#i cannot/will not cut them off cold turkey

[ohsweetflips]

tbh the thing abt coming into myself vis a vis gender is that there is the realization that, at least for the foreseeable future, there is a very tangible (and already very present) “limit” to how far i can take. any kind of transitioning.

[nexus-nebulae]

god sometimes i wish the whole "you wouldn't say/do that to a physically disabled person" lie that certain mentally ill people say was true bc i fucking WISH i could use "I'm in a wheelchair" as a gotcha for people being ableist against me. unfortunately,

[cosmic-ghost-hermit]

Heyo! All the art on these readings is drawn by me. Take what you can from the reading and leave all that does not resonate behind but always be open to new perspectives.

The archetype reading was inspired by the deck I used today. The guide book uses examples from anime to fit the descriptions of the tarot cards. I thought that was really clever so I decided to build off that idea and tell you what archetype you are most drawn to wants to tell you. In short, this is really a message from a specific cards energy. I hope this helps anyone who might be struggling!

PILE 1

Crystal: Tigers Eye

Character: Badtz-Maru

Archetype: The Empress

Astrology: Taurus ♉️, Libra ♎️, Pisces ♓️, Virgo ♍️

Dear pile 1, you are represented by the empress of this deck. The archetype you embody is someone who is luxurious, modest, kind and attentive. You care deeply for those you love and would do anything to assist them and make their life easier. You are a fantastic friend, partner and companion. You don’t necessarily have to be a woman to embody that energy. The message this part of you wants to tell you is that your kindness is being taken for granted. Your attentiveness is being discarded as if the love you gave isn’t worth anything. Your intuition is telling you to withdraw from the connection that is causing this. You maybe started this friendship or connection a while ago but you have started to notice this pattern from the other party in this relationship. They don’t return your love. They don’t say thank you when you go out of your way to be good to them. This doesn’t mean you should necessarily cut them off. Just don’t go out of your way anymore. They are undeserving if they cannot be grateful to you for all you do. I see if you did stop it would barely be noticed at first. However, the person will slowly realize how much you did to assist them. How much work you did was important and helped them get through the day easily. If they apologize and communicate they did wrong that won't necessarily be your queue to go back to scratching their back. You need to wait for them to lend their assistance to you. That will be your invitation to return to being kind. Until then use the extra time you have working on your passion projects and aiming for your dreams.

🖤✒️🔎💻🕋🛞♟️🎤🎼🎱🏴🪨🐕‍🦺🕶️🎩🐦‍⬛💣🎵🎶♣️♠️🏴‍☠️👁️‍🗨️

PILE 2

Crystal: Flower Agate

Character: Keroppi

Archetype: The Devil

Astrology: Leo ♌️, Aquarius ♒️, Capricorn ♑️, Gemini ♊️

Hey pile 2! Your archetype is the devil. Don’t worry though, for this doesn’t make you evil or bad. All this communicates to me is you are an enjoyer of the darker parts of life. You enjoy what other people usually fear. This is definitely not something horrible you should shame yourself about. I see you probably enjoy altered states of reality or perhaps you are very free with your sexual expression. I see you like the taste of control, power and vengeance. Again not a bad thing in my mind. Humans have many states of being and no part of existence is incorrect. Your message from the devil archetype is not asking you to cold turkey your behavior. However, I think it is saying balance is super important when you dabble in darkness. You might be prone to addiction to literally anything you can get dopamine from. I am an addict as well. I know how hard restraint can be. Even doing this reading is giving me cravings to be honest so I know you deal with cravings constantly. Your cards are saying it doesn’t matter if you feed the addiction. You will always be starving for more. You will always be chasing something you can never achieve. Please take care of your body before the cravings lead to worse. When I was dealing with my addiction I ended up in the hospital multiple times. It would have killed me if I hadn’t stopped. It is okay to dabble in darkness but seriously I beg you, from the bottom of my heart please moderate. Moderation is key to keeping yourself safe. If you are meant to have the darkness, it will be in your grasp. If you are in need of a break. Trust the universe when it takes it away. You are not evil for needing. I want to reiterate that because I know how it feels to need something that hurts you.

💚🦈🪀🧃🍵🪦🥗🥒🥑🌪️🫒🍸🍏🥝☘️🌱🥈⚓️🪴🎍🐍🦎🚬👒🤢

PILE 3

Crystal: Carnelian

Character: Tuxedo Sam

Archetype: Emperor

Astrology: Cancer ♋️, Aries ♈️, Sagittarius ♐️, Scorpio ♏️

Hey, pile 3! Your archetype is the emperor. You are a force to be reckoned with. A master of your craft and skilled beyond other people's wildest imaginations. You have a plan and have been putting so much energy into it. You know exactly what you want and exactly how to get it. Your cards are pretty straight forward just like you are. They are telling me that working hard is good! That your progress is fantastic and you have made it so far! However, the pace you are keeping at is almost unsustainable. You can’t juggle all of the tasks you are trying to keep under control. You cannot do it all by yourself. That isn’t logical! Humans are not solitary creatures. We need community and connection to continue on. Humans who have been left alone for too long go hecking crazy! You absolutely can handle all of it mentally. I am not saying you are incapable because you are SO CAPABLE. Rome was not built in a day. Masterpieces are not made out of minutes, they are made out of days or months or years. You are creating a masterpiece so allow yourself time to think about it. Allow yourself the space to brainstorm and be patient with your body and your creativity. Be gentle with yourself. You are only one person and the secret you are missing is that you are not alone. The silly little secret is that you don’t need to set a deadline for the greatness you are going to grow into. One of my favorite artists didn’t make it when he was 20. He grew into his greatness when he was 35. Does that make him any less of a great artist? Absolutely not!!! You are cool, awesome and wonderful! Why do you need to prove that when you already know it is true?

💙💤🌀🪬🌨️🧿💎🚿🧊🫐🌊🌧️🌬️💨🌏🦋🪼🐬🧢🫂🥶💠

-ghost 🖤🩵

[mythserene]

Mark Lewisohn: Drug Buddy (Part Deux) - Mark explains heroin

The longer clip—which is very long and so does have some cuts of his many digressions—is so stupid in so many ways that I cannot address them now because I have to finish my real work. But I am still going to post it below the short clip. The main point is Lewisohn's certainty that John and Yoko were never addicted to heroin. And in his analysis, besides being very impressed with John's experimental ways—which I very much relate to—he opines that John possibly didn't know what withdrawal really was like when he wrote Cold Turkey and also says that John and Yoko once got off heroin by having a driver drive them across America in the back of a car and at the end “they were over it. Which must've been a trip. And a half.”

Like, literally read one single thing on heroin withdrawal, fan boi. A universal side-effect of opiate withdrawal is the alimentary canal waking up and beginning to work again, and it's messy. Always. You don't want to be in the back of a car with no bathroom or clean underwear. It's also incredibly uncomfortable, even including on the eyes, and so I hope they had some curtains on those car windows. The adjustment from the opiate-induced pinhole pupils back to full, shocked, reactivity can feel like getting your pupils dilated at the optometrist. Either way, withdrawal is the opposite of sexy and Lewisohn's breathy awe makes me want to vomit.

In this little clip he talks about the Two Junkies interview and how he has figured the Get Back heroin situation out by the chronology of Spanish Tony (Sanchez) being on set 13 January, then John throwing up in the Canadian Broadcasting Corp's interview on 14 January, and then, says Lewisohn, from John being okay after he throws up. From these clues Lewisohn has deduced that John and Yoko got some from Spanish Tony the day before, did it that night after work, had a hangover the next day, and then were fine. So he has made the jaw-droppingly idiotic (and even more confident) deduction that that's how it went and that there's no evidence that they ever did it again that month.

🫠

LEWISOHN: I think it's very easy to assume that John was strung out on heroin the whole time [of the Get Back sessions]. It's very evident that he was not. He's far too creative and lucid to- to-- doesn't exhibit any signs whatsoever of being strung out. In fact, in Twickenham—I think it's the 14th of January, it's the last day at Twickenham—John begins the day with an interview set up the day before with Canadian Broadcasting Corporation, and John is kind of green in this interview. And he's- he's clearly unwell, and in fact he goes off to throw up. And we know that he's thrown up because he comes back and says, ‘I've just thrown up.’ There's no secrets with these guys. They told us everything. Um, and then he's a bit more together. His speech becomes a little bit unglued, and he just becomes a little bit more together. ... And if you look, the day before there's a picture of ... some guys around the Beatles, and one of them is Tony Sanchez. Now, he was- he was heroin supplier to the Stones. And he turns up on the 13th of January, and that night they do heroin, and the next morning John is green, and then he throws up. So there's a clear chronology there. That they've got it from Tony, and they've taken it, and he's not well. And- but there's no indication that he takes it again.

I threw together a few clips of John (and Yoko) from the Two Junkies interview. John before throwing up, John saying he's sick and the cut afterwards—that definitely does not show him saying that he's thrown up—and of him still being toasted afterwards. But if Mark Lewisohn had watched the video—actually watched it with a desire to understand it instead of projecting onto it—let alone had read anything or asked one single expert—he would be unable to talk such nonsense. Not that he's ever challenged on any of it.

Here's the longer clip where Lewisohn sprints into an embrace of full-on, mind-blowing, cringeworthily embarrassing ignorance. “And in fact I'm not sure how many times he took it...”

How does he have the confidence to say such idiotic things without ever even bothering to do a Google search? I would fear the exposure of looking like such a fool. But I know the answer. Because people listen to him and take his words on faith.

[idontmindifuforgetme]

Do you have any advice for someone going through the "people turnover" you described? I'm really questioning some current friendships but I'm scared of the consequences. Like I know if I lose these friends, there will be a massive hole in my life that cannot be patched easily or quickly

i'm going about it in a "demote, promote, or terminate" kind of way atm, while also being aware of my emotional capacity. there's this really close friend i have, but now i'm realizing she's not the best for me. cutting her off cold turkey would be too much for me, so for now i've resorted to demoting her--in my mind, she's no longer that close friend i thought she was. she's more of an enjoyment friend i'd call up to go out places w, pass the time w, etc... i wouldn't trust her w personal details the way i did. i'm heeding my limits while also doing something about this situation.

other friends i'm straight up just "terminating." something is fundamentally not working in our friendship, and i'd rather deal w the temporary grief over the long-term misery of keeping them in my life. that's how i'm going about it--i'm weighing the temporary grief against the long-term consequences of continuing to invest. & there are also a friend or two i'm promoting :) realizing they're actually really dope and they're the ones i should be investing in the most instead. so we'll see how that goes !

6 months ago this would have hurt like hell, but rn i'm honestly in a state of calm bc my life is so full without these people already that i can just double down on other areas of my life. studying, working out, reading, writing, other hobbies i wanna take up, a future i'm really excited about, being more in touch w my boundaries... just been a super therapeutic time for me. i know my world extends beyond these people. i guess what i'm trying to say is on the chance i lose literally everybody, i would not let there be a gaping hole for me to be in pain about. i'd just mend it w other facets of my life that are super vibrant already. i've learned a long time ago that friends, however much u adore them, should be an augmentation instead of the foundation of ur life itself. and i'm also the kind of person who'd rather be alone than surrounded by people i don't connect with tbh

[polyhexian]

Would Worst possible timeline jasper and Darius have the opposite dynamic as eventually jasper and Darius. Like Darius is mad at Jasper for mistreating hunter?

What is the state of THAT relationship in general in the worst possible timeline

Also would both hunter and jasper be golden guards or would it be the golden guard (jasper) and some special underling immediately under the golden guard (hunter)?

Also would hunter know what Jasper looks like? Like would he be aware he looks like a smaller scrawnier version of the scariest man in the isles ?

OUGHHHH how fun for bad ending timeline...

I'm imagining like. Once jasper makes his commitment he's full gg mode. He completely retreats into himself. And now it's sooo clear how fucking dangerous being around him is. And how high the stakes are now. There's no way anything he tells Darius will satisfy him and theres no way he can hide this from him without Darius figuring out something is wrong. And for jasper, being around Darius is- he is jasper around him. He feels stuff. He cares about things. And if this is his life now? That's over. He cannot be jasper anymore, full stop

So yeah I think he fully 100% stops talking to Darius cold turkey. Darius gets more and more frustrated because he knows something bad has happened. And finally if he gets jasper cornered and demands to know what's going on, jasper is going to be harsh. If he isn't, if he doesn't get Darius to back off, he's going to get killed. If he snoops in the wrong places he's a dead man. So I think jasper, like with hunter, is going to have to utilize violence in the name of their greater safety. He's going to hurt him. Maybe not even physically- maybe just emotionally. Maybe he tells him what he did to tyrian. Maybe he tells him he owes him now. Whatever he does is the step too far that makes Darius finally back off. Even if he DOES think something bad happened and maybe he even thinks jasper IS trying to protect him- but fine. Don't take my help. I guess we really aren't friends anymore.

Only YEAH in this one he's not grieving. He's paying attention. And jasper is now training this little kid. And HARSHLY. What happened to the jasper that cared so much about kids? I guess he doesn't care much about ANYONE anymore huh?

Absolutely peak dynamic is bad ending timeline Darius takes an early interest in hunter and is super protective of him. When hunter is little Darius teaches him how to sew, but it starts with him teaching Hunter to do his own stitches because jasper hit him so hard he got a cut that needed them and hunter isn't allowed to get magical healing. And Darius is just furious at jasper... How could he do that? How could he hurt a little kid this badly? He really has changed, huh?

Meanwhile jasper sees this. He can't show an ounce of kindness to hunter or he risks his life because he CANNOT have Belos start to doubt his conviction or loyalty.

But... By being so harsh to hunter... He drives him further toward Darius, who is more and more driven to show him kindness and take care of him. In a weird way the harder jasper pushes hunter, the more hunter actually gets to feel loved because Darius makes more and more of an effort.

Just. What a horrific situation again to be in. What a fucking endless nightmare.

I think in this hunter is not the golden guard yet. He doesn't need to be because jasper is here. When hunter is Ready he's going to replace jasper. Maybe at eighteen? I've always written him as being sworn in at thirteen, but there WAS no GG at the time. If there WAS one, he can spend more time training and get his position at like. Older. Maybe he would have a new title of some kind for his apprentice type position. Lilith had a cool white raven mask! Maybe he's like... The Silver Scout. Not gold yet. Something along those lines you know.

GOD okay imagine... In this worst ending timeline when Hunter runs away after hollow mind, jasper is desperately trying to capture him and bring him back so he can beg Belos for his life... Meanwhile Darius goes full rebel and HE grabs hunter first because hunter! Goes to him! For help!

And now Darius and jasper are fucking ENEMIES fighting over hunter. And jasper is THE BAD GUY...

[ilikeyoshi]

all right. since i can't see my general care doctor until mid february (or a gastro doctor for 6+ months), i'm asking here. what crops up suddenly during/after a stomach flu/antibiotics, only reacts badly to milk-heavy products, but doesn't behave very much like lactose intolerance. and more specifically what can i do about it. (tmi under cut)

i've been having on-off episodes of vomiting and diarrhea for a month now. milk and ice cream are confirmed triggers. i had NO lactose issues 30 days ago, until i caught a stomach bug (theorizing) and then had complications from an antibiotic (also theorizing). furthermore, the symptoms, specifically they're timing and what relieves them, are not very consistent with textbook lactose intolerance (secondary OR primary).

notes on symptoms:

stomach cramps begin ANYWHERE from 4 hours to 2 DAYS after eating milk heavy products, followed a couple hours later by diarrhea and, a couple more hours after that, sudden, nausealess vomiting. symptoms subside after vomiting. the entire ordeal takes 4-8 hours from when cramps start to all symptoms subsiding. (for reference, lactose intolerance usually sees symptoms starting 30 minutes to 2 hours after eating milk products, and usually DOESN'T include vomiting at all, let alone as the thing that finally relieves symptoms.)

anti-nausea medication DELAYS vomiting, but DOES NOT stop it from happening. furthermore, all other symptoms (most significantly, pain) persist through the delay. i have been forgoing any anti-nausea meds because it only prolongs the pain and i still ultimately vomit.

i'm going to start lactase enzyme supplements in the form of drops and tablets on sunday. i'm trying to cold turkey remove milk and ice cream since they're confirmed triggers, but it's very difficult, especially because water has a texture my autistic brain HATES no matter how i flavor it, so drinking it enough to stay hydrated is basically impossible. i've tried EVERYTHING to make water work, i CANNOT drink it consistently enough to stay hydrated, i really don't want advice for THAT right now. just this stomach problem.

if you have any ideas, whether things i can try now or things to talk to my general care doctor about, please leave a reply! reblogs are also appreciated in case you have followers that might be able to help. thanks! 💖

[silvershayde]

Sharing cus tbh I feel lonely rn and I'm very confused? Feeling s bit uninspired

So today (last day of classes before mid term break) I had an eye appointment and they said my eyes produce less tears, Haven't read up on it but they also mentioned technology and how it causes headaches

I'm almost done with school so I actually have soooooooo much free time sans the studying I gotta do, but I also wanne reduce my technology usage cus I have a crippling dependency ever since I had to revise my other hobbies to not get out of track with classes, but just thinking of picking up those hobbies again feels daunting and like, I won't be able to feel the love I had for them which makes me sad :(

I already crochet and have books to draw in, but writing for fic has always been online cus it's just easier to save and preserve my writing that way (plus more secure in my case) than to write ideas in a book and run the risk of them getting lost. But I really wanna cut down tech usage so instead of just writing out the plot in full I'll use paper and pen to write out the outline of my story plots and then make notes of the misadventures or side quests the characters go through and the characteristics of the characters

Honestly, I'm talking about this to someone else cus I kinda want an alternative perspective? I realised that school has made me so dependent on someone telling me what to do and I hate it, so I wanna try and practice independence more, especially planning how I wanna do my hobbies

okay, so as someone who has written stories both online and physically in a book, i was more productive writing it down on paper. sadly i did lose the book, but that was more because i did move around quite a bit when i was younger and it was hectic and not because of negligence on my part (then again i am also known for losing things but usually i eventually find them. and i actually don't know if i would read it back or not i was like 12 when i wrote it lolol)

I don't know too much about less tears can do to your eyes other than your more prone to have irritation and straight up scratches on the eyeball (i know this because my optician told me i had this but then didn't tell me what to do about it - still haven't done anything about it but i know eyedrops help)

honestly do what you truly think is best for you. if you're struggling with what to choose i suggest doing a pros and cons list and put em side by side. that's what i do when i'm truly indecisive and other's opinions don't really help. but! i will say that even if indecisive and asking others opinions, usually you lowkey know deep down what you wanna do and all it takes is someone else's thought process to know if you would fully go for it.

if you wanna cut down tech usage, instead of going cold turkey and making it harder for yourself, use night shift/night light (or whatever is your device/phone's equivalent) so you can reduce blue light at night. I know that androids have this black and white thing that gets enabled at a time for you. ALSO!! i cannot stress this, disable notifications. You'd be surprised about how much less you'd go on apps and stuff when notifs be off. But this is all the stuff that's worked for me personally, you can try these out to see if they work.

eye strain is a very real thing. technology/screens/whatever are usually what causes this and even looking away from a screen and doing something else can make it worse if it gets that bad. when you start to get that annoying thing at the back of your eyes or you feel a light ache around your eyes, know your slowly starting to experience eye strain and you need to relax them. having dry eyes i think make it worse because of the scratching/irritation it can cause and because if your eyes are dry enough, your ability to BLINK would start to get affected. and that's just a long day

about your other hobbies, i get it feeling daunting if you havent dabbled in a while, i feel it whenever i get back to drawing after a long while. all i can say to that is slowly ease yourself back into doing it. start small, because if you go in acting as if there has been no time between the last time you've participated in your hobbies, you could start being overly harsh on yourself if it isn't going as smooth as you wanted. but trying it out, is better than not at all. and it'd help reduce screen time

[softguarnere]

Like A Girl (Like A Man)

Shifty Powers x OFC

Chapter 23: Turkey and Hooch

Summary: Gene’s hands shake more than before as he passes the picture back to her. He doesn’t look at her. “She just . . . looked familiar, somehow.” A/N: Sorry for missing last week's update! I was on vacation and so busy hiking in the middle of nowhere that I didn't have much of a chance to work on this. There are so many details in this chapter that I want to point out, but at the risk of spoiling things, I'll add them to the author's note for the next chapter instead. (But if you're impatient like me, you can find them in the endnotes for this chapter on AO3) 😊 Warnings: language, death, grief, mentions of war, injury Taglist: @lady-cheeky @liebgotts-lovergirl @latibvles @lieutenant-speirs @ithinkabouttzu @mrs-murder-daddy @hxad-ovxr-hxart

Belgium, 1944

Like wildfire, the news spreads through the company – they’ve found a woman disguising herself as a paratrooper!

Zenie drops her spoon in the middle of the chow line. It’s just hit the snow when Bill ducks down to pick it up, pressing it into her hands like nothing happened. No one seems to notice.

“No shit?!” Skip cocks an eyebrow, a look that makes him appear half surprised and half skeptical.

“It’s what I heard,” Lieutenant Compton is saying. “The American soldiers who captured her said they never would have known if they hadn’t made her take off her helmet. That’s when they saw her braids.”

“God-damn! Did the Krauts know she was a girl?”

Compton shrugs. “I don’t know. And I don’t think they kept any of them around long enough to find out.”

“Well shit. I mean, that’s really something.”

Bill’s posture loosens. They’re not talking about her – just someone like her. Someone who has been caught just as easily as she could be. Any thoughts of wandering to the OP to find Shifty vanish from her mind. What if she takes a wrong turn like Babe did and ends up in a German foxhole? Hinkle wouldn’t be so kind to her.

Luckily, even in the snow-covered forest, Shifty’s powers of navigation cannot be thrown off. No one has ever doubted his abilities as an outdoorsman, but it’s still a nice surprise when he drops down into Zenie’s foxhole that evening.

He smiles, the warm air from his mouth creating a puff off steam against the cold that perpetually hangs around them. “Siyo.”

“Siyo,” Zenie echoes.

The joy she feels at seeing him is not reflected on Shifty’s face. All the worry in the world settles into the crease on his forehead as his brows scrunch together. He taps her sling.

“You really were hit.”

“Just some shrapnel.”

“Just?” The corners of his mouth twitch despite himself. “You act like you didn’t feel a thing.”

Try as she might, Zenie will never be able to forget the pain and the heat zipping through her arm as the shrapnel cut into her, or the discomfort as Gene and Renée dug it out of her flesh. Her friends’ sentiments keep echoing in her mind, though: it could have been worse. So, yes – just.

With no one around, Shifty leans closer to her, his shoulder pressing up against her uninjured one. “Sorry I didn’t make it here sooner. Shames kept sendin’ me out to scout. I couldn’t say no, bad as I wanted to.”

“You can’t ignore orders,” Zenie agrees. Shifty hums, frowning as he stares at her sling. She nudges his ribs with her elbow. “You’re a good soldier, Shifty.”

“I should have just come. Especially when I heard they found a woman . . .”

“Not me, though.” Somehow, the situation pulls a breathy laugh from her throat. God, what are the odds? She gets hit and keeps her secret intact, but a German girl gets found out just because she got captured when she was in the wrong place at the wrong time. Could have been worse. What was it Renée said? That someone was watching out for her. Well, that just might be true. She’s made it this far. Some would classify that as some sort of miracle.

Keeping their shoulders pressed together – keeping their connection established – Shifty leans back a little so that he can study her. “Are you okay though?”

She’s alive. Even in this icy forest with its daily explosions and its lack of food, she’s still here. Sitting in a hole in the ground, sure, but at least not laying in one in the horizontal sense.

“I am now.” She doesn’t bother hiding her smile. “I think I’d be more okay if you stayed here.”

“Am I stealing Bill’s spot?”

“He won’t be mad. Especially now that he knows.”

Shifty’s eyes go wide. “Bill knows?” Other questions remain unspoken: does that mean that everyone in the company will know within the next few hours?

“I trust him,” Zenie assures him. The Italian’s words from their earlier conversation echo in her mind. She repeats them, for Shifty’s sake. “We’re going to be fine.”

Bastogne is changing them.

Babe is not the same when he comes back from his patrol. Julian’s death weighs heavy on him in a way that feels similar to the way Bill’s grief clung to him after his brother’s death. He’s quieter. Silence does not suit him. Often the only sound he makes is the harsh, rattling cough that settled into his chest soon after they arrived here. A shame – he has a face that was meant to be happy and a voice that was meant to tell jokes and to laugh.

Zenie recognizes the hollow expression on his face all too well. It’s the same one that stared back at her in the mirror for so long after Granny died. She slides Babe her extra cigarettes and hopes that he understands what she’s trying to say by giving them to him. I’m sorry, I know it hurts, I’m here with you.

Gene is constantly on the move, running from foxhole to foxhole trying to fix everything. Several people have started whispering that he’s going crazy. There’s never a day when he doesn’t drop into her foxhole to ask how Zenie is doing or to check her arm. Besides the snow and the miserable temperatures, it’s the one constant thing that she can count on each day. Although he seems . . . distant, now. They were never close before, but he doesn’t stick as closely to her as he did before Bill knew her secret.

Zenie, too, feels different. The old sense of urgency returns. The same one that haunted her back in her room as a teenager, then the one that caused she and all her friends to live fast and reckless before and after D-Day.

Whenever Shifty isn’t all the way out at the OP, he’s sharing a foxhole with Zenie. And whenever they’re sharing a foxhole, she presses up against him, relishing the short time that they spend together. As cold as it is, no one can say anything about her leaning into his side or his arm around her. Anything to stay warm in this place – if anyone notices, no one gives them a second glance, because they’re all doing the same.

Pressed against each other in their foxhole, they peep over the rim, exchanging worried looks with men doing the same from their foxholes nearby. Today it’s not the cold that’s set them all on edge, but an unexpected foe – thirst.

“Jesus Christ, he’s actually gonna do it,” someone says as Babe lifts himself from his foxhole. He crouches low, glances up at the sky above them, looks around at all the faces peering out at him from the frozen earth, then takes off like a shot.

Zenie holds her breath, listening, just like Shifty taught her to all that time ago back in the woods of Clinchco. The second she hears the humming of a plane engine, she’ll shout a warning to Babe. After all, that’s what had taken the kid from I Company the day before. He had attempted the same mad dash to the little frozen creek nearby, only to get hit by strafing from an American plane flying overhead. All for some water.

His body is still there. Stiff, motionless, and frozen to the ground. Babe lifts the corpse’s hand and pries the handle of a jerry can from its fingers. He glances up at the sky again before slamming the bottom of the can into the film of ice that covers the creek. Zenie counts the seconds as he plunges the can into the water, holding it down as it fills up with water.

Finally, the deed is done. Still crouched low to the ground, Babe begins the two-hundred-yard dash back. A few feet away he pushes himself sideways, sliding over the icy ground and landing beside Bill in a foxhole, like a baseball player sliding onto home plate – safe!

A collective exhale is released from those watching. After a moment’s pause to make sure they’re still in the clear, Bill and Babe climb out of their foxhole, motioning for everyone to follow their lead.

Men scramble from their foxholes and form a line. One at a time, Bill opens people’s canteens and holds them steady while Babe fills them with water. He hardly finishes filling them before men lift them to their lips, greedily gulping at the cold water.

At the back of the line, Zenie’s tongue sticks to the roof of her mouth as she waits. If they run out of water before she gets there, she’ll make the dash to the creek herself, she decides, injured arm be damned.

Babe squints down into the jerry can to gauge the water level as Zenie and Shifty approach.

“Goddamn it,” he hisses. Water sloshes inside the can as he shoves it under Bill’s nose. Take a look! the gesture screams in defeat.

“Je-sus Christ!” Bill turns the jerry can so that Zenie and Shifty can see for themselves.

In the darkness of the can and with the lack of light from the cloud covered sky, Zenie squints, trying to make out what her friends are looking at. Bill gives the can a slight shake, and that’s when she sees it.

Despite the dryness in her throat, Zenie swallows thickly. “Is that - ?”

Shifty curses under his breath when he realizes what he’s seeing. There, in the bottom of the can, are floating chunks of something spongy looking. Zenie has never seen anything like it before, but it doesn’t exactly take a genius to deduce that it’s pieces of human brain. Specifically, those of the dead man from I Company.

Babe grimaces. “What do we do?”

For a moment, Bill hesitates – something that he seldom does. He sighs through his nose. “We gotta drink somethin’ if we don’t wanna die.”

“Hey!” Babe calls to the men who have already received their water. “Use your water purification pills. Now!”

Without letting the Philadelphians fill her canteen, Zenie screws the lid back on and walks back to her foxhole. She would rather take her chances with dehydration than drink water with brains in it, thank you very much. Bill and Gene will just have to try to understand this time.

Lots of things feel very big at sixteen. Any misfortune or slight can feel earthshattering enough to end it all. Now at twenty-one, with the distance of time and an ocean between that stupid Christmas party, Zenie realizes that 1939 was not the worst Christmas of her life. Sixteen-year-old Zenie had been wrong; she had no idea how much worse it could get. Especially because, if the rumors are to be believed, the generals are out there somewhere enjoying a dinner of, in Colonel Sink’s words, “turkey and hooch” in the lovely company of such bright shining stars as Marlene Dietrich . . . and Rebecca Sadowski.

But – at least this time she’s not quite so alone. In the cold of the foxholes, Shifty is pressed up against her right side and Gene is on her left. Somewhere across the snow, German voices ring out in familiar melody. They might sound beautiful under different circumstances.

With shaking hands, Shifty tucks his pictures and letters back into his jacket. Zenie shuffles through her own one last time, wanting to look at Granny’s kind face before trying to sleep for the night.

“Who is that?” Gene asks suddenly as Zenie is about to tuck one of her photographs back into the pile.

She stops, staring down at it before tilting it so that Gene can better see it. Through the darkness settling around them, Matthew and Marilyn smile up at them from their graduation picture.

“My older brother and sister,” Zenie explains. Shivering, she hands the picture to Gene.

He holds it very close to his face, squinting. For all that he does know about Zenie, there’s also a lot that he doesn’t. Besides the fact that she’s not a man, she realizes, he really doesn’t know much about her. In fact, from what she keeps hearing Babe complain about with the nicknames, he doesn’t seem to have that level of closeness with anyone.

With a finger stiff from cold and stained from his work as a medic, he points to Marilyn. His lips part slightly but he doesn’t speak.

“Marilyn. She married the boy next-door – her teenage crush. Didn’t want to be left at home without him, so she joined the Red Cross after he joined up.”

Gene’s hands shake more than before as he passes the picture back to her. He doesn’t look at her. “She just . . . looked familiar, somehow.”

Back in Bastogne’s church, for a split second, Zenie had thought that she caught sight of her. Maybe Gene has seen her, in all his trips back and forth between here and there. She’s about to ask when she realizes that Gene has closed his eyes. His breathing is starting to even out. With his job keeping him in constant motion, she couldn’t wake him up just to ask him. Tomorrow morning. She’ll have to try to remember to ask him then.

She tucks her photographs and letters back into her jacket and leans into Shifty’s side. He slips his hand into hers, tilts his head so that it rests on top of hers. The German voices are still singing somewhere across the snow.

“Ulihelisdi danisdayohihv,” she says, adding her own language to the mix. Then, with the foolish optimism and determination of her sixteen-year-old self she thinks, When I get out of here, I’m going somewhere warm. If she can’t stop Christmases from getting worse, at least she can stop them from being cold.

[thegravityblog]

Mona

You are my first love and the amount of respect and admiration we still carry for each other, regardless of how we ended, is a bit heavy for me because I am not used to this. I wanted to thank you for coming and supporting me at a time when I am all alone, feeling emotions at the speed of a supercar every second, while I'm intentionally being targetted and hurting filled with hate from the person from whom I'm healing, grieving and thought I would always love. Their actions are fading all the memories with every passing day, it's heavy I won't deny there's no point in running away. Intentionally I am being made to hate them, and it's happening. I cannot feel or see anything good about them, they know I still feel for them and they are doing things that would even hurt me more - and how they even say that they love me? I won't wish such a filthy love to my worst enemy. I was dropped in a snap of a finger as if I never mattered. I still put efforts into making amends, to work on everything together as a team, and I am being hurt so much that all that is turning into hate, and abuse which I didn't want but if it's happening, I am letting it happen they planted it. I told you everything, I have given up my anti-opiate medication buprenorphine, cold turkey, and it has been really difficult for me, the first 15 days I couldn't even sleep properly plus I am tapering pregabalin from 600 a day, I'm at 150mg now. The physical and mental anguish of giving up these medications, plus the treatment I am receiving. I gave them endless chances, and I expected the same but what I am getting, I would again never wish this upon my worst enemy. I lost friends, and with some, I was cut off for never returning to that life again. No friends are better than the fake one's. Thanks for sharing the weight and listening to me, at a time where I am all alone with handling so much. Yes, she is sleeping with my former best friend and you were right to ask, what kind of a friend even is that? I saved myself, but it feels bad when years of relationships turn into betrayal, it's fine this incident is shaping me into the strongest I can be. Thanks for the support. I am writing this in appreciation for the effort you put in. We spent 3.5 years madly, childishly in love with each other ended due to our family, had a phase of bitterness but years later when we again communicated at least we met with respect. We met with kindness. We met with love, just a different kind of. The way you were looking at me, tells a lot and thanks for respecting me like everyone's first love should be. We were young and carefree, and now mature enough to meet each other not to hurt each other. You really make me feel good, worthy, and at peace. And you always will. Much love, Me.

[tiny-tigers]

hey girl my advice (from someone who as a teen had a serious harry styles obsession🤣) is to remind yourself that you should be living life for yourself and not to please someone else! in the bluntest way possible, if they wouldn’t do what you do for them, for you, then it’s not worth it! moments of acknowledgment might give you happiness but nothing is as fulfilling as real reciprocated love, which sometimes these obsessions can stop us from getting.

I actually found that going completely cold turkey and cutting off all contact with anything to do with the person helped me, then when I knew I wasn’t emotionally invested anymore I could become just a fan again. otherwise it is more difficult to slowly step back from the position you’re in now.

as well, spending money on these small burst of happiness from seeing someone is okay but if the happiness comes from a place of hope that something more can happen then maybe it’s worth reconsidering whether it is financially and emotionally worthwhile

it can always helps to find a real life situation too to focus on!

remind yourself what is real and what you just hope is real 🪽

Hi ❤️‍🩹,

Firstly thank you for taking the time to answer me with that long message ( I appreciate )

Second, I unfortunately think it is not exactly where the problem lies ? Well partly but not entirely ?

I think I am not confused between what is real and what could be as I am plenty aware of his situation - friendship circle / gf / family and his will to be under radar for that part ( I didn’t tried to get F involved with the page or anything) / I am aware I could never be part of that world BUT

I used to think it was because I was too ugly too much imperfect , it made me so angry about myself because when he was with common girls I was asking myself « why not me » in the back of my head and for that you are true.

When in reality if you take only F , yes she is common but she has a background I could never have : English / same circle of friends / money / blonde / stereotypical / high position in F1 so high profile … and so and so. I cannot compete and was never in competition from start simply because I am identified as a fan anyway. So I have real knowledge about my reality I am not derailing.

Why it hurts tho it is when I wish he never acknowledged me , it started by a DM from his part and from that gesture it all started to make him approachable and to blur distance between « « star » » and I .

I could just see him as back then being a little boy in his path to glory having his first fan and in a sense it is what happened it is what makes me special and he already told me it was the case. We do share a special bond only in that way , as much as he is coming to see page everyday and made the promise he will continue to do so…I think he likes it as much as he hates it (just like me), people must tease him which he must hate but I think he wouldn’t care that much if he wasn’t a bit hyped by having a fanpage.

What hurts / disgust me

It is people who tried to match with him with fake dating profiles while he was still on dating apps to prove me a point ( that I will never get a chance and pretending to have receipts on how bad he was when he actually wasn’t) just because they had saw here I was infatuated. They used him just to hurt me.

People who pretended to have info just to hurt me / some that wanted to deal pictures /infos requesting sexual favors ( do I look that naïve honestly ?!!! And think so low of my self esteem that it looks ok to request that ???) / him being ok with his friend flirting and giving me as a prey was absolutely not ok.

With the popularity of the page, his friends and family members came along and it is all I ever dreamed of as I wanted the page to be only for him to have a safe place but they allowed me a place I shouldn’t have taken because I am not having the neutrality to be distant enough I recognize. Either I blame him and don’t rate him or I hype him too much, no in between as I struggle to find some equilibrium. I think it is better when I don’t check socials media that much and I am more focused and unbothered by his flinch of heart when I do sort myself out of it all and don’t get involved with emotional side first.

The problem is : I am emotionally invested, I am too much involved already, I am persuaded I care too much and I am irrevocably in love with him without knowing the depth of who he is so I guess I am under the impression I will always be in love with that image of him I created in my mind no matter what and how hard I try . He should do something really really bad to break the charm and spell I am under.

And I do not care that much it is one sided because he gave me a lot in return / friendships / travels / joys etc

That part is very clear . He is that star . I am that worm star gazer , looking at star from a high telescope 🔭 and it will never change : and honestly that is okay ✅

Sometimes star is shining very close to that worm (caterpillar much idk ?so at least room for improvement🐛) and it gave her life.

I have based for too long my life on what saved me from despair : him , rugby and all. I need to switch interest because it is obsessive and when I lack recognition from him I feel like a part of me is dying. He crossed my sky when I was at the deepest low I had experienced in life and he pulled me back up so I feel like I owe him a bit.

In a way it is the worst because it is not that much one sided in terms of recognition? I am important as his first fan , he gave me everything I could dream of as a fan , he is not that much unapproachable which is even worse as it entertain the bond , he knows me , my first name , my story , where I come from , he sees me , so yah I shouldn’t be complained or in the need to want more and more every time , I just need to be satisfied as it is and that is all.

I have too much feelings for him as I cannot recognize him as having a lot of defaults when I am sure that if I knew who he truly was maybe I would never want to touch him with a stick?

And last problem I live for aesthetic , I am deeply interested in art and beauty, from a young age to my studies to my job and career… So take it as it is , with very biased eyes , but for me and maybe only me, he is the most beautiful thing (cannot be human) I have ever seen in my life : no less.

And it hurts that is a living thing 🤣 if I could frame it and put it into a museum for everyone to see but no one to touch I would still go to that gallery every day .

Ok I didn’t unpacked much and need to reread your advices because some of them addressed the problem indeed but some didn’t it is just me being stupid

[ariannasenvolant]

today i felt like coming on my blog and pouring out my feelings. so this is me doing just that: 

Changing Relationships

When I was younger, I would rearrange my room once a month or so, because I was tired of the layout and wanted something new and fresh. Because of this, I thought I was pretty good at adapting to change, since I was always changing my room. 

However, the same can not be said about my relationships with people. Relationships can grow and thrive, die, and also grow apart. All of these changes except the growing and thriving together part pains me a lot. It has brung tears to my eyes one toooo many times. 

When relationships with people in my life start changing seemingly “for the worst,” my mental health suffers immensely. I sit and think about for days. I talk to people about it. It never leaves me. I wake up and think “oh...x,y, and z, things aren’t the same anymore.” I think I struggle with accepting/embracing the changes in relationships. I am attached to what we once were. 

With my first love, I remember being really really sad to break up with him, because I knew any relationship we have afterwards would never be as good as the one we just had. This is because, when you’re with someone romantically, you just know so many intricacies about them and are able to talk with them in ways that may not always be so appropriate/easy with just friends. My ex and I remained friends for two years, until last month he told me that he didn’t feel right to be in this relationship (this friendship) with me anymore. This caught by surprise, because it’s been two years, and I don’t know the exact reason why it didn’t feel right for him. My first guess is unresolved feelings. But even though our relationship before he cut me off wasn’t as intimate as when we were together, I still valued him so much as a friend, as someone who was my first love. I feel like he realized it was time to let me go, something I struggle with doing. I cannot just cut people off. 

One of my best friends, I guess she’s former best friend now, is being distant in our friend group, i.e also us as friends individually. My friend group from middle school was strong throughout high school as well, however, once college started, things changed. We started to nourish relationships in pairs, rather than altogether. It was hard for us all to meet up at one time, which is why it’s easier to hang out with one person all the time rather than scheduling for 3. However, in the midst of the other pair (the one I wasn’t in), I felt excluded in their conversations and the bubble they had around themselves. Nonetheless, once I got over that they were just closer to each other than me, I still enjoyed being with them. Now however, this one friend I’m talking about, she’s not even as present as before with her pair. And so it’s cold turkey on my end. Every relationship requires reciprocation, and I just was not getting that with her. And it sucks, because it was never this bad. She clearly showed me that our friendship was not a priority to her anymore, and I struggle to accept it, because how could I throw away years of friendship like that? How could she? People continue to tell me that your childhood friends are your real friends cause they know the real you, and to continue to try and be her friend, to show that I’m always there for her. I would love to be a pillar of stable love for her, but I am very insecure in our relationship. She’s not showing any signs that she even want’s to be friends with me. This hurts a lot. This is an example of growing apart. My dad always would tell me “your friends will stab you in the back. your friends today are not your friends tomorrow” and she’s showing me that he’s right, when I wanted him to be wrong. to Taliea. today is your birthday, happy birthday, hope you enjoyed. to the next birthdays i won’t be celebrating with you, im sorry and i hope you continue to enjoy. I just never wanted it to be this way. But i have to accept it. 

Now, to my other best friend. a person who my soul is truly at peace with. we were toxic lovers, always on and off because the comfort we provide for each other is truly like no other. it can be the end of the world and I’d feel comfortable enough to rest in her arms, as long as it’s her arms I’m in. Our relationship is changing and I feel like we’re growing apart too. It’s a distance I think we’re both making on purpose, because we’re scared to fall back again. the signs of change hurt in transitions. delayed replies back. turning off tik tok likes so I can’t see her activity any more. the i love you thats pending in the air and the hug that can’t last for too long. we both agreed to move on, but i remember how deep we went, and i’m forced to look the other way. no matter how hard we try, i suppose we wont work out. just like my first love, lovers to friends hurts. with time of course, the heart heals and embraces, which is the period I am in now, but looking back, at what we could’ve been, hurts. i suppose there’s no use in doing that anymore. which is how im coping.

in all these changing relationships, I could only worry about myself. be grateful for the rain and sunshine and continue growing, despite who is alongside or far away from me. I can only wish we all grow tall to see each other when we reach the clouds. i have no hate in my heart and i hope every one of you bears an abundance of sweet fruit and beautiful flowers. hopefully one day i’ll be blessed to taste and smell your achievements but if not, thank you for the memories we shared. i feel like life runs in circles and cycles, and it’s never the end with these people. this is all a transitioning period in which a year or two, when we’re all in a better place, i’ll hit you back up and see how you’re growing. i suppose i don’t believe in dead relationships, we simply grow apart, as people, we are still here, living. 

[gyrovagi]

so truthfully i'm pretty sure The Scenario as i have been referring to it originated in my brain as 'okay how contrived would a situation have to be for caden trevelyan and solas to have gay sex about it.' and then it got derailed as i thought about it and the scenario does not involve anything approaching gay sex. it's literally just a weird situation that nobody enjoys that changes nothing. (shrek they dont even have dental voice) caden doesn't even convince solas to cut off his leg

i've mulled it over too much though and i'm fully writing a fic (Which has made my recent google searches look fucking crazy) so now it's a canon incident for caden and is i think... if not exactly a turning point for his relationship with solas, it's Defining. if that makes sense.

anyway what happens is at some ambiguous mid-late-game stage, maybe even right after exiling the wardens, caden makes it his next priority while corypheus is firmly on the backfoot to clear out the red templars in emprise du lion. (i know judging by levels the game wants you to go here lies the abyss -> wicked eyes and wicked hearts but caden would prioritize the politics.)

this is going great! up until right after capturing suledin keep, he fucking collapses in the middle of the stairs. turns out he's been walking around on a pretty nasty leg wound that's been infected by red lyrium. there's inquisition troops in the area and a healer among them but solas is undeniably the best healer on hand (and the only mage). so now he's in the position of - for the second time - keeping this guy alive when he can really only guess about the thing killing him. the new developments are 1) cassandra isn't threatening him with execution if caden dies, though the power vacuum if the inquisitor perished now would definitely not be pretty 2) solas and caden have barely restored what can charitably be called a 'semi-functioning working relationship' after caden punched him in the face.

(varric and cole are here also. cassandra's back at skyhold dealing with the Rammys of seeker secrets and potential divine candidacy.)

after some tense aggressively polite conversations about power and vulnerability, several cryptic comments from cole, and one episode of house md, solas finally figures out that caden quit lyrium cold turkey and hadn't told anyone except his advisors, cassandra, and the apothecary who was trying to work out something to help with his + cullen's withdrawal. it follows that lyrium withdrawal has weakened him and caused the red lyrium infection to progress as dramatically as it has. solas concludes that there are essentially two options: try to cut the infection out, which being kind of out in the middle of nowhere with limited supplies means a very real risk of losing the whole leg if not dying anyway, or (temporarily) go back on lyrium, in the hopes that with untainted lyrium back in caden's system, it will be able to counteract the effects of the red lyrium. solas has conducted a few experiments that seem to indicate this would work.

caden, being the stubborn asshole he is, goes. cut my leg off then. i'm not going back on lyrium. and solas is like in any other situation i would respect your decision, if not your reckless methodology, but this has gone past obstinance into sheer stupidity. this is no mundane ailment. red lyrium is dangerous and you are extremely vulnerable at the moment. what i am suggesting is temporary and you can wean off safely this time. if you do not do it you will die. caden replies not if you cut my leg off :) i'll do it if you don't have the stomach for it. and solas storms out of the room and angrily requests varric talk some sense into trevelyan as a friend since apparently the boy (Caden is 25.) has lost his fucking mind

varric of course is not very happy about the idea of amputation either but caden cannot be budged and there's not a lot of time to wait around for him to change his mind. solas briefly seriously debates the ethics of putting lyrium in the wine. and the pasta. ultimately he decides that this isn't justifiable, even if he doesn't care that caden would never forgive him for it, he wouldn't be able to live with it himself. what he can live with is calling caden's bluff.

so solas brings in Ye Olde Thedosian Amputation Instruments and tells caden, if you insist this is your decision, very well. but i refuse to do it. you said you'd do it yourself, so you can, and i'll make sure you don't bleed to death. caden of course meant it when he said it but that's still a whole different beast from actually Cutting Off Your Own Leg. of course he can't do it.

caden fumes silently for several minutes. solas ends up watching him limp out to retrieve his lyrium kit (which caden's kept in his things, of course, because it doesn't count if it's not an active choice he makes every day). his hands shake preparing the dose but he snaps at solas when offered help. when he finally downs it he asks simply to be left alone. there's not much we have to say to each other, i think.

within a week or so, his condition's much improved. owain shows up because he received word that a) his brother was in bad shape b) there's dragons need hunting. bull came with for dragon hunting and maybe also so he could give a direct report to the qun on whatever the hell the red lyrium situation is out here. (sidenote because i've been thinking it and i need to shoehorn it in somewhere i'm not saying owain and bull fuck but i'm not saying they wouldn't fuck.) caden decides it's probably best to minimize mage exposure to red lyrium so he suggests solas head back to skyhold and help figure out the next move against corypheus. he goes on a kind of awkward brotherly dragon hunting expedition with owain.

the whole incident is never discussed again ❤️ caden is pretty pissed remembering the whole thing when solas DOES give him an impromptu amputation. oh so if you're arguably at fault for my limb requiring amputation then you have no qualms cutting it off.

(i'm undecided between caden having successfully quit lyrium by trespasser, or if it's too evil to be like. actually once the red lyrium infection set in to that point it could never be fully cured just held back by going back on lyrium, so actually caden's options are still either take lyrium or cut your leg off or die. need to ponder the shrimplications for his character and their relationship and the themes and narratives of it all.)

well i guess the inaugural post (apart from my personal friend bluebeard's wife) gets to be this whiteboy sketch that i drew and then stared at like. this is too much. i dont know how exactly but in some way its too much

[olivia-anderson-fanfic]

Into The Unknown, Part 1

... I have no self-control do not perceive me

Marinette stared at the pile of bright red, yellow, and green clothes on the ground. It was all she’d done in the five-ish minutes since she’d portaled onto the scene. Just… stared.

It wasn’t like there was much else to do, anyways. Red Robin was currently beating the absolute fuck out of the person that had the audacity to disintegrate his brother right in front of him. It wasn’t like she could even fix it because the witch had been out cold before she had been able to pull Red Robin off to get a hit in so she could use her lucky charm.

So, she stared.

It was weird. She could almost feel a person inside the clothes but… maybe that was the residue or the ashes or whatever gets left behind when you zap a person out of existence? She didn’t really want to check, to be honest. Gross.

Eventually, though, she hesitantly leaned down and brushed her hand over it, trying to find the energy and get rid of it because it was really uncomfortable --.

… oh hell no that pile of clothes did not just fucking giggle at her.

She narrowed her eyes and carefully lifted up the bottom of the shirt, only to yelp and fall back. She scrabbled on the gross Gotham alley ground until her back hit Red Robin’s arm and he was forced to pause or risk hitting a meta (which would not have been good for his health).

“What?” He hissed.

She swallowed thickly. “That’s a child.”

“... what?” Red asked, all the anger bleeding from his tone in his confusion.

“We let Batman’s kid turn into a baby,” she whispered… then, it sunk in more. “We let Batman’s kid turn into a baby.”

He straightened on top of the thing that was really more bloody pulp than person at this point. “What do you mean ‘we let Batman’s kid turn into a baby’?”

But she didn’t really get a chance to answer because the baby chose that exact moment to be sick of being suffocated under all the armor and pushed it off.

Red Robin gulped. Because, yep, that was Robin as a baby. Batman was going to kill them.

Except he wasn’t going to kill them. Because Batman doesn't kill. No, Batman would find something even worse and that would suck.

The baby -- Robin? Should she still call him that mentally? -- giggled at their pain. Like an asshole.

They were so fucked.

~

He’d let B’s favorite kid get turned into a baby. Was there a way to get unadopted? Because if there was it was totally going to happen. Or maybe his dad would just cut him off because he was 19 now and could just get kicked out.

No. Nope! Not going to happen. No. He could fix this.

“Okay. Okay okay okay. We need a plan,” he heard himself saying.

Ladybug scoffed. “We? I was barely even here, this is on you.”

“Leave me alone to deal with this and I swear to god I will tell B that you did it.”

She paled. “You wouldn’t. No way.”

“Yes way. So, help me think of something.”

The baby giggled and started crawling over and both of them averted their eyes because, unfortunately, the child did not get baby clothes to go with his random transformation. Baby Damian didn't seem to care as he reached them and started climbing on Ladybug since she was closest. At least it wasn’t him. He did not want to see his adoptive brother’s… ew.

Ladybug made a gagging sound and then quickly summoned a lucky charm. She kept her face turned away as much as her neck would physically allow as she fumbled her way through swaddling the child in a polka-dotted blanket.

And then her shoulders slumped a little. “Great. Great. This is… great,” she muttered, picking up the bundle o’ baby.

He let himself look down now that it was safe.

“Alright, we need to go to another dimension where time moves faster,” Ladybug said after a few seconds. “And then we wait for him to age… fifteen-ish years. Best way to not make Batman notice.”

“... what about us? We also age.”

“Huh…? Oh. Right. You’re human.” She pulled off the glasses she was wearing and blinked a few times before handing it over. “Congrats on your upgrade. The tiny horse god is named Kaalki. She likes cake.”

“The tiny --?” He let out the world’s manliest screech as his eyes landed on the floating bug horse hybrid thing holy shit no no no no no the sci fi movies didn’t prepare him for this shit.

Kaalki looked a little offended but then her eyes landed on the baby and she gasped. “Aw, baby humans are always so cute.”

“Great, Kaalki, you take it,” said Ladybug.

Kaalki did try, to her credit. It just so happened that the approximately one-year-old baby was a lot bigger than the… whatever she was. Tim was refusing to believe that this was a god. Too many implications. He already had something to have a breakdown over, he didn’t need another thing right now, thank you very much.

Tim rested his head in his hands but he had more things to worry about than the blood that he was accidentally streaking through his hair.

“Okay. Okay. We can go to another dimension and try and raise him. Maybe we can make it have a ratio of one month here for every year there so any differences could be blamed on that.”

“Ya!” Said baby Damian. He probably didn’t actually know what was going on but he sure seemed excited so that was cool.

Ladybug sighed and nodded. “Great. You get food and money and clothes and I’ll take this lady to the cops… and I guess I’ll watch the kid until you get back because your dad cannot know.”

They shook on it.

~

This may be the dumbest idea that she’d ever had, and that was saying something. She didn’t know if she could trust Red Robin on this one, they hardly ever worked together. What if he just left her alone with this kid and let her try and figure this out on her own?

No. He wouldn’t do that. He was the last person known to be with Robin. Robin going missing would be bad for him, too. And, besides, she was pretty sure that he was a duty-driven person based on what she’d heard, she just had to hope that he saw this as his duty, too.

She turned the baby in her arms to get more comfortable as she waited for him to (hopefully) come back.

Part of her wanted to try and find someone from this world to reverse this but she didn’t know any outside of her, Adrien, Alix, and (now) Red Robin. Not on a personal level. Not enough that she knew for sure that they wouldn’t blab to Batman about it.

So, no, this is what she was doing.

But she had things to do. So, she pulled out her yoyo-phone-hybrid-thingy and wedged it against her ear.

“Chaton,” she said the moment he picked up. “You’re alone, right?”

“Uh… yeah?”

“Great. I, Ladybug, relinquish the Miracle Box and name Chat Noir the new guardian.”

“WHAT --?!” He didn’t get to finish as a box dropped on his lap and knocked the wind out of him.

“Just for, like, a year and a half. Sorry. Bye!”

“DON’T JUST ‘BYE’ ME WHAT THE --?!”

She hung up and closed the yoyo, hooking it back to her belt and ignoring it when it started buzzing again.

She looked down at Robin, who was squinting up at her. She returned the squint. Why was this baby so quiet? She didn’t get it. Surely, he should have been crying at this point.

“Do you still… remember things?” She asked, hoping against all hope that maybe he had retained his memories at the very least.

Robin smiled at her, but it was the blank-eyed baby smile that meant he wasn’t really understanding her. She bit down a curse.

Great. So, she’d not only gotten a baby but she’d gotten a fucking weird one. Great.

~

Tim left a note for his family saying that he, Damian, and Ladybug were bored and were going dimension hopping. His family would probably be suspicious but, hey, at least it wouldn’t be his problem for a good fifteen years on his end.

And, yeah, he knew this was probably one of his dumber plans but… it wasn’t the dumbest. And he was always one to commit when it came down to it. One time he had faked being shot and dealt with crutches for an entire year just to convince Vicki Vale that he wasn’t Red Robin. He had no fears that he couldn’t see this through.

Ladybug, though? A total mystery. She did nearly everything on a whim as far as he knew. She hopped from city to city fighting crime for absolutely no reason outside of boredom and made up all of her plans on the fly. No, he was a bit concerned about her ability to keep doing it.

So, he went as quickly as he possibly could. There was no rhyme or reason to what he was grabbing. He was just… putting stuff in there. There was money and three watches to help them move between dimensions, yes, but there was also a fanta orange and a copy of Hitchhiker’s Guide To The Galaxy and exactly seven pairs of socks.

… yeah, he had the necessities. Probably.

He nearly got out the door before he realized he was still in his crime-fighting gear and he quickly shucked it all off and tossed it into the tub so the blood wouldn’t track any more than it already had. He did not need to avoid Batman’s wrath only to end up on the receiving end of Alfred’s.

He pulled on the first hoodie and jeans he could grab and looked around to make sure he hadn’t left anything of importance.

Okay. Now he was ready to go.

~

Marinette was awkwardly bouncing the baby when Red Robin finally showed up.

… not that she would have recognized him if she hadn’t felt Kaalki hovering in his pocket. In her eyes, he was just a random white guy wearing shades in the middle of the night.

She glanced up at him and gave him an awkward smile.

“Ready?”

He smiled back and held out two watches. Neither fit baby Robin so she prepared herself to choke out a literal baby holy fuck what even was her life.

“Which dimension should we go to?”

“Preferably one without miraculi,” Marinette said. “I don’t want to know what happens if there’s two of the same god in a dimension.”

He nodded slowly. “Probably best if Batman doesn’t exist, either, he’d probably notice my existence.”

“... so… no heroes at all?”

“Looks like we’re going cold turkey,” Red Robin said in a tone that was probably supposed to be joking but just came out flat.

She pushed herself to her feet and waited as he scrolled through the millions of dimensions.

Finally, he came upon one and she added the coordinates to her and Robin’s watches.

She readied Robin’s watch against his neck and tried to ignore the kid’s sudden squirminess.

“3… 2… 1…”

They were gone in a whirl of blue light.

~~~~~

Next

@nathleigh @peachmuses

[mistystarshine]

i think the after china au would be more interesting. it seems like there'd have to be so much changing around with the characters and their core traits in order for the role-swap to work, and im a fan of the idea of soul-sick angel not just abandoning his weird vampire family

I'm sorry that this is so late! I had to wait for muse to strike. (Muse struck after I finished a tour if Stonehenge for study abroad and was waiting for my classmates to finish.) At long last, here are my rough thoughts for how this au would go! 

It starts during the Boxer Rebellion. Well, no. It started the second Angelus got his soul back, but it changes during the Boxer Rebellion. In the direct cause-and-effect sense, everything happens because the baby incident doesn't, thus allowing Angelus to linger with the others for a little while longer. On an emotional level, it all happens because, in the midst of his guilt and despair and desperate attempts to repress them, Angelus feels a sense of responsibility. Where he once looked at Drusilla and felt pride, there is now a stabbing guilt that gets harder to ignore with each passing day. Then there is Spike. Spike, now a proven slayer killer who Angelus had beaten the goodness out of in an attempt to turn into something like himself. 

As time drags on and he dodges killing and Darla grows more suspicious, aggressive, desperate for him to return to his former self, he knows that he cannot stay. It is that sense of responsibility that stops him from having one last fight with Darla and mournfully disappearing into the night. What will happen to Spike and Drusilla if he leaves? With that slayer's death, they have gone from two of the worst things he's ever done to a genuine threat to the world. They are doomed to get worse if he leaves them to continue down the path he set them on. But because they are two of his greatest victims (and there are and will be times when he struggles to acknowledge Spike as a victim, but in this moment, it is clear), he can't bring himself to kill them. So where does that leave him? 

When Angelus decides to ask Spike and Drusilla to come with him, he isn't very hopeful. Maybe they respected and feared him before, but they must have sensed the change in him, even as he drowned in denial and struggled to repress it. They won't abandon Darla for him. 

Except… They do. He doesn't understand it, but they do. 

(There really isn't much to understand. Drusilla adores him. She's scared by the soul and the prospect of him becoming something other than the monster that made her, the monster she knows, but she's even more scared of him leaving her completely. And Spike? Spike always looked to Angelus before Darla. She's family, yeah, but after Drusilla, his true loyalty has always been to him. He's starting to see through the cracks in his facade and is irritated that Angelus would break like that, but he isn't going to abandon him when he very clearly needs him.)

In other circumstances, Angelus would have separated from the Fanged Four and broken down completely. He would have retreated to the sewers and lived a miserable existence until the powers that be sent a messenger to him with a mission. That isn't an option here. He can't keep pretending that everything's fine and he's the same anymore, but has to at least try to hold himself together for Spike and Drusilla. Especially if he wants them to try to undo even an iota of the damage that he's done. So he does. He tries. 

Trying isn't always enough. The fact of the matter is that Angelus is still fairly freshly ensouled and not in a good state. Even if cutting Spike and Drusilla off from killing cold turkey weren't a hopeless battle, he doesn't have the energy right now. So he starts small, he tells them that he isn't willing to kill anymore and refuses the victims that Spike tries to drag to him. This results in arguments with Spike and miserable wailing from Drusilla, but eventually, they accept it. 

(When Angelus starts dropping hints that they shouldn't be killing either, Spike ignores them. He hears them though. Hears them and doesn't have any fucking clue how to process it outside of anger and insult, both of which he pushes down because Angelus clearly isn't right right now. But come on, really? Spike is a killer, and Angelus is the one who molded him into one. What right does he have to ask him to go back to being the miserable little poet he once was? How dare he even consider asking that of Dru, who may not be capable of such a change even if she tried with every fiber of her beautiful being, so mistakenly desperate to please him? Spike really might rip his head off if he weren't such a miserable sod.)

Angelus is a heavy name, a dark name, a name stained with blood. He told himself that it still fit him when he was still with Darla. It doesn't. It hurts a little more every time he hears it. Eventually, he tells Spike and Drusilla to call him Angel. Both of them resist at first, Drusilla heartbroken, Spike with anger and mockery. Both of them give in eventually. 

(This is when Spike, tired and resigned beneath his fire, realizes that this isn't temporary. Angelus - Angel - is different now, and he isn't ever going back. Drusilla already knew. She still sobs into his chest all day when Angel changes his name.)

(Angel is still barely more than a shell of his former self, holding onto his sanity by threads. Part of Spike, the part that resents the madness that he drove Drusilla into and everything that he did to him, finds it vindicating. The rest of him just wants it to stop. Angel isn't Drusilla, of course - he won't move mountains and swim across oceans for him like he would her. But he does acknowledge that Angel gets worse every time he finds out about him or Dru killing someone. Now, Spike isn't about to reform for the bastard, but he does improvise a bit. He gets more selective about who he kills, going for the people that society would be better off without, and coaxes Dru to do the same. He makes sure that Angel knows about it, but doesn't say that it's for him, because it isn't. It isn't. Spike's life is easier when his grandsire isn't totally consumed by self-pity or loathing or whatever else fuels his brooding. This is totally self-serving.)

The change in Spike and Drusilla's hunting habits isn't what leads Angel to the realization, nor is it one of any number of small gestures over the next few years. It just hits him out of the blue one day, when he's feeling… Not like his old self (never like his old self), but more clarity than usual. Spike is trying to look out for him. He's not treating him like Drusilla, no, but he has been slipping into the role of caretaker for him as well. And Angel's been letting it happen. His pride has taken more than a few beatings by this point, but this is when he realizes that he needs to pull himself together and start trying harder. Soul or no soul, he'll be damned if he's going to rescind his leadership and leave Spike in charge. 

It goes… dubiously. Despite his initial indignation and outrage, Angel recognizes that Spike and Drusilla have been making some degree of progress, so he doesn't push too hard. Spike doesn't like that. He quite likes the changed dynamics they'd been falling into. (Kind of. He'd be happy if Angel wasn't stewing constantly, but now that he's had a taste of what it's like not to have Angelus breathing down his neck, he doesn't want to go back. And he doesn't completely trust that Angel won't go back.) The conflict comes to a head when Angel insists that Spike and Drusilla stop hunting humans completely. While Spike eventually relents, he also makes it clear that he won't be giving another inch. And that… is that. It's all Angel can manage, truly. He may have been able to push himself to improve somewhat, but he still has notable bad days. Spike doesn't.

(Spike knows that. More importantly, he knows that Angelus never would have outright told him to stop killing humans unless it was some sort of sadistic power play. This certainly wasn't. It's part of the reason he agrees, the reassurance that even if Angel is being a pest again, he isn't going back. Which is kind of alarming. He remembers how upset he was when he realized that Angel would never be Angelus again and doesn't know when he stopped wishing they could go back, but he stopped. It almost makes him think deeper about why he was willing to stop killing. Then he decides not to think very deeply about it at all.)

(Getting Drusilla to stop killing is easier than anticipated. She knew that it was coming. The boys forget how much she knows. It might have hurt if it was harsh or sharp or sudden, but it wasn't. It was soft and gentle and subtle, from all people to bad people to no people at all. Or close to it. She slips up sometimes, when the song is too strong and the heartbeats call and she forgets that what will be has come to cross, but it isn't often. Spike helps her make sure that Angel doesn't know, that it doesn't break him into bits, and gradually, she gets better at remembering.) 

It isn't easy; it was never going to be easy. But they manage. Eventually, Angel and Spike slip into something along the lines of a partnership. It's new and unusual for both of them, but possibly the only way to make this work. Spike learns not to make a fuss about it when Angel's composure slips and he has to take charge for a few days. Angel learns to accept that it happens at all. 

Time passes. Every day is bad in some way, but gradually, painfully, Angel's worst days grow to be less. And Spike… Spike grows more restless. 

They hear word of a slayer in New York. Spike becomes interested, the same look of obsession that appeared when he first learned about them. Drusilla declares that their fates are bound. And Angel is terrified that everything is about to be for nothing.

Angel suggests that Spike could try helping the slayer. He's clearly been itching for a fight - surely trying to help the chosen one would be as much of a challenge as killing her. He sounds casual when he suggests it. Truthfully, he's desperate, terrified, and not thinking straight at all. There are a million reasons why Spike approaching the slayer as an ally are a horrible idea, but they don't occur to him until Spike has already started considering it. So he backtracks. He offers alternatives while Drusilla laughs. It doesn't matter - Spike knows what he wants to do now, and he's going to do it even if it gets him killed. 

(Spike doesn't know what he wants to do. He's gone years without killing, but he's still considering challenging the slayer to a death match when he sets off for New York. Then he meets Nikki Wood and finds someone who he wouldn't mind fighting alongside. He also sees that Angel is right. A slayer has danger coming at her from every angle, which means it'll be the fight of his life. It takes a while to convince her, but eventually, he finds himself with a fighting partner. He still visits Angel and Dru regularly and tries not to think too heavily about the implications of him leaving them alone for long periods of time. That he trusts Angel to at least try to look after her properly. That he trusts him not to steal her.)

Angel is worried about Spike, he can't even pretend that he's not. But he also can't bring himself to face the slayer. Her watcher might very well identify him, and… it's not the fight he fears. He hasn't seriously considered suicide in a while now, but if the slayer killed him, he know he'd deserve it. It's the explanation. It's the notion of finding himself face to face with this force for good and contend with his own existence. Perhaps it's cowardly, but when faced with this prospect, he ends up keeping his distance. Instead, he spends the time when Spike is away focused on Drusilla. He tries to improve her mental health. He fails; of course he fails. It's why he turned her when he did. Vampires are static creatures in a way that humans are not. When he turned her while caught in the throes of madness, he trapped her there for the rest of her undead life. Where a human might be able to heal, she is simply stuck. He tries anyway, beating herself against the unyielding wall. 

(Angel does better than he thinks he does. Drusilla's head still spins with fairies and pixies and fear and confusion and always - probably - maybe? - will, but it helps that he's there at all. He doesn't see what Drusilla sees. Doesn't know that this is the beginning of the end for her and William, doesn't know that he's started down a road that leads to summer and light. She doesn't want to lose him. It hurts. It would hurt more without Angel there. So even as he tortures himself trying to fix what he did such a perfect job of breaking, Drusilla tries to be good. Doesn't fuss, doesn't make a mess, doesn't tell him that he couldn't have completely destroyed her heart, because she can feel it break-break-breaking.)

One day, Spike returns with a black leather duster on his back and tells them that Nikki Wood is dead. Angel would ask if he killed her, but the despair wafting off him stops the words from leaving his mouth. For the first time, he allows himself to truly believe that one of the monsters he created might not truly be beyond repair. He wishes that it hadn't come at quite a cost. 

It's over a year before Spike tells him what happened. It happens out of the blue, on a night where Drusilla is quiet and Angel is drifting somewhere between almost alright and certainly not. He says that Nikki had been possessed by a demon with aspirations of ending the world. Try as they might, they weren't able to get it out of her. In the end, Spike ended up killing her himself. Spike looks Angel in the eyes, challenging, and asks if he's going to kill him now that he has a second slayer under his belt. Angel only apologizes. 

(What Spike doesn't stay is that he'd wanted to stay. He had gotten to know Nikki's son while he worked with her and grew to care for him deeply. With her gone, he'd wanted to help care for him. Her watcher turned him away, saying that for all he had been a valuable ally, Robin could not be trusted with a vampire.)

Spike declares that he never wants to get anywhere near a slayer again. Angel accepts it with relief. 

And then Sunnydale happens.

So! There are chunks that can be expanded upon and there's definitely more that comes after this, so if anyone's interested, let me know and I could be persuaded to continue. Here's where I note that there probably would be Bangel during the time frame of seasons 1-3, but would also probably end up being Spuffy and Cangel in the end. 

[screamingay]

time to make some changes

watched bo burnham vs jeff bezos again and obviously i'm even more tempted to delete everything but ultimately what i really want to do right now is set some serious limits on my relationship with the internet and my phone like cj suggested at the end of that video. limit my notifications, seek out longform discussions over memes and humor, maybe even turn my phone off one day a week like ben shapiro idk.

for me, an attempt to completely remove my soul from social media would feel like trying to remove a chain link fence from the middle of a tree that grew straight through it, in the sense that it's nearly impossible but so worth the effort.

i know how young i am and i know that there's so much potential joy and fulfillment around me if only i could meaningfully engage in it. there are local communities who see value in me that i would likely see for myself if i could allow my mind to. but i feel poisoned by irony! and performance! the audience lives inside me and i know the only way to silence them is to start living my life with intent and with physical presence, which i cannot achieve online, as much as corporations would like me to believe.

so, what? what comes next? hopefully, life. with hope, i can cut myself free of the chain link fence and grow beyond it. even though i will carry a piece of it deep inside me as long as i live.

this is, by the way, an attempt at true unironic thought and feeling that i have been avoiding, ironically, for the seven years i've had this blog. feels a bit strange to do actual blogging on it.

point is, i'm not saying any of this for an audience, despite the fact that i know it will reach one (no further than my own followers, though, if it can be helped). i have a real paper journal that i write in regularly, but this subject simply begs to be posted. after all, it's not like i'm going to throw my phone in a lake and go cold turkey on social media. i have friends online, i have communities online, and they're just as important to me as the ones i see regularly in my hometown.

all i'm saying, essentially, is that i want to regulate my relationship with online spaces by posting more in this format, long and unironic and personal. and by writing it in posts rather than on paper i hope to think about and interact with the internet in a more nuanced way in an attempt to be more present in my own life, while possibly inspiring others to do the same in their own ways.

if it isn't clear by now, i'd prefer this to not be reblogged, although i can't ensure that since i don't have the update that would allow me to disable it. unless, of course, you want to talk about this more! i'll also tag any other longform blog posts like this for easy finding later.