#but goddamn i hope i don't
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Hi Jonny! 🦇 I've heard mention of a discord server and I was curious if it's a closed server or if there's a way to obtain the link. Thank you!
If it's when we're streaming, it refers to a private Discord me and Sash maintain with our stream mods, where they send through messages from chat (and sometimes give me advice if I'm stuck on a game).
The idea of being in any way responsible for any sort of public or semi-public discord server makes me break out in a cold sweat.
#i really hope professional promo doesn't go in the direction of more discord servers#ill make a macguffin and co one if i absolutely have to#but goddamn i hope i don't
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"Put on the lab coat science boy!" I cheer while half of the fandom is still reeling from the minor skin changes he's already made
#atlas.art#artists on tumblr#mcyt#hermitcraft#hc s10#mumbo jumbo#this is the best thing that's ever happened to me personally#this whole scenario and arc and skin change were crafted in a lab to make me personally loose my goddamn mind#as the current state of my personal blog proves lol#if i catch you on the 'i hope this isn't a permanent skin change' bandwagon we are becoming mortal enemies /j#you can pry is grey streaks out of my cold dead hands i don't care about waffle hair#this is hydrogen bomb vs coughing baby to me
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All of the quest menu descriptions for Aventurine's quest "All the Sad Tales".
(... And the one from "A Walk Among the Tombstones.)
#hsr spoilers#honkai star rail spoilers#hsr#honkai star rail#hsr aventurine#penacony spoilers#i really don't look at quest menu text often#but i'm glad i did this time around#i think that's all of them but i could have missed one or two#the text for the next step sometimes changes while keeping the same description so i only captured it once each time#this is was really funky but also goddamn aventurine just had a horrible time the whole patch#delightful for me personally#who loves it when characters suffer#mihoyo pulled 0 punches#i hope i used enough spoiler tags cause that's big fat spoilers right here but it's one of the things i liked the most about the new quest#i love it when games have fun with their medium#ray's records
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ok this is ACTUALLY fucking insane. did we as a whole learn NOTHING from what happened with welcome home. even from a strictly logical standpoint! if you make the creators uncomfortable, they leave, and if the creator leaves, so does the content. oh my *god.* just because they make music and tell stories doesn't mean they don't deserve to be respected. to quote keath itself: LEAVE IF YOU ARE UNKIND.
#im not normally this angry but what the hell guys. hoping tumblr is being relatively okay with this but im so fucking fr rn.#if you're like this dni.#and spread the goddamn word i don't know keath in the slightest but i know that this is insanity#yaelokre#meadowlark
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"الخيل و الليل و البيداء تعرفني ... والسيف و الرمح و القرطاس و القلم" ، المتنبي
Translation: "the stallions, the night and the wasteland know me ... and the sword, the arrow, the parchment, and the pen", Al-Mutanabbi
A tribute of sorts to a man of many attributes.
#someone send me an ask about all the goddamn symbolism i put into this#i dont think ppl read my long ass tags so one of you has to bear it lest i explode or smth#also this is no way the end of my fanart of this guy oh ho no#its just something i wanted to do for a while#also don't mind the bilingualism i just cant help it#this beast took approx 55hrs over the course of the entire pomegranate season#i wasn't dead for the past 2 months no i was dealing with uh chronic illness and also finals#peace and love hope yall like it or I'll cry#my art#cwilbur#dsmp#dsmp fanart#no glasses here cus i had to draw his freckles it had to be done#fennec.art
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This month's feature is Crazy:B, with this edition releasing alongside their new Valentine's Day single 'Lovebug'! (written and produced by my hopes and dreams)
art-only version below the cut!
#enstars#ensemble stars#crazy:b#rinne amagi#niki shiina#kohaku oukawa#himeru#i love how this project was so i draw anything other than eden and bees and i immediately go back to drawing bees#me throwing all my schoolwork to the wayside for this one#i hope you know i was literally sitting in class instead of the project i have due in a week#i have been sitting here rendering for nearly 4 hours straight to get this out on time#and i still didn't#but it's okay it's close enough#happy (late) valentines day#i don't disklike it but i can definitely do better on this one#oh well#no one is more difficult on me than myself#enseason#if happyele won’t make the bees valentines event then I will goddamn#put their asses in more pink stat#the pink hoodie in my comic yesterday was foreshadowing#I thought their outfits were too plain and then they ended up being worse to deal with than the trickstar ones#you’ll see why whenever I post the sheets#that poor n in the masthead is never gonna see the light of day I’m so sorry
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People who don't enjoy horror can play Resident Evil games by pretending every zombie/boss is going after the playable character because they want them sexually. Trust me it works everytime. Mr. X ain't so scary now that you know he just wants to fuck Leon
#I love doing this#Same w re4r. I hate the regeneradors the most so I pretend they just wanna suck Leon off or smthn and it makes them funny#Like get OFF the floor... You desperate fuckers.... Goddamn who raised you.....#Resident evil#Resident evil memes#leon kennedy#claire redfield#Ada Wong#Ethan Winters#Chris Redfield#Jill Valentine#Obviously only the adult MCs I hope I don't have to explain that
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oooh please someday tell us what you think of GOT
oh, no, it's my fatal weakness! it's [checks notes] literally just the bare modicum of temptation! okay you got me.
SO. in order to tell what's wrong with game of thrones you kind of have to have read the books, because the books are the reason the show goes off the rails. i actually blame the showrunners relatively little in proportion to GRRM for how bad the show was (which I'm not gonna rehash here because if you're interested in GOT in any capacity you've already seen that horse flogged to death). people debate when GOT "got bad" in terms of writing, but regardless of when you think it dropped off, everyone agrees the quality declined sharply in season 8, and to a certain extent, season 7. these are the seasons that are more or less entirely spun from whole cloth, because season 7 marks the beginning of what will, if we ever see it, be the Winds of Winter storyline. it's the first part that isn't based on a book by George R.R. Martin. it's said that he gave the showrunners plot outlines, but we don't know how detailed they were, or how much the writers diverged from the blueprint — and honestly, considering the cumulative changes made to the story by that point, some stark divergence would have been required. (there's a reason for this. i'll get there in a sec.)
so far, i'm not saying anything all that original. a lot of people recognized how bad the show got as soon as they ran out of Book to adapt. (I think it's kind of weird that they agreed to make a show about an unfinished series in the first place — did GRRM figure that this was his one shot at a really good HBO adaptation, and forego misgivings about his ability to write two full books in however many years it took to adapt? did he think they would wait for him? did he not care that the series would eventually spoil his magnum opus, which he's spent the last three decades of his life writing? perplexing.) but the more interesting question is why the show got bad once it ran out of Book, because in my mind, that's not a given. a lot of great shows depart from the books they were based on. fanfiction does exactly that, all the time! if you have good writers who understand the characters they're working with, departure means a different story, not a worse one. now, the natural reply would be to say that the writers of GOT just aren't good, or at least aren't good at the things that make for great television, and that's why they needed the books as a structure, but I don't think that's true or fair, either. books and television are very different things. the pacing of a book is totally different from the pacing of a television show, and even an episodic book like ASOIAF is going to need a lot of work before it's remotely watchable as a series. bad writers cannot make great series of television, regardless of how good their source material is. sure, they didn't invent the characters of tyrion lannister and daenerys targaryen, but they sure as hell understood story structure well enough to write a damn compelling season of TV about them!
so but then: what gives? i actually do think it's a problem with the books! the show starts out as very faithful to the early books (namely, A Game of Thrones and A Clash of Kings) to the point that most plotlines are copied beat-for-beat. the story is constructed a little differently, and it's definitely condensed, but the meat is still there. and not surprisingly, the early books in ASOIAF are very tightly written. for how long they are, you wouldn't expect it, but on every page of those books, the plot is racing. you can practically watch george trying to beat the fucking clock. and he does! useful context here is that he originally thought GOT was going to be a trilogy, and so the scope of most threads in the first book or two would have been much smaller. it also helps that the first three books are in some respects self-contained stories. the first book is a mystery, the second and third are espionage and war dramas — and they're kept tight in order to serve those respective plots.
the trouble begins with A Feast for Crows, and arguably A Storm of Swords, because GRRM starts multiplying plotlines and treating the series as a story, rather than each individual book. he also massively underestimated the number of pages it would take him to get through certain plot beats — an assumption whose foundation is unclear, because from a reader's standpoint, there is a fucke tonne of shit in Feast and Dance that's spurious. I'm not talking about Brienne's Riverlands storyline (which I adore thematically but speaking honestly should have been its own novella, not a part of Feast proper). I'm talking about whole chapters where Tyrion is sitting on his ass in the river, just talking to people. (will I eat crow about this if these pay off in hugely satisfying ways in Winds or Dream? oh, totally. my brothers, i will gorge myself on sweet sweet corvid. i will wear a dunce cap in the square, and gleefully, if these turn out to not have been wastes of time. the fact that i am writing this means i am willing to stake a non-negligible amount of pride on the prediction that that will not happen). I'm talking about scenes where the characters stare at each other and talk idly about things that have already happened while the author describes things we already have seen in excruciating detail. i'm talking about threads that, while forgivable in a different novel, are unforgivable in this one, because you are neglecting your main characters and their story. and don't tell me you think that a day-by-day account tyrion's river cruise is necessary to telling his story, because in the count of monte cristo, the main guy disappears for nine years and comes hurtling back into the story as a vengeful aristocrat! and while time jumps like that don't work for everything, they certainly do work if what you're talking about isn't a major story thread!
now put aside whether or not all these meandering, unconcluded threads are enjoyable to read (as, in fairness, they often are!). think about them as if you're a tv showrunner. these bad boys are your worst nightmare. because while you know the author put them in for a reason, you haven't read the conclusion to the arc, so you don't know what that reason is. and even if the author tells you in broad strokes how things are going to end for any particular character (and this is a big "if," because GRRM's whole style is that he lets plots "develop as he goes," so I'm not actually convinced that he does have endings written out for most major characters), that still doesn't help you get them from point A (meandering storyline) to point B (actual conclusion). oh, and by the way, you have under a year to write this full season of television, while GRRM has been thinking about how to end the books for at least 10. all of this means you have to basically call an audible on whether or not certain arcs are going to pay off, and, if they are, whether they make for good television, and hence are worth writing. and you have to do that for every. single. unfinished. story. in the books.
here's an example: in the books, Quentin Martell goes on a quest to marry Daenerys and gain a dragon. many chapters are spent detailing this quest. spoiler alert: he fails, and he gets charbroiled by dragons. GRRM includes this plot to set up the actions of House Martell in Winds, but the problem is that we don't know what House Martell does in Winds, because (see above) the book DNE. So, although we can reliably bet that the showrunners understand (1) Daenerys is coming to Westeros with her 3 fantasy nukes, and (2) at some point they're gonna have to deal with the invasion of frozombies from Canada, that DOESN'T mean they necessarily know exactly what's going to happen to Dorne, or House Martell. i mean, fuck! we don't even know if Martin knows what's going to happen to Dorne or House Martell, because he's said he's the kind of writer who doesn't set shit out beforehand! so for every "Cersei defaults on millions of dragons in loans from the notorious Bank of Nobody Fucks With Us, assumes this will have no repercussions for her reign or Westerosi politics in general" plotline — which might as well have a big glaring THIS WILL BE IMPORTANT stamp on top of the chapter heading — you have Arianne Martell trying to do a coup/parent trap switcheroo with Myrcella, or Euron the Goffick Antichrist, or Faegon Targaryen and JonCon preparing a Blackfyre restoration, or anything else that might pan out — but might not! And while that uncertainty about what's important to the "overall story" might be a realistic way of depicting human beings in a world ruled by chance and not Destiny, it makes for much better reading than viewing, because Game of Thrones as a fantasy television series was based on the first three books, which are much more traditional "there is a plot and main characters and you can generally tell who they are" kind of book. I see Feast and Dance as a kind of soft reboot for the series in this respect, because they recenter the story around a much larger cast and cast a much broader net in terms of which characters "deserve" narrative attention.
but if you're making a season of television, you can't do that, because you've already set up the basic premise and pacing of your story, and you can't suddenly pivot into a long-form tone poem about the horrors of war. so you have to cut something. but what are you gonna cut? bear in mind that you can't just Forget About Dorne, or the Iron Islands, or the Vale, or the North, or pretty much any region of the story, because it's all interconnected, but to fit in everything from the books would require pacing of the sort that no reasonable audience would ever tolerate. and bear in mind that the later books sprout a lot more of these baby-plots that could go somewhere, but also might end up being secondary or tertiary to the "main story," which, at the end of the day, is about dragons and ice zombies and the rot at the heart of the feudal power system glorified in classical fantasy. that's the story that you as the showrunner absolutely must give them an end to, and that's the story that should be your priority 1.
so you do a hack and slash job, and you mortar over whatever you cut out with storylines that you cook up yourself, but you can't go too far afield, because you still need all the characters more or less in place for the final showdown. so you pinch here and push credulity there, and you do your best to put the characters in more or less the same place they would have been if you kept the original, but on a shorter timeframe. and is it as good as the first seasons? of course not! because the material that you have is not suited to TV like the first seasons are. and not only that, but you are now working with source material that is actively fighting your attempt to constrain a linear and well-paced narrative on it. the text that you're working with changed structure when you weren't looking, and now you have to find some way to shanghai this new sprawling behemoth of a Thing into a television show. oh, and by the way, don't think that the (living) author of the source material will be any help with this, because even though he's got years of experience working in television writing, he doesn't actually know how all of these threads will tie together, which is possibly the reason that the next book has taken over 8 years (now 13 and counting) to write. oh and also, your showrunners are sick of this (in fairness, very difficult) job and they want to go write for star wars instead, so they've refused the extra time the studio offered them for pre-production and pushed through a bunch of first-draft scripts, creating a crunch culture of the type that spawns entirely avoidable mistakes, like, say, some poor set designer leaving a starbucks cup in frame.
anyway, that's what I think went wrong with game of thrones.
#using the tags as a footnote system here but in order:#1. quentin MAY not be dead according to some theories but in the text he is a charred corpse#2. arianne is great and i love her but to be honest. my girl is kinda dumb. just 2 b real.#3. faegon is totally a blackfyre i think it's so obvious it may well be text at this point#it's almost r+l = j level man like it's kind of just reading comprehension at this point#4. relatedly there are some characters i think GRRM has endings picked out for and some i think he specifically does NOT#i think stannis melisandre jon and daenerys all will end up the same. jon and dany war crimes => murder/banishment arc is just classic GRRM#but i think jon's reasoning will be different and it'll be better-written.#im sorry but babygirl shireen IS getting flambeed. in response stannis will commit epic battle suicide killing all boltons i hope#brienne will live but in some tragic 'stay awhile horatio' capacity. likely she will try to die defending her liege and fail#faegon will die there's zero chance blackfyres win ever#now jaime/cersei I do NOT think he knows. my brothers in christ i don't think this motherfucker knows who the valonqar is!!#same with tyrion i think that the author in GRRM wants to do a nasty corruption arc + kill him off but the person in him loves him too much#sansa i have no goddamn idea what's going to happen. we just don't know enough about the northern conspiracy to tell#w/ arya i think he has... ideas. i don't think she's going to sail off to Explore i am almost certain that the show doing that was a cover#because the actual idea he gave them was unsavory or nonviable for some reason. bc like.#why would arya leave bran and jon and sansa? the family she's just spent her whole life fighting to come back to and avenge?#this is suspicious this does not feel like arya this does not feel right#bran will not be king or if he is it'll be in a VERY different way not the dumbfuck 'let's vote' bullshit#i personally think bran is going to go full corruption arc and become possessed by the 3 eyed raven. but that could be a pipe dream#the thing is he's way too OP in the show so the books have to nerf him and i think GRRM is still trying to work out#a way to actually do that.#i don't think he told them what happened with littlefinger or sansa. i think sansa's story is vaguely similar#(stark restoration through the female line etc)#but the queen in the north shit is way too contrived frankly. and selfishly i hope she gets something different#being a monarch in ASOIAF is not a happy ending. we know this from the moment we meet robert baratheon in AGOT#and we learn exactly what GRRM thinks of the people who 'win' these endless wars of succession#and they are not heroes#they are not celebrated#and they are neither safe nor happy
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Sighs, got inspo to draw them after seeing @nullbutler 's post about them, of all pairs, these two were the least I expected to end up drawing together but here we are
Here's the post in question, the ✨inspiration and motivation✨:
#black butler#black butler art#black butler fanart#kuroshitsuji#kuroshitsuji fanart#kuroshitsuji art#ash landers#claude faustus#black butler ash#black butler claude#claude x ash#ash x claude#clash#is that their ship name?#i don't know man I never expected myself draw this goddamn chicken-man (ash)#hope he burns (again)#art#fanart#ship art#artist on tumblr#illustration
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"If i don't come back I love you all."
how about your lungs first?
#digital art#tropical's art#art#high contrast#cw eyestrain#eye strain#child death tw#Wacky Footage of a Minecraft Player Who Went Missing#This series is a satire of Minecraft ARGs but when it wants to get its horror on it succeeds#It's just#Man#AwesomeG man and the message they left in their last video (it's very hard to see like goddamn)#And Hungry ate their lungs first while they were alive and they wanted to go down and fight this entity that wouldn't leave their mind#Alone and and and ouuuuugh#Don't get me started on Zander and his friend#They just wanted to get popular and they were just goofing off as kids and Zander blames himself for his friend's death and his own like#What the hell man Zander you weren't foolish you were just a kiiiid#Anyway I hope Hungry and Souler devour more people <3#collinlock16#minecraft arg but the protagonist is tired#The gif quality was on purpose this time B]
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#i hope the very obvious parallels between Rook and Hawke that we've seen so far manifest more fully in the game#because i'm salty every time these interviews touch on Origins and Inquisition and i'm over here like. THERE WAS ANOTHER WHOLE ASS GAME#not talking about Hawke or Kirkwall is such a goddamn bummer whenever these comparisons to previous games pops up.#it's so blatant that i have begun to imagine that the similarities between Hawke and Rook are so deep that devs don't want to draw attentio#but it's really that people don't ever want to allow DA2 an iota of space next to the other games#datv spoilers#dragon age: the veilguard#datv#DA2#dragon age ii
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christ alive I love my parents and I'm glad I got to see them but they are just. so fucking exhausting
#i've identified something about them#which is this#they genuinely do not grasp that other people have Real Experiences that don't map to their view of the world#like it's not that they don't view those experiences as valid or whatever#it's that they genuinely and truly do not grok that other people have experiences they don't approve of#like that the experiences actually happen and aren't made up#“why do you insist on referring to X with they/them pronouns?”#“because they don't identify with a gender”#“well you're either one or the other”#“well they don't feel that way and they don't identify with a gender”#“well you're one or the other”#“okay but literally they do not feel that way and you not liking that doesn't change it like wtf and also sex and gender aren't the same”#etc etc etc ad fucking nauseum#fucks sake#also this is always my mom who drops this shit#my dad just pretends like nothing is happening and ignores the conversation like the wuss he is lol#to be fair i get it because i would not go up against my mom either if i was him because he has to live with her stubborn ass#it's probably obvious but they blithely misgendered me the whole goddamn time they were here#UNLESS THEY WERE IN FRONT OF OTHER PEOPLE IN PUBLIC LOLOLOLOLOLOL#HMMMMMMMMM#FUNNY HOW THAT WORKS#anyway fuck them and i hope they get home safe because they're old as fuck and probably going to die in the next 5-10 years#and when they do it will be terrible and also part of me will be relieved and idk how to feel about that tbh#so like#yeah#:/#covington-shenanigans gets personal#(to be clear they just didn't use pronouns for me at all in public)#(they have never once gendered me correctly and probably never will)
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COMMISSIONS ARE HERE!!! I'm broke as hell so I gotta draw for cash. If you're interested or have any questions DM me. <3
I'm Liazrad on Paypal, Cashapp, Venmo, and Ko-Fi!
#commissions open#original art#i really hope these new prices are acceptable...i don't like charging too much but goddamn i put a lot of work into my art#and yeah. i'll do backgrounds now. unfortunately for me. i hate doing em but some ppl want a beautiful scene damn it
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there's something sooooooo heartbreaking about quests as a narrative piece. you set out on this journey to rescue someone or defeat a great evil and along the way you face hardship and horror and you grieve and fight and love and lose and then when it's all over you come home. everything is the same as when you left, but you're so irrevocably different that you no longer fit in the one place you used to be truly at peace. you're tired from your journey but you find no rest or recovery, only ghosts. and you almost wish for another quest, another dangerous mission, because at least then you know your purpose.
#hi sorry i just rewatched the lord of the rings trilogy and im in A State#its just. the concept of leaving your home with your 3 friends to go on a quest for something you don't understand.#you're all plucky and full of life and hope.#and then you're beaten down and nearly killed and you don't know if anyone's still alive or if you're the last of your friends left.#and you suffer. oh do you suffer.#and when the battle's over and it's time to come home you don't recognize the person you were when you left.#you're too traumatized and haunted by everything you've seen; everything you've suffered; everything you've done to survive#and you're a ghost in your own home because nobody from your hometown can understand.#and it's so painful and you're so so tired that when you have a chance to move on to leave your friends behind#for the sake of getting some goddamn peace ...#well what else can you do but take it?#im just oughoughoughoughough#this applies to both frodo and bilbo i think#the dichotomy of the scene where bilbo is Leaving the shire (running and shouting for joy because he's going on an ADVENTURE!)#and when he returns (beaten down and grieving and lost. a stranger in his own home.)#literally makes me gnawwww#im feeling some kinda WAY#winter speaks#tropes#on knights#<- rich inner world
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hey this is the opposite of what I wanted from season 6, actually. Why do these writers hate me personally
#screaming crying throwing up#you mean to tell me Tory can't just have some peace. FOR FIVE SECONDS#actually diabolical to kill her mother right when she was finally getting some goddamn stability#not to mention the LaRussos (accidentally) boomerang launching her right back into Cobra Kai#I get they were trying to help but jesus read the room#I'm not even gonna touch the hawkmetri situation#(mostly cuz I think this is actually a very necessary fight and there's hope at the end of this tunnel)#but god damn if those actors don't shove as much Queer Yearning into every scene they had this season#especially Eli jesus christ#oh hey I'm caught up now I can use the tags#cobra kai#ck spoilers#tory nichols#hawkmetri#hawk moskowitz#demetri alexopoulos#crane-talk
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The bell on the coffee shop door jingled as Raven pushed it open, the familiar "Welcome to the Regrets Cafe!" greeting barely being processed. She ordered her usual, hot chocolate with extra whipped cream and a peppermint stick. Call it childish, Raven found it comforting when she was wallowing in her own thoughts. Blame it on her growing motherly instincts from raising Paloma.
She carefully cradled the warm mug in her hands when her name was called, watching the steam peek our from the gaps in the melting whipped cream as she settled into her usual table by one of the massive front windows with a world weary sigh. What she failed to notice was that, for once, the table wasn't empty.
"Rough day?"
Raven just about fell out of her chair, head snapping up to see a person sitting across from her, the barest hint of a smile peeking out from behind the coffee mug they were sipping from.
When Raven finally recomposed herself in her seat, she cleared her throat before answering the question. "That's a word for it, sure." The person hummed, setting down their mug and leaning forward over the table. "Mentally or physically?" "...what?"
They gestured to the shop around them. "This is the Regrets Cafe. Hardly the place people go when they're just tired from a hard day at work but it wouldn't surprise me. So, I ask again, mentally or physically?" Raven blinked a couple times before sitting back in her chair, deflating a little. "Mentally." "I figured. What's on your mind?" "Are you always this prying?" "Only to the people who sit at my table looking like they hold the weight of the world on their shoulders."
Raven highly considered just getting up and moving to a different table at this point just so she wouldn't have to actually talk about what was going on in her head but by now, this person had caught their attention. "You first. Why are you here?" They chuckled at that, sitting back and crossing their arms over their chest. "Should've expected that." They turned and stared out the window into the setting sunlight. "Just thinking about someone I shouldn't." "Ex?" A whirlwind of emotions passed over their face at the question; anger, betrayal, sadness, regret, before landing on a cold mask of apathy with a click of their tongue. "Tsk. Nah, he's burning in hell where he belongs. Just...a friend who got caught in the crossfire." They finally turned their gaze back to Raven. "Now you. Got an ex on the mind?"
Raven sighed, laying their forehead on the table with a quiet thunk. "Ex feels too strong of a word for him. Like yes that is his title but it doesn't feel right." "Was he a good ex or a bad ex?" "What's the difference?" "Physical and/or psychological abuse. The fact you have to ask is a touch concerning." "Oh, well, by that definition he was a good ex." "Okay, where's the regret?" Raven paused for a moment to swallow the rock in her throat that had formed as she lifted her head off the table. "...he didn’t deserve to die. If it wasn't for me, he'd still be alive." "Ah, there it is. Survivors guilt." They nodded sagely. "Can't say it's an unfamiliar feeling, though it is an unfortunate one." "Did you lose your friend too?" "Mm, not quite. They're still alive just...don't remember me. And I can't talk to them again." "Can't bring yourself to?" "No, legally I cannot speak to them again. Trust me, I would if I could."
Raven almost laughed. Legalities, boy was she familiar with those. "Yeah, I get that. I lost my name the day I lost him. I lost...everything. Everything I'd ever known died with him. It had to." "Run away? Start a new life?" "Not exactly? Went into witness protection." "Ahhh, that explains it. So you had to start all over, leave everything behind whether you wanted to or not." "Pretty much." "Are you scared?" "Of witness protection?" "Of forgetting. Forgetting who you were, who you used to be. Are you scared of the day you forget your own name?" The intense stare the person was leveling them with made Raven shudder. She almost felt like she was back on trial. "Sometimes. But at the same time, that life brought me nothing but pain, I'm glad to leave it behind."
They sat back, eyes turning to the ceiling like they were searching for something in the tiles. "Do you regret loving him?" Their tone was softer, more thinking out loud than an actual question. Raven smiled the smallest bit, taking a swallow of her now significantly cooled cocoa. "Sometimes. But then I look at the people I have now and remember that I found them through loving him. So maybe it was all worth it." She watched their head tilt back down, looking at Raven again. "What about you? Do you regret loving your ex for what happened to your friend?" They sighed, chewing on their lip as they contemplated their words. "Every day. Every day I regret loving him because if I hadn't, they would be fine. They wouldn't have had to go through everything that they did. They wouldn't have had to get their mind wiped and all the memories taken away. They wouldn't have...had to forget me. Had to forget how they helped me in the lowest point of my life. Had to forget how much I cared about them." They paused, their jaw clenching to hold back tears. "But then I see the domino effect. The things that happened because of it. The person I met because of it. And then I wonder if it was all worth it and if fate really does exist. It's-" "Confusing. And complicated. And frustrating as hell." Raven finished for them, making them chuckle. "Sounds like you've done this before." Raven shrugged with a smile. "Not so much a reoccurance, more so just a more recent one." "Oh? So then miss recent expert, what's your opinion?" They leaned forward with a smile and a quirked brow. "What's your advice?"
Raven considered what to say for a while. What would her advice be? "Others can't write your story for you. They can hand you the pen and paper but they can't put the words on the page. You have to write your ending yourself. It's up to you to decide if you want to write it happily or not." The words rolled off her tongue easier than she thought they would. Her own spin on the words that kept her from running away from the best thing that happened to her. Would Crow be proud of her? She hoped so.
The person's eyed widened for a moment, blinking in surprise. "That was...shockingly profound. And actually really good advice. Huh. I'll have to remember that." Raven stirred her mostly melted peppermint stick through her cup. "Your turn now. What sage wisdom do you have for a newcomer to grief?" Raven half teased, not really expecting an answer.
"The world isn't out to get you. You're allowed to rely on others, the people around you want to help. You can't keep throwing yourself at the wall and expecting it to break every time. One of those times, it's going to be you that breaks. But when you do, you don't have to pick up all the pieces by yourself." They spoke softly, sounding like they were repeating a mantra. Maybe they were repeating advice of their own. Raven couldn't help laughing. "Sounds like we both are rehashing the words of someone far better at this than we are, huh." "Aw damn, you can tell that easily?" They both dissolved into laughter, not noticing the jingle of the bell at the door.
"Darlin?" A smooth Southern accent made Raven turn her head. Standing behind her new friend was a man, flannel shirt and worn blue jeans with a cowboy hat. Looked like he'd walked off the set of a western movie. Her friend tipped their head back to look at him and smiled. "Hey there cowboy. Come to find me?" "Clearly. I've been trying to text you but you haven't been answering." "Ah shit, have you? Sorry, got caught up talking, I haven't been checking my phone." They pulled their phone out of their pocket and scrolled through what Raven assumed was their missed messages. The cowboy just smiled and ruffled their hair. "It's fine, darlin. I'm glad you made a friend." He turned and faced Raven. "Sorry, should've introduced myself. Name's Sam. Their partner." Raven almost slapped herself when she realized she'd spent this whole time talking and never bothered to introduce herself. "Oh, hi. Sorry, I never actually introduced myself. I'm-" "Miss Raven!!"
A familiar excited voice interrupted her, the girl it belonged to running up to cling to her in a hug. "Paloma, don't run, you could slip." Ivan chided softly, coming up behind her. Raven just laughed, squeezing the little girl in return. "She's fine, Ivan. What are you even doing here?" "Well you weren't home at your usual time and hadn't texted so I figured you stopped on your way home somewhere and came to take a look. I'm just glad we found you." Ivan leaned down and kissed Raven's forehead, earning an amused look from her new friend. "He yours, I'm assuming?" "Yeah, he's mine. And the cowboy belongs to you?" "Who, this guy? Nah, he's just some puppy I picked up off the street one day." "Darlin..." Sam warned but his smile made the threat hollow. "Well, I thank you two for finding my girlfriend and keeping her in one place. Made it easier on me." Ivan offered, earning a wave from Sam. "Ah, don't thank me, thank my partner here. I only came in a minute before you did to find them myself. So I should be thanking you." "Please, it was no trouble. It was...quite the productive conversation." Raven waved off his thanks, smiling softly at her friend. They shrugged, returning a half smile. "Yeah, you could say that. Have a few less regrets than when I walked in here. Maybe one day I'll get rid of them all." They downed the rest of their drink and stood, taking Sam's hand. "Well, it was nice to meet you Raven. Maybe we'll run into each other again." "Maybe. Stay safe out there." "You more." They gave a final wave and headed out, leaving Raven with Ivan and Paloma.
"So, who were they?" Ivan questioned, taking the now empty seat. "Honestly...I have no idea. I never asked for their name. But they gave an interesting perspective for me to think about." "In a good way or a bad way?" "Good way, definitely." "Well that's nice." Raven hummed in agreement, turning to look out the window. "Maybe one day I'll stop having regrets too." "Miss Raven, are you going to finish your drink?" Paloma asked, poking the now cold mug. "Ah crap, my cocoa! Aw, now it's all cold." Raven pouted sadly, making Ivan laugh. "Oh Raven, has held the weight of lives in her hands yet pouts when her hot chocolate gets cold."
"Oh we'll see how funny it is when I pour it over your head mister!" "No, wait, I concede! Ah!"
(I have no idea why I wrote this. I had the thought "What if Darlin and Raven had a conversation about how dating their exes changed their lives" and boom, this was born. Okay this post is long enough, I'm shutting up now.)
#asmr roleplay#redacted audio#redacted asmr#escaped audios#redacted darlin#redacted sam#neon barbarian#neon wings#fanfic writing#writers on tumblr#writing#honestly this was a lot of fun#and kind of therapeutic#but goddamn was it hard to keep finding ways to refer to Darlin since they don't have a canon name#like fuck man#made this ten times harder#but i made it work#i think#i hope#im going to bed now#bye
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