#fruit from the trees

[prattleskidaddle]

Love is like a rattlesnake

Before it bites it tries to warn you

[bressynonym]

an apple a day 🍎

[canisalbus]

This might be a strange question, but do you think it would be cathartic for Machete to have a tamagotchi in the modern AU? One of those things where it heals his inner child but he isn't sure why?

.

[smile-files]

mommy let you use her ipad, you were barely two

and it did all the things we designed it to do

now look at you, look at you!

(objectober 2024 day 10: internet)

[sesamenom]

Festival of the Trees in Rivendell (very much outdated) vs Festival of We Got Another Wine Shipment in Mirkwood (invented three hours ago)

somewhat inspired by this post by @elvinye

[doubleedgemode]

Happy summer, everybody!

This has been a big project to take and while there's stuff to improve I'm pretty happy with it. Be sure to zoom in the big picture for details and read the comic from left to right. (Needless to say, please don't try A.B.A's behaviour.. For your safety)

Bonus doodle:

[flangst]

I've been mulling over this topic since 10/7.

[serpentface]

Do psychotropic drugs and/or ritual play a role in any of the blightseed cultures? A pretty broad question, lol

Yeah that’s a very broad question, the answer is about as much as it tends to play roles in real history. Alcohol is pretty ubiquitous (outside of cultures that abstain from intoxicants) and used for a variety of purposes, opioids are commonly used in some parts for pain relief or recreational purposes, stimulants (usually in mild, natural forms) are used to provide extra energy, and hallucinogens are most commonly used as part of a larger religious framework (rather than for recreational purposes). Any more elaborate answer kinda has to be case by case in a certain culture or part of the setting.

I'll just take this as an opportunity to talk about the one established sect that pretty much REVOLVES around psychoactive use. This is the Scholarly Order of the Root, which is a sort of mystery religion + elite community of scholars who currently occupy the Ur-Tree and its forest in the far southern Lowlands (southeast of Imperial Wardin, on the same land mass).

The Ur-Tree is the obligatory Huge Fucking Fantasy Tree (and its surrounding forest). It’s a mass of vegetation about a mile tall and almost as old as Plant Life Itself, its upper branches are primeval plants, which become more modern the nearer they get to the ground (and each 'level' holds tiny ecosystems, some containing descendants of LONG-extinct arthropods/other small animals). Its lowest branches and the surrounding forest are contemporary plant life, and all is connected and protected by an incomparably MASSIVE fungal mycelium network (which is itself a living god).

A lot of the Scholars' more secretive practices revolve around experimentation with substance use with the goal of expanding the Mind and transcending the body to fully connect to the Dreamlands, and they have a supply chain of traders and mercenaries called Rootrunners who traffic substances into the Lowlands. Most of their psychoactive use is in a very intentional capacity and not just like, for fun, but a LOT of them are just straight up addicted to cocaine (in the form of alchemically refined bruljenum, which is used for practical purposes of its stimulant effect during long hours of work).

All known psychoactives are desirable for experimentation (particularly hallucinogens), with each having properties that either allow expansion of the Mind, transcendence of the body, or outright divine communion. Their effects are logged in great detail and interpreted to form the basis of the Scholars' understanding of the natural world and reality itself.

The most important substance is Ur-Root, which is root matter from subterranean levels of the Ur-Tree that have both their own intrinsic psychoactive substances and a very, very high concentration of living god mycelium. The tree root contains DMT and the mycelium has its own wholly unique effects (being an actual living god). They alchemically refine it into a purer, more potent form, and use it to expand beyond the body and directly commune with the Giants, a group of entities they have identified as the only true gods.

An Ur-Root trip starts off with minor visual distortion, which turns into shifting fractals that slowly obscure the vision. Eventually the senses are entirely taken over by a 'tunnel' of rapidly shifting fractals and geometries. In a complete trip, the experiencer gets a sense that they have been pushed through a membrane and entered another realm, finding themselves in a distinct experiential Space.

At this point they may encounter entities which communicate to them in a language impossible to describe but wholly understood. These beings are understood to be the Giants, or at least aspects of the Giants that mortals are capable of comprehending (they often take familiar tutelary forms of the Mantis or the Snake, or appear resembling the same type of sophont that the experiencer is, all composed of ever-shifting geometries). The experiencer often feels a sense of unconditional and endless love from these beings, though the Giants may be more hostile and may appear in the form of the Trickster (usually a cultural figure regarded as malicious, be it an animal or otherwise) in a bad trip.

(^Up until this point, this has mostly just been a DMT 'breakthrough' experience ft. 'machine elves' and the like).

They are then removed from this space and returned to something that feels like the real world, but is nearly unrecognizable. They have a sense of rapidly moving through time, and will usually see 'the spires' towards the beginning, which just so happen to look like this:

(source + some context via Implication- the spires are exactly what this art is depicting)

The experiencer continues to move across an unfathomable amount of time, occasionally 'seeing' other such flashes of unfamiliar landscapes and creatures, and yet also being devoid of all their senses, the 'seeing' is pure, unfiltered experience. There is a sense of interconnectedness with all life, and that one has become the forest (or even Life) itself. The sense of time is wildly distorted, the trip lasts only about 5 minutes but feels like an eternity and is understood as literal hundreds of millions of years.

The experiencer has usually lost any remaining sense of Self and individual consciousness during this phase (in which case this time distortion is usually a neutral or even peaceful experience), but some retain a fraction of their identity, and find themselves trapped and conscious while experiencing what feels like eternity (which can be LIFE-CHANGINGLY distressing, even after the fact).

(^This latter part of the trip is the effects of the Ur-Tree fungus).

The trip ends with a sense of rushing through the ground and back up into one's body, at which point they will abruptly return to their senses and consciousness. The details are then immediately retrieved via interview and recorded in immense detail. The whole experience is understood as having been full comprehension of the Dreamlands, communion with the Giants, and then a tour through the act of creation.

This is done as part of the initiatory practice into the inner mystery-religion of the scholars, and as needed for study by high scholar-priests. It is not taken lightly, both as it is absolute communion with the gods and reality, and in that it can be a very, very difficult experience. People who have gone through this often walk away with a permanently shifted perspective, often in a positive and/or comforting way- a sense of interconnectedness with all life, a peace with the concept of death, seeing less of a point in individual ego and the concept of Self, and comfort in the sense of divine love they (may have) experienced. This heavily influences the philosophy of the Scholars and has had effects by proxy in the religious worldviews of the region.

Details of this experience are closely guarded, and initiates are given absolutely no prior knowledge and expectations for their trip. This is seen as a necessity- their naivety will allow for a true, unfiltered experience, and can be used to gauge whether they should or should not be accepted. Those that have a distinctly bad trip upon initiation may be assumed to have been 'rejected' by the giants and thus denied full priesthood, though this largely depends on How they interpret their distressing trip- those who identify this as a test and harsh lesson in a journey to enlightenment may be accepted (as this is how fully initiated scholar-priests interpret and handle their bad trips).

This inner priesthood is only a small fraction of the Scholarly Order, and its greater function is as a hub of education and repository of knowledge, and Scholar-trained doctors can provide some of the best medical care available in the setting ('best medical care in this setting' only means so much but it's pretty solid, relatively speaking). Only a chosen few Scholars ever get to commune with the Ur-Root, and most of the divine secrets revealed in the process are kept hidden (though they indirectly influence the politics and worldview of the entire order).

[chalkscrub]

babygirl doodles from a little while ago

[gin-draws]

✨the sun✨

[lunalikestowriteanddraw]

I love that Marius, Lethica, and Farryn are basically the parents of the group at this point. Especially towards Briggsy. The amount of times the three of them had to scold Briggsy for doing something within the past 12 episodes is astonishing

[canisalbus]

earlier I remembered a post of yours mentioning Machete importing a Sicilian lemon tree

did he import it because of his roots or did he just desire lemons?

I do find it sad he never got it fruited

if only, maybe Vasco and him could've enjoyed some lemons together

I think it was a futile attempt to establish some connection to his birthplace. He's come such a long way from there and has barely any memories from his early childhood. Sicily is a vulcanic island with famously fertile soil, it's been a well known producer of high quality lemons for centuries.

The credit for the lemon tree goes to @doomcountry and it was mentioned in her excellent Machete fic "A Voi":

( https://archiveofourown.org/works/50945128 )

[mumpsetc]

Split the Cell

[orcelito]

ok I don't think we as a fandom talk about the way Vash cries blood enough

we only see it once or twice from what I remember, the one definite time being here ^ when the puppet attack first begins & he's dealing with the emotional agony of seeing so many of his family turn into puppets.

so it's clearly something that comes out only when he's in severe emotional distress.

the interesting thing is that Wolfwood is fucking TERRIFIED of him bc of it.

whatever this moment is, Vash is giving off the same sort of oppressive energy that Wolfwood's experienced with Knives. it's the first time during their travels that he's really been forced to recognize What Vash Is. he knew it of course, saw him in Jeneora, but he's such a goofy guy it's easy to forget.

but whatever Vash is doing here, it makes Wolfwood Incredibly aware of what he is.

so the real question i think is What exactly is going on here? is it unintentional? is it simply a response to the emotional agony?

Vash isn't the type to indiscriminately terrify everyone in the vicinity on purpose. he wouldn't be doing this purposefully out of anger while Wolfwood's there. no, in this moment, he's not even angry at all. he's Distraught.

going from This

to this

in just a moment.

yeah. that's some fucking emotional agony. i dont think Vash is doing this entirely on purpose.

but THEN...

as both Leonof and Wolfwood stare at him in fear, Both feeling his oppressive energy, Vash then lets out some sort of blast that blows against everything between him and Leonof. it doesn't destroy anything, doesn't even injure him, but it's a physically tangible effect that scares the Shit out of Leonof & spurs him into motion.

there may be some anger involved in this moment, but it's not the hair-trigger rage you would expect from seeing his family turned into puppets. it's something Quiet, something almost cold. he's distraught, Resigned, & retaliating just because he has to.

Vash hates all of this. he doesn't want to fight him. he fucking Knows this guy too, knew him as a kid, & none of this makes sense. but he knows that he needs to fight him, & doesn't have any kind of choice.

but he's not happy about it. not in the slightest.

[citrine-elephant]

angst/fluff chreon for you:

leon having people to be vulnerable with. he feels safe, comfortable.

and he gets so so so excited, that's he's talking chris' fuckin ear off. until he has a moment when he realizes he's been talking for awhile. and he slows down. visibly embarrassed.

he's happy, he's smiling, and he feels so fucking guilty about it. what about all the people who were dead? who lost their loved ones? living in terror every day? does chris really give a shit about something so mundane and pointless? he's annoying, isn't he? it's best to just shut up and go back to what he's made to do. just be a good little lap dog and keep killing the bad guys.

anyways when he goes quiet and apologizes, ready to slip out of chris' place and just fuckin bury himself alive, chris squeezes the shit out of him.

"hey, if you think you're annoying me, you're not. you can talk until my ears bleed, but at least i'll know you're alive."

cue leon ugly crying and telling chris he'll smother him in his sleep if he tells anyone. (it's the ugly crying he's mainly worried about (he's afraid that he'll come across as too needy) - and anything that can compromise a future mission by exploiting his darkest parts.)

[innamorat4]

There is some discourse on my dash about if eating fruit from a tree in a public space is considered stealing.

To add even more to the fruit discourse, talking about my experiences living in Brazil… as a child, my grandma’s house had a huge mango tree, and the neighbors crafted a pile made of brooms + a soda plastic bottle cut in half attached to it and they would poke it out of the walls of their yard into my grandma’s yard, up until the tree, to pick up mangoes. They had an acerola (barbados cherry) tree sticking out their yard wall, and the wall was short enough that we only needed a chair to reach the top of their tree, and we would take their fruits too. Seemed like a fair trade. I never knew their names, we never talked about it, but we would hear each other from the yards, laughing at ourselves “stealing” each other’s fruits.

I am an adult now, in a different, bigger city now, and there is a blackberry tree in my house. My mom planted it to attract birds, but it attracts neighbors, and we’re fine with it. A man once used the berries to make jam, brought some with cheese for my mom in return. A neighbor brought stairs to reach the top of tree. People I’ve never seen brought bags to pick up more berries. And in all honesty… it’s chaotically wholesome. And I wouldn’t have it any other way, and I don’t see it as stealing. I see it as: there is a tree full of fruit, and if people don’t eat it, it will fall off and rot, and it seems a little wasteful to not share it. I think a lot of people share that thought here, and there is a famous cartoon character known for his stories that usually start with him stealing guava from the trees of his neighbor (his name is Chico Bento). As I said, chaotically wholesome.