifesto has been checked off. the ghosts of her past have been laid to rest. she can finally take off her crown. she can finally pursue the quiet, humble life she's wanted for so long. she can finally breathe.

... but can she?

edelgard is nothing if not driven. her intelligence, vision, and sheer willpower allowed her to plan and execute a revolution against two countries and the most powerful institution on the continent, all while she was still a teenager. as royalty, her life was never truly hers even before she became heir to the adrestian throne, with all the additional baggage of survivor's guilt and the desire for vengeance and her need to ensure nothing that happened to her can ever happen to anyone else, ever again.

so what happens when that drive has no outlet? what happens when someone who has been constantly in motion, constantly working and planning and preparing every spare second of every day since she was fourteen years old, suddenly has to stand still? what happens when someone whose hands have been bound for so long—first literally in the dungeons of enbarr, then by the weight and responsibilities of her crown—is set free?

being edelgard, she would step away from the throne, no matter how hard it was for her to give up control. she's always been focused on the endgame, and she knows that if she doesn't let go, she'll be setting the wrong tone for fódlan's future. she's too devoted to that endgame to cling to power much longer than she needs to, though i could see her making some excuses and trying to iron out just a few more things to buy herself some more time to mentally prepare before she's done for good.

but who would she be then? who is the woman without the crown? what becomes of a machine once it is no longer needed, when it has made itself obsolete? what about when that machine is a person with legs and arms and an innate unwillingness to gather dust on a shelf?

what happens when you get everything you want? what happens when all your wanting has been for others to thrive, and now you have to want only for yourself? how do you discover who you are when you've spent decades being everything for everyone else? how do you find meaning again? how do you find purpose?

after a lifetime of devotion and passion and movement, how do you learn to sit with yourself, and be quiet, and be still?

gosh, i would love to meet her. i would love to pick her brain. but boy, i do not envy the work that girl has to do.

fanart for my dog cause she turned 12 this year!!! (guesstimate)

HAPPY BIRTHDAY KRYPTO!!!

some actual pics of the birthday girl for the lucky few that see this 😉

not to sound too horny but i want a chenford sex scene so bad.

sigh.

time to finish berseria i think. :(

It's just so interesting that Kota tweeted today says his wrestling anniversary is July 1st and he wants people to listen to his entrance theme cause something might be happening soon and then TK announces today that Kenny vs Yuta is happening on the July 5th Dynamite

almost 4am can't stop thinking about the meaning of the idiom 'to have blood on [someone's] hands'—to be responsible for a person's death—combined with the fact that Zach is the one we are specifically shown with Daryl's actual blood on his hands (once for real and once in a dream)... Not Josh who had been holding the sword Daryl fell onto, but Zach who took the sword out.

((Hhhhhh, I'm too tired to draw any more of it, but I can't leave it there--))

Killer smiles, and takes your hand. "Of course. Who wouldn't want to see a cutie like you again?" She winks. When her eye reopens, you can see a faint, silver eyelight. "Hm. . . Now that I think about it. . Maybe I'll be here Christmas Eve. How does that sound?"

as long as i can get one last goodbye hug, i'm ready to wait for years >:') <33333

the germanification of enha (it's because they love me)

Ok wait. Yes tell me what episodes are good and everything else you said in the tags, but does rick and morty have lore? I thought it was episodic?

ok first Yes there's lore. there's like. the backdrop premise of rick having just came back into his daughter's life after being absent since she was a child for undisclosed reasons but it is a big part of beth's characterization and why he gets away w all the shit he gets away with. but there's also Lore that ties w rick's crybaby backstory™ and like the universe in general is probably more. Complicated? Expanded? than you'd think? bc yea it SHOULD be episodic and self contained but the team is at war w that concept since s2 if not s1 already. it's why i'm annoyed at people complaining abt the random filler episodes in s7 like girl that's the Normal Episodes. the Lore Heavy Episodes are the little special treat for you not the standard?? it's a sitcom unfort.

so. maybe still my favorite episode is STILL from s1 ep8. rixty minutes aka interdimensional cable ONE!!! let me set the scene. a few episodes earlier morty's school was doing prom and he asked rick to make him a love potion to get the girl he has a crush on to go to prom w him. rick fucks up SEVERELY bc his nihilistic scientist brain didn't understand love (??? i mean we know he Does. but it was s1) and he accidentally turns everyone first into morty stans who wont him desperately and then into straight up Monsters. he can't figure out how to fix it so what he does instead is move morty and himself into a new dimension where the incident had also happened but that dimension's rick had fixed the problem And gotten himself and morty killed accidentally. so they swoop in and dig a grave for Themselves and take those rick and morty's place. for rick it's Nothing it's Normal he's been doing this a while he's closely aware of the many dimensions and many versions of himself etc in fact it becomes a Huge plotpoint soon. but morty's still new to this and having to? handle his dead body? and put it in the ground? and take its place like nothing happened? that's tough for him! baby's traumatized. rip

but everything's been self contained enough so far that you sort of dismiss it right. then two episodes later interdimensional cable happens. aka rick fucks around w their tv to hook it up to. interdimensional. cable. so they can watch stuff from every other reality out there (whoa!) and as they binge they bump into jerry being interviewed on some late night show and they're like HUH???? THERE'S A VERSION OF REALITY OUT THERE WHERE JERRY'S RICH AND FAMOUS???? so now beth and summer are also wondering what They're up to in other realities and rick gives them some goggles that let you see what different versions of you are doing. rick himself and morty are the only ones who don't care and just keep watching silly tv having a laff. in the meanwhile summer complains that every version of her is doing nothing cool while her parents are hitting the jackpot and beth offhandedly mentions that "if we accomplished our dreams it probably means you were never born" which is obviously HORRIBLE TO HEAR so summer being an angsty dramatic teen wants to Run Away From Home and beth and jerry start fighting abt how you ruined my life and all. morty smells blood in the water so he goes upstairs to cheer up summer and she's like. they had you on purpose as a symptom of their problems you're not the Cause of their problems you can't make me feel better. so morty points out his and rick's graves in the yard outside the window and tells her he's not even her real brother he's as much of an incident as she is rn and now that he eats breakfast a few feet away from his corpse he knows better than most how meaningless all of this is anyway. and he tells her. something that still brings tears to my eyes. he goes "nobody exists on purpose, nobody belongs anywhere, everybody's gonna die. come watch tv?"

ARGH! HE'S JUST A 14 YEAR OLD BOY WITH AN INSANE MAD SCIENTIST GRANDPA WHO'S BEEN DRAGGING HIM ON FUCKED UP ELDRITCH SPACE ADVENTURES THAT HAVE BEEN SHATTERING HIS INNOCENCE AND UNDERSTANDING OF LIFE! AND NOW HE JUST WANTS TO WATCH TV WITH HIS SISTER! it kills me it's so humane and childish and it was REALLY gutting to me. cause i didn't expect a callback at that point. i didn't expect the trauma to impact the characters. it was completely out of left field and it made me say oh. so this is good. so this is actually worth watching.

dacryphilia

The very worst thing you can do right now is bore me. Caleen shudders. “You’re not going to believe me anyways, are you?” Her voice tremors, and Dedra wants to hear it break. “No,” she says slowly. She can feel a smile tugging at her lips. She fights like mad to suppress it, and fails. It pulls at her lips, threatening to split them, and she lets her teeth show. “I suppose not.”

Or; The Interrogation Scene and some bonuses from Lt. Dedra Meero's point of view.

Or; Sophia "Dyke With Bad Taste" A-Flickering-Soul saw this

and this

and THIS

and thought, "How can I not write the most reprehensible, terrible, Dead Doveish 2.6k words about it?"

Mind the tags.

I've been trying to form a coherent post about the... I guess ending of Sewercontrol AU that's all about DJ and Roxy being so excited and emotional queerplatonic partners, reuniting after one is freed from Glitchtrap and the other is finally safe to approach them. I want the cool and fun DJ to have a little fit of zooms for the first time of his life cause it's all over and they get to zoom together now, in tears, hugging every five seconds, being completely incomprehensible to everyone within earshot together...

I just love them your honour. This is the most coherent I've been about them all day.

Shadow and Bone s2 dropping in less than a month this is so dangerous for me I have school please

i'm in bed (wooo, love wins!) but also need some time for the sleeping meds to kick in so

i'm rolling miss mal like a rotisserie chicken in my skull and had a thought

how she'd never touched certain fabrics, how finer things in life were so scarce and so rare, how the day her father left, her mother told her he was abandoning them, how she used this little girl to try to manipulate him into staying, how mal cried for a day straight when he'd left, how she waited for years and years for him to return, how he never did, how her life changed after that, how her mother became the sole influence on the way she perceived and interacted with the world. how truly terrified and alone she was after her mother was killed. about the soil under her fingernails as she dug a crude grave for what was left of her. how it was soaked from the rain and her tears. how cold she was from the storm. how lost she must've felt. how terrified that they would return for her as well...