#a little bittersweet though

[hypersoft-tyre]

kmag first point of the season i repeat KMAG FIRST POINT OF THE SEASON!!!

[puppppppppy]

renaissance dogys

characters belong to @canisalbus

[aweirdbugcreature]

Blue flag basically

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

In the same bed, but not on the same page

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[xhollowfaerie]

silverv (sadness hours) drabbles #2

warnings: angst, character death, mourning, big big sadness :( a/n: I haven't even finished the game, I just vaguely know some of the endings, so idk if this even counts as spoilers? it's more of a what-if I imagined bc I don't even know if it really makes sense but this isn't super canon compliant, I just really missed my partner while they were at work and ended up depressing myself more lol I cried sm writing it and they cried reading it so idk if there's typos or inconsistencies or weird syntax, neither of us can reread it well enough to fix them bc we're saps

- End of Beginning.

“Hell of a ride, huh, Johnny?” Blood spurted out of her mouth onto his clothes as he held her. Johnny had never trembled before in his life. Not when he performed in front of thousands. Not when he raced through Arasaka Tower. Not when Adam Smasher blew him in half. 

“Don’t do this to me, V” was all he could say through the lump in his throat, feeling the drips down his face before seeing them roll off her cheeks.

Fuck. He’d thought it over and over, but he never fucking told her. And now, he’d fucked up. They were out of time.

She was so beautiful. V laughed, clinging to his hand and squeezing it reassuringly. He squeezed it back before cupping her face, running his thumb over the mix of his tears and her blood.

Both of their visions glitched and a rapidly climbing percentage aggressively flashed at them.

“Fuck, FUCK! It wasn’t supposed to go like this, I was- I was gonna fix it, V, I- FUCK!” Johnny broke down and buried his face into his hand, holding V closer to him as he looked away and clenched his teeth, bumping his balled up fist into his forehead.

“This isn’t happenin’. Tell me this is just one of our nightmares. We’ll wake up and blow these fuckin’ ‘saka bastards off the map.”

All she could do was smile up at him, reaching her hand to softly brush some hair out of his eyes.

“I know you’ve heard me thinkin’ it, but I’d never admit it. Your fangirls were right... You are a hunk.” Her own eyes filled to the brim with tears. She held his face lovingly.

“V, listen, this isn’t how this ends, I won’t fuckin’ let it-”

“Johnny.” “Damn this fuckin’ cesspool of a world, fucked full to the brim with greed, I’ll burn it ALL TO THE FUCKIN’ GROUND IF IT MEANS!-” “Johnny.”

His miserable expression lingered on her smile. He touched the warm hand over his face, and both of their expressions flickered with the faintest relief, followed by the deepest sorrow.

One last time, they get to feel each other’s touch. 

And this time, they both knew. It was as real as it could get.

“We both suck at this, don't we?” Her voice. No, he couldn’t fucking imagine living in a world without her voice, without their bickering, without hearing her scream her heart out and play his old songs on her guitar…

“I’m sorry, Valerie.” Her eyes widened as he apologized, before leaning down to rest his forehead against hers. “I’m so fucking sorry.” She took in his scent for one last time. Her favourite mixture of cigarettes, whiskey and chilli peppers, that stupid mac and cheese he always had her make…

He would never forget how sweet her voice sounded.

“It’s okay.”

With the last of her strength, she held her necklace, the fateful bullet Vik had plucked out of her skull, the day her and Johnny first met. The day she died.

“Take care of Nibbles, alright?”

She held it to his chest, taking his dog tags between her fingers and tangling their necklaces together with a sly grin.

“Go. And promise me… you’ll really live this time. For yourself. For…” Johnny didn’t want to hear it. He inched in closer, their lips barely apart. 

He didn’t wanna hear it.

Their kiss was short and sweet. Johnny didn’t want to let go, so she whispered against his lips.

“I forgive you, Johnny. I’d do it all over again, and there’s no other rockerboy I’d rather cuss out  in my head until the end of my days.”

With shaky hands, Johnny took off his dog tags and placed them around her neck. His sobs worsened, and he tried to hold her tighter, squeeze her harder; as he did, she began dissipating into ones and zeroes, melting into him until he caught one last glimpse of her before she was completely gone.

“See you in the next one, John. Don’t miss me too much.”

Johnny collapsed onto the bare floor of code, feeling the agony of the Relic inside their head. 

Feeling the thing he’d feared the most.

He couldn’t feel her anymore. At all. All that was left in her wake was her necklace. He held it so tightly his knuckles turned white. The last thing he remembered was the sensation of his palms going numb.

- Sailor Song.

Johnny flicked the cigarette into the dirt, taking a sip of the pomegranate soda. V’s tastebuds relished at the familiar drink, making a laugh bubble in his chest.

“Fuck, V. Your body really likes this shit. It don’t even taste like mudwater no more.”

Her bullet necklace dangled from her- his neck.

He glared at the view of the city off the cliffside, resting against the hood of their Impala.

His shaky hand squeezed the paper it was holding onto before catching himself and loosening his grip, lest he wrinkled his most prized possession. Wordlessly, he tucked his wallet out of his back pocket, opening it up to a small picture of V’s smile he had taken one time she got drunk and he used her lack of sobriety to take a selfie of her grinning like an idiot with messy hair and no makeup. He thought he did it to fuck with her at the time. Now he knew he did it because he was aware, in the back of his mind, of how much he’d miss her.

He stared at the picture for a moment before stripping his gaze from it, catching his reflection in a nearby puddle. The way the face staring back was as much him as it was V both destroyed him and helped sew back together the irreparable gush inside his heart. He struggled to settle into her body, to claim it as his - it felt wrong - but he could no longer recall struggling to call her home. So he did his best to keep bits and pieces of both and carefully stitch them together. He let her natural roots grow out and dyed them black, the rest of her hair staying pink. Johnny used her muscle memory to redye it from time to time, remembering the countless nights he’d try to explain to her, time and time again, that he couldn’t see the damn back of her head, woman, I can’t see any more than you do, you-

“...drive me insane” their gravelly  voice rang out of his throat. “You’re a dick, you know that?” he replied to himself, before returning to the lower, rougher tone his voice had settled in her vocal chords at. He had found himself replaying many of their conversations out loud, lately.

“And you’re a cunt. We might just fit together after all.”

He cleared his throat after a moment of silence and slid the aviators back over his watering eyes. “Christ, Johnny. Talkin’ to yourself? Who’s a senile old man now?” The words took him by surprise, so much so that his eyes widened and, for a moment, darted around as if to catch a glimpse of her. The gust of wind howled past him, leaving nothing in its wake.

He took one last fugitive glance at his arm, Johnny + V permanently inked into them. He broke into a grin before grimacing and grinding his teeth, hopping off the hood to kick an empty beer can and grab his head, letting out a howl.

The words scribbled in V’s handwriting resided within the letter in his wallet, the same words he had taken the liberty to tattoo on V’s other arm, opposite of their stupid tattoo he got when he took over her body one time. The note she had left him the day she knew was their last together, taken out of a poetry anthology they had been reading over cigarettes and bourbon for weeks, whenever they woke up from a nightmare.

"Where you used to be, there is a hole in the world, which I find myself constantly walking around in the daytime, and falling in at night. I miss you like hell. ― Edna St. Vincent Millay"

[dykedvonte]

I like to think in the P.E au that Anya and Curly specifically get haunted hard by Jimmy's weird reality crossing guilt manifested.

It's targeting them because Jimmy's guilt grows more around them. The idea of him acting and playing nice despite what he did. It's like a buffet that allows it to pick from their plates.

Anya sees this stagnant version of her, blood from her mouth, clutching her stomach with a bottle of pills in her other hand. She's talking about not being heard, a pixel, relief from a burden. She tries to ask a question and it's never the right one. She's not understanding but in a way, she's getting that this version of her is in pain. She tries to help, extends a hand and asks how she can help, stop it. She stares and there's utter despair and disappointment in her eyes.

What did you do?

Curly sees this burnt mangled thing. But he can't call it that. Even with no skin and chipping teeth, covered in sullied bandages and smelling of death overdue, he can see his face. He can recognized that eye, he stares at it a lot in the mirror, usually a second one is attached but he digresses. They are just watching, staring and unmoving. He asks himself what happened, how can he help and his own retched mangled voice comes out from a empty maw.

I told you.

They have no idea what it really means. They don't know who to tell. Flashes of a life they don't know or maybe a future they haven't lived yet. Perhaps they treat it as their own minds trying to tell them something. They bare that burden themselves and that alone makes it heavier. Plumper. More appetizing to the guilt causing it.

Tragically that guilt is not their own.

[canisalbus]

Look, I know it's supposed to end badly. But I need to admit that in my head, they declared a mutual "fuck this shit" to the world and society. Packed all the stuff they could one late night and escaped to a remote open plain in the middle of some thick woods where they spent the rest of their lives healing and living freely in nature.

I've been having a lot of intense feelings about them as well. The tragical elements are so baked in to their story and setting, it's hard to imagine a happy ending for them. But every now and then I find myself thinking of scenarios and AUs where they both live and grow old together. For coping purposes, I suppose.

[herefortheships]

One great thing that can come out of Beetlejuice 3 ending with Lydia and Betelgeuse married, is that they can continue the story as a show if they want to, later on. An animated show, is what I mean, about Betelgeuse, Lydia, and Astrid. I could watch an animated series about their little family getting into all kinds of Neitherworld shenanigans.

[feroluce]

Thinking tonight about Caelus, and the nature of his loss and his grief after the Everything that went down in Penacony during 2.0.

Because Acheron, Black Swan, and Misha kind of knew of Firefly, they at least met her, but they didn't like really know her, and Caelus never even got the chance to introduce her to the rest of the Astral Express Crew. The only person who would have talked to her much was Sparkle, who is. Probably not really someone Caelus is interested in grieving with skznmsks

Anyway, all this to say, I like thinking about how alone poor Caelus is in his grief, because he was the only one who knew Firefly. He's the only one really mourning her. There's no one to talk about her with. There's no stories to trade or memories to reminisce with anyone over. It's not as though he knew her for long, but still. No one else knew her at all.

And I love the thought of all of this coming bubbling up, hot and acidic and bitter, during a conversation with Sampo, who Caelus just so happens to run into in the Golden Hour. Poor Sampo is kinda blindsided, he knew shit was going down in Penacony, but yeesh. And he just. Isn't quite sure what to say about it all, because he's never really encountered this before. His feelings about the Masked Fools are...a mixed bag, but he's been a part of them for a very long time, and when you're with a close organization like that, it's hard to feel alone, in grief or otherwise.

So Sampo sits there on their little bench that the two of them have occupied, and he thinks of his old friend April, how she'd died in his arms cackling and spitting her own blood after a heist gone wrong, and how after he'd dragged himself back to the World's End Tavern they'd all held a Fool's Funeral- which is basically just a big party where everyone gets really really drunk and reminisces and toasts the dead and celebrates their life.

He still thinks about her a lot, and he remembers how the time he'd most keenly felt her absence was on Jarilo-VI, the one place where he couldn't talk about her because he couldn't say anything to give himself away as an alien. The Fools still tell stories about her every time he goes back to the Tavern. His first toast of the night is always in her name. Even now, all these years after she'd died, Sampo is still learning new things about her. He's never had to grieve her alone.

Caelus doesn't have any of that.

He might never have that. As they speak, Caelus has no proof that Firefly was even her real name, or if she dreamt with her true appearance. He might not ever find out who she even was.

And just imagining that kind of loneliness hollows out a strange little pit, right behind his sternum, deep between his ribs.

So Sampo claps Caelus' shoulder and offers him a deal. Come find him outside of the dream. He knows a guy who can get them a lot of beer for really cheap-

("Is that guy you and your five finger discounts?" "Whatever do you mean, dear friend, I don't even know the meaning of the phrase, hehee.")

-and they can hole up in a bar or a hotel room or something, and get completely shitcanned. Tell him all about Firefly, tell him everything, and he'll tell Caelus about April and everyone else he's ever lost. Sampo will carry Caelus' memories of Firefly with him, and at least this way, Caelus will be a little less alone in remembering her. And the next time they cross paths, Sampo will be the one to bring her up, and to tell her stories, and Caelus can get to be the one listening. He won't have to be the only person to talk about her anymore.

Caelus rolls his eyes when Sampo avoids another remark about sticky fingers, but...ok, yeah. That sounds good. Nice, even. Thank you. Caelus bumps his shoulder against Sampo's. Sampo bumps back.

(They find each other again the next day, and true to their word, get themselves completely and utterly shitcanned. Caelus talks more than Sampo has ever heard him; every minute detail, every word choice, Firefly's every odd little mannerism and habit. Because Caelus wants to make sure this will outlive him, that even if the Stellaron dwelling within him finally burns him to a crisp and he really does up and kick the bucket, or even, godforbid, if he forgets, he wants to make sure someone remembers her. She deserved that.)

((And it takes quite a while, after that. Caelus doesn't see Sampo again until after everything has settled down. On his last day in Penacony, he finds the guy slinking out of a seedy back alley and all but runs right into him. Sampo happily leads him to some dive bar in an even seedier back alley that Caelus has never even heard of, and Sampo raises his glass. "To Firefly! Who sounds like she probably would have hated me at first, but I would have liked to have met her anyway."

And Caelus stares at him, almost looking startled, long enough that Sampo worries that he's read him wrong and brought this up too soon. He's halfway into planning how to talk himself out of this situation when Caelus finally throws back his head back and laughs, tells him that yeah, Firefly would have politely called him out on every lie he told, and all their conversations would take twice as long with the way Sampo is so full of shit.

And he can see it, the same way he watches and sees through everyone, that Caelus' eyes have a tightness to them, his knuckles are nearly white around the handle of his mug. But he smiles. He hits his glass against Sampo's far too hard and throws it back and gets foam everywhere like he does every time they drink because the guy's about as elegant as a raging bull, but those things don't lessen the genuineness of his smile.

The grief is there, but so is the elation, and those emotions aren't a sliding scale between one or the other. It is all of both and both at once, and that's what contents Sampo enough to throw his own mug back when Caelus makes a toast of his own, "to April!!".))

[grassbreads]

If nothing else, I do love how all three priest romances I've read so far have included some element of "desperately trying and succeeding to keep your most loved one from destroying themselves."

Silent Reading is first and foremost a story about Luo Wenzhou grabbing Fei Du over and over and saying "You are not evil, and I will take care of you whether you like it or not, motherfucker," and it works like a charm. Yu Lanchuan in NPNPH is constantly (and successfully) trying to keep Gan Qing in the light and stop her from committing crimes that would ruin her life if she went through with them. Sha Po Lang emphasizes this aspect less, but Chang Geng and Gu Yun are both still constantly throwing themselves into danger while getting pissed at the other one for doing the same, and they fuss endlessly over the other one's well-being and chronic illness until they're both cured and live happily ever after.

And then the second priest wrote something without a canon couple and was no longer bound to give the main character a happily ever after with their loved one, she dropped the "and succeeding" part completely. Xi Ping tries desperately to save Zhou Ying, and Zhou Ying does end his life happily having achieved his goals, but Xi Ping fails utterly to save him in the ways he wants to. He still dies, and they never get their living reunion. Zhi Xiu tries to save Xi Ping from the cruelty of fate, and he succeeds in some ways, but he can't save Xi Ping from his centuries of lonely immortality.

The priest romances I've read so far have all, to varying degrees, been about the question of how to help and save a loved one that doesn't value themselves as much as you think they should. Tai Sui is about what happens when you can't save them. It's about what happens when your most beloved person's self-destruction succeeds.

[rubbishvibes]

I started watching Star Trek recently... Scotty has my entire heart

[artsystargazer]

The fibromyalgia and ME/CFS diagnosis is finally official after fighting for so long to know what was wrong with my body.

I also got my autism assessment results. I'm autistic! Shocking, I know.

[moe-broey]

HEARTBREAKING

Worst Dad You Know Has an Extremely Endearing (Now) Reoccurring Character Trait

For further context: this whole FB involved Sharena and Henriette seeking out lockpickers in the Order of Heroes to open this VERY SECURELY locked box from Gustav's room that took Tina's special staff to finally crack open (or rather -- "steal" the contents out of. No one could actually break the lock!)

And the first instance of this!

It makes me wonder if he saved anything related to Sharena..........

[seas-of-silver]

First Sentence, Then Scene: “I know your secret.” Lila said as she pinned Marinette to the wall.

Just a lil warning that I touch on anxiety and dealing with that... emotional feedback (I guess you could call it?) of being in a high intensity situation with your bully/source of anxiety.

~/~

'I know your secret,' Lila said as she pinned Marinette to the wall. Marinette wriggled, but Lila's grasp didn't budge.

'What secret?' Marinette asked, still trying to loosen Lila's grip. 'I don't have any secrets.' Lila tsked, shaking her head in mock disappointment before smirking up at her with a devious glint in her eyes. 'Playing innocent, I see...'

The Italian's tone sent shivers up Marinette's spine, but made sure she gave no indication of how the girl's words affected her.

'The only one "playing innocent" here is you,' Marinette spat. 'Everyone thinks you're so kind and sweet, but you're like the devil in disguise.'

'Hah! You flatter me,' Lila purred, 'but I am not the Devil- well, not yet, anyway.'

Marinette's eyes narrowed.

'See, the problem with you angelic types is that you're too honest for your own good,' Lila said, voice heavy with faux concern that made Marinette want to grind her teeth. 'Too kind, too generous, too self-sacrificing. You would do anything for a friend, and expect nothing in return.'

This was pressing on all of Marinette's buttons. She knew what the true purpose was of these words, and yet-

'And that is why you'll always lose to someone like me,' Lila finished with a devilish grin.

'You know what your problem is?' Marinette snapped. 'That attitude. Those lies. I know you can't help it, you're born this way, but the thing is you could be so much more than this.'

She couldn't help but take satisfaction in the way Lila's eyes widened ever so subtly.

'You have an incredible talent, and an even more incredible mind - you could be truly amazing if you wanted to be, but you don't, so you're not. You lie, you cheat, you play these twisted games, wasting your time and energy on things and people that do not matter to you - and for what? To get me down? To hurt me? We both know that you're targeting me with all this, for some minor disagreement long-since forgotten- which, let's be honest, doesn't justify all that you've done since then. I've tried to make amends, to help you, to do what I can to build bridges, but you burn them every time, turning away any offers I made so that you could keep that flame burning within you. You think that everything that makes me who I am makes me weak to the likes of you, but in reality-' Marinette forced her hands free from Lila's weakened grip, '-that's why you'll never win against someone like me.'

'Aaaand cut!' Nino cried, leaping out of his director's chair, his hand clutching his cap as his arms waving excitedly. 'That was electric! That was super tense and believable and ohhhhh, I knew this "angels and demons hidden amongst humans" theme was going to work! And you two! Man, I could not have cast more awesome people for these roles!'

'You're welcome, by the way,' Alya lightheartedly sing-songed from behind him, grinning happily.

'Yeah, okay, I owe you an Andre's ice-cream, but if this take is as good as it was in person, I am buying you ice-cream every day for a month!' Nino promised before dashing off to look at the take.

'Whew! It was sooo hard being so mean!' Lila fibbed, earning her some comments on how fantastic of an actor she was by their fellow classmates. With Lila sufficiently distracted, Marinette let out a shaky breath, the adrenaline pumping through her body making her fidgety and unsettled.

'Hey,' Adrien greeted gently as he approached her, placing a hand on her shoulder as he handed her a glass of water, 'you did fantastically out there.'

They both knew the real meaning behind his words.

'Are you okay?' he asked.

"I know your secret." Lila's line echoed in her mind, Lila's expression - and the way it scared her - haunted her. It was like she really knew...

'Yeah... but also... no?' Marinette answered. She wasn't entirely sure he'd understand what she meant, but he nodded like he did. 'The acting bit, I'm fine with, but her? It's... she's...'

'Overwhelming?' he prompted. 'Like suddenly, it's all too real, and it's hard to remember where you are and what you're doing.'

She nodded. He understood.

'I felt like that every time Dad was at a photoshoot,' Adrien admitted. 'Despite him being my father, he's this intimidating, powerful, incredibly critical figure that with one look can pull my performance- can pull me apart, and make me feel vulnerable in such a way that I feel like a kitten backed into a corner, trembling in front of this towering, snarling dog, and it always made me want to run and hide. But I had to fight through it, push through, pretend I had everything under control when I didn't feel like that at all, and let myself decompress once I was alone and safe in my room.'

Marinette's heart ached for Adrien, while also taking comfort in knowing she wasn't alone in feeling this way. Any other time, she might've felt guilty for taking comfort in such a painful thing, but she was too rattled right now. Instead, she silently hugged him, ignoring the stinging of tears forming in her eyes as she wrapped her arms around him, careful not to spill the water in the glass she was still holding as he hugged her back.

In his arms, she felt safe, and the world around them faded away as she let the adrenaline run its course and bleed out of her system, knowing he'd catch her if she fell. She ignored Nino's cries of a perfect one-take wonder, she ignored Lila's grandstanding to their peers, she ignored the clicking of phone cameras. She was in her own bubble within Adrien's arms, and all she could hear was the sounds of their breaths and his steady heartbeat against her ear.

~/~

Ask game: Give me the first sentence and I'll write a short piece for it!

[kasieli]

Hi, Cass! Hope you are having a good day! May … May I ask if you have more art/ideas for your LoA! Damian x Hero! Raven? It looks so interesting!

So many asks today! (Don’t worry, I love it)

And yes!!! Idk if you’ve read Tempest, but that is pretty much the entirety of their characters. If you’re referring to the DamiRae week art I posted a while ago (sorry…again…) I do have a continuation of that just haven’t finished it yet (sorry…again…again…). That idea kind of stemmed off of Prince!Damian of the League and Hero!Raven that finds herself stuck in captivity (or something of the sort), so…tbh…it sounds kind of fun to continue. (So many fics, so little time).

In terms of Tempest, I do plan on drawing more of that story/that version of their characters, so keep an eye out!!!

[lemongogo]

vash w this hairstyle is literally so cute.. .. wolfwood matchies or smt T__T