I wanted to try and write something that would eloquently sum up my feelings, but I am not sure that’s possible.
I think I have been fluctuating between every stage of grief for the last 9 hours. When I saw the news about season 3 I was not in a place where I could react. I had to pretend that it was a normal day for another 5 hours until I got home. I didn’t want to be told “it’s just a show.”
The truth is it was, and will continue to be, so much more.
Ofmd came to me at a time when I truly needed it, as I am sure it did for many others. Truth be told I think it came at a time the world needed it. When queer peoples rights to be people are being debated and criticized left right and center, when hate is filing the world around is, OFMD came in with an open embrace. It came with acceptance and unconditional love. With it we found friendship and community. It helped us find our place in the world.
I am not the same person I was when I first sat down to watch the silly little pirate show. It has left a permanent mark on me, and I hope one day I can put this energy back into the world.
I still have a small sliver of hope that as a community we can turn this around, but I am scared to set myself up for more sadness.
Simply by existing OFMD has made the world a better place. I can not express the deep sorrow I feel that it will not be able to finish telling its story. We have had far to long a history of obscuring queer stories from public view.
The last line spoken by Holmes in Arthur Conan Doyle’s stories was “someday the true story may be told.”
OFMD was one step closer. Todays news doesn’t prove the word isn’t ready, it proves that we are still being held hostage by the same structures and ideals that were in place what Conan Doyle wrote those words. OFMD was revolutionary but it shouldn’t have to be. Real or fictional, everyone deserves their stories to be told.
That’s why todays news was more devastating then “it’s just a show.” It’s another battle lost. But we mustn’t stop fighting. Not for Our Flag Means Death, not for anything we believe in.
I just want to thank everyone who worked on Our Flag Means Death for putting so much joy into mine, and countless others lives. While I am devastated it’s over prematurely, I am so glad it existed.
“Nothing’s sad till it’s over. Then everything is.” - The Doctor.
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I’m BEGGING for more “retired!Dream opens up a weird magic fey bookshop” au. Its so intriguing!
you are in luck. i wrote more
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"So," Hob says, leaning in the doorway of Dream's study-of-sorts, "much as I love the recommendations, do you mind if I browse?"
He's taken, recently, to meeting Dream on the upper floor of the shop, bringing coffee and watching Dream label and sort his new books in incomprehensible categories. He usually gets some interesting book facts out of it, too, or strange little stories -- "this book washed up on the Sardinian shore some years ago", "this was signed by a long-dead author, I've been curious to see how long it will take for a collector to find it," "an old man bestowed this upon me on the eve of his death, it's the only copy in existence" and so on -- not to mention the pleasure of Dream's company. He is so odd, and so engaging.
Dream looks up at him now with a tiny smile that crinkles the corner of his eyes. "Of course. Find whatever you wish."
Hob has been wondering if Dream's serendipitous knack with books will extend to browsing, to random finds. Only one way to know.
He leaves Dream to his labeling and goes to wander the shop.
This time, he does get swallowed in Oneiromancy, where he finds Sleeping Worlds, a book about dream travel. Then he wanders deeper into the shop, passes categories like, "Cat Training," CLOCKS, "Mathematics: Easy -> Impossible", and, "♾". Of course he goes into Infinity, and picks up The Birth of Numbers, a book whose text starts in the center of the page and spirals outwards, font growing larger as the book goes on, and in another section called "Romance: DIFFICULT LEVEL" -- whatever the hell difficult means -- he picks up a tiny book that's just one line, one syllable on each page.
I
on
ly
want
ed
you
to
see.
God, Dream's shop is weird.
Dream finds him there some time later, deep in Sleeping Worlds. "I see you've had a productive day."
"Yeah, sorry, lost track of time."
Dream keeps looking at him with a little smirk.
Worry darts through Hob's stomach. "Wait, what time is it?"
"Midnight," says Dream, with satisfaction. "I've absorbed you."
Yeah, no kidding. Hob scrambles to his feet. "Jesus, Dream, sorry. I'll get out of your hair."
"No matter. This is what The Library is for."
Hob goes to hand him the books, and he waves a hand. "Keep them, I will get them back eventually."
Ominous. Great.
"Gonna break into my house and retrieve them?" Hob asks. He probably wouldn't even mind, to be honest.
"Nothing so alarming." He gestures Hob forward, and Hob follows, lets Dream walk him out.
It is, indeed, pitch dark outside on their shared street. Hob's supposed to open the cafe at 6. Whoops.
"Thanks for the books, Dream," he says. "And for. Ten hours of distraction, apparently."
Dream leans in the narrow doorway of his shop. "Of course. Come browse... anytime."
And he melts back into the shadows as Hob steps down onto the street.
--
Hob wonders if he's an idiot for wanting to ask Dream out. Dream is clearly some kind of other thing, and hanging around him did kind of get Hob cursed. But the way he bites his lip when he's making notes in books is so cute. His unerring ability to make perfect book selections is both strange and endearing -- even the books Hob had picked up on his own had been exactly what he hadn't known he was looking for. Hob's heart picks up every time he steps into the cafe.
But if he's to ask out Dream, his own personal weird bookshop creature, he has to do it right.
And he knows how.
The next time Dream comes in for coffee, Hob sits down across from him and hands him a book. Dream looks at it in surprise, and Hob has the sudden thought that as the all-powerful selector of tomes, he probably isn't gifted books himself.
The book is called, Broken Hands. Hob had pulled it off his own shelf. Dream doesn't ask him what it is, instead he flips open the cover and reads, as Hob had hoped he would.
The first page of Broken Hands has the following paragraph:
Kissing her hand, he came to know himself. Kissing her mouth, he came to know them both. When they went onward, for now only in his mind, he kissed more of her, and more, and more, and then, he knew her. He wanted to know her.
Dream reads it, and looks back up at him. Offers a tiny smile. Yes, Hob knew he would get it.
"You have something you would like to ask me, Hob Gadling?" he says softly.
"You have something you want to answer?"
Dream takes a long sip of his coffee, but looks at Hob over the rim of the mug, a smile in his eyes. Then he swipes away the milk foam from his upper lip with his tongue and says, "I'd say that you are very foolish, to still wish to associate with someone who did, in a sense, get you cursed. But that I find myself grateful for this foolishness. People do often come back to the library, once they find it-- but they don't often come back for me."
It makes Hob sad to imagine--Dream the perennial custodian of The Library, shepherd of its patrons, gifting small touches of coincidence and magic, but always in the background, a bridge and not a destination. Meanwhile, Hob likes the strange books, but it's Dream he keeps wanting to hover around, to lure back into his own space.
He dares to take Dream's hand and squeezes. "...So?"
"I'd say that I'd like to get coffee with you, if you know a place."
Cheeky thing. "Yeah, there's a Starbucks a couple blocks down," Hob says, gesturing, and Dream chuckles. Hob's still holding his hand, and brings it to his lips for a light kiss, and gets to watch as Dream's cheeks tint pink. His heart lifts in his chest. So easy and light.
"You're gorgeous," he says, and that blush deepens. "I'd suffer even Starbucks for you."
"You would suffer much, then," says Dream.
"We'll get our Starbucks and wander around WHSmith and have a fabulous date," Hob says, and Dream's face goes through the most exquisite journey of horror.
"You demand too much," he says, faint. "You enjoy my suffering."
"Little bit, yeah." Hob's certainly enjoying the reaction.
Then Dream looks at him in challenge. "Very well," he declares. "You've set the date. Now you must follow through."
Hob can't even spare a thought to the distasteful activities he's now gotten himself into--he has a date with Dream. "So that's a yes?"
Dream smiles again, a tiny, pleased thing. "It is a yes, Hob Gadling."
--
They do go to Starbucks. Hob is treated to the glorious sight of Dream sipping a pink drink out of a long straw, which is so worth dealing with the coffee. Then he indeed drags Dream to WHSmith, where Dream stands in the middle of the brightly-lit store, spins in a circle staring at carefully lined book displays with wide eyes, says, "Hell would be more merciful," and bolts away. Hob follows him, laughing.
Outside, he finds Dream leaning in the shade of a tree, looking vaguely shell-shocked. Hob really shouldn't keep laughing at him, but he can't help it. "Were you traumatized permanently by the big chain store?"
"Yes," says Dream, but, despite the perilous adventure, smiles. "You are a cruel man, Hob Gadling."
"Nah. Just harnessed the fluorescent lighting to chase you back into the safety of my arms."
"Oh?" Dream pushes off the tree and steps closer, until he's standing just before Hob, close enough to touch. "Was that the goal?"
Hob takes the leap that's offered and touches Dream's cheek with a light hand. "Did it work?"
This close, in the midday light, Dream's eyes are almost grey. The shade of the tree dapples his skin. It's still odd to see him out of the contained space of his bookshop, of Hob's cafe, but it does make this feel more real. A part of the world beyond the spun-sugar story of their orbiting binary stars.
Dream rests a feather light hand on Hob's chest. Studies Hob from under his eyelashes. And instead of answering, he leans up and, with that same light touch, presses his lips to Hob's.
Hob revels in the mere touch of him for a moment, but doesn't let it stand at light for long. He takes Dream's face between his hands and deepens the kiss, sweeping his tongue into Dream's mouth, swallowing Dream's hum of pleasure. If only he could put into the kiss what he had felt when Dream had handed him Nightingales. A sudden finding of something long lost that was always meant to be rooted in his heart.
When they part, he makes good on a promise and does pull Dream into his arms. It feels like a great indulgence. It also feels right.
"Make me a solemn promise, Hob Gadling," Dream says against Hob's cheek, arms wrapped around his back.
"Anything."
"Never take me here ever again."
Hob laughs into his hair, squeezing him tight. "What could one possibly want from here when The Library exists?"
This seems to greatly gratify Dream, who preens in Hob's arms. Hob kisses the shell of his ear, then his cheek, then they part again, and he takes Dream's hand. "I'm glad you expanded your horizons with me for a day."
"And now I will shrink them again," says Dream. "Except for one." To which he runs his thumb along Hob's lower lip, a touch Hob sways forward to follow almost drunkenly as Dream smirks. "Come."
He starts leading Hob back in the direction of their quiet street, and far far away from any fluorescent lighting, and Hob follows, touching his lips fondly. And lets himself be cautiously, tentatively hopeful that this will continue spiraling up into something real, because he wants it so bad. Curses and all.
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Hail, True Body (masterpost)
Artworks by @corvidaeconundrum
'Hail, True Body' is a religious horror series that focuses on what it means to be human in a world that God has abandoned. For Mark Owens, 1993 is shaping up to be the worst year of his young life - and that's saying a lot all things considered. When his best friend Cesar Hernández calls him one night in October, Mark ignores the broadcast warnings to help him out. But Cesar is acting... strange.
Though perhaps that's understandable. His mother did just die, after all.
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Please be aware of each story's tags before you read. All Parts are in the order that you should read them.
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Overview/Summary of the Series (a quick guide)
PART 1: Mimicry (complete, 6 chapters)
PART 2: Where Is Your God Now? (complete, oneshot)
PART 3: Old Rugged Cross (complete, 5 chapters)
PART 4: What's In A Name? (complete, oneshot)
PART 5: The Good Samaritan (ongoing, 1/13 chapters)
PART 6: An Eye For An Eye (TBA)
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Character Designs (busts, fullbody art coming soon!):
Mark Owens & Cesar Hernández (1993)
Cian Daniels (1993)
My Boundaries
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PLAYLISTS:
(Playlists will be updated/added to as and when - you are also welcome to suggest songs!)
'Imaginary Boy' - Mark Owens' 'The Cure' Mixtape
'Good Old Fashioned Lover Boy' - Cesar Hernández' 'Queen' Mixtape
'Mixtape 1964-2000' - Cian Daniels' Mixtape
'Ghoul Huntin' - Azzy's Playlist
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This masterpost will be updated as and when new Parts are posted, designs are released, etc. If you have any questions please ask!
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