#I really must go find this

[vaguely-concerned]

thinking about not only the specific people lucanis pulls in to represent the 'locks' in his psyche, but the storytelling that happens in the structure/order of them. the underlying ideas are presented something like:

the lucanis who went into the ossuary never came back out again; he died down there (the boy caterina raised is gone forever) -> you're putting yourself in danger doing this (by being close to me), you should leave because I can't bear it if you get hurt because of me -> it doesn't matter even if we do try this, it won't work anyway (again because of me) ('you know what he's like, you can open the door but he won't walk through it' :'( oofie doofie) -> what if the real secret is that there was never anything but the monster in here from the beginning. you should leave, there was never anything here worth saving in the first place. (implicitly: what if I deserved what happened, all along.)

it runs pretty cleanly from outward-oriented attachment anxiety ('caterina won't even want me back like this, she won't recognize me (the same way I no longer recognize myself)) and gradually deeper inwards until we reach self-image and self worth. or you know, the harrowing basic lack of it lol.

"careful -- they'll know we're not right," spite says in one of their first scenes... but clearly, some very deep part of lucanis has feared or suspected for much longer than that that there's something inherently not right at the core of him, way before any demon entered the picture. and the voice he gives those lines to is the person who should know him better than anyone in the world, who he has loved more than anyone in the world -- and who deliberately chose to hurt him so horrifically anyway. 'It's better if I'm just a monster and deserved what happened than it is to allow for the idea that the brother I love doesn't really exist and maybe never did'. it's better if he's fundamentally flawed in some way that needed fixing to help him survive, and that's why caterina chose to hurt him again and again -- out of love. (this one I think he might have a very sad wakeup call on one day if he ever ends up with the responsibility and care of a child of his own in some way and realizes just how alien the idea of ever intentionally hurting them for any reason is to him. oh buddy. also interesting that he keeps caterina as the outermost lock -- there IS a distance he keeps there that he hasn't with illario. he doesn't resent her 'anymore' he says, but he also keeps her carefully further away from his deepest self.)

as far as I could tell the only note in the mind prison that's fully hidden and needs to be uncovered is the sad painful helpless stupid little truth that even after all this, even knowing what happened... he still loves his brother. is there anything illario could ever do that would make lucanis completely stop loving him, do you think? sometimes the trouble with unconditional love is that it is, well. unconditional, even when some terms and conditions probably would have been in order haha.

that's the pattern you see there again and again; he would rather destroy and abandon and imprison himself at every turn than let go of love, even when it's just scraps, even when there's only ever enough of it to hurt him. it's only when rook shows up and as it were takes his hand and walks along with him that he can entertain the idea of changing the story of what walking out the door might mean in the end.

[beaft]

funny to think that when i was a kid i was all "i REFUSE to ever work an office job, i am a wild creature, my spirit is free and tempestuous and cannot be contained within cubicle walls" and now at the age of [REDACTED] i'm like please. please give me an office job. please give me a sensible office job where all i have to do is get up at the same time each day and clock in and send emails and clock out again. i am on my knees begging.

[mycroftrh]

2012!Avengers where Loki keeps leaving dead bad guys in front of Avengers Tower like a cat giving their human dead mice

The Avengers think it’s some sort of weird threat and Thor’s like no no this is how he shows his affection! He once caused an interplanar incident by assassinating someone he shouldn’t have for my birthday

Tony’s like oh, so that’s what was going on when he killed his bio-dad and tried to blow up his home planet in that supremely fucked up lil Shakespearean tragedy you told us? It was a gift for you and/or Odin? And Thor’s like no that was - oh. Ah. Some things are now coming together

[gummi-ships]

Kingdom Hearts Dream Drop Distance

[polinsated]

"the look on his face after he confessed his feelings to her... and he realized he has her" [credit to this tiktok user]

[unnonexistence]

i think ive expressed this sentiment before but i love chapter titles so much. i love chapter titles that follow a naming scheme. i love really long chapter titles that start with "in which". i love chapter titles that just plainly state something that sounds unremarkable & you can't tell why it's important until you read the chapter. i love chapter titles.

[cent-scratchnsniff]

doodles and stuff. struggled with painting until i gave up

[butterfilledpockets]

bout to invent the donnie coin

next update will be pretty soon! No more than a couple days :D

previous part ----- part four ---- next part

[sallymew4]

EVERYONE STOP WHAT YOURE DOING RIGHT FUCKING NOW

EVERYBODY SHUT UP IMMEDIATELY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!

[humming-fly]

Jsyk the "noticing patterns" thing in that post you reblogged is often an antisemitic dogwhistle so idk if you really want to keep it up

are you...are you talking about the charlie day media analysis hyperfixation post???

I'll be honest idk what you're referring to there but whatever it is I'm going to respectfully disagree, the phrase "noticing patterns" is Exceptionally common (and is in fact my Job as a research scientist), and in this instance seems so incredibly tailored to the tumblr spectator sport of crazed media analysis that I think you'd have to double over backwards to read anything else into it

(putting more into this, in general I'm also not inclined to just hand phrases off to antisemitists or other bigots just cause some asshole probably used it next to some powerpoint slide of late night tv hosts and salaries or something - in that instance someone using the 'connected 2 dots' meme or like an emoji thinking face rather than the 'noticing patterns' phrase would Also be antisemitic in that context, but it wouldn't necessarily make those images antisemetic themselves ya feel?)

I might be missing some additional context here in which case I apologize but yeah my general knee jerk is to not just give bigots free reign of claiming the english language without any pushback 👌

[15-lizards]

ONCE AGAIN THERE IS MORE TENSION BETWEEN THE PRINCESS AND HER BASTARD BROTHER THAN THE PRINCESS AND HER DULL BODYGUARD LOVE INTEREST. Targ nation up 1000

[vaguely-concerned]

the fact that irving canonically survives through the end of asunder to be at wynne's funeral is so fucking funny to me. nothing but love and respect for MY unstoppable cockroach morally grey machiavellian mage dad!!! he's survived in his position through multiple attempted rites of annulment and blood mage plots popping up left right and center around him. the chantry keeps trying to stamp him out but his dodge game is simply out of this world, divine. civil wars, political machinations and minefields, chantry atrocities, this wily old motherfucker is dodging and weaving his way through it all, not-quite-no-hits-taken-running-it-but-honestly-close-enough-under-the-circumstances style. if solas does succeed in tearing down the veil I would fully believe that one of the like three people still alive at the end of it all would be a very weary 90 year old first enchanter irving going 'oh this shit again huh'. the maker has cursed him for his hubris and his paperwork is never finished (affectionate, it's fine he canonically loves paperwork)

[winepresswrath]

Madame Yu would never but oh for one fic where she packs up the kids and flees the jurisdiction. Jiang Cheng and Yanli would be so upset and miss Wei Wuxian and their father and you know, their home & community. Jiang Fengmian feels like he's taken a truck to the face (thanks truck-kun). Wei Wuxian is sure it's all his fault and is deeply distressed. Madame Yu is probably literally possessed. But still. It sucks! leave! Hit the bricks! listen to the meme skeleton that has taken up residence in your head.

[markantonys]

me at the weekly team meeting: my personal best for the past week is that they released a trailer for the new season of my favorite show and i'm so excited

manager: what's the show?

me: wheel of time

teammate: oh, i love those books

me instantly acquiring a new target to hunt down and talk the ear off of at the office social gathering tomorrow:

[animation-is-my-jam]

how do you feel about people who think tobey should be taken in by dtb or the botsfords or just forget he has a mum?

I think they're all cowards and stupid.

When people say they want complicated female characters but they can't handle a flawed mother who they now deem as irredeemably abusive....What I am talking about this fandom can't even handle Becky when she's mean to Tobey (as she should be).

[captocie]

i've just seen another post asking what the gender neutral or nonbinary word is for "sir" or "ma'am" and i'd like to put forth "em" as a solution.

"sir" comes from sire, "ma'am" comes from "madam." "em" then, comes from "eminence" as in "will that be all your eminence?" or "will that be all em?"

it's short and quick to say, like both sir and ma'am, and it's gender neutral and stems from a word denoting nobility like both sir and ma'am