#what a great followup these are good points
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I finally caught up on watching the Ahsoka show, and I’m so glad, because episode five was so good. I think that it did a great job of addressing the fact that Ahsoka never got to really sit back and fact the trauma of being thrust into a war as a child (which is why I think it’s important to me that we saw two battles, one before and one after she left the Jedi Order—we’re reminded that she never escaped the fighting, even back then).
I’ve seen a few posts now that reference Anakin asking “is that what this is about?” when Vader comes up, and I was surprised to see how differently I had interpreted the scene from what they all were saying. The posts mainly depict this line as Anakjn brushing off Vader like it’s not a big deal, and Ahsoka shouldn’t think about it. In my eyes, though, Anakin sees Vader as his mistake, his demon, something haunting him. He’s not brushing off the fact that it mattered to Ahsoka, he’s denying the idea that the things he did wrong are somehow her mistakes, too. And it fits perfectly into that surrounding dialogue: Anakin is telling her she’s part of a legacy, thinking that, by holding onto that, she can know she’s something more than the violence and fighting she took part in. He tells her that she is more than that, and that he knows because he, too, is more than that. But Ahsoka can’t look at herself and not see the violence which was her mark on the legacy, and when she looks at Anakin, she sees only the evil he did or the master he was.
And then we come to the line “Is that what this is about?” It’s not asked in a way of ‘Oh, is that all?’ The followup exchange clarifies this:
“If I am everything you are…”
“You’ve learned nothing.”
Anakin has been telling her that the choices she had to make during the war weren’t her fault, nor were the mistakes, that she’s MORE than that. And what she’s gotten out of that is that his mistakes are hers, too. And I don’t think he realizes she’s doing that until this point, which is when he takes them back to the beginning, changing tactics and becoming Vader, so that Ahsoka can address this supposed part of herself she’s afraid of.
I don’t know if any of that makes sense, but it’s just SUCH a great scene, and Hayden Christensen did so well as Anakin in the episode as a whole, and I loved this line and had feelings about it
#ahsoka#star wars#star wars clone wars#anakin skywalker#ahsoka tano#ahsoka series#ahsoka spoilers#episode 5#darth vader#ramblings#edited for typos#because I typed this in a rush on my phone
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Followup to this post. While the Whispers of the Divine aasimar mod has a really cool scourge aasimar-ish option for making your character look like they're being torn apart by burning inner radiance, I wanted to replicate Aylin's endlessly-put-together-again kintsugi vibe. So I messed around with Blender, Substance Painter, bumbled about figuring out Larian's texturing, all the unwrapping and mirroring and seams and whatnot, and ended up having quite a great time, all told. And I'm quite pleased with the results!
The "heart" bit is inspired by her concept art and the scars on the back are of course from the wings. Some more WIP pics and screenshots under the cut.
Starting point was the game's default "Nightsong" body. First Blender experiment before I decided to just freehand it:
Getting some nice gold going in SP, to later separate into the normal map and the "body tattoo" mask:
I ended up using the Unique Tav framework to get this all in the game once it was done and the Body Tattoo Switcher with some parameter tweaks to get the colour and metalicness of the cracks right. Big shoutout to this BG3 Normal Map converter that saved me so much time and the documentation from Volno's Texture Toolbox. Figuring out what goes where exactly and how to really get it all working together was... a process. I am so sorry for all the indignities, Aylin.
Interestingly enough, her default NPC head does have the kintsugi details all over, even though it's not visible because of her hair. Both her canon hairstyles are default PC options (called, iirc, Partial Eclipse and Bardic Inspiration), which is a nice bonus and saves some time.
For Aylin As A Player Character purposes I prefer the "Nightsong" prison hairstyle because you can actually see her face with the camera angles you're going to have 90% of the time. But I mean... you can also give her a cool undercut. She looks good in anything.
And here we are! I played just long enough to recruit Astarion in order to steal his outfit, pull a guy out of a rock, and then get some blue dye.
Time to get robbed by some kids again.
#bg3#baldur's gate 3#mods#dame aylin#aylin kintsugi mod#aasimar#texturing#nudity#figleafed because tumblr but eh#and i guess this falls under#my art#oathkeeper draws things#anyway one of my big takeaways from doing this was: sure hope balthazar and his boss are both having a very bad time wherever they are :)))
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2012 Karai x reader Incorrect Quotes
A spiritual followup to the incorrect turtlexreader quotes, because honestly Karai is the only one of them who I actually have a crush on! Definitely more niche tho lol
***
(Y/N): *in a jail cell* What about my Miranda rights!? You’re supposed to say I have ‘the right to remain silent’”! NOBODY SAID I HAD THE RIGHT TO REMAIN SILENT!
Karai: *in the cell next to them* You have the right to remain silent, what you lack is the capacity.
April: Can I get a waffle?
(Y/N) and Karai: *fighting and yelling at each other*
April: Can I p l e a s e get a waffle?
Karai: If I was married to you I would put poison in your coffee.
(Y/N): If I was married to you I’d drink it.
(Y/N), to Karai: One universe, nine planets, seven seas, seven continents, and I had the unfortunate luck of meeting you.
Leo: Hey, that’s not very nice-
Karai: There are only eight planets, you uncultured swine!
Leo, forgetting about (Y/N): VIVA LA PLUTO, SCREW YOU!
(Y/N): Y’know, maybe things aren’t so bad. I’m here. I got the nice forest breeze. Just alone with my thoughts.
Karai: Hey, (Y/N).
(Y/N): GODDAMNIT!
(Y/N): Karai has only knocked me out three times this week. Our friendship is really developing.
(Y/N): You know, Karai, you are the sun in my life.
Karai: Why? Cause I'm smoking hot?
(Y/N): Because it hurts my eyes looking at you.
(Y/N): *angrily presses Karai against a wall* WHERE'S THE MONEY?!
Karai: ...
Karai: Are we about to kiss-
(Y/N): What’s up with you?
Karai: What do you mean?
(Y/N): You’ve been nice and helpful and considerate all day. What’s your game?
(Y/N): So what’s the plan?
Casey: I don’t know. You’re smart, *points at Karai * they’re mean, come up with something.
Karai , writing in their diary with a glitter gel pen: I'm losing my sense of humanity. Nothing matters. God is dead. There's blood on my hands.
(Y/N): Let’s not Karai this into a worse situation than it already is.
Karai: Did you just use my name as a verb?
(Y/N): This is a bad idea.
Karai: Then why are you coming along?
(Y/N): Someone has to get your injured self home.
(Y/N): Did you have to stab them?
Karai: You weren’t there. You didn’t hear what they said to me.
(Y/N): What did they say?
Karai: "What are you going to do, stab me?"
(Y/N): ...That’s fair.
(Y/N): What's gone wrong, Karai?
Karai: Hey! That’s one hell of a thing to say to a person. Just because I’m calling doesn’t mean there’s a crisis.
(Y/N): That’s technically true, I suppose. Why are you calling?
Karai: Well... There’s a crisis.
Karai: *on the phone with (Y/N)* I can’t talk right now, I’m doing hot girl shit.
(Y/N): You’re pulling Oreos apart and saving off the frosting to make a mega Oreo, aren’t you.
Karai: Maybe.
(Y/N): You use humor to deflect your trauma.
Karai: Awww, thanks-
(Y/N): That’s not a good thing.
Karai: All I’m hearing is that you think I’m funny.
(Y/N): What are you doing here?
Karai: I could ask you the same question.
(Y/N): I live here. This is my house.
Karai: I should probably ask you a different question.
(Y/N), holding an unconscious Karai: Oh no. Please don’t be dead.
(Y/N): You know, I really wish you’d just admit you made a mistake sometimes.
Karai, stirring their coffee: I prefer it with salt.
Karai, looking in the first aid kit: Why did you fill this with pop-tarts?!
(Y/N), bleeding out: I thought it was funny at the time.
(Y/N): Do you want to explain the text you sent me last night?
Karai: It was autocorrect.
(Y/N): Autocorrect wrote "You're so hot. Please step on me."?
Karai: Yes.
Leo: So you’re dating (Y/N)?
Karai: What? No! I’m just buying them an accessory since they have terrible fashion sense.
Leo: That’s literally a wedding ring.
(Y/N): Love is weakness and an evolutionary mistake.
Leo: You are literally making a Valentine’s day card for Karai.
(Y/N), pointing their hot glue gun towards Leo: You’re on thin fucking ice.
Mikey: That shirt looks great, (Y/N).
(Y/N): Thanks.
Mikey: But I bet it would look even better on Karai's floor.
Karai: Are you hitting on (Y/N)... for me?
Karai: Hey, babe, remember how I had to go to the pharmacy to pick up my ADHD meds?
(Y/N): Yes?
Karai: Well, it turns out they're all out for the next five days.
(Y/N): Fuck.
Karai: It's gonna be a fun week!
(Y/N): I'm going to Leo's house.
Karai: Nuh-uh. Through sickness and health, motherfucker.
Leo: (Y/N), gather the others. We need to have another Karai-is-doing-something-stupid-again-and-we-have-to-stop-them-before-they-hurt-someone convention.
Leo: So, how long have you and Karai been together?
(Y/N): No, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no, no. Karai and I are not together. No. No.
Leo: Really? Sixteen ‘nos’? Really?
(Y/N): Where are you going?
Karai: To get MYSELF a gift cause somebody didn't get me one!
(Y/N): I told you I did! Its coming here on Friday!
Leo, knowing full well that (Y/N) got Karai an engagement ring: *eating popcorn*
Karai: *kisses (Y/N)*
(Y/N): !
Karai: ...Did you steal my chapstick?
(Y/N): Did- did I what?
Karai: My chapstick, (Y/N). Did you steal it?
Leo: Karai, for the love of God, not this again.
(Y/N): I- No, I didn't steal your chapstick. We use the same chapstick.
Karai: No, there is absolutely no way we use the same chapstick, because it was only sold on one Etsy shop two years ago and they discontinued it, and I loved it so much that I bought the last of their stock, and I keep it in my freezer so it doesn't go bad. It's been discontinued for three years. No one uses the same chapstick for three years. So unless you've been eating a whole fuck ton of something that's flavored like chocolate and popcorn, you absolutely stole my fucking chapstick.
(Y/N): Chocolate and popcorn?
Leo: Why do you think it got discontinued?
*(Y/N) and Karai flirting with each other yet again*
Leo: And you two are sure you're not dating?
(Y/N): 100%.
Karai: Of course not! Why would you think that?
Leo: I wonder why that possibility would even cross my mind, Karai. I fucking wonder.
Leo: I dare you to kiss the next person who walks into this room.
(Y/N): Screw that, I’m not kissing any of you.
*Karai walks in*
(Y/N): Fine, I’ll do it. Rules are rules you know.
Karai: Hi.
April: Hey, did you do what I said? Did you tell them?
Karai: I did.
April: And what did they say?
Karai: “Thank you.”
April: You’re totally welcome. What’d they say?
Karai: They said, “Thank you.” I said “I love you” and (Y/N) said, “Thank you.”
Karai: How do I make a date really romantic?
Shini: Be mysterious.
Karai: Okay!
*later, while on a date with (Y/N)*
(Y/N): So where are we going?
Karai: None of your fucking business.
Shini: Hey, (Y/N), are you free on Friday? Like around eight?
(Y/N): Yeah.
Shini: And you, Karai?
Karai: Umm... yes?
Shini: Great! Because I'm not. You two go out without me. Enjoy your date!
Karai: I’m this close to falling in love with (Y/N).
Shini: Your fingertips are touching.
Karai: Exactly.
(Y/N): Jail is no fun. I’ll tell you that much.
Karai: Oh, you’ve been?
(Y/N): Once. In Monopoly.
Shini: Truth or dare?
Karai: Truth!
Shini: Do you-
(Y/N): I dare you to kiss me.
Karai: *kisses (Y/N)*
Shini: They said “truth”, right?
#tmnt x reader#tmnt 2012 x reader#reader insert#gender neutral reader#gn!reader#tmnt karai x reader#tmnt 2012 karai x reader#karai x reader#tmnt 2012 karai#karai hamato#tmnt karai
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I wanna imagine that the cards are a real thing in-universe. Like, the brothers, royals, Solomon and Thirteen all get put into a trading card game just because they’re all very popular individuals with their own fanbases Everyone’s card art is a little different from their actuall looks bc the actual people aren’t involved in the art production, so everone gets washboard abs and clear skin. It’d also be considered defamation of any of them are portrayed with a single blemish lol.
Of course Asmo collects ONLY his own cards and MC’s cards, even if some of them look off. “This one’s hair is too brunette but I love the SHINE they put in my lipgloss!” Or something silly like that. They go into a photo album binder where he gets other pieces of fanart.
Leviathan collects SO many card and knows the rules and decimates everyone at the games, but he absolutely refuses to collect his own cards. “Can you imagine if I played my own card as if I were actually cool? Like I had those powers, or l-looked as dashing a-as they portray me?? None of my cards would actually be good?? I’m JuSt An OtAkU??” Never plays the holographics of MC. Those get framed but never displayed. (MC finds them and they do the same to him since they both avoid their own cards. In fact they do a daily dropoff where if there’s an envelope under their door they can usually expect it to be the others’ cards.) He’s also a master of making different decks, like he has a deck for every sin, every person, etc. The Royals+Angels deck and the Envy deck are his favourite ones.
Mammon thrives on the Devildom TCG market. Rare cards go for a ton of Grimm! And also you wanna know why he keeps trying to sell pics of Lucifer, right? He knows one of the official card artists. “This was the outfit this card was based on, yeah? Here’s the followup of him rolling his sleeves and loosening his tie! And I bet you’re gonna love THIS one! Nobody can ever seem to get his angry smile just right until they see it in person, but this picture comes pretty close. Doesn’t it give you shivers? I can start at 1500 grimm. Also, could you tell whoever is making THESE cards to stop whitewashing the GREAT Mammon? Plzkthx :)”
Satan’s not much for card games unless a friend challenges him to a different, more classic game, like rummy or liar. But he does keep the trading cards he likes the most. Art is art, what can he say? They’re also perfect bookmarks. His fave is probably one of MC that captures them perfectly in his vision.
Lucifer thinks the whole TCG is just silly and doesn’t really participate in any of it........... But Priddy Boy’s gotta be ✨Perfect In Everything✨. The man has canonically been stated to be good a video games for the simple need to be good at everything, you think he wouldn’t study strategy and play like it’s chess or smth? That and in his Dad Wallet where he keeps pictures of his brothers (and MC), he keeps his favourite cards of them behind each respectful photo.
Beel doesn’t really collect or know how to play, but Beel has autographed many a card after fangol games, so he can at least understand it’s a collectible item. He tried learning from Leviathan how to play this one time, and it made sense to him for the most part. Card has Life Points, Attack Points, and Special Skills. Beat up opponents' cards and win. Not too different from most other card games. But there are complicated rules to it that he forgets or mixes up. He’d much rather use the cards like dolls and make them “talk” to each other.
Belphie also doesn’t play or collect, but he does enjoy getting his hands on the holographic cards. One day Levi was sent to look for Belphie to tell him it was dinner time. He found the youngest in the attic cutting up the cards into shapes and gluing them back-to-back, hanging them up like a mobile. Levi fainted backward down the stairs and refused to look at Belphie for two months straight.
Solomon really likes these cards! Like Satan he uses them as bookmarks, but specific Sin Colours and People get paired with certain books. Green Satan cards are used on cursed tomes or books about curses, blue Satan cards are used in art history books. Pink Asmo cards are left in Seduction Spell books, while yellow Asmo cards are for books about venoms from creatures. Etc. Makes categorization much easier!
Barbatos doesn’t collect, but he does know how to play. He referees for the Young Lord sometimes whenever Diavolo gets a chance to have fun.
Y’all know ya homeboy DIAVOLO is one of the biggest collectors! He and Levi are both DAUNTING on the “battlefield”, though Dia doesn’t take things so seriously like Levi does sometimes. He’s even commissioned actual paintings of himself and everyone so that those portraits can be made into cards. They’re the rarest ones, there only being one of each person out in the world. As much as Dia would have loved to keep those cards, he likes to watch the chaos of others scrambling desperately try to obtain an Ultra Rare Royal Painted Holographic. Besides, he still has the original paintings! (Also he likes to collect the DevilWendy’s kids meal toy versions of those “cards”, which are actually those plastic “gold” plated cards inside of “”””pokéballs””””. Adorable!)
Some Thirteen cards have special abilities based on real traps of hers. Some of Thirteen’s traps are based on some of the cards. She likes to tape some cards up like stickers to some of said traps as decorations. Or as part of the trap. She once tried to entice Solomon with a card, but Levi fell for it instead and nearly got impaled in a tiger trap she called “Super Duper Rare Double Dare #106”.
Mephistopheles says he doesn’t care about such childish playthings. But once the Diavolo released those Ultra Rare Royal Painted Holographic, and ‘Phisto got highest bidder on the Diavolo card, SUDDENLY he’s become Maximillion Pegasus and his signature deck is the Diavolo deck.
Luke isn’t really one to play, but he does like the art of some of them! He’ll put some in a scrapbook! It’s also another bookmark technique, where certain people’s cards get bookmarked on their favourite recipes. He got the idea from Solomon’s method of bookmarking.
Simeon also doesn’t play but mainly collects. Got a little hooked on it before Raphael moved in and the room was being used for Levi’s spare collection stuff. He was even given many of the Common ones for free (what Simeon did with common cards, Levi didn’t nearly care as much, and trusted him more with cards than he could trust Belphie with holo’s...). He’s collected all the Seven Lords themed ones. It’s a nice, low-key hobby, like stamp collecting. He donates the ones he doesn’t need to MC or Levi.
Raphael neither plays, collects, or knows anything about them really. But he does still have an annoying familiarity with them, thanks to Michael wanting him to buy several packs, nay, BOXES of packs. Michael needs to be the number one Lucifer Card collector. Bro misses his bro... ;(
#obey me#obey me shall we date#obey me!#obey me! shall we date?#obey me nightbringer#nightbringer#om#imagines#obey me imagines
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Heyyyyy it's Couldn't Sleep aka inciting Carlos request back at it again. I was wondering if I could ask for a sort of pseudo-followup I guess? Where the reader has a nightmare about their not-so-great childhood and Carlos comforts them and tells them it's ok to cry and they're finally safe now. I uh....... didn't have a great night. cptsd for the win. Anyway love you, Ren. Hope you have a good day. Again, thanks for writing my other prompt. I'm gonna try and get a nap in today I'm still so sleepy.
I'm so sorry this is coming out so late! I hope you were able to sleep and you've been getting okay sleep since you sent this in. CPTSD is not fun ever, and I'm so sorry you have to struggle with it. Remember that you're strong, courageous, terrifying, and you can shake the world off its axis if you put your mind to it <3
But most of all, you're safe. Especially in Carlos' arms <3
~*~*~
It's a prison that you can almost forget about.
Its claws can become almost blanket soft, a whisper against the skin. Its footsteps can fit almost perfectly into your own, the same shoe size and indent in the sand. Its voice can become nigh indistinguishable from your own, praise and happiness flowing freely.
But in the end it is still a prison. Its claws still sharp, digging canyons into your arms, your chest. Hounding your every step, threatening to trip you up. Telling you foul and disgusting lies, wrapping you into a world of darkness and fear.
It is a prison you have yet to find the exit to, as you go from one room to another. As you are once again forced to relive what should only be distant memories, distance feelings, the claws digging deeper and deeper into your flesh. You try to remind yourself of the people who matter, who care about you, but it tries so desperately to hold you in place, to keep it company in the rot infested darkness. Choking you, trapping you.
And all you can do is scream. Scream into an endless void that swallows your very sound, your very heartbeat, what makes you you as you endlessly struggle, the blood endlessly pouring down your limbs and pooling at your feet.
An endless ocean, suffocating, thick--
Your eyes fly open as you jerk up, lungs struggling to suck down air as you scramble backward, back hitting the headboard, eyes darting to asses the threat, to find the exits--
"The door is over there, and it's open."
You hear him before you see him, a small gesture capturing your gaze as he points. Fear roots you in place, eyes boring into his, watching his body language, his expression, waiting for--
He's at the edge of the bed. No, he's standing at the foot, arms up, palms pointed your way.
Something eases in your chest.
"You're okay," you hear him say as the fear crashes, leeching your limbs of energy. "You're safe, sweetheart."
Glancing once more about the room, you note the drawn curtains, the cracked window. The rumpled blankets at the foot of the bed and to your side, too far away for you to have done it yourself. The water bottle on your bedside table, unopened, and indeed the bedroom door ajar.
Looking up once more, you finally take in Carlos. Shirtless, hair askew, shoulders tense, you recognize the look he's giving you as your muscles finally relax.
"Carlos," you whisper, dragging your knees up to your chest and hugging them tight.
"Hey, honey. I'm here. What do you need?"
All you can do is reach out a hand.
He moves slowly, deliberately, giving you all the time in the world to shift away as he crawls back onto the bed, hand grasping yours and bringing it to his chest, pressing your palm above his heart.
"You're safe, sweetheart," he repeats, bringing his free hand up to gently wipe away the tears you didn't realize had escaped. "You're home, with me. And I won't let anything hurt you, you know that."
You nod.
He reaches over, gently drawing you against his chest, loose enough so you can back out if needed.
Instead you melt into him, the tears coming freely, wracking your body as sobs escape. You're so tired but so wired, your brain struggling to align itself out of the dream and flashbacks, trying to remind itself that you're safe now.
You've always been safe with him. Especially as Carlos tucks you in close, his heartbeat now in your ears, a steady, constant rhythm in your life.
"You're safe," he says again, quieter, as his fingers run across your shoulders, your back. "You're safe. Take a deep breath." You do, holding it until until he says to let go. As you take your fourth breath he reaches to grab the water bottle. "Here. Take a drink."
It takes a moment to open the cap, but the cool water sliding down your chest helps ease more of the tension, cooling the stove heating your blood. Sighing, you set the bottle down and rub your face. "I'm sorry."
"For what? Having a nightmare? I get them too."
"For waking you up. For..." For the fear, the sadness, the helplessness, the anger, for a damaged version of yourself. "For this."
"And what is this?" he asks, brushing more tears from your cheeks. "For how amazing you are? For how you're ride or die for the people you care about? How badass you are every day?"
"I--"
"Sure, maybe you put dye in my shampoo once and I walked around with green hair for a week. But it was Saint Patrick's Day. Most people wear a green shirt or something, I had green hair."
A smile tugs at your lips.
"I had people come up to me going, 'Carlos! What awesome hair!' and I went, 'Thanks! My partner gave it to me!' and then got to listen to how smart and cool they thought the idea was."
"You put dye in my hot chocolate and turned my tongue blue in retaliation."
"We're not talking about that right now."
This time you chuckle, and the sound prompts Carlos to kiss the top of your head. "Wanna help me brainstorm ways to turn all of my coworker's tongues blue?"
"Do I get anything out of it?"
"Aside from being the mastermind? Maybe a kiss or two. Depends on how well your plan works."
Shifting your head up, you give him a smile and kiss his jaw. "Deal."
#resident evil#carlos oliveira#carlos oliveira/reader#carlos oliveira x reader#carlos oliveira/gn reader#carlos oliveira x gn reader
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#9 for soft prompts with Ravioli I am WEAK for shoulder kisses 😍
Shoulder kisses are so so good I agree! There are mouth and cheek kisses in this as well as the requested shoulder kisses. I’m sincerely hoping that’s ok! If you’re not comfy reading that though I’ll gladly take another go. Written as a direct followup to this! From this soft prompts list.
Fandom: A Link Between Worlds
Pairing: Link/Ravio
Other tags: kissing, new relationship
Wordcount: 1113
Ugh. Well. That could have gone better.
Could also have been worse! But it could have gone better.
Once again, Link staggered home. No broken bones or openly weeping wounds this time, thankfully. The burst of life magic released when those especially large monsters died always took care of all of that.
No, Link was just tired. Exhausted, really.
He maybe hadn’t given himself quite enough time to recover after that fever.
But it didn’t matter. One more monster gone. One more Sage free of Yuga’s entrapping spell.
One more thing Link had to do before he could allow himself a little rest.
He hit the front door at the same brisk pace he’d used all the way home, stepping over the doorsill and dropping his pack to the floor without slowing.
Ravio jumped at the sudden bang of the door slamming open, squeaked when Link kept walking straight forward and faceplanted in his shoulder.
“Mr Hero! You’re home! Oh, what’s wrong this time?” He patted Link down as if searching for injury.
“Nothing,” Link muttered. “I missed you.”
“Oh!” Obviously still a little startled - Link could perhaps have entered his home with a bit more grace and a bit less steely determination written over his face - Ravio returned the embrace regardless.
It felt a little easier, the second time. A little less hesitant, a little more sure of his welcome.
“I missed you too,” Ravio returned after a long pause wherein Link breathed, trying to gather his famed courage. He maybe shouldn’t be hanging all over Ravio like this, but he couldn’t bring himself to move now that he was finally here.
He’d had a little speech all figured out. Been practicing it all through that dungeon, to the point of almost lethal distraction, at which point he’d finally forced himself to focus and just finish the thing so he could get back home already.
Except now he couldn’t quite remember the neat, tidy little way he’d figured out to ask exactly what Ravio meant by the word fond.
This shoulder under his cheek sure was nice, though.
“Mr Hero!” Ravio’s yelp startled Link to enough awareness to realize he was perhaps leaning a little too hard.
He might be more tired than he’d thought.
“Sorry,” he mumbled, getting a little more of his feet back under him. He didn’t lift his head, though. Or unwind his arms from where they’d found themselves around Ravio’s waist. They fit remarkably well.
“Maybe you should go to bed?” Came the tentative suggestion.
Link made a disagreeable noise. There was something he’d wanted to do first… something he had to ask…
“I’ve been thinking,” he slurred into the scarf. Exhaustion made his head spin. He felt almost giddy, but that wasn’t right. He still had to ask a question.
“About?”
“About what ‘fond’ means.”
“Don’t go expecting discounts!” Ravio declared, despite that he’d given Link exactly that the very first time Link purchased something from him outright. “I still have a business to run!”
Link snorted.
What was it he’d meant to say next?
“Can I kiss you?”
Hm. That wasn’t it.
Wait.
Pulse suddenly pounding in his ears, a great rushing in every extremity, Link jerked up. Ravio’s arms tightened, keeping him from going too far. “I mean. Uh.” He’d had something better to say what was it, what was it–. “I missed you?”
“You already said that. I missed you too. Go back to the other thing.” Every hint of cheer and nervousness that usually colored the way Ravio spoke disappeared in favor of what sounded like complete seriousness.
“That’s not. You don’t have to– I mean, I’d be happy if fond just meant you wanted to, to. Just be friends. Or.” He’d had an entire dialogue prepared, and he was ripping it to absolute shreds along with any possible chance.
“Yes.”
Or not.
“Yes?”
“Yes.” Intent. That was the word. Ravio sounded intent.
Heart still pounding, Link turned his head and kissed Ravio’s cheek through his hood.
He lingered. Just for a moment. Just long enough for it to register what the action was. Then he pulled away, loosened his arms, giving Ravio space to move back if he wanted.
Ravio looked at him. Link had no idea what kind of expression lay under that hood.
A little tentative, feeling suddenly shy, Link curled back down to Ravio’s shoulder.
Ravio’s hands cupped his face, pulling him up. He yanked his hood back just enough to kiss Link squarely on the mouth.
This one lasted much, much longer.
~~~
Ravio’s bustling in the kitchen woke Link earlier than he would have preferred the next morning, as it usually did. Today, the soft clattering of dishware and cutlery didn’t seem quite so harsh on his ears. Link spent a little while listening to the happy little hums that he’d begun to associate with the smell of food being prepared.
Eventually collecting himself enough to get up, he padded across the floor on near silent feet and wrapped his arms around Ravio from behind.
“Good morning, Mr Hero!”
Link hummed.
Ravio had his hood on already, but not the scarf. Link pressed his mouth to a place midway down his shoulder that the scarf would usually cover.
Ravio’s head tipped over onto his, one hand coming up to press Link’s face against himself. “I made breakfast!” he declared, cheery voice at full volume despite the closeness and the early hour.
“Sounds good.”
Link didn’t move. Ravio didn’t either.
Link shifted his mouth a little to the left and kissed the new spot. Then a little more, making Ravio squirm and finally laugh when his lips found that narrow little strip of bare skin.
Ravio’s shoulder, Link decided, might just be his new favorite spot.
“Do you want breakfast or not?”
“Is there tea?”
“Of course!” Ravio sounded downright affronted, as if serving breakfast without tea were an insult of the highest order.
“I’ll take tea and a kiss,” he said, hopeful.
Ravio squirmed out of his arms, but he turned around and pulled Link against himself instead, leaning back against the counter. Link wrapped his arms around Ravio in return. They still fit just right. “You were ill only a week ago, and you just ran off to fight some horrid monster! Recovering heroes need a proper breakfast!”
“They need kisses, too.”
“Breakfast first. Then kisses,” Ravio relented. “But don’t take too long! I have a shop to run!”
Happy with this arrangement, Link dropped one last kiss on the shoulder beneath his chin and pulled away to drop into his spot at the table.
Breakfast was nearly as delicious as the kisses that followed it.
#i'll post this part to ao3 eventually as well#just gonna give it a night and check it again in the morning first#albw#my fic#ravioli#ravio#link
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It’s Q&A Friday Saturday with your host R.Q anon! This week’s question is…
Any songs you wish had a certain character cover?
That’s all for this week. See you next week for another Q&A Friday!
so like, songs already in-game that i would've liked to have been covered/covered by a diff group?
Setsuna Trip is the first to come to mind. I really wanted that to be Ichika/Saki. I still like the Minori/Airi version but I dunno I just think it would've worked better for Leo/need, especially since the instrumentation felt more pronounced on the sekai arrangement.
Back when we were waiting for the final vbs archive I said I thought Toya and An should cover Hibikase, Haikei Doppelganger, or Fraulein=Bibliotheka, and I still agree with those, even if An/Toya don't get in-game covers.
I also think it would've been cool if WxS got to cover Buta ni Natte yeah yeah since it's kinda a followup to potato ni Natte iku? Also I like both those songs a lot so it's a bit self indulgent but I still think it would've been good.
Bad End Night or Vampire's Pathos would've been great as WxS covers too...
While I'm at it I'm gonna complain about the obnoxious amount of full unit covers we got last year. Here's some full unit covers from last year that I think should've been duets:
Shiroi Yuki no Princess wa - Honestly I love this cover but the line distribution is a bit messy and I think it would suit being a duet. Any MMJ duet could work imo and I hope we get duet alts at least. Maybe Shizuku/Minori or Haruka/Airi
Aa, Subarashiki Nyansei - whose fucking idea was it to make a duet into a quintet, and then on top of it not even try to keep the line distribution consistent with the roles. Again, don't really mind what pair and ik this is a ship-bait-y song but i'd rather have a wxs cover with good mixing and line distribution than a cover for a ship i like lmao
Kyu-kurarin - Shizuku/Haruka. It's a bit different from what they normally cover but their solo alts sounded really good.
Shinkai Shoujo - back in like. literally 2021 I said I wanted this as a Shizuku/Haruka duet and I'm never letting that go.
Envy Baby - Mizuki/Ena. This is just because I think their vocals are really good there's no actual reason for it. (I know this is from this year but shhhh the point still stands)
#SORRY RQ ANON I DIDN'T REALISE I SENT THIS TO DRAFTS orz#i meant to post this on monday#asks#mod talks
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Bill Motz has now made a thread where he gives details on why Molly McGee did not get a season 3.
How do you feel knowing the full details and story on what happened with Molly McGee behind the scenes?
I wish I'd watched it more as my dropping off it probably didn't help. It also explains why , from spoilers i've read, the penultimate episode comes off like a finale in itself. .because that was written as the SEASON 2 finale, and they had to jam the series finale on the back of it to end the series properly. And from the sounds of it the ending is satisfying and props to disney for just.. giving them an extra episode when asked to tie up the show, but it's still frustrating. Far from the worst Disney has treated a show, but still not GREAT. I"m also curious what those season 3 spec scripts were and if we'll ever see them. That's 10 extra episode just hanging out there.
It is nice the series at least got two pretty good from the sounds of it seasons even if the season 2 plot dosen't sound nearly as solid and most followups in fanfic will probably end molly X ollie as soon as they can, but it ended on it's stronger recurring plot.
It's also sad to see ANOTHER disney show go down this early with Hamster and Gretel being the only one on network guaranteed to last more than it's current standard two season order. The lack of permenance in this era of animation, even for shows I don't watch.. is really getting to me. At this point Big City Greens is the ONLY show on the animation side not either wrapping up season one or entering season 2, with only Hamster and Gretel guaranteed to surivive past that, and even THEN that guarnatee is flimsy as owl house learned the hard way. It just hammers home something that was easy to forget in the past few years when disney let shows run longer: that disney REALLY gives up on shows quickly if their not making huge numbers, the same issue nickelodeon has.
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Hot Street - Thoughts
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first of all, I hope Michael can fight, bc lord knows when I get to the pearly gates it is on SIGHT for not RELEASING THIS ?????????
listen. I respect him bein all about love and peace and the world becoming a better place- great stuff, good for him, but keeping HOT STREET in the vaults? WHY I OUGHTA- 🤺🤺
no but seriously.
this is the epitome of 80’s funk. this song IS time travel. wasn’t even dropped in the 80’s but you can feel it he fr had the nerve to ask can we feel it umm YES MF WDYM
honestly sick of this me n Mike have personal beef at this point.
he had the nerve- nay, the AUDACITY, to sing backing vocals of “badadeedaaaaah” and then he was all “heehee 🤭” keepin that shit under lock n key? actually unbelievable.
this would have been number one for weeks I don’t wanna hear anything to suggest otherwise. certified hood classic. a banger. a tune for the ages. the day I found this on my spotify, my frontal lobe formed.
that said, I have absolutely no idea what the lyrics are on about he was honestly just riding the beat talkin shit that sounds good and for that I can only commend him. anyone know if he actually says ‘hot street’ at any point in this song bc I swear it just sounds like he’s singing OUR street and if that’s the case, where did Hot Street come from?
someone needs to get ouija board out and get the answers from Mike himself bc he’s got to have done some cryptic bs w this one. it’s too good. crack in a song. also, if anyone gets him on the line could they please deal the followup question regarding whether he gives his blessing for us to blow up S*ny for buying his music? thank you xoxo
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friday roundup + a list
I follow a few people who do monthly reading/etc updates and I have always enjoyed reading them and been slightly jealous that I couldn't seem to stick too it, it always felt too overwhelming for the end of the month and I'd put it off, but! idea! combine with my little friday list posts which I'd also stopped doing because I was afraid they were boring so...combo might be interesting enough for me to keep doing them!
reading:
Cabin at the End of the World - Paul Tremblay: I liked this one, especially how, similar to The Pallbearer's Club, you end the novel not really knowing what was real or not and the point is it doesn't matter what was real, only how the characters understood reality.
Bloom - Delilah S Dawson: For book club. It definitely had it's issues (it didn't start off super well), but it was short and captured that fun Hannibal-like energy, where the foreshadowing is super obvious and you're just like noooo nooooooooo girl don't eat it! (I was gratified to get to the acknowledgments and find it was indeed inspired by Hannibal.)
(in progress) Lord of the Rings: Keeping on track with the one-chapter-a-day read through for Lent! We just finished The Two Towers today, onto Return of the King tomorrow.
(in progress) (phone book) Light of the Jedi - Charles Soule: So I'm trying to keep one book going on my phone (a 'phone book' lol) to prevent doomscrolling, and right now I'm rereading the High Republic series and continuing on. I fell behind after Phase 1 ended, but I'd really like to catch back up. Light isn't my favorite of this series and it's not my least favorite -- tbh I stopped reading after Phase 1 because I hated Midnight Horizon that much, I'll be skipping that one on this reread -- I read a review when it first came out that said it felt like the whole novel was inciting incident and I think that's exactly it, it has to do a little bit too much to establish the setting and characters, and never really feels like it gets going. Besides, I tend to like things a little crunchier, so some of the optimism of the start gets kind of grating for me personally. Much prefer the followups and the aftermath, but this isn't bad and it's certainly better than doomscrolling!
(in progress) Notes on an Execution - Danya Kukafka : This is so good. It's so good. I waited a while for the library hold and it was 100% worth the wait, it has that literary fiction style that I really love in my genre fiction on occasion.
watching (tv):
The Bequeathed (Netflix): Didn't live up to my expectations, but that might be on me because I read a review that erroneously called it a 'creature feature' and I was like 'damn, there's going to be a creature, that's crazy, when's the creature showing up??' There was no creature. And the solve to the mystery wasn't that interesting either. Meh.
(in progress) Silo (AppleTV): This show is surprisingly good, as I posted early this week. Like. I heard about it from a true crime podcast ad read, and just kind of watched it because I have a free AppleTV trial and a crush on Rebecca Ferguson. It wasn't meant to actually be good, but...it is??? It's really engaging, and I think shows how much good acting and direction can elevate a script. The ending of the last episode I watched was objectively kind of silly, but it was so well done you felt like it was super serious. Damn though, this is totally going to be the thing that gets me to keep paying for AppleTV because there's going to be another season. Damn. This is how they get you.
watching (film):
Dune Part 1 (2021): I made everyone watch Dune Part 1 in preparation and also it was my birthday and they could not say no. I think my mom made it....15 minutes? but my dad and I had a great time
Dune Part 2 (2024): I was so on top of the IMAX tickets for this, I refreshed that page a hundred times last monday to get the perfect seats in the mid-center and then I did not BUDGE for all 3ish hours of this movie. It was. So good. There was one shot that legit made me feel like I was on a roller coaster. I think I'm going to go see it again next tuesday. It was so good.
video game update: Still stuck on Dead Space. Still stuck on Cult of the Lamb. I'm figuring out how to balance side quests and the main storyline with KOTOR, which is progress, and on my perpetual Fallen Order playthrough I just did the sad Venator side quest and then got to Dathomir for what would have been the first time if I was not always so set on immediately getting the double-bladed lightsaber upgrade.
craft update: I'm two short rows away from being done with the short row section on my sweater vest. Infinity scarf has been derailed because I tangled a skein of yarn so badly it's probably going to take hours to fix it and I need that color to keep going. So. Tabled.
weekend list:
work (boo) - but work has been pretty slow and fridays are my wfh day so the below items will probably partially get done while I'm on the clock
laundry (also boo) / tidy
it's going to rain all day so the secret goal of friday is really just not to leave my house
work on current long wip which, yes, I did end up restarting -- or rather just starting the second draft earlier than I expected. I was going to push through and have a full rough draft before I started the second but it was really rough and I think now that I have 1) the most self-indulgent scenes, 2) all of the 'plot exposition' scenes written it was time to start going in order and straightening out inconsistencies and repetition.
I finally got an HDMI splitter so I can use the PS4 and get un-stuck on Cult of the Lamb (I haven't checked on my cult in so long!!), I just need to reorganize the wires
maybe untangle yarn. maybe. but I think that's going to wait for sunday at the earliest. I need some cooling off time, but once I can look at it without rage, I think it's just a matter of putting on a movie and being patient
go for a run
I hope this is....mildly interesting at least, if not feel free to block the lists tag XD have a good weekend! <3
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FINALLY saw Mutant Mayhem, and it was really good!!! I might wanna give it a second watch later along with other Turtle stuff rewatches and do a more in-depth review then, but I'll say the spoiler-free highlights now.
The obvious striking thing is the film visual style, which going in I knew broadly as "like Spider-verse", but that feels like a gross oversimplification for this movie's fantastic look. It's a mix between grungy realism, rough sketchiness (my mom said it looked like one of my drawings, which, yeah I'll take it), and oddly some vague claymation vibes? The turtles especially feel like chunky molded clay in the best way. It's a super cool style that definitely stands out on its own but still feels thoroughly Ninja Turtles despite not quite looking like any one individual prior incarnation. A bit of 2012 with the grungy blockiness, a bit of Rise with the vibrant expressive animation, and a heaping dosage of just general "this would've been the coolest thing ever in the 80's."
Other major high point is just how... exceptionally pleasant the movie is. It's arguably the most light-hearted Turtles incarnation to date, even beating out Rise in terms of friendly vibes... well, barring the bottom-shelf swears and on-screen puke, personally could've gone without the latter but oh well.
From the moment we see the turtles we get to see how much this movie appreciates the mundane, with dialogue, visual details, and quick gags that just... I dunno, feel natural? Like, this movie pulls of an astounding amount of reference humor that feels like it'd be irritating if it weren't so believably honest. Yeah, if they were teenage brothers they would say Mikey's head looks like a mix between Hey Arnold and Stewie Griffin. Of course they would. Also the "cringy" music choices rubbed me the right way too, again this movie's tone is so sincere that I can't help but love these too. My mom also specifically cited this as a high point.
The "pleasant vibes" praise extends throughout the movie, but I think going fully in-depth on that point would require spoilers. Rest assured, this movie's an exceptionally feel-good watch.
I guess only critique is one I saw coming but because I was dodging spoilers I didn't have the full expectations for. I heard vaguely that there were gonna be a lot of classic mutants showing up for this movie, hence the title I suppose, but I was worried it was gonna be a Spider-Man 3 kind of situation where it'd be constant bad guys that don't leave much individual impact. Which... is both true and not true for this movie. It's not THAT detrimental by any means, but I do still wish the individual characters got to do more. I like what they do get to do, but only a couple actually get to do much, even Bebop and Rocksteady barely have a few lines despite being THE mutant bad guys and having some of the biggest celebrity voices. I think maybe even two or three of them could've been cut and their presence wouldn't have been missed, but I can also appreciate the novelty that these characters probably wouldn't get a big screen debut otherwise. I dunno, maybe I'm just petty these are all classic picks and aren't new characters from my eras of turtles. Fishface for the sequel, come on folks if I believe then you can too.
On that note though, I am hoping that obvious sequel bait goes somewhere, because this movie deserves it. I wanna see this incarnation again, which... I mean I'm pretty sure did well enough to where it's already in the works? If Spider-Verse is gonna be a trilogy (still haven't seen Across yet btw) then this movie certainly deserves at least one followup.
But yeah, great movie! I think I do have to put this as my favorite TMNT movie ever now, so uh... sorry to the original two live action movies and none of the others.
(also I was gonna do a season 1 review of TMNT 2012 but I started it a while ago right as I finished it early in January but then it got overwhelming and I didn't have as much as I wanna say so I don't know what I'm doing with that yet, I might move on to season 2 but idk there's still a lot I wanna say about the show but I still don't know the format. Also expect Things I Love #4 about a completely unrelated show I'm due to finish a rewatch of soon)
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Name: Chomp-Chomp
Debut: Pac-Man: The Animated Series
I’m glad Pac-Man has a dog. He is the kind of guy who should have a dog. He’s a “family guy”! He has his family, and they have their dog. His entire family is held ransom due to legal disputes, his dog is still there for him. He gets a fresh new state-of-the-art family, and his trusty dog is still there, same as always, a welcome constant in his life! That’s the great thing about dogs, that they are immortal! But where do such creatures possibly come from?
They come from Hanna-Barbera cartoons, of course! When Hanna and Barbera give you a dog, that’s when you know you’ve made it. I do not have much to say about the cartoon itself, but if you’re the DOG of a famous character who debuted in a licensed cartoon and went on to become a mainstay of the franchise, that’s when you know you’ve REALLY made it!
The Hanna-Barbera cartoon had weirdly a lot of influence on the game series, serving as a source of inspiration for Pac-Land, which even uses a version the main theme song as its dang music! And look who’s there, it’s our pal Bluish-Gray Chomp-Chomp. Mere years before his first metamorphosis.
I have talked about Pac & Pal here before, but it is important to Chomp-Chomp’s history, so I will go over it briefly again here! Pac & Pal is a Pac-Man followup featuring Miru, a friendly yet mischievous character who helps collect fruit in the maze, at the cost of some points for the player. When (unsuccessfully) testing the game in the west, it was renamed to Pac-Man and Chomp-Chomp, replacing Miru with the cartoon dog! I love Miru to death, but look how cute Chomp-Chomp is in these sprites! I’m not sure why he was redesigned, but it’s definitely my favorite design for him, and I wish the game was popular enough to properly release, so we could have both versions. And like I said in the Miru post, I think a dog actually fits better in this context, as a character who you know is a friend, but who you might not want to get away with your stuff!
And then, Chomp-Chomp just sort of kept appearing in things! Long after the cartoon was even relevant, here he was in Pac-Man World, for example, where he has clearly pupated between games, since he now has developed a whole new body plan! He also talks in this game, which is very funny, because he sometimes says dog phrases like “good boy”, as if he’s mimicking what his owners have said to him.
I’ve always been a bit torn on this design. It’s very cute! But I just feel like a Pac-Dog SHOULD be spherical. What if he was spherical?
Oh no! Oh god! This is wretched! Why would you do this, Pac-Man World 2? This is not a dog! This is just a Pac-Person with floppy ears! This is not how you make a spherical dog!
Ah... thank you so much, Pac’n Roll. I really needed that. Thank you for reminding me that a Pac-Dog can be spherical without looking like the equivalent of Pac-Man’s severed head. He is just named Pac-Dog here, but we all assume this is Chomp-Chomp.
The most recent Chomp-Chomp development... well, you may be aware of the Legal Hell that Ms. Pac-Man has been in, and you may be aware that Pac-Man’s entire family has now been retconned into new characters, with new names and new designs. But what of our dear Chomp-Chomp? Must he be replaced, as well? Are we in for the most drastic redesign yet?
Nope! Good ol’ Chomp-Chomp is our anchor, keeping us stable and comfortable even when the world as we know it crumbles around us. His body is smaller in comparison to his head now, and I think I kind of like it more? The more stylized proportions feel like they fit more with the other characters! He DID, however, get a name change.
He is now Pac-Buddy! It feels unnecessary, but whatever! It’s fine, I guess. He is indeed a Buddy. Maybe they were worried Hanna-Barbera would decide to start caring about the Chomp-Chomp name again. I don’t really care what they call him, though! The Pac-Dog is here, he’s always been here, and with the more consistent branding recently, it seems like he is finally here to stay!
#chomp-chomp#pac-buddy#pac-man#pac & pal#pac-man and chomp-chomp#pac-man world#pac-man allies#not mario#funky friday#mod chikako
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Bluey's Diggers
The Australian character, it is said, was shaped by World War 1. The diggers, the soldiers we sent to Turkey to buy breathing room for Russia so it could push on Germany and reduce the impact on France. That is a good and comforting myth to have in which we get to do something cool and impressive and tough (partake in a war) while also thinking everyone involved is stupid (because they were) and conveniently ignore the complete lack of our own agency in it (why didn’t we say no?). It sort of crystallised the Australian character as liking and being impressed with war and death, accepting death as a potential consequence, and all that good grim military fantasism that paints us as hardworking even to the point of death, and also quite stupid in that we didn’t once consider if maybe the people we should be shooting at are the ones telling us to get shot.
But thing is, I have complicated feelings about Bluey.
If you’re not familiar with it, because you are somehow off the internet and also don’t have a four year old, Bluey is a Homestuck spin-off series about a kid named Bluey and her sister as she and her dad and mum and related family and friends get along. It is beautifully animated, charmingly expressive, deeply resonant, wholesome in ways its genre often struggles to express, and filled to the brim with thoughtful, attentive character work. In the ways that a kid’s cartoon show can be good, it is great.
This isn’t some sort of ‘waiting for the backhand’ way of things, like, not ‘it’s good for,’ or ‘it’s good but,’ or some secret interpretation thing. Bluey is just a really impressively well-made version of what it is and it underscores how many things like it do not exist and are often making media for children without the same mindset that these shows can be good.
But Bluey is also a show that deserves attention for how it is Australian. How exceptionally Australian it is. The characters all have Australian accents, as voiced by Australian accents. They reference Australian versions of things, Australian buses and trains, Australian wildlife, Australian sports, Australian school structures, Australian public works, Australian music, Australian infrastructure. It is a very Australian series.
In the episode that earns a lot of critical acclaim, Cricket, there is a shot of one of the dog’s dads,
This isn’t my observation. I knew about this before I ever saw Cricket, from the poem by Omar Sakr, called Bluey in the genocide. It’s a great poem, it’s a beautifully phrased piece of simple critique about the assumptions present in the work. Because this, this is where people want to put the brakes on the Australian-ness of Bluey. This is where they want to say, hey, okay, yeah, alright, we don’t know where this guy is, but if this is an Australian story about Australian characters, then where in the world that’s hot are you going to find an Australian soldier?
(The answer is the Middle East.)
It is an omnipresent normal that Australia likes our military, a service that has been called to defend Australia kinda, once, and called to other nations by the people who live there about two times and the rest of the time we’re being roped into the adventures of other empires. We are a colony that colonises, the normalised and included white-enoughs.
And this is part of the thing with Bluey, the complication of the Australian-ness of it all. Because like, this is a show for four year olds. This is a show that nonetheless, represents a kid’s interest in army, and makes the very realistic point that the kid’s interest in army is tied to that kid’s dad being in the army. That is extremely Australian, too. And then, while we’re accepting all these obvious things that are obviously about Australia and the obvious followup, that’s where we jerk to a halt.
Because we know we don’t want to.
Like, this dog being in the Middle East brings with it a lot of assumptions about the real world. This implies that there’s a Dog 9/11. It implies there’s a Dog Financial Crisis. It implies that there’s Dog Curtin Line and Dog Coolies and Dog Skeletons from Chinese Dogs underneath the Dog Sugarcane fields just an hour’s drive from Bluey’s House.
And like, that’s a bummer! That’s a bummer to think about! That’s not how we like to think of our history. We were crystallised by the Diggers, but only the good bits, only the bits that weren’t about a willingness to go and kill people who didn’t care for no good reason! It’s a better crystallising event than, say, the Eureka Stockade, where we fought against police trying to crack down on and control workers (and we burned down Chinese hotels) or the story of the Kelly Gang, where we fought against police abusing and controlling the poor. The crystallisation of Australian-ness is instead about the diggers.
About our military.
The military that reached across our country and has stories in it like the time we rioted against American soldiers with whom we were allied. Stories like the time we claimed someone was too European to avoid the draft, stories like the sinking of the Centaur, which was a hospital ship. Stories like Billy Hughes being racist at the treaty of Versailles, literally a subservient agent of racism for the community of powers above him.
We think of our military as normal, and not that bad, just like we think of ourselves as normal, and not that bad. We will always have the example of the empires we serve as being worse, so whatever we did is not so bad, because we’re not like those people we are working for and whose orders we follow. They’re the real bastards. They’re the ones who are benefitting from all of this. Right? We’re not so bad, we’re just doing what we’re told and really, we’re not even getting that much out of our obedience, right?
Happy Anzac Day.
Check it out on PRESS.exe to see it with images and links!
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20 Questions for Fic Writers
Tagged by @iamstartraveller776! Thank you! ☺️
1. How many works do you have on AO3? 49 (that number will be changing soon)
2. What's your total AO3 word count? 538,126 (a full third of that is a single story 😅)
3. What fandoms do you write for? Ummmm....I have written for numerous fandoms over the years, and most of them you haven't heard of! (no seriously)
4. What are your top 5 fics by kudos? The four fics that make up my Star Trek: Enterprise series Built to Last, (and one other lol).
From the Ground Up
What We Build Here
For the Duration
The Place We Call Home
Lay Down the Beat (Dirk Gently's Holistic Detective Agency)
5. Do you respond to comments? Heck yeah! I love comments. I'm such a comment ho, bring 'em on.
6. What is the fic you wrote with the angstiest ending? I have kind of an allergy to angst, so...none, really. Okay, What We Build Here has a slightly angsty ending, but that was ONLY because I knew I was writing a followup and the angst would be healed! Bittersweet is about as hard as I go.
7. What’s the fic you wrote with the happiest ending? Hmmm...Almost all of them? 😄 Destiny and Venturing the Uncharted both have pretty darn sappy happy endings, and of course, the whole point of the Built to Last series was to provide a happy ending, so... yeah. Come to me for all your "everything's gonna be okay" needs.
8. Do you get hate on fics? Haven't on AO3. Tumblr, though...that's another matter. (Which never fails to bewilder me. You're gonna take time out of your life to send anon hate to ME? ME?? Who the actual frilly heck am I to warrant anon hate??)
9. Do you write smut? If so, what kind? Sort of? Kind of? For years, I didn't try, and now I have, and it's all rated M because I don't think I have anything more explicit in me, but I'm enjoying it? (it's all extremely fluffy, though, because I'm just a fluff merchant at heart)
10. Do you write crossovers? What’s the craziest one you’ve written? No, I never have. I'm not sure my brain's wired for that.
11. Have you ever had a fic stolen? Not that I know of, but the majority of my fic is so niche I would be stunned if I did.
12. Have you ever had a fic translated? See above, re: niche
13. Have you ever co-written a fic before? Sort of...years ago, I co-wrote some Baldur's Gate AU fic with a friend that never got published anywhere. Which is a shame, because it was good stuff.
14. What’s your all time favorite ship? Whichever one I'm writing at the moment lol.
15. What’s a WIP you want to finish but doubt you ever will? Probably the sequel to In a Strange Land. Of all the stories I've started and never finished, that one stings the most.
16. What are your writing strengths? Dialogue. I like to think I have a pretty good ear for it (so to speak).
17. What are your writing weaknesses? Plot. 😅 I'm great at having characters sit around and talk, but I'm terrible at having things actually happen.
18. Thoughts on writing dialogue in another language in fic? Complete neutrality. I've never done it, so I don't give it much thought.
19. First fandom you wrote for? Buffy the Vampire Slayer! And if you managed to dig up my old LiveJournal, you could still read it!
20. Favorite fic you’ve written? I love them for different reasons at different times. 😄
Tagging anyone who wants to play!
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🥚for the prompty?
“Babe.”
“I’m not listening, I’m busy.” Taako readjusts the cat bed and the blankets piled on top of it. He puts his hands on his hips and sticks his tongue between his teeth in deep thought, which is unfair, because it gives Kravitz the heart pangs but good.
“Babe, we cannot raise a dragon egg.”
“Oh, hang on, I forgot.” Taako clambers over the couch and untangles the heating pad, and adds it to the mess of softness. There’s a glimmer of shining scales in the low light of their shitty lamp that turns off when you bump it, and Kravitz swallows.
“We–Taako, we live in an apartment.”
“Point being?”
“Taako? Taako, are you hearing yourself??” Kravitz starts pacing again. He can’t watch Taako intently rearrange the blankets and old towels and the cat bed and the heating pad and the left socks that Beans stole and hid in that cat bed. He can’t watch Beans watch Taako with indignation and uninvested interest. He can’t watch the news, muted on the TV, about the missing egg and the heaps and heaps of gold the damn thing is worth. Or the hemorrhoid cream commercial that follows, but that’s because the acting is terrible. “How far back do I need to go? Dragons are living creatures. Dragons are famously dangerous living creatures. Dragons are famously dangerous living creatures that grow up to be very, very, very-” his voice almost cracks, “big.”
“Yuh huh,” Taako says, and heads to the kitchen. Beans follows with a hungry jingle of his collar. Kravitz sighs and joins the party. “But, they’re small for a while. And also, how different are dragons from cats, really? And also also, I’m not intending to keep it for like, forever, forever, you know?”
“I don’t know.” Kravitz leans against the doorway and watches Taako open up a can of the good stuff to placate beans over his pilfered real estate. Beans sings the song of his people, as you do. Taako dumps it on a paper plate, fighting Beans off to get that far, and then plops it on the floor. A little bit of Nasty Gravy gets on the cabinet. Kravitz wishes he didn’t notice. “I don’t know what you’re thinking. You haven’t told me what you’re thinking, and I, unfortunately, am not a mind reader, or a mind scanner, or a mind vibe checker, or-”
“Surely you’ve checked some of my vibes, Krav.” Taako takes a break from being serious about the egg thing to grin gap-toothedly at Kravitz, charming fucker that he is. “Surely you’ve palmed the sacks of my vibes like so many dollar store marbles.”
“They’re hefty for sure,” Kravitz woes. He wants this to be less serious. He wants to not have to be the fun police, for multiple reasons, namely fuck’em, and, followup, fuck’em. He wants to be able to play in this space. But the news and also the dictionary fucking definition of the beast in question has him rattled. “Please. Please label these marbles I am palming. What am I missing here? Because I’m seeing you take a stolen dragon egg into our home, with- with intention to let it hatch and become a blood-thirsty lizard of great stature?”
Taako clicks his tongue in thought, and gets a paper towel about the gravy situation. A little bit of love escapes the prison of Kravitz’s heart, and oozes.
“There’s a couple things.”
“I figured.”
Taako wipes the gravy. Beans chows down. Kravitz tries to quell his anxiety, which is rather a lot like telling a tsunami to follow the rules of the road, you rapscallion, can’t you see there’s business to attend to? Harumph.
“They were gonna sell it to a guy who was gonna make a dragon omelet.”
“That, sucks, for sure, but it seems both implausible and also-”
“Are you gonna say not my responsibility? Cause the omelet thing is true, and they were picking from a long list of chefs to do it, and-”
“Oh,” Kravitz says.
“Yeah.”
“How do you make a dragon omelet? Isn’t that not even how it w-”
“I don’t care, okay? I couldn’t let it happen. And- And you gotta tell me you wouldn’t let it happen either, okay? A dragon- I mean, chickens, that’s one thing. Ostriches even, fuck ‘em. But a dragon is a fully intelligent creature, right? And this one has been incubating for a long time, Krav, you know what would happen if we cracked it into a sizzling frying pan? Krav? You know what- you know who would have to smell that??”
Kravitz looks at Taako. Taako very intentionally doesn’t look at Kravitz.
Kravitz pads over in his house slippers and wraps his arms around Taako.
“Yeah,” he says. “Yeah, I get it now.”
“Go ahead,” Taako sniffs. “Tell me it’s stupid. Tell me it’s none of my business, and also that it’s illegal, and that the police choppers are talking to the landlord company right now, and they’re double mad because the choppers woke them up, so we’re gonna get double evicted, and-”
“Taako,” Kravitz soothes. He kisses his cheek gently. “I’m not above a little crime. Besides.”
“Besides what.”
“It’s not like it’s going to be apartment sized immediately. We’ve got plenty of time to figure this out.”
They share some calming breaths. It’s dim and quiet in their kitchen, and the only sound is Beans’ collar as he gorges himself on wet food, which is comically familiar and thus relaxing.
“What if I get attached?” Taako whispers.
“Don’t you dare,” Kravitz replies, sweet as honey butter.
#sorry it has been one Million Years#this school year has been nuts#fan5fics#taakitz#taakitz fic#taz#tazb#taz balance#the adventure zone#the adventure zone balance
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Do you have a favorite Sandalphon unit? Or does it depend on the job you want him to do?
I need you to know I got this ask late at night and spent like 2 hours figuring out how to answer this before deciding I should go to bed instead of looking like the conspiracy theorist with a wall of print-outs and red threads at 4AM
Talking about favorite characters or units is. Genuinely so hard because I throw myself into a massive rabbit hole. Does it depend on the fight? The lore? The art? Fate episodes? Voice lines? Skills? Full auto? Release? Utility? Synergy? Meta? I'm 100% insane for this but there are too many things to consider here--
Short answer: All of them. Don't make me choose. For as much as I lean into meta there is one man who will make me go monkey regardless of meta. Job doesn't matter when I'll GIVE him a job to do. Though it is easier when his kit is either versatile/specialized or good for full auto/hard content. Either ones of those I'll make work in a heartbeat.
Long and unhinged answer under the cut.
Light Sandalphon (Event): The OG. The reason I went insane. Did you know he's actually surprisingly usable especially after his rebalance? Hit kit is fun but slightly outdated, symbolic of who he was and grew to be. This one gets bonus points for the lore (every uncap art shows a part of his joruney) and the voice lines, as you can have him be a rat for this one still. Base art and final uncap art go hard. First ringed character.
Light Sandalphon (Grand): A followup to his event SSR tbh. I get what they're going for in terms of art but it looks too soft compared to his other alts, which bothers me. It does look like a painting which fits the vibe of his lore. Voice lines sound slightly off to me, but I'm insane for this when the content itself is delicious. Kit is strong and satisfying, building on what his event ssr has except modern and miles better. Damage numbers are fun as hell. Can be slotted in the front but is always solid even in the back, which I'm eternally grateful for. Only cost me half a spark, which is nice of him.
Earth Sandalphon (Grand): A+ lore. Absolute rat. Insane voice lines. Love how unhinged he is. Cygames was insane for giving him to us in the end. Extremely usable for off-element raids, but not that great outside of that. He was on my gold brick farming team for a good while. Not so much fan of the posing for these arts. Does come with his ratty OG dialogue arts, which is a bonus. Base art is nice. He may be evil but he also only cost me half a spark.
Water Sandalphon (Summer): I went insane for him on release. Love his outfit, but didn't like the posing for this. The bonus art I love but looks too blue next to the rest of the team, which bugs me. Still great piece though. Voice lines are fine. Kit... actually kept me from using him. I used him at first and designed around him, but his kit is not great on full auto, since his buff skill isn't supposed to activate first. Thinking about it I'm going to bring him back now out of spite. If I can click Fediel's field, I can also click his sk1. Fun fact about this one: I had to wait a full year to get him because initially i only had 290/300 spark rolls. Next year he came home in 10 rolls. So technically a full spark over 1 year. I spent the remaining spark on summer Lucio to spite him for doing this to me. Have hardly used Lucio ever since then.
Wind Sandalphon (Valentine): Quite possibly my favorite outfit for him, he looks comfy and the style and colors remind me of the Eternals, which is a huge plus. Kit has a bit of everything, it's not as stacked as his Light Grand but in turn has major support options. He's on my endgame team for super ultimate bahamut. I find that he usually offers at least some things I need, so I make a point of building around him to utilize his full kit. Voice lines are fine, though I miss his bratty attitude. I think this one has a nice balance. Like his water ssr, he talks about coffee... and treats that pair well with coffee, and coffee breaks, which I appreciate a lot. He's nerding on main. Does great on full auto as well, since he helps keep the team alive. Got him right before the spark was done, and had a spark prepared specifically for him in case he would get a Valentine's alt.
I think this version of him his my current favorite, though his event ssr and earth ssr are close for their voice lines and lore alone.
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