#LISTENING TO HER HEARTBEAT

[vividfriend]

phantom heartbeat

imogen has never heard such a slow heartbeat before, not that she makes it a habit of going around listening to ‘em, mind you. it’s just different, she thinks, as she presses her ear more firmly to laudna’s chest.

though her memories are covered in a thick fog borne of time, she still remembers how easily her daddy had scooped her up into his arms so many years ago. she remembers how he held her to his chest as he stood on their sun bleached porch, looking out at the beginning of a new day. she remembers the curiosity she felt as she put an ear to his chest, how she gasped at how loud it was, how strong it felt.

(“daddy, why d’you tick so loudly?” she had asked, eyes sparkling with the kind of wonder only a six year old could have.

her daddy had smiled, something he did so often back then, as he pressed her tiny fingers to his chest. “gotta keep tickin’ to live, sweetheart. you tick, too.”

“i do?” she gasped as she brought her other hand to her own chest, surprised to find how steadily it thrummed against her palm.)

she can’t help but observe how there’s something so odd about hearing laudna’s heartbeat now against that memory. how it thrums so delicately against her ribs, a slow and gentle rhythm, just barely there and almost dull in how soft it beats. and it’s hard for imogen to correlate the word dull to the woman beneath her because laudna is anything but.

laudna is rich and vibrant, more than just a passing phantom, stronger than any puppet. laudna is a shimmering beacon brighter than any moon, imogen thinks, and is startled at how quickly her own heartbeat picks up as if to chase that thought.

underneath imogen’s ear, laudna’s lungs breathe, her blood rushes, her heart beats and beats and beats—

a reminder,

a reason,

a confession.

[spooky-space-kook]

People from my childhood have been dying lately. All of them traumatically.

I can't really... express the unmooring that's come with that. I keep thinking that the framework of my life is being torn down person by person. The people who built my childhood are disappearing into dust, all while the isolation that started with COVID has only gotten deeper. I'm losing the people I had, the framework I had, and it's replaced by what feels like *nothing.*

The worst part is that they... still feel alive? In my memories? I can sit in a room here and now and be present while also seeing them in my memories, and the powerful urge to *warn them* just rocks my ass from nose to toes. I know it's just memory but god dammit they feel alive in there.

[turtledotjpeg]

@hxhbigbang24 time!!

I drew for this fic which made me SAD and also made my HEART WARM!! I will not say too much to avoid spoiling future chapters, but I illustrated a few moments from this scene near the end of the story that I loved!

[randomnameless]

Why do the FEH devs insist on ignoring Nabatean lore so much?

I recently had a surprisingly cordial discussion on redshit with someone about the "nabateans = colonisers" take, and one of the main points raised was that the game was purposedly foggy around Nabateans/Sothis/their story because it would obviously favor a certain narrative (and thus make another narrative look, uh, not that marketable anymore).

To be honest, we still ended up with a product that had a lead go "this race and its blood* is the reason why the world sucks" and yet that lead is still marketable enough to have raunchy cipher cards and 5 FEH alts, so I actually wonder if, while pissing on that lore had that purpose, it was ultimately pointless since Supreme Leader can still sell goodies despite her incarnation in FE16.

And not only Supreme Leader - but the entirety of WC where we basically have 70% of the cast crying/complaining about their "mixed blood" or lack of and basically adding their 10 cents to the "this race and its blood is the reason why the world sucks".

I mean, can you imagine Sylvain selling any goodies and alts if Flayn replied to his "wah wah people only are kind to me and want to fuck me because I have Nabatean blood :(" by some uncharacteristic "good for you, I have to hide my ears, had to dye my hair, have to lie about my family because if the truth is found out about my identity, I will be hunted and vivisected like an animal and harvested for parts by people who call my kin abominations - just like what happens in the game where the same people who call my kin "abominations" ally with a classmate who calls me a creature and pretends I am incapable of human feelings based on my race".

FE Fodlan's main selling point is its cast of students, for various reasons, but even if I tried to kid myself, Nopes and FEH made it clears : students are the main selling point.

If you spare more time and attention to the Nabatean plot/lore, the students either grow from "likeable" to "despicable" or worse, you won't gaf about them because yeah sure, Hilda might be upset because people expect things from her due to her crust, but it would feel like a "peanut" compared to Seteth's irrational (granted, it's not so irrational since GW exists) fear that Flayn's newest friends would dissect her if they learnt she was a Nabatean, and being conflicted by finally letting her have human friends and form bonds she crave, or protect her due to the trauma from the genocide of their species.

Don't get me wrong, I love peanuts, I mean, not everyone can have a tragik of loaded backstory!

And yet, given how this verse's DNA is "can you fight against the red emperor who uwus about you", they had to add copious amounts of Earl Grey to their games so there's no clear-cut factions :

The "Your alien blood and its influence on the world corrupted it, so I want to reform it under my command" vs "I don't want to die and you oppose me due to my race and side with the people who genocided my kin"

is turned to :

"Your alien blood Crests and its your church's influence on the world corrupted it, so I want to reform it under my command"

"I don't want to die and you oppose me due to my race and side with the people who genocided my kin"

Sprinkle with the cast's hammering here and there that the "reforms" might be needed - but never develop on what they are - and add a few baseless and groundless takes as a toping (basically everything Claude says about tolerance and the general "isolationism/foreign policy" stuff) and you get FE Fodlan where the Red Emperor's war isn't seen as the catastrophe it is in the other entries from the series!

Now, for FEH...

FWIW, the F!F!Billy's trailer had them try to explain that Sothis was a bit pissed about her slaughtered/massacred children when Nopes never gave any reason about why she was pissed - maybe on Billy's behalf bcs Jerry's dead, but come on, she would indeed deserve the medal of the worst parent in the franchise if that was the case, since Billy can murder her daughter without Sothis taking over ! - but given that they cannot write/go against the source game those characters are from.

They tried a bit, with B!Supreme Leader and Hegemongard's FB, but then it stopped (because she had no "new unit" released since then lol) and I can understand why : Hegemongard came out before the Supreme Emblem, and Hegemongard hates dragons who are seen/perceived as gods by some of their human followers. Come FE17, and now Supreme Emblem accepts Alear because they are "one of the good ones". We can come up with HCs and details and talk about what are emblems or if Hegemongard's views were only hers at the end of AM all day long... But imo, Doylist wise, it still feels it's a retcon because the devs from the main games tried to scrap and remove the most "controversial" traits she had.

For the other characters... Well, you see what Marianne is in FEH (but even in her base games), she's one of the few characters who reacts - in a way - to the partial history about relics and demonic beasts and all... only to give sad uwus to Maurice.

FE16 (and Nopes) refused to have any "student" character react to the Nabatean lore/reveal, about what are relics and all. There are no lines, Claude shared some knowledge in the explore section of VW's last chapter, but we don't have anyone muse or think or even talk about what are relics, what are crests, and what kind of fuckery their ancestors or the ancient humans of Fodlan did.

With that in mind, FEH can't do much : either they write Marianne in a retcon-y way like what happened for Hegemongard (and they're not afraid to piss on characterisation, look at Lyon!), or they flanderise her "character" and develop her around 3 lines she had in the game in her paralogue, and continue to give sad uwus about Momo when he was at best a guy who slaughtered and murdered so much that he abused the Nabatean turned into a relic to the point where he turned in a demonic beast even if he had a matching crest, or at worst, had been part of Nemesis's piñata party in Zanado and was something of a genocider.

Tldr :

Why FE Fodlan never gaf about Nabateans : earl grey + the marketable cast has to stay marketable and you can't sell peanuts at the same price you'd sell swordfish

Why FEH dgaf about Nabatean lore : they can't afford to retcon characters + they have to sell peanut alts with the same seasoning they had in their base game.

For what it's worth though, I think FEH is more daring than the base game(s) given how they gave more lines and screentime to Rhea - through her different alts - than GW. And they even designed her Halloween!alt's lines to piss on some of Claude's assertions, while the various FB involving members of the church also - indirectly - reply to some accusations thrown their way in FE16 when, FE16, never gave them an opportunity or lines to explain that those takes were full of dung.

*"but random, maybe she doesn't know that the crests she often decries is "dragon blood"!"

It's highly debatable, especially given what she and Hubert throw to Billy in CF - but even if she doesn't, Doylist wise we still have a character who, knowingly or not, says "this race and its blood* is the reason why the world sucks" and who is never called out on her prejudice. That's more of an issue regarding the general writing though, she has to be a red emperor and took pages from Ashnard's book, and yet, the player must still feel bad and want to romance her, so her mindest/goal cannot be looked at too closely, because, I guess, even the devs thought it would be difficult to romance her (thus sell goodies!) if more light was shed on the "blood from this race corrupts our people" schtick -> which in turn would also make characters whose backstory and gimmick rely on "crying about crests" be way less likeable, thus marketable and able to sell goodies.

[royalarmyofoz]

had a particularly sappy image in my head today of allison and patty slow dancing in patty's living room

[fairypaw]

Au where Onewhisker takes in Darkkit!

Heres Heatherpaw and her overgrown guard dog brother Darktail.

Hes still very awkward and stiff around him what with the whole WindClan civil war and deputy dispute shenanigans and Darkkit definitely added some fuel to Mudclaw's fire (How can you expect a traitor be leader etc).

Darkkit mostly grew up an outcast and it definitely felt like being the illegitimate step son of Onewhisker around his new family since he treats him like he doesn't really know what to do with him. Though, Whitetail actually grows fond of him and even mentors him herself, and he eventually becomes heatherpaw's mentor who is his absolute pride and joy Darktail loves his baby sister so much Breeze and Lion should be terrified (they are)

I also kind of imagine him kind of taking in Breezepelt since he, himself was an overlooked kit by his father and idk could be a nice found family moment

Uhh and i can definitely twist this some way so he still stays the villain by the time AVoS rolls up but im tired and gonna leave that for interpretation or whatever you say when you dont want to figure things out yourself 💥💥

OH YEAH designs by @/murdermitties and @/sootslash !!

[harmoniouseclipse]

Me and my freaking ship charts for my freaky mind

[quietlyblooms]

my brain is just swirling with thoughts of chiyo and the sorts of friendships she’d have with certain characters and also how soft and smitten she’s feel waking up to someone using her as a pillow. i think the weight of another person would be so comforting to her, but the fact they’re laying on her?? holding onto her?? it’s too cute for chiyo to be normal about it :’ )) she’s gonna sleepily admire them and run her fingers through their hair, maybe absentmindedly rub their back or trace patterns on their skin. she’ll probably fall back asleep like that, too. she’s such a sucker for physical touch to begin with, but especially when it’s in a softly intimate situation like that. i feel like i’m rambling but man… it’s really cute to think about.

[tianalaurence1]

the National Coastwatch 30th Anniversary Dinner at Trinity House London, where Her Royal Highness The Princess Royal was the guest of honour as Royal Patron.

[lilyharvord]

Once again I am screaming and crawling up the walls like Evil Dead over the fact that all the electricons grabbed onto Mare in Harbor Bay when she saw Cal’s body and the healer trying to resuscitate him.

Like everyone around her (except for her) knew her dumb ass was so in love with him that if he died she was going to go off like a fucking bomb and kill all of them and to avoid that they literally were fully prepared to either knock her out with their own ability or contain hers as much as possible.

Which just leads me to believe that if he had died, like if the healer had failed and he had died on the sand Mare would have turned immediately to Iris’s war ship and we would have gotten the duel of the fucking century. Because Iris would have been fighting to just survive and Mare would have been blindly fighting to kill at all costs in as painful of a manner as possible. And she would have taken so many lakelanders and nortian soldiers with her. So tbh, if Dane/the Scarlet Guard was smart, they would have let Cal die in that moment and they could have ended the whole thing in Harbor Bay.

[kestrel-of-herran]

zhang jingyi and chen feiyu for lighter and princess poster filming (2/2)

[garbagequeer]

being post swiftie is hard for example the other day i was at my place with a friend who hates taylor swift and i was playing my list of songs ive been listening to this summer and fucking i think he knows comes on and i say hey it's your bestie. and she's like why are we listening to taylor swift. and i go it's my summer playlist sorry this song is so bad. and she goes so why have you been listening to it. and i go well i like it. and shes like do you like it or is it bad. and im like well it's bad but you know i like taylor swift. and she goes okay so you think it's like what a taylor swift song you dont fuck with. and im like well no i do like it but it's not good. and we went in circles like that for a while until i was like well i like this song and i like taylor swift but i know this song is bad because i also like music. do you see what i mean. and i dont think she did

[dairyfreenugget]

(Going insane boinkinh one AU in my head)

Hey hey hey

May I interest you in

(Slowly slides my FaaF AU towards you but void just Disappears without a trace one day before the accolade)

Teehee

[enderwasended]

Okay I'm curious

If you got a squip, who/what would it look like and what would you get it for?

Personally if I got one I'd get it for academic help/study aid (not cheating on tests) and making sure I don't die in the lab

As for who it is I'd either go Jason Momoa, my history teacher, or my design for it

[yercrow]

wrong jonathan content but this is fiyeroelphie to meee

[skrunksthatwunk]

...seonhee... straight women aren't that excited to look at cute girls...

me when i leap out of my chair heart racing eyes shining cheeks flushing at the thought of flirting with women (i'm heterosexual)