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littlelightfish · 2 days

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Holm nation... I have a heartbreaking announcement to make.

We didn't get to see this panels animated.

(I wanted to see Laios helping him, this one isn't the one this post is all about)

I feel it's important to his character enough that Kui decided to dedicate three panels about how he aproaches and resurrects Kabru.

He is used to resurrecting people, his party sucks at keeping themselves alive. He walks up to Kabru's corpse with a worried look on his face. Then he kneels besides him and takes a second to process what he is seeing. He is seeing a young man, Kabru, dead. It makes him feel unseasy, a bit of shock that he can't take the luxury of process at the moment. He doesn't want to look, so he closes his eyes and focuses on his spell. He is realizing he is the only one alive from his party (he doesn't know where Mick is or how he is). He is the last one standing. The reality of it all slaps him in the face.

The panel of him just... looking at the mess Kabru's corpse is was just... It was important. It talked about him as a character. "I'm not doing this because I want to, but because I have to". He doesn't has time for emotions. He has a job to do.

It's just three panels. But they provide lots of context between the ones that came before and after.

He doesn't just rubs Kabru's head because he's being afective. He does it because he cares. He does it out of relief. "As long as I'm here, any of you'll be dying soon. And I'll always be here. Don't worry." He is far from being OK after all this. Marillier died, Daya died, Kuro died, Kabru died, Rin died, Mick probably died too (but he doesn't saw it). He... By the time he was the only one standing, the fight was over, and he could alredy resurrect them. He wants to feel sad. To worry, to be concerned, to mourn. But he can't. It isn't necessary.

He is a cleric. He for sure has a notion of dead way different than anyone and feels a certain way about resurrection. "Dying is dying, even if you resurrect." It's a bug at the corner of his mind, he doesn't pay it any attention. He gets resurrected multiple times, he is gratefull he is alive. But seeing all his friends dead? And the most of them mutilated? Covered in their own blood? He has this desire to mourn. To cry the loss. To panic. "They are all dead."

He knows they'll come back. He has to make them come back. So he does. And they are alive. But they weren't a few seconds ago. And he just plays it off, he puts his calm face on as soon as there is another party member alive that could ask him what happened that it disturbed him so much. He throws all those sad feelings under the rug and focuses at the task at hand.

They're going to be ok, he just has to do his job: bring them back from death. They shouldn't even be dead. But they are. And he's going to fix it. No point on feeling sad about them dying if they can be alive soon!

I think the concern that the anime puts here it's something that could come close to what he feels inside. Those seconds are the only ones we see him looking something akin to worried for his friends.

But then...

His worry vanishes in seconds. The moment Kabru revives, he does it in such a "Kabru" way, that he tells himself: "This is fine, they're going to be back soon, nothing to worry about, I just have to hurry". He wants them all back to live. We know for sure that in his priority list there wasn't any "reviving Toshiro's party members first". He was going to make sure all his party, all his friends, were alive before even thinking of resurrecting other people if he still had the magic.

Those three panels they didn't animate are something that was there for a reason. To give depth to Holm. This last episode is definitely the one in wich he shines the most. He isn't the main character at all this episode, but he does the most important stuff on the background. He revives them all. This all lack of something if you don't show what Kuy drew on those panels.

Here he just... goes to work. He says: "lemme handle it" and he does. No concern, no worry, no, nothing. He just does. No thoughts.

It makes me sad. Those panels were important. :(

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theosbutterfly · 2 days

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the best thing at this party — t. nott

❝ fighting in only your army frontlines, don't you ignore me i'm the best thing at this party ❞

pairing: jealous!theo x malfoy!reader

context: at yours and draco's annual back-to-hogwarts bash, a pair of weasleys show up uninvited, much to theo's dismay.

words: 2.3k+

warnings: jealousy, somewhat possessive behavior, reader's kind of a bitch, theo's kind of an asshole, marijuana use, alcohol use, vomiting, a little fluff, mainly angst

"so where's the principessa?" you hear theo bring you up in conversation as you and pansy descend the stairs to join the boys in the foyer. "taking extra time to fix up her hair?"

"é un dato di fatto, lo ero," as a matter of fact, i was. you lean a hand against the banister, stopping on the last step, eyes focusing on theo. there's a chance you may or may not have learned italian just to make sure he couldn't insult you without your knowledge—not that it stopped him, but at least this way, you could defend yourself. "it takes time to look this good. but glad to know you noticed my absence."

"ooh, she got you there, mate," blaise chuckles, placing a hand on theo's shoulder, who shrugs it off.

"whatever," he spat, rolling his eyes. "i need a drink."

"finally something i can get on board with," mattheo points a finger at him, and they both turn to head towards the sitting room, pansy trailing closely behind them.

"is pans still trying to get with matt?" enzo asks, tilting his head up at you as they walked away.

"beats me," you shrugged, stepping down the last step and glancing between them. "now, why are you two standing here like a bunch of statues? last i checked, party's over there." you point your thumb towards the parlor, which appeared to be glowing green.

"the gate's still open," blaise shrugs. "draco wants us to watch for 'undesirables'."

"undesirables?" you repeat the word just so he could hear how ridiculous it sounded. "has he gone mad?"

"he wants to make sure no one from the other houses show up," blaise clarifies.

"fuck that," you shake your head. "come on." you link your arms with one of blaise's and one of enzo's, waving a finger up in the air. "colloportus!" the spell causes the front door and front gate to seal shut, as you begin walking with blaise and enzo towards the music. "now, where's dobby?"

your house elf immediately appears in front of you at the sound of his name.

"dobby is here, miss y/n," he looks up at you. "what can dobby do for you?"

you unlink your arms from blaise and enzo's and crouch down to be eye level with him. "fetch me the good liquor from the cellar downstairs, and then come find me when you've got it."

he nods. "dobby is on it miss y/n!"

—

"what are you doing standing here all alone?" daphne greengrass saunters over to theo, who was leaning against the bar, a drink in hand.

"daphne greengrass," theo greets her. "i'm surprised you're here. wouldn't the head girl disapprove of rowdy parties as such?" he waves his drink towards the crowd that had turned the malfoy's parlor into a makeshift dance floor, and she chuckles.

"i'm turning over a new leaf," she shrugs, taking a sip of her own drink. "it is our last year, after all."

"thank merlin for that," you walk between them, and lean over the bar to reach for four shot glasses.

"y/n," daphne's voice is strained as she clears her throat. "nice to see you."

you stand up straight after retrieving what you were looking for and turn your head towards her. "i'd say the same, but i'm not a liar."

theo shifts his eyes between the two of you, slightly amused at the way daphne takes a deep breath to keep her composure while you throw her a close-lipped smile.

"where'd you get the bottle, y/n?" he cuts in to prevent a cat fight from breaking out between you and daphne, and eyes the bottle of fire whiskey in your hand.

you look at him. "i had dobby fetch it from the cellar," you say. "pans and i are gonna drink it dry."

"just the two of you?" he raises an eyebrow, condescension painting his features. "does draco know about that?"

"why?" you challenge. "are you gonna go run off and tattle on me?"

before he could reply, another voice cuts in. "oi, malfoy! are we getting pissed or what?"

you turn your attention away from theo to the one of the weasleys you'd found lurking around the corners. "well, you're quite the impatient one, aren't you, freddie?"

heat rises in theo's chest when he gets a better look of the guy under the green light, and realizes its a weasley. what the hell was he doing here? and why were you allowing it?

"time is of the essence, darling," fred tells you. "george and i are trying to get a taste of this drink you've got before we inevitably get kicked out of here."

"what are you doing here, weasley?" theo speaks through gritted teeth, and looks at you. "you invited them?"

"of course not," you shrug. "they snuck in."

theo's eyes narrow at you. "and you're offering them a drink instead of throwing them out?"

"they ditched their house colors to don ours for the night," you tell him, eyes focused on fred. "i think that deserves them a little taste of slytherin."

theo doesn't miss the way fred's eyes trail over your body, and rolls his eyes. "maybe even more than a little," fred smirks.

you giggle at his words, but before you could walk away with him, theo grabs the back of your arm, pulling you close, his lips right above your ear. "cosa fai?" what are you doing?

you tilt your head up to have your eyes meet his. "mi sto divertendo," i'm having fun. "dovresti provarlo qualche volta." you should try it sometime.

you yank your arm out of his hold and don't give him a chance to respond, waltzing away towards the crowd.

"merlin, she is fit," fred comments, watching the way your hips sway as you walk away. "is she seeing anyone?"

"if she was, it certainly wouldn't be you," theo tells him.

"we'll see about that, mate. excuse me," fred throws him a smirk, before walking away to follow you across the room.

theo watches as he does, bringing his glass up to his lips to finish of his drink.

"do you-" daphne starts, but he doesn't let her finish, slamming his glass down on the bar and walking off.

—

"you all look pissed," pansy stumbles over to the guys, who were seated in a secluded area of the manor that was somewhat devoid of all the noise from the party in the parlor, passing around a joint.

"not as much as you, it seems," mattheo chuckles as she falls beside him, head falling against his shoulder. "where you been?"

"drinking with y/n," she says, eyes slowly fluttering close.

"that was your first mistake," enzo tuts, taking a long drag and inhaling. "that girl can drink double her weight in alcohol."

"mhm," pansy hums, eyes fully closing as her body falls limp against mattheo.

"alright," mattheo shifts, just enough to wake her and get her up on her feet. "look like someone's had enough for the night. come on." he begins to the guide pansy out of the room, his eyes telling the guys that he'd be right back.

"what the bloody hell did they even drink?" blaise asks, shifting his eyes between theo and enzo.

"fire whiskey," theo blows smoke out of his mouth and takes another drag.

blaise's eyes widen. "and they didn't think to share? bloody wankers."

"they were too busy sharing it with y/n's new conquests," theo replies bitterly, passing the joint off to him.

"seems to me she's sharing more than that," enzo cuts in, raising his silver flask to point at you and fred on the opposite side of the room, where surely enough, you were tucked between him and the wall, one hand beside your head and one hand on you waist.

"oh, bloody hell," theo rolls his eyes, pulling a chuckle out from enzo.

"who is that guy anyway?"

"fred weasley," theo grits out.

"you're bloody kidding," blaise snickers, leaning forward to flick off some ash from the a joint.

"oh, i'm bloody serious," theo nods. "he's been eye-fucking her since she showed him the tiniest bit of attention. it was quite pathetic, if you ask me."

"what's with the bitterness, mate?" enzo asks, attention shifting to theo. "you jealous?"

theo scoffs. "jealous? please. non durerà in alcun modo." no way that's gonna last. you weren't exactly the "relationship" type.

enzo shakes his head. "no clue what that means, but it didn't sound nice."

"you know how y/n is," theo tells him, hand motioning towards you and fred across the room. "it's nothing but a game to her."

"so what?" blaise asks, handing the joint over back to enzo. "you bitter she won't let you play?"

"who won't let who play?" mattheo rejoins them, and sits back down beside theo.

"theo's jealous fred weasley's got his claws in y/n," enzo catches him up.

"alright," theo stands from the sofa, no longer wanting to hear anymore of it. "i'm done with this shit."

—

unfortunately for theo, the second he headed for the bar and away from the boys, you were also already there with fred.

"alright, freddie, what's it gonna be?" your body was bent over the bar counter, fred's eyes trailing over it as you tried to reach for two different bottles. "rum or brandy?"

"oh, i'm in the mood for something much tastier, love," fred flirts, causing theo to roll his eyes.

"bloody hell," you hear theo mutter, and stand up straight after taking a hold of the two bottles you were looking for. "can't you two do this elsewhere?"

"well, no one's forcing you to stand there and watch," you retort, eyes shooting him an ice cold glare.

"for merlin's sake," he groans, clearly frustrated. "if you wanna fuck him, at least do it in one of the many private rooms upstairs so you can at least keep some of your dignity."

the words fall out of his mouth before he can stop them, making you scoff and set both bottles down before getting close to him to make sure he hears you loud and clear. "fuck you."

you walk away from both of them and head for the corridor, while fred looks at theo.

"that-"

"don't fucking say anything, weasley," theo cuts him off, and leaves him behind, legs immediately following after you.

"y/n, wait!" he takes grab of your wrist and pulls to make you stop and turn to look at him.

"get off!" you shake his hand off your wrist, arms crossing in front of your chest as you looked at him.

"oh, smettila di essere una tale stronza," oh, stop being such a bitch. he tells you.

"you know what theo-" you start to give him a piece of your mind, when an uneasy feeling suddenly creeps into your stomach and slides up the back of your throat.

fuck.

you immediately push past him to head for the nearest bathroom and he follows, as your knees hit the cold tile floor and reminiscents of what you ate before you started drinking came pouring out into the toilet in front of you.

"alright," theo winces, crouching down beside you to take a hold of your hair and gently rub a hand up and down your back. "let it out."

—

"ugh," you complain, swinging your bedroom door open and proceeding inside as you tucked your now messed up hair behind your ears. "this was not how this night was suppose to go."

theo chuckles behind you, closing your door and tossing your heels down on the ground beside your dresser.

"oh, i'm so glad you find this amusing," you spat, undoing your hair and placing the bobby pins down on your vanity.

"i just find it funny that even after two years of drinking, you still can't hold shit down," he says, taking a seat at the edge of your bed.

you mimic his words, but don't actually say anything. "ugh!" you groan loudly when it suddenly becomes much harder to tug your dress off. "why is this not-"

you stop when you feel cold fingers trail across and down your back, your skin feeling like over a hundred degrees. "hai dimenticato di aprirlo, farfalla." you forgot to unzip it, butterfly.

your eyes threaten to flutter close at the deep sound of his voice, goosebumps rising upon your skin, as he slowly unzipped the back of your dress. "theo…"

his hand lingers above your lower back, as he leaned down, lips just right above your ear. "potresti fare meglio di weasley, lo sai?" you could do better than weasley, you know that?

his breath on your ear makes a shiver run down your spine, as your head tilted back against him. "mostramelo meglio allora." show me better then.

to anyone else, this would seem odd. but to the two of you, this was just how you worked. one second you were bickering, and the next, whispering sweet nothings. it was a dance that you both knew all too well.

though the thread he used to keep you at a distance threatened to snap, theo holds himself back—you were draco's baby sister. he wasn't suppose to want you. he couldn't.

"dovresti dormire un po'," you should get some sleep. he lets himself stay beside you for one more moment, before finally pulling away—to your disappointment.

"you're not gonna stay?" you grab at the sides of your dress to keep it from falling down as you turned to look at him.

"non posso," i can't. he shakes his head at you, despite your forming pout. he didn't know what he'd get himself into if he stayed, and a part of him was afraid to find out. "buona notte, farfalla."

good night, butterfly.

part 2 coming soon!!!

re-entering my slytherin boys era bc tension with theo is the BEST kind of tension, and hopefully this didn't disappoint.

reblogs and comments are deeply appreciated <33

click here to be added to my tag list!!

tags: @helendeath @freshlypickledpancakes

#theodore nott #theo nott #slytherin #theo nott angst #theo #theo nott fic #theo nott x reader #theo nott x y/n #slytherin boys #slytherin fic #harry potter fic #hp fic

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fixing-bad-posts · 2 months

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found poetry

#i didn't edit any of the text here because holy shit this is already a poem #the ''fixing'' is just taking this out of context #fixingbadposts #fixing-bad-posts #found poetry #found poem #earnest fbp

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sheerakk · 7 months

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#was looking for some fics with these two #I imagine this is one of their first interactions and Hunter is already fed up with Darius #but Darius is just trying to get to know the successor of his mentor and check if he's at least a little bit capable of doing his job #he's also a little weirded out by the similarity between these two #basically I imagine Darius gave him a couple of vibe checks that Hunter had failed #and Hunter takes it as questoning his place in the coven #god darius design is so pink and awful #it's so jover uni starts tommorow #it's like the most boring drawing ever but I'm just still in my I have to get better at backgrounds era #and also if I'll draw 100 awful things I get a decent one eventually #it's like inktober but lasts your whole life and devours your soul in the process #no caption just pure tags now I understand those few people who keep reblogging all my tags cuz I give all the fucking context there #there's probably like 10 things I would spot tommorow that would fix the drawing a whole bunch but I just ...don't want to ig #the owl house #sheerak #the golden guard #darius deamonne #hunter toh #toh hunter #hunter deamonne #toh fanart #the owl house fanart #dadrius #not yet but #you guys most fellow toh fanartists moved on and fanart fiona and cake but I keep brainrotting the same stuff over and over #good old toh trashpile

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unexpectedbrickattack · 9 months

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short king and his shorter kings

#pizza tower #pepstavo #peppinoise #i sketched it out WEEKS ago #but w me almost finishing this godawful comm i felt compelled to do something for Me #i cannot wait to finish; i have a couple of forms sitting there collecting dust but im too overwhelmed w this shitty comm-#-to even attempt to tackle those. i need to scrub my brain and start fresh. but after i finish it lmao #anyway hey. hope everyones okay and vibin #dont take this seriously but also. heehee.#in hindsight i feel like i need to bump gustavos head up a lil bit but weh #not too compelled to fix it.#additional context that i think is fun; gus is just a touchy dude and he finds all kinds of reasons to pick peppino up #and every time peppino is like SO flustered and shocked bc itll be in the view of customers #like some sports team wins and its on their tvs and ppl are hootin n hollerin #and like people will notice and keep cheering and its alot hes like oh my GOD u cannot keep doing that im going to explode and then die #noise will do it to prove he can do it and then his back snaps in two bc he weighs like 80 lbs (36kg)#but for like a brief moment of time he is facefirst in tummy and hes ecstatic #theo it is not funny to be rushed to the er bc u broke ur back #also suggestive (but funny i prommy)#but he absolutely would be that like girl who needed a neckbrace from having her gf accidentally sit on her face too hard #hes like ouuuuhhghh....that was worth it. how long will it take to recover doc bc i wanna do it again :)#meanwhile. i think if that happened peppino would literally go into hiding. ur not finding him.#it would literally haunt him that he nearly killed this rat w his fat ass #as if this is not the way both gus and noise would like to go out. it would be peaceful for them i think #anyway #runs away cutely; see u in two weeks maybe

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spicyicymeloncat · 6 months

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Okay here’s another controversial “Green family take” tell me if I’m wrong.

“People who hate Harumi and Lloyd family dynamic ignore that Lloyd and Morro also shouldn’t have a family dynamic, when Morro did the exact same thing”

Because besties I agree I honestly think green cousins doesn’t make much sense either since yknow Morro and the whole possession thing, but at the same time if you look at canon, they just aren’t the same thing and yknow I need people to actually stop looking at Harumi as the girl version of Morro and the only reason we hate her is because she’s a girl.

Because she’s not.

Like yes I agree there’s definitely a lot of bias towards Morro, if he was woman he would be demonised to hell and back but since he’s man then he is adored, and vice versa with Harumi and sexism fucking sucks.

But Harumi and Morro are different guys. Harumi is portrayed as worse in canon in Lloyd’s eyes. Yeah Lloyd got possessed by Morro and that’s obviously bad tm but other than what people assume possession entails, Lloyd was never as shaken as he was with Harumi.

In s5, we never saw Lloyd be conflicted about the possession thing. He had no fear of Morro. We have no reason to believe that a ghost possession feels worse than being a sleep and maybe having a vague awareness of what’s going on. He barely mentions Morro after s5. And I will say I think this is a writing flaw, obviously it would’ve been cooler if Morro actually had some kind of impact on the ninja, but regardless this is the canon. Lloyd hates Morro but he’s not traumatised yknow. It’s not to the point that Harumi got to.

I feel like getting possessed should be worse than getting lied to, but Harumi did on top of it, start a cult in his name, Kill actual Characters (the royal family and Hutchins) and then kidnap Lloyd and his mother and his uncle and then resurrect his father removing vital parts of his father’s mind/personality/emotional cognitive abilities etc. on top of that she also nearly killed the ninja and wu (which Lloyd believed she did).

Somehow she was much more dangerous than Morro was, she was a much more successful villain.

Additionally I would say Morro has more of an excuse to be seen as family, even if I I’m less of a green cousins fan. Because Morro and Wu actually have a father son relationship, in which Wu was actually responsible over Morro. They had a normal albeit imperfect dynamic before Morro left. Regardless of Lloyd and Morro’s interactions, that dynamic was still present even in the very end.

It doesn’t mean and Lloyd and Morro have to be buddies, just because there’s a family connection doesn’t mean shit (this is the show of found family have we learned nothing? Blood connections don’t matter, only friendship).

But like in comparison to Harumi and Garmadon’s absolute parody of a relationship, where Harumi turns to the man who doesn’t remember what love is and asks him to be her father (at this point neither of them know what “father” even means), Morro does have a family dynamic and Harumi does not.

So in response to the original quote, Morro has a much more solid claim to any kind of family dynamic bc his relation to Wu is much more family esq, and also he was bad yeah, but the show portrays Harumi as worse especially in Lloyd’s opinion.

I just don’t like the argument that Morro and Harumi have done the same things, when the severity is definitely different imo and they aren’t just copies of each other. Imo it’s an oversimplification to reduce their characters down to each other.

#u heard it here first #spicy is not the biggest fan of green cousins or Garmadon siblings #sorry #if ppl make good content for it then I’ll let it slide but generally not a fan #i feel bad for saying it but I guess I really just don’t like Harumi as much #i feel like whenever people talk about Harumi it’s always ‘oh you hate her cuz ur sexist’#no I hate her because I don’t like how she’s written or how her character is established #like Ik some people like her backstory but I just don’t #it just feels like the writers went ‘let’s blame the characters for no reason’#and I’m just so sick of the evil love interest trope I hate it so much and that is what Harumi is on s8 #because it’s happened 3 times now #THREE #PIXAL SKYLOR HARUMI #It’s that mindset of women are evil they’ll seduce you with their crimes against human nature #okay that tag is gonna sound very appealing to the gays on here but like in the context of the show it’s just demonising women #like take out the romance aspect and fix Harumi’s backstory and maybe I’d like her more #i will say Morro is badly written also he does nothing interesting really other than his backstory #i like what he means about wu but like they do not even explore that dynamic much in the show #he’s like an unopened present #his set up is so good but they don’t do shit with it #idk idk #obviously all my opinions #ninjago

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rubiatinctorum · 8 months

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okay yes we all know prison sucks in real life but my friend in internet YOU chose to play the game where we bet on the forgiveness of fictional singing prisoners like race horses ft. a metagame more bizarre than yugioh's. "there is no solution inside the framework of MILGRAM so inno and guilty voters are all wrong, it's a waste of time because no verdict can help the character" people are SO CLOSE to getting the point and yet. that doesn't preclude you from being able to have something intelligent to say about the characters' situations knowing they're existing within the framework of MILGRAM anyway. If your whole take on a character's position is "they shouldn't be here in the first place, all options suck" you're probably playing the wrong online voting game because without the characters being in MILGRAM there would be no... MILGRAM to play, you know?

Like yes it's very much part of the point, it seems to me, that our actions have consequences and Psychological Torture Prison is Bad. but we can't get them out until the trials are over so are you going to keep pestering us because you don't like the game while we try to maximize ideal results, or are you going to step aside and leave us in peace if you're not going to play the game. If shipping them all off to therapy were an option it would be called THERAPY (with a backwards R) and we all would have done that in trial one.

#rubia speaks #sorry i'm getting a little annoyed with the 'all options are bad except getting amane out of milgram' takes #MILGRAM #sorry to tell you amane is a character in milgram created to be put in milgram and situations. she and the rest of them exist for the story #she's a character she's a tool for the story and this story is MILGRAM you're not gonna fix-it-fic AU your way out of this #can't wait to see how evil and mean this sounds out of context to my MILGRAM-unaware irls on here #the prison is bad whether you're inno or guilty just for having been there THAT'S THE POINT.#the psychological hell of guilty verdict is bad THAT'S THE POINT #these crimes don't feel bad enough for what they go through on the back end THAT'S THE POINT #if you're not going to vote bc nothing matters leave us in peace to our votes because they matter to us

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msvorderofoperations · 9 days

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New dream diary.

This one was kind of odd in its tone. At times deathly serious, and others incredibly superficial. I dreamed that I was in a far future kind of setting where this game had kind of taken over the world at large for good and for ill. It existed in many forms: a miniature based war game, a trading card game, and mixed reality massively multiplayer online video game. I say mixed reality, not just as something that incorporates real world objects into itself, but as something that directly affects reality as well. It also conferred great powers on high level players. But I will get back to this in a bit.

Another aspect of this dream was that I was in a polyamorous relationship in a sort of hub and spoke system. Myself and a few other people were romantically involved with this one woman, but weren't really involved with each other. And for whatever reason, the polycule all lived together, except for the woman we were all romantically tied to. Some of them I got along with great, and we were good friends, but this one guy I did not much like at all and we pointedly tried to spend as little time around each other as possible. This is borne out at one point by this guy talking up how much time they are going to spend together the next time she visits, and I take him at his word. But when she arrives, she specifically wants to be with me.

This is awkward for a number of reasons, not all of them interpersonal. I had been prepping for a day to myself, playing a single player version of the card game which was offline but could still record progress and would update my associated stats upon the next time I logged in. I also had not fully bathed, and this is where the dream took a very tonally strange tangent. Instead of bathing at home like would be the sane thing to do, I instead find out about a fully automated robotic bathhouse in India, and opt to use it instead. Doing so involves me fully teleporting myself to the complete other side of the world, which I do as a lark. But in doing so, I forget to bring my shampoo, so my hair is still a greasy mess. And again, instead of just doing it at home, I feel the need to make the trip once more.

Unsurprisingly, one of the things our shared romantic interest wanted to do together was have sex. But in thinking I was not going to be partaking today, I gratified myself shortly before she arrived. Which the dude who lied about her being with him today (sorry that I don't have names here, my dream did not provide any so I have to describe everyone in terms of my relationship to them) makes fun of me for doing. Which, in addition to being shitty by itself, he implies that by doing so I am unworthy to be in a relationship with her because of it. For her part, she does not seem to pay this any mind. She is actually quite interested in the details, because she finds the idea of me touching myself to the idea of her very hot. From here the narrative starts to pull away, as for whatever reason my dreams will often be sexually charged but they almost never actually feature any explicit sexual content.

The narrative then takes on a more limited-omniscient perspective, showcasing the shared goings-on of the other members of the polycule as I am away with our shared love. Specifically, it starts with one of the people I am friends with investigating a recent, and hugely influential moment that happened in the MMO part of this game. It was a group activity that involved trying to stop the latest attack from the antagonist faction, which went about as bad as it could have. All of us had different roles and skill sets, which we had tried to apply as best we could to minimize the impact of this event. I will spare the unimportant details, but the long and short of it is the my role was the intelligence gatherer, and I found out what the object of this enemy incursion was. Despite being about a large scale attack across many parts of the in-game space, the main objective for them was a bomb, planted in a playground at a school. I tried to warn people of this, saying "Its a bomb, in the mirror in the playground." But for whatever reason my messages were becoming garbled and what people heard was "In the mirror underground" and no one could make sense of it, so they took it as being spam.

While the thing with the bomb was happening, the guy who was determined to undermine me was dealing with his own problems. He had proper heard my warning and had been trying to make his way to the school to either disarm it or evacuate. Unfortunately, he had run afoul of the bunch of extremely dangerous high-level enemy monsters. They were the weird giant worm-like things that could move shockingly fast, and had minor reality warping powers. Specifically, they had the ability to redirect kinetic weapons fire elsewhere, which was a big problem because that was the main way this dude engaged in combat. The last time he had fought these things, they redirected his bullets into another member of the polycule, and killed them. Vowing to not let that happen again, he instead tries to escape, but it proves very difficult as he has become surrounded. The one merciful thing about these worm enemies is that while they have incredible hearing and absurd reaction speed, they are completely blind. So while he can't find his way free or fight out, as long as he stays calm he isn't in much danger himself.

Eventually though, the time to stop the attack passes and the bomb does end up going off. It is discovered in the aftermath that the reason the placement went undetected was because the explosive being used is a new, novel compound that does not read as an explosive. It is functionally an inert mud in basically all circumstances, but once the catalyst is introduce it becomes a hyper-powerful energetic explosive. To the point that all it took to blow up this whole school was something about the size of a tennis ball. And the very weird thing is, the catalyst is blood. Any kind will work.

Also in the ongoing investigation, there is a secondary site where no lives were lost but has fairly significant structural damage. In winding back the game state to see how bad it actually is, he sees that a player was present at the time of the event. It turns out to be the guy who was trapped by the worms. It seems in his frustration at having not been able to stop the explosion, in the ensuing chaos after he went on a destructive rampage in a place where there were no people present and then used the editing powers granted to high-level players to make it look like it was done by the opposing faction.

When my time alone with my paramour comes to an end, my friend quietly confronts me with the information that the other guys was responsible for the secondary destruction. We are keeping it on the down low not because we place any blame on him, but because we see that this event has enormously effected him and that we want to try and help him work through what he's going through. So we opt to try and organize a group activity for the whole polycule.

While that is happening, the subject of all our affection tries to make good with the dude who is clearly Going Through It and low-key making it everyone's problem. She tries assisting him with other aspects of the game like the TCG and the miniature, but at every juncture, he brushes her off and intimates that he is better off alone. Which obviously is very upsetting to her.

In the meantime however, we have finished our planning for the group excursion. We opt for something simple in just taking a walking tour of an area downtown and sampling the food and drink available at the best places there. As we are are out and about, an incident occurs. In a shared roadway, a dude in a pickup truck doesn't stop for us, and I end up doing pretty intense damage to it to stop it before it hits anyone. In trying to fix up his truck in the aftermath, I end up kind of ham-fistedly apply the high-level editing powers that I have only recently been given access to. I try to restore the surface of the hood of the truck back to what it was, but end up incorporating the surface of the road and the dirt beneath into it's appearance. While my friend shows me more direct ways of utilizing the powers to more useful ends, the troubled guy goes to check on the driver.

It's at this point that this take a turn for the worse. The driver is fully unconscious, which is odd because the truck had been moving very slowly at the time of the accident. In checking his face against records, it turns out that this guys is a known collaborator with the enemy faction and is wanted by the authorities. As this is happening we have opened the hood to see if there was any damage to the engine that we can repair. And we find...nothing. No engine, no battery, nothing that would allow this car to move under it's own power. Just ruptured containers and what looks for all the world like clay soil. We quickly realize that this car was being used to smuggle whatever this substance is, and by hiding it in the engine bay and impelling it through unseen means, cursory searches wouldn't find it. Some kid grabs a chunk of it, and before anyone can stop him, all hell breaks loose.

In handling it and tossing it to himself, it hits a mosquito and it becomes abundantly clear what this stuff is. it explodes with a incredible report, and the whole scene erupts in incredible carnage. Because of how crowded this place had been, the viscera keeps reigniting it, all while the shock of the explosions push the remaining amounts of the stuff all over the place. It has a terrible cascading effect where is seems that there is no safe place to be. Even those off street level in the buildings above are succumbing to secondary and tertiary explosions. I am able to survive the initial blast and try to corral people to stem the tide of violence, but nothing seems to be working. While all this mayhem is going on, I see my love trying to save someone who has broken off from the group. And I see in excruciating detail as a rogue piece of debris catches her in the head and immediately and soundlessly kills her.

At this point I wake up.

#subconscious conversation #long post #I really wish I had an idea why so many of my dreams take on this long-form narrative affect #it would probably be easier to parse as to what my brain was trying to recontextualize if stuff was in smaller more manageable chunks #Like I can get a lot of what my brain is relating to in most circumstances #but in trying to get the correct context I have to also extract a bunch of other ancillary shit or I might miss losing something important #But I can definitely see some aspects of my real life in this #The feeling of powerlessness in trying to fix problems #The inherent complications of trying to maintain an ethical polyamorous relationship #The misapplication of strength or skills that can serve to make problems far worse #and the inherent anxiety that comes with that #This dream was A LOT #not just in terms of violent content #but just in calling out a lot of stuff I've been not so quietly worrying about for a long while #and as is frequently the case recognizing all this shit does precisely fuck all in actually providing solutions

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