#and Istus destroyed me like I knew she would

[iamsweden]

HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO BE NORMAL AFTER THE ELEVENTH HOUR GN????

[ma-lark-ey]

Hi!! I've seen other people make posts about why they love TAZ,,and I figured I should add my two cents. I also just wanted to share this experience somewhere. (Spoilers for Balance and Amnesty!!)

For a bit of background; in December/early January, I got dropped by some of my closest friends. I'd already been doing bad mentally for the last few months, and that sent me into a complete spiral.

I was quarantined, couldn't see my friends, couldn't leave the house, couldn't make any attempt at things that used to make me happy. I was (quite frankly) at my lowest point. I'd heard rumors of the Adventure Zone for years, and even seen content of it on my socials.

In mid May, I said fuck it and listened to episode one. MBMBAM (as good as it is) wasn't my cup of tea in podcasts, I needed something with plot. I knew the McElroys were a genre of entertainment I could get behind, but I needed plot to get invested.

TAZ Episode 3 was when I really became hooked. Magnus latched onto my heart, and Griffin's voice brought me a comfort I'd long forgotten.

Its important to note at this point in my life, I hadn't picked up a pencil to write or draw in almost six months.

I was honestly inspired to watch after a cosplayer I really admire began to cosplay Lup! I loved the personality I saw in her videos and photos of Lup, and I wanted to know more about her.

I listened to Here There Be Gerblins, and it made me smile. I listened to RockPort Limited, and I remember cleaning up my dresser and folding clothes when I found out Jenkins was the killer. I listened to Petals to the Metal, and I remember standing in my living room laughing during the whole Trent scene. I listened to Crystal Kingdom, I remembered standing in my yard in shock when Mangus sliced Merle's arm. I listened to Eleventh Hour, I remembered sitting in my chair and crying during the flashback and throwing my stuffed animal in rage at the Taako flashbacks. I remembered listening the Lunar Interlude where Lup carved her name in the wall and screaming joy at the introduction of the character who inspired to check this amazing show out. I remember playing Minecraft while listening to the Stolen Century (I was building a Ravenloft in my world!)

My favorite memory from listening to it though, was the scene Lup finally entered. I'd been listening to this podcast nonstop since I started. I remember listening to that scene and just *crying,* i remember clutching at my heart when her death was described because I'd fallen absolutely in love with her during Stolen Century.

I remember listening to Magnus' death scene while sitting at my kitchen table. My mom asked me why I was crying. "MAGNUS GOT HIS DOG!" Was all I could compute, she had no idea what I meant.

After i finished Balance, I started drawing again. It was simple, at first. Just a headshot of Lup with my favorite quote from her. But it was a start! I picked up my materials for the first time in months.

Then I started Amnesty. In minutes I was absolutely smitten. It was like Aubrey personally grabbed my hand and told me I was gonna be better soon. I latched onto Aubrey just like I did Magnus (Travis has always been my personal favorite brother.) I remember feeling guilty for skipping the last half of Commitment, but given my religion trauma that I was still processing at the time, I knew I needed to just role right along into Amnesty for my own sake.

My fondest memory of Amnesty was sitting in the car during a road trip and scribbling down things on my sketchbook.

Another prominent one was when Ned revealed to Aubrey he was the burglar. I fell to my knees when he said the sentence, and no I'm not being dramatic. I was cleaning up my room, and i collapsed onto the floor and laid in a fetal during the whole scene, ugly crying. I love all of the Amnesty characters, its my personal favorite campaign, and Ned and Aubrey meant everything to me. That scene *destroyed* me. I also remembered crying on my road trip when Ned was killed. I'd never felt so much emotion from a piece of media before.

After that I actually digested all of Balance. And the one character who's stuck out to me is Taako. And I know he's a cliche character to latch onto. But, its not his personality or his appearance or whatever that makes me love him. It was his back story. When I found Balance, I was working throufh the betrayal and loss of my fourth set of friends. I'm the kind of person who takes in people I know are toxic in hopes of helping them. And Taako was the perfect mix of myself, and the people I found myself befriending.

His history with Sazed hit close to home, in the betrayal aspect. And his betrayal by Lucretia. I understood his heart felt in those moments, and I latched onto him. I thought, "You understand how I feel right now." And I've *never* drawn so much in my life.

In just three days I made two whole pages of sketches, in just the last three weeks I've done ten pages of my brand new sketchvook (averaging it to 4-5 full drawings a page). I hadn't picked up a pen in months, and now I couldn't Put one down.

There was one night a couple days ago where I just sat in bed, grinning and crying while I looked at all the art I had accomplished, the countless pieces of writing I'd presented to my friends proudly. I rejoined roleplay groups, which I had also dropped after my mental health dropped. I came out to my IRLs as nonbinary!

The characters the McElroys created have given me this... This inspiration I've never felt before. I've hyperfixated on things before (like Undertale! That was my biggest.) But, no piece of media has ever made me feel like a character reached out of my screen and grabbed onto me.

I remember Istus telling the Gang the iconic line of "You're going to be amazing" and to me, it felt like Taako and Magnus just reached out of my phone and gave me a bear hug. Hell, just a few days I translated that feeling into a sketch.

I just bought the graphic novels, and have orders merchandize. I've *never* gotten into something, and had merchandize for it three weeks later. I've never loved something so much I sent my friends literally novellas of just me recounting my favorite scenes to them.

The Adventure Zone has literally brought the most joy into my life I could ever ask for out of media, its helped me in so many ways.

These stupid little DnD campaigns mean the absolute world to me, and I could never be happier that I found them when I did.

So, if you've read this far, there's one last thing I wanna say; even if you feel like you're at literal rock bottom, like you could end it all tomorrow and no one would care. That not even your greatest passionate with bring you joy, youll find something or someone that will pull you out of that point so fast it makes your head spin. In the emphamis words of "Zeke Owens" (Griffin) "One day, youre gonna laugh at a joke. You'll go swimming, and you'll smile in the sunlight. You're gonna pet yourself a good dog and its gonna feel amazing."

[ruffboijuliaburnsides]

don’t take my sunshine

So, last week, @sonorofserendipity did a Big Hit on us here Adventure Zone fans.  A BIG. HIT.  And she has no fix for it and does not intend to create one.

So I did it instead.  This will not make much sense without her fics first.

(You can also read this on AO3, if you’re so inclined.)

"We can't fix this," Istus had said, eyes wide and face ashen. She repeated it again to Lup when the very angry lich had confronted her.

"You're supposed to control fate!" Lup shouted, voice cracking. "Just undo it!"

"I'm so sorry," Istus murmured, hands unnaturally still and silent in her lap.  "But destruction this complete… it can't be undone."

Lup had stormed out then, not wanting to completely lose her temper at a goddess who wasn't even at fault. Istus said there was nothing to be done. The Raven Queen agreed.

Well. They'd clearly never succeeded at doing the impossible. Lup had; this world's very survival was proof enough of that.  It took her time, though, to fill in the gaps in her knowledge, to find enough information about the Wonderland liches without asking Kravitz (as that seemed cruel).  Still, she made progress, and eventually, finally, she was ready to start working in earnest.

"I need you to make excuses for me," Lup told Barry before they headed into work one day.  "I have snooping to do."

"Sure, babe," Barry said, as unfazed as if she'd mentioned they needed to pick up milk on the way back home. (Less, really, considering his allergy.)  "Sickness or family emergency?"

"Do you think he'd buy sickness?" Lup mused, tapping a finger to her lips.  Barry shrugged.  "Nah, just tell him Taako needed me, it'll keep him from snooping on me and has the benefit of being technically true."

"Gotcha." Barry stood and kissed her cheek. "Let me know how it goes."

She gave Barry half an hour to get Kravitz out to do the day's field work, then let herself into the Eternal Stockade.  The male elf, Edward, was gone of course — and Lup was still damn proud of that.  But his sister Lydia… Lup knew exactly who she was now — Lydia was still knocking around, apparently crying over her fate and her lost brother, feeling sorry for herself.

Not sorry enough, in Lup's opinion.

"Wakey-wakey, Lyds!" Lup announced, rattling the door to Lydia's cell. It was kind of cute how Krav and the Queen were so sold on this actual prison, instead of just containing the formless souls somewhere miserable. Cute and a bit disturbing, but that was Lup's jam.

Lydia came to the bars and all but snarled at Lup when she say her. "YOU! It's your fault I'm here! Your stupid umbrella—"

"Well, first of all," Lup interrupted calmly, "It's actually your fault you're here, that's the whole point.  Secondly, I believe you're actually thinking of my twin brother Taako."  She leaned in close to the bars and smiled, baring far too many teeth.  "I'm the one who was trapped in the umbrella and tore your brother's soul to shreds for what you did."

Lydia, wisely, pulled back from the door with a gulp. "What… what do you want?"

"I want you to tell me everything about how and why you took people's soulmates from them."  Lup smiled even wider. "Leave nothing out."

~~~

Lydia was surprisingly forthcoming, especially considering what Lup did to her brother. Then again, Lup pondered, maybe it was because of what Lup had done to her brother. Liches, she'd found in the couple of decades she'd spent as a Reaper, were often far more terrified of oblivion than pain or death.

The souls hadn't been destroyed as completely as Edward had, according to Lydia, just the bond between the fragments had been destroyed, and the stolen fragment mutilated and kept to help power the machine that was Wonderland.  What had happened to them after Wonderland's destruction, however, Lydia couldn't say.

"Maybe they came here?" she suggested nervously. "I really don't know, I swear."

"Shut up," Lup snapped. "Don't cause trouble or I'll be back," she added as she stalked away. Lup was a little at a loss. She could poke through Kravitz's files, but he might not have anything, and there was no way of telling when he'd be back today.  Better to not get caught digging through her supervisor's things if she didn't have to.

So her options, if she didn't want to put this off again (and she very much did not, it had already been twenty years and that was long e-fucking-nough), were to wander around the entirety of the astral plane hoping to find something, or dig through Krav's stuff and hope they'd had an unreasonably busy day.  Neither option was very appealing.

As she mulled over her options, a soft pull tugged at something within her, and she straightened herself up, a raven feather fluttering out of her hair as she combed her fingers through it, scythe already out to answer her Queen's summons.

Yeah. That could work, too.

"Hey, Big Mama!"  Lup always reveled in the soft rustling laugh that nickname provoked from the Raven Queen, even when Kravitz wasn't there to be scandalized. ("Look, obviously you can't take this job too seriously, you have to have a little fun with golems or whatever," he'd say, "but she's a goddess!")

"You've been haranguing one of the prisoners, little spark."

Lup was torn between pride and embarrassment - of course the Raven Queen was aware she'd done that.  She'd known it was likely, and she didn't mind because frankly Lydia deserved it.  But getting called out on it was very uncomfortable.  

"It was really more mild interrogation," Lup protested.

"Did you learn what you hoped to?"

"Some of it."  Lup hesitated — even as close as she'd become to the Queen, she tried not to ask for actually substantial favors from her goddess.

"You can ask, little spark," the Raven Queen prompted, a hint of a smile in her voice.

"Right." Lup paused to draw her thoughts together.  "What happens to… broken souls, if they're not completely destroyed?"

"The soul fragments from Wonderland," the Raven Queen said, her voice rumbling ominously.  Lup was glad she'd learned when to tell if the Queen was mad at her or something else, or that would be… terrifying. "Yes, they are here. They are called to this place, as all souls are, and I keep them safe until the rest of their soul joins the sea."  She sighed deeply.  "This is not the first time someone has…. stolen this."

It was strange that Lup was so relieved to hear that. At least one day her brother would be whole again, even if it wouldn't be until he was dead.

If she failed, that is.  And she wasn't going to.

"If I promise not to hurt them, can I see them" Lup asked hopefully, pulling out all the stops on her puppy dog eyes.  "Just… see if I can learn anything from them?"  She was great at getting her way with the Raven Queen when she wanted to.  It was just usually for smaller, more ridiculous things.

"No," the Raven Queen said.  Lup deflated somewhat, shoulders slumping.

"I see."  She could still try to find them, but even Lup was loathe to go against direct instructions in a situation like this.

"I have a job for you outside your normal purview, however, that may keep you occupied."  Lup nodded, disappointed but curious.  "It has long vexed me that certain magics can damage and even destroy the soul's bond that binds two beings inexorably together, and that neither fate nor the keeper of souls could rectify such a situation."

"Mama?" Lup asked, frowning.

"You, little spark, have done many impossible things." She cocked her head, bird-like, and Lup understood in a rush of excitement and gratitude. "Perhaps if anyone can do this impossible thing, it is you."

"Just me?"  Lup all but bounced on the balls of her feet, eager to get started.

"You may seek what assistance you require."  The Queen paused, then added, "If you and your Barold could refrain from giving my head reaper too many conniptions, I'd greatly appreciate it."

Lup couldn't help but laugh.

~~~

Kravitz didn't need to know until she had a plan. Right now, she didn't have one, she just had research to do.  Which was why she (very apologetically) informed Kravitz that she was working something very confidential at the Raven Queen's request, then stole Barry while Kravitz tried to figure out if she was full of bullshit.

"We're gonna fix Taako," she told her husband as she led the way to where the Raven Queen had indicated the soul fragments were kept.  

"Tall order," Barry commented.  Lup smacked his arm lightly.  

"The Kravitz thing," she clarified.  Barry immediately shifted from teasing to intent, leaning in as they walked, his focus lasered in on her.

"Tell me."

~~~

The broken souls were both heartbreaking and terrifying.

Some were recognizable, though damaged - an iris missing petals, a sewn doll with frayed seams and missing hair.  Most were all but unidentifiable, though, faintly glowing twists of souls ripped into until they barely have enough form to stay in one piece.

"Holy shit," Barry whispered, horrified and awed.  "I knew they'd been doing this, but—"  His jaw clenched, and Lup reached out to squeeze his hand.

"You didn't do this," she murmured.  He smiled faintly at her and squeezed back.  

"Thanks."  He looked back out at the souls, drifting through the air.  "Are these all from Wonderland?"

"No," Lup said.  "Most of them are, though."

"Think you'll be able to find Taako's?"

Lup looked out at the aimlessly drifting fragments of souls.  There were so many.  So many.

(It made her want to march back to Lydia's cell and drag her here by her ear, and somehow make her feel the pain of each one of those losses.  She was the one whose relic could consume entire cities in a moment of rage.  She was no stranger to the burning in her veins that called for vengeance.

She took a deep breath, and let it pass.)

"Well," she said, rolling her shoulders, "don't know until I try!"

It took longer than she'd expected.  The souls weren't full beings, the way the souls in the sea were, but they still had… something.  Lup couldn't quite put a word to it.  Emotions, maybe.  They carried the hurt, the trauma, the loneliness that the people who'd lost them couldn't feel.  And those emotions were the only way they had to communicate, to reach out to try to find the rest of themselves, to find comfort.

Lup spent the better part of three hours gently and slowly twisting through the room, doing her best to exude safety and comfort and compassion.  She got through half, maybe.  She hadn't found Taako.  Probably.

Barry took a more scientific approach, of course.  He looked at each one individually, taking notes.  He tried to see if there was anything he knew of from over a century of study, from so so many different worlds with different magics, that could help strengthen or repair them.  He looked up from one tattered rag of a soul fragment to see Lup wobble on her feet and shook his head.

"Lup, it's time for a break," he called out.

"I haven't found him yet!" she protested, fists balled up, eyelashes clumped together from mostly-unshed tears.  Barry pushed himself to his feet and wrapped an arm around her shoulders, tugging her into an embrace.

"You can't help him if you run yourself ragged," he pointed out, tugging her to the side of the room and pushing her down to sit on the ground.  He dropped down next to her, letting her immediately lean against him, resting her head on his shoulder.

"This is pointless.  They're all miserable and broken and how the fuck are we supposed to put them back together?"  Lup took a few shaky breaths.  "What if I was wrong, Bear?  What if I can't help him?"

"You just need some space to think," Barry said, rubbing her back gently.  He started to say more, but a new soul fragment drifted in, catching his attention.  It was mostly whole, except for the fact that it had been excised from the soul it belonged to.  It was shaped like a small animal - long-bodied, with big eyes and small round ears - and it was damaged as if it had been stabbed in the stomach.  "Holy shit."

"What?" Lup looked up, following his line of sight, and gasped softly at the sight of the little creature.  "Holy shit."  She stood up quickly and reached out to cup the little shape in her hands, cradling it to her chest.  "It's a fucking mongoose."

~~~

They took the mongoose soul home in a specialized container Barry dug up from somewhere, because it was new, and it was a mongoose, and it was twenty years since the Day of Story and Song and Lup had a sinking suspicion she knew where it had come from and she didn't want to lose track of it.

"This is bad," Barry said, staring into the jar as Lup dug her stone of farspeech out, calling up one of her speed dials.  

"We don't know it's him," she said as the stone connected.  "Hey, Krav!"

"Lup?" Kravitz's voice crackled through the stone's speakerphone.  "Is everything all right?"

"Yeah," Lup answered, lying through her teeth with a pained smile so she would sound upbeat over the stone.  "I just wanted to let you know everything went fine with Taako earlier."

"Ah," Kravitz said.  There was a long pause.  Lup held her breath, praying he wouldn't ask the question she expected.  "Who's that?"

"Just a friend, don't worry about it, okay bye!"  Lup hung up and threw her stone at the sofa.  "FUCK! This is bad.  This is my fault.  I could've told him what I was doing and then maybe he wouldn't have done such a stupid—"

Barry let her pace and rant for a while; he always knew when she needed to vent or needed to be soothed, and she loved him so much for it.  She finally wound down after a few minutes and slid into the seat at the kitchen table next to him.

"What do we do?" She asked after a moment.  Barry considered it.  

"Well, we've got to find a fragment that is Kravitz as much as this," he patted the jar gently, "is Taako.  Then…"  He shrugged.  "I don't know.  But we'll come up with something.  In the meantime, you're exhausted and I can't do any more on my notes until I get some books from work, so how about I order some takeout and we'll have a night in?"

"Yeah," Lup said with a faint smile.  "Sounds good to me."

~~~

They had a few busy days after that, doing their usual gig - people had mostly stopped becoming liches and doing necromancy around the anniversary, but there were still a few dumbasses out there causing trouble.  (It was a little surreal, to Lup, to work with Kravitz and know she had part of his soul in a jar on her kitchen table.)

Then, a slow day, one that Kravitz could handle alone, and she stole Barry off to the chamber of soul fragments, jar in hand.

"What if we just… let it out and see if it likes one of the other fragments?" She suggested, staring out at the faintly glowing sea of fragments floating in the air.

"That could work," Barry said.

"You think?" she asked, actually a little surprised, because she figured it was kind of a dumb idea.  Barry chuckled sheepishly and rubbed the back of his neck.

"Well, uh, I don't have any better ideas, so might as well, right?"

Lup laughed and kissed his cheek before opening the jar, allowing the little soul-mongoose to drift up and out.  "Go on, little dude, go find Kravitz."

To Lup's absolute delight, it slowly started to move into the mass of fragments, not drifting aimlessly like the rest of them, but moving straight as an arrow.  A very very slow, injured-mongoose-shaped arrow.  She followed it almost all the way across the chamber, Barry trailing behind her scribbling notes as quickly as he can.  Eventually it slowed and stopped, hovering just near a fluttering, badly-damaged fragment that Lup can't quite discern the shape of.

The glow that both fragments give off brightens, just slightly, and the mongoose curls around the other shape, which starts to pull itself back together into the shape of a single feather.

"Yes!" Lup whisper-yelled, somehow feeling like being too loud would disturb them, even though the souls had thus far shown no sign of noticing any sounds they'd made.  "Bear, look!"

"I see," Barry responded in equally hushed tones as he scribbled furiously.  "This is amazing!"

"Yeah, and also we can fix Taako and Kravitz now."

"Oh."  Barry stopped taking notes long enough to look sheepish, the hushed tone falling away.  "That too, yes."

"You're such a nerd," Lup said with a fond smile.  "So that's half of the problem solved.  Or at least, half of the problem if both parties have their souls mutilated, but whatever, it's still progress."

"Re-binding them to Taako and Kravitz's souls is going to be the hard part, though," Barry pointed out.  "The Raven Queen knew Taako's fragment was here, it's just that she and Istus couldn't do anything to put it back."

Lup blinked.  "What did you say?"

"Uh…" Barry frowned down at his notes as if they held the answer.  Which, to be fair, they might.  "Re-binding them is going to be hard?"  A wide grin slowly spread across Lup's face.  Barry was almost worried - that grin usually meant trouble. "What are you thinking?"

"Who do we know, darling," she said, "who knows probably more than anyone else in creation about bonds?"

Realization dawned, and Barry found himself grinning, too.  "Let's give him a call, then."

~~~

"Well, I have no idea if it'll work," Davenport said, leaning against the railing of his ship, the Cloudblaster, after Barry and Lup finished explaining their plan.  "But sure, I'll swing by and park her… where, you think, by Magnus and Lucretia's place?"

"There's family dinner next weekend," Lup agreed, nodding.  "So Taako should be there, and I'm pretty sure we can get Kravitz there with some effort."

"Thanks, Cap," Barry added.

"Don't mention it," Davenport chuckled, and patted the ring that encircled the stern of the ship, glowing faintly.  The glow pulsed a bit as he did, a whirring hum rising almost like a purr.  "I didn't build this baby just to turn down my family when they need our help."

~~~

"We're having family dinner tomorrow and you're coming," Lup declared to Kravitz the next week.  Kravitz looked both confused and concerned by her statement.

"Uh," he said.  "Why?"

"Because we want you to," Lup responded, sitting on the edge of his desk.  "You're practically family to me'n Barry, we talk about you a lot, everyone's liked you the times you've met them."  She smiled innocently.  "Also because Big Mama says you have to."

The Raven Queen had been distressed by the revelation that Kravitz had cut apart his own soul, and when Lup had asked if she could order Kravitz to go to the family dinner and soul repair party, she'd said yes almost before Lup was done explaining.

Kravitz grimaced — though whether at the order or the nickname, Lup couldn't tell.  Probably both.  "Ah," he said.  "I see."

"You're gonna go ask her, aren't you?" Lup asked.  Kravitz raised an eyebrow.

"Obviously.  It's entirely within the realm of possibility that you'd decide to fake it just to get me to come to your social event at which I will be exceedingly out of place."

"Okay, cool, see you in a couple hours!" Lup sing-songed, hopping off his desk.  "At Magnus's house, don't be late!"

Right before she stepped through the portal to said house, she heard Kravitz sigh. She laughed brightly and closed the portal behind her.

This was going to work. She was as sure of it as she was of her love for Barry, her familiarity with Taako. Once they’d gotten Davenport on board, Lup and Barry had gone to bounce it off Lucretia, to see if she knew anything else that might affect the bond engine. She’d called in Angus and (after some dubious discussion) Lucas as well. Over the course of about three days, they went over every imaginable outcome, formulating equations and magical theory based on what they knew of souls, soulmates, and bonds. The possible results (depending on a number of factors they just didn’t have answers for) ranged from nothing happening to full success to everyone exploding.

(Explosions were unlikely and not expected, but Lucretia and Angus rightly argued that almost anything Lup or Lucas were involved in had at least a small chance of exploding, and neither of them could really disprove that, so it was in the list.)

Taako was showing off in the kitchen for some of Angus’s most recently acquired stray kids who were here despite Lup’s insistence this was a family-only affair, if only because of the potential drama.

“They don’t have anywhere else to go,” Angus said (firmly, not plaintively as he would’ve once), and that was that. It wasn’t like Lup was great at saying no to the kid even when he didn’t make a compelling argument.

Lup caught Barry’s eye from across the room, careful to try to stay out of Taako’s line of sight. Barry casually got up, his satchel in hand, and strolled over to the living room.

“You’ve got both fragments?” Lup asked, voice soft despite the cacophony in the kitchen that would certainly drown out even a loud conversation.

Barry hefted his bag. “Both in shatterproof jars. Is Kravitz coming?”

“Checking with Mama first, but she’s on our side, so he’ll be here.” Lup bounced on the balls of her feet and ran a hand through her hair, looking over at where Davenport’s new ship with its new (and purportedly improved) bond engine was parked. “This is gonna work,” she said with a confidence she didn’t feel.

“It’s gonna work,” Barry agreed, and his calm certainty was just the buoy Lup needed to keep herself from descending into anxious pessimism. She was a fuckin baller evocation wizard, but while she was more than passable at necromancy these days, Barry was the one of them that really got things like souls, death, and the like. If he was sure, that was good enough for her.

The time Lup had asked Kravitz to come was actually just after she guessed they’d be done eating, mostly because trying to deal with dragging Taako away from the kitchen was more work than even she was willing to put out.  She timed it nearly perfectly, too, with the polite knock coming while Taako was in the middle of ordering Angus’ kids around while they did the dishes. “Exactly on time,” she said with a chuckle as she opened the door.  “And with a bottle of wine.  Why am I not surprised?” “It’s… polite…” Kravitz hesitated, and looked down at the bottle in his hands.  “Is this not a thing people do anymore?” “Oh, no, you’re fine, I’m just teasing you,” Lup assured him, taking the wine and setting it on the side table near the door.  Then she grabbed Barry’s bag from where it hung on a coat hook and shouted over her shoulder.  “Babe! Ship time!” “Okay!” Barry’s voice filtered back from the dining room.  Kravitz had started to follow her a bit inside, and seemed startled when she turned him around and propelled him out the door. “Lup, what—” “We’ve got something to show you before you come in and subject yourself to the madness.” Lup said lightly as they moved towards the Cloudblaster.  “Angus has three new kids this time, and Magnus and Taako are being horrible influences, as always.” “Uh,” Kravitz responded.  “Right.” Lup parked him just next to the ring of the bond engine, which hummed softly even as it idled.  One really good thing about bond engines, Lup had discovered over the decades, was that since they literally ran on bonds, they never needed to be turned on or off.  Which meant that as soon as they got started, the engine would be ready. “Cool, just… stay here for a minute, okay?” Lup said with what she hoped was a reassuring smile.  Kravitz frowned, and she hastily added, “I promise it’s nothing bad, it just needs a little preparation.” “Okay, sure,” Kravitz agreed, reluctantly, and Lup hopped over the railing and onto the deck itself, where she and Barry had stashed everything but the souls themselves.  It wasn’t much, just a chalk circle to try to help focus their energy into the engine, and some incense because it couldn’t hurt to say a prayer before trying it.  She was up there touching up a few smudges on the circle when she heard Barry and Taako approaching. “Barry, I swear to god, if you and Lup found some fuckin goth to set me up with—” Taako was protesting, but it was clear he was curious about what was going on by how he let Barry maneuver him into place next to Kravitz. Lup put the finishing touches on the circle, then stood, reached into the bag, and pulled out two jars, glowing softly. “Hey Kravitz!” she called, and (when he looked up) none-too-gently lobbed one of the jars at his head.  “You lost this, loser!” Kravitz yelped and tried to duck, but still got grazed by the magically-reinforced jar.  “What the fuck!” he yelped.  The glow inside pulsed slightly.  Lup flashed a grin and hopped down, handing the other jar to Taako, who was looking rather bemused. “I asked myself the same thing when I saw it,” she told Kravitz.  “You’re a dumbass and you’re lucky we love you so much.” “Uh… so goth coworker?” Taako hazarded.  “Granted, where you two work, I’m not exactly surprised…” he trailed off as he opened his jar, the still-ruffled but otherwise restored feather-shaped soul fragment drifting out.  “Ooookay, definitely not what I expected to be in that jar.” “Is that a soul?” Kravitz asked, sounding horrified. “Open yours and find out, Bone Boy,” Lup said.  Barry was already out of sight, starting to power up the bond engine, which hummed behind them.  “I promise, if this works, you’re gonna thank me.” Kravitz opened his, the little mongoose floating up and out of the jar to press against his chest, its glow brightening.  Taako didn’t even seem to notice, so enraptured he was by the feather cupped in his hands.  Behind them, unheeded, the bond engine hummed, then whirred, the bright glow of it growing by the moment.  Lup focused inward, on the bonds she shared with these two dumbasses, and how strong they were, and how they were weakened with their bonds with each other broken.  Power and purpose were the two most important components of any arcane working.  Barry was, through the bond engine, providing the power.  What Lup had to do was give that power a purpose, and convince an inanimate object that ran on the very essence that holds everything together that it wanted to mend the broken souls in front of it.  

For a long, heart-stopping moment, nothing happened. Lup held her breath, eyes fixed on Taako, willing the universe to make this right.

And then, so slender and faint she almost missed it, a tendril reached out from the bond engine to wrap around Taako.  And then another, and another.  Lup finally tore her gaze away from Taako long enough to verify that Kravitz, too, was being wrapped in tendrils of light.

"Is, uh.  Is this supposed to be happening?" Kravitz asked, voice pitched high and slightly reedy, like it got when he was nervous.

"Yes!" Lup exclaimed, grin widening as the tendrils started sprouting from the boys themselves, feeding in on the souls in front of them and each other, faster and faster becoming a solid mass of white light.

"What did you do?" Taako asked, but then she couldn't look at them anymore and the sound of the engine's workings were deafening and for a moment she worried it had all gone wrong and it was going to explode after all, and then—

Then it was over.  The engine slowed and fell silent, the bright light dimmed, the bonds becoming invisible again, and when her vision cleared, Taako and Kravitz were facing each other, no sign of the souls they'd held when they began.

"Holy fuck," Taako whispered.  He tore his eyes away from Kravitz, and missed what Lup didn't - Kravitz's face crumpling in pain and disappointment.  The dumbass still thought Taako would forget him again.  "Lup, holy fuck!"

"I know, right?" Lup all but shrieked, and descended upon them to pull them both into tight hugs, her arms around their necks.  Kravitz stiffened and didn't seem to know how to handle the outpouring of affection (or anything else, for that matter), but Taako whooped and pulled her grip off her fellow reaper to swing her around happily.

"This is fucking amazing!" Taako put her back down as Barry dropped from the deck, patting poor confused Kravitz's shoulder in a comforting fashion.  "Lulu… you need to fuck off, 'cause ch'boy's got like two decades worth of makeouts to catch up on."

Lup laughed, kissed Taako's cheek, and waved Barry over as she headed for the house.  Her work here was done, finally.  

The last thing she saw, glancing over her shoulder before the Cloudblaster was blocked by the trees, was Kravitz's face lighting up in joy and understanding as Taako launched himself into his soulmate's arms.

[clonerightsagenda]

I think I mentioned this the first time I listened to TAZ all the way through, but there's one part of the ending that’s still strange to me. Paloma tells Taako about the world of tar and world of ash and reminds him there is always a third choice. Later in that same arc, Istus tells THB:

Your fate is guiding you, not today, not tomorrow, but to a moment that will challenge you in a new and horrible way and I cannot make the difficult decision that lies at the end of your quest for you, but I can grant you the time that you need to make that decision.

Given the close proximity of these two pieces of information, you would think these are referring to the same choice. You might also think it refers to the same choice as the judges refer to when they say

A terrible choice, it is not theirs to make-- It is nobody’s to make.

After all, choosing whether to leave the world to be destroyed vs. cutting it off and starving it is a pretty terrible choice no one should have the right to decide for everyone living in it.  And it would make sense that they would need time to think hard enough to come up with a third option.  However, Istus doesn't show up then. She shows up to give them time to think about staying with Lucretia right at the end, which comparatively doesn't seem like a very important choice, since they’re not super conflicted and she casts the barrier pretty much right afterward.

Because Istus implies that choice will be so important, I'd mentally expected much higher stakes.  So, when Griffin says "the Starblaster is offering you a way home" I thought he meant *home*, and the terrible choice they would be faced with was choosing whether to return to their original home system - somehow undoing all the damage the Hunger had wrought during their 100 years at the price of abandoning their new friends - or staying put at the price of letting that destruction stand. That doesn't make much sense metaphysically speaking, but it's what I thought was happening just because Istus had prepared me to expect a "new and horrible challenge" that... didn't really manifest.  

IDK, maybe Griffin was planning on her popping up earlier but they came up with the third option too quickly, so he knew he had to bring her in somehow.

[c-is-for-circinate]

I feel like I’ve seen two or three TAZ roleswap fics on AO3 now where the boys switch places with/are fully replaced by Julia, Hekuba, and Lup.  Which is cool!  I love me a good roleswap, yay all-girl trio, etc.  But they all seem to involve a complete roleswap, backstory and all, and I can’t help feeling like there’s a more interesting story to tell...

(so many spoilers under this tag and I know people on my dash haven’t finished listening so BE WARNED)

For starters:  Everybody keeps their backstories.  The boys were still on the Starblaster, Lucretia is still the Director, and sadly, Lup is still in the umbrella.  So she can’t be the third party member.  Ren, however, is entirely available.

Getting out of the Underdark was one of the hardest things Ren ever did in her life.  People don’t leave there.  You just live there in the gloom forever.  But Taako came in, with his wagon and his show and his glitz and his quiche Lorraine, and Taako left again, and Ren...followed.  She just followed the elven wizard-chef.  No idea where to go up in the world above, no idea what to do with herself, she just took to the road and followed Sizzle It Up With Taako halfway across the continent as Faerun’s first cooking show groupie.  Because she could.  Because she had to follow something.  Because she believed in food, and magic that was used to make things shiny and spectacular and fun, not the magic of the Underdark that was all necrotic and sinister, threatening and cruel. Taako loved having a groupie.  It puffed up his ego like nothing doing.  He never even made it to Glamour Springs--Sazed had his fill and poisoned the cream for the pasta carbonara three stops earlier, and Taako tasted it right up there on stage.  Keeled over dead in front of twenty-five townspeople and Ren, right there in the front row. Something inside of Ren cracked, after that.  Something like hope.  It happens, when heroes fall.  She wasn’t going back to the Underdark, not ever, but she didn’t need to follow around anyone who was just as fallible as her.  She’d learned some magic, following the show.  She could cook.  She’d be fine on her own.

Julia co-started a full on revolution at age 24.  Oh, sure, Magnus did the figure-heading, the bravery, the rushing in, the inspiring, but she was important.  She did the caution.  The careful thinking.  She mattered. She was so cautious that two years later, at the end of the fight, with Governor Kalen there on the ground in front of them, and Magnus with one hand on his axe ready to swing, Julia reached out and laid a hand on his arm to stop him.  Deposing tyrants was one thing, but cutting their heads off would probably make other local leaders a little tetchy.  Killing mercenaries in a fair fight was one thing, but cold-blooded execution?  She didn’t want to see what it would do to Magnus. So they let Kalen go, and two months after that she got to see what an assassin’s blade could do to Magnus when he stepped in front of her in that gazebo he built with his own two hands on their wedding day.  And that was the end of that. She was already on the road when she got word that Ravensroost had fallen.  There was nothing to go back for, now, but she hadn’t planned on going back in the first place.  Caution was useless in this world.  Caution got people killed.  It was boldness that won them the revolution, and caution that lost it.  She could be bold.  She could fight.

Hekuba came from a world of order and orders.  Make these deals, harvest these pearls.  Honor this bargain.  Marry well, have a child, run your household with an iron fist, keep everything running, keep it in order.  Mourn your husband, but not too long.  Marry this distant third cousin of a valued business associate to cement that contract.  Always, always value the contract. Merle never did well with order.  Or with orders, for that matter.  She’d be standing there in the kitchen, a squalling Mookie on one shoulder and Mavis hiding behind her apron, trying to deal with whatever disaster the world had seen fit to send this day, and rather than pitching in to help clean up, he’d add three more dirty dishes to the towering pile in the sink and wander off to watch the ocean.  It was a relief when he left.  One less agent of chaos in her regimented life. The hurricane that blew through a month later was no blessing, or the crash in the pearl market six months after that, or the bandits, or the flu that swept through town... The world is a chaotic place.  It’s too much to face alone.  Might as well try to stand on the shore of the ocean and hold back the tides.  Hekuba had a choice: double down on the sinking ship of her pearl farm, or go find a new plan.  Leave the kids with one of her many, many cousins--make a contract for their care, because every dwarf, or any dwarf that isn’t Merle Highchurch, will always honor a contract--and go rake some profit out of the world’s chaos for herself. It was too much to face alone, but if Hekuba had learned anything from years of marriage with Merle, it was that calling a god to your side didn’t require reverence.  It was just another kind of bargain.  If you knew the gods existed, and Morthammer Dwin of the wanderers surely existed, you could strike a deal with them like anyone else.  And Hekuba could always keep a contract.

They meet up in a bar when a gnome named Craig nails a list to the wall.  The only hand involved in manipulating them all into one place is Istus’s.  She misses her champions, but these three will do.

They almost fall to the gauntlet.  They are immune to nothing, have no resistance to the thrall.  They are three low-level adventurers who are so so weak still and have never been stronger than they are now.  Ren is reaching towards it when the lich appears, billowing red smoke and a voice like thunder that says, “NO.”

This is what Barry knows, in the mere minutes after his body is vaporized and his soul rises free yet again, with all his memories still swirling in confusion: 

He has seen the effects of Lup’s gauntlet enough times to recognize it when it kills him.

Gundren Rockseeker was a good man a week ago.

The human woman with the wedding ring introduced herself as ‘Burnsides’ in that pub, in passing, and that is a name that matters.

They were kind to him, these three ladies.  When he was injured and mortal and confused, they were kind.

He is not letting Lup’s gauntlet destroy another town.  Not again.

The lich resists all Ren’s spells and Hekuba’s pitiful level-one blessings.  No one can get near the gauntlet.  He says to Killian, in his distorted voice of echoes and death, “If your Director wants it, she can come and claim it herself.”  Killian doesn’t ask how the lich knows the Director is a woman, and Hekuba, Julia, and Ren don’t ask who he asked for with the crackles and static of his demand.  They retreat to the moon base together, all four of them, leaving the red-robed lich alone in the circle of perfectly smooth obsidian glass.

Madame Director interrogates them all on their family ties before she allows them to take the test to join the Bureau, Julia first and then the rest of them.  She doesn’t blink or flinch at any of it, not when Julia bites out the story of her dead husband and father, not when Hekuba talks about her children, and she doesn’t consider any of it a deal-breaker, so that’s fine, then, all things considered.  They’ve got a new job.  It seems to pay pretty well.

Lucretia sits on a ridge just on the edge of what used to be Phandolin, Barry floating next to her and not a single bodyguard anywhere around, hunched over the staff and gauntlet on her lap, and cries, and cries. “I killed them, Barry,” she says.  “And you, look at you.  I did this to them and they died.” “We could leave,” Barry says dully.  “Just get in the Starblaster and go.  I don’t know if they’d ever forgive you, but...” They’d be alive again.  They’d all be together again.  If they remembered anything at all. “Not without the Light of Creation,” says Lucretia.  “They loved this world.  I’m not letting the Hunger get it.  No matter what.” Barry says, “You can’t do it without my help.”

(Lucretia lies awake at night and wonders: is it better to leave this plane and start all over again, let the Hunger descend just long enough to escape, abandon the world to that kind of destruction before they can lure the Hunger away but save her family, her friends?  Or should she make her final stand here, close off this plane like they should have done to begin with, doom Taako and Magnus forever? Will they let her make her final stand if they leave?  Will she doom more people by going? Can she face them again? She doesn’t sleep, and she doesn’t know.)

[fromfelidae]

OK guys hear me out on this but- I think that the entire TAZ world, or at least the seven red-robes are running on a constant majoras mask/refuge year long loop that resets with the earth being devoured by The Hunger, and that there is a second voidfish that (up until now) kept this a secret

There will be a tl;dr at the end

SECOND VOIDFISH

UPDATE: CONFIRMED AS OF EPISODE 58

This is up first because its less of a theory and is something I have no doubts about happening in canon. There is a second fully functioning voidfish out there, and it is blocking memories from *everyone*

- First and foremost, the huge memory gaps each of the boys find that they have in the eleventh hour when June is going back through their memories, emphasized by the fact Magnus’ had the biggest gap

- This is made especially evident by Magnus remembering a book floating in the voidfish tank, I strongly believe that this was the book of the “lonely journal keeper” keeping record of all the events of the red robes, it was destroyed by the voidfish, explaining the huge memory static in THB

- Magnus only began remembering because he died, this ones obvious because the episode started off with an explanation of how voidfish cannot suppress memory from beyond the grave.

- The reason it is coming back so slowly (shoutout to Brian for figuring this out) is because of how unconventionally Magnus died, he was seperated from his body, killed, and then possessed another body. If he had died ‘normally’ his memories wouldve been restored in a similar manner to when they drank the voidfish water

- This is also how Barry remembers! he was dead- with this information, we could argue that literally any living person could be a red robe without knowing

update: now we know who the red robes are

- (EDIT): Its possible the second void fish is the “EGG BABE” the voidfish told Magnus about! given that communication is difficult, the voidfish could have matured enough to be able to consume and hide memories as well

LOOP THEORY

Getting it out of the way now, Refuge is the biggest foreshadowing for this theory, (see more at the end of this post), the entire arc in and of itself was basis for what the entire world is like.

I believe that the world, is being looped in a Refuge-esc style.

I’m not sure where it starts, but it ends with the world, each individual plane, being eaten by The Hunger. akin to how each loop in Refuge ended with being eaten by the purple worm.

The only difference being not every loop is exactly the same, things are different slightly each time- which explains why there were two suns, and the sky was purple in Magnus’ memory. I think that was his origin before the loops began.

evidence:

- (UPDATE) The vision the voidfish showed Magnus "12 multicolored circles rotating in perfect harmony with one another" Then a Bright white circle flies into the center, and the circles begin to make more intricate movements and rhythms until a large black circle appears and consumes all the other circles. Eventually the white light breaks from the black circle and the entire pattern repeats.”

It’s unclear right now what the white circle is, but the large black one is clearly the 13th plane, The Hunger. The scene the voidfish is describing is what has been happening over and over in the loop, repeating when The Hunger consumes all (and the white plane escapes).

- In the eleventh hour Griffin tells the boys that something about dying like this is ‘familiar’, while theyve gotten close to death before in the podcast theyve never truly died, how could it be familar if they hadn’t been reliving an even bigger loop unknowingly for years

- Kravitz states the boys have died more than anyone hes seen before! He acts as though he cant understand /how/, this was before the 11th hour so there’s literally no explanation other than they’ve been dying over and over again from the hunger, on a loop (EDIT: it was bought to my attention that Kravitz stated they have different death counts! taako having the least and merle having the most- while this complicates things i still think the loop is possible)

(EDIT 2.0: SOLVED!! by @stalllme in this post here)

- Barry Bluejeans turning to Magnus and saying “next time”, theyve been trying to save the world over and over in each loop, unable to succeed (until now??)

- This quote from Istus  "Our existence is made up of countless realities where the same people are just doing the same actions at the same time in parallel worlds throughout the echoes of creation, except for you! The three of you are the only three that there are doing the things the three of you do here in this world! When I say that you’re unique, I’m not being flattering, I’m being quite literal… The three of you are anomalies, and I certainly have god-like powers and I don’t like to brag, but I’ve never known anything like the three of you and I don’t know why that is, but I’m intrigued…”

This is relevant because this is going to be the loop that they break.

- It’s important also, because THB broke the loop in refuge, foreshadowing that they could potentially break the one around the world

-  Another helper on the “loops but everything is slightly different” is @martypines’s theory that the second sun in the purple sky that Magnus saw could be a base for the red robes! similar to the bureaus except, well, a sun

every arc is foreshadowing for end game

1 (here there be gerblins) - basically Barry Bluejeans’ origin story, cant be asked to expect much from here seeing as griffin had barely started fleshing out the story until halfway through the arc

2 (murder on the rockport limited) - (UPDATED: thanks to this anon!) murder on the rockport limited taught us and the boys not to trust people by their first expectations, similar to the attitude shown towards the redrobes. that attention to detail, a keen eye and the boy detective are key to solving a mystery

3 (petals to the metal) - Introduces us to the fact not everyone who takes a relic is evil, and more importantly, the sheer strength and power that love has. Hurley is able to break the thrall the sash has on Sloane through the power of her love.

4 (crystal kingdom) - The astral plane got introduced the most prominently here, showing us the ability to pass between them, the fact people live on past death, and that multiple dimensions do exist. There was probably a lot more important exposition I’ve forgotten.

5 (the eleventh hour) - The most important arc imo!! The entire concept of looping is introduced here, that a whole town can be completely unaware theyre reliving the same day over and over again, resetting as they are all killed. It also introduces the concept that red robes arent inherently evil

6 (the suffering game) - Unsure as of the moment, it was very endgame.

MISC BUT STILL IMPORTANT

Magnus and the red robes were collecting information about the loops, and trying to fight against it. I also strongly believe that they are the seven birds in the prophecy.

- This is backed up by the book being destroyed in the voidfish tank, I believe that was written by “The Lonely Journal-Keeper”

UPDATE: CONFIRMED: this is what lucretia was doing

- This would explain the reason Magnus knew to protect the chalice in Refuge! because the red robes had already figured out the global loop that was happening, and it was almost an unintentional test run?

EDIT: I believe LUP was the leader of the redrobes, and might be still alive but very out of action. (UPDATE: Davenport was the leader, chalupa theory got confirmed) I strongly believe she was the one speaking to Taako through telecommunication (no other female redrobe has been introduced by name excluding her, it makes the most sense!)

I think shes the leader, or at least, was very strongly important to their ‘family’ (in barrys words) because of the strong emotional connection Taako feels, he cant distinguish it but its there. LUP meant a lot to all of the redrobes when they were alive, i mean, she was able to convince Taako ‘dont trust anybody or anything’ to trust Barry. (UPDATE: Chalupa theory was correct)

prophecies and their continued relevance

" But I saw a brilliant light heralded by seven birds flying tirelessly from the storm. I saw seven birds: the twins, the lover, the protector, the lonely journal keeper, the peacemaker, and the wordless one.”"

I am almost certain that the birds in Maureen’s prophecy are the red robes. the lonely journal seeker would be the one who wrote the book we saw getting fed to the voidfish. this is backed up by “A Brilliant light[...] flying tirelessly from the storm”, i believe the light is the silver ship we saw in Magnus’ memories.

(UPDATE: confirmed, and

taako & chalupa = the twins barry = the lover magnus = the protector lucretia = the lonely journal keeper merle = the peacemaker davenport = the wordless one)

“In the future, you will be offered a terrible choice, between two options that will determine the fate of reality itself. In this moment of crisis, remember: There is always a third option.”

"And I cannot make the difficult decision that lies at the end of your quest for you, but I can grant you the time that you need to make that decision."

This is the choice that will determine the fate of both the world and the astral plane, it’s also what Istus said she would give the boys time to choose as seen in the second quote. She’s granting them the time they need to find and make that third choice

The first one just looks like an ocean made out of tar, with a black sky above it, and this tar is like bubbling, and you see some stuff moving under the surface of the tar but you can’t make out what it is, and that’s on the left picture. And the one on the right is just a grey world, covered in ash, that is just completely barren and lifeless.

Shoutout to bee for figuring this out a few weeks back! This is what we believe the boys will have to choice between, saving the astral plane (1st) or saving the physical (2nd). I am not as confident in HOW this will play out, but it is relevant.

UPDATE: all but confirmed that these are descriptions of what the astral/physical planes are becoming due to the hunger!!

-  "I have one last prophecy for you, Taako. Something you will need to know. In your hour of greatest need, you will find the power that you seek from the man wreathed in flames."

speaks for itself

the patches THB recieved were red robe patches

-  And they’re these dark blue circle, like, iron-on emblems. And inside of each of these blue fabric circles, there are twelve more circles, all of different colors around the outside of each badge. And in the middle is a word that’s written in a language that none of you recognize. You cannot read, you cannot make out what the word is, what these badges are for, because you cannot read the word in the middle. And tucked in between these three badges is a note that says, “For Your Eyes Only”

- "(..) Sewn into its breast you see a familiar sight- you see a circular patch with a design containing twelve multi-colored circles and a sort of shifting imparsible text in the middle of it. Only Magnus, you can read that text plain as day, it says “I.P.R.E.”

update: basically confirmed, these were THEIR redrobe patches

TL;DR

Time is looping on repeat, every loop being a slight variant but always ending with The Hunger swallowing the world whole, causing a reset.

The vision the voidfish showed Magnus is the happenings of every loop.

Refuge’s entire existence is foreshadowing for the global loop

There is a second voidfish suppressing everyone’s memories of said loops, especially the red robes. the reason Magnus and Lich-Barry remember is because they died (CONFIRMED)

This means that literally anyone alive could be another red robe without knowing

The red robes are a group of seven, who worked together to gather information about the loop and try to break it.

LUP was the leader of the red robes (it was davenport)

The patches the boys received in the candlenights lunar interlude are red robe patches (CONFIRMED)

Maureen’s prophecy about the seven birds is about the red robes

Paloma's prophecy about making the third choice is about THB choosing between the astral and physical plane somehow, possibly by breaking the loop

Istus used her divine power to give the boys more time to make the third choice, which is, to break the loop

here is my tag for this theory! if you have any additions, questions or find mistakes please send an ask!! i love discussing it ^_^