#and there's a lot of ways to read it

[volstruckerz]

thinking a lot about caleb’s 16 charisma and how carefully he chooses his words and about his proficiency in deception, persuasion, and intimidation. thinking about how a lot of what caleb says can be confusing because i feel like he is often at a war with himself between saying what he really means and feels vs. saying what is “right” or the most effective in a present situation.

i find it interesting that you can interpret a lot of what caleb says as both his genuine feelings and as something carefully constructed to fit a certain person, situation, or goal, depending on what he wants out of it, i.e. comforting fjord or any of the other party members, telling beau about his past to get into the cobalt soul library but carefully omitting key details. like yes, he wants to comfort them, but he also can’t quite remember how to talk to people just as “friends,” with no ulterior motive, transactions, pursuing a certain agenda, or racking up favors (this is where i feel his social awkwardness comes from, the stilted but earnest way he says he’s learning how to “people again” despite seeming to be very good at negotiating, bargaining, or deceiving. friendship is different than understanding how to use people for your own gain). 

i find it especially tragic that ikithon probably saw bren’s somewhat instinctual sense of empathy and bleeding heart and warped it for his own personal gain, to teach him how to use that to deceive and use others. this also explains caleb’s later insistence that he’s been “using” the nein, which veth later points out just sounds like he’s relying on others, just as they all are, because they are friends and family. for all his understanding of people, he has to relearn how to form relationships with them that aren’t a means to an end, which becomes super evident in the campaign.

i think caleb finds himself wanting to change because of how much he cares about the nein, despite everything in him telling him not to. he finds himself trying, after all these years, to be a good friend, but it’s fucking hard — after so long of learning to be a practiced deceiver and manipulator who thought of friendship as something you would never deserve again, how do you try to begin again?

i find it hopeful that caleb’s immense capacity for empathy and understanding others stayed constant with him through everything and that he was almost helpless to it (i also find it important that while caleb was helpless to his heart, actually trying to grow and be a better person took intent and practice, not something that just happened. it was something he had to intentionally work towards for a long time) — that no matter how much he wanted to just gain more power and pursue his ultimate goal, he still found himself loving veth beyond a mere partnership but as someone like family, and that he grew attached to her and loved the mighty nein and started to do things for them that didn’t really help him at all but simply because it was important to them and. and that he still loved astrid and wulf after everything. this is how caleb, who is constantly afraid he is exactly what ikithon made him, really shows that he isn’t him (“not yet,” to quote beau) for several reasons: because he tries, because he cares about hurting them, because he has a heart that loves, despite everything.

i find it very compelling that to have a very perceptive understanding of people can either lead to an immense capability for empathy or manipulation, and that it is a choice caleb often wars with — saying or doing the most effective thing that he was taught to do or acts of love that are ultimately riskier, left you more vulnerable, and are a gamble in its effectiveness. it’s a struggle he faces for most of the campaign as he grows, and i find it very realistic that the change doesn’t happen in an instant — it happens gradually, where the audience starts to become confused between deception and vulnerability, where we start to see a mix of the two. i find it important that just because caleb’s first attempts at comfort don’t start as something wholly vulnerable and straight-forward, that he’s still trying and that most of it still comes from his heart, even if he’s also still trying to control a situation, i.e the “you were not born with venom in your veins” speech to essek. that when caleb would have never been vulnerable with these colorful group of assholes, he finds himself wanting to open his heart and trying, in his stilted, confusing way, to let himself love again, simply for its own sake. i find it very human, hopeful, and super compelling to watch play-out throughout the campaign as he grows more into himself.

[egophiliac]

buckle up lads we're going BACK INTO THE BOOK

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

HOT, SINGLE, UNSTUDIED SPONGES. 3000 NAUTICAL MILES AWAY. Come sail the distance and read Tiger Tiger!

[hinamie]

unconditionally

[starry-bi-sky]

I am loudly pushing the batdad agenda i am loudly pushing the— DPxDC Prompt

“Woah. You look like shit."

Granted, that’s probably not the first thing Danny should be saying to the guy that just bit the curb, but in his defense; he’s not running on 100% right now either.

The man -- tall, towering, and broader than Danny is tall -- whips around on his heel, black frayed cape flaring out impressively. Danny would've whistled in appreciation, but he takes the time instead to wipe the back of his hand across his mouth, smearing the blood running from his nose across his cheek.

"Sorry." He blinks widely, not even flinching as the man with the horns zeroes in on him. "That was rude of me. I have a really bad brain-to-mouth filter; Sam says its what always gets me into trouble."

And she's not wrong either, per say. His smart mouth is what landed him in this situation -- with blood blossom extract running through his veins and cannibalizing the ectoplasm in his bloodstream. Thanks Vlad.

The man grunts at him; a short, curt "hm" that shouldn't make Danny smile, but he does because he's somewhat delirious and probably concussed. The man keeps some kind of distance, sinking towards the shadows of Gotham's alleyway like he dares to melt right into it.

If it's supposed to scare Danny, it doesn't work. Danny's never been afraid of the dark; he's always been able to hide himself in it. He blinks slowly at the mass of shadows.

"You look hurt." The shadows says, blurring together around the edges. Danny squints, and licks his lips to get the blood dripping down his chin off. Ugh, he hates the taste of blood.

"I am." He says, "My godfather poisoned me. M'dying." The agony of the blood blossom eating him from the inside out looped back around to numbing a while ago, so all he feels is half-awake and dazed.

"Hey," Danny stumbles forward towards the man, a bloodied hand reaching out to him. "You-- you're a hero, right? You're not attacking me; which is more than I can say for most costumed people I've met." Maybe it's a poor bar to judge someone at, but he's already established that Danny's not in his right mind.

The man makes no change in expression, but Danny realizes blearily that it's hard to tell with the shadows on his face. He stays still long enough for Danny to latch onto the cape -- stretchy, but almost soft under his fingers.

He looks up blearily into the whites of the man's eyes. "Can you help me? I don't-- I don't wanna die." Again. He doesn't wanna die again. He blinks slow and lizard-like. "I mean- I'll probably get to see mom and dad again, but I told them I'd at least try and make it to adulthood."

There's a clatter down the street, and Danny's ghost sense chills up his spine and leaves a bitter, ashy taste in his mouth. He immediately knows who it belongs to even before the deceptively gentle; "Daniel?" echoes down the way.

"Daniel? Quit your games, badger, Gotham is dangerous for children."

Danny's mouth pulls back, and blood spills against his tongue. "Please." He rasps, and grabs onto the shadow's cape with both hands. "Please. He's going to kill me. Please--"

"Daniel? Is that you?"

His lips part, dragging in air to plead with the darkness again. He doesn't need to, the whites of his eyes narrow, and the cape whirls around him before Danny can blink. Soon swaddled in shadows, the Night lifts him up, and steals him away.

[ryssbelle]

Drew a bunch of Marinettes in a bunch of different artists styles it was a lot of fun!!

Artists who's styles I mimicked: @buggachat @hamsternamedmarinette @ladybeug @sabertoothwalrus and @anna-scribbles all epic artists 🤟😎

[cj-the-random-artist]

I kept debating how to end this short little mini comic. In the original script, they were gonna hold hands (scandalous, I know lmfao), but I didn't think it hit quite right in comic format when I tried to make it longer. Hence why it ends... like that.

Anyways I wrote like a ton of comic scripts for COTL comics that just didn't hit right / I couldn't commit to making and then when driving home from work last week in the pitch darkness I thought about how nice it is to see like actual stars. And I feel like with the cult grounds being kind of among a lot of trees and all that it might take a short hike to get a really, really, really good view of the night sky and stuff. Thus. This.

It's arguably not my best work (I'm out of practice drawing good night skies and all that) but I'm happy with it. Enjoy this thing I made

[virusmeds]

sorry guy but... i guess.... i coulnt fight the homestuck...😢😔💔💔

i have nothing to post rn and i noticed that i recently got like 3-4 homestuck fans following me SO THIS POST GOES OUT TO THEMM!!!!! shoot-out to u!!

[forgetful-nerd]

Raph’s progression from begrudging accepting hugs to being the one giving them freely and openly was really cute to me.

This turtle is physically affectionate your honor.

[untisun]

Happy New Year!

Ink belongs to @comyet With New year's text (Not sure if i like it or not):

[meamiki]

silly comic based on a time i struggled to read live on stream :thumbsup:

context clip compilation below ASDASDFASA

(cw for brief mention of hospitals/strokes)

[kagoutiss]

pelican town, ‘72

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

This wine tastes like pigs blood!

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[shirajellyfish]

So many writers put so much work into their robot lore and how the robots work and where the components are and meanwhile I'm just like

High research writers with actual notes on how robots work: I both respect and fear you. And most of all love you.

[ffcrazy15]

There's this way of doing female-ness in Christianity that I call "pastel flower journal Christianity." I've got nothing against pastel flower journals per se, but for some reason people believe it's the end all and be all of female spirituality, and I think it's a real disservice towards young Christian women.

One of these days I'd like to start a prayer-and-reading group or something for young women, but there would be no floral themes or over-focus on how "God thinks you're beautiful even if the world doesn't" (a true statement, but it's wayyyyy too often the focus in women's spiritual reading). Instead we would be reading:

Seneca's Letters from a Stoic

Frankl's Man's Search for Meaning

Sheed's A Map of Life

Portions of Pieper's book on leisure

Kreeft's Three Philosophies of Life

Guardini's The Lord (or something similar)

Therese's Story of a Soul

and some select portions of the Nicomachean Ethics.

(Also they're all getting the porn talk. I don't know why we give the porn talk to young men but not young women. There's this idea that women don't use porn and they only need the talk about "guarding their heart." Bullshit. There's porn on the YA shelves of Barnes and Nobles and before that there were bodice rippers. Young women need the porn talk too.)

Every young woman needs to be getting a basic grounding in virtue ethics, logic, natural law, scholastic philosophy and Biblical hermeneutics if they're going to get by in today's spiritual landscape. Enough faffery and emotionalism in young women's spiritual education! Give them real food to chew on, not pasty sentimentalism!

[vaguely-concerned]

on the one hand I think inner demons could stand to have a bit more romanced rook specific content, but on the other hand the underlying in-built implication that 'yours is the one true voice of comfort and safety in my inner world' is a sentiment and intimacy so way beyond the romantic or the platonic or any secret third thing you could care to name that it makes me lose my entire poor little mind a bit. it's so big and fundamental — near-existential — that in that exact moment at least the distinctions kind of seem irrelevant.

all the people lucanis' mind conjures up along the way are relationships he has that are unavoidably mixed and fraught in some ways even when they're also full of love (they are fraught BECAUSE they're full of love) — the good in them inseparable from things that hurt him at the same time. (it's about: the basic disorganized attachment patterns this poor guy is dragging around with him. careful with those, they're dellamorte heirlooms. what you love also inevitably hurts you and you won't be allowed to have one without the other, you have to surrender parts of your soul to hold on to what little you have left: this is the story up until now.) and the idea that rook isn't that to him — that beneath the fear of wanting them when romanced (which is more its own separate thing because within this psychology, actively wanting something and not just clinging on for dear life to even a meager status quo lest you lose it is in itself dangerous bordering on catastrophic), this is a relationship where there isn't resentment, or guilt, or shame, or dread, or rage, or self-hate, or any of the other emotions that keep him paralyzed, unable to move this way or that. no debts, nothing owed of yourself and your soul's substance except what you can freely and safely and happily give. love and freedom don't coexist — but, I mean, you're almost starting to make me think........... unless...👀👀👀. the unconditional and undramatic 'you are here and I am here with you, you can be exactly how you are right now with me and it's safe for us both even though you're afraid it won't be, I'm not going anywhere' acceptance rook shows him here that he returns to them in the big romance scene, when it's rook who needs it. the way he's just. standing there in the center of it all, like a child desperately helplessly waiting to be found, hiding in the place he hopes you'll know to look first. (rook does know. it's one of the first things they say in there.)

in short the most important room in his little mind palace for the romance is the very first room — the one where rook isn't. where, in fact, rook cannot be, because they disprove the entire structure of the place with their existence and presence in his life. with everyone else he's putting words in their mouths about what they think of him, and rook is the one who actually gets to come in to speak their own words to him — and have him listen. ('he'll listen to you, he always listens to you', 'your voice is a comfort'.) of course rook isn't present anywhere else in there — at the risk of stating the obvious to a tedious degree, they aren't one of the locks, they're bringing the key. in the very finest 'the messenger and the message' sort of way.