#i guess this is just angst now

[sunsmiter]

What happens to Frank?

What happens to Frank Horrigan when the Enclave has no more use for him? When his duty is over and the Enclave has no more need for a filthy mutie like him?

Assume the Enclave wins. The NCR is purged, their Rangers fleeing northwards, their fortresses abandonned. The Brotherhood is broken, their bunkers breached, their power armors deserted. Assume the Slavers have fled, hunted down by Enclave patrols. the Enclave, finally, is victorious. Now, only one question remains: What next?

What’s next for Frank Horrigan, Enclave Special Agent, supermutant cyborg, experiment, and doomed to die once his duty is complete? Will he walk happily to the slaughter, knowing he's to the executed, and accepting of his fate? Will he, for the few final hours he has left, as the stims stop and the sedation ends, will the horror finally set in, of what he's done and what he's become? Will he die unrepentant, forever swearing his loyalty to a faction who wanted him dead, praising Richardson as the last breath leaves his rebuilt lungs? Will he die in company of his beloved President, shot by the hand that fed, beat and leashed him?

Will he die remorseful, for once in his short, brilliant, violent life, cursing the men who doomed him and turned him into what he was?

Will they even afford him an execution? Will they simply turn off his life support and leave him to keel over, collapse and wither from the augments they knew he could not sustain? Will they kill him like any other filthy mutie or an Enclave traitor, a bullet to the back of the head? Will they take him in a moment he's unaware, or will he know perfectly well of his execution, yet sit down and wait for it? Will he even fight back?

The Chosen One, long dead by then, is not there to save the Wasteland. Or him, for that matter.

Or perhaps, Frank Horrigan is not as obedient as they believe. Perhaps, as his cybernetics fray and his reagents grind to a halt, in final moments of lucidity granted by the waning stims, he realizes what is about to happen. He was loyal. He was the Enclave’s finest soldier, their greatest enforcer.

And is this his reward? Is this the thanks he gets? To be put down like a dog?

Maybe he fights. Maybe he makes them bleed. Maybe, as his body finally begins to give in, as his augments shut down, as his muscles spasm from withdrawal, he still crawls toward the bastards who killed him. Maybe, in his final breath, he reminds them why they feared him.

And when they finally bring him down, struggling against the monster they had made, he leaves ruins behind him. Even in his last moments, bisected, bleeding, arm and leg rotators broken, bionic eye shattered, he was still crawling towards the bastards that betrayed him.

And when he is finally dead, a pile of corpses around him, the Enclave will erase his name from their records. He will be forgotten, utterly obliterated from history, as if he never served at all. He will be gone, as if he never were, and the Enclave will celebrate the removal of this stain upon their purity: the death of a mutant, and not a soldier.

Or perhaps, his watch ends, and he goes quietly.

Years. He served for years, he served them with his flesh, his strength, his literal blood and bone, and now they’re done and there’s nothing left to do but let him go. Perhaps he knows, perhaps he knew all along, he was just another walking corpse.

When they finally come for him, he does not resist. The last orders are given, the last Vertibirds set off from the oil rig - rusting by then - and the sound of the few remaining engines fade. Switches are flicked. Weapons are stowed away. Officers cheer.

And Horrigan receives his last order.

He accepts this as he accepted every other command, because that is all he has ever known. The chems are already thinning in his veins, The cybernetics they forced into him strain, his organs burn under the burden of enhancement.

Perhaps, as they lead him away, he does not feel fear. Frank Horrigan does not know fear. But in those last moments, as the final dose wears off, as his thoughts clear for the first time in years, perhaps, just perhaps, there is regret. A flicker of something buried under decades of conditioning. Just a flicker of what could have been…

But of course not. He is Frank Horrigan. He does not question, because to do so would have been beyond him. He does not struggle. 

He does not fight back, even as the bullet enters his skull, and he dies ignominiously, obeying the man that killed him.

His ride’s over, and it’s time to die.

[egophiliac]

What do you like about the Diasomnia boys if I may ask?

I always love hearing about the different reasons people enjoy characters.

I mean, c'mon. he has split custody over Sebek okay

also, Lilia in particular has maybe the best timeskip character development of all time

[futurepastme]

SecretConsort!merlin

I had this fic idea before falling asleep, I don't know if anything like this already exists (probably). Be warned that I didn't revise this once.

First of all Arthur and Merlin absolutely love each other, but they start off as friends with benefits. Until one day Arthur can't handle anymore

“Say you're mine. Say you'll be mine and no one else's”

“I'll be yours as long as you're also mine”

And yeah, they go exclusive after that (they already were but now was official) and give them a few months or years, but eventually Merlin becomes Arthur's secret consort and they are officially official, mother's sigil and all, because like I said, they Love each other.

Anyways, eventually Uther finds out they are together and he gets tomato-red furious, and only calms down when Arthur agrees to marry for political reasons, whomever Uther chooses for him.

The thing is, Uther kind of learns to like them as a couple, not that they go all out and about telling the world, because is still supposed to be a secret, but Uther sees the sweet glances and the smiles, and most of all he sees how willingly they are to die for each other and it just sits right with him. Uther thinks Merlin makes a good consort for his son and is in no hurry to marry him off anymore.

But of course, nothing really stays the same, and the day comes where the only way Uther finds to keep peace with another kingdom is to marry Arrhur off to some other king's daughter, and he hates it because he knows and he approves of his relationship with the skinny boy that makes his son so happy.

And then comes the heartbreaking scene of Arthur telling Merlin the news and the even more heartbreaking scene before Arthur's wedding day

“I won't be able to be only yours anymore”

“Maybe not, but I'll always be yours”

And they cry through the night holding each other tightly as if the world were to end, because it just might.

And the next day, Uther can freaking see it 

They are both behaving, no one is causing a scene but from up close you can notice how bloodshot their eyes are. And he can see it in the way they refuse to make eye contact, he can see it as he sees Merlin silently crying as Arthur shows the crowd their future queen.

And Uther hates it.

And is not like the new princess is a horrible person but she just doesn't like Merlin, she doesn't want to share her husband. She makes Merlin leave Arthur's Chambers and forbids him to follow Arthur all day unnecessarily, but she knows she can't win.

Not when the King himself gives Merlin royal chambers on the same floor as theirs, and especially not when Arthur doesn't spend the night on his.

Arthur has duties, though. Husband duties. And he has to fulfill them and it kills Merlin.

And Uther can just watch helplessly as Merlin's gaze follows Arthur and his wife and he stays behind as the servant he is supposed to be and is so unfair because she doesn't even love Arthur 

And they keep growing apart but keep fighting for each other because they are fucking made to be together so they still try even if the best they can do for days is hold each other for a few minutes just breathing each other in because that's home and that's where they are meant to be

It continues for a while until one day comes where Arthur goes out without Merlin

And at the same time while he is away, his wife finds herself with child, and everyone's so happy and Merlin just has to leave for a while because he can't handle it

But again, things never go as planned and the knights return with Arthur's body, because something went wrong 

And you can honestly choose what it was, a curse, a spell, bandits, a boar, a mercenary, it doesn't matter because Arthur is dead now and Merlin wasn't there to save him

And now Uther has to deal not only with the death of his only son, and with his widow wife with child but he'll be the one to tell his consort and is so devastating 

Merlin's face turns from sad to haunting and it's like the world ended and Uther can see himself in him, he can see the death of his love weighting on Merlin the way it weighed on him, if not worse

Arthur's body stays inside the castle for two days before the burial so the people of the castle can say their goodbyes and no one has seen Merlin, they are not even sure he went to see Arthur 

And everyone is concerned about the poor widow all dressed in black, she is sad, sure, but the tears rolling from her eyes are just for show, Arthur was barely a friend, but he was good to her

Arthur's body is being prepared for removal, overseen by his family and close friends before the public ceremony took place, and that's when it happens 

Merlin just barges in and stops everything. 

He's spent two days working in it, and he just doesn't care anymore, as long as it works

And Uther once again just watches as this skinny boy fills the room with golden light, and he can't even care to do anything because honestly he would do everything for his love if he could 

And everyone watches as the light coming from Merlin starts being absorbed by Arthur through his chest and is so beautiful to watch

Arthur starts to sit up as Merlin lowers down and they just have a moment, a small second where they are both there and Merlin just rests his head against Arthur's 

“I would do it again. I would do it as many times as needed because I love you and you are my everything”

“Merlin?”

And then the light is gone, and so is Merlin 

And Uther watched as his widowed son holds his lover's body, just like he did over twenty years ago

[cy-fi-theansweris42]

So @keferon's Empurata Prowl posts are living rent-free in my mind, lol. I just had to write out the scene from this post so look out for the angst below the cut!

(Tumblr please don't kill my formatting--)

There's someone in front of him.

Prowl doesn't dare make a move, doesn't dare let the mech in front of him know he's awake and aware now. Doing so runs the risk of them putting him under again if they're an enemy, removing all possibility of escape (awake the chance is small; 25%. Unconscious— he doesn't need to run those numbers to know it's zero).

He will not lose this chance.

He waits, hoping his vision will improve enough that he can see more than the darkened silhouette moving in front of him, that his hearing will lose the staticky quality it took on the moment he regained consciousness and he might recognize a voice. It's taking every ounce of willpower he has to keep his doorwings from fluttering ever so slightly to gather data on his surroundings.

It's taking everything in him not to run away as the restraints are undone, to keep his doorwings from flaring high and wide to scream stay away, danger, threat in a way that a small buried part of him wants to scream.

(He will ignore that part. Emotions have no place in trying to plan an escape. Fear can cause one to act too soon, to lash out when they should be biding their time waiting for the moment with the highest chance of escape. Tactically, emotions lower the chance of a successful escape.)

He has to wait, he cannot lose this chance to escape over something as trivial as emotions. Not when that runs the risk of more being done to him.

He will not let them do anything else to him.

So Prowl stays as still as possible as the final restraint is removed, not daring to try and run. Not yet. They would be prepared for him to try and escape the moment he could, they would plan for it. If he waits, pretends he's not aware enough to realize he's free to move, they may slip up, may give him the chance to escape successfully.

…Or he could be missing the only opportunity he'll have, and he doesn't even know it.

He doesn't know enough. There's too many unknown variables.

Number of enemies: 1 (or more) Location: Unknown Route to exit: Unknown Status of allies: Unknown Chance of successful escape: Unable to accurately calculate (no more than 30% at best).

He wishes he could see more, see who's in front of him, who the taller mech who just came close enough for him to notice is (had he been there the entire time?). He wishes this static in his audials would go away so he could hear what was being said. He wishes he could move his doorwings freely and know if he was surrounded by enemies instead of just not knowing.

(He wishes he had his hands still, he doesn't know if he'll be good enough of a shot with this claws. He wishes he had his face still, this singular optic being a screaming sign of what was done to him and he was helpless to stop it. He wishes he knew what all they did to him, what did they do, what did they do to him—).

He can't help it. He needs to know.

His doorwings twitch, just enough to tell him the two mechs in front of him are the only others in the room. It's enough to catch the smaller one's attention. There's noise, maybe speech, and he can make out their hands coming towards him—

Their hands are coming towards his head, his neck, he thinks he sees needles, and he can't just stand there anymore.

Prowl feels his new claw dig through metal, through the glass of a visor, as the static in his audials crescendos, becomes a roar. His plating is flared, his doorwings spread high and wide, and he is shaking.

He can't stop shaking.

What did they do to him?

[the-dragon-hearted]

Part 1

There is a universe, somehow, where everything aligned just perfectly and left four desperate children on Silco's doorstep. A universe where Piltover is just a bit more ruthless: where Vander's connections aren't trustworthy and where his foolish sentimentality wins.

Vander's arrested, in Vi's place. He's so proud of her for trying to do the right thing - but he'll not make a sacrifice out of Felicia's daughter. The violence in the streets has to stop and Piltover won't stop until it has someone to blame for the theft. So the Hound becomes a sacrificial lamb.

But remember, his agreements are flimsier, and the trust between enforcer and undercity is as thin as the razor blade Mylo keeps in his pocket. The gold-trimmed enforcers aren't happy with a Hound dressed in wool - they want the girl. The one Jayce identified. Some pink-haired snot-nosed filthy brat. The thief. The terrorist.

They labeled her a terrorist: Vi. For a near-harmless explosion in a district she would've been beaten in, just for the grime in her hair.

And the Hound won't have that.

For the second time in his life, Vander's knuckles are stained with enforcer blood and the undercity begins to burn. Vi's next to him, eager to fight, but scared. She's just a kid after all. Always eager. Always scared.

Claggor, Mylo, and Powder come running as they limp back to the Last Drop. Powder's too busy crying into Vi's shirt to pay much attention to the screams outside. Reinforcements are just a few minutes away. The rats of the undercity retreat to spare themselves from the brutality beneath an enforcer's heel and the streets grow quieter and quieter. They all know how to slip away when the time demands it, but this is more than sneaking through the sewers and waiting for the storm to pass.

The enforcers, the council, Piltover: they'll keep coming. The blood on Vander and Vi's hands ensures that much. And they don't want him -

He looks to where Vi is hugging Powder back, a: "Sorry Powpow," being breathed. "Didn't mean to scare you -"

He can't let that happen. He can make himself the bigger problem - the biggest threat and that will buy the kids time and give those rich bastards a victory.

But then... it'll just be them.

Claggor's strong, Mylo's sly, Powder's clever, and Vi is brave. They're all tough as nails and they'll make it. At least until this underbelly starts ripping itself around. Vander's a smart man who knows what will happen in his absence, the cannibalistic tendencies of desperate people who need scapegoats.

And Vi's already willing to play the martyr. She proved that much. No, if he leaves he needs to leave them with something. Anything. Something that's as willing to fight for their future as...

That's when he gets the terrible idea. Right around the same time he hears the tell-tale racket of enforcers running down cobblestone. He grabs a bar napkin, and Claggor bars the door. He fumbles messily around for a piece of graphite or a damned pen.

Vi pushes Powder behind her and grabs a half-empty bottle from a table. There's a shatter as she arms herself with razor glass. These kids are well versed at making weapons, they have to be.

They'll only get better at it if he finishes this note. He's signing their lives away to a different demon. There's no guarantee they'll live long enough to give him the note. It's a terrible idea -

"I'll never betray Zaun's children"

Powder's climbing behind the bar with him, clinging to his leg. Mylo climbs over the other side, fiddling with a collection of rusty steak knives. Claggor's grabbed a chair and broke it, two wooden beams in either hand.

Suffocating in the streets is better than dying on a bridge.

"Take this," he gives it to Vi before slipping on his knuckles. "Find Silco. Ask around, and he'll find you."

"What?" it's a challenge from her. She's ready to fight to keep what she has.

She doesn't realize that every fight comes with a loss. And eventually, it's going to take everything from her. Once you bloody those knuckles you never stop - not really.

But not today. Today it'll only take him, and hopefully, she'll remember what they talked about. She'll remember that despite this shitshow - he's proud of her for finding a peaceful solution. He's proud of her for putting down those fists.

But there was no way in hell he was going to let her go.

"Take care of each other," he orders slipping on his other gauntlet. Mylo and Powder stare at him with wide eyes. Claggor's lip is trembling.

"Remember. Remember, to look out for each other!" he orders.

"No!" Powder seems to understand now as Vander pulls the bracings away from the door. She scrambles over the bar with a muffled wail. Mylo stops her right as Vander throws the door open.

"Vander!" Vi screams, but the hound is loose.

He's in the streets and he's set about making these fools remember why they follow the light. Why they fear the undercity so badly they chase its children to sate their fury. Dark things live in the undercity. Zaun's children are raised in air so heavy it turns their lungs to iron. Her streets sharpen their teeth and build calluses over their knuckles until the only thing they feel is the warm crimson in their wake.

Vander had hoped he'd never do this - be this. But jaws shatter under his fist faster than glasses fill with his whiskey. He's good at this. Always has been. The kids slip away - he knows that much.

Everything else is a bit of a blur. He glimpses Ekko, once, on the rooftops. The boy heads after the other four and Vander is thankful for that. Benzo didn't survive the first wave... he doesn't have much chance to reflect on that because there's another enforcer in his grip and a new scream in the air.

He buys the kids plenty of time. Too much time.

Enough time for all of Zaun to hear the news: the Hound's fighting back! Five enforcers are dead! Six! Ten! Enough time for Vi and Mylo to find their informants.

Silco isn't exactly a subtle name. He's well hidden, that's true, but a familiar blond limped his way over to one of the abandoned warehouses after Vi kicked the shit out of him. Word on the street is that he's in with someone named Silco. Doesn't mean much to the informant or to Vi.

It's enough. They slip into one of Zaun's many industrial districts just as Vander finally falls.

Piltover's attack dogs got him - they would eventually, he knew that much. A wild hound is fierce but numbers always win. Part of him's happy to die on familiar cobblestones. Better than the cool stone of prison - better than anything Piltover had in mind for him. This way, the kids would know what happened to him. They wouldn't do anything stupid.

Well... they'd probably still do some stupid things. He coughed out a laugh, blood hacking out of his lungs as it all began to fade. Good. They deserved to be a bit stupid. They were kids...

Just kids.

Hopefully, Silco remembers that...

Silco? Oh, Silco remembers. He'd been making a plan revolving around that. Kids are foolish. Kids are loyal. Children are painfully easy to manipulate and kill. Children are easy to make disappear.

Killing Vander and his children was quite literally on his upcoming schedule. It was going to be a glorious sort of revenge, making Vander watch it happen - helpless to stop it as he drowned in his own pacifism. It was going to be inhumane. The final nail in Silco's old coffin.

So pardon him for taking a moment to stare at the victims delivered to his doorstep. Half of him wants to laugh. The other half feels like he's been shoved back into that damn river.

The children only stare back, wide-eyed and curious. Scared too... haunted in some wonderfully poetic way.

"Can I help you?" Silco demands cooly after his disbelief has been satiated.

The pink one steps forward, naturally. She's Vander's little favorite, his poster child: basically a replica. Taking charge is probably laced in her veins.

She hands him a napkin.

"He told us to come here," she breathes, and it almost sounds like a prayer.

Silco cannot focus on anything but the napkin.

"Well... not here," the wily boy in the back disagrees slowly as he gives a scathing glance to a dead mouse in the corner. "He told us to find you."

Silco watches them carefully and then unfolds the napkin. If this is a trap it's ridiculous and definitely not Vander's idea. Perhaps these children are simply suicidal - or stupid.

He reads it.

Pauses. Reads it again.

He glances to that pink one again: Violet. Felicia's daughter. The other one is to her right, clinging to the elder's bruised knuckles. Powder... right?

Mylo. And Claggor.

Vander's children.

Vander's children!

He reads it one more time.

"It is kind of messy," Claggor's sheepish tone contradicts his appearance sharply. "He was in a rush -"

"I can read it," Silco snarls. He whirls around and plunges further into the bowels of the warehouse.

The children follow, blindly. Because they were told to. They follow the devil into his den because Vander told them to.

Why Silco let them, he'll never be able to explain. Never. Why he didn't finish was Vander started: destroy all remnants of their old life, including those damned children - he'll never say.

He can't. Because Vander sent him his children and a note. It changes nothing.

Except it changes everything.

[artandbrimstone]

// JRWI TOTAL MONSTER KILL EP 1

and,

your sister does not come home that night.

close ups under the cut

[twilightfreefaller]

THE KNIGHTS OF ANGST

Well i got involved in some silly fun and suddenly ended up drawing an anime team up shot of me and a few other users. We got lore and everything! We are The Knights of Angst protecting The Beast of the Forest, guardian of the Fountain of Fluff, from the Hunters of Fluff who would exploit The Beast and disrupt The Balance!

Also for anybody interested in who's who in this picture.

(SIDE NOTE: Anybody who suddenly finds a silly fun thing turning into an RP on somebody else's post. Please. Remember you are spamming them. If they aren't a participant of the impromptu RP or you don't know if they're cool with it. Please move somewhere else. That's just basic RP etiquette. And I'm sad to say I forgot that for a hot second. SO just consider this a PSA!) (Also: Keferon had nothing to do with the spamming they just ended up in the pic as the magic macguffin everybody was hunting.)

TAGS! @writinginkpen @glitchgh0sty @madcoincidence @spector-author @cosmique-oddity

Ghosty, Spector, I know you aren't in the anime team up pic, but you were part of the silly fun so I added you to the tags.

[jasonsbruce]

[veinsfullofstars]

🪞 Fallen angel... who do you see staring back from the Mirror? 🪞

(ID: Kirby series fanart of Galacta Knight and my personal interpretation of his Mirror World counterpart. GK hovers above facing slightly to our left, his feathery wings spread wide, shaded in lilac and tipped with gilded wing talons, a swallow-like tail visible. He holds his shield forward in his left hand (our right) and his lance to the side in his right (our left), a single magenta eye leering at the viewer through the visor of his mask. A halo of heart spears floats and shines angelically behind his horns. Below him, M!GK hovers in the same pose but flipped horizontally and without the halo. Visually, M!GK has mostly the same features as GK, with his color palette being darker and less saturated (dusty purple body, dark gray armor, gray mask, maroon lance, rose-gold horns and weapons accents). His eyes are not visible in the shadow of his mask, but there are signs of erosion running down the metal surface in rusty orange lines, almost like tear tracks. Instead of feathery wings, M!GK has wings composed of jagged shards of pink crystal, glittering and lit from within by a luminous glow. A few pale feathers can still be seen peeking out from his back. END ID.)

Hey, so... what if... I went a little insane for a minute? What if I just... concepted a character... for the sequel... to an AU... I've told no one about... and haven't even finished writing yet? What if I then... pulled the salt shaker labeled "ANGST" out of the pantry and just... unscrewed the cap all over this poor lad? Oh, and Galacta Knight's here, too, I guess.

Sketch started 02/21/24, render started 03/01/24, finished 03/06/24, updated for color correction 11/02/24. | Kintsugi AU Masterpost

[angeart]

hand slipped—

alts/woundless/progress under the cut

bonus: original pen sketch doodle–

[xxplastic-cubexx]

sorry just got reminded of the entirety of uncanny x-men #309 and how it's charles having a therapy session with himself about his love life and desires and how he kept sacrificing himself and his wants for The Cause and the whole time he imagines erik to represent his innermost thoughts in the form of a therapist to have him unravel all this

[soysaucevictim]

I just have the mental image of a mopey Roman being dragged around.

Rn, have the strongest image of Virgil gripping one of Roman's hands and Janus is grabbing the other.

*Insert elaborate system of cognition analysis about wtf is happening here.*

[sainteclectic]

maybe I'll lead you into the light

[vlarelythere]

TFW all your hopes and dreams, everything that you've ever wanted, and what you've worked so hard to achieve, just melts away between your fingertips.

All these kisses and fluff has made my brain swing wildly into needing angst territory, and I'm not even sure if this could count for daily kisses but I suppose Vlad could be kissing the top of clone Danny's head? (Danny's huge hair is just blocking the view)

Based on the painting Ivan the Terrible and His Son Ivan

[starflungwaddledee]

is that silhouette at the end of your last post supposed to be a morpho form of meta?

it looks like it has meta's wings and his galaxia

this fandom is incredible...

"what is the unintelligible shape in this shadow?!"

"pfft. starflung this is easy. despite the fact we can see only two of her tines and the hilt is wrong it is CLEARLY the legendary sword Galaxia."

kirby fans really are so powerful at picking up hints and clues from just a shred of information. anyway, here's your... reward?

and uh... and uh...

@phanzon no but it.... it could be.

[spork-supremacy]

like imagine Cole and Jay just having a casual conversation at some point right before the upcoming day of the departed (after crystalised) and they're just randomly thinking about death.

"Isn't it kinda weird that some of us have died so many times."

"You've all died once, you just don't remember."

"What about you?"

"I haven't. Guess the universe has never gotten around to me. "

"Heh, maybe it has something really special planned for you."

No, it just won't let me die. Believe me I've tried.

(also this specific thing is playing over the scene)