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wordsandrobots · 1 year

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Dragon Slayer

[I wrote this seven years ago, as part of a series of stories I was playing with at the time. I’ve moved on from working on them, but I happened to look this one up today and it’s not terrible so . . . here it is!] According to the books, Elspeth Drake slew the last dragon in England in 1804 with an enchanted hat-pin. No one paid much attention at the time on account of dragon slaying being a couple of hundred years out of fashion.

The dragons didn't pay much heed neither.

People imagine dragons are ancient. They imagine big old dinosaurs and because they're dinosaurs, they assume they must've died out. Ancient means extinct, they say. Stands to reason. It's right there in the song – the knights are no more and the dragons are dead.

They're wrong.

Ancient's a funny word, see. Means different things. Could be hundreds of years. Could be decades. I'm ancient. The ground's ancient. But we're ancient in different ways. On different scales. And dragons, dragons aren't ancient like old bones and fossils. They're ancient like rot. They don't sit there, quiet and dry in the rock, they fester away down there like big, fat maggots, chewing on their own tails 'til something makes 'em force a way to the surface.

They're simple things, in their way. All they need to hatch is something horrible. A family burning in the same fire. A whole village, dead of the plague. A war. Nothing complicated, nothing unusual. Sometimes the echo of those things sinks down deep, down into the dirt, down where there aren't any new families to come along and build new houses and there aren't any medicines to heal away what's gone before. They stick there, those echoes, 'til they've gone mouldy and ancient and in the end, out comes that fat maggot, a memory gone sour. An idea gone rotten.

Up and up it comes, clawing through the earth and out it comes and if you're lucky, it'll just drive a few shepherds crackers or make the local parson murder his sister. If you're lucky. If you're not . . . well, mebbe it's best not to think about that.

Elspeth Drake slew the last dragon. Happen she did a good job of it too. But it weren't last dragon. Couldn't of been. Not when they're being born all the time. It were just last dragon to make it to the surface.

Now I've got to deal with the next one. Me, all alone in this big empty field, in the dark, while a whole townful of people it'd gobble up in a day sleeps a couple of miles away. And me without an enchanted hat-pin.

Not that I have much truck with enchantment, mind. All that faffing around, trying to tie what you can do to something you can hold in your hand. I say, if your hand's good enough to hold summat, it's good enough to work with and to blazes with the rest. I never needed a wand in me life and I don't plan to start now.

So it's just me, me hat and me stick. Damn thing, that stick. Only started using it to get a bit of sympathy but these days it's stopped being pretend. Every time I wake up I seem to have a new ache, and another every time I go to sleep. Makes me wonder if I'm still up to doing this on me own. Mebbe I should have got one of the young 'uns to lend a hand . . .

Tch! Pull yourself together, woman. Yer still plenty strong enough to deal with one measly worm.

Stroke of good luck I heard about it though. Sensitive souls sometimes feel dragons and the like coming but I've never been much good at sensitive. Took old Elsie Moon rattling by on the bus to pick it up. Otherwise, first we'd have known about it would've been pitched battles in the railway station or some such nonsense.

That's not going to happen now though. Nothing's getting past me.

Wish the wretched thing would get a shift on. It's blooming cold out here. Pity specifics have never been Elsie's strong suit, otherwise I mighten'tve had to make this an all-night vigil –

All at once, it's knocking against the topsoil, sounding like the crack of doom inside me skull. Two ticks after that, a great whoosh of wind hits me. The grass around me is blown flat – I feel that, even if I can't see it. Same way, I feel the dragon pulling itself into the night, right in front of me.

It's not got a shape, exactly. Not so as you could point to. There's nothing to block out the muddy glow bouncing off the clouds, nothing that casts a darker shadow. It's just there. Big as a nightmare and twice as ugly. Its breath rolls over me, hot and angry. I remember swords in the distance and flaming hay blacking out the sky. I can taste drying blood in back of me throat. Nasty ideas choke the chill from the air.

But I've got me hat. Me dad's tin hat, from back when he were an air raid warden. He stood up to fire, did dad, to fire and worse. I shove that bit of him, the bit of him that was able to do that, between me and the dragon and tell it to lay off mithering me.

It don't take kindly to that.

Ranting and roaring, it comes at me. Doesn't stop to think or plan. All fire and poison and fuss and shouting. Never thinking about what it's doing. Never caring. Nothing to care with. It falls on me like burning fog, like all the worst days of me life. There's so much of it I have to plant me feet and brace against the wretched stick to keep meself upright. Every bone I've got shouts up at the weight of it. Me skin prickles, me eyes water – the damn thing's wrapping itself around and around, squashing the air from me lungs.

I can hear its heartbeat, pulsing strong and hungry. They're coming to get you, it hisses, those men with swords and spears. There are always men like that. The men who want to tear down your world and kill everything you've ever known. They're going to kill you. You're going to die. And even if it isn't them, you're going to die anyway. Because you're old and you're weak and your breath burns in your lungs where it once came easily and your limbs are brambles where they once were oak. Soon you'll be stuck in your bed, a hollow husk, just waiting for your eyes to go dark and your mind to turn to porridge, waiting to turn into a stupid lump of gristle, slick with your own filth and blood. You're going to DIE.

It shouts the last bit, jaws snapping shut around me. I'm in an oven, cooking alive in the stink of other people's half-forgotten terror. Hard to remember I'm still standing in a field, that I'm not walled in with broken timbers and hot coals. You're going to DIE. Hard to be sure which of us is the one thinking that now. I should've brought help. What were you thinking, woman, trying to kill this thing on your own?

YOU'RE GOING TO DIE.

I lift a hand to me head, to press at the pain. Only me fingers knock the tin helmet instead. The metal's still cold to the touch, cold enough to give me a shock. Course it is. There's no heat, not really. Just hot air and most of that's on the inside.

YOU'RE GOING TO DIE!

Of course I am, you daft snake. We're all going to die. We're born dying. That's good and it's bad but mostly it just is. Nowt any one of us can do about it. But let me tell you, it's better than mouldering away like you are, stewing in your own bloodiness. What do you know about dying, or living come to that?

I grip me stick as it roars some more, flapping at me face, shouting about how terrible it all is. The wood is hot with sweat, but it's an honest heat. I push me mind down the stick, down into the ground. I feel me feet from the wrong side for a second and then I go deeper, down into all that muck the dragon pushed up through. You want death, y'great stupid worm? I'll give you death.

I'll give you the death of everything that ever walked this patch of land, the death of every last thing that walked and hopped and flew. I'll give you the death of everyone who ever cared about whatever it was that hatched you. 'Cos that's the truth: you're an anger that's got nothing left to point at. Those men with spears? They're long since dust and bone. What did they ever leave behind? Bunch of gold that got lost? Bunch of swords that rusted away? You're sour milk. No one in their right mind would drink you.

And even if there's someone mad enough out there to let you in, they'll die soon enough. And the next and the next and the next. You'll play hopscotch until you run out of people. And then you'll die too. Die of hunger. No one left to think you.

Dragons'll be around forever. But this one won't be.

It screams at me. You're going to die, it screams. So're you, I tell it and smother it in the truth. I take it by the neck and shove it into the earth, show it everything that were ever lost to the mud. I'm going to die. It's going to die. And tomorrow there will be something new. Mebbe better, mebbe worse. But new. Different. It tries to make me despair over that. I show it why that's hope.

It can't take it. It just falls apart, fire going out at last. I suck down grateful lungfuls of night chill and let the embers flutter down on me. Everything aches and everything's sore but I don't care. This is the good kind of ache, the ache of a job well done. I snort and thump the ground with me stick, muttering a quick thanks to dad's ghost for making me swear never to sell his hat.

The last shred of worm whirls away on the breeze, scattered to join with the rest of the dead leaves. I watch it go and smile into the darkness. Too old, my eye. What were I thinking? I'll be doing this 'til I drop, just you see if I'm not.

According to the books, Elspeth Drake slew the last dragon in England in 1804. They'll need to be updating them now.

#writing #original fiction #Yorkshire #witchcraft #witches #dragons #magic #urban fantasy #except in the Vale of York #so mostly farmland #my writing #probably a metaphor #Whittacker's Witches

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astrobydalia · 3 years

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Feeding you more astro observations😛

Credit: Tumblr blog @astrobydalia

🔍 Look at the planet that rules the DECAN!! I have noticed that this provides a lot more detail and information about a house’s rulership. If you don’t know what decans are, check this post. For example: Say you have the cusp of the 5th house landing in Sagittarius on the second decan (Aries decan in this case) Then if you were to look for the ruler of the 5th house you would look for Jupiter but you’d ALSO may wanna take a peak at mars (bc mars is the ruler of Aries) to get even more info and detail on that house’s rulership

📚 Mars in Sagittarius/9th house can be especially upset/annoyed when people teach them wrong (like wrong/confusing info) even if it’s not deliberate. That’s bc Sagittarius influence makes you have “faith” in the people you see as mentors and having those people disappoint you in their guidance can be specially upsetting

📝 I want people to understand this: Harmonious aspects are not a guarantee that the energy between those planets will manifest positively. Just like challenging aspects don’t mean you are doomed. Challenging aspects mean life long struggles and life lessons basically. Harmonious aspects just mean that the energy between those planets flows effortlessly. How energy manifests in a person depends on overall context of the chart and how that person CHOOSES to manage/use that given energy

👀 Having Pluto conj. the ASC, in the 1st house, Scorpio ASC or even Pluto/scorpio in the 5th can make you very jealous and possessive about your own individuality/persona. Meaning that you could find a sense of empowerment in being the black sheet or being different or even intimidating in some way and you may be the type of person to low-key really dislike or even resent it when people compare you to someone else pointing out similarities. It’s like marking your territory on your individuality

🥵 Everybody is always saying how Scorpio risings are magnetic and stuff but have you ever met an Aries rising??? These people have literally everyone drooling over them. They exude a vibe of effortless empowerment that is just sexy. They will generally attract people that will confess their love to them rather than the other way around

👡 Venus in Virgo individuals really have the most insipid taste ever. (And that’s coming from someone that has a “less is more” philosophy)😭 It’s like they’re SO picky that everything that they end up giving the approval is so... basic.... But one thing is sure is that you’ll at least never see them looking like a mess

🖇 Uranus in 2nd house is an incredibly resolutive placement. They’re the type of people to come up with like super random DIY stuff.

🚲 Earth mars are really the ones that invented the “unbothered” concept. They ACTUALLY don’t give a fuck, they just don’t (specially Capricorn). This obviously doesn’t mean that they don’t take things seriously. In fact it’s quite the opposite. What I mean is that they usually don’t let things get to them. Similar to Scorpio mars, they REALLY dislike wasting their energy with just anything bc they DO take things seriously. With earth energy there’s this huge energy of investment, they don’t like to invest energy on things that aren’t worth it. You’ll be actually surprised and scared to hear an earth mars saying they are genuinely pissed or upset. Capricorn mars will put you IN YOUR PLACE. Virgo mars would be the type to pull receipts and facts. Taurus mars is a lot more chill but people really underestimate the powerful and grounded presence they can have

🔫 Capricorn and Scorpio mars are the scariest mars signs. In that order. And you can’t change my mind

🍆 Scorpio mars people like prolonged, slow but intense sex. Basically having sex with a Scorpio mars is like listening to a very good song where you just keep waiting for the beat to drop but it never does. I guess that’s why Scorpio energy can be so intoxicating bc it always leaves you at the verge of full satisfaction in a way you just keep going back for more.

👔 Venus in Capricorn/10th house or Capricorn in the 2nd house are people that prefer wearing suits or uniforms. If not, they usually make uniforms out of their outfits, they tend to pair the same shirt, with the same jacket with the same shoes, etc. It’s like they have a series of “set” looks. They can also have some clothing pieces, a hair style or something that they ALWAYS wear. This last point can apply to Capricorn risings too.

🗣 Stop the Gemini slander guys, Leo/Aries mercuries are the real professionals when it comes to interrupting and talking over people

☠️ I’ve noticed that Scorpios attract toxicity more than they are toxic

🤝 Your 9th house and your Jupiter is the core of your morals and moral values, they represent what is morally/ethically most important to you

💧 Moon in the 7th house people are known for molding themselves for their partners and that is true, but I’ve also noticed that they do mold their partners too emotionally. They WILL project their feelings into their partners and WILL make their partners feel exactly the way they feel constantly. It’s like their way of handling their own feelings is by managing them through that other person and for that they mold the other person’s feelings into their own or project their feelings into them. They won’t be interested in partners that don’t allow them to do this.

⚡️ People with Venus-Uranus aspects experience a lot of “I never thought I would fall for someone like that” or “never thought someone like that could fall for me” when it comes to lovers. And also friends: “I never thought you’d want to be my friend!” type of vibes

👥 People with the same ASC but different MC really have very different vibes between eachother. I won’t say like completely different but it’s more like they are almost two “types” of that ASC bc of this difference

🎭 People with Scorpio+Leo energy are dramatic AS FUCK. Life’s a tragedy for them. Just imagine Leo energy showcasing Scorpio’s inner intensity. They could really give Sadness from Inside Out a run for her money

Credit: Tumblr Blog @astrobydalia

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tyrannosaurus-trainwreck · 3 years

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I propose a new rule for action film franchises. Let’s call it the Settle Down There, Edgelord Rule.

Say you have a franchise--let’s use the Bond films as an example--where every single film, the fate of the entire fucking world hangs in the balance. No matter what got accomplished in the last film, they’re right back at it in this film, having to save the entire world again. But somehow, the stakes have to be higher than the last time, or it starts getting harder to get audiences back for more of the same, because it starts feeling really repetitive.

“Why’ve you dragged me back in from my life of sordid semi-retirement, M?” asks James fucking Bond. “Is it yet another doomsday device in the hands of a madman?”

“We should be so lucky, 007,” says Q, handing James Bond a fountain pen that is also a doomsday device. “This time it’s a doomsday device in the hands of two madmen, both of whom have extremely personal scores to settle with you.”

“Well in that case, I suppose I can hardly say no,” James Bond sighs wearily, already longing for the days when it was only a single madman with perhaps a nuclear warhead or two who harbored a vague and academic disapproval of spies in general.

The problem with the ever-rising stakes is that eventually it does become a bit ridiculous. Remember when Fast and the Furious was about stealing consumer electronics for money? And now barely eight movies later they’re stealing nukes and driving to space and somehow John Cena is involved? Another two movies and they’ll be doing donuts on the moon to save earth from being blown up by previously-unmentioned alien conquerors.

So every so often, let’s say every third movie, writers should have to hit a reset button. Not on the action or the mayhem or the actors’ intensity or whatever it is that gets eyes on screens and butts in seats. Just, you know. The stakes.

“Why’ve you dragged me back in from my life of sordid semi-retirement, M?” asks James fucking Bond. “Is it yet another doomsday device in the hands of a madman?”

“We should be so lucky, 007,” says Q, handing James Bond a fountain pen that is also a doomsday device. “This time the madman’s made off with one of the Queen’s corgis.”

“What?” James Bond demands, aghast. “How could you let this happen?”

“Their dog grooming credentials were impeccable. They passed every security check. They’d have been allowed to groom Her Majesty herself,” M tells him grimly. “There’s something you should know, Bond. It was... it was Trixie.”

“Not Trixie,” Bond gasps. The look on his face is that of a man having a flashback to ‘Nam. “What do they want for her safe return?”

“That’s the sticky wicket, Bond,” Q volunteers, waving vaguely at a wall that begins playing a video.

On the wall, Willem Dafoe cuddles a corgi and stares dead-eyed at the camera. When he speaks, it’s in an accent that’s vaguely Germanic but not like, enough to make any trade partners really mad about it.

“Trixie is such a good dog. Such a good girl!” He looks at the dog, face becoming animated and warm. “Who’s a good girl? Is it you? It is you! You’re a good girl!”

He looks back at the camera, eyes once again blank as a shark’s.

“I think, my friends, that Trixie is too good a dog for the rotting corpse of an empire that she was whelped into. I shall take her with me, and together we shall venture into a brave new world of grassy farms with plenty of room to run and many, many children with which to play. If you redeem yourselves, perhaps you shall live to see this world that I shall make. Perhaps you shall live to go... to the dogs!”

The video cuts as he rubs the corgi’s ears and gives her a treat.

“That absolute bastard!” Bond snarls, hurling the fountain pen doomsday device across the room. “Tell me you have something to go on!”

And then we’re off to the races, with typical Bond-level shenanigans, fights, and body counts.

It’s only that instead of having to come up with a scenario which is somehow more important or more dangerous than the last movie, which was already threatening to kill a billion people or knock the planet off its axis or whatever, it’s just a scenario in which everyone is really, really emotionally invested.

And before anyone starts up with the “these sorts of action-movie shenanigans are only reasonable with incredibly high stakes” argument, let me remind you that by the time they need this proposed intervention, we have already hit patently unreasonable situations and behavior. Like, these are not reasonable people who are just in it for a boatload of money and somehow fell ass-backwards into a Bond villain scheme for making it. They didn’t join the rotary club and oops their way into a series of flamboyantly homicidal consultation gigs.

If we can buy somebody going completely balls-to-the-wall, conspiracy-of-thousands, weirdo-cult-aesthetics, murdered-my-own-parents all-in on *checks notes* basically being the CEO of a slightly more criminal than usual international conglomerate that required precisely none of that? If we can buy the iron-jawed goons fist-fighting a guy who’s essentially at this point the goddamned terminator for a generous hourly wage?

Then I think we can buy a weirdo-cult-aesthetics conspiracy-of-thousands megalomaniac who just really, really likes that goddamn dog, or hates the protagonist, or wants to share the daguerreotype of Abraham Lincoln’s penis with the world as the Great Emancipator would have wanted, and the shadowy government-bankrolled action-hero forces driven by fate to stand in their way.

It’s not any less reasonable, anyway, and then when the next movie comes out you can go back to saving New York City from a nuke or Paris from a weather-control device or whatever and no one will be like "well this is a step down from the pageantry of the previous installment.”

I should add that there’s no reason the Settle Down There, Edgelord Rule can’t be applied to any sort of serial media.

Your doom-and-gloom tv show just keeps fighting worse and worse villains every single season? Why not take a break next season and fight a homeowner’s association instead of an artistic serial killer? Go on a hard-fought, poorly-lit, grim-and-gritty slog through the byzantine process of figuring out which impound lot the Impala got towed to after a bullshit parking ticket.

Instead of having your teenage characters grapple with Even Worse Demons, they can just, like, egg their principal’s house when it turns out he’s a normal human-level petty tyrant and not a master vampire. Your nemesis figured out your secret identity, and instead of trying to kill your family or whatever, they hacked your facebook account and friended all your obnoxious relatives/coworkers/friends-of-friends and are embarrassing you in public, and now you have to go on a ridiculously convoluted and dystopian spirit quest to get The Zuck Himself to reset your password.

The possibilities are endless! Unless you keep ratcheting things up, anyway, in which case you’re eventually and inevitably going to wind up fighting Satan, then God, then Worse God, then Satan’s Dad, Which Is Somehow Not God? Don’t @ Us, Our Mythological Research Prior to Writing This Was Confined to Metal Albums and American Horror Films.

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traincat · 3 years

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I’ve been trying to piece together a few things from your Twitter and Tumblr posts alike and still can’t make heads or tales of things, so would you mind helping out a FF & spideytorch noob? 1) what is currently happening with Johnny in the comics? (I’ve fallen head over heels for this guy, largely all your doing) 2) when’s the last time he and Peter have interacted, canon wise? (And do you think upcoming interactions are likely?) 3) your thoughts on if they’ll have him come out in the near future? (has that ‘biggest change to the fantastic four’ teaser come to pass yet?) Love all your content, thank you!

I'd say no problem but then I started thinking about this current run again and got a headache. But yes, I can do that to save you from reading it, because it is very largely not good.

So I don't think it's unfair to just flat out say the current Fantastic Four run is not very good, largely due to writer Dan Slott's efforts. Slott was previously on Amazing Spider-Man for 10 years, to mixed opinions, but a large portion of Spider-Man fandom, myself included, blames him near singlehandedly for the decline in quality of Spider-Man books over those ten years. I will say, in the interest of fairness, that Slott as a writer has an incredible fondness for the Spider-Man/Human Torch relationship, and that a lot of the recent teamups and interactions between them have been written or co-written by him. So it's all not all negative here. But in general, I personally find Slott's more recent comics (the last seven-ish years especially) to be badly plotted out, messily characterized disasters that feature characters written with all the emotion of a cardboard cutout. That's me putting it nicely.

To explain this fully, you have to understand the position Fantastic Four comics were in from the years 2015 through 2018, both in the fictional 616 universe and in the real publishing world. Following the 2015 Secret Wars event (great if you want some Johnny angst in the background of your plot), the Fantastic Four were disbanded -- Reed, Sue, and their many biological and found family children were presumed dead but in reality were remaking the multiverse, unable, for a reason that was never clearly defined, to reach home. Ben and Johnny were left on Earth. They had an unspecified falling out, likely due to Reed and Sue's absence, and went their separate ways -- Ben joined the Guardians of the Galaxy and went to space. Johnny was featured on both Inhumans and Avengers books. What's notable about this period is that it's the first time since 1961 that there was no Fantastic Four book being published by Marvel. Now the real world reason behind this is both complicated and extremely petty: Marvel really wanted the Fantastic Four film rights. Marvel denied this explanation at the time, stating that the reason was sales motivated, but it was a thoroughly flimsy excuse and Jonathan Hickman, writer of 2015's Secret Wars and overseer of the current X-Men plot, gave an interview saying the decision was film rights motivated. This decision kept the Fantastic Four books off the shelves for three years, up until the Disney-Fox merger, which secured the X-Men and Fantastic Four rights for Disney's Marvel Studios. Marvel then announced that the Fantastic Four book would be returning. So that's a little bit of background as to the precarious place the Fantastic Four currently occupy in the Marvel universe -- it's worth noting that this year is their 60th anniversary, and Marvel has done very little for it. Compare this to the X-Men, whose film rights Marvel also obtained during the Disney-Fox merger, and whose books are currently dominating the publishing lineup. The Fantastic Four definitely occupy an unpopular position, one Marvel themselves is at least partially responsible for forcing them into.

But to move back into the actual content of the book -- the readjustment period Slott wrote reintroducing the Fantastic Four into the Marvel universe can be described as clumsy, at best. It's never fully explained why Reed, Sue, and the kids couldn't return to Earth, something that was explored in Chip Zdarsky's 2017 Marvel Two-in-One, which featured Ben, Johnny, and Doom on a multiversal roadtrip to try and find their family and which I on the whole recommend, despite it having an awkward ending due to being cut short by Slott's announced Fantastic Four main title.

(Marvel Two-in-One 2017 #4)

Instead, the Fantastic Four return to a Marvel universe a little different than how they left it, with the Baxter Building -- formerly the offices of Parker Industries, the company Doc Ock started in Peter's body during Superior Spider-Man that Peter inherited after his defeat and then lost spectacularly when he trashed his own company to fight nazis (good for him) -- occupied by a different fantastic foursome in a plot that goes nowhere and does nothing. This is somewhat emblematic of the early days of Slott's run -- he introduces ideas that fail to go anywhere, including Johnny's rekindled relationship with his other best friend and former college roommate, Wyatt Wingfoot, who he was seen being very cuddly with in the early issues.

(FF 2018 #1) A small group of Fantastic Four fans have argued for a while that if Marvel was to have Johnny come out, a relationship with Wyatt would feel very natural -- they're already close, with Wyatt being an important Fantastic Four supporting character since the '60s. I have some further analysis here on the conspiracy theory that Johnny and Wyatt were supposed to be in relationship at the beginning of this run but that that plot was, for whatever reason, nixed. I don't know that I entirely believe this theory, for the record -- but I do think the pieces line up remarkably well.

Anyway, that didn't/hasn't yet happened, obviously. Slott instead for the most part put Johnny on the back burner for the beginning of his run, up until the Spyre arc, which I have reason to believe is the main story he pitched that he credits with securing him the Fantastic Four title. The Spyre arc suggests that the Fantastic Four's failed space exploration during which they got their powers wasn't just to beat the commies to the moon, as Lee and Kirby envisioned (simpler days), but to reach a specific planet outside of our galaxy. When the team sets out to conquer this mission, they arrive at the planet, but are quickly captured. The planet, they find out, operates like a soulmate AU -- everyone has a fated person that they are matched to via a gold armband. Reed and Sue are soulmates (and Ben is confined to an underground subterranean with the other monsters, because this is a Fantastic Four comic) while it's discovered! Shocker! That Johnny is actually the soulmate of the one the planet's inhabitants, a winged woman named Sky, with the suggestion that this is both why Johnny's previous relationships have never worked and why he loves space exploration -- he was just trying to get to his Soulmate TM.

(FF 2018 #15) "What's going on here? Where are my clothes?" As you can see, this didn't start off super great, with Johnny being separated from his family, stripped naked, and put in Sky's bed with a soulmate armband slapped on him. Did I mention they're only removable if your soulmate takes it off for you? And that Sky has consistently refused despite Johnny asking her to? Yeah. It's bad. (I think it's important to note Johnny's long history as a victim of assault plays into this narrative, whether or not Slott is personally holding that in mind while writing, which I don't believe he is. cw in the linked post for discussions of sexual assault.) There's an additional issue here in that Slott has a history of problematic writing regarding women of color, featuring characters he's created to act as love interests being oversexualized, infantilized, villainized, or some mix of all three, with two examples of this phenomena being Cindy Moon and Lian Tang, both of whom he introduced in quick succession in Amazing Spider-Man. Slott certainly didn't have to write Sky as manipulative or controlling towards Johnny, but that's what he chose to do, and that factors into the bigger picture of unfortunate themes in his writing.

Sky returns to Earth with the Fantastic Four despite Johnny appearing unenthused about the idea and initially generally reluctant to interact with her. Apparently they went on a few dates after this and kind of made up. I don't know because I stopped reading for about ten issues in there but I feel confident I missed very little. It's hard to talk about the Sky plot without referencing Johnny's previous interactions with a character named Lyja, a Skrull whose relationship to Johnny I have a long breakdown of here. It's doubly hard, because Lyja actually showed back up in Fantastic Four during this plot. Lyja's modus operandi has remained consistent throughout almost all of her appearances, which I guess makes sense, because she literally has no storylines that do not involve her being obsessed with Johnny, and this recent story isn't any different: Lyja shows up, Lyja disguises herself as another woman in Johnny's life to get close to Johnny, Lyja gets caught and claims it was all fine because she did it for love. This time she disguised herself as Sky.

(FF 2018 #32) Not gonna lie, kind of proud of him for this one. That's one of my problems with Slott -- very occasionally, he busts out good moments, only to undermine them with the rest of his narrative.

In the same issue, Alicia Masters, the first woman Lyja impersonated in order to get close to Johnny, uses her supervillain stepfather's radioactive clay to control Lyja's mind and send her back to space, and I do think she utilized girl power when she did this. Johnny, left reeling after Lyja's latest attempts to trick him into a relationship, ends this issue by sleeping with Victorious, Dr. Doom's right hand woman.

I know she pegged him. I know it. This scene was a little controversial in Johnny fandom, because a lot of people viewed it as Johnny cheating on Sky and thought that that action was out of character for Johnny. I'm personally of a little different opinion, which is that regardless of whether or not you view Johnny and Sky in a committed enough relationship that Johnny's tryst would count as infidelity when all Johnny and Sky are bound by are magic plot soulmate bracelets, I think Lyja's involvement changes things significantly when it comes to Johnny's characterization. All of Johnny's "playboy" periods, if we can call them that, coincide directly with Lyja having been in and then left his life again, which I think makes a certain amount of sense -- it's Johnny trying to wrest control back after a situation where he had none. None of this is explicitly canon, I have to note, but sometimes in comics you have to do the work yourself. So I think this is a case of something being accidentally extremely in character that Slott accidentally stumbled into because he had these love triangles in mind, not because he put a lot of thought into it.

Speaking of love triangles! Johnny sleeping with Victorious gets more complicated when Dr. Doom announces his intent to marry Victorious -- not because he has any romantic interest in her (this engagement caused a lot of uproar in Fantastic Four because Victorious had been previously referred to as being like Doom's adopted daughter) but in order to install her as Latverian regent in his absence. I'm not going to lie, I love a political wedding. Victorious, for some reason, thinks Doom will be deeply upset that she slept with some closeted blond twink and the member of the Fantastic Four he views least as an enemy and more as an annoyance. Johnny, who Sky is currently not talking to because she "felt" him sleeping with Victorious through their magic plot soulmate bracelets, also feels nervous about Doom finding out about this, which I guess is slightly more valid. Anyway, for some completely ridiculous reason, Victorious decides the best time to tell Doom about this little indiscretion is when they're standing at the altar, which coincidentally the Fantastic Four are also standing at, because Doom asked Reed to be his best man in a not at all homoerotic little setup involving midnight swordfighting and Reed slipping Doom's emerald ring onto his own finger. Sorry to sidetrack into DoomReed territory here but it's just like. It's just a lot.

(FF 2018 #33) Also, Ben walked the bride down the aisle. :,) Look at his gigantic hand.

Anyway then Doom decides he's going to kill everyone in a completely reasonable and not at all overblown reaction to Johnny and Zora having what was most likely both disappointing for Zora and weepy for Johnny sex. And that brings us up to where Fantastic Four comics left us yesterday -- in answer to your "big change" question, that's most likely coming up in the next issue, so it hasn't come to pass yet.

Having gotten all that out of the way -- the last time Johnny and Peter interacted canon-wise was in the recent Empyre Fallout Fantastic Four, at the end of the Empyre event:

It was cute! Slott does right good interactions between them. This is possibly the Stockholm Syndrome talking. I don't know if more interactions are likely imminent -- the Empyre event was fairly recent. On the other hand, Slott does like writing interactions between them. So I'd give it about a 50/50 shot. I was skimming the letter page in the latest issue and someone wrote in asking if Peter was likely to appear in the pages of Fantastic Four again any time soon, so there is definitely a demand.

As for Johnny coming out -- I don't know. It's not a call I feel comfortable making at this moment, which I guess means I wouldn't bet money on it. I'd like to say yes, especially because I think Slott set up, whether that was his intention or more likely not, several good places in his run where Johnny could have come out. The beginning, when he's implied to be living with Wyatt again and where he and Wyatt are paralleled against Ben and Alicia. Ben's bachelor party, where Johnny laments not finding the right person -- specifically person and not woman -- and where Ben tells him to "be brave, Johnny Storm." And the soulmate planet plot, where I think could have had a very different and much better ending if Johnny had told Sky that she couldn't be his romantic soulmate, because he knows he wants to be with a man. But those are just places that I think would have made good opportunities for a coming out story. Instead, Johnny's been involved (dubiously) with three different women over the space of the last 10 issues, which is more heterosexuality at one time than he's been confronted with in the last 60 years. So my thoughts are still that it's going to happen eventually, but quite possibly not anytime soon.

Hope that helps! And that my incredibly long answer about what's currently going on with Johnny in comics sheds some light on things!

#johnny storm #traincat talks comics #*replies #long post/#wednesday spoilers

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smilesthroughfandoms · 3 years

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Every single episode of Ducktales (2017) Summarized in Roughly in One Sentence or Less!

Thank you Frank and team so much for introducing this family to a new generation of kids while remaining faithful to your source material. I hope you all enjoy my attempts at humor!

Woo-oo!: We don’t really know what’s going on yet but let’s do this!

Escape To/From Atlantis!: “Well I’m wearing a kilt McDuck! A kiiiilt!”

Daytrip of Doom!: They’re all siblings now and I love them all.

The Great Dime Chase!: “Shut up, everyone! I’ve done something brilliant!” (Also: Guess’s who my favorite character is?)

The Beagle Birthday Breakout!: Lena and Webby are best girls, fight me on this

Terror of the Terra-firmians!: This is the Spoopiest episode and also the most heartwarming.

The House of the Lucky Gander!: He’s an asshole but I love him.

The Infernal Internship of Mark Beaks!: He’s an even bigger asshole but I love him.

The Living Mummies of Toth-Ra!: I too would do anything for a good burrito.

The Impossible Summit of Mt. Neverrest!: “If I had a nickel for every person who cursed me with their dying breath, I’d be twice as rich as I already am.”

The Spear of Selene!: Of course Scrooge showed up freaking Zeus.

Beware the B.U.D.D.Y System!: The fusion of Iron Man and Sailor Moon I never knew I always wanted.

The Missing Links of Moorshire!: I always knew My Little Pony had a deadly fandom but this is ridiculous…

Mystery at McDuck Manor!: Took you long enough, Duckworth, welcome back.

Jaw$!: In this house, we love and respect Tiffany. (Also: Whoever came up with this episode title is the coolest person ever)

The Golden Lagoon of White Agony Plains!: Scrooge and Glomgold are in love with Allison Janney, and honestly, same.

Day of the Only Child!: Doofus is even creepier than Lil’ Gideon, and that is saying something.

From the Confidential Casefiles of Agent 22!: *hums James Bond theme intensely to myself*

Who is Gizmoduck?!: He’s not throwing away his shot! (I’m sorry, I had to)

The Other Bin of Scrooge McDuck!: I love Louie in this episode, he’s such a mood.

Sky Pirates… in the Sky!: The Pirates of the Caribbean meets High School Music crossover starring evil Panchito I never knew I needed.

The Secret(s) of Castle McDuck!: We’re all Webby in this episode.

The Last Crash of the Sunchaser!: *ugly sobbing*

The Shadow War, Part 1: Night of De Spell!: Donald finally gets the love he deserves.

The Shadow War Part 2: Day of the Ducks!: *spoiler warning* How is she still alive?!?!?!

The Most Dangerous Game… Night!: David screaming “GAME NIGHT!” is the best damn thing I’ve ever seen.

The Depths of Cousin Fethry!: I love Cousin Spongebob!

The Ballad of Duke Baloney!: Dammit, Frank.

The Town Where Everyone Was Nice!: They’re boyfriends mates, sorry I don’t make the rules.

Storkules in Duckburg!: Storkules is the ultimate Donald Duck fan, we cannot comepete.

Last Christmas!: Somehow the Ghost of Christmas McBrayer is the least surprising thing I’ve ever seen in this show.

Whatever Happened to Della Duck?!: Oh, so that’s how she survived.

Treasure of the Found Lamp!: Dijin is the best character.

The Outlaw Scrooge McDuck!: Yee–and I cannot stress this enough–haw.

The 87 Cent Solution!: *wheezing* Dammit, Frank…

The Golden Spear!: Oh my god, they were roommates!

Nothing Can Stop Della Duck!: Dammit, Frank!

Raiders of the Doomsday Vault!: “So stand out, above the crowd! Even if I gotta shout it out loud!”

Friendship Hates Magic!: Webby gets two friends for the price of one seance!

The Dangerous Chemistry of Gandra Dee!: BEAKS SMASH… THAT LIKE BUTTON! (I’m so sorry)

The Duck Knight Returns!: *spoilers* The single best superhero, origin story-based episode ever!

Whatever Happened To Donald Duck?!: *sobbing* He’s a good dad!

Happy Birthday, Doofus Drake!: This entire episode is creepier than most indie horror games.

A Nightmare on Killmotor Hill!: All the kids’ dreams are moods… except Huey’s, his dream can go jump off a microwave.

The Golden Army of Cornelius Coot!: Della is just pulling a Donald and adopting any and all kids within arms reach at this point.

Timephoon!: “I’m on it!” *gets struck by lightning* “I’ve immediately failed you!”

Glomtales!: I don’t know what’s more surprising, the fact that Louie won the bet or that they used Glomgold’s theme song takeover as the intro.

The Richest Duck in the World!: Drag them, Owlson. Drag them all…

Moonvasion! Part 1: *deep inhale* D A M M I T F R A N K!

Moonvasion! Part 2: Glomgold is my new favorite villain character.

Challenge of the Senior Junior Woodchuck!: Huey and Violet fight for the right to be crowned the squarest of squares.

Quack Pack!: Radical dude! *insert cheesy 90s riff here*

Double-O Duck in You Only Crash Twice!: We were all simping SO HARD this episode don’t think I forgot!!!

The Lost Harp of Mervana!: Scrooge fails a vibe check.

Louie’s Eleven!: Is it really a heist movie if something doesn’t go completely wrong?

Astro B.O.Y.D.!: So much ANIME!!!!!!

The Rumble for Ragnarok!: Eh, the MCU did it better

The Phantom and the Sorceress!: Seeing Gladstone suffer brings me an odd amount of joy

They Put a Moonlander on Earth!: They’re lesbians, Harold!

The Trickening!: Did… did no one really tell Launchpad how Halloween works?

The Forbidden Fountain of the Foreverglades!: If I had a nickel for every time a cartoon version of Ponce de Leon died a gruesome death on screen, I’d have two nickels, which isn’t a lot but it’s weird that it happened twice, right?

Let’s Get Dangerous!: *spoilers* THEY ARE A SUPERHERO FAMILY!!!!

Escape from the ImpossiBin!: Scrooge and Beakley are a little too excited to traumatize their family because of their trauma.

The Split Sword of Swanstantine!: Dewey and Webby literally walk in blind, Violet spices things up, and Huey unleashes the Rage™

New Gods on the Block!: The most accurate representation of Zeus ever.

The First Adventure!: Young Donald is one heck of a mood.

The Fight for Castle McDuck!: The sibling culture episode.

How Santa Stole Christmas!: Charles Dickens would approve, probably.

Beaks in the Shell!: Huey ships Fendra and Gyro needs to stop hiding in the closet.

The Lost Cargo of Kit Cloudkicker!: The Battle of Theatre Kids... in the Sky!

The Life and Crimes of Scrooge McDuck!: All the emotional weight was nearly overshadowed by One (1) attractive goth twink.

The Last Adventure Part 1; A Tale of Three Webbys!: They’re so cute! I love them!

The Last Adventure Part 2; The Lost Library of Isabella Finch!: Letting the kids on the plane is the single smartest decision Scrooge has ever made in his life.

The Last Adventure Part 3; Tale’s End!: *ugly, happy, heartbreaking sobbing* Woo-oo!

#ducktales 2017 #ducktales season 1 #ducktales season 2 #ducktales season 3 #dt 17 #ducktales spoilers #dt 17 spoilers #frank angones #don't repost #smilesthroughfandoms

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inthestars011 · 4 years

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what it’s like falling in love with her🦋🥺❤️

(Venus !!)❤️❤️ I did this fast so I apologize for grammar spelling mistakes xox

(I’m doing this by thinking of my friends and their methods or way of acting in romantic relationships however I will make another one doing in love with him and will touch on men with all the venuses that I’ve personally been in love with to add an even more personal touch xox)

Aries- Kisses that are short but kill you in the 5 seconds they last. Gives you forever in a minute. Always leaves you wanting more and that breaks you but fills you simultaneously. She knows that. She’s aware of her presence and that it feels like burning in all the right places. She seems naive and pure at soul, but shes well aware of the danger she holds in her hands and she uses it to her advantage. She loves the wanting, the chasing. She lives for the thrill, the game. She will run away before you can dispose of her heart and she might not let you see those broken parts but might just show a side that’s much funner, when it gets serious she may just become a runner. Sometimes, she is nothing but a machine running on fumes of lust expelling and leaving without a trace whenever she must. Some day she may realize that love might just be worth it, and that she really deserves it. But it still must consist of passion, fireworks, and all, if you plan on keeping her for the long haul.

Taurus Venus- she doesn’t want you to know she is soft, as she’s shown that side before, to many people she has lost. She’s not ready for change so her walls are built high, not even broken open by heavy ocean tides. Deep down she is melting, she is all love at the core. Filled with romance and god, so much more. She wants someone to truly share this with, but forever is all she ever asked for. If you cannot give her that she’ll retreat, become stubborn unable to make two ends meet. she might be slow at first to show her passion, she may show it through a touch that inhibits so much love. there’s nothing better than the comfort of her hug. She will heal all of you through a softness that you didnt think exists. She’s the definition of wife material, someone you’ll forever miss.

Gemini Venus- they describe her as flakey and that’s not always the case. There’s so many sides to her like differing tulips in a vase. I think she likes love but can find it in so many places, I think she can find love amongst so many faces. Maybe it’ll take a while for her to find her forever, but I do think deep down she does want forever. She won’t show all this meaning right off the jump. She’ll show something more innocent, naive and young. She is cute and pure, that, we are sure. She hides such greatness behind that coy smile, and the right person has to detect that, to truly find that. Maybe that’ll take a while. but that person will come that realizes shes more than just fun, she is the moon, just as much as she is the sun. She is eccentric and wildly funny. Her love feels like flying which is freeing but, a little terrifying, honey! It sometimes feels like, at any moment, she might let go, leaving one freezing in the December snow. Once it is true love, she is just as comforting as she is adventurous, she’ll give the whole world and expect nothing in return. Her love comes in teachings and there’s something we all can learn, from the glimmer in her eyes to her childlike hope. if she is truly in love, you will know.

Cancer Venus- her love feels just like home. The mom or dad you never had, and to play that role, she’s probably glad. every touch is enveloped with so much care. You can still smell the sea within her hair. She might be the mother or the baby or maybe even both, she always did help you unfold. When you think of her, you think of making out in your childhood bedroom, you think of the clinginess she exuded, maybe the eternal doom. The moods were never your favourite but you learned to savour it. You accepted every side of her maybe even the annoying parts too. She was your special seashell in the deep ocean blue, her love was nothing but true.

Leo Venus- Golden shimmers from above, a dramatic flair when it came to love. It was always, all show, all beauty, nothing below. Sometimes that was beautiful, sometimes you hated it. There was no in between, she served melodrama for breakfast lunch and dinner and you ate it up, there was no room for desert. Her love was like light shows and the strips of Las Vegas, entrancing but maybe too much at times. there was some innate programming she had that made her feel like she was never enough, but that she was, that she was. She was the big romantic gesture, love was extravagant and so was she. She wanted a love as she saw on the screens, the one that filled her childhood dreams. It was hard to live up to her firey passions, but it was worth it because she’d give you so much in return. She would love you till her flicker would burn out and she was all just heavy smoke and she’d continue loving you in the darkness. They called her the lion for a reason, her loyalty was fierce but her wrath was even fiercer. Her love was so lush, yet, the anger would defeat her.

Virgo Venus- Pure and awkward. The angel that was too good for you, the one that made you dream of laying and praying beside her feet. Not because her flirting skills were smooth and effortless, not because of lusty bedroom eyes, but because of the sweetness that filled her tired sighs. You could see that she wanted something real and that, pursuing maybe wasn’t her strong point, but you would do that for her. Once you got to know her, you unpeeled every layer and found more and more gold underneath, it scared her to show it, but her love grew fonder and she did it more confidently as time went on. Time is what grew our love and our passion, and it was as real as it could ever be. It was divination, it was serving a higher purpose. It was husband and wife, Adam and Eve, something so religious, something so prestiged. It may have seemed regular classic or boring. But to us it felt like our own little story. You got to know a bit more everyday and the excitement of that never did go away. I thank you for fixing all my brokenness even if it was slowly and surely, I thank you for helping me change. You are the only god to which I would pray to, the only holy ness that made the sadness go away.

Libra Venus- She’ll scare the hell out of you with her words. They’ll fall out of her mouth effortlessly, soft flower buds, blooming. She knows just what to say and she holds so much power in that. Her charm and her brilliance got you down on your knees, just a sentence, is all that it takes. Kisses sweet like strawberry shakes. But before you know it she doesn’t love you anymore, it was just a fantasy she had, merely a mirage. It wasn’t real but to you it was and it’s confusing and it’s making you insane. She didn’t mean to cause any pain, she is a fairy in the garden bouncing from tree to tree ever so lightly, taking what she can get and moving on to what’s meant for her. And maybe that wasn’t you. Maybe that’s ok. Because she’ll find someone who makes her heart beat from their touch and their words, someone that doesn’t make her want to create an imaginary world. Someone who just is pure beauty to her, someone who is nothing but real true love. Something more down to earth and better than the heavens up above. She will find it. And she will never let go.

Scorpio Venus- the tension that she holds. “Are we angry at eachother or are we so in love we can’t breathe?”She always made you feel both. Sometimes you thrived off of it, sometimes it made you seasick. She bit your lip and made it bleed as she pulled you in for your final kiss. She cried a little as she left. There was softness in her dark facade there was something light and airy. You only could touch it for a second before it slipped back underneath the oily meSs. The chaos was exciting and her loyalty was meaningful. Her jealously could kill and that you’ve seen. You smelled danger from a mile away on her shirt and you gravitated towards it for some reason. She’ll make her scar and the slice will hurt your skin, but you’ll forever want to bleed. She is what you need.

Sagittarius Venus- with her, love wasn’t hard. No, she made you think it was easy. It was giggles and being best friends. It was passionate make outs and spontaneous adventures. Love is all well and fun. Love is the horizon, a new dawn, abeautiful beginning. But sometimes it had to end. Sometimes she would run free and realize “this isn’t for me.” And sometimes she would come back as if nothing happened. It seemed like dissapearjng but to her it was just living out her honest truth. She wouldn’t wanna stay if what you felt for her wasn’t the same as what she felt for you. when it’s good it’s all passion, it’s perhaps not romantic but casual and fun. it’s two love birds on the run. Don’t know where they are going but they’re together and isn’t that what matters? They don’t know that eventually both their hearts might shatter. She loves the unpredictable and will revel in it with you, images of soaking your hands in waterfalls and late night rendezvous.

Capricorn- Her love is timid and perhaps bitter, but once she falls in love she’ll be unsure what hit her. She may laugh at romance till she is in the dream herself, she’ll then learn to fall in love with love itself. It takes a lot to serenade this girl, and she wants nothing less than what is perfect and no one can deny that she deserves it. She showed true commitment and loyalty and someone treated her like a joke and left her broken without a glint of hope. She is now careful in love and can you really blame her? But once you tear those walls down it’s impossible to tame her. She’ll want kisses in public and cuddles by the fire, she’ll believe that you are more than worthwhile. Yes it may take a while to break down the stones that she’s pilled in front of her heart, she will be more like concrete, but a soft touch and a smile that means well might just turn her into fragile glass, into running water. If you bash those walls down with steely swords and fight the dragons that protect her pretty soul than she might just believe in you, you might just help her believe in love again, and ultimately, she might believe in herself.

Aquarius- She will confuse you as she shape shifts into whatever he pleases. Sometimes, she is one full of romance and love and she gives you summer heat and sweet icecream. But sometimes the sunshine is fleeting, she is cold and detached and wants to be nothing more than friends. She is full of surprises and contradictions. She loves in a way that is strange but captivates you, you always want to know more. She is a good and loyal friend, funny and filled with adventures and a good wit. She is awkward and unsure of how to pursue true love though she does want it. deep inside she’ll never admit it, no, those feelings she hides. She’ll pull you in, and there you are falling in her wishing well, unable to climb back out and sometimes you can surround yourself in her water and drown in feelings but sometimes it’s empty and vacant, depressing, sometimes she is an endless drought. She’ll make you love her so much it terrifies you but she’s like electricity in your veins, absolutely addicting.

Pisces- She is the girl with eyes full of stars staring at you across the crowded room with a shy smile. She will not approach you but instead let herself escape to a dream in which you are the main role, she will be able to taste your lips, to smell your cologne even as she is not near you, even when she’s lying in bed at home. She will wish for you to come and save her from herself and she wishes you are as good as her heart makes you up to be, she wishes when you finally come and love her that you will never leave, because when she is abandoned, she is still left with those empty dreams. And the fantasies do haunt her, the memory of your soft kiss will taunt her. I hope for your sake you live up to what she dreamt you to be, otherwise she may be surprised, heartbroken, and she will not hesitate to leave. To chase some perfect crystallized image that dances in her head, she’ll cry and scream when people tell her Prince Charming simply does not exist, but she still believes all her past lovers were simply frogs she had to kiss and that she still awaits her soulmate. All this love and lust is only fictious for she is just the girl with eyes full of stars staring at you across the crowded room with a shy smile. Do approach her.

#astro #astrology #venus #venus signs #aries venus #taurus venus #gemini venus #leo venus #cancer venus #virgo venus #libra venus #sagittarius venus #capricorn venus #scorpio venus #aquarius venus #pisces venus

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bread-elf · 3 years

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DWC 2021 - Day 1

This story revolves around a side character deeply involved in Jiroki's backstory. For more context on this character, you're more than welcome to read from the beginning, somewhere in the middle, or his end.

Afterlife Shadowlands, pre Chains of Dominion “I love you. I’m sorry.” The last words spoken by Rydras Feathergrazer, his strength waning as he looks up at his most cherished beloved, who he had purposely distanced himself from for so many years. Now laying in her arms he watches the weeping face of the Kaldorei woman, sea green hair spilling out from the bun she had made before the battle. The wounds on him blistered with fel corruption and seared his skin, and he could barely breath as is. But that no longer was a problem once she had honored his last wish. Their hands intertwined together around the hilt of his own dagger, and he only feels a pinch before he lets himself slip away with ease. And yet, he opened his eyes again. Blinded by the luscious blue forests of Ardenweald, he finds himself amongst protectors of the forest, both present and past, for he gave his life for the Wilds. And that was worthy enough to become one with the great forest beyond.

A new purpose given, and no longer in the mortal realm, he reformed himself. No longer Night Elf, no longer Rydras, he chose to glide through the forest as an Owl, once a favorite form in life. But now he embodied it, another soul amongst hundreds of thousands to serve the forest. He knew of other souls who lived here, such as Arileath and Sheradal, a couple who once treated him like a son, parents of once a dearly beloved of his. Both now at peace, guardians as well for their duties. Years pass for the living as the dead remain secluded. Though the Owl had anticipated eternal peace, a drought begins in his precious forest, and the Drust soon follows. Strange times indeed, apparently even the dead can still live in vain. And what’s more, mortals from the living world begin to slowly spill in, doing everything in their power to keep the delicate balance of the Shadowlands intact before all is ruined. Some souls steered clear of the living, as did the Owl. Having no need to interact with them, nor did he want to be reminded of the flawed emotions of the living. And each time he found himself watching any of the living, inklings of curiosities and old faces beginning to surface, he reprimends himself and widened the distance of his past self. Even now, up high in his chosen roost, he finds himself shooing away the past as another soul scurries up the tree in haste. “Spriggans! Spriggans!” The soul in the shape of a squirrel, though the Owl is familiar with this one. “Spriggans attack the mortals!” “And?” The Owl rarely spoke, but he chose to do so to regard the squirrel. “Why are you here? Go and tell the Wild Hunt. There is nothing I can do.” “You were asked by name!” The squirrel lingers near the edges of the Owl’s nest, trying to be respectful, but still urgent. The Owl’s head swivels hearing that, but the soul continues to speak. “And for Arileath and Sheradal! A mortal you all know!” “What-?” The Owl feels something inside of his stomach and chest. A sudden clutching of anxiety, and fear. “But-” The squirrel seems to have no other information to offer, suddenly scurrying back down the tree and leaving the Owl alone. Large wings spread, and the Owl now finds himself sweeping through the forest once more to find this mortal. Only a few faces come to mind who would know of all three of these souls. Faces that the Owl had worked hard on dismissing. If their time comes and they come to Ardenweald, then he would welcome them. But who knows if they were alive or elsewhere in the Shadowlands, and he had already accepted he would never see them again. And now the wall he had worked so hard on began to crumple, memories of his former life beginning to trickle in. Of his dear friend Brethilon, of his time as a druid, with his Shan��do Arileath, the way he had denied himself of her for so long. Much of Ardenweald had decayed away due to the drought, so his scope to look around is much smaller, for better or for worse. Though he spots the familiar souls of Sheradel and Arileath, both bears, regarding a being made of living flesh and bone. An elf like he once was, tall and proud but shaking with emotions, sea green hair spilling down to conceal her face as she wept. Something lurches inside of the Owl, his flight faltering as he quickly makes a landing. Though he had no heart, it was like he was still in his mortal flesh and something squeezed it, and for the first time in ages he felt the desire to run. For a moment he scrambles, clumsy as an owl on the floor and feeling out of breath, and in his desperation he takes on his spiritual elven form and uses those legs to run. A ghost from the past, Rydras Feathergrazer stops at a hard halt once Jiroki is just yards away from him. The last image of her burns inside his mind’s eye, her moonlit eyes weeping and filled with sorrow as she puts him down like a dog. Though as the woman turns, she is different than he remembers. Scars line her cheek and ears, her tangled hair decorated in a way he’s never seen before, those moonlit eyes now the dark side of the moon. But the way

they widen, how she reels back in shock, the sudden tension of her body; the way that only she can move that he remembers. Jiroki clasps her hands over her mouth, already beginning to shed tears as she once again see’s the face of her first love. Even Rydras feels something stinging at his own eyes, though he had no means to cry. But he feels a surge of emotions inside of him; so much love, so much regret, so much grief. No longer thinking straight as a jumble of words come into his mind, his chest and head feeling like they’re about to explode, and so he lets it all out like a flood.

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“I’m in love with you!” He blurts out words he could never make himself say until the bitter end, and that causes Jiroki to create a shocked and confused expression. But he will never have another chance. “You heard me!” Jiroki blinked back tears, trying to process this sudden occurrence between the two of them. He is the first to turn her into a woman, and also to break her heart, yet also the longest love she has ever had, will ever have. And after killing him, after living with her biggest regrets all these years, he stands before her now speaking this. In his desperation, he continues. “I’m in love with you!” Hands come up to grip the sides of his head, as if trying to prevent it from splitting open. “And I know that love is just a shout into the void, and that oblivion is inevitable! And that we’re all doomed...” His hands throw out to the surrounding forest of the Afterlife, slowly withering away. “And that one day, all of our labors will be returned to dust! And I know that the sun will swallow the only earth we will ever have!” And then he looks at her. “... And I’m in love with you!” Suddenly the energy is sapped out of him, his confession finally spoken after all this time, and weakly his arms fall. “... Sorry...” A strangled cry escapes Jiroki’s throat, no longer able to bury it. She feels like throwing up, but she endures, just so she can run to him. The reaction is unexpected to Rydras, but he himself runs to her as well, and they embrace as best they can as soul and mortal. Her body trembles and she cannot stand, so he slumps to the ground with her, both on their knees as they weep together. Though no longer living, Rydras feels his insides tearing up as he mourns with her, at the loss they both share, yet there’s something else mixed in. He can finally be at proper peace, for he told the woman he loved his feelings. @daily-writing-challenge

#stories #Youtube

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mornyavie · 3 years

Text

Glossary of references in The Bifrost Incident

It’s Very Long and yet also not really complete. If there are any questions / clarifications I can add, or I’ve messed anything up and need to fix it, let me know!

The tl;dr is that nearly every word in the album draws from either Norse mythology or the Lovecraft / Cthulhu mythos, directly or indirectly.

@moony221b here’s that glossary that I promised forever and a day ago.

Edit: I decided to create this document of annotations (x). Lyrics taken from Genius; I’m not totally sure how accurate they are, but hopefully they help get the point across! Again, questions and complaints both welcome.

Arcomba

I can’t find anything on this, would be interested if someone knows.

Asgard

One of the Nine Worlds, specifically the one where most of the Æsir (the subset of gods most associated with humans, including the well-known ones like Thor and Odin) live.

Thus Asgard is the planet on which the most powerful inhabitants of the Yggdrasil system, and those named after the gods, are found (though the subjugation / colonization relationship does not exist in myth).

Azathoth

This one’s from Lovecraft; Azathoth is the greatest of the Outer Gods, often served and worshiped by other gods themselves. Often described as mad, a demon, a sultan, or putting it all together as the Mad Demon Sultan. Resides at “the center of the universe,” where he appears as some sort of vast, amorphous, bubbling, roiling mass of “nuclear chaos.” (Nuclear probably refers to center, not nuclear power, which didn’t really exist when this was written). Servants about him play drums and flutes.

Mentioned briefly as the train travels through the Bifrost and into his realm, and a lot of the narration in those few verses draws directly from Lovecraft’s descriptions.

Baldur

The god of light and beloved by all, Baldr was killed by Loki in his final betrayal of the gods. After the murder Loki was tracked down and imprisoned, and will escape at the start of Ragnarok. In particular, Loki used a spear made of mistletoe... or, in the album, missile two. And tricked another god into throwing it, which I think is mimicked in the distance and impersonality of the crime. Look up more of his story if you want, it’s interesting and important, but that’s the relevant info here.

Bifrost

The rainbow bridge that the gods use to travel between worlds.

Which is, of course, directly analogous to the wormhole-ish extradimensional-ish space of “shifting, undulating hues” through which the train travels.

Edda

The Prose Edda and the Poetic Edda are the names given to two pieces of literature that are most people’s main source for Norse mythology. The Prose Edda was written by Snorri Sturluson around 1200 to teach his (mostly Christian) contemporaries about the mythology and mythological references that made up a big chunk of Norse literature. The Poetic Edda is a set of poems that serve as a major source for Norse tales.

This is partially just a way to connect our hero Lyfrassir Edda to the Norse traditions, but also definitely a reference to their (presumed) role as the main “recorder” and source of information to get out of the Yggdrasil system.

Fate

Honestly the way the Mechanisms deal with fate in general is very interesting and arguably sometimes quite Nordic... but in particular, Bifrost Incident references fate or destiny a number of times and features a number of situations where the outcome is fixed and can’t be changed, but you have to fight anyways: “Killing me won’t save your world” “I don’t care” or how Loki and Sigyn can’t stop the train, but can only delay it. A lot of Norse tragedy revolves around people heading into battle knowing that they’re doomed and fighting anyways, or around the cycle of conflict that marked the cultural requirements for avenging insults. And the myth cycle is notable for the fact that the gods know, explicitly, exactly what Ragnarok is, what’s going to happen, and how they’re going to die, but will fight in it anyways.

Inevitability and helplessness in the face of what you can’t possibly understand, let alone fight, which is a depiction slightly sideways of the Nordic version, are very Lovecraftian themes.

Fenrir

A wolf, child of Loki and father of Skoll and Hati, who was chained by the gods (particularly by Tyr, who placed his hand in the wolf’s mouth as “hostage” to assure him they would unchain him later, and lost the hand). He will break free at Ragnarok to join the battle against them and kill Odin.

With his association with monsters and with Loki, it’s fairly clear why he was aligned with the resistance movement. He’s serving “five life sentences” as a reference to his being chained, and the whole motif of the train’s journey being hijacked for a prison break certainly references the various characters who will be freed or break free as Ragnarok begins.

Frey

The brief reference of Frey being killed by the raging fire of the sun, with “no weapon, no defense,” is a direct translation of the god’s role in Ragnarok, when he will be killed by Surtr. Frey gave away his sword for the opportunity to woo his eventual wife, and so will be armed only with a stag’s antlers in his final combat. Also called Freyr.

Freya (“weeps tears of red-gold”)

Like her brother Frey (and yeah, these names get confusing), Freya is associated with harvest and fertility, though unlike him she also gets battle. In the song she weeps red-gold tears at the death of her husband Odr, which in myth she is said to do when her husband is absent. Also called Freyja.

Garm

Garm is another wolf, who guards Hel’s gates. He also breaks free at Ragnarok, and his howling heralds its coming. As in the album, he will fight and kill Tyr. Also called Garmr.

Hati

There’s a lot of wolves in Norse mythology. This one is a child of Fenrir. He chases the moon across the sky, and will swallow it when Ragnarok comes.

Mentioned briefly only as one of the resistance members on the train.

Heimdall

Heimdall is the watchman of the gods, with keen eyes and foresight, and guards the Bifrost as the entrance to Asgard. He will blow his horn to summon the gods to the final battle during Ragnarok, and he and Loki will kill one another. Also called Heimdallr; you’re probably noticing a pattern. It’s a grammar thing.

Mentioned as guarding the train and “doing his part.” His dying screams initiate the train’s destruction and echo throughout it, which presumably recalls the horn thing.

Hel

Another daughter of Loki, and, as the name will imply to English speakers, a guardian of the dead. She refuses to give Baldur back to the world of the living after Loki kills him. Also the name of the realm in which she resides, and to which go those who die of disease or old age. Doesn’t necessarily have the same bad-punishment connotation as modern Hell. I don’t know whether there’s any indication of what she herself is doing in Ragnarok, but many of her people and associates are certainly fighting against the gods, and I’m fairly certain the ship Naglfar, which carries Loki and his allies to Ragnarok, sets sail from Hel.

Hel as a prison colony clearly references the various characters the gods have chained or otherwise imprisoned (though, in myth, not all within Hel) as well as her alignment with “other side” during Ragnarok, and the jailbreak the resistance members are planning recalls the breaking of all these bonds as Ragnarok begins.

Hoddmimis

The woods in which Líf and Lífþrasir (see Lyfrassir) will shelter to survive Ragnarok and the various disasters accompanying it.

So, good news! We can be marginally assured of Lyfrassir’s survival after taking shelter at the mining-colony of Hoddmimis.

Jormungandr

The world serpent, which lives in the seas and encircles the earth. Will arise during Ragnarok, causing great floods, and fight Thor; Thor will slay the serpent, but in turn the serpent’s poison will cause his death, after he staggers “nine steps back.”

Thor’s fight with Odin-turned-serpent is pretty clearly analogous to this, especially the taking nine steps to the window before destroying it with his hammer, resulting in both their deaths. I don’t think there’s any mythological basis to Odin turning into the serpent, though

Kvasir (“blood drained out”)

Kvasir was a very wise man/god and the originator of poetry. I’m leaving out a fair amount of his birth and life; the important information here is that two dwarves who were jealous of his knowledge tricked him, killed him, drained his blood, and mixed it with honey to make mead. Any who drank of the mead gained the gift of poetry / scholarship; eventually the gods stole it.

I’m not sure if there’s a reason they decided to specifically describe him as a resistance member, but there’s a clear parallel in Kvasir’s blood being drained and used to power the train, especially with the language of glyphs and sigils providing power.

Loki

Ah, Loki. Male in the general canon, though not without genderbending (he turns into a mare and gives birth to Fenrir, Hel, and Jormungandr, for instance). Inasmuch as the Norse myths we have can be organized into a “chronology,” you could do it (in my opinion) along Loki’s path from a mostly benevolent trickster god whose antics occasionally cause trouble to a genuinely malevolent figure. Associated with wit, magic, and trickery. Despite how modern lore (I suspect influenced by Marvel) often portrays Thor and Loki as brothers and children of Odin, in the myth Loki and Odin are bonded as blood-brothers. But Loki also often appears alongside Thor. As mentioned, parent of three of the main figures of Ragnarok. In the “final” myth, he jealously arranges the death of the god Baldr, who was loved by all; then he appears at a feast, where he exchanges insults with the other gods. This is the last straw; they capture him and chain him to a stone, over which they tie a serpent. Venom drips from the serpent’s fangs, causing him great agony. His wife Sigyn stays by his side, catching the venom in a bowl, but when she is forced to leave for a moment to dump it out his thrashing causes earthquakes. He will break free at the start of Ragnarok and sail to Asgard, where he and Heimdall will kill each other.

Hopefully that’s enough to give you a good background for Loki’s role in the album... it’s pretty clear why she’s framed as the opposition to the gods and the “leader” of the resistance movement, as a call to her role in Ragnarok. Her association with magic and trickery make sense for her being the “expert” in the twisted Lovecraftian “science” that produces the train. It also parallels her role in myth; her actions often get the gods into trouble, but they just as often need her wit and knowledge to get them out of it, as Odin needs her knowledge despite her taking action to destroy the train. And the setup at the end - drip, drip, drip, her face twisted in pain, her wife beside her, her “release” heralding the end of the world - precisely echoes the language of her bondage in myth; though her mind-destroying imprisonment by Odin also invokes this.

Lovecraft(ian)

A highly influential horror writer from the early 20th century. He’s largely credited with the creation of the creation of the “cosmic horror” genre, a type of horror which emphasises a vast, unknowable, uncaring universe against which we cannot hope to even begin to fight. His ideas and the gods / demons / creatures he created form the basis of the “Cthulhu mythos” or even “Lovecraft mythos,” which today is a sort of standard set of assumptions on which writers can build. Lovecraftian themes of apocalypse, inevitability, and powerlessness are highly prevalent in the album. Several of the gods in this mythos are used; in particular, Yog-Sothoth (see below). Also, a lot of the general description (madness, roiling chaos, undulating colors) draws from his distinctive vocabulary that remains staple of the genre. It’s worth noting that Lovecraft was a horrible and very racist person, but the genre today is widely used by people who are not terrible.

Lyfrassir

Líf and Lífþrasir in Norse mythology are the two humans who will survive Ragnarok and rebuild humanity; a hopeful sign for our album’s protagonist!

Midgard

In Norse mythology, the “middle” world where humans live. Earth.

Nagthrod

I don’t know this one.

@acorn-mushroom pointed out that it may be a mis-transcription of Naglfar, the name of the (ocean) ship which will carry Loki and his followers from the shores of Hel to the battlefield at Ragnarok. It’s made of dead men’s nails.

Odin

The king of the gods in Norse mythology. As the god of both wisdom and madness, Odin’s role in the album as a researcher and technological ruler whose discoveries drive her slowly mad is both very Lovecraftian and a reasonable leap. I could say a lot about the figure of Odin, but I think this character is one of the most divergent from the myth, in detail if not in role.

Odr

Óðr is Freya’s husband.

Outer gods

A Lovecraft thing referring to several of the most horrible and powerful gods, including Yog-Sothoth.

Ragnarok

The apocalypse, basically, in Norse mythology. Proceeded by various catastrophes, especially a very long winter, mentioned in the album, culminating in a great battle between the gods and their enemies, and resulting in the death of the majority of gods and other creatures of the world.

Ratatosk

A squirrel who runs up and down Yggdrasil, carrying messages between some of the tree’s other inhabitants and sowing discord. The Ratatosk Express links the worlds of the Yggdrasil System, and causes “discord” in the resistance’s opposition to it.

Sigyn

Loki’s wife. See Loki for her role in his imprisonment.

Skoll

Sköll in Norse mythology is the wolf that chases and will someday eat the sun. Association with Fenrir (another wolf) and other monsters motivates his inclusion in the list of resistance members.

Thor

A Norse god, associated with war, lightning/thunder, strength, and in general sort of... common people, as opposed to Odin’s association with kings and royalty. Prone to anger, which makes sense with his depiction as a volatile military leader in the album. He is heavily associated with his hammer mjölnir, hence jokes about “throwing a hammer in the works” and whatnot. Often associates with Loki, both as friends and as enemies as Loki progresses from a mostly-harmless trickster to actively opposing the other gods; thus how in the album he and Loki were once friends. See above for his death fighting Jormungandr.

Tyr

Another Norse god associated with war. He sacrificed a hand to bind Fenrir, and will be killed by Garmr during Ragnarok, both events referenced in the album.

Yggdrasil

The world-tree of Norse mythology, which supports the nine worlds of the cosmology.

Yog-Sothoth

An Outer God of Lovecraftian mythos; also called the Gate and Key. It is associated as sort of the substance of time and space, binding together the cosmos. A lot of the description during the Ragnarok sequences draws directly from the “canonical” descriptions of this deity, and the invocation spoken by Lyfrassir in Red Signal draws from a story about this creature, The Case of Charles Dexter Ward.

#the mechanisms #the bifrost incident #information #references #thoughts #norse mythology

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feanorianethicsdepartment · 3 years

Video

youtube

‘today’s silm vocaloid song: clear sky engine (クリヤスカイ機関) by nyanyannya and hara ft. rin kagamine and zunko tohoku

this one’s about elrond, maglor, and the sudden non-ending of the world. you know that thing where you build an elaborate fandom video in your head for a completely unrelated song, but you don’t have the most basic art skills you’d need to make it a reality? yeah, i square that circle by writing them out. here, have an extremely long songfic/filk/commentary/thing

It was just another day, beneath a black sky

The bustle of camp churned on around me

I wasn’t paying attention to what my hands were doing

Dreaming of a shining star-lit sky

we open on elrond, living in a world about to die. the fëanorians were forced to abandon amon ereb years ago, and now the last of the host ekes out a precarious nomadic existence, raiding deserted villages for food and losing more people they can’t replace with each battle. they’re still doing better than everyone else on the mainland, though. their blades, at least, remain sharp

(the smoke from the fires of angband has risen to cover the whole continent in dark clouds. some of the sun’s warmth still gets through, and on good nights the star of high hope is still faintly visible, but the light-filled skies of old are little more than memory. all the survivors know that the end is near. it’s only a matter of time)

He’d broken a promise he’d made to us

So I was a little more annoyed at him than usual

He chatted with me while I worked to make up for it

And I made all my usual complaints

elrond and elros are at this point... i’d say very early teens? not that they had much of a childhood; the fëanorians are so short-staffed the twins have been doing odd jobs around camp pretty much since it became clear they weren’t going to run away. today elrond is taking stock of the medical supplies, less because he has any interest in the healing arts than because it’s a job that needs doing and everyone else is busy

maglor is hovering within talking distance, doing elrond-doesn’t-care-what. the twins’ relationship with maglor is extremely complicated to say the least, their mercurial hellbeast protector who scares the shit out of everyone else they’ve ever met and who has stood between them and the darkness for as long as they can remember. recently, he promised to stay with the twins while they did something difficult, but he failed to do so for a whole host of reasons, including getting into a two-hour shrieking match with maedhros at the last possible moment. elros shrugged it off, like elros shrugs everything off, but elrond is a simmering cauldron of adolescent rage at the best of times

which is why maglor’s checking on him, giving him an outlet for his anger before it can turn into despair. because what would be the point, in the end? they’re all going to die anyway. one of the reasons maglor’s resisted sending the kids to balar so hard is that no matter where they are, eventually morgoth will sweep down and destroy them all. there’s nowhere safe left, nothing they can do to protect them. none of this is even new, it’s a shadow that’s hung over them all since the twins grew old enough to understand this

so maglor and elrond chat, or rather elrond grumbles incessantly and maglor snarks as upliftingly as he can remember to. it’s a day like any other, nothing about it to distinguish it from the hundreds that came before or however many will come after. that is, until one of the lesser minions comes over, yelling, ‘boss! boss! you have to see this!’

elrond turns around. for the first time ever, he sees true hope on her face

“Have you finally grown tired of us?” I hissed

But in that moment excitement ran round the campsite

And someone cried out with joy

“The hour we thought would never be, the return of the light, has finally come to pass!”

far, far away, the hosts of the valar are landing on the shores of beleriand. disembarking from their luminous ships, clad in radiant armour and carrying blessed weapons, their brilliance pierces the dark fog that has settled over beleriand for so long. shining like the stars come to earth, the hallowed army of valinor begins its long march towards the gates of angband. far above, ships riding jets of light slice open the smog

this news - this unexpected, unbelievable, impossible miracle bestowed unto doomed beleriand, this chance that their enemy might actually fall - is the greatest thing anyone in camp’s heard all century. maybe in more prosperous times the host would have groused about the valar finally seeing fit to get off their asses, but in this world turned to ash any chance at victory is to be celebrated. the minions throw a massive impromptu party, of the kind they haven’t since before sirion. elros is right there with them, singing off-key and laughing as loud as anyone else. even maedhros cracks a tiny relieved smile

maglor watches the festivities from the outside, more genuinely optimistic than he thought he was still capable of. elrond joins him, brow furrowed as he tries to comprehend it all. they talk

“It feels like a dream I’ll never wake up from”

“What are you blabbering about now?”

elrond is voiced by zunko, maglor by rin. the song’s more of a dialogue than a duet, so i’ll be bolding maglor’s lines

The sheet of paper I held in my hands read

“The hosts of the West have come! Our world is saved!”

the letter’s from gil-galad, or at least his administrative apparatus. it’s not even that hostile; apparently the armies of the gods showing up out of nowhere to save them all from certain doom has him in a magnanimous mood. there’s some drivel about surrendering and eärendil and all wrongs being forgiven, but neither maglor nor elrond is paying attention to it

“Hey, do you remember?”

“Remember what?”

“Love and justice and valour and hope”

“I remember the sea of blood you drowned everything in for them”

elrond didn’t really have any formal schooling - nobody had the time - but he has managed to pick up a lot of stuff from the stories the people around them tell. that the fëanorians came to middle-earth for high noble ideals, and that it was trying to fulfil those ideals that led them into darkness, is something maglor told him once, when he was in a darkly honest mood

“Haha, that’s just details, everybody makes that kind of mistake when they’re young”

“Why are you like this?”

a mood maglor’s obviously not in at the moment, if he’s laughing off the kinslayings like this; elrond knows this isn’t how he actually feels about them. normally elrond would just roll his eyes and move on with his life, but things are different today

The camp was full of laughter, as if everyone had lost their minds

elrond’s not used to happiness. not full, unironic happiness, untainted by the shadow of their inevitable death, not from the fëanorians. the sheer jubliation suffusing camp is fundamentally alien to him, a child of a world about to end. he doesn’t know what to do with the knowledge that maybe they won’t all get eaten by dragons. he doesn’t know what to do with the hope in everyone’s eyes

so instead, when maglor wanders away from the party, elrond catches him with a song

“What if for one more year, ten more years, a hundred more years, the shadow still reigns?”

“Then ten thousand years, a hundred thousand years, a million years later, we’ll see it fall! For certain”

“What if I lay out all one billion eight hundred million three thousand and sixty-eight of the fears I carry?”

“Then there’s one billion eight hundred million three thousand and sixty-nine songs I can give to you”

maglor’s been teaching elrond how to do this, how to snatch someone into a world of music and throw your voice at them until one of you can’t take it any more. maglor wins this one, as usual; even if his song is incapable of anything but violence he’s got centuries of experience on elrond, enough to turn the sharp edges of his voice into blades in elrond’s hands. and that is what he’s doing, clumsy and harsh as he is; he’s trying to give elrond a reason to hope

elrond is the one who breaks the spell, dropping the melody, letting the music dissolve into the air. maglor flashes him a grin and walks off, humming merrily. elrond just stands there, still unable to understand

I’ve heard it before, it’s all anyone can talk about, even if I try to avoid it it stabs into my ears

cut past a decade or so, to well into the war of wrath. elrond and elros are in their mid-teens now. they’re still with the fëanorians, but these days the fëanorian warband is effectively an auxiliary unit to the amanyar army, skirting around the edges of that much larger force. for the first time in a long while, elrond and elros have regular-ish contact with people outside the fëanorian sphere of influence, mostly peripheral edain and the sindar who run messages between the camps. it’s different, talking to new people

(the sky is still covered with smog, but it’s gloomy grey, not oppressive black. the sun is faintly visible through it, most of the time. the rain is much less poisonous than it used to be, and on good nights you can almost see the moon. the closer they get to angband, the darker the clouds grow)

“It is as the gods have decreed, soon the darkness will be swept away and the Enemy will be cast down

And after the war in the purified world, we will all live happily together

Building new homes in a land unmarred by evil”

the people outside the host are much more optimistic about the future, for one. the fëanorian minions are happy morgoth is getting trounced but they don’t really talk about what comes after that, like they can’t imagine a world without war. the sindar, and especially the edain, on the other hand, have all these plans about the cities they’ll build, the arts they’ll perfect, the children they’ll raise in a world without danger. elros is super into this; he barely spends time with the fëanorians any more, he’s so busy going between different edain camps, making friends, planning for the future. elrond, though...

Even my twin knows what future to reach out for...

elrond doesn’t know what to do with any of this. the very concept that someday the war will end and the sky will clear and he’ll have a bright future is still something he doesn’t fully understand. even more, he’s defined himself for so long as not-a-fëanorian, now he’s regularly interacting with people who doubtlessly aren’t he’s having trouble figuring out what else he is. he’s stuck between people who are lowkey hoping they’ll die gloriously in battle and people who have been dreaming about what they’d do in a world without darkness all their lives, and he doesn’t know what he even wants, not really, not yet

so he keeps on living, just like he always has. he’s been promoted to sick tent dogsbody and is learning how to heal with song from the last minion who can kind of still do it. he acts as a proxy between the fëanorians and the more timid outsiders they keep running into. when he goes (or elros drags him) exploring in other camps, he keeps track of every new detail he comes across, in case it’s somehow useful later

and he keeps talking to maglor, with anger and spite and sarcasm and whatever other emotion he’s covering his uncertainties with today. maglor always listens, usually offers to help, and sometimes elrond even lets him. the fëanorian camp settles into a rhythm of buildup-fight-recovery-buildup-fight-recovery, so regular it lulls elrond into complacency. he takes the future he still doesn’t quite believe in one day at a time, until suddenly the ground crumbles beneath his feet

You say it’s to ‘fulfill our ideals’ but what you mean by that is ‘to sate our bloodlust’, I know

With their blades and teeth sharpened for battle, the kinslayers broke away from the light and disappeared into the shadows

there’s a whole mountain of reasons why, as they draw near to angband, the dregs of the fëanorian host abruptly peel off from the valinorean army and vanish into the night. they know they're more effective as a stealthy shock ambush unit, they’re somewhat concerned the amanyar will turn on them the second morgoth is no longer a problem, they're making one last desperate rush for the silmarils, all that and more. it’s not the first time they’ve suddenly packed up and left before their enemies can react, probably not even the first time they’ve done it to the hosts of valinor. there’s just one little difference

Leaving us behind? Leaving you behind

they’re not taking the twins. said twins only find out about this, like, the day before they decamp. maedhros’ justification is something about them not being able to support noncombatants on the march, but the twins believe that about as much as they believe that the fëanorians are doing this for any kind of hope. elros, of course, was half-planning on leaving anyway, going off to chase his own ambitions with his new edain posse. he copes with it pretty well, relatively

but elrond’s mind goes blank. once he thought the day they let them go would be the best day of his life, but now it’s come it feels so wrong, and this horrible coldness is seeping into him. in a flash of what feels like foresight, he suddenly knows the people who raised him will never come back. how dare - why - he can’t -

with a sharp desperate burst of sound that’s a surprise to even himself, elrond lashes out a song to catch maglor

“For ten more minutes, one more week, half a year, please, let me stay with you!”

“In a year’s time, ten years’ time, a hundred years’ time, we’ll see the starlit sky together”

“What if one billion eight hundred million three thousand and sixty-eight times I begged you not to go?”

“Then there’s one billion eight hundred million three thousand and sixty-nine of your other wishes I’ll hear”

and elrond just stops. he lets the song trail off, staring at maglor. he’s in an incredibly weird mood, with something that could almost be compassion in his eyes

there’s only one way he can find out what’s happening, elrond realises

“In that case - !”

maglor was never really demonstratively affectionate with the twins. it would never have come off as real on his part, and they wouldn’t have believed it in any case. still, he supported them. he let them trail behind them, all but cling to the backs of his legs, in those first horrible weeks when they were terrified of absolutely everything. he taught them to ride and he taught them to read, how to reinforce a blade with nothing but song and close a wound with needle and thread. on the darkest nights, when all the world was filled by the howling beasts of morgoth and the wailing of the unhallowed dead, he held them tight and flared his own fires high, a warm smoky bonfire between them and the void. he answered their questions, and told them stories

and sometimes, he tried to be kind

“Sing me a lullaby like the flat of a blade”

“Which one would you like?”

“I want to see a flower that will still bloom”

“I know just the one”

“I don’t care what kind of monster you are! Just please stay with me, for even one more tomorrow...”

“...I’m sorry”

“What do you mean?”

“You were given your name because your parents wanted you to see the stars someday”

it was easy for maglor to justify keeping the twins when they didn’t have a future. the shadow of death blotted out the sky, so why not hold them close for whatever little time they had left? no matter where they were, the void would soon claim them all

except it didn’t. in the end they were not forsaken. the sacred light came out of the west to burn away the darkness and finish the war he once thought they could never win. the hosts of the valar have gotten farther in decades than the noldor did in centuries, and soon enough they’ll cast the enemy down and release the world from his terrible maw. and then the future the free peoples dreamed of will stretch out before them, full of possibilities beyond measure

and that’s why maglor has to let them go. the magnificent people that elrond and elros are already becoming will only wither among hopeless kinslayers who have nothing left but the sword. to flourish into their full glorious selves, they need to be with people who dream, who can travel towards the future alongside the twins with light hearts and songs on their lips. maglor refuses to let his own darkness drown the last people in the world he does not hate. elrond deserves so, so much better than maglor is capable of giving him. he deserves to see the stars

hearing all that, there’s only one thing elrond can say

“You can’t even keep one miserable promise! Don’t pretend like you’re my father, kinslayer!”

and that’s the last elrond sees of maglor. the fëanorians vanish in the middle of the night, leaving elrond and elros (and about half a dozen minions who are taking their last possible chance to get out) behind. elros takes up with his edain buddies and starts making contacts and forging alliances. elrond winds up in gil-galad’s orbit, surrounded by people who are very understanding about how awful his childhood was, which just pisses him off more. he doesn’t throw tantrums or refuse to work, those aren’t luxuries he was raised with, but he spends a fair bit of time spurning every bit of sympathy and aid he’s offered and trying not to cry himself to sleep

with time, though, he finds a place. it starts with círdan, the first person who believes elrond about what his time with the fëanorians was like. then he befriends erestor, and then gil-galad starts actually respecting the way elrond feels, and then he gets officially taken on as an apprentice healer. he starts learning about his own ancestors and their peoples, and reaching out for stories he never knew could be his. as the final battle of the iron hells begins, elrond is doing... better

and soon, the hope that no one in beleriand once dreamed would be fulfilled becomes a reality

And then, as if it had never held power, the darkness was cast down...

they win the war. the armies of angband are crushed. the peaks of thangorodrim are torn down. the prisoners of the deepest pits of the iron hells are freed. the forces of evil are scattered to the four winds. morgoth, the fallen vala himself, is defeated and captured and bound with great chains, unable to ever hurt anyone again. the precious remnants of the light of the trees, the remaining two silmarils, are recovered. the dark clouds evaporate, and for the first time elrond can remember, the sky is perfectly clear. the war of the jewels is finally over

elrond has grown so much since the day he first heard that the hosts of the west had come. he still can’t quite believe it

They held a great celebration beneath a star-speckled sky I’d never seen before

“The world is saved and we are freed! Evil has been vanquished forevermore”

The triumphant voices of the generals poured out over the victory feast while the stars shone true above the happy ending

the soldiers of valinor and the people of beleriand (what’s left of them) throw a truly massive party. it’s still tinged with their grief over everything they’ve lost, but the atmosphere is primarily one of ecstatic relief. they’re alive, and they’ve come out the other side. dwarvish tailors dance with high maiar, humans who don’t remember the moon get drunk with elves who remember cuiviénen. even after the official festivities die down and people start hashing out what they want to do next, the general mood remains buoyant and cheerful. at long last, they live in a world without danger

none of it feels real to elrond. gil-galad’s talking about building a kingdom on the other side of the blue mountains, elros and his grand edain alliance are trying to bully the maiar into letting them set up on tol eressëa, and elrond feels so disconnected from it all, like he’s watching someone else’s life. he’s happy the enemy has been overcome, of course he is, but he’s not feeling the overwhelming joy everyone else is. he can’t let his guard down yet, something is still wrong -

Except he hasn’t come back, they haven’t come back, where did they go, what have they done?

The word raced around as fast as the wind, giving me an answer I never wanted to hear -

where is maglor? the fëanorians broke off to fight the war their own way, but the war is over now, where are they? they were so happy to hear that the amanyar had arrived, he can’t imagine them not thrilled to see the enemy they hated more than anything else fall. in the warm afterglow of victory, it feels like even their sins might be forgiven, and they could finally go home. they have nothing else left; why wouldn’t they take that outstretched hand?

but nobody’s so much as glimpsed their flag since some time before the final battle. elrond quietly assumes, perhaps even hopes, that they all died fighting, and yet he can’t shake the cold dread crawling up his spine

elrond has mixed feelings about the silmarils, and doesn’t particularly care to be near them. by the time the news of their theft reaches him, maedhros and maglor have already fled into the night

Still driven on by their oath, they turned their blades on their kin one last time

“And stole away the hallowed light”

Yes, that light which sank all of our lands beneath a deep dark layer of corpses and ash

all elrond sees is the aftermath, the blood sinking into the ground. it’s far from the first time he’s seen people killed, but somehow now it’s all hitting him, all at once. he sees the bodies and it knocks the breath out of him. all he can see is the dead, from finwë on down, the rotting carcasses of every last person who was slaughtered for these gems, a whole continent bleached with death. they call the silmarils the most beautiful things in the world, jewels shining with the very light of creation, but elrond can’t see it for the blood they’re dripping with

that’s the immediate thing that has his hands shaking and his breath running cold. by morning it’s had a chance to sink in a little, and -

He lied he lied he lied he lied

maglor regretted the kinslayings! elrond knows he did! it was never even something he actually said, it was obvious from the way he talked about them. every single one was a complete disaster, nothing the fëanorians ever got out of them was worth what they lost in the process, and afterwards things always got worse in ways they never expected. and maglor hated the person the kinslayings had turned him into, elrond spent enough time around him to pick up on that much! surely he’d do anything to not have to commit another one?

apparently not! apparently all that regret, all that loss, the arguments and the nightmares and the coldly determined efforts to stop them following his path, it all meant nothing! he still gave in to despair or maedhros or whatever, killed yet more people, stole from the army whose return he said was like a dream come to life, spat in the face of his last chance to go home, and vanished! gil-galad’s people were right! he really is nothing more than a monster!

the shock of it all makes something snap in elrond, whatever fragile optimism he absorbed from the people around him draining away until he feels completely hollow. hundreds of years of suffering and death, and for what?

Smeared with the blood of untold hundreds, untold thousands, untold millions of people

Did they buy us peace for even half a year, even a week, even ten minutes?

Noooooooo!

Even the very land we lived on crumbled and drowned

What was the point?! What was the point?! What was the point?!

I feel like I’m going insaaaaaaane

morgoth may have fallen, but beleriand is dead! nothing remains, not the lush green lands of the stories, or even the dessicated forests of his childhood, just desolate earth and the devouring sea. almost everywhere he’s ever known, almost everyone who lived and fought and dreamed there, are lost forever. nothing was saved, everything was destroyed, what good is a clear blue sky when there’s nothing beneath it?! how can they call this a happy ending?!

elrond can’t see any light here, all the great battles and heroic deeds seem absolutely pointless in the face of everyone and everything immolated in the endless grasping for these gems. the hosts of valinor leave the continent they shattered, the remnants of gil-galad’s people escape the raging forces of nature, and the survivors bicker and fight over resources just like the fëanorian minions elrond grew up around. the world is never going to get better, he realises. the dream of a paradise will never come true

and then one night, running a message down the craggy still-turbulent coastline, he hears a snatch of a distant, familiar voice

I can hear a voice whittled away to a weapon singing what could almost be a lullaby -

elrond leaps off the ridge and onto the rocky beach, scrambling over the uneven ground. he’s heard the rumours about where maedhros and/or maglor went - all of them, there’s dozens of them, he didn’t pay any particular heed to the ones where maglor wandered the coast, but if they were right, if he’s here -

his own voice has grown strong over the years, solid and forceful and mature. elrond screams his song into the emptiness, hoping against hope it will be heard

“What if for one more year, ten more years, a hundred more years, the shadow still reigns?”

“Then ten thousand years, a hundred thousand years, a million years later, we’ll see it fall! Isn’t that so?!”

“What if I lay out all one billion eight hundred million three thousand and sixty-eight of the griefs I carry?”

“Then there’s one billion eight hundred million three thousand and sixty-nine days for you to live!”

“That must be it...”

the impression of a hand touching his cheek, the ghost of a smile. for a moment someone else’s voice slips into the ebb and flow of his song, a shadow reaches out to wipe the tears off his face. live, it whispers. you who i held dearest last, live

elrond’s breath catches in his throat, and the song, and the shadow, vanish. it’s just him on a forsaken beach, the only sounds the waves crashing and the gulls calling. the sky is completely overcast, the clouds dull and grey. he watches them drift along for a while, as his pulse slows down and his airways clear up. live, the word echoes in his mind

he waits until his breathing is back to normal and the churning emotions inside him have settled into a form he can handle. then he wipes his face and clambers back onto the ridge

(life. it’s not much, but it’s enough. it has to be. his home is destroyed, but he is alive; his family is broken, but he is alive. he is alive, and they want him to live, as much as he can while he still has a chance. the world he lives in will never be perfect, but he knows how to work with that)

(and besides - elros, círdan, gil-galad, erestor, the other healers, the small knot of elves of all stripes who seem determined to follow his banner. he hasn’t lost everything, not yet, and he won’t let the world take away what he has left. he’ll never abandon those he loves)

the clouds are lightening. soon the stars will be out. elrond takes a deep breath, and starts running towards his future and the person he’s going to be -

thousands of years later, a memory resurfaces

“Two million, two hundred and forty-one thousand, five hundred and thirty-nine days... Ah, yes. I know I forgot to say it earlier, but you did a very good job”

a smattering of notes are lifted by the ocean breeze. they travel inland, across the worn-down mountains, around the weathered hills, above the tangled forests, up the untamed rivers, and finally into the hidden valley

in the gardens of imladris, lord elrond hears a voice he hasn’t for millennia. a watering can slips out of his hands, and suddenly he can’t breathe

It was just another day, beneath a dark sky

The ocean and the wind roared on all around me

I wasn’t paying attention to how my tears were falling

Trying to remember a clear star-lit sky

that youthful dream of a world free from evil never came true. the shadow came back, and it kept coming back, taking his people, his friends, his family, his wife. everything they built after the defeat of morgoth has been reduced to dust by the weight of time, and every year more of it slips through his fingers. elrond doesn’t know how much more of it he can endure. he doesn’t know how much more he can lose

he chases that scrap of music all the way to the seashore

I ran down the path between the rocks and the spray following that voice I never knew why I loved

But in the end I could only stand weeping

elrond searches up and down the coast, scouring the shoreline for clues, asking the locals, listening. sometimes he hears whispers of song, long wailing lamentations that make his heart ache all the more now that he understands how that despair feels. occasionally it’s loud or consistent enough he can track it, trying to pinpoint the singer’s location in the intense storms of bitterness and grief

but he never finds anything

“You fool, he’s already gone. Like he was never there at all...”

all that’s left is a voice on the wind

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thebalkanwitch · 3 years

Text

Cancer Season!

Full Moon in Capricorn!

Supermoon!

Strawberry Moon!

This is LONG-TERM energy

This is SETTING UP YOUR LEGACY energy

This is redefining what “family” means to you energy

Feeling overly sensitive? Feel like you need to re-establish boundaries? Feel like you need to go that extra mile in order to see results? Feel really horny, too? Yeah it’s not you, babe, its Cancer season AND a Capricorn full moon. Let’s get into it:

I was working late the other night and Harry Potter was on (I’m an artist, and I like to have some background noise while I work, preferably music, audiobooks or a movie I’ve seen a thousand times), and let me tell you when Harry went into that pensieve I cried like a baby (you all know exactly which scene I’m talking about). Granted, I was pms-ing but that’s not the point (and yes, I know, there are problematic characters written by a problematic person, but let me enjoy my guilty pleasure, this one time please and thank you), the point is, Cancer Season came in and hit me like a tidal wave, pun intended, and I know I’m not the only one!

Cancer is water, Capricorn is earth

Emotions, Logic

Heart, Mind

Feminine, Masculine

Mother, Father

These are sister signs, or two signs that sit opposite one another on the astrological wheel. There’s an interesting push/pull dynamic when it comes to these types of pairings. At first glance you would assume that they wouldn’t get along, but they actually have more in common than you would think. In this case, the Capricorn full moon falling in Cancer season is quite simpatico. They’re both cardinal signs, they’re both hardworking (in their own ways, respectively) and they are both determined. Caps and Cancers may tackle projects differently but they are tenacious and will get the job done! This is an excellent time to focus on career goals/ family planning/ your 5 year goals, etc

I know I sound like a broken record but seriously, you cannot welcome new things (blessings, relationships, projects, beginnings, etc) without clearing out all the old shit! It is stagnant energy, it is dead weight and it is taking up space. That being said, have you cleaned? No, but seriously, have you CLEANED?? I mean spiritually, emotionally, physically cleaned.

I recently went to a family event (first one post-pandemic) and I gotta say, I really didn’t miss most of the people I saw. That’s what I mean by CLEANING. Only a handful of people have been in my home in the last two years and it has been absolutely wonderful! Not everyone needs access to you or your energy. Not everyone is entitled to you or your time, remember that! Setting boundaries is not only a necessary form of self-care but also self-love and spiritual cleaning. You don’t want some asshole coming into your home, touching everything, fucking up the peace and throwing your energy off, regardless of how they are related to you. I understand this is easier said than done, especially coming from the Balkans. “Family” comes with a sense of entitlement that makes navigating every gathering like maneuvering a minefield (WHY DID YOU GAIN SO MUCH WEIGHT? WHY DID YOU LOSE SO MUCH WEIGHT? ARE YOU SICK? WHEN ARE YOU GETTING MARRIED? WHEN ARE YOU HAVING A BABY? WHEN ARE YOU HAVING A BOY? WHY AREN’T YOU WORKING? WHY AREN’T YOU STAYING HOME WITH THE KIDS? Etc). We’ve all dealt with this nonsense in some form or another and at times it seems like FAMILY is an oppressive four-letter-word that we are just doomed to deal with forever, but let me remind you of this interesting little fact: Albanians are probably THE most family-oriented or family-minded culture that I know of (and this may be the incorrect terminology, so if anyone has a better suggestion, let me know!), to the point of being almost neurotic when it comes to whom is considered FAMILY.

There are very strict social and cultural mores that are followed to this day, among Albanians, specifically when it comes to marriage and familial bonds. Albanians cannot marry someone with the same last name. Albanians cannot marry their cousins, at least not until their 7th cousin. After their 7th cousin it’s open season because let’s face it, by the time you go that far in the family tree they either don’t exist or they’re so far away that there is no chance of being blood-related. Albanians cannot marry someone from their godparent’s family and vice-versa. Albanians should not marry someone within their “mëhallë” or neighborhood because chances are somebody’s got a secret and the neighbor’s cute son could actually be your brother 😆 (gross but realistic and true and while this is not a strict cultural rule, it is a general rule of thumb). Finally, the most interesting little tid-bit and the point of this whole spiel, Albanians cannot marry someone in the same “fis” or tribe as their own.

What is a fis? A fis is a tribe or clan that each family belongs to. Every single Albanian family can trace its lineage to a specific fis, and each fis is composed of multiple families. So marriages were always a serious affair and had to be considered and discussed at length, with great focus on lineage and creating new kin-ties. THAT BEING SAID, YOU DETERMINE WHO IS IN YOUR FIS. YOU DETERMINE WHO IS ALLOWED INTO YOUR FAMILY. If someone is blood related to you but doesn’t make the cut, it is what it is. If someone is not blood related to you but they are your sister, guess what? You just got a new sister. This is the energy of this time. Restructuring from the ground up. What is your family going to look like? What is your career going to look like? Where do you see yourself in 5 years? 10 years?

Full moons represent completion, the end of a lunar cycle. Think about what you want and how to get it! Organize your time, ground yourself and focus on your priorities.

Themes: quality over quantity, grow up/ glow up, pick your family/ grow your circle

Keywords: practical, disciplined, emotional (just because you KNOW what you have to do doesn’t mean it’s gonna be easy. If you need to cry, cry. If you need to scream, do it! release all that shit and move forward accordingly)

Use: *YELLOW* tigers eye, citrine, amber (work that solar plexus!)

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nulienna · 3 years

Note

Hi! You mentioned in your Curufinrod post (which I loved, a lot) that you have headcanons about Finrod and Galadriel? Would you mind telling them?

Hi!! I'm so glad you liked my Curufinrod post, I felt like it was such a mess 😅 As for Finrod and Galadriel, I actually picture them as having had quite a difficult/complex relationship, which is maybe kind of an unpopular opinion idk but I just can't pass up an opportunity to make everything as angsty as possible... We know that Galadriel was incredibly headstrong and determined to travel to Middle-earth and have her own lands to rule, and I imagine that of all Finarfin's children she was the one who was most determined to continue with the journey after the Doom of Mandos was passed, and probably the one who motivated her brothers and their followers to continue even as Finarfin decided to turn back. I mentioned in my other post that I think Finrod argued with Finarfin over that decision and I think Galadriel did too, and probably even more heatedly. This is something they both would come to regret, but I don't think Galadriel ever doubted her actual decision (or not for a very long time anyway!), whereas like I talked about before Finrod was very conflicted and thought a lot about if he should have chosen his father over his siblings and not the other way around. I imagine that this led to a bit of tension/resentment growing between the two of them later down the line when Finrod started to doubt himself more, and possibly he came to think that if Galadriel hadn't been so determined to leave, perhaps Finrod would have changed his mind. I don't think this is actually true however - at the time, Finrod was almost as eager as his sister was to travel to Middle-earth, and it was only with time that he started to feel differently and kinda look back with a biased perspective on those events. Galadriel in turn resented feeling blamed for what had been after all Finrod's own decision, as well as disapproving of his compunction with the whole thing anyway. I still think they were close, and supported each other when it counted, but them having a kind of strained relationship makes a lot of sense IMO when it comes to Galadriel's decision to stay in Doriath for most of the First Age instead of bringing Celeborn with her to Nargothrond or taking lands of her own. Perhaps on some level she was grateful for the excuse to not interact with Finrod & her other brothers quite so often, because deep down she did feel somewhat responsible, and even if she was confident she had made the right choice and thought Finrod was being cowardly and trying to have his cake and eat it by getting everything he had supposedly wanted from the Exile (realm of his own, fancy cave palace, shiny necklace, legions of adoring followers, etc) whilst absolving himself of any blame by convincing himself he only left because of her, she still thought that perhaps he would have been happier if he had stayed behind. I also think that Galadriel, like Turgon, would have been one of the Noldor who flat-out refused to have anything to do with the Feanorians after Losgar and the Ice, whereas we know that Finrod continued to be friendly with them (ahem) long afterward, and I think this probably caused tension too, as well as the whole debacle with Angrod getting Quenya banned which tbh I think Galadriel handled badly by picking and choosing what to tell Melian and not really having a plan for what to do when the Sindar inevitably discovered the truth (despite deciding to live with them!). After that, Galadriel kinda drops out of the story for the rest of the First Age, and we know she departed over the Blue Mountains with Celeborn before the fall of Nargothrond, possibly even before Finrod's death, so I'm kind of undecided on when their last meeting was or if they fully reconciled before Finrod's death or not. I do think Galadriel later had a lot of regret for not being there for Finrod during the later events of the First Age (or indeed for anyone else lol) and wishes they had been better at putting their differences aside and making the most of the time they had. I imagine that Finrod's legacy influenced Galadriel very greatly throughout later ages and she always thought about what he might say or do when it came to making very important decisions (after all, Finrod was very much a role model for Galadriel growing up in Valinor and she emulated his behaviour in many ways, even when they were at odds with each other). Either way, I think it would be a very emotional reunion between them when Galadriel finally returns to Valinor, and of course they're both over the moon to see each other again and all past hurts are forgotten because Finrod is incapable of holding a grudge and Galadriel has mellowed out a lot by this point! Oh god this got out of control again 😅 to attempt to summarise, Finrod and Galadriel's relationship I imagine to have a lot of very nice parallels to Fëanor and Fingolfin's (Galadriel is after all depicted as a "better version" of Fëanor), only never quite breaking down to quite the same extent and this time with a happy ending! Tolkien does such a great job of depicting complicated, tension-filled and yet still loving sibling relationships and I think Galadriel and Finrod could have been another great example of that if their dynamic had been expanded upon a bit more in canon.

#i'm so sorry this took so long!!#i wanted to take some time to think about it properly and finals are kicking my butt atm #niphredilien #answered #galadriel #finrod #my dumb ramblings

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tisthepoetl · 3 years

Text

There are many stressors in a modern day lifestyle.

Usually these include the looming threat of death, the monotony of working for currency that stopped being useful years ago and deer.

There are so, so many stressed people. Made worse by the apocalypse that didn’t happen, the riots that most definitely happened, and the negotiations that have been “in progress” for the last few years.

The amount of rapid budget changes are stressing out some people. The amount of rapid cultural exchange is stressing people out. If you work in any field, any field at all, you are likely to be stressed as all hell.

Eventually, they have to pick someone on the ship to be shown as an expert negotiator. No one is prepared for this. Most of them are middle men, most of them don’t have a clue what they’re supposed to be doing, and all of them are panicking.

So they drew straws. The most important decision of all time is made by dumb luck, and honestly that’s a pretty good metaphor for everything happening right now.

Name someone on their haphazard crew and they will have a conflict of interest. Name one member and they will be grossly under qualified.

America has four ambassadors out of the eight chosen. Not because they’re the most presentable, or the most qualified, or the best possible choice, but because they overpaid for a privilege nobody wanted.

If all of this goes to hell they're getting the blame. And if they get the blame the only plan is to point at whoever was voluntold to be leader and pray for leniency.

Every part of this is a desperate attempt to stall before the actual powers back home have found a way to bullshit having any actual control of things.

It shows.

It really, really shows.

So, who was the unlucky scapegoat for the possible downfall of all of humanity?

If you guessed Samantha who wasn’t supposed to even be on this ship, you would be correct!!

Seriously, she was the back up for someone who was almost conceivably qualified. Sort of, if you squinted and ignored the fact they were only there via nepotism, only to be pulled out once everyone realized they were sacrificial lambs.

And then the replacement was also saved from this bullshit via bribery and blackmail and probably some other third sketchy thing she doesn’t know about.

So, here she is, Samantha who had planned on changing her name before realizing she wasn’t getting out of this. Samantha, the replacement for the replacement who was chosen by a lottery held only for the illusion of equal opportunity.

There are literally billions and billions of people whose lives will be affected by whatever she ends up doing. Countless children, parents, lovers and friends and siblings. All of whom would either die or live by whatever ends up happening.

Luckily, she has one coping mechanism which never fails: Repression!!

So she thinks about literally anything else. Thinks about her favorite song as the ship nears the giant towering shape of the Galactic Senate’s meeting place. Thinks about fluffy dogs as she is led by the hand through walls and portraits and treasures with descriptions she can’t read because there are no translators yet.

Thinks about her mother, thinks about her sibling, thinks about the fact everyone could literally die and it would be her fault, and wow she’s already here.

The meeting place has a mouthful name that she could only pronounce if she managed to dislocate her jaw, grow a new set of teeth, and get a proboscis. Everyone calls it the Meeting Place, because again, there are no working translators, they all have to rely on vague equivalents.

The Meeting Place is a moon sized ship, so incomprehensibly large that any species will be able to fit. It has a dock, and a large empty room with nothing in it except for alien leaders who could slaughter them all at a whim.

There are no chairs. The temperature is set to “Mildly unpleasant but liveable.” Unity and democracy means that everyone is equally uncomfortable, because this exact temperature is workable for most species.

Samantha feels a chill down her spine, both from the cold and the fact that so many of them are glaring at her. She is in the center, her crew is placed too far away to help her, and their borrowed ship is miles away from where they are now.

She prays to the gods she doesn’t believe in and hopes she can stall well enough for the clusterfuck back home to get their shit together.

“H…” she starts eloquently. She tries to refind where the rest of humanity’s first impression was stationed, but her view is blocked by the hundreds of giant aliens. “He..llo?” she finishes.

There’s a click, and she flinches back because what if that’s a weapon. A small cube clatters to the ground in front of her, before popping up and showing a hologram.

She would be visibly impressed, in awe, if it weren’t for the fact she’s half sure these diplomats could take any reaction as an insult.

She wouldn’t be able to explain herself either, it’s too early for any sort of translator to have been made, it’s too early for anything about human body language to be common knowledge.

The crowd surrounding her rustles, fins are raised and noises are made and colors are changed. It means something, probably, but she can’t tell what.

The hologram cube makes a loud, ear splitting sound, like a mix between a flatlining heart in a movie and a fire alarm going off. It snaps her out of her spiraling.

There are two large lines pointing at a screen that is pulsing with the most neon red she’s ever had the unfortunate luck of seeing. She stares at it, and realizes it’s a quiz.

Well, more like a shitty rushed powerpoint. Like something you would make in under an hour for the fun of it.

It says, “What Human Want [Ask],” and she has the sneaking suspicion that whoever made this wasn’t trying very hard. Underneath are barely recognizable butcherings of numbers, listing answers from one to three.

“1. Want hurt. Want no us. Lone want.”

“1nd. Want love. Want share. Want us help.”

“1rd. Want no meet us. Want late meet. Want lone.”

All of it is….confusing to say the least. At this point she doesn’t even know if this is a joke or not.

Then again this wasn’t supposed to be her job, she doesn’t understand them either, and maybe they were genuinely trying here. But then again there are so many of them, they probably have enough resources to make at least a dozen Earths and this meeting took multiple years to take place.

The red that flashed before flashes again, than flashes a disturbingly real fingerprint on top of the answers.

She presses the second one, and wills herself to not regret it immediately. Love, sharing, help, all of that sounds good.

Except what if the help is from humanity? What if their definition of help, share, love is killing everyone ever living and she just doomed it all?? What if it means—

“[Greeting] [Greeting Happy] [Greeting Love] [Greeting Happy Angry Bored] [Greeting (Deragotory)]” a voice drones through a translation of the crowd. Samantha wonders when this will be over, and if she’s going to die of anxiety before that happens.

“[Greeting Small Childish] [Greeting Sad Fear] [Greeting (Endeared)] [Greeting Pain Hurt] [Greeting Love Fear Pain]” it doesn’t stop, running through every risen scale and moving limb to translate some vague approximation.

The aliens have translators. The translators are awful. This is taking so much time, which is good for the mission of stalling and bad for Samantha’s sanity.

“[Species Name (Derogatory)] [Mother (Derogatory)] [Criminal (Deragot—]“ the whole crowd is making noise, some like barks and some like tweets and some like a monster out of hell.

And all of them seem to be arguing? Or insulting each other? Either way it continues on for a long stretch of time with nothing but noisy aliens and a robotic voice reciting nonsense that always ends in “(Derogatory.)”

“[Wrong: Too long.] [Wrong: Too fast.] [Wrong: No word Human.]” The sounds are longer, most of the crowd making them rising and puffing out to be bigger. “[Plea Slow.] [No Word for Our Word.] [New Local Child Pet Ally speak.] [No word for Our Word.]”

Samantha realizes once again, that she should’ve left when she had the chance. And never entered that stupid lottery.

“[I hate every single one of you.] [Stop! The Ally-New-Child-Local may hear.] [You are all stupid [Species Name]]” the noises transition into understandable sentences. “[The small Diplomat-Traveler will be confused. Stop.] [They are doing fine. They will not understand our words.] [When is that useless translator going to update, Myy-Rrr-Pl?]”

Humanity as a whole can only take so much. One human as a whole can only take so much. She is halfway to a mental breakdown, fully confused and honestly she just wants to go home. This is the kind of wonder she would love if she didn’t have to personally deal with the consequences.

So she goes the way of most unqualified, underpaid workers, and gives up. She isn’t going to scream or sabotage anything, but her ability to feel was already warring with the tempting concept of not giving a fuck.

She speaks, for the second time. “I can hear you. And I don’t much appreciate being called a child.”

“[.....]” the crowd is finally silent. She basks in the peace.

“[I told you to stop confusing the Ambassador.] [Shut up Myy-Rrr-Pl. You didn’t even get these made right, we had to make a presentation, that’s how awful you and your tech were.] [It's working now, okay?]” The peace was lovely while it lasted.

“Humanity wants, uh, to not be dead,” she says. “And to not be enslaved either. Or like used as food.”

“[Can you understand it?] [Of course I can, I’m the one who learned the language.] [You barely learned it. You put half that presentation into a free-use translator.]” they keep talking, keep barking, chirping, hissing over her. “[This is a disaster.] [It’s not that bad. My presentation went over well enough.] [Myy-Rrr-Pl shut your beak about that [intercourse (derogatory)] thing.]”

“CAN YOU BE QUIET FOR ONE SECOND??” Samantha shouts above the arguing ambassadors. There is only so much she can tolerate, the noise alone is irritating but the senseless, contextless bickering is unbearable

“This is ridiculous,” she continues. “I don’t even know what’s going on, none of you dropped us an explanation. Why can I suddenly understand you? Who the hell is Meer-er-pull? And what the fuck is going on?”

There is no more translation, and nothing to translate into constant robotic rambling. There is no peace in the silence, just an underlying tension as every alien in the room turns to stare her in the eyes.

She wonders if she’s fucked up, if she’s doomed literally all of humanity because she couldn’t tolerate it all and lashed out. There’s an apology on the tip of her tongue, but she can’t manage to push it out through the indignation and fear.

No one breaks the silence. None of them speak. Samantha’s momentary confidence wavers and she considers making a run for it before realizing there are more of those giant aliens stationed at every exit.

“[....Aumko, I think we may have [intercourse (deragotory)] this beyond fixing.] [Feces (Derogatory) Feces (Derogatory) Feces (Derogatory)—]” Luckily, it doesn’t sound like she’s going to be executed for this. Unluckily, the aliens are just as unprepared as they were, and it wasn’t going to get any less confusing, was it?

“[I told you [Anatomical Feature (Exapserated)] that we should’ve started with a smaller group of diplomats. Instead of a “proper” meeting with everyone involved, we should’ve picked one from each of the 3 species, then gone from there. That would’ve been—]”

“I’m not getting any less confused here!!” Samantha cuts off the alien. “I’m not getting any younger either, I’m sick of your childish bickering, get over it and give me an explanation. Please, for the love of god.”

There’s a moment of pause as the translator spits out a bunch of meaningful white noise. It takes a couple moments before one of the birds speaks up.

“[We should cancel this until another time,] the bird chirps. Which isn’t satisfying, which isn’t an explanation, but hey it does technically fulfill the mission of stalling. And honestly she’s taking any win she can get from this. “[We’ll meet up with one of their diplomats, in a less noisy location. They’ll meet with one ambassador from each of our species.]

“[That doesn’t make sense though!!] [How will we even choose?] [A smaller meeting would be a sign of disrespect, we must show that we don’t view the New-Ally as lesser.]” the noise starts up again immediately.

“[SHUT UP!!]” roars one of the giant bears in a show of irritation that she can relate to on a spiritual level. “[Myy-Rrr-Pl will serve as the [Error: No suitable translation]’s ambassador. I’ll be the second ambassador. The third will be Kss’ta.]

There are ruffled feathers, low growls, no outward arguments but no agreements either.

“[I will quite literally fight anyone who decides to waste my time any further.] the bear is...puffing up? The mane of fur around its neck is puffed up like the pelt of an angry cat. “[Myy-Rrr-Pl is the only one who can even half speak the language, and who has the most context. Even if her presentation was awful.]”

“[I’m going to be there personally to ensure this doesn’t happen a second time. And Kss’Ta is the only one of you [Species Name] [Intercourse (Derogatory)] who doesn’t argue around in circles.”

The crowd is unhappier than ever. The bear speaking sounds done with it all. Samantha is too exhausted to give a shit at this point, and just decides to be glad it’s finally over, for now.

“[Is everyone here agreed with me?”] it flares about the room, ears pinned flat to its head and mane big enough to engulf the whole of its neck. All of the crowd flinches back, no one argues too vehemently, though complaints are muttered.

The bear turns to Samantha. “[You have my apologies for my own behavior, and the behavior of these [Species Name (Derogatory)]. We’ll escort your ship back to your station.]”

Relief hits her in a mix of “it’s finally over,” and “thank fuck no one died.”

Everyone leaves, with the mission sort of accomplished, with the peace talk sort of working, and a compromise no one is happy with. Except for Samantha.

But then she learns she’s the ambassador for humanity again, and a piece of her dies at the revelation.

Humanity’s welcome to the galaxy was chaotic, idiotic, ill prepared, and an overall clusterfuck of literally galactic proportions.

At least no one died.

#the terror of being known #humans are weird

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plumoh · 3 years

Text

[FE3H] farewell, i love you

Rating: T

Word count: 2114

Summary: Felix keeps dying; Sylvain can't allow this to happen. / Time loop.

Note: AO3 link. Major character death, ambiguous ending; originally written for Sylvix week 2020. I love time loops and the tragedy of loving someone :’)

“I’m not leaving you.”

“I know.”

“Leaving you is the last thing I’d do. And if you’re the one who leaves, I’ll follow.”

The smile he sees, stretching his lips, isn’t a happy one; it’s flat, barely a twitch, not reaching his eyes and making his face glow with resignation.

“Of course you’d say that. You always do whatever you want.”

***

Sylvain dunks his entire head into the river and wishes he could wash away the bloodied memories from his mind as well.The freezing water does nothing to draw him out of his torpor—it keeps him stranded on a single thought he will never be able to discard, haunting him until the day he dies.

Two hands grab his shoulders and yank him backwards, forcing him to furiously blink to get the water out of his eyes. He shakes his head, sending more droplets all around him like he was a drowning dog.

“Damn it, Sylvain, stop that!” Felix growls.

Sylvain grins and flicks more water in Felix’s face. Felix punches his arm in retaliation.

“Ow, you’re no fun, Felix,” Sylvain whines.

“What do you think you were doing? Are you trying to freeze your brain?”

Felix is frowning, arms crossed over his chest, radiating tension and unease. He has been nothing but on edge for the past weeks. It’s surprising he’s still able to hold a conversation with anyone, and without spitting vitriol and fire, at that—Sylvain is well aware of how Felix can get at this stage of the war.

“Well, if I freeze my brain I can’t have dilemmas over what I want to eat for dinner, and I think it’s very sad,” Sylvain says, tone light. “Oh wait, that means I’ll be able to think with my dick.”

Felix keeps glaring at him. He’s more stubborn, this time. It wasn’t so difficult to make him drop a subject, before. Sylvain rubs his neck, unable to meet Felix’s eyes (what kind of irony is this?).

“We’re marching on Tailtean Plains tomorrow, so I was cooling off,” he admits.

The weather has been terrible for the past month; even for Faerghus, the Great Tree Moon is considered a rather pleasant moon, with rays of sunshine lasting longer than a few hours a day. But this year, rain has been pouring, slowing their advance through the mud and the fog, grating on everyone’s nerves and chipping at their patience. Felix has been snappish and frustrated, not concealing his desire of looking forward to reaching their destination, and put the war behind them.

Sylvain knows this won’t end well. They haven’t engaged in battle yet, but he knows that it’s doomed.

Felix stays quiet for a moment, then lets out a shaky exhale. “You need to focus.”

Sylvain bursts out laughing, startling Felix and those who are bathing next to him.

“Don’t worry, there’s no way I’ll lose focus,” he says. “I can’t lose focus, not now.”

Sylvain directs a smile at Felix; he doesn’t know what he looks like, but Felix is staring at him, eyes wide and shining like he’s facing a complex problem that he can’t solve by swinging his sword at it, like he’s had the solution swept from under his feet at the last moment, and he can’t bring himself to think of another one. Sylvain tries his best to avoid putting this kind of expression on Felix’s face, so he aims at a bigger grin, but Felix stands up abruptly, and retreats to camp.

“Don’t lose yourself.” Sylvain thinks he hears as he watches Felix’s back getting farther and farther away.

The Tailtean Plains are drowning in a heavy rain that makes every step a struggle. They can’t see farther than two meters ahead; the sound of the rain blending with those of the weapons clashing, the soldiers yelling and the beasts howling create a cacophony ringing in Sylvain’s ears wherever he goes. Fighting in these conditions is pulling at his thin willpower to stay sane.

He spurs on his horse and doesn’t look anyone in the eye when he brandishes the Lance of Ruin to kill the Kingdom soldiers, like he was born for it. He paints the ground in red and cuts a path through those people he was once supposed to fight alongside with—he vaguely remembers his orders but he’s stopped listening to orders a long time ago.

Felix is like death itself on the battlefield. He’s a whirlwind of ferocity and grace, striking true with every thrust and never leaving an enemy alive in his quest for victory. He always looks forward.

Sylvain has the tendency to look everywhere except forward. That doesn’t mean he’s able to be on time.

He sees the archer notching an arrow at Felix’s back. Even on horseback, Sylvain won’t be able to reach him fast enough to protect him. His voice won’t carry far enough, and even if it does, it will be too late.

“Felix—!”

Felix’s body goes down just as Sylvain sees, on the other side, Dimitri approaching. Felix’s blood flows in-between the cracks of the earth. The rain on the Tailtean Plains drowns their screams and their blood and their tears.

Sylvain barks out a laugh, slapping a gloved hand on his forehead and dragging it down his face. Dimitri’s face is pinched, his gaze traveling from Sylvain to Felix, and from Felix to Sylvain. Ever so slowly, he readies his lance.

“There’s no fucking point,” Sylvain says, and the world goes white.

***

“Didn’t we establish that if you’re not strong enough, we can’t die together?”

“But Felix, you’re the one who’s too strong.”

“What’s that supposed to mean? How can anyone be too fucking strong?”

“If you’re too strong, you leave me behind.”

***

This Felix is different. His words are still coated with poison and his swordsmanship is still impeccable, but he’s less subtle about his intentions. He might kiss Sylvain like he represents his entire world, he might whisper sweet nothings into his ear, and he might tell him he will protect him, Sylvain knows that someone else will always be his priority.

This Felix will drop his sword if he thinks this is the only solution he’s left with. He will run and cross the whole battlefield to fulfill his duty, to make sure he isn’t fighting in vain. This Felix is more transparent about his desire to change Faerghus, and to change Faerghus he needs to ensure that the right person sits on the throne.

Sylvain, in this universe, will always be second to Dimitri.

Gronder Field burns, swallowing corpses and ideals alike. Sylvain knew something would go wrong; he always knows when something will go wrong, but he never knows when something will go right. He watches as Felix moves towards Dimitri, like a flower drawn to its source of light, to fight alongside him.

This Felix forfeits his life and dies in Dimitri’s arms, because he believed in Dimitri.

Sylvain sinks on the ground, his forehead hitting the hard soil and smearing blood all over it, and he closes his mind.

***

“Don’t you think that sometimes we shouldn’t cling onto our principles so fiercely? It’s said that many people lose themselves to their ideals.”

“If they’re dumb enough to get killed because of stupid ideals, it’s their problem.”

“What if that ideal is growing old and dying in a bed with someone you love?”

“Is it Sylvain code for having sex?”

***

The first time Sylvain came face to face with Felix on the battlefield, on opposite sides of the war, he couldn’t bring himself to fight him.

Felix still died first.

***

Sylvain is letting his mouth devour Felix, pressing on his lips, on his jaw, going down on his collarbones then on his torso. He’s not stopping and he’s wishing this moment never ends, so that he will continue having Felix in his arms and not be forced to let him go. His hands are wandering and touching, caressing the skin of his back and of his thighs. The desperate and urgent nature of his moves don’t bleed into rough handling, though; Sylvain is careful and is treating Felix’s body like it is his personal sanctuary.

“Are you okay, Sylvain?”

Sylvain fears his words would transform into sobs if he speaks up. So he kisses Felix, relentlessly, absorbing everything from his scent to the curve of his mouth and the sounds his throat makes. He takes. He takes and takes, and stores it all into a corner of his mind, for him to assemble later as if he is piecing together the different parts of something that he can’t quite remember.

Felix responds to his kisses and touches, and stops asking questions. He’s become patient and less prone to lashing out—Sylvain knows this won’t help avoiding the inevitable threat looming over them.

Sylvain gets carried away by his worries and the comforting kindness he finds in Felix, and ends up being the weaker one, once again. He’s weak so he gets injured in his endeavor to protect Felix, because he’s not capable of achieving anything if it doesn’t involve his body, and Felix gets killed soon after when he’s protecting him.

***

“I...”

“You don’t need to say anything.”

“The future you envision... Am I included in it?”

“What kind of question is that? As if I could get rid of you.”

“It’s a promise, then? Living together, and dying together?”

“...It’s a promise.”

***

Felix follows Ingrid to join Claude’s class. Sylvain follows Felix.

Dimitri dies. No matter how tight Sylvain is holding Felix, no matter how pathetic he becomes as the days pass, he sees the way Felix is slipping away, drifting aimlessly without a purpose anchoring him to somewhere peaceful. Sylvain watches him slip between his fingers and disappear, going back on his word (he always goes back on his word, but he doesn’t remember, he never remembers), and leaves Sylvain behind.

All he can do is attach a memory of Felix on a sword he didn’t want.

***

When Felix gets deployed at Arianrhod, Sylvain begs Ingrid to switch place with him. She’s not pleased and neither is Dimitri, but they relent and tell him he has to be careful. Sylvain doesn’t answer them.

Their positions don’t allow them to fight side by side, so Sylvain spends their entire trip to the fortress telling Felix he loves him.

“You make it sound like we’re going to die.”

“I just felt the need to tell you I love you,” Sylvain says with a smile.

Felix snorts, but the curl of his lips is gentle and vulnerable, and he doesn’t resist when Sylvain pulls him into an all-consuming kiss. Sylvain feels himself breaking.

When he doesn’t see Felix or Rodrigue coming to back him up during the siege, Sylvain doesn’t bother ending the fight, exhaustion seeped into his bones, and he shatters the world.

***

“Do you think happiness is possible for people like us?”

“Everyone decides for themselves whether they can be happy or not.”

“Ah, so are you happy?”

“Maybe not now, but I’ll be eventually, probably. When the war ends.”

“Well then, we’d better survive so that you can find your happiness.”

“Yours, too. It’s a two-way street.”

***

Sylvain doesn’t believe in fate. He doesn’t believe in anything anymore. He’s a decaying soul inhabiting a body that won’t ever see the end of the war and the reconstruction of the world. Every fiber of his being has been pulled taut, and today is the day he snaps.

The Tailtean Plains wail and shriek. There is no energy left in Sylvain to continue this senseless battle with himself.

The glint in Felix’s eyes means he won’t back down. Good. Sylvain brandishes the Lance of Ruin and charges at Felix, summoning the power of his crest just as Felix makes his flash. The light of their crest is blinding and screeching. It’s wrong, so wrong, but Sylvain is tired.

Felix’s sword goes through the plates of his armor like ash, and Sylvain brings down his lance to pierce Felix’s flesh. Their gazes travel to look at each other, and Sylvain sees an entire world of possibilities in these molten eyes, but none of them will grant them what they are wishing for.

“It’s laughable, isn’t it...?”

Felix smiles weakly, and closes his eyes. Sylvain exhales slowly, finally feeling he isn’t racing against time anymore. It leaves him unsatisfied and empty, like he’s forgetting something essential, but he is free. His mind drifts elsewhere, and slams the door shut.

Felix wakes up in yet another body, a new promise brushing his lips; but these promises never amount to anything, because he’s forced to eventually break them.

#fe3h #sylvix #felix hugo fraldarius #sylvain jose gautier #exploring the extent of someone's love through time loops is always fun

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