#basically unedited (:

[sleepnoises]

boyfriend got some great pictures of woims and slugs this weekend

[canon-gabriel-quotes]

Transcript:

I'd like to congratulate you on getting your CPR certification.

Now remember, when you’re going in for compressions, it should sound like somebody is standing behind you with the worlds largest Dorito and cracking it open!

Go in firm and hard and snap as many ribs as you can on the way down, that means you’re doing it right.

You save that life. Good luck.

Or... Or... Or kill them, I don’t fucking care.

Audio source

[mumms-the-word]

a random assortment of gales looking sluttily lovingly at you

[the-dragon-girl-27]

I feel like recently I've been doing lots of art i forget to post I should stop forgetting to post maybe ill spam old art i forgor to post at some point

I drew these back when that KAFU game was announced, It doesnt have costumes or modules like project diva from what they've shown i wish they did those here is my ideal world of where they did

[shoku-and-awe]

Met up with @todayintokyo for year-end brunch at the place with real bacon! Both of us had dramatically different hair than when we saw each other last, and I got to try beetroot hummus for the first time! Also, she had the brilliant idea that the two new shots in my arm (Moderna and influenza) might appreciate the company of a third (Irish coffee), and her hypothesis could not have been more correct! Good fun and good food.

[idkwhatimdoingbutslay]

uhhhh... yeah, just had an urge because they make me feel incredibly sane

Caitlyn runs her fingers through Vi’s hair. She practices a pattern, a tried and true routine that Vi always responds to perfectly; dive into the strands at a medium pace, rest, scratch at her scalp one, two, three, four times with nails before massaging her scalp with fingertips, then curl a strand around a finger, but only after going in and out and in and out of Vi’s hair twice. 

Vi keeps Caitlyn close, so close. She keeps her arms wrapped tight around Caitlyn’s thighs, tucking herself deep into the valley between the powerful muscles. Humming into Caitlyn’s skin each time she restarts her process, Vi relaxes completely into the embrace. She makes sure their breathing matches, following the rhythm of Caitlyn’s chest rising and falling with her finger up and down the ridges of Caitlyn’s thigh.

Vi never imagined having times like these; being able to come to a better place after a bad day, having the privilege to bask in such an environment. It’s almost suffocating, but Vi wouldn’t mind losing all of her breath to this feeling, to this ease.

Caitlyn worries, sometimes, when Vi goes quiet. When the air is missing all of the snark and banter; when Caitlyn can hear Vi thinking. Despite the little buzz of anxiety in her blood, Caitlyn appreciates how still Vi is. She’s not antsy or bouncing on the balls of her feet, she’s calm. Not calm with some bubbling underneath, but a real ease that she allows herself to enjoy. She’s proud.

The hand not in Vi’s hair is occupied with a book, fingers running along the texture above the gathered pages as Caitlyn’s eyes scan the page diligently. Caitlyn is about to flip a page when she feels light kisses press along her right thigh, sending sparks all up and down her body. Caitlyn reacts suddenly, her routine coming to a halt as she grabs at Vi’s hair in surprise.

Vi breathes out a laugh, sweet and husky, as Caitlyn loosens her grip and lifts her book out of the way so she can see her partner.

Caitlyn raises an eyebrow at Vi in question. 

Vi does a poor job at concealing her grin behind Caitlyn’s thigh.

“Was missing your pretty face,” Vi grits out, her voice drenched in exhaustion after the day they had. It’s all rough and coy, just how Caitlyn likes it.

“Is that so?” Caitlyn asks, her voice just almost just as rough.

“Mhm,” Vi hums, nuzzling into Caitlyn’s skin.

Caitlyn smiles. “It’s unfortunate that I cannot say the same thing.”

Vi rolls her eyes playfully and scoffs, not daring to pull away.

Flashes of the first time Caitlyn had Vi even remotely like this rush through her mind. After their first days of exploring, discovering and bickering, they laid together and felt in each other’s presence. The first time Vi was willfully vulnerable in front of Caitlyn, wanted and needed to be vulnerable in front of her. 

Now, there aren’t as many insecurities or doubts.

The world around them is just barely scraping by as it tries to build itself back up, but they’re still breathing.

After each loss and each failure, they’re still breathing, privileged enough to do the reparation work they both know they’re meant to do.

By each other’s side.

Caitlyn cups Vi’s face with her palms, running her thumbs over Vi’s cheeks — admiring scars, freckles and a stray tattoo — for a few moments before pulling her up so they can meet face to face. She pauses, causing Vi to raise an eyebrow with a painfully soft gaze. Noticing Vi rolling her shoulder lightly, Caitlyn can’t help but take one hand away from Vi’s face to help ease her shoulder pain just a little bit.

Caitlyn smiles before pulling Vi in, pressing a light kiss onto her lips.

It doesn’t hurt, not like the first couple of times. Neither of them are trying to say a final goodbye or having their tears mix into their saliva as they kiss. Neither of them are angry enough to gnash teeth or reluctant enough to only allow the kiss to last a mere second.

And Caitlyn’s sure those times will come, but she knows that when they do, she’ll never have to guess whether or not it will be their last.

Vi forgets every weight, every Albatross on her shoulders. She doesn’t wait for Caitlyn to come to her senses and run away, she doesn’t run away herself. Instead, she plants her hands right on Caitlyn’s hip and allows the roots to flourish. Caitlyn’s seen it all and she still stays, nurturing and cultivating the seeds of Vi’s growth and attachment. Vi’s seen it all and she can’t imagine not staying, daring to grab a few blooming flowers from Caitlyn’s bush for safe keeping.

“You are so fucking stuck with me, Cupcake.”

“I would fucking hope so, Vi.”

[luckycharms1701]

haha, only *checks notes* 3 days late! my entry for the TMNT Spring Shellebration!! 🌱🐢

mind the tags children

head bonks: @yorshie @avery73 @justalotoffanfiction @thejudiciousneurotic @writinandcrying @xnorthstar3x @morenovix218 @donniesgirlie @gornackeaterofworlds

[depthofpixels]

It’s a shame that such a beautiful game was wasted on such terrible game design.

[teruel-a-witch]

that time Steve took his 'partner' to his aunt's as his wedding date :) (after they got dressed together at his house ;))

Danny: what's with the fluffy green flower?

Steve: I just like it.

Max: ah, Detective Williams, I believe Commander McGarrett is doing homage to the tradition started by Oscar Wilde when a green carnation was worn by men who ...

Steve: Max, I beg of you, please shut it.

[brigidandair]

So, I saw Damsel today...

**Spoilers and complete plot for the movie Damsel will be all over this post, so don't read if you care about spoilers. Also, this is based on one watch only, so if some timeline details are very slightly wrong, that is why, though the important parts I'll be discussing are not contingent on these details.**

I'm not usually one to closely review a movie, but this one left me with a lot of thoughts that kind of sum up a lot of my feelings about big budget movies in the past decade, so here I go.

First off, I did like Damsel. I enjoyed watching it. It was gorgeous to look at, and Millie Bobby Brown did a fantastic job with the role and script she was given. However, I was left feeling like there was something very important about the whole experience missing, and it took me a few moments to really put my finger on it afterwards. The plot was fine, if a bit predictable, and I did appreciate the focus on Elodie as a protagonist. I loved that the dragon was given a plausable reason to want to devour/kill princesses, and that the dragon wasn't slain at the end, even though the opportunity was presented. And oh my goodness, the costuming department did a phenomenal job.

What I want to do here is give a rundown of the plot, and to then give my thoughts, so if you've seen the movie and don't care for a rehash you can skip to the next set of dashes.

--------

So, basic plot: The film opens on a scene of a king and his entourage of knights are entering a sinister cave, where there dwells a fearsome dragon. The king declares that they will defeat the dragon, and his knights charge, but are immediately melted by the dragon's fire, leaving only the king. The king drives his sword into the ground, and falls to his knees, and the scene cuts away before we see what happens next.

Centuries later, Princess Elodie and her little sister Floria live in a kingdom that is beset with hardship. They are low on money and food, and their people are facing a hard winter. So when the king is contacted by the royal family of the kingdom of Aurea--a kingdom they had never heard of, but that seems to be very wealthy--with the proposal that Elodie marry the Aurean prince, the family immediately travels to Aurea to finalize agreements. Amongst the traveling party are Elodie, Floria, their queen stepmother, and the king.

Upon arrival in Aurea, Elodie is introduced to prince Henry, while the kings meet alone. However, when the king emerges from the negotiation chamber, his wife immediately notices that he seems upset and deeply disturbed, though he assures her that everything is in good order, the deal has been made, and their kingdom will soon have more gold than he ever dreamed of as compensation for their daughter's marriage to the prince.

The stepmother queen, sensing something is wrong, goes to Elodie and tells her not to marry the prince, but she has resigned herself to helping her people, even if it means marriage to a man she does not know. That night, she steps out ont her balcony and sees another tower, with another young woman doing the same, before the young woman's maid calls her back inside.

The next day, Elodie is married to prince Henry, and is told of a ritual that is performed after weddings up on a nearby mountain, that honors the trials of their ancestors. They travel up to the mountain, where Elodie is told of the story we witnessed at the opening of the film. When the ancestors of the Aurean people arrived on their island, it was inhabited already by a dragon, who set upon them, raining destruction for the insult of invading its land. Though the king was unable to slay the beast, he was able to broker an agreement. His people would be left alone if he were willing to sacrifice his three daughters to the dragon. So now, whenever a new royal heir is married, they make the trip up to the dragon's mountain, over the chasm that leads to its lair, to commemorate the sacrifice of that original king.

The queen motions to Henry, who then slices his palm, and once Elodie has done the same, they mingle their blood, symbolizing that their people have now become of one blood and line. The prince tells Elodie that, at this point, he is to carry her back across the chasm, and that she should close her eyes. But halfway across, he whispers that he is sorry, and then he throws her over the edge, down into the depths of the dragon's caves.

Elodie survives relatively unharmed, her fall having been broken by many roots and branches along the drop, but there seems to be no way out. Very shortly thereafter, she has her first encounter with the dragon itself, who epresses delight at the thought of getting to kill her, and Elodie is forced to run from the dragon's fire. She hits a dead end, and there she finds the body of the young woman she had seen the night before, half burned, and realizes that they were always ment to be sacrifices to the dragon. The dragon continues to taunt her, breathing more fire down the passage where she is trapped, but she notices a narrow hole in the cave wall that she manages to wedge herself through it, barely escaping and sustaining a severe burn on one leg. She rips part of her dress off, wrapping it around her wound, and continues.

From here, we get a lengthy series of scenes of Elodie navigating her way through the trecherous cave system, hounded at every turn by the dragon. She finds an area inhabited by bioluminescent slugs, which she gathers in another part of the dress that she tears off, to use as a lanter, and finally reaches a small cave where a princess before her has written on the wall that this place is safe, and that the dragon cannot reach there. Written on the walls are the names of dozens of other princesses that, over the centuries, have reached this cave before inevitably being caught and killed by the dragon. Next to the names is a rough map of the cave system, showing Elodie a passage marked with a sun, which she assumes is the way out. She takes time to rest here, falling asleep, but when she wakes up she finds her burned leg covered in the bioluminescent slugs. She tears them away in disgust, but notices that anywhere a slug has been, her wound has been healed. Her determination renewed, she continues.

Elodie follows the directions of the map, making her way to the presumed exit, but finds that there is no way down the sheer rock face. As some riders go by she screames to them for help, but the dragon appears and nearly kills her, forcing her to retreat back into the caves. In short order, she ends up in the cave we saw in the opening sequence, and Elodie finds a three broken dragon eggs, with the desicated corpses of the baby dragons that once inhabited them still in the debris. The scene cuts back to that opening sequence, showing us that before encountering the dragon herself, the king and his knights murdered the dragonlings as they hatched.

Elodie realizes that it was the king who had originally attacked the dragon, killing her only children, not that the dragon had been a tyrant. The only reason she had demanded three daughters was in recompense for the wrong that had been done to her. The deal that had actually been struck was that the humans could only be allowed to survive if, every generation, they continued to pay the same price so as to never stop feeling the pain of losing their children. The kingdom, however, has figured out a loophole. By taking princesses from other countries, they could simply mingle blood, fooling the dragon into thinking that the princesses were actual descendents of their line instead of girls that they only knew long enough to technically become part of their family before being sacrificed.

However, at this point, Elodie's father, having been overwhelmed guilt for selling his daughter, arrives at the caves to save her. Before he finds Elodie, the dragon shows up, killing the king's men and mortally wounding the king himself. The dragon resumes her search, and Elodie is given the time to bid farewell to her father as he dies, and he is given the opportunity to ask her for forgiveness, and to tell her to use the rope that they had used to enter the cave to escape. He tells her that Floria and her stepmother have a ship and are waiting for her. So Elodie forgives her father, and follows his direction, barely escaping as the dragon persues.

When the dragon realizes that Elodie has escaped, she begins to raze the mountainside, creating an inferno that is visible from the Aurean castle. The queen of Aurea sees the destruction, and takes action, going to the ship where Floria and the stepmother are waiting. She has her men kidnap Floria, cutting her son's hand and throwing her into the chasm in Elodie's place. When Elodie finally meets up with her stepmother and learns of Floria's capture, she immediately resolves to retrieve her sister, and she follows the same footsteps that she had taken before, returning to the dragon's main chamber.

The dragon, still set on getting Elodie herself and able to smell that Floria is of the same family as Elodie, sets Floria up as bait for Elodie, but Elodie sets up a distraction, drawing the dragon away. She goes to Floria, who has been injured by her fall into the chasm, and before they can get away, the dragon returns. Elodie takes up the sword her father had dropped before, and manages to position herself directly by the dragon's eye, determined to tell the dragon of how they have both been lied to. The dragon, however, does not believe her, and tey have a battle, where Elodie uses her ingenuity to trick the dragon into severely injuring herself with her own fire. As the dragon lay wounded on the ground, Elodie shows her the cut on her hand, and tells her that the dragon has only been perpetuating the violence that had so hurt her before, killing innocent daughters instead of exacting the revenge she had sought. The dragon tells her to end it, then, but Elodie refuses, instead retrieving some of the bioluminescent slugs and placing them on the dragon's wounds to heal her.

The scene shifts to another wedding, where the third and final princess is marrying the prince, unknowingly destined to become the last sacrifice. As the ceremony nears its end, Elodie, still in the rags of her own wedding dress, walks in. She gives a speech to those present, and tells the last princess to take her family and go. The queen declares that they are not afraid of Elodie, and she says that it isn't her they should be afraid of, right before the dragon arrives, killing the royal family and razing the castle to the ground.

In the aftermath, Elodie's stepmother is given rule of their kingdom, which now has all of the resources that Aurea once owned, and Elodie sails off on a ship, with the dragon flying beside her.

The End.

--------

So, what was wrong with this film? Plot-wise, nothing that would ruin it for me. It was a good story, and, like I said before, lots of fun to watch. But I was left feeling extremely empty. See, at its heart, this story was about the love and loss of children. The dragon was the last of its kind, left alone because of the unthinking cruelty of a king who viewed her as a beast, and cared not at all about the lives of her young. The dragon, though not innocent for all the dozens of lives she took over the centuries, was acting out of pain and loneliness, wishing only that that pain and loneliness be shared by those that inflicted it upon her. She was the one wronged, and the royal line of Aurea callously shunted their punishment off on the innocent and desperate. They did not deserve their prosperity, so the storyline had to lead to the breaking of that cycle, but the problem is that the film focused more on the retribution and that Elodie herself was badass than it did on any emotion.

And that's the big big thing. This movie left me empty because it was empty. Elodie was awesome, and she ended cycle of death, but we didn't know anything else about her. We get told she is clever, so that we don't question how her plans always end up working. We are told that she is capable, so that we don't question how she always manages to pull through. We are told that the prince is somewhat reluctant, but only barely, so that he doesn't seem too cartoonishly evil. We're not given enough to know the extent of his guilt, or enough to really know how complicit he is, or if it's really that his mother (who honestly is kinda cartoonishly evil) forcing the issue. It seems like we're supposed to kind of like him and feel bad that he doesn't want to kill these women, but it feels like it's only halfway suggesting the idea instead of developing aything. Elodie's stepmother is kind, but we are barely shown any of that, instead glossing over any real emotional connection in favor of action. She basically exists to give very heavyhanded foreshadowing, to tell Elodie when Floria is taken, and so they can say that Elodie doesn't have to be bound to royal duty after the death of her father, because there's someone else who can do it. And we're just told that Floria and Elodie are close. Floria seemingly exists solely as a plot device to make Elodie choose to face the dragon after her escape.

The glow slugs are a deus ex, somehow capable of healing life-threatening wounds on both humans and dragons in seconds, which seems to be just so they can pretend for a second that Elodie could really get hurt, but then have her in good enough shape to escape before her family leaves or the next princess is sacrificed. And also so that she can prove how badass she is by mortally wounding the dragon and having it at her mercy, but still have it up in moments, ready to come toast the real bad guys.

And Elodie's character is, unfortunately, also stuck with this same shallowness. She's intended to subvert the "damsel in distress" trope, and she kinda does...except that there are numerous times she is saved by pure luck, and the plotline of her having to go save Floria is just straight up doing the trope, just with a princess saving the damsel instead of a prince. I didn't even catch the names of the queen or king of Aurea, the prince's name (which is as bland as he is) is only spoken a couple of times, and the stepmother, who is arguably one of the more major characters aside from Elodie and the dragon, gets about 3 minutes of screentime and doesn't have a name that I can recall. Neither does the dragon, for that matter, though at least we get to see her more than the stepmother.

This is a story stripped down to its bare bones, and it's only as much of a huge shame as it is because there was real potential. I can't help but imagine how much better it could have been if given even another 45 minutes to help us understand and connect to our characters. I would have loved a real conversation with the dragon, getting to really feel her pain and experience the true cathartic acceptance and regret for what was done to her and what she did in response, instead of cutting away to the last wedding. I would have loved to see the dragon show any dimension of character other than anger and cruelty. I would have loved to see the prince wrestle with himself, or try to push back at all, or see the true struggle that Elodie's father experienced before he reached the conclusion that he'd made a mistake and needed to go save his daughter. Why did the ancestor king of Aurea choose to kill the dragon in the first place? It's implied by the end that the dragon was attacked unprovoked, but we don't really know. Was the dragon actually a hostile force that made them want to kill her, or was she simply there and the king wanted to eliminate a potential threat? Did no other princess ever try to talk to the dragon, espcially when they had a safe cave they could shout from, and the dragon conveniently seems to know when to immediately murder someone or let them speak for the plot? Why would the dragon continue to harbor such strong feelings for so long, and think she was truly achieving justice and exacting revenge when the humans were obviously thriving so?

And what do they plan to do from here? We know Elodie wants to travel and see the world, because she (once again) told us so, but is she doing that? And what of the dragon? We're told that she is the last of her kind, but how do we know there aren't any more elsewhere in the world? Is every gleeful murder of an innocent girl at her whim just forgiven and forgotten because she wasn't killing who she thought she was, and now centuries of hatred and bias has evaporated entirely, making her a friend of humankind? The ending could have been made better in seconds, should we have been given any kind of closure for either Elodie or the dragon in any way at all. Perhaps they're going off together to explore the world, to find out for sure if the dragon is truly alone or if there are more of her kind out there. Perhaps the dragon really does know, definitively, that she's the last, and so has decided to accompany the princess that ended the tragic cycle that defined her for so long, to keep her safe as she lives life the way she always wanted. Maybe the dragon has vowed to atone for her cruelty towards humans by going with Elodie, assisting the different peoples they encounter in their travels. Hell, even if a single narrated line was given that told us "and so they went on many adventures, and lived their lives to their fullest" it would be unsatisfying, but not as unsatisfying as the actual ending.

It just...it could have easily been vastly improved in almost every emotional sense. Caring about our characters, their motivations, their struggles, and the emotional heart of grief and loss could have made this a deeply moving film, but the focus was instead placed on the princess saving herself. And I get the desire to do so, the desire to subvert that trope, but a story can't be a full, satisfying arc with just that. It's the same problem we keep seeing with big budget companies and their attempts to cash in on social issues. Don't get me wrong, I'm glad for any progress, even if it is largely a soulless cash grab, because any progress, however small it may be, is still heading towards an eventual shift in social consciousness, and thus permanent change. But this film wanted to get the brownie points for having a badass princess who doesn't need a prince to save her, and so they ONLY cared about that. It wanted to show off its budget and CGI, and "subvert" the trope, but it missed everything about why women might want a capable subversion of these longstanding, sexist tropes.

A capable woman isn't solely defined by the fact that she is capable. The point isn't to say "I can do anything a man can," but that's what this film makes it out to be. Elodie, and the entire story itself, is stripped of literally anything but what it needs to be to keep the plot moving. The story keeps saying it's about Elodie, and how she overcomes the obstacles in her way, but at the exact same time, it doesn't care about her at all. It cares about appearing to care about her story, and it's so frustrating to see all that potential wasted on such soullessness. It's like having every piece of a puzzle, but the filmmakers only bothered to put together the edge pieces, threw the rest in the garbage, and called that good enough. So instead of a beautiful, satisfying picture, we're left knowing that the rest of the pieces exist, but that they'll never be put in their rightful places, and that the beauty it could have communicated has been wasted.

So yeah, I liked this movie, at least in that I enjoyed the concept and the actual watching of it to a certain extent, but I wanted to love this movie. I hate how good it could have been, and that if it were given the love and care it needed, it could have been made into so much more.

At the end of everything, a story isn't just a spectacle. It's sharing and exploring our lives, ideas, and humanity through imagination and creativity. The beauty of fantasy is imagining what people would do when put into extraordinary situations, or at least imagining the extent of ourselves we wish we could be. A story like this one can be fun once in a while, but a truly good story, one that you remember and carry with you, usually remains because it resonates with you. And it just really sucks that Damsel denies its characters of their emotional cores, because when you eliminate the emotion of a story, the viewers are denied a connection to the humanity that makes that story worth telling.

[toiletshit]

[essektheylyss]

I have been grumpy with my Essek voice while writing this week so I'm watching the last supercut and honestly it's so funny that Essek somehow ended up with the highest number of eyes of the Nein except for Beau and Caleb despite not even having been present when the book was first foisted on them, because he got targeted that many times by the Somnovem eyes during the last fight.

[blueflyingturtleontheway]

So, I've heard some voices here and there lamenting how little Gabe content - especially new Gabe content - there was and you know what? I completely agree, so I thought why not, I can try to add my little droplet into this tiny sea of Gabe appreciation we have here on tumblr.

Summary: Elena visits Gabe in his house for the first time and learns something new about his past.

Word count: 1937

AN: just some friendly fluff really, headcanon heavy, from Elena's POV but Gabe centric

"Oh, watch out, the first step is-" Gabe turned around just in time to catch Elena when she started to fall backwards. "-loose."

"Thanks for the warning." Elena shot him a glare when she regained her balance. In response Gabe only sent her an unapologetic grin and pulled her up on the next step.

"Everyone's so used to it by now that we keep forgetting to fix it with my dad," he explained as they finally reached the first floor.

The stairs led to a narrow corridor, with the same room placement as the bakery beneath it. Two doors on the right, one on the left and a wide opening to the living room at the end. In a few brisk steps Gabe opened the door on the left and invited Elena in with a courteous gesture.

"Welcome to my humble abode, your highness."

Her highness graced him with a nod and slipped by him, into the small room. Elena gave it a quick one over. It was indeed small - in fact, there probably wasn't much more space than what each guard got at the barracks - and the decor wasn't much fancier either. Cream colored walls, a thin bed by the window, a wardrobe opposite of it, one wall taken up by a bookshelf and a small cabinet by another made up basically all the furnishing of the room.

"Humble is a good word." She nodded solemnly, earning herself an eye roll from her friend. They both chuckled.

"Hey, it's your room that's out of the norm, you know?"

"I have no idea what you're talking about," Elena retorted, thinking about how three or even four such rooms would fit into hers. She walked over to the cabinet and picked up some trinket. "But it's nice to finally see where you grew up."

Gabe couldn't stop a fond smile sneaking onto his lips when he noticed the badge she was examining.

"Yeah and I didn't really get to change much here in the past five years. For example this thing I got back when-"

"Gabriel!" He was interrupted by his mother's voice from the bakery.

"I'll tell you in a moment," he sighed. "Make yourself at home!" He added from the doors and quickly ran downstairs to his parents.

Elena took another look around the room. It wasn't entirely empty, she had to admit that, and the poster of Antonio Agama on the inner side of the door confirmed that Gabe didn't change the decor much since he moved out.

She moved to the bookshelf and moved her hand across the titles - though there weren't that many of them to count. The lower shelves were taken up by some boxes and bags and what could've been a neatly packaged tent. Then finally a whole shelf dedicated to the whole collection of Antonio Agama's books. Elena chuckled to herself when she read some of the more dramatic titles and noticed even one that wasn't in Avaloran. On the next shelf, between other various travel books and biographies, was only one book by señor Agama, titled simply 'The Gecko's Tale'. Driven by a hunch she took it out and couldn't help but laugh when she read the blurb on the back. Although that explained how the whole kingdom found out that she's a bit adventurous too.

Finally her gaze got to the plant on top of the mantle. Hidden so deep in the room, it extended its ivy like stalks towards the sun, climbing a string helpfully hung between the bookshelf and the window.

Down on the windowsill two other plants looked out on the little cobbled square behind the house. Elena leaned in to smell the orchid and noticed something half hidden behind the pot. Slowly, so as not to accidentally damage the plant, she reached for trinket and retrieved it into the light. It turned out to be a wooden doll, painted to resemble a familiar navy and maroon uniform...

"Is this you?" She turned to Gabe as soon as he entered the room and showed him the figurine with a wide smile.

Gabe stopped for a moment. Furrowed his brows as he tried to see what Elena was even holding, and then furrowed his brows even more when he recognised it.

"Of course not," he grumbled, closing the small distance between them. "It's just an old thing anyway."

"It does look a bit like you though." She jumped away from him at the last moment.

Gabe gasped. Elen giggled and moved her hand away when he tried to reach her.

"Why would I even have a figurine of myself?"

For a moment they circled each other, like two lions judging if it's worthy to fight the opponent for a steak, except the steak was now wooden and 15 centimetres high. They both hunched subconsciously and made their steps in the fencing manner.

"I don't know, why does Esteban have a whole wall of his own portraits?" A sly grin slid on her face. "But I see you've decided to match his collection."

"Oh now you've done it." Gabe shook his head to hide his smile and in the split of a second was right by her. Feigning to go right for the prize, he swiped her legs out from under her.

Elena waved her hands in the air giving Gabe just the opportunity he was waiting for. He swiftly yanked the figurine from her hands, giving her the last push to fall backwards completely. He turned his head with a victorious grin, just in time to see her legs rising at the height of his knees. And suddenly the ground was much closer than before.

He folded his arms to his chest, protecting the figurine with his body and rolled on the floor. Though he didn't have to roll far, of which he was promptly reminded by his head crushing into the cupboard.

He groaned loudly and let his body fall limply to the floor.

His pained complaint was answered by Elena's laughter from the bed.

"I'm getting too old for this," he mumbled and Elena's laughter only got louder.

Finally he sat up and lifted the figurine to his face. He carefully examined it for any cracks or splinters, checked if the joints in the limbs didn't fall out and most importantly if the head was still on firm. Finally when he made sure the trinket didn't get damaged, he let out a relieved sigh.

"You're lucky it's still whole," he grumbled, rising to his feet.

"Hey, I was being careful." Elena now sat up too and sent him a playful smirk. "All the way until you decided to trip me like that."

Gabe rolled his eyes again and huffed in pretended annoyance.

"So if it's not a limited edition General Nuñez action figure," Elena continued. "What is it?"

Gabe sat down next to her and thought of an answer for a moment. He changed the position of the little soldier's arms and reached for a pin to put into his hand as a sword.

"It's really just an old toy," he said finally. "But you know, it has sentimental value."

He finally passed Elena the figurine, so she could take a look at it herself. It wasn't as old as she thought at first. The paint was faded, but still held onto the uneven surface of the wood and as she moved her fingers across it, she realized that it must've been all whittled by hand, by someone who put great care in it, but wasn't a professional.

Still the amount of details was impressive, especially in the construction of the thing. She moved the tiny soldier into the proper fencing position and to her delight found out that it fits flawlessly, the wire on the joints creaked quietly, as if it had been waiting for an opportunity to shine for ages.

She glanced between the figurine and Gabe on her left for comparison. The uniform, despite the familiar colours, was a tad different, it resembles more what she remembered from her childhood, than the uniform Gabe was wearing at the moment.

"I got it from my first fencing teacher," he continued.

"The same one who threw coconuts at you driving training?" Elena raised a brow, earning herself a chuckle.

"Yeah, the same one." A sad smile reached the corners of his eyes as old memories resurfaced in his memory. "He was a tough man and always talked about how big an annoyance I am, but -" he gestured to the figurine and shrugged.

"Well, that explains why it looks like you," Elena bumped him with her shoulder. "I'm sure he could've already seen that you'll be a great guard."

"Oh, I don't think he even wanted me to be a guard," Gabe laughed again. "But you know, the situation was a bit different." He pondered something for a moment before continuing. "And to be fair, I didn't even realize that it was supposed to be a guard at the time, I was pretty sure he just came up with the design by himself. I only really connected the dots a few years ago, when I found this old thing again."

Elena nodded silently and put a comforting hand on his arm. She could see that this topic wasn't easy for him.

"Though maybe what you said was the point." He straightened suddenly and his gaze went back to the figurine. "Maybe he wasn't completely against me joining the guard, just... joining the right one."

His smile became wider and it was like his whole face lit up. Elena raised the little soldier's arms to make it cheer. They both laughed at how expressive this piece of wood was.

"So where is your coach now?" Elena asked, caressing the wooden toy one more time.

He only sighed at first and for a moment his gaze became clouded again, before he shook his head to cast the memories away.

"I wish I knew," he sent her a sad smile. "One day he just... disappeared. A few trinkets and one letter is all the proof I have that he wasn't just my hallucination."

Elena's lips twitched in a matching sad smile, but before she could say anything, they both heard a voice from downstairs, calling the unmistakable word 'dinner!'

Gabe clapped his hands on his knees and sprung up to his feet.

"Ah, just in time", he extended his hand to Elena. "I think eating is a much more fun topic than discussing the weird things I did in my childhood."

Elena examined his face for a moment more, but gave up on asking all the questions that pushed to the tip of her tongue. She sent him a smile instead and accepted his hand.

"Oh, you mean you did more weird things?" She made the little figurine gasp.

"I feel like I shouldn't have started this topic," Gabe laughed.

"Oh no, you won't escape now." She poked him in the chest and put the little soldier in his hand. "I gotta know all the crazy stories."

"Okay, okay, I'll tell you something," Gabe raised his hands in defeat. "But you can't mention it to my parents, please, they'll never stop until they tell you my whole life story."

Elena made a theatrical gesture of tapping her lips in thought as she backed out of the room.

"I'll consider it," she sent him a wide grin and in a second turned and ran towards the stairs.

"Hey- wait!" Gabe called out, running right after her to save what was left of his reputation.

[lialox]

I really want to write 'Three Ways to Survive in a Ruined World'.

Not the whole thing. But like, excerpts.

I know there are a lot of young readers out there that rely on stories. I want to code some very specific lessons into another person's story.

Like, how to do well in interviews. Resume reviews.

How to figure out what career you want.

How to find your first apartment.

The cheapest and easiest possible recipe I have.

How to use household appliances.

How to file your taxes.

How to make friends in a new city.

Simple tips on how to save money when you've just been tossed out into the world.

[yuripira4e]

in honor of just getting to 10k words on my first draft of this here's a little snippet of something I have planned/ written

Damon had returned two days later, at nearly last light. The cover of darkness had almost been enough to shield the black and blue bruising blooming over his skin. He had tried to hide his new limp from her, but the blood soaked through his bandaged knee said more than words could carry through her naïve skull.

Sit down dragonfly. I have something to show you. The words had been laced through with pain, his bruised face more visible in the light, even if he tried to hide it behind his honey-warm smile. Marked almost impossibly without touching the edges of the royal seal. No cuts either.

He had walked her to her bed chambers, tucking her in before beginning to set aside the steel gauntlets that nearly always adorned his legs. She sat guiltily away from him, still feeling the low churn in her stomach at the thought of him being tortured in forfeit of her stupidity. They said nothing as he had carefully pulled down the cloth that kept the steel from rubbing too uncomfortably against his shins and had laughed when Jude had made a face, turning up her nose at the older man who had feigned offense in return, making a show until Jude had removed her hands from her nose and sat closer.

Looking closely, she had watched as he turned the warm bronze part of his foot over to reveal the lighter half and its numerous blisters and pains. It was only when she looked toward the curve where his toes met his sole that she saw it.

“Damon!” she’d shrieked. He’d shushed her quickly, his wide eyes contrasted by the exhilarated smile on his face.

“Damon” she’d whispered even more fervently; reverently, because in jagged, blocky cuts, still red around the edges, and probably illegable to anyone who wasn't so well acquainted with the man before her, were the letters R and J.

“Yes, I do think I may have gone slightly dim when I was down there. Too late to do anything about it though. I did it with a stone. And no, Rireran doesn't know, and you're not going to tell him. He'd have my head.” he explained easily, though she discern the nervous truth of the statement. If the guard would be mad, it would be nothing on their high mages wraith when Damon did something foolishly impulsive.

“This is dangerous! My father would-“

“He would cut it off at best.” He admitted, waving his hand like it was a non issue. “And he would be right to do so. My oath has been tattered by this. Even just the intent.”

“.. Why?” was all she could think ask him.

He stared at her, the corner of his lip twitching down sadly for just a moment.

“You cannot choose your creed, dragonfly, nor your blood, and certainly not the seas of your birth, but you can choose what choices you make. I made this one. I respect your father with every bone in my body. He is our king. But.. I regard Rireran with every divide of my soul. He is more than an oath. He is the path of my retribution. He is the article of my faith and all my devotion. As are you.” he told her softly, gathering the plush sheets to tuck around her even more tightly before continuing.

“My oath garters that I should not feel what I feel, and I wish I could be selfless enough to stick to it. But I cannot.

When I was down there- the only thing I wanted was to tuck you into bed. To tell you this was not your fault. I thought about playing squares with Rireran. That I should replace that ugly burgundy and brown board. I wouldn’t though. Because it is ugly and I hate paisley but it's the only thing in my room I had with memories of either of you.” he rambled, trying to force all the words out. “This is for me. It’s for me.” He repeated at her like she didn’t believe him. Like everything he did was not a testament to her. “It’s my reminder to myself that I will not always be strong enough, and it’s my promise that I will protect you and honor my oath despite it. That I would mar every inch of my skin in your name.” He breathed out shakily, before running a large hand over her curls.

“You are kind, Jude, your guilt proves it. And I know you will be a wonderful queen, but at times I wished you to be a more selfish child.”

He had been crying then, she remembered. Yet he had looked so sure of himself- of her. So sure even if her small brain didn't understand anything else, it might've been able to comprehend the affection he held so openly. Vulnerable in a way he never shied away from, even when she couldn't seem to hold him in the same esteem. At that moment Jude did not feel kind. The only kind thought in her head was the voice of the man in front of her, gently guiding her in rights and wrongs. And she had watched as her kindness had been carried away like a fish at the butcher and spoiled in ways she might never know.

“You're going to die of an infection” she had responded instead, choking down any wetness that threatened her eyes and voice, yet he let her small hands poke the heel nonetheless. He laughed as she had traced the J. She tried not to think of her father. Of her mother. She stared ahead at the awful, bloody mess on the foot of the man who had raised her and committed it to her mind like a portrait, one she would hide away so that maybe the mildew that infected every other thing that could be beautiful of her mind- it could not touch it.

It would stay dry and hidden, but It would stay hers.

[whiskingskin]

Something I've heard over and over and over again from my genderqueer friends about testosterone is that they're terrified to start, cause it'll make their anger?? Worse?? Maybe it was me finding myself In a body more comfortable, or me already being in therapy and conscious of my emotions and their impact but. Being on testosterone made a lot of my emotions feel more manageable.

Testosterone doesn't make you angrier. Testosterone doesn't transform you into this man-beast that yells at everybody and is suddenly horny all the time. Testosterone doesn't affect your problem solving skills, your people management, or your lack of foresight into your own anger like?

If you're routinely blowing up at the people in your life then yeah. Yeah, testosterone might make that action feel a bit easier and wilder. But if you, you know, acknowledge your emotions and allow yourself to experience them without taking them out on other people... then that. Won't. Happen.

You will never be able to control your emotions. Never ever ever. But you CAN and WILL control your reactions to these emotions.

Idk where my rambles were supposed to go but. Testosterone doesn't make you an angry person. You might BE an angry person, just on your own, and that's fine. What's not fine is taking that anger out on others and blaming it on testosterone. You're not the victim, you're just a dick.