#arti is probably way too big still but it is what it is

[starstruck-critter]

🚁➕🧨

[butchreg]

mama ! sevika with a weepy , clingy ! regressor headcanons !!

requested by 🪶 anon ! the people long for more cg ! sevika .. i am here to ( try to ) provide. silly random pictures this time sorry they don't really match. big old dog is sevika and little cat is you if you even care... sorry these aren't my best i don't have a ton of thoughts this time <//3 arcane masterlist here , upcoming list here

sevika who was never big on physical touch , struggling at first to get used to you being clingy. it's not unpleasant for her but it's certainly something to get used to , she's a bit surprised that you'd choose her of all people to latch onto in this way.

she's also never been great at dealing with big emotions. at first her eyes will widen when your face begins to scrunch up , clearly seconds from crying. she might begin to panic though she tries to hide it. "hey , hey. what's wrong , kid ?" she works hard on her tone so she doesn't sound too gruff or out of her element. she'll put her hand on your shoulder a bit awkwardly , trying to comfort you physically.

she's not great at comforting people but she's a great listener and very perceptive. if she notices you acting differently she'll gently pull you aside. "what's the matter , kid ?" she'll ask straightforwardly in a soft tone. she hunches down to look you in the eye , resting a hand on your shoulder. if you don't answer she doesn't push but she needs you to know she cares. "well , i'm here if ya need me, hm ?" she'll say raising an eyebrow at you.

okay i doubt this book exists in zaun but i do not care... sevika doing kissing hands with you , her clingy little cub whenever she has to go off to work or on a more dangerous outing. you'll start to cry and she'll gently shush you , placing soft kisses on both sides of your hands. "now you do mine ," she instructs in her gravelly voice. you wipe your teary eyes. "what for ?" she's embarrassed as she explains it to you , you make her so soft it makes her sick. you giggle , eagerly kissing her hands before pressing yours to your cheeks.

when you get weepy , she'll pick you up , plopping you on her lap , bouncing you a bit. this immediately calms you down , sometimes all you need is your mama's touch.

mama bear sevika who is always holding your hand out in public. she tells everyone it's just because you want it , but it's just as much for her own comfort. she doesn't like her cub getting too far , especially when you tend to fuss easily. the idea of you getting lost terrifies her probably even more than it does you.

sometimes as a treat sevika will give you piggy back rides or shoulder rides. "you're killin' me kid," she'll joke when you ask her forty minutes later for just one more spin around the house. still she carries you around one more time , collapsing onto the couch with a dramatic sigh when she's had enough.

sevika setting up a card game for you and your stuffed animals when she has to leave you. "watch out for the bulldog , he's a cheater." she'll warn you playfully. "mamaaa , i don' want you to gooo ," you'll whine tearfully. "aww , buck up kiddo. i'll be back before round two," she'll say with a wink.

if you're having a bad day and are more weepy than usual sevika will cheer you up by attempting to draw for you. key word : attempting. she's not an artist by any stretch and you always laugh when she tries to draw your special stuffie , or jinx. she'll snort , trying not to laugh herself. "aw, c'mon , kid. you're just jealous you can't draw like i can."

mama sevika who loves to cuddle up with you in her lap and read to you. she does lots of silly voices and will quiz you on plot points. "one more chapter , pleeeease !!" she'll pout at you , booping your nose. "no time tonight , cub. you gotta get to sleep." you'll whine and fuss , but eventually she wins , arguing that if you're too sleepy tomorrow you'll be too grumpy to read. she'll tuck you and your stuffies in bed giving all of you forehead kisses before flicking off the light and turning in for the night as well.

[apparitionism]

Real

Can’t believe tomorrow is a particular Wednesday already; this season has rushed in like the most foolish of fools, and as a result I’m rushing to push out this new holiday story... because I too am a fool. This is set post-series (including the nonexistent season), though not by much, as the first little bit will make clear. It’s kind of all about fallout. And who wants what, and why, and whether they’re willing to work, wait, and do other things that probably start with “w” to get it. Anyway, season’s greetings to all—and to all (including, eventually, Myka and Helena, I promise) a good night.

Real

“She’s back,” Artie announces one autumn night, and before anyone (Myka) can fully register what that might mean...

...she is.

Is, is, is... a distillation of so much of what Myka instantaneously knows again as possibility, as hopes and wishes jolting back to life, as again (still) the only presence that instantly makes Myka aware of herself as a body, one that responds with barely controllable fervor to that presence—that other body.

Artie goes on saying words, “reinstated” and “agent” among them, but the roaring of Myka’s blood drowns them out.

She fears she will spontaneously combust. She would rather spontaneously combust. That would be better than having to consciously keep from spontaneously combusting, in response to Helena existing, to her moving and speaking, in a proximity that Myka should prize but that her body, fervently responding, informs her is completely insufficient.

Myka escapes as soon as she can, to sit in the dark of her room, to sit and process, but her usual, reliable processing processes fail her.

They always have, where Helena is concerned.

All she does is sit, empty but for the replaying of Helena’s entry into the dining room, her stride so sure, her aspect so unlike the dismissive, shrinking shrugs of Boone... that had sent Myka’s soul soaring.

Helena had greeted them all with good humor, her manner and words to everyone so convivial. So convivial, but also: to everyone, and that is what finds clawed purchase in Myka’s heart, here in the dark.

Here in the dark, Myka viciously tells herself that she deserves no special acknowledgment. Why would you?

She also tells herself, This will get easier.

****

In some ways it does. For example, Myka’s shock at, and subsequent need to recover from, each new sight of Helena lessens somewhat. Or maybe it’s that her body becomes accustomed to absorbing the impact.

In others, it profoundly doesn’t.

Case in painful point: one evening when they’re all cleaning up after dinner, Claudia says to Helena, “So can I ask you something?”

“Clearly you can. You just did,” Helena bats back, in play, and envy stabs Myka.

“You’re as bad as Artie,” Claudia groans. “But here goes: are you still seeing that lady?”

Terror appropriates envy’s knife, gashing anew. Myka has not let herself begin to imagine how to get such a question answered, and here Claudia just says it while lowering a stack of dirty plates into the sink.

Helena’s airy reply: “Still the case. Obviously we’re long-distance at the moment.”

Something previously un-knifed in Myka collapses at that “obviously.” Obviously. Obviously. Obviously, the Warehouse return had not entailed a renouncing of Helena’s non-Warehouse connections. As Myka had obviously, she now sees, believed—hoped!—it would.

The depth and breadth of her error sends her to her room again, lightless, wounded, empty, waiting for time to pass until she once again has something to do.

Such as a retrieval with Pete.

The next one of which proceeds well—it’s not a big, dangerous deal, but rather a matter of a sad, not villainous, loner seeking connection via an artifact-compromised comic-book message board. Pete’s his enthusiastic self about the comics of it all, and Myka lets it lull her into a near-trance of this is how it used to be, before everything.

Until they’re on the plane home, when Pete says, “So H.G.’s back.”

“Thanks for the update,” she says, bracing herself, because of course that won’t be all, because that would be too easy.

“And what about that girlfriend?”

“What about her?” Well, that was stupid: asking some reflex question she doesn’t want answered. She braces herself again.

“You think she’s her one?”

That’s worse than she’d imagined. Myka doesn’t want to go anywhere near that Schrödinger-box, for fear that peeking inside would reveal a very dead cat. Would in fact be the deciding factor in that cat’s demise.

After a stretch of silence, Pete says, “Bet she’s not. So what are you gonna do about it?”

What does he mean? Do about the girlfriend not being, or being, Helena’s one? Do about Helena being back in the first place? She would rather avoid nailing that down—another let’s-not-look Schrödinger box.

“I’m going to ignore it,” she says.

“That’s not healthy. I mean, I get it, but it’s not healthy.”

He coughs ostentatiously. Meaningfully? Myka doesn’t know. Can’t tell. Won’t ask. She hates how she feels compelled to leave this cat in limbo too, just so she can shift away from any potential situational consequences.

If only she had resisted the pressure to shift her definition of love.

She tries for resistance now, even though it’s too late: “I’m not going to try to keep her from doing what she wants to do.”

He cocks his head in that exaggerated what-are-you-saying way. “I thought you might though. Try.”

Myka is tempted to demand, “Why would you think that,” but she knows why he would think it, and revisiting that fight is an impossibility. Especially now.

“But you’re not trying,” he says. His tone, though, ratchets down the danger. It’s a relief. “So why not?”

Now Myka’s tempted to give some indignant “I don’t have to justify my behavior to you” answer... and yet. She does owe him more than that. Especially now, having misled him so severely before, she owes him some decent measure of honesty. So she says it as plain as she can: “Because people should do what they want to do.”

“Huh.” He puts on his “thinking” face—the real one, not the cartoon. “But you’re not doing what you want to do.”

“What?” Myka says, playing dismissively dumb. Hoping he’ll give some dumb response.

“You want to stop her doing what she’s doing.” Myka shakes her head at that, trying to pretend it’s dumb, but Pete rolls his eyes. He sees the weakness. How can he be getting her so right in this when he got her so so so wrong before? But then again she’d got herself wrong... “So why wouldn’t you do what you want to do?” he finishes.

Want, want, want. Myka wishes he would quit using the word.

Yes it’s her fault for using it first. Yes she should have shut him down forcefully to begin with. Yes that applies to situations preceding this one.

In any case, wanting is pointless. It literally does not matter: its only product is empty space, a horrific gaping sink, a vacuum as vast as space itself.

So she says, as pedantically as she can, “Because if one person’s wants affect another person’s wants, that’s a different category of... you know what? Never mind.”

“You only ever say ‘never mind’ when you know I’m right.”

“What? I say ‘never mind’ a lot.”

“Which means...” He taps his temple.

“No. No it does not.” But she does smile.

Pete bobs his head as if she’s actually agreed with him, and so they end on a familiar, jokey note. It’s far better than they could have managed some months ago, in the immediate aftermath of their... mistake? Misunderstanding? Mismanagement? Misadventure? Misapprehension?

Stop dictionarying, she tells herself. Despite its being one of her default ways of trying to process confusion, it rarely delivers the clarity she seeks. At any rate, their short-lived whatever-it-was was a mis-everything.

She takes out the book she’s brought with her, H Is for Hawk, so as to fill her head with Heather MacDonald’s solitude rather than her own. She has lately found that overlaying her own thoughts with someone else’s ruminations is quieting, so she’s reading even more than usual... it beats sitting in darkness, waiting. Which she supposes means she should thank Helena (thank her) for her extensive new knowledge: of, here, grief and falconry, but also, the Wright brothers, Joan of Arc, India’s partition, séances in the 1920s, Salem’s witch hunts, various aspects of the Supreme Court...

Erudition must surely outweigh emotionalism Extremity. Enthrallment? Embitterment.

Stop dictionarying.

****

Relentlessly, the holidays approach. Myka tries to ignore them too, particularly their invitation to soften. Unhealthy, Pete’s accusation echoes.

But in speaking to Pete, Myka had lied: she isn’t really ignoring anything Helena-related. In a folder of significant size in her mind, she stores a cascade of spreadsheets in which she tallies and tracks as many of Helena’s movements, statements, interactions as she can, in as much detail as possible: e.g., it wasn’t enough for Myka to get Steve to tell her about his retrievals with Helena—those accounts, while captivating, were incomplete, secondhand—so she has made perverse use of her hard-earned Warehouse database access to read Helena’s actual mission reports, like some pathetic online stalker. They’re literarily significant, she tries to use as additional justification, ignoring the fact that no one other than Warehousers will ever know how or why.

It’s not that she’s hoping to gain insight from any of this; the activity is simply itself. A flat gather of data. For those spreadsheets.

Which she uses, of course, to torture herself, not least for her damning inability to gain insight. Thus proving Pete wrong: it isn’t ignoring things that’s unhealthy. No, it’s paying them attention—stupid, pointless attention—that causes disease.

That’s true, but Myka genuinely does not know how much longer she can suffer making herself sick.

Lovesick, she sometimes thinks... but that makes “love” too prominent in the mix. No, the “sick” is what matters, and it is chronic, not acute. Which means it must be managed rather than cured, and she will manage it, because she has to: because she is an agent and Helena is an agent and they live in the same house and say the same mutually polite “good morning” to each other each day.

Sometimes Myka wisps a wish, in the wake of one of those morningtides whose undertow she cannot reveal, that she could begin to shift her thinking, to try floating above rather than falling under, the better to work her way to commencing the actual ignoring.

But then Helena will talk to Steve about the particulars of his Buddhist practice, or to Claudia about a joint invention project’s feasibility, or to Artie about a disputed wrinkle of history, or even to Pete about, bizarrely yet bizarrely frequently, which menu items should be avoided at fast-food chains... and Myka enters each new datum into the spreadsheets out of avid habit, all while ferally wishing everything different—even, some days, heretically, Helena gone. And while castigating herself for having wished, before, so stupidly inchoately, pleading with the universe to let Helena come back. More: to send Helena back.

How very monkey’s-paw of you, she jeers, to leave out specifics. In particular, to leave out “to me.” Send Helena back to me.

Before Helena came back, Myka was lost; now she’s still lost, but differently. And if there is one thing Myka has never liked—in fact, has always feared—it’s change.

So in truth she can probably suffer making herself sick for quite some time. As long as nothing about the making—or the sickness—changes.

****

The days leading up to Christmas itself are blessedly busy. On the 22nd, Myka and Steve head to West Virginia to bag a problematic coal-miner’s lamp; the work keeps them away until Christmas Eve, and if Myka happens to linger a bit longer at the Warehouse after Steve goes back to the B&B once they’ve deposited the artifact... well, that’s because she’s very conscientious about filing reports in a timely fashion.

In fact, she lingers a lot longer, and she’s happy to arrive home to a mostly silent B&B... however, she is instantly deposited into precisely the sort of situation she’d hoped to avoid: she must walk past Helena, who is in the living room, alone, with the television on. Impossible to slink past undetected, and thus rude to try—particularly once Helena says, “Welcome home.”

How disorienting, for Helena to be here and to say that. Worse, the articulation seems to ring of... before. When Myka was special.

But she is imagining that. She must be.

“What are you watching?” she asks, though she doesn’t need to. Helena is watching the Yule Log.

“A strangely mesmerizing facsimile of a fire,” Helena says, without looking up. “Do I strike you as hypnotized?”

You strike me. Myka’s thought stops there, true as can be. Aloud, she says, “You know what it is, right?”

Now Helena looks up. She blinks at Myka and nods, oddly soft, childlike. “I consulted Google.”

Helena is absurdly fond of Google. Myka struggles to keep from finding this absurdly charming. She struggles similarly with the way in which Helena articulates the word itself—every witnessed occurrence of which is represented in the spreadsheets. so Myka is painfully aware of the way Helena puts a slight formal emphasis on both syllables, such that it sounds, in a capping absurdity, as if she’s saying she consulted Gogol.

Not that acquiring input from a dead Russian writer would necessarily be all that different, absurdity-wise, from having instant access to a towering percentage of the world’s collective knowledge. And Helena probably understands that congruence, if that’s what it is, better than Myka ever could.

Myka knows she’s thinking herself down treacherous paths; she should say goodnight and walk away. But it’s Christmas Eve, and she gives herself a present she shouldn’t want but feels she has earned, earned by ignoring—or, to the contrary, recording—so strenuously. She has done such hard work. So she lets herself ask, “Why are you so focused?”

“Pete gave me a choice: watch the Yule Log or talk to Myka. I believe he thought I would reject the former as unworthy of my attention. Yet here I watch, mesmerized.”

“Since when do you do what Pete tells you?” But thanks, I guess, for letting me know where I stand. She can’t then hold back a jab: “Anyway, shouldn’t you be spending the holiday with the famous Giselle?”

Helena blinks again. This time it’s not at all childlike. “That’s why he wanted me to talk to you. But to answer your previous question: since he told me he’s in love with you.”

He... what? “What?”

“You asked me since when do I do what Pete tells me. I’m answering.”

Keep up, Myka; keep up. “When did he tell you that?”

“This evening. As part of what I fear—or hope?—was intended as a Christmas gift.”

“For you?” That’s not keeping up.

“No.”

“Then for who?” That’s not either.

“Whom.”

“Well, excuse my grammar, but I’m a little weirded out.” This is the most extended conversation she and Helena have had since... before. That’s destabilizing enough to her ability to concentrate on words. but what, exactly, is she supposed to do with these words?

“Weirded out,” Helena says, an unexpected affirmation. “As was I. I wasn’t aware.” She makes a small “huh” noise, as if she has to bridge her way to what’s next. “That the two of you had been involved.”

Oh. Hence the bridge—but this is a shifting surprise. “I thought someone—Claudia—would have told you. Must have told you.” Must have, and that in turn must have contributed, Myka had been sure, to Helena’s lack of engagement. She’s always known your judgment was abysmal, she’d lashed herself, based on those must haves, and this is certainly fuel for that fire.

“Our discussions have been more focused on her future. And my past. And technology, of course.”

“Of course,” Myka says. And then, quick, before she loses her nerve: “It didn’t take.”

“Technology?”

“The involvement.”

“I gathered that from its current status.”

“Right.” The conversation, such as it is, should probably end here... but something is off. “Wait. You said he said he is in love with me.”

“Yes.”

Myka had believed it was over. All over. The idea of having to deal with it, with any aspect of it, in perpetuity, or at least with no clear sundown, preemptively exhausts her. And it rekindles her anger at the entire situation, at its utter pointlessness. “I don’t know what to do with that,” she says. She immediately regrets the admission.

“He said he’ll get over it.”

“Well, that’s something. I guess.” It comes out grudging, and that’s another admission Helena shouldn’t be privy to.

“He said you won’t.”

“What? Get over it? No, the problem was that I wasn’t ever in love. With him.” She’s saying far too much. She supposes it’s fortunate that she’s looking at this repetitively flickery video loop, rather than into Helena’s eyes. She supposes also that said loop is a reasonable metaphor for how her life has been proceeding. Lately. Before, and lately.

“He said that too.”

“I’m sorry, but you’re losing me.”

“Interestingly, he said a version of that as well.”

“That you were losing him?” Not hard to believe; sometimes Pete can barely follow a laser pointer.

Helena focuses her gaze on Myka again, adamantine. “That I was losing you.”

And just like that, Myka is through the looking glass. Trapped like Alice, trying to get out. “Why would you care?” she chokes.

Helena lowers her brow, a stern schoolmarm confronting an intransigent pupil. “Because as I mentioned, he said—and seemed quite certain—that you won’t get over being in love.”

Myka knows now what’s next. Helena is about to say, “With me.” Because once again: that fight.

Oh yes I will. That’s what the ignoring is for. When I work my way around to it, that’s what it’s for.

“I didn’t know,” is what Helena actually says, clearly taking Myka’s silence as affirmation of those unuttered words.

“Oh please. Like I could have been any more obvious.” Obviously. She says it with contempt at herself, past and present: what a pathetic moonstruck puppy.

“At which point?” Helena asks.

That’s a surprisingly troubling question. Timelines. Decisions. What did you know and when did you know it? What did you show and when did you show it?

“All I knew was how you responded. Not how you felt.”

Of course the former was all Myka herself had known, certainly at first, and their consonance surprises her. If only she could share that consonance, and her surprise in it, with Helena... but that seems too much like a reward, one that neither she nor Helena deserves. Again exhaustion: at their lack of merit. “I don’t want to play these games,” she says.

“Then don’t.” Was that a shrug? Did Helena really shrug?

“Fine. I won’t.” It’s childish, yet it feels like the best end she can manage tonight. You didn’t seek this out, she assures herself as she takes a first step away.

Before she can seal the escape with her second step, Helena says, “You might at least release me from this view.”

“You talked to me,” Myka says, doing her best to make it all go away. “You’re free.”

Helena turns from the flames too quickly for Myka to dodge being caught by the look. “I am in no way free.”

That is not my problem, Myka would like to maintain, but Helena’s gaze and tone are implicating, which is entirely unfair but still needs to be dealt with. She sits down next to Helena on the sofa. At a judicious distance.

Now they are both watching the Yule Log, which, indifferent to them both, continues its facsimile flicker. “I guess it is kind of mesmerizing,” Myka says after some time.

“We haven’t spoken much,” Helena rejoins.

“There hasn’t been much to speak about.” Without peril, Myka adds, internally, and by that she means, peril to me.

“On the contrary. But I’ve tried to ignore it.”

“So have I. I hear it’s unhealthy.”

“Perhaps. It’s Pete’s strategy as well, according to him,” Helena says. Then, following a throat-clear, “With regard to his feelings for you.”

Myka doesn’t need to clear her throat. “He’s the one who told me it was unhealthy.” Which puts her in mind of his ostentatious cough: it’s meaningful now. Ridiculous, but meaningful.

“Then I suppose we’re ailing, all of us.”

“I suppose we are. An epidemic of ignorance.”

Helena smiles a little at that. Myka can’t help but smile back, and she maintains it as Helena asks, light, “What is the prognosis?”

“Depends on the ignoring’s end result,” Myka temporizes.

“Pete maintains that ignoring something long enough makes it go away.”

Or it kills you, Myka might say, like cancer. But instead she stays light. As light as she can. “Maybe he’s right. No, probably he’s right.” She owes him that.

Now a pause. A wait. What’s next? “So is that where we leave it?” Helena asks.

Maybe it goes away. Maybe that’s what’s next.

Myka can see it, now: see the spreadsheets dissolving into unnecessarity, see herself not responding physically to Helena, see Helena becoming, in essence, like Pete: someone with a past version of whom a past version of herself made a mistake.

She hadn’t imagined, not before this minute, that it was possible. But now a road leads there.

Can she take that road? She looks again into the fire. The not-fire. It mocks her: Everything you really want turns out to be unreal. On the other side of some facsimilating screen. A mirage. She turns away from it, ashamed. She looks at Helena... for the moment, Helena is still real. Still able to render Myka’s resistance from her body, here in this moment by sitting quietly and watching fake flames, in the next by doing nothing more than breathing out, breathing in.

Myka has not yet taken that awful road. Not yet. One more try, she tells herself. But no, that’s not right. She’s never really tried. Never really. She’s waited—longer than she thought she should—and she’s hoped—harder than she thought she could—but that wasn’t trying.

So: one try.

It can’t be the try she might have made in the past, a desperate just-please-touch-me push. Under the circumstances, that’s impossible. So, what?

An olive branch? No, peace isn’t the right aim, even now.

Better, perhaps: something she wouldn’t have said before tonight’s... encounter. Something related to tonight’s encounter, something more real than she’s offered so far: “We fought. Pete and I.”

TBC

[copinghex]

Out of the Eden | A.S

Summary: When Arthur makes an unpleasant discovery about his drinking partner he has to make a hard decision. TW: Drug abuse

Arthur waited for a maid to instruct him with a chest crushing feeling, his mouth was dry, craving a drink or a cigarette. At the current moment he couldn't afford any.

Looking at the family picture on the corner table, guilt dragged him down. Y/N weakly smiled, she looked happy and well, a huge contrast with the state he brought her home earlier that morning.

London was a wild place, perhaps even worse than Esme's description, Arthur indulged in it without struggle, already used to the violence and promiscuity, he was doomed, fucked up in the head since childhood, but Y/N wasn't and if she was moribund now, he was the one to blame.

He still remembers the first time she entered the club, curious eyes wandering around as if she knew something was different. Many rumors surrounded the place since the peaky blinders took it from Sabini and she was willing to discover all of them.

Something Arthur was unaware though, was they were once the same, high and wild, drowned into the misery of addiction. However, she had faced the battle of getting clean a long time ago. He swore if he knew that before, he would've stayed away from her, because now she was back to the same problem.

"Mr. Shelby," the maid called.

"Yeah? Where is she? Where 's Y/N?" he quickly asked.

"She's asleep, but her parents-" 

Before she was done speaking, Arthur rushed through the hallways of the house, it wasn't hard to find the angry father and worried mother.

"Where is-" 

"Shhh," the mother interrupted, "she's sleeping," 

"And you'll get out of my house, get the fuck out my daughter's life!" the father completed.

"Get off the way," Arthur tried to push them.

"Get out!" the mum yelled, "Can't you see what you've done?! My daughter was fine, she was about to get into college!" 

Arthur gulped, Y/N never mentioned her plans for the future, "Look, I just want to see her," 

"No," the father forbade, "a man like you is the last thing she needs, you're gonna get her killed!" 

"Alright, step out the fucking way-" 

"Mum?" Y/N's voice made them freeze.

Through the bedroom's door, her sleepy voice called again. The trio switched a tense stare before the mother slightly opened the door.

"Yes, sweetie? Do you need anything?"

"What's all this noise?" she asked, curled up under the blankets.

"Nothing you should worry about, go back to sleep, alright?" 

Before she could close the door again, Y/N's attentive eyes reached his figure, "Arthur?" 

"Yeah, I'm- I just wanted to make sure you're alright," he explained.

"He was on his way out," the dad completed.

"No," she quickly denied, "I want to talk to him, come in, Artie,"

"Y/N," the mother warned.

"Please, mum? He was kind enough to wait until I wake up," 

With a defeated sight, the parents allowed Arthur to enter the bedroom. The door closed behind his back and he tensed up, fearing his awkward ways made her change her mind about him.

"Come here," she shrunk her legs to give him space at the edge of the bed.

"Uhm, what the hell was that yesterday, Y/N?" he sat down.

"I'm not sure, I probably just had one too many and my body powered off," she dismissed the subject as if it was nothing, "my parents will always make a big deal out of it, don't mind them," 

"You looked fucking terrible, I almost called you a doctor," 

"A doctor in a club? Don't be ridiculous, Arthur," boldly smiling, she laid her head on his lap, making herself comfortable in the spot. Arthur lifted his hands in surprise, unsure of how to proceed.

Slowly, he rested one hand on the mattress as the other remained still, observing her from close, Arthur realized under the layers of make-up her skin looked soft and her eyelids shook slightly, these details always went unnoticed with the club's poor lighting. 

Enchanted by the view, he petted her hair with uncharacteristic gentleness. This was the first time they saw each other outside a club and he was mesmerized by how beautiful she looked without the heavy party outfit.

"I'm glad you're here," she whispered without opening her eyes.

"Yeah?" 

"Uhm-uhm," she agreed.

Arthur hesitated, he knew it'd ruin the moment, but he just had to ask, "Why didn't you tell me you were sober?" 

"Why does it matter?" 

"'Cause now you're not, love, must be a fucking struggle to quit," he explained and she didn't answer, "Uhm?" 

"Well, I guess it's because it gets tiring," 

"What does?" 

"How long can you go sober?" 

"...I don't know,"

"See? Every day is a struggle, you'll have to restrain yourself for the rest of your life and I was tired, tired of fighting what I wanted the most," she opened her eyes, "then there was you, I didn't feel guilty for relapsing when I was with you," 

Arthur watched her delicate head in his lap with messy thoughts on his own. She found relief in his presence, but for all the wrong reasons, he knew he'd drag her down if they kept meeting.

"Uhm, and what about college?" he drawled.

"I don't know anymore," she answered, "I don't want to stay away from you,"

"Oh, an university degree is worth much more than me, better believe it," 

"I know, but that's my choice, right?" 

Tensing up, he positively nodded even if he disagreed. He wouldn't let himself ruin the only good thing that happened in his life lately, he couldn't, even if it broke his heart. The first time they saw each other out of a club would also be the last.

[bitter-panacea]

Goultard's "reincarnations"

In the World of Twelve, we know of many different characters who have reincarnations. Whether they have 9 lives and keep their memories with every reincarnation like ecaflip's sons, or whether they are immortal but lose their memories at every rebirth like most eliatropes and dragons of the council.

Goultard is sort of an anomaly. Although he calls this process "reincarnation", there is no rebirth involved.

Goultard : We were friends in one of my reincarnations, and i remember i had a lot of fun with you.

We know Goultard has died before. Probably many times. But (as far as i'm aware) we only know of two specific times. One in the Dofus manga and one in Wakfu.

When goultard dies, his body simply... stays dead, until it has the time to regenerate. Goultard uses a specific word to speak of this regeneration : "recompose" himself. As in the opposite of "decompose", "putting himself back together". And he can apparently also absorb things inside him during this process???

Goultard : I must have accidentally absorbed you when I recomposed myself

In volume 5, we see Goultard die, or more accurately, we see Vald die, since at this time Vald is the one controlling the body that they share.

Vald was at the wrong place at the wrong time, got caught in a scheme that didn't concern him, and paid the price anyway. He was drugged, and his body cut in two at the waist.

Vald : No... Not... like this... I can't die... like... this...

Shortly after, the body has come back together, and Goultard makes his first appearance.

Goultard : Unfortunately for you, the plan wasn't perfect! / Homar's minion : What? Who the hell are you? / Goultard : My name is Goultard, little maggot, behold my darkness...

Goultard : ... For it is the last thing you will ever see.

I have SO MUCH to say about the way Gou's introduced in the manga but that's for another post.

Note : Goultard later "survives" similar or worse injuries. Since Vlad and Vald are said to be less powerful than Gou, i think we can imagine they're also less resistent to injuries than he is. He gets brutally impaled on the Cornu's fist in volume 17, but stays conscious and keeps trying to fight even with a giant hole in his abdomen.

Cornu Mollu : I have to admit you're taking a long time to die, it commands respect.

Just look at him teehee :)

Not dying means his body has a harder time regenerating by itself, and he requires medical attention to recover. (Arty needs it too they both got demolished in that fight)

Eni : Don't act like a child, the eniripsa suppository is the best way for you to get your strength back!

Eni : Didn't need to make a big deal out of it (slaps his ass)

Didn't need to include that, i just wanted to.

In Wakfu s01e22 Rubilax, we learn that Goultard is dead when Tristepin visits his tomb and starts to talk about what his life has been like since they parted ways.

I assume Goultard dying was the very reason they parted ways and Tristepin started adventuring on hiw own.

We have no clue what killed Goultard or for how much time he's been dead. But Tristepin is still young, and i dont think he's been on his own (with Rubi) for very long. I'd say two years at MOST.

But Goultard wakes up and says, although he was dead, he's not anymore, so really, there's no reason to worry or even ask. And they never mention it again after that.

I've seen multiple people say Goultard faked his death. I would tell them to rewatch the episode because this really does not look fake to me.

Goultard coming back from the dead exactly at the moment tristepin needed him is not a coincidence, to me it shows that goultard's "reincarnation" is at least partly a conscious decision. He could have simply stayed dead but decided otherwise.

In the Dofus manga special-issue Les Shushus de Rushu, while he is enchained and imprisoned, we can see that Goultard can sleep for years on end, entering a sort of hibernation/meditation.

Kiki : When are you going to wake up and take care of your wives? / Azra : You've been sleeping for years, it's time to get up! Wake up Goultard!

I think him dying is similar to this. To him, choosing to stay dead instead of regenerating and waking up is like staying in bed and oversleeping.

In volume 27, Goultard himself implies he doesn't know if he can die permanently.

Goultard : First of all, nobody knocked me out.... We don't even know if that's possible.

When he's dead, does his spirit go where all other spirits go when they die? No way to know. But my guess would be to say no. Since he laughed hearing Tristepin's stories, it means even dead he's somewhat conscious of what's going on around him. Maybe like a ghost?

Is he, in a way, like a walking corpse, already dead but kept alive by magic? This feels kind of puella magi madoka magica to me, but I obviously can't explain what i mean without majorly spoiling puella magi madoka magica.

[riant-draws]

You're so big brain yes yes yes moon and younger pebbles thoughts yes I'm eating up your art

First, thank you!! Sorry I took so long to respond ;-; been pretty tired lately and had to give this a lot of thought… perhaps too much… eheheh buckle up, anon, you’re in for an essay~ (also, I know you asked about Moon and younger Pebbles but this is like, 90% an analysis about Pebbles, oops-)

^ excuse me what happened here

also please keep in mind that these are just my headcanons (although some of them are very closely tied to canon, which is why I’ll be referencing some pearls) sooo uhh yeah! rambles under the cut!

To talk about Pebbles as a “kid” (in quotes because I don’t believe iterators have a childhood or developmental period that can effectively be compared to humans), I first have to talk about his construction—mostly because it was so unique.

When reading the pale green pearl (exterior) to Artificer, Pebbles mentions that his construction was very controversial among the council. And, when given to Moon, one of the white pearls reads:

“‘We, of the Five-hundred-and-ninety-second High Convocation of the True Anointed Citadel, do hereby demand, with full force of Law and Religious doctrine, an Immediate end to construction of the Apostate Superstructure Abomination. To place shadow upon the Divine Body of the True Anointed Citadel is outrageous blasphemy and cannot be tolerated, no matter the circumstances...’ Clearly this was ignored.”

As we can see in the game, Pebbles was built mostly on top of what’s now Shaded Citadel—which really pissed off the monks and religious leaders of the True Anointed Citadel, a very holy site. While talking to Artificer, he speaks casually and plainly, so you can assume that he didn’t mind their disdain for him. Granted, by the time of Arti’s campaign, all his citizens are long gone, so perhaps he just doesn’t care about their opinions anymore (if he ever did to begin with). But. When he was still brand new, he would have had to listen to so much hate directed at him, all for simply existing. While I did say earlier that I don’t think iterators have developmental stages like humans do, they definitely still mature and develop. Just because you’re created with an adult brain doesn’t mean that you’re automatically mature and experienced. Even Pebbles reflects on how he’s changed while reading the viridian pearl (garbage wastes):

“[…] much of my early work was encrypted before storage. Though my younger self has done a very poor job. […] now I can just see all of the holes in it. Created from a youthful and reticent mentality.”

So, clearly, iterators do learn and grow. But getting back on topic, I imagine that especially since Pebbles was very young when all that hate was piled on him, it would’ve been traumatic. Additionally, it’s implied (again, mainly in the pale green pearl) that he’s not exclusively hated. The pearl’s author clearly doesn’t want to piss Pebbles off, and they also state that one problematic House “[has] less than forty members on the Council, but still Tilt the spiritual Discourse with Our Iterator in a direction that most obviously Displeases him, and is hardly High Held by anyone in the Community either! We can not Risk this!”

(Of course, the pearl’s author is probably biased so who knows if they’re a reliable source of info or not, but there’s no way to verify that and hey it’s in the game after all so I’m just gonna roll with it.) This means that there are citizens (possibly even the majority) who actually like him, or at least want to remain in his good graces. With him. Y’know. Being responsible for their livelihoods and all. And you might think: great! Pebbles isn’t being universally hated! Well. The outpourings of both love and hate from his creators would create such a toxic environment and cause a lot of cognitive dissonance in him: he’s adored, even worshiped, a proud iterator revered as a godlike figure. But on the other hand, he’s despised, called horrible things like “Apostate Superstructure Abomination,” generally told he has no right to exist, etc etc. And this probably went on for years and years (or whatever the in-universe equivalent is). That would wear down anybody’s self-esteem. Which, in canon, you can see echoes of those thought patterns when the storyline takes place, who knows how long later. This stuff has affected him deeply.

All of this to say, I think his arrogance and god complex (that he displays in canon) are coping mechanisms—whether he’s aware of it or not. He tells himself that he’s “godlike in comparison” to everything that walks this forsaken world, that he’s so much better. In doing so, he runs from his mistakes and doesn’t process his emotions and traumas, generally making a bigger mess of himself. Because to admit the truth would be to admit that he’s broken, that he’s lonely, that he hates himself, I could go on but this isn’t getting any shorter aha…

Moooooving on, not to state the obvious, but it’s heavily implied throughout various pearls and bits of dialogue that Pebbles was one of the last iterators ever built. Given that he was constructed far closer (relatively speaking) to the time of public mass ascension and the fact that Moon was struggling to care for them, his creators would’ve likely been desperate (and perhaps a bit sloppy) while building him. As a result, the parts of him responsible for regulating his emotions and decision-making (his equivalent of a prefrontal cortex) are stunted, as that would’ve been one of the last things to develop. All of this just contributes to his, well, susceptibility to mental health issues/instability. Yaaaay.

side note: I also headcanon that iterator cans are more grown than built. When reading the light pink pearl (outskirts), Moon mentions that structures are infused with microbes that initiate healing cycles that gradually heal and waterproof broken structures. While she’s likely referring to structures on the ground, it would make sense that at least all parts of an iterator below the rain layer would be made in the same fashion. And if you take the bronze pearl (Metropolis), for instance, Moon tells the player that “It’s a blueprint for a type of large immobile purposed organism. This one seems to be specifically for the cities built on top of our structures. […] newer designs began to use a mass-produced cellular build called living blocks,” she’s basically saying that the buildings on top of Pebbles and other newer iterators are primarily organic. So why not grow large parts of their superstructures as well? We already know that iterators are partly biological, and also, growing them certainly would make a lot of the construction process at least semi-autonomous. And this way, the ancients wouldn’t have to risk their lives to go below the rain layer and work on his legs, underhang, etc.

Time for one of my favorite headcanons! And one that’s much more headcanon-y than the others lol, that is, Pebbles’ puppet being child-sized. Big head, big eyes, sorta stubby limbs, rounder features (except his antennae, those are triangles for some reason ffs lol idk what I’m doing) etc. First (and more boring) reason is that if Moore’s law applies in some form in-universe (not an all-important Law of Science or anything, just an observed trend meaning that as time goes on and developments improve, tech gets both smaller/more space-efficient and better), that means Pebbles shouldbe both one of the most powerful iterators and one of the smallest. But if the whole reason e was built was to provide a home to Moon’s citizens because she couldn’t care for them very well anymore (deep green pearl, Metropolis—this is Moon’s reading, but Pebbles’ is interesting, too), why would they make his can smaller? Simple: they didn’t. Instead, his can has more empty space inside it as components are smaller, and his puppet is tiny. Like. Waist-high on an ancient.

Another reason he was designed to look childlike was to try to make him look as appealing & likeable to the public as possible. With how controversial his construction was, his creators and whatever equivalent of a marketing team they employed would’ve hoped to sway the monks and everybody who strongly opposed his construction, like, “look! he’s just a little guy! look at those pink cheeks! you wouldn’t hate a ‘kid’, would you?!?” (spoiler alert: they would)

But as consequence, his image was very marketable soooooooo

yeah idk man pebbles plushie canon

On the more angsty side of things, unfortunately for Pebbles, many ancients and even other iterators (looking at you, Sig and Suns) didn’t take him very seriously since he permanently looks like a kid. This just added fuel to the fire, making him even more frustrated and feeling unheard. Just. All of it is such a bad situation.

Moon, of course, sees how he’s being treated by his citizens (who used to be hers, and she wasn’t fond of them anyway) and her own peers, she knows it’s so harmful to him, but what can she do? She may be the local group senior and his administrator, but he strikes me as having such an independent personality (yay more stuff caused by trauma) that he feels like he’s caught in her shadow, perhaps. “Looks to the Moon’s little brother.” So he probably isn’t… very receptive to her attempts to build him up, but man, she still tries. And it’s worth mentioning that he’s also a workaholic, so he always thinks that he has “better things to do” than, say, spending time with his sister.

I bet she’d still try to play games with Pebbles (and he’d probably indulge her on occasion), show him cool things, engage him in conversation, try to get him to talk about his interests, etc., all to bond with him and get to know him better. And he’s a stubborn little piece of work, sure, but he genuinely does care for her (it’s in canon and shows up in several places).

I could say more but this has gone on long enough, but I do wanna clarify that while I don’t support his decisions or actions, his motivations are understandable. my guy is a dude who was put into a horrible situation and screwed over from the beginning. sure, all the stuff he’s been through doesn’t excuse his garbage, sometimes immature behavior in canon, but it certainly explains it. (good lord, I could write an essay on how he’s changed by the time of Rivulet’s campaign alone) uh anyway he’s a fascinating character who I spend too much time thinking about thank you for reading if you made it this far lol

(also, gotta say that a lot of these apply to my fic, too, shameless plug and some of them have already been mentioned or alluded to in it—it’s a time-travel fix-it that starts waaay back in the past so if that’s your thing, hey XD)

[the-real-rain-world-confessions]

I'm an oldster in this fandom, relatively speaking. started playing in 2020. I remember when the msc mod became hush-hush. i remember when Hunter was the favorite. i remember when shipping was scarce, a cute little side thing no one minded. there was so much more room to live and breathe the real language of the game. The depth of the lore and the characters was boundless. i remember the day the official discord server hit 15k members.

I love Downpour. I love everything downpour brings to the story of the game (except one thing, fuck Survivor OE ending. it ruins the campaign). I fully believe Downpour is canon, I believe Downpour successfully expands on everything set up in Vanilla. I'm beyond grateful i was able to experience Rain World truly Vanilla, and see the world and characters deepen and expand in such thought provoking and significant ways. Downpour is good. I dont even think the campaigns are that overpowered. With the exception of Gourmand and Rivulet, i think the DP campaigns have really high skill floors, with ceilings even higher. i think it's fine. and i dont care because the stories are worth it.

No, my issue is with the community, the fandom, if you will. I am as gay and allo as it gets. Fuck the shipping scene in this fandom. its fucking oppressive, its boring, surface level junk that actively detracts from the depth of the game. iterator shipping i can tolerate, i still dont mind, its the fucking slugcats. shipping Artificer and Hunter is stupid because they dont live at the same time, arti is probably dead by the time Hunter is made. shipping Artificer and Saint is mega stupid, arti definitely died! i think all these characters, slugs included, have fascinating parallels and reltionships ripe with conflict and intrigue, there's tons to talk about but no who fucking cares, muh fucking artihunter look theyre red and orange they're lesbians. enormous groan. if it was just a silly joke, i wouldnt care, but it's way too much of the fandom now and it blows chunks. unfortunately i love and respect canon too much to be willing to fucking obliterate it as required to actually engage with the slugcat shipping.

i miss when you could just talk about the lore and not have to throw in a big caution sign that you do actually think downpour is canon and good, sorry fellow old guard. i miss when you could just talk about the characters and not have to throw in a big caution sign that you take the game seriously and not as fodder for shipping or warrior cats oc bait.

it begs the question: why are you 1.9 people here? are you here because you love this game for what it is? or are you here just for the fandom? dont ruin this for me like you did to undertale.

- Sliverist

.

[its-the-sa]

do you think there was backlash from other scavs when chief and arti befriended and eventually dated each other?

i imagine that quite a few of them would be less than eager to forgive the war criminal

there definitely was a backlash, but probably not to the extent that you'd expect. or at least not in the way you're thinking. both due to how the cycle works, and how I imagine scavenger culture works, i think a majority of them were willing to accept arti being integrated into the tribe, if only begrudgingly.

first and foremost, because arti didn't kill anyone permanently. there's a huge difference between killing and perma-killing, so while arti's crimes were certainly heinous and left a lot of scavs deeply traumatized, the fact that she didn't actually take anyone away from their loved ones made a big difference as to how many of them were willing to tolerate her presence. as long as she was no longer an active threat, most of them were more concerned with helping each other recover and heal from their collective trauma than with trying to interfere with whatever the king had going on with the murder cat.

secondly, and for similar reasons, I think a certain amount of lethal violence is just a normal part of scav culture. obviously nothing to the extent of what arti did, but based on how recklessly they behave in-game, i imagine it's common for scavs to kill each other over minor disputes, by accident, or even for fun. so, the capacity of scavs to move on and coexist with someone who killed them is a deeply ingrained social skill, because it's vital to keeping their society functioning.

of course, there are rules about how much violence is acceptable in any given situation, and just like anything else, breaking those rules requires payback. scavs keep close tabs on who owes what to whom, so anyone witnessing a murder would have a good idea of whether it's justified or not, and whether it warrants retaliation.

for example, if arti had the restraint to only kill the scavs directly responsible for her pups' death, the rest of the garbage wastes tribe would have been like 'ok yeah, fair'. they would've appointed some new toll guards, and the matter would've been considered settled. arti's reputation only tanked because she went way too far, and started targeting scavs who did nothing wrong.

so i think, to the metropolis scavs, arti's massacre was not so much an unspeakable evil as it was just a massive personal transgression. she slaughtered an entire tribe who owed her nothing, and in doing so, she incurred a massive debt to them. so when the king suddenly took a liking to her and decided to integrate her into the tribe, that didn't mean no one was allowed to harm her; it just meant they'd have to forgive her debt once she paid it.

the scav king really couldn't do anything to protect her from this without causing a full scale mutiny. (and honestly, arti is too proud to let him even if he tried. she knows she dug her own grave, and she's going to fucking lie in it as many times as it takes to earn her redemption)

however, he probably did have to set down some rules regarding how and where her victims were allowed to seek revenge, to prevent them from all mobbing her in the street. i imagine the official policy would've been something like:

all disputes with arti must be settled one-on-one in organized arena matches

arti is obligated to accept a challenge for every death she caused

the challenger can either fight her themselves, or they can choose someone to fight for them

anyone willing to fight for arti may do so if she allows it (she won't)

regardless of the outcome, the fight will be considered a blood payment and the dispute will be forgiven

any unprovoked violence towards arti outside of the arena will be considered violence toward an innocent person

thats about as lenient as he could get away with being, and still be fair enough for most scavs to accept. so, yeah, there was a backlash in the sense that many of them wanted revenge, and many of them got it. but it was mostly within the bounds of what's permissible, and it didn't cause any kind of major rift in their community. arti was willing to pay for her place in the tribe with her blood, and most scavs can respect that even if they still don't like her.

and as for the few who still weren't satisfied, and felt the need to make her suffer more than she deserved...

well. lets say they got a personal reminder of what happens to people who hurt the king's loved ones.

[boyswhowawa]

Artificer Design!!

Or at least me working on it!!

This is the last drawing I did, and I think it really shows off the design well!!!! I really love this design I came up with, and it's with heavy inspiration from @snickerdoodlesart, so a bit more on that, and the design! under the cut

First things first, the reason I chose to take inspiration from Snickerdoodles' design is, because it's just super fucking rad and gender, ajsd;flkkjas;fkldjadkl;sfja

HOWEVER, I understand completely if taking inspiration like this is not okay, and I would be fine with deleting this design and restarting should you say so, Snickerdoodles, genuinely

regardless, some fun stuff!

first things first, I did some studies of Snickerdoodles' design, just simple ones, because I wanted to figure out what it was that I really felt was so like... fantastic about it???

(the answer ended up being "god everything comes together so well, the shapes and the dynamics of the scars and how the explosive things interact with it all just make for such a wonderful design that is like, the PURE energy of the character it comes from, in such a sincere way that I feel like this IS the character in every facet of what they could be")

but what I learned was that like, I wanted to try to have fun with the scars! so that's what I went for!

So then I started sketching, and I had this idea with the face

I wanted the eye scar to be like, totally bright similarly to Snickersdoodles' (admittedly a lot of the face scar comes from snickerdoodles...)

but I knew with some bits *around* the eye I wanted to have these extra little cuts, that sort of just... idk i like doing cheek markings and I thought this was a creative way to do it!! also the eyebrow is just three lines that are sometimes meshed together<3

I really really liked this face, so I keep it going forward

this is the next sketch I did, to figure out where I wanted the scars to be placed!!

this is kind of where I slightly decided I wanted Arti's head kind of hunched forward at all times, big huncho boyo, she's great

I also wanted just, a BIG burst spot on their tail, and like...

then I was like "oh i'm gonna finish this sketch actually"

then I--- inked on the wrong layer. aj;sdlkfja;klsdfjakl;j

so it got stuck like this and I couldn't do anything about it....

I think when I do color my arti properly again, I wanna have it lean over to a reddish dark purple rather than this

also i think the cherry bomb thing being like woven into the spear cloth was too much, and doesn't really work for arti's bomb spears ?

i just messed up a lot, basically

Oh! Also this is where I was like "oh I can put extra little light spots in Arti's scars...."

then I did this to sort of vaguely show what an explosion from Arti might look like, or more accurately, Artificer 'Igniting', rather than just doing bursts, I imagine this Arti revving up and just being extremely hot for a while, letting out bursts of energy still, but not able to do it as easily from a neutral, unignited state

this was SO fun to do, using pink and yellow is really fun when i'm trying to do something with strong energy

this also is where I feel I figured out everything I felt I needed to still figure out with the design, the scar placements, the scar styles, the shapes I wanted, etc. etc.

and then finally, I did a sort of pseudo ref for Arti!

and while I am super happy with this, and super proud

more importantly than that, I want to be sure that this is *okay* with Snickerdoodles, it wouldn't be right of me to just, steal things from your design for my own sake, and it's not like I'm starving for design ideas, I can probably think something else up if I try hard enough, so there'd be no harm done, and if you're at all uncomfortable with me taking inspiration like this, just let me know as soon as you can

[spotsupstuff]

What do you think about the RW ships? just curious is all.

hmmm.. well! first i do wanna preface this with the obligatory "i'm not hating on anybody with this, u do u and i do me is my genuine philosophy. i'll respect u from the distance if you do the same for me"

aight so i'm not gon list every ship in the fandom that has spawned in outta the stardust n give my specific opinion on it, cuz i'm not exactly keepin up

the only two ships i don't mind n find cute on the paper are NSH x Moon and Arti x Gour cuz both of them have that Old People Love Each Other in Easy Peace Despite The Circumstances Surrounding Them kick to them. i'm a weak bitch for that type of troupe for romantic relationships. not gon do anythin with 'em in my own stuff, though

i find myself more interested in the entirely and wholly platonic interpretation of everything in the game. platonic love is a matter of course, makin the story flow feel more smoother to me for that while also stayin nicely close to that religious narrative of the game (u can fight me on this but the Ancients' religion isn't *wrong*. the bad thing that happened with it is that it was taken to extremes and variety wasn't allowed. i could tell you why riddin oneself of the third and fifth sin isn't a bad idea at all- afterall, i kind of live by that myself!- and what they probably meant by riddin yourself of the sins without the extremist approach)

for the other ships... 🤔

well, the iterators are far too rooted in my head as sibs to vibe with ships with them, but more properly told: • Suns and Pebs are too much of "teacher and naive student" to me and i also find this dynamic more interesting to explore. uuuuu how spicy it is to think of Suns brainwashing Pebs but meaning it well uuuuuuuuuu • Suns and NSH are... let's just say that if i was in NSH's place and Suns talked to me like that i'd slap them so fuckin hard n if i WAS in a romantic relationship with them i'd dump them then and there (not in a bitchy ex kind of way, i'd be still down to talk, but i can't imagine bein in a relationship where the other half calls the most likely inevitable death of your closest friend a "setback" to their brainwashing of that friend's little brother would be Very healthy) • n i think what is the only other iterator ship left, Sliver and Moon... i find it kind of silly, honestly? like as far as *i* know the main reason why that exists is cuz Moon remembers what happened with Sliver after being given her own pearl about some notes she wrote herself on Sliver despite being baround three gazillion bagillion braincells short. i don't really see that as a strong incentive to start shippin 'em cuz like. you give Moon a very solid memory jogger and right in her second set of monologue she states that Sliver is literally a legend among the itties-titties. the best i can compare it to a real life thing is asking an american if they have any idea who Abraham Lincoln was at all. or asking a slovak if they knew who Finally managed to solidly establish our language after centuries of oppression. like of Course you're going to know That even on ur deathbed??? those are incredibly important historical figures for you n your home!!! also c'mon she remembers the feckin bug pupae, if THAT stuck in there this big boy info is def gon be kickin around

as for the slugcats... well ehh..... you can probably guess from what i mainly draw that i'm not Too focused on the slugs, only maybe Hunter so my slugshippin lore knowledge is p weak. when i first saw the slugshippin take off before i started postin bout RW again i thought it was silly to ship animals n still kinda do? 🤷‍♀️ doesn't help that canonically they have no business meeting each other except Monk n Surv (that is a strong No to shippin) and Hunter's writhing corpse n Gour (we are Not ducks we do not support necrophilia). i generally like to stick to the timeline, personally. good world-building. i respect good world-building too much to deviate too hard

BUT! i am going to use my status as pre-Downpour RW veteran and tell you to not listen to the whiny wrinkly babies in the tag that wail about how slugshippin is ruining the fandom. fuck 'em bitches, you do what u wanna (within moral common sense)

[savior-of-humanity]

[ OUT ] for Arti and Atreus... but consider, reversed.

The Rain was coming.

Atreus had been totally unfamiliar with it before they had traveled down from Five Pebble's shell a few cycles ago, but he had been very quick to learn just how much of a threat it was. Nothing that lived below the clouds, from the lowly bat-fly to the mighty Vulture, was safe from the danger once it started, as the torrential rains were so powerful and deadly that anything caught in the downpour for too long was crushed to death. Caverns and structural interiors offered no safety, either; anywhere else the rainfall couldn't reach, the rising floodwaters would quickly drown. The only thing that could protect a creature from such destruction was a shelter.

And he had no idea where that was.

Normally, this wouldn't be a problem; Artificer knew the lay of the land far better than he did, and usually she was the one to point the way whenever they had to retire for the cycle. But she was in no condition for that now.

They'd been ruthlessly hunted by Scavenger kill-squads, and while she was perfectly capable of dispatching them, their numbers were so numerous and frequent that she had utterly exhausted herself, sparks and smoke still clinging to her fur. Walking, let alone running, was completely out of the question - he could already tell she was struggling to just stay awake. He could probably carry her on his back in his current form, but considering that he wasn't fully grown, he wasn't sure if he could make it in time with her weight on top of him.

So he did the only thing he could think of in the moment; he shifted back into human form, scooped her up into his arms, and ran for his life.

The earth trembled beneath his feet. The very heavens almost seemed to roar as the rainfall grew stronger, battering against his skin and clothes like hail. The world was ending all around him, and still he kept running - putting his own body between what sounded like Ragnarok all over again and Artificer. She'd done so much for him, he had no doubt that she'd do the same favor for him, but it was about time he return the sentiment for once.

For some ungodly reason, some Scavengers still stick around even despite the torrential downpour threatening to crush anything still stupid enough to linger on the surface. Whether they just couldn't run away in time or were foolish enough to take a shot at slaying them both, he didn't know, but he didn't stop. Not for them, not for the spears that found themselves lodged into his flesh, not even for the rain that battered and bruised him with the strength of stones.

He sees what he's looking for; a box-shaped symbol over a pipe entrance, just barely big enough for him to squeeze into. He has to stop to rip the spears out of his flesh, body hunched over both from the sheer strength of the ever-worsening rainfall and the effort he took to protect Artificer from it. He knew that if he'd been in his previous form, they both would be dead at this point. Still, he manages to crawl inside just before the rain worsens to the point where it would've crushed even him flat.

The shelter is large by a slugcat's standards, but in reality it's still rather small for a young human like himself - at the very least, it had enough space to accommodate them both. Atreus wheezes a bit as he settles into a comfortable position, with Artificer's exhausted form resting in his lap; the wounds ache, and he knows his skin is going to be a painted canvas of bruises just from the rain, but he at least has the luxury of being able to heal from them.

Outside, the roar of the rain is but a distant, comforting din - he can't help but think of summer Midgard rains, and he allows the noise to lull his tired body into a deep sleep.

[fromtenthousandfeet]

Was MHJ Getting Too Big for Her Britches?

I'm still doing my best to keep a neutral stance on Godzilla vs. Kong (PBD vs. MHJ), but a few more questions and thoughts come to mind.

What's with the timing? Why would HYBE risk blowing up NewJeans right before they release new music? Doesn't the company want and need the profit they generate?

Why did they make this situation so public rather than dealing with the matter swiftly and privately? Did HYBE assume there would be no backlash?

Is it true that MHJ has a non-compete clause in her contract and that it's indefinite, meaning she would never be able to work in the same capacity in the Korean music industry ever again? If so, it's pretty clear why she called herself a slave to HYBE.

Now for some observations.

Min Hee Jin is cooked. As soon as a shareholders' meeting is called, whether forced by the SK courts or simply when the next meeting arrives, there's no way she will survive as CEO given HYBE owns an 80% stake in ADOR, and they will certainly vote her out. She's done for.

I don't think HYBE will continue to support NewJeans. They will no doubt release the 4 songs the group has ready to go, but beyond that, they will likely focus on Illit and other GG within the corporation. If NJ does manage to survive, will the level of care and investment into their success be the same? Who knows.

Love her or hate her, so much of what she says in this interview resonates with me as a life-long music lover. I hope you'll take the time to read it, because it's pretty clear why she and Bang PD probably don't see eye-to-eye on much of anything, at least with the way he moves these days. Here's my favorite quote from this interview: "Some BTS fans want to compare how well one member’s album does over another member’s. BTS is a group that’s been around for 10 years now. They did their duty, basically. So I think it’s time to focus less on the stats and just enjoy their music—[let them] do what they want to do." A million times this!!!!!!!

https://www.fastcompany.com/91113146/k-pops-leading-company-has-declared-war-on-itself-this-never-seen-interview-profiles-the-creative-legend-at-the-center-of-it

Did you see how high NewJeans placed on all those Forbes Korea lists? I wonder if Mr. Bang got wind of the lists ahead of time and blew a fuse? I have this nagging sense that NewJeans and MHJ are getting the same treatment Jimin is getting. BPD just can't deal with anyone who is more successful than he is, especially if they don't use his precious methods, strategies, partnerships. But he needs BTS and he needs Jimin to keep the money flowing. Maybe MHJ and NJ are disposable?

Lastly, I saw the original rumors about the potential cult connection on X/Twitter (before the ALLKPOP article) and the suggestion that MHJ was shading BPD in the OMG video. Despite not being a fan of girl groups, I checked out the full video, and truthfully, I loved it. It's arty, clever, and entertaining. I have no comment on the cult imagery because that's not my area of expertise and I don't really care, tbh. But MHJ, after your music career is destroyed, please come here to the US to make music videos or movies.

Here's the video just for funsies.

[pookapufferfish]

1. First impression of me? - big blog so a lil scary but your art and personality were comfy :]

2. Current impression of me? (If it is different from first) - still comfy!! and really nice! u very awesome person that's ur impression >:]

3. Nicknames for me? (If you have any name you just call me for no reason, even stuff like "the pufferfish guy") - lemon fren, citrus fren, lemon, pooka, pufferfish pal, u just the fren of frens

4. Favourite design of mine? (Canon scugs, ocs, any design) - riv and hunter! maybe arti too, also really love spearsona design I like the colors a lot

5. Any advice? (You wanna give me advice about anything. Art tips? Life advice? Perfect way to toast a sandwich?) - keep being the amazing person u are fren!

6. Food I remind you of? - citrus things for probably obvious reasons, but also warm foods like pie

7. What height do you think I am? - :), but also when I didn't know I think I assumed u were taller than me

8. What artwork of mine do you like a lot? (Could be your fav but asking for favs is hard sometimes) - oo not sure, love the comics you've made, also really love the art I have as a pfp on disc a lot too its very cozy

9. Animal I remind you of? - fluffy! like a bear

10. Give me a fun fact, if you want - fun fact, you are an amazing awesome person

I am lemon and I am friend

fun fact you are cool

[artichow]

You know what I’m about to ask you

RyuGin!!!!

OOOOOUH BABY!!!!

hehehehee them :D

Ship It

I am mentally ill about them /pos

What made you ship it?

I... don't know,, can't think of a moment really, although that scene at the end of fury and gingka's little speech may have been a big sign :) what was that gingka :D Also I think like narratively the scene at the end of fusion where gingka catches ryuga while falling has done something to my brain forever, it is so precious and important to me like.... OUURGH my feelings about ryugin is very!!! arti. grhej can't find a better way to describe it, they are a specific idea of ship i have in my brain that i like as someone who is incredibly confused and lowkey scared of romantic relationships and dating in general, that's why to me they are both aroace (jus like me fr,,) and what they have?? complicated but also so simple somehow!! But honestly I think I liked this idea of ryugin pretty early into my rewatch but i was kind of scared voicing it at first because there can be really shitty interpretations of those characters and their dynamic. I also am a fellow ryuga enjoyer who lives in the magical land of delusion and canon rewrite so :')) that helps a lot. But they mean so much omg i love them so fucking much!! I hope I can write coherently about them because!!!!

What are your favorite things about the ship?

Omg so many things... I love how I think about them with the right song and it hits me right in the feels! I love how similar they are and also vastly different their upbringing (mainly hcs on ryuga's side but yk how it is) and destiny was. Like I'm still absolutely going feral over that post from last year I made about both of our first look of them in the show?? Tbf it's the second scene where we see Gingka but still,, where he's on top of a building seeing the whole sky above him, while when we first see ryuga outside of vague flashbacks or the opening, he's in a sort of coma in a weird coffin surrounded by machine? And the shots of their beys parallel each other?? Like gingka is holding pegasus, probably feeling comfort holding onto his companion and momento of his dad, of his village. Meanwhile Ryuga's hand is lose cause he's asleep but it seems L drago is wide awake and already feeding off of him, one was a bey given to Gingka with a heavy burden of a goal but representing hope and the other was stolen, in order to only bring destruction. I think their relationships to their bey evolving throughout the show is super interesting to compare (but that's also because I hc a lot of things about ryuga that aren't canon because sometimes i want to chew on canon and chug it in the "don't care" bin).

Okay I think I only gave one reason FUCK umm I like the similarities and differences in their designs a lot (scarf/coat, headband/crown, gloves/no gloves, rounder features/sharper). That's mostly to do with Mr Adachi's really cool designs but still I wanted to mention it.

I like the hope in it you know? Ryuga's such a broken person but he's also like,, in my au 14/15yo during fusion and still a kid during the series? And how he almost died at least once (i'm also counting fury because no he didnot i don't care) so young and all this time without any form of genuine care or love. Like I like thinking about him mainly because there's not much that can excuse his actions but it's so interesting too? Like i like explaining the path he takes after fusion. How he's stuck in a downward spiral, hungry for power still because to him power is the only way to feel safe and in control, never being used again. But that ultimately keeps him away from genuine connection still and it also drives him to an almost death and just makes him extra stupid during fury :D idk to me fury ryuga felt so much like character regression, they really saw his masters character and went "yeah but what if..." NYWAY I digrace. I like how they're both just kids and the moment Gingka remembers/realizes it during their final fight in fusion is the thing that saves the world, that for gingka to still be Gingka and to save beyblade, how can he not save this other kid in pain. It is in tune with his character but it's also such a huge accomplishment on his part? He went through so much, his friends, his village, his father got taken away because of Ryuga. It's not all because of Ryuga and Gingka probably knows that but still?? He absolutely hated his guts and for good reason too. But I find it just so!!!! I love the idea that despite it all, there can be love after all of that. However you define it, just compassion and understanding <3 It is so cheesy but maaaaannn what are we without the power of love. I just love ryugin so much, i always try very hard to not make it sound like i'm glossing over all the problems ryuga caused and the emotional and mental toll gingka suffered becaus it's here, but also I love to believe that Gingka is just such a beam of light and he truly empathize with people in general, and something in him will always reach out to Ryuga. And that moment when he stopped him from falling to his death is just so!! To me in my hcs and aus and everything it is just the thing that starts ryuga's growth and character developement, like yeah he's still a stupid guy with a lot of issues but he's going to try. At least in my book (i feel like i'm rambling about things that are so far from canon but whatever i'm vibing my brain is vibrating rn). I just keep thinking about that quote from the good place "the point is people improve when they get external love and support. How can we hold it against them when they don't" and i want to tear up a little.

okay i have a couple more i think that i can think of,, vhfdj this is getting so so long,, oopsie. Um anyway, I like to imagine Ryuga actually helps Gingka too (it's not all one sided i promise but look at this mess of a boy) especially in expressing his feelings and communicating, i feel like gingka would and just by nature still struggles with this but because they understand each other's intentions very well most of the time (and that's canon baby) ryuga helps pointing it out if that makes sense. I also love how they're both intelligent while very dumb at the same time like they maybe aren't beyblade geniuses like Yu but they understand that game so well and so quickly i love that a lot. And I like how they both acknowledge it and respect the other for it.

I like how I imagine them both being vagabonds in their young adult years (*cough* snufkin much *cough*) and valuing their time alone but also sharing adventures together and feeling very comfortable with the other and just vibing :)

It's so funny when i think about it like trying to simplify their dynamic in my head cause it's just: gingka to ryuga is the light, the guy that saved him, the thing that changed everything and he can never fully understands it frustrates him but he can't keep away very long evn though he thought he'd always belong in the dark. And Ryuga to Gingka is friend (extra plus edition) :) both so valid honestly gdfhjsdhj

I love that there is SO MUCH angst potential but also this ship just brings me a sense of peace and joy, like it's somehow cozy??? with these two in it?? but yeah :)

they both absolutely annoy and pester the crap out of each other <3 look at them they're so stupid >:) what is my life if every character in the world is not annoying and dunking on ryuga honestly

Is there an unpopular opinion you have on your ship?

this has been such a long post holy shit and i feel like i still have stuff to say :') uuuh unpopular? I guess I hate most of the fanart i see of them unsurprisingly... But that's also just the pinterest side of the fandom like... between the straight up absolute weirdo stuff you never want to see ever again, the perpetual whitewashing of ryuga, the abusive/uncomfortable stuff you find it's just :') but again that's true of a lot of characters and ships in the fandom. Idk if me seeing them as aroace and in a more qpr relationship is unpopular, honestly I feel like we're just us two vibing in the ryugin sphere Hani ghfdjsk

btw now that i'm done writing this whole page i'm thinking "but honestly still i'm not really that big on shipping, i feel pretty normal about them even after putting this much effort into this silly ask :') Anywayy whatever the relationship nature is i just like these two characters a whole lot so yeah it's just such a wonderful dynamic and ship to think about <3

[popculturebuffet]

Since we've done Nickelodeon's Nicktoons, I thought it'd be nice to talk about their live action originals since they're just as important to Nickelodeon's legacy too. The first batch is hard since most of their pre-1989 originals were either anthology shows with no recurring characters (outside the occasional host), are lost aside from one episode of footage at best (ex. By the Way, Nickel Flicks, and Hocus Focus), or game shows and talk shows with only a host as the recurring character. So gonna skip a lot of pre-1989 stuff. Favorite character from some of the following Nick live action originals from 1979-91: Pinwheel (some episodes are on Youtube and the show that started Nickelodeon in the first place), You Can't Do That On Television (the show that began the Nick slime and helped with Nickelodeon retooling in 1984), Out of Control, Hey Dude, The Adventures of Pete & Pete, Fifteen, Welcome Freshman, Salute Your Shorts, and Clarissa Explains It All?

That's fair as i probably haven't seen any of it. I also haven't seen pinwheel, out of control, fifteen, or welcome freshman. But i'm fine with doing this just be warned there will be some eras I have nothing for

You Can't Do That on Television: i've seen this maybe once. it was alright.

Hey Dude: It's a little wild and a little strange, when your living here out on the range. Danny is my faviorite iwth his laidback attitude and nice hats. The show itself.. is okay. It has a great premise, a bunch of teens working on a dude ranch... but it's held back by slow pacing.

The Adventures of Pete and Pete: ARTIE THE STRONGEST MAN... IN THE WORLD! Thoguh Big Pete's a very close second. Okay now THIS is more like it and one of my faviorite nick shows period, one i'm dying to talk about in full at some point. For now Adventures of Pete and Pete is a show I found in college via youtube and dvds and deseves a streaming release. And a proper complete box set. It's a fun show that really captures what it's like to be a kid, with it's exagerated deeply surreal world that's not cartoony but just off enough. Theya lso nicely pair stories; Big Pete's teen stories are usually more grounded: a bigger deal than they would be for an adult, but as big as a teen would see them, while LIttle Pete's are the big bombastic wars you'd expect from a small child railing against the world. The result is pure bilss and well worth your time. Funny, all too real and all it's own, this show is one of Nick's first and finest.

Salute Your Shorts: I saw this one more on teen nick's splat block back when I had cable but I like it. Like Hey Dude it's a tad slow but unlike hey dude has a bit more bombastic characters to make up for it. You have Ug Lee, the counsler, but tmonkey and over the top villian and Danny Cooksey as secondary antagonist yet also sometimes main character Budnick. Add in Donkey Lips and Sponge for color and you've gort a great cast. The Female Cast did feel a bit lacking in comparison, but still felt more fleshed out than hey dude. THe result is a pretty dang fun show with great comedic timing.

Clarissa Explains It All: nananananananana. Alright alright. Ferguson. Was true as a kid, was true rewatching it as an adult: The little shithead is just so delightful egotistical and his plots are a great highlight. The show itself is fantastic, a young melissa joan hart being great and Pushing Up Roses has a greaet video on the shows history. The nicely used fantasy and computer stuff to break up the action and contrasted Clarissa's typical but fun problems with Fergusons zaany schemes and rampant ego perfectly. The result is a fun show that's both creative yet down to earth and relatable.

[declanfs]

10/22/23

Quick little hike at the battlefield, and by quick I mean 3.5 miles of carrying your through the forest. You did not want to ride in the backpack. You did RUN the first .2 miles. Then I gave you a piggy back ride until my arms got too tired and then dada carried you for like 1.5-2 miles. I carried you the last mile or so I think, but it might not have been that far and just felt like it because you weight 32 pounds and are very long. It didn’t help that it was cutting into your ideal nap time, so we can’t blame you.

We saw lots of cool mushrooms, a baby copperhead (possibly), and a cool green and purple caterpillar. I didn’t take many photos because it’s hard to take pictures when your arms are full of a baby.

You still love magnatiles, and this is a house you built all by yourself. You love to make “cloud towers” like from Tumble Leaf and sometimes they are so tall that you have to use a step stool to stack the pieces on the very top. You like to pick things out of the book for me or dad to make, and then you really like to smash them all up. We make garages for mater and lighting McQueen, for your monster trucks, and have made a zoo for your animals and many other random things I can’t remember. I just really liked this thing that you made all by yourself, it looks like a castle and is very arty with how you stood some pieces up and laid others on their sides. It’s fun to watch you play on your own because you get in a super focused zone and you’ll play for 15-20 minutes singing songs to yourself and talking for you people or just talking to yourself as you figure out what you’re doing.

Sometimes your toys get stuck or are falling down and other toys have to help them. Sometimes you just line up every single block or car or magnatile in a line that is like 3 feet to 30 feet long depending on what you are using. Earlier you spent a good chunk of time pouring water into your new balance scale thing. You’re a very skilled pourer and I don’t think you spilled even a drop.

Today you actually helped me with toy rotation. You tell me which toys you want to keep out or put away (usually it’s putting all the last week’s toys away), and then you are entertained for a good hour or more because all the “new” toys pull your play in all kinds of directions. This week the train table has all your construction vehicles and kinetic sand. The playroom has the ABC puzzle, some books, your rock and roll monster truck, the lovevery flowers and peg board, and bubble blowing train that pop and Deedee got you for Christmas last year. You were afraid of the train at first because it’s kind of loud and it didn’t help that it fell on your toe at one point, but now you love it and it played for like 30 minutes straight with its very loud music. **cringe smile**

The last little update is that we went to Belvedere with Granny on Friday. She took the day off and it was perfect. It was a bit cool and the rain didn’t start until we were driving home. Your favorite favorite part was probably the corn maze. I’m going to add two more videos from this day (slide + maze), but you loving the maze was such a funny surprise to granny and me. It’s like you knew exactly what to do and exactly where to go and you basically ran through the entire thing to lead us to the exit without getting lost once. You were gleefully and maniacally laughing as we could barely keep up with you as you raced around the corners, but it was so fun. You wanted to hide in the corn and jump out to scare granny and you were so pleased with yourself about following the paths and leading the way. You are such a joy.

You are still unsure of the big bouncy pillow. I think you are deterred by all the other kids being on there and jumping and running around in complete chaos. Which I totally understand, I bet it feels really scary to be so small and to see all these other bodies bouncing and running around with no predictability. At one point, another boy spun around and his foot barely grazed the top of your head. I don’t even think he noticed because you fell at almost the same exact time and his sock probably skimmed the top of your hair, but you noticed. You said “mama, he kicked me.” So the next time he came over I tried to advocate for you to teach you how to talk to the other kids and how you have to stand up for yourself, but it’s sooo hard. I mostly just made observations about how he almost kicked you on accident and then talked about how it was lucky that no one got hurt. This is so tricky because I don’t know where that kid’s adult was and I feel like all adults handle things differently. And I’m sure that 99% of adults would prefer to handle situations with their kid on their own. But, I promise to work on this. To strengthen my voice so your voice will be strong too.

Another favorite was the corn pit. This was our second time here in two weeks so you knew what you did and did not want to do. The corn pit, the pig races, feeding the animals, the big bubbles, and the obstacle course thing were on your YES list.

Being a pig pal and the zip line swing things were on your NO list. You enjoyed the slide a lot, but we did not do it as much as I expected. I definitely want to go back to Sneads so you can do their mountain slides again, especially if we go on a weekday in the beginning of the week and no one else is there!

We opted to get pumpkins at the store because Belvedere is so expensive and we ran out of time to go on the hayride before they closed at 2. I’m not sure you would have wanted to anyway though, so it’s all good and we will try again next year.