#idk how to tag this one exactly

[azurecanary]

At what point, does me simply mentioning in passing that i am a queer Christian, invite someone else to tell me that i will end up killed because of it

I swear, some people will be so incredibly against religion (as is their right), but as soon as they see a queer Christian, they are possessed by evangelical puritans

[me-beef]

@strangeravatar made a great point

i was gonna focus on the spike-hotboxing-celestia aspect but i got distracted somewhere along the way and i think i forgot what joke i was trying to make

but dont you think its interesting how many guards of the exact same color/body type she's managed to accrue?? i do

ooohh you want to go look at our stickers so bad

[hinamie]

i'm exactly as normal about him as I thought I'd be

[thesummerstorms]

You know that conversation you can have with Emmrich where he asks what your plans are for your body when you die?

I think Arsinoë accidentally horrified him. Not by clinging to non-Nevarran ideals about cremation, but by telling him she never thought anyone would care that much one way or the other.

She would be dead, so she wouldn't care. And honestly, a majority of compradi die as Fledglings without graduating; she thinks their bodies were probably burned (since you have to do something with bodies) but they certainly don't have funerals, so it certainly wasn't worth worrying about then.

Emmrich interjects, trying to wrangle his own shock long enough to point out that she's not a Fledgling now, so surely...?

Well if she dies now, Arsinoë all but shrugs, it would depend on the circumstances, wouldn't it? She isn't someone important like a Talon or the scion of an established Crow family. She certainly isn't Caterina Dellamorte, who warrants something verging on a State Funeral.

If she died, there is still a non-zero chance it would be at another Crow's hands, in which case it's anyone's guess what happens after.

If she dies honorably fulfilling a contract, then Viago might feel obligated to do something if he isn't pissed off at her failure and she's isn't still in Exile. He's her mentor, so probably he would manage at least a small pyre. Maybe even a flower or two for the flames if he's letting himself feel sentimental. Teia would probably be there because Viago was.

But just as often, when a contract goes wrong, there's no time to go back for the body. The mark get ahold of it, or whoever's left on the contract has to focus on survival rather than the dignity of a corpse that can't feel any of it.

But really, none of that would matter to Arsinoë, would it? She'd be off wherever dead souls end up going, or maybe in oblivion, who knows. She doesn't have any family to be horrified by her corpse unless you count Viago, who is Fifth Talon, has bigger things to worry about, and will get over it.

But anyway, why do you ask, Emmrich?

Emmrich is too aghast to answer clearly at that point because every single point of Arsinoë's answer goes so deeply against everything that is ingrained in him as part of the Mourn Watch, from the belief that a corpse just doesn't matter to her sincere belief that no one would care enough about her for any particular mourning rights.

And the thing is Emmrich does care. It's his professional duty to care, but he's also become fond of his young friend and he cannot handle imagining that she could die on this mission or the next and potentially receive no rites at all.

Cue Emmrich starting to plan how he's going to have Rook interred in the Grand Necropolis when the time comes. It may involve some string pulling, especially if (hopefully) she dies not on this mission but in the distant future, and even more so if he precedes her and has to leave the job in one of his colleague's hands. But Maker help him, there will be a plan and her death will be respected.

When it comes to light, Neve is uncertain and a little weirded out, but also a little offended by all this. She's fallen in love with Rook, but even before that, the respect between them would have warranted a pyre and Arsinoë's name on the Wall of Light if there was no one else to arrange things. Is this why she's never asked about what happened after Varric-

Lucanis is horrified by the idea of Arsinoë as one of the spirit-possessed skeletons in the Necropolis or one of the jewel-eyed skulls in its many niches; he snaps at Emmrich about Nevarran obsession and respecting Rook as Antivan.

Emmrich refuses to budge. She expected the Crows to do nothing for her. She deserves better, deserves to be remembered, even if she isn't Nevarran.

Lucanis seems fully stunned by the idea that Rook believed this in the first place, given Viago's attachment. Given Lucanis's own growing feelings. Emmrich does soften a little bit when he sees that Lucanis truly didn't realize, but he also doesn't fully divert his plans.

Gathering a grave-dowry is normally left to a lover or family member if the deceased was themselves unable, and Emmrich is neither. But needs must, and though his friend now seems attached to Neve and Lucanis, hearts can be fickle. A plan is better. So he puts away small things here or there, eyes which of Rook's enchanted rings and amulets she seems to favor just in case.

It almost helps him live with the knowledge that Arsinoë believed she would die unmourned. Almost.

[sereniv]

Can someone who is NOT a zionist tell me why Jewish people have so much conspiracy and hate? when did it start and why? how and why did it spread?

Preferably someone who is jewish or really knows what theyre talking about answer

[pokemon-radical-red]

I hate it when I headcanon a character who’s canonically a girl as a trans man and make ships of him and a character who’s canonically a guy and I refer to it as a gay/mlm/guyxguy/whatever ship and someone gets mad. Like omg let trans people have FUNNNNN. Why are queer headcanons and genderbends cool until they’re saying that the character is trans???

“OMGGG you’re so misogynistic I can’t believe you would erase FEMALE representation!!!”

and like half of the characters in the franchise are women, and a total of… NONE of the characters are trans men. Also, my headcanon doesn’t change the source material. If my stuff upsets you, you can block me and go engage with the source or maybe every single other fanwork, since mine is the only trans man hc for this character that I’ve ever seen.

or when people are like “WTF??? this is so transphobic!!! how dare you imply that a character who looks like that could be a trans man?!?! do you think that trans men are women or something??? she uses she/her, and you’re misgendering her!”

No, I don’t think that being a trans man makes you a woman or vice versa. That’s why it’s a headcanon, and the headcanon is that this character is actually a trans man and not a woman at all! You’ll never guess what pronouns most trans men had to use at some point in their lives, and you really won’t like it when you find out about pre-(or no-)transition trans men… or trans men who are in the closet… or trans men who don’t know that they’re trans yet.

“But the character is a kid!!! Saying they’re trans is sexualizing them.”

I’ve seen this one from other queer people. Like did you miss when all of the homophobes said this about your identity, or do you think that bigotry is only bad when it’s directed at you?

“Why would you say ‘testosterone could fix her’??? Are you trying to call her a delusional woman?”

Why would your brain even go to that first? This literally has to be a bad faith reading, because there’s no way that someone could see what I said and get this unless they were specifically looking for something to be mad at me for.

(Note for anyone unaware: “Estrogen would’ve fixed him!” was a meme going around at the time I said this. I’m not sure if it’s still super big, but this was a joke to the effect of that.)

“So girls can’t be tomboys anymore? You just wanna trans everyone?”

This is like actual real life transphobic rhetoric. This isn’t even just shitting on my headcanon, but in fact, sending transphobic hate to a trans man. Thanks 👍. Maybe you should go send JK Rowling another message about how much you loved her essay instead of bothering me.

[rivereleven]

Edge of midnight is so good because it’s like. The little things. One moment i think about in particular is,

(spoilers for Episode 6 and a little bit of 5).

When Marius recounts his dream not ONCE does he ever mention the fact that the ‘undead’ he was killing was specifically vampires nor does he mention the fire (if Im remembering correctly.) Despite his justification for this dream there is still this sense of shame if you will. Its so so good

[gobblewonkrs]

Hard to say why, but recently been thinking a lot abt planes? Here's something I think looked nice, if I make more mayb I'll throw those up here as well :)

[xdwtbvftu]

trans wallace question mark

[optimistic-autistic]

i personally do like broadway epic iii but the london (2018. not west end. take that thang away from me) one is my favourite by far. like- ''the sun rose and fell in his chest when he held her / he felt the earth moving without and within'' is such a great moment. and it also keeps the garden imagery??? i'm in love. it's so beautiful agdhjzfhs

[blue--flammingo]

cringetober 2023 and 2024 day four

(4 - 23 - angel x demon)

well i instantly thought the "x" in angel x demon meant like ship sooo...

(like this one sm)

(4 - 24 - fursona/fursuit)

uh sort of a fursona?? I have to confess : I don't think i've ever drawn furries (and I don't think I ever will again)

(have mixed feelings abt this one)

[spaciebabie]

unamed is a "failed" (really they only failed b/c they were unable to be controlled) biological weapon and dahlia is a military girlie who has started to be disillusioned w/what she's actually fighting for (its nothing: spoilers) and it comes to a head when her squadron is tasked with terminating this "biological weapon" that has somehow evaded the government for years and killed a good portion of their soldiers. everyone is super vague about it, they tell the squadron (minus the leader) basically what they need to know and nothing more. its a biological weapon. it can kill you. it has killed before. it has the ability to rip chunks of concrete off of buildings and destroy entire blocks of city. you must kill it.

now dahlia is scared for her life. shaking in her military boots, she knows shes a good soldier, but is she fit for this? shes not the best around and she doesnt try to be, there are others who fill that position for her, but after this? she could become a military hero. it makes her stomach curl up in a knot b/c she already was considering quitting because of the shit shes seen. maybe this was a sign that she should actually quit

but she doesnt

and thats the best/worst mistake of her life.

they get out to where this biologican weapon has made a "home" for itself and its run down, stinky, dirty, just the worst possible place any living thing can...well live.

so thats immediately a red flag for her! but, she has orders to follow.

they get all stationed up. they're going to ambush this thing and put it down like a dog. its a bit sad she thinks to herself as she sets up the rifle for use. shes the one tasked with sniping this thing when it emerges. her squad mates all light up the in ear radio with testing testing...bravado to delta barking out various military speak. shes not really paying attention. shes just thinking about the "biological weapon" that had the misfortune of being born into this world.

yet another innocent life ruined by the government. and better yet the same entity that created this life is going to end it. that truth is more bitter than the blackest coffee in the world. and after this, dahlia says, shes going to finally quit. she thinks about what form this biological weapon could have taken. some kind of big cat? maybe a wolf or dog (she knew they were experiementing with those). maybe some unorthodox animal like a cow maybe a chicken (she didnt know why chicken experimentation was kept under such strict wraps but whatever. the military is weird.) or ape. really, there were no limits. the big guys did what they wanted. and then one of her squad mates gives the signal that the weapon has left its chambers and headed into the main area. dahlia sniffs (its freezing out here), steadies her breathing, and coils her finger around the trigger...she waits for the target to enter the view of her scope and...

its a person.

its a whole ass living breathing person. a skinny, malnourished looking one at that. they're effectively wearing rags, their dark skin is ashen, their cheekbones protrude from their face, it looks like they havent had a good bath in awhile, and dahlia falters. her breath hitches. she removes her finger from the trigger. surely this isnt the weapon they're speaking of. this guy looked like they could barely pick up a spoon. so she radios her squad leader who had seen a picture of the thing and is like, "hey i think there's a civilian out here" leader is like, "okay we'll check it out hold your fire". a moment passes. the civillian is still just kind of standing there not doing anything. looking around absent mindedly. kicking rocks. interesting. when they catch the real bioweapon she's gonna go down there and help this person out. get them some clothes, a bath, and-

"there are no civilians around solider, free to shoot" what. surely she must be mistaken. and so she asks again. and is met with the same response. so she asks more clearly, "is the bioweapon a person?" there's a beat of hesitation before the leader confirms that yes, that poor looking fellow below is actually what they were sent here to kill.

but she doesnt have time to register what that means or throw down her weapon because the ground is suddenly ripped from under her.

[slavhew]

Hello!

If you're not too busy, would you mind listing some of the things you think count as death flags for Mr. Spender?

There's the obvious fact that he's the "old" mentor to group of young protagonists, but what else do you think would count?

OHH BOY ok so I'd think I'm a crackpot for this but since we're talking about Zack "Foreshadowing" Morrison. I have some thoughts

No harm in leading with the (chronologically) first thing that jumped out at me:

This one IMMEDIATELY made me antsy whenever I came back to it after my initial read, and considering Zack has referred to it on twitter in the past as one of their favorite jokes it's definitely not been forgotten about.

Second, the sheer amounts of near-misses, jokey or not, of Spender narrowly avoiding specifically lightning

Again, not much, but it's weird that it happened thrice, latter two of which had real gravitas rather than an one-off joke.

And third, Spender himself. He's repeatedly shown himself to be kind of a self sacrificing idiot, as well as prideful to a fault. Granted, it's both him and Mina trying to take on all the responsibility of saving Mayview and its inhabitants from their fate.. But Spender is exactly that right measure of doesn't-value-himself-enough (chest footprint aftercare or lack thereof), having an obscene amount of power (enables his loner act + pride) and poor judgement that has the capacity to put him at great risk. And it has!

Spender has not only shown low enough self-esteem to view himself as the de-facto scapegoat for the safety of the town, but also prideful enough to make very bad calls that end up in people, often himself, hurt (COUGH FORGE INCIDENT COUGH)

This is all conjecture, but it's definitely enough to make me worried about him :') Even if all this doesn't mean he'll necessarily die he's definitely getting (even more) seriously injured at some point. I love the guy but he's so far doing a horrible job of convincing me he wants to live bad enough to circumvent at least that

[lunarharp]

sillay kitty comic (cw animal abandonment ?? but it's fine.)

[sockdooe]

Voltron cats……….drawn on magma

[ohwolfling]

Hi, welcome to Galeposting with a sound design drop out who never seriously learned composition but can pick up on vibes and has a lot of feelings. I'll be linking to blog posts by composers and every musical piece I talk about.

Gale's introduction music has this instrumentation that feels like the wind, then these mournful swells above it and under it. I'll dig around more but I think the most consistent things in Gale's theme, the Gale-ness of it, is this soft, curious, playful sort of bouncing thing. Some of the more wind-like instrumentation I think is just... the Weave, it goes between comforting and foreboding in every Gale scene. The more sinister and haunting pieces you hear less and less in your romance with Gale (though I think all romance has the same variation to Down by the River to a certain extent - I need to go through all of them to track where it DOES shift- there's a lot of natural sound with Gale for sure and the Act II romance scene has the same sort of playful plodding and adds string, lmk if it's the same in any other act ii romances), so those to me feel decidedly Mystra?

I have a few pieces that I listen to as a sort of IDEA of what Gale's theme would be without the influence of Mystra or his conflicted emotions about the Weave, still a little playful, still deadly curious, and ultimately mournful. Our inescapable sad boy...

The French Library by Franz Gordon jumps around minor chords in a way that threatens to become triumphant or whimsical but ultimately returns to the same melancholic steps, sort of folding in on itself. It sort of reminds me of Mozart's Symphony 40 having a depressive episode instead of a bit of rage.

If you want these things but in a way that feels like a lullaby, a clumsy attempt at comfort, another Gale staple for me right now is Midwayer by Joep Beving. Beving has spoken about his music being a way for him to re-engage with his humanity, which I think you can FEEL on this entire album, but especially here. This quote in particular I really love in thinking about my little Gale playlist-

“We are either trained or we’re designed to respond to particular stimulants. For me it’s rediscovering the human skill in things so for me the message would be we have a common or shared understanding of what it’s like to be human. And we should not lose that connection.”

This brings me to a favorite fictional parallel I've found with Gale - Gaius Baltar from Battlestar Galactica. Composer Bear McCreary stayed away from themes in a traditional sense with a focus on music that world builds, establishes stakes/settings, over traditional sci fi theme/motif spamming, HOWEVER, you can track all major players through the show, which includes Gaius... I'm gonna go into these character parallels mostly by digging into the score for Battlestar Galactica below the cut here.

Gaius, a mortal plucked up by a God via a Six Cylon. The Six Cylons were designed for love- in this case, while God's feelings towards Gaius seem ever changing, focused on his PURPOSE over his comfort or happiness or anything else (SOUND FAMILIAR), Caprica Six very genuinely loves Gaius & they get what I think is one of the most beautiful endings in the show (arguably happy, although I don't think "happy" was the goal of any of those endings). Gaius' Folly is instead of loving Caprica as equals he walks right into the hands of the Cylons by handing her his ego instead and giving her access to a defense mainframe for "journalism" (she ended the world, oops). Anyway, in Gaius' pieces, you always have mournful swells, ominous things above and below him, the conflict of a man chosen by God, tortured by God, loved by something and someone who borders the line between a demi god AND is the fruit of man's attempt to play God.

Bear McCreary on the earliest interations of Gaius Baltar's theme, starting properly in season 2 (blog post here):

Dark Unions is on my work-in-progress Gale Dekarios playlist and I didn't realize it until I sat down to try and pull pieces unique to Gale that it is almost, sonically and structurally, a dark echo of how Gale is introduced. If you listen to one into the other with no knowledge of the work they're from, it feels like they could be manifestations of the same piece.

When Gaius Baltar accidentally wields his relationship to God and stumbles into creating a cult (I mean, THE PARALLELS), his theme evolves to a kind of chant, The Cult of Baltar. Bear McCreary describes it as a drone, but the same whimsy and desperation remains. Here's what Bear McCreary has to say about the dichotomy of spiritual, cult leader, hand of God Gaius, sonically and thematically (McCreary's blog post here):

And here is the prayer, translated to Anglo-Saxon, that the cult says to Baltar, and some thoughts about the two sides of Gaius Baltar still warring with one another, showing up sometimes where the other should instead:

Are there any pieces of music in Baldur's Gate that define a Mystra theme more concretely? For those of you who have done multiple romances all the way through (I still haven't finished a play through, I'm TERRIBLE), is there anything unique to Gale that I should pick at more?

The Shape of Things to Come isn't technically a theme for Gaius or any one character, but it's so pivotal to how he transcends himself at the same time that he is forced to acknowledge his own frailty as compared to god(s). If you're unfamiliar with the show, the scene it first appears in is worth gazing at... (spoilers obv but trust me, you'll be confused & it will still be worth watching the show) it inhabits, along with Gaius, a kind of liminal space that Gale does in the story of Baldur's Gate I'd argue, and this sort of sweeping piece is the kind of piece Gale DESERVES in a world where this game gets to be even longer and about every origin character as individuals.

anyway...