#DO I TAG THE SHIPS.........not today i think

[rareomens]

Oh hey, no. Don't do that. Please.

This is a bit of a read but I've spent a long time thinking and editing, and I'm saying this all gently but seriously.

I imagine the above was NOT intentionally said to prick anyone's emotions, but this kind of comment on Rare Omens prompts is like saying it about any of them. It reminds me that so many of these pairs are only tolerated at best by the majority of folks in the fandom. (Every one of these prompts has people who don't like or even actively hate them. Take a look at the prompt list in our pinned post, and marvel at that statement but know it to be true.)

This prompt month event has a "don't like? ignore it and move on" policy. Trust me from experience with my own rare ships: we hear the disgust or hate enough, we know others aren't into it.

If you don't like something, that's okay! If you want to talk about not liking it, that's also okay. BUT PLEASE don't reply to people who are clearly having their fun in a post. It's not necessary and it only makes people feel badly to see it directly in the notifs. It only digs away at feeling welcome to whatever we get from enjoying a pair (or OT3, or polycule, etc). And that can lead to feeling unwelcome in the wider fandom the rest of the time... which is absolutely devastating to feel.

You can post separately and start a conversation to find people who feel similarly if you feel strongly and want to have those conversations—though hating on rare pairs/characters is common and such posts are probably not necessary. Anyone doing so: please DO NOT TAG a ship in your tags when hating on it. Bc the people most likely searching that tag? They DO like it, and don't need to wade through a bunch of negative comments to find fellow fans.

I started Rare Omens bc it was hard to find transformative works for ships I liked (be it as a couple or ANY OTHER way you can pair characters up—as a reminder: it doesn't have to be NSFW; it doesn't have to be SFW either of course). I wanted to find other people who enjoyed what I enjoyed. And to help people experiment with making stories and art they otherwise might never have thought about. And it has gone really well! I've seen NSFW ships, and friend ships, and respected enemies, hated enemies, and AUs of all shapes. Participants over the years have mentioned that they never would've thought to try writing certain characters in stories or draw them off on adventures. THAT, I love. We know there's ever anyone out there excited for their faves and waiting for it.

I also want to say...

I saw this reply earlier today but I was out at a showing of Macbeth where I made the acquaintance of a bunch of Good Omens fans (ranging in age from 20s to 60s at a guess). One of them even cosplays Metatron, and their Crowley and Aziraphale showed pics. It was real fun to see them include a rarer character in their cosplay group. I didn't have a chance to reply to this until now, and I'm glad I waited. I'm thinking about that cosplayer too: it can be disheartening to see "your" rare character excluded from the fun of transformative works.

Right. All this to say:

Please be kind to your fellow fans, even when they're playing with the dolls in ways you would never.

We don't have to force ourselves to like anything or interact with it (in fact: don't interact, talk privately to your friends who understand), but we gotta let people have their sandbox too. Because if we're excluding our weirdest and wildest takes, the most gloriously crackfic pairings possible, then we're not safe for anyone. We're not transforming anything.

Ship and let ship.

Thank you.

[UPDATE] Docdust and I have chatted. They've adjusted their comment. They are friends with the others and meant it in a positive way. So new addendum 😅: inside jokes outside our groups can be seen by others who might not know our history or what we're doing with RP.

I'm glad no one was really hating on a pair. And I'm equally glad to have Rare Omens' stance on it all written out here. Thank you all for continuing to be supportive of each other!

It’s Rare Omens 2025 Day 4

Aziraphale and Metatron!

Are the Guardian and the Voice lovers, enemies, siblings, friends, work colleagues? Share your prompt fills of the Guardian and the Voice and tag us.

You can also post to the **AO3 collection** Rare_Omens, which we'll check regularly throughout the prompt month.

[slavhew]

you win. try again?

[butterflysnowflake]

man can I just say how adorable Wolf's interaction with Delia in the wedding scene is? When she's explaining her situation he gives her the most understanding looks and it's because they both effectively had the same cause of death. Delia turned her mourning of Charles into part of her performance art, and died from being scammed with asps who were NOT defanged. Wolf wanted to deliver the most authentic performance possible and died from presumably a negligent armorer who didn't bother to check if the grenade was live or not before shooting. both of them were quite literally killed by their art (not by their own faults to be fair but from someone else's irresponsibility). and it's kind of lovely Delia got such a sympathetic escort back to the netherworld who knows her situation firsthand probably better than anyone else

it's weirdly wholesome and empathetic even as their situations were both played for morbid laughs, and if Delia didn't have eyes only for Charles (what's left of him) and Wolf wasn't in a committed relationship with Janet I'd even say I could have seen things going somewhere between them

[souenkun]

Pokémon Masters EX spoilers ahead!

Kabu likes to play TAG with his pokemon... and he's shown to have a much softer side beneath his strictness in pokemas too... he's so grandpa-shaped to me 😭💖

[sillydeimos]

2bskinner is really good... idk what it is about it whenever i see it im like....YES!!!! lets fucking go. id draw it more but its hard for me to like properly express the kind of dynamic id like them to have

[dustykneed]

Hello! Random whipper snipper! Share a WIP of your work!

ooh, with pleasure. six the musical araleyn fanart? in the year 2k24? more likely than you think xDD

i realize this looks finished, but technically i'm still deciding whether to add a background or not lol. still, for the sake of sharing a proper WIP, here's a line or two from an araleyn brainworm WIP that i started reworking yesterday (mild tw for religious guilt and period-typical internalized homophobia from aragon's pov):

She remembers sharing her bed with Anne at Henry's behest, remembers the nights of tossing and turning and trying not to think about Anne asleep next to her-- remembers waking up to dark hair spilling across her pillow and the press of blood-warm bosoms against her own, softer than sin, as hot as the Devil, remembers lying still as death, mouthing prayers into the heat of Anne's neck like an act of penance.

[amtrak12]

HELP! I've fallen down a Bering and Wells hole again and can't stop watching fanvids. I misssssss them!!! 😢

[quibbs126]

My brain is now yearning for a redemption/character development arc for TFA Sentinel

I want to see it, but I don’t think realistically it’ll ever happen outside of fanfiction. At least not out of this continuity

[barb-l]

man. do Ch*rlastor shippers even like or know Charlie as a character or is she just a hollow character for self-insert purposes to them

[feroluce]

Thinking tonight about Caelus, and the nature of his loss and his grief after the Everything that went down in Penacony during 2.0.

Because Acheron, Black Swan, and Misha kind of knew of Firefly, they at least met her, but they didn't like really know her, and Caelus never even got the chance to introduce her to the rest of the Astral Express Crew. The only person who would have talked to her much was Sparkle, who is. Probably not really someone Caelus is interested in grieving with skznmsks

Anyway, all this to say, I like thinking about how alone poor Caelus is in his grief, because he was the only one who knew Firefly. He's the only one really mourning her. There's no one to talk about her with. There's no stories to trade or memories to reminisce with anyone over. It's not as though he knew her for long, but still. No one else knew her at all.

And I love the thought of all of this coming bubbling up, hot and acidic and bitter, during a conversation with Sampo, who Caelus just so happens to run into in the Golden Hour. Poor Sampo is kinda blindsided, he knew shit was going down in Penacony, but yeesh. And he just. Isn't quite sure what to say about it all, because he's never really encountered this before. His feelings about the Masked Fools are...a mixed bag, but he's been a part of them for a very long time, and when you're with a close organization like that, it's hard to feel alone, in grief or otherwise.

So Sampo sits there on their little bench that the two of them have occupied, and he thinks of his old friend April, how she'd died in his arms cackling and spitting her own blood after a heist gone wrong, and how after he'd dragged himself back to the World's End Tavern they'd all held a Fool's Funeral- which is basically just a big party where everyone gets really really drunk and reminisces and toasts the dead and celebrates their life.

He still thinks about her a lot, and he remembers how the time he'd most keenly felt her absence was on Jarilo-VI, the one place where he couldn't talk about her because he couldn't say anything to give himself away as an alien. The Fools still tell stories about her every time he goes back to the Tavern. His first toast of the night is always in her name. Even now, all these years after she'd died, Sampo is still learning new things about her. He's never had to grieve her alone.

Caelus doesn't have any of that.

He might never have that. As they speak, Caelus has no proof that Firefly was even her real name, or if she dreamt with her true appearance. He might not ever find out who she even was.

And just imagining that kind of loneliness hollows out a strange little pit, right behind his sternum, deep between his ribs.

So Sampo claps Caelus' shoulder and offers him a deal. Come find him outside of the dream. He knows a guy who can get them a lot of beer for really cheap-

("Is that guy you and your five finger discounts?" "Whatever do you mean, dear friend, I don't even know the meaning of the phrase, hehee.")

-and they can hole up in a bar or a hotel room or something, and get completely shitcanned. Tell him all about Firefly, tell him everything, and he'll tell Caelus about April and everyone else he's ever lost. Sampo will carry Caelus' memories of Firefly with him, and at least this way, Caelus will be a little less alone in remembering her. And the next time they cross paths, Sampo will be the one to bring her up, and to tell her stories, and Caelus can get to be the one listening. He won't have to be the only person to talk about her anymore.

Caelus rolls his eyes when Sampo avoids another remark about sticky fingers, but...ok, yeah. That sounds good. Nice, even. Thank you. Caelus bumps his shoulder against Sampo's. Sampo bumps back.

(They find each other again the next day, and true to their word, get themselves completely and utterly shitcanned. Caelus talks more than Sampo has ever heard him; every minute detail, every word choice, Firefly's every odd little mannerism and habit. Because Caelus wants to make sure this will outlive him, that even if the Stellaron dwelling within him finally burns him to a crisp and he really does up and kick the bucket, or even, godforbid, if he forgets, he wants to make sure someone remembers her. She deserved that.)

((And it takes quite a while, after that. Caelus doesn't see Sampo again until after everything has settled down. On his last day in Penacony, he finds the guy slinking out of a seedy back alley and all but runs right into him. Sampo happily leads him to some dive bar in an even seedier back alley that Caelus has never even heard of, and Sampo raises his glass. "To Firefly! Who sounds like she probably would have hated me at first, but I would have liked to have met her anyway."

And Caelus stares at him, almost looking startled, long enough that Sampo worries that he's read him wrong and brought this up too soon. He's halfway into planning how to talk himself out of this situation when Caelus finally throws back his head back and laughs, tells him that yeah, Firefly would have politely called him out on every lie he told, and all their conversations would take twice as long with the way Sampo is so full of shit.

And he can see it, the same way he watches and sees through everyone, that Caelus' eyes have a tightness to them, his knuckles are nearly white around the handle of his mug. But he smiles. He hits his glass against Sampo's far too hard and throws it back and gets foam everywhere like he does every time they drink because the guy's about as elegant as a raging bull, but those things don't lessen the genuineness of his smile.

The grief is there, but so is the elation, and those emotions aren't a sliding scale between one or the other. It is all of both and both at once, and that's what contents Sampo enough to throw his own mug back when Caelus makes a toast of his own, "to April!!".))

[ectoplasmer]

You know that saying about how moles and freckles are places where your soulmate liked to kiss you in your past life? Imagine your f/o taking every chance they get to kiss you on those exact spots. Having them sneak a quick peck to the area and seeing them smile to themselves against the skin before they pull away. Them kissing an area where there are a lot of marks over and over again, as if they’re trying to appreciate each and every one. Them grabbing your hand and lifting it to their lips to kiss any spots there, or having them roll up your sleeve to peck any marks, having them sit in front of you to kiss any along your legs… just your f/o making sure you know they love kissing you on those specific spots <3

[starflungwaddledee]

if starstruck Dee gets a comically large bow then Marc should have the comically large eyelashes

i was actually thinking that they both already have bows and eyelashes. consider: the ol' switcheroo

[the-sky-the-stars-the-sea]

This. Just. This.

“Are you bored?” - a genuine question

“I’m not.” - a lie

The one asking “are you bored?” is the one who is pitying the other. The other lies and says they are not bored because they have waited for this moment for so long, and maybe if they say they’re happy then they will be, because isn’t this everything they ever wanted? Even if deep down they know this is all an illusion?

And this is why neither of these ships are endgame.

Meanwhile:

So yeah. Mhokday and Sandray are endgame.

Because it’s first crush vs someone you love who actually loves you the way you want to be loved.

So of course it’s the latter one that wins in the long run.

[rystiel]

i’ve seen people disappointed by the deadpool & wolverine movie because they don’t kiss but by god that car scene was them having hate sex actually

[hurtcomforted]

why are some antis bending over backwards to make every ship they don't like problematic? "they're like brothers, this is practically incest!" "you can't ship that, he's married with kids in canon!" "he's a kid in some of the comics so this is actual pedophilia!"

you know you're allowed to just not like stuff, right? you don't need some higher moral reason for it.

[thatgremlinkid]

Shipping your favs together is so funny because what do you mean I’ve been thinking about Diggers and Click going on scenic road trips in Diggers van and they occasionally stop so Click can take pictures of the wildlife and greenery just because I lobe them like what is wrong with me