#Hoping to have him up on my gumroad tonight

[feralfacade]

SOON

I was very inspired but TADC, so I made my own gummy friend :3 I want to try and recreate Gummigoos texture as close as I could with poiyomi (I just made it slightly more see through cause I think its neat)

[nonasuch]

dogfather update: historical inevitability

Finally! Sorry this took so long, but we’re into the home stretch and almost to the end. There should be about two more updates before I can call this officially Done. After that, I’m planning to take prompts and write one-shots, but I’m not rewriting any more of the books. 

As always, everything dogfather-related is tagged with the dogfather and story updates are tagged with dogfather story post. If you get antsy waiting for the next update, check out my AO3 or the zines and comics on my Gumroad. 

For those who know the more tragic histories of the wizarding world in any detail, there are certain patterns that emerge to the discerning eye. Again and again, it seems, young witches and wizards are abandoned, betrayed, even doomed by their elders, for reasons that seem petty or perverse with the clarity of hindsight.

Young Ariana Dumbledore, long forgotten, was cut down through no fault of her own. Eileen Prince raised her son in a cold and loveless house, where he learned that he could not expect affection or kindness, nor entrust them to anyone else. The elder Evanses, for all that theirs was a happier home, failed to recognize the growing rift between their daughters; if they saw it, they could not patch it well enough to hold. The noble and most ancient house of Black, of course, provides a great many instructive examples. Even Tom Riddle was a child, once, consigned to a miserable, neglected youth by mere accidents of birth.

In all such cases, the same question arises, over and over again: why wasn’t anyone paying attention?

Why was there no adult, no sober, responsible, caring person, who saw the suffering children in their midst, and intervened? It seems so clear, after the fact, that such and such a sequence of events would lead inevitably to disaster. Why was it not prevented?

A villain is sought. Perhaps there is someone to blame. Someone with authority, someone who could have changed things, and chose not to. Perhaps someone wanted these tragedies to happen. Perhaps some intricate plot required them, to achieve some obscure and lofty greater good.

Here is a terrible secret:

Sometimes, even with all the will in the world, with sober, caring, responsible adults on every side, the disaster happens anyway. Sometimes adults are not nearly so wise and capable as they seem, in the eyes of a child, no matter how hard they try. Sometimes all it takes is a blind spot, a misstep, a momentary lapse in one’s constant vigilance.

Later, it will seem obvious. If only someone had been looking a little closer! If only someone had listened a little better. It would have been so easy to change things, they will say.

But in the moment, there are only ever ordinary people, trying to make the right choices. Still feeling like children doing their best impressions of grown-ups, no matter how old they grow.

For what it’s worth, the adults in question will certainly blame themselves, after the fact. But their sins are not unreasonable ones.

To answer the first and most obvious question: when the moment arrives, Harry’s godfather is not there. It’s been two days since the full moon, and Remus is having a worse time of it than usual. Harry’s parents ask Sirius to stay a little longer: they hardly see him anymore, after all. He lets himself be persuaded. All perfectly unremarkable things, in the moment.

"See Professor Dumbledore?" Professor McGonagall repeated, as though this was a very fishy thing to want to do. "Why?"

Albus Dumbledore underestimates his bright and resourceful students. He set a trap for Quirrell, left it baited all year, knowing he was mixed up in something Dark. Dumbledore fears that the ghost of Tom Riddle might show himself, and hopes for some other explanation. It never occurs to him that Harry and his young friends could not only uncover but solve a puzzle intended for someone else entirely. Until they do it, of course.

"Professor Dumbledore is a very great wizard, Potter, he has many demands on his time --”

“But this is important -- and it’s MacIntyre, actually--”

In the ordinary way of things, Minerva McGonagall knows that when children seem truly distressed they almost certainly have a good reason; they shouldn’t be shooed away from the grown-up concerns they already know too much about. But she has worries of her own. There is Quirrell, of course, and the way that Albus grows increasingly tight-lipped and inscrutable over the course of the year. The fear that You-Know-Who might return plagues her. So many of her students are living reminders of what the last war cost.

"MacIntyre, I know what I'm talking about," she said shortly. She bent down and gathered up the fallen books. “I suggest you all go back outside and enjoy the sunshine."

(In her fleeting moments of free time, Minerva has been sounding out Ministry officials, hoping to find one who might be convinced that a notorious, long-vanished convict deserves the fair trial he never got in the first place. It hasn’t been a success.)

As for Severus Snape, well. There is one student in particular who reminds him, very painfully, of what the war cost, and he has done his level best to pretend as though that student does not exist. This determined blindness extends, unfortunately, to the student’s closest friends, and so he does not notice when their suspicions of him reach a tipping point, and spur them into action.

"It's tonight," said Harry, once he was sure Professor McGonagall was out of earshot.

This is how it happens. It’s no one’s fault, not really. The adults will look back, later, and see all the places where they could have done something else, something better. Paid more attention, been more responsible or simply more kind. The children, left to their own devices, will triumph or fall on their own, and it will not occur to them to wonder why no one stopped them.

In this case, all ends happily enough. The children are clever, brave, resourceful and kind, exactly the sort of young wizards (and witch) that Hogwarts always hopes to produce. They solve the puzzles, they stop the villain. No one dies.

But they should not have been left to do it alone.

Harry spends three days in the infirmary, but he doesn’t remember them. If he really works at it, he has a vague recollection of being carried, held carefully and close; of lights going on and off, and grown-up voices murmuring around him in low, worried tones.

He thinks he might hear the lullabye his mother used to sing to him, when he was small: come away, o human child / to the waters and the wild / with a fairy, hand in hand / for the world’s more full of weeping than you can understand.

It sounds like Padfoot singing it, almost, but his voice is hoarse and cracked.

When Harry does wake up properly, it takes him a moment to get his bearings. He looks around wildly: he’s in the hospital wing. Padfoot is asleep sitting up in a chair against the wall, next to an enormous pile of sweets and fruit and flowers. And Albus Dumbledore is standing at the foot of his bed, smiling kindly at him.

“Good afternoon, Harry,” he says, very softly, so as not to wake Sirius.

[thesylverlining]

So... got something pretty special for you guys tonight.

You might have heard me yelling a while ago about The Dethzine, a Metalocalypse fanzine.

Well, these two pieces of mine, illustrating the incredibly metal Brendon Small’s 8-minute epic, The Ocean Galaktik (and my theory about what would have happened to General Crozier!) are going to be a spread in said fanzine, and I am more freaking excited than I can even tell you. This thing got me painting again. For that alone, it’s important.

But it’s much more than that. The Dethzine - official blog over here @thedethzine​ - is an incredible collection of 35+ artists and writers, all making amazing art dedicated to this badass, hilarious, beautiful show that we still remember, love, and haven’t given up on. I don’t even care if it’s silly to say, or how it sounds; Metalocalypse was incredibly formative for me as a young teen/artist/creator. At its core, it’s a beautiful story about creation, found family, and powerful music, all tied up in a nonsense, ridiculous douchebag wrapper.

It’s important to me. It’s important to a lot of us. It made my life better, it made me feel braver, and I’m honestly trying not to cry writing this (because that’s not very metal), because we’re not only donating almost all the proceeds to humanitarian aid charity Direct Relief, but, sadly, the family of director Jon Schnepp, who recently suffered a fatal stroke. 

We meant for this to be a memorial tribute to a beloved TV show, and it ended up being one for him as well. Nothing can begin to make up for that loss, but I sincerely hope that this can be tangible proof of the lasting impact the show he helped create, and how our lives are better and more metal for having our faces melted by its awesomeness, and our hearts face-fisted by its brutality.

You can pre-order the zine, both PDF and physical, here on Gumroad

Or check out its official site for extras (stickers!) and more cool stuff!

Thank you for reading, and I hope this looks like something you’ll enjoy.

...But there’s no freaking way you’ll enjoy it as much as I loved being part of it. Rock the fuck on. <3

(Lastly, because tumblr IS DEFINITELY hiding this post because it has outside links, reblogging is incredibly appreciated. Thank you.)