#but I just can't pass this up.

[letitbeswaggedout]

[inkskinned]

you're in the habit of denying yourself things.

if someone asked you directly, you would say that you love a little treat. you like iced coffee and getting the cookie. you drink juice out of a fancy cup sometimes, and often do use your candles until they gutter out helplessly.

but you hesitate about buying the 20 dollar hand mixer because, like. you could just use your arms. you weren't raised rich. you don't get to just spend the 20 dollars (remember when that could cover lunch?), at least - you don't spend that without agonizing over it first, trying to figure out the cost-benefits like you are defending yourself in front of a jury. yes, this rice cooker could seriously help you. but you do know how to make stovetop rice and it really isn't that hard. how many pies or brownies would you actually make, in order to make that hand mixer worthwhile?

what's wild is that if the money was for a friend, it would already be spent. you'd fork over 40 without blinking an eye, just to make them happy. the difference is that it's for you, so you need to justify it.

and it sneaks in. you ration yourself without meaning to - you don't finish the pint of ice cream, even though you want to. the next time you go to the store, you say ah, i really shouldn't, and then you walk away. you save little bits of your precious things - just in case. sometimes you even go so far as putting that one thing in your shopping cart. and then just leaving it there, because maybe-one-day, but not right now, there's other stuff going on.

you do self-care, of course. but you don't do it more than like, 3 days in a row. after that it just feels a little bit over-the-edge. like. you can't live in decadence, the economy is so bad right now, kid.

so you don't buy the rice cooker. you can-and-will spend the time over the stove. you can withstand the little sorrows. denial and discipline are practically synonyms. and you're not spoiled.

it's just - it's not always a rice cooker. sometimes it is a person or a job or a hug. sometimes it is asking for help. sometimes it is the summer and your college degree. sometimes it is looking down at scabbed knees and feeling a strange kind of falling, like you can't even recognize the girl you used to be. sometimes it is your handprint looking unsteady.

sometimes it is tuesday, and you didn't get fired, and you want to celebrate. but what is it you like, even? you search around your little heart and come up empty. you're so used to denying that all your desires draw a blank.

oh fuck. see, this is the perfect opportunity. if you had a mixer, you'd make a cake.

[biggest-gaudiest-patronuses]

real talk having the 2nd worst new years eve yet 🤢🤢🤢 (throat infection, twisted neck, banged-about-foot, ego AND the rest o' me all bruised like misjuggled peaches 🍑🍑🍑)

im bent outa shape and suspectin the universe owes me 8 buck if anyone wannsa chip in

[lotus-pear]

the dialogue choices in this game should be more diabolical

[yeyinde]

now why would you hide these in the tags..

also thinking maybe reader is newcomer too, maybe on vacation. everyone knows not to mess with price, say things about it never ending well.

but reader pays them no mind, thinking that their overreacting. of course, they aren’t, and reader is forced to check out of their hotel and into their new forever home with price <3.

and he's your first experience with an alpha, too. like sheltered reader, surrounded by betas your whole, stumbling onto John Price, of all people. but of course you're curious. you've never met an alpha before outside of the ones in your school - all the same age, the same hormonal shifts at the same pace; it's just not the same, is it?

and despite the tug between you, he can see where this going when you start batting your eyes at him, and softening under the burn of his glare. you're not going to like it. you'd never be able to handle him. and he tries to tell you this. warn you away. find a beta, a smaller, younger alpha. he doesn't care - just stay the hell away from him.

but you've been doted on your whole life and English Burt Reynolds isn't going to be the first man to tell you no.

so you push. prod. dig a little deeper. lay it on thick until his presence, a novice in your life, triggers the first stirrings of a real heat. forced proximity. freak storm. one bed. he breaks before dawn, but before you can even start to feel triumph, the reality of getting fucked by an older, more experienced alpha rears.

maybe you realise this when he pulls his fat, angry looking cock out, and barks at you to get back on the bed because he hasn't even started yet, and if you wanna strut around town, aching for his knot, well. he'll give it to you.

problem is: he's too big. too rough. you've been treating yourself like fine silk, something precious, and what he gives you (after growling at your pussy that he can't wait to break her in) is nothing at all like you were expecting. and this idea of a heat making you malleable, soft and ready, falls to pieces when you remember that anatomy isn't magic and no amount of fever in your blood will ever soothe the ache of him eating you up like a man starved.

but hey. you got the big, surly alpha in the end, didn't you? guess no one taught you the meaning of a pyrrhic victory.

[majimasleftasscheek]

kazumaji week 2024 - karaoke kings

oughhoughg matching outfits... 😩💖

[chalkrub]

art trade w/ thrak800 on twit - love this fella !

[beargregor]

wait i'm curious, what makes you say that gregor doesn't like everyone else (if i read that post right)? just curious since i've never seen anyone else say that

i don't necessarily think gregor dislikes everyone else at lcb but i do think that gregor is an incredibly petty person that isn't nearly as close to the rest of the sinners and even outright dislikes some of them cough cough rodya cough cough which a lot of people just Refuse to see because he's as much of a doormat as he is. there's several examples i could get into to try and prove my point however i'll just focus on what i personally think to be the biggest ones.

additionally, this is going to be kind of long, so i'm adding a read more. read more! read it. sorry for being so wordy. i have several diseases.

Pt1. gregor is the type to try and get along at least decently with everyone, especially if he gets a good first impression from them.

this is less a point in favor of gregor's distance w/ the rest of the sinners and more just a contributing factor to it. once again there's several examples i could point to here but i think the most in your face one happened in canto I with yuri, as several people have pointed out. even before gregor comes clean about growing attached to her as quickly as he did because she reminds him of his sister, we get this interaction.

i'll go ahead and make the disclaimer now that i don't necessarily think gregor is the most reliable of narrators, especially when it comes to his feelings and interactions with most people, but from the way he acts when the topic of yuri comes up (and the way we still see him act even all the way up to c7, nearly a whole year after yuri's death) i don't see reason to question his sentiment here. gregor immediately got that aya and yuri were close, potentially even taking note of their traded belts, and went out of his way to get something nice for yuri despite hardly knowing her.

i feel like a lot of people have forgotten as much, especially since it's been so long since c1, but gregor actually spent a good bit of season 1 doing the exact same thing with the other sinners! gregor reads a connection between him and ishmael pretty quickly despite getting off to a rocky start

mostly because gregor can tell that ishmael is pretty sardonic in a very similar way to him. there's been multiple instances where ishmael and gregor have essentially expressed the same sentiment at different moments, most notably gregor's little argument after ishmael got shot with a decay ampule in c4

and ishmael's response to pilot talking about self-sacrifice in c5

i could go ahead and pull up more examples, but in general pm has gone out of their way to show us that gregor and ishmael are pretty similar, so it makes sense for gregor to assume that they're friends, right?

this will be pushpin 1. keep note of this for Later.

ishmael's only the first sinner we see gregor trying to do this with in s1, we also see him try it out with heathcliff, sinclair, and ryoushuu

he's tried to get along with charon, being one of very few sinners that we've seen actually try to establish a connection with her at all

even rodya, despite my insistence that gregor doesn't like her nearly as much as the fandom thinks he does

all of these seem pretty fine and dandy, right? sure it frequently leans towards self-degradation, micromanaging, and commiseration, but gregor can at least be pretty chummy with most of the sinners, can't he?

Pt2. hell's chicken was more than just comic relief guys please

i'm fully aware that this is quite the hot take, but i think hell's chicken deserves a lot more credit for character writing than the fandom gives it. hell's chicken gave us foreshadowing for several events, such as the donqui bloodfiend reveal

heathcliff's distortion in c6 (as well as hong lu's highly speculated distortion at some point in the future)

and ryoushuu and sinclair's continued connection by making him the odd one out on her team

which, hey! that implies something about gregor's odd one out, don quixote, too, doesn't it? yes. yes it does. that's pushpin 2. keep note of that for later.

speaking of pushpins, hey! that's pushpin 1!

splitting into teams is one of the major events in hell's chicken, and most of the sinner's choices are either motivated by very little, backhanded, or motivated primarily by not wanting to be on the opposite leader's side. i didn't include all of the picks, just because i feel like including most of them already gets this across, but i think gregor took one major thing from this: most of the sinners, when push comes to shove, will only side with gregor when they refuse to or can't take his opponent's side.

now, don't get me wrong, i'm fully aware that this is primarily intended to be comedic relief, but when gregor is being described as having his trust broken by ishmael or nearly crying because no one on his team properly sided with him for him, i feel like it's pretty fair to read into this.

something that i think is pretty important to remember in conjunction with this is that we know that gregor is the type to hold a grudge, both from his general attitude towards the G corp soldiers in c1 as well as his continued distaste for vergilius

even beyond the splitting into teams of hell's chicken, the sinners have given gregor plenty of reasons to feel bitter. i feel like this is something people have noticed but haven't really put a finger on, but it's kind of wild just how often the rest of the sinners make gregor the butt of the joke

and sure, we could argue that a fair few of these aren't really made with any ill intent. quite a bit of it could have been meant as harmless teasing, but with gregor being more sensitive than most, it coming from nearly all sides, and as often as it does? yeah, i think he's prone to taking it a bit personally.

Pt3. yes i do still think gregor was the third most important character in canto VII you guys gotta hear me out okay

of course, all of this leads up to the bit of the story i highlighted, doesn't it? c7? i totally get why people haven't really picked up on all the gregor things i did in it, seeing as they were mostly not *directly* said about him or by him.

personally, i think that gregor's distaste for talking about himself on any serious level and thus leading to him getting sort of "sidelined" narratively (which i take issue with that claim, but still. it's effective for getting what i mean across atm) is supposed to lead players to take a deeper look at the times gregor gets held up to other characters and compare and contrast what's being said about them by the matchup. as i showed earlier with his immediate latching onto ishmael, i think this is something gregor himself is at least partially aware of too.

so, that begs the question, who was gregor compared to in canto VII that makes me think it's one of the most critical pieces in understanding his character?

really, i'd like to avoid getting too lost in the analysis of this canto specifically, since i'd like to do a proper post about this later, but i figure i can bury the lede a little before doing it properly.

c7 features several characters being made to perform in sansón's play, acting out the relevant backstory for this segment of the plot. a lot of these characters have rather direct, degrading reasons for playing the roles they do.

outis, a character with an inflated ego who wants her journey to have a purpose, is made to play an aimlessly wandering villager with a single line.

hong lu and ryoushuu, two characters for whom families and the expectations placed upon them are likely going to play a major role, are made to play bloodfiends.

rodya, a character who resents her lot in life and is constantly shown to be eager to leave her destitution behind her and become someone special, is made to play a helpless villager that's too poor to even offer any money to the hero that saves her.

heathcliff, a character that has spent most of his life getting dehumanized by comparing him to beastly animals, is made to play a literal bear whose sole purpose in the plot is to get beat up and then quickly left by the wayside.

sinclair, a character that has two opposed parties essentially treating him as a macguffin to procure for their side, is made to play the character who was arguably the catalyst for this entire canto, not to mention playing a decently major role in ruina.

our star don quixote is made to play her father, the first kindred, but there's someone by their side the entire time, isn't there? don quixote's dear, steadfastly loyal companion. a character which don quixote has tasked themself with getting to come out of their shell?

hello again, pushpin 2.

gregor has been made to play our unreachable star, sancho. someone had to, of course. you can't really tell a story without it's main character, now can you?

now, i should once again give a disclaimer. i am not trying to say that i think adapting what happens to donqui/sancho in c7 to gregor is the road pm is going to take here, not only would that toe a bit past the line of foreshadowing, but it'd also just amount to rehashing that plotline again, which i don't think would make for a particularly exciting story.

what i DO think is that we can take a lot of the things that are said to either directly be the case for sancho and use them to inform how we see gregor.

and god, does playing sancho have some fucking implications for our favorite ossan archetype.

starting off, the earliest moment we get to see of sancho is quite literally her just waiting for death to take her in a pile of ashes.

which, i should remind everyone, is actually pretty damn close to what happens to gregor's literary counterpart at the end of the metamorphosis. gregor samsa experiences one final breaking point that pushes him over the edge and makes him decide to just wait for starvation to take him.

gregor and sancho both consider themselves to no longer be human, something which sancho goes out of her way to highlight repeatedly throughout the canto and gregor is quick to get defensive on her behalf for when outis starts really tearing into her

sancho spends quite a lot of this story denying herself the joys of community and friendship, despite knowing that, even with the rest of the sinners frequently making jokes at her expense and outright insulting her, they were things that she desperately craved.

and, while this is getting into my "outis is a red herring meant to distract us from gregor's eventual betrayal" theorizing, i also think it's worth noting for this discussion that sancho's fellow kindreds, her family, all seem to be under the impression that she dislikes them and ultimately her departure was an act of betrayal

and that, despite gregor being one of LCB's resident mood makers and attempted conflict de-escalators, one of the sinners that's most prone to making appeals to the bonds they've all forged together, only him and faust remained silent during everyone's speech

so yeah, i think there's quite a lot of little details and hints building up to the reveal that gregor's not quite as fond of everyone as he presents himself to be. i do think a lot of this ultimately comes down to gregor getting in the way of his own happiness, similarly to donqui, particularly because he's been frequently portrayed as something of a self fulfilling prophecy, especially by giving him as many christ allegories as they have by way of priest and garden of thorns. gregor is convinced that the rest of the sinners don't like him because he's not convinced anyone could like him, so he convinces himself that he hates them because why should he care if someone that he hates hates him too?

a lot of this ultimately ties back to my personal interpretation of what happens in the metamorphosis as well as my own theories regarding all the times gregor has made weird callbacks and references to lobcorp and ruina, but yeah. i think about this guy and his deeper characterization a fairly normal amount, i think.

to end this off i'll highlight one of my favorite little "gregor is fucking seething and trying so hard to keep it cool" moments, in the credits CG for c7 we see rodya teasing him by drawing a little horse on his window and actively pointing and laughing at it, which gregor really doesn't seem all too pleased about.

i personally think this ties into the other cruel part of sansón forcing gregor to play rocinante, which is the more literal "he's actually just straight up playing rocinante" side of things. gregor was quite literally made to play something less than human, less than even animal really, as he was reduced to nothing more than the shoes don quixote wore as she got to play the leading role. sansón directly makes jokes about gregor being nothing more than shoes in the play twice, which adds to this reading, i think.

this, imo, really plays into the adaptation of the metamorphosis! i've seen a lot of readings for the book that posit that, despite being the protagonist, gregor samsa can't really be considered the main character due to nearly everything he experiences in it being used to further his family's character development at his expense, which i think fits nicely with limbus gregor seemingly having the most said about him through indirect means by holding him up to other characters. also it's rodya carelessly making fun of His Big Major Insecurities™ again like she did in c1 which i always find fun. rodya i love you but god you're the worst.

[marypsue]

Man, it's cool and all if you see a metaphor for marginalisation in the monstrous, and if you want the power fantasy of 'what if you could just eat anybody who threatened you/pissed you off'. Me too.

However, as soon as you start saying 'no, these monsters are a 1:1 on Specific Marginalised Group, and you have to treat them in the fiction like they are directly representative of real human members of the marginalised group', BUT you also, in the fiction, make them hurt/kill/eat humans? And then try to shame me, your audience, for noticing or engaging with the bit where they kill people, because you made them directly representative of a real-world marginalised group? You have lost me, and also, I think, the plot.

[crabsnpersimmons]

"Slow down, Sunshine. You're not falling behind and you are loved for more than what you do for others."

[dkettchen]

I do enjoy dressing her entirely in canon outfits/cuts and the occasional top she's borrowed from nami and being like ye canon!sanji sure does own a pair of 3/4 pants with ballerina loafers he sure did wear that before with his whole cishet man ass and we didn't bat a single eye at it

[demaparbat-hp]

How does that first encounter go down between them in your Spitfire AU? I imagine some real conflicting emotions on all sides!

I would love to hear you ramble!! ❤️

*cracks knuckles* Alright, let's do this.

As far as the world is concerned, Lu Ten II doesn't exist and the Royal Bloodline ends with Princess Azula. The little kid that follows Prince Zuko everywhere? That's Ten Ten, an orphaned stowaway his Crew found and adopted for some weird reason no-one ever questions—the kid is just that lovable.

(It helps, honestly, that Lu Ten II is a carbon-copy of poor, forgotten Ursa. No one would ever think to connect him with Fire Lord Ozai, long may he reign.)

Little Ten Ten loves to run off when the Crew is on shore leave. He gets into trouble sometimes, but only because of his chronic inability to look away from people who need help (it makes Zuzu both so proud and so shouty-because-he's-worried. It's fun until it isn't).

By now the Crew knows not to panic when the kid goes missing for a couple of hours in a harbor town—which is why no one noticed Ten Ten's disappearance until it was too late.

"Could someone please explain to me," what starts as a mutter becomes a shout as anxiety takes over Sokka, "why on earth did we go into town to buy necessary, highly specific supplies, and returned—not only with a stolen waterbending scroll—stolen! From pirates, Katara!—but with a Fire Nation-looking KID?!"

While Ten Ten is having the time of his life goofing with Aang, out-sassing why-is-this-happening-to-me Sokka, and melting Katara's heart—Zuko is losing his mind, sanity, and temper because how on Agni's name do you lose a Prince of your nation?

But, sir, he's like three-feet-tall—

HOW, JEE?!

Needless to say, the pirates kidnap the pretty waterbending thief and her kid with the sharp tongue and fancy-looking clothes. Which turns out to be a Bad Idea™ because, well, a skinny guy from the watertribes and his way-too-young-to-be-bald companion? They can absolutely deal with them.

A Crew's worth of murderous Fire Nation soldiers lead by the unforgiving, terrifying, bloodthirsty Prince?

They are not ready for that.

[inkskinned]

she says he won't let her get a dog, which is fine, because they're in an apartment, and that's the kind of thing people say about their partners. he won't let me get a dog. and you're at a dinner party and you tilt your head a little to the side just like that dog he won't let her get, because is this the thing that's going to upset you? you don't know every corner of their relationship, she could be joking, they could have had so many healthy conversations about the dog, right, and maybe she's not letting herself get the dog because of money and time and whatever. but, like, she did say let

and she wants to move away from his hometown and he wants to stay and then he tells you with a wink and a conspiratorial stage whisper don't worry i'll convince her and she laughs about it - so clearly this is something they laugh about. but you do just stand there and stare at him like what the fuck, man. you can't say what you want to say which is why do you get the final say on everything because they're both obviously aware of the other person's stance on this and have obviously had private conversations about it and what are you going to do about it except make a scene and then he'll be mad at you and call you one of those bitches behind your back and she'll cut you off, which is a loss that doesn't feel worth it just because he makes you a little skeeved out every 3rd comment

and they both agree he just isn't the type to get flowers which is fine because everyone shows love differently, and are you really gonna judge someone based on their sense of individual relationship responsibility? maybe he's constantly cleaning her car and writing her poems and making her furniture or something. maybe she doesn't even like flowers and this is perfect, actually. and no you couldn't date him, obviously, ew; but like, she tells you she's happy. you almost send her a tiktok that says don't be 25 and the cool girl that doesn't need anything, you'll hate not getting flowers at 30, but that's like, starting drama & you shouldn't start drama needlessly.

and you're a little older than her but not so much older you can pull the whole trust me on this one babe thing and besides that wouldn't have worked anyway (when does it ever) and besides you have trauma so you and your therapist both agree that you're always looking for a problem even when there isn't one. and you tell yourself that just because you see them for 15 minutes every month does not mean you can identify every single red flag based on a single shitty half-joking(?) comment

and besides, what are you going to do? she says i actually wanted another stand mixer but thankfully he stops me when i'm about to spend too much money and you're standing there like are you okay? is this normal? is this just something people say? and again - what are you going to do?

to your therapist you try to language it - it's not, like, any of my business. but sometimes, doesn't it feel like - you should do something. there's got to be something, right? you've tried dropping little hints but they sail right through and you've tried having a single serious conversation and she got upset because why does it matter to you, yes it's different but we're happy, it doesn't need to make sense to you and you're like. really unwilling to push a boundary about it anymore; because the truth is that you know logically it shouldn't matter to you, as long as both parties are happy.

and besides, you've been wrong before. it's just... like, every time you see them both, something else happens, some kind of shiver down your spine like do you even hear each other when you talk. it's their strange, bickering orbit. just the way he's on his phone through dinner or watching sports instead of helping in the kitchen or, fuck, another one of these little throwaway comments he makes about we'll see about that, babe. she laughs when he calls her passions stupid shit and meanwhile she gets him tickets to see the knicks and he tells you well at least she's smart about something and still! it's none of your business.

you say get the dog anyway and she laughs. like, this is is you being funny. and not you saying - no really. get the dog. get the dog and get out of here. pack up and start running.

[o3o-lapd-o3o]

(part ???? of this ongoing thread/universe/au?) (part 2 & part 3 & part 4 & part 5 & part 6 & part 7 & part 8 to this!)

there's a masterlist now!

(will be two parts as my brain wouldn't stop coming up with more nonsense as per usual) (future/present me: it was not just two parts)

*not long after telemachus met his dad's enemy 'friend', the god of the seas poseidon, for the first time*

*poseidon has fled (gods don't flee they briskly walk away) left to go back to the sea*

*odysseus, penelope & telemachus are having dinner*

telemachus: *smiling while retelling the meeting to penelope* -and he was so nice! father is so lucky to have him as his friend-

odysseus: *slightly chokes on his food at poseidon still being referred to as his friend*

telemachus: *looks at odysseus* -father are you ok?

penelope: *who knows odysseus' real relationship with poseidon*

penelope: *hasn't had much entertainment in 20 years*

penelope: *wants to stir the pot some more* ignore your father my dear, please continue telling me all about his friend

odysseus: *looking at penelope*

odysseus: *under his breath* penelope why?

*dinner continues with poseidon being the subject much to odysseus' dismay*

telemachus: *enjoying the family dinner*

telemachus: *gasps*

odysseus & penelope: ???

telemachus: we should have a big family dinner! father you can invite lord poseidon! i'll invite athena!

telemachus: *happy with himself for thinking of such an idea*

odysseus: *doesn't want to shoot down his son's idea, but also DOES NOT WANT TO SPEND ANY MORE TIME WITH POSEIDON*

odysseus: *scrambling for an excuse* son, he's a god and surely is very busy an-

penelope: *with a devilish grin* -and i'm sure will make time for his friend! what a wonderful idea telemachus! i'll let the palace cooks know!

penelope: off you go dear husband~ go and let your friend know~

odysseus: it's evening-

penelope: first thing tomorrow then!

odysseus: *sighs in resignment* yes my love

telemachus: great! i can't wait to tell athena-

*athena appearing out of nowhere*

athena: i heard my name and came.

odysseus: athena?!

telemachus: athena!!

penelope: oh lady athena!

athena: *smiling whilst looking at telemachus* what would you like to ask me telemachus?

telemachus: oh yeah! we're going to have a big family dinner! father just needs to invite his god friend-

athena: *confused as she's odysseus' god friend* but i-

odysseus: *panicked* wait-

telemachus: -lord poseidon!

athena: *wide-eyed in shock*

athena: *slow blinking* did you say odysseus' friend is p-po- my uncle?!

telemachus: *nods and smiles* yeah, i thought you knew!

odysseus: *wondering how he'll explain this whole situation to athena*

odysseus: *under his breath* well now she knows...

penelope: *laughs to herself*

(to be continued!)

(okay i know i said in the reply to the ask i'd post the dinner scene, but my brain wouldn't stop throwing stuff for me to add in the run up to dinner. so there WILL be the dinner scene, but that will be in another post... tomorrow? -depending on how my work day goes-) (future/present me: it was not just one more part, nor did i upload it the next day)

[cecoeur]

it's hell on earth to be heavenly them's the breaks, they don't come gently

[sysig]

Recently had a silly Handplates dream where Papyrus was trying to snoop around Gaster and Alphys’ lab, but didn’t know who Alphys was and so was trying to pass it off as his own lab lol (Patreon)