#I did not expect to cook but I did

[myrablurple]

hey how would you write them first meeting each other

I’m so so sorry for how long it has taken me to answer to your ask 😭 I haven’t written an actual story in a while so I’ve gotten super rusty. Plus I was super busy in December, and I went crazy writing this than I originally expected.

Anyways, here’s how I think Merula and Zestial first met. Shoutout to my friend Dany for helping me out with parts of the story. This is all in Merula’s POV because while I was tempted to write some of Zestial’s POV, I don’t feel confident in writing him properly as of yet. Excuse any improper Early Modern English HSHDBDNDN

The Woman and The Spider Overlord

Word Count: 1924

Warnings: None

—

The streets of Pentagram City, or so what she assumed it was called based on posters and billboards, was lively as usual. Demons walked by, a couple of them violently beating up another demon. Merula flinched when she heard the sound of the demon’s cries and clutched on tighter to her cloak. She kept her head down to not draw attention as she silently walked past the violent scene, silently remembering the advice Eclipse had given her days before: keep her head down and keep to herself and no one will bother her. For the most part that is.

However, even if she had been following said advice and been here for over a week, the sound of screams and gun fire still made her skin crawl. She didn’t belong down here and she needed to find a way out. Fast. But how?

She silently walked as she wandered around over to a different street away from that bloodshed, her hand quietly raising up to her face to adjust the cracked mask on her face as she felt it slipping for a bit. The last thing she needed was for her mask to slip off and expose her human face-. Her thought was cut short when she felt a wave of pain flare up in her back but it went away as quickly as it came. She silently cursed in her head.

Great. She had just taken the last of her painkillers not even two hours ago and now her back was already flaring with pain thanks to that mark. Where and how was she going to get more painkillers? Goodness, she sounded like she was addicted to drugs thinking like that but what choice did she have? She had no money and she couldn’t risk getting a job down here without exposing her real identity. The sound of her stomach growling sent another wave of pain through her, making her briefly pause from the pain of it before forcing herself to keep walking. She needed food too, she wasn’t going to last long at this rate. Part of her was thankful that Eclipse was the one who found her that week ago but the more she thought about her “savior”, the more she felt bitter about it.

While she adjusted her mask again and was stuck in her thoughts, her brain running a million miles per minute, she had failed to notice the demon up ahead and how everyone around her was reacting to them. She just kept walking ahead, not paying attention to the fearful whispers and screams others emitted because of this one demon. It was only when she ran into them by accident did she snap awake from her thoughts. She stumbled a bit back but managed to catch her footing, and snapped her head forward, her hand adjusting her mask once more. But all she saw was nothing but a dark cloak which caused her to slowly raise her eyes until she made eye contact with the demon’s four eyes. Oh dear, he was tall, and the air around him felt eerie and dangerous.

She had royally messed up.

“I a-am s-so sorry! I-I w-was not paying attention to w-where I was going and…,” Merula had begun to apologize profusely, her voice cracking slightly and praying he wouldn’t cause her harm. She was absolutely stricken with fear but she trailed off when the demon began to chuckle.

“Aren’t thee a peculiar soul,” the demon spoke, still towering over her as he bent down a bit to look at her. “To be so bold to walk afront of mine own path and to apologize so freely to me, thou art peculiar.”

Merula could practically feel her heart pounding against her ribcage as he chuckled again. Her brain was screaming at her legs to move but her feet were firmly planted in the ground by his gaze alone. She looked down at the ground, taking in a shaky breath before speaking again.

“S-So sorry again…have a good day sir.”

She somehow managed to get her feet to cooperate and tried to move past him. But she had only managed to take a few steps forward when he raised his hand up. She immediately stopped, her hands trembling beneath her cloak.

“Pardon me an I may be so bold but an I may ask, shalt thou join me on a stroll,” the demon asked.

It took her a couple of seconds to figure out what he was asking her thanks to his old fashion way of speaking. She realized that he was asking her to join him on a walk and her mouth immediately grew dry. Why did she have to run into him? If she accepts, she runs the risk of him figuring out what she is, or do something to her. But if she declined, she could potentially die and in her current state, there was no way she could outrun him. Regardless, she was trapped and she had a feeling he knew that too. He wasn’t asking her. He was demanding her to join him.

“V-Very well…,” her voice cracked, her fear evident and she hated that.

The demon smiled but it chilled her to the bone. The two of them began to walk side by side, but she kept her distance and eyed the demon through her mask. All the while she could feel the eyes of others on them, making her clutch her cloak tighter. How was she going to get out of this one? She was drawing so much attention to herself simply by walking next to this demon. This was the opposite of the advice given to her. Granted most if not all of them immediately turned their heads or ran away in fear if they happened to be walking close to them. Hell, some were setting themselves on fire. But still, this was too much attention for her liking and made her wary of what this demon has done to elicit such reactions to his presence alone.

“-nameth?”

Merula snapped from her thoughts and glanced up at the tall demon. She noticed he had haunched down a bit and was slightly closer to her. His bright neon lime green eyes stared directly at her, a bemused look in his face. She jumped a bit back, her heart racing faster, especially when her mask slightly slipped again and she quickly adjusted it again.

“W-What,” she asked, silently cursing that he found her reactions amusing.

“I wast asking what is thy nameth,” the demon chuckled. “Thou art a very jumpy soul.”

“O-Oh…it’s Mer-.” She cut herself off too late and she noticed that he noticed that.

“Mer?”

The teasing smile on his face made her face burn up in embarrassment. She wasn’t keen on telling him her real name, but she already messed up by saying the first part of her name unless she could quickly come up with another name beginning with “Mer”. She stewed for what felt like hours but it was only a few seconds for her to give an answer.

“I-It’s actually Merula…”

“Merula,” He said her name slowly. “A lovely name for a lovely lady.”

She couldn’t hold back the snort that escaped her lips. She was far from lovely, especially in this state she was in. He certainly had better manners than the majority of the demons she had observed down here which felt so ironic to say seeing where they were. She adjusted her mask again, noticing how he was still looking at her.

“I…thank you…,” she quietly muttered, glancing away. “What is your name then?”

“Didst thou not hear me earlier tell thee?”

Her face flushed again under her mask and silently cursed again at his teasing smile when she glanced back at him. Curse her luck, of course she wasn’t paying attention when he probably said his name and now she was looking like an idiot but based on his reactions so far, he seemed to be more amused by her behavior than anything. Which was starting to feel like it was against her favor of her plan to eventually escape.

Her silence was also probably telling for him as she didn’t respond to his question because she snapped from her thought again when he spoke again.

“Mine own name is Zestial, 'tis a pleasure to make thy acquaintance, my own lady fair.”

Lady fair? She assumed it had to be from his time seeing his way of speaking. She politely nodded her head in acknowledgment, and felt her mask slip again.

“Pray tell, wherefore dost thou cover thy face? Thy mask appears to be ill fitted for thee.”

She tensed up after she had adjusted her mask and avoided his eyes. What could she tell him? She needed to think of something to say, all the while she was scrambling to think of a way to escape him before he figured out she was human.

“I…I d-don’t like how my face looks,” she stammered out, praying that was enough for him.

But instead, he had stopped walking and she felt a large clawed hand on her shoulder. She immediately jerked away from his grasped and he, thankfully, pulled his hand away when she moved away.

“Apologieth but don’t lie to me, mine own lady fair.” Her hands trembled underneath her cloak, frozen where she stood from his gaze alone. “Now, wherefore dost thou cover thy face?”

What could she say? She was trapped. Her brain was screaming at her feet to move, to lie again, anything but revealing the truth. Finally, she took small steps back, away from him while continuing to avoid his gaze. She had no choice, she needed to run away from him even if she probably couldn’t get far. It was better than exposing the truth.

The sudden sound of a scream behind her caught her attention and she turned around right at the moment the tail of a fleeing demon made contact with her. It didn’t hit her extremely hard but it was still strong enough to send her stumbling back and fall to her knees thanks to her weak state.

Her body flared with pain as she clutched the area where the tail had hit her. Carefully and somewhat shakily, she managed to pick herself back up but she swayed a bit and couldn’t help but grit her teeth. She hated how a simple blow managed to make her fall to her knees. She hated how weak she was right now. She hated that she even was in this situation.

Through her swirling thoughts and pain, she stared at the ground, completely shutting the world around her until something caught her eye. On the ground in front of her were shards. White shards littered the ground in front of her and her eyes slowly widened in horror at the realization at what was broken before her.

She snapped her head up and it was met with Zestial’s eyes.

Merula hadn’t even noticed him appear in front of her or the fact he had put a hand on her shoulder to stop her from swaying. But he could see her face, her real face as the pieces of her mask laid between them.

Her breathing suddenly felt louder in her ears, her body gripped with fear as she couldn’t tear to look away from him. Watching helplessly as his eyes widened at first with realization before a wide smile spread across his face.

“Thou art peculiar indeed, my own lady fair.”

[ayyunah]

Prying eyes and words of malice. You are not who you are.

close ups under cut bc i wanna show my rendering yayy:

[d-does-art]

Please consider

[fatuismooches]

A compilation of a few notes in no particular order written by two odd scholars found by the Traveler on their journey throughout Sumeru. Some of the words have been crossed out or lost to time, making them illegible.

Forgotten Note (found in the desert inside a huge Ruin Golem)

[A page torn from someone's notebook that seems to be hastily written and forgotten.]

... I can't believe what I've just witnessed. We spent DAYS traveling out here to the desert because Zandik wanted to tinker with that huge robot for ages. Me too of course, but that's not the point. Here he was just a few moments ago, brimming with excitement at being able to pilot it. It was cute...

... And then not even a minute later, he was hunched over, clutching his stomach and mouth. I was initially concerned, but he merely waved me off and began writing at the speed of light, still holding back the urge to throw up. And that's when I realized this fool was ███-███...

... Zandik was going to give it one more go but I quickly stopped him. I wasn't about to have him getting sicker than he already was. Tried to fight me on it but he was dizzy enough to take himself out. He's currently grumbling at me in the corner, but he'll get over it...

... Silly man, he let me put his head on my lap while he rested. Good thing I packed some light snacks... but note to self: for the foreseeable future, don't let Zandik into any kind of transportation. Hopefully, he'll outgrow it one day though...

—

Zandik's Note (found on the edge of Sumeru near Fontaine)

[A short note containing idle thoughts - the lack of importance may have caused it to be discarded.]

... There is an area in the desert that provides a clear and close view of the neighboring nation, Fontaine. [Name] insisted on showing me it as we happened to be close by...

... I'm not particularly interested in that land, but there are some things that may be worth looking into. [Name], however, wants to get academic leave to do some research there - more truthfully, they want to try out the macarons. How typical of them...

I suppose it's not the worst idea. They are an excellent partner, plus the extra ███ would be useful for my ███ research, and I'd make sure those people would never know...

... Regardless, there's no rush. Perhaps one day we can go...

—

[Name]'s Observation Log - Page 34-35 (found in the rainforest inside a tree hollow)

[A page torn from an observation log wedged deep inside a tree, preserving a little bit of its contents - it seems the writer wanted to hide it.]

... Day 1 of my first expedition with Zandik. Of course, every course comes with a dreaded group project but I am happy to be paired with him. Zandik, however, not so much. He's barely spoken to me the whole time. Well, he barely speaks to anyone in general, guess that's part of the reason other students refer to him as ███ ███. But I literally live with him, don't I deserve some special privilege?...

... Day 2 of my first expedition with Zandik. I looked a bit at his notes last night so I could start drafting the research report, but then he snatched them away when he noticed. He's extra grumpy at me now. I wonder what kind of things he writes about...

... Day 3 of my first expedition with Zandik. We've gotten a lot of stuff done but he seems far more interested in ███ than looking at plants. There's this one ruin in the distance he keeps eyeing. I bet if I wasn't here, he'd be there. If I present him with a ███ ███ of each type, would he finally talk to me? Hmm, that'd be hard to hide from the sages though...

... Day 4 of my first expedition with Zandik. I lied and said there was a better spot to get samples and brought him to that ruin. Long story short and after a lot of annoyed Zandik later, we made it in. When the killing machines awakened, it seemed he had a bright idea and had begun instructing me to hit them in a very precise way. Well, he certainly knows how to use someone efficiently... After all of that, all of a sudden he had found his voice and began shooting off orders to fetch this tool or that textbook and so on. Never got a thank you but he compensated with some loud, excited mumbles...

... Day 5 of my first expedition with Zandik. Thanks to Zandik actually doing his share of the work, we finished the fieldwork quickly. I showed him what I had so far and he seemed pleasantly surprised, although his expression was still flat. As we worked, he wasn't as talkative as he was yesterday, but the silence wasn't awkward like before. Well, as long as I get paired with Zandik, I think I'll survive this semester, and it'll be a bonus if he warms up to me. Speaking of warming up to me, Zandik wants to come back to the ruin we went to yesterday - with me too!!!!! It'll be our little secret that no one will find out. I think I got on his good side a bit, he looks cute when he's smiling. His teeth are even sharper up close.....

—

Nearly Torn Note (found inside an ancient book in the House of Daena)

[A small paper that has nearly been ripped in half, but some of the words are still cohesive.]

... I ███ them. Why are they here? I told them I did not need help, nor was I interested in assisting them. But they're here anyway. Of course they are. When are they not? Is there ever a moment when they're not constantly chirping in my ear? No, of course not. I'm ███ to live with them after all...

... With their ███ smell wafting through the dorm after a shower, or the scent of their cooking that they specially make ███ ███...

... Their stupid voice is prattling away right now, and I ███ how I do ███ find it irritating. My mind seems to automatically ███ ███ anything their ███ mouth says...

... I found their touch repulsive, but now I ███ for them to...

... There is something wrong with ███...

[At the bottom lays a tiny doodle of someone, presumably the person who occupied Zandik's mind, and has been intensely scratched off.]

—

Collaborative Note (found in an old camp near the woods)

[An abandoned note that appears to be written by two people. The top half is messily written and smudged thanks to the large amount of ink spills and blots. The second half is neater but the writer seems to have given up.]

... My ███ is a ███. Thanks to ███ help, we were able to acquire numerous ███ to help with the ███ ███. Were it not for them, there could have been a great ███ in my ███...

--------------------------

...Alright, that's it. Zandik is banned from writing notes now. I'm drawing the line. I bought five pens with us, and he has broken four of them so far. It's barely been a few hours! I still don't know how he does it- okay well now he's tapping me impatiently to write down his thoughts. Best get on it before he breaks this one and starts using ███ as ink...

...After a series of ███ were conducted, it has been concluded that it may be ███ for a ███ ███ to be ███-███. Wait... all the ink is on my hand now! And it smudged more!! Ugh!!!...

... I'm going to start forcing him to wear gloves... he's getting his inked hands all over me... at least we can shower ███!...

—

Paimon and the Traveler reviewed the notes they found contemplatingly - it was definitely not all of them, considering how hidden many of them were - but they found themselves oddly intrigued by the multitude of notes left by these two characters. Paimon was more interested in the love story part.

"You know, Paimon's not too sure... she's getting some mixed vibes from Zandik here... he seems kind of a big meanie to [Name] to be honest!" The Traveler watched in amusement as Paimon got grumpy on your behalf.

"... But he does seem to lighten up sometimes. Maybe he's not as bad as we think. Guess we can't piece together their relationships just from some notes, eh?"

"Well, Paimon thinks they seemed like a cute couple, well, minus for some things. Mostly, um... Zandik's oddness which you can't really excuse but I guess it's okay because they're long dead! Still, [Name] sure had strange taste in men..."

[cloudcastor]

moms…..

[xxplastic-cubexx]

was talking to my brother the other day after i rewatched dark phoenix and he was like 'why is everyone so mean to charles in this movie?? were they always this mean to him ?? is it cause he's bald now- he lost his pretty privilege??' and i fear i havent recovered

[sentrysapper]

can u do either spy and engie in a fancy ass restaurant or them out in the woods camping/country area and one of them is just. completely put off their elemnt it would be silly

-a certain northern anon

[effen-draws]

"I don't see Glorihan, I just see me."

I have been binging @bcbparty these last few weeks and OH MAN what a good actual play podcast! Love the lore, love how damn silly these characters are, love how messed up it gets at times:-))

Argh! I could talk about this podcast for hours but I WON'T because I'm only on ep 41... for now...

[ganondoodle]

the closer we get to arcanes finale the more worried i am bc so often .. if not always .. things i like end in a way that i dislike so much it ruins everything else for me

and im so worried they pull a 'this is a multiverse' thing bc then they can say every skin is somehow canon bc its all different universes you seeeeee and jayce went mad bc he lived through all of them or something, or force it to end in a way that makes the champions end up like they are in game- Vi is a shitty cop, Jinx is just heehoo craycray bc xyz etc

[sk3tch404]

Late Night Hanma Blurb

A/n: Thought abt this during an itty-bitty road trip today. Smoker Hanma does smth to the chemicals in my brain. Forgive me for any lengthy bad writing. I've had a long day and I just wanna yip yap about one of my fav crazies 🙇

CW: Hanma can give two shits about your lung health but chooses not to when he feels like it, intimidation, threats of forced drug usage, sometimes forced participation in violent activities, thoughts of lovers suicide/murder(?), and whatever other yappin I put in here.

Hanma who smokes a fuck ton and doesn't mind giving you the good ol' second-hand effects of it, but absolutely detests you doing it on your own.

He snatches the stick from your mouth and holds it up and away from you with a small grit in his teeth. Hanma glares down in some curiosity but clearly squints in irritation.

"The hell is this? Don't tell me I'm being a bad influence on you now. If I catch you with one of these again, I won't let you off the hook so easily. You got it, Y/n?"

When you retort, telling him it's no different from when he does it and it is your own choice whether he likes it or not, he merely scoffs with a tilt of his narrow head. Throwing down the cigarette, the sound of his sneaker stomping and scraping it out against the pavement echos through the air with an annoying presence. Shuji demands the rest of your stash with a looming stare that can only put you into a state of sinking discimfort.

"Come on, don't be stubborn. Ya know, if you wanna do it so bad, why don't you try the whole pack? Mine too since it's a shitload better than that cheap stuff."

Reluctant on suffocation and early lung cancer, you begrudgingly hand over your smokes to him. Hanma smacks down on the box with an evidently loud shot of noise and slides it out of your palm--- pocketing it. He stretches out narrow smile as he leans down towards you.

"See, now it ain't so hard to listen."

He's still ticked off by the fact you think you can do whatever to your body without his permission, but since Shuji is so generous, he'll let you learn from your mistakes. See, he can be nice.

Don't test him though. Next time you're caught defying his selfish wishes, he's beating you down with degrading language and probably also beating whoever was involved. The convenience store employee that sold you the cigs, vape, or maybe even chewing tobacco? Yeah he's taking out his held back frustration on them. Bro is jumping over the counter and tearing their shit up.

Avoiding him because of his brutal and honest-to-God psychopathic personality? Now that's just cruel. Shuji is dragging your ass by the back of your shirt and pushes you to his motorcycle. The leopard print on the back of the bike makes you wanna barf every time you see it, but you got to keep it down if you wanna have enough energy to deal with him. He'll take you out no matter where you are at in that point of time and make you remember who he is; who you think you're messing with.

"Y/n, how many times do I have to tell you? Aim for the nose. That's easy for amateurs like you. Actually, lemme show you how to really deliver a jaw breaker-"

Yeah, he'll show you just how bad it can get with some random thugs on the street. You should be grateful with how gentle he's treating you. Instead of ending up with facial fractures, you have nice dates and thoughtful gifts. He's even teaching you a few tricks. How lucky can you get?

"I'm all done. Shit, I'm starved. Let's go grab a bite to eat, kay?"

Hanma thinks the only way you'll ever keep paying attention to him is if he keeps you and your actions in line. If you go off doing your own thing, his usually unmoving heart can't just stand there and watch you slowly leave him. Despite the negativity be brings into your life, he actually gets really fuckin anxious when he doesn't know or understand what you're doing. It's so troublesome how you make him feel. Yeah, being bored as shit is bad, but seeing you, the only thing that could ever bring him down to his knees unwillingly, slip away with nothing but disdain for him? Fuck no. He won't accept it. Shuji would rather kill you and then himself than have to bear the strange feeling of pain, or what other people call heartbreak, by his lonesome self.

Should he ever say he loves you, that would be the point of no return for the both of you. His hands have you tight in his clutches. No way out, no way back in for anyone else.

[pianostarinwonderland]

skully who r u [fae skully + a ramble on his possible background]

we have less than a day before we get the ending for this event and IM. NOT READY. im not ready to hear about how skully is a person from the past (and we're thinking 200 years or so), nor am i ready to go back to twst to hear that he's dead in our time and he's really the founder of modern halloween that nrc celebrates

... that's assuming he's human tho

and fortunately or unfortunately, there's hints that twst has been dropping that leads us to think otherwise

firstly: ears WHERE

in his live2D, you dont get to see his ears At All. not even a hint of an ear lobe. we know twst to be very detailed and deliberate with their designs so why did they choose to hide his ears

in his illustration, u can see a hint of an earlobe, but it's still very much covered

and as we know, when we look at malleus and lilia ears, we Know that they have pointy ears marking their pure fae ancestry. soooo skully..????? 🤨 fae skully real?????

i partly market the fae skully agenda bc PLS. WHAT IF... MEET . . .. .. IN OUR TIME. .. .. .. .... . PLS... . ... . .. . ..... 🥺 WE SEE HIM ALIVE BUT A LIL OLDER AND WAUGHHHHHHHHHHHHH pls i cant handle this yall

secondly: there is still that part in Episode 1-4 of skully saying to us "moshi... ne, moshi" instead of "moshimoshi", and a lot of ppl shared that the belief of supernatural beings not being able to address someone more than once is at play here. which would at least indicate to us that skully is at least not ur regular human being. and that is one thing about skully that we Can be sure about

on what skully may be, myonmyon put out a thread about how skully may be at least inspired by the Fear Gorta, a fae whose folklore was created from the irish famine. it's characterized by a skeletal appearance who wears tatters and rags. it can be benevolent or malevolent, but if u treat it kindly, it will bestow good blessings upon you. Fear Gorta also refers to Hungry Grass, which, if one steps on a cursed patch of grass (which i assume the fae created), they will always be hungry, no matter how much they eat, and will eventually die from starvation

ok why the irish famine? myonmyon and a few other theorists on twitter have speculated on skully possibly being inspired by (or maybe even being the twst equivalent of) the irish immigrants who moved to america, and from there, the tradition of halloween spread, resulting in the modern halloween that we know of today. it makes sense too given skully's character of spreading halloween to his fellow peers, who don't know what halloween is

oh but i don't mean to end this post here, no not yet. because there's a really interesting thread that i also found by Y_wwwsomething about how skully even got his viewpoint of halloween. i do like this thread because they kinda argue against skully's halloween being based on samhain, which a lot of people initially thought that that was his halloween. but samhain, even if it does have its scary side, is still a festival with feasting and noise, still very unlike skully's halloween. if anything, they suggested that the briar valley halloween is much closer to samhain.

my personal conclusion was that skully's halloween is based on all hallow's eve, and he's from a catholic family who celebrates halloween in a solemn manner. however, this thread is suggesting that skully idolizes the victorian british gentlemen and consequently the victorian halloween

let's look into the victorian halloween first. we note that the victorian halloween that was celebrated was often done by the upper class. several online sources will tell you that their halloween parties is, funnily enough, purposed for matchmaking. many halloween games involved girls looking into their futures, whether it's eating apples at midnight while looking at the mirror or looking at whatever object is in their apple or cake to see if they'll marry or die alone. halloween for them is less focused on fright and more on lover's passion.

however! their halloween parties are also dramatic in that they turn off the lights and only leave candles on, and when they greet guests, it's either by putting their own hand on the guest's shoulder or a glove filled with sawdust.

so we could have a situation here where skully, just like jack with christmas, may have observed one (1) party and misunderstood the victorian halloween, taking from it only the scary aspect and mixing it with any prior beliefs he may have had. it doesn't yet explain why he spent halloween alone, and tbh the catholic halloween celebration alone is already a near exact match of skully's definition of halloween, so im not very on board with this. could be that they are also loose enough to be festive? but im not sure

but im very interested about skully's possible reverence for the british gentlemen, which inspired his love for jack skellington! in the victorian era, they were defined by their birth (so if they were born to aristocratic parents), but men could also make themselves into gentlemen by growing their wealth and influence. some men have occupations that are respected enough to call them gentlemen (i.e. army members, members of the parliament). eventually the definition of a gentleman is one who received education from certain elite universities, but this is towards the end of the victorian era, so when trying to become a gentleman back then, it was much harder. so of course men tried to climb to become gentlemen. charles dickens actually wished to be recognized as a gentleman and so he wrote about it in great expectations.

and this is what interests me: during the irish famine, it's noted that british rule still stood on ireland, and if anything, the british elite even worsened the irish famine as they controlled trade between them. irish goods were exported out to britain and other countries while the people had nearly nothing, which either killed them off or pushed them to migrate. interestingly, british penal laws had it that irish catholics especially were suppressed—among their laws included that their land and home were confiscated by the british parliamentary officials in ireland

so what am i trying to get at here? it's that there's probably a nonzero chance that skully looked up to the gentlemen of britain... or if we're thinking in twst terms, the gentlemen of the queendom of roses. and this may be influenced by whatever was going on in his hometown, whether it's something akin to the irish famine and colonization or something else. a desire to be free? a desire to be more than what he is right now? it would very much be similar to sally and jack: sally, in how she wanted to be free from dr. finkelstein's controlling parenting, and jack in how he wanted to not just be the pumpkin king and tried to take over christmas. it also sort of mirrors leona's and jamil's desires for themselves too, how they want to be free to do the things they want to do and make an impact around them

what's even yummier is considering that if skully is a fae, or at least a nonhuman creature that has a distinctive ear shape, then he might take shame in his fae nature as he may perceive that the ideal gentleman is a human, which is similar to how sebek takes shame in his human nature. hence, his ears would be covered by his hair in order to hide this and mingle among the gentlemen.

anyway. idk how i went from "skully is a fae" to "skully is probably an irish catholic suppressed by the british colonial rule and wants to social climb hence he looks up to the ideal british gentleman, sees jack skellington in that image, and aims to be like that so that he can make something out of himself" but we ball ig

anyway, im cooked for tomorrow, im not ready yall :(

[hiphopcherrrypop]

WHAT

[stellar-collective]

went a bit crazier w this one than i intended but here’s Phoenix and Reginald in the ghost hunters au!! notes and extras below the cut :3

OK let’s talk about Phoenix’s design! this is them specifically after the conclusion of Cog In The Machine since bits and pieces of their appearance change throughout the story. they got their nose scar from Solaris, at the start of CITM they’re on crutches (and tbh they probably still should be but they’re stubborn about that kind of thing), and they got their red jacket sleeve during KBOOM! they also took some souvenirs from the ghosts that ended up being friendly to them; a violin string from Anna and a thin rope from Ollie. they turned both into bracelets and consider them good luck charms (and based on the fact that they’re still alive, they sure seem to work!)

their dynamic with Reggie is basically the same as canon; they both have a rather casual, almost irreverent view of their rather dangerous job and don’t spook easily. Phoenix is the front of the operation, engaging the ghosts directly, while Reginald hangs back with the equipment and gives them slightly questionable advice through their walkie talkie. he’s usually in the house with them, just a step removed from the situation so he can more easily run in and pull them out in case things go pear-shaped (which they do more often than not lol)

uhh let’s see, here’s some random stuff about the drawing itself: the UD on their cards stands for Upon Death, so it’s a final wish sort of thing. i gave Phoenix a last name because this au takes place in 2012 and they’re a civilian so they needed one but i didn’t put an enormous amount of thought into it. could still change. i used a website to make the newspaper to the left of Phoenix; it’s about Ollie! ok uhh yeah more coming soon in between pirate au stuff and normal content but that’s all i got for now :]

[meowserita]

Reading the battletech romance novel hungry like the wolf, and finished the first chapter and gods i am so happy the got an actual romance author to write it because its so good, and also was not expecting for the leads to be so immediately cooked. Like gods this whole thing is gonna be a feast seeing everything fall into place, and i havent even gotten to the mech fights which from what ive seen should be as hilarious as they are well written

[gunsatthaphan]

👏🏻 🏳️‍🌈 👏🏻

[ghostpebble]

i fear faker is an absolute BANGER and it's stuck in my head