#SHATTERING INTO A BILLION PIECES

[jalluzas-ferney]

My cries are emitting radio waves to aliens on Saturn btw

[withdenim]

Lullaby <3

[potatobugz]

happy dreams

[vaguely-concerned]

what would I do without you. indeed illario.

lucanis trust me! indeed illario. the ea-nasir vibes on this shitty little rat of a man (somehow still slightly affectionate despite myself)

I am obsessed with WHERE this letter is found and what we're meant to read into those context clues. I don't have a handy save for this mission right now to double check the details, but from memory: It's the room across from what seems implied to be Caterina's room (Lucanis says these are the family quarters, so Illario has kept her locked in her own room all this time probably?? Oh oh house arrest, house arrest for grandmother for ten thousand years style)? We find the scraps of a letter from Zara to Illario, torn to pieces with one fragment still in the empty fireplace so presumably we're meant to assume he burned it, and this old letter from Illario to Lucanis lying neatly on a table. Whose room is this? Because here's a theory one could put together that has some real crazymaking potential for me specifically at least:

Considering that we're helpfully down to only three Dellamortes to account for, it's likely either Lucanis' or Illario's room. If I'm remembering right/let's for a moment assume that Caterina is being confined to her own rooms -- the fact that Lucanis is her favourite and also heir apparent I'd say tips the scales for me that it's likely she'd keep him closest, whenever he's home. Thus opening for the possibility that all this time Illario has been staying in the room of the cousin he murdered but as it turns out not hard enough that he didn't come back again like a haunting, reading his own old letters to him that Lucanis apparently kept all this time (!!! ow !!!), and sparing them from the spiteful fate he gave Zara's 'aww chin up you'll get 'em next time babe' one, right across the hall from where the grandmother he apparently can't bring himself to kill or seriously hurt even with everything else he's done is imprisoned and i n c r e d i b l y pissed off, if she gets out of there while he's sleeping or something he's fucked. Has he been sleeping in Lucanis' bed since kidnapping Caterina????? (did they ever share a bed, when they were children? for comfort if not ever out of real necessity?) is this some kind of incredibly fucked up way to try to be close to them both somehow even when he is the one who messed it all up to begin with? no matter what I have so many questions here what is WRONG with this family???????? (well I don't think we have time to get into all that right now that's a novel not a text post probably fhsdkj)

[joshuaballsett]

[littlest-nightingale]

These images make me want to explode/pos

[bestworstcase]

rotating salem’s songs in my mind again

both polemics against ozma’s deception and manipulation of other people—not salem, others—“show them gods and deities/blind and keep the people on their knees,” “what if all the plans you made/were not worth the price they paid…”

“it was you who ended their lives/made them to dig their own graves/with your dark, sick, cruel design/convinced them their world could be saved/have you no shame?/signing them up for your war/trained them to fight what they can’t beat/your sins are what they’ll pay for” <- this hits even harder after v9 but also like. ‘what they can’t beat’ isn’t salem it’s the abstract idea of division it’s disunity it’s all the bad things ozpin personifies in salem.

‘divide’ isn’t a song about ozpin sending canon fodder after salem it’s about the mandate. with your dark sick cruel design, you convinced them their world could be saved. your sins are what they’ll pay for. the world of remnant cannot be saved redemption is a game mankind cannot win both salem and ozma know this. and if ozma ever summoned the gods… he disobeyed light just as she did. he was told not to seek salem out, but he did. he loves her. the god of light does not forgive. your sins are what they’ll pay for.

but the second half of the song. the second half…

sacrifice them for your needs slaughter is coming the end drawing near you’ll regret your deeds legends and fairytales scattered in time maidens and kingdoms wrapped up in a lie these children you mislead you’ll watch them all bleed strength will not bring victory

<- these verses explicitly describe ozpin’s actions. sacrifice them for your needs, these children you mislead. you’ll regret your deeds.

this is followed by:

divide them tear them apart sever their trust it will strangle their hearts inside them plant seeds of doubt hope will be smothered they’ll turn on each other hatred will sprout suspicion and doubt friendships deny while allegiances die

sacrifice them for your needs. divide them. inside them, plant seeds of doubt. these verbs are in the imperative mood and the first is addressed explicitly to “you,” i.e., ozpin. ‘sacrifice’ also uses the imperative mood this way: “take the lives of those you need/sow the death and reap the seed,” “show them gods and deities/blind and keep the people on their knees/pierce the sky, escape your fate.”

it’s all about ozpin’s deeds. sacrifice them for your needs, these children you mislead, divide them, tear them apart, sever their trust, inside them plant seeds of doubt, this is salem’s perception of what ozpin does. (and she’s not wrong: the rampant dysfunction and distrust in ozpin’s inner circle is demonstrated in v2-3. ozpin does lie, he does manipulate, he does make sacrifices.)

so

the taste will be sweet when you get what you’ve earned and i’ll watch you burn

you’ll regret your deeds -> recitation of his deeds and their consequences (it will strangle their hearts, hope will be smothered, they’ll turn on each other, hatred will sprout, friendships will be denied, allegiances will die) -> you’ll get what you’ve earned and i’ll watch you burn

and salem watches the broadcast with a smile on her face as ruby reveals his conspiracy to the world.

pierce the sky, escape your fate/the more you try, the more you’ll just breed hate/and lies/truth will rise/revealed by mirrored eyes.

“take leonardo; he was one of ozpin’s most trusted, and now… hmmm. :)”

“hm. her again :)”

salem has been savoring the thought of what it will do to ozpin when he finds out summer is alive and a turncoat for fourteen years now like it’s a fine wine. that summer helped orchestrate the fall of beacon. his silver-eyed paragon of heroic virtue.

[welcometogrouchland]

Does life ever get so bad that you want to start hanging out at church/mass again?? Like not really for spiritual reasons (kind of but not really but maybe but no) but more for nostalgia reasons

[noblehcart]

-gently sets this blog on hiatus and fades into the mist -

[honeyluned]

dude. dude. what the fuck was jjk s2

[willowparkfanclub]

joel looking at his watch on the roof after he first realizes he may care for ellie???? oh that did MAXIMUM DAMAGE

[windows144]

Jessica .... </3.. Please have a good day today jessica... Please........

[dyshonor]

Emma had already bought him a gift.

But Emma had not bought him a gift.

She didn't really know what he liked. She hardly knew him, in all honesty. With the frequency with which she saw him, most probably wouldn't judge her for not getting him a gift at all. But Emma would. Because that was Randal, even if it wasn't the Randal that she knew. It was the Randal that'd become her Randal, right? And a future friend is a friend all the same.

(it'd be lonely, wouldn't it? to not be acknowledged, for the crime of not yet being who you will be someday?)

She knows from their time in Valentia that he's not a fan of sweets. Did he like sweets when he was her age, and grow out of it? Or had that always been how he was? Randal as he was now was kind of the opposite of the Randal she knew—but not completely, not so thoroughly that she felt it an obvious assumption. Best not to risk it. That left cookies or cupcakes out of the question, though. Does she find somewhere that'll sell her a bottle of whisky if she asks with wide enough eyes?

...she's not sure she wants to encourage that.

"Randaaaal!"

The young trainee hadn't relied on her pegasus today, and so she'd resorted to searching for him on her own quick feet. She's quite lucky to have found him at a reasonable hour. Quite lucky to have found him at all, really. And yet it is carefree the way she rocks on the heels of her feet when she finally stops beside him.

"It's your birthday today! Did you forget?" Probably not, given how high and mighty he tried to act, but at the same time, she could hardly imagine how confused his sense of time must be. Emma herself had a hard time keeping track of it, now, and that was without the sort of complications Randal had dealt with. "I looked all over for a gift for you... but, um, I realized I don't actually know what you like."

And with complete familiarity, she grabs him by the wrist, pivoting on her heel to pull him along.

"So you're gonna come with me, and we're gonna hold a party with everyone!" She'd already asked Poe, Niamh never said no when Emma invited her to festivities, she bet she could swing Alice if she begged... "Then I'll get to know you better, and we can get you gifts next time. I got a cake for us and everything!"

She knows he's not a big of sweets—but it felt wrong to have a party without a cake.

"I hope thirty candles is enough."

-- RANDAL HEARS THE CRY from afar and feels his shoulders tense. It is with an incredible amount of self-control, cultivated after hours of meetings and handshakes with well-to-do usurpers, that he makes them ease when she rocks up besides him.

His birthday? Well he hadn't forgotten it- in times once-recent, it was an opportunity to force political rivals in front of you- but he had certainly not expected anything to come of it. It was a day to keep in mind, a day to procure fake, obligatory showcases of love.

He does not expect much. Emma loved that dastard, and she surely would have wanted to spend his 'birthday' with him. Knowing her, she'd likely been planning something for months. If this was some sort of scrambled coping mechanism, then he was far too miffed to let her down gently. No, before she's even finished stating her intentions, Randal has opened his mouth and-

A pause. "For... me?"

Well, she knows Randal- not him, that dastard, they were the very same but not him- but she still takes the time to clarify that she doesn't know what he likes.

What he likes.

He opens his mouth, closes it. The insults that come pre-baked with his tongue falter and wither. It is such an unabashed display of kindness that it leaves him without words.

By the time he finds himself, Emma has yanked his wrist and sent them spinning. "Wh- wait a second--"

The words coast over his head in near-numb fascination. A party, with 'everyone', whatever that meant. For him? As in, him? Surely at least some of them were there for the dastard, for that person they were surely waiting for him to slip back into, but it was being organized for the presentation of his sake...

He bites his lip. This is stupid to get excited over. No matter his age, he is an adult, and an adult that is seeking to strike out on his own and far away from this place that that dastard has brought them to.

(but is it wrong?)

Randal trips and catches his balance as Emma rambles on, full of promises of gifts for next time. Next time?

(he is not going to stick around forever. he is going to blink and that dastard will take his place back, as he has every right to. randal: the one who stands with a face clear of stubble, the one with hair still short enough to curl at the nape of his neck, the one granted a fresh nomer of 'wicked knight', will flash by with hardly anyone to remember him by.

he will be that dastard, that person actually worth being around, and he will be as good as dead. he is not so delusional as to think that he can actually keep him at bay forever- he does not know if he wants to.

so. if, like everything else that he has stumbled through, this doesn't matter anyway, why can't he indulge?)

His face twists into a pout.

"Thirty- I'm not that old!" he sputters. "I'm twenty! Something! Nowhere close to thirty, or if you're going for that old dastard's age, then--"

(maybe, if he's lucky, there really will be a next time. for him.)

[oceanwithinsblog]

i was minding my own business while listening to this bbm inspired playlist and i accidentally heard the (official?) lyrics to 'the wings' for the first time

* i usually listen to the official soundtrack on spotify, i didn't know there was a version of this song with lyrics lol

well ... i will never recover.

[christmassavestheyear]

still thinking about how todd ran off in the snow. he didnt care about the cold, he didnt want to listen to his friends. he just wanted to get away from all of it.

[gorillaxyz]

i said "ahh look at his long spidery fingers..." while we were watching death note earlier & my dad thought i saw a spider... no i was talking abt L and his long scary fingers