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coolcattime · 2 years ago

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The Journal of Katherine Delaney -- Entry One.

This is a character journal I'm writing for my current D&D campaign for my half-elf wild magic sorcerer, Katherine Delaney. It's a custom campaign with the best friend as the DM and set in their custom D&D world: Libris, the great book.

This is kinda just something I'm doing for fun. It's turned out pretty long though, because as it turns out I have a lot of thoughts and also turning multiple d&d sessions into one journal entry makes for a pretty long piece of writing.

This is probably just gonna be something I post every so often as the campaign goes on since I like writing.

It’s been a while since I’ve kept a journal. Being on the move makes it inconvenient, I suppose, but after today I needed some way to process all my thoughts, and writing has always helped with that in the past. Now that it seems I’ll have a more permanent place to stay rather than having to carry a large book around with me, I may finally be able to actually keep a journal again.

I can say with certainty that the situation began around a week ago. While waiting for Leontine to arrive back from telling my family about my safety and the fact I’m not ready to return home right now, the brooch Rupert had gifted me began to make noises as if it was an actual bird. It was an extremely odd experience, especially as it started tugging, pulling me somewhere. I’ll admit, had I acquired that brooch in any other way than a gift from my brother, I probably would’ve gotten rid of it at that point, but instead I followed it. I followed it all the way to a town called Four Hollow, where is calmed down and acted once again as a regular piece of jewellery. At least it did as long as I stayed in the town, my attempts to leave where meant with bird song and being pulled back. So, seeing that I was quite stuck, I wrote to Leontine of my new location (which she thankfully was quite understanding about) and found myself once again just waiting.

It appeared that I’d arrived in Four Hollow at a busy time of year as they were (and still currently are) preparing for a festival. From what I learnt over the few days I’ve been here, the giant crystal that the town is built around provides the town magical power that they’ve used to make many things run automatically in such a way I’ve never seen previously. It’s quite fascinating, seeing all the ways such magic can be used to improve life, and the town’s appreciation for that is why each year they hold a festival to show their thanks. Currently, they’re in the build-up phase, showing off the impressive feats the crystal can do, mostly things akin to firework shows, things that are entertaining and attractive to those from out of town. In three days’ time, however, they will turn off the magic for twenty-four hours, to allow the crystal to rest and to show their appreciation for the improvements it’s given to their life. Obviously, the idea of magic being turned off worried me, but I’ve been assured that it’s just the magic related to the crystal, so I’ve little to worry about.

I’ll admit, I had gotten a little bored of watching the displays of the crystal by today. I’ve been here for quite a few days and while impressive, the displays did little to take up the time in waiting for Leontine to return. I was actually sat watching a squirrel when I was pulled into meeting the group.

For the stake of easing my confusion, I’m going to briefly describe each of my new companions now, rather than when we actually introduced ourselves, so I can use their names throughout the whole story.

Vallana (Val): A firbolg woman who appears to have an unhealthy obsession with killing goblins in a way that’s frankly uncomfortable. She’s at least friendly towards the group, but certainly is more than a little murderous.

Caspien: Val’s traveling companion. A gem dragonborn cleric. He seems frankly exhausted by Val’s talk of goblins. Though he may just be easily frustrated in general.

Maize: A centaur woman with an unsure disposition, but clearly strives to be helpful. Mentioned disliking the ‘fae bourgeoise’ and I’m not sure if I should worry.

Hamish: A shifter man who appears to be part cow. So far, I think he’s the best natured of the group as he seems to just genuinely want to help people. He is a friend of Rupert.

Scorn: A tiefling man with no horns, no tail, and near pitch black skin. We found him ‘brooding’. Is apparently a wizard, though he hasn’t mentioned what school of magic he’s studied. Quiet, but I think he’s a good person.

Dynol: A goliath man with a large ice spike in his chest. Has apparently lived in Four Hollow for a number of years. Grumpy.

Anyways, the beginning of today’s oddities began when Val appeared in front of me asking if I’d seen a goblin, quite an imposing question from an armed stranger that towers over you. I had managed to stutter out an answer when thankfully Caspien appeared, apologising for his travelling companion. The two began bickering, as apparently her questioning strangers has been a recurring issue, but they had only exchanged a few sentences when Maize came by. She had a crate strapped to her back, and I saw a wine glass falling from it. I had meant to catch it; it was just my luck that I practically threw it to the ground. I was incredibly embarrassed, only more so when Hamish ran onto the scene assuming the breaking glass was due to a fight. It was then that the confusing events of the day truly began.

An earring, designed to look like the tags you sometimes see on livestock, that Hamish wore began moving, swinging seeming of its own accord. Such an event had apparently not happened before, and we decided at that moment that we were being lead somewhere. Admittedly that’s an odd idea now that I look at it written down, but sometimes you just have to go with the seemingly alive piece of jewellery leading you somewhere.

It led us to a back-alley pub, completely empty save for the bartender and Scorn. He was sat alone in a dark corner booth, and I think he may have been enjoying himself far more before we invited ourselves to sit with him. At least, that’s the impression that the awkward silence we found ourselves in gave.

The silence was broken by Caspien accidently triggering the loudest noise I’ve ever heard. I swear if I hadn’t been nearly deafened, I would’ve panicked far more. However, by the time that the ringing in my ears stopped it was quite clear that Caspien had made the noise with some magic trinket he had, shaped like an orb made up of rings. It was also clear, thanks to just how empty the bar was, that Dynol had entered. He seemed quite frankly out of it, though perhaps that was just the result of the sudden noise. He didn’t come over to us until after we had started our introductions. This time is also when I learned of Hamish’s friendship with my brother, as he’s apparently stayed at his girlfriend’s tavern a number of times.

Dynol oddly came over to accuse one of us of pulling his bag, something none of us had any motive to do. When we all denied doing so, he opened his bag and produced the broken handle of a sword which was glowing dimly, and he appeared to begin swinging it haphazardly. In retrospect, it was most likely the object pulling him around, but it did seem rather reckless of him at the time.

Either way, he did join the group as we were finishing introductions. No sooner than we were all sat down, did an object that we each had begun to act wildly. I have already mentioned by own brooch, Hamish’s earring, and Dynol’s sword handle, however it seemed that everyone in the small group had some kind of object that appeared to (and likely did) have a mind of its own. Val had a coin, Caspien a spear tip, Maize a smoking pipe, and Scorn a holy symbol. None of us had acquired these objects in the same way, a fact obvious to me as none other than Hamish would’ve had the opportunity to receive a present from my brother (unless they’ve all met him somehow, but I sincerely doubt that). Yet all of them were clearly reacting to being in the presence of one another. Perhaps due to that fact, Caspien touched the broken piece of spear he had to my brooch, which quickly flew off as if it was a real bird.

I don’t know quite what possessed me to chase it. I think I just didn’t want to lose it (though I funnily enough have now) or maybe had followed it once so I just thought it was worth doing so again. But, either way, I stumbled out of that pub and after the brooch as if my life depended on it. The others followed me, though that hadn’t been a thought in my mind until they did so. I’m sure we must have been a confusing sight, such a large group running out into the fields and woods outside of town. I can’t say how long we ran for, long enough that I probably should have given up on following.

I was extremely thankful for the others’ presences when the brooch passed through some overgrowth too thick for anything larger than it to easily follow. Had I been alone, I likely would’ve had to use a spell. I know none that would’ve been great for the situation, and I can just imagine surging alone and ending up unconscious in the middle of nowhere. Hamish pulled down one of the smaller trees, which seemed to just completely bend to his will, clearing a path for us. Maize had leapt over, an impressive feat that put her a little ahead of the rest of us, but I’m quite sure it also broke whatever glassware was still in that crate she still had strapped to her. Honestly though, that didn’t cross my mind as instead I was totally focused on what was at the bottom of the valley we were walking into.

A crashed airship. That’s what we had been led to (and as we got closer, we found the brooch hitting itself against the door we used to get inside). None of the others had seen an airship before (and I admit that I’ve only seen one myself in pictures), wondering out loud how such a large ship had crashed landlocked when the closest body of water is Chicken Lake, which is far too small to justify a regular ship of this size. I corrected them, that this a ship designed for flight, but I had to admit at further questions that I didn’t know how it achieved such a feat. Caspien proposed a theory that its large balloon is filled with water, much like how ships for the water are propelled by air. I’m not quite sure how that would make a ship fly, but I don’t have any better theories.

Naturally, we decided to explore the thing, though it only became stranger when we were actually inside. Immediately I realised the floor was wrong, feeling like stone but not looking like it (and I imagine that it would be a bad material to use in something that needs to lift into the air). Of course, it was dark, so I wrote off the oddity to that, even after we lit a torch so those who can’t see in the darkness could explore comfortably. It became clear that there was a number of directions we could explore: one staircase up, two staircases down (one to the left, and one to the right), and a corridor that went straight ahead. We decided to firstly go down the left staircase, which led to a door we managed to unlock with Hamish’s earring which in turn opened to a large open area and a corridor with seven doors. Curious, I opened one of the doors and was greeted by a bedroom forming that matched by own tastes to a frankly strange degree. A bed designed for two with purple sheets, a rug covering most of the floor, a bookcase, a dressing area, and a desk that I’m currently writing at. All the furniture is where I would have put it. There was more specific stuff too; a ballet barre, a music stand, some empty plant pots stack up waiting to be used. Yet the real oddity was the books. When I picked one up which happened to be on mycology, it was in a state as if it had been read and well-read at that, but all the pages where blank. I was tempted to close my eyes and run my fingers across the pages but decided against it. I didn’t want to be questioned about what I was doing, and if there had been braille, I would’ve been able to see it. That and I doubt Leontine is reading books in braille.

Now one room I likely would’ve written off as coincidence, however as the others each opened a door, it became clear that everyone was experiencing the same thing I had, a room being formed to their exact tastes. We made a few jokes about whoever previously owned the ship having very broad tastes, but I think joking went out the window when a bedroom perfect for a centaur appeared. After we had all entered a room, the large space that had been empty also transformed, turning into a common room of sorts. Again, I have to assume that it’s suited to our tastes. I noticed a few of puzzle boxes I’ve enjoyed in the past, as well as sets for a few games I’ve played with Leontine.

I, at this point, wondered aloud if we had walked into a trap. One of the others noted maybe, but if it was a trap, it was a nice one. I wonder now, knowing the truth of the situation, if it would be accurate to say I was paranoid, given that everything is fine, but this situation could have just as easily ended with as all being eaten.

…Why did I write that?

Fuck, Jas, I… Get back on track… I, I just need to focus on the present.

After managing to convince Val not to do the, frankly dangerous, task of bring a campfire on wheels she had found in her room down the staircase, we returned to our starting point to continue exploring. We decided to take the staircase up, which led to another locked door. This one we unlocked with Val’s coin, and it led out to what must be the uppermost deck as it’s open to the air. I believe this deck will be easier to enter and exit from once we get the ship out of the crater that they’re a little stuck in currently, though I guess that’s something to speculate on later. There wasn’t much up there, just a clearer view of the balloon, as well as some pipes that lead into it. Honestly, how this ship works is beyond me currently.

With little to see up there, we headed once again back down to our starting point. We decided to explore the final staircase, heading down once again. The deck below was blocked by rubble, with only a further staircase down available to explore. So, we headed further down, reaching again a locked door. This one was unlocked by Scorn’s holy symbol.

Inside this room was what I could only describe as an incomplete engine, the kind of thing an artificer may build, but clearly broken. And once again the trinkets we were carrying began to act oddly.

I don’t remember who the first to throw their trinket into the engine was, though I clearly remember the result of it connecting to the engine, as if it was always a part of it. Lights came on, whatever magic was present on this ship coming back as the engine was repaired. We all followed in turn, and I could hear doors opening and other loud noises that I couldn’t explain. It was when the final item was thrown in that the ship came to life more literally. And by that, I mean, the ship began to speak.

Ship, a simple yet fitting name, is apparently not just an airship, but rather a colony of mimics. Yes, the objects we had all been carrying around (myself for the better part of a year) were mimics, dormant and apparently friendly mimics, but mimics all the same. I question how my brother managed to craft such a thing into a brooch, but I feel like that’s a mystery he won’t have an answer to. At the very least, Ship isn’t planning on killing us as we can “grow the colony”. Apparently, prior to our arrival, they had been sleeping for a quite a while, unable to wake until the seven objects we carried were brought back to the engine, but before us they were merely passed and sold between people. And our reward for awakening them? The airship, something so rare in Libris that most haven’t even heard of such a thing. Well, Ship did say that one of us could kill the rest for sole ownership, but I’m quite against that idea, and I sincerely hope that none of the others are contemplating it either.

I should probably be more scared of being on a ship entire crafted by mimics, but during our introduction Maize compared them to a group of sentient mushrooms that want to help you. That was the moment I realise that such a fear may be quite hypocritical of me given my relationship with Leontine. I’m unsure if Maize has met Leontine, or just managed to allude to her via an otherwise very unusual metaphor, but I imagine if they haven’t met Maize will be quite glad to meet her. I think Leontine will get along with Ship too, so that’s two people to immediately introduce her to once we’re reunited. However, Caspien seemed to quite dislike the idea of the mushrooms, describing the idea put forward by Maize as his “worst nightmare”. Perhaps I should warn him about Leontine, but I don’t think I should get into the habit of warning people about my partner. I’m sure he’ll be fine with the idea once he meets Leontine, after all she is completely wonderful. They’ll all love her, I’m sure. Well, not the same way I do, but who wouldn’t love her. She’s so cute, especially when she’s talking about mushrooms and her eyes light up and she gets so focused, I could just watch her forever when she’s like that. And of course, she can hold her own in a fight! That’s probably important to these people, so many of them have armour and weapons. And she… she’s just the best and… and I miss her so much.

Anyways, Ship then introduced us to the, I guess, caretaker of the place: Laundry. They appeared to be created of different clothes (I believe with a basket underneath) formed into the shape of a wizard. Apparently, they were named by the last crew of Ship, and are here to do our laundry and “create new rooms”, which I assume is something to do with the completely empty deck where the rubble I mentioned earlier has now been cleared. I guess this place really is just to shape to our desires, so long as we continue to keep the mimics happy.

After these two introductions, Ship gave us the information that they’re currently grounded, unable to fly until we get them another mimic. This mimic is currently in the town of Four Hollow and is the form of a key the size of a half-elf’s forearm. To be more specific, it’s the size of my forearm. I’ve never had my forearm used as a measurement before, but at the very least we thought it was likely that someone in the town will have seen a key that large. We asked Dynol who had lived there for a few years, but he seemed quite oblivious to the place.

So, we decided to head back into town, now with an unexpected quest binding us. We started by finally getting the crate Maize was carrying to where it was meant to be. I doubt there was any useable glassware left, but at least we could now fully focus on our task. We attempted to talk with one of the people in charge of assigning the volunteers tasks, but he seemed thoroughly uninterested in helping us. However, after a small amount of pressing, he did say that the only key of such a size in the town is the one currently inside the crystal.

We took one of the tours available in order to confirm this fact, and looking inside from a closer vantage point, I could clearly see it. The key we need is the focus inside the crystal, the thing that allows the town to harness the magic and make sure the crystal doesn’t explode. In three days, it’ll be taken out of the crystal for twenty-four hours. We have that time to get a hold of it, something I’m quite sure the entire town will try to prevent us from doing, or we lose the opportunity for a full year. So, here’s the real problem we’re presented with: how do we acquire the key, and can we do without destroying Four Hollow’s livelihood? Those problems were made worse by Ship’s confirmation that they wanted the key forever. At least I saw those things as problems. Val and Dynol seem to be quite happy to just kill everyone in the town (Val because, well, she seems to quite like murder, and Dynol because they looked at him oddly). Maize seems to not understand the need for towns in the first place. The others, at least, seem more reluctant to destroy the livelihood of an entire town.

By this point, sat in the common room aboard Ship, we didn’t know much about the ritual yet. Really, we just knew that the ritual is performed by various religious types who visit the town for it, and that the key with initially be taken out of the crystal by one Marion Windcutter. Now, I’ve heard of him. A diplomat or envoy of sorts from The Elmmyu’rra States. He’s not technically a noble, though he’s counted as one due to his renowned ability for sorting problems between noble families. I’ve never personally met him, but it’s possible he’s met my parents. Hopefully if he has, he likes them well enough as then dealing with him will likely be a lot easier.

With a lack of good ideas for obtaining the key blooming, we decided to take advantage of the common room and relax a little. I decided to write to Leontine about this situation. I couldn’t tell her nearly as much as I wanted to, after all look how long this entry is, but I told her the basics. Firstly, I needed to make sure she knew I was with a group. After all I had been alone when she left, and this situation could very much look like a kidnapping if you were unaware of it. Secondly, I gave her directions to the ship and a request to not enter Four Hollow. Perhaps I’m just overly paranoid, but I’m sure this situation we’ve found ourselves in will end in trouble. I don’t want Leontine to turn on there on Sunday and get lost in the chaos, or worst get there afterwards ask after me and get into trouble due to our actions.

The others questioned the paper crane a little. I suppose it is a piece of paper that can find by itself, but it is basically just a trinket. I of course told them that I was just sending a letter, and to watch out for Leontine. Perhaps I should’ve given a longer description of her, so they don’t confuse her with someone else, but there’s no one quite like Leontine. I can’t imagine anyone else claiming to be her and someone actually believe them.

After I sent the letter, I decided to watch Hamish and Caspien while they played a game that I recognised but didn’t know all the rules of, I asked some questions, to attempt to pick up the gist of what was going on, but the two seemed to disagree on the rules.

Now, I personally didn’t notice, but it must have been at this time that Scorn was standing awkwardly in a corner with a death grip on his pack. I can’t say I blame him for this, after all it had only been a couple of hours since we’d met, and he seemed to prefer his own company. However, apparently Ship disagreed. No sooner had he said:

“Not, really no,” I assume in response to a telepathically asked question, had Ship locked every door currently available to us, effectively sealing us in the common room. Their motive for this was both quite simple and less nefarious than one might expect given the description I just wrote. Apparently, this odd group we find ourselves in will not work if we are not friends. That’s logical enough, after all we will be living and travelling together so we must at least be able to tolerate each other. Though I’m not quite sure locking us in a room with a bottle of alcohol and a deck of cards is the most effective method possible.

The alcohol, which we started while deciding on a game to play, according to Maize was a type of grain alcohol. It was fair stronger than I would have preferred without anything mixed in. I still drank it, but I couldn’t help but grimace at the taste.

We settled on playing poker, and playing the rules set forward by Scorn as we each had a different set of rules in mind. It was quite nice, relaxing as we weren’t gambling. Caspien ended up winning the first round which he called beginner’s luck.

As we played, we decided to discuss our favourite thing we’d done while adventuring, a topic put forward by Hamish who also told his story first. Apparently, he’s somewhat of a local hero where he’s from, having driven off some monsters away from his home village along with a rallied army of townsfolk. He smiled as he spoke of this. Without question, Hamish is a good person and I understand why Rupert befriended him.

Scorn admitted that he hasn’t done much adventuring yet as he’s been doing various types of training under an archwizard. He apparently doesn’t have a preferred school of magic, though he admitted to not being gifted at transmutation. Yet this was so far the most open he’s been with the group thus far, so I decided not to push on the issue (though I believe from words said later that Caspien doesn’t believe that Scorn is actually a wizard, though I don’t see any reason he would lie about such a feat).

Maize went next, telling of the time they accidentally broke the wrong person out of jail. A bold story to tell to a group of people you’ve barely met, but I have to admit it was entertaining. She had met to break out a dwarf and instead broke out a halfling who she had decided could well be a dwarf that simply shaved. The crime either one committed was apparently not important to the story, though perhaps she didn’t know herself.

I shared a story next, telling of a time myself and Leontine chased an owlbear from a farm. It was the best story I could think of that didn’t involved Jas or Désirée, so I wouldn’t need to answer questions about them. Yet even the safe story prompted some questions, mostly about how one chases an owlbear. I, of course, explained briefly that it was a combination of my own magic (though I didn’t mention that it was mostly due to most of them making a loud noise when cast) and Leontine’s aura of mushrooms that injury any foe that come too close to her. Caspien didn’t react much to this, so either he wasn’t listening to the question he asked, or sentient mushrooms don’t scare him as much as he claimed. I hope it’s the former as if I’m going to be friends with these people as Ship suggests necessary, I need them to like Leontine. I think I may already be on the way to that as Hamish appeared to have heard briefly of her from Rupert and therefore, he must know how important she is.

Val’s story was, predictably, about killing goblins. Oddly enough she began by talking about leaving her home, a place she only really described as being very different from the rest of Libris that she’s explored and that there were also goblins there. However, before I could question that she began describing killing goblins. The shocking reveal was that Val, like Hamish, is considered a folk hero. The goblins just so happened to be a group of marauders who were terrorizing a town that happened to be very thankful for Val’s actions. She promptly learned the wrong lesson from this encounter.

Finally, Dynol told, shortly and simply, the story of his first kill after leaving the village, that of a white bear. He still wears the pelt too, so I suppose at least it wasn’t just a kill for glory. Apparently, this is also when he found the sword hilt that led him here. Caspien almost immediately questioned his first kill being a bear, which admittedly is a fair bit bigger than most hunters start, but I assumed based on his wording that it was just Dynol’s first kill as a solo hunter rather than absolutely.

I realise now, having written down all the stories that Caspien didn’t actually share a story, not even one like Scorn to just say he hasn’t really adventured before. It’s a little odd thinking about it as he seemingly loves to talk, as is abundantly clear from the amount he’s been mentioned thus far. Perhaps he simply forgot as it was after Dynol’s story that Laundry (apparently free to move around the ship unlike us) entered with food.

It was a pot filled with something that was between a soup and stew, too many vegetables to be a soup, but a little thin to be a stew. Laundry was little help in identifying it, merely calling it food. I suppose it didn’t matter as long as it was edible.

We questioned where the ingredients had come from, as Ship had said the alcohol was from the previous crew and none of us felt like eating century all rations (and I’m also not quite sure we’d survive it). Thankfully they were fresh, wild vegetables and roots gathered from the woods the ship has crashed in. Of course, that means that Laundry had left the ship, though they made the excellent point that anyone who sees them will just think they’re a wizard. Honestly, if we get fresh food out of it, I see no problem with them exploring. Though Dynol did have a complaint about the lack of meat, but really did he expect a sentient laundry basket disguised as a wizard to kill something? I’ll try and see if there’s a market or a butcher in Four Hollow if he complains again, though I’m not much of a cook so he’ll have to deal with that part.

While eating, we played a second round of poker. This time Dynol won. I think the second loss may have frustrated Scorn a little as he threw his cards down, lightly but still. Admittedly, I’m not the best at reading people, so maybe it was a completely innocent gesture. It was about here that Maize decided to tell another story. This one was about an incident where she decided to try and flirt with someone. Apparently, a common way of doing so where she if from is to kick an object as hard as you can. This did not translate to wherever she was at the time, and it was instead seen as an act of aggression. She claims to have been completely run out of town. Now as to why she told this story of an incident where she was clearly embarrassed, I’m not sure, perhaps the alcohol had gone to her head, but it did bring the group together. Enough for Ship to ask if we were friends now. Obviously, we all answered yes, even if I’m still not quite sure if completely trust everyone yet. Scorn said that he still didn’t trust any of us with his stuff which I thought was adamantly fair.

Finally free to leave, we decided to return to Four Hollow once again, in order to talk to those taking part in the ritual about Hamish and Caspien joining. The walk was much easier this time as we had begun to form a path through the brush. It was certainly the least peaceful though, even compared to the original frantic run. The entire time Caspien was just ranting about his hatred of badgers. The entire half hour walk. I was thankful to hear the humming lights of the town as hearing them meant there was finally quiet. Honestly, the magic of the town is completely fantastic. It would take a council of magic users to sustain something like this in any other town, but here it’s just one crystal. Can we really just take the focus and not think about what we’re destroying for it?

We proceed to the church, a stone building while most in the town are made of wood. It was lit up and heated, a welcome beacon. All of us but Scorn went inside, he elected to wait by the doors. Inside our eyes were drawn to three places.

Immediately we looked to a group of three dwarves in the middle of the room. Dressed in robes and blindfold, they were loudly chanting prayers in a language that I believe was drawvern, but I didn’t understand to know for sure. Crystals of various colours decorated their robes, jiggling with their movements and providing a messy melody to their song-like prayers. Their display had gathered a small crowd.

However, despite how their show display may have made it look, they were not the only religious devotees in the building that appeared special. One was a firbolg woman at an altar. Her back to us, it was clear she was wearing a backless dress. She was reading a holy text, though not as loudly as the dwarves. The other was an older elven woman sat alone reading a thick leather-bound book. She dressed in in grey vestments with only a blue band as decoration.

Of these three, we decided to firstly talk with the firbolg, as she didn’t seem as busy as the dwarves nor as unapproachable as the elf. As we approached, she turned around and I just had to admire the craftsmanship of her dress. It was far more ornate than anything I’d expect a holy person to wear. Crafted from shimmering purple fabric, different shades creating a handprint pattern, each one having a heart in the middle. Painted on the fabric surrounding the hands were blue flowers. I can’t imagine how much time it must have taken to create it.

She introduced herself as Tulip, a follower of The Evening Glory, and asked us our business. We introduced ourselves and said we (or rather Hamish and Caspien) wanted to take part in the key ritual and therefore we wanted to know a bit about it. Hamish seemed shocked that we wanted him to take part, despite mentioning that he was a cleric when the ritual was first brought to our attention and us talking about the plan multiple times before this point. Anyways, Tulip answered our questions, explaining the ritual to us. The ritual itself doesn’t have any fancy techniques we would need to know being very individual. Marion will take the key from the crystal, taking it to a room where each religious devotee in turn will be given the key to perform a ritual for their god onto it. The key doesn’t leave the room at any point and each person will be search on their way in and out (expect perhaps Marion). Obviously, that’ll make stealing the key during the rituals a harder task than we initially thought. She also told us if we wanted more information on the crystal and the key and the history, there’s a book in the mayor’s procession that will contains this information. Hopefully we’ll be able to look at it tomorrow.

Then Tulip asked what exactly Caspien and Hamish would add for the ritual if they were allowed to join, what their gods would do for the key. So, they presented what gods they followed. Or rather Hamish presented the goddess he follows as a paladin: Chauntea, goddess of life and bounty. Caspien meanwhile doesn’t follow a specific deity. He’s a cleric of the tempest rather than any god that represents such a domain I’ve never heard of a cleric doing this before, but I didn’t want to question him. If I ever return home, I’ll ask my questions to one of the churches there. Most of them have at least a shrine to gods of oceans and storms, to keep our ships safe and our city’s name of Storm’s Rest true.

Even with a lack of a real idea for what they’d do for their rituals, Tulip gave her blessing for them to join. Apparently, there’s far less people here this year than is normally expected (and Tulip claims to have been taking part for forty years so she would know). However, she also noted that it wasn’t just her blessing that we would need. We’d also need that of the mayor as well as the dwarves and the elf who will also be taking part in the ritual. She gave us some warnings about the elf, an apparently prickly woman who’s been participating in the ritual for as long if not longer than Tulip but has never given anyone her name. A follower of Mystryl, the previous deity of magic whose death is what caused the spell plague. I had researched Mystryl before, in some of my attempts to figure out the origins of my own magic, but such research couldn’t give me insight into the pain of following a god killed by someone’s greed.

It was about at this point that Scorn re-joined us, a story of an odd individual he had met outside. While standing alone he had been approached by a man who had questioned if he was banned from the church. Thankfully this question was due to the man apparently fearing the church and believing those in it had cursed him as opposed to stereotyping. Apparently, the gist of the conversation was that the man believes he’s been cursed by the church and also wants to know how to cure lycanthropy and then ran off, though obviously I only know what Scorn relied to us. When Scorn told someone in the church about the encounter, he was told the man was called Mikihel and is known as being quite strange and a hypochondriac. However, this information didn’t stop Scorn from wanting to research lycanthropy once we were done with the church.

Obviously though we still had business to do at the church. Given that they had a break between their sermons, we next went to time with the dwarves. Despite being blindfolded, they turned towards us as we approached, likely as we aren’t exactly a stealthy group. They attempted to talk in unison, but never quite managed to. I suppose it must be a rather difficult trick to do in regular conversation. They introduced themselves as devotees of Thautam, a god of crystals and magic. As they stated themselves, it was obviously to see why they are here.

To get their blessing, they simply asked for mysteries, to bolster their knowledge. And the group did give mysteries, mostly nonsense mysteries that were really mysteries at all. They were good enough to impress two of three the dwarves though. The other ended up storming off in frustration, but we ended up getting the blessing by majority vote.

Finally, there was the elf. As we approached, I prepared myself for careful diplomacy that I was already sure would be needed. It hadn’t occurred to me that my companions might not be so careful. As soon as we approached her, the woman rejected our request, telling us to leave and instead talk to the mayor or Marion when he arrives tomorrow. Of course, we told her what Tulip had told us, both that we required her blessing to participate and that there were significantly less people present this year. However, she didn’t seem particularly bothered by this information. In fact, she said from her perspective she believed she should be the only participating the ritual. Caspien questioned why, getting frustrated, and I answered that obviously she knows the most about the crystal. Whether true or not, it felt like the right thing to say. She’s likely been the one doing the rituals the longest, and also the crystal is believed to be a magic from pre-spell plague, that’s why people think it surges like wild magic does, which would make it a remnant of Mystryl. Of course, it being a remnant of Mystryl is the point she argued, that she is the only one with a real connection to it.

This is about when Caspien did something both infuriating and stupid, insulting the woman for following a dead god. I have absolutely no idea what he thought he was going to accomplish by doing this, other than soothing his own frustrations in a way that completely ruined our entire current plan. I questioned out loud if we just were just giving up on diplomacy, hoping for a hasty apology, not an answer of yes. For obvious reasons, his childish, pointless outburst resulted in the woman slamming her book closed and exiling the entire group other than myself.

She invited me to sit, an invitation I graciously took, and questioned why I was with such a group of people. I, perhaps unwisely, told her the truth. That it was quite a forced arrangement, caused by mere happenstance, and if we didn’t act as friends it will result in being locked together in a room by a ship. She found this funny, I assumed from disbelieve, until she said it was due to the idea of a member of the Delaney family being bossed around by a ship. I was shocked momentarily. I forget sometimes that my coat has my family crest on it, a fact I could tell didn’t impress the woman. I haven’t been this close to home in a while and even now I'm still the length of a continent away, being recognised hasn’t been much of a concern. She said she keeps up with local politics, I wonder if that means she knows that I’m technically missing.

She had more questions, the first being why we had an interest in the ritual. I answered as truthfully as I could, without giving away details that would get us into trouble. That Ship is fractured, that a part of them is in the town, that we suspect that it’s the key from the crystal. And then she asked what if the key is part of Ship. So, I confessed my own dilemma about the situation. I want to fix Ship, obviously I do, and they’re sentient so it would cruel not to, but I don’t want to leave Four Hollow, a whole town, without their main livelihood and at the mercy of wild magic surges, some I know isn’t pleasant. I want to find a way to make a replacement, either for Ship or the crystal, but I have no idea if that will be feasible and if it is if the group will help me create it when we don’t truly need to. She appeared to have some sympathy for the problem I’m faced with, even if I cannot tell her the full extent of the situation. Finally, she asked why she should give her blessing to Caspien and Hamish and I gave her the simplest reasoning I could muster. If they got her blessing, they would very likely leave her alone as opposed to if they didn’t, where I’m quite sure they would return to bother her some more. Not my best argument, but I truly couldn’t think of a reason to argue that Caspien deserves anything from her. Thankfully she accepted my reasoning and said we had her blessing. I thanked her before leaving, re-joining the group outside to tell them I’d savaged the situation.

We needed to talk to the mayor, but given that it was night had already fallen, we decided to wait until tomorrow. So, Scorn asked if we could help to a library. I agreed whole-heartedly as there were a few things I wanted to research myself. So, we all headed to the thankfully still open library. I think at some point, the building must have been a regular shop just based on the layout and the types of displays that were being used, but that made little difference to us. There were free books and places to sit and that’s all we needed. As Scorn went to research the crystal, I went about finding books on airship crashes and mimics.

None of my readings gave me any clue towards the material the key is mimicking as I hoped it might, but I did learn some interesting facts regardless. Ship likely crashed around 100 years ago as that’s the only crash I could find out about in the general area. Secondly, mimic colonies aren’t really limited at all to what they can turn into, being able to create far more complex structures than feral mimics due to their being more than one mimic present. If a colony mimic is separated from the rest, it can go into a time of stasis and hold its form so long as it doesn’t transform again, which is likely why the key has remained a key this whole time.

Scorn’s research also revealed some interesting information, namely that the crystal has a history of defeating itself and the town, or at the very least there’s very dramatic possibility fictional stories of it doing so. Now, I’m hoping that this mostly just applies to the crystal itself and not the key, but we may have a serious problem coming our way on Sunday.

With what research we could do for our main mission done, Scorn headed downstairs to look up some books on lycanthropy. Almost as soon as he had disappeared from view, there was a loud crash from his direction. We all rushed to follow him and there was Mikihel (quickly confirmed by Scorn as he was the only one that had met him prior), ranting and raving about Scorn betraying him, about being terribly cursed. It must have taken five minutes of arguing, including both Maize and Hamish pretending that they were lycanthropes as well (Hamish successful, Maize not so much), to get the man to confess to believe that he’s a were-slug that transforms on a waxing gibbous. He added on that he could only transform outside when I pointed out that that was the current phase of the moon.

After this confession, he ran off, us following him all the way to behind the church. He stood, still not transformed, yelling at us to stand back from his coming beastly form. And then, to the shock of all of us, he did transform into a slug. Not a giant monstrous half-slug half-man, just a regular slug. Then I heard laughing from the bushes.

As it turns out the person that had cursed Mikihel was not the church, it was in fact an eleven-year-old. The son in fact of the church worker Scorn talked to about the man, who had happened to break into her spell scrolls and had been tormenting Mikihel with them. Now, how a child could use a spell scroll well enough to actually affect someone I don’t know, but I suppose Mikihel may not be the wisest of individuals and that may have improved the child’s odds. We returned the child to his mother, making sure he would get an appropriate punishment, as well as making sure that Mikihel was returned to his normal form. He was given some compensation from the woman (apparently a betting pool of some sort, I’m not exactly sure), and left declare the child his archnemesis so I’m not precisely sure if we made the situation better or worse. I suppose it doesn’t really matter as this isn’t seem at all related to what Ship wants us to do, but at the same time at least we don’t need to worry about an evil cursing cult within the local church. I do wonder if there was more to the story, children typically don’t just go around polymorphing people, but no one seemed especially concerned with figuring out the why of the situation.

Well, either way, it seemed we had done everything possible for tonight. Marion won’t arrive until tomorrow and it seemed too late to be bothering the mayor. So, we headed to the tavern, the one we had originally met Scorn in, to have a drink or two. Val made her intentions of getting blackout drunk before we were even in the building. I had intended to have a few drinks myself until Maize ordered the place’s ‘finest ale’ and that apparently was shrimp ale.

I don’t quite understand how fish and seafood-based alcohol became popular away from the coast. I’m from a coastal city and let me make myself clear, they don’t taste good. There is absolutely no reason these kinds of drinks should have started to be served inland, but here one is. ‘Exotic’ according to the bartender. What does that matter if it tastes horrible?

Well, upon realising what was being served, I decided not to drink. I wasn’t the only one not to partake, Hamish refused as well, stating that he’s a vegetarian. Everyone else did partake, though I believe Scorn may have regretted it. He only had one drink, quite a lot of which was left still at the end of the night. True to her word, Val did get absolutely drunk. After about four pints, she turned an odd shade of pink, leaving the question of just how much shrimp was in the drink. The colour change confused her but did not deter how from drinking more. She ended up having to be dragged back to Ship by Maize who thankfully had the strength to move the tallest member of the group who was wearing full armour. I imagine if she hadn’t, we would’ve had to leave Val at the tavern and hoped she’d make her own way back.

We’re back on Ship now. Night has well and truly fallen. I pulled one of the blank books from the bookshelf in my room to write in, I didn’t see the harm seeing that they are empty, and books are meant to be filled. It has helped with my thoughts at least. The nonsensical events of the day feel a lot more certain in my mind. I still am not quite sure about the people I am stuck with, however, there’s a saying that all the best adventures start with an odd situation involving strangers getting stuck together. Or at least that’s what the most famous book on the most famous apparent adventure in Libris says. So, I should think of this as an opportunity, as a do over. A Delaney is meant to be an adventurer, and even if they assured me that it was fine, that there was nothing anyone in my position could’ve done differently, I know I royally fucked up. So maybe I can do it right this time, do more with this opportunity than I ever could have done just wandering aimlessly. I’ll become a real adventurer, and I’ll make them all proud.

#d&d #dungeons and dragons #character journal #mimic campaign #katherine's journal #katherine delaney #original writing #this is like nearly 9000 words cause it's like two and a half sessions

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munsonsduchess · 2 years ago

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I posted 1,610 times in 2022

375 posts created (23%)

1,235 posts reblogged (77%)

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I tagged 1,427 of my posts in 2022

Only 11% of my posts had no tags

#eddie munson - 414 posts

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Longest Tag: 116 characters

#❝ oh no the earthquake got my husband while i was protecting my daughter all the while my other daughter was missing

My Top Posts in 2022:

I Was Made for Loving You

summary: eddie is restless and can't sleep, you do not appreciate finding the bed empty warnings: tooth rotting fluff, vague threats, eddie munson is a warning in and of himself w/c: 711 authors note: the way my soul has completely taken over by this man, season four dropped what two weeks ago and i'm over here simping like i'm sixteen again. not beta’d we die like women

(Moodboard by me)

It was late, three am according to the digital alarm clock on the nightstand beside his bed, you were sleeping peacefully. Hair strewn around the pillowcase under your head and your soft breathing the only other sound in the trailer besides the scratches of pencil against paper as Eddie scribbled out ideas for his next and possibly final campaign depending on the grades for his finals.

The two of you had spent hours sitting in the living room of the trailer while Eddie's Uncle had been at work going over flashcards and notes you'd made especially for Eddie so he would be able to graduate this year. Given everything that had happened with Vecna and the Upside Down you both felt as though you were owed a break.

Music played softly through one earphone from the tape in the walkman on the desk as Eddie worked. He'd been restless, unable to sleep, lying there staring at the ceiling and wondering if this really would be his year. That he would finally be able to take you out of Hawkins and make something of himself, to throw the label of 'freak' behind him and start over.

He heard the shifting of bedding from behind him but didn't register that it might mean you'd be awake, that was until he heard you call his name,

"Eddie?" the long haired boy turned around and felt his heart squeeze at the scene in front of him. You'd worn one of his old Hellfire shirts to sleep and it was even a little small on you so it had crept up your middle while you slept, "what are you doing?"

"It's ok sweetheart, go back to sleep" he said softly, "I'm just working on some notes"

You blinked wearlily at him and rubbed your eyes against the light on his desk. This was exactly what Eddie had wanted to avoid when he'd decided to use his restlessness for something productive instead of disturbing you.

He smiled and turned back to his work but was instead met with a pillow to the back of the head. Turning again to ask why you'd thrown such a deadly weapon at him Eddie was instead met with your scowling features, although the effect was somewhat dampened by the fact that you had a little trail of drool on your chin and pillow marks on your face,

"It's three am, the campaign can wait. Come back to bed" you said, voice scratchy with sleep, "i'm cold"

Eddie laughed lightly to himself. There was no way you could be cold on such an unseasonably warm May night and he knew you were just using it as an excuse to get him to abandon his work,

"Princess –"

"Now Eddie"

The scowl on your face had been replaced with what could only be described as an adorable pout which honestly he was defenseless against which you knew all too well,

"Psychological warfare is it?" Eddie laughed again, "well I suppose the freshmen can live a little while longer"

Clicking off the lamp and stopping the tape in the walkman Eddie made his way back over to the bed shucking off his grey sweatpants as he went. When he finally did climb back into bed beside you he found himself pulled tightly into your embrace with your fingers in his hair,

"It's gonna be fine. I promise. You're going to graduate this year I know it"

"How do you know that?" "

Because I'm going to make sure of it one way or another"

"That sounds vaguely like a threat sweetheart"

"It is. Now go to sleep. Moron"

Eddie had nothing to say to that. It was true that once you had set your mind to something there would be no changing it regardless of what anyone else tried to do. With that comforting thought and the sensation of your fingers running through his hair, nails scratching softly along his scalp and the feeling of your breathing it wasn't long until Eddie found himself unable to keep his eyes open any longer and instead sank into a peaceful sleep and dreams of a new life with the person he loved most in the world.

No more Freak. Just Eddie. A new man for a new life.

734 notes - Posted June 5, 2022

Joe Keery and Joseph Quinn in interviews is giving “someone told Joe he was distracting the other kids in the class so they made him sit next to Joseph the quiet kid and oh god now there’s two of them”

852 notes - Posted June 6, 2022

Girls Got Rhythm

summary: eddie fucks you in his van after a show w/c: 2206 warnings: 18+ only no minors, praise, swearing, oral (f recieving), unprotected sex (you're smarter than that), slight spoilers for Vol 2 authors note: so how are we feeling Eddie Nation? That season finale was ... something huh? Anyway this is probably going to be the first of quite a few fix it fics from me because like Nick Fury said "I recognise that the council has made a decision, but given that it's a stupid ass decision I've elected to ignore it" Not beta'd all mistakes are my own and add flavour. We die like heroes. Please reblog it really helps me out!!

(moodboard by me)

⊱ ────── {⋅. ✯ .⋅} ────── ⊰

The atmosphere in the bar was electric, bands had been playing all night and now finally it was Eddie's turn, they were the headline act in the Hideout that night. Long gone were the days of playing to five drunks and a group of hicks that wouldn't know good music if it slapped them in the face.

Turns out being wanted for and then acquitted of murder was actually something of a reputation builder in the metal music community. It gave Eddie a kind of street cred he didn't have before and now people were coming from all over to watch Corroded Coffin play.

Throughout it all though he had you, his number one fan. As you'd tell him again and again. You'd been there through Spring Break 86, through Vecna, him almost being mauled alive by those demobat things. You'd never once left him or dipped out when things got out of control and there you were now standing right in front of the stage in possibly the most sinful outfit you could have conjured. Eddie felt his cock stir in his jeans just looking at you, of course that was a pretty regular occurrence on its own but seeing you standing there with your homemade Corroded Coffin shirt, the shortest mini skirt imaginable not to mention your legs wrapped in fishnets leaving nothing to the imagination and Eddie didn't have to imagine what was waiting for him underneath that skirt.

You smiled up at him as he took his place front and centre on the stage, the spotlight shining on him giving his fuzzy brown curls a halo which was at odds with the devilish smirk on his lips as he began playing. The crowd had been waiting for this all night and they were going wild for Eddie and for the band, this was everything either of you could have wanted. You'd both remember this moment in time for the rest of your lives.

It hadn't been easy getting here, putting in hours in the bar waitressing and behind the bar. It was really the only place that would hire you both since you'd made it abundantly clear that unless both of you were hired then neither of you would work wherever it was and having been rejected by everywhere else you'd applied for, even the video store which Harrington assured you both would be an easy place to get hired, you were more than willing to put in whatever hours the management of the bar needed you to if it meant for one night a month Eddie could stand on that stage like the Rock Star he was always meant to be and play to his devoted fans. Even if most of them only came to see the guy accused of murder in such a small town.

⊱ ────── {⋅. ✯ .⋅} ────── ⊰

After the set you knew Eddie would be helping the rest of the band carry the equipment back to his van since as big as they were in Hawkins no one else was going to help them carry their gear. Sure enough you found Eddie stood by the stage door slash delivery entrance. HIs hair was stuck to his forehead and the back of his neck with sweat but the smile on his face told you that he couldn't care less about that,

"Hey, can I get an autograph? I'm your biggest fan" you called to get his attention, "honest I am"

"Baby you can have anything you want" Eddie grinned at you holding his arms open so you could slot yourself against him, "anything at all"

"Anything?"

"Name it"

"Well in that case" you leant up on tiptoe to kiss Eddie softly, the leather in your boots squeaking as you did so, "you looked so good up there baby"

"You look better" Eddie said, snaking an arm around your waist to pull you closer to him, "couldn't keep my eyes off you. I thought I was gonna have to jump off the stage at one point and let everyone know you're mine"

"I think the amount of hickies you leave should tell people that"

"Yeah but then you cover up all my hardwork with these" Eddie laughed, his fingers playing with your necklaces, "I think I'm gonna have to prove it again"

You didn't need to ask what he meant. You could feel how hard he had gotten through his jeans and you'd be lying if you said watching him on the stage hadn't had the arousal dripping down your own thighs. You loved watching him play whenever, wherever and tonight was certainly no different.

"So what are we waiting for?"

⊱ ────── {⋅. ✯ .⋅} ────── ⊰

You had thought that perhaps Eddie would have told the rest of the guys that he'd arrange another way for them to get their stuff out of the bar that he'd take you home to your crappy little one room apartment and the murphy bed that squeaked so much your neighbour thought it was an infestation of some kind.

You should have known better. Why would Eddie bother driving all the way home when his van was right there?

Which is how you found yourself on your back with your skirt pushed up around your hips while Eddie knelt between your legs, eyes dark and hooded as he stared at your exposed pussy,

"Baby? No panties?" he breathed, casting his eyes upwards for a second to catch the way you bit your bottom lip as his fingers slipped through the mesh of your tights and ran through the slick forming between your thighs, "you're already so wet, is this all for me?"

"All for you Eddie, love you"

"I love you too sweetheart, I'm gonna love you so much"

Before you could form a sentence your brain short circuited with the sound of Eddie ripping your tights and giving himself better access to your dripping pussy. You let out a moan when he used two ring clad fingers to swipe through your folds collecting your slick and using it to push a finger into your warm wet entrance.

A few mumbled obscenities fell from Eddie's lips as he watched his finger being sucked back into your waiting cunt again and again. How your hips bucked and searched for more, he never got enough of seeing you like this.

See the full post

1,214 notes - Posted July 1, 2022

The God (and goddess) of Hellfire

summary: at a high school dance dustin learns some shocking news about you and eddie w/c: 2,049 warnings: language, eddie's dirty mind, mentions of the readers body (breasts) a/n: yeah so i was hoping to get something else entirely out this week but then my co author came home and also i read class ring by @eddie-van-munson which now lives rent free in my head and i had to try my hand at wife!reader. Not beta'd once again this is nothing but my own meandering thoughts and if you notice a typo or a mistake no you didn't.

(moodboard by me)

(Moodboard by me)

⊱ ────── {⋅. ✯ .⋅} ────── ⊰

It was the first big high school dance the freshman were able to attend and both Eddie and Steve had insisted on singing up as chaperones. Well Steve had done so first of all and Eddie refused to let Steve go alone and "hog all the glory" though what glory he was talking about was anyone's guess. Still true to his word Eddie had marched down to the front office and demanded that his name be put on the chaperone sheet for the dance after Steve's, which is when you'd gotten the call to ask if you would come and chaperone Eddie chaperoning the kids. Something about a spiked punch incident in your junior year neither you nor Eddie claimed to have any knowledge of but you'd agreed anyway since if Eddie was dead set on chaperoning it wasn't like you had any plans.

You'd dug out Eddie's one good suit from the back of your shared closet and your best dress along with it before making a special trip to the dry cleaners in the newly rebuilt Starcourt Mall. It would be pricey to have your things dry cleaned but for an occasion like this you didn't mind dipping into your savings, Eddie always looked so handsome in his suit and the usual mix of weed, aftershave and cigarette smoke wasn't exactly the perfect combination for a high school dance. At least not the first one for Eddie's little Hellfire proteges.

The school gym had been decked out in whatever theme the dance committee had chosen, as near as you could guess it was 'under the sea' but you couldn't be too sure. You'd been given punch bowl duties apparently to keep it safe from anyone with 'nefarious intent' according to Principal Higgens with a pointed look at you and Eddie. Eddie just grinned and slipped his silver flask back into your purse as discreetly as he could manage. It wasn't altogether boring being at the punch table, you had a good vantage point of the dancefloor and it was funny watching Eddie and Steve following each other around the dancefloor and bickering like an old married couple.

"It's nice to see you back in Hawkins High" a voice said next to you making you jump a little, you'd been so lost in your own little world you hadn't noticed your former english teacher Mr Shields making his way over to you,

"It's an important night," you replied with a smile, "Punch? I promise nothing happened to it"

"It's not that I'm doubting you but I seem to recall an incident with a punch bowl in your junior year involving you and Mr Munson"

"Everyone keeps mentioning that. I have no idea what they're talking about"

You knew exactly what they were talking about. You'd distracted the poor wallflower behind the punch bowl and Eddie had emptied his flask full of Rum he'd siphoned from his uncle into the bowl. You'd both denied it but of course you'd both ended up in detention because the teachers weren't stupid.

"Well I must say married life certainly seems to suit you" Mr Shields continued, "I admit that when I heard about you and Mr Munson tying the knot so quickly I was doubtful but you seem to be flourishing"

"YOU AND EDDIE ARE MARRIED?" the sound of Dustin Henderson yelling shook you, you hadn't noticed the smaller boy who was currently standing in front of you his mouth hanging open,

"Dustin close your mouth you'll catch flies" you sighed pushing your hair out of your face, "and what are you yelling about? Of course Eddie and I are married"

"Since when?"

You looked at Dustin for a moment trying to figure out what sort of joke or prank this was. Had Eddie put him up to this? Or was it Steve?

"Are you serious right now? Since two years ago when I graduated, you know that"

"No I didn't!"

"Dustin I wear a wedding ring!" you showed the boy your left hand and the ring that adorned your fourth finger, "you've seen it before"

"I thought it was a class ring! Or one of Eddie's!"

As if summoned by mention of his name alone Eddie appeared beside Dustin looking confused, he looked between the boy and you furrowing his brow,

"What's with all the yelling over here?"

"YOU DIDN'T TELL ME YOU WERE MARRIED!" Dustin thrust an accusing finger in Eddie's face and scowled at him. Eddie's confusion seemed to mirror your own and you sighed, this was going to be a long night.

➽───────────────❥

The dance had ended and now there you all were sitting in a diner across town. You, Eddie, the Hellfire kids and Steve Harrington who was giving some of the kids a ride home so had tagged along to the diner,

"So let me get this straight, not one of you little idiots noticed that my girl wears a wedding ring?" Eddie asked, "you see her every week for hellfire!"

"Yeah but we thought it was one of your rings" Mike said as he looked around at his friends for support, "you've got a lot"

"It's a small gold ring, Eddie's are huge and silver" you countered, "not the same thing boys"

"We thought you were just dating!" Lucas interjected, "we didn't know we swear!"

"Eddie your children are fucking stupid" you sighed, you'd had such faith in these kids. Well in Dustin, the jury was still out on Wheeler and Sinclair.

See the full post

1,564 notes - Posted July 6, 2022

My #1 post of 2022

Eat me Alive

summary: domestic bliss with eddie is interrupted when an unexpected visitor comes calling w/c: 2,046 warnings: 18+ Minors DNI, explicit smut, unprotected sex (don't do it, i'm warning you), dirty talking, bulge/size kink, praise, eddie munson in grey sweatpants, swearing a/n: so this was actually requested by anon and a few of you who liked the post mentioning a part two for the god and goddess of hellfire.

Not beta'd but a special mention to @pillow-titties who knew the american word for cooker. If you spot a typo or a mistake just ignore it, that's for authenticity.

(moodboard by me)

⊱ ────── {⋅. ✯ .⋅} ────── ⊰

Eddie stood in front of the stove watching the bacon and eggs sizzle in the pan, a cigarette perched on his lips and his grey sweats hung low on his hips, his hair tied back in a low bun with one of your scrunchies. You were singing in the shower and it made him smile, he never thought this sort of domestic life would be for him but you'd gotten rid of all those negative thoughts.

You were singing to yourself mostly while you cleaned yourself up, summer had arrived in Hawkins and since Eddie had graduated he didn't need to worry about having to go back to school again in September so he was taking a few weeks to spend just the two of you before he got a proper job and started earning.

You'd been laid on your bed in your shared trailer reading Stephen King, the trailer itself had been a graduation gift to Eddie from his uncle Wayne and your parents combined. They knew you both wanted your own place and couldn't quite afford a house just yet so they'd spoken to the manager of the trailer park and had put a deposit down on an empty unit so you would have somethere of your own now that Eddie had graduated and you could properly begin your lives as a married couple.

It was another lazy day since you had a few days off work to be at home with Eddie so you'd finally broken the back on the new Stephen King novel you'd been meaning to read. Something about a clown that was snatching up kids in a small town in Maine. You'd been engrossed in the book but apparently Eddie felt as though you weren't paying him enough attention so he had done away with your book and made you pay attention to him.

➽───────────────❥

He'd already drawn one orgasm out of you with just his mouth before he'd inserted his fingers into your sopping wet pussy. His mouth was still firmly attached to your clit, creating a vacuum with his lips as his tongue spelt out his name over and over again while three of his large fingers pistoned in and out of your drenched cunt.

"Eddie - fuck, feels good. Don't stop" you cried, your hips moving to meet the thrusts of his fingers. One hand fisting his hair tightly making him moan around you adding vibrations as he lapped at your core. His rings had been turned around so they faced inwards and were bumping against your swollen clit as Eddie moved to suck another bruise onto the inside of your thigh,

"Can feel you squeezing me baby, gonna cum again? Gonna soak my face?"

"Gonna cum" you agreed, gasping as your back arched off the bed. Eddie's fingers curling forwards to hit that spongy spot inside you that made you see stars. His fingers worked you through your orgasm and as you came down to earth again,

"God you're so hot when you cum" Eddie groaned, palming himself through his sweats. You could see the damp patch on the front of the material and you bit your lip in anticipation, "gotta be inside you baby, gonna fill you up, have you dripping"

"Fuck me Eddie" you rached out your hands for him and helped to discard the sweatpants, audibly moaning when his cock sprang fee and slapped his stomach.

You'd always thought Eddie's cock was just as pretty as the rest of him, long and thick with a curve in the middle that helped him to hit your g spot. The tip was red and leaking and you wanted to run your tongue along the prominent vein on the underside of him,

"You don't have t'ask me twice princess" Eddie lined himself up at your entrance and slowly slid himself into your dripping pussy, moaning at the feel of you clenching around him, "always so fucking tight, so wet"

"S'all for you Eds" you wrapped your legs around his waist bringing him closer until his pelvis was flush against your own, "so big, stretching me out so good" you moaned. You loved the feel of him deep within you, the bulge in your tummy and the outline of his hard cock against your skin.

Eddie waited until you started to wiggle your hips to let him know he could move. He pulled out almost all the way until just the tip was still inside you before plunging back in. His movements were deep and controlled, he wanted to draw this out for as long as he could but you wanted him quick and hard,

"Babe we can take our time later. I need you"

"Who am I to deny my girl what she wants? What sort of husband would that make me hmm?" Eddie cooed at you as he lifted your legs so they were thrown over his shoulders allowing him to sink deeper into you with each thrust.

You cried out, hands gripping onto his shoulders and nails digging into his skin. Eddie fucked into you at a relentless pace, his hands holding your hips angling you so that each thrust hit where you needed him most,

"Oh fuck Eddie, right there"

"Yeah baby that's the spot?" he angled you again and the tip of his cock brushed your g spot making you scream out his name, "that's my girl, always takes me so well"

"Fuck, fuck, fuck, Ed - feels s'good" your eyes were rolling back into your head as Eddie fucked you like you were a doll he'd bought in one of those back alley shops. You were there only for him to get off, his own personal sex toy.

The thought made your head spin only adding to the sensations already coursing through your body. Sweat slicked and chest heaving, a combination of the summer heat and the exertion as Eddie fucked you,

"Look at that baby I can see my cock in your tummy" he grinned, taking one hand off your hip to press down on the outline of his cock which only served to make you moan louder. Your brain had shut off by now, all that mattered was Eddie fucking you so good and the orgasm that was building in your core again, "awh what's wrong sweetheart? You too fucked out to speak?"

Eddie loved knowing that he was the only one who had this affect on you, no one else would ever get to see how pretty you looked while he fucked you stupid. How it felt to have your tight little pussy clench around him, sucking him back in with each thrust.

He could feel your walls fluttering around him and knew you weren't going to last much longer. Taking the hand that had been pressed against your tummy he began rubbing fast circles on your puffy clit making you cry out again and arch your back. Your body hurtling towards your third orgasm of the day,

"Ed - gonna - god - gonna cum!"

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3,884 notes - Posted July 8, 2022

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canyouhearthelight · 4 years ago

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The Miys, Ch. 142

Another late chapter... I’m really batting a thousand lately, seems like.

So, work has been insane, but @baelpenrose reminds me to post when I forget, thankfully. And this is SUCH a fun chapter. I hope you all enjoy!

I dropped into a seat in Mess Hall Seven with a groan, so exhausted that I barely managed to get soup and a grilled cheese from the console. Tyche yawned and nodded in agreement before poking at her sushi bowl idly. It was six Von-days after the last drill, and between coordinating increased training schedules for Shelters Three and Seven and helping Charly plan kink-night at the Undine, we were wiped.

“People are ungrateful,” she muttered before managing to barely balance a piece of salmon into her mouth.

I muttered something that hopefully sounded like agreement before I scooped up a bite of my soup with one wedge of sandwich, too lazy to even bother with the spoon. “Remind me why we don’t have Vati and Hannah handling the practice schedules?”

“Because they are handling the extra evacuation drills with Jokul and Arthur.”

Personally, I thought they were getting the better end of this deal, but since the raging success of their first Food Festival, it really was only fair. “And the relocations for those who need it,” I admitted. “Except mine.”

“Conor may actually strangle one of them if any of your plants don’t make it,” she pointed out, gesturing with her chopsticks for emphasis after having given up and using her fingers to eat her lunch. “Not to mention I wouldn’t wish packing with Maverick on anyone.”

“He’s letting me pack the books and textiles.” I shrugged in acceptance after taking another bite of soup-dipped sandwich.

We picked at our food in silence after that, grateful for something resembling a reprieve, before we were interrupted by a flurry of grey hair and enthusiasm landing in one of the nearby chairs with a heavy thunk. “Good afternoon, Madams Reid.”

“Hey, Jokul,” I muttered as Tyche just waggled her fingers at him. I really think I liked it better when he was trying to kill me. Right now, I might even let him do it.

“I know you are both on your meal period, but I wanted to test the waters on potentially scheduling a community activity,” he rushed out.

Tyche guarded her lunch with an almost feral aggression, having heard what happened the last time Jokul had interrupted my lunch. “That should really be something you run by Al-”

“Worthington, yes, I know,” he interrupted. “However, I know you are both quite busy and I wanted to be respectful of your time. As such, I will make this as brief as - ow!” He snatched his hand back away from the other half of my sandwich, rubbing where I had slammed my spoon down onto it.

“I have no idea where the food stealing comes from, but don’t,” I warned him.

“Rude, got it,” he nodded in a terrifying impression of Charly’s normal demeanor. “As I was saying, I recently learned a new type of game from Terra, from the Before. It involves teamwork, and encourages creativity and escapism, and I think it would be a very good community activity - “

I surrendered to my urge to groan. “We are not doing a redux of Settlers of Cattan. Arthur stabbed someone last time.”

“I didn’t press charges…” Jokul pouted, glancing at the scar on the back of his wrist briefly. “Besides, it was only a fork. Clearly he didn’t mean it, there were four knives in arms reach counting my own.”

Tyche cocked an eyebrow at me. Seriously?

I pursed my lips and wrinkled my nose in response. Yep.

“So what game is it this time?” I asked hesitantly.

I was reward-bombarded with a grin. “It’s called Dungeons and Dragons! Somewhat like a video game, but with more people, and using writing implements and paper. Oh, and different kinds of dice, very important. One person is something of the narrator, to give the game a kind of structure, while the other players act as characters in the game… Ivan introduced me to it, and it is quite challenging with the right people. The dungeon master - that is the narrator - has to re-evaluate the story based on the actions of the other players, but the players themselves don’t know what the dungeon master is going to do. It is very much a social diversion, and there are many classes….”

As Jokul continued to gush, he was rather oblivious to the fact that Tyche and I were stuffing our faces as quickly as possible to avoid interrupting him or laughing. We had both played when we were younger - in fact, we had been introduced to the game by our mother. There had even been a very overwhelming pop-culture movement in our youth around the game, which further emphasized just how far out in the boonies Jokul had grown up. As shocking as it was that he was just now discovering the game, it came at exactly zero surprise that he enjoyed it so much - it was right up his alley of interests.

About fifteen minutes and two more grilled cheeses into his retelling of the campaign he was part of, Charly and Arthur squeezed in with us, their own lunches in tow. As seemed to be a growing trend, Arthur reached over and snagged one of my sandwiches before I could react, shoving half of it in his face.

That was apparently enough to snap Jokul out of his story. “Hey! Why didn’t you hit him?”

“His deathwish, not my problem,” I shrugged.

Around the remains of my lunch, Arthur managed to enunciate. “Told you, Noah fissed the dairy allergy.”

“Bleargh,” I gagged comically. “It’s okay, think I’m done anyway.”

Jokul’s hand swatted Arthur’s out of the way to steal the rest of my food. “As I was saying, Ivan was quite clever with his resolution to deal subdural damage to the player who was very much ruining the storyline by insisting his character was immune to magical sleep…”

“Oooooo! I love tabletops!” Charly squealed, bouncing in her seat. “What setting are you playing in right now? My favorite was always Exalted…”

“Miss Harper, I think we are discussing different activities.” Jokul sounded supremely confused, but my heart broke a bit.

Arthur shook his head. “Maybe not Exalted, but what about Ebberron? Swordhaven, maybe? Just tell me it isn’t Ravenloft… I know you haven’t been fucking around in a Dark Sun, but I beg you to tell me you aren’t playing Ravenloft.”

“I’m not sure what those are… Ivan introduced me to Dungeons and Dragons. There is only one setting.”

“So… Greyhawk or homebrew,” Arthur nodded. “Best place to start, get the basics down.”

Jokul’s head pivoted toward me and Tyche, squinting in annoyance. “You knew, didn’t you? And you let me prattle on…”

“You were so… happy….” I explained plaintively. “We didn’t want to ruin that for you.”

Tyche nodded. “We both remember how fun that first campaign is. And honestly? We’ve been having a kind of crappy day. It was nice to hear someone be excited about something that isn’t work related.”

“But I came to you to discuss making it a ship activity…”

“Originally, yeah,” I shrugged. “That was maybe the first thirty seconds. After that, you were doing what literally every tabletop roleplaying person has done since the beginning of time… telling stories about the fun, dramatic, and frankly stupid shit the people in your party are doing.”

“Says the two-foot eight halfling rogue,” Arthur scowled.

“I rolled it at random, it was fifteen years ago, get over it!” I threw my hands up dramatically. “At least I wasn’t mated to a frickin’ deity.”

Charly giggled uncontrollably while Jokul goggled at us. “Exalted is broken in all the fun ways.”

“You literally sacrificed, and I quote ‘all of your fucks to give’, for necromancy.”

“That was your idea!”

Jokul turned toward Tyche, waiting for her to say something. She just held up her hands defensively. “I was a murder monk-bunny.”

Arthur snorted. “You were the Black Rabbit of Inle….”

“Well if my wife would have just stopped dying…!”

“At least none of us were the Platinum Knight who pissed his pants every time he confronted his favored enemy,” I laughed. “He never did live that one down. Every. Single. Dragon. He would crit fail his roles.”

“Oh, please,” Arthur intoned drily. “Did I ever tell you about the time one of my players managed to make ‘Notice me, Senpai’ into the most terrifying in-universe warcry imaginable?”

Charly choked before swatting his shoulder. “Not in front of my pasta. Please.”

Jokul, however, looked both horrified and intrigued, egging Arthur on. “Barbarian whose entire clan worshipped a god named The Senpai…. Just imagine, a barbarian in a rage, bellowing ‘NOTICE ME, SENPAI!!!’ before just scything down thirty men with a broadsword.”

At this point, I was laughing so hard that tears were rolling down my face. “Please, please tell me there was a kilt and pigtails involved….”

Jokul touched his own hair, before straightening as seriously as possible. “They are warrior’s braids, Councillor.”

That was it, I couldn’t take it anymore. I just put my head down on my folded arms and waiting to either pass out from laughing so hard or from exhaustion. A few deep breaths and a spinning head later, I managed to wipe my face on my sleeve and realized the conversation was continuing without me. Just as I was clearing my throat to let Jokul know he should be fine to start organizing something and to send me a rough outline, Arthur dealt the final blow.

Leaning over, he whispered over my shoulder. “By the way, the barbarian’s name was Drystan of the Doki-doki tribe.”

I was proud that I managed to get up and dash into the hallway before collapsing against the wall in maniacal laughter. I barely registered Hannah’s voice behind me asking everyone at the table if I needed medical assistance, and that did not help.

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#the miys #found family #humans are weird #science fiction #aliens #apocalypse #humans are space orcs #humans are space fae #earth is space australia #post apocalypse #post post apocalypse #original science fiction #original sci fi #original writing

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dragon-swords-prophecies · 3 years ago

Note

Hello, hello, and happy storyteller saturday ^^ So, I noticed that DnD is a large influence for your writing too. So, I was wondering which came first for you, writing or table-top rpgs? How do you think it influenced your writing style/approach to writing?

Hi! Happy sts! I apologize for the rambles in advance. There's a lot of them and I am sorry.

So I obviously did writing in school and still do, but I assume you mean actually fun writing like the WIPs I have now.

I started playing DND about four and a half years ago, in the summer before my birthday with my dad. A few months before (I think. Time is hard) that he and me and my mom had tried to play a game of first edition (which I believe he had started out with in the 80s), but it was complicated and we have up. Then he got a copy of the 5e players handbook and boom, new interest that's never going to leave. I got obsessed with it, and did a couple campaigns on outschool (those were fun. I was a terrible roleplayer, but they were fun) before playing a multi year long one with my dad, and that was the campaign that created Enna and Anne (that one only ended a few months ago. We did take a break in the middle for about 6-7 months but it was homebrew and amazing). So Enna was my third or fourth charchter ever made. And I love her so much, but by god does she need a rebuild. So does Anne, though I did do a rebuild for her. Non dex based melee rogues, yay!

Anyway, I started writing sometime in February 2020. Maybe January.

Nope, it was February. (Wait, that actually means I've officially been writing for two years! Wow) So, that was a big thing and they were originally essentially paper cutouts of the dnd versions of the characters. It was, uh, interesting. And then, sometime in May or so 2021 (I think), I found writeblr and that was a thing. I started this blog and wow, I did that and stuff.

Anyway, I have rambled away from your question and the short answer is: dnd came first. By about two years.

And now for your other question:

I think it influenced my writing a lot. It's why I started off with fantasy. It's why even though I had a couple failed forays into scifi, urban fantasy, and steampunk (that I rarely talked about), high fantasy stayed my favorite (ok. It's also bc of dragons and elves) and it's what I write.

It's... At the middle of them all my stories are dnd stories, they're quests and massive designs of complicated stuff. I don't know. They're something. *Shrugs*

My writing style is all because eof the books I read and the rate at which I read them.

And I'll put that under a cut bc this is getting long and very ramble-y.

I read mostly super long fantasy books, so I write what I would want to read and I write it as long and complex as I can, but still for teenagers because that's what I am and I read so fast, my reading level has always been pretty high, so I have always wanted something complex and long and with dragons that wasn't a stupid romance with maybe a hint of plot on page 73 (fanfiction is the only romance heavy stuff I actually like).

And that's why I loved LotR, except for the two chapters of the family trees of the shire. That was long.

I loved Percy Jackson and all the associated books and shadow hunters because they were long (sometimes) and both had complex universes and not really dragons but both were queer so that made up for it.

I loved Throne of Glass because it was long and had sort of dragons, and anyway (I'm sorry for the rambles):

And so, I write long stuff with dragons and confusing plots. Of course that's the stuff that few people I know like, but that's fine.

Oh look, finally the end of this. Thank goodness. I'm sorry about how long this is.

#sts #storyteller saturday #ren c leyn #asks #sts asks

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sapphirelass · 4 years ago

Text

What family is all about - Weasley FamilyxWeasley!Sister

Hiiiiiii!!! It’s... been a while. Again. Let’s face it, I’ll never be able to post as often as I’d like. I just don’t like rushing stuff, or posting anything I’m not happy with, so...

Anyhow, I LOVED writing for the Weasley family, and I’ll most likely do it again soon. Bill and Charlie are both underrated characters in my opinion and I had a ton of fun letting them ‘shine’ (despite this being a sort of sad story, but that always seems to be where I end up... XD)

Also, I might have to edit this once more, but it’s late, I have not posted in about two weeks and I just want to go to sleep XD That being said, take it for what it is, and I’ll try to correct any grammatical errors later. Good night! <3

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Please note:

1: I don’t own any of the gifs used, nor any already established characters, so credit to the authors and original creators - You have done a phenomenal job :)

2: English is not my native language, as I was born and raised in Sweden. I have, however, studied English for almost a decade, so I don’t think it’ll be a problem, I just thought I’d let you know ;)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Word count: ≈ 2800 (they just keep getting longer, don’t they? XD)

Warnings: Light swearing, blood, angst

Enjoy! :)

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

That’s what family is all about

“How big did his tongue get?”

“It was four feet long before his parents would let me shrink it!”

The sound of laughter was heard from the kitchen as Elwira Weasley entered her childhood home. She worked as an arithmancer, and had been stationed at a research-facility in the northern parts of Sweden for the past few years. Her work took up most of her time, but she had just travelled home to go see the quidditch final with her dad, older brother Bill, twin brother Charlie and all their younger siblings.

“It isn’t funny”, her dad shouted. “That sort of behaviour seriously undermines wizard-muggle relations! I spend half my life campaigning against the mistreatment of muggles, and my own sons-”

“Are just a wee bit too daft to understand that!”

She walked through the door and found her entire family, plus two other people she didn’t know, all sitting or standing around the kitchen table.

“Ellie?!”

Her older brother and twin, with whom she had always been extremely close, both made their way across the room and pulled her into a hug so tight she could barely breathe.

“Blimey! ‘ello Bill, hey Charlie! Long time no see, huh?”

“Certainly!”, their mother exclaimed while pushing the two oldest sons to the side as she tried to get a good look at her grown-up daughter. “Not a single visit since Christmas, Elwira Weasley, we’ve had to do with owls for six months?!”

“Sorry, mum, there’s been a lot of work to do… I thought I’d stay for the rest of the summer though, if that’s okay with you?”

“Of course, dear! Have you eaten yet?”

“No, I’m famished!”

Mrs Weasley went off to get another plate, and Ellie, after greeting everyone and being introduced to Harry and Hermione, took a seat between her dad and youngest brother.

“So Ronald? Had a good term?”

“Err.. Sure? Nothing interesting except for the stuff I wrote to you about, though.”

“Well you’re going into your fourth year now - almost halfway through!” She paused for a moment and turned to her father. “You good dad? You seem a bit… tense?”

Arthur looked up from his plate and sent his daughter a kind smile.

“Don’t worry about it, darling. Hosting the world cup comes with a great deal of problems all with the need to be solved. Admittedly, it’s not really part of my job, but the entire ministry becomes quite chaotic when something like that is days away. I’m a bit stressed, that’s all. How are things up in Scandinavia?”

“They’re… somewhat slow to be honest. There’s so much work to do between like October and February, but in the summer it’s mostly filing and other boring bits of paperwork.”

“Elwira?”, Hermione asked. “Sorry, I’m just curious, what is it that you do? Ron’s never told us…”

“That’s probably cause Ron doesn’t understand what I’m doing”, she smirked, “but of course, I work with, and study, arithmancy which, as you might know, is part of what’s called ‘natural magic’.”

“Great!”, mumbled Ron quietly, making sure only his friends and older sister heard. “Hermione, there are four rules in this house, okay? One: Don’t ask Charlie about dragons, Two: Don’t ask Percy about anything, Three: Don’t ask dad about muggles, and Four: Don’t ask Ellie about her job. Break either and you’ll be stuck listening to a five hour lecture.”

Hermione didn’t seem to be bored though, so Ellie ignored her brother’s comment and continued.

“It’s the type of magic that has been studied and worshiped since ancient times and has a very strong connection with nature. The natural phenomena with the strongest affiliation with magic is, while they in themselves have what the muggles would call a ‘scientific explanation’, the northern lights. Meaning it’s only when they’re visible that we can make any significant progress.”

Ellie paused and glanced at the younger girl, trying to see whether she had caught on or not, and was happy when realizing that she had.

“And... “, questioned Hermione, “the northern lights are only visible north of the polar circle and b-”

“Between September and March, exactly… Meaning there’s sadly not that much advanced research that can be done during the rest of the year…”

“It’s still a fascinating subject though. I only started last year, but I love it.”

“I’m glad! At least some people appreciate the wonderful art that is arithmancy, Ronald!”

Ron looked up at the mention of his name and met his sister’s gaze.

“I just don’t find it interesting”, he said.

“Right, because you ha-”

Ellie didn’t get to finish her sentence before being interrupted by her twin brother.

“Hey, Ellie? Must have been fun watching the Nordic versus Germany, huh?”

“Oh shut up, Charlie!”, she groaned while putting her head in her hands. “Holy Merlin…” The Nordic National Quidditch team, of which she had become a huge supporter in the last few years, had suffered a HORRENDOUS loss against Germany, and it had certainly not been a fun night.

Her brother, however, did not shut up, but instead burst out laughing.

“Charlie, it’s not funny!! You should have been there though… You’d have done a much better job than the stand-in seeker we had.”

“What were the results again? 700-20?”

“... 520 actually”

“520 to??”, Bill said mockingly

“You’re idiots both of you… 520-0, happy now?”

Ellie hadn’t realized that everyone else around the table had been listening in on their conversation, but was made aware when Fred, George, Harry, Ron, Ginny and Arthur began laughing loudly.

“Why is this so funny to everyone? England lost badly too, and neither Romania nor Egypt even qualified to compete?!”

“Yeah...”, began Fred.

“But none of them lost with 520 points.”, finished George, earning himself a furious look from his older sister who stood up and shook her head.

“I’ll go see if mum needs any help…”

~~~~~~

Ellie loved her family, and therefore all her slightly annoying brothers, beyond everything, but being away from them for months and then meeting them all at the same time was TIRING! Having no desire to sleep through the world cup, she decided to go to bed early the night before, and she had barely closed her eyes before she fell asleep...

~~~~~~

“3, 2 ‘shhhh, quiet!”

Ellie took notice of the obnoxiously loud whispers, but it wasn’t enough to fully wake her up.

“We’ve got one more chance, 3, 2, 1, ELLIE!!!!”

She woke up instantly and sent a blast of blue sparks towards her older brother, barely missing him by an inch.

“What ‘ru doing, El? You can’t just go attacking people?!”

He tried to sound angry, but failed miserably, a heartwarming laugh escaping his mouth.

“You bloody idiots?! Why’d you scare me like that? You’re 21 and 23, not five?”

“Brings back memories, doesn’t it? Do you remember-”

“Yes, I do!”. She rubbed her eyes slowly, “‘85, look can you two please let me sleep?”

“Sorry, sis”, said Bill. “We’re leaving in half an hour. The kids and dad left ages ago.”

“Yeah, you don’t want to be late do you? Not when you can cheer for a team that might not loo-”

“Charlie, I swear!”

~~~~~~

The match was fantastic! Ellie would never admit it to her brothers, but it was nice to watch an even one for once. Watching and cheering with her family brought back fond memories of childhood games at the Burrow or Hogwarts, and she realized just how much she had missed actually playing. They stayed up late discussing players and tactics, but eventually their father ushered them all off to bed.

~~~~~~

“Ellie?”

“Ellie??”

She stirred slightly and pulled the sleeping bag tighter around her.

“Ellie! Damn it, wake up!”

She opened her eyes slowly and saw her twin brother bent above her. The sight made her sigh.

“Charlie”, she mumbled. “We see each other once- or twice a year nowadays, do you really feel obligated to wake me up every time you get the chance?”

“Elwira, I’m serious! Get up!”

This caught her attention. Sure, the twins often used their full names when messing with each other, but it didn’t sound like Charlie was joking at all. She sat up, rubbed the sleep from her eyes and yawned loudly.

“What’s going on? Wha- Charlie? It’s still dark out? Why’d yo-”

“Ellie, c’mon. We have to help dad. Someone’s attacking the muggles.”

He threw his sister a jacket and pulled her out of the tent. Arthur, Bill and Percy were all waiting outside.

“Dad?”, she asked. “What’s happening? Charlie sai-”

“We’ve got to help the ministry!”, he said while frantically trying to count everyone and make sure they were there. “Fred, George, you make sure the others are safe. Go wait in the woods and I’ll come for you when the situation’s under control. Bill, Charlie, Percy, Ellie, let’s see if there’s something we can do.”

Nobody questioned Mr Weasley’s instructions, and immediately left in different directions. There were people everywhere though, and the two directions quickly became three, four, six. Spells and curses were fired left, right and centre and Ellie found herself disarming and stunning at least a few death eaters. There weren’t that many of them, roughly thirty or so, but the insane amount of witches and wizards fleeing the campsite made it difficult to fight back. She couldn’t risk hitting any random bloke.

While duelling a tall man in a black mask, Ellie suddenly stumbled forward, a particularly nasty curse having hit her straight in the back. Falling to the ground felt way more painful than it should have, and her wand landed well beyond her reach. She groaned as a burning pain spread through her lower back, but made an effort to get back up anyways. She did, however, not make it very far before the sharp end of a wand dug into her throat.

The death eater behind her sniggered and pulled her up by the collar of her shirt.

“Well, well, well… Why’re you trying to ruin our fun?”

He stood way too close for comfort and Ellie felt his breath on her neck. She tried to answer, but the curse that was shot at her must have hit its intended target, as all that came out when she opened her mouth was a strained cough and warm blood.

The bloke holding her let out a dark chuckle and threw her to the ground. She could barely keep her eyes open, and a thick, red liquid oozed from the wound in her back.

“Not so high-and-mighty now, are we?”

Ellie lacked the strength to fight back, and to the death eaters that seemed to take all the fun out of the situation. They set off back towards the campsite, leaving Ellie on the ground next to a few pines. She tried her very best to sit up, but ended up passing out…

~~~~~~

“Charlie?!”

Bill ran up to his younger brother and pulled him in for a quick, one-armed hug.

“Charlie, you okay? We’ve got to get back to the tent. Where’s El?”

“Wha-, I-I thought she was with you?!?”

“What? Last I saw her you were together?”

The brothers shared a lock of utter terror.

“Bill, we have to find her!”

“I know… Dad went to get the kids and Percy’s back in the tent waiting.”

“There’s no time to waste then. Let’s go”

~~~~~~

They had been running around the camping grounds for half an hour, and there was still not a trace of a living soul - let alone the special one they were searching for. At first, they had been shouting her name at the top of their lungs, but were now walking silently. That was, at least, until a shout made both of them turn around.

“Bill! Charlie! What are you doing? I told you to stay in the tent?”

Arthur Weasley came running towards them, with Harry, Ron and Hermione following close behind.

“Dad!”, Charlie shouted. “Have you seen El? We can’t find her?”

“What?”, asked Arthur. “But she was with you, wasn’t she?”

“Yes, at first, but we must have gotten separated… Dad, is that? You know?”

He threw a dark glance at the skull and snake decorating the night sky and said, “Yes. Yes it is. Look, I’ll take Ron, Hermione and Harry back to the tent, and I’ll meet you back here in ten minutes, okay? Don’t go too far. Come on kids!”

~~~~~~

Just as the brothers were about to give up, go back to the clearing, wait for their dad and hopefully find both their sisters safe and sound, Bill noticed something. A glimpse of red in the moonlight…

“Charlie? Get over here fast!”

The younger brother followed Bill’s gaze and immediately set off through the forest when his eyes found a mess of ginger hair sticking out from behind a rather large pine. Bill followed closely behind.

“ELLIE!!!?!!”

Charlie stumbled to his knees and turned his sister around, trying to get a better look at her. He pressed his hand to her wrist and breathed a sigh of relief when he found a pulse.

“She’s alive”, he mumbled. “Bill, she’s alive!”

“Good. I- Good.” Bill was lost for words too and mumbled a quick “Let me see”.

He pushed some hair out of her eyes and searched for any clues to what had hit her. He was a curse-breaker after all, but that usually meant working with curses placed on things or places, not people.

“Charlie, I-I don’t know what that is… it’s not a curse I’m familiar with and I’m no healer… You want to carry her?”

“Of course”

Charlie brought his twin into his arms and picked her up, her bruised, limp body threatening to fall unless he held on tight enough. The brothers walked back to the clearing where they’d promised to meet their dad, but kept a close watch on their sister. They would apparate, though at the moment none of them felt like they had much time for ‘Deliberation’. It wasn’t very far anyways.

~~~~~~

“DAD!”, Bill shouted as soon as they noticed Arthur in the clearing where they were supposed to wait.

“Boys! Didn’t I tell you t-”

“We’ll take that later, Dad, you’ve got to help her!?”

Arthur Weasley was speechless, which had most likely never happened before, and Charlie felt so helpless. This was worse than his worst nightmares, and there was nothing he could do. Had it been a wounded dragon, sure, he knew loads about them, but this?

“Dad?”, asked Bill. “What can we do?”

“Right. Er… I suppose there’s no use trying to get you to wait here?”, he said while looking at Charlie who frantically shook his head. “Right, Bill could you go back to Percy and the kids? Fill them in on what happened? Then Charlie and I’ll take Ellie to St Mungos, okay?”

Bill didn’t look too happy with the idea, but nodded nonetheless.

---

“Charlie sit down!”

“Fred, he can’t”, said George. “Hey, I think you missed a spot over there, Charles”

“Shut it both of you! Honestly, why am I the only one that’s worried?”

Arthur stood up and put an arm around his son.

“Listen, we’re all worried, but walking back and forth isn’t helping anyone. Just sit for a moment, huh?”

“No, dad, you don’t understand! It’s my fault. We were supposed to stick together! I let her out of my sight...I-”

“Charlie, we all-”

“No, Bill, you don’t get it either, I should-”

“-let your sister sleep for once? That’d be greatly appreciated, thank you.”

The entire family turned at once, and found the oldest daughter struggling to sit up.

“EL!!”

Charlie stumbled over and put a hand on his sister’s back, trying to help her up, but unfortunately placing it right where the curse had hit her.

“Auch!”

She moved away from his touch and he pulled his hand back immediately.

“Blimey, Ellie I’m so s-”

“Charlie, it’s good. Don’t worry about it.”

Ellie pulled her brother into a hug, though he was now extremely careful, and she looked over his shoulder at the rest of her family. Her eyes met Bill’s and he sent her a kind smile. She gestured for him to come join them, and eventually the whole family found themselves in a loving group hug. Molly did her very best to wrap her arms around all her children, desperately trying to convince herself that they were all there - safe and sound and loved.

Because if there was one thing the Weasleys had a lot of, it was love and that is, after all, precisely what family is all about.

~ L

Masterlist

#weasley family imagine #bill weasley x sister #charlie weasley x sister #harry potter imagine #weasleys x sister #HP #hp one shot #Goblet of Fire #quidditch #arthur weasley x daughter #creative writing #writing #hp fan fic #harry potter fan fiction #weasley siblings #weasleys x daughter

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staggeringsmite · 4 years ago

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ooh, top 5 moments you've had/witnessed as a DM? (please use this an excuse to hype yourself up if you want!!)

my players make dm’ing beyond worth it, so i really have to give credit to them for the joy of what they bring to a lot of these scenes <3 (also this is all wandering isles bc it’s been my most narratively satisfying and invested dm experience) Buckle Up it’s a long one!!!

bonus: i’m very proud of my individual character moments! throughout the campaign we’ve had about four of these (the intro session scenes, two dream sequences for every pc, and a set of individual trial scenes). we’re a pretty big party so it’s hard to narrow it down, but i just love writing and running those longer narrative moments bc i think it’s a v interesting insight into each character and gives them each a separate moment to shine <3

5. “promise you’ll come back to her” / burning of contingency letters

i put these moments together perhaps to cheat a little bit, but also because they deserve it. xarus, the party’s barbarian whose family was abandoned by his mother at a young age pulls theresa, a forge knitting cleric about to board the airship he is a quartermaster of in order to find a cure for her sick wife. he asks theresa to promise him one thing, that no matter what she will come back to her wife. along the way they write contingency letters to their loved ones in and outside of the party as their adventures grow more and more dangerous, and eventually, exhausted and worn, theresa and xarus find each other in the den of a safehouse to talk. recognizing each other’s willingness to self-sacrifice, their conversation ends with them burning the contingency letters they’ve written, committing to life. these scenes come together because it shows how far they have come together, and the theresa and xarus relationship will always be a highlight of the wandering isles to witness. sometimes the players do all the best work for you, and it’s so wonderful to sit back and watch <3

4. miles is missing

damien returns to the university he works at after an unprecedented amount time away to check on his office before he heads back out on another adventure with the party. while there he moves to put a sticky note (canonically a magical item in the wandering isles universe) on his rival colleague’s (and gay lover/roommate of 20 years) door only to find it entirely emptied without a trace. despite their bickering, miles and damien are very close, and miles would never pack up his things and go without telling damien.

this was a more subtle cliff-hanger for the session, but it was made so much fun as a dm because the players were excited and joking the whole session about miles’ second appearance (and only since the very first session) so his sudden disappearance was made much more severe based on everyone’s anticipation of meeting and having a light-hearted interaction with him.

3. the infamous sex rave

sometimes things go very right as a dm and sometimes things spiral out of control when a pc mislabels a situation which becomes a running joke of the campaign. either way i love being stubborn in my defense of “it isn’t a sex rave!!” whenever they bring it up (and immediately playing an npc who also calls it a sex rave). basically the players had a heist encounter in which they were hired to break a group of pirate prisoner’s out of a secret underground information center (where magical artifacts were also being held and studied, and there was pertinent information stored for the party to take a swipe at). the group split and one subset of party members were forced to hide from guards on the outskirts of a large, gladiatorial style ring within the compound, in which prisoners were competitively battling in order to test the abilities of certain unknown artifacts for the entertainment of anonymous nobles in masquerade getup. based on the magical lighting effects, the strangely dressed noble onlookers, and the,,,, Fighting Noises being some of the only things the pc’s perceived from the level of the auditorium they hid at, it was unfortunately misnomer’ed the “weird sex rave” and has only been referred to it as that ever since.

2. mother abel’s goodbye

hmmm am i making players cry again? yeah maybe. mother abel was an elder cleric of nosa crossing, the starting city of the campaign. she’d lived through its settlement, destruction, rebuilding, and given her all not only to the city but also to the jilted creed (a secret society dedicated to disrupting geline, a large and dangerously powerful island-state which is one of the campaign’s greatest evils). in the last use of her strength she took on a role as a conduit for a powerful plane shift ritual to transport the residents of the city to safety in the feywild as nosa crossing began to be overrun by potent wild magics in the prime material plane. as a low-level cleric, the spell took its toll on her, and as the party arrived in the feywild via a similar ritual to find the inhabitants, they were led to her side. theresa, a native of nosa crossing now reunited with her wife yodean, went to abel’s side with yodean. as yodean sat on the foot of the bed, theresa kneeled as though praying to hold abel’s hand cleric to cleric, confessing her gratitude but admitting that she cannot give as freely as mother abel did, that she and yodean deserve to live for themselves as much as they choose everyday to live for other people. with her final words in a soft, weak message, mother abel comforted theresa in her decision. the scene as a whole was so wonderfully sad, and the best dm moment of something so raw as telling aj, theresa’s player, that while there was no way to confirm it in any real capacity, something in theresa felt that perhaps mother abel held out a little while longer to make sure she was safe one last time and make sure she’d truly gotten everyone home.

1. rosa’s betrayal / lian’s resurrection

enough of that sad shit let’s get mean babey!! aslkjglfk i will be riding the high of this session for an eternity, but it’s quite a lot to break down. rosa rucksaw is the captain of the crew the party rescues in the heist sequence, who eventually reveals herself to in fact be xarus’ mom who fully left to assume a new identity and is Pretty Horrible as a person. at the safehouse, the party is asked by the people they were hired if they would be willing to take the crew to a longer term safehouse island, and the decision is left to xarus. not wanting to be like his mom, xarus agrees to endure a little more time with them in order to them this service out of convenience and kindness. a few hours from their destination, rosa finds xarus on the deck and honestly? kinda begins to admit some amount of guilt for all the shit she did,,,, literally seconds before she reveals that when her and her crew were caught by geline, she struck a deal in order to keep them alive, saying to her biological son “out on the cloudsea your crew is your family, and son, believe me, i’d do anything for my family” before her crew on the deck anchored the ship to an invisible gelinish war vessel and we snapped to roll20 for combat. the look of horror and betrayal on everyone’s face as her monologue hit those final lines, ugh and the fact that no one was super suspicious made it even better!! sometimes it Really Works, and this was one of those times!

flash forward in the battle, and an npc (it’s miles, the gay lover from a few numbers ago) being held hostage by the gelinish vessel is killed, as he is resurrected by two party members (damien and theresa) damien reaches for his soul, as theresa, who multi-classed into divination wizard after a pc named lian died (with failed attempts from theresa and xarus to hold her back) feels another presence in the grey, misty beyond. lian died in session four, and when i said her name to reference jack’s character everyone lost it mostly out of confusion before i began to narrate lian feeling restless in the afterlife, eventually reaching out and forming a celestial warlock pact with miles through his connection to damien and being called upon by her goddess sune as theresa reached out, offering lian the chance to go back. theresa returning to that moment with both her clerical and divinatory abilities, with the blessing of sune, lian emerging on the battlefield, now a vengeance paladin instead of life cleric, with a flaming sword and celestial wings at her back was such an incredible highlight to set up and run,, i just, <333 very proud of myself (and very thankful jack was on board for her coming back) for this moment

thank you so so much!! this was a long ramble, but i hope it was somewhat interesting to people not in the wandering isles <33

send a top 5 or 10?

#ask #thats-the-moon-grey #thank you!!!#dm'ing is so...good

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what-a-messsss · 4 years ago

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2x3 rewatch

I keep forgetting that Brach is still in S2. Oops. Also, I apparently went to check something in S6 last time I watched something, so it started at 6x2 instead of 2x3 and I yelled. But anyway, on with this mess. “Death Came in Like Thunder” apparently. It sure did.

Ah yes, let us not forget that Branch is MANLEH. This shall be proven to us by him murdering his cousin, Trunk, with big ax. Chop chop, Branch, kill Trunk. But oh no, must also show that he is People Smart, so must also lose because this makes him likable. And many white people clap. Yaaaay. But be sure to say, “I let him win, Ferg,” while your competitor is right next to you, so he almost surely heard you. Good good.

Oh Ferg. Could you look more gormless if you tried? (I mean, probably not, since presumably that was the goal of the actor, so he would have been trying. But still.) Bb.

Heh, nice thematic cut to Walt also chopping wood. And YAY, Henry’s gorgeous truck (and gorgeous self). I’m just going to take a moment to appreciate the fact that Henry rolls up and just helps himself to some of Walt’s thermos of coffee. Because of course he does. But I do so love these touches that they put in that do underline the fact that they are married have been besties for going on 40 years. Also, I love this jacket of Henry’s. The woven top, jean jacket sort of one? Yeah, top 5 costume pieces of his for me. (Also on that list, all basically tied with each other, basically any pants he wears. I am reminded, when they cut back out to a full body shot. Because I am very shallow, and he is very pretty.)

Haaaaaa. And of course Cady talked to Henry before she talked to Walt. Walt is a butthead. And, yeah yeah, she just found out that he’d been lying to her for over a year, but that just proves my point that Walt is a butthead. And we’re back to this whole idea that she left her phone, which just... ugh. No. But Henry’s face when he says that she said that she is safe, and he’s so worried, but still willing to respect her boundaries.

“She is an adult, Walt.” “She’s my daughter.” For fuck’s sake, you jackass, your ADULT daughter; that’s the whole flipping point! Also, that little emphasis on my daughter, pfft. If you didn’t want to feel like she preferred her cool dad to you, maybe try being less of an AAAAAAASSHOLE. And, like, respecting her. Even a weensy little bit.

“Etta Place” I don’t remember if we find out why that’s the ‘assumed name’ that Cady chose, but I’m intrigued. Wait, I just googled. Looooool. She spent years with Butch and Sundance. Nice.

Walt is such a soft touch with teens. *snack crackle pop* that kneecap back into place. Vic starts this scene saying, “The 911 operator,” though, which is interesting, because I was kind of under the impression that Ruby was the main dispatcher, so it would be kind of heartening if she actually had back up with that. ...Or maybe they’re just far enough out that a cell call made would be picked up by a tower farther out and have to be routed back in to the station/them. I have no idea how that actually works. Another rabbit hole for me to totally not go down. Hopefully. Shit. They’ve apparently upped the fine for trespass since the show, though, because it’s $750 (or 6 months in jail) now and Walt says it’s $500.

And once again, we see Vic actually wearing gloves while investigating a suspicious death, and Walt just squinting into the distance helpfully. I suppose “things got bad” in Basque country around WWII, but there has been friction there that dates back before the Spanish Civil War, or even the Carlist Wars the previous century. It did get gnarly with the dictatorship of Franco, and the formation of the ETA in retaliation, though, so yeah. (Francisco Franco is also on the list of people who anybody with a time machine should go back and beat the shit out of.)

Shit, I forgot about the animal death.

Knock knock, no answer. Better just wander in without a warrant. I know that the guy who they know lives there is dead, but still, no fricking warrant; I suppose the worry of a poisoning could count as probably cause?

Gods, but there are moments when I do absolutely adore Vic, and they are usually when she’s taking the piss out of Walt. “Reclusive bachelor chic; you and Marco have the same decorator.” Looool. But also, sad, because Martha has only been gone for a little over a year, and Walt is not the kind of person who would, like, change stuff and get rid of her things, so that’s kind of odd. Maybe Henry and/or Cady went though and put away some of her things to try to help Walt move on? But damn, the ‘excuse you’ look on Walt’s face when she does say it, pffft.

AND AGAIN, Vic wearing gloves, Walt with his bare ass hands picking up the picture of Picasso’s Guernica; can you at least *pretend* you’re a cop, *some* of the time, buddy?

Lol at the barrabilak; they are pretty well by the Rocky Mountains, so it’s probably not all that surprising that Walt’s had some “Rocky Mountain oysters” before.

I had forgotten that Vic had four brothers. But her comment about Sal going off to look after the sheep and how if someone had told her that one of her brothers were dead she “wouldn’t care about any damn sheep,” I don’t know. It kind of annoys me. It’s totally in character for her, which is good, but I think it’s part of what can annoy me about her character. Different people grieve differently, but also, I know she’s only been in Wyoming for a year or two, tops, but how is it so hard to fathom that someone one would be concerned about their livelihood, even in the face of personal tragedy? Just, seeing beyond her own very narrow experience doesn’t seem like something she’s very good at. It would be one thing if she’d framed it as “this is suspicious, and here’s why I think so as a cop,” but it was, “I wouldn’t react that way personally, so it’s sus.”

Sure, be suspicious because there’s a suspicious death and family members are always suspects until ruled out, but approach it like a cop. Or at least think about it from more angles than just your own, not terribly similar experience. You’re a white city cop who can’t (or won’t) adjust to being in BF rural-ville, but these are immigrant shepherds whose family come from a homeland where the cops were just as likely to kill you as answer questions, and you’re side-eying a guy for going to make sure that their meal ticket doesn’t get obliterated?

I need to keep reminding myself that I really did want to like Vic. I really did. She just... they don’t make it easy for me. Maybe she’s serving as an avatar for audience who don’t know about some of the culture stuff, and the audience get answers from her ignorance? But honestly, I wish they’d picked a different way to handle that, if that’s what they were trying to do. Her response to Henry being salty about Thanksgiving still really pisses me off. Because it was shitty and racist, and... do we really need a character basically rolling their eyes and saying, “It was so long ago, why don’t you just get over it,” about something that is intrinsically tied to the genocide of so many people? Why are Indigenous people just supposed to “get over it” but “Remember the Alamo” and “Southern Pride,” and shit? Fuck’s sake. Honestly, that might have been the moment when they lost me on her character. She has moments where she’s awesome, but they never really address her being fucking racist or give her a chance to grow into a better person. Which sucks a lot. Fuck. Ok, that was a lot. Sorry. Back to the actual ep.

AH, nice of you to beam in from the campaign trail, Brancheroo!

Uh, so I paused it to look at pic in the newspaper, and then being me, started to look at the articles surrounding the pic. And the one with the headline “Fans Injured At Local Game” is actually about the Stewart case? From 1x3? I’m guessing that somebody went to the trouble of writing up an article for that for some S1 ep after it and they just plugged it in because when not paused, you might catch “Sheriff Longmire” there and that’s all they need. Especially since the text starts to repeat after the first paragraph. (I am the worst pedantic little shit.) Ooooor, maybe even though it’s S2, it’s hardly been any time since 1x3? The date on the newspaper is March 31, 2012, so there’s a timeline hint.

Awwwwww, once Walt points out the bird, Ferg knows exactly what it is. Occasional twitcher, are we, my lad? “A red-tip meadowlark,” indeed. Oh bb; Ferg’s face when he sees Walt looking at the pic of him with Branch in the paper.

“You go too fast, you miss the little things.” Every once in a while, he actually sort of mentors Ferg. I wish he did more of that, especially since we see later how capable Ferg can be.

Go suck an egg, Branch. Why does she get all the “good” assignments? Maybe because she was actually on the job when they found the body, not campaigning.

OPE. Lizzie’s gift. Yeah, I’d probably choke on that coffee if I were you, too, girl. Better hope that there wasn’t perishable food stuffs in that gift, because that has been in there for a whiiiiiile, hasn’t it. Wait, was Ferg in the office when Lizzie dropped off the gift? Because his face said more than just “Did somebody give Vic a present?” Suuuuper subtle with that whole pushing the drawer closed with your foot there, Vic. Pfffft.

“Cyrano Caballero” How daaaare that skeeve take Cyrano’s name in vain?!?! (I have a thing about Cyrano de Bergerac. It’s quite possibly my favourite play, and I adore the character, and have exactly 0 chill about it at all. I find Brian Hooker’s translation of “The Ballade of the duel at the Hotel Bourgogne Between de Bergerac and a Boeotian” with “Then, as I end the refrian, thrust home,” vastly superior to any other translation that I’ve heard or read, though for the rest of it, I will grant that there are others to be preferred. But that version of his Ballade is exquisite, and I will not be swayed. Holy shit, FOCUS. That is so very much not the point.) It’s not even a throw away line in this ep, it’s just a random, very well chosen, if utterly appallingly insulting, company name. It’s actually incredibly clever for what the business is, and if it didn’t make me so stomping mad, I would applaud whoever came up with it heartily.

Vic’s face listening to this jackass’ spiel is a thing of beauty. “A good woman goes a long way of easing the obvious stresses of your daily life,” the jackass says, cutting his eyes at Vic when he says “obvious stresses,” and I caaaackle.

What is it about this guys’ horrible glasses that just makes him so much more hate-able? I’m not entirely sure, but kudos to whatever costumer put those on him, because they are perfect. In the ‘I want to punch him’ way of perfection.

And after all of that about Walt’s “lady friend,” Vic brings Lizzie’s present. Womp womp. That went super well. Yuuuup, run while you can.

Poor Ferg. Branch manipulates him, Vic ignores him, Walt shuts him down... Poor guy just can’t get a break.

I actually kind of like this motel manager--the one who “doesn’t judge people” and is a stickler for warrants? At least somebody in this county cares about warrants. Also, those doors are actually really pretty. Nice colour, and the carved scrollwork designs are nice.

What an odd shot: the one when they’re coming out of Walt’s office after talking to Skeevy McGrossFace and Rosa. It’s a weird sort of shaky-cam stepping back, just preceding Branch walking, and then turns to follow him when he sit’s on his desk. But it’s a really different style of shot than I can remember, so much so that it’s a bit jarring, especially after the series of nearly stationary close ups that we just had. Weird. [18:42-18-50]

Cady! I haven’t made much note of her costuming before this, but it seems notable that’s she’s only in monocromatics. Especially next to Fales in muted tones, but still some colour, and surrounded by the colourful grafitti of the alley where her mother was stabbed. Nice way of setting her apart from everything.

SHEEPIES! Ooooo, that wagon is so cool. Ah dang, the way that Sal corrects Walt’s pronunciation of his brother’s name is so gloriously passive aggressive. Good for you, my dude. Names are important, and people should have the respect to make the effort to get them right.

Aaaaaand Walt, the definition of Do, Don’t Tell, just shoves the guy to keep him from drinking the possibly dangerous water, rather than, like, using his words. Walt’s gonna Walt.

Iiiiiiiii am a mess, truly. It cuts to an architectural model and I start giggling like a 6th grader, because I know it’s going to be a Jacob scene. He’s not even on screen yet, ffs. HANDS. I’m fine. Totally fine. (That’s totally a lie. I just rewound to the beginning of the scene because I kept giggling too much to pay attention. What the hell.) First time we’ve seen one of the chips, which at this point must be a marketing mock-up, since nothing is built yet. And he actually types, not just doing the hunt-and-peck thing that is sometimes easier on a tablet.

Looking at the weaving that is up on his wall (maybe a rug?) I’m hoping that the prop people actually did buy from Northern Cheyenne artisans. They apparently did most of their filming in New Mexico, so I hope they made the effort to get the patterns right, and buy from the actual tribe they’re supposed to be portraying, I guess? And now I’m distracted by the fact that the random hanging light behind Jacob is at a weird angle?

Look, ever since I realized that the “Hey,” that Jacob does is apparently just A (thanks to it also happening in That Damned Xmas Movie) I am endlessly amused (and charmed) whenever Jacob does it. I don’t know why it makes me so happy, but it does. (This is legitimately embarrassing. How much trouble I am having focusing. Beyond my normal focus issues, which, as shown above, are already impressive. Because thiiiiirst.)

“My boys at the lumber yard did just throw you a campaign rally.” I love how Jacob is basically apparently not just his secret angel-investor, but also a sneaky campaign manager. Did Branch just think shit like the rally just happened? He’s not fricking Ferris Bueller; somebody organizes those. And apparently it’s either Jacob himself, or someone who Jacob appointed to do so.

“I thought you were just a casino developer.” You have noooo clue, Brancheroo. “I prefer to remain a silent partner. White people get nervous when Indians start taking back their land.” Oooooope. Especially interesting because there are previsions for the Tribal Council to purchase land to be Tribal land (Section 6 of Article IX of the Tribal Constitution), but this seems more along the lines of personal acquisition. Though maybe not, because “on the board” doesn’t necessarily equate to being the owner.

The set up of Jacob’s office is so interesting. Functionally for the show, it’s probably for better shooting angles, so that we can see more of Jacob behind the desk while Branch is sitting in front of it, but from an in-the-verse decorating standpoint, bit’s fascinating. He has this focal wall with the gorgeous wall hanging, flanked by floor to ceiling window, but instead of having his desk centered on that wall and directly facing the bulk of the room, it’s at an almost 45 degree angle on a huge rug, and it’s so unexpected. I kind of love it, and want to analyze it for days. Also worth noting is that pride of place is given to the Hotamétaneo’o headdress which is on a stand centered in front of the wall hanging.

How fucking tired must Jacob be. He’s used to Walt... Walting, but then Branch comes in, who he is literally spending his own money to support in his bid for sheriff, and he pulls the same shit of assuming that he’s behind Bad Shit. And then Branch frames it as “bad P.R,” so he’s there to “discuss it with [him] privately.” And then basically threatens him with Walt. I swear. ...there is something a little amusing about Walt being used as the stick in the carrot and a stick method of negotiating. He certainly is enough of a blunt object most of the time.

Oh fuck you so much, Branch. Playing the “can’t give you details about an ongoing investigation” card as though you have some professional or moral leg to stand on after basically blackmailing Jacob with Walt’s vendetta is just such shit. You don’t get to look down your nose at Jacob’s quid pro quo pragmatism when you were the one who came to him for financial backing. You sanctimonious little shitheel. If you didn’t want to deal with Jacob, you shouldn’t have taken his $100k. He’s a business man, and you’re an investment, and not a quixotic one.

“He’s probably the only person to have died from [hemlock] since Socrates.” And then Walt’s incredulous look and her, “Alright, I googled it,” were subtle comedic gold.

Ooooooo, that was a nice little shot. Not quite foreshadowing, but showing Branch’s suspicions and sort of inviting the audience to share them. Walt says his bit about the Army poisoning “Indian wells” to kill them off and get their land, and then we see Branch fiddling with the Four Arrows chip and narrow his eyes considering and slip the chip into his pocket, looking suspicious. It’s a really neat little moment of visual storytelling, no lines, literally three seconds long, just sort of snuck in there, but super effective. Really nicely done.

And again, Cady is in monochromatics. And, shit, just gave Fales Henry’s name. Aaaaaand right after, she realizes that the junkie was killed and realizes that it had to have been one of her dads (or so she thinks).

Sal’s monologue in the cell is a good emotional payoff that plays off of Vic’s comments towards the beginning of the episode. I see the narrative worth of her making them, and how the structure of the episode benefits from it; but seeing those writing elements from the outside of the show doesn’t make me able to like her as a character who said them in-universe. And then the threat Sal makes of vengeance on someone who killed one he loves also underscores the stuff with Cady’s investigation into her mother’s death very well. As much as I gripe about the writing *cough S6 cough finale cough* there really is some damn good writing in this show, and I don’t show enough appreciation for it.

Huh, and now there’s a sort of inverse of that weird shot preceding Branch from earlier, but this one is much more effective and less off-putting. This one [33:00] precedes Walt as he walks back into his office, still a medium close up, but it’s much steadier, and the way it is framed, it does quite a bit to convey his mindset, and he walks out of the shot and we see the three deputies following him in like baffled ducklings, making the shot serve another purpose, too. Which honestly makes that earlier shaky follow shot of Branch even weirder, because this one was so much better.

And then Walt has his creepy little speech about how someone would want to watch the light go out of their eyes and not caring if you get caught. I do appreciate that when he’s talking about the psychology of killing with poison he doesn’t just call it a “woman’s method” which media so often does. It might have been the writers keeping who the killer was abstruse, but it was still more gender neutral. Especially since according to The U. S. Department of Justice's report on Homicide Trends in the United States (1980 to 2008) of all poison killers in that time period, 60.5 percent were male and 39.5 percent female. (Table 5 on page 10.) So that long held idea that even Sherlock Holmes was written to have that poison is “of course” a woman’s weapon is pretty crap.

Awwww, the good old days when Walt paid attention to animals. ...I am still bizarrely salty about the fact that he never named his horse. What a good pupper!

And then we have a classic example of Sneaky!Walt, which always takes people quite by surprise, because he’s usually as subtle as Miley Cyrus.

Also because when he does this, it tends to be pretty fucked up, in a Make Someone Think They’re About To Die way. And then he does His Thing, where he just lays out all of his suppositions, with no proof, only the terror of her thinking that she’s been poisoned and you’re withholding medical intervention to get her to confess. And is, irritatingly, correct about his theories. But I’m pretty sure this qualifies as coercing a confession? She thinks she’s fucking dying. Even Vic looks at him like it’s fucked up, and her moral compass where he’s concerned is... skewed.

They way this reveal was played out, (”How’d they find her so fast?” “Hard to say...”) is somewhat ambiguous as to whether it’s supposed to be that Branch went there to tell Jacob or not, but I kind of doubt it? I kind of figure that the meeting that Jacob was having when Branch rambled in was already with Rosa signing the paperwork. Jacob is smart. So, HAH. Little good your “can’t comment on an ongoing investigation” schtick did.

And then the news that someone in law enforcement has been asking after Henry.

“Lizzie was waiting for you here tonight. You should talk to her, Walt. She seems to think she is in a relationship with you.” ....omgs. The tone. I mean, yes, the blisteringly glorious SASS, but how does one not read that as incredibly shippy? Howwwww?

“You are an honest man, Walt. I would like you to stay that way.” Oh Henry. When did you decide that you weren’t? Was it when you hired Hector? Or was there something before? ...I feel like there were things before that. Hello darkness my old friend.

“It is not your job to protect me.” “It is my job...” THOSE WERE THE DAYS. Those were the fucking daaaaaays. And the emotions on Henry’s face after Walt says, “That was my right,” as though Henry cheated him of something. I am so deep in OT3 feels I cannot even see daylight here. The feels of them having been an OT3 and then Walt pulling this shit, and Henry having to defend his own “right” to avenge Martha? It wrecks me. “A good woman was murdered. A bad man is dead. End of story.”

#Longmire #Walt Longmire #Cady Longmire #Henry Standing Bear #Branch is such a tool #Jacob Nighthorse #The Ferg #Victoria Moretti #Episode commentary #How many tangents did I manage to go on this time?#so many #Martha Longmire #I ramble about shots and framing and narrative too.#It took me so long to do this.#I am such a mess.

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breaniebree · 4 years ago

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12, 13, 17, 19, 36, 59, 84 for new asks please!

Hi, Anon!

Thanks for asking! Love that there were so many!

12. Who is your favourite character to write for? Why?

Hmm... I think this changes depending on my mood. Lately it's been Tonks and Remus. I love writing their domestic bliss as well as Tonks being a badass Auror. I've been having fun with them. But usually I really love writing the Weasleys, particularly the brothers views on Ginny. I find them so fun, giving them each their own personality and Ron deserves so much love. He's just so awesome!

13. Who is your least favourite character to write for? Why?

Crouch. He's disturbing and disgusting, but that's how he appears to me and I can't change him or his gross ways. Also, I really hate writing from Draco's POV because I find him difficult and a bit of an enigma. I believe him to be an asshole, but very kind and attentive to those whom he deems worthy which makes him a contradiction to write sometimes.

17. Post a line from a WIP that you’re working on.

“Mum, we don’t know what happened. Everyone could be okay,” Ginny said, trying to keep her voice strong.

Molly merely held Ginny tighter as they stood there and waited for news.

19. Are there any stories that you’ve written that you’d really love to do a sequel to?

Hmm... I feel like everything I've written has more or less been completed at the end. Though I suppose I would like to write more of my Missing Moments one-shots, but I just haven't been inspired to do so as I've been so busy with A Second Chance. I do sometimes feel like I will need a sequel to ASC just to cover after the war, but we'll see ❤️

36. Can you give us a spoiler for one of your WIP’s?

Hmm, lots of spoilers here LOL. Um, yes, I can, the line (which I gave you 3 of) is from the last chapter I completed. The bit I am currently working on...

...and a flash of purple before he found himself flying through the air.

He grunted as he landed on his side, his ears ringing. His hand moved to his head, finding blood and he coughed as the room began to come into focus once more.

Grey smoke filled the chamber as purple flames erupted from the left side of the room. He blinked in confusion as the purple human torch disintegrated with a bang and a second rumble shook the chamber. Marble and stone collapsed as the flames shot out like long tendrils, stretching to reach everything in sight.

59. Which character(s) do you find the most difficult to write?

Most difficult for me tends to be Luna. I love her and I love her quirkiness, but I always find writing her is hard. I'm always worried I don't get her tone right, or her personality, or I take her a step too far or not far enough. Whenever I have her in a scene, I find myself second guessing everything I write and it's rather stressful to be honest LOL.

84. Copy and paste an excerpt you’re particularly fond of.

An excerpt I'm particularly fond of... I think I've said it before that this changes a lot depending on my mood, but lately I think it's the opening of my story ASC

They were dead.

They were both dead and it was all his fault.

He didn’t cry. He had no tears left in him to cry. He didn’t rage; he’d spent weeks doing just that, slamming his fists into the stones until his knuckles had bled; until his fingers were broken, but the pain never fazed him. He ate mechanically as the healer fixed his hands and the next day, he’d punched the stone all over again and again trying to feel something … anything.

He screamed. He shouted that he was innocent. He threatened to kill his former best friend, his brother. But it was for nothing.

It was all for nothing.

He was the one who had been betrayed; the spy who wasn’t; he was guilty in the eyes of the world and nothing he could say was going to change that.

And no one was listening anyway.

At first he thought that at least he would come. His best friend; the one who he had trusted most outside of the one who was his blood brother. The one who he had kept secrets for; the one who was so thankful and confused as to why they even called him friend, called him brother in the first place.

But he never came.

He too thought he was guilty; that he was just like the family that he had tried so hard to run from.

The days turned into weeks which turned into months. He paced; he ran on the spot; he spent hours doing push-ups and sit-ups; contemplated making a noose with his thin shabby sheet and just ending it until the rage consumed him once more. He was not going to take his own life; not while he was out there, the truly guilty party. The spy. The one that he had once called friend and brother.

The months dragged into that first year and his thin hold on his own sanity started to slip away from him as he counted the days, digging the rock into the stone to tally his sentence.

On his twenty-third birthday, he spent the day in fitful dreams; memories of the woman that he had called mother holding her wand above him and telling him how worthless he was; how spineless and unworthy he was to be in the Most Ancient and Noble House. He relived the feel of the torture curse, seeing his mother holding the wand; relived the pain of the belt that his father struck across his back and when he heard his own screams echoing in the stone cell — he clawed at the stone until his nails bled.

By the second year, he forced himself to transform the moment the memories came to the surface. He forced himself to think of happy thoughts, but he couldn’t remember any. Had he ever been happy? He was innocent. It wasn’t a happy thought, but it wasn’t a miserable thought either so they couldn’t take it away from him. He hadn’t murdered those people, true. But could he really be considered innocent?

It was his fault that they were dead; his decision; his stupid mistake.

He was innocent.

He was guilty.

He was innocent.

He was guilty.

He paced the cell back and forth as far as the chains would allow him; back and forth, marking the days each morning when he woke. He slept as a dog; woke to eat the gruel that they called porridge; one hour of push-ups; one hour of sit-ups, keep the body disciplined, keep the mind sane, he told himself repeatedly. He’d nap as a dog; wake to eat the gruel that they called stew and as the first wave of unhappy memories would unfold into his system, he’d transform and whimper in the corner.

By the third year, he had his routine down to a science. No one spoke to him. The healer came to check on him once a month; let him wash with a bowl of lukewarm water and a clean cloth. The healer never spoke and the soul-sucking creatures hovered as the healer trembled, waiting for him to finish so that he could leave. The moment that the healer was gone, he became a dog once more.

When he started his count into year four, he knew that he would die alone in this very cell. No one would ever discover that his old friend had been the real one to betray them; the real one to trick those who cared for him.

No one would ever know his story.

“Sirius?”

The voice sounded foreign, almost too far away. He recognized the Scottish burr, but he couldn’t place it. No one had spoken to him in four years, six months, and seventeen days. Was that his name? His head pounded, but for the first time all day it was clear, telling him that the soul sucking creatures had distanced themselves, at least partially, from his cell.

“Sirius Black?”

The hesitation in the voice now got his attention and he realized that it wasn’t a memory; someone was actually speaking to him.

Someone was outside of his cell.

He moved towards the bars, long thin fingers gripping the iron and his grey eyes bruised around the edges meeting the square beady brown eyes that he recognized so well and his heart stopped at the sight of them.

“Minnie?” he whispered hoarsely, the old nickname slipping out before he consciously thought about it.

The brown eyes rolled in exaggeration at him and for the first time in four years, six months, and seventeen days — he felt a bubble of laughter rising in his throat.

“Sirius,” she said softly, reaching to hold his ice cold hands where they clutched the iron bars tightly. “You remember me? I was worried that I might have been too late. The healer said… never mind. You know me.”

He shook his head, clearing the cobwebs that lingered there. “Yeah,” he said roughly. “Why are you here, Professor?”

Her eyes looked sad as she gripped his hands tightly from where they were clutched around the bars. “I’m sorry that it took so long, Sirius, I’m so sorry, but you are finally getting a trial. A trial to prove your innocence.”

His dark grey eyes met hers in shock. “What?”

“I don’t believe for a moment that you betrayed James and Lily, Sirius. I never have. James was like a brother to you and you… you loved that little boy. You deserve a trial. Maybe if we can understand why you…”

Sirius snorted now, his fingers gripping hers as he realized what she was saying. “You believe that I murdered thirteen people in a crowded street, but I didn’t betray my best friends. Interesting view you have of me, Minnie, my dear.”

“Sirius,” she said again, her voice quiet and stern. “I believe that you are innocent and I have been campaigning for you to be set free from the moment that you were arrested. Finally, the Minister has taken heed of my words and agreed to give you the trial you should have been given years ago. It will be in three days time.”

Sirius squeezed her fingers gently. “I am innocent, Minnie. I would never have betrayed them, never!”

McGonagall nodded, smiling at him. “I know. I will see you in three days, Sirius. I’m rooting for you.”

As he watched her leave, he felt the darkness pressing in on him once again and he moved away from the bars, letting his back rest against the cool stone.

Four years, six months, seventeen days — but he was getting a trial.

Thanks for the asks!

#ask me anything #harry potter fanfiction

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shadowfromthestarlight · 4 years ago

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The moment a group of people stormed the Capitol building last Wednesday, news companies began the process of sorting and commoditizing information that long ago became standard in American media.

Media firms work backward. They first ask, “How does our target demographic want to understand what’s just unfolded?” Then they pick both the words and the facts they want to emphasize.

It’s why Fox News uses the term, “Pro-Trump protesters,” while New York and The Atlantic use “Insurrectionists.” It’s why conservative media today is stressing how Apple, Google, and Amazon shut down the “Free Speech” platform Parler over the weekend, while mainstream outlets are emphasizing a new round of potentially armed protests reportedly planned for January 19th or 20th.

What happened last Wednesday was the apotheosis of the Hate Inc. era, when this audience-first model became the primary means of communicating facts to the population. For a hundred reasons dating back to the mid-eighties, from the advent of the Internet to the development of the 24-hour news cycle to the end of the Fairness Doctrine and the Fox-led discovery that news can be sold as character-driven, episodic TV in the manner of soap operas, the concept of a “Just the facts” newscast designed to be consumed by everyone died out.

News companies now clean world events like whalers, using every part of the animal, funneling different facts to different consumers based upon calculations about what will bring back the biggest engagement kick. The Migrant Caravan? Fox slices off comments from a Homeland Security official describing most of the border-crossers as single adults coming for “economic reasons.” The New York Times counters by running a story about how the caravan was deployed as a political issue by a Trump White House staring at poor results in midterm elections.

Repeat this info-sifting process a few billion times and this is how we became, as none other than Mitch McConnell put it last week, a country:

Drifting apart into two separate tribes, with a separate set of facts and separate realities, with nothing in common except our hostility towards each other and mistrust for the few national institutions that we all still share.

The flaw in the system is that even the biggest news companies now operate under the assumption that at least half their potential audience isn’t listening. This leads to all sorts of problems, and the fact that the easiest way to keep your own demographic is to feed it negative stories about others is only the most obvious. On all sides, we now lean into inflammatory caricatures, because the financial incentives encourage it.

Everyone monetized Trump. The Fox wing surrendered to the Trump phenomenon from the start, abandoning its supposed fealty to “family values” from the Megyn Kelly incident on. Without a thought, Rupert Murdoch sacrificed the paper-thin veneer of pseudo-respectability Fox had always maintained up to a point (that point being the moment advertisers started to bail in horror, as they did with Glenn Beck). He reinvented Fox as a platform for Trump’s conspiratorial brand of cartoon populism, rather than let some more-Fox-than-Fox imitator like OAN sell the ads to Trump’s voters for four years.

In between its titillating quasi-porn headlines (“Lesbian Prison Gangs Waiting To Get Hands on Lindsay Lohan, Inmate Says” is one from years ago that stuck in my mind), Fox’s business model has long been based on scaring the crap out of aging Silent Majority viewers with a parade of anything-but-the-truth explanations for America’s decline. It villainized immigrants, Muslims, the new Black Panthers, environmentalists — anyone but ADM, Wal-Mart, Countrywide, JP Morgan Chase, and other sponsors of Fortress America. Donald Trump was one of the people who got hooked on Fox’s narrative.

The rival media ecosystem chose cash over truth also. It could have responded to the last election by looking harder at the tensions they didn’t see coming in Trump’s America, which might have meant a more intense examination of the problems that gave Trump his opening: the jobs that never came back after bankers and retailers decided to move them to unfree labor zones in places like China, the severe debt and addiction crises, the ridiculous contradiction of an expanding international military garrison manned by a population fast losing belief in the mission, etc., etc.

Instead, outlets like CNN and MSNBC took a Fox-like approach, downplaying issues in favor of shoving Trump’s agitating personality in the faces of audiences over and over, to the point where many people could no longer think about anything else. To juice ratings, the Trump story — which didn’t need the slightest exaggeration to be fantastic — was more or less constantly distorted.

Trump began to be described as a cause of America’s problems, rather than a symptom, and his followers, every last one, were demonized right along with him, in caricatures that tickled the urbane audiences of channels like CNN but made conservatives want to reach for something sharp. This technique was borrowed from Fox, which learned in the Bush years that you could boost ratings by selling audiences on the idea that their liberal neighbors were terrorist traitors. Such messaging worked better by far than bashing al-Qaeda, because this enemy was closer, making the hate more real.

I came into the news business convinced that the traditional “objective” style of reporting was boring, deceptive, and deserving of mockery. I used to laugh at the parade of “above the fray” columnists and stone-dull house editorials that took no position on anything and always ended, “Only one thing’s for sure: time will tell.” As a teenager I was struck by a passage in Tim Crouse’s book about the 1972 presidential campaign, The Boys in the Bus, describing the work of Hunter Thompson:

Thompson had the freedom to describe the campaign as he actually experienced it: the crummy hotels, the tedium of the press bus, the calculated lies of the press secretaries, the agony of writing about the campaign when it seemed dull and meaningless, the hopeless fatigue. When other reporters went home, their wives asked them, “What was it really like?” Thompson’s wife knew from reading his pieces.

What Rolling Stone did in giving a political reporter the freedom to write about the banalities of the system was revolutionary at the time. They also allowed their writer to be a sides-taker and a rooter, which seemed natural and appropriate because biases end up in media anyway. They were just hidden in the traditional dull “objective” format.

The problem is that the pendulum has swung so far in the opposite direction of politicized hot-taking that reporters now lack freedom in the opposite direction, i.e. the freedom to mitigate.

If you work in conservative media, you probably felt tremendous pressure all November to stay away from information suggesting Trump lost the election. If you work in the other ecosystem, you probably feel right now that even suggesting what happened last Wednesday was not a coup in the literal sense of the word (e.g. an attempt at seizing power with an actual chance of success) not only wouldn’t clear an editor, but might make you suspect in the eyes of co-workers, a potentially job-imperiling problem in this environment.

We need a new media channel, the press version of a third party, where those financial pressures to maintain audience are absent. Ideally, it would:

not be aligned with either Democrats or Republicans;

employ a Fairness Doctrine-inspired approach that discourages groupthink and requires at least occasional explorations of alternative points of view;

embrace a utilitarian mission stressing credibility over ratings, including by;

operating on a distribution model that as much as possible doesn’t depend upon the indulgence of Apple, Google, and Amazon.

Innovations like Substack are great for opinionated individual voices like me, but what’s desperately needed is an institutional reporting mechanism that has credibility with the whole population. That means a channel that sees its mission as something separate from politics, or at least as separate from politics as possible.

The media used to derive its institutional power from this perception of separateness. Politicians feared investigation by the news media precisely because they knew audiences perceived them as neutral arbiters.

Now there are no major commercial outlets not firmly associated with one or the other political party. Criticism of Republicans is as baked into New York Times coverage as the lambasting of Democrats is at Fox, and politicians don’t fear them as much because they know their constituents do not consider rival media sources credible. Probably, they don’t even read them. Echo chambers have limited utility in changing minds.

Media companies need to get out of the audience-stroking business, and by extension the politics business. They’d then be more likely to be believed when making pronouncements about elections or masks or anything else, for that matter. Creating that kind of outlet also has a much better shot of restoring sanity to the country than the current strategy, which seems based on stamping out access to “wrong” information.

What we’ve been watching for four years, and what we saw explode last week, is a paradox: a political and informational system that profits from division and conflict, and uses a factory-style process to stimulate it, but professes shock and horror when real conflict happens. It’s time to admit this is a failed system. You can’t sell hatred and seriously expect it to end.

Matt Taibbi is one of the only people I subscribe to. He’s one of the few journalists I like because I actually believe he’s genuine.

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