#I think the most depressing things about the goblin party are

[wolfsong-the-bloody-beast]

[chaoticbardlady99]

Yesterday I Felt like Dancing (Astarion x GN! Reader)

Synopsis: You have burnt both ends of the candle and haven’t been taking care of your mental health. Unable to get yourself out of bed, Astarion begins to worry about you…

Author note- I have been hardcore struggling with my mental health lately and writing my silly little fics has been the only thing pulling me along. I thought it might be therapeutic to write about my current feelings (I have ADHD, MDD, and GAD so it’s a party up in here). I hope you enjoy!

CW- Suicidal Ideation, symptoms of depression, brief outburst, mentions of mental health diagnosis and poor medical advice.

Title inspired by song “Into the Walls” by Griff.

*not my pic, could not tell you where I found it so I apologize in advance. If you think it might be your picture, please message me so I can give proper credit.

Your last day before backtracking from the Mountain Pass to the Goblin camp is a difficult one.

Not for the group as a whole- just you specifically.

Days before a Mindflayer kidnapped you, a healer back home had told you your brain was sick. You had been devastated- resigned to your miserable fate.

You had been struggling for years at that point with inconsistent motivation, exhaustion, nightmares, and irrational thoughts for months. You have been functional for the most part, but then an overpowering wave will hit you like Warhammer in the ribs and you are rendered useless until it passes.

The healer suggested sunlight, exercise, eating healthy, and spending time with friends to help your affliction when you hit rock bottom. You were wildly unimpressed with her. At the time, you preferred to self isolate so you stayed by yourself in the woods trying to find peace there. You would have to let her know that her “going out and enjoying the sun” message is not always wise- you may get a tadpole shoved in your head. You can’t be that mad though- the tadpole helped bring your pep back.

Anyway, you have been doing all of that for weeks now, you even felt great, but today? You could not have hit rock bottom harder even if you tried.

You woke up that morning unable to get yourself out of bed. It was a rest day so it wasn’t a big deal, but you also know that your companions are going to have things they need to talk to you about and favors they need you to take care of.

Gods you had tried to get up. You are grateful that your past self had the gumption to wash off and change into clean clothes last night, but your armor is still disgustingly sitting outside your tent and your hair is long and wild. You had wanted to braid it, but it all felt like too much work.

Everything feels like too much work right now- even staying awake- so you drift in and out of uncomfortable naps throughout the morning. No matter how many times you fall asleep, begging for relief from the painful brick wall sitting on your brain, it never leaves.

You can feel the midday breeze rustle your tent. You’ve been laying here for hours now. You are crying and you honestly aren’t sure why. You feel completely paralyzed by all the things you need to do to be ready for the Underdark.

You need to clean your armor, go over the Goblin Camp’s map with Wyll, find Gale a magical artifact, and probably comfort Lae’zel since she’s been branded a heretic- but you won’t. The shame and self loathing continues. You are a silly, worthless little human being.

Every person who knocks on your tent gets a simple, “I’m just not feeling well,” and then they walk away. You don’t know why it makes you more sad than appreciative. If you were in their shoes- you would be bending over backwards to make sure they had everything they needed and you wouldn’t let them feel alone. Then you resent yourself for feeling that way towards your companions- they don’t owe you anything and you were the one who chose to help them- you didn’t ask for anything in return. This is all your fault.

The only person who hadn’t come to visit you was Astarion- which hurt your heart just a little, enough that the numbness coursing thickly through your body wavered for a moment. You are quite smitten and he is obviously not. Another mistake to add to the swirling black hole your mind has fallen into.

You knew it was stupid to want his comfort and affections- you had merely slept together a little less than a week ago. Astarion has been quasi avoiding you ever since and when he does talk to you- he’s awkward. You constantly look for flying pigs- Astarion feeling awkward or being awkward is unheard of.

You have come to accept that you were just some tryst and obviously he hadn’t enjoyed it as much as he said he did.

Astarion isn’t to blame and the situation itself certainly didn’t contribute to the sudden lack of emotions. You knew that you were on the verge of a mental collapse sooner rather than later, but you had foolishly hoped you wouldn’t be alone through it. It feels less all consuming when you try to find a reason. It’s more comfortable to know than it is to give up and say, “my brain is fucked and there isn’t a damn thing I can do so I guess I’m stuck here.”

You are jolted out of your thoughts by another knock on your tent.

“I’m sick,” you say flatly.

“Ha- you act like that will deter me. I can’t even get sick, Darling.”

Before you even have time to register that Astarion is on the other side of your tent- he pushes his way through the flaps and stares down at you in confusion. And… concern?

Astarion steps inside and kneels down next to you- scanning you for evidence of illness or injury.

“I suppose I had been worried for nothing,” he smiles sweetly at you, “you are totally fine. Come on Darling, you have to get up and eat. Wyll is fumbling with that map.”

You look at him and begin to cry. Astarion’s face lights up with alarm.

“What- what did I do!?”

“Please don’t make me,” you sob, “I just want a break. I’m so tired. I want to lay in this bed forever and never leave, but there is so much to do and it’s paralyzing.”

You continue to cry and you cover yourself with the extra blanket- successfully hiding your face.

“Go away,” you whisper, “I need to be left alone.”

You say it, but you are far from meaning it. You want him to stay- to hold you- but he doesn’t want you so it will only make everything hurt worse once the numbness fades away.

You wait for several moments and then you hear him leave. Your silent cry turns into choked sobs and your body is shaking from the pain you are in. The numbness hurts. The numbness tells you that you shouldn’t be alive.

Maybe you shouldn’t be.

Everyone here would be able to figure it out on their own (eventually) and you would finally be free. Free of your uncomfortable brain, free of your ugly body- free of the expectations of others. You would no longer be holding them back like you are today- like you will again in the future.

You are sure they would temporarily grieve you, but that was the deal with this whole journey. You had all accepted that one of you or all of you could die at any moment. You will just put them in more danger by being here…

You shake the thought from your head, violently- your head is pounding from the growing tension headache and dehydration. The tears eventually stop and you just… well, lay in bed again. You stare blankly at a book over in the corner. You keep trying to convince yourself to get up and read the damn thing- do literally ANYTHING else than just stay here in your bedroll.

Instead, you fall asleep.

++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

You wake up to someone knocking on your tent post. You grumble incoherently, covering your head and you hear your unexpected guest sit down next to you. The smell of food fills the tent and your stomach grumbles.

“You need to eat, my Dear,” Astarion says softly.

You are stunned to hear his voice grace your ears. You slowly pull the blanket down to just below your eyes and look at him. Astarion looks distressed, like he doesn’t want to be here. Why would he? You’re a nuisance.

You sit up gingerly and grab the bowl from him. You manage to give him a lopsided smile.

“Thanks. You don’t need to stay, I will be fine on my own,” you say apathetically, staring into the broth.

“I want to stay,” he says, “if you’ll have me.”

The expression on his face is unreadable, but he seems genuine. You nod, your lips pressed together tightly. You eat as much as you feel like while Astarion studies you.

Usually your anxiety is at an all time high (in maybe one of the better ways) when you are around Astarion- he gives you butterflies, butterflies, and even more butterflies. Usually your heart is racing in his presence, but right now you just feel empty.

“Where is your hairbrush?” Astarion asks.

You frown with confusion, “it’s in my bag, why?”

Astarion gets up and goes over to the bag- digging out a few items. He pulls out a lantern, your hairbrush, and a hair tie. Astarion comes over to you and sits down behind you. You feel him gather up the stray pieces of your hair and get to work.

Astarion runs his fingers through your scalp and your tangled hair- the feeling is soothing and it opens something inside of you. Your body shakes silently with sobs and you feel the worm behind your eyes wiggle as Astarion asks for access. You aren’t sure.

“I want to understand,” Astarion says, “please.”

His voice is so raw and desperate- you swallow thickly before allowing him to explore your current emotional state. The silence in the tent is palpable and you feel tense, uncomfortable even. No one has ever cared for you while you are in this state before.

You feel him continue his hairbrushing after he exits your mind. Astarion leaves soft kisses on your shoulder as he gently pulls apart every knot. It helps- you realize- to feel cared for. The numbness still hurts, you still hurt, but it’s nice to not feel so alone.

After Astarion is done brushing your hair, you feel his delicate fingers begin to intricately braid your hair. You wonder when he learned how to do hair.

“Leon’s daughter, Victoria, used to ask me to braid her hair all the time,” Astarion says in a bittersweet voice as if reading your mind, “I picked it up so that she would stop bugging me about it. She said and I quote, ‘you have the perfect braiding hands!’”

You smile to yourself tenderly, “That’s very kind of you, Star. I am sure she appreciated it as much as I appreciate it now.”

You feel Astarion’s hands falter at your words and you are unsure if you have upset him or not. A pregnant pause occurs before Astarion finally clears his throat and goes back to braiding your hair.

“I’m glad that I can help,” Astarion’s delicate, vulnerable words hang in the air, “I’ve… been worried about you today.”

You feel positively flustered and bad for making him feel that way.

“Oh you don’t need to worry about silly ole me! This happens sometimes” you make your voice chirpier than it needs to be, “This is actually the longest I’ve gone for a long time without this happening. I have theorized that the tadpole might help which is kinda cool- I think?”

You laugh awkwardly- desperate to ease his worry.

“How often does this happen?”

Shit. That was the winning question wasn’t it? Astarion will surely never see you as anything less than broken now.

“I’m not really sure,” your voice comes out in a whisper, “I usually always feel a bit of it all the time, but it’s manageable. I function very well regardless.”

“But this one isn’t manageable and evidently you aren’t functional right now.”

You sigh, “No, it isn’t and no, I’m not.”

“What changed?”

“Nothing,” you say, maybe too harshly, “that’s the part that drives me crazy. Yesterday was incredible- I was on top of the whole world, felt like dancing and screaming from the rooftops, but today!?”

You inhale and hold back the muted scream that wants to fill the air.

“Today,” you hiss, “I don’t even want to deal with any of this shit anymore. I’m so fucking tired. There is too much to fucking do and too many people depending on me. Then everyone gets irritated with me if I ask to push off their problems so I persevere through it despite knowing I’m getting bad again. I’m a giant stinking trash heap that everyone keeps adding more to.”

Astarion finishes braiding your hair and presses your back to his chest, pulling you into him. He puts his arms around your waist and settles his chin and face in between the crook of your neck.

“I just feel like such a nuisance all the time- no matter how hard I push myself to prove I’m not. Sometimes I think everyone would be better off if I just… went away.”

You both sit there quietly. At some point he had taken one of your hands in his and he was tracing shapes into the back of it with his thumb. Your omission still hangs heavily in the air.

“I wouldn’t be better off,” Astarion says hotly, “I’d be stuck with all these weirdos by myself. That would be truly miserable, Darling.”

You shake your head, a half smile on your face.

“And besides- you are not even close to a nuisance,” Astarion states, leaving a kiss on your cheek, “at least you aren’t in constant need of magical objects to eat or blood to drink. Oh and you don’t require a painstaking amount of searching to prevent you from literally burning everyone alive.

“Oh and did I forget to mention, we have not one, but two women who despise each other and follow hateful Goddesses which was a fun choice for whatever sick bastard twisted our fates this way.”

You laugh breathily, closing your eyes and letting the sound defrost some of your insides.

“What I’m saying is- I think you are the least of everyone’s ‘nuisances’, my Darling,” he says, squeezing you tighter to his chest, “despite how little you think of yourself. We ne- no, I want you to stay. I know everyone else would say the same, but I must emphasize that I would be horribly distraught if you disappeared. Hells I’d even pay to have you resurrected.”

You gasp playfully, your voice falling slightly flat, “You? The most frugal man I have ever met would pay 200 gold coins to ‘Strike thy name from the record’?”

Your impression of Withers gets Astarion to genuinely laugh- the sound vibrating in your chest. You lean into him and he guides you back to laying down. Astarion entangles his legs with yours as he holds you tightly- your faces are mere centimeters apart. You love the way Astarion smells- rosemary, bergamot, and brandy. You wish you could be wrapped up in him forever. You are still in pain- everything still hurts and feels too difficult, but right now it feels a little less heavy.

“I would throw bags of Gold Coins at that corpse out of revenge, my Dear,” he teases, “you couldn’t possibly think I would ever let you rest peacefully in your grave- I would be far too angry with you and unhappy without you to let that happen.”

You lay there and despite yourself, you lean forward and leave butterfly kisses along his cheeks with your lashes. Astarion scrunches up his nose reflexively and smiles at you. You plant a sweet, short kiss on his lips.

“Thank you Astarion- for everything.”

You close your eyes as he traces circles along your lower back. Your eyes begin to droop, and you fall asleep.

+++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++

When you wake up the next morning- you are disappointed to find that you are all alone in your tent. The heavy numbness is still there and you sigh. At least last night made it more bearable.

You look on the side where Astarion had been sleeping and find a note with a bottle attached to it. You pick it up and begin to read.

Tav,

Astarion had asked me about herbs for some relief regarding mental discomforts. I unfortunately don’t know many, but this is a mixture of St. John’s Wort, Valerian Root, and Ashwagandha. Historically, I know these have been used to alleviate emotional and mental pain.

Astarion didn’t tell me why he was asking, but I deduced it was you pretty quickly when he began shooing everyone away from your tent this morning.

I hope this helps- we are all here if you need us. May Silvanus light your path as you navigate this difficult time.

-Halsin

You sit in your own stunned silence for what feels like hours. Halsin knows and he wants to help? Halsin doesn’t think you are screwed or a nuisance? The man barely even knows you!

You are a bit embarrassed, but you can’t help but laugh at the image of Astarion telling everyone to leave you alone.

You open the bottle and a pleasant, earthy smell fills the tent. You drink the mixture (that definitely does not taste anywhere near as pleasant as it smells) and you do feel a slight bit better. Your apathy feels even more tolerable now. You will have to thank Halsin.

You slowly rise from your tent and look around. Everything is packed up neatly in the corner- your clothes from the previous day are folded nicely and you notice all the holes are sewn up.

You jump when someone enters your tent abruptly- the midday sun warming your skin. You turn around and Astarion is smiling at you, but looks nervous.

“I cleaned off your armor and your weapons,” he says awkwardly, scratching the back of his head, “I also packed up your stuff- as you can see. We have to start leaving unfortunately, but I’ll help you get on your armor like I usually do- I might still need help with mine though, but I can ask someone else if it’s too much for you right now. Lae’zel and Karlach offered to pack up your tent. Wyll and Shadowheart figured out the map- Wyll is going to be our ‘fearless’ leader for the day. Gale has some food for you to snack on while we travel- which you will be eating, by the way.”

Astarion is looking at you with a vulnerable expression on his face. He plays nervously with the gold coin in his hands.

You can hardly believe what you are hearing.

“Did- did you do all this for me?” You say with disbelief.

You never thought Astarion was capable of smiling shyly until he had admitted to you that you had been his first thinking creature- you certainly never thought you’d see him become shy twice in your presence.

“I did and it wasn’t a nuisance so don’t even begin to worry about that,” He walks over to you, gently cradling your face in his hands, “I hope this is all okay.”

You smile- the first genuine feeling of happiness you’ve felt in the last 24 hours gently sparks in your chest as you stare up at him. You get up on your tiptoes and bridge the gap between your lips.

“Thank you Astarion, this is perfect- you are perfect,” you are crying tears of joy, “this is the kindest gesture anyone has ever made for me. So just, thank you.”

“Of course, Darling,” he says smiling in between kisses, “I won’t let you lose to yourself. We’ll get through this together from now on- no more hiding.”

And for once? You actually believe someone.

-if you guys like this, please let me know if you would want a part two written from Astarion’s perspective.

Update- I did the thing you silly geese

https://www.tumblr.com/chaoticbardlady99/735969926279528448/i-took-all-this-love-i-found-and-i-hope-that-its

Tag-list: @spacebarbarianweird @domainoflostsouls

[lanaevyssmoved]

helloooo Afhiri sounds SO lovely. can you tell me more about how they feel at the start of act 1 about her predicament with the tadpoles, her companions, etc etc if you want!!

it might be cruel to say that they're pretty damn simple . actually no its not ive decided theyre pretty damn simple. literally wakes up and has a panic attack because where is flute?? where flute?? WHERE. FLU TE? flute was no where to be seen (depression). a very sad clown exploring this ship literally with minimum interest because flute :( flute :( this is a child who has lost their autistic hyperfixation toy.

lae'zel is hot. the sword scene is hot. hiri has immediate gay panic and forgets flute for 2 whole seconds. asks lae'zel if seen flute. lae'zel doesn't even know what a flute is.. smh. sticks around because was told to. does whats told (for now........ ominous.) so to start lae'zel is literally party lead this clown is NOT a protagonist (for now...... no im not making that joke twice)

SHADOWHEART IS HOT... absolutely ignores lae'zel to free shadowheart. literally dumbass tries to pull the door off. lae'zel ends up being the one like "maybe u should look around if u INSIST on saving this HALF ELF." frees shadowheart :) oh my god you have an autistic hyperfixation too?? your rock is so cool!!!!!!!

the flute is not rescued. please F's in chat for the lost flute of afhiri's childhood. her father made her that flute and it's DEAD. AND THERE WASN'T EVEN TIME FOR A FUNERAL.

the first thing they do after hoarding all of the fish on the beach like a little goblin creature is find gale's portal. shiny. Oh My God is that an arm without a body? that is Soooo cool...... high fives. they free him of course!!! used bard Magicks to calm that shit down and free the silly man. she finds him SOOO silly. he is such a silly little guy. his lil expressions and hand movements are SO funny. she wants to get acting classes from him so she can be just as funny and then she'll rank up in Clown. she's sure of it. (he is a clown to her. a truly excellent clown. there's real talent..........)

after that she gets knife throat by astarion :( not very nice of you :( i would have given you money if u wanted :( oh not a robbery? OH WE'RE WORM BUDDIES? friendship acquired :) they genuinely don't have any more thoughts rly at the start because he is mean and she doesn't understand its mean and looks at him stupidly like a dog who cannot understand the new word u just said. tilts head :)

their friendship stat is SO high all of a sudden. this clown has had NO friends their entire damn life (weirdo coded) and suddenly they've got SOOO many best friends oh my god they're so excited for the campfire stories hehee :)

next is oh my godd its the hot. gi..gi... Girlfriend? :) no its gith u stupid clown. get pied. ANYWAY tells the tieflings some absolute BULLSHITERY. this clown is So good at lying (this is a positive. their moral code is kinda messy.) and frees lae'zel :) shadowheart doesn't trust lae'zel but how can you Not when she's Also Green? I'm Green? You're Green? Da Ba Dee

after that its oh my god is that A GOBLIN? never seen a goblin before. finds them extremely cute. they're also kind of green (positive). and A WARG? can i PET IT? No? It'll eat me? bite off my hand? chew up my suit? this is supreme sadness. wait- flute still gone. that's supreme sadness. ALSO WYLL IS FUN!!!! wyll gives her fairytale hero prince vibes and is absolutely fascinated and thinks as a bard should sing of his tale because hes so cool (please don't trust them. they will make him sound like a fool.)

hearing about the spooky scary teeth-ling from wyll is super!! exciting!!!! a devil?? fought in devil war?? fire?? death?? epic story . we must find out more (not to kill. to talk to. must have some REALLY COOL STORIES!!!) very easy to convince wyll not to kil- OH MY GOD HOT?? HOT? ?? literally hot. this is the most Supreme Gay Panic. afhiri never thought about girls (or boys) like this before. none of the Lads give the Panik.. but these girls are a little too much (fainting vibes) also karlach is so fun :) daydreams about karlach throwing her like a javelin into battle

the tadpole though :/ they don't know!! everyone keeps saying. bad! evil! bad! removal! death! kill! and they're like :/ idk guys.. worms are kinda cute. u ever seen a worm do a lil wiggle on some mud? its so cool.. i wish i was a worm..... everyone is concerned. do not trust them with decisions (they trust them with decisions. they are All stupid.) they name the worm. the worm is named little buddy. it's not creative. it's not a name. but this is Little Buddy and she talks to her little buddy sometimes. she even wrote it a song. (she doesn't consume more little buddies. that's weird.. this is HER little buddy and those are OTHER little buddies. there's only one little buddy for her....)

extra: GUARDIAN. oooohhhhh my god .. never seen someone soooooo CLOWN. (this is false. guardian looks nothing like a clown. theyre projecting HARD. guardian plays along because this is clearly going to work better than being Hot and Mysterious). trust them explicitly (reminder: not smart), treats like another Best Friend like the squad. gets sad they don't ever join them in camp for her performances. does private performances sometimes :)

DOUBLE EXTRA: the possession.. of Flute 2.

a daring tale of (gale takes some of the squads money and buys them a flute. cannot bare to see the sad puppy dog eyes any longer.) AN INCREDIBLE ADVENTURE OF PERIL AND DANGER... THERE WAS GNOLLS AND GOBLINS AND MAYBE A BEHOLDER!!!!! gale.. an incredibly brave adventurer.. this is going in his next song

[b0nelessdoodles]

Art Summary 2023

shoutout to the one month were i drew fanart and then everything else was just dnd content again lmao (also shoutout to me being late to posting this haaaaa)

2023 wasn't the best year for me personally. between money problems and job searching, health issues, mental health issues, unintentional discomfort at my new job, and the overall issues of the world it just hasn't been great and I felt it heavily in my creativity. I never really had any creative highs this year outside of artfight (and even then i felt like i didn't do well) which only fed into some of the issues I was having.

But looking back I am really happy with most of what I made! Sure I didn't draw much but hey I think I popped off when I did!

So here is to 2024! Already off to a good start in the art department and even if I slow down at least I've had fun so far!

(i was gonna put me gushing about things in tags but its a lot so i'm doing a read more this post is already so damn long lmao i'm sorry)

okay i'm here to gush about two pieces at a time and their contents cause then make me happy to look at so lets get started on that with march and september 'cause hey! look at the relationship development of my little goblin guy!

march was when kk (tic's best friend and now boyfriend) first appeared to the rest of the party outside of just tic talking about him. literally the entire party could see that kk was in love with tic and was just like "oh buddy sorry about that" 'cause tic was a dumbass and romance was just never something he thought about until meeting the party. then we flash forward to september where the two confessed to each other after what really felt like the end of tic's story arc. at least it felt that way to me 'cause he reached his goal of killing groll and becoming the king of goblins but i know he still has shit to do I'M LOOKING AT YOU TRAVELLER AND RIP! but yeah that was the whole reason he left and it was done. he did it! but it almost cost him kk and the two ended up having a really important talk about it. kk chewed tic out and spilled his guts and i still think about it a lot holy shit it was so good omfg but it was in that moment that it clicked for tic. that if he had actually lost kk he had no idea what he would do, that he felt like his whole life would fall apart without him. and just man it was good wholesome content. congrats to the goblins for being the first canon relationship! (even tho they were not the first confession that one goes to rhami!)

now that that block of the text is out of the way we get to more depressing ones, those being january and october with my guy, dr. cecil wilfree.

its just.... man. what do i even say about him. january was probably the last moment before his life went into a full downward spiral, eventually leading into his demise. that piece isn't even anything major but rather something like a reminder going "hey, remember when wilfree had two normal eyes? good times!" and just man (-insert that image of a horse standing on the beach-) compare that to where he's at in october and knowing what happened in those 10 months? january he still had trust and hope, he believed that he was going to get back home and help river out with his plague, maybe even get aster home if she'd let them, maybe find a way to cure himself and help casey. but by the end there was no hope and he found out that he had been used, was nothing more than a tool for someone who he trusted, despite knowing that he really shouldn't have. river was dead and it was his fault (at least in his mind it was), he had failed to protect aster and traumatized both her and willow, and he could do nothing to save an entire population from being wiped off the face of the map. and he caved under the guilt. he gave up. its sad to see him alive and pissy in january and then look at december and see a shell of the same man, no more thoughts in that head as his mind got disconnected from his body and self.

and then for extra sads we've got december which was his birth month, so i drew something from a time before the campaign. back when he was alive and well, no soul curse and unknowing of the horrors yet to come, and receiving a gift from someone whose life he could soon destroy due to his own hubris.

anyway! pay no mind to may! i didn't draw a damn thing that whole month!

[dionysia-does-stories]

Haud Your Halloween

Cringetober 2023, Day 31: HALLOWEEN!!

On AO3

Rating G - 1,335 words - Original Work - Halloween Traditions & Lore

Summary: A little girl, Alice is depressed that there will be no real ghouls, ghosts and fairies out on Halloween after she learns that the doorway to the otherworld is through elevated earthen mounds--and she lives in Florida where the world is flat.

Story:

Some merry, friendly, country-folks, Together did convene, To burn their nits, and pou their stocks, And haud their Halloween

-Robert Burns, Halloween

This Halloween was not going according to the plan Alice’s parents had devised. Her parents had the sort of relationship where you planned everything down to the millisecond so you could spend as little time as possible interacting with each other. That philosophy bled into their parenting style. Most of the time if Alice was raised by anyone, then she was raised by her older brother. Wolves might have been better role models then Alice’s brother, Jonesie. But they wouldn’t be half as much fun.

The problem was that Jonesie had been reading to Alice from a book of old Halloween traditions. The pages were filled with the really good stuff. Ghoul stories of headless men and women walking the Earth. Halloween hosts who’s parties you may never escape. The dead come back to life to walk the Earth. And the most important piece of information. The tradition that was currently causing a problem. The location of the Halloween goblins, ghouls, fairies, (or as Alice had began to say with unintelligible accuracy to anyone who would pretend to listen, the Aos Sí)

Aos Sí meant people of the mounds. That’s where the otherworld was. Where the fabric between dimensions thinned and magic seeped into the human world. And Alice was distraught about it. Because there were no hills in Florida. That is where she lived. In stupid flat Florida where there was no magic and no fairies could ever come to visit. This was the greatest tragedy of her young life and her parents thought she was being dramatic over nothing.

What was even the point of Halloween now that she knew the ghouls and fairies couldn’t reach her?

“Isn’t that a good thing?” her mom had asked, “Aren’t ghouls and ghosts scary.”

Alice had looked up from where she was crying on the bed. “Life is scary,” she declared with the eerie foreknowledge of childhood. “The point is to be scared but to live fully and well anyway.”

“Well, I can’t argue with that,” her mother conceded, “But I do think you’d be happier if you went trick-or-treating anyway.” She left Alice’s room.

Her dad had left an hour ago. He’d only budgeted two hours of his time for “family Halloween activities” to begin with. When a temper tantrum had been imminent, he suddenly had to get back to the office.

Halloween this whole year had been a fight. Mom had wanted her to be a princess. Dad had wanted her to be “you know, the thing with the glitter.” Alice had spent hours thinking about it. She’d agonized, doodled some ideas, agonized some more. Finally, she’d settled on being a tooth fairy. Her costume had 300 real teeth. Not human, as she’d reassured her mom, teachers, classmates, and that woman at the grocery store. (One of them was human but nobody other than Jonesie needed to know that—It was her brother’s old baby tooth after all.)

Alice wished Jonesie was here for the holiday. But he was a teenager and that meant celebrating Halloween in a very specific way. Jonesie was off getting drunk and kissing girls (Why? Alice had no clue.) They’d read a Halloween tradition about young men playing a sport where they chucked flaming logs at each other. Jonesie had convinced (like it was hard) his friends to play. Alice was a little worried they were going to get hurt (or set the swamp on fire). But at least he was properly celebrating Halloween. Even without elevated topography. 

Alice threw her window open the hot still air slinked into her room. She looked out at the starless sky. The flat jungle of flora just past the back of edge of their yard was taunting her. You’ll never get to walk among the Aos Sí. You’ll never even get to toss flaming logs in the swamp. You’ll be small and silly and dramatic forever.

That was the real problem. What she saw as fun the adults saw as loud. What she saw as mystical the adults saw as morbid. She was the black keys on the piano. Every note she played was somehow flat. And people were always trying to correct the way she sounded. She didn’t think there was anything wrong with her though.

Alice climbed out the window. So what if there were no hills? She could still dance in the moonlight. She could still play fortune telling games. It was still Halloween even here in this flat place.

She shimmied down the side of the house, whispering half remembered rhymes and songs to herself. She tore across the grass into the jungle like trees. She ducked under Spanish moss and leaped over low growing ferns. She spotted a weed that looked easy to pull and yanked it from the ground. Tradition held that the massive root system indicated wealth in her later life. She threw it over her shoulder.

She ran through the forest, picturing a bonfire in her mind. She hadn’t been able to convince her parents that the fire, the lights, the warmth, the glow was the most important part. The burning at the center of the human side of magic. So, she would burn. She would be her own bonfire.

She crashed over a fallen log and found herself face to face with a wild boar. She’d learned about dangerous wildlife in school. They were taught how to run away from alligators and which snakes were poisonous. But the section on wild boars had been the scariest. They were taught that you can’t out run one. They’re fast and mean. They’ll gore you in the back. Your best bet is to climb a tree and wait for someone to find you.

She locked eyes with the boar. There was an intelligence there, a sparkle of something otherworldly. 

She gave it a try. “Hello, Mr. Pig, sir.”

The pig snuffled at her. Alice’s fine hairs were sucked into the snout, before an exhale released them. 

“A fine night,” the Boar greeted her in return.

From behind a tree a slender woman’s figure dressed in white emerged. Where the top of her neck ended instead of a head, she had a bouquet of wild flowers. There were bits of birds’ downy feathers and pecan shells mixed in with the flora. A snake and a mouse chased each other threw it.

Alice was frozen in awe for a moment before she stood and sketched an awkward curtsy (the first of her life). “Hello, Good Lady, Ma’am.”

The flowers twisted in what might have been a smile. It was hard to say, but it seemed benevolent. “What were you looking for little tooth?”

Alice glanced down at her costume. It worked! The Good Lady thought she was a fairy. “I thought I wouldn’t find any others out tonight.” That was mostly the truth.

The Headless Lady called the boar to her. “Why not?”

“There’s no hills here.”

“But of course there are.” The Lady shuffled a delicate toe through the sandy soil. “This whole land is made of dust that blew from great mountains. Everything remembers what it once was.”

“That hasn’t been my experience.” Alice wondered about the wisdom of disagreeing with such a formidable figure. But she’d never had an adult take her so seriously.

“You are young,” the Good Lady said, “You will see. Time inevitably changes all things. But there is no inevitability to forgetting what you are. That is always a choice.”

With a nod, the Good Lady and her Boar carried on their way.

Alice set off in the opposite direction, toward the road. She’d go to the houses with the superheroes and the princesses. She’d delight in every revelry and fright Halloween had to offer. She’d seen the future. It didn’t matter if the world made sand of her. She was not flat. She carried her hills inside her.

[keenerkey]

Top 5 fanworks of 2021

rules: it’s time to love yourselves! choose your 5 (ish) favorite works you created in the past year (fics, art, edits, etc.) and link them below to reflect on the amazing things you brought into the world in 2021. tag as many writers/artists/etc. as you want (fan or original) so we can spread the love and link each other to awesome works!

Tagged by: @playboyphilanthro-pissed (thanks :))

In no particular order tbh

1) I Am Yours:

Osner // 42.7k // Harley is Tony’s bio son, ex comes to town, Goblin // T

Harley is now publicly Tony Stark's son, and life seems to be getting better after the whole 'Darrell Incident'. He is the rising heir to Stark Industries, Harry and him are solid, and he is finally free from the guilt and drama of his first few months in New York. However, when Harry gets busy with some government deal at Oscorp, Harley's ex Tj moves to New York, and the avengers have to deal with a new threat from some underground drug-dealing ring, everything starts to go downhill...again

This was honestly such a fun one to make. It is the sequel to I Am Your Son, which was the first fic I ever made, which I would’ve put in this list but I decided not to since a lot of it was written in 2020. I had a few ideas of what I wanted, such as a Goblin appearance and more Abby but it changed a lot from the first draft lol. It was fun to write!

2)soon you’ll get better:

Abbie&Harley // 3.3k // cancer, grief, death, songfic // T

The same sickness that killed their mother is back for more. Harley deals with the grief of losing his sister, through first discovering the sickness till the end. or Abbie Keener has cancer. Harley Keener doesn't know if he'll survive losing someone else. based on "soon you'll get better" by Taylor Swift

This oneee. Honestly probably the most depressing one I’ve written and I love writing angst lol. It is based off Taylor’s song, mentioned above. The song never fails to make me cry and I- the idea immediately came. I based each scene off of each section of lines and it just worked. Definitely one of my favorites by far. I added a little paragraph at the end a few years in the future because honestly? I thought it needed that. I’ve lost people and I wanted to show some kinda healing from everything in the story.

3)Spideydevil drawing:

Um, yeah. Didn’t think it was gonna be in this lineup since I primarily write fics but I am just so proud of this drawing. I draw as a hobby but I don’t do it often nor do I post it, so yeah. It’s fun. This was requested of me when I asked if anybody wanted something and I’m glad they said something cause it was a treat to draw.

4) Whiskey Glasses and (Un)Wanted Attention:

Tony&Harley // 4.3k // Grief, Trauma, Mentioned Rape/Non-Con, Harley feeling ignored // M

Harley is at another party at Avengers Tower, sitting alone, watching Tony brag about Peter and introduce him to all the business associates. It has become very clear who Tony will hand the company to, and Harley can't even deny he's jealous.—But the worst part is that Tony barely pays attention to him anymore. He so badly needs attention.—So when one of Tony's business partners shows him attention at the party, Harley grabs onto it with fervor. It felt good to be wanted, to be appreciated. —God was it a mistake.

Ohh this one. My baby. Honestly probably my favorite. This one was a product of what I had been feeling about Harley for a while. Ignored, overlooked. The story told itself. I’m a sucker for angst and hurt/comfort and this gave it all too me. I’m really proud of how I wrote the little details, the metaphors. Wasn’t sure I was gonna add comfort until people asked me too haha. Glad I did tho because the comfort chapter is my favorite part.

5) Abbie Keener, A Fashion Icon:

Abbie&Harley // 1.3k // keener siblings exploration, Abbie is a fashion designer, kids ig they are young // G

Abbie Keener loves making fashion and clothing, and Harley models her designs for her. However, Abbie is going through a goth phase, and Harley isn't to ecstatic about it.

This one!! Bro literally just a one shot but my first and I’m a proud mamma. I think this is one of my favorite fics about the keener siblings not to get egotistical or anything lol. Idk I wanted to include it :)

Tags: @dead-inside-pt2 @prosperdemeter2 and @ anyone else who sees this and wants to :) (no pressure at all!!)

[harry-peter]

Demonizing The Mentally Ill

So this silly little Spider-Man shipping blog has been going since 2012, and in all that time I’ve never really said much about myself. Until a week or so ago when that unpleasant, so far nonsensical twist involving Harry happened in the Spider-Man comics. Man, that opened the floodgates! There will apparently be a new comic out tomorrow which deals with the horrible situation and is written by the also horrible Nick Spencer. So... time to talk Harrys and Parksborns and why this blog exists in the first place, but more importantly time to talk the portrayal of mental illnesses in superhero comics.

Businessman #1: So you’re really going to do business with Osborn, Jay? Isn’t that a little risky?

Jay: Eh. I’ll just write a Goblin clause into the contract, or maybe I can get nut-job insurance - Then, it might even pay for him to turn into a blithering psychopath! [Laughter]

Peter: Hey, guys, take it easy. You’re at his party.

Jay: Sorry, sorry... [to the others] One of his college buddies. College most likely being code for “looney bin.”

Businessman #2: Like father, like son...

[Amazing Spider-Man Extra #1]

So the above is a moment of realism that popped up in an 2008 Spider-Man comic. (Don’t worry, Peter starts fighting those guys in the next panel.) I say realism because that is what a lot of people think about mental illness.

...and well, here we are jumping into the difficult thing already, there’s an extent to which superhero media also thinks that. You’ve probably heard it as the background noise to both older and newer Marvel and DC comics.

Comic books have long relied on mental disorders to drive their most memorable villains. Consider the Batman line, in which the Joker, Harley Quinn and other “criminally insane” rogues are residents of Gotham City’s forensic psychiatric hospital, Arkham Asylum. [New York Times]

It’s just sort of part of the mythology of superheroes at this point, you know? And I know strides have been taken to improve it in recent years which I’m very grateful about. But there is an extent to which when people say of superhero comics, “It’s just people in suits beating up the mentally ill,” you can sort of see where they’re coming from. One tiny moment in a superhero movie that’s always stuck out to me is in The Dark Knight, where this exchange takes place after Batman apprehends a criminal:

BATMAN: He's a paranoid schizophrenic, former patient at Arkham. The kind of mind the Joker attracts.

And I don’t mind The Dark Knight as a movie I guess, but considering what the Joker is (a mass murderer) lines like that strike me as so goddamn irresponsible.

(Speaking of Batman, here’s an interesting factoid: The Child Within, probably so far the most in-depth story about Harry’s mental illness and its hows and whys, started off as a Batman story. J.M DeMatteis talks about it in the 2004 book Comics Creators on Spider-Man. He ended up switching Batman and Two-Face for Peter and Harry and the results were, he says, “much more interesting.”)

Anyway, that brings us to another guy with schizophrenia...Harry.

Doctor: Perhaps if Harry hadn’t been so depressed when he took the drug, it wouldn’t have hit him so hard, but that can hardly matter now. You can see the result, total clinical pychosis. What a layman would call schizophrenia.

Peter: Terrific. While I’m off battling the Hulk in Montreal, my roommate drops acid and cracks up. No wonder Gwen wanted me home...

Even Peter here is not overly sympathetic about Harry’s drug use and diagnosis. Which I suppose just makes it hit home all the more about how extremely stigmatized those conditions are.

I guess this is where I come in. I was I guess about 18 when I read all this, generally clueless about most comic-book universes (the MCU didn’t even exist yet) and just about to be hit VERY hard by a mental illness I was aware of but didn’t know the name of or how godawful it was gonna get. This was OCD, as it turned out. It presented in some...interesting ways, and in the spirit of being open about mental health let’s take a look at them... In my mind, everything I did could potentially lead to the death of a loved one, no reason just feelings, so eventually I really did stop doing anything and sat on the bed all day. I pulled out my hair (this is a seperate thing that also has a name, trichotillomania) and then I just kept it in boxes and stuff because I was too afraid to throw it away. Actually I kept pretty much everything, I was afraid to get rid of it. At one point I actually did more or less stop eating, because the “voices”/intrusive thoughts in my head were telling me to. I thought there was a high chance some of the people around me were the devil or possessed by the devil, trying to get me to drop my rituals and kill my loved ones. God, there’s so many things, some of them I actually don’t even remember. I’m actually kinda surprised I didn’t get sectioned, in a way. Maybe it might even have worked out, I don’t know, I wonder about that sometimes.

I once spent a entire morning thinking my cat was a demon and not wanting to go near it, because it winked at me. (I used to use this story as an anecdote when meeting new people. It does not work.) The list goes on and on and on.

Well, you get the picture. There I was back in the late ‘00s with the sort of mind a supervillain attracts and -

- uh it worked? Just not in that way.

I probably said this in the other post I made about the current comics mess but man I was really, really lucky to encounter a character with a mental illness who wasn’t demonized just as I was going through it myself. That was the really staggering thing to me. Harry was clearly not well mentally, alienating and scaring people, he wasn’t a superhero, he wasn’t even physically attractive (ditto) and yet everyone liked him. Peter loved him, even. (There ya go, the secret origin of this blog.) Not only that, Peter made it clear on more than one occasion that Harry was ill, not evil. In between me being awestruck by all this I guess I thought, “This is a thing? People will still like you even if you’re mentally ill? They’ll fight for you?!” And that turned out to be correct.

So you can probably understand why I’m so repulsed by a comic book twist that literally demonizes Harry, i.e turns him into an evil demon. Because the Harry we know now, post-resurrection into the modern-day comic, is pretty much just a normal person in many regards. Yes his father is a supervillain and he still struggles sometimes but he’s just...a good dude. A good father, too, which is important in terms of showing the breaking of an abusive cycle. Right now we not only have Harry as a demon but also Norman as an apparently good person, which on a meta level just... feels really gross. That’s his abuser.

It’s not like this sort of thing hasn’t been done before, I suppose. There were plans to make Harry the villain behind the Clone Saga at one point, which is full-on baffling to me. It negates all the amazing work J. M. DeMatteis did with Harry, it negates his death scene, it negates everything. What the hell? And then there was The Amazing Spider-Man 2, which I hate about as much as you would reasonably expect a mentally ill person to hate an adaptation where a canonically mentally ill character murders someone without remorse.

(Another fun fact about me, as if you didn’t have enough of those already, is that - sigh - I actually do, like ASM’s NotHarry, stand a chance of inheriting an incredibly unpleasant disease. Only a slight chance, but godddd, Amazing Spider-Man 2 is just a trauma tour for me. I geniunely will never watch it again, I can’t.)

But generally Harry in his various forms has remained a good person who always chooses love over hate no matter what. And now, with the Kindred reveal and everything that’s come with it... I don’t know what to think. I certainly don’t trust or remotely like Nick Spencer, a man who apparently considers this reddit-y nonsense to be good writing. It feels very much within his wheelhouse to make a story where the abused, mentally ill man is ~the real~ abuser and his cruel, violent father is ~the real~ victim, and that’s what I fear the most about all this.

Is any of this stuff I’m talking about ableism? I don’t know. Other people are way more qualified to answer that question than me. I suppose if I was to turn my brain off (oh god please) I’d say it feels ableist? I remember coming out of ASM2 and I feel like the thought buried in the back of my brain was, who knows if it’s fair or sensible, “They’ll think we’re all like that.”

(We are not.)

Well, until tomorrow at least, that’s me about done. If you’re reading this and any of the mental health stuff sounds familiar, you’re absolutely free to message me for advice, I’ll do my best. I might not get to you for a few days because of the regular adult life stuff but I will eventually, I promise. (Gotta pay forward the “People will fight for you” thing.) I suppose I’ll probably always be in recovery from my own brain goblin but man, it gets so much easier when there are other people/characters, ya know? Oh and I can also guarantee, despite unpleasant twists of fiction such as this, that neither you nor my cat are actually a demon.

.

.

.

(Too long, didn’t read? “When I said Harry Osborn was a kindred spirit, that wasn’t what I fucking meant.”)

[pyrodarknessanny]

Whilst the topic of treating women with  respect is a hot button issue at the moment it got me thinking about my own experiences in life. and whilst I can say that I am one of the lucky ones who’s not been assaulted   things have happened around me that  had they gone differently  my story would be very different indeed. it also saddens me  that I know so many close friends and family who were not so lucky , many of them were children when they were first abused. and yes I do know  “not all men”   but   as the brothers , fathers , uncles , cousins ,friends and co-workers  the weight of this falls on you to call out  the  unacceptable behaviour of your peers. I’m going to list this instances in chronological order. and keep in mind that  I am a  goblin , short, weird , don’t care for looking nice and makeup and such  but still  ive been put on the spot numerus times in the past by  “nice guys”™ high school , senior years .   met some one I thought was decent online . we had an on again off again  video call thing going it spanned years  and started innocently enough  however in the latter years  when I was super depressed it turned quite toxic and manipulative   where he would refuse to   pay attention to me, controlling the calls , there was a time zone difference  so I was up till 4am most nights  hoping that this person would be around.    When we did get into calls  he had me doing  increasingly  dangerous things .   he’d even convinced me to  send him a  substantial amount of money of the last 12 months of our contact.          I’ve since cut them off  cold some years ago now but   they’ve certainly had an impact on me

 In between this on again off again online thing   when I was single I’ve and no less than 3   older male friends  try to hit me up because their  partners at the time were out of town. one even messaged me one night when I was high and tried very hard to convince me that it would be a good idea to drop round.       I don’t talk to any of them now but  each one I told to stay faithful to their partners and denied their offers.    

Also in high school - this happened at my  part time job. boss had a mate who would often sell him stuff for the store ,  bit of a flipper. one of the other senior staff thought it was FUNNY  to tell him that  I was fair game. so this guy who is well in his 40’s   would seek me out at work and harass me. usually when I was at the back of the shop bagging the bulk produce into smaller retail portions. mind you I’m  an 18 yr old autistic person .  had to find excuses to  avoid this person   make it look like im working  in the areas that had security cameras on them or   hope that there were customers so he couldn’t  talk to me.       I had spoken out about this  to the boss and  the owner of the business ( as it was one of his friends)   but they  all thought it was a harmless game. guy bailed me up at the back of the store one afternoon as im bagging  up animal feed.  Store was dead quiet  so not a lot of escape options   I had had enough of it by that point  and put him in his place.   Fortunately  for me he was a little old Asian man  had he of been some one of my dad’s stature  that scenario would have played out MUCH differently.  

Hey now speaking of family! growing up in an abusive household sure dose   wounders for building character huh? im on good talking terms with my family now but growing up  was interesting.

Our house hold was one of hard disciplines.  We didn’t just get smacked we got absolutely belted.

Or our things were broken… actually it was only ever MY things that got trashed out of discipline. my 4 brothers always got off Scott free. Whenever there was a fight or argument ? it was always me that was in trouble  regardless of the circumstance.

Good lessons to teach the kids eh’

My real dad  was off the sceen,  we were more or less raised by our step dad but   when he got an upper management job at his place of work , shit at home  got  bad.    The abuse turned from physical   to psychological .     nothing was ever good enough.   You were always trash  or a disgrace. and praise was only ever given to  the brothers.          So  yeah more good lessons  for  impressionable teens.   shitty ex #1 -  met them at a convention , seamed like a reasonable kind of guy we hit it off and it was great.    Very quickly realised something was off about them. tried very hard to control me .  would say one thing and then do something else entirely. caught them out on numerous lies and on more than one occasion said some very concerning things about minors.       Moments that stand out the most .   was staying at my place for a party , either a birthday or Halloween .   at my house with my family and close friends , had the gall to try and control my behaviour  because  he thought I was being too weird , he did this in front of my mother and best friend.     Another time , it was my birthday and he promised  to buy dinner out . started out as  we would go to this fancy casino restaurant .    ended at a Mc Donald’s with me catching the train home by my self  fuming.     I should have ended that one much sooner than I did but I didn’t want to come across as “mean” or unreasonable  so it let it drag out for another 6 months before I told him to fuck off.

 Dude then proceeded to cyber stalk me and  several friends there after. he was super bad at this and  finaly backed off when I threatened to call the cops. YEET!

 Shitty ex #2 -  technically we only dated for a few weeks decided that it didn’t work for either of us but stayed good friends .        had to tell them  frequently  about what things were and weren’t appropriate  for the friendship afterwards ,    eneded turning into one of the biggest narcicists ive ever seen.

 Miscellaneous things.   Im mentioned before about peer pressure and that its on the boys to call this shit out when they see it. I’ve had  to be the voice of reason for a number of male friends   when they were getting  a bit too obsessed over  girls who had zero interest in them.        One guy in particular  could not leave it alone  , this girl he was white knighting for    was a friend from school , she had a partner but he  swore black and blue that   he could “save her”  from making shitty decisions.     I think he eventually gave up on her when she ripped him off over some digital art that was a trace job and he lost  a good sum of money but   it was disturbing to hear just how obsessed he was with  her.

[warsofasoiaf]

Have you played Fallout 4? What did you think of it?

Joseph Anderson had a phenomenal video on Fallout 4. Although it is enormous, so be careful. Overall, there were things to like and things not to like about Fallout 4. I’ll start with what I liked first. Throwing a cut in here because it’s long.

Combat in the first-person Fallout games has always been clunky, and enemy AI relatively largely consisted of straight charging or shooting from as maximum range as possible. Difficulty came primarily from enemy quantity, high damage output, or incredibly enemy hitpoints. The last of these has been a particular Bethesda problem in their games, with enemies being incredible damage sponges, making late-game fights a boring slog as you slowly whittle down their health while being impossible to damage in any meaningful capacity. While enemy variations aren’t nearly as high as the game’s fans would have you believe if you conceive of them as AI patterns, the AI activity did have some nice variations. Human enemies used cover, ghouls bobbed and weaved as you shot them, mole rats tried to ambush you. It’s got nothing on games with fully realized combat system, but it does make the combat that you do engage in much more enjoyable. 

All of the random crap you can pick up in a Bethesda game having a purpose is another positive. It is a true nuisance to find out when playing a game that I hit my encumbrance limit only to find out it’s because I’ve picked up a bunch of brooms, bowls, and other garbage accidentally while grabbing coin and other worthwhile treasures. Actually having these things mean an object is worthy mechanically, aside from level design; typewriters are useful as items as opposed to something that shows you that the ruined building you’re in was formerly a newspaper. As crafting is a big portion of the game, having these things provide component parts that you use for crafting on their own creates more utility in these elements of clutter which still require modeling, rendering, placement, etc. Now if you need aluminum, you’ll try to raid something like a cannery because it will have aluminum cans, which is an excellent way to create player-generated initiative. It also reinforces one of the primary themes of the game which is crafting and design, where even the trailers of the game suggest building as a key idea of the game. Certainly sensible for a post-apocalyptic game to focus on building a new society upon the ruins of the older one, and given what the game was trying to do with their four factions mechanic, it’s clear that this was their intent, and good job for trying to ensure that things factor back into their principal intent. 

Deathclaws look properly scary, the animations with Vault Boy were funny, there’s some pretty window dressing. The voice work wasn’t bad, the notable standout being Nick Valentine. The Brotherhood airship was an impressive visual. I had a little fun creating some basic settlements, particularly in Hangman’s Alley where I tried to create a network of suspended buildings and Spectacle Island where I had room to grant every prospective settler a shack. Bethesda clearly looked to create a game with mass market appeal, and I believe the metrics bears out that they succeeded in that regard. The robots in the USS Constitution quest were very funny, the writers were able to make the absolute ridiculousness of the situation work (curse you Weatherby Savings and Loan!) and framed it well as a comedic sidequest, with a final impressive visual if you side with the bots and the ship takes flight.

Now that this is out of the way, I think that a lot of what Fallout 4 did was not the right move. 

The quest design was particularly atrocious in this regard. Most of the radiant quests boiled them down to a simple formula - go to the dungeon, get to the final room where you need to either kill the boss or get an item from the boss chest, return. In this game though, the main story quests often were boiled down to just this simple formula. You need to find a doodad from a Courser to complete your teleporter? Go to the dungeon, kill the boss, recover the item. The Railroad needs you to help an escaped synth! Do it by going to the dungeon and getting to the final room. This really hampers the enjoyment of games because the expressiveness of the setting and elements of an RPG is often explored through quests. Quests are meant to get you out into the world and give you an objective, but they are also meant to connect you to the people that you’re dealing with. If every quest is boiled down to the same procedure, that hurts the immersion, but the bigger sin is that when you return you have another quest waiting for you. That robs the player of the sense of accomplishment because there is no permanent solution to problems, even for a minute. There is no different end-state for the player to see the transition from one to the other and feel accomplished that they were the ones who did it. Other RPG’s always understood this - a D&D game might have a party save a town investigate an illness dealing with a town, take out an evil druid who has charmed the wildlife into attacking supply and trade shipments, slay goblins who are raiding cattle, there are a lot of possibilities that might even feel samey: if you’re killing charmed dire wolves or goblin cattle thieves, you’re still going to the dungeon and fighting the boss, the usual flair and variation came from encounter design. After you’d do that though, the NPC’s might say “Hey, Mom is feeling better after you cured that disease, she’s starting to walk again,” “Hey, we were able to send a shipment of wine from the vineyards out to the capital, here’s some coin for the shipment as reward for your service,” or even just a simple “Hey, thanks for taking out those cattle thieves.” There’s a sense of accomplishment even if it’s a fleeting “we did a cool thing.” Computer RPG’s are tougher in this regard, part of the sense of accomplishment in tabletop gaming is also with your friends, it’s a shared activity, but usually in that the reward was some experience and character growth and going to new content. There isn’t new content here in Fallout 4 though, because of the samey quest design and lack of progression.

The conversational depth was also ruined, with so much of the voice choices mangled by the system of conversation they designed. By demanding a four-choice system, they limited themselves to always requiring four options which completely mangled interactivity. The previous menu design allowed for as many lines as you wanted, even if the choices were usually beads on a string. The depth and variation, however, are even lower than what could be found in games like Mass Effect 3, and the small word descriptions were often so inaccurate that it created a massive disconnect between myself the player and the Sole Survivor, because they weren’t saying what I thought they would be saying. That prevented me from feeling immersed, because a “Sarcastic” option could be a witty joke or a threat that sounds like it should come out of a bouncer. The character options were already limited, with Nate being a veteran and Nora being a lawyer, but this lack of depth prevents me from feeling the character even moreso than a scripted backstory. You get those in games, but being unable to predict how I’m reacting is something that kills character. 

Bethesda needs to end the “find (x) loved one” as a means to get people motivated to do a quest, or if they don’t want to rid themselves of that tool in their toolbox, they need to do a better job getting me to like them. More linear games can get away with this, but open world games encourage the sort of idle dicking around that doesn’t make any sense for a person who is attempting to find a family member. Morrowind did this much better, where your main task was to be an Imperial agent, and you were encouraged to join other factions and do quests as a means to establish a cover identity and get more acquainted with combat. Folks who didn’t usually ended up going to Hasphat Antabolius and getting their face kicked in by Snowy Granius. Here though, what sort of parent am I if instead of pursuing a lead to find my infant son I’m wandering over east because I saw what looked like a cool ruin, and I need XP to get my next perk (another gripe, perks that are simple percentage increases because they slow down advancement and make combat a slog if you don’t take them, depressing what should be a sense of accomplishment). By making us try to feel close with a character but by refusing to give us the players time with them, there is no sense of bonding. I felt more connection to James in Fallout 3 than I did for Sean, but even then, I felt more connection to him because he was voiced by Liam Neeson than because of any sense of fatherly affection. The same goes for the spouse and baby Sean, I feel little for them because I see them only a little. I know that I should care more, but I also know that I the player don’t because all that I was given is “you should care about them.” You need time to get to know characters in game, along with good writing and voicework. I like Nick because he quoted “The Raven” when seeing the Brotherhood airship and I thought that was excellent writing, I didn’t have any experiences with Sean to give me that same sense of bonding. 

They’ve also ruined the worldbuilding. The first-person Fallout games have always had a problem with this, with Fallout 3 recycling Super Mutants, the Brotherhood of Steel, and other iconic Fallout things into Washington D.C. Part of this is almost certainly the same reason that The Force Awakens was such a dull rehash of the plot of A New Hope, they wanted to establish some sort of continuity with a new director to not frighten off old fans who they relied on to provide a significant majority of the sales. The problem of course, is that this runs into significant continuity problems, now needing Vault 87 to have a strain of FEV and having a joint Vault-Tec/US Government experiment program there on the East Coast, so we can have Super Mutants. Jackson’s chameleon isn’t native to Washington D.C., but we need to have Deathclaws because they’re the iconic scary Fallout enemy, as opposed to creating something new with the local fauna, which is only made worse because they did do that with the yao guai formed from the American black bear (the black bear doesn’t typically range in the Chesapeake Basin near DC these days, but it’s close enough and given the loss of humans to force them back they could easily return to their old pre-human rangings). Some creatures are functions of the overall setting and can be global, ghouls are the big one here since radiation would be a global thing and fitting considering Fallout is a post-apocalypse specifically destroyed by nuclear war. Others though, are clearly mutated creatures and so they would be more localized. Centaurs and floaters were designed by FEV experiments and collared by Super Mutants, they should really only be around Super Mutants. Radscorpions shouldn’t be around, there would probably be instead be mutated spiders. Making things worse are that the monster designers do develop some excellent enemies when they think about it. Far Harbor has a mutant hermit crab that uses a truck as a shell (a lobster restaurant truck, which is passable enough for a visual joke even if it falls apart when you think about other trucks that they might use) and a monster that uses an angler lure that resembles a crafting component - these are good ideas but the developers needed to awkwardly shoehorn in iconic Fallout things that have no place there. This isn’t to say that I’m in love with a lot of Fallout’s worldbuilding, a lot of the stuff in Fallout 2 I found to be kind of dumb particularly the talking deathclaws, but as the series went on it took objects without meaning. The G.E.C.K in Fallout 3 was pretty much a magic recombinator which makes no sense as a technology in a world devastated by resource collapse, something similar can be said about the Sierra Madre vending machines. 

Fallout 4 though, had a lot of worldbuilding inconsistencies that really took an axe to the setting. The boy in the fridge outlasts the entire Great War, but apparently never needed to eat or drink water. This is, of course, stupid, because ghouls have always been shown to need to eat and drink - Fallout 1′s Necropolis section has a Water Chip but if you take it without finding an alternate source of clean water, the ghouls will die. Ghoul settler NPC’s that flock to your player-crafted towns require food and water. The entire thing was ruined from a complete lack of care, to build a quest where you reunite a lost boy with his still-alive ghoulified parents. I think this one bothers me not simply because of the egregious worldbuilding which isn’t even consistent in the very game it’s written it, but it’s done so frivolously for a boring escort quest. It feels scattershot, and that’s the problem I think with a lot of Fallout 4′s quests. They feel disconnected, like every writer worked in a cubicle without talking to any of the other writers. Same with things like the Lady in the Fog.

Are we done with that? Good, because now we’re going into the parts that I really dislike - the main quest and the factions. These are just awful. The developers took what folks really liked when it came to Fallout 2 and Fallout: New Vegas (Fallout 1 did have interesting factions but they were largely self-contained, more towns than anything else) and completely botched it. New Vegas was the clear inspiration for these factions, with the four faction model of NCR, Legion, House, and Indepenedent meaning that there were four different ways to go forward into the future, so we get three factions that fight each other and a fourth more player friendly faction that roughly resembles the Independent Vegas where you can pick and choose which factions you bring in with you and which you get rid of. Thematically, this fits in with the core of the game, crafting is a big portion of what you do and so crafting what sort of world the Commonwealth would be is simply a logical extension of it. The factions aren’t presented well though. The Railroad are impossibly naive and don’t demonstrate any rougher edges like denying supplies to humans in order to fuel their synth effort, even though such a thing should be evident if the post-apocalypse of the Commonwealth is to be believed. The Institute are sinister murderers and replacers without bringing any of the advanced technology that could provide some benefit such as the gigantic orange gourd that can grow. So much of their kill-and-replace mentality seems to be done for no great overarching purpose. The Minutemen are basically blank, pretty much just a catch-all for the player-built settlements, though the player as the leader of the Minutemen ends up getting bossed around by Preston to the point of the faction rejecting your commands to proceed with the main quest, a significant problem with Bethesda factions where you are the leader but never get any actual sense of leadership. There doesn’t appear to be any addressing of the failures of the previous Minutemen whether that be the previous summit, or new problems such as settlements feuding with each other requiring the general to intervene and mediate. The Brotherhood come the closest to a real faction with advantages and drawbacks if you squint, they are feudal overlords with the firepower to fight Super Mutants and other mutated nasties, but also violently reject ghouls and synths as part of their violent dogma except for seemingly not caring when you bring a companion around or killing ghoul settlers in settlements they control. But even then, we don’t really see the Brotherhood providing protection to the settlements that they demand for food, the typical radiant quest to destroy a pack of feral ghouls or super mutants is directed from a Brotherhood quest giver to a randomly determined location, hardly a good way to illustrate whether or not the Brotherhood is actually protecting settlements that they administer. We see little change in the way of the Commonwealth save that certain factions are alive or not because the game needs to stay active in order to perform radiant quests, so not even the signature ending slideshows can give us the illusion of effects building off of our actions. This is contrary to the theme of building a better world in the Commonwealth because there is no building. 

Special notice must be given to the Nuka-World raiders because they show the big problems with the factions. You can be a Raider in Nuka-World but only after becoming the Overboss, which is fair enough. But you’re already a Minuteman, but the Minutemen don’t activate any kill-on-sight order and Preston still helps you out. The game is so terrified of people losing out on content that they make permanent consequences rare, and when you do something like order an attack, it can be rescinded automatically if one of your companions is there. As an Overboss, you do grunt work in the Commonwealth, and the factions get mad and pissy if you don’t give them things despite even if you only give one section of the park to one of the factions, that’s more than they got from Colter. It’s like they don’t exist until the player shows up, which is exactly how a lot of modern Bethesda character and faction building seems to be. While in most computer games a sort of uneasy status quo is the desired beginning state because it gives the protagonist the chance to make ripples while justifying the existence of a status that allows the player to change it, it has to be applied consistently. 

The main quest itself is silly. There’s a decent twist with Sean becoming Father that sort of works, which would have worked much better if we had actually gotten a chance to bond with him, although the continuity of everything gets wiggy quick. When he said that he looked over the world and saw nothing but despair, I was wondering if they were going to actually bring a big question up and a debate between Father and the Player, the idea of what worth the people on the surface have, but it goes nowhere, it’s a missed opportunity. The main quest is just a means to meet all four factions and it’s a barebones skeleton at best. There are some interesting concepts they try, but what they do often falls flat. They try to establish some sort of empathy for Kellogg in the memory den, but it’s lazy and cheap because he kidnaps a baby and wastes your spouse, a wasted effort of empathy only made worse when you get criticized for not showing any sympathy. Kellogg then shows up in Nick’s memory for one second and then that little story nugget is ignored. The half-baked nature of the story keeps being brought back up, which is a pity because we actually saw them do a competent job in Far Harbor. The Followers of Atom are crazy and they really aren’t sympathetic in any way, but some of the folks inside the sub aren’t so bad that it might prevent you from wanting to detonate the sub, or at least you might think enough that you look for another solution. DiMA did some monstrous things, and if you bring him to justice, the game actually takes the time to evaluate whether or not you helped out Far Harbor, with meaningful consequences being taken if you took the time to do the sidequests which imparts far more meaning to them. 

While there’s a lot of problems that show up in terms of binary completion, the question of whether to replace Tektus and turn the Children of Atom to a more moderate path is a good question, it actually gives a lot more merit to the Institute if they were ever to have been shown to enact the same level of care. That only makes the Fallout problems stand out more, because it shows that they were capable of it but didn’t. This isn’t the only missed opportunity, synths themselves become a big problem. The goal was to create a very paranoid feeling but it was so sorely under-utilized that I never grew suspicious of folks because the game never gave me enough incentive to be suspicious of them. I didn’t think that Bethesda made synths that would give you false information or ambush you because that would have been potentially missed content. The idea of whether you are a synth or not is clearly an attempt to give the game more depth than it is presenting. You’re not a synth, Father’s actions make no sense if you are one, and DiMA attempting to make you think you are is silly because you know you aren’t one.

I think the game would have been much better if they had dropped the notion of Fallout entirely. If they had instead looked to create an open-world post-apocalyptic game focusing on crafting and building towns, perhaps with an eventual goal state of building many towns, establishing transportation networks, and rebuilding a junkyard society as a decent place (or going full Mad Max Bartertown complete with a Thunderdome for players looking for an evil and over-the-top option). That might have been an interesting game for Bethesda to potentially develop a new IP, even contracting with smaller studios for those who wish to tell story-heavy games in the setting. Instead, they applied Fallout like a bad paint job, cobbling together weak RP elements and story that made the game feel like a hydra that couldn’t recognize it was one being with multiple heads, constantly tearing the other parts of itself to ribbons. 

If I wanted to further improve it, I think I would have instead made the spouse a synth. It would require some serious reworking, but I would have made it so that Sean did believe that synths were people, or that they were real enough that the difference was negligible, they had free will. During the initial grab, the Institute took the entire cryopod where Sean was, baby and parent both. They used Sean to create the next generation of synths, but something happened with the parent, and they died during defrost. Sean hates the Institute for what they did, but what happened was truly a medical complication, not malicious in any way. When he learns that the player character is active, he creates a synth programmed to believe they are the spouse. He believes that exposing who he really is to the surviving parent would be traumatic, and as he hears that the player character is thriving, he wants to give them a chance at a normal life, and to alleviate the loss that he had in his life with the loss of his own parents. So the spouse is sent to you, and for a long time, you and the spouse have no idea. You adventure together, you build settlements together, the game encourages you to have a good relationship. It doesn’t have to be hunky dory, and I’d argue it’s actually better if it’s not. Have the spouse be programmed with some rough experiences in the Wasteland, so they’re nervous, skittish, maybe even a little resentful that the player character snoozed their way through everything, but slowly rebuild the relationship. That way, when the quest eventually comes where you find the truth, the player character has to confront that reality. Then when you confront Sean, Sean explains himself and the player is given the choice to forgive him, be understanding but still angry, or be hugely pissed at the manipulation. That’s drama that uses the core theme of what synths are about with the whole kill-and-replace motif the Institute does. There’s a plot twist that batters the player, there’s one that’s just messy and gross and tough to reconcile. There’s one where the conclusion the player comes to is valid because it’s the player themselves deciding what the meaning of it is.

So overall, I see Fallout 4 as a bunch of missed opportunities and clumsy writing wrapped up in the popular shallow open-worlds that triple-A games end up having. 

Thanks for the question, Jackie.

SomethingLikeALawyer, Hand of the King

[inkdrinkershadowsinger]

Thoughts/ Background The Deathly Hallows Part Two

The introduction music is so haunting. The castle in all its glory is haunted by dementors and fog. Snape is solitary. Everything is singular and empty on the grounds. The only color we see at Hogwarts during this time is during the final battle when McGonagall pushes Harry out of the way, and we see that flash of fire from her wand. That’s when you know stuff is about to kick off.

Griphook sounds so lost as to why Harry would bury Dobby. The divide between creatures and wizards, between goblins and wizards has gotten so great that neither side even thinks to assume that the other possesses even the smallest hint of kindness or humility. This is a fic all in itself.

What are the goblins stake in the sword? What is with the mention of the tiara in the books? I feel like Rowling had more to say about this topic, but for some reason she didn’t.

I hate that Fleur seems to be so meek in this movie. I want her to be this badass fighter chick, the kind of person who the Goblet of Fire would chose once again to play one of the most challenging games ever, the kind of person who would leave her country and family for an amazing opportunity and adventure, but her character wasn’t given much time or space to be free to show itself in that manner.

Wandlore is super fascinating. Is there a book about wandlore? Like a companion book like Quidditch Through the Ages? I feel like there should be.

It looks like that is a quilt patch behind Harry’s head. It would have been a gift from Mrs. Weasley.

It always bothered me that Luna was just like, “Yeah, I’m going back to school.” They just locked her butt up in the dungeons, and then she decides to go back to a school where the people who locked her up are currently in power and could torture her for information about the whereabouts of Harry Potter, the person she literally just escaped with. I think, that’s why this scene was cut from the final cut of the basic DVD versions.

Ron is so quick here to be like, “They suspect us. They suspect us.” But the silence doesn’t go on for that long. It feels like someone with such an iron gut gets antsy really quickly, and not antsy like sweating a bit, but antsy like he’s about to start crying. It just seems weird. One of the basic security measures to the bank might be that they have like a gas that leaks through that makes people feel paranoid or something like that. You want to get 200 galleons out, but what happens if you get robbed on the way out the door? Better to only get 100, thus keeping money in the bank under the goblins eyes. It would help keep out thieves as well, petty and otherwise.

None of the other goblins think that something is off with the behavior of this one goblin who seems to be in a positon of authority?

Goblins are keyed into the various vaults? Which means that they could seal them at any time as well, right? Is this in the books?

Hermione, baby, your Gryffindor is showing, and it is SEXY!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! Lol

Those goblins are like, “Assume the fire breathing position.”

You can see how deep down they are. And I know this isn’t real, but to think that that dragon would have only had that small opening of real light shining down on it all that time is truly depressing.

Litearlly, they all deserve to bite it after what that dragon was put through.

“And he’s homicidal.”

“We plan, we get there, all hell breaks loose.” I feel that.

I always assumed that Voldemort when to Gringotts and killed the goblins. But no, he summoned them to Malfoy Manor, and then killed them. Why would he do it like that?

That mirror is rectangular, but I always envisioned the mirrors as being circular.

Why does Aberforth tell them that the Order is finished? He knows that it isn’t. This whole speech of his is very demoralizing. But Harry dgaf…..

This, “I trusted the man I knew” attitude is why Harry named one of his children Albus Severus.

Hermione is the one who asks questions of Aberforth, and yet, he directly responds to Harry. I always thought that was odd.

And Aberforth has been helping them the whole time? Then why the speech?

Neville badass Longbottom.

Another nod to the books.

I wanted some more information about what was going on in Hogwarts while Harry, Ron, and Hermione were on the run. I wanted to hear more about what Dumbledore’s Army were getting up to while the others were hunting horcruxes. There were tasters of it in the book, but I would have loved to have had more of it tbh.

Fact: Neville’s plant from five is the mascot for the Hogwart’s resistance.

“She gots lost of those, hasn’t she?” This line from Seamus at the very beginning of this movie just made it so perfect. This movie is a gosh dang masterpiece.

Snape had such a hard job. I mean, I know people hate on Snape, and I can understand their reasoning, but I have a soft spot for the man. Maybe I read too much fanfiction because fanfic!Snape and canon!Snape are two very different individuals.

Harry’s name among these students is the stuff of legend. The way they all look around and start talking carries that spark of hope that good rumors sometimes have.

Harry, “Perfect timing group.”

People back up when Harry faces Snape. People move the hell out of dodge when McGonagall draws her wand.

Snape takes out the two Carrows behind him before he apparates out of the school.

Padma gets zero dances at the Yule Ball, and then Voldemort invades her mind. Great.

Pansy, my darling, there is a time to speak and there is a time to stay silent. Read the room.

Filch, ditto.

Why do all of the magical, “evil” Slytherins allow Filch, a squib, to lock them up?

Even the portraits are getting out of there.

All the kids in the background are completely flummoxed.

“Boom!”

Say that five times fast. No, say it once without messing up and you get to be bff’s with Maggie Smith.

This spell is sick, this music is sick, McGonagall is a queen. When I saw this in theater, my skin got goose pimples. “Do your duty for our school!” It is just so amazing, and iconic. This whole scene makes me feel so empowered, and pumped like I’m about to head into battle, like I’m about to defend my home and my life.

My thoughts on the diadem and the other founders objects can be found in a post that I made. My thoughts are strong, and though they aren’t canon, they are still unspoken canon.

Voldemort is like, “I was about to monologue. Why you speaking to me?”

“You okay, Freddie?” Don’t come at me like that, writers.

We all died laughing in the theater when Ron said that. “Harry talks in his sleep.” Harry only speaking parseltongue when around snakes theory is still enforced when you think about the snake Pettigrew sneaking around the whole time.

Exactly why the fuck does Remus need Tonks more than her small child? I never understood this line, and I never liked them as a couple. Thought the book version was creepy, and the movie version unrealized.

Some movies really don’t need to be split into two for the ending *Divergent trilogy* but this one really benefitted from having two films. I wouldn’t want this huge battle scene and character plot and humor to be lost.

No one thinks to cast a spell to catch Neville??? This is like the first flying lesson all over again.

Go, Mr. Weasley, you are on fire.

Kingsley, whip their arses with that fancy shit. LET’S GO!!!!!!

Harry reached out to Ginny first. This movie is so lacking in any real chemistry between these two actors and characters that it is almost painful. This is one instance, that I never noticed before, that makes all of their other interactions less cringey to watch.

Neville almost died on that bridge. He might as well tell Luna how he feels. I love this and can fully ship canon book couples with canon movie couples at the same time. Thank you very much.

That kiss between them is so weird. I just can’t.

Hermione in this scene is proof that men rattle your brain with smooches. Lol

So, if you are using the room of requirement for something, and someone who already has been in that same room, and wants it for the same reason that you do, they can get in as well? But not if they want it for the same reason, which is why Umbridge couldn’t be get it in Order of the Phoenix.”

There are so many Easter eggs in this scene in the ROR. You can see a chess piece from 1, pixies from 2. It just enforces my headcanon that the house elves use the ROR as a sort of dumping ground for the random stuff that they find at the school.

Harry is so gosh dang blasé about seeing Draco again. He’s just like, “What’s up, dude?” He is not concerned in the slightest that he has three wands pointed at him right now. They are just causally chatting about whose wand each other has got.

The statue of the pig right behind Harry and Hermione. It would make sense Voldemort would try to totally remake Hogwarts, and I think that would go into removing those odd little things that make the castle a bit quirky. The castle looks bleak and unnaturally bland compared to the other movies. It would make sense that he would want statues of hogs also taken out.

You see the lanterns that Slughorn had at his Christmas party.

Why is the fire morphing into different animals? The phoenix attacks Draco, Blaise, and Goyle, the tiger chases Ron and Hermione, and then the snake goes after Harry. And then they all converge on the trio? Why make it animals? Is there any significance to this? I never noticed that they were actually animals before.

Finding the brooms perfect. Saving them perfect. Killing the horcrux then kicking it into the flames. Perfect.

The music while the trio are fighting to get to boat house is so haunting and lovely and it’s like it calls to every nostalgic atom in your body.

Really, death eater, you’ve got time to stop and cast the cruciatus on someone in the middle of this warzone?

I love that Hermione was the one to blast Fenrir away from Lavender. So touching.

Aberforth, Mr. IT IS ALL GOING TO END HORRIBLY WHY EVEN TRY, has enough hope and good memories to cast away that many dementors. Yeah, he’s fake.

Voldemort just doesn’t like that Snape is taller than him.

I just wanted a touch of the friendship that was expressed between Lily and Snape in the book. Harry understood it, and said it perfectly at the end of book seven. I wanted some of that to translate to screen. It wasn’t just because Snape had some weird crush on her it was because they were friends, best friends. Ron and Harry and Hermione friendship. The next time someone comes at me with that bull I’m just going to refer them back to the facts.

This is probably the first time that Snape had ever been allowed to really look at Harry as a person rather than someone who is supposed to hate him. It is the first time that he could be unguarded around him.

Snape hired more healers. Why else would they be there? He knew that with the group in charge that as in power, that they would be needed.

I can’t stand this barrage of lost souls. It is painful, and I get flashbacks from when I read the book for the first time, and the pages were covered in my tears.

It doesn’t look like Snape even has anything in this office. It looks barren. He knew he had no time to get comfortable in his position.

That tree is beautiful.

I love their friendship. I will always love their friendship.

Look at Snape and all those books. Lily and Snape, the studious, top of their year duo with the Marauders who eschew libraries but still manage to succeed. I don’t need to think hard to imagine the rivalry. In fact, I did imagine it, and wrote some down in the thing, message me if you would like part of the thing.

Hermione knew, or at least, strongly suspected that Harry was going to have to do what he sets off to accomplish, for sure.

I love that when Harry walked into the forest to face down death that he had these people, these guardians, these people who at one point or another swore to protect this boy with everything that they have get to be the ones that are with him at the end just like at the beginning. Things are different for them, and different from how they thought it would be when Harry was born into this world, but they still kept their promise.

“Does it hurt?” This is something that a child asks. We forget that Harry, here, is only supposed to be 17 years old, that’s a kid. Added to that, you have the very real

“We’re here, you see?” Perfect.

“Stay close to me?” “Always.”

My thoughts mean nothing in the perfection of this scene.

Hagrid is still looking out for Harry’s best interest. He is the only adult worth a flip in more than half of these films.

“The boy who lived come to die.”

I know Dumbledore is like, “The man” here, and the mentor or whatever, but I would have really have liked to have the person who met Harry at Kings Cross had been Snape especially after harry had just learned the truth. Way more dynamic.

Narcissa straight up lied to the most dangerous wizard ever. She deserved that pardon for her family. All she wanted was out, and to take care of her son, and I respect that. Don’t give a dang for the rest of the world when they would gladly let you burn. Take care of number one even when number one is a group instead of a single entity.

You hear that noise when Neville picks up the hat, and if you read the books, you know what he just found. He was out there preparing and scouting for another battle, and Hogwarts rewarded him.

Hagrid carrying in Harry’s body was so painful to watch. Visually, there little death parade plus the music just puts you in this anxious state. Pinpricks.

The acting by Bonnie Wright here is superb. The lack of chemistry is not equally weighted on her shoulders.

Luna looks at Draco like she is sick. Then like she is sad. I hate it. She was wishing for something else there for sure.

The way Dean Thomas looks at Voldemort in this scene is the way that I feel about that weird af hug.

Voldemort has to restrain himself from killing Neville on the spot for interrupting him.

Neville has never in the course of these movies failed to speak when needed. He stood up to the trio in 1, and he spoke up against Seamus and nearly everyone else in the common room in Ootp. Neville stands up for what is right.

All of those death eaters are like, “Fuck! This boy came back to life again? What are the Dark Lord’s AK’s broken? Nevermind, fuck this shit, I’m out.”

That music when Neville regains consciousness. YES!

See, if Voldemort didn’t play with his food, he might have won.

NOT MY DAUGHTER YOU BITCH!!!! When I say people cheered and screamed in the theater when Molly said and did this epic shit I ain’t kidding. IT WAS AND STILL IS ONE OF THE MOST ICONIC HP QUOTES OF ALL TIME!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!! ONE OF THE BEST, MOST EMPOWERING QUOTES!!!!!!! We all want Molly Weasley to have our backs like this.

The whole ending of this movie is LEGENDARY!!!! I went to the midnight showing for the release of this movie with a bunch of other diehards, and seeing Neville cut the head off of the snake, and watching Harry finally beat Voldemort with the elder wand. I mean, we were literally just in such a state of excitement and yes and hallelujah, it was insane.

Neville and Luna. I see y’all.

Percy is talking to Arthur, reconciling.

That guy behind Cho is definitely about to shoot his shot with someone.

Filch, bless his heart.

Ron and Hermione. Harry knows. Harry blesses this union. Harry has been the number one ship captain this whole time, and now he is rewarded.

I like that Harry snapped the wand in the movie. See, if book Harry had snapped the wand, the Cursed Child would have never graced our consciousness with its heteronormative agenda. Scorbus is life. Fight me.

This series has had such a serious impact on me. I love it. I spend hours upon hours inside of this universe every day as beloved fanfiction writers play inside of it’s territory. It made me a reader. It helped me when I wasn’t sure what was next for me in life. It gave me entertainment and enjoyment, and still does. I love it, and I hope that I always will. We cling to the thought of magic because we hope that it is really, we hope that like in this world where there is magic that cannot be easily be explained exists. We hope that in our world, too, there is that same kind of magic that can wrap itself around us.

I think that kind of magic is real. I just think that we have to look for it, remember it, talk about, cherish it, and spread it around for others who have forgotten to look for it themselves. And great literature, like this series, helps us to do that.

That is why it will be remembered for generations to come. At least, if I have anything to say about it.

[c-is-for-circinate]

Ten episodes into Critical Role (starting with the second season, and NO SPOILERS PLEASE), and okay yeah, I get why people like the show.

There’s a lot to talk about and I’m sure most of it’s been said before, but I’m just in love with how nuanced and contradictory these characters are.  And contradictory is exactly the right word, not just because of how they oppose each other (though goddamn that is fun), but how they oppose themselves, how every single character is this mess of characteristics that don’t match up on first glance, except they actually fit together to create such rich characters.

Like Fjord, okay, start with him--he’s not the leader because this group is too much of a disaster to have a leader, but he’s the most consistently calm, solid, reliable, and generally sensible person in the whole group.  Which is not usually how you’d expect your party’s half-orc to behave, but that’s fine, that’s just messing with race expectations, that’s easy.  What’s interesting about Fjord is that he’s so clearly the group’s token decent guy, the honest man.  He has an eldritch nightmare and actually tells the others about it, which nobody else in that fucking crew except maybe Jester would.  He’s a straightforward guy who seems like he was maybe actually normal once, again unique in this group, who also happens to be a warlock with very clearly eldritch powers he doesn’t understand.  And he has no problem whatsoever with using and expanding those powers, or with killing, or with stealing and conning and enjoying any ill-gotten gains the group may collect.  His objections to the team’s plans are almost always practical and logistical (the ‘this seems very complicated and also is likely to end in this very obvious disaster when this logical hole gives way under us’ sort), not moral.  It consistently feels like, if he hadn’t had whatever disaster shipwreck eldritch sea-beast warlock pact experience set him off on this path, he out of the whole group would be obeying laws and being generally decent to the people around him and working a simple, honest job with some hard labor involved, and he’d be happy with it--but he’s on this boat now and he’s in completely, and he’s just as forthright with that loyalty as he is with everything else.

And Jester is flighty and silly and fun and describes a childhood that horrifies the entire rest of the group in blithe, carefree tones, and I love it so much because it makes so much sense.  Sure, she was isolated, secluded, and hidden from the world for years--but it was important for her mom’s business, and her mom loved her, and it was normal, and it was fine.  Because that’s normal to her.  And she’s completely carefree about her childhood, just like she makes a carefree game out of slaughtering gnolls and being entirely willing to kill guards or other sentient people, with the same level of fun as she gets pulling minor pranks.  She would happily and generously give away pastries or money or healing to anyone, and then turn right around and fuck up their entire day just because it’s funny, and not even see a conflict there.  Except that every once in a while we get a glimpse of just how desperately lonely she’s been for so fucking long--and it only comes out when she’s talking to or about the Traveler.  It’s never when she’s talking about home, or the brothel, or the room when she was locked in, because those things were normal and fine.  What’s not fine is the idea that she might lose contact with the Traveler, or maybe her mother.  And of course that’s it.  Because everything that was normal and fine and happy and funny had to be okay, because it was life, and that’s just how it was, but the Traveler and maybe her mother were the things that made it all okay, and if she loses them, she loses everything.

And I haven’t even begun to figure out Nott yet, Nott who seems in many aspects like the most straightforward member of the whole crew--not in the Fjord way of directness and honesty, but in the easy, tropey, simple-to-classify way.  The goblin rogue who loves picking pockets and collecting shiny things, quick and sly and easily intimidated, with quick fingers and a bit of a background in alchemy, it all makes sense.  Nott makes sense.  Except that if you take a step back and look around at context, Nott makes no fucking sense at all.  I have no idea why she’s out here, adventuring with these losers, instead of back home with the other goblins.  We have seen zero other goblins out and around populated places so far.  Even her partnership with Caleb straddles the line between ‘oh, of course’--a couple of criminals who met in prison and helped each other escape and decided it was more practical to stick together? sure! makes sense for a goblin!--and ‘wait, what the fuck?’.  Why was Nott in any sort of prison that Caleb would ever be in to begin with?  If she was arrested by humans, why didn’t they just kill her outright, given the attitudes most humans we’ve seen seem to have to goblins?  She is so friendly and ready to hang with the rest of the group, is so delighted to play with Jester, she’s such a social creature, so how did she ever end up playing sidekick with this socially awkward human disaster to begin with?

And right, speaking of Caleb, the man is a goddamn mess, even putting aside all of his stubbornness and his mysteries and the actual literal mess of him.  He’s shy and awkward and anxious and scared around people, except for when he decides to very intensely threaten somebody with murder and disembowelment, just as a matter of course.  He’s anxious about everything, but he’s okay with monster-hunting.  And he’s fine with murder, so long as it isn’t done with fire, he’s one of the first to go in for robbing corpses, he straight up does not give a shit about the people he and Nott rob, he doesn’t trust or even particularly like the rest of the Nein, he doesn’t (appear to) care about other people at all--except that he would do anything for Nott, full stop.  And he has strong feelings about parents and kids and families, and he gave Jester the money he swiped from the spider lair because he got angry at her for being an apparent spoiled rich girl and wanted to apologize, and because it seemed important to her an he cared.  And all of these truths hang together around the central figure of this one guy with a fucked-up past he doesn’t have words for, who prefers books to people and doesn’t really know what he’s doing, in the world, in general, even at the fairly low level he thinks he does.

And of course Caleb keeps clashing with Beau, because Beau is simultaneously so self-invested and yet also somehow more interrogative of the whole world around her than anyone else in the group.  Beau wants to know all of Caleb’s secrets.  She wants to know everybody’s secrets, but she wants Caleb most of all, because he’s spent the most effort trying to keep them that way.  And she’s so curious about her party members, so curious about things going on in the world--she asks more questions about random shit than anyone, she’s currently spearheading both the investigation into the Gentleman and, with Fjord, the Zadash revolutionary’s club, because she wants to know.  Except Beau never gives off the impression of actually liking anybody or anything she discovers.  (Fjord trying to give her lessons on complimenting somebody without making it sound like a backhanded insult was amazing.)  She has ‘chip on my shoulder’ writ so large across her it might as well be in neon.  She is Out For Herself; she hates the system but she’s not going to go looking for ways to take it down, not when she can drink and fight shit to get cash that she can spend to drink with.  But she can’t stop asking questions.  She Doesn’t Care, but she can’t stop trying to learn more.  And right, the constant back and forth of ‘yes she cares’-’no she’s a self-interested bitch’ could feel wishy-washy, but instead it just feels right, because Beau is very young and very angry and very impulsive, and she is very bad at effectively caring for the things and people she cares about, and it is so clear that she’s been treated so badly and had so little power to fight back.  And now she’s got the power to fight back so she lashes out and she hits things and she’s constantly mean, and she chokes out the little girl she got arrested to protect two days earlier because nobody ever taught Beau how people actually take care of other people, did they.  She needs to know Caleb’s secrets because Caleb having stuff going on that he won’t talk about means that there are factors at play that can affect Beau’s life that she can’t control, can’t even know about.  All I know about her parents so far is that they had enough money to pay a temple to take her away when she caused too much trouble for them.  Which actually appears to say pretty much everything that needs to be said.

And fucking Mollymauk Tealeaf, the one goddamn spoiler I had for this show before I started it and I am simultaneously gutted over him from day one and grateful to be prepared because I do not think I would take losing him well as a surprise.  Molly is so fucking good.  He’s a good character, and he’s such a good person, except he would cheerfully deny it with a grin if anyone ever accused him of it.  He is such a tremendous cynic.  He has been all over and he believes that people in groups of any size are stupid, dangerous, probably corrupt, generally bigoted, probably lazy, and out for themselves at every turn.  No horror anyone does can surprise him, and yet he’s blithe and easy about it all.  Of course people are terrible, that’s just how people are, no sense getting depressed over it.  He’ll just slide his way in with a smile and a deck of tarot cards and a bit of flash and dazzle, use people’s vices against them, maybe run just a bit of a con if it looks to be profitable, and slide right back out again.  Except that by god, Molly cares every bit as much as Beau does and unlike her, he actually knows it.  He was ready to go to the mat for any- and everyone in that circus, called it a family and held on to it as hard as he possibly could even as everyone in it bickered and hated each other and were ready to jump town and leave each other behind.  He is so kind to people with less than he has.  And he’s never forceful about it, he never pushes his care forward, he just makes a few gentle comments to Jester about expectations and disappointment that might help ease the crushing blow he so clearly sees coming her way, without actually calling her out or starting an argument.  He just suggests to Nott that there exist people in the world that shouldn’t be robbed, not because they’ve no money worth stealing but because those people can’t afford to lose what little they have.  At some point he took it upon himself to be the person who keeps an eye on everyone else in the party, whether to try to defuse an argument or pick someone up when they’re down or corner them and take them to task, quietly, out of earshot of all the others.  It’s impossible not to get the sense that Molly is already more invested in this group working and staying together than anyone else here, and he takes that fact as a given, and he’s ready to put in the quiet background work to keep it in one piece.  He’s already brushed off or buried whatever mourning he did for the broken circus family he so clearly loved so well, and it should be a contradiction, but mostly it just feels like Molly is too used to being ready for things to go south and people to leave, because life is just shit like that and you take what you can get.  He treats love exactly the same way he treats money: a thing that’s hard to come by and well worth collecting if you possibly can, to be enjoyed and played with to the very fullest while you have it, because soon enough it’ll be gone again either way.

At any rate, I’m really enamoured of this show that has characters so nuanced by ten episodes in.  (Granted, ten episodes clocks close to 40 hours, but shhhh.  D&D time is different.)  I chalk a ton of it up to, ‘oh, shit, this is why voice actors are the perfect people to put on D&D as a massive serial fiction adventure’.  Every single person at the table makes a living out of putting nuance into characters with just their voice, so of course they know what they’re doing, and they’ve all played zillions of characters (their IMDB pages are so long, jfc) with plenty of nuance to begin with.  They know how to do this shit.

The other thing, I think, is that everybody at the table feels safe with the idea that they’ll have enough time to draw these characters out all the way to the end.  Everybody in this group has so many secrets, so many of the linking pieces that lay out and explain the layers and contradictions, and nobody is rushing to pull any of them out on the table right up at the start, because everybody there is totally secure in the idea that they’ll get 500-odd hours to tell this story and it doesn’t all have to happen yet.  Character death is always a risk, but the only healer isn’t going to up and move to another state, and nobody is going to get married and have no time any more, and the DM’s manager at work isn’t going to suddenly start assigning Thursday night shifts and all of the sudden scheduling is a disaster for so long it never gets fixed.  Nobody is going to decide they don’t care any more and just stop showing up.  They’ve been at this together a long, long time, and also they’re making an actual show about it that they actually get paid for, and they can take as long to tell the story, and make it whatever story, that they want.  It’s a really different kind of energy than any D&D game I ever managed to play, and even different from most shows that never know when the ‘cancel’ hammer might come down from the network.

It’s pretty cool.  I like it a lot.

[embarrassingsmartphonegame]

Anything (Chapter 2) - Nik Ryder x f!MC

Summary: After surviving an attempt on her life, she discovers there are worse fates than dying. And they’re all ice cold. 

Warnings for this chapter: descriptions of depression, excessive alcohol usage, non-explicit sexual content

Link to the previous chapter

==============================================

Three months later.

Nothing.

Nothing.

‘Still nothing.’ Leah groaned as she rolled over to the other side of her queen bed. The other side was cold; she estimated that the woman from the previous night left a few hours prior. What was her name? Something that started with an A: Aisha, Asha, Ashley? Whatever, it didn’t matter. The name of the man from 2 nights ago didn’t, and neither did all the others.

Wordlessly, she got up and walked around her bedroom, shivering as her bare skin made contact with the air. It was already May; why was she always so cold? She considered for a moment packing some broccoli in her lunch because she read somewhere that being cold all the time could mean she was anemic, but she had to rush that morning to get to work on time so no time for lunch.

“Good morning!” she greeted as she entered the office, putting on her usual chipper facade. No one looked up, save for old Rob from accounting who gave her a grunt in response. When she got to her cubicle, she let her face slip into the same old neutral expression and got to work. 

‘Fri-yay,’ she thought to herself sarcastically as she read the latest TGIF email from Janice from HR. Bless her heart for trying to keep morale up in their office. Leah deleted it immediately. More paperwork, more emails, more denying invitations to co-workers’ baby showers. The day passed by in its usual gray, clicking blur. She never did get her broccoli; that would’ve been a wild day if she did.

She got home that day at precisely 5:30pm like she did every other day. At 5:45pm she had her usual small dinner prepared, and at 6:00pm she’d finished eating while mindlessly watching a trashy reality show involving a woman from Brazil coming to the U.S. to marry some ugly guy who still lived with his mother. She snorted at their antics, and the episode and her meal ended quickly. She tried for the millionth time that month to take part in her beloved hobbies again: dance, paint, pluck at the strings of her old violin. 

“Years of violin lessons...these fingers are like lightning!” She slipped the rings off the goblins’ fingers as Nik started an argument to distract them, her mischievous grin never leaving her face.

She pushed down the aching in her chest at the intrusive thought, picking up her bow.

“My mom still plays!” she quipped, strolling with her newfound father through the warm glow of Lamrian.

Leah almost slammed her beloved violin down, but she kept control. She always did. It was only 8:00pm: too early to go to bed and get nightmares again. Wordlessly, she slinked into the only clean dress she had left: a little red number whose bloodstains and memories she knew wouldn’t get noticed in the dark by the other club goers or her. She didn’t want to wear it. But it was either that or a maroon velvet dress with thigh high slits and even more painful memories. She’d meant to throw that maroon dress away, but when she got home 3 months before it was hurriedly buried deep within her closet and she didn’t have the energy to look through it. Piles of dirty laundry were scattered through the floor of her room and she pushed them under the bed in a sorry attempt to make it look somewhat presentable. She lined her eyes with black eyeshadow and eyeliner and slipped into some heels before leaving her apartment.

Nothing.

She woke up with the red dress on the floor the next morning, her bed thankfully cold and empty again. It always was annoying if someone tried to stay, but she was now usually able to go after the ones who wouldn’t. But something was different this time; her phone was buzzing. She groaned, thinking it was her another courtesy invite to a baby shower. To her relief, it was a text from Kristin, and she read and responded to it through squinting, hangover afflicted eyes:

Kristin: heyyyyy bestie! surprise, I’m coming to your town tonight! I miss you xx

Leah: Huh way to give me a heads up, bitch! Lol jk, I miss you too and you know I’m not busy. Dinner and drinks later?

Kristin: you know it babe

Leah suddenly remembered it was Saturday, so she didn’t have to go to work that day and deal with the endless indifference of corporate life. Her thighs sore and bruised from the previous night, she slipped on a large white t-shirt and silently headed to her kitchen. There wasn’t much; she hadn’t gone grocery shopping in 10 days and used the last of her groceries for dinner the previous night. She sat at her small dining room table, stirring her usual cinnamon into her coffee and flipping through the messages of that week: a picture of Cal and Donny on a fishing trip, a sample of Vera’s latest song, Katherine talking about her latest catch. A rare genuine smile graced her features as she responded to all of them, making sure to apologize for taking a week and a half to respond...again. She tried to warm herself up with the coffee and cinnamon combination, and she hugged herself without much success.

The rest of the day passed by slowly, and the only productive thing she did was throw her giant pile of dirty laundry in one washing machine and then the dryer. Who cared if the clothes weren’t supposed to be washed together? Certainly not Leah. Pretty soon it was 10:00pm and she stood in front of the one club in her small town waiting for Kristin.

“Leahhhh!!!” Kristin squealed and ran over, pulling her into a tight hug. Leah inhaled sharply; she may have healed very fast and the skin was nowhere close to being open, but the scars were still slightly tender to the touch. She told all her hookups she had open heart surgery as a child, and they never questioned it. She hugged Kristin back and bit back a groan of pain. 

“Kristin!! I’m so happy to see you!” And she meant it. She actually meant it, especially after she almost lost her because of the...she shook her head, willing those memories away. Ignoring the stinging on her chest, she hugged Kristin tighter, jumping up and down a little. “So why exactly are you here?”

“What? I can’t just see my best friend?” Leah raised an eyebrow, but she let it go. Asking Kristin to explain anything she did was like asking a fish to explain astrophysics in Latin. Last time she tried was junior year of college and Leah would never get those 45 nonsensical minutes of her life back. It wasn’t unusual behavior for her to take a random trip to see her over the years anyway.

“You’re right, let’s get some shots in us!” Leah and Kristin hopped over to the bar, and pretty soon there was a line of tequila glittering in the darkness. Music blared out of large speakers, vibrating in their ears. They each clinked a shot glass together and knocked it back. Leah immediately felt warm and dizzy and her face flushed, since she hadn’t eaten anything that day. In fact, she didn’t remember much of what she did that day...or really the past few days. 

Leah laughed as Kristin launched into a story from something weird that happened to her back in New York, and pretty soon the line of shots was empty with Leah drinking most of it in a span of 15 minutes. The rest of the night passed in a blur. Random men kept buying them drinks and Leah kept chugging them, unconsciously desperate to feel that warm and dizzying effect some more. It felt like she was drifting off into space as she danced with some guy named JT or whoever who worked for ClickIt. She swayed to the music and let him run his lips across her neck and bend her over without a care in the world. Nothing, nothing, nothing mattered to her at that moment. Nothing. Until she felt soft hands pulling her away and dragging her through the crowd and away from the shouting man behind her. She blearily looked at whoever was pulling her, and she was surprised to see it was Kristin with an uncharacteristically sober, serious look on her face. 

“Yeesh, Kristin, since when have you been the one to cockblooooock?” Leah joked, her words slurred. Kristin led her to a quieter corner with a free couch and sat her down. To her surprise, Leah felt Kristin tugging at her dress, and she realized that she was actually placing it back over her chest. And she was too drunk to worry about her scar showing.

“I think you’ve had enough,” Kristin said, holding her by the shoulders.

Leah snorted. “Good one.”

“Leah, seriously, I never say this. But you’ve had enough.” Kristin swiped the drink from her hand that she didn’t even realize she was holding (and spilling on herself).

“Hey, what the hell! What’s gotten into you?” Leah pouted.

“Uhhhh what’s gotten into you is more like it! You’ve been acting really weird these past few months and we’re all worried!”

“‘We?’”

“Me and Vee. You’re not yourself,” Kristin explained, gazing into her brown eyes intensely. Leah inhaled sharply.

“What are you talking about? I’m still Leah! Come on, Kristin, I’m just having fun!”

“No you’re not.”

“What?”

“Honestly, Leah, I know I’m your party queen friend, but we’ve also been best friends since we were 18. I know you’re not having fun because your smile is sooo fake and it’s only because of the alcohol. And that guy you just kissed? Totally not your type.”

“Well ok fine maybe I’m having a midlife crisis or something. Been invited to too many baby showers and shit,” muttered Leah, her drunken brain letting words slip out.

“You’re 25!”

“I could die at 50!” ‘Technically did die at 25,’ she thought bitterly as she tried to reach for her drink in Kristin’s hand, but her best friend held it away from her.

“Seriously, Leah, this isn’t you!” declared Kristin, shaking her a little.

“What isn’t me?!” Leah started shouting, frustrated.

“All of this! The responses to texts that take weeks, the fact that you don’t play the violin anymore, the fact that you’re so goddamn skinny now! Leah, I think you really need help,” Kristin pleaded, her warm puppy dog eyes glimmering in the darkness.

“Kristin, really, I’m fine. I’m just busy with work, that’s all.” Even in her drunken state, Leah knew she was deflecting. 

“At that job you hate and put minimal effort into? You really expect me to believe that? I know this is about how you got attacked in New Orleans.”

“Don’t,” whispered Leah, a chill running down her spine. “You wouldn’t get it.”

“Did you forget I got mugged and was in the hospital for a week? I still have no idea what happened, but I can tell you I get it more than you think.” Guilt flashed through Leah’s throbbing mind as she recalled Kristin pale and prone in that alleyway before she ran to try to evade the bloodwraith. If it weren’t for her being around, Kristin wouldn’t have gotten hurt. It was all her fault. Leah stayed silent.

Kristin continued. “I know you. You thought since you almost died, you should stop taking risks, stop putting your own life in danger. You stopped being your usual brave, chaotic self. So you ran back to Wyoming—which, may I remind you, you only came back here after college to care for your dad and he’s gone now. You hate your job, you hate where you live, you don’t even talk to your mom anymore; why are you still here? And don’t tell me it’s because you can’t find work anywhere else; I know you haven’t tried yet. I thought you wanted things to be different this year.”

Leah flinched at the mention of her dad—no, stepdad. It was true. She did come back to care for him after college, but he eventually succumbed to the cancer after years of her caring for him. She and her mom were never close in the first place, and she definitely couldn’t face her after Elric. “Ok maybe I decided to play it safe from now on. What’s wrong with that? I was too reckless in New Orleans and that’s what almost got me killed.”

“What’s wrong is you’re contradicting yourself.” Kristin gestured at the rest of the club. “Playing it safe yet you’re constantly here and getting drunk and sleeping with a new person almost every night for the last month. I know you haven’t been eating well and you haven’t been talking to your friends as much. You’re literally depressed now, and I can’t stand by and let you go on like this.”

“...Maybe you have a point,” she finally conceded, running a hand through her hair. It was no use arguing. “But I don’t know what to do. I don’t even know what exactly I’m running from.”

“Love.”

“What?”

“You know what I’m talking about. You fell in love and you’re scared. When I saw you in New Orleans with that Nik guy, I haven’t seen you that alive in years.” Leah froze at Kristin’s unintentionally poor choice of words, but then rolled her eyes. She had no idea there was more, even if a small, buried deep part of her admitted Nik was part of the reason she left. Leah pushed down her last happy memory of them dancing on the float at Mardi Gras.

“Kristin, I knew him for a week.” And what a hell of a week that was. “Sure he was hot, but it was clearly just a fling. Come on, you know I’m not that stupid.”

“I’m not saying you’re stupid and this is just about a guy. But you are running away from things. Come on, can you really say you’re happy here?”

For the first time in months, she inadvertently let warm tears roll down her cheeks and sobs catch in her throat, and she had never felt more human, more alive since leaving New Orleans. Kristin wrapped her arms around her and let her cry as some new pop song about being in love with a liar blared from the speakers of the bar. Leah leaned into the familiarity of it all, feeling like a 19-year-old getting her heart broken for the first time again. This time she was a heartbroken 25-year-old pondering how her life turned out this way. As her sobs turned to hiccups, she thought about how lucky she was to have a friend like Kristin, who’d been calling her out on all her bullshit since day one. The two stayed in the corner for a few more hours, allowing them to catch up more.

At around 4am she and Kristin parted ways, promising to stay in touch better. Kristin gave her a weary look as she headed back to her hotel. Leah stumbled back into her apartment and into her bed, alone for the first time in a month. She wrapped herself in a ball in a blanket and closed her eyes. 

Crrrkkk!

Leah’s eyes snapped open. With trembling hands, she took out the baseball bat from under her bed and poised it up in her arms, ready to take on whoever was breaking into her apartment. She stalked as quietly as she could (which was not very) outside of her bedroom and turned the lights on in her living room to see if anyone--or anything--was there. The bat clanged to the floor as her eyes took in the figure in front of her. 

“...Father?!”

==============================================

Tagging: @furiouscloddonutpeanut @nighthunterkatherine @saivilo @samara-rani @god-save-the-keen  @xxdangerouscapri15xx 

A/N: Lol so how about that Nightbound finale? I personally got frustrated with both the fact that it’s a standalone and how they handled Nik and MC’s diamond ending where MC basically begs Nik to love them and all of a sudden things are okay. Of course this fic is taking some liberties (mainly because I wrote the first chapter before the finale) for that added drama. Also yes, MC almost hooked up with TJ from LoveHacks because I can’t think of anything more embarrassing. Anyway, hope you enjoyed this chapter! Next chapter I promise we’ll see our favorite cursed Nighthunter. I don’t know how fast I’ll update this, since I’m moving and starting medical school soon, but writing is my stress relief and I’ll try my best to make it not too long.

[varricmancer]

Lost And Found | 3

Pairing: Varric Tethras x OC

Word Count: 5,880

Summary: Instead of the nothingness she had craved, Crystal woke up in the world of Thedas. What had once been merely a story that she loved now seemed very real and she was right in the heart of it all. She soon finds a reason to live again and a love in the arms of someone as quietly broken as her.

Warnings: Attempted suicide (not graphic, but possible trigger). The OC has depression and low self-esteem, so don’t expect her to be some bright mary sue. At the same time, this sounds darker than it is. It’s going to have fluff and comedy and all that eventually, but OC has some growing to do first. She’s just not the usual strong and easygoing character many oc’s are. She’s more of a delicate creature. Also, it is Dragon Age, so there will be descriptions of war/battles/violence.

Notes: Would you guys be interested in a chapter from Varric’s POV? 

The day after the Herald left the crossroads was spent packing up what Crystal thought she’d need to keep from her little borrowed hut. Giles had assured her that she was free to take anything, but she only wanted to take essentials considering how much traveling they’d be doing not only now, but in the future when they would need to move to Skyhold. 

She left out what she would need for the remaining week, of course, but packed up everything else she wanted to keep. All she had to use were flour sacks until she could afford to get something better. All she determined worth keeping was the clothing she could actually wear, the fur and small blanket from the bed (she hoped for a decent place at Haven, but she also knew they were still starting out and struggling too), and the small collection of paper and charcoal sticks she’d been hoarding. She’d been itching to draw, but paper itself was hard to obtain for the common folk as it was all made by hand. Parchment was a little easier, but still hard to come by in the middle of the wilderness. 

She spent several days like that, giving away what she couldn’t use and preparing the hut for the next occupant. It was on the third night that the sending crystal Varric had given her began to glow. She picked it up and sat on her cot in anxious fascination. She was a little worried about trying to keep up with a conversation on such a weird device, not that she’d been any better at them on cellphones. Texting was much more her speed. After a few moments, the crystal made a little sound like a delicate bell, followed by the rumbles of Varric’s voice. 

“So, the Magistrate is standing there looking like he has a giant staff up his ass and goes, "I was looking for someone with your...special talents.” You can tell right away that Hawke has decided to fuck with the guy, because he gets that crazy grin of his going and says, “I'm guessing you don't mean my ability to juggle small rodents while humming Orlesian ballads."

There’s a rumble of laughter and Crystal realizes that he’s telling a story to his group, probably sitting around a fire at one of the camps. She smiles to herself and lays on her little cot, listening as he continues the story. She doesn’t even mind if he probably did the Thedas version of butt-dialing her. She found his voice comforting, a bit of familiarity in this strange land. She soon found herself falling asleep with a smile on her face. 

***

It quickly became apparent after three more nights of the sending crystal activating that Varric was letting her listen to the stories on purpose. She couldn’t figure out why, but she was grateful. She’d spend her days helping where she could around the village, and her nights relaxing in her cot listening to the stories, some familiar and some he was clearly making up on the spot. Sometimes the others would join in and tell stories of their own, sometimes they would just discuss things that happened that day and their plans for the next. Anytime the conversation swayed towards discussing Crystal herself, she noticed Varric was quick to change the subject. She figured the others weren’t aware she was listening in.

The best reason she could come up with was that he’d been very observant and noticed she had the constitution of a terrified rabbit and had decided to try to let her get to know them a little bit before she ran off with them. It seemed like a very Varric-like thing for him to do, she supposed. 

Tonight, however, she was hoping to hear it in person as it had been a week. She figured if they wanted to be technical they wouldn’t arrive until tomorrow, but she’d heard that the Herald had been spotted nearby and would most likely arrive in the crossroads in a matter of hours. Being that it was the middle of the afternoon already, she guessed they would most likely stay the night and leave for Haven the next day. 

Thankfully, they would be arriving to see an improved situation. The sisters and Mother Giselle had already left for Haven days ago, taking the wounded soldiers with them. That cleaned up the area quite a bit, as people were able to take back their own houses and the area was no longer haunted by the screams of the dying. 

With the supplies the Herald had given them, the people themselves were looking better. Everyone was well fed and clothed. Crystal had even gotten to bathe with real soap, simple as it had been. It probably wasn’t good to use it on her hair, but she didn’t care. She was clean from head to toe for the first time in weeks, even if she’d still had to use a bucket of water instead of an actual tub. She was just happy that the next time she saw everyone, she wouldn’t look like an unbathed goblin. 

In fact, as she slipped in feet into the best looking pair of shoes she could find, she realized she’d unconsciously taken a great deal of care with her appearance. It had taken her nearly an hour to dry her long hair near the fire (good God she missed hair dryers), and she’d let the results fall freely down her back in cascading waves. She was pleased that the harsh soap didn’t seem to dry it out that much.  The dress she was wearing was the best she could find, long and a lovely royal blue color, if a bit scratchy. Obviously, she wasn’t going to find something of amazing quality out in the middle of nowhere, but she looked decent enough in it and the color looked good with her brown hair. 

She was growing nervous, she realized, as she began fluttering around her little hut. She was anxious to get out of here, yes, but that also meant she was going right into the middle of everything. She was terrified that maybe she was making a mistake and should just stick it out here, or at least wait until they went to Skyhold before joining them. That would be the cowardly choice, of course, but she’d never claimed to be brave. 

She huffed in frustration and grabbed a precious piece of paper and one of her charcoal sticks, striding outside to sit near the little pond. There was a log stump there that she liked to use as a table, so she set her things down and observed the bustle of the little village. Soon enough she caught sight of Giles standing near the crossroads sign speaking to one of the Inquisition soldiers. She smiled and set charcoal to paper, letting her overactive mind quiet as she drew. The paper wasn’t what she was used, of course, and the bumps and ridges in it made her displeased with the result, but it would do. 

After nearly half an hour, she judged her sketch good enough and cleaned the charcoal from her hands with a quick flick in the pond. She didn’t want to risk getting anything on the one good dress she had. Giles hadn’t moved from his spot near the stone fence, though the soldier whose ear he’d been talking off had since moved on, so she walked over to join him. He grinned when she got close enough, waggling his eyebrows in his exaggerated way. 

“Well, don’t ye clean up nicely, lass.” 

“I’m hoping after the past few weeks we’ve all had that we all cleaned up nicely,” she laughed, then shyly handed the paper to Giles. 

“For me?” He stood up straight and took the paper, whistling as he looked it over. “Now, no ones ever made my likeness before, but even I can tell this is good.”

She beamed from the simple praise. “I studied art. Not sure what good that’s going to do me here, but it’s what I know. Anyway, this is just a simple thank you for looking out for me. You know I don’t have anything else, so this is the least I could do.” 

Giles reached out and squeezed her shoulder comfortingly. “Lass, ye don’t owe me a thing except staying safe. I feel like I’m sending ye right into the mouth o’ the beast, but the Herald lad seems a good sort. Certainly helped the crossroads, and I hear tell he shut down the fighting all over the Hinterlands. I think if I have to trust anyone with ye, it would be him and his lot.” 

There was a commotion near the tunnel and the two shared a looked before observing as people crowded the party coming out of it. She sent Giles a little grin and wandered over, hoping it was who she thought it was. 

The Herald and his crew were all riding new mounts, along with a few riderless ones behind them. The trip to Dennant was apparently successful. The mounts varied greatly from the Herald’s Fereldan Forder to Solas’s Red Hart. She was not looking forward to hearing that thing in person. It was bad enough in the game. 

One of the mounts without a rider was a Battle Nug, something she’d never thought she’d see in her life beyond the screen. It was cute in a strange sort of way, with the rhino face and bunny ears. The hairless skin was cocoa brown, not unlike her own hair. Although the gorilla-like hands would take some getting used to. How did it not hurt it to run around on those things? 

Varric separated from the party, trotting his sturdy looking pony over to her and jumping down as he grinned. The once over he gave her was fairly subtle, but not enough that she didn’t catch the way his eyes roamed over the curves revealed by her almost too tight dress. She could also see just how quickly he dismissed whatever he was thinking as he turned to observe the nug. 

“Ugly, huh?” he chuckled. “Pretty sure he just gave it to us because no one else was buyin. Apparently, it’s a runt and when people actually buy these things they want em big.” 

“It’s kinda cute in a way,” she shrugged, her smile widening when he groaned. 

“You’re going to get along great with Red. She has two of the regular ones at Haven. She’s going to freak when she sees this guy.” 

“Is that who he’s for?”

“Don’t know yet. When I said he gave it to us, I meant really gave. As in threw it in for free. I guess while it goes along easy enough, it’s really picky about who rides it. Wouldn’t let any of us touch him more than a couple pats. Dennant says it’s nice and well trained though,” Varric shrugs, and walks next to her as she goes closer to the Battle Nug.

As if it had sensed it was being talked about, the beast’s attention zeroed in on the two of them. Its snout wiggled as it scented the air, before releasing a loud huff and walking closer. Crystal reached out her hand and let it sniff at her, giggling as the heated breath tickled her. After getting in a few good sniffs, it batted it’s head against her hand, begging for pets. She scratched the area between his huge horns, the feel of the skin not unlike a hairless cat she’d once pet. 

Suddenly, it surprised both of them when the Battle Nug dropped down and began trying to herd her towards it’s back. 

“I think it wants you to ride it,” Varric chuckles, shaking his head. 

Crystal stuttered, “What? I’m...I don’t even know how to ride.” 

“How were you planning on getting to Haven?” Varric asked with a raised eyebrow. 

“I don’t know,” she answered weakly, staring at the huge saddled back of the nug. “A wagon or something?” 

“If that was the case you should have gone with the sisters. With us, you’d have to ride. I suppose if you’re really scared you can ride with one of us, but it looks like this big lug has chosen you, so maybe you can give it a try at least.”

She bites her lip and stares as she tries to gather enough courage to climb up. The nug is still nuzzling into her side, trying to encourage her, she supposes. 

“I’m wearing a dress, Varric.” 

“The saddle is big enough that you could sit side saddle. I’ll help you up.”

She sighs and lets Varric lead her to the side of the beast. 

“If it makes you feel any better, I’m not a big fan of riding either, but it gets the job done,” Varric shrugs and laces his hands together as a makeshift mounting block. 

She straightens her back, nodding in a show of fake bravery. She places her hand on Varric’s shoulder and is momentarily distracted by how solid it felt under her fingers. Thick and muscled - and flexing? A quick glance at Varric’s lazy grin and dark eyes is enough proof that he knew where her mind had gone and was maybe showing off a little. 

She flushed and quickly lifted a leg, stopped by Varric clicking his tongue. 

“The right leg first for side saddle.” 

She nods and does as he says, placing her right leg in his cupped hands. He boosts her up a little and she scoots into the leather saddle. The squeal she makes when the nug stands up was embarrassing, and Varrics slow chuckles didn’t help. 

“Alright, now these guys are pretty slow so you don’t need to worry about speed. Reins are fairly easy; left and right, pull back lightly when you want to stop. Press into him with your thighs to go.” 

Crystal releases the death grip she has on the saddle horn, reaching for the reins. Her hands are shaking and she’s sure the nug can sense how scared she is because he’s not making any sudden movements; just stands there patiently waiting. She exhales and digs her thighs in and the nug starts a gentle trot. She barely has to do anything with the reins as it makes little circles and walks up and down a tiny stretch of road, occasionally shaking its head and looking back at her.

The Herald had joined Varric as they stood watching her, and she waved at him and sent him a little shaky smile. 

“Look at that. He wouldn’t let any of us on him, and now he’s prancing around like a pony. Look at him showing you off,” Maxwell chuckled as he greeted her.  

This wasn’t so bad, she mused. She relaxed a bit and let the nug wander around until it walked back to the rest of the mounts. She pulled the reins back gently and it stopped completely, dropping belly down so she could slide off easily. 

She was a little unsteady still from the adrenaline rush and nearly fell as her knees buckled. Varric was quickly at her side, wrapping a thick arm around her waist as Maxwell reached a hand out in concern. 

“You good there?”

She nodded and grinned sheepishly, “Just a little shaky. First time rider.” 

Maxwell grimaced with sympathy, “Yes, I remember my first time. I couldn’t sit well for two days.”

Varrics sniggers quietly and she rolls her eyes while Maxwell continues on, oblivious. 

“Make sure you used creams or oils to make it a smoother ride.” 

Varric’s snickers have become outright guffaws and Crystal finds herself giggling when Maxwell stares at them in confusion for a full minute before he finally groans. 

“Varric, you have the sense of humor of a child.” 

The dwarf’s laughter quiets slowly and he shrugs, flashing the Herald a playful grin. 

“Anyway,” Maxwell begins with a sigh, “Since the nug hasn’t let anyone else ride him and it appears he’s decided he likes you, he’s yours,” he nods towards Crystal. 

Her jaw drops and she looks between the Herald and the giant beast. 

“Oh, really, I couldn’t.” 

“Of course you can. I’m giving him to you. He was free, so it’s not like it’s a great burden. And before you can use any other arguments, the Inquisition will handle his basic care needs like food and such. Congratulations.” 

She opened her mouth to retort but with nothing coming to mind her jaw snapped shut. She sighed and flushed. 

“Fine. Thank you.” 

“You’re welcome. When you get a moment, please join us for a meal and we can discuss the events of the last week and our future plans.” 

With that, Maxwell saluted the two of them and sauntered off, whistling. 

“He’s kind of a brat, isn’t he?” 

Varric snorts, “Yeah, a bit.” 

Crystal sighs and looks at the Battle Nug that is now snuffling into the ground. 

“So now the only thing I actually own in this entire world is a giant pig-rabbit.” 

“Seems like it,” Varric laughs. 

“I’m not as ungrateful as I sound, I promise. Just...overwhelmed, I suppose. I don’t really know what I’m supposed to do with a great big beast like that. I suppose a plus side is if we meet any bad guys on the road, he can just sit on them and save me from having to fight.” 

Varric shakes his head with a grin and gestures for her to lead the way back to the center of the village where everyone was meeting up. They are both silent for a few moments before he clears his throat. 

“You look nice, by the way.” 

She blushed and really fucking wished any of the clothes here had pockets so she could shove her hands nervously in them like she wanted. 

“Thanks. It’s a miracle what eating every day and using actual soap can do.”

Varric snorts before returning the acknowledging wave of the Herald once they were close enough. 

The party is sitting outside of her hut, of all places. Giles winks at her cheekily as he settles into one of the stools he’d dragged over for them to use and proceeds to dominate the conversation, pelting everyone with questions. She knew it was mostly because he was just a talkative fellow, but also because he knew that she preferred to listen. 

Talking to anyone, especially a big group of intimidating people like this, was incredibly hard for her. Back in her world, she was a certified medication-guzzling socially anxious mess with severe depression. Here in Thedas, she was simply known as shy, which amused her. 

The village was already at work preparing the fresh rams that they had brought back, filling the air with the scent of roasting meat and the sounds of excited villagers. Crystal leans her back against her little hut and wills herself to relax, listening to the now familiar voices of everyone around her. Her fingers itched to sketch the little village, knowing it was her last night here among these people. She’d start with her own little hut, she muses, perhaps at dawn when the sun just begins to color the sky. Maybe one of the children as they sit in rapturous fascination whenever she tells them a story. She’d already drawn one for Thomas of his sweet daughter that he’d lost. He’d cried and thanked her with a fierce hug that brought tears to her own eyes. 

“What do you think, Crystal?”

She straightened quickly as she was jolted out of her thoughts, glancing at Maxwell in confusion. She’d been so out of it, she hadn’t even realized Giles had gone to get them food. 

“Pardon?” 

“We were just discussing our travel plans. It took us a little over four days to get here from Haven, but that was also because we made minimal stops since most of us are used to travel. We were wondering if you would be fine with that or if we should think on factoring inn stops into our plans?” Maxwell explained with a kind smile. 

“Oh, God, no. No need to do anything different for me. I don’t want to be a bother.” 

“It wouldn’t be a bother. Personally, I like to stay on the road as much as possible, because that’s less paperwork I’m forced to do.” Maxwell grinned as the others chuckled lightly. 

“So...if you’re talking about taking me with you, everything went well?” she asked tentatively, still slightly afraid that her very appearance in Thedas might have changed even the small things. 

“Oh, yes. Everything was just where you told us, even the ridiculous Druffalo. The caches of supplies are on their way as we speak. We closed all the rifts except for the one by the river you told us about. Set up very comfortable camps on all the marked spots. Took out the Templar and Mage hideouts. We were all very impressed. Obviously, we haven’t delved into your future knowledge that you say you have yet, but this was enough to know that at the very least you seem to be on our side for now.” 

Crystal released a relieved breath, finally able to release weeks of tension. She’d be in the thick of things, but she’d also be surrounded by those that could protect her the most. 

“Thank you.” 

Maxwell nods, pausing as if to catch his thoughts before asking. 

“You seem like...there’s something specific that you’re wanting protection from. That you believe we can protect you from, specifically. Are you...able to tell me what that is?” 

She chews her lip in thought, trying to figure out what she should say. 

“I’m not sure? Honestly, I don’t think I’m the smartest person, so I’m never quite sure my logic behind what I can and can’t share is sound. I’ll be happy to go over things more once we get to Haven, but I think I can at least tell you we should start stocking up on travel supplies and weapons. Haven doesn’t seem the sort of place that would withstand an attack, does it?” 

They all looked mildly disturbed by that, but Maxwell nodded in thought. She was relieved no one asked her to go into detail, because she wasn’t sure how she would have been able to talk her way out of that. She was afraid if she told them too much, it would create so much change that she wouldn’t recognize the story anymore and be worthless. 

Giles soon brought them bowls of roasted meat and vegetables, and they were all more than happy to change the talk to more pleasant things. Varric and Maxwell both were very nice about asking her questions and trying to draw her into the conversation. Cassandra acted like she wasn’t there most of the time. Crystal knew it was most likely because she still considered her a threat so she tried not to be too hurt by it. Solas seemed as content as her to merely listen to those around him. She was especially glad he paid her no mind. 

“Excuse me, Miss Crystal?” 

She turned towards the shy voice of one of her favorite kids in the village, Malcolm. He was like her little shadow most days, and was always quick to ask for a story or for her to teach him how to draw. 

“Good evening, Mal. Did you need something, buddy?” She asked with a fond smile. 

He shoved one of his hands practically in her face as he handed her what appeared to be a rock. 

“I worked all day doin’ chores for Ma so I could give you this. It’s a heating rune. Cuz you’re gonna be traveling and hate the cold like me. You just press your finger here and it warms up, but it doesn’t hurt or nothin’. So you can keep your tent warm and it works in water too!” 

“Wow, Mal! This is so nice. Thank you!” 

She grins at the blushing boy and means every word. If this thing works like she thinks it should, she can look forward to toasty tents on the road. Damn she hated being cold, especially after these last few weeks with nothing but a thin blanket to warm her. She leans over and hugs him tightly. 

“You’ll remember to keep up with your drawing, right? I expect you to send me a drawing every now and then so I can see your progress. I’ll send you some of whatever I see too, okay?” 

“Kay!” Malcolm grins and runs back to his parents. She smiles at the little rune before tucking it into her pocket. 

“You didn’t mention you had a suitor,” Varric smirks. 

She snorts and plays along. “Oh yes, he’s lovely. He catches me frogs and only wets the bed twice a week. The catch of the ages, really.” 

He huffs a little laugh before turning to the group. 

“Did I ever tell you guys about the time Hawke bought a mine?” 

Crystal grins and leans in to listen, even though it was yet another story that she already knew. The way that Varric told them always made them sound new, however. She could tell the parts he was embellishing heavily and tried to contain her commentary. She was amused by Maxwell’s gasps of surprise and Cassandra’s eye rolls when Varric tried to describe the dragons in terrifying detail. Mostly, she was just happy to be sitting here listening in person. 

Varric was so expressive when he told a story. His hands waved enthusiastically, and his face showed every emotion. He timed everything perfectly to get the reactions he wanted, smirking slightly whenever someone was shocked or appropriately enthralled. She soon discovered that she’d been focusing so much on him that she’d missed most of the story, too entranced by the dwarf himself. 

She needed to get over this fascination with him, and fast. That way lay heartbreak and pain, she was sure of it. 

She yawned loudly, hoping the others would catch on. Thankfully, Maxwell must have been looking at her because he yawned too. 

“I think we should all get some sleep. We have a long few days ahead of us,” he grunted as he stood up and stretched. 

The others murmured their agreements, slowly getting up and putting the stools to the side. 

Giles scratches his belly as he looks them over. 

“We have a couple o’ empty huts that you lot can use. You’d have to squeeze in there, but it would probably be a nice break from tents at least.” 

“I have one extra cot in mine as well, if it’s needed,” Crystal ventured quietly. 

The party spoke amongst themselves and eventually it was decided that Solas and Maxwell would share one hut, Cassandra would take the other as she wanted to bathe in privacy. Of course, this left...

Varric’s smirk as she glanced at him in surprise was gone so fast she could almost believe she imagined it. Everyone wandered towards their assigned places for the night, leaving Varric to open the door for her. 

“After you,” he said softly, standing to the side as she tried to get past him before he could see her blushing. 

Maxwell ran up and threw Varric his pack of supplies before he could enter. He accepted them with a grunt of thanks and shut the door, bringing the wooden bar down to secure it. 

Crystal was practically vibrating she was so nervous. Logically, she knew that nothing was going to happen and that the chances of him being genuinely into her beyond friendly flirting were zilch, but she couldn’t help the rush of anxiety she felt just being in a room alone with him. 

“So, uh, the cots are over here. The one on the right is a little more sturdy since it belonged to the man who owned this place before. I’ll take the smaller one,” she winced as she heard how shaky her voice sounded. She hated that he probably thought she was some freak scared of her own shadow. 

He nods and smiles gently, seeming to pick up on her nervousness. 

“If you wanted to change into your night things, I promise I won’t look if you don’t. I must protect my virtue, after all,” he drawled. She couldn’t help the giggle that escaped over his stupid joke, letting him lighten the tension in the room a little.  

She peeled off her slippers and tucked them away into her bag of supplies. She’d use the more sturdy boots she had for the journey. She snuck a quick peek at Varric, finding him turned all the way around facing the wall as he shucked his own clothes. She nibbled her lip nervously and quickly pulled the dress up and off, leaving the thin white chemise on to sleep in. Unable to help herself, she looked out of the corner of her eye towards the dwarf behind her. 

He’d already torn off his shoes and shirt, leaving him barechested as he struggled with his belt. She inhaled lightly as she watched his back muscles rippling like some damn romance movie hero. She turned away just as quickly, knowing that with his skills he’d probably know if someone was watching him. 

She cleared her throat and instead focused on finishing readying for bed. She went to the little table that she’d turned into a sort of vanity and poured water into a bowl for washing her face and a cup for brushing her teeth. She missed the convenience of running water and tubes of toothpaste, not to mention her creams. This place was drying the hell out of her skin. 

When she was done, she poured everything out and cleaned up the area. 

“There’s still plenty of water left if you need it,” she said softly. 

“Yeah, thanks,” he rumbled, his voice close enough that she figured it was safe to look. 

She wanted to groan out loud and barely stopped herself from doing so. He’d changed into some comfortable looking pants at least, but he’d left his chest bare. Judging by the look on his face, he knew damn well the effect he had on her and did it on purpose. She didn’t even like body hair, but she couldn’t stop staring at him. He’d even pulled his hair from its tie, letting flow freely. It wasn’t that long, just towards the middle of his neck, but it was still such an intimate thing to see, she thought. 

He chuckled as she turned to busy herself, trying to keep her mind on other things besides half naked dwarves that were too handsome for their own good. She set her bags near the door for easy pickup in the morning and started the fire, knowing that the hut would be ice cold in a couple of hours if she didn’t. 

Once it was blazing she stood with her back to it, letting it warm her before she tried to sleep with her one little blanket. The first thing she planned to do once she figured out how to get money here was going to be buying at least five blankets and the stuff to make proper pillows, not the blocks they used here. 

She was swaying slightly with her eyes closed, listening to Varric humming and cleaning himself as she tried to relax enough to get to sleep quickly. She heard the splashing water stop and sounds of a towel being unfurled, then suddenly he growled.  

Her eyes shot open and she stared wide-eyed as Varric’s face turned hard and tense with hunger. His hooded eyes traveled the length of her body, and when she looked down she realized, to her utter horror, that the chemise was so thin that standing in front of the fire had made it damn near see through. She could see everything, and if she could, so could he. She blushed wildly but rushed past him and jumped into her cot, covering herself with her threadbare blanket. 

She could hear him breathing heavily, like he was trying to calm himself. A few moments later he walked over and pulled a blanket from his bag, settling into the cot that was so close to her own she could practically feel his body heat. 

He turned on his right side as he got comfortable, facing her. In a surprising show of bravery, she turned towards him as well. They both lay in silence for a few moments, looking at each other with only the flickering light of the fire, studying and weighing each other. 

She knew he was at least somewhat attracted to her, but she also knew he was probably fighting it because of his loyalty towards Bianca. Though she was sure he messed around at least somewhat, but never seriously and never with feelings. And Crystal, no matter how attracted to him she’d turned out to be, wasn’t the type to do anything casual. She grew attached too easily, was too needy for flings. She had a feeling he could probably tell and that’s why he was able to restrain himself. 

She sighed curled up more into her little blanket, starting to feel a little more tired now that the heat was starting to fill the little hut. The only thing she needed now was Varric’s familiar voice rumbling through the sending crystal. 

“Why did you let me listen?” she suddenly blurts. 

Varric’s soft grin says he was expecting the question sooner or later. 

“I thought it might help. Woman all alone in a strange place, about to travel with a bunch of scary warriors for almost a week. Figured it might help you get to know us a little and at least let you know we weren’t planning on chopping you to bits or feeding you to a dragon.” 

“I was so very worried about the dragon too. Bless you, sir.” 

He chuckles and sends her another little smile. 

“Goodnight, sweetheart.” 

Crystal fights her blush and whispers, “Goodnight, Varric.” 

She turned away and faced the wall as she willed herself to sleep, trying not to focus on every little sound he made. It was a very long night. 

[atruththatyoudeny]

Happy 1D Fanworks Appreciation Day!

I want to thank all the amazing authors and artists who make this fandom as special as it is.

Here are all the fics I read and loved this month: (this is going to be looong)

I don't want a taste (I want it all) || thedaggerrose (blessedfetish) || "Fuck me yourself you coward" AU - college - crack - humour - 3k

The AU where Harry tells Louis to go fuck himself, Louis tells Harry to fuck him himself, and Harry follows through.

Always || JamieJam93 || amnesia - references of past depression - 85k

Thousands, if not millions, of fans had been right. Harry and Louis had been in love and together for four whole years. They were 'the dream team'; the couple that made others sick while simultaneously envious.

But thousands of fans had been right about something else too. The pressure had been too much. The fame had been too much. The closet had been too much, and, four years after the pair swore to each other that nothing could break them on the night of their first kiss in 2010, they broke up.

Fast forward to 2018, on the night of One Direction's last ever concert, and Harry has yet to move on. It's not as sad as it seems-he still lives his life and, for the most part, he's happy-but he knows that Louis was his one true love and is trying to prepare himself for a life completely without the other when an accident erases Louis's mind of all of his memories. In reliving the moments with him, trying to make him remember, Harry comes to find that maybe he never really forgot them at all and maybe, like him, he hadn't moved on either.

Enjoy The Ride || 2tiedships2 || a/b/o - strangers to lovers - road trips - fluff - 11k

The one where Louis, an omega more than tired of being treated as lesser than alphas, is forced on a road trip by his beta besties only to meet Harry who might just be the alpha he never knew he wanted.

Whisper The Wind || jacaranda_bloom || strangers to lovers - surfing - fluff - 36k

The one where Louis rides an elevator that may change his life forever, Harry loves the ocean but is a terrible surfer, Liam proves not all heroes wear capes, and Niall might actually have all the answers.

A kiss to build a dream on || noellehenry || Christmas - social media - pining - 17k

Harry has a brief encounter with a handsome stranger at the local Christmas Fair, the romantic kiss they share changes everything.

Harry is determined to find his Prince Charming and sets up a tumblr blog with help from his best friend Niall, owner of the locally famous Steamin' mugs.

Let the challenge begin!

Enter the Rose Garden || angelichl || a/b/o - friends to lovers - 10k

Soft heats make omega Louis clingy. Enter alpha Harry.

I been feeling high when I touch your body || Anonymous || gym - boxing- 17k

Harry is a boxer, Louis is an architect and Liam is the worst cupid that could ever exist.

The Pink Ghost of Princess Park || objectlesson || PWP - humour - sex toys - established relationship - light dom/sub - 7k

The thought of the vibrator does not go away. It’s sitting there collecting dust all through January, and every time Harry and Louis have to leave town for a press event or a show or to record or what have you, they come back home, and it’s still there, the Pink Ghost of Princess Park, the fucking glittery haunting that Harry cannot stop thinking of Louis stuffing up his arse.

Leave Your Mark On Me || FullOnLarrie || a/b/o - restaurant - mating bond - friends with benefits - enemies to friends to lovers - 32k

When Chef Harry Styles’ unbonded Omega designation threatens to derail his career, he does the only thing he can, and goes in search of a black market bond.

You Can't Change The Rolling Tide || LiveLaughLoveLarry || sailing - enemies to friends to lovers - childhood friends - friends to lovers - 25k

Louis lives on a tiny island off the coast of England and runs a sailboat touring company. When Niall is sidelined for the summer after his knee surgery, Louis needs a temporary new partner. Who better to fill that role than Harry, recently returned to the island after five years away? Louis is pretty sure there are plenty of better options. They don't get along until they do.

Take Care Down By The Water || shyserious || fantasy - magical realism - celtic mythology - fluff - angst - 37k

Louis has spent his summers at his Granny's in the Isle of Barra for almost as long as he could remember.

This summer wasn't supposed to be any different, but the little Scottish island turned out to be harbouring more than just the gorgeous white beaches, the clear waters, and the town drunk scaremongering the foreign tourists.

Pray Till I Go Blind || el_em_en_oh_pee || religion - religion kink - demon - homophobia - blasphemy - 19k

Louis is (kind of) a preacher. Harry is (probably) a demon. Of course, nothing's as simple as that.

This is not a love story.

Nocturne || rosegoldhl || fairy tale - fantasy - action/adventure - pining - 36k

Harry is a goblin living in the woods, entirely enthralled with a human named Louis.

I'm still learning to love || literato || minor character death - kid fic - pining - fluff - light angst - 74k

An au where Harry has almost everything in the world except for the will to move on.

Tell Me Your Secrets || dimpled_halo || For A Good Time Call AU - enemies to friends to lovers - dirty talk - phone sex - humour - fluff - angst - 17k

A For a Good Time Call au where Harry and Louis get off on the wrong foot when they first meet. When dire circumstances forces them to become roommates, Harry finds out some things about Louis that he doesn't expect will help him discover some things about himself.

We come in line || starsinoureyes || The Switch AU - mpreg - fertility clinic - 19k

Harry decides to have a baby on his own, Louis doesn't agree it's a good idea but lets him do it anyway. It took seven years and Harry getting artificially inseminated for them to find each other. Louis has a secret he didn't tell Harry and it might affect their family. Also featuring: a pre-pregnancy party, fertility clinics and pregnancy scares.

Sugar, butter, flour || EmmyLouWho || Nailed it! (TV) Fusion - reality tv - pining - 5k

Louis watches Harry start to pour icing onto his half-raw, still hot cookie, and tries to hold in his groan. He isn't sure if they’ve ever had a contestant on the show who tried so hard…and yet completely failed at every single step.

You can’t rig the show to help a contestant, he tells himself. Even if they’re adorable.

dopamine || Only_angel_28 || collge/university - meet-cute - social experiments - fluff - strangers to lovers - 7k

Louis honestly doesn’t know how he gets himself into these types of situations.

Well, actually, that’s a lie. He’s doing this because he needs the money, and because he’s curious. And, okay, maybe because he might be a little bit lonely too. He has always had what his mother affectionately calls an “adventurous spirit.” Couple that with being a (tragically single) broke grad student and voila! here he is scrawling his signature on a release form provided by the university’s sociology department. Essentially, he is agreeing to snog a stranger on camera for the sake of science.

Shouldn’t be a problem, right? All he has to do is lock lips with a (hopefully) fit bloke, collect his money, and be on his way. Easy peasy. Little does he know, fate has other plans for him in the form of one adorably quirky art student who goes by the name of Harry Styles.

Best kind of bad something || wildestdreams || established relationship - angst - fluff - ambiguous/ open ending 40- k

A NorCal AU where Louis is the town troublemaker and everyone hates him except for Harry.

What, like it's hard? || starkidpatronus || Legally Blond Fusion - girl direction - enemies to friends to lovers - enemies to lovers - humour - fluff - 25k

In which Harry goes to law school to win back her man, but gets a lot more than she bargained for.

Tell Me This Is Paradise || QuickedWeen || girl direction - smut - 5k

Harry Styles has been lucky in love but unlucky in the bedroom with all of her previous boyfriends. When her best friend Niall finds out that she's never had an orgasm, she knows just what Harry needs: Louis Tomlinson. Niall sets Harry up to get sorted out.

Your rainbow will come smiling through || hazkaban || Cinderella Story AU - minor character death - bullying - fairy tale retelling - 17k

When harry isn't working at his stepfather's cafe, he's trying to make swim captain and trying to finish all his coursework on time. when he's not doing any of those things, he's talking to the boy he met on the oxford hopefuls subreddit. when they decide to meet, he's elated. he finally gets the chance to meet the boy he's been crushing on! when the day comes to meet his prince, he learns that his online crush is none other than louis tomlinson, captain of the football team and friend of his terrible stepbrothers. now harry has to decide whether telling louis the truth is the right choice or if it's better to just let sleeping dogs lie.

From, your secret admirer || flicker_album || secret admirer - Valentine's Day - tumblr - mentions of anxiety - 13k

The one where Louis is Harry's Tumblr crush so he sends him secret admirer messages for Valentine's Day

Every Story Has Its Scars, Ours Is a Brand New Start || Rearviewdreamer || strangers to lovers - hurt/comfort - domestic violence - angst - dubious consent - implied mpreg - kid fic - 62k

Life as a devoted husband and an amazing father turned out to be a little different than Louis had expected. Everyone tells him it doesn't have to be that way; that he's worth more and that he's so much stronger than any one person trying to keep him down. It's all just words though until he meets the one person who makes him truly believe it.

The Pain Is For Pleasure || lovelarry10 || BDSM - established relationship - 67k

Louis and Harry have been together for a few months. Everything is great, but there’s one question burning in the back of Louis' mind - why won’t Harry have sex with him?

I Just Wanna Get Back to Us || louiesunshine || soulmate-identifying marks - angst - post-divorce - exes to friends to lovers - mutual pining - getting back together - slow burn - 62k

Or, where Harry and Louis are divorced soulmates who are seeing each other for the first time in two years.

Soup Of The Day || jacaranda_bloom || strangers to lovers - minor injury - hurt/comfort - 20k

The Restaurant AU where Louis and Niall are chefs, Chicago is windy, and cracking the big time is harder than they ever imagined. But when a mysterious man starts grading Louis' soups by leaving little piles of rocks, could it be just the thing they need to get them on the road to success?

Bleeding Love || momentofclarity || girl direction - enemies to lovers - famous/non-famous - 27k

Louis is an animal rights activist who throws red paint at fur coat wearing it-girl Harry Styles. Then there's a crack in the surface and something new starts bleeding through.

Oh, Darling My Heart's On Fire (For You) || aiienharry || girl direction - fluff - angst - 33k

Two girls fall in love on a road trip that was supposed to last a week and a half, but it ends up feeling like a lifetime.

Sweet Dreams Are Made of This || MrsStylinson || fake/pretend relationship - escort - angst - heartbreak - fluff - friends to lovers - 30k

Loosely based on The Wedding Date. Inspired by 27 Dresses. Basically, Fake Boyfriend AU with a twist. Louis' sister is unknowingly getting married to the ex who broke his heart. When faced with the prospect of turning up alone, Louis panics and hires a corporate escort named Harry. General chaos and epic jealousy ensues.

[a-beast-of-prey]

▌𝐑𝐄𝐀𝐋 𝐍𝐀𝐌𝐄:  Forever unknown and doomed to be known only as K’ (pronounced Kay Dash, not Kay Apostraphe. K Prime also works, but if you call him that to his face, he’ll deck you).

▌𝐒𝐈𝐍𝐆𝐋𝐄 𝐎𝐑 𝐓𝐀𝐊𝐄𝐍:  Single. Though I do have some writing partners whose muses he’s shacked up with, since I multiship. However, they all belong to their own seperate continuities/verses and don’t overlap unless all parties agree to it.

▌𝐀𝐁𝐈𝐋𝐈𝐓𝐈𝐄𝐒/ 𝐏𝐎𝐖𝐄𝐑𝐒: Pyrokinesis; wields Kusanagi fire from his right hand only. Can sometimes make the fire manifest as small explosions, adding extra oomph to punches. Also able to kick it out in projectiles. Translocation; has a branch ability of the technique where he appears to completely freeze time for roughly three seconds. Minorly boosted strength and healing capabilities thanks to genetic manipulation and modifications. Rather uncanny aim with thrown projectiles (especially if they’re odd, like eyewear).

▌𝐄𝐘𝐄 𝐂𝐎𝐋𝐎𝐑:  Blue. Exact shade seems to change, but a sky or slate blue might be the most consistent. (I know I use “icy” as a descriptor a lot, but it’s more for the emotional coldness they give off than the actual colour. Plus the juxtaposition with his flame powers lmao)

▌𝐇𝐀𝐈𝐑 𝐂𝐎𝐋𝐎𝐑:  Snowy white. Platinum or silver also kinda works.

▌𝐅𝐀𝐌𝐈𝐋𝐘 𝐌𝐄𝐌𝐁𝐄𝐑𝐒: Older sister, Seirah, who is dead but got cloned. The clone also responds to Seirah, but is more commonly known as Whip. May or may not have a mother and father somewhere in the world. Or they could be dead. Who knows? Certainly not this poor lad. :^)

▌𝐏𝐄𝐓𝐒: None; can’t afford to look after one on the team’s current budget, and it also isn’t safe for an animal to hang around them when they’re still being hunted for the powers in their bodies. Used to have a dog as a child, pre-kidnapping.

▌𝐒𝐎𝐌𝐄𝐓𝐇𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐘 𝐃𝐎𝐍'𝐓 𝐋𝐈𝐊𝐄: Sweets, King of Fighters tournaments, and being controlled by people.

▌𝐇𝐎𝐁𝐁𝐈𝐄𝐒/𝐀𝐂𝐓𝐈𝐕𝐈𝐓𝐈𝐄𝐒:  Sleeping, riding his motorcycle, reading, yoga.

▌𝐄𝐕𝐄𝐑 𝐊𝐈𝐋𝐋𝐄𝐃 𝐀𝐍𝐘𝐎𝐍𝐄 𝐁𝐄𝐅𝐎𝐑𝐄: Lots of people. Mostly NESTS personnel and assassination targets for NESTS before defecting from them.

▌𝐀𝐍𝐈𝐌𝐀𝐋 𝐓𝐇𝐀𝐓 𝐑𝐄𝐏𝐑𝐄𝐒𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐒 𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐌: Crows, beasts of prey (mostly wolves, tigers, and lions), lazy asshole cats.

▌𝐖𝐎𝐑𝐒𝐓 𝐇𝐀𝐁𝐈𝐓𝐒:  Rude; tendency to take his temper out on others... generally with fists and fire; smoking and drinking; isolates himself, especially when he’s hurting emotionally; bottles up vulnerability until it eventually explodes; leaves his sunglasses collection everywhere so it all gets sat on/thrown in the wash/generally ruined; deliberately throws those same sunglasses at people’s faces and doesn’t care about how many pairs break or how much it costs because it looks cool; binge eating or starving himself when depression is at its worst.

▌𝐑𝐎𝐋𝐄 𝐌𝐎𝐃𝐄𝐋𝐒:  None. Admires certain qualities in people around him, but doesn’t put them on quite that high of a pedestal because he sees them more like equals.

▌𝐒𝐄𝐗𝐔𝐀𝐋 𝐎𝐑𝐈𝐄𝐍𝐓𝐀𝐓𝐈𝐎𝐍:  Bisexual.

▌𝐓𝐇𝐎𝐔𝐆𝐇𝐓𝐒 𝐎𝐍 𝐌𝐀𝐑𝐑𝐈𝐀𝐆𝐄/𝐊𝐈𝐃𝐒:  His immediate thoughts are no thank you and fuckitty bye. He has enough commitment issues (and issues in general) that make it difficult to enter a meaningful relationship in the first place, let alone marrying someone. Eighteen is also too young to be thinking of that shit anyhow. Big no to kids too for the same reason, and also because he’s terrified of the idea that any nut spawn that come from him are going to grow up as sad and messed up as he is. Also acutely aware of the fact that he can barely take care of himself some days, so he’d struggle with a little snot goblin that depends on him. Might consider adoption, maybe... Though this would have to be a very tight-knit relationship that’s been going on for years to even entertain the thought, mind you.

▌𝐅𝐄𝐀𝐑𝐒: Hospitals and lab settings; having the few people he sees as friends abandon him completely; losing his flames (even if he sees them as a burden, he figures he’s useless without them, and will be abandoned accordingly); the hypothetical loss of all sense of self, and also completely forgetting his friends, should he ever start regaining his lost memories.

▌𝐒𝐓𝐘𝐋𝐄 𝐏𝐑𝐄𝐅𝐄𝐑𝐄𝐍𝐂𝐄𝐒: All black leather is his main go-to. Otherwise he just wears whatever the fuck is comfortable, regardless of ugliness of colour and/or patterning. Tacky Hawaiian print shirts are a favourite for some reason - probably Maxima’s abysmal dad fashion sense™ rubbing off on him. Generally prefers jeans and long pants. Tightness and looseness of all clothing varies. If applicable, jackets and button up shirts must be open so he can breast boobily. Often ditches shirts under jackets and hoodies like a tosser because it looks cool, irregardless of, say, nipple chafe from leather. Almost never seen without his cross necklace because it’s very important to him. Always has a minimum of one to three pairs of sunglasses on his person at all times, even if you can’t see them being worn on his face.

▌𝐒𝐎𝐌𝐄𝐎𝐍𝐄 𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐘 𝐋𝐎𝐕𝐄: Platonic sense? He’s got Maxima, Kula, and Whip/Seirah. Romantically is, again, verse and partner dependant because I multiship.

▌𝐀𝐏𝐏𝐑𝐎𝐀𝐂𝐇 𝐓𝐎 𝐅𝐑𝐈𝐄𝐍𝐃𝐒𝐇𝐈𝐏𝐒:  Never initiates them and actively pushes people away with prickliness and rudeness instead. But if you can somehow tolerate his bullshit with patience and kindness without abusing it, or his trust, over enough time, there will be a slight shift in demeanour, mostly without him realising it. He’s still rude as hell, but there’s no bite to his insults anymore. True friends earn unwavering loyalty - the kind where he will fight and lay his life down for you, if necessary - and quiet and subtle shows of kindness. More open displays of kindness are not only mega rare, but awkward. But it’s kind of endearing and cute... just don’t tell him that or he’ll sulk.

▌𝐅𝐀𝐕𝐎𝐑𝐈𝐓𝐄 𝐃𝐑𝐈𝐍𝐊:  Coffee. Beer too.

▌𝐅𝐀𝐕𝐎𝐑𝐈𝐓𝐄 𝐏𝐋𝐀𝐂𝐄 𝐓𝐎 𝐒𝐏𝐄𝐍𝐃 𝐓𝐈𝐌𝐄 𝐀𝐓: The beach. In the apartment he shares with Maxima and Kula; the couch is his favourite spot, as is the kitchen. Roaring down any stretch of road on his bike.

▌𝐒𝐖𝐈𝐌 𝐈𝐍 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐋𝐀𝐊𝐄 𝐎𝐑 𝐈𝐍 𝐓𝐇𝐄 𝐎𝐂𝐄𝐀𝐍:   Ocean is preferable, but he’ll take whatever he can get on a hot day.

▌𝐓𝐇𝐄𝐈𝐑 𝐓𝐘𝐏𝐄: Anyone who can put up with his bitchass to begin with, tbh. Looking at some of my ships though... rays of sunshine, or someone who meets his snark with equal snark, seem to stand out. Superficially, if they’re hot in some fashion he’s going to have a passing interest. Mmmmmight have a thing for larger men lowkey? A fan of big chests on anyone; they’re optimal pillows. Someone who can kick his ass just as much as he kicks theirs.

▌𝐂𝐀𝐌𝐏𝐈𝐍𝐆 𝐎𝐑 𝐈𝐍𝐃𝐎𝐎𝐑𝐒:   Indoors. He’s not afraid of going into the woods at all, but if given a choice, he’s melting into a couch and never stepping foot outside unless necessary. He’s lazy and is loath to part with creature comforts.

TAGGED BY: nobody; I stole it from several people when it was making rounds a few weeks ago

TAGGING: *reaches thru my screen to boop ur nose*

[darrowsrising]

You know, I will just throw questions back at you if you don't mind because I can finally scream with people! Tell me about your favorite RR characters aswell, please? ♥

I never mind people asking me things about RR. I love this series with my heart and soul and everything in between. Also, stop apologizing to me about long posts regarding RR, I love them and I have lots of long rants to confirm that.(don’t search for them, they are full of spoilers…and my distaste for Dancer and Roque!) Also, I’ll try not to spoil the fun for you…

Darrow:

My absolute favourite. I love him to bits, he’s my precious, murderous baby! I’d start a #DarrowDefendingSquad or a #DarrowPreciousMurderousBabyBoy, but that’s not my style. Or his style for that matter. He can take care of himself, 75% of the time…the other 25% is not really up to him (it’s a combo of his friends and pure luck).

Jokes aside now, Darrow’s feelings and realness always got to me. When I started reading Red Rising I was 17 and I was recovering from a very bad…burnout (I went to see a psychologist and she told me that I was hurting emotionally from many bad things happening at once, but it wasn’t like…depression or anxiety per se). His feelings, whether it was rage or kindness or anything in between, were so valid to me. He reminded me that it’s perfectly alright to have confidence in yourself, to go after what you want, to be proud of yourself, to love again (friends, lovers, whatever) and many other things. I was at my lowest then and he showed me that ambition is not a dirty word, that confidence in yourself isn’t a bad thing and even if these things intimidate the people around you, they are valid and you shouldn’t be ashamed of despicting such things.

That made me relate to him a lot. I still find myself (whenever I revisit the books) being like “mood” or “same” or “that’s my boy” or “my pride and joy” or “Hail Reaper” at many of his thoughts, actions and one liners. I will always love him, although he is very thick headed sometimes and that’s annoying.

Mustang:

She is my favorite female character. I love the fact that despite growing up with Nero au Augustus as a father and Adrius as a twin, she is still kind. She is also fair, open-minded and highly intelligent. And strong in more ways than one. I love that she is multi-faceted (although haters think she is bland and 2D…Pixies, where? Did we read the same books?) and despite her family and the way she was brought up, she finds it hard to pretend and is mostly genuine (unless she has a plan). I love how she doesn’t give (to use Sevro’s terminology) two squirts of piss over the title of heir of House Augustus, although she’s more than capable to fill in the spot. But she’s more concerned with making the world a better place (she is a Reformist and although the story follows Darrow more, that is a big deal giving that she tried to make laws to help other Colors including the banning of the Board of Quality Control). I love how she is a logical person, yet she sacrifices a part of herself for her family, because she is human and bound to do illogical things. I love how, despite loving her family so much, she often goes against them, because it’s the right thing to do. I love how she is underestimated and she just spits (not literally) in their faces. I just love how she is a fighter, a politician, a leader, because we rarely see females like that. 

Sevro:

Sevro is a breath of fresh air. He is who he is without warning labels and apologies. He is a survivor, a loyal friend (very rare kind), a badarse. He is amazing. His existence is a defiance and I love it, although that resulted in a lonely childhood. I love him to bits tho, because he also shows how good it is to be yourself and like yourself despite everything. He is very sweet despite being a hard arse and his insults always leave me very impressed. It’s obvious that at the Institute, he just wanted to survive and get a modest job (like Fitchner - thing which Fitchner probably encouraged), but he started to see Darrow and his behavior with the others and he wanted to make friends. And when Darrow became his friend - his only real friend until then - it made him want more, dream for more. And I just love that. I love how Sevro evolved and how he protects his friends - Howlers included. The only thing I’m not a fan of is his hygene…and his pornographic collection of holoFilms.

Victra:

Victra is a warrior, an heiress and a business woman. She kicks arse, takes names and simply slays. I love that there is more to her than meets the eye (although I don’t trust NerdsTM to appreciate her like she deserves). I love how bad arse and loyal she is. I love how she enjoys life and all it entails. I love that she lets herself be vulnerable in public and it makes her courageous. I love how open she is about herself, yet she is still mysterious. I love the fact that she never lies and she loves jade jewelry and displaying her scars like jewelry and the smell of the air before the rain hits the ground. 

Fitchner:

I feel like Fitch is way too underrated. He was fairy chosen to be Rage Knight -  a position Lorn filled which only makes it legendary and harder to get. He beat Proctor Jupiter and Tactus’ eldest brother - which I hope is Tharsus, because Apollonius is in my graces atm. Not only that, he created the Sons of Ares, he lead them and infiltrated into the Society’s highest ranks to destroy it from the inside and build something better. It was his plan, his sacrifices, his dream. There would be no Rising without Fitchner. Not even Sevro, but hey, it’s not like the guy would say something like “The entire world should thank me for Sevro - he came from my sperm, ok, my swimmers made the little Goblin. You’re welcome!”…when we all know Sevro’s enemies would rather curse Fitchner’s balls for helping create their doom…

Getting back on track, Fitchner was the okay-est Proctor and one of the best characters.

Adrius: (no, it’ not an unpopular opinion, here we love Adrius)

I believe Adrius is the best villain hands down. There are no excuses for his actions, he is a genocidal maniac with daddy issues. He looks at people like they are objects, not human beings, he has no compassion and has no knowledge of empathy. And I love him. I give him sympathy, because he is a monster, but he was made that way. Although he displayed terrifying behavior from a young age, his fall towards evil could have been avoided if his father gave two (2) fucks about him. I love his relationship with Darrow and how they were rivals, then sort of allies, then…you’ll find out. I just love how Adrius was written. He is really great as a villain. I hate what he did to Darrow, tho. When he killed Nero I was happy for him, but no one touches Darrow, so that was his worst move ever. Like…Pixie, you just signed your death warrant, stay away from Mustang’s Bitc- Boo!

The Telemanuses: 

All of them are amazing! Much love to all of them! They deserve the world! I include Niobe, Thraxa and Xana, but that’s all I’m going to say, because you need to read for yourself to believe me.

Cassius: (long stoty, because i didn’t really like him at first)

You know what? I disliked Cassius as much as Darrow did first time he saw him…too annoyingly perfect. And after what Darrow endured it felt like a disgrace to see an entitled little Pixie dance his way on marble corridors at the expense of so many Colors. As the story progressed, Cassius’s entitled arse didn’t improved and the most annoying part was him bragging about the death he claimed. I know he did it to make people talk and find out who killed Julian, but that doesn’t make him right. The 49 other people killed in the Passage were just as innocent as Julian. He made the death of the person he killed sound cheap. Even Antonia had more respect towards that. And Titus made it worse, but that gets off tracks. I understand his pain. If someone would have killed my sister in the Passage, it would have sworn revenge too. But the painful thing is that Cassius saw only Julian’s death, Julian didn’t deserve to die. But that is also true for all the other people who got murdered in the Passage. They didn’t deserve to die either, but you don’t see anyone going at Mustang or Sevro with blood oaths to murder them. The whole system is fucked up and must be changed. Killing Darrow might be a thing of honour, but honour doesn’t bring back Julian.

The fact that he lied to everyone that Darrow was killed by Adrius to claim his spot as Primus of Mars wasn’t good publicity either. And then, he got to be even more of a Pixie in Golden Son. But it was Mustang who convinced me to give him a chance. Because she was the one who revealed that Cassius is conflicted, that he regrets losing not one brother, but two. That he suffers, but tries to do his duty to his family and honour them. Bit by bit, I was open to seeing Cassius from this perspective, so I gave him lots of benefits of the doubt. Until he killed Fitchner and all I wanted was to see his head on a spike turned ugly by gore and maggots. Then Morning Star happened and I went from: fuck Cassius (and not in a nice way) to Bloodydamn finally, Pixie, you made me so proud. Then, we got Iron Gold and man, if something happens to him I’ll kill all the Gold families of the Rim and then that bitch of a ward. 

I really love his character development. I can see that mine is an unpopular opinion everywhere in this fandom, given that even the author has a soft spot for Cassius (not that that stops him from making Cassius suffer even more), but yeah…that is the story of how I got late to the “We love Cassius” party. I’m being short on the good details, because I don’t want to spoil you, but I hope you understand.

Holiday and Orion:

They are amazing human beings and although they are side characters I love their contribution to the series. I love their personalities and talents and their overall no nonsense attitude. 

I’ll stop here, before we go off charts. Here are some honourable mentions in no particular order: Aja au Grimmus, Ragnar Volarus, Theodora, Matteo, Mickey, Tactus au Rath Valii, Lorn au Arcos, Apollonius au Valii Rath, Alexandar au Arcos, Rhonna of Lykos, Diomedes au Raa, Trigg ti Nakamura, Volga Fjordan.