#i haven't finished with this yet btw

[eliza-makepeace]

murtagh book thoughts

okay, it's been a while since i finished the murtagh book, and i've managed to figure out in coherent thoughts what it made me feel. it's coherent thoughts but it's not a coherent exposition, so you're warned.

in terms of the story, how its divided and all of that -- i liked the first half of the book very much. very enjoyable, murtagh's dealing with his past and his issues, trying to find where the stone comes from, we see his and thorn's bond... fun stuff. some parts are heartwrenching, but in general, it's interesting and enjoyable. still, it feels a bit like a videogame, where you have to get to point a, to point b, to point c in order to get your objective. and as much as i appreciate the new depths of worldbuilding paolini takes us into in "murtagh", i still feel like it's not "proper" worldbuilding.

by that i mean it feels like one of those old western movies where you know the characters can't walk too far away because what you think is a long field is actually a painted wall. the concepts are there: lyreth, the girl who fancied him at court... but you try to look a bit further into them and they're hollow.

the second half of the book, when they meet bachel and chaos ensues... not really my cup of tea. and it's not because i don't like storylines like that, where there's an interesting and fucked-up female character, cults and so forth. that's actually a pretty interesting idea, if only it had been properly executed. personally, my biggest issue with it is that murtagh already had gone through this. he'd already gone through having his agency taken from him, having to do horrible deeds because he can't help it, feeling hopeless and used... and i'm not complaining about this decision because murtagh is my poor little meow meow (although he is). i'm complaining because i feel like it reduces his experiences with galbatorix to nothing. back in inheritance, him being galby's name slave was the worst thing that could and had happened to him. now? bachel's worse. but it's the same principle. and i still think galby had more reason to be worse mentally and in terms of identity, for murtagh, than bachel was.

it also erases all of the healing and character development he'd gone through in the first half of the book. you could argue "oh, now that he's experienced freedom he can deal with bachel better than he could with galby" but i don't really agree and i don't really care. what's the point in destroying him in the ic, putting him relatively back together in the first half, and then obliterating him again (and worse, apparently) in the latter half. and then he's sad, and tired and devastated, but less so than in inheritance (which doesn't make sense if bachel was worse for him than galby), when he sees nasuada again.

the irony that murtagh's bond with alín feels more organic and natural than his with nasuada.... not in terms of characters being alike, just in the way it's written. paolini could've bothered with showing scenes of m and n at farthen dur, bonding, "courting" as he put it, so that the rest of their relationship actually has a strong base for the rest of the ic (giving a proper explanation which originally isn't there because the ic is in eragon's pov and not murtagh's), and so that their reunion is far more meaningful because it shows nasuada and him knew each other, actually bonded with each other before murtagh was kidnapped in eldest, to the point of developing romantic feelings for each other. if paolini hadn't put murtagh in random side quests throughout the book, he could've shown this and it would've worked better imo.

personally i think we didn't get enough tornac, or selena. i think murtagh should've pondered more about what it meant that eragon was brom's kid. what it meant about selena, how that changed murtagh's perception of her as a person. i'm a bit tired she gets reduced to just being his and eragon's mom, and it seems like that's the only way paolini wants them to see her too. murtagh seeing his mom like an individual, a person with her lights and shadows, with her depth, might have been an interesting thing and a new way to see himself as her son. every time paolini is about to reach something interesting with his characters, he changes course and i think that's a shame.

[nicecrumbart]

Keep thinking about that one scene in secret life

[cozylittleartblog]

Columbo and the Knight (1984)

put me in the universe where Columbo ran through the 1980s and had a crossover episode with Knight Rider. I think they deserved it, and I am not just saying that because they're my two favorite Old Shows. @telebeast wrote a little fanfic blurb about it and I HAD to visualize it into a comic (which is also the longest comic I have finished thus far at five pages...), so writing credit goes to them.

Autism W!

[neon-catarina]

heart but he has eyes for about 2 seconds before the mean old blue flowers got to them

ignore the lyrics i didnt feel like removing them

[sf3uuf]

I've been thinking about JJBA again...

[le-chevalier-au-lion]

le dragon rouge: rosquez [e]

“Grandmother,” Valentino drawls out. Marc’s fangs gleam, wicked—he can’t stop staring. They’re smaller than he had imagined. Sharper, very white. “What big teeth you have got.”

Marc lets out a snort. Doesn’t smile and doesn’t blink either. “All the better to eat you with.”

It’s—disquieting. It is also disquieting when he does it in press conferences, or when he’s listening hard to whatever bullshit Valentino is saying, but nothing softens the blow here. Marc’s attention falls over him intensely, scrapes along his nerves.

Hungry—which happens to be the crux of their current issue.

Valentino is thinking about it—Little Red Riding Hood. Being eaten. Same difference. Marc’s mouth is close, is the thing, and bitten pink. Almost pretty enough to distract him from what it hides, how his voice comes out lisped through his teeth.

It sounds a bit goofy, except everything Valentino can see is how ashen his face looks, the marble motionless of his posture.

He’s acutely, unfortunately aware of his heartbeat on his jugular, also.

Valentino is not surprised by anything that has happened thus far. It was right there on his files— MÁRQUEZ, Marc: vampire, 21 years old . So no, not surprised.

And he caught Marc feeding, once. On a fucking club bathroom, a girl in a mini green dress pressed between him and the grimy wall. She was screaming, but no, not that away. Less like she had teeth on her throat draining her dry, more like she had a couple of fingers in her cunt.

So sue him, he is a little curious.

“Valentino,” Marc says, doing a terrible job of trying to look steady with his huge, liquid eyes and the pinched tight press of his lips, like he’s salivating and wants to hide it. “Are you—ok?”

“Yep,” he pops the p obnoxiously. Makes himself grin. “Come on, food is getting cold.”

“Hmm—okay.”

It doesn’t sound very certain. Valentino is pretty sure he should be offended.

Marc bends down to hover over him anyway, pressing Valentino against the bed, chest on chest, worse than chains. His thighs had been cold, braced around his hips, but he’s fucking freezing —like metal left out in the winter. He can feel the hair on his standing on end. His little flinch, trapped under him.

It’s June in Spain, he shouldn’t burn like ice. It makes no sense.

The cold is better than looking at Marc, though. Easier. Kid’s—whatever, a predator species, something bad and wicked, but he doesn’t usually look like that. Doesn’t usually look like much of anything unless he’s up on a bike and taking them all for idiots.

And he’s terribly sweet for Valentino too.

He isn’t sweet in this bed. Eyes too dark, with an inorganic, lifeless glint to them. Body too still, never fidgeting, every move deliberate, seamless.

Valentino had read about it once—uncanny valley. That there had to be a reason for humans to be afraid of things that look like them but aren’t them.

Marc’s nose brushes against the hollow of his throat. Valentino swallows around nothing—mouth dry and sour. His pulse spikes. He wonders how much of that the vampire nuzzling him can feel, smooths out a scoff before it bursts out of chest.

“It’s alright,” Marc aims for soothing and misses it by a mile. He’s panting, and each word sounds like it was pried laboriously from his mouth. “I’m not going to hurt you.”

Valentino laughs. Can’t help it, or how gravelly it sounds. “I thought that was the point.”

Marc huffs. The chill of his face pressed on the side of his neck is like a naked blade. 

“No, it isn’t.”

There’s this something tugging under his skin. Not fear—well, not only fear, Valentino has an alright sense of preservation for a moto rider, and he isn’t exactly thrilled by pain—but still there. Prodding like thorns.

Annoyance, except he doesn’t know why, doesn’t know anything other than the fact it makes him itchy, restless. He’s a pinned butterfly, the sheets creaking under him.

Marc’s lips skim over his carotid, icy, a little cruel—which is new. Horrible. And horrible in the way it makes his stomach clench. Valentino sucks in a rattling breath. His tongue might as well be glued to the roof of his mouth.

“I can find someone else.” Marc inches away from him, tries to get up.

Valentino clamps his hand on the back of Marc’s neck, watches him jolt like a live wire. “You don’t want to,” he says, thrumming, runrunrun instinct screaming at him—he sounds catlike still. A little steelier than he’d planned to. “I think you want to eat me real bad.”

Marc makes a noise—helpless, half-choked, amused. “Yeah, I do.”

“Well. It’s polite to ask.”

“Please, please,” he mutters, a laugh threaded into it. Because of course Marc wouldn’t be ashamed of begging—Valentino chews on the inside of his cheek until it aches, something white-hot pulsing through him. “May I bite you?”

May I . Proper little boy, isn’t he?

Valentino lolls his neck to the side. “Be my guest.”

He sounds very magnanimous. It’s almost a joke, another one, and Marc—

Marc grabs his chin. Bears down on his shoulder to keep him in place. Valentino thought—he thought he’d hesitate a lot more. He doesn’t know why he did.

Then there are teeth.

It hurts. It really fucking hurts. Valentino makes a noise, strangled, like he’s sawed off a chunk of his tongue. Cold sweeps over him—worse than an ice bath after Sepang, the shock making his body seize and spasm.

Marc might as well be raking teeth over his raw nerve endings. Injecting him with poison.

Too much to feel, and barely anything he can untangle. Barely anything he wants to untangle. Valentino’s head goes taffy thick, fuzzy around the edges. His vision blurs, breaking in blocks of color and little else.

He would flinch if he could. Maybe. Or maybe not. As that haze rises, Valentino relaxes muscle by muscle, and he might as well go down a drain, bones liquid, that jolt of nauseous fear bled out of him along his consciousness. Ha .

Marc moans, a quiet, wrecked little noise, halfway to a sob, like he does when Valentino is mean to him, pushing in his spit-slick cock after quali and pressing his face against a wall to keep him quiet.

Everything about him is still cold , glacial, except his frantic tongue on his neck. That feels scorching, and Christ, Valentino isn’t sure about pain anymore. It’s a blurry, feverish thing crawling under his skin. Too much. Too big. Valentino isn’t sure about pleasure either.

There’s only Marc, and that wet sucking sound right against his ear. He laps Valentino up, hungry and fucking shameless about it.

He feels his heart pumping, feels his blood moving the wrong way inside his veins—into Marc. It’s the most in-his-body Valentino has ever been.

A high, keening groan echoes between them, through the pounding in Valentino’s head. It has to be coming from him. He can’t stop it, or close his mouth, or think about moving. Valentino sinks— ah , ah , ah , dizzy when he tries to figure out he’s hurting, or not hurting, or feeling good.

He’s shaking. Like that one time when he brushed against a live wire by accident and couldn’t unclench his hand, stood there jolting until Stefania pushed him.

It sizzles inside—that feeling he can’t name, like an orgasm that just won’t quit until Valentino can’t decide if it’s great or worse than a knife between his ribs.

Valentino drifts on nothing. Time drips around him, and his blood drips into Marc. Marc who’s starving, who doesn’t ever care about stopping. Valentino is getting wrangled like his Honda on the corners, bent to his will. He laughs about it. Tries to.

Marc would eat him whole. He would.

And it isn’t great , but Valentino lets himself be taken over, fights to keep his eyes open—so he can look at the ceiling. At the tanned sliver of skin on Marc’s nape.

Everything spins. Loses meaning.

It all comes crashing down when Marc lets go of him. Valentino blinks, his eyes gritty—shudders, too. Entire chunks of his body are unresponsive, numb.

Marc presses his face against his chest, stays there. He’s panting, shoulders heaving with it, fever-hot to the touch and thrumming with wild energy. Can’t seem to stop fidgeting above Valentino, his fingers restless on the bones of his collar, back and forth and back and forth, right where it pushes against his skin.

Slowly, with Marc keeping him pinned to the bed, Valentino realizes his vision has focused again.

His senses come back to him one by one—the cool, smooth sheets under him, the rancid yellow lamplight, Marc’s strong things braced around him, the staleness in his mouth, the metallic smell thick and soupy in the air.

Marc leans back. Still fucking disquieting—except not quite. His cheeks are flushed pink. There’s red all over his lips, all over his chin, messy like when Valentino hooks his fingers into the babyfat of his cheeks and makes him show the come on his tongue, tells him to not swallow. He isn’t stone, or cold metal, or motionless.

And his eyes. They’ve gone from unnatural to searing, dark as pitch.

Alive. Hard to miss it when he was so other before.

It’s pretty. Reminds Valentino of that one time he saw an eagle pluck a kitten from the side of the road in Tavullia, the glossy blackness of its feathers.

Marc shifts again on his lap. It hits him like being highsided into the asphalt. Valentino scrambles for air, his cock oversensitive in the cooling stickiness inside his underwear. He had—

“Uh.”

“I’m sorry,” Marc snorts, not sounding sorry at all. He’s rubbing himself against his thigh, Valentino realizes. Looking fucking obscene about it, his budge fat and heavy, straining against his shorts. “It happens sometimes.”

“Alright,” he says eloquently, in an ugly jumble of syllables. Lets his eyes linger. “Aren’t you going to do anything about it.”

It isn’t a question.

So Marc immediately shimmies out of his clothes—awkward, overeager—and wraps a hand around the big cock he doesn’t fucking use for anything because he acts like he’s going to die without Valentino inside him.

He’s flushed dark, wet . Valentino isn’t sure he wants it—but he’s thinking about it anyway, Marc’s thick dick in his ass and Marc’s teeth on his throat, all at once. Being eaten. Consumed. All of it. If he could, he’d scorch that thought to ash, and his tacky underwear too.

His next breath comes out funny, a little choked. Marc, uncaring godling that he is, throws his head back, opens his mouth to moan.

He works his hand like he’s on time attack, no finesse—ruts against it, in this ugly, brash desperation that Valentino can’t help but stare at. It’s too soon, and he might not have enough blood for an erection, but his own cock twitches anyway. The pain of it is like being pricked with a needle.

Marc didn’t want to stop—he knows that. Would’ve loved to drink him dry, keep him for himself, hishishis in the gore in his stomach. It makes Valentino clammy, jittery. It also makes Valentino think about cutting him open, burrowing in.

All the way up to his elbow. Or mouth first—have them match.

“You needed it,” Valentino hisses. It’s easier to say than you could’ve killed me .

“I did—fuck, you’re so—l don’t how you let—”

Valentino doesn’t like what Marc is about to say. He hooks his fingers inside his gore-splattered mouth, right over his retracting fangs. They’re shaking, chilly, an uncoordinated weight. Marc clearly doesn’t care—garbles out this reedy noise, eyelashes fluttering low over his cheeks, and tries to sink his teeth in.

“Don’t,” Valentino hisses.

Marc goes wide-eyed, nods. He’s sweet like this, almost.

“Can I—,” he asks frantically, in a slur of words, leaking all over his hand.

Valentino toys with saying no , just to see if he’d cry, or get angry, or ignore him and keep going. Lets it shine through in his face. Marc whines, his dangerous mouth wobbling pitifully. That smooths the unkindness unfurling in his chest like an overgrown rose bush, all thorns.

“Of course,” Valentino croons, remarkably gentle, in rehearsed showmanship.

Gentleness comes easy with Marc’s leash in his hand. Easier at his harsh, stuttered, “ Valentino ,” when he sweeps a calloused thumb over the head of his cock.

Marc topples forward, curled above him, the blood on his chin drying brown and stark against his skin, the pale scar running there. The blood on Valentino’s throat is fresh, though, still dripping sluggishly on the sheets. His head is light, untethered, running in manic racehorse circles around Christ, Christ, Christ .

Each time he blinks, his eyes feel sandy, and his skin is clammy, underwear scraping along his dick, but he’s wired wrong under Marc’s second-hand heat—hungry too. Reckless with it.

“You’d take anything I gave you, no?” He hums genially, the words cracking like a whip between them, Marc scrambling to nod. “Whore.”

It drips honeyed from his lips— puttana .

When Marc comes, he does it with a small, wounded noise, jaw twitching. But Valentino told him no, so he doesn’t bite. Just shakes, pants open-mouthed and wanting, with his come trickling over Valentino’s chest. His eyes plead, and he clings to that, to the uncomplicated cruelty that this opens up.

Tomorrow, Valentino will get rid of everything—the bloody sheets, his clothes, the ache in his veins at Marc’s wicked, white fangs and the fat weight of his soft, come-tacky cock.

Tomorrow, for sure.

[halichor]

Redesigned Elian for an AU but I don't have an outfit for him yet, so have this lil sketch I made while working between comms ✨

[i-wear-the-cheese]

Me approaching a random lesbian couple: so uh, which one of you is the dark religious fanatic and which is the brawny two-handed weapon fighter?

[flickering-nightfall]

ubemaster (they are ube colored to me)

[wow-its-four]

Constantly thinking about Grantaire surviving the barricades and the grief that would follow .

Marius not knowing he's still alive, Grantaire locking himself in his apartment .

They see each other while both going to the bakery or something. Marius has a child with him. Grantaire realizes how much he missed.

[alicenpai]

finally rewatching utena after 8 years - i didn't finish it the 1st time and im determined to finish it now, im about 1/3 of the way in 👁 the series has a lot of themes like identity and idealism, that resonate with me more now that im older. definitely the kind of thing i can see myself drawing... also rewatching kaiba. can't wait for the waterworks!!

[justanothermachine]

Sonic Hater Club

also slightly different camera angle w/ more glitter?

[waitineedaname]

hiiii lily what is this ‘orv’ i have been seeing…..

HIIII MIKE. SMILES. orv is Omniscient Reader's Viewpoint! it's a webnovel with an ongoing webtoon adaption and it is making me Fucking Crazy. basically the premise there's this really unpopular really long webnovel called Three Ways to Survive an Apocalypse, and for years, Kim Dokja has been the only reader. when the novel finally ends, the author sends him an email with the txt file of the whole novel, and then suddenly the novel is wiped from the internet and in that instant, the events of the novel begin taking place in Kim Dokja's world. the apocalypse begins and humanity is subjected to cruel scenarios and challenges livestreamed for the entertainment of these powerful entities called constellations, and as the only one who read the story to its end, Kim Dokja is the only one fully equipped with knowledge of how this story goes (or at least, how it originally went)

it is SO good. it lures you in like "ooh this is a normal reverse isekai" and then ends up being CRAZY. it deals with questions about the boundary between characters and Real People and whether that distinction really matters, and it's one of those stories that looks the audience dead in the eye and dares you to look away first. literary devices are made Real (oh fourth wall we're really in it now...) and it plays with narrative voice and pov and unreliable narration in such fun ways. it is ultimately about the value of stories and the value of being a reader and the choice to wrestle with the story that's been written for you in favor of the story you really want to tell. it's also about Kim Dokja having something Deeply Wrong With Him skdlfjlksdjf the journey i went on with him was "okay he's a reader insert who reads novels as escapism, i get it" -> "oh actually he has something wrong with him" -> "oh he has something Wrong With Him" -> "WHAT. WHAT THE FUCK. HELLO. WHAT WAS THAT." I'm obsessed with him.

I read the webtoon first which I think is a pretty effective onboarding point! some of the art had my jaw on the FLOOR it's so cool. the webtoon has adapted roughly the first third of the whole novel so far, and if you want to read the novel just dm me and I'll hit you up with the epub file lol (not just mike but anyone who is interested!)

[gotchibam]

Hello!! I've set-up another ko-fi goal as I'm saving up again for my personal budget. My current freelance work has been unreliable lately so I'm having financial troubles again ;_;

My commissions are open! If they’re a bit too much, I also have a few discord emotes (plus adoptables) in my ko-fi shop if you’d like to support in a small way ;w; And ofc, tips are also very much welcome!

All tips + commissions I receive will add up to this goal! As always, each & every support I get is greatly appreciated. Thank you so much!! 🙏🙏🙏

☕ My ko-fi page: https://ko-fi.com/gotchibam

✨ Commissions page: https://ko-fi.com/gotchibam/commissions

[momentomori24]

So I only watched a couple of routes for Flipside but now I'm fully convinced that Nicole's characterisation either got handed to someone else or was just changed entirely. I knew she was different in Re-Up and I had an inkling on how but I couldn't 100% place my finger on it until this instalment came out. I'm starting to feel like whoever wrote her here didn't completely get her character in the first game. Is that just me.

[melina-mellow]

Kinilumi fluff and it's just Kinich gently kissing the nightsoul tattoos on Lumine's shoulders and thighs or calling her by her ancient name.