#I didn't watch most of it

[littleapocalypsekitten]

I repeat: I absolutely defend the art of self-distraction and enjoying frivolous things in times of crisis. Yes, even if "other people do not get to." Me or you suffering a mental breakdown isn't exactly going to be of help to people in war zones. In fact, I dare say, if you want to be fresh for the latest protest or to write or call your asshole congresscritters again or to do anything else to actually try to *help* - you need to be in good enough mental shape to do so. Sometimes (most times) that means distracting yourself from the horrors for a hot second so you don't overload. There is a point where the obsession with "Awareness" turns into "Here, in your face all the time until you develop compassion-fatigue and a doomer attitude." We cannot "first solve all of the world's problems" before we get to enjoy anything. If we worked that that, Humanity wouldn't enjoy anything, ever. The world is always ending - for someone. Crises never end. Sometimes you HAVE to drink your coffee and say "this is fine." Maybe the coffee perks you up enough to help you reach for the fire extinguisher (you forgot where you left it).

[krysmcscience]

I have some questions about karaoke night, Alex Hirsch. Very Important Questions. Which I will happily scream at a poor hapless baby triangle who can have no answers for me, and possibly also does not have object permanence yet.

Follow-up that is I guess suggestive, but let's be real here, Bill's a fucking triangle:

Dude slipped right into his birthday suit, lmao

this is so stupid :D

Anyway, I don't care what anyone says, this brilliant individual knows what's up - Bill is absolutely way more of a monsterfucker than Ford could or ever will be, full stop.

[zivazivc]

Like a completely normal adult person, after watching the new trolls movie, I obsessively started putting together the brothers' backstory, the deeper reasons for their separation as well as how that all took place without disregarding the fact that they were trapped in the troll tree, which of course evolved into a fic in (forever) progress... yeah

Anyway, even though they aren't actively in the story much, i needed to design the parents, so uh meet Rosiepuff's daughter, Tulip, and her husband Branch.

I designed them based on the brothers' adult looks and in Tulip's case also on her mom's.

bonus baby branch:

[a-scary-lack-of-common-sense]

Me when I really want to draw fanart for a fandom because it looks so cool, but I haven't the slightest idea about any deeper lore than surface level plot and symbolism

[essektheylyss]

the visceral gut drop of "—and in his place is a gently floating male drow—" vs the absolute giddy high of "—who is no longer Seth. Instead you see, a dark elf—" like, Essek Thelyss really is narratively That Bitch and he sure knows how to make a fucking entrance

[licorishh]

no way she's alive ?? yea those mental health breaks because social media makes people suck are wild huh

[quicksilversnails]

Took some notes from the Wild Life retrospective episode of the Imp & Skizz podcast featuring Grian because I thought the behind the scenes info was really interesting!

(3:15) The wild cards were all kept totally secret from the players (apart from Grian), with the exception of the superpowers and finale (as they required the players to set keybinds)

(3:45) The players were given files containing the required mods each week, which were named things like "creeper rain" to throw them off

(4:12) Wild cards were a combination of data packs and mods

(4:38) Grian told them not to read the folder name to avoid spoilers (which is kind of impossible), so everyone fully believed there would be creeper rain lol. Grian was saying it in jest but everyone took it seriously and were apologetic about having seen it, to which Grian told them not to worry

(6:58) Grian originally contacted a data pack dev called Brace for help with programming the wild cards. Some, like the shrinking/growing could be achieved with minecraft attributes, but the snails were too janky and unusable. Grian still liked the idea though, so he reached out to mod developers Henkelmax and Breadloaf, who designed the pathfinding/behaviour from scratch

(8:49) They had a debugging mode used to test the pathfinding of the snails, shown in the podcast and in Grian's credits

(10:09) Grian wants most of the credit to go to the development team and artists, as he was mostly in charge of ideas & organization!

(10:39) Grian's only regret with the snails was that they were too fast in session 3, leading to unexpectedly many deaths. They were apparently not so difficult to get away from during testing, but perhaps the testers were more used to them than the players were

(11:44) Grian: "We did develop to the lowest common denominator" ie. prioritizing how players would struggle over how worrying about if players would do too well

(12:56) Oli's voice for the snails was iconic. It cost Impulse a life because he intentionally stayed closer to it to hear the voice lol

(13:42) Danny was in charge of the snail models and animations

(14:11) During testing, the snails just sounded like Oli, which made it feel weird. They pitched up his voice so that it'd be less immediately recognizable

(15:18) The snails' jumping attack was meant to be clearly telegraphed: they would stop, wiggle, make a "ooeee" sound before jumping. Many players had their friendly creatures volume turned very low/off (as cows and other mobs are loud), which made this attack much less obvious for them

(16:57) The growing/shrinking had the least testing done for it, as it was the simplest conceptually and to program. This meant that the falling off of blocks due to the shrinking hitboxes wasn't anticipated

(17:55) Before the 1st session, Grian told them that he didn't think anyone would die to the wild card. Pearl's death made Grian pretty nervous, as he didn't want everyone dying too early in the season

(19:29) 6 lives were given, knowing that many of the death to the wild cards were unexpected/unfair. The intent was for ~3 lives to be allocated for wild cards, and ~3 for PvP.

(21:13) The developers were all fans of the Life Series!

(22:43) The shrinking/growing was intentionally pretty simple to ease players/viewers into the concept and build up toward more dramatic wild cards like the snails

(25:38) In the hunger episode, Grian didn't know which foods would be good

(25:58) Grian thinks that "it's unfair that Grian already knows everything" is valid criticism, but that it's important for him to be involved with the ideas. Having someone else do that is like having someone else record his videos: Life Series is his brainchild

(26:35) Well before the season began, while they were still developing the concept, Grian asked the other players for wild card ideas that would meet a few criteria. All of them ended up being unused for one reason or another. Impulse thinks his ideas were very "inside the box" because he was viewing things through what was possible in vanilla Minecraft. His idea was to have a scavenger hunt where the players would search to find a relic. The first person to find it would get a buff. Skizz's idea was for every player to turn into a random passive mob for every given interval of time. They would have to find every other player of the same mob type as them or else the whole group loses a life.

(29:44) The food qualities were weighted by the rarity of the item, so very common blocks like dirt and cobblestone would never give anything good. The other items were randomly selected

(30:23) Regular blocks/items cannot be made edible normally, so they had to circumvent that and custom code a fix for items not stacking correctly

(32:41) While a lot of players do want to win, the main priority is creating entertainment, which prioritizes playing recklessly

(33:20) The food wild card wasn't included in the finale because it would've felt like "too much". There was a higher risk of technical issues since it changed the data values of items, and Grian didn't want someone's last death to be because they ate their sword. In his mind, it was a good and fun wild card, but didn't need to be repeated in the finale. Impulse points out that they all would have collected more rare items by that point, removing the incentive to search for blocks to eat

(33:46) The wild cards in the finale were nerfed from their original sessions. The shrinking/growing had a smaller height range, the snails moved slower, etc.

(36:21) The personalized snail skins were a late addition by Danny, who made 18 skins very quickly

(36:49) Grian did not anticipate the snails becoming as popular with fans as they were. After the session released, they had the idea to release the snail merchandise, which directly funded the rest of the season

(39:20) Grian spent what "felt like every day" testing with the developers. They'd record the sessions on Tuesdays, meet up with the dev team, talk about what need to be done, testing, bugs, etc, edit and upload on Saturday, and would get a few days grace before starting again

(40:01) After the snail session, Grian was worried that the season would be very short due to all the deaths. They were considering toning down the later wild cards but ultimately didn't change them too much

(40:36) The time wild card was carefully balanced. If it had gone even a little faster, many players likely would have died because they wouldn't have time to react to threats like baby zombies or creepers.

(40:57) While sessions normally run for a variable amount of time, session 4 was hardcoded at 2 hours. Grian ended the session ~10 minutes early, just after they hit max speed, because he felt like things were getting dicey

(42:46) When the wild card first activates, it looks a lot like the server had frozen or crashed. Grian told the players before the session started that it would look like the game was broken, but that it isn't broken. Skizz tabbed out anyway and missed the beginning 😔

(43:30) Having the rain start just as the wild card began was a good visual indicator of time slowing down. This was a suggestion from the dev team (probably Brace)

(44:41) Impulse and Grian "cheesed" the end of the session by going branch mining. Grian wanted players to take advantage of the wild cards (eg. mining quickly, helping to kill someone), and not have them just be an annoyance.

(45:30) Keeping the client and server-side time stay in sync was challenging. The sky's motion was changed to be smoother on client-side. The players were also not as fast as the server (around 2x faster), the server was going faster than that, and the time of day was even faster

(46:56) The sounds were pitched up/down based on the speed to add to the effect

(27:46) In testing, if the players were made 7x faster, it would be basically unplayable, which was why it was capped at 2x speed. This made mobs very dangerous, as they were now faster than players and could catch up to you and kill you easily

(49:01) On several occasions, they had to extend the fuse duration of creepers to make them more fair. In the time session, their speed was only increased by ~10%

(49:39) Usually, Grian was the one to test the wild cards and notice when things like creeper speed would be an issue, since he was the one with experience making videos

(50:50) A challenge with balancing wild cards is accounting for the playstyles of so many players: reckless players like Scar and Skizz, "kind and gentle" players like Bigb who would stay off to the sides, and "the sweat squad" (Scott, Impulse) who play very cautiously

(52:48) Trivia Bot was the only wild card that was not planned in advance. Grian was struggling to come up with a wild card for that episode, and wanted to have a wild card available that could give people lives in case many people died to early wild cards without it feeling cheap.

(53:33) Trivia seemed a little boring on its face, so presentation was essential

(54:34) This one made Grian the most stressed due to all the moving parts involved in making it (coding and pathfinding mostly by Henkelmax, visuals by Hoffen, audio/music, questions)

(55:08) Trivia Bot's design was based on Grumbot and Mettaton from Undertale. Hoffen drew concept art shown in the video

(58:32) They show Trivia Bot's custom animation for becoming a snail and it's really cool

(59:12) The music was the most stressful part of the project. Grian spent 2-3 days looking through Epidemic Sounds for a Trivia Bot theme song and couldn't find anything good. He commissioned Zera @hopepetal for a theme song, which is played in the podcast. However, Grian realized he needed a full audio package, so he commissioned Oli late in development, who created the final soundtrack and many audio variations

(1:01:38) Grian wants to send appreciation for everyone who worked on the project, even if their work ultimately went unused

(1:02:58) Skizz was happy to give back however he could by staying on standby in the final episode as a zombie, as the players were able to "reap all the benefits" of the hard work of the development team

(1:05:21) Grian didn't know any of the trivia questions beforehand, which were done by fans of the series. The goal was for ~50% of the questions to be answered correctly, which was approximately met

(1:07:11) Players couldn't get questions about themselves because it would be too easy. This would encourage players to leave their bot, allowing other players to mess with them

(1:07:57) Grian felt a little left out from the discovery element of the wild cards, and decided to mess with Scar by hiding his bot. He wasn't expecting Scar to die from it, and could tell that he was genuinely a little upset by it. Grian felt bad about it, which led to a genuine in-game alliance between them

(1:12:32) Grian was very close to letting Trivia Bot give lives as rewards, but decided it would feel too cheap

(1:14:38) Mob swap was slightly toned down, with more camels and sniffers spawning

(1:15:07) Evokers didn't drop totems anymore. Instead, there was a minuscule chance a warden or wither would spawn, which would drop a totem if killed. Grian was a little disappointed that the warden got cheesed in the end

(1:17:45) Having the mobs start passive and turn hostile was mostly for the presentation, building anticipation, and so players could predict where mobs would spawn and react accordingly, making things feel less unfair

(1:20:32) There was no superpower made for Skizz (or Mumbo presumably)

(1:20:38) The superpowers were another late addition. There was a large design doc where Grian created all the powers, which were handed over to Henkelmax and completed over 4 days

(1:21:42) Grian avoided superpowers involving strength, that could cause someone to die easily. Most of the powers were social or movement-based, which couldn't be used for offence as easily

(1:22:25) Some powers were randomly assigned, others weren't. Impulse's was random. Cleo's, Bigb's, Lizzie's, Grian's were assigned.

(1:24:25) Grian gave himself the mimic because it could easily backfire (like in Grian's fall damage death), and because it would've been confusing for a player who wasn't aware of the other powers. They likely would've spent the episode just figuring out how everything worked and not actually using the power to its best ability

Lots of discussion about the superpowers and how they interacted in the episode itself, go watch if you're interested :)

(1:33:38) Talk on how the series "standard" rules evolved since 3rd Life. There was no keep inventory, and no restrictions on enchanting levels or potions, which created slow or unbalanced fights

(1:36:23) 3rd Life was designed to be an experimental series, which made Grian eager to improve it. For example, some people just weren't dying in 3L, leading to the boogeyman in LL, and so on

(1:37:17) The goal with the seasons isn't to one-up the previous one, but to create a different experience every time, which keeps things engaging for the creators

(1:38:31) At the end of each session, Grian would ask the group if they had fun and how they felt about the wild cards. According the Skizz, the answer was "a resounding yes"

(1:39:08) Grian had moments throughout the season where he personally felt like things didn't go well for him, and was anxious for the rest of the group's episodes. Things worked out while editing the raw footage, though. His issues were never with the wild cards themselves, but his own actions (traps not working, spending too long branch mining), but would always find funny moments in his footage

(1:43:41) Everyone in the Life Series cast genuinely likes and genuinely respects everybody else in the group. This allows them to make the show and get mad at each other, because they know it's all just in-character

(1:44:50) It'd be hard to top Wild Life in spectacle, and Grian doesn't want to start an arms race with himself. The next season could potentially be closer to 3rd Life, but Grian's not sure yet. For Grian, Wild Life was the most enjoyable

(1:45:20) Grian: "As long as people keep enjoying [the Life Series] then I'd love to keep doing it"

(1:49:35) With the finale, Grian knew how the wild cards played out the previous sessions and was able to adjust them

(1:49:56) Grian's goal was to create safe chaos where everyone knew what was happening and wouldn't die to them, which didn't go entirely to plan. The snails were 60% of their original speed and people still died

(1:51:03) Grian made a precise timeline of when each wild card would start/stop, it wasn't randomized.

(1:54:16) All the superpowers were randomized, with Bdubs' power being removed from circulation because it didn't have much use in a finale setting

(1:56:10) It was important for Grian that in the final moments, the wild cards were removed, so there were no interruptions. The timing worked out well because there were a few people left and it ended within ~10 minutes (this implies that the change wasn't based on # of players alive, as people had speculated based on Gem's death)

(1:58:48) The players all randomly switched to zombie skins throughout the session to mess with people on NameMC. Well-played :)

[e-b-reads]

OK this is an excuse for me to be a little pretentious/pedantic, but I figured others might also want the opportunity to be a little pretentious/pedantic, so I'm making a poll out of it!

My pretension: I like reading (duh!), and I'm OK with a little inaccuracy for the sake of artistry. I mean, there are definitely authors who never bother to google basic terminology in a field, or try to write convincing history (or fantasy) without actually knowing much history...but if an author I otherwise like gets a little detail wrong about some specialist thing, I'm not likely to even notice. Except! If the thing is about boats/sailing. Examples below, but first, the poll:

I'm sure there's some technical mistakes (especially related to boats I'm less used to, like tall ships) that still slip by me. But I've had a couple times recently (different books/authors) where I was reading and enjoying myself and was suddenly twitched out of the story by an inaccuracy. One book where someone was asked to secure the boom after a tack (on a nice 45-ft modern sloop) which already doesn't make a ton of sense, and then she moved to a strange place in the boat to apparently do this. Another where the author twice mixed up jibing and tacking in dialogue (on the lines of "Don't sail to close to the wind or you'll jibe!" At least once the speaker was supposed to be an expert sailor).

Anyway, I still enjoyed the books overall, but I noticed both times I literally had to stop reading a think for a second, like wait, was I imagining it wrong? No, it's the author's fault! So now I'm telling you all about it.

[anto-pops]

Bitter Truths - Sebastian Sallow x Female!Reader

Summary: Following the revelation that Sebastian has gone back to dabbling in the Dark Arts, you end things with him and try your hardest to stand firm in the decision. He has no intention of making things easy for you, however, and he’ll manipulate any situation to his advantage if it means getting you back on his side.

Even if that means manipulating you.

Word Count: 6k

Warnings: 18+, aged up characters, dark!Sebastian, emotional manipulation, explicit sexual content

Full fic is also up on Ao3 here for your viewing pleasure

You weren’t sure who you hated more. Professor Sharp for refusing to hear you out following the disaster in potion’s class, or your idiot of an ex-boyfriend for causing said disaster in the first place. 

There was absolutely no reason for it either. Even though the two of you hadn’t talked in a week, you liked to think you were familiar with his tendencies in school. Helping Garreth with his obscure, insane ideas had never been something Sebastian made a habit of doing, which just left you all the more frustrated. 

He had clearly landed you both in trouble intentionally. 

Following your fifth-year, you had dutifully stayed firm in your boundary that if Sebastian so much as glanced at anything pertaining to the Dark Arts, you would cut your losses and leave him to deal with the consequences. For too long, you had wallowed in self-pity at the blatant way you had let him take advantage of your kindness, manipulating you into helping him essentially get away with murder. The broody persona he had returned to Hogwarts with your sixth-year had led you to believe that he wouldn’t listen, but he had proven you wrong. Bending over backwards to get on your good side, you had eventually relented and let him back into your life, and that inch given quickly turned into a mile earned when both of you started dating.

After making it through the entire year without a glimpse of his former habits, you had mistakenly assumed your final year of school would be much the same. For the most part it had been– until last week, apparently. 

You had found Salazar Slytherin’s spell book in his dorm. 

It had been well hidden, too; charmed to look like an ordinary textbook, then wrapped in one of his old scarfs and stuffed at the bottom of his trunk. Call it a gut feeling, but you had known something was going on with Sebastian even before finding the book he’d sworn up and down he had destroyed years prior. He would stay out well past curfew, coming back looking anxious and worn down. The far off look in his eyes you had seen towards the end of your fifth-year had returned, along with the dark circles under his eyes that told you he wasn’t sleeping much, if at all. 

Most damning of all had been his three day absence from school. Sebastian had said the Ministry had summoned him to London to finally sign over the deed to Solomon’s old house in Feldcroft to him. An innocent enough excuse, and a believable one when it had been relayed to the Headmaster and to the faculty… but not to you. 

Sebastian wanted nothing to do with that house. He had told you so himself numerous times. 

So why was it that when he’d returned to Hogwarts after those three days, the barely there scent of Dark Magic accompanied him?

Gaslighting yourself into believing that you were imagining things had been difficult, but you’d managed to convince yourself that it wasn’t real– that the rotting, smokey scent that had clung to his clothes for that brief moment was a trick of the wind. But then you’d found the book.

After throwing that stupid spell book in his face and swearing at him with every curse-word that existed, you’d followed through on your promise to him. You ended things then and there, too angry and too irrational to even take the time to hear him out when he’d begged you to. 

“Please just listen to me! It’s not what you think, darling, I swear. I was only–”

“I don’t give a damn, Sebastian!” If looks could kill, the glare you shot his way would have had him collapsing on the spot. “I don’t need to hear the lies or the justifications. You lied to me. You told me you were done with this shit, but apparently that was a fat load of crap. I can’t even look at you right now.” 

Turning away from him to reach for the door handle, you yelped in alarm when his arm shot past your head to hold the exit shut. You spun around, eyes wide with shock and anger, and met his stormy, frantic gaze. He was unrecognizable; his chest heaved violently as he drew in quick breaths one after another, and his mouth was drawn in a tight line across his face. Coiled tighter than a spring, you worried that he would snap with you in his crosshairs, and that thought induced a kind of fear that you hadn’t felt since your fifth-year. 

“You need to let me explain,” he grit through his teeth. You heard his nails scrape against the wood of the door as his hand curled into a tight fist, and the sound snapped you out of your momentary stupor. 

Planting your hands squarely against his chest, you shoved him away with the strength of a Troll, sending him stumbling back towards the middle of the empty dorm with a look of disbelief etched across his face. “No,” you turned back for the door, wrenching it open and flinging it behind you as you stepped into the hallway. “I don’t.”

He had tried and failed to speak to you since then, but you had gone out of your way to avoid him as much as possible. You found yourself sitting with Poppy and Natty during mealtimes, and you’d skipped a few classes altogether to spare yourself the torment of having him try anything there. If your friends knew something was wrong with you, they didn’t comment on it, and you were immensely grateful for their willful obliviousness. 

Unfortunately for you, however, you had underestimated Sebastian’s ability to manipulate situations to his advantage. 

Even after two years, Garreth hadn’t stopped concocting his… unique brews. It was a gamble to walk into Professor Sharp’s class and assume that nothing would blow up in his face that day. You knew it, the Professor knew it, everyone knew it. 

So why Sebastian had seemingly gone out of his way to help Garreth this time around told you enough about his unwillingness to let you go quietly. 

There was no way of knowing what he had given Weasley to add to his Restorative Drought at the beginning of class, and quite frankly, you didn’t care. The exchange had transpired right before you eyes, and whatever thick goop Garreth had dumped into his cauldron had caused an explosion that put all his past fuck-ups to shame. Instantly the room had filled with a pungent gas that was so foul and nauseating, Natty had been forced to run out into the hallway to expel her lunch from her stomach. In the midst of your own gagging you had pulled out your wand to cast Ventus, a wind charm that collected the bulk of the gas into a concentrated funnel that was then directed towards the open window in a bid to clear the room. 

Your plan would have worked… had Professor Sharp not blocked the magically condensed jet of putrid air with his face. 

To say he’d been angry would be a monumental understatement. The palpable rage that had radiated from him was a deadly sort; simmering beneath the surface, powerful, and silent. He had wasted little time after that in docking you, Garreth, and Sebastian fifty house points each before sending the three of you away to detention for the evening. 

Garreth would have attended… had he not gotten violently ill following the debacle. He hadn’t even made it down the hall outside the room before folding over on himself and vomiting profusely all over the floor. Evidently he had taken the brunt of the eruption and was left to cope with the aftereffects. You didn’t envy him. 

Nurse Blainey had apparently promised that her patient would make up the detention as soon as he was done throwing up the contents of his stomach, which had ultimately left you stuck in Professor Weasley’s classroom alone with the current bane of your existence. 

You knew it was pure chance that Garreth was unable to sit in detention with the two of you, but for some reason you were convinced that Sebastian had seamlessly orchestrated the whole thing. 

The bastard was probably feeling awfully smug about it, too.

Sebastian sat at the table furthest from you, boring holes into the side of your head that you were doing your damnedest to ignore. The only thing that likely kept him from outright trying to speak to you was Professor Weasley anally watching the two of you like a hawk in-between grading reports. She had already scolded the life out of you both, taking additional time to chastise Sebastian, because apparently she had seen him in detention “far too many times this semester”. Yet another thing he had kept from you, evidently. It didn’t even seem like he had taken the reprimanding to heart if his slack posture and disinterested expression was anything to go by, but you were too angry to pay it any mind. 

This was shaping up to be the longest three hours of your fucking life. 

The chipped wood on the edge of the desk continued to captivate your attention in favor of meeting the brunet’s unrelenting stare. Your jaw ached from how hard you’d been clenching your molars together, and your leg had cramped up twice now from bouncing it to rid yourself of the jitters that plagued you. You were prepared for the bulk of the detention to continue like that; slowly, suffocated by a tense silence, and wholly uncomfortable. That is, until the door to the classroom was thrown open rather aggressively. 

Looking up from your desk, you watched as a nurse from the Hospital Wing barreled through the entryway, her hair disheveled beneath her bonnet and her glasses crooked atop her nose. She sucked in a sharp breath before straightening herself out and saying, “Matilda– I’m so sorry. Nurse Blainey asked me to fetch you. Your nephew is… well, he’s in quite the state.”

Professor Weasley took her own glasses off to pinch the bridge of her nose, heaving a heavy sigh before muttering, “Merlin, that boy will be the death of me, I swear. Is he alright?” 

“He’s– well…” the nurse trailed off, nervously wringing her hands together as she searched for the right words. “He’s alive, but whatever he added to that potion is causing some… concerning side effects. He has four arms and quite a few extra toes presently.” 

“He what?” Professor Weasley abruptly swiveled her head in Sebastian’s direction, fixing him with an incredulous look that he had the good grace to shrink at. “What exactly did you give him to add to that potion?” 

Stubbornly, you watched through your peripheral vision as Sebastian shrugged nonchalantly before murmuring, “Just troll bogeys. He didn’t tell me what he was trying to accomplish with them, though.” 

Pointedly, Professor Weasley rose from her seat and walked around her desk, brushing a few wrinkles out of her skirt as she strode for the door. “I’ll save my questions about how you got your hands on such a thing for after I get back. In the meantime, don’t even think about going anywhere. Both of you.” 

You could only furrow your brow indignantly before she had turned her attention back to the nurse. The woman spun on her heel to lead the way without a second glance, and as soon as the massive door clicked shut behind them, your heart sank into your feet. 

You were alone. With him. 

An uncomfortable feeling emanated from within the room, the air ripe with tension thick enough to cut with a knife. It took everything in you to keep your eyes averted at your desk before deciding to simply put your head down against the wood. If Professor Weasley was bound to be preoccupied in the Hospital Wing for the remainder of the evening, you could at least catch some shut eye in the meantime. The events from the last week had taken a toll on you mentally, and you were beyond eager to wrap up the day so you could fall into your bed and sleep. 

It couldn’t have been thirty seconds before you felt the table jostle as the culprit of your misfortune made himself comfortable next to you, and with your face still hidden in the crook of your arm, you pursed your lips in blatant distaste. 

Maybe if you pretended to be asleep, he would give up? There was no way he actually thought that there was a conversation to be had after everything he had done. Aside from a handful of inappropriate, choice words that were unbecoming of a lady, you had nothing to say to him. 

Evidently, it seemed that Sebastian thought otherwise. 

“We need to talk.” 

Merlin– even though you had heard his voice around school in the last seven days, having it directed at you while he used that deep, commanding tenor was another thing entirely. A weak, naive part of you was inclined to listen, but you stubbornly burrowed your face deeper into your arm and somehow pressed your lips together even harder. No, you thought, we don’t. 

“Either you talk to me now while we’re finally alone in here, or I’ll drag you to the Undercroft afterwards. Willingly or not.”

At that, you sat up to glare incredulously at him. The unmistakable conviction in his voice and the obstinate tilt to his chin confirmed that he wasn’t lying in the slightest, and he crossed his arms over his chest as though daring you to call his bluff. 

He wouldn’t…

“I would,” he countered your thoughts with narrowed eyes, which in turn resulted in another unamused glare from you. “I’d be an idiot not to try when you’re finally in a position to listen. Especially considering you’ve avoided me like the plague all week.” 

The audacity of this man. How dare he make you out to be some heartless villain. His status as a pariah in your eyes was his own doing, directly caused by the steady flow of manipulations and lies that had dripped from his lips for who knew how long. You had given him another chance after everything, and what did you have to show for it now? Nothing but an aching heart and enough resentments to last a lifetime. 

“And whose fault is that?” you snapped, every word laced with venom. “Your priorities were made abundantly clear to me after you lied straight to my face. How long did you think you could keep it from me, hm? Did you think I was too stupid to notice, or did toeing the line right in front of me excite you somehow? You’re not allowed to be upset that your actions had consequences.” 

As you sucked down a breath and fixed Sebastian with a hard, unyielding look, he stared at you oppressively. His mouth pressed together as he processed your words. Whether it was what you had said that left him speechless or the fact that you had said anything to him at all, you didn’t know. Regardless, he took a second too long to reply, which gave you the chance to click your tongue disapprovingly.

“I have nothing to say to you, Sebastian. Go back to your seat before you land us in more trouble.”

At that moment, it was as if he had been doused with chilled water. Sebastian snapped out of his stupor and frowned, his back straightening as he gathered his resolve once more. “I beg to differ, I have plenty to say. We haven’t even scratched the surface of what needs to be said–”

“Nothing needs to be said!” you blurted, your steely resolve crumbling ever so slightly. This wasn’t as easy as you thought it would be. To spit in the face of his pleading and remain firm in your refusal to hear him out. He sounded so… desperate. More than that, his words were tinged with unmistakable sincerity. Some internal part of you writhed in agony as you ignored your heart and forced out, “I don’t care, Sebastian. I’m tired. I gave you plenty of chances before and you’ve officially squandered every last one. I can’t do this with you– not now, not ever.” 

The telling sting of tears welling in your eyes had you averting your gaze to the door, silently praying for Professor Weasley to come back, because you were being made acutely aware of how difficult it was to keep this up. You had given Sebastian nearly two years of your life. You had loved him– you still loved him– but you didn’t think you had the strength to go down this path with him again. The Dark Arts had brought the two of you nothing but misery, and for him to go back to it after all this time not only infuriated you, it saddened you. 

He had done so well for himself. He had changed, wholly and truly. Even Ominis had let him back into his life after a grueling six months of pleading. But for him to pull all of this on you a second time… 

How did the saying go? Fool me once; shame on you. Fool me twice…

You were tired of being tricked. 

The sudden feeling of Sebastian’s hand skimming down your spine had your head swiveling back towards him in a flash. Your arm flew up to knock him away, but he anticipated the move and caught your wrist with his other hand, coiling his fingers around the limb to lock you in his grip. Through the well of tears in your eyes, you watched as he brought your trapped hand to his mouth, pressing a chaste, gentle kiss to the inside of your palm before nuzzling you affectionately. The motion was so tender– so adoring– that you couldn’t help but watch him completely dumbstruck. 

“I’m sorry,” he murmured against the skin of your hand. Kissing you again, his dark eyes flicked back to meet yours, “I’m sorry for lying. I should have been honest from the start. There’s no one else I trust more in this world than you, you know that, right?” 

The hand on your back took to tracing languid shapes against your blouse, inching its way lower towards the waistline of your skirt, and your breath hitched in your throat as you hastily wiped away an errant tear that slipped down your cheek. You eyed him warily and curled your fingers in the hand he still held, but he made no move to pull away. “You should have done a lot of things, Sebastian. But you can’t change the past. You messed up, and I need you to accept that.” 

“But what if I could?” He spoke the words in a low voice, then tilted his head down so he was gazing at you through his dark lashes. The look… it was predatory. Animalistic, in a way. It scared you that you even began to find the expression intriguing. Moreover, you had no clue what it was he meant… but you wanted to. 

“What if you could what?” 

“What if I could change the past?” Your brows furrowed in alarm, but Sebastian ignored your wary countenance and slid to the edge of his seat so he was mere inches from you. The hand on your back reached the tucked hem of your shirt, his fingers brazenly sneaking beneath the material to trail his touch up your bare back, and despite your reservations, you couldn’t help but shudder. “What if I could use power no one has ever dreamed of? What if I was close to uncovering magic that could make anything possible? Dark or not, it’s magic. It was created for a purpose. What’s so wrong with using it? It’s a tool, same as all spells… it would be wasteful to bury it just because the Ministry says so.”

“But–” his fingers skimmed over your brassiere, toying with the metal clasps that held it in place with a look of mischievousness glimmering in his eyes. Unwilling to back down, however, you forced the rest of your retort from your lips. “It’s not just the Ministry that says so, it’s history. Look at Isidora–”

Sebastian tugged on the hand he still had clasped in his own, drawing you into his space so suddenly that you gasped softly. He let go of your wrist to cup your cheek, leaning in more until he was so close that you could see your own reflection in his eyes. “Isidora’s problem was that she lacked conviction. She was motivated, sure, but she still sought approval from the wrong people. Those Keepers became a vise of her own making. She was never going to get anywhere with her abilities so long as she waited for their consent.” 

You had a feeling you knew where he was going with this. A bad feeling. 

“But you?” His eyes jumped between your own, flicking down at your lips every so often as he slipped two of his fingers under the strappy attire beneath your blouse. “You could be so much better than her. You can control your powers with so much more finesse than she ever could, and together we could unlock untold secrets about magic. Think about it, darling. You and me, unearthing troves of hidden knowledge. What’s the harm in that?” 

He didn’t even give you a chance to respond. The miniscule distance between the two of you vanished in a heartbeat as Sebastian closed in, and your words were stolen from you as his lips crushed against yours with an intensity that muddled your thoughts. You weren’t an idiot– you knew this was his way of distracting you from everything; his lies, the spell book, the utterly incomprehensible bombshell he had just dropped on you. In prime Sebastian fashion, he had disarmed you completely and reduced you to putty in his hands, your previous anger momentarily forgotten as he probed around your mouth with his tongue. 

It was entirely too predictable… but you would be lying if you said it wasn’t addicting. You had missed him. You didn’t think you would ever stop loving him– his faults be damned. 

The fact that the two of you were in Professor Weasley’s classroom barely mattered to you– especially not when the hand on your back finally undid the clasps of your brassiere with a dexterity that enticed you far more than was healthy. With that out of the way, Sebastian dragged the limb out from under your shirt and wrapped both arms around your midsection, continuously devouring the tiny sounds you made with his mouth as he hoisted you out of your chair and deposited you roughly on the desk. 

It was positively frantic. The hurried pulling of clothes and the panted breaths exchanged in-between kisses made it seem like the two of you had been apart for years instead of one measly week. You were still angry with him for lying, and you were worried about what indulging him now would mean for the two of you later down the line… but for the time being, you didn’t care. Sebastian was your vise, and you were certain that no matter how hard you tried, you would never be able to bring yourself to be rid of him. 

You were left to hold yourself steady as Sebastian let go of you to tug at his belt, his teeth biting and pulling at your bottom lip harshly as he drew away briefly to flick the leather aside and undo the catch of his pants. He pulled his cock from the confines of his briefs hastily, stroking himself furiously with one hand as the other blindly gathered your skirt into a disheveled heap below your navel. The ferocity with which he yanked your undergarments down your legs made you gasp, and as soon as those were pulled down past your thighs, he went right back to swallowing up the delicious sounds you made. 

Without breaking away, Sebastian dragged you towards the edge of the desk and lifted one of your thighs up, holding it firmly to his hip as he bumped the head of his cock against your throbbing cunt. The growing wetness there made the teasing slide of his tip through your folds positively heavenly for both of you, and you felt arousal curling in the pit of your stomach when the man before you growled. 

He broke away from your swollen lips with a shaky exhale, and you blinked up at him as you took in the ravenous expression that adorned his handsome face. Flushed cheeks, messy hair, and a lustful, wanton gleam in his dark, bottomless eyes. It was all for you, you realized dimly. 

It was one of the worst ideas you had ever had, but you decided to be greedy. If he was going to offer, then you were going to take. 

You adjusted your weight so you were supporting yourself up with one hand while your other flew to the back of Sebastian’s neck. If the feeling of your nails digging into his skin was unpleasant, he definitely didn’t care, seeing as he groaned appreciatively when you dragged his lips back to yours. It was all a flurry of tongue and teeth as the two of you shamelessly rutted like animals atop the desk, until he finally moved his hips to press into your sopping wet entrance, and the stretch was as delectable as it was jarring. 

“Fuck,” you heard him mutter against your lips. The fingers he had wrapped around your thigh dug into your flesh, the incredible feeling of your warm, pulsing walls enveloping him making him shudder with delight. “I love you. I love you so much, you know?” 

You nodded brainlessly, still processing the feeling of him breaching you. “I love you too. You’re everything to me, Sebastian. I–” 

His hips jerked forward at the declaration, making you cry out against your better judgement, and even though being noisy was quite possibly the worst choice either one of you could make, Sebastian seemed to relish in the sound. In a split second, he had you laid out on your back across the desk, tightening his grip on your leg with a strength you knew would leave bruises. He shook his head as he chuckled to himself, then fixed his sights on you as he began to pump his hips with a tenacity that left you breathless. Your spine arched off the wooden surface as he worked to set a brutal pace, his lust-dark eyes watching you rapaciously as your mouth fell open around a long, drawn out moan. 

“We were made for each other,” you heard him state gruffly. Your other leg was swiftly lifted and tossed over his shoulder, spreading you open for him so obscenely that you knew you would never be able to attend class here with a straight face ever again. The new position gave him the freedom to press his broad hand against your lower stomach as well, applying ample pressure so he could feel the head of his cock spearing into the deepest parts of you. It felt surreal– it was mind-boggling– and you were certain that you broke your nails when you instinctively dragged your fingers along the desk. “Two sides of the same coin, darling. That’s what we are. You’re mine, and I’m all yours. Only yours. You believe me, right?” 

Getting your tongue to work was next to impossible, so your acknowledgement came out sounding like more of a garbled wheeze. Sebastian only laughed at your fucked-out state, moving his hand from your stomach up your torso, shoving your undone brassiere out of the way to roughly squeeze one of your breasts in his warm palm. The intensity of his thrusts kicked up then, and he took to grinding his balls against the swell of your ass with every deep, aggressive plunge of his cock. 

Through your hazy vision, you saw as his head tipped forward between his shoulders, the pleasure he derived from fucking you on the desk taking him to new heights. You were inclined to think similarly, because for some unfathomable reason, the threat of the Professor walking in at any moment only added to the rush of ecstasy that coursed through your veins. 

The force of Sebastian’s thrusts made your arm shake as you lifted it from the desk, planting it squarely over your clit so you could rub aggressive, desperate little circles over it. The instant gratification had you groaning loud, your voice echoing off the walls of the classroom and dragging Sebastian’s attention back to you. He wrenched his hand apart from your breast to snatch yours away from your bundle of nerves, then pinned the limb to the desk beside your head. 

He leaned in close to your face, bending your leg so far back that the sinful sound of his hips slapping against your wet skin amplified tenfold. It was equal parts embarrassing and erotic, and you mewled pitifully as he smirked and proclaimed, “That’s my job, darling.” 

You were about to say that you didn’t care whose job it was, so long as it was a job that got done– but his calloused thumb planting itself over the nub interrupted your snide comment, replacing it instantly with a quivering moan that had him twitching inside of you. Entirely at his mercy as he pounded into you, the rapid flicking he bestowed upon your clit brought you closer to that blissful edge you yearned to fall over. The fire in your gut burned hotter, your senseless noises got raspier, and in turn Sebastian’s hold on you became possessive. 

He watched you unblinkingly, waiting for you to reach your peak with rapt focus, and all you could do was meet his unwavering stare as your climax finally washed over you. Your mouth fell open as a choked groan escaped your hoarse throat, and Sebastian swiftly released your thigh to cover your mouth with his hand, muffling the noises enough so that the sanctity of your activities wouldn’t be broadcasted to anyone nearby. 

You were hardly of a mind to care– you were seeing stars. Everything around you flashed white as you trembled uncontrollably beneath him, your muscles tensing and your walls sucking him in impossibly deeper. A rumbling groan sounded from him as he fucked you through all of it, only deigning to increase his pace once he felt you go lax under him, and then it didn’t take long for him to follow you over that edge. He repeated your name over and over again as he came, bottoming out into your soaked cunt as he emptied himself deep within your walls, those predatory eyes of his sliding shut for the briefest of moments. 

It was hard to say how long the two of you stayed like that; coiled around one another as you both worked to control your breathing. Sebastian’s hand slipped away from your mouth, granting you the ability to suck down deep, steadying gulps of air, and shortly thereafter you felt him trail his fingers down your sides soothingly. 

Through the post-coital haze that clouded your mind, you found yourself staring at him as he stood straight and pulled out of your brutalized folds. He tucked himself back into his pants swiftly, scanning your flushed body beneath him with a sort of unbridled longing that left you feeling exposed. 

Where did the two of you go from here? What was next? 

Wordlessly, Sebastian helped you sit up, huffing out a laugh when your forehead thumped against his chest weakly. He took it upon himself to fix up your clothes, tucking your shirt back into your wrinkled skirt before carefully bending down to drag your underwear back up your boneless legs. You had to shift a little to help him get them on properly, but your head stayed firmly planted against him the entire time. 

A hand on your neck roused you from your hiding spot, and you cautiously tipped your head back to look up at him through your lashes. Sebastian stared down at you with a hopeful expression on his face– something else akin to excitement shadowing the look. “Do you trust me?” 

That was one hell of a loaded question… especially following everything that had transpired throughout the week. You mulled it over quietly, choosing your words carefully before opting to say, “I want to.”

He sighed and brought his other hand to your cheek, cupping your face in his clammy palms as he nodded. “Okay. No more secrets. No more lies. I swear to you, from here on out, you’ll get nothing but the truth from me.” He waited to see if you would push him away or refute the statement, but you didn’t. You just pursed your lips, hesitating only briefly before nodding. It seemed pointless to call his bluff right now. “Would you come with me? To do all the things I told you about?”

From outside the classroom, you could suddenly hear the sound of muffled voices approaching. Professor Weasley had to be returning from the Hospital Wing, and the two of you were still in a very precarious position. One that was guaranteed to land you in more trouble than you could fathom. 

Sebastian jerked your face back towards him, forcing your eyes to return to his as he looked at you with sheer desperation. “Would you?” he reiterated urgently. 

“I–” you gingerly lifted your hands to hold his wrists, opening and closing your mouth as you worked to formulate words. “I don’t know, Sebastian. It’s a scary prospect, and so many things could go wrong–” 

“Not if we work together,” he insisted, chancing a quick look at the massive doorway. The voices and footsteps from outside were getting louder, and you got the distinct impression that Sebastian thought that you were running out of time. He looked back at you, eyes burning, “If we do this together– as a team– there’s so much we could accomplish. You and me against the world, darling. We can bring in a new era of magic that no one has ever dreamed of. You just have to trust me.” 

It was terrifying to consider. It was balmy and likely to end in the worst of ways. You were both still so young– still figuring out where you stood in a world run by magic. Your shared, tumultuous past with Sebastian had barely opened your eyes to the surface of what your abilities could do. Of that, you were certain. Part of you was afraid to traverse that path once again and run the risk of something worse than Solomon transpiring. 

But another, much stronger part of you was curious to test your limits. Sebastian wasn’t wrong; Isidora’s magic was ripe with potential, and if he really did mean to help you along the way… 

If you couldn’t convince him to veer away from the path he had chosen, the least you could do was walk it with him. Maybe doing so would prove beneficial… or maybe it wouldn’t. There was no way of knowing for certain. 

“I do trust you,” you said plainly, the weight of the statement settling over the two of you like a blanket of iron. Despite your reasoning behind saying the words, you still couldn’t help but feel like you’d just signed a deal with the devil. 

He smiled at you then, the sight blinding when coupled with the excitement that glimmered in his captivating, brown eyes. Your grip on his wrists tightened a fraction, and Sebastian used your own hold on him to tug you off the desk and into his arms in one, swift motion. “Then hold on tight, darling.” 

It should have been impossible– and the implications of the action left your mind reeling– but in the next second, a deafening crack sounded all around the two of you and echoed off the walls of the classroom. You had no clue where he was apparating you to, nor did you know how he had managed to even do it while on school grounds, but you knew that you trusted him to keep you safe. 

From here on out, you had to trust him. You realized, through the roar of magic that flooded your ears, that there was no other choice. 

[thomas-the-goat-of-satan]

one of the funniest things about Light Yagami is that he is So aware of himself and So invested in Not Being Perceived As Strange that he has no real grasp on what an actual human interaction should look like. he knows what a Perfect interaction should look like, sure; he knows how to appear effortlessly charming and how to assuage suspicion, but the issue with that is that he reacts to really stressful and bizarre situations in an unnaturally prim and proper way, and then somehow can't understand why that makes him look even weirder. like. okay. this man with the darkest eyebags you've Ever seen and ever Will see walks up to you during your college entrance ceremony and says, "yeah, I'm L. best detective in the world." and Light goes through seven Completely Understandable And Normal Reactions in his head before he settles on, "y'know what would be the normal thing to do here? to completely fabricate my reaction so that I seem as disingenuous as possible! I can't have this guy think that I learned how to interact with other human beings from anywhere else but PBS KIDS! I have to react like Chief Yagami's totally normal son would!!" and like, that's all good and well, but if you were Actually Normal and not the weirdest person on planet earth, you'd have probably looked at the little cryptid and said, "uhm, actually I think that you're a filthy liar and also you dress stupid. why do you exist in greyscale."

[hoziersong]

the reason poolverine is so appealing is also because in all of his two-decade run in the xmcu they have given logan some of the most boring and rushed relationships with women (because it was the 2000s and the mold that they followed for rugged manly protagonists meant an astounding lack of chemistry between them and their love interests in favor of giving them the "dead wife who has a montage at the beginning of the movie" treatment etc etc) and then they put him in a 2 hour long film with a guy even more insane and fucked up than him and they matched each other beat for beat. say what you want about the mcu but they achieved a level of chemistry between logan and wade that fox couldn't reach in 20 years with like four different love interests. which is also a petition for them to either go the gay route or finally let logan find a woman he has good chemistry with and who can pass the bechdel test

[brutallyboned]

I recently watched a video about a creator who did a bad thing and the allegations against said creator, and at the end of the video, the person making the video started listing all the media on their shelf that had been partially or totally ruined for them because the creator did a bad thing. I understand not giving a living person money. I also think it's a lot healthier to reconcile the possibility that many, most, or even all of the media you enjoy will have had at least one person working on it that did, said, or believed very bad things and be at peace with that. Dumping fandoms, stuff that you own that you've already paid for, and just stopping yourself from enjoying things you once loved every time this happens could definitely make you afraid to enjoy anything and feel the need to 'vet' creators and put undue pressure on them. If you genuinely can't enjoy a piece of media anymore, that sucks but it can't be helped. But if you still get joy from it and you're shaming yourself for it--especially if you're just doing things like making fanart, writing fics, talking about the thing with other fans, and not even spending money on official merch that will get back to said creator idk. That's not helping anyone. And the thing is, this will keep happening with popular pieces of media. It's not going to stop, you're not going to be able to predict who is a bad or good person based on the work that they've made.

[iwasbored777]

[bixels]

Be honest, what are your thoughts on appledash? Do you hate it or its more of not a big deal

Not a big deal to me. I like it, I see all the appeals, I just personally like Rarijack more.

[toothbrush92]

ahhhh gilermo 🧛

[linusbenjamin]

Lost —1.01, Pilot