#cause i feel like “this chapter spans a month” can't happen three times and then be followed by “this chapter is one day”. pacing and all.

[purpleturtle9000]

I've got the Titanfall fic mostly outlined but there is a chunk in the middle that still just says "Jack's doing hot girl shit (has clinical depression)"

[xryosakeyx]

Anyways, here's some random sketches related to the fic I finally can get around to posting 'cause it's a bunch! (These span from about three months, so yeah...) They don't really lean into heavy spoiler territory, so I thought it'd be safe to post them!

^Blawsth's champ (name's Lucille, if anyone cares...). First sketch is from earlier today and it's supposed to be of him in his youth. If you've read chapter one already, a specific detail that was made was that the Pokémon Ash is looking for pops up every thirty years or so, and let me tell you, a whole bunch of stuff happened within that time lol. The rest of the sketches were made in June, so I haven't drawn him in a good while. His whole thing was that I based him on shock-rockers and his backstory does take influence from that subset of performers. That comic in the last pic kind of gives ypu the idea of it, and that is if you can even read my stupidly tiny handwrit–

Okay, y'know what? Let me decipher it:

JAKE: You don't get it Ash, Lucille was banned from performing 'cause he went overboard!

ASH: Oh, really?

JAKE: That and he's the champ!

PIKACHU, as a tiny blob thing on Ash's shoulder, turning his back away from the camera as he sees a weird goth-thing from the distance: Pi.

JAKE: Ah! There he is, great eyes Pikachu! Lu-cille! Sign my autograph, please!!!

Alright, satisfied?

^Some gym leader stuff. First sketch is supposed to be of a double-battle gym where one specializes in water and the other with fire. Their main motif is that they're supposed to be treasure hunters, so their Pokémon are very agile in combat as they bounce back from one another. I'm still trying to work on their outfits a little, but their masks are supposed to be based on their aces which are (of course) more fakmons! Their names (right to left) are Lenny and Hans.

Second was two sketches I did of the grass specialist, Vendanna, who is an actor known for her stunts. The main challenge in her gym is the various status effects her Pokémon can create (mostly poison), so trainers should watch out!

Third is Lizzie who is supposed to be a ghost specialist. She tends to be very introverted, only popping up whenever the supernatural bells ring, but her Pokémon are the complete opposite and love getting other's nerves. I based her off trad-goth stereotypes because I feel like they're very underespresented in media, but yeah, she's basically Blawsth's personal "witch" and has more knowledge about the card game than most people (still unsatisfied with her boots though...). Also, her ears are pointed 'cause I felt like making them pointy :P

Also, BTW, these won't be the exact order of gym leaders Ash and co. have to deal with, I just felt like sharing them for now!

^Rivals. I unfortunately can't really share much of their story with you guys as their role leans into spoiler territory, so I'll keep it as brief as possible. First is named Cianna and seriously wants to be the The Very Best Like No One Ever Was™. Out of Blawsth of course. Alright, in all seriousness, as a childhood friend who had to move upstate years ago, she hoped to reunite with Miley, who is oddly very evasive towards her, which is quite sad because she never got around to say goodbye to her...And that is as much info I can actually share on the both of them as characters! Alright, onto the next one...

The second is named Urie and oh boy I seriously can not wait to finally introduce him to the story. If you can recognize who I nabbed his color pallete from, congratulations, you're still not really going any relevent story info until I actually write about it. Anyways, all you gotta know about this guy is that he has this smirk you just want to punch and he's annoyling very friendly, surprsingly enough. To an extent (I could only post this single sketch of him though as (A.) I was only going for the color pallet when it came to this set so I couldn't care less about the face... and (B.) I do have an entire page just dedicated to him because he's so absurd of a character to me, but unfortunately it's behind another page filled with sharpie sketches and if you guess anything from the third pic, it likes to bleed through a lot).

Third is Luka and not only is she a coordinator hailing from Unova but she also participates in gym matches as well! She also oddly wants Ash to step away from his companions, for some reason...Yeah, gotta keep things hush-hush, lol. Other than that, she's a very snarky individual, some might even compare her to an Ekans. Others...a more sinister Pokémon...(anyways, say hi to Lizzie again at the bottom corner! She's selling her a doll that doesn't even work, LOL!) (Also, I imagine this one with a Joisey accent!)

Anyways, that's as much as Tumblr will let me post without going over the image limit, so I'll go follow up with this post tomorrow! Your SOTD has been brought to you by, once again, Specimen! I keep thinking of this song in paticular when it comes to contest ideas, especially considering Blawsth's whole culture going a little bit overboard with it ever since Lucille was banned from performing.

[milfmaddiebuckley]

So much of her life had changed within the span of four years and though she could never not be grateful for that, she can't help but wonder if there was just something about her that was destined to cause pain to herself and those that surrounded her. Maybe there was some sort of Buckley family curse that she didn't know about, one that had stolen Daniel long before his time and almost took her and Buck with it many times since. Perhaps it was just her that was cursed, perhaps in a way Doug had been right and maybe she was the problem, not anyone or anything else and she hates it because all she ever wanted to do was help people. All she had ever wanted to do was create joy when people needed it most, she wanted to help people in their darkest moments or when they were scared and needed reassurance and she had done that. She had done it in her eight years as a nurse at Mercy General Hospital back in Hershey, she had done it in her two years as a 911 operator during her time at dispatch, but then she had been caught up in her own dark moment and had quit her job to try and get the help she needed for herself.

It had been one hell of a struggle, but she had officially been diagnosed with postpartum depression eight months ago and, with the help of her Howie - her rock through it all, she had managed to regain a sense of belonging and direction. There were bad days and sometimes they were so draining and exhausting, leaving her physically stuck in bed for sometimes days at a time, but they were becoming fewer and fewer and maybe that was when she should have started to become suspicious. Maybe that was when she should have remembered that happiness was only temporary, but it's too late now.

Surely there should be some rule in the universe that says that there's only so much pain a human can experience in their life until something gives and maybe that rule wouldn't even help her in this scenario, because she was the thing that was about to give. Or maybe that rule only applies on different dates, because she does know what today is and judging by the look in his eyes, he does too and she knows that him doing his research certainly won't be of any help to her. Three years. It had been exactly three years since she had last been in a situation all too similar to this one and she knows that he has the upperhand in more ways than one because she had been trying to reel in from flashbacks ever since she woke up, and that had been the reason she had left the apartment in the first place. She had been intending to distract herself, to go and get even more presents for Jee's first birthday party in just over two weeks time, to go outside and get some fresh air in an attempt to ground herself, reminding her that she was safe and loved and she had survived. But, apparently the universe had other plans for her and if she wasn't certain of that before, she is certain of it now as she stares into the same pair of eyes that remind her so much of her late husband's - dark and inherently evil - and though she can't help but notice every similarity, she knows that this is different.

The only thing she can fully comprehend right now is the sensation of the cold steel pressing against her neck too tightly, a parallel to the way it had happened to her three years prior, not deep enough to draw blood, rather...a warning of what's to come. Except she doesn't know what is going to come because this wasn't Doug, it was Vincent, and the only person who truly knew what he was capable of was Tara, just as she was the only one who truly knew what her late husband was capable of behind closed doors. Though she also can't help but remember how her husband had killed a man in cold blood and almost stole the life of another. She had never expected that of him, she never would have thought that he was capable of killing anyone other than her in her time with him, but he had and maybe that's what causes her stomach to churn and breath to hitch as she dares herself to maintain eye contact.

"Tara's dead. She overdosed and it's all your fault. You were the one to put all of these crazy ideas in her head, you were the one that tried to convince her that she could leave me. We weren't meant to end like that, we were meant to grow old together and live happily, but I guess that that's over now. And it's all your fault, Maddie."

She can feel the bile rising in her throat, her whole body trembling as he takes another step towards her and pushes her further back against the wall, towering over her in a way she knew too well. The news of Tara's death is devastating, but it didn't really come as a surprise to her. She had seen for herself the situation the other woman was in, she knew what Tara must have been experiencing under the roof of a house that was meant to be called home, and she had learnt just how much the amount of domestic violence crimes and calls had increased over the last year or two, especially with the pandemic and lockdown. It still feels as if the universe is laughing at her though, because she had done everything she could to try and get Tara out of that situation before it did become too late, she had faced the repercussions for her actions and though she knew that she couldn't truly make the other woman leave, she had thought that she would. But now...now it's her turn to experience the same level of pain and fear that she had what simultaneously feels like yesterday and a whole lifetime ago. Now, she has to try and protect the people she loved the most from it, the same people that didn't deserve this. It pains her to think that Chim and Jee will likely be sitting in the living room right now, merely fifteen yards away with the exception of the wall that separates them, waiting for her to come home.

There is no doubt within her that she will do anything and everything to protect them, but it's only now she realises that she has a few things to come to terms with first before she accepts her fate.

And that was her baby girl, the same one that caused her so much joy and anguish over the last eleven months, one week and five days since she had been born. Her baby Jee. Perhaps if she had been in this situation a few months ago, she would have struggled to see the light at the end of the tunnel and found it so much easier to just give up on her family, but she had fought so hard for the life she had now, she had fought so hard to get to the place she is now, and that place was one of constant love. The same girl who was about to turn one and surpass the age that Buck had been when Daniel had passed away. A part of her can't help but wonder if she had been forced to get all of the pain out of the way before such a crucial point in her daughter's life, so that she doesn't screw her up in the way that their parents had, but a part of her also can't help but notice the irony in the fact that it was only when she had stopped questioning her ability as a mother that she was to be taken away from Jee forever. She can't see herself getting out of this one, not alive, and maybe it's her own fault for wishing death upon herself so many times in the past. Mostly it had been with Doug, when she thought that it was a much more merciful option than continuing living but there had been moments before and after when she questioned it all and perhaps this is punishment for doing so.

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