#The Offering (2023)

[shorthaltsjester]

watching the sdcc panel and i am just very :) about how sweet their answers to “what are some of the micro moments from the game that have stuck with you the most over the years?” are. taliesin saying what the fuck is up with that which was the first like The Party Gets To Know Each Other moments of c3. travis saying asking his wife if he could kiss her in campaign. marisha going way back to the cannonball competition in campaign one. ashley choosing the beauyasha date but also just the silly goat noise matt made. liam adding onto that to compliment matt roleplaying grass so well and then saying his favourite moment was writing a story for laura and reading it to her as caleb for jester. and then matt saying that was his answer, and that his favourite moments of the game are when they find ways to give gifts to each other whether tangible or not. and sam saying his favourite moments have less to do with the story and is more so when he can just. see his friends across the table from him. when marisha perches and when laura and ashley are (badly) drawing dicks and liam saying he loves when sam sneezes and ashley tells him to stop it and just. yeah. they Are an extremely popular online powerhouse, but i’m so happy that they’re also friends building a world together out of gifts to and love for one another.

like i Am so enamoured with the characters and the world of exandria but the moments when you can feel the love that those people have for each other reach out from behind the stained glass of their performances (to steal a metaphor from brennan lee mulligan) are so extremely special and i am endlessly grateful that they decided to share their silly little home game with the world.

[beyondplusultra]

every lover's got a little dagger in their hand

[thesleeptokenarchive]

On This Day: August 16 2023

Our beast of a drummer, II, posted this drum cam of The Offering from their appearance in Budapest on August 2 2023. [IG]

[canonkiller]

boats and their captains

[haxxydraws]

🩸🩸🩸

[lifemod17]

Hi, I'm unwell, nice to meet you!

'The Offering' breakdown on Drumeo

[amiracleilluminated]

August Diehl as Woland in The Master and Margarita (2023)

[wild-woofs-press]

For the 2023 Renegade Bound Fic Exchange (cc: @renegadepublishing).

Fic: Play It Again by metisket Words: 63,206

fonts title: Bebas author name: Amiline body: Cochineal

bookcloth: duo flieder • endpapers • htv: siser infinite galaxy

[gravelsong]

And if you listen closely in the direction of Canada, you can hear the faint, anguished warbling of a man who could've had it all

God he's so cool though

[woof-squiggles]

VOTE FOR HER

[yesloulou]

https://twitter.com/lh44updates/status/1683077918434508801?s=46&t=kc8Qs1lSmzNPxieZS5PEug <- please look at Max tickling Daniel to get his attention and the way he looks so blushy and sooo bashful they make me go insaneeee I’m gonna strap myself to a rocket and launch myself into space

WHERE. ARE. THE. PHOTOS. WHERE. ARE. THE. PHOTOS.

[gael-garcia]

Gael García Bernal + best supporting actor Gael García Bernal's ✨thighs✨

—CASSANDRO (2023, Roger Ross Williams)

[marejadilla]

Tom Bagshaw, “In The Space Between”, 2023, digital painting. Bagshaw was born in Bath, England.

[mistressemmedi]

Las Vegas will be the first GP where drivers will not be penalized for committing crimes on track against their rivals. As the Capitol intended.

[zeestarfishalien]

Oops, John Constantine Found Family

[Day 1 dpxdc week 2023; John Constantine // Found Family // Oops]

• John Constantine/Box Ghost/Lunch Lady

John curses the Infinite King the first time he’s asked out to dinner.

It’s ridiculous, the parents of the little ghost child are loud and obnoxious and…definitely not endearing in the slightest. He’s sure he’ll be sick of the word “beware” before the end of the night.

But it is and he’s not.

He agrees to another dinner, more to prove to himself that this would never come anywhere close to working. He doesn’t get nice things and these two are just so…ridiculous and it’s so different from how his entire life has been, one nitty-gritty moment after the next; dooming his soul for power and favors.

But they aren’t turned off by his life or his rude demeanor. They like him and they show it. Against all odds, they just work.

And to think it all started with the end of the world…

~•~

John hates when he’s the last call, the hail mary pass, for the end of the world. Most of the better options for solving problems take time to put together, which is something few on the Justice League seem to understand and even fewer (read: None) seem to remember when a big threat comes about.

Since it’s potentially the end of the world, what’s one more time selling his soul going to hurt?

Possibly a lot this time. The King of Restless Dead holds sway over those that fall in the in between. They are historically stronger than most demons and spirits and on par with most deities. And since it is a title one by conquest most of the time the one to take over the throne is more powerful than the previous holders.

Now John really isn’t all that keen on joining the King’s legions but like he’s mentioned previously, end of the world and all that.

It’s a fitting enough end for him, he thinks and he hopes that his planned contract doesn’t have any loopholes for the King to take advantage of. Loosing the King of Restless Dead, King of the Infinite, King of the space between worlds, upon Earth for them to wreck havoc would probably cause Batman to revive John just so he can kill him again.

So it’s with a heavy heart and skyrocketing blood pressure that John starts chanting the words to bring the King of Ghosts to Earth, this Earth here and now. He’s got to be specific. Every single word matters…

…

John doesn’t know what he was expecting. A terror of the night? A horrific figure or possibly some sort of Eldritch entity that nearly melts his brain with its very presence?

Not a teenager that’s for fucking certain.

He’s not…he’s not certain what exactly he’s seeing as a funky little girl with blue skin and pigtails hikes herself up to peek over the teen’s shoulder.

He opens his mouth, probably to spit out some snarky comment or another but something in the teen’s eyes stops him. Then the overwhelming power hits him with the full force of a speeding freight train.

His lungs are too tight, too full. He can’t breathe, he can’t even twitch a bloody muscle under those glowing toxic waste eyes. The teen tilts his head, assessing John, weighing his tattered and bloody soul.

“What do you want, Laughing Magician?”

And that’s a fucking title. The King has his fucking title in hand with just a glance at him. The teen is all seriousness despite the little girl floating up to rest her upper body on his head like being The King just means he’s a glorified babysitter. She’s unaffected by the roiling waves of power washing off of him and crashing into John repeatedly.

He swallows and chokes on it because his throat is suddenly too dry. He coughs a few times before sinking into a bow.

“Oh King of Restless Dead and all those trapped in between death and life, I came seeking your aid to save this world and its inhabitants.” He doesn’t dare look up no matter how crawly his skin feels or how the hairs on the back of his neck stand on end.

“Ohhhh. Oh yeah, I was keeping an eye on that but then Boxy asked me to babysit the tyke here. It’s that bad already?”

John has to fight every cell in his body not to look up at the King and give him a taste of the incredulous look on his face.

“We’ve lost several heroes already and countless civilians. Superman is stuck in recovery after an attack, he can’t be out there. Wonder Woman has a broken leg and Batman is no-“

“Okay, okay I get it.” He interrupts, “It’s bad. I’m on it. I just need one thing in return.”

“My soul?”

“Ewww no.” John finally does look up at that just to catch the genuine disguston the teen’s face. “I need you to watch little Boxy junior here while I take care of this. She’s too young for the battlefield.”

“But I’m not qualified to take ca-“

“Thanks!” The King plops the little ghost girl on John and she grabs onto him while he’s too shocked to respond. It’s a good thing she’s a ghost and can fly since it takes him entirely too long to wrap his arms securely around her.

She’s studying him furiously and seems to find him suitable since she eventually grins and introduces herself.

“I’m Box Lunch. Who are you?”

“John,” he answers and that’s all he planned to give her but she stared him down with her beady little red eyes, waiting. “John Constantine and as His Majesty said, I’m also sometimes called the Laughing Magician.”

“Ohhh, so you have lots of names like Danny does.”

“Danny?”

She sends him a flat look.

“You’re kinda slow aren’t you.” When he doesn’t respond she lets out a big sigh, something she definitely doesn’t actually need. “You call him King and use one of his titles but you don’t know who he is?”

Now that’s an answer. And an alarming one at that. Just how high in the ghostly courts are her parents that she can casually call the King by name?

“I uh…” he fumbles a moment for words. “News and info about your world doesn’t cross the veil to here very well.”

“Oh…” She says it like she didn’t realize that. “Oh yeah, that’s Danny’s world. I’ve never actually been to a living realm that wasn’t Danny’s.”

“Not even when you were alive? Or were you from His Majesty’s world?”

She levels that unimpressed look at him again before sighing the worlds biggest sigh. Highly entertaining coming from someone so young and so small.

“Come sit with me.” She floats to the floor and snags his hand to drag him down too. “I will teach you Silly Magician.”

He follows, not sure how to tell her no thanks without upsetting her, so he goes along with it.

~•~

By the time that The King in all his teenager glory popped back in, John and Box Lunch were snuggled into a nearby couch with John reading to her from a spell book (it’s the only thing he had on hand and he made sure to only read the kid safe parts to her).

And the rest is, as they say, history.

More accurately the continuation of John’s very very strange life but details, details.

[cascowriteswords]

bite me

Clarke should have seen this coming. The signs have been there all along. 

“There is such thing as too much garlic, Clarke.”

“The sun is hurting my eyes.” 

“My skin is sensitive, Clarke, I can only wear gold or medical grade titanium.”

“This is the skin of a killer, Clarke.”

Okay, maybe not that last one. 

But still, the signs were all there, all these years. It was only her own naivety that prevented her from predicting this earlier on. 

“So, vampire, hm?” she hums as Lexa jogs down the stairs, velvety black collar popped up around the slender column of her neck, coattails flowing behind her. “I didn’t peg you for team Edward.”

“I’m not,” Lexa answers smoothly, pecking Clarke’s cheek as she takes the mug of coffee held out toward her, leaving a black outline of her lips in their wake. “Party City was fresh out of werewolf costumes. But I’m not team Jacob, I’m team Seth - the only good character.”

“I see,” Clarke says coyly. “Remember when I said you should pick out a costume a few weeks ago? Instead of the night before Halloween?” 

Lexa is buzzing around the kitchen, spreading avocado onto her toast and grabbing pickled onions from the fridge. It’s an ironically vegetarian breakfast for someone with painted-on blood dribbling from the corners of her mouth. “Are you saying you think the kids won’t like my costume, Clarke?”

Working as a physical therapist in an outpatient pediatric clinic means going all out for Halloween isn’t optional. Lexa’s kiddos would be so disappointed if their favorite clinician wasn’t dressed up, and getting 3 year olds to focus on PT is hard enough on a normal day. She has all sorts of spooky themed games and obstacle courses planned for the day.

“Of course not, they’ll love it. They love you.”

“I love you,” Lexa quickly says, eyes flicking up to meet Clarke’s in a way that somehow still makes her stomach swoop even 3 years in. 

“I love you,” Clarke answers, grinning affectionately at her sweet golden retriever girlfriend as she eats her toast in full vampire garb as their tiny bistro table. “Are you going to ask what I think about your costume?” 

Lexa quirks a brow inquisitively, peering at Clarke over the top of her mug as she takes a sip of coffee. “What do you think of my costume, love?”

Clarke moves away from the counter she’d been leaning against and prowls forward, as if she’s the one dressed as a lethal predator instead of Lexa, intently focused on her target. When she reaches the table she rests one hand on its edge and the other on the back of Lexa’s chair, caging her in. “I think,” she says, ducking down to press her lips to the hinge of Lexa’s jaw which earns her a lovely, pretty breathy sound from her girlfriend, “You might be the one dressed as a vampire, but I’m going to be eating you tonight.” Lexa swallows thickly and Clarke grins; nips at her neck, feels the pulse fluttering beneath her tongue as it laves over the skin there. 

When she leans back Lexa’s eyes follow her, pupils a bit wider and darker than they were just a moment ago which suits her costume quite nicely. Clarke reaches out and runs a thumb along Lexa’s bottom lip, cleaning up the edge of her black lipstick. “I’m going back to bed for a little while,” she tells Lexa. “Have a great day at work, honey. And happy Halloween.” 

“Clarke,” Lexa whines. “How am I meant to focus at all today now.”

“You’re a highly intelligent and cunning immortal being, you’ll figure something out.”

She skitters up the stairs smugly, already knowing how tightly wound Lexa will be when she returns home in 9 hours.

Already more than a little excited to unwind her.