#if youve got a question abt it feel free to ask! ive got a whole thing planned i just havent written very much of it

[liloinkoink]

today i offer you a dramatic no context scene from the middle of a beauty and the beast au. tomorrow? who knows...

After the seventh time Ren falls asleep in with Martyn in his room, Ren gives him back his knife.

He’d taken it the day they met, along with all the other trinkets Martyn had been collecting since he first stepped foot in the castle. Martyn hadn’t understood the point, then—sure, take back everything he stole, but what is Martyn going to do with a knife? With deadly claws and a long reach, Ren could tear his throat out long before he could do anything with a dagger. Martyn wouldn’t even dream of being able to get close with his stupid knife. Why even bother taking it except to demoralize him even further?

Lying against Ren’s sleeping body, Martyn understands.

It would be easy, is the thing. Ren sleeps light, but he’s adjusted to having Martyn around. He’s no longer cracking his eye open every time Martyn shifts his legs, doesn’t raise his head whenever Martyn touches his side. He wouldn’t see it coming at all, and it would be his own fault for trusting a stranger to brush the dirt and knots out of his hair.

Ren is an idiot. Giving Martyn his dagger back will be the last thing he ever does.

Martyn sits up slowly, listening to the sound of Ren breathing. It doesn’t change, not even as Martyn pushes Ren’s tail out of his lap.

He always sleeps well on the nights Martyn is in here, doesn’t he? Might have something to do with how long he fights falling asleep, trying his best to talk to Martyn for as long as possible. Martyn is starting to recognize the signs of when he’s losing that fight—his eyes close, though he shakes his head to try to keep them open, to keep his gaze on Martyn as long as he can. His words start to trail off, no matter how desperately he struggles to keep up their conversation, until his words turn dreamlike, incomprehensible. The constant wagging of his tail slows to a gentle tap, then stops entirely.

Ren’s insistence on fighting off sleep has never made any sense to Martyn, either, but so few things about Ren do.

Not that it matters now, anyway.

Martyn turns, as slowly as possible, back toward Ren. Still, he doesn’t react, not even a twitch of his ear. He’s fast asleep, has no idea what’s coming for him.

Carefully, without breaking his stare, Martyn reaches for his dagger.

Ren hadn’t thought anything of Martyn setting it on the side table, in the place where the brush usually goes. Hadn’t thought anything of giving it to Martyn at all, the little blade held proudly between his teeth.

Maybe it had been a taunt—Just one of his own fangs had been the size of Martyn’s weapon. Martyn isn’t sure if he believes that, though.

Ren… doesn’t seem the type.

Ren is trusting. Far, far too trusting. Martyn had lasted one day, one day of Ren’s posturing, and the king had folded immediately to following him like a pup. Bringing his meals, assigning him easy tasks, accompanying him throughout the day, convincing him to rest when the sun sinks to the tree line, inviting Martyn to sleep at his side.

Martyn holds the dagger in his right hand, now, knuckles white around the hilt.

For a monster, Ren is naive. His eyes shine with joy as he stands at Martyn’s side, as though that’s something he should be happy about. Didn’t anyone ever tell him? There are things crueler than beasts running around these woods.

Martyn reaches out, slowly, with his left hand. He feels around Ren’s fur with his fingers, looking for Ren’s pulse. He feels it under his fingers, a steady rhythm. Martyn glances to Ren’s face—Still does nothing. There’s not even a flicker of his eyelids as Martyn feels for Ren’s ribs, finding the space between them.

It’s the smart thing to do. Martyn needs a safe place to stay, one where he won’t be found. This place is safe…ish, minus the beast whose mercy Martyn lives at. Ren may be kind for now, but the limits he places on Martyn’s freedoms are dangerous.

Martyn can’t eat, not properly, not when Ren can't cook and keeps him from the kitchen. Keeps him from the gardens, too, and the armory, and that keeps his strength in check. He’s constantly helping clean and repair the dusty, crumbling rooms, which gives him less energy to fight back. There’s a lot of this castle Martyn doesn’t know, and Ren has been here for years. Ren is powerful, and Martyn knows from running his hands through the fur that Ren is all muscle beneath the coat.

Martyn can’t leave. He can’t go home, and he has no one else to hide with. He needs this castle. He needs this place, all of it. Ren stands between him and the perfect haven.

And Ren, fool that he is, has given Martyn a knife.

Martyn draws his hand back, away from Ren’s heart. Both hands close around the dagger’s hilt. He'll never need to worry about a thing again, so long as he buries it up to the guard.

Martyn raises his weapon high above his head. In the faint light of the moon, the blade glows a dim, cold white.

Martyn is calm as he holds the blade in the air. His breathing is silent, mouth set into a firm line. His eyes are steely sharp, zeroed in on the space between Ren’s ribs. It’s basically black, dark fur hidden by the shadow of Ren’s legs, where Ren is curled around himself. He'd be curled up entirely into himself, hiding his heart and every other vital thing, if it weren't for the fact he left space for Martyn to lean against him.

Martyn, fool that he is, takes a glance at Ren’s face.

Ren looks content. His snout lies in the square of light from the window, gently illuminated against the white sheets, soaking in the midnight moonlight. In the still of the night, Martyn can see clearly his soft breathing. If Martyn had to guess, he would say Ren isn’t even dreaming, at a sort of peace second only to that found by the dead.

Not that Ren’s death will be peaceful. It will be fast, sure—he’ll be dead before the stain of his own blood sullies his snout, but bleed he will. Will he be able to move, Martyn wonders? Should Martyn be prepared to dodge? Or will Ren’s body continue to hold as if to fit him, even in death?

Will he even have time to know who killed him?

Martyn hadn’t understood the point of taking his knife. The weapon is too close, too personal—he’d never get a chance to use it, not before Ren could stop him, not unless Ren was an idiot.

Will Ren have time to open his eyes? He’ll see Martyn immediately. He’ll know what Martyn has done, what Ren has allowed him to do so very easily. Even as quickly as Ren will die, he will know what Martyn has done. He’ll understand his mistake.

Knives are personal like that.

Personal enough Martyn knows that he’ll see Ren’s eyes, when they open. Martyn himself will know, intimately, the exact moment Ren understands what Martyn has done.

Ren’s eyes, when he’s happy, seem to glow. It counters the fact he can’t smile without looking like a monster, the way they shine with the light of the sun. What will they look like, in the dim glow of the moon, as that light fades? Will it die with him? Or will it go just a beat too soon, in the moment Ren understands what Martyn has done to him?

If Ren opened his eyes now, what would he see?

Martyn holds the knife above his head, though he does not manage to keep it very high. He frowns, biting his lip on the inside of his mouth. His eyes are wide with a growing, pleading horror.

The only thing that stops Martyn from slamming the knife back down onto the nightstand is the fear Ren will hear it.

Tomorrow, Martyn will take Ren’s face into both of his own and scratch every spot he knows Ren likes, listening to his laugh and to the way his tail thumps against the bed. He’ll move to Ren’s back when the weight of Ren’s eyes starts to crush him, running his nails up and down along Ren’s spine, keeping his hands from following Ren’s ribs too far down. Ren will laugh, will relax, will sigh and roll so that Martyn can more easily access his stomach, and Martyn will feel so suddenly and violently ill that he has to leave the room.

Tomorrow, Martyn will duck away the moment he’s able, taking the mop and bucket to the worst, dirtiest, most disgusting corner of the castle he can find, and he'll scrub away like it will clear red-black shadows from the back of his mind. He’ll wave Ren off once, twice, three times, shooing away his food and his company, up until all the blood is gone and there’s nothing left to clean.

Tonight, Martyn settles back into the space Ren makes for him at his side. He pulls Ren’s tail back across his lap, and notices, not for the first time, how perfectly he fits.

[matoitech]

hello u dont have to answer this if u dont want, but ur situation with gender is scarily similar to where im at except im in the mindset that im nb wlw and dont rlly kno whats going on. I guess if u kno how to explain it, I wanted to ask how u made that jump or how u could tell it isnt just a "womanhood is like that" kind of thing and is actually "i am a guy"

oh man i wish i had smth that would make it Click for u easier cuz i def understand being rly confused abt this kinda thing.. i got a few Thoughts, idk if they will help u out but hopefully they give u some more thoughts to chew on that will maybe help anyway. this got so long oh hell sorry gbfhg

i think like the main thing as like a tip b4 we get in2 the Meat of it is it is good to relax and b open to thinking abt bein a guy as a possibility, i dont know if this will make sense bc i do not know how to explain it rly but when i was struggling 2 figure stuff out what i had rly needed 2 know was that being a dif gender can just feel like You (but as u become more comfortable w it, you but happier!) for some reason i thought u had to meet certain criteria to b ‘allowed’ to make what seemed 2 me at the time a Leap but thats not how it works lol. u as u r right now can b a guy if u want to or r considering it. u dont have to feel different and u dont have to think abt ur body a different way or anything. sry if this part doesnt make sense its difficult for me to verbalize lol

it was hard for me personally bc ppl would b like ‘if u Want to b a dif gender than b one’ but like i said in those last posts, for a long time i genuinely did not know i Wanted to be a guy/was a guy, or whatever. i had no conscious longing about it or anything, that came later once i was more comfortable w accepting it. i didnt have ‘i want to be a boy/am a boy’ moments i can rly consciously remember putting into those words as a kid, cuz i just did not care about gender on that level till i was a teenager. like i cannot stress this enough, ur life and feelings abt gender n whatever do not have to match up with what u have commonly heard the trans experience is about. once u figure stuff out and r more comfortable w urself u may look back and notice things that may b like that common trans experience, but remembering this stuff or having these childhood experiences or whatever in the first place is not a ‘requirement’. like i said, no requirements for bein a dif gender

for me like.. knowing it for sure... making the Jump as it were. like its kinda embarrassing but literally the way i Found Out was i was feeling all sorts of things whenever i watched promare and i just felt this INTENSE longing whenever i saw galo that i later realized was just me rly feeling the Gender w him and being envious of that.. it had happened w other chars b4 growing up, but i had never rly noticed to that extent till now. and one night i was thinking my usual ‘i wish i looked like galo i wish i could be a guy’ maybe for the first time in like a Conscious thought, when i had never rly heard it in words b4, and i kinda stopped and was like. what? i WHAT? and then it clicked and it was like a euphoric moment for me. easily top 5 best 2 ams of my life. it is kind of a hyperspecific experience but it is also not UNCOMMON rly lol

also figuring out my sexuality was intertwined in that bc i was iding as a butch nonbinary lesbian and i had tossed the idea of ‘maybe id b more comfortable as a man’ around a bit but the idea of being a straight man didnt feel right 2 me, but luckily i kind of made the connection of wait im a man and im attracted to men at like the exact same time, it had to b both at once for me personally to figure it out and b happy about it. idk if thats smth going thru ur head at all but it was for me and was part of my Journey i guess and may help to think abt it a bit lol

and while yes its absolutely about what makes u more comfortable at the end of the day, i think it wouldve helped for me to hear ppl say that just bc the idea of being a dif gender (in this case Man) might make u feel confused and maybe even uncomfortable rn, that doesnt necessarily mean u r not one if youve been struggling w this and wondering, it might just mean u havent had that clicky moment and r ready to rly think abt it yet. i have grown much more comfortable w myself over time as ive figured this stuff out and i am still open to figuring out more abt myself and i think thats a good place to b at! just b open to stuff like this that u maybe had never thought would have a positive effect on you or make you happier.

speaking from experience i think if ur confused and maybe even miserable telling urself that womanhood is just like that and u gotta suck it up and get used to feeling uncomfortable and bad, u dont have to live like that! im not saying that ‘oh im actually a guy’ is gonna b what everyone who is struggling w thats answer is cuz obviously thats not true- and im not saying how i just described it is even how u feel- but like. as someone who thought that same thing but less consciously. womanhood does not have to be a confusing sad experience, its not an inherently miserable experience, it is possible it just isnt for you and trying smth else might make u feel better. and that can b rly hard to figure out in the moment, cuz ur Used to feeling like this and even if youve heard it can b different it might b hard to have that ‘oh theyre talking to ME, it can be different for ME not just everyone else’ moment lol

also i dont know if this is relevant to u but im saying it in general 2 anyone who needs it i guess; being a man isnt a bad thing and it doesnt make u an inherently bad person, manhood and masculinity r not inherently or naturally toxic or something. thats a harmful mindset to have for multiple reasons and a whole nother post so im not gonna b like and now a word about transphobic red flags but like, worth mentioning that that can b harmful or dangerous to trans ppl, transmascs and transfems.

my god this got rly long... if anyone else has went thru a similar thing and has anything 2 add, feel free to :0 hope i somehow got around to answering ur question w all the rambling! i am just one guy and my experience may or may not b helpful to hear about, especially bc my memory is not the best lol <3 hope it helped at all tho!

[ghostfruits]

hey can i ask a personal question for the members of ghostfruits; how do u guys personally deal with suicidal ideation and self harm? i notice that theres alot of mentions of death/depression/suicide/etc in your comics, and im a huge fan of you guys and im currently struggling with my own demons and thought I would ask. i hope this isnt too intrusive, feel free to ignore me.. - a suicidal, depressed fan.

i know we’re in public rn but i’m gonna just talk to u like a person, real quick. im going to talk to u like i would have if u were like in front of me

its like 2am and so im worried i might not be as lucid as i think. im sorry in advance if this is like, whole gibberish

im gonna speak for just myself, as the the person who is most often inserting specifically that kind of shit into our work, but definitely not like, the only person on this side like massively struggling with a similar variety of things

i dont know

a lot of people seem to be making work about problems they Used To have, and like ways they Used To feel, and like overcame, and then it becomes safe for them to make like, art about it. like the turmoil happens behind the scenes and then they like open up abt it publically after the fact via art. or at least like thats what im seeing happen, or like, ppl talk abt like "i made this bc it would have helped me figure my shit out sooner if someone had made s/t like this for me" and the like, probably dissappointing truth of it here is i'm bleeding in like real time. i dont have solutions to it. you and me are both in the immediate thick of the same kind of emotion. i didnt manage to puzzle it out. when i was 9 i started feeling like i wanted to kill myself and im 25 and ive wanted that, still, the entire time. i dont all the way know why its like that. sometimes i used to think it was like, a reaction to specific kinds of hardship or loss or dissatisfaction with my circumstances, but lately ive been worried that maybe good things or good times or good feelings are just like, distracting me from something that is my Actual desire, that being dead is the path im just like occassionally straying from. when i say that out loud i have a really easy time imagining a second person telling me that isnt a healthy thing to be saying or feeling, which usually means it isnt, but thats like, really how i am feeling, that is really where i am at with it. that probably means i dont have any business directing another persons like, outlook on it

so

while i cant tell you how to live with it, or cope with it, or manage it, bc im not doing any of those things, i can tell you really confidently that i dont think you should be dead, and you're being misdirected by either yourself or the world or like something else altogether into thinking thats the key that fits into whatevers in front of you. i know i dont know you, but i know like, a lot of people, and iv never felt like any of them should be dead. ive never met anybody who i thought itd be like fine if they died. theres people im hugely indifferent to, theres people i hate, there are people who have hurt me or others enormously and ive still never thought in earnest like "this persons best plan of attack i think is to kill themselves"not like anybody. not like anybody ever. iv said some fucking wild shit abt niggas but iv never said that, and i cant imagine ever saying it. or thinking it, or feeling it. i dont imagine youd be like an exception to that

thats easy to say, but, im not the person who has to live with it tho. thats easy to say to you but you still have to wake up tomorrow and live out whatever has got you so fucked up you're at like, a death point with it, and if youre coming here to ask abt it, youve probably exhausted a lot of other options already ill bet. and its like, probably wack as fuck to meet like another dead end here too. i dont know if youre still reading this even. i probably wouldnt be. iv had madd niggas hem and haw at me forever abt "temporary problems permanent solutions" and then just like shuffle me out of their office or living room or whatever and expect im not supposed to like pop myself on their doorstep. niggas acting like im fucking playing. like i got it out of my system bc we had one conversation and now im supposed to go eat lunch and be regular. idk. id be very mad at me, if i were you. i dont know if you are, but i wouldnt blame you for that. the reason i say all this is to articulate like;its possible that after hitting another roadblock here, youll feel like, "ok then fuck it" and like set your sights on just like, doing it. like bc i didnt have any jewels for u it would like reinforce it maybe. i would like u to consider this tho;

theres MADD niggas smarter than me. i was extremely useless to you just now. this is not like the pinnacle of help you're ever going to get. the answers you need for this exist even if youve already turned over a dozen rocks and theyve all been like, as useless, as this, tht has like absolutely no bearing on if the next rock will have useless shit under it. every single time u flip a coin it has the exact same chance of going one way or the other. this like did not have the medicine u need in it but the main thing i would want to stress to u is that it *does* exist and uve just had like a supremely shitty time finding it

somebodys got it. the only thing i can like confidently promise u is that somewhere, somebody, definitely knows the answer to this. u might be the person even. im not sure. /i/ def havent found it but like its in the mix somewhere. idk

i cant prove it to u but im positive ur not done yet, & you should stay

i didnt read back over any of this after i typed it, & so im gonna apologize again if it was just like, fullblown nonsense

[nonbeesphoric]

how can you be agender and unaligned but also a gay man? I’m curious as to how you can identify as agender but also as mlm

theres a few reasons. (ive talked abt it before if u scroll a bit, if u wanna know more)the social classes of "man" and "woman" are heavily tied to heterosexuality. as a gay man i reject that completely because i dont connect to it at all. if alignment terminology (man-aligned and woman-aligned) wasnt misused so often and used to reduce nonbinary people to man-lite or woman-lite, while erasing the fact that their identity is a whole nonbinary identity, then i would say im "man-aligned". however, this isnt the case, and i dont want people to ignore a vital part of my identity. i say im unaligned because i actively reject alignment terminologyim not a woman, and im exclusively attracted to men, so my love of men is inherently different than a straight woman's (aka my love of men isnt straight)i cant explain why im agender, its just one of those things, yknow? i dont have a gender, i'm disconnected from the whole concept, it doesnt apply to me, im genderless, etc. etc. but like despite that, i do share experiences and feelings and spaces with men (thats what "man-aligned" originally meant, but again its misused so often that i cant identify that way).a few of these things are: nonstraight love for men, people that are attracted to men being attracted to me (and not ppl that r attracted to women), not belonging or being comfortable in women's spaces (and feeling comfortable/accepted/belonging in men's spaces), transitioning in a stereotypically masc/male way, being perceived as a man and thus potentially having male privilege. theres a lot of things. i also present socially irl as a man very heavily and really only come out as agender or nonbinary to people im close with. its half a safety thing, half i dont feel like every single person is entitled to know that part of me. its honestly a little personalso i guess the easiest way to put it is im agender and i love men in a gay way, again, while STILL being agender. i hope that cleared some things up, and if youve got more questions go ahead and ask or feel free to DM me ! btw i specifically id as a gay man and less as mlm but im not super picky abt it(by the way this feeling is slightly more common in wlw, i find, because not only is the class of woman tied heavily to heterosexuality, they also can potentially feel the need to distance themselves from the male gaze. i would ask an agender lesbian about the topic further, because they might have more insight than me)