#holding down the fort

[maretriarch]

jane fans be like wait bro she gets good.......uhhhhhhhhhhhhhhhh............ eventually. in this au canon divergent fanfic i wrote

[mysterycitrus]

im not complaining cause this is like my dream team for a dickie grayson book but i do think there’s some comedy to dick getting like four seperate runs as robin in the past five years vs actual current robin tim drake getting a single shitty solo and then coasting on nothing but vibes

[ovaryacted]

Please nobody tell me that the hype for Logan Howlett/Wolverine died down already cause I’m trying to post some nasty old man Logan ddlg smut and I don’t want it to be a miss. Please I beg PLEAK! 🙏

[beechalk]

M*A*S*H is a really good show. It's a shame all the men have blue eyes but what are you gonna do

[proudsnackeezowner]

Yeah hey throwback to when dan fully bought this for phil

Viewers pick my birthday presents my ass dan you're not slick

[aspiringwarriorlibrarian]

The fact that Tai acts all sunny and shiny belies the fact that he's even worse than Qrow at self-isolating.

"Trauma? What trauma? I have no trauma. It'll go away if I don't look at it. I lost two of my teammates and drove the third away myself, I occasionally socialize with other teachers but have no deep relationships. I'm in a house by myself and the dog and that's fine, it's all fine. I'm watering my plants like they do in therapy. I'm still wearing red."

[throwawayasoiafaccount]

i am reminded once again that people are so weird about rhaegar.

it’s interesting but nauseating to see the shift about him on the anti-rhaegar side of the fandom as it’s clear that people are still wildly and crazily deep in their fanon versions of him, but have decided he’s somewhat useful to them as the fandom becomes less accepting of the ‘targaryens are bad and all mad’ narrative that was floating around for years, so some of the antis have slightly changed their tunes.

i should clarify that the shift does seem subtle right now, so maybe it’s not going to affect the way the antis discuss rhaegar that much, but i find it interesting and a bit annoying so im gonna discuss it.

the shift is basically starting from ‘rhaegar was a moron and killed his family by fucking his whore so he deserved death’ and seems to be heading to ‘rhaegar was secretly really cunning and cruel and actually loved elia but she was iffy/neutral of him and he only got with lyanna to have a baby and left her to die cause he was always gonna go back to elia.’

both of these are crazy interpretations imo, but the second one is even worse than the first. the first interpretation is at least a tad bit understandable, but the second is completely based on fanon land nonsense.

because… how is rhaegar seen as cunningly cruel when he’s only been paralleled with dany and jon, two incredibly kind characters? one of the first times dany is directly paralleled to rhaegar is when dany was protecting others! while we do learn a lot about rhaegar through these parallels, there’s also an on page interaction that completely contradicts the ‘rhaegar is cruel and callous’ interpretation. it starts when jamie is recalling rhaegar’s departure to the trident, he remembers when jon darry snapped at him, telling him to obey and stay with aerys; then rhaegar takes the time to console a teenage jamie and ease his worries before he leaves. we have all this and yet people interpret this character as cunningly cruel and willing to use others for his own ends?

like bsffr… this is a character who prefers writing songs and singing them instead of violence and the song of swords. that says a lot about rhaegar, and it’s all good things.

speaking of good things said about rhaegar: barristan as whitebeard, when he was still sussing out dany, calls rhaegar able, determined, deliberate, dutiful, and single-minded. these are all positive descriptions. barristan also later says that there’s a lot of good to be said about rhaegar, more than any of dany’s other relatives. this is not the description of someone hiding a nasty personality behind a perfect facade, it’s a deliberate set up preparing us readers for the big rhaelya reveal and to contradict roberts anti rhaegar propaganda.

i also want to mention the other side of rhaegar. he was described as melancholy and was said to have sad eyes, and according to cersei he looked wounded. it seems like he suffered from depression. and based on the parallels between aerys and viserys, i think it’s safe to assume that aerys was likely abusive to rhaegar like viserys was to dany. what’s written in a world of ice and fire supports my case and shows that things were always very very tense between rhaegar and aerys. things were so tense in fact that aerys even brought varys in as spymaster partly because he mistrusted rhaegar. that is a very terrible environment for someone to grow up in, and yet rhaegar still pulled through so much so that characters still sing his praises years after his death. that’s impressive and shows how good of an impression he left on so many characters.

now, i also want to discuss the rhaegar x elia ship as it’s getting more popular as the tides keep shifting. one quote that these shippers use to support their ship is the “rhaegar was fond of elia” remark made by barristan, but the context of that conversation is specifically left out by these shippers. basically the conversation began when dany is telling barristan that she’ll do her duty and marry hizdahr, so she asks barristan if rhaegar wed for duty or love. barristan hesitates and tells her that rhaegar was fond of elia but says nothing about love. context is key here. and while it’s not surprising that these shippers need to strip away the context as they have to go up against rhaelya, which has a lot of textual support, it is deceitful and proves that their case is weak in compassion to the build up of rhaelya.

anyways… yeah… this shifting tide is weird af and seems like a huge backwards dive into fanon land, and while i can’t control anyone i think i’ve done my best to stay true to canon by mentioning what we know about rhaegar and trying to keep my interpretations grounded.

tbh… i don’t even like this character that much, but i think his impact on the fandom is so cool. cause it’s like… here is rhaegar, a sad boy, and yet so many people treat him like he’s satan incarnate responsible for everything bad. it’s like so wild and so far from what little we know of him. so, basically, because of this fandom discourse, i became interested in this character and am now one of his defenders. yeahhhhh….

also, because so many people liked to basically shit on rhaegar for ‘doing nothing’ and ‘just letting war break out’ i found it kinda fun to theorize about what he may have actually been doing at the time of the rebellion. as of now, i’m pretty set in my belief that he specifically went to dorne to conspire with house martell and potential allies in order to overthrow aerys. my theory is based on what we know of his personality, and i think his last words to jamie clearly hint that he had some sort of plan in place; and since he was last in dorne, it’s only logical to conclude that there was something going on.

that’s all

[radioactivepeasant]

Surprise Snippet because I didn't get time to post a schedule this week

(Woe: Summer Reading Programs be upon me)

But because I can never resist giving Damas of Spargus a hard time, I propose the following scenario: Jak carries germs from Sandover that modern people aren't vaccinated against. Modern people like Damas. And because Jak doesn't do anything by halves, it's a disease that only effects channelers because it's a non-dark-eco eco imbalance.

In his roughly twelve years as king of Spargus, Damas had dealt with the occasional illness. In the two years before he took the throne, he'd gotten all manner of unpleasant ailments. Crane Cough, White Flu, Dust Colic, even! And that was something most Wastelanders grew out of in infancy! But vaccinations were for the elite. For everyone else it was survive or die, unless you were willing to hand over your entire artifact intake for the week.

Damas had been one of the lucky ones: being a channeler meant he recovered far more quickly than some of the other recent exiles.

He'd grown complacent since then. A germ could be dealt with in no more than a day or two with a little eco and a couple hours of rest. He could pinpoint the early warning signs of every disease common to Spargus and Haven alike.

That was, in hindsight, the first sign that Jak had not originally come from Haven. Because whatever was rattling around in that bullheaded kid's immune system was like nothing the doctor had ever seen before.

It started so innocuously. A slight pain behind his eardrums that he could ignore. Stiffness in the joints that he put down to having finally passed forty. Something sluggish in the chest, almost like anxiety.

He already had Anxiety, that didn't narrow anything down at all.

And then, without warning, the symptoms all combined and intensified. It felt like influenza, but without the respiratory distress. Worse somehow.

The boy was present when the symptoms crossed from incubation to a full manifestation of whatever hell he'd just contracted. The timing could hardly be worse: he'd just finished reprimanding two young scouts for fighting in the vehicle pit. And of course, Jak had been one of those scouts. He'd thrown the first punch, because of course he had, but at least it hadn't been unprovoked this time.

"At least". As if there being two guilty parties was somehow better.

Evidently young Kwan had proposed some kind of bet revolving around artifacts, and suggested that the loser would have to go shirtless for a day and show off their scars.

Damas didn't support Jak breaking his nose, but seeing as he was convinced that every Wastelander under twenty-five had some degree of senselessness, he supposed it was probably a valuable lesson for Kwan.

Which did, unfortunately, make it hard to rule fairly between them.

Ultimately, Kwan was given a sharp rebuke about goading non-consenting comrades into bets -- especially when some degree of their autonomy was on the line.

Jak's reprimand was more along the lines of warning him to either walk away or find an older Wastelander to handle things, blast it all-!

But seeing as Jak was the first one to throw a punch, it was Jak who had to forfeit the artifacts he'd picked up for the day in order to pay for the eco Kwan would need.

Not that this stopped Damas from adding that this hadn't been the first time Kwan's love of bets had gotten him into trouble, but by Volcan it had better be the last.

A rather shame-faced Kwan had just left the tower -- like rot was Damas going to allow them to occupy the same elevator at the same time, somebody would be dead before the ground floor -- when the lung cramps started.

"I'm...sorry," Jak was in the middle of saying, with extreme reluctance, "for fighting in the garages. I'm not sorry for hitting him, though."

When his only answer was an unnaturally wet sounding cough, he looked up to find Damas clinging to his staff for support. His other hand gripped his chest, veins standing out. He'd gone pale.

"Oh shi- Damas!" Jak ran up the stairs. "What's wrong?"

"Are you choking?" Daxter asked in loud, exaggeratedly slow words, "Do you need assistance?"

What's it look like?! Damas wanted to shout, but he could barely get his lungs to expand enough to breathe, let alone speak.

Something bitter and hot flooded his mouth on the next cough.

At least his lungs had reopened with the ejection of the fluid, but he couldn't help wondering if he'd just coughed up a vital organ. Damas spat, and something thick and colorless splattered across his boots. It wasn't bile, nor mucus. There were, on closer inspection, specks of color floating in it. Green, red, yellow, blue- the colors of eco, but far more saturated than they had any right to be.

Jak pulled his fingerless glove off and laid the back of his hand against Damas’s forehead like he was a child. Just as quickly, he removed it.

"Uh. Have you been having like...a lot of aches? Joints and jaws and stuff?" he asked nervously.

Damas glared at him, but ultimately nodded.

"Crap. Crap crap- uhhhh okay. Okay!" Jak ran his fingers through his hair.

"Damas, you gotta sit down, okay? It's Blackwater virus, so altitude is bad, right?"

"Th' rot's* Blackwater?" Damas rasped. He clenched his teeth against the ache in his jaws.

"Pal," Daxter said to Jak, with an unusual gentleness, "They don't have that here. Probably haven't for a long time, you get me?"

The ottsel hopped down from his shoulder. "You stay with Lumpy Lungs there, I'm getting a doc to rule out everything else."

Damas knew without asking that Daxter was trying to spare Jak. That boy had a debilitating fear of exam chairs that went beyond the usual childhood disdain for doctor appointments. And by now, Damas wasn't the only Spargan who had connected the dots between his fear of doctors and his refusal to let anyone see all of his scars.

Jak took hold of his arm and pushed him down to sit on the stairs. Any other day the manhandling would've gotten someone at least a good punch in the gut. But right now Damas could barely catch his breath enough to stand his ground. That was humiliating even without the unidentified fluid still lurking at the back of his throat.

"Okay, okay-" Jak was talking more to himself than to Damas. "Eco's pretty saturated so you're prooooobably right at the beginning of this. Crap.”

The boy dropped to sit beside him with a groan.

"I- crap! I'm sorry, Damas! I didn't think I was in here often enough to pass Blackwater to you! I swear, I thought I wasn't contagious anymore!"

The pinching in Damas’s lungs returned, and with it, the wrenching coughs.

"You-?" he managed to gasp.

Jak winced. He looked so strangely young when he felt guilty about something.

"Two- two weeks ago? Remember I didn't take any jobs for a couple days and you had someone go make sure I was still in the city? I was getting over Blackwater virus. I um."

He tilted his head back and blew out a breath.

"Used to only get it when I was little. But after the- after what Praxis did to me, I'm more susceptible to it than I used to be. Usually I can catch it in the incubation period before it gets bad, but I've been more focused on work than tracking symptoms."

"Why," Damas wheezed, "didn't you just get eco?"

"From the white coats? Rot no!" Jak snapped.

"From. The well." Damas bent double with another cough. "I know. You're. A channeler."

"Oh." Jak looked away and tapped his fingers together nervously. "Good point. But...no, eco doesn't work on Blackwater."

"What?"

"It's the eco that's infected."

"What?!"

* author's note: the use of "rot" as a curse word in Spargus is used as an abbreviation of an older curse. The full phrase, usually lobbed at Marauders during skirmishes, would be "Go rot with your dead gods". That's a bit of a mouthful, so Wastelanders just looking for a handy expletive will shorten it to "rot"

>>>>>>>>>>>>>>>><<<<<<<<<<<<<<<<>>>>>

Legend said no one had ever made Damas of Spargus do anything against his will. Or at least, no one that lived to tell the tale. The previous ruler of Spargus didn't count. Just the idea of telling the king where he could and couldn't go was sacrilegious!

...unless you were the new kid, apparently.

In fairness, Damas didn't actually remember Jak talking to the doctor and that blasted moncaw. He didn't remember the moncaw reluctantly giving in to Jak’s...strongly-worded...demands to be shown where Damas slept at night. What he did remember was a ringing in his ears that blocked all sound, and a vicious ache in the front of his skull. He remembered someone slinging his arm over their shoulder, and then he was coughing too hard to actually pay any kind of attention to his surroundings whatsoever.

He didn't remember entering his rooms. But he most certainly remembered the moment he realized he was on the couch he used as a bed when he couldn't bear to unlock the room he'd shared with his wife and child. Jak was all but shouting at a monk who had apparently followed them in.

"He doesn't need eco! You give him that, he's gonna feel five times worse!"

"I hardly think a boy is qualified to tell me the ways of eco."

"It's rottin' Blackwater! You wanna help him, or you wanna poison him?!"

The monk planted his feet. "You will not stop me from treating my king, newcomer." He reached for the flask of eco all monks carried.

Daxter made a sound like a buzzer. "Brrrzt! Wrong answer! Jak, get this clown outta here."

Before Jak could oblige, Damas caught him by the wrist.

"No. Fighting," he coughed, and gave what he hoped was a stern look.

Jak softened his voice immediately. "I'm not, I'm not. Trust me, okay? I'm helping you."

"Sire!" cried the monk, clearly worried, "The scout won't listen to reason! The doctor brought me in because he couldn't identify this poison in your system! Let me give you the eco your body needs to heal, please!"

Jak shook his head firmly. "The virus will use it.”

"What virus?!" Brother Rhys exploded, "These are not the symptoms of a disease, they are the symptoms of a toxin!"

"I am aware." Jak turned away from him. "I get this about once every two months. I know what I'm talking about, okay?"

Daxter hopped up onto the couch as if he meant to intercept any eco. "It sounds counterintuitive, but you gotta go with the old ways on this one, doc. Modern medicine makes it worse."

Jak crouched in front of the couch, ignoring the monk.

"I'm gonna get you some water, okay?" he said in a low voice, "This is pretty much going to wreck your system for a couple days. You should probably cancel any meetings you got coming up."

"Probably?" Daxter sounded offended. "Try absolutely! Blackwater puts you out of commission for days, and you're you!"

"I'm not gonna tell you what to do-" Jak started.

"Yeah we are," Daxter interrupted.

"...yeah, I am," Jak sighed in resignation.

"I know it sucks, okay? But you gotta let this flush itself out."

"And how. Exactly. Will it do that?" Damas growled.

Who did this boy think he was, giving him orders like they were kin? He was barely out of puberty and he wanted to take command?

"Charcoal."

"You must be joking," Rhys complained, "We've gone back to the dark ages!"

"Why d'you think it's called Blackwater?" Daxter asked dryly. "You gotta flush the toxins the old fashioned way."

"Don't think," Damas wheezed around another chest cramp, "that there won't be a reckoning for this, boy, because there will."

"Uh-huh. After you drink the charcoal.”

[cryscriesjpeg]

I’m assuming she’s holding up the team 7 fort just like her mom 😤

[sid-noxious]

Bernice! my only kitty to be affiliated with the Lackadaisy itself. and I think my favorite design so far...

[huldrabitch]

If Halit has 1000 fans, I’m one of them

If Halit has 100 fans, I’m one of them

If Halit has 50 fans, I’m one of them

If Halit has 1 fan, It’s me

If Halit has no fans, It means I am dead

[rekofan101]

DAY 354: i desperately need the last chapter to come out or for a ytts pov to come out. yttd fandom is withering away and so is the reko content

[hindahoney]

Big shoutout to jews who wear tichels/sheitels i love you

[rvspecter]

where the fuck is the GM crew

[asciuto]

all that you ever wanted from me was sweet nothin' 🐝

[nadja-antipaxos]

Hozier debuting "Jackboot Jump" on Late Night with Seth Meyers on November 20, 2019.