#he of all people should thrive in immortality because he sees that good and that love

[desertfangs]

And that's why Daniel, the person who impresses this on Louis despite Louis trying to show the despair, is not only an important character but has one of the strongest hearts in the whole damn coven. The true romantic.

Yes! Exactly. I almost put something in the tags about that, too, but it felt like too much for tags. But yes!

Louis, in the interview, is trying to tell a story about loss and grief and despair and hopelessness. And Daniel, who has only known about vampires for one (1) night, hears that story and realizes that vampires have such a high capacity for love and so much time in which to find it and express it.

Daniel, at that table in that room in San Francisco, knows that if Louis went to Armand right then, Armand would open up his arms to him and they could be together. If Lestat were there, they could move past their differences and find love.

It's Daniel who tells the other vampires in Prince Lestat, “Every single one of you that I’ve ever known has had this capacity, to appreciate beauty and to love.”

Maybe it's part of why Daniel and Armand connect so quickly, as even as he's scared of Armand, he knows deep down the love he's capable of.

Daniel has always been the heart of the coven, a romantic who sees the potential and possibility eternity offers, not just for knowledge and experience, but for love.

[moviemunchies]

Over twenty years after the original, and the “resurrect Maximus and make him immortal” script was thrown out, Scott finally directed a sequel to Gladiator, set a generation after the events of the first movie.

Yay?

Lucius, the kid from the first movie, is now back as an adult and going by ‘Hanno’. He left Rome for Numidia, where he lives with his wife, but when the Roman general Acasius conquers Numidia, Lucius’s wife is killed in the battle, and he’s captured to eventually become a gladiator under Macrinus, an ambitious businessman who promises to deliver him a chance at revenge. They’re taken to Rome to entertain the corrupt twin emperors of Rome–who Acasius and his wife, Lucilla (Lucius’s mother!!) hope to depose.

The general critical consensus appears to be that this movie is trying to be the first one, and only kind of succeeds. There are bits that are shout-outs to the first film; I think early one, I think there are even shots that look familiar. The problem is that while the first movie goes the way it does because of events that make sense, this one has a Plot that feels it only exists as an homage to the first movie, without the work to back it up.

Take our protagonist, for instance. The first movie shows us that Maximus is an effective general, a skilled warrior, and beloved by his men. When he becomes a gladiator, we see how he survives, thrives, and leads his fellow gladiators. In this movie, Lucius has a similar character arc, but nothing is done to show how he can do all of these things. He’s a soldier in the beginning, but we have no indication that he’s a particularly good one, nor is he much of a leader or effective strategist. When he steps up as a leader, or gives directions to his fellow gladiators, I scratch my head and wonder where this came from.

Both Lucius and Maximus have their wives fridged, but in the first movie, Maximus is constantly thinking back to his deceased wife. Lucius? I kept forgetting that she ever existed. Neither case is very good towards female characters, but this movie’s treatment feels even less so, because it’s as if it’s only in an attempt to replay the Plot of the first movie.

Lucilla is in this movie, though the story struggles to decide what she’s here to do. There are points where she’s referred to as ‘the Queen’ which… she’s not, especially as the twin emperors have no apparent relation to her.

Gracchus is here, too. He doesn’t do anything, Scott just wants to see if we remember him from the first movie. It also just feels sad, because his presence reminds us that nothing that our heroes worked for in Gladiator were ever accomplished. The Senate has none of the power, corrupt emperors are still running Rome into the ground, and the people are still voiceless and being entertained by the gladiator arena rather than being taken care of. Like, okay, given history, we know that Rome wasn’t given back to the people, but it wasn’t as if history is Scott’s strong suit, so you might think that in this universe, perhaps it was. Now we know it’s not.

With all of this in mind, I can’t help but think maybe this movie should have been its own thing, only loosely connected to the first. Maybe it could have been set a century or so afterward, and contained vague references to the first film, I don’t know. The attempts to tie it into the first movie, through returning characters or certain reveals (which were spoiled in the trailers?), don’t feel earned.

There are other things in the movie that bring it down. If you’re a history nut, you’ll obviously have problems with the story, though given it’s a Ridley Scott movie, and how he’s been about this lately, I can’t say it’s a surprise. The CGI animals are not great–I’ve seen everyone and their mother talk about how the baboons look, and that’s entirely fair because they look barely recognizable as baboons. The rhino was okay for the most part, but the sharks? Those looked pretty bad, too.

Another random thing that bugged me? There were random inscriptions in places that were clearly written in English instead of Latin, just so the audience can read along. The characters are reading them aloud in those scenes, too, so it’s pointless hand-holding.

The one good thing everyone can agree on with this movie, though? Denzel Washington as Macrinus. He’s clearly having a ball out-acting just about everyone else in every scene. I’ve seen some people take issue with how his character was written, especially in today’s environment–a former slave who holds a grudge against the institutional powers, framed as dangerous and untrustworthy–and I agree. Doesn’t change that this guy’s clearly the highlight of the movie.

It’s an action movie, too, I guess? The action is fine, for the most part. So if you want a historical action epic, and you’re not too picky about how the story fits together, you might have fun with this. 

Still, it’s not as if you have to see this movie for any reason. It doesn’t feel like a great or necessary follow-up to Gladiator. It doesn’t feel like that well-done of a story. It’s just… kind of there. I wouldn’t call it a bad movie, but it’s not really good, and I think there are plenty of other movies you can watch in its place.

Take it or leave it, it’s just ‘meh’.

[lordofthestrix]

♧: something my muse is really good at

I will die on this hill: For all his dark-heartedness and Machiavellian tactics, Tristan has implausibly high leadership skills. One of the consistent facets of the vampires of the TVD universe is that they are extremely bad at staying in groups for long periods of time with any degree of success. The other two mildly victorious attempts on the top of my head are the vampire community of Mystic Falls during 1864, who were progressively having lots of problems with the human population and the local werewolf family noticing their existence, culminating in their imprisonment, and the vampires of New Orleans who seemed to be living pretty well under Marcel before the events of the show but...You can't really count as a consistent group afterwards? They continuously got massacred and replaced by a new sired bunch. There is the pre-Gia generation, the Gia generation, the post-Gia generation...They were never the most talented at staying alive. And the Strix, at their earliest chapter, seemed to be following the same mold as the other vampire groups. They existed for a short while, Elijah left and they were self-admittedly doomed. But add as touch of Tristan and they began singing a different tune. Let's move forward a couple of centuries to discover if those crazy kids actually survive: Tristan: Now that Constantinople has fallen, the Roman Empire is no more, my Strix endure beyond even that which was deemed eternal. In time there will be no place on Earth where our influence is not felt. Not even the Mikaelsons hold that power. Okay. They are still there. Big projects. Big ambitions, it seems. Let's go really into the future and see how that turns out for them: ELIJAH: Only the most dangerous and influential congregation of vampires the world has ever known. AYA: We're the top of the food chain-- the smartest, the strongest. And, we take what we want. So, yes. I give credit to Tristan as the one who unlocked the secret of how to keep vampires thriving under the same banner. And mind you, Tristan is not an Original. He is your classic kind of immortal. Not impossible to plot against with enough ancient vampires involved. You can't read Aya's description of the organization and tell me that it doesn't attract, among others, the kind of personalities that join an elite group and instantly wonder if they shouldn't be the one on the throne. Still, he remains unchallenged as the one leading them for the better part of his millennium. Still he gives them reason to be loyal to him. I talked quite a bit in the past about Tristan's brand of loyalty (The whole "But nothing more important than how to not be you. Where you betray, I remain loyal. Where you abandon, I remain. And, should you find a knight or two in shining armor still foolish enough to fight for you… They will die right alongside you.") but here it is more relevant to point out that Tristan finds that loyalty corresponded when it comes to the Strix. In fact his last words concerning the organization addresses it so high as to regard it as a form of love. (For Tristan, love and loyalty are even more intrinsically connected than to the average person but that is a headcanon for another day) Here is this extremely cunning, extremely ambitious legion of vampires. And instead or scheming power plays and take their chance the first time I leave the board, they are using all of their guile and resources to try to bring me back. That sort of sentiment. Tristan: You realize that I am here because my people love me? You are here because those same people loathe you. You have driven them to this. I do think that Tristan has an unexpected and rather ferocious talent for inspiring strength in others. And, as arrogant as he is other ways, I actually don't think he realizes how personally good he can be at doing that.

AYA: Tristan has been a collector of extraordinary talent for the better part of a millennium. He chooses the best of the best and helps them evolve. AYA: Tristan de Martel guided this organization for centuries. He was a radical thinker, decisive leader, and, to each of us here tonight, both mentor and friend. He was, in a word, irreplaceable.

[seraphimichael]

"Die."

Apparently it was true what people said: your life really did flash before your eyes when you died. Michael had wrongfully assumed that he'd be immune by product of either his immortality or his divinity, but despite both of these truths he saw the lengthy life that the seraphim had lived stretched in front of him.

The war of The Great Old Ones, it took a thousand of Michael's kind to fell even one, creatures of indomitable power, Michael and his siblings had been created with the soul purpose of destroying them. The infantry and the front lines, it was in the years that followed when the archangel walked the realm in Adam's skin that he understood then that Michael and his siblings were never meant to survive.

In the garden of Eden Michael was never a child, but he laughed alongside his sibling and learned the truth of familial bonds. Bonds of war and heartache, buried feathers and broken promises. Lucifer was renowned for their beauty, but there was a time when he had been Michael's closest friend. Their treachery had carved a valley within the seraphim that he hadn't thought could ever be crossed or mended. Because Michael's careless father had decreed it, he'd bloodied his hands once again, this time with the ichor of his own kin. Many more years later still that Grace he ripped and returned to the aether fell to Ulthar once more, the great glutton hoarding a wealth of power above him. Performative fatherhood in its cruelest shape.

Babylon's fabled hanging gardens brought to Michael an Oracle, Damkina, she'd foretold that the archangel would be her doom but within her he found his salvation. A daughter, Omarosa, more beautiful than any other. The nephilim babe never reached her prime because there were far too many with an axe to grind, Michael and his Blessed siblings with their cacophony of enemies. He buried the demon as he'd buried his family, and for years he'd forsaken all else to do nothing but carve away at a world that felt empty and hollow. This was the blade that Ulthar had wanted, this was the sword that his father had forged.

In a cradle a newborn infant wailed as the blood of their father stained Michael's hands. Another sibling slain, another life destroyed. Nathaniel. It was true, the seraphim had made a terrible father, it was no wonder considering he'd had nothing significant to emulate. No guidance from anyone but the child that tried to awkwardly from themself again and again. The blade that he created and wove through the air, the sensitive wave the hunter's empathic abilities developed and shaped them. Michael had always been proud, but for whatever reason he'd had such a hard time saying it.

Vivianne showed him why, because children shouldn't be soldiers, they shouldn't be trained to see an enemy behind the face of everyone who called themselves a friend. Children should have been children, not sword-wielding hunters in training. Michael had taken that from Nathaniel, so when they succeeded, when they thrived and flourished, it was impossible to feel anything but regret. Pride, sure, because Nathaniel was strong enough to survive anything, but they had deserved a father and instead Michael had given them a mentor.

It was over now, Michael didn't have any time left to make amends or to make things right. He'd thought dying to save the world on Nathaniel's behalf might have been good enough, but the seraphim couldn't even do that right. In the end all Michael had managed to do was turn against his family, and cut himself from the same terrible fatherhood cloth as Ulthar.

"I love you, and I'm proud of you."

The Voice Caster's death command sunk in, and sinew broke apart as Adam's vessel burst from within as Michael's Grace suddenly imploded in on itself.

DEAD

There is no relief at seeing their father, there should be, and that is the first sign that something is terribly wrong. It's not something he taps into all that often on account of it's incredibly overwhelming, the whole empathy thing. But whatever form Assan had taken didn't feel like he normally did and while the tiefling was brutal, the way he'd popped the creatures around them like grapes.... Michael was Micheal though, the best, the biggest, the baddest, that kind of thing. But in that moment he regrets calling out to him. "I'm fine, I got startled, you should-" Nate looks around at the scene around them and it's not a lie, he'd done it without thinking too hard on it. There is this deep sinking feeling in their own gut. "You should go, I'm fine." It's so hurried and he's looking up at the seraphim, the man who'd raised him, the one who had trained him. And he knows how all of this ends, Michael had told him such months ago and it hadn't made it any easier to wrap his head around.

[cosmicjoke]

Wow, haha, so, “Memnoch the Devil” is definitely a weird one in the series thus far, but super fascinating, particularly in how it deals in religious themes.  I’m sure plenty of people have discussed all of that before and in much greater depth and understanding than I ever could.  So as usual, I’ll just focus my thoughts on Lestat and his particular character arc here.

Lestat’s relationship with David continues to be really interesting to me.  Though I get the sense that David, unintentional though it must be, is having a damaging effect on Lestat in this story.  I saw someone mention in another post a few days ago that David was “terrible”, and I wondered what they were talking about, since David, up to this point, seems to have been a good and caring friend to Lestat.  But I think I might see a little of what they meant here.  David is obviously a kind of father figure to Lestat, and really, Lestat’s desire to have David as a companion I think stemmed from this hope that he would have the strength to last with Lestat in a life of immortality.  Because he saw in David someone who was like him.  A man of action, a seeker of adventure and danger, etc... 

Lestat continues to rake himself over the coals in this story for thriving within the state of vampirism as he does.  He’s as burdened by the guilt of it as ever, by the fact that he can thrive in it.  People talk about the sense of Catholic guilt in these stories, and how of course that comes from Anne Rice’s own personal issues regarding it, and obviously you can see that struggle imbued onto her characters.  Lestat, you would think, is someone free of it, given his atheism, and his general ability to overcome and move forward from the various philosophical questions which plague him.  But so much of Catholic guilt comes from a sense that one shouldn’t ever be free from the suffering of guilt, or original sin.  That we should always be punishing ourselves for being born as sinners.  And I think that particular struggle is deeply present in Lestat himself, regardless of whether he believes in God or not.  Lestat’s sense of guilt comes directly from his ability to move past his suffering.  He thinks he should be more weighed down, more burdened by it, and the fact that he isn’t serves as proof to him of his own, inherent wickedness. 

David starts talking to Lestat here about Hawthorn, and his character of Ethan Brand, and this concept of how this character became a fiend when his moral nature had ceased to keep pace with the improvement of his intellect.  David says directly

“That’s our damnation... Our moral improvement has reached its finish, and our intellect grows by leaps and bounds.”

And Lestat thinks in response

“Still I said nothing.  What was I to say?  Despair was so familiar to me; it could be banished by the sight of a beautiful mannikin in the window.  It could be dispelled by the spectacle of lights surrounding a tower.  It could be lifted by the great ghostly shape of St. Patrick’s coming into view.  And then despair would come again.

Meaningless, I almost said, aloud...”

David says earlier to Lestat that he won’t “survive long”, because he’s so tormented by the act of killing.  And Lestat tells him this feeling won’t last, that he’ll get over it, that that’s the key to survival. 

But this must truly be horrible to Lestat, because once again it seems he’s chosen to bring someone into immortality with him who isn’t equipped to endure it with him.  Once again he’s faced with having made a companion who seems poised to succumb to their own misery and guilt.

David telling Lestat that their moral improvement comes to an end with their vampirism of course just seems to feed into this idea which has tormented Lestat for nearly his whole existence, that being that a vampire can do no good in the world, can have no real purpose or contribute in any meaningful way to anyone.  He sees no point in his existence, and so he has no way of battling against the meaninglessness of life itself, the very thing which caused Lestat to have his first, real mental breakdown. 

And then you have Lestat’s internal thoughts regarding his own despair, and how he continually finds ways to get over it, and how it then comes back again, and again he finds a way past it.  How there’s this cycle which allows him to continue on while so many others give in to their despair and eventually try to destroy themselves, or do destroy themselves. 

He thinks of this cycle as “meaningless”, and I think that’s a reflection of Lestat’s own, inner sense of guilt at his ability to overcome his misery.  He actually feels guilty for being strong, for being able to move past his feelings of deep depression, and again that goes back to the idea of original sin and Catholic guilt, and how, if we were really good people, we shouldn’t ever be free from this sense of personal misery, we shouldn’t ever, really, be happy; the idea that we should somehow suffer or pay for being born into sin.  The whole penitential idea behind Christianity and living in a state of minimal comfort, living in a state of abstinence. 

Lestat’s personal sin isn’t that Jesus died for him, or whatever, and he needs to always acknowledge that.  It’s himself.  He’s the problem, according to basically everyone he’s ever met and interacted with, according to every awful experience he’s ever had.  His optimism and hope, his enjoyment of life, his love of art and luxury and finery, his relishing in his existence, has always been treated by others as some sort of destructive force, and wielded against him as some sort of evidence of his inherent evil.  I think Lestat views his own ability to bounce back from his depressions as indicative of his despair’s shallowness.  He thinks his feelings of pain and misery, his sense of guilt and unhappiness can’t really be all that deep, or real, because he always finds a way to move on.  He sees someone like Louis, who wallows and exists within a near constant state of sadness, who punishes himself by living in poverty, or Nicki, who did the same before eventually succumbing to his depression completely, or Armand, who also lives in a near constant state of misery, and then compares it to himself, to his ability to find release and distraction and freedom in art, in things like the lights around towers and the beauty of a church or a mannikin, and thinks it’s some sort of condemnation of his own character, that it exposes him as shallow and petty and unfeeling. 

He looked for in David someone who could share in his ability to overcome his bouts of depression, because, again ironically, Lestat’s ability to endure and overcome his pain leaves him in a state of almost constant aloneness.  It leaves him isolated and outcast.  And sadly, it seems like David is beginning to trend here towards the same, consuming despair that plagues everyone else of their kind, threatening once more to leave Lestat abandoned. 

Ironically, Lestat’s ability to overcome his sadness ends up only causing him more sadness, more pain, more misery.   It leaves him alone, and it causes him to think of himself as some sort of uncaring, unfeeling monster.

[thecarnivorousmuffinmeta]

Hey, in that prehistory time travel thing you wrote about, when Bella gets a premonition/nightmare, do she and Caveman play very precarious charades or does she draw shitty, shitty cave art that Caveman perceives as dire prophecy? I mean, technically, it is. I also assume interaction with other vampiric cavemen is usually fraught with tension, but would they ever form a coven? Proto-Volturi/actual Volturi if Bella's power realises her food source's in danger and she rationalizes it for sympathy?

Anon is referring to this post. The TL;DR is that Bella becomes a prophet and ends up unintentionally married to a hot caveman vampire. She probably calls him Caveman.

How Bella Conveys Her Prophecies

Well, when she's human, she has her Voodoo Witchcraft Dreams where she speaks aloud. Sometimes, this is just nonsense, other times... it's not. So Caveman gets to witness Bella tossing and turning, muttering in tongues, and probably has an internal "Fuuuuuuuck" moment as he realizes that something may happen.

The other moments are when Bella just starts babbling to herself in gibberish, talking to "Hallucination Edward" as she tries to explain, a divine messenger who tells her important information sometimes. That's also weird.

I imagine as Bella becomes a vampire, she either gets waking premonitions in which she babbles in tongues for a minute or two while getting her information, or she has conversations with Hallucination Edward. It's a thing, Caveman just watches until it finishes.

Then, as you note, comes the charades.

Eventually, these two are going to learn how to communicate with one another. Either Bella will finally pick up the local tongue or the vampire will learn English. My money's on Caveman, I have no explanation in this, just that Bella mired in depression doesn't seem at the peak mental capacity to learn a language that has nothing in common with English.

Though even then there's a wide cultural disconnect between the pair of them and a lot of misconceptions.

Regardless, until that point, yes, we get shitty shitty shitty cave art. Because Bella is a terrible artist in my brain and I stand by that now. This is accompanied by interpretive dancing and poor acting via charades.

Caveman takes this all very seriously, as he should, because this is usually very important information. He just wishes for god's sake that the gods who speak through her were a little more intelligible. He gets it, they have to pass through mortal hands and tongues, but couldn't they try a little harder?!

They probably eventually work out a system where he gets pretty good at figuring out what's going on. People, when they run into them and those people aren't eaten, are amazed at his abilities and assume that he has some divine gift for interpreting the words of the gods. He believes he does too.

Bella thinks her pictures of horsies are great.

What About the Other Vampires?

Oh yeah, that's going to be a mess, and probably what most of Bella's visions are about: how to avoid conflict or else conquer their enemies.

Bella, with her insane gift, is a prize to be won and would be highly contested among the paltry vampire population that exists. She can protect them from other vampires, give them information on the best food sources, etc.

Caveman's going to have to constantly be protecting her (as is Bella, though all she knows is she keeps having weird visions about vampires and Edward is sitting there telling her about some new vampire out to get her every other day).

That said, by necessity, I imagine a coven is formed.

Probably only one or two more, given the precarious size of the population and how much they're going to need to travel to keep the human population sustainable, but more numbers means a better chance of surviving fights.

Caveman due to statistics, probably isn't gifted, and so I imagine Bella's gift could lead them to turning or else picking up a gifted vampire who complements what they already have. They need the offensive brawn of the group or a physical defensive measure like a Proto Renata.

Is This New Coven a Proto-Volturi?

... Shockingly, yes.

First, Bella unintentionally does what Aro does: she collects a core coven of very gifted members. There's herself, of course, and whatever other vampire they pick up to round out their numbers/supply a much needed military style gift.

And given how small the population of humans is, the harsh conditions they live in, I imagine that Bella realizes rather quickly that... they could wipe out the human race.

I imagine they pass through several villages which have been decimated by vampires. Either by immortal children, feasts, territorial conflicts, you name it. Now all those humans are dead, the survivors if there are any starve and freeze to death in the wilderness without society as a support.

This is... really bad.

Bella notes to Caveman that this can't keep going. First, Bella would rather not eat people period, but second if they keep eating like this then there aren't going to be people left. The reason they've been having all these territorial disputes is because vampires from god knows where have travelled into their territory to eat their people because they ate all of their own.

They're locusts!

Caveman admits that she... may have a very good point there.

I imagine Bella's tactics differ though.

The idea of keeping vampires a secret is a non-intuitive if brilliant solution. It's an easy way of tracking when you've gone too far: if the humans start noticing their numbers decreasing then you've eaten way too many people. I don't see it as something Bella would come up with.

I mean, god, imagine it. A group of Myceneans sitting around, in the age of gods when demons walk among us and devour who they will, and Aro says, "I'm going to save the world by making the gods disappear." It sounds insane, they're going to make everyone pretend demons don't exist? Why? And yet it works out such that the secret is something Bella takes for granted, something very natural to her.

This is not a plan that Bella would come up with.

In fact, now in the past in the age of gods and demons, I imagine she's not quite sure why vampires were ever kept secret from the human race. Feels weird, in retrospect.

I imagine what they do instead is protect their territory. They form a pact with the humans over a pretty wide swath of land: provide us a tithe and we will protect your people from the demons, and become a local pantheon. Any other vampires who come into the territory are killed, territory expands as Bella and company form alliances with other covens, and the human race...

Well, the sentence for petty theft is probably now death at the jaws of a vampire, and Bella probably tries and fails to get her coven on her nifty animal diet, but human clans aren't wiped out to a man anymore. Mankind survives and with the aid of a prophet vampire (who suddenly knows a weird amount about farming so as to keep the peasants from revolting) thrives with an industrial revolution.

It's weird times.

[faerienextdoor]

pastas and your insecurities

tw: i think depictions/descriptions of stretch marks may trigger some people! and mentions of scars, but no specification

Brian, cellulite and stretchmarks:

- he is a gentle himbo soul. He calls your stretch marks your lovemarks and lightning bolts.

- he loves the bumps and grooves on the back of your comfy thighs. thighs he's constantly found himself resting his head in when his head rumbled and ached from a migraine.

- you're a gift to him and the world.

- and he wants you to feel like you're perfect. because you are, to him.

- during cuddle time, he rests his head on your tummy, snuggled between your thighs.

- he'll lift your shirt and kiss the marks that travel up your tummy, and smile at you as his kisses tickle your soft skin

- "have I ever told you how beautiful you are?"

- he asks that so innocently and with so much sincerity. it can melt the hardest of asses.

- he is your personal hype man! If you wear something you usually wouldn't, he'd stop to stare for a while at first

- then breaks out in a giant happy grin, and pulls you into him.

- grabs your hand, and spins you around.

- all that shit. so he can get a good look at you

- kisses the crown of your head gently

- "how did I ever get so lucky?"

jeff, and scars:

- his initial reaction is to laugh off your insecurities

- he's used to joking around what he hated about himself and knows he doesn't want anyone delving in, and finds it more comforting for them to laugh it off with him

- but the laughter dies down and the smiling bastard is frowning at you now

- he knows what it's like to hate your scars. He's picked and tried to scrape off his own burnt flesh, and made them worse in the bed.

- "what the fuck are you on about? c'mere"

- he aggressively loves you. He doesn't want you to feel like how he feels about himself.

- he'll kiss any patch of scarred skin he has permission to and can get to. even if it's an awkward place, his thin lips are pressing his love to them.

- "beautiful. gorgeous. handsome. I could never get enough of you"

- he mutters compliments to you and holds you, pressing his face into the curve of your neck. he breathes in your smell and let's it out in a soft sigh

- "never talk bullshit about yourself again, you got it?"

- he won't take any of your negativity from then on out

- in his eyes: he's the only one who can tease you

Tim, stretch marks and thighs:

- he's a big dude himself. and in the best, most pleasant way.

- he has muscle + fat. a good mix that has made him the best cuddle buddy

- you've told him yourself. So why do you put yourself down for what you love about him?

- he loves how cats can curl so happily on your sun soaked lap in middle of summer

- he loves your beautiful marks, and finds them to be so unique and beautiful on you

- the deep grooves he can't keep his hands away from when you're cuddled (skin to skin, or with very little clothes)

- he looks you in the eyes and gently tells you how you make him feel

- "you make me the happiest I've been in... a long time."

- Masky loves your form too. He loves how it looks in tims shirts or a tight fitting outfit.

- masky rests his heavy head in your lap in the most annoying way.

- I'm talking about forcing himself in your personal space, just for some sugar

- and he's content laying there for /hours/

- and you bet your ass you're not moving an INCH unless you threaten to piss on the couch/bed

- "gorgeous"

- he compliments you in a blunt way

- and when you feel especially down, you'll find extra shiny rocks in your pockets

jane, voice:

- she could listen to your voice for hours

- or the rest of eternity

- and she damn well should

- when she's stressed and unable to nap, she'll beg you to tell her how your day has been. and in the most detailed way imaginable. tell her which direction the blender spun when it churned up your fruity smoothie

- and pretty soon her eyes are fluttering shut and sleep is welcoming her like an old friend

- "oh dearie, want to talk about it?"

- she sets everything aside for you. she wants you to spill your feeling guts out so she can make sense of it all. it doesn't make sense. your voice soothes her and makes her feel so happy. it's tender and gentle on her canals.

- she holds your hands and makes you look her in the eyes. she tells you how she sometimes can't sleep without you talking to her. she's fallen asleep countless times by your side because of your voice alone

- and she swears you are an angel from above with an voice as soothing and musical as yours.

- when she misses any of your calls, she'll pray that you left her a voicemail

- and instead of texting, she'll call to hear your voice. even if it's a simple topic that can be solved better through messages

Helen, hip dips/tummy:

- you're like the most perfectly sculpted statue to him. or a portrait made with the best paints and spent the most amount of time on

- he's breathless by your beauty constantly

- and he's a flustered blubbering mess. unable to find his words or compose himself when you so much as smile at him

- god knows how he managed to land a date with you. or a committed relationship.

- he begs to paint you and that's when the topic comes up

- he sits there and listens patiently, frowning more and more as you spill your squishy heart out to him

- he's silent for a moment

- "but I think you're beautiful."

- he isn't sure how to say it. but to him, god spent the most time on you

- you stun him anytime you enter a room

- and he takes extra care of you. he makes sure to compliment you more and more, hoping his words and the love he manages to shower you in is enough to mend you

- it probably isn't, because that might not be how it works for everyone, but he's trying and will do anything it takes for his lovely

- he's extra touchy, hugging you closer. you can feel his heart beating against your back as he holds you to him, back to his chest.

- "you always look so beautiful without even trying... how?"

- and he kisses you

- you'll get some good ol' helen lovin'

Ben, acne/eczema:

- let's get something straight first: he's a tit. a whole one. he's teased you before but never jabbed at insecurities

- and he did it to show his love at first

- but here you are, mumbling about how you hate your acne and the deep scars it's left on your back and face.

- "that just means your skin is oily"

"I wish it wasn't. it makes me look /ugly/"

- he stops right then and there, turning to stare at you like you insulted his entire family tree

- and you may as well have

- he tells you to never say that again and doesn't listen to excuses

- takes your face in his hands and makes you swear on it

- he kisses all over your face

- "I'll do face masks and shit with you if it'll make you happy"

- and he follows through with that!

- when he's at the store he buys new products to try, and he reassures you that your skin will get better eventually when you're upset over his glow

- he had a hell of a lot of acne when he was alive and a thriving teen

- and he can't find words to explain how beautiful you are to him

- you just are and he assumes it's common knowledge

- to you and everyone else

- he won't let you talk shit about yourself, and won't let anyone else do that either

LJ, face shape/proportions:

- he just frowns insecurities at first

- isn't there more to worry about?

- he sees it genuinely dishearten you and softens. he gently takes his claws through your hair, mumbling about how he didn't know it bothered you so much

- "...but it's.. your face?"

- he winces at his own stupidity and inability to comfort someone else

- he lets you ramble it all out and tells you the hard truth: there isn't a lot you can do. plastic surgery is expensive and often gets botched, and there's people out there who'd kill for a face like your own

- he's a hard ass but a very very loveable one

- he kisses you and holds you to him, telling you that he loves you over and over

- the next day he's arranged a day to yourself so you aren't stressing your weak squish brain.

- he's taken care of your household responsibilities for you and brings in your favorite snacks

- puts on your favorite show or movie and cuddles you the rest of the day

- he holds you so securely and protectively, even when it's just the two of you

- no one will get their hands on you or make you feel bad about yourself

- not whole, he still has a good ass kicking in him left.

Toby, and scars:

- he knows what it's like. he has scars up and down his arms and over his back from the car wreck and faint ones on the side of his fingers from how he tore his skin down to the bone with his his teeth

- he doesn't take the same approach as jeff, and instead wants you to talk it all out and cry until you're exhausted

- he tells you every scar has a story and he loves yours

- because it brought you right to him

- and he couldn't have made it through most of the shit he has without you.

- "I l-luh-love you"

- you make him feel better about himself and he wants you to feel the same way with him

- he'll gently brush his fingers across your scars, tough so light and airy you can barely feel it

- he's always ready to listen to how you got them

- no matter how stupid or not badass the story may be, he's invested because you're his storybook

- and he can't wait to dig in and read it again and again

Ej, big nose:

- he's always found himself gazing at your profile from his spot. anytime he can see it, he traces it silently with just his eyes

- and he looks away flustered

- he thinks it's fits your face. he doesn't take listening to you talk about a nose job or anyone else's straight bridged nose

- yours is perfect and he can't picture you with another one

- he lifts his mask and presses a kiss to the bridge or the tip of it often

- and he loves watching your face flush red in reaction

- "I think it looks lovely on you"

- and he'll tell you that every single day if he has to

- with him being an immortal demon means he has plenty of time

- as long as you're glued to his side he's telling you how much he adores the features that are plastered to your face

[i-will-physically-fight-you]

Gibbous Chapter 9

Chapter Title: The Thought of Fresh Meat Is Making Me Ill

Summary:  It was October. A month full of cheer for the macabre. A month where humans gleefully wore the skins of those they saw as monsters. A month that Virgil generally enjoyed. It was the one month out of the year where he felt the most alive. Yet somehow, for this year’s October, he felt dead inside. Like his body had turned into the rotting corpse of a zombie and his soul was somehow still trapped inside.

Pairings: platonic lamp & platonic sleepxiety

Chapter Word-Count: 5503

Warnings:  Verbal/Emotional Abuse, Anxiety, Depression, Paranoia, Arguing, Disassociation, Sensory Overload (Yeah this one isn't gonna be a particularly happy one, Virgil Is Spiraling Mentally Big Time)

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Surprise b*tch, bet you thought you saw the last of me! I'm back for my yearly update--this chapter is dedicated to all the lovely comments people have left on previous chapter! Also!! I rewrote a significant amount of Crescent Chapter 3 and added onto Gibbous Chapter 5, the latter you might want to reread as it adds a bit to the opening scene of this chapter.

Chapter title taken from "I know I'm a Wolf" from the Young Heretics!

-

In books, there was always a perfect, logical sense of progression. Stories were generally told in a three-act structure. The setup, the midpoint and the resolution. The beginning of a story established the protagonist to the reader. It gave you details about their personality, their way of living, their wants and desires. Then the protagonist found themselves upended by an inciting incident.

Something that caused their way of living to never again be the same. Tension grew and grew as they sought to come about a way to continue living. Until it reached a climax, one where after which, they either thrived or withered away. In which case, the story ended as the protagonist returned to a new sense of normalcy.

One that would last until the next inciting incident came along to shake up their world once again.

Once one found this pattern, it was hard to ever see stories the same way again. There were certain things to always expect—things you could decipher before the story’s end. Real life, however, wasn’t quite like that.

Or at least this was what Logan had come to find. Sure, in many ways events in life played out like stories. There was an inciting incident, something that arose tension as one sought to solve the dilemma. It just wasn’t as neatly bound together like a story or even a math equation. Life was messy, complicated—it threw in plot twists or details that critics would claim lazy and unbelievable.

Logan was harshly reminded of this in the case of one Virgil Raine. He couldn’t understand—he was doing everything right, remaining patient and giving Virgil a chance to open up to Logan on his own time. Yet the human shied further and further away, all development he made since working at the library immediately erased. Virgil even shut out all notions of spending time outside work without explanation. It’d been weeks at this point with no result despite the attempts of Logan, Patton and even Remy, who was arguably the closet with Virgil.

Perhaps this was something that should be expected. Virgil rarely spoke about his past, but what little he shared, he had to fend mostly for his own from a young age. Whoever hurt Virgil caused him to believe again he couldn't rely on anyone but himself.

Logan was not a particularly violent person. He'd been ignorantly cruel once upon a time, yes, but even back then he wasn't one to have the urge to kill people. The wolfish part of him begged to differ, as always. His instincts howled at him to find that person and tear them limb to limb. Better yet, they demanded he snatch Virgil away and bring him against his will to the pack, to safety. As much as Logan wanted this, logically he knew Virgil might never fully trust Patton or himself ever again despite their good intentions. Illogically, he couldn’t bring himself to do the one thing he swore he’d never do again, even if it was for Virgil's safety.

He pondered this, sitting in front of a mountain of paperwork. It was late, too late for him to still be at the library. He couldn’t bring himself to move from his desk, not until he figured something out. He gnashed sharpened teeth in agitation, gripping his hair with claw-like fingernails. It didn't help that normally this time of the month, his cognitive thinking skills were usually in a different state of being. If he wasn't careful, the cleaning staff might find a wolf rampant in the library the next morning.

His phone rang just then, some meme-related ringtone Roman picked out that he’d found funny. Logan snatched it up and answered it.

“Patton, listen, I will be home soon I am just finishing up—”

“I’m not Patton,” The person on the other line cut in, “It’s me, Remy.”

“Oh,” Logan cleared his throat, thrown off by this revelation, “is something the matter?”

“Yeah, something’s the matter alright,” Remy said, his voice hoarse, “I fucked up big time with Virgil.”

 -

It was October. A month full of cheer for the macabre. A month where humans gleefully wore the skins of those they saw as monsters. A month that Virgil generally enjoyed. It was the one month out of the year where he felt the most alive. Yet somehow, for this year’s October, he felt dead inside. Like his body had turned into the rotting corpse of a zombie and his soul was somehow still trapped inside.

He supposed it had something to do with how September slipped from his fingers much in the way that his phone slipped from Jerad’s fingers. Falling all the way down, down, down, breaking upon the asphalt below into a million tiny pieces. Tried as he might, the memory haunted him in the waking world as well as his dreams.

 Only, in his dreams, sometimes it was him that fell to the ground. Like a shoddy version of Humpty Dumpty. Remy, Patton and Logan would try to fix him to no avail. They’d always leave, scoffing that it wasn’t worth it. He couldn’t cry or reach out towards them, begging for them to return. He could only lay there, broken and bleeding, watching as they abandoned him. Sometimes Roman showed up to gloat, mocking him for thinking they ever cared for him.

The worst thing about it? He knew it was going to happen in real life. It was only a matter of time. Even Jerad knew this.

“C’mon, you really want to hang out with them and not me, your friend?” Jerad scoffed, “what have they done for you? Have they helped out you when you couldn’t pay rent? Replaced your shitty phone for the best smartphone out there?”

“Well no but—”

“Face it, V-Man, they’re using you. They set you up with a new job, making you beholden to them and it’s sickening! They don’t actually care about you. Once they’ve had their fun jerking you around, they’ll just throw you out with the garbage. And I don’t want you coming to me, bawling like a baby, when it happens!”

As much as Jerad was a jerk, Virgil knew deep down he was right. He’d been so ecstatic at their displays of friendship, he didn’t even stop to consider it was all a façade. Maybe they themselves thought it was real, that they actually cared for him. But eventually they’ll realize the truth. That he’s a loser and nothing more.

Or maybe they already knew the truth and were merely toying with him. Virgil was just a human, mortal through and through. Remy, Patton and Logan were all near-immortal, unkillable save a well-placed piece of silver and a stake of wood in Remy’s case. At least with Jerad, he was honest. He knew Virgil was a loser and made it clear he only hung out with Virgil because it was better than nothing.

Jerad had been nice to Virgil lately—or nice as Jerad could be at least. He’d insisted on occasionally giving Virgil rides to and from work. An offer Virgil couldn’t refuse—no matter how hard his heart thudded against his chest with Jerad’s sharp swerves and his blaring car radio. He taken to asking about Virgil’s day even, asking where he’d been and what he’d been doing. He even took Virgil out to bars and clubs in an attempt to get him to loosen up.

Virgil wanted to tell him he’d rather set himself on fire than willingly enter a noisy nightclub. However every time his lips went to form those words, he found himself saying yes always. So that was how he found himself dissociating in a noisy nightclub, holding onto a pink-colored alcoholic beverage he faked taking a sip from.

A hand knocked jokingly against his forehead. “Yo, Virgin!”

Virgil blinked, his gaze blearily onto Jerad. It was hard to concentrate with all the flashing lights and loud music. He wanted to crawl underneath his beloved purple fleece blanket in his dark, silent bedroom and never leave. But he couldn’t leave just yet. Jerad had been nice to take him along to the club. If he’d asked leave now, he’d get upset. He knew eventually Jerad would get upset at him for something, but he preferred to delay that as long as possible.

“Yeah?” Virgil mumbled, curling his fingers tighter around the alcoholic drink that had been hoisted upon him. Jerad knew he didn’t like alcohol—it was something he ridiculed Virgil about constantly. He always insisted on Virgil drinking, saying he’d stop being a pussy and man up eventually about it.

“Are you high or something? You looked like you were seeing into the third dimension or something.”

Virgil shrugged. Jerad laughed at that, patting him on the back. Virgil tensed from each thud of Jerad’s hand, but he did not flinch or move away. It was a friendly gesture on Jerad’s part. If he wanted to really hurt Virgil, he would’ve put more force behind it.

“Probably not! You’re too much of an anxious wimp,” Jerad said, downing the contents of his drink, “but let me know if you ever get man enough to try it—your good friend Jerad has connections.”

“Okay.” Virgil said, his voice sounding far off in the distance to his own ears.

Jerad laughed again, and then started rambling about something probably among the lines of his most recent hookup, his parents being jerks for not giving him a new sports car or the latest college professor he deemed a complete idiot. Virgil stared at him, nodding all the right moments yet barely processed any of the words being directed his way.

 Even with lungs filled with air and a warm beating heart, Virgil felt nothing. He was nothing. A worthless sentient waste of space. Like an ugly mutt nobody wanted that should be euthanized to end its miserable existence.

His phone—the replacement one Jerad gave him—vibrated in his pocket. A text, no doubt from one of the others. The fourth one this night. Virgil’s hand twitched, refraining from looking at it in the presence of Jerad. Virgil didn’t feel like losing a second phone within a month of the first.

“Um, hey,” Virgil interrupted, wincing, “I gotta go use the bathroom, is that alright?”

“’Is that alright?’” Jerad mimicked in a high pitch tone, “Dude, is this elementary school or something? You want a hall pass? Me to hold your hand the whole way there?”

Virgil stared at him.

Jerad rolled his eyes, “Go ahead, whatever. I don’t care if you take a dump, just be quick with it.”

“Thanks.” Virgil bit out, running off before Jerad could change his mind.

He twisted and pivoted around the crowd of sweaty, glistening bodies wearing skimpy clothing. The bright neon lights and loud music warped around him like something out of a nightmare. Eventually he made it to the restrooms and locked himself in the nearest stall. The pulse of his heart roaring in his ears, he drew the phone of his pocket.

Four New Text Notifications from Patton

Patton: [Image of a black cat that looked approximately a year old. It appeared to be nestled close to Patton’s chest, staring up at the camera in wide-eyed stare.]

Patton: Look at what I found on my evening walk! Isn’t she the cutest??

Patton: I’m trying to convince Logan to let me keep her. Maybe you can come visit tomorrow and meet her??

Patton: It’s ok if not! I know you’ve been busy and I want to let you know I’m here for you, you can come to me about anything okay?

Virgil’s vision blurred a bit. He didn’t understand it. Why hadn’t Patton given up already? It’s been weeks since he’s sent Patton a text. He’d been terrified, too, really. And in the few times he ran into Patton at the library, he made excuses and scurried the other way.

Logan was at least kind enough to exchange a few pleasantries and keep their verbal interactions work-oriented. And Remy? They still delved deep into discussions about their taste in music but there was an awkward unspoken agreement not to bring up what happened that one morning. Virgil also shied from hanging outside of work, hoping Remy would eventually forget about him. It seemed to be working; Remy hadn’t offered to hang out in about a week or so.

But Patton? Patton seemed determined to stay in contact with Virgil, sending his dumb silly memes and cute animal videos. He sent good morning and good night texts, while making sure Virgil knew he could respond to them on his own time. On one hand, it made sense—this was the same Patton who saved a complete stranger’s life for literally no reason. On the other hand, he wished Patton would give up. It would made things easier, make it hurt less for everyone.

His phone buzzed with a new text notification.

Jerad: Dude, did you fall in or something?

Virgil swallowed, wiping away any stupid tears running down his face. As he typed a response to Jerad with shaky hands, the bathroom door slammed open, banging against the wall. He almost dropped his phone in the process, silently cursing at how close he’d been to breaking yet another phone.

Several loud booming voices filled the bathroom, peppered with obnoxious laughter every half second. Virgil shut his eyes, resisting the urge to cover his ears also in the process. The noise was too much. It was too much in the club outside, but all those voices echoing off the small crammed walls of the bathroom made Virgil want to scream.

The door creaked open yet again, the voices venturing away from Virgil. Good, they were leaving so Virgil could finally self-destruct in peace. Or so he thought, as a set of footsteps stopped abruptly, wavering. The club music blasted from the doorway, drowning out whatever discussion took place.

Then the door swung shut, the roaring club music muted once more. Virgil waited, breath catching in his throat as the single set of footsteps took a couple strides towards him. Oh god, this was how he was going to die, wasn’t he? This was probably some serial killer with an obsession of killing people in night club restrooms.

This was, of course, the moment his phone started vibrating in his hand. A call. Someone was calling him in the final moments of his life. Virgil looked down at the caller id; Remy. His heartrate spiked, dancing so painfully close to what a heart attack must feel like. Why was Remy calling him? Was he at last going to tell him he was done with Virgil forever?

Virgil almost wanted to ignore the call. But then he glanced at the black boots hovering near his stall and gave it a second thought. If this was going to be how his life ended, it’d probably be best to say goodbye to someone at least. Sucking a breath in, he pressed the green phone icon and held the phone to his ears.

“Hi?” He whispered.

“Hey Virgil,” Remy said, echoing oddly in Virgil’s ears, “what are you up to tonight?”

Virgil glanced down at the black boots menacingly close to his stall, “Umm, I’m just home, chilling.”

“That’s a lie, Hon. I know you’re hiding in a stall of this bathroom.”

“W-what are you talking about?” Virgil couldn’t breathe.

Remy sighed, sounding so similar to the person outside the stall, “Please, let’s talk face to face, alright?”

This was some sort of trick to lure him out of the stall, wasn’t it? Still, with the hand not clutching tightly to his phone, he reached out and unlatched the stall door.

Remy stood there, expression hidden under his black shades. His hair was slicked back with gel, shimmering with a glitter of some sort. He wore his iconic black leather jacket with a black crop top underneath. His whole outfit was black, in fact, down to his ripped jeans and the ankle-length boots. Virgil had seen him wear something similar before to a college event he’d taken Virgil to.

“W-what are you doing here?” Virgil demanded.

“I could ask you the same,” Remy responded, eyebrows raised above his shades, “this isn’t your scene, Virge. What are you doing here?”

“I’m not answering unless you answer.” Virgil said, trying to ignore how much he sounded like a toddler.

“A few of my homies from the art program wanted to celebrate the end of mid-terms. This is the night club most of the college body hangs at.” Remy crossed his arms.

“And how did you know I was in here?”

“A few keen observations,” Remy mustered a thin smile. He tapped his nose for emphasis before drawing his finger close to his lips. Virgil’s eyes widened in understanding. Vampire senses, then. “But mostly, I’d recognize those faded converse of yours anywhere.”

“O-oh.”

“I answered your question, now it’s your turn, Virge.”

“I…” Virgil said, the rest of his words strangled in his throat. His phone buzzed in his hand; another impatient text from Jerad no doubt. He didn’t bother to look at it, choosing to focus on taking a breath in rather than going unconscious from a lack of oxygen.

He could tell Remy the truth. That he’d gone with Jerad—his roommate whom he used to complain to Remy about all the time. But then Remy would ask why he was with Jerad and then—well. Then Virgil would have tell him what happened the time he found him the night his phone broke and well, Virgil wasn’t ready for that. He couldn’t tell Remy about his humiliating mistake.

“I…went here to have a good time completely by myself.” Virgil withheld himself from wincing because wow that didn’t sound weird or suspicious in the slightest, “So you can go catch up with your friends or whatever, I’m good hanging out right here.”

“Right here, in the restroom?”

“Yeah.”

“Honey,” Remy said, his voice washed with some emotion Virgil couldn’t identify, “Let’s ditch this shithole and go somewhere else.”

“W-what—but your friends—” Virgil stammered.

“—will be fine without me. N-G-L they’ll probably too trying to give themselves alcohol poison even realize I’m gone,” Remy shrugged his shoulders, “besides, you don’t seem as gucci as you say you are in here and it’s been a while since we really hung out hung out, y’know?”

Virgil stubbornly directed his gaze away from Remy, jaw tightening. It had to be okay, didn’t it? Jerad was most likely to get too drunk to even coherent colors, let alone that Virgil slipped off without him. Maybe he wouldn’t be mad. Maybe he wouldn’t fly into a rage and come close to hanging him off a balcony. Besides Remy would be even more suspicious if he said no.

Virgil sighed, holding the home button on the phone until it shut off completely. That way he wouldn’t have to deal with Jerad calling him, demanding to know where he’d disappear off to, despite ditching Virgil all the time without warning.

“Alright, fine.”

Remy smiled, his teeth looking a little too sharp for Virgil’s liking. Wordlessly he turned aside and reached for the bathroom door.

Virgil swallowed, shoving the phone in his pocket to be forgotten about. Tried as he might, he still flinched as lively blare of the club’s music and flashing lights greeted him with full force. He froze, cowering before the threshold of the door. A hand landed on his shoulder, soft and gentle.

“Virgil?” Remy asked, his brows furrowing together.

Molten lava settled in the pit of Virgil’s stomach—pity. That was the expression on Remy’s face he couldn’t identify at first. He didn’t want pity; Virgil knew what pity meant. He didn’t want pity of any kind, it reminded him too much of the foster parents that looked at him like he was some feral dog that could be whipped into obedience. And sure, Remy had never hurt him but it didn’t mean Virgil forgotten about that morning spent at Remy’s dorm a month back.

Eyes lit up with a burning, controlled fire. Words hissed through a clenching jaw, “Tell me their name and I’ll beat them up for you.”

If Remy was willing to hurt who he deemed as threats to Virgil, who’s to say he wouldn’t be willing to hurt Virgil? To reprimand Virgil, to let him know how much of an idiot he was being? It sounded absurd, even now, because he’d known Remy for almost a year. Remy had plenty opportunities up to now to do something and hadn’t. Yet he was a vampire; years were nothing to him. He had plenty of time to wait for Virgil to slip up in some way and make his irritation known.

And Virgil knew by now to expect the other shoe to drop in a relationship—it was why he distanced himself, isolated himself to solely to work and his cramped little room at the apartment. He was foolish to believe Remy, Patton and Logan were different. Logan and Patton especially—what was he thinking? Patton saved him, sure, but Logan had been hellbent on locking him in their basement for the eternity of time. Why had ever he allowed himself to accept their apologies, to believe something was going right in his life for once?

“I’m fine.” Virgil snarled, shoving himself forward. It was like marching into a warzone, the music assaulted his ears and rattled uncomfortably against his chest cavity. He grimaced, keeping his eyes towards the floor, away from the flashing lights. He stopped a bit before the ocean of bodies that stood between them and the entrance.

He knew if he looked up, he could make out the back of Jerad’s shirt from his spot at the bar. Stupid, this was so stupid. Why had he allowed himself to get talk into this by Remy? There was no doubt in his mind that Jerad would catch him trying to leave and rightfully demand why he was ditching him for Remy. It was a shit thing to do, after all.

Friends don’t ditch one another without explanation. Jerad left him, sure, but he always had an explanation after the fact. Virgil didn’t think Jerad would like his explanation very much. Especially when it involved Remy, one of the people Jerad had been trying to warn him about.

A hand gracefully looped itself around one of his own, tugging him off to the side rather than through the crowd. Virgil looked to see Remy guiding them towards a set of doors, ones clearly marked for employees only.

“Remy—”

“Shhh, this is a faster way outta here, trust me.” He said, flashing a smile. Perhaps it was meant to be comforting but for Virgil it only caused his stomach to churn.

Right before they made it to the doors, an employee materialized in front of them. “Excuse me, sirs, you’re not allowed back here—”

“Cindy, gurl, remember me, Lansing? Worked here last summer? Do you remember, yeah?” Remy lowered his shades to take a look at her. Virgil peered behind him, unable to view Remy’s face. He could see Cindy’s face, however. Her face pinched up in confusion, frowning, before abruptly smoothening out with a wide grin stretched from ear-to-ear. She looked right at Remy, her gaze shifting entirely off of Virgil as if he no longer existed.

“Lansing, oh! Oh yes, I remember.” Cindy said, with a high-pitched laugh. Virgil shrunk further back into Remy’s shadow, squeezing Remy’s hand tightly. Something was wrong and he didn’t like it. Remy never mentioned working as a bartender—and that wasn’t quite something Remy would be quiet about. Virgil could just  picture the outrageous bartending stories he’d have if that was the case.

Remy laughed along with her, light and airy.

“Good, then can ya do a fellow former co-bartender a favor and let us slip through, just this once?”

“Gurl, of course, just if you caught don’t let Gregory know I was the one that let you pass.” She leaned in conspiratorially, face twitching a bit.

“Oh don’t worry, you won’t see us again, in fact forget that you even saw us. I’d love to stay and catch up, but I bet you have things to do.”

She laughed again at that. “Yes, of course. It was nice seeing you, Lansing, but I have to go.”

Cindy hurried off, quickly dissipating through the crowd. Virgil blinked; what the fuck? What the fuck was that—

He didn’t even have time to process the encounter before Remy led them into the dimly lit back hallway of the nightclub. Whether it was a faster way out of the nightclub was debatable. For all his talk about previously working there, Remy seemed just as lost as Virgil in the winding hallway. He led them one direction, only to immediately pivot down the other way.

Remy wasn’t talking. Remy was always talking endlessly, as if speaking was as vital as oxygen to him. He was terrible at whispering too—something Logan would get on him about at the library. That was why he was usually stuck on front desk duty to speak with patrons, helping out at events or doing organizational work in the back office. For Remy to be this silent, like the brooding calm before a storm, well. Virgil’s lungs wanted to seize up right then and there.

Eventually, they made to a door that opened out to an alleyway, right where the night club kept its dumpster. The moon gleamed from her perch in the sky, nearly full but not quite. Like a cookie with a bite taken out of it. Virgil knew there was terms for the different phases of the moon. His mother loved taking him out to see the night sky. She’d point out the constellations and tell him what phase the moon that night was.

He wished he could remember, for her sake, what they were. Considering he knew actual werewolves, you’d think he pay better attention to it. But it was a topic Virgil never felt brave enough to venture and one that neither Patton nor Logan opened up much on their own about.

He stared at the moon, transfixed, that he almost forgotten the reason he was outside in the first place. Not until Remy murmured something before attempting to lead him off somewhere. The gaping dread from moments prior seized hold of him once more.

“No!” Virgil snapped, yanking his hand out of Remy’s grip. He stumbled backwards a few steps, slamming himself into a wall of the building in the process.

“Virgil?” Remy asked, frowning as he took a step  forward.

“What the hell was that back there?”

“What do you mean—”

“Don’t act stupid!” Virgil demanded, taking a shaky breath, “That lady—Cindy—you did something, I—I don’t know, she was acting weird! And—and you were acting weird! So I’m asking again; What. The Hell. Was. That?”

Remy stared at him, his breath hitching, “Virgil, I was just trying to get you to a quiet place ASAP before you—”

“You’re still not answering the question.” Virgil cut in, his intestines tightening themselves into knots over it. Because maybe this was just a classic case of Virgil paranoia striking again. Maybe he really was driving himself into a panic attack over nothing. Maybe he was accusing Remy unjustly.

Yet, if that was the case why would Remy flinch if Virgil struck him physically with his words?

“Virgil,” Remy said slowly, “I need you not to panic and hear me out, ok?”

Virgil’s heartrate accelerated. Not panic, not panic?! What did Remy expect but for him to panic at those words?

“Okay.” Virgil said, definitely panicking.

“What have you’ve heard about vamps?”

“That they—you drink blood. And your reflection doesn’t show up in mirrors—and—and if you get bitten by a vampire, you’ll either turn into one or get mind controlled.”

“All technically true, well I mean—there’s a fuck-ton more to the turning process than that—” Remy cut himself off, “That’s beside the point. The point is, what you call mind-control, we call ‘enthralling.’ Enthralling is…”

“Is what?”

“Enthralling is, well. It’s a form of hypnosis. Anyone enthralled by a vampire is mostly aware of it and the least likely they are to follow a vampire’s suggestions, the more likely they are to fight against the hypnosis. And it can be activated through eye-contact which is what I did to Cindy.”

Virgil couldn’t breathe. Suddenly pieces were slotted together in mind, forming a picture Virgil never wanted to envision. That faint but visceral memory of Remy with red eyes, the natural charisma Remy held with anyone he met, how Remy managed to steal confidential information from Virgil’s employee file in the back office of Kirby’s Burgers—all of it. He thought Remy, out of anybody, was safe. Past his sassy, laidback exterior, Remy was honest, willing to speak his mind about anything and everything.

If Remy enthralled a complete stranger without blinking an eye—who’s to say he wasn’t above doing it to Virgil? Who’s to say he hadn’t enthralled Virgil into being his friend? Who’s to say Virgil wasn’t an oblivious mouse in a game of cat and mouse? Oh gods, this had just confirmed all of Virgil’s worst fears and more.

“Virgil—” Remy said, reaching out, his eyes hidden beneath his shades. He continued speaking, a mumble jumbo string of excuses probably. Virgil couldn’t stand to stay around and listen to it.

“Stop—just don’t—” Virgil stuttered, taking one step and then another towards the open sidewalk. What was just a few steps then became a few hundred until he found himself leaning against the door to the apartment, hands shaking to slot the key to unlock it.

A few more steps he was inside, the usual musty smell an unexpected comfort. He sat on the couch, seconds stretching into eternity. He half-expected Remy to have chased after him, demanding Virgil to listen, why couldn’t you just listen, you’re so stupid no wonder you’re pathetic—

Virgil blinked a few times, his eyes burning with some sort of irritation. For some reason, Remy let him go. He couldn’t decide if that was a good or bad thing. His head ached and so did his ears for some reason.

 Jerad entered the apartment a few millennia later. Virgil froze at the rattling doorknob, his hand clutching onto his phone in his pocket.

“There you are, you fucker!” Jerad drawled, stumbling over in a drunken stupor. His hand moved towards Virgil, but not with a closed fist. Instead he patted him on the back like earlier, “I can’t believe you did it! You finally got the balls to go and hook up with somebody! I guess I can’t call you Virgin, now huh?”

“Uh-huh,” Virgil murmured, not correcting him on that assumption. He sat there, a bit of tension draining from him. Jerad wasn’t mad for abandoning him. Jerad was still a jerk, but at least Virgil mostly knew what to expect of him. It wasn’t ideal, but that was life. It was better to deal with the devil you knew, then the devil you didn’t know. Virgil was stupid to have ever thought otherwise.

“My parents are being such dicks at the moment,” Jerad said, precipitously changing topics as per usual of him, “sometimes I wish I didn’t have to wait until they were dead to take my inheritance and do what I want to do, y’know?”

Virgil didn’t really know. Did his parents leave him money? They had to have had some sort of savings stashed away. A life insurance of some sort, right? It wasn’t like they were poor. He never thought about inquiring into that. Jerad accidentally slapped Virgil across the arm with a huge hand gesture, still ranting about something. Maybe it wasn’t an accidental hit.

Virgil didn’t know. His tether on reality felt weak, like a balloon close to floating away into the stratosphere. He almost wished he could float away, but the weight in his chest said otherwise. Jerad passed out not long after his rant, slumped half on the floor and half on the sofa. Virgil took this opportunity to slip into the comfort of his bedroom and turn on his cellphone once more.

 Seventeen new text notifications and five missed calls from Jerad greeted him, along with one new text notification from Logan. He clicked on Logan’s and his conversation, staring at Logan’s text at the bottom of it.

Logan: Virgil, Remy wanted me to inform you that he is taking a leave of absence from work. Please let me know if you need to take a leave of absence as well or need to confide in somebody as a friend, Patton or I would be happy to listen.

Virgil stared at it some more. Then he tapped out a short response, set the phone on the stool that was his makeshift nightstand and collapsed headfirst into his mattress. 

Virgil: K thanks, I’m fine

-

A/N: Hope everyone is doing well, if you enjoyed the chapter please consider leaving a comment--it's completely free and helps me out as a fanfic writer a ton! I'm technically not in the Sanders Sides fandom anymore, but I still have a lotta fondness for this fic and I will finish it, even if takes me ten years to do so :') -Kat

[flying-elliska]

Just binge read the Bone Season series by Samantha Shannon and !!!!!! amazing. Now I want to yell about it for a bit, bear with me (essay incoming sorry)

- the concept already, urban fantasy dystopia, just feels both so fresh and so obvious it's surprising it's not more of a Thing, and the world building is next level. the modern technology + Victorian aesthetics is not just cool (although it is) it evokes the fact that Victorian England was a brutal, very unequal and fucked up society, so it really fits a dystopia. Plus Scion is also an evil empire that invades other countries, which is also thematically relevant, as is the fact that the MC is Irish.

- I'm obsessed with the concept of a magical mob and Underworld (unsurprisingly) and people who are pushed to the margins of society because their very existence has been outlawed and bond together to find freedom but are also forced to exist in a state of constant brutality and the damage it all does

- the first book throws a lot of plot and world building at you in ways that can be a bit overwhelming and confusing, and doesn't give you a lot of time to connect emotionally to the characters, so that took me a while, but it's really worth pushing through for, i love them all now.

- I love the main character, Paige, so much. she's a survivor ; clever, witty, action oriented and very down to earth ; she's also very competent in ways that feel earned, and interestingly flawed, not some gratuitous emotionless Strong Female Character with plot armor or a 'not like other girls' complex. She's proud and she has a mean, ruthless streak. She's brave, too loyal for her own good, and impulsive to the point of recklessness, and sometimes her gambles pay off and sometimes she has to pay a very heavy price for them (it made me yell at the page several times). It's really cool to see a female MC that is so invested in the politics of her world. I hate that so many female mains in fantasy or dystopia are these isolated loners who hate politics, only really care about a handful of people and want to retire to their husband/2.5 kids happy ending as fast as possible, with a plot-line that focuses over personal development rather than political goals, because it sends this weird message that women are not meant to be in the public space. (Not making this into a rant about the Shadow and Bone books but lol I could)

Paige has to shoulder massive burdens that nobody in their right mind should want and that's understandable, but you do get the sense that she enjoys being a criminal, running free and scheming and climbing over roofs and outwitting her enemies and sticking it to the government. She doubts herself sometimes, worries about people only valuing her for her powers, but she doesn't have a lot of time to waste on self-consciousness, angsting or moping about her feelings. It's very empowering to read. And she's fiercely compassionate in moments where it's actually very dangerous for her to be. She has this constant struggle between the part of her that finds injustice intolerable and the part of her that is grimly pragmatic. This is exactly what women in fiction have been excluded from for too long, complex dilemmas about action and morality taken seriously, not just love triangle shit. It's great. Although wow does she deserve a break. Ouch. Baby </3

- the world is incredibly fucked up but there seems to be no sexism/homophobia/racism, which is refreshing to read. the main romance is m/f but there's a lot of ambient queerness, just because and not to 'make a point' ; the author has confirmed that the MC is demisexual, her bff is gay, the love interest is pan, there's a badass trans commander/mob boss, you get randomly informed that this henchwoman has a wife or that this mobster is trying to save his boyfriend, it's great (and it's not a word-of-god after the fact thing like jkr it's actually shown on the page, they just don't use any labels)

- the main romance is a slow build that is very low-key at first, enemies to reluctant allies to friends to lovers, but becomes really powerful over time. the fact that the MC is demi means it can't rely on 'omg so hot i can't stop thinking about him!' clichés - nothing wrong with attraction at first sight but it often leads to lazy storytelling and irritating instalove, tell over show romances. the characters are drawn to each other but it's more of a meeting of minds and souls at first, admiration and common goals, and their actions are still first and foremost guided by strategy, not sentiment. (sidenote I've often wondered if i wasn't at least a little demi myself. that would explain why i have such high standards for credible romance lmao.) also there's a significant power imbalance at the start but it gets very much deconstructed before anything can happen and it's an interesting negotiation. Warden could easily have fit in the 'brooding immortal douchebags' category but there's an alienness and gentleness to him that lifts him above that, along with the respect and space he gives to Paige and their shared experience of trauma and hopes for a better world. Her hot-headedness and his calm, deadpan sort-of-humor play off each other really well. Also I love the idea that develops over the series that their connection isn't a distraction from their fight but that it makes them stronger and allows them to resist and find solace from the deluge of constant horror that is their world. their whole dynamic in s4...no words. also the second time i read a scene where one character is bandaging the other's wounds and there's touch aversion involved and like, I LOVE that.

- lots of complex different bad guys. some are just brutes, some are sadistic masterminds with superiority complexes, some are deceptive and manipulative and morally ambiguous. love that the Big Bad Guy is a woman - female characters being fully realized means that sometimes, they're just incredibly evil (as long as it's not tied to their gender, i love that). Paige and Jaxon's relationship is fascinating - he's a terrible, manipulative person but i do feel in his own way, he cares about her and wants to see her thrive ; but that's not necessarily a good thing as he sees it as a justification to make her go through awful things. She knows he's awful but she can't get over the fact that he took her in, taught her, believed in her and gave her a sense of belonging and freedom when nobody else did ; she was super proud of being his mollisher and it makes sense it would take time for her to rebuild her sense of self without that, on her own. I like that the ambiguity isn't resolved (it's also a very good illustration of how emotionally abusive parental dynamics can get their hooks in you). The fact that he's aroace really works there too, could have been a lot creepier otherwise and i feel that's really not the point.

- also it's really cool how each book really feels like its own thing, it never feels repetitive, there are huge twists and a shift of focus each time - the penal colony in Oxford in the first, the London Underworld in the second, traveling through England in the third, Paris in the fourth, etc. The pace is pretty breakneck and i wasn't bored for one moment - actually at times i would have liked more quiet moments w the characters. There are two novellas that focus more on that and the second one is an exploration of trauma and recovery that's particularly hard hitting and beautiful. The first book does feel like a beginner novel, it's a bit clunky in terms of exposition, pacing and character development etc ; and there are moments where all the violence and brutality feel a bit repetitive ; but overall the story builds up so beautifully and in so many complex ways it's just really worth it and it's not for nothing i read the four books and two novellas in five days. just have to wait for the next one now though argh

- anyway more people should read it

[obae-me]

Could I please get hcs on how the brothers would react to a mc that doesn't like or feel comfortable receiving compliments? They personally make me uncomfortable since most of the time, people only give me compliments if they want something from me or are just joking and being cruel.

I’m sorry this one came out late, but I really liked writing this one. I hope you like it, thank you, Anon! 💜

Lucifer

He’s the Demon of Pride, and as such, despite his sound and logical mind, he doesn’t realize there are...people...who don’t like compliments. It doesn’t occur to him as a possibility at all. He loves compliments. He thrives under praise. He’ll puff up his wings and strive for perfection just so people will look at him.

So, naturally, he finds compliments to be high on his list of forms of affection. If MC does something right, he’ll compliment them. However, in return all he’ll get is a scoff? A questioning glare? This makes him furious.

What he doesn’t realize is that MC is used to being used. To being praised only to be betrayed. There was always an ulterior motive, so why should demons be any better?

“You would throw back something I willingly gave you?”

“You’re only giving me a compliment to get something out of me, so why don’t you just tell me what you want instead of lying to me?”

That wasn’t a rebuttal he was expecting. Yes he was a demon, and yes sometimes his intentions weren’t the most pure, but to think that someone would believe he’d sink so low as to give compliments in desire to extort them? His brothers maybe, but him?

He took a moment to look at their expression. It was sour and uncomfortable. It’s not what he expected. This was a problem that went deeper than just distrust in demons. He’ll ask them if they’ll talk about it. They don’t go into detail, which he respects, but explains that compliments feel only like lies, and it makes them uncomfortable.

He’ll learn to find other ways to praise them other than compliments. He’ll reward them with a dinner or a little treat. If they’ve done something he’s really proud of, he’ll put it up where people can see. He’ll still give them simple compliments every now and again out of habit, and while MC still doesn’t fully accept it, they’ll smile and nod this time instead of throwing it out the window.

Mammon

He doesn’t give out too many compliments to anybody in general, much less a human. On top of that, it’s especially rare that he’ll give a genuine compliment. This is the demon that MC should be wary of, if he says something nice about them, it’s a very very high chance that he does want something. Not necessarily because he wants to harm the other person, it’s just that he’s grown up with Lucifer as an older brother, and more often than not, puffing up his ego can get him off the hook.

Naturally though, this makes MC very distrustful. On the off chance he does give MC a legit compliment, he might as well have said that he doesn’t like money, because they won’t believe it one bit. He’s totally in the dark about it, he doesn’t get humans at all. He thought he did a good thing, he thought they would’ve loved praise from him, the one and only Mammon. He went out of his way to ask Solomon about it. He was a human too so surely he’d understand.

“Probably because they think you want something, Mammon.”

“But I didn’t that time!”

He was hopeless.

If that’s how they felt, he was going to have to show them how genuine he could be. He was a gentleman, an icon, a pillar of power, so he was going to have to prove it. Everyone found it amusing just how exaggerated he was, treating everything that MC did with respect and reverence. Even Lucifer was in awe over how hard he was working to treat people with honest intentions.

He would make sure MC was there when he returned stolen things back to his brothers. He tells them he’ll cut off gambling and bets immediately. He opens doors for them and escorts them to RAD all without asking for a fee. He wanted MC to trust him, he thought that maybe, just maybe, someone wouldn’t call him scummy for once.

Yes, the brothers had a secret bet with themselves to see how far Mammon could last. Lucifer won, he tends to know his brothers the best. Mammon stopped being completely honest to everyone in about two weeks. He really did try his best to continue to be honest with MC, though. Even if no one else did, they wanted MC to trust him.

Levi

He has a hard time taking compliments too, so if there’s anyone that understands MC, it’s him. Compliments always riddle him with anxiety. He can’t be anything but a dirty, nasty, ugly otaku. His brothers tend to just roll their eyes at it. He’s a powerful demon, he can’t really think that way, he’s just being whiny.

So if MC doesn’t accept any of his compliments, he thinks it’s himself that’s to blame. Of course they’d look extremely uncomfortable to be complimented by him, they probably thought he was a pervert now. He shut himself in his room for days. The brothers had seen this happen before, so they weren’t concerned, but MC couldn’t help but be worried.

They came up to his room, knocked on the door, but was left with silence. Not surprising. They felt like they had to apologize anyway, so they spoke to the door, hoping that maybe Levi would hear some of it. They apologized for making him feel bad. They apologized for being stupid, for being rude.

Levi opened the door, shaking his head furiously. He hadn’t thought that of them at all. They both end up putting their feelings on the table. MC will share with him some of the stories of why they can’t trust honey-coated words anymore. Levi will talk about his failures as the third-born.

“We’re both a mess, aren’t we?”

In the end they’ll both spend much more time together than they had before. Even just the peace of being in the same room, even if they were doing different activities, set them a bit more at ease.

They both worked on trying to be better at accepting compliments, with no pressure put on them, of course. And if any demon ever tired to butter MC up to abuse them, they’d be destroyed by Levi before anyone could say Game Over.

Satan

One time tried to give MC an compliment that was so eloquently written, it could’ve been written by a poet. They did not take it well, to no fault of Satan’s or his work. It was so disgustingly sweet, MC went pale, nauseous off his words.

Satan felt so angry and embarrassed, he refused to be around MC for a week. Which made things worse. Both Satan and MC were spending far far too much time in their rooms and spending copious amounts of effort just on avoiding each other. The other brothers had had enough. They all got together and summoned both of them downstairs to talk. Lucifer called them out.

“Whatever happened certainly doesn’t warrant this new behavior, so you two are going to talk it out. Now.”

“Satan doesn’t like me, doesn’t surprise me, I knew everything was a lie anyway. With a compliment like that, it was too good to be true.”

Satan was uncharacteristically at a loss for words. The brother’s plan seemed to be working, so they left the two alone to talk it out. The two went back and forth for a while, clearing up all the misunderstandings. Satan had never felt dumber. He knew more than most, even among immortal beings, and yet he still let his emotions overtake his logic.

Now that he knew how MC felt about compliments in general, he knew how to handle them. If anyone thought that words alone were among his area of expertise, they were mistaken. He would do countless research on other ways to show praise and affection that wouldn’t come off as hollow. He’d fight anyone that made them uncomfortable again.

Asmo

He’ll have the hardest time with this. He’s a compliment churning machine. He’s a hype man. He’s a man of love., and so he wants to let the people he loves just how much he loves them.

It’s like never ending torture for MC, and they can’t help but feel like he’s doing it on purpose. How could he tell them they look amazing? How could he cuddle as close as he wants and describe them down to the detail? Every day made MC feel sick.

It got worse when MC was around him the first time he got drunk. He’d throw himself at them, every word he said laced heavy with alcohol.

“MC, you’re so cute, I want you by me all the time. MCCCC, you’re so wonderful, and beautiful, and cute-ah but I already said you were cu-“

MC shoved him off of them in a panic. “Stop, Asmo. Just stop!” They fled to their room leaving a confused drunk demon on the floor.

The next morning, while he fought a demon-sized hangover, he draped dramatically over his bed, running over last night’s kerfuffle in his head. Although the minor details were fuzzy, the important parts remained, including MC’s words. What’s this he was feeling...guilt? No no, he couldn’t have that, he needed to fix this right away.

He brought over his fluffiest robe and a tray with little cookies and fruity tea. MC almost didn’t let him in, but Asmo looked...different. Asmo sat them down and made sure they indulged themselves a little before apologizing. He had gone too far, and making other people feel uncomfortable was not an attractive quality.

MC felt like they needed to admit to him as well that any compliment they receive makes them feel that way. It was just too much for them all the time. He’s stunned, but how is he supposed to tell you how much he loves appreciates you?

MC decides to limit him to one compliment per day, maybe two if they feel like they can handle it. So now every day Asmo stays silent till he can think of the most perfect, most beautiful thing to tell them, hoping that maybe one day they’ll fully believe him and take it to heart.

Beel

He’s very much an actions over words person, so it’s rare that he’ll compliment MC with words alone. He likes to bring MC food, make sure they’re well fed and hydrated. He’ll keep them protected, that’s how he best shows his affection. He’ll follow MC everywhere he can, watching over them.

Sometimes he does tell them that they’re so sweet, and MC just shrinks further into their seat. He’ll frown. He doesn’t know why, but he does notice this anytime he says anything nice about them. So he’ll double down on getting them all the food they want. For him food equals love.

MC found it nice, since he was working so hard on making them feel good without trying to compliment them, but one night they came to their bedroom to find enough food to feed a small demon army. They appreciated it, but maybe Beel was taking this further than he needed to.

They brought him back to their room, and he looked extremely pleased with himself. He wanted MC to eat it all, he wouldn’t have one bite...other than the few bites he snuck already. However, MC begged him to help them eat it, it would be impossible to eat it all themselves. While Beel was eating, MC sighed and crossed their legs.

“Beel, I appreciate this so much, but you don’t have to go this far for me, you haven’t done anything wrong.” 

They explained how they just didn’t like compliments in general. No matter who they came from, no matter who said it. Demons, angels, humans, even God himself could say something kind about them and they’d still take it with a grain of salt.

It didn’t take long for Beel to understand, thank goodness. Of his many brothers, Beel is one them who supports them immediately despite how strange it seems. He’ll back down a bit, but still make sure MC knows every day how much he is proud of them by the things he does.

Belphie

Get a compliment from Belphie? Probably if there was something majorly wrong. He’s not good with words in general, and he doesn’t compliment anyone. Not his brothers, not humans, not even Diavolo. So this isn’t too much of an issue for MC.

However, he keeps a close eye on MC, closer than most people realize. Because of this, he notices one day when a grimy, good-for-nothing demon he doesn’t know, tries to win MC over with their words in order for them to do something.

“Aw come on, MC, you’re so smart, brilliant even! So won’t you do my part of the project for me? It’s nothing you can’t handle, you can handle anything!”

He can’t help but notice MC lean heavy on the wall behind them, using the books in their hands to cover the lower part of their fading face. He comes over and puts a ‘friendly’ hand on this demon’s shoulder. Upon laying eyes upon one of the powerful Student Council, they hesitantly tell MC they’ve got somewhere to be and then scatter. Belphie looks at MC and shakes his head a bit.

After what he’s done, after everything he’s said, he has no business helping MC out like this. He knows how much of a hypocrite he seems. He shoves his hands deep in his pocket and turns away. No wonder they can’t take compliments very well when every demon here that does sounds like, well...sound like him.

“Thank you, Belphie.” He stops, looking back over his shoulder at MC. This human...they were so dumb and confusing, but...he didn’t want to leave them alone. They were exhausting yet because of them he’d slept more peacefully and had more good dreams than nightmares.

He won’t ever tell them how much they appreciate them, which is fine, sometimes MC prefers it that way. He’ll mostly stay silent, but stay close to them. MC can know how much they mean to him without him having to say a word. Especially if Belphie feels comfortable enough to fall asleep on them, sometimes in their lap, sometimes on their shoulder. It says volumes.

[vodkassassin]

My dude, my gal, or maybe nonbinary pal (just to be sure, don't know your pronouns) you gave me the light, you have opened my eyes. All this ships I didn't know I needed and now can't get enough of. Your writing is a DELIGHT. For a prompt, how do SQH's disciples see him? What about the demons under MBJ? That one shot of LQG getting jealous of MBJ in which the underling backs away slowly means this isn't the first time that has happened right?

Thank you so much! It really makes me happy to hear that people enjoy reading my stuff. It’s half of what makes writing it so enjoyable for me. Another part I enjoy is how I seem to be dragging all you poor fools down with me into my shipping abyss of rare pairs. God bless.

I went with the demon perspective! Might do a disciple perspective next time? Idk. @quiensecomioelpie

—

As an agent of the Northern kingdom, Mao Liang is required to attend strategy meetings whenever they are present within the palace. Regardless of whether they had just returned from a long, grueling mission in the field only the day before, or not.

Luckily, there’s never that much attention brought to them, and Mao Liang is never expected to share their opinion or thoughts during the meeting, only directly to his majesty and the advisor afterwards. A relief, because if Mao Liang had to speak to the dozens of generals and high ranking soldiers and fellow agents that stand around the colossal, war room table alongside them… Well, that’s a crowd, isn’t it? If Mao Liang was forced to publicly speak, they might actually die.

Someone who doesn’t seem to ever have a problem with addressing a crowd of demons, though — be they gruff soldiers or generals or a glowering, looming king — is someone that is worth admiring.

Lord Shang pulls his furs around his shoulders more tightly, attention directed almost entirely on the maps sprawled out over the table they’ve all gathered around today. His head tilts toward the side just slightly, like a predator whose eyes have zeroed in on his prey, and Mao Liang has to fight the urge to shiver at the sight.

The odd twitches that they see in their fellow demons tells them that they, too, experience the same unease, so at least they’re not alone in this.

It was an odd thing, at first, to fear a human — much less a cultivator. In the beginning, as Lord Shang was just ascending into his climb for power in the Northern Kingdom, it had been something Mao Liang had been almost offended by. Just as any demon in their right mind would be, faced with such a slight, twitchy little thing, whose eyes rove to and fro as if they are a frightened animal. It screams of weakness, to any demon eyes.

Any demon that doesn’t already know better, at least.

Within the decade, however, it became clear that this feeling did, indeed, have its place in Mao Liang’s heart. That they were not experiencing a falsity. That Lord Shang, despite his diminutive appearance, is deserving of this respect, and not just because his majesty is so fond of him.

Not only is the cultivator powerful — Mao Liang still shudders in remembrance, whenever there is a storm in the sky strong enough to birth lightning — but he is conniving. He is intelligent to a terrifying degree. He is scarily efficient, productive, and reliable.

When Lord Shang says something will be done, it is done.

When Lord Shang says changes need to be made, they are made, no matter how many voices make their dissent known (nor how many idiots have, over the years, attempted something much more underhanded — they all fail, each and every one of them, and eventually the attempts were fewer and fewer, before just completely grinding to a halt).

If Lord Shang decides you are not fit for a position….

Well. In the beginning, he’d have just taken care of it himself. Through varying means, all of them increasingly terrifying, according to the rumors Mao Liang has heard over the years. Now, though…

Now, if Lord Shang decides someone has to go, the king himself is ever so obliging to make sure that it happens, often post haste.

So much power in the palm of a single person, even if he is an immortal master — it’s awe-inspiring.

So, Lord Shang indeed deserves the respect he commands from the heart of every Northern demon, and even those beyond their borders. However long it had taken them all to realize (and then accept), the state of the kingdom in recent years has been thriving more than it ever has in the past. Things haven’t been this good since perhaps the early golden age of the current Mobei Jun’s great and mighty ancestors. And they all know exactly who to credit that for.

“Here.”

Mao Liang startles, gaze snapping down to the map and zeroing in on where Lord Shang’s dainty (and deceptively powerful, mustn’t forget that) finger is tapping on an outlined enemy outpost.

“Eliminate them, first.” Lord Shang says.

“Ah — my lord?” One of the generals hedges awkwardly, tone coming out rather flat in his attempt not to offend — as it happens with most demons, their accents when speaking the common language does not leave a lot of room for niceties and polite speech. It’s caused a lot of scares with Lord Shang, where the demons under his attention are never certain if they’re about to get banished from the kingdom or executed by the king (which would be a mercy, certainly).

Mao Liang winces, covering it up by clenching their jaw tightly and eyeing the general who spoke from the corner of his eye, as Lord Shang turns his attention directly upon him.

The general is standing ramrod straight, shoulders stiff and brow pinched, when the advisor’s aquamarine gaze cuts to him. The demal shouldn’t have spoken up at all.

“What is it?” Lord Shang asks, pleasantly. Mao Liang feels a shiver wrack their spine.

Lord Shang is always pleasant, right up until he isn’t. It’s when he isn’t, that one has to watch out for oneself. But it’s ever so difficult to know when that caution is required, because Lord Shang is unpredictable, in a sense.

It takes a lot to truly and irreparably offend the honorable advisor. The last one who had…

They’re still scraping the poor guy’s innards off the wall of that conference hall, Mao Liang is pretty sure.

“That outpost…” the General begins, haltingly. He eyes the peak lord hesitantly, searching the neutral mask for any sign of displeasure, before continuing. “It’s not very important in the grand scheme of things, my lord. The enemy does not particularly value it. To expend our forces on its destruction would, I believe, be a waste of our resources at this time.”

There. Succinct and to the point. Mao Liang cranes their head around to peer at the advisor, who stands at the head of the table.

In the shadow of his majesty’s great bulk and dark glower (which is currently directed at the silently sweating General, poor demal), Lord Shang looks so much smaller than he actually is. Almost breakable. Non-threatening.

Mao Liang has never heard a more hilarious joke in their life. Non-threatening, their ass.

“You would think so, wouldn’t you?” And oh, there is cheer injected into the advisor’s voice, now. Mao Liang watches in fascination as the general visibly cringes. “Ah, but that’s where you’d be wrong, General Peng! You see, this particular outpost actually is rather important, especially to our enemy. They’d just like for us to think that it isn’t. The larger outpost, here?”

Lord Shang sweeps his hand across the map to the larger outline that’s much closer to the Northern borders.

“That seems more of a threat to us, just like you pointed out earlier. And I agree, it does seem that way — however, this larger outpost is only a decoy. A red herring, if you will. It’s larger and more heavily manned specifically to distract us from this smaller outpost over here.”

General Peng flinches minutely, having his own contribution to the meeting so effortlessly and nonchalantly thrown back into his face as only an incorrect assumption rather than a logical deduction. He doesn’t speak, though, even to ask the advisor where he’d gotten such information from.

No one ever asks Lord Shang how he knows something. Everyone knows that if Lord Shang knows something, then he just knows it, and you are to trust it, because he is never, ever wrong.

It is frightening enough, having the advisor of the king know your name, personally, without you ever having introduced yourself to him. Small, meaningless facts about you, the names of your family, where your clan ancestral ritual grounds are (something that no demon tells anyone outside their own clan, upon pain of death. And having that just thrown out there in casual conversation? Terrifying.). What you had been doing, while undercover, just the week before….

Mao Liang’s first meeting with the Peak Lord Shang had been memorable, to say the least. They had come out of it with a very, very healthy fear and respect for the man, of course. Ask any demon in the Eternal Winter Palace — hell, any demon in the damn kingdom itself — and they would tell you the same.

“It’s this outpost we have to worry about.” Lord Shang is saying, tapping once again on the smaller outline. “It’s the center of their operations. Everything that actually matters is hidden underneath it. It is absolutely crucial that those of you in the field ensure that it will no longer be a problem. You should take, I’d say, around three platoons.”

Mao Liang glances down at the outline. The outpost is tiny, nestled into the belly of a valley. Just looking at it, they would guess there are only perhaps a thousand demons in total guarding the place. Sending in six thousand soldiers to take it out is a bit of overkill.

But, then again, if the real operations are all happening underground, concealed….

General Peng’s lips thin into a pale line. Then, the demal nods in acceptance. “If Lord Shang says so.”

“I do,” Lord Shang says, quietly, not even lifting his gaze back up from the map, staring down at where his own finger is pressed to the outpost.

General Peng’s entire face goes pale.

Before anything else can happen, like Lord Shang going completely silent and unhelpful (It’s happened in the past, Lord Shang deciding that they no longer required his advice, if they were so certain of their own (always subpar) intelligence on the matter. His majesty’s ire, in response, had been absolutely brutal on everyone even peripherally involved. Mao Liang had been lucky enough to not have been in attendance at that particular meeting, but they’d heard stories.)— before anything like that could happen, the king himself decided that enough is enough.

Mobei Jun shoves off the table and sends them all a sharp glare.

“Well,” his majesty says, powerful voice expanding into the air and filling the cavernous war room like it was something material. “You have your orders. What else do you want? Get out.”

As they all scramble to their feet and head for the door, Mao Liang is at the forefront. They hate tactical meetings. They’d rather be on the field. Or in their quarters, sleeping. Or in their quarters, reading. Anywhere that other people are not. This meeting has already drained their meager energy levels to almost nothing. It’s nap time. It’s nap time.

“Mao Liang,” Mobei Jun’s voice calls, and they fall to an abrupt stop just before the doors. “Stay behind.”

Demons, generals and soldiers and even fellow agents, stream past them, and they quietly despair. Fuck! They’d been so close!

They turn, and step back to the table. They execute a bow, working to keep any expression off their face entirely — especially when Lord Shang smiles at them. Oh, ancestors.

“There’s a mission that requires the best counter-intelligence agent that we have,” Lord Shang begins, as flattering as ever, and Mao Liang knows immediately that they’re in for a lot of work. Dammit. “Here, follow me. There’s no reason to do this in such a drafty, echoing hall. I’ll debrief you on the way to the kitchens.”

Ah! Mao Liang hasn’t eaten since yesterday! And from the glimmer in Lord Shang’s eye as the man smiles, he knows it too.

Another thing about Lord Shang, that Mao Liang particularly admires, is how the man cares, despite everything else. If you ever work directly underneath Lord Shang, you can always be absolutely certain that he will look out for you.

In the Northern Kingdom, there is no place safer.

[roguestarsailor]

You know what since we’re still in quarantine and i have nothing else better to do, i need to obsess over ACOTAR. I don't like a court of frost and starlight. For the longest time I couldn't figure out why I didn't like it. I aggressively read the book in maybe a day and I closed it feeling frustrated and annoyed. My version had A Court of Silver Flames preview so that definitely contributed to my annoyance greatly.

It's because it felt too perfect. Everything that had happened -- after the entire war was fought and won, they just go back to their normal lives? Yes there were hiccups and yes there were still aspects that made every IC character feel like their problems aren’t solved yet...but it didnt feel right. yes i enjoyed the snowball fight between the bat boys, feyre + rhys sexy time, and those little comfort moments too, the slice of life type things and seeing feyre accomplishing her goals and how hopeful the future seems BUT its too fast. the good parts of the book did not offset the bad parts of it.

Feyre literally accomplished pretty much every single goal she made back in ACOMAF just like that?? within a span of what a few months? a year?? She really came back from an entire war -- probably the first war of many since she's immortal and just like that, after her 21st birthday: she gets a whole entire estate, wants to start poppin babies, opens her art studio and starts teaching kids and then acting like she can rule an entire court?? the timeline is sooo short esp since its been brought up over and over again how everyone is literally 500 years old and have a super “messy” history and their changes seems to come super dupe slowly. but feyre, who has only lived 0.000000002% of her fae life, is out here thriving just fine???

the war devastated thousands of illyrian soldiers where its changing the politics of the illyrains and the faes, all of whom feyre has responsibilities over too as high lady. the mortal queens are still at large who left the humans on prythian to die which is why feyre was willing to go to war in the first place! what about the rest of hybern and their land and residents?? they wanted to enslave humans for social and economical reasons! then what about integrating humans w deep hatred and fear with deeply prejudice fae??? there’s also spring and summer court who are literally in ruins. thats literally so much. so idk how feyre is just chillin???? she gonna let rhys do all the hard work???

like feyre sit down. u should not be having a baby. esp since it took u literally a 700 pages to heal from those 3 months UTM. ur telling me shes gonna whole heartedly bring in a newborn in a war devastated world, with civil unrest (illyrains, other courts), with the messiness of human and fae integration, with trauma u and rhys will have to continue to overcome esp after THIS war??? even helping ur sisters w their traumas??

this is a personal opinion on this subject (and maybe my thoughts will change on this later on; opened to other thoughts) but when i read the part about how that weaver/seamstress artist who made that dark quilt that feyre loved talked about how her mate of 300 years didn’t come back from the war and her biggest regret was that she didnt have a kid to remember him by i just thought ur kid isn’t some sort of memorabilia. don’t have a kid to keep the memory of ur mate alive; have a kid cuz u want a kid purely for the sake of having a kid. ur memories and photos and shit will keep their memory alive but its not having a kid. some primitive need to keep the genes alive maybe?? but the way it was phrased and then in turn how feyre was like oh i need  a baby pronto cuz rhys might die in the next war and regret not having a kid with him didn’t sit right with me. also the other couple were together for +300 years and have a rich life together, while shes been with rhys for literally two years THATS NOTHING IN FAE YEARS. thats still the honeymoon phase and also ur problems arent even close to being over!!!

everyone was shitty to nesta. in ACOMAF, we saw how much the IC went through and still did all they could to help feyre. what made them not think nesta deserve the same welcome? nesta is mean as a defense but did no one try to figure out what would help (amren got close but shes so under developed)??? feyre knows nesta feels too much and yet she continued to be shitty. continued to flaunt her wealth, her status, her familiarity/borderline know-it-all attitude about fae/night court, her ~estate~. forcing nest to the solstice party when nesta was literally like i dont belong, im looking at everyone through a window type of thing; the fire cracking triggering her, etc. what kind of power play was that when she made nesta come to her estate, where nesta could SEE how ~homey~ and how suscessful feyre is and fully see all the lovely paintings of everyone feyre loves that explicitly exclude her to tell her to fuck off to a war camp?? bro???? cas was a dick too and elaine was rude. i think a lot of his actions were meant to make her angry since anger keeps u fighting (as was the method of rhys for feyre in ACOMAF) but what he said was stupidly shitty and i demand that he apologize properly. elaine could have done more to help her sister but whatever. mor was definitely an ass too (and im upset for how little her character growth is). 

Lucein. that man can’t catch a break tbh. im happy that hes w the band of exiles cuz he is whole heartedly accepted there. feyre was definitely an asshole to him even tho he helped as much as he could throughout the books. he tries so hard w elaine as well and it did hit my heart a bit when she was like gloves to work in my garden?? no ?? i use my bare hands see oNly aZiReL sEeS mE fOr WhO i Am. and at the same feyre is like flaunting her mate status to lucein which is mean as shit. its like this man can’t find love in prythain. then tamlin sending him his box of his things??? thats for sure brutral. tam was literally his partner through it all; savior of sorts even. no love from IC, no love from elaine, no love from feyre, no love from tamlin, no love from autumn court rejected everywhere! also HIS TRUE FATHER?? HEllo??? 

then on tamlin. i pity the guy! was i suppose to feel that way??? it felt like he is allowed to get a redemption arc and maybe i’ll even root for a redemption arc??? i was absolutely excited for freysand in ACOMAF but after ACOFAS, im like tamlin is....not completely bad??? his relationship w feyre was bad and the controlling parts were very much a no-no. i dont truly understand the dynamics of an abusive relationship but i can understand that it can be insidious and its the little things that hurt the victim. and i felt  feyre through ACOMAF and rooted for her to escape her abuser! but then it felt like i dont think he was doing any of those things out of malice. ill say tamlin is a bad leader and doesn’t know how to run a court outside of what he sees his father do. his understanding on everything is based on the traditions of the past which i think fueled most of the things he did i.e. not telling feyre she was in danger since maybe his mom didn’t do those war planning things. ACOTAR showed how he truly cared/loved and took good care of feyre and her family. he even talked about how he didn’t believe in the enslavement of humans! i think that tam wanted to preserve what he thought was the good (aka feyre + her love of painting) and get back a sense of control that he and his entire court lost while chained to amarantha. but at the same time, i think he truly thought feyre wasn’t safe. he knows rhys can crush minds and knows feyre can’t read/write so when he got that letter telling him shes safe of course hes gonna flip shit and made a deal w the devil (although those temper outbursts were DEFINITIVELY not ok!!!). he also didn’t listen and has sense of he knows best when feyre was not the type of person. but feyre destroyed his entire court. he lost all his sentries who literally went out to die for him during amarantha’s reign. he lost lucien too; his trusted right hand man. his people were cursed for 50 years and then continued to suffer UTM and was in the process of rebuilding too!  but just seeing spring court, WHO BORDERS THE HUMANS, be in ruins where his subjects left him, his people left him and hes all alone in the manson?? that was sooo sad. so im like why does what feyre did not feel satisfactory????? im mad that it didn’t feel right??? maybe there wasn’t a point where feyre talked to tamlin -- like really talked to him esp w her new found voice and power, etc. anyways, i dont hate tamlin and was like oh shit i think feyre fucked up a bit there.

rhys is a dick to nesta. which made me think, if feyre wasn’t his mate would he extend the same love and care to her???  i loved how he tried so hard to make sure feyre was ok. made sure she wasn’t breaking! all of it! but for nesta, he had the audacity to use his high lord voice and be an ass overall. even tho he can see how cas is fucken in love??? even just how he talks to cass feels off too. 

i’ll even go as far as to say because of how terrible ACOFAS was, it created this intense divide within the fandom. i remember reading the first three books and was absolutely 1) rooting for freysand  2) curious about the sister relationship and how it will be mended 3) i definitely didn’t hate nesta nor did i hate elaine either -- but i was adament about them talking it out with feyre for those tough times 4) saw a more realistic and charming healing arc 5) was rooting for feyre to be a stronger voice and grow into herself 6) love the dynamic of the inner circle + feyre

but after ACOFAS, I have this intense need to defend nesta and was super mad at how she was treated after the war and in turn a deep dislike for elaine for both her lack of agency, lack of grit that made all the other characters interesting, and lack of care for her sisters (who showed how much they would risk for her). i dont hate rhys but i was extremely not happy with him and his attitude and behavior. feyre became more arrogant and was acting like how asshole rhysand would act. like her life is perfect now and i was not rooting for her anymore. freysand didn’t feel like they have complimenting qualities that made them interesting in the first place but rather they are merging to become the same person but in a bad way. that mind reading thing was cute in the beginning but it became insufferable since all thoughts were shared so seamlessly it made reading feel weird. 

anyways those are my thoughts on ACOFAS. it was a 1/5 stars for me and im mad those events transpired. reading the other books made me excited to know what was gonna happen and i was truly ready to accept the characters as flawed and nuanced as they are. im not mad about character not liking each other but i am mad that everything felt off. ACOFAS just felt regressive in some parts and forced in other parts. i know not everything ends in a nice tied up bow but this book single handily ruined what i thought about these characters in the worse way possible. this book wasn’t suppose to wrap up all the problems that exists in the other books but it didn’t feel hopeful like i thought it would. it didn’t feel wrapped up and didn’t feel like i should be excited about the next books. theres so many missing pieces i feel that i think need explaining and at the same time, i think it introduced too many problems at once which made it feel like its jumping around everywhere. although im still excited for ACOSF because i love nesta, and nesta deserves so much better and i want to have hope that this bad ending will either make sense later on or it was just a blimp.

[elareine]

Reverse robins idea. Jason doesnt become a Robin. The bats dont even find him before the cat herself. Selena is still on and off with Bruce at this point. Damian as noticed the little kitten running around and decides the kitten need a more responsible adult than his father and the cat. Cue thugs being terrified of the shadow that follows the little kitten around.

Thank you for this adorable prompt <3 Sorry it took me so long to finish. 

“Uh. Dami? What’re you doing?”

Those were—a lot of throwing knives. Like, actual knives, not Bat-themed at all.

Damian didn’t look up. “Sharpening my weapons.”

They looked plenty sharp to Dick, but Damian was a fussy old maid like his father. Their father. He was still getting used to that one.

“You’re supposed to be in Metropolis,” Dick pointed out.

Damian scowled. Dick didn’t take it personally. He liked his oldest brother. Dami glared a lot and yelled at Bruce when he was mean, and he never told Dick that he should stop seeking revenge for what happened to his parents. “Change of plans.”

“Can I come?”

“You’re heading out with Father tonight,” Damian pointed out. “And anyway, no.”

“What’re you doing? Is it a date?” Full disclosure: Dick wasn’t entirely sure what a ‘date’ was. He just knew that everyone blushed when he asked the question and that Bruce, according to Alfred, never got any.

Damian, however, just shook his head. “No. It’s a mission.”

Dick tilted his head to the side. “I don’t believe you.”

“That does not matter. It is the truth either way.”

Bullshit. Damian was sharpening his weapons, okay, but there was no mission for him in Gotham tonight. Bruce had told Dick so when he mentioned that all that would be happening tonight was a Catwoman heist, so he would pick Dick up after.  

(Dick had a sneaking suspicion that for Bruce, ‘heist’ and ‘date’ meant the same thing.)

Nooo, Damian was up to something. Something important—or embarrassing—enough that he would lie to his cute little brother about it.

Just wait until he told Babs about this! She was always going on about “Steph did this” and “Cass did that,” and now, finally, Dick had a juicy mystery to distract her. Hehe. This was going to be fun.

—

Selina would never understand Bats. If you’d asked her twenty years ago if she could see Bruce adopting a gaggle of orphans, she’d have laughed but agreed—if the kids were all alone in the world or in a situation that reminded Bruce of his own.

Like, the first kid—okay. That was his son. From the daughter of an immortal cult leader, Selina later found. Weird enough. Then the second just showed up because… the city needed him? And he was right? And then another assassin kid, this time a daughter.  

Really, only Dick fitted the pattern she’s envisioned for Bruce. Which was ironic, because, by that time, she’d taken in her own boy (the first after two Catgirls), who fit the pattern much better.

Of course, their child-rearing methods showed some marked differences. Selina thought it was for the better, really. Jay needed to be trusted, given responsibility, to determine his own fate. She let him run his own missions, treated him as an almost-equal when they went out together, didn’t comment on how he sometimes didn’t seem focused on the target so much as on the corrupt people owning it. Jay was thriving.

When his shadow showed up, Selina had expected him to be angry, the way he was whenever B mentioned a concept like ‘bedtime’ or Selina tried to protect him. But he’d lit up like there was nothing more comforting than a six-foot-four shadow following you around, glaring at criminals and innocents alike.

Selina, in her heart of hearts, did not like Damian. She didn’t fault him for his flaws, but it was hard to like someone who called you a harlot under his breath a million times.

Jay, though, adored him. Like, hung-onto-his-few-words, begged-to-buy-a-sword adored him. They even went out on patrol together sometimes. So Selina… let them. Taught Jay more restraining holds and knock-out moves than she had the others because he was a gifted thief already, but that was clearly not all that would be on his path.

And, hey. Usually, she and Bruce had to put their… thing on hold when they were responsible for pre-teens. If these ones took care of themselves, she wasn’t going to complain.

—

“Dames,” Jon greeted him cheerfully, “what’re you up to? Gonna join me tonight?”

“I can’t.”

At twenty-seven, Jon was way too old to pout. He still did. “Aww, why not? Important mission?”

“Not precisely.” There was shuffling on the other end of the line. “I… Catwoman is planning a two-person heist tonight. Batman has intentions of preventing it.”

Jon instantly forgave him. He looooved seeing this side of his partner. Damian rarely let himself be openly soft about anyone but his family, pets, and team, and even that was kept incredibly guarded.

(He often considered that Damian would have benefited from being a younger sibling. Being the first to come live with Bruce had been a steep learning curve for the man. Too steep.)

Didn’t mean Jon wouldn’t tease Damian about it. “So two adults are not supervision enough for the kid?”

“You know it isn’t,” Damian growled. “Father and that woman might do a passable job separately, but not together.”  

“What, are they fucking again?”

“Jon!”

Jon laughed. “C’mon, you caught them often enough to know it’s happening.”

“I’m not listening.” Damian immediately proved himself a liar by adding: “This is a dangerous area. They should know better.”

“Good thing you’re there, then.”

“I am sorry, though.” Damian’s voice softened. Jon once again marveled at how far he’d come. The teenager he’d befriended back then would never have such a thing. “Rain check?”

“I could join you, instead,” he offered, just to hear Damian sputter: “What—no! Your colors are visible a mile away!”

“Awww, don’t be like that!”

He decided then and there to keep an ear out for the kid when Damian wasn’t there. Just in case Jason wanted to sneak away to find his birth mother in a foreign country or some other stupid dramatic Gotham shit.

After hearing what had happened to Damian years ago, Jon had already made it his mission to protect the Robins, whether they wanted it or not. There wouldn’t be any more dead ones on his watch. It wouldn’t hurt to add a kitten to the list.

—

Jason had it handled. Really, he had. One of the goons had just taken a bit longer to go down, that was all. The knife had been totally unnecessary.

It took him another three minutes to do anything about that—two of the security guards were still standing, and they were pissed. Jason pushed one down the hallway, choked the other, and then clocked the first so hard he went down.

Then he turned around and searched for the darkest shadow. “I had that.”

Nothing moved.

“…it was a pretty good throw.” Maybe Jason should rethink his stance on throwing sharp shit at people, after all. He still maintained that a gun would be cleaner and more straightforward. Maybe Selina (and Damian) were right though about the value of silence. Their fight hadn’t alerted anyone.

At that, the thrower finally emerged from the shadows, cape dramatically outlining his figure. Jason rolled his eyes. What was it with Bats and dramatic costumes? Selina had made him swear that no matter how much he hung out with them, he wouldn’t ever wear one of the stupid things, and that was one promise that had been very easy to give.

“I have an observational task at the Bowery in two hours and could benefit from a second pair of eyes,” Damian said stiffly. “And your knowledge of the area, of course.”

Oh, awesome. Jason loved working in his old neighborhood. Made him feel useful, like he was doing something. “Can it wait an hour? Only, I’m kinda busy here, in case you didn’t notice.”

“Of course.” Was that a smile under the mask? “I will be waiting.”

Jason gave him a thumbs-up, though he made sure to call: “Don’t barge in again!” while running off. Selina would be waiting.

Jason had had a mother. Still had, really, death didn’t change that. Selina had told him she didn’t want to replace her, which was good cause she couldn’t. As for fathers��Nah. Jason had had enough of those for a lifetime; thank you, Bruce, you can fuck off.

But a big brother? That was new.

He liked it.

[maxwell-grant]

So that ask about a Doc Savage/The Shadow crossover (which as an aside, I agree that Doc is probably the worst of the archetype he is functionally the Ur-Example of that isn’t an intentional deconstruction focusing on his worst eugenicist/borderline-fascist aspects to create a villain) has me thinking: what exactly would be the boundaries for a good, well-written crossover between the Shadow and different genres or eras of what we all collectively call pulp? Could someone do a crossover between the Shadow and Indiana Jones that didn’t rely on one or the other being little more than a glorified cameo in a small portion of what was essentially the other’s story, or reducing the former to his lamest two-dimensional “gun-toting homicidal maniac” interpretations? Could the Shadow ever functionally exist in a universe shared with a space opera setting like the Lensman series? It seems like one could theoretically do a crossover between the Shadow and a character of the same era like Nero Wolfe or Sam Spade, but would it strain credulity to attempt it with characters from an updated form of the private detective archetype like Thomas Magnum’s Hawaiian noir or Rick Deckard’s cyberpunk dystopia? Obviously not expecting answers to each of these hypotheticals specifically, just as examples of the kind of thing I’m wondering now.

I will be going through some of your hypotheticals though, you clearly gave a lot of thought to this and it's only fair I respond in turn. I am always eager to respond anyone who wants to ask specifics about writing The Shadow, because much of what I strive to do through this blog is to just inform people about the many, many things that made The Shadow great, the things that have been neglected, and to provide paths anyone who wishes to write the character may take. I'm not sure if I'll ever be able to write The Shadow someday, but the least I can do is spread knowledge as I work my way there. I'd like to think I've done allright so far.

It's a fairly big question though so we're gonna through it by pieces...

...not THAT way

what exactly would be the boundaries for a good, well-written crossover between the Shadow and different genres or eras of what we all collectively call pulp?

Part of the reason why I did a post yesterday on The Shadow's influences is because looking at them, looking at a character's influences and history, I think are always essential to the prospect of tackling them. And in that regard, The Shadow doesn't actually have much, if any, boundaries stopping him from crossing over with just about anything. The most that's stopping the pulp heroes currently is, besides legal issues, their time periods and obscurity, but The Shadow is the most famous of them all, and a lot of stories have already worked with the idea that he's immortal (which I have my misgivings with, but for better or worse is clearly not going anywhere, and it's not a unworkable concept).

Right from the start, The Shadow was designed to be a long-running, versatile character that could partake in whatever adventures they felt like telling, and part of this is due not just to an incredibly strong personality not afforded to most pulp heroes or characters in general, even those who tried imitating him, but also the fact that he often takes a narrative backseat to the agents and proxy heroes, which means he doesn't have to carry a narrative by his own (and is in fact best suited not to), can blend in to just about anyone's story, and still stand out and be the center of sprawling mysteries. Actually, I'm gonna let Walter Gibson answer this one for you:

While his major missions were to stamp out mobs or smash spy rings, he often tabled such routines in order to find a missing heir, uncover buried treasure, banish a ghost from a haunted house or oust a dictator from a mythical republic.

There was no limitation to the story themes as long as they came within the standards of credibility--which proved easy, since The Shadow was such an incredible character in his own right that almost anything he encountered was accepted by his ardent followers.

Widespread surveys taken while the magazine was appearing monthly showed that a large majority of newsstands sold nearly all their copies within the first two weeks of issue. While other character magazines might show an early flurry, their sales were either spread evenly over the entire period or gained their impetus about the middle of the mouth and sometimes not until the third or even the fourth week.

From the writing standpoint, this made it advisable to adhere more closely to the Cranston guise and to emphasize the parts played by The Shadow's well-established agents, since regular readers evidently liked them. Also, it meant "keeping ahead" of those regulars, with new surprises, double twists in "whodunit" plots, and most exacting of all a succession of villains who necessarily grew mightier and more monstrous as The Shadow disposed of their predecessors.

Always, his traits and purposes were defined through the observations and reactions of persons with whom he came in contact, which meant that the reader formed his opinion from theirs.

This gave The Shadow a marked advantage over mystery characters forced to maintain fixed patterns and made it easy to write about him. There was never need for lengthy debate regarding what The Shadow should do next, or what course he should follow to keep in character. He could meet any exigency on the spur of the moment, and if he suddenly acted in a manner opposed to his usual custom, it could always be explained later.

The Shadow’s very versatility opened a vast vista of story prospects from the start of the series onward. In the earlier stories, he was described as a “phantom,” an “avenger,”, and a “superman,” so he could play any such parts and still be quite in character. In fact, all three of those terms were borrowed by other writers to serve as titles for other characters.

Almost any situation involving crime could be adapted to The Shadow’s purposes

The final rule was this: put The Shadow anywhere, in any locale, among friends or associates, even in a place of absolute security, and almost immediately crime, menace or mystery would begin to swirl about him, either threatening him personally or gathering him in its vortex to carry him off to fields where antagonists awaited.

That was his forte throughout all his adventures. Always, his escapes were worked out beforehand, so that they would never exceed the bounds of plausibility when detailed in narrative form. And that was the great secret of The Shadow.”

In some regards, The Shadow is a mirror. He presents himself to people the way that's best suited to them, the way they'd like him to be, the way he needs to be to affect them. They want money, he has it. They want honor, glory and purpose, he gives them that. They want to fight and turn around social systems for the better, he funds their dreams. Gangsters want the underworld's greatest hitman on their side, he becomes that and lets it be their doom. The story calls for a rich aristocrat who can rub elbows with politicians and kings and presidents, he can do that as long as it suits him. Kent Allard can be a world famous celebrity in one story and a disfigured, broke and faceless nobody in the next. You want a kind janitor with unexpected fighting skill to spy on police and assist the homeless, he has a little someone named Fritz for the occasion. You want an evil monster to be defeated, bring out Ying Ko. Hell, James Patterson's upcoming Shadow novel, which by all reviews seems to be pretty lousy, apparently features The Shadow transforming into a cat. Why? Screw you, that's why! But you'd never see James Bond or Batman spontaneously transforming into a cat without outside interference. He's The Shadow, he's got a face for everything.

(Okay to be clear I don't actually want the Shadow to literally transform into animals, at least not without a good explanation which the book clearly doesn't provide, but I do think it illustrates my point about how generally weird he is)

He is a shapeshifter who can be just about any character in any given narrative who only reveals himself when it's time to materialize into a cloaked terror or a familiar face (whether it's Cranston or Allard or Arnaud and so on). War stories, romance stories, sci-fi stories, globetrotting stories, parody stories, he's done all of them and then some. He doesn't need to be the protagonist of a story, he doesn't need to be invincible, and he doesn't really have any set rules regarding powerset. Gibson stressed credibility a lot, but for over 70 years now, that's clearly gone by the window of the character's writing. By design, he was always meant to be able to smoothly integrate into any existing narrative. Frankly, the only thing that's really holding him back (or saving him, depending on how you look at it) is the fact that he's not public domain (yet).

I think for a start, it's not so much boundaries, because in make believe land boundaries are just things to be overcome on the way to telling a story, so much as it's a good working knowledge of the character and of how far you are willing to stretch your storytelling limitations to include him, because he can account for just about all of them. Now, obviously there's stuff that works for the character better than others, a lot of Shadow fans don't like it when they take the character too much into fantasy, there's debates on how superpowered should he be if at all, and so forth. I have my own preferences, but one of the bigger tests of long-running characters is how can they succeed and thrive when placed outside of their element, and The Shadow can do that.

Could someone do a crossover between the Shadow and Indiana Jones that didn’t rely on one or the other being little more than a glorified cameo in a small portion of what was essentially the other’s story, or reducing the former to his lamest two-dimensional “gun-toting homicidal maniac” interpretations?

would it strain credulity to attempt it with characters from an updated form of the private detective archetype like Thomas Magnum’s Hawaiian noir

Well regarding the first question, the latter portion I think is very easy to do. Just, don't write him like that. Just be aware of why that's a mischaracterization, why the character doesn't need that to work, why he works better without it, and so on. It shouldn't be that hard.

Regarding Indiana Jones and Thomas Magnum, I think these two actually lend themselves very easily to crossovers with The Shadow. On Indy's case, he already is a Pulp Hero operating in the same time period, who's got a heavily contrasting niche and personality to build a fun dynamic around. Indy is more story-driven, in the sense that the Indiana Jones moves are all centered around his experiences and point of view and growth as a person, compared to The Shadow's stories, which are not really about "his" story as much as they are about the stories of the people he comes in contact with. Indy is a blockbuster superstar while The Shadow lurks and slithers through the edges and cracks of a story until it's time to strike. But if anything that just makes even more of a case as to why they could team up without issue, since there's a further built-in complimentary contrast to work with.

I have never watched Magnum P.I so there's definitely stuff I might be missing, but looking him up, past the necessary explanation as to why The Shadow's hanging around the 80s, it wouldn't strain credulity at all for the two to team up. The Shadow has had Caribbean/beach-themed adventures and one unrecorded adventure in Honolulu, he has a beach bum secret identity called Portuguese Joe that he could use for this occasion, and Magnum seems like exactly the kind of character who could star as the proxy hero of a Shadow novel. He's lively and friendly and can look after himself, he has a job that leads him to trouble and puts him on contact with criminals as well as victims, he's got secrets and a dark past and a laundry list of character flaws, he's perfectly capable of carrying a story by himself but can be out of his depth in the schemes that he gets caught up in.

Could the Shadow ever functionally exist in a universe shared with a space opera setting like the Lensman series? Or Rick Deckard’s cyberpunk dystopia?

I'm going to tackle parts of this question more throughly when I answer one in my query that's asking me "How would you do The Shadow in modern day?", which I still haven't gotten around to answering because it's a tricky one. I won't go into the specifics for the two examples you listed because I've never read the Lensman books and googling about them hasn't helped much very much, and Deckard's a fairly standard P.I character mostly elevated by the movie he's in, there's not really much to discuss regarding him specifically interacting with The Shadow. The question you're asking me here seems to generally be: Could The Shadow functionally exist in settings so radically apart from the 30s Depression era he was made for?

My answer for this is a maybe leaning towards yes. Starting with the fact that the concept of The Shadow is more suited for allegorical fantasy along the lines of space operas and cyberpunk, than the gritty realism he's been saddled with for decades, which I'll get into another time. For some reason, a lot of people seem to harp on about how the Shadow's costume is impractical and unworkable for modern times, and said James Patterson novel mentioned above ditched it all together, which as you can guess was a massively unpopular decision. Matt Wagner talked once about how cities don't have shadows and men wearing hats anymore and that's part of why you can't have The Shadow in modern times (as if The Shadow was always supposed to be dressing like an average guy, and not cowboy Dracula). But nobody seems to have a problem with characters dressing up exactly like The Shadow showing up all the time in dystopian future cities with fashion senses where they stick out like a sore thumb (and really, they should stick out, otherwise what's the point of being all weird and dark and mysterious?)

Although The Shadow is specifically suited for urban settings, is conceptually rooted in 1930s America, and there are important facets of his characterization related to history like the Great War, there are not the be-all end-all of The Shadow. It's part of the character. Other parts integral to the character are, as mentioned above, the versatility and metamorphous nature he was always intended to have. His nature as a character who exists to thrive in narratives not about him and not centered around him. His roots on Dracula and King Arthur and Oz and Lupin which are concepts that have had so, so many drastical revisions and turnabouts that still stuck to the basic principles of the icon.

Besides, The Shadow's already been there. He's already been to space, he's already been in alternate dimensions, he's already reawakened in modern/future times several times now (when he doesn't just live to them unchanged). He's been a cyborg twice, and between those, El Sombra, Vendata, X-9, the Shadow-referencing robot henchmen from Bob Morane and Yu-Gi-Oh's Jinzo referencing the movie's bridge scene, it's enough to constitute a weird pattern of The Shadow and Shadow-adjacent characters turning into robots. Perhaps one positive side effect of The Shadow's decades-long submersion in fantasy is that it's opened the character for just about anything, and I think this could be a good thing if it was married to an adherence to the things that made him such a juggernaut of an icon in the 30s and 40s.

Really, The Shadow partially works on Predator rules. And by that I mean, the big secret of the Predator that filmmakers don't seem to get is that the best way to make a Predator film is to just put the Predator somewhere he's not supposed to be, and let that play out. Because the Predator is, by design, a trespasser who invades narratives and turns the power dynamics around, and that works for any narrative you put it into.

The first movie is all about setting you up for a jungle action movie with Schwarzenegger's Sexual Tyrannosaurus Crew as the biggest baddest death squad around, only for the Predator to appear, turn the tables on these shitheads and pick them off one by one until Arnie scrapes a victory by beating it at it's own game. The 2nd movie is about a drug war between cops and gangs in L.A, until the Predator shows up and suddenly he's the big problem again that's gotta be put down. All the other movies fail because they try to be "about" the Predator, but the Predator doesn't work that way. He's a ugly motherfucker who's here to fight and kill things in cool ways for the sake of it's warrior game, who already has a specific structure to how his story's meant to play out, and that's all he needs to be. What you do is just take that character, take the structure he carries around, and throw it somewhere that works by different rules, and let the contrast play out the story.

Obviously there's a lot more to The Shadow than this, I write a billion essays on the guy after all, but much of what makes The Shadow work, much of what made The Shadow such an icon at the decade of his debut and such an interesting character to revolve any kinds of stories around, was because of the great contrast he posed to everything surrounding him, and the ways he can both be at the forefront as well as the backseat of any story.

Going back to what Gibson said:

Almost any situation involving crime could be adapted to The Shadow’s purposes. He could meet any exigency on the spur of the moment, and if he suddenly acted in a manner opposed to his usual custom, it could always be explained later.

The Shadow was such an incredible character in his own right that almost anything he encountered was accepted by his ardent followers.

advisable to emphasize the parts played by The Shadow's well-established agents, since regular readers evidently liked them.

The keyword here isn't that the Shadow should be realistic, frankly that's always been a lost cause. He was never really that realistic, and it's unfair to expect writers to keep pace with Gibson who had lifelong experience with the in and outs of magic and daring escapes and whatnot. The keywords I want to stress here is "accepted by his ardent followers".

Make a good explanation, an explanation that fits the character, an explanation that works, and the rest will follow. And if you can't, make us like the character. Make us accept that he can do and be all these things. Give us something to be invested in. And if that can't be The Shadow himself because he has to stay at arms length constantly to be mysterious, Gibson cracked the code almost a century ago through the agents. Make us invested in them, and through them, we will become invested in The Shadow.

The pulp Shadow would get tired, get injured, need rescuing, need to stop and rest and catch his breath, would need to think and plan and make split decisions on the spot and sometimes would make the wrong ones only to reverse them in the nick of time, and it made the fact that he was achieving all these things all the more impressive. The pulp Shadow was a creature of fantasy grounded in the history of the world he was a part of.

If you can make people care about The Shadow, be truly, genuinely invested in him and his world and the people he comes in contact with, be as invested in those as audiences were back then, you can and maybe should put him anywhere, doing anything, as long as you know what you're doing. As long as you understand what makes The Shadow tick, what makes him work and what doesn't, and whatnot.

Which is a lot of words for "do whatever you want, just don't fuck it up"

[thebibliomancer]

Archaia’s Jim Henson’s The Dark Crystal Age of Resistance #10

The Journey into the Mondo Levidian Part 2

The true untold tale of All-Maudra Mayrin’s inaugural adventure!

Well, untold in the show. Comic is telling plenty.

In part one, Mayrin becomes All-Maudra and has plenty of unresolved mother issues and insecurity about it. Her first crisis is the growing Sifan separatist movement which threatens to shatter Gelfling solidarity and make her more of a Most-Maudra. She charters a ride with Captain Kam’Lu to go speak to the separatist leader Fenth but the ship goes and sinks.

So far we’ve had a journey so far but not into or Mondo Levidian. We probably should get around to that soon. There’s only three issues left.

So let’s get started!

When the ship sank, Mayrin jumped overboard to save Kam’Lu. Now they’re stranded in the middle of the ocean on a raft.

Mayrin is insistent that they try to find and save the crew of the Scalene Anchor and also Dot. Kam’Lu is equally insistent that No That’s A Terrible Idea. They have no food, no water, and no hope of survival unless they’re lucky enough to find land. They’re in no position to rescue anyone else. Plus...

There are political considerations.

Kam’Lu: “If the other clans believe the Sifans killed the All-Maudra, we’ll never be trusted again.”

He also mentions that Fenth predicted that THIS EXACT SITUATION might happen if the All-Maudra intervened in the Sifan separatist movement.

Huh.

Speaking of Fenth, the plot cuts over to him for a bit.

He learns of the sinking the Scalene Anchor and the presumed death of the New-All-Maudra and thinks hey, its free real estate.

High Councilor Fenth: “That means... There’s no one in line for the All-Maudra’s throne! The seat is vacant!”

skekSa: “How... fortunate! Haha! Ha! Haha! You wanted autonomy for the Sifans! Freedom from the greedy hands of the Vapra clan, yes? That is why honored me with this grand tithing -- to enlist my immortal aid? I am the only one who is sympathetic to your cause. That is why the Skeksis are here. To help Gelfling lead...!”

Call it a shot in the dark but I feel like skekSa was involved in the suspicious sea monster sinking of the Scalene Anchor.

Of course, she’ll probably get away with it. It’d spoil the surprise too early if a Skeksis was caught doing an evil scheme.

Also, look at the ambition on Fenth. Grows up in a matriarchy where clan leaders are always women, where the word for clan leader means ‘clan mother’ and thinks to himself ‘psssh i can do that.’ Good on him. Dream big, guy.

Back over with our mismatched comedy duo, as all Dark Crystal stories must have, Mayrin and Kam’Lu have some mismatched comedy duo banter.

Like her criticizing him for not being able to find land despite being a captain of a ship. And then immediately spotting land while he’s indignantly defending his credentials.

Or her maligning his swimming abilities since he fell off a boat and got knocked unconscious and had to be saved from drowning by her.

So he decides to turn this into a swimming contest, winner gets to be All-Maudra.

Good fun.

Just how I like my Gelfling buddy comedies.

Of course, its all fun and games until the island turns out to be a sea monster that eats them.

And it turns out that the island is a sea monster that eats them.

A mondo levidian, if I had to guess.

Giant turtles passing as landscape. Giant monsters being mistaken for islands. This comic series is too good to me.

So the two slide down the mondo levidian’s throat (gross) MANAGING TO BICKER ON THE WAY DOWN!

Kam’Lu: “Don’t you have wings?!”

Mayrin: “They don’t work well when they’re wet!”

Amazing.

They slide and slorp and flump all the way down to presumably the stomach.

But as they stop to rest, they realize they’re not alone.

Sulub: “Yer some kinda fishie-fish I ain’t ever seen! Betchur tasty! Anyway! No wrigglin’ while I kill ya good!”

OH MY GOD

This comic series is too good to me.

Look at this delightful podling crabtaur.

Once Kam’Lu proves immune to Sulub’s “advanced technology” (ie Sulub stabs Kam’Lu in the foot with a spear), the podcrab agrees to take the two Gelfling to see his village elder.

Sulub actually assumes that Mayrin and Kam’Lu are married and here on honeymoon at the thriving fish digestive system tourism industry I guess. Mayrin claims that Kam’Lu is just a fool and her servant (and Kam’Lu doesn’t speak Podling very well so has no idea about this) and introduces herself as the All-Maudra.

Sulub: “ALL-MAUDRA! The legendary All-Maudra! Well, why didn’t ya say so! Sulub is gilltickled and downright honored to lead ‘the all-powerful and all-knowing’ All-Maudra to our home. You’ll be enjoyin’ to know we’ve kept care of your most regal gifts! Still in pristine condition for havin’ come in a while ago!”

The gut city of Bajula has a statue of the previous All-Maudra, one apparently commissioned when Mayrin was baby.

Huh.

Well. Its helpful to Mayrin that they know about the All-Maudra and are excited to have her here. And that they’re assuming that she sent the statue ahead of herself, like luggage.

Sulub tours Mayrin and Kam’Lu around Bajula. Showing them the goo farms, the visitor center, the fermented... milk wine bar.

The king shows up and is disappointed that the Gelfling want to leave so soon into their visit and asks if Sulub even bothered to show them the goo farms!

But since Mayrin insists that they have important outside stuff to do outside, the king decides to rush through some exposition.

These podling crabs? They’re called Boblings.

Bobling King: “Thousands of trine ago, my tribe set out to explore the Silver Sea as proud, stalwart Podlings! Our regal forefathers were not known to swim, but their bravery was unmatched, and they set out to conquer everything they discovered! All those who would get in their way would be destroyed by the might of the Podlings! Yet there are creatures in this world that are mightier, and the Mondo Leviadin emerged from the Silver Sea and devoured their ships. Thousands of digestive cycles passed as we changed to better suit our new home. Our new world.”

An unstoppable army of Podlings sounds funny until you remember how awesome Hup is. The Mono Levidian may have spared the peoples of Thra a tragic fate.

Also, I’m a big impressed at the lack of linguistic drift. Thousands of trine and Bobling language is indistinguishable from Podling and Gelfling is still recognizable.

Kam’Lu gets fed up with the Bobling King and starts yelling that he’s cold, he’s hungry, he doesn’t want to be in a fish’s guts! Mayrin manages to convince the king by speaking of duty.

Bobling King: “You speak of duty. I know it well. As a leader of my kind, I would do anything for their survival. So yes, I will help you and your servant. Why you married him, I will never know.”

Kam’Lu: “Her what? We’re what?!”

Hah, that misunderstanding is paying dividends.

The king explains that the levidian only surfaces to feed once per trine and that it stays near the surface for a time after feeding.

So if Mayrin and Kam’Lu don’t get to the porticol (blowhole) within eight or so intestinal groans (.... hours??), they’ll be stuck until next trine.

WHICH IS GOING TO BE REAL BAD FOR MAYRIN’S CAREER.

Even though the Boblings are but a simple goo-farming people, the king sends his daughter Gunda, the most skilled hunter in Bajula, to escort them.

Gunda: “But father, the journey as never been done by a single Bobling. You send me into certain danger!”

King: “And do you not crave danger?! My daughter, you are the only one capable and brave enough to undertake such a quest! Please! A duty for your king!”

Gunda: “So be it. I will guide you to the porticol, but know that it is dangerous and uncharted. There are many creatures that call this place home. We must be vigilant. Stalwart. Like my podling ancestors!”

This is a fun little bit because it implies a life and experiences and that these Boblings haven’t just been sitting waiting for protagonists to show up. I mean, they also have been doing that. They have a visitor center set up. But they’ve been living their own dramas.

And off they go! Mayrin, Kam’Lu, and Gunda! On a grand journey to a giant sea monster’s blowhole!

Wait, is this thing a mammal?

So that’s issue 2.

We’re finally in the Mondo Levidian. And now all the protagonists want is to get out. So we’ve got the title, we’ve got an objective, we’ve got some fun side cast, we’ve got a ticking clock before Mayrin and Kam’Lu have to look at the sea monster gut apartment listings, and we’ve got some outside stakes!

Mayrin continues to impress. There’s even a moment right when Kam’Lu rouses after the shipwreck where he seems in awe of her confidence in a crisis.

Kam’Lu has his own personality now that’s not parroting Fenth. Its being a butt monkey, with a slight shade of being a little shit. Between Mayrin giving him shit for supposedly being bad at sailor stuff to getting stabbed in the foot by Boblings twice to being mistaken for Mayrin’s servant-husband, Kam’Lu is having a trying adventure. Plus his ship sank and all of his friends may be dead and if they fail to escape the Mondo Levidian, he’ll go down in history as the idiot that got an All-Maudra killed.

Poor guy.

Gunda has only had two pages to shine and she seems endearing! But it feels weird that Sulub isn’t coming along. He’s the introductory Bobling and all. But I guess speaking only Podling would be an impediment to interacting with Kam’Lu. Still, its weird that he just seems to fade out of the story once the king shows up.

Farewell, Sulub, you funky crab potato.

[dasphinxone]

AU Moodboard based on the Norwegian fairytale East of the Sun and West of the Moon for the Book of Nile.

Nile lives with her mother and brother in the snowy lands of a magical Snow Kingdom.

During Nile’s youth, there was a brutal civil war in between the usurper, Merrick, and the rulers who called themselves the Immortal Coven. Nile’s father, a great knight, sided with the Immortals since they were the true rulers. Unfortunately, the Immortal Coven lost the war and disappeared in the aftermath. So no one knows if they are alive or dead. Nile’s father also died fighting during the war.

King Merrick the Usurper took over the kingdom. His rule is pretty terrible. Since Nile’s father fought for the losing side, his surviving family of his wife, Nile and her brother moved north to the snowy isolated tundra to avoid King Merrick’s potential retribution against the Immortal Coven’s supporters. While Nile’s family isn’t dirt poor, they are certainly not rich and sometimes struggle to survive.

One night during a terrible winter storm, a great white polar bear comes knocking on their door looking for shelter. He’s magical and can talk. He also assures the family that no harm will come to them. It turns out he’s right and shelters with them for the night without incident. He also peacefully leaves in the morning. A few days later, the polar bear returns and says he’s looking for a wife in Nile. Mostly because he’s lonely and wants a companion. Also, she was so kind to him during his shelter from the storm. He swears on his life that no harm will come to Nile and that she will want for nothing. In exchange, he’ll pay for her dowry and make the family rich. He gives the family 24 hours to arrive at their decision.

Nile’s mother immediately says no. I mean, sure, it’s a magic polar bear. But she would never push Nile into sacrificing herself for her family. However, Nile tells her mother the decision isn’t hers and that she would rather see her family safe and secure than pass up a chance to change their destiny. Plus, Nile’s teenage brother will be able to go to school and her mother will never have to work again. So Nile agrees to marry the polar bear.

They marry immediately and the polar bear makes good on his promises. He gives Nile’s family enough treasures to set them up for life. Then he has Nile climb on his back and he races across the tundra to take her to his home. It turns out to be a beautiful, enchanted winter castle. There are (human) servants who speak of the polar bear’s kindness and treat Nile well. The polar bear gives Nile whatever she wants without question. She’s also free to roam the entire castle and the grounds.

His only request of her is that while he sleeps by Nile’s side at night (should she want him to, of course), Nile will never be able to look upon his true form in the light. Nile finds it odd but agrees since she’s used to dealing with magic due to living in the enchanted kingdom all of her life.

Nile is happy for the most part. Her Polar Bear husband treats her well and seems to have a good heart, whether he’s in his bear or his night form. Her family is taken care of. She can have whatever she wants at this beautiful, enchanted castle and the servants for company. Except Nile becomes increasingly and understandably lonely. And it’s been months since she’s seen her family. While her Polar Bear husband is worried that her brother will turn her against him, he doesn’t stop her from visiting her family. He just warns her to not talk to her brother too much and remember their rule that she’s not to see her husband’s real form outside of the darkness at night.

Nile returns home and sees that her mother is thriving while her brother’s schooling is going well. While her mother is happy to see Nile happy, her brother can be a bit overprotective of her. Especially when Nile explains that her husband becomes his real form at night. She just can’t see him by his own rules. Nile’s brother eventually convinces her that her Polar Bear husband is nowhere near human in his true form that she feels at night. He’s simply a monster and she needs to kill whatever it is she’s married to. In fact, Nile should drug her husband and take a candle to him so she can see him for what he is before she kills him.

Nile reluctantly agrees she needs to know the truth. Yet she refuses to promise her brother that she’ll kill her husband. Later that month, she returns back home to her enchanted castle.

It takes Nile a few more days to arrive at a plan. Eventually, she does the deed and drugs her husband. Except she sees via candlelight in their bed that she’s been sleeping next to what looks like a solid human. Looking closer, she realizes that it’s pretty Prince Sébastien (also known by his common name of Booker among the people). Booker is one of the lost of the Immortal Coven who used to rule the kingdom before King Merrick the Usurper came along.

Nile is so shocked at the revelation that she accidentally drops the hot wax of the candle on the human form Prince Sébastien and it wakes him up. Rather than being angry with her for her violation, he’s in anguish. Because had Nile waited just a few more days, she would have been married to him for a full year and his curse of being a polar bear during the day would have been broken.  He would have then remained in his human form forever and in the light.

Before the civil war that Nile’s father died in, Princess Andromache was the Immortal Coven’s leader. She ruled the magic Snow Kingdom for thousands of years alone until she found her wife in Princess Quynh, a fellow Immortal. They both eventually found Prince Yusuf and Prince Nicolò and then Prince Sébastien/Booker. The five of them equally ruled the kingdom fairly and justly and the people were content. In turn, the magical Snow Kingdom thrived.

Well, until Princess Quynh disappeared in a shipwreck while she was on a diplomatic mission. Her loss was felt not only by the whole kingdom and the Immortals, but especially by Princess Andromache. Princess Andromache became exhausted and cynical. She remained in mourning for her wife for centuries, clad in all black and the silver of steel. Things started to slowly decline. The kingdom was also weakened by a series of bad harvests, droughts and winter storms. That’s when Duke Merrick invaded the kingdom by claiming that Princess Andromache and her fellow rules had no right to rule for so long. The people were split in their loyalties and hence the civil war.

Prince Sébastien tells Nile that he was cursed by King Merrick the Usurper. For Merrick promised that he could bring back Booker’s dead wife and children to him if he betrayed his fellow Immortals in the last years of the civil war. Lord Copley was the one who presented Prince Sébastien with Merrick’s deal, as he too wanted his wife back from the dead. But Copley was cautious, waiting to see if Duke Merrick could actually raise the dead with Prince Sébastien’s family as the guinea pigs. Copley also realized how that sort of power could change the world and no one would have to suffer from the grief of losing their loved ones ever again. Also, Prince Sébastien and Lord Copley were tired of fighting. Especially in a war that was killing thousands.

Except Merrick the Usurper lied. He used Booker’s information about the others of the coven to strengthen his own magic and defeat the Immortal Coven. He then cursed Booker and turned him into a polar bear. Booker was doomed to wander the world in such a scary form  because it would be nearly impossible for him to find his second chance at true love.  Lord Copley fled and has never been seen since the end of the civil war.

In order to break the curse, Prince Sébastien has to find a human wife and stay married to her for a year in order to permanently return to his human form. If his marriage doesn’t last for a full year, he will be forced to marry King Merrick and turn over what ever is left of his magic and immortality to Merrick. Since Nile broke her promise, Prince Sébastien is now doomed to marry Merrick.

Nile is determined not to let that happen and insists there must be a way to stop the impending marriage. Prince Sébastien says that she must rescue him if she wants him back. In order to find him, she must head East of the Sun  and West of the Moon. There, she will find a castle that lies at the ends of the earth. He also tells her where Lord Copley has exiled himself since the end of the war. For he will guide her as well. With that, Prince Sébastien disappears along with all of the servants. Nile is left alone in the now freezing and abandoned castle.

She packs up some cold weather gear, rations and weapons and hikes out to save her Prince. First, she heads to Lord Copley’s castle and sneaks in. Stunned at Nile’s existence as Booker’s willing wife, Lord Copley agrees to help her. He gives her a golden apple, a golden carding comb and a golden spinning wheel. While he does not tell her explicitly how to use each item, he believes she has the wits to know the right time to use them. He also lends her the fastest horse of his stable and tells her to head east until she reaches the mountains. Nile will then have to climb to the top of the peak and call out to the East Wind.

Nile manages on her journey and heads to the top of the eastern mountains. She calls on the East Wind to assist her. Taking pity on this brave woman, the East Wind doesn’t know of a castle located east of the Sun and west of the Moon. However, his husband in the West Wind may know of the place. So the East  Wind carefully takes up Nile and winds her over to his husband in the west

The West Wind also does not know of where this castle east of the Sun and west of the Moon lies. But his good friend the South Wind may know. So the West Wind carefully takes up Nile and winds her over to the South Wind.

The South Wind is also at a loss for the location of this mystery castle. While she is stronger than the East and West Winds, she needs to take Nile to her wife of the North Wind. Like the East and West Winds, the South Wind takes a liking to Nile and winds her over the North Wind.

The North Wind usually blows cold and harsh. Yet she admires Nile’s strength and determination. She is also happy to see her wife in the South Wind. The North Wind tells Nile that a long time ago, she once blew an aspen leaf to a castle located exactly east of the Sun and west of the Moon. While the North Wind found herself exhausted with going so far, she is willing to take Nile there on the recommendation of the East, West and South Winds. Nile is then winded to the enchanted castle.

She finds that the castle is indeed King Merrick’s winter retreat. She finds out from the local townspeople that the King is planning his wedding to Prince Sébastien. Once the wedding rituals are done, the King will be able to steal the Prince’s magical powers and immortality, just as Booker said. Nile disguises herself as a servant and sneaks into King Merrick’s castle. She’s able to locate Prince Sébastien’s quarters, where she finds him alive and in his polar bear form since it is during the day.

Prince Sébastien is stunned that his beloved wife has made it so far. He tells her that while he is a prisoner of the castle during the day, Nile must physically steal him from King Merrick’s castle in the night and while he’s in human form. If they can make it off the castle grounds by sunrise, Sébastien  will be saved, remain in his human form and retain his magic and immortality. Nile and Sébastien agree that she will meet him at his quarters that very same night so they may escape.

Nile arrives to Sebastian’s quarters and bribes the servant attending to him with the golden apple she was given by Lord Copley. The servant lets her into Prince Sébastien’s quarters only for Nile to find him drugged to sleep. No matter what she does, he doesn’t wake up. Defeated, Nile retreats by sunrise.

The second night, Nile bribes the servant with the golden carding comb, the second gift that Lord Copley gave her. Except Sebastian has been drugged again and does not wake. Nile once again leaves him at sunrise.

The next day while Nile is working and still disguised as a servant, she’s given a note by the servant she bribed the previous two nights. It’s from Prince Sébastien. It turns out he suspects he’s been drugged by King Merrick’s right hand in Lord Keane. As Keane is taking every precaution to ensure that Prince Sébastien doesn’t escape before the wedding. Tonight, Prince Sébastien will not eat his dinner and will toss it out of the window of his quarters. That way, he’ll stay awake when Nile arrives.

The third night, Nile bribes the servant with the golden spinning wheel Copley gave her. When she enters, Sébastien is awake, in human form and ready leave. The two of them sneak out of the castle and make it to the palace grounds.

Just before her and Sébastien arrive to the outer gate of the palace grounds, they run into Lord Keane. Since Prince Sébastien is weakening due to the coming dawn and about to transform back into a polar bear, it is up to Nile to defeat Lord Keane. She does so in a battle of combat and wits and slays him. She then drags Prince Sébastien  across the border between the castle and outside its grounds, managing to save him just as the sun crests the horizon.  

King Merrick flees his castle in terror.

When Nile saves Prince Sébastien, Merrick’s evil spell is finally broken. Sébastien becomes his full human form. Also, it allows the winds to return to their their human forms as well. It turns out they were the remaining four Immortals. The East Wind was Prince Yusuf, his husband the West Wind in Prince Nicolò. Princess Andromache was the South Wind while Princess Quynh was the North wind who led Nile to Prince Sébastien.

The reason the North Wind helped Nile is because after she managed to free herself from the wreckage of her ship deep beneath the cold arctic seas, the minute Quynh touched solid land, she was turned into the North Wind. This was due to Merrick’s cursed spell that specifically affected all of the Immortal Coven once they lost the war. The North Wind found Prince Sébastien wandering the tundra in his cursed polar bear form. He told her of his grief of losing his family and the guilt of his betrayal of his Immortal family. He also revealed to her how to find Princess Andromache and the others in their wind forms. In exchange for his honesty and helping to find her wife, the North Wind helped Nile find Prince Sébastien.

With the Immortals now in their true human forms and all of their magic returned to them, they defeat Merrick the Usurper. The people of the magic Snow Kingdom welcome them to rule again via referendum and they resume power. Nile renews her vows with Booker, her family and the other Immortals as their witnesses. Princess Andromache then bequeaths Nile the title of Princess for Nile’s bravery and her role in helping to free the Immortals from Merrick’s curse.

Sébastien is devoted to his wife for saving not only him but also his new family. The other Immortals welcome her into their fold as well since Nile magically gains her immortality. Likely, fate has seen fit to grant her such due to her saving everyone from Merrick the Usurper and the rescue of her Prince. And unlike in The Old Guard, Princess Nile is able to tell her family and they all maturely deal with her new immortality.