#ill wake up in the middle of the night

[spottedbread]

DUDE they interrupted PBS kids for a test of the emergency broadcast system with the loud fucking buzzer

[moonkhao]

hi.

[themissingnumbers]

HOW IT FEELS TO DISAPPEAR: DESCENT

FIRST/PREV | NEXT [Tell Blue you saw something.]

"Hey, uh... I'm- I'm so sorry, but I think I saw something weird..."

"... You tend to get that in a haunted graveyard," he replies flatly, turning to look back at you with a raised eyebrow.

"I- I KNOW," you scoff, "I caught plenty of Ghost Pokemon around here! I just... Don't think this was one of those...? I'm worried- what if it's a stray Pokemon? It looked tiny..."

He frowns, scratching his chin.

"You don't have to stay stuck to me at the hip, man," he replies. "You wanna look around? Look around. Just... Try to be careful, would you? Don't go too far, don't head up any other floors... Gods know what kind of curses or bad omens are lying around here."

You spring to your feet, nodding quickly.

"Of course-! Trust me, I wouldn't dream of doing anything reckless," you assure him. He laughs a bit, nodding in return.

"Good. Cause I swear, if I have to bury you, I'm gonna ACTUALLY go crazy."

You giggle with him, giving a big salute- although a part of you can tell he's not entirely joking. You brush the thought aside, though. You're a capable trainer- probably the most capable trainer in all of Kanto! You know you don't have anything to worry about.

"Well, you can tuck that shovel away, Mr. Gravedigger- I'll be fine! Cross my heart, hope to not-die." you tell him lightheartedly. "I'll just be right back, okay?"

He nods. "Okay."

With that, you step back, walking farther into this floor of the graveyard. You carefully maneuver around the various headstones- what kind of bad karma would it be to knock a grave out of place, you think with a shudder. But you're careful as always. Being cautious was never a problem for you, after all!

... You end up searching between the cracks and crevices of tombs and graves for a while, though. You feel about ready to call it quits, doing one last walk around the outer walls of this floor, when you finally spot the culprit of that brown little blur that had scared you so badly, hiding in a far corner behind a grave:

An Eevee.

The poor thing looks terrible... Thin, sickly, and trembling. Your heart sinks for it- Eevees aren't from this part of Kanto, and especially with the state it's in, someone must have dumped the Pokemon in the tower and called it a day. It's starving so bad, you can see its ribs, and you wonder; how long has it been here...?

You try to approach quietly, as to avoid startling it- but when it sees you, it still tenses, its hackles raising and its ears flattening against its head. You can't blame it- being abandoned by some cruel trainer must've done awful things for its trust of humans.

Still, you aren't going to get anywhere if its scared of you.

[mifithemuffin]

there's nothing more fulfilling than discussing themes motives and implications of canon events with people who are equally insane about a piece of media as you are

[pink-lemonadefairy]

🌻 ₊˚⊹ ࿔ 🌳

[stinkrascal]

ur such a red flag if u say u hate cats and how cats never like you bc my kitten looks at me with so much love in her eyes like how could u ever hate cats

[haganez]

GRR whatever rant on my complex ass feelings

i don’t like my older sister she sucks and irritates the shit out of me and has been for years but i don’t wish anyone with kids dies like this while they’re both young. ive been taking care of her a lot and i thought maybe she’d change and suddenly be a saint or something but she’s still the same irritating irrational person ive always known her as, just in a very bad spot

Even now she’s homophobic and transphobic she sucks just in general as a person and it’s something ive been telling her for years. Im doing my best and I don’t even think this is kindness but basic respect, if someone is disabled they should have help but jesus why does it have to be me

Im more concerned for her kids than anything and I feel bad I feel like a monster but how can I spare empathy when she’s still the same bad person ive known all my life.

[paunchbunny]

god i hate myself for not getting valentine's day candy on sale when I had a chance. my disappointment is immeasurable and my day is ruined.

[aturnoftheearth]

literally send me to the mountains let me go free forever… <- yearning so bad i might cry

me when i’m going away for a long time……

[of-mutts-and-men]

Lemon sun carmine moon charcoal rising

Mulberry in transit (this is astrological for when i lwarn to drive )

I had to read that like ten times to finally realize what you were talking about lmao.

[bluejaybytes]

@snowshinobi Hiiiii :3 I'm responding to your tags on a new post and not the original since the original was already somewhat lengthy, and I plan on being LONG and RAMBLY, but I have sooo many thoughts on what you said and I'm going to say them. Also my browser crashed TWICE (TWO TIMES. 2) when trying to write this post so I'm really fighting for my life out here to get my silly little OC posts done. Also it's under the cut because it's looooong as hell LMAO

Firstly, you're so nice to me forever <3 Secondly, I think you've basically hit the nail on the head. The majority of the issues Maggie has coming back from death and her 9 years gone are really tied almost exclusively to her close family, because she... never really had anyone else. While in-universe it's only 9 years, realistically the jump in technology and culture is around ~20-30 years (Maggie died in the 90s/early 2000s essentially, and wakes up in a just barely futuristic city), but... the most jarring thing to her in terms of what she missed out on is just. Flipphones are no longer popular. Other than her family, she's only close with one other person... who just so happens to be a ghost, and therefore both 1. Wouldn't change much over the timespan due to how long she's been a ghost and 2. Unlike her family, was aware that something happened, since she could see the ghost-of-a-ghost Maggie left behind (The ghosts name is Opal, she positions herself as a sort of "guardian angel" figure, though she's not actually, and serves as just another parental figure for Maggie while also getting after the ghosts that constantly harass her to pass on messages to the living). Maggie has no real relationships outside of her family, and while her relationships with her family are massively impacted by her unknowing death, other than that... the timeskip itself doesn't weigh on her because she had no one regardless. Her struggle to adjust to everything thats happened would've happened regardless of the timeskip for her, because she was such an isolated shut-in that it's the same whether it happened the next day, or nearly a full decade later

So another very interesting thing is that you've actually completely seen where I was going with everything, in spite of everything I said being very surface level and not actually delving into the plot at all. I completely skimmed over Jenna (She's very important to the plot, but she's by in large a regular person as opposed to Maggie's... everything), but for some additional context, Jenna has a horrendously shitty homelife, so her moving in with Maggie is both a gradual process (It goes from spending time there, to spending nights, to eventually just never going back home and moving in fully), and also serves as an escape for her. Part of that is also, so vitally, the food aspect. For some additional additional context, souls essentially serve as a persons lifeforce, practically every bodily function is improved by a soul that's stronger, though the "strength" of a soul is essentially entirely random, and not dependent on the individuals actions of any kind. Maggie had a generally weird soul before (Seeing ghosts inherently means she has to have something going on with her soul), but when she wakes up after her death, her soul is now even weirder, and part of that is that it essentially lets her get away with bad habits she absolutely should be seeing more consequences for. She barely eats, and when she does, it's basically exclusively crackers and whatever other safe foods she has around the house, because actually making food is a level of care and effort she just... doesn't give to herself in the slightest. Part of Jenna staying with her is that Jenna, without really discussing it, entirely takes up the mantle of caretaker of the apartment, with the biggest task being food prep, Jenna sees Maggie's unwillingness to take care of herself and silently steps up and starts making her actual meals so she's eating properly.

The problem is is that this also kinda... just straight up sucks? Jenna doesn't think much of it, it's something that needed to be done so she's doing it, she wants Maggie to be well fed even if she won't do it herself, and she's already been responsible for making all of her own meals for years prior anyways, so it's just another thing she does. Except that's shitty! Maggie's seen firsthand how terrible her homelife is, and it really weighs on her how even in her escape from that, Jenna's still being put in a position where she feels like she must care for her or else she just won't eat properly. So food is such a massively important thing to both of them, it's this symbol of love for both of them, it's love on the part of Jenna, for stepping in and taking care of Maggie when she can't do it herself, and it's love on the part of Maggie, for realizing how her own bad habits impact the people she cares about and wanting to lift that weight by taking care of herself better. It's also very vital for Maggie because she just... doesn't... have hobbies. Learning how to cook becomes really her only hobby and she puts all of her love and care into it, because for the first time in a long while she's actually passionate about something! ...Unfortunately she also is very very bad at it. She's inventing new dishes like "Burnt Salad" and "Please Help I Fucked Up Kraft Mac N Cheese" and still having to have Jenna come in and help her. But it's the thought that counts, and it'll only be a matter of time before she can make something vaguely edible.

And finally, the stuff about names! I didn't post it here, but while idly talking about her in a Discord server I'm in, I definitely think that had I made Maggie like even a few months later than I would've done she would've been nonbinary. As it stands right now though, I'm saying she's probably some form of genderweird but too busy trying not to die to think about it <3 Growing up knowing that ghosts are real and routinely being shut down by authority figures in her life about it has made her very aware of how bullshit a lot of things are and how the people who claim to be knowledgeable tend to not know what they're talking about (Beyond just the "people don't think ghosts are real", she's also got ghosts willing to tell her when people are lying because they've got nothing better to do than just gossip) , so if she spent even just a moment thinking about gender as a social construct she'd instantly recognize that and probably take up some form of genderweird label, but as it stands she's just too stressed with Being The Protagonist to think about that

Now, the thing with Margaret. I'm not even going to lie to you, I think you made a better connection to how a name connects with community in terms of the narrative themes than I did. The thing with Margaret denying the name "Maggie" existed for two reasons, the in-universe explanation is that, with the little scrap of soul Margaret has leftover from Maggie, it's essentially working overtime just to keep her vitals working, it can't dedicate time and energy to making her an individual with preferences and a personality, so part of that is that she doesn't respond to "Maggie" because ultimately, that is not her name. Her name is Margaret and she's not going to respond to "Maggie" because "Maggie" isn't her name. Of course, out of universe the reasoning is that I wanted an easy way to distinguish between Maggie as she is the protagonist, and the version of her that lived in the years she was gone, so different names makes the most sense.

I think your connection to how name relates to community genuinely works on a level I hadn't fully pieced together myself yet and I really love that because I think that absolutely works with everything. One of the main conflicts of the plot is how Maggie is entirely disconnected from her family thanks to the years she was gone, with Margaret having no priorities beyond "survive", she basically never spoke with her parents or brother for years. While her family tried to reach out to her repeatedly (Especially given that, while they're unaware the truth of what happened the night Maggie was murdered, they do know something happened, and they believe that whatever it was severely traumatized her, and that's where the sudden and drastic shift in personality came from), there's a point where they just... gave up. She wasn't trying to talk with them or contact them in the slightest, so around a year or two after Margaret moved out, her parents gave up on her. Her brother would still be there a bit, but he also didn't really... try... anymore.

When Maggie wakes up, she tries to call her parents... and they don't pick up. They'd grown resentful over the years, and now that Maggie wants to talk to them, they don't forgive her for the years of not speaking to them, and aren't interested in whatever she has to say after nearly a decade of trying to reconnect with her and being met with nothing. It's her insistence that she wants to be called Maggie that actually gets her brother to realize she's telling the truth and that something happened. She shows up at his door, already something that Margaret wouldn't have done, and that combined with her being visibly upset when he calls her Margaret and tells him that's not her and that she's Maggie, it signals to him that whatever's going on is real (...though he would've figured this out eventually, given that she also literally 17 again and not in her mid-20s, and has a giant glowing stab wound in her chest). I think it works absolutely perfectly as being a symbol of community, her disconnect from her community is what led to her being called Margaret, and her desperation to be returned to that community is when she's Maggie again. So uh. Congrats on getting the themes of my OCs better than I did <3

And uhhhh closing thoughts! I honestly did still skim over the majority of the plot (Literally never even mentioned Eli or what's going on with her stab wound </3), but I think you reeeeally hit the nail on the head with everything I'm kinda getting at with these OCs, which is... frankly wild given how little main plot I actually got at. Basically everything I mentioned in my original post was the setup, not the main plot. But waaaaugh thank you for being so niceys to me and also giving me another excuse to ramble endlessly <3

[rucow]

well someone's having a party today

[thelastevilregal]

Why am I so tired?!

[butchviking]

when they invent a self-changing duvet cover.... then we will know world peace

[tamaharu]

i cannot fucking sleep with a roommate and my melatonin is shit im going to kill myselfff lolllll

[cowboybrunch]

i started enjoying writing so much more when i realized that if i didn't want to write a certain scene, i could just.... skip it

know what happens in the scene but don't want to flesh it out right now? bullet points and then move on

dont feel like writing a certain character interaction? only want to write the dialogue? parenthesis and then move on

something happens here but im not sure exactly what? placeholder and move on

this is not groundbreaking by any means but i was stuck thinking that i had to write the story in order so allowing myself to write what i want when i want has been. huge