#in other news i actually like drawing scar with short hair

[daily-redscape]

[7] Friendship bracelets

[tibby-art]

hitman au save me .. its been seven years ..

haven’t been able to draw/write much of this au lately but i want to write a few little scene snippets i have stored my brain :’D ill include them under cut

=+=

“This better be something good,” Scar muttered to Cub as they stepped out of the elevator. The hitman, while bound to his contract, considered ‘boring’ missions to be a waste of his time.

“I hope so,” Cub hummed. “Hope so.”

The ConVex swung open the doors to the NHO conference room, not bothering to check if their bosses were actually ready for their meeting.

“Holy mother of—! Knock next time, will you?” A man setting files down on the conference table jumped visibly as the doors slammed open.

“The Vex require a dramatic entrance, Beef,” Scar said casually. Cub snickered.

“Sure, whatever.” Beef furrowed his brow, used to this behavior. He didn’t have time for this. “Okay. Doc was supposed to do this briefing, but he’s busy with his machines I guess, because of course he is, so.” He huffed, composing himself. “Your new top-secret project. This one’s a doozy. Have a look.”

Beef slid the folder across the table. The hitmen flipped it open, absorbing its contents with hungry eyes.

What caught their eyes immediately were the photos. The person of interest looked nothing like a powerful crime boss or a dangerous anomaly. A young adult with glasses, dark eyes and short, sandy brown hair stared back at them.

“Who’s this?” Scar raised an eyebrow. Is the NHO asking them to assassinate some normal-looking university student?

“That is Grian,” Beef explained, both hands planted firmly on the table. “Grian has been with us at the NHO for months.”

“I’ve never seen him before,” Scar remarked.

“Grian’s case is top-secret. He’s been staying in high-security, private quarters… as well as our research laboratories.”

“I thought you guys seemed super suspicious lately! I knew they were hiding something from us, Cub,” Scar nudged his partner with a grin. Cub did not budge as his sharp eyes combed through the documents. He hadn’t heard a single word spoken to him.

“Cub? What’s the deal?” Scar asked. He preferred to let Cub read their mission files and summarize it for him, anyways. Dyslexia and top-secret government files were not a great mix. Oh, what would he do without Cub?

“Watchers?” Cub finally spoke, looking up at Beef with a quizzical frown. The other man nodded slowly. “You’re kidding.”

“After months of testing and analysis, we can confirm that this individual is the only currently documented case of a mortal possessing Watcher abilities,” Beef nodded slowly.

Scar had heard whispers of the Watchers only a handful of times. As a vex, he knew plenty about the realm of magic, the divine, the fae, you name it! But Watchers were said to be ancient entities, perhaps as old as time itself. So old that they were widely considered to be a myth.

“So this is not a hit,” Scar said after a moment.

“This is not a hit, Scar, good lord, do not kill this person,” Beef put both hands on his forehead and let them slowly drag down his face.

“Mortal, you say?” Cub raised an eyebrow.

“Yep,” Beef said. “She was a completely normal citizen until he got these abilities in some freak accident. Lucky for everyone involved, the NHO was able to take control of the situation before anything… dangerous happened.”

“So,” Scar narrowed his eyes slightly, “If this isn’t a hit, then what do you want from us?”

Beef sighed. “After months of testing to determine Grian’s situation, the NHO has decided that he is too important to return to life as a normal citizen at this time. Instead, we’d like to utilize his abilities in our goals to maintain order in Hermit City, and we need someone to train her how to be a special agent in the field.”

“You want the ConVex to train a Watcher how to be a hitman,” Cub said with a slight smirk at just how insane that sounded.

“Yep.”

“Huh.” Scar put both hands on his hips. “Well, that’s not what I was expecting.”

“I suppose we could give it a shot,” Cub said. Although the ConVex were bound by a fae contract to work for the NHO, the vex took every opportunity to feign control over their situation. There was no choice here. Beef had given them an order.

“Sure, sure! We are very good at our jobs, after all,” Scar grinned. Whatever happened, good or bad, would at least be entertaining, surely.

“You’ll come back here to meet her tomorrow morning,” Beef instructed. “Hand me that file back and be here by 9, will you?”

“Sure thing,” Cub replied coolly, sliding the file back to the man. Scar couldn’t help but grin wider when he noticed Cub’s hand casually in his pants pocket, some folded white paper barely visible in his grip.

“Don’t be late. I’m serious this time,” Beef called out as the hitmen turned and exited the conference room.

=+=

The conference room was tense that morning. Towards the end of the table sat the NHO - Beef, Doc, Etho, and Bdubs. On one side sat Cub and Scar. Across from them, Grian sat alone.

“So, how about introductions?” Doc clapped his hands together. “Er… Cub and Scar, this is Grian. Grian, this is Cub and Scar. You guys already know the deal. Grian is going to come with you on missions from now on.”

The ConVex hadn’t taken their eyes off of Grian since they entered the room, unable to resist their curiosity. They had both read the files, but still found it hard to believe the person before them was a Watcher. Grian sat rigid in his chair, fiddling with his hands, looking tense and exhausted. She eyed the vex curiously as well.

“Well hello there,” Scar greeted. “I’m Scar, and this is Cub.”

“Hey, hey,” Cub said quietly.

“Hello,” The corner of Grian’s mouth twitched in a possible attempt at a smile.

The three continued to stare at each other until Bdubs cleared his throat.

“Wonderful introduction. Now that we’ve broken the ice, let’s talk about your next mission.” The man picked up a small remote, and the large screen on the wall behind them illuminated.

“Before we send our agents out into the field, we meet like this to discuss the details and ensure that the mission is clearly understood,” Doc explained to Grian, throwing a disapproving glare in the ConVex’s direction.

A lengthy file on some high-profile criminal appeared on the screen, as Bdubs proceeded to read off the information. Scar slumped back in his chair. These mission briefings were the worst. It was time to zone out and have Cub tell him the details later with all the fluff cut out.

At about ten minutes in, Scar yawned absentmindedly.

“Oh, are we boring you, sir?” Doc interrupted Bdubs to shoot a piercing stare at Scar.

“Oh, not at all!” Scar said cheerfully, but slumping in his chair slightly lower.

“As I was saying,” Bdubs continued loudly.

Scar glanced over at Grian. Her eyes quickly darted back to the presentation when they made eye contact. Scar looked over at Cub and found he had still not taken his eyes off of Grian. Hopefully Cub was at least somewhat paying attention, because he sure wasn’t.

Grian continued to fidget with his hands. Scar felt a pang of pity for him. The vex were used to this sort of environment, but according to the NHO, Grian had a completely normal life up until a few months ago. Now suddenly, he gains these terrifying powers and spends months in a top-secret lab having tests run on her all day. Who wouldn’t be overwhelmed?

Scar yawned again, this time more intentionally. He earned another death glare from Doc, but Bdubs droned on. He glanced over and saw Grian rubbing a hand on his cheek to help hide a grin.

The art of annoying your boss was a delicate one. Timing is everything. Let enough time pass until they’ve forgotten, or they think you’ve stopped, to continue the game. Scar lets about ten minutes pass before his next yawn, bigger this time.

“Quit it,” Beef hissed. Even Etho glanced over. Doc kept his eyes on the screen, but his jaw was clenched. Grian let out a cough that sounded suspiciously like a laugh.

Five minutes later, Cub clears his throat rather loudly. Bdubs stutters over his words for a second, but because Cub is Cub, none of the NHO seems to be able to tell if that was a deliberate cough or not, and they decide to ignore it. Cub shows no emotion.

After an hour that felt like an eternity of Bdubs explaining every possible detail about the case, it seemed to be almost concluded. That was, until a rather loud yawn was heard throughout the conference room.

“WILL YOU LET ME FINISH, FOR GOODNESS SAKE?!” Bdubs finally erupted, whipping around in his chair to face Cub and Scar.

The hitmen stared back blankly. They glanced over across the table, and Bdubs followed their gaze, where Grian sat with both arms over her head in a large stretch.

“Sorry,” Grian said simply when all eyes were on him, lowering his arms. “Just had to stretch a bit.” He stared back at Bdubs innocently.

The NHO stood there, confused. Bdubs was at a loss for words, unable to get a read on the new recruit. He sighed and turned back to the screen. “Well, regardless, I think we’ve about summed things up,” he grumbled.

Scar made eye contact with Grian once again. The two cracked a smile at one another for a second, too quick for the NHO to notice.

Scar had a feeling that him, Cub and Grian were going to get along just fine.

=+=

[phosphostar]

Could you make hc for the mouthwashing crew (minus Jdiddy) if they had actually been saved and made it back to earth after the crash? Like what life would be like for them? PLS PLS I JUST WANT A HAPPY ENDING FOR THM😭

LMFAO OF COURSE I CAN!!!!!!

return velocity

what if the crew (anya, daisuke, curly, swansea) made it back after the events of mouthwashing..?

cw: uhhh none really? except for what’s under the cut! tell me if i missed anything <3

𝐝𝐚𝐢𝐬𝐮𝐤𝐞

oh my sweet summer boy.

he made it out with uhm

let’s just say a whole bunch of scars

his mom, was obviously worried. horrified. her baby.. hurt?? because of her? her heart is broken

but daisuke’s like “nono it’s okay!! i got a cool scar to show off to the ladies!!”

she just facepalms

i also hc daisuke never really learned how to drive. was too worried about partying. so swansea had to drive him and anya to their respective houses (i’ll get to why curly wasn’t there in a moment)

his parents meet anya and swansea

they are so happy they met swansea. this man taught our son? he’s gonna do great.

until daisuke goes back to yapping about video games. yeah so great.

they heavily thank anya though, for helping with saving daisuke after climbing into the vent. without her, he would’ve certainly died

basically daisuke finds his purpose (keeping cool in situations and dedicating his life to his friends)

𝐚𝐧𝐲𝐚

my poor baby anya

so we all know she struggled getting into medical school prior to the events in mouthwashing

in my mind daisuke’s parents helped pay for her medical school due to her basically saving his life

she goes to medical school, gets her necessary digress, and works in healthcare!!

ABORTS THE BABY.

SHE DOES NOT KEEP THE BABY.

becomes curly and swansea’s primary healthcare worker because she knew them best

really into gardening! helps take her mind off the ptsd of everything that happened

got a restraining order against j-diddy

gets a kitty named towellet. she loves the thing.

𝐬𝐰𝐚𝐧𝐬𝐞𝐚

oh my swansea. no one loves you the way i do.

obviously is so happy to see his wife

and his kids!! can’t forget about them

they’d be worried sick, obviously hearing about the news of the tulpar

he reassures them that he’s safe (obviously), and he’ll be able to retire!!

his wife is obviously excited

i hc his wife is already retired and his kids already have kids

peepaw swansea for the win <33

i also hc he adopted an old bulldog.

they watch soap operas together all day and snore on the couch super loudly

𝐜𝐮𝐫𝐥𝐲

…

surprisingly didn’t die??

also he wasn’t in swansea’s car because uhm.. he was airlifted to the hospital

his recovery is difficult, obviously

he has moments he’s not sure he’ll make it out alive, and wonders if he should even still be breathing

obviously loves when swansea, daisuke, and anya visit. he literally loves it

he was given a multitude of surgeries, including skin graphs from donors, so some parts have darker hair than others, he thinks it’s cool.

daisuke was also a good match for blood i hc!! anya, daisuke, and swansea now regularly donate blood and plasma <3

i hc curly got an emotion support/guide dog names ratchet

sweetest baby around and curly adores him

he has prosthetics for his limbs, and used to completely cover them, a mask on his face and his hood up to complete the look

now he’s more confident in himself, and will happily go without a mask and basketball shorts!!

he has a voice box, but is still getting used to it!

daisuke bleached all his hair and cut it off for curly to make him a wig

he dosent wear it much, but he keeps it in a safe space

he wears a much more comfortable hair system

daisuke made his out of love, not practicality

𝐩𝐨𝐥𝐥𝐞

company goes belly up.

curly and everyone sues him. even j-diddy.

they all win

what more can i say

𝐠𝐞𝐧𝐞𝐫𝐚𝐥

they all still love hanging out, the 4 of them

goes to anya’s graduation

daisuke constantly draws for all of them

swansea fosters kittens

anya loves to bake treats for all of them

curly loves to spin his shoulder around to cause his prosthetic to spin in a complete circle

…

i’m so sorry

𝐣𝐢𝐦𝐦𝐲

well.

woah.

he had a hefty trial.

obviously found guilty

got beat up in prison

was released on good behavior 🖕

i don’t think anya ever truly forgave him, or anyone for that matter.

which like good?

but he does visit curly sometimes at his hospital room

and sends the whole crew birthday/holliday cards

(only sends them to anya after his restraining order is done)

got a pitbull named mikey. loves his baby

he’s trying to turn his life around

he’s definitely still not sane

has been admitted to a mental institution involuntarily a few times

is on heavy medication to regulate his mood

got a sleeve tattoo of stars representing the crew (with their permission). i think he has a full sleeve

(thank you @/curly-my-beloved for that idea!!)

definitely got some of daisuke’s doodles tatted on him

a few important dates

he’s trying to be better

still an ass tho

i still don’t like him

[sapphirestones09]

AAAAAAA FINALLY! I'm done playing @oneknightstand-if. As part of the celebration, here is Rosie's colored sketch (ﾉ◕ヮ◕)ﾉ*:･ﾟ✧ Lol, this looks like an anime title card And thus! The Stats!

Blobbed: Yep (We are what now?)

Bold : 205 (Is this high lol?) Sweet : 46 Sassy : 159 Optimist : 76

Health : 85 Mark Status : Healed Merlin Healing : 2 Merlin Forced Healing : 0

Caution : 9 Will : 7 Cloudcuckoolanderness : 42 (Not enough, we gotta go full cray cray) Silent : 7 Curse Level : 4 Fear Level : 6 Corruption : -5 (Is this low enough?) Mute : false Mindcontrol : false

Downtime : Had Breakfast | Snarfed Sweets | Shower Accident |

Route : Went into Store & Fought | (What I gotta use the hunting knives as soon as possible in some way right?)

New Inventory : Hairdryer | Sweets | Shower Mat | Everclear Alcohol (Molotov! Molotov! Molotov!) They Know : false | It Sees : Masked | You Replied False Some stats are missing when I scroll from the past posts in the forum. Such as Crazy Theory, Crazy Theory Level, Pottymouth, Serenades, Interpretative Dance, and a deep dive into the Adrian and Merlin's relationship stats (I WANT TO SEE HOW MANY TIMES I FLIRTED GODAMMIT!). I wonder if I can access it (╥ω╥) About Rosie!

You are currently known as Rosaline (Rosie) Bane a seemingly normal female wildlife biologist. You have red eyes, very long flowing icy blond hair, and a short and petite figure clad in a red cape with an amaranth face mask. People tend to take particular notice of your hair. At first glance, people tend to find you not very intimidating.

You excel at sword fighting, gardening, and having a magnetic personality. Meanwhile, you've got a weakness for prescription medications and enclosed spaces, as well as having anger management issues.

You have an ear piercing. You also have a couple of scars along your neck and wrist.

A tragic accident that claimed your whole family lies in your past and the fate of your future remains murky with the apocalypse ever looming in the background. At least no one has suspected that you are actually a serial killer.

Your final words were "And now for a final word from our sponsor—"

Note! I didnt know I could play something as chaotic and as fun as this game provided me. Its super fun and enjoyable and yet amidst the chaos I loved the characters that was shown and grown to get attached to them to a degree. Both Merlin and Adrian are mysterious and enigmatic in their own ways that makes me look forward to the story and how it progresses towards their character. Also seeing Adrian being exasperated over Cloudcuckolander MC's antics tickles my funny bones more than I can admit. I admit I was reluctant to get into the game seeing as its such a huge one, but after playing all I can say is MOAR! I NEED MOAARRRR! AND PLEASE AUTHOR TELL ME HOW TO SUCCESSFULLY PASS THE STAT CHECK FOR MOONWALKING ON THE FENCING ROUTE! I NEED TO MOONWALK! I NEED THESE PEOPLE TO CLAP FOR ME! And please can we apologize to Adrian for punching him? (っ˘̩╭╮˘̩)っ I know in the grand scheme of things, Adrian forgives us already but we still wanna apologize (ಡ‸ಡ) And oh boy, I think Im gonna draw lots and lots of fanarts now... Skill Stats!

Personality Stats!

Can we still claim to be a newbie after Merlin's extensive lore dump on us? Relationship Stats!

Inventory!

Your ultimate weapon is unknown.

You are currently armed with... nothing, at least as far as you know.

Cold Steel SRK survival knife

You also have on hand...

E-phone 7XL

several small bottles of prescription medications

photo of your family

Killer McKiller Face's favorite stuffed animal (Rip our micro pig (ಥ﹏ಥ))

well-worn Bible (To ward off evil of course!)

mystical Magic 8-Ball (Another holy item! I sure hope it does not contain anything otherworldly that will potentially endanger us and others ha.ha.ha (→_→)

small herb garden of eclectic plants including a mutant Venus Flytrap (The only queen Rosie will ever potentially bow to!)

collection of various survival & hunting knives

small bag of iridescent pearls

bottle of 95% alcohol Everclear (Molotov! Molotov! Molotov ⸜(*ˊᗜˋ*)⸝)

slightly squished pastry (I KNOW MY PRIORITIES! AND ITS SWEETS!)

[danidoodles124]

After a while of drawing other people’s redesigns, i made some of my own! have a look!

they’re all sad and tired because honestly, who blames them

i’m gonna post some new doodles soon here, so enjoy!

below are some of my headcanons and explanations behind their new get-ups! 👇

Evangelyne Changes:

-i gave her the shoulder scar from when Remington shot her in S2

-brought back the little belt from her S2 suit, because i like it

-the dark spots on the hands of her gloves are for better gripping, just because i think it’d be useful

-her shirt/tarp is similar to that of Pinpin’s from S1, but with an arrow instead of

Yugo Changes:

-it’s time those old ass shorts retire, along with a more secure belt after Black Bump in S3..

-he’s growing his hair out to measure his physical change, since he’s tired of looking like he’s forever 12

-covered up his shoulders with a more secure shirt, i just think it looks neat

-also has hand grippies

-has his plaits from using the Dofus, along with few scars (majority covered)

Tristepin Changes:

-instead of a solid black arm, his “rubi arm” takes more similarity to Rubilax’s actual arm in his demon form

-along with his left eye, just because it looks pretty cool

-his right eye carries a scar that stars from his forehead, down his eye and stops at his neck. this is from a dragon while facing Ogrest. He had partial blindness when this happened, but fusing with Rubi fixed it

-his big scar on his chest is one he kept from Razortime, a fairly touchy subject

-he also needs to change his pants..

Amalia Changes:

-she’s really in her warrior princess arc rn, now more that ever

-she’s grown up, she had to behave like a queen now, but why not look sick as fuck while doing it?

-she has her horns from her crown/tiara(?)

-she has little daisy earrings because they look cute

[its-in-the-woods]

Chapter Two, Life's too Short

Chapter one <- if you missed it.

Cooper howard/The Ghoul x Lucy Maclean

Post end of season 1

No beta.. I tried to edit 🫠

Ninety five percent written just tweaking

⚠️ Warning ⚠️

There will be canonically typical violence and eventually smut

+18 only

Slow burn sorta kinda

Please be nice this my first fic in almost a decade 🫣

Will eventually post on AO3 once I can get access... or where suggested 🤷🏻‍♂️

They had made it to the outpost. An outpost that was okay with Ghouls anyway. Ghoul's kind wasn't accepted at many places, the whole going feral thing was a bit of an issue. The other issue was that Lucy drew a lot of attention. Even though Lucy had done her damnest to blend in the lack of scars, having all her teeth and most of her fingers was a dead giveaway. She made sure to keep herself close to the Ghoul as he walked into the village. There weren’t many eyes that weren’t looking at them. They made a hell of a sight, a genetically engineered dog, a pre-bomb Ghoul, and Vaultie. Sounded like a lame joke Chet would make back in the vault. 

A man stood up and moved towards them as they walked past him. The hair on the back of her neck stood up. Trouble. Her brain screamed to turn around. The Ghoul had already moved, his sawed-off pointed directly at the man, men, there were at least four of them. Lucy’s hand went to her gun holster and they paused. She desperately needed to start listening to those instincts.

“I don’t know whatcha boys are thinkin' of doin', but if you don’t wanna new hole in your meat suit I suggest you. Back. The. Fuck. Up.” Ghoul punctuated the last words with a clenched teeth grimace.  The man held the gun as if it were an extension of his arm. 

The whole place was silent, the scene from when Lucy had originally met the Ghoul played out in her mind. The whole place blasted to pieces in a matter of seconds. She knew the Ghoul had zero reservations about murdering anyone who even looked at him funny.

“We aren’t looking for any trouble” Lucy swallowed, part of her hating that she was always trying to look for solutions that didn’t end in blood. 

One of them gave a near-toothless grin. “Just wanted to say hello to such a fine little thing.” His voice made her skin crawl, as the man moved towards her. “Don’t see too many smooth-skinned Vaultdwellers around these parts.”

“I am sure you’d find a better company with us then,” Another man’s eyes roamed over the Ghoul, “Unless you're a Ghoulfcker.”

The Ghoul’s face tightened, and his finger went to the trigger-

“Wait, can we please not. I don’t want company. In fact, I would actually be really flattered if you just left us alone. Because this is going to get ugly fast” Lucy sighed out rubbing the bridge of her nose. The tension in the air could be cut with a knife. Part of her had already resigned to the fact that these men were dead.

The four men looked in between each other and then went to draw. The Ghoul blasted the closest two without a second thought. Lucy had pulled and hit the third, the fourth went to bail and Dogmeat had grabbed his calf. He screamed trying to beat the dog off. Lucy aimed at the same time as the Ghoul and brains went everywhere. A bloody mess, it always ended in a bloody mess. 

"Oh for fucksakes. I let the Ghouls in an suddenly everyone's getting blown away." Hollered an older woman from the second story of a building. She was a tall imposing figure with striking red hair streaked with grey. Her clothes where a patchwork of various materials, boot knee high leather of some kind. She looked at the two of them, the only ones left out in the open.

"Well, I will be damned. Is that fuckin Coop?" The women yelled, peering down at the Ghoul.

Coop? That's what the Ghoul's name was, Lucy felt like she had heard that somewhere before. Her mind went over the name a few times trying to place it. 

Coop tucked his shotgun back into its holster, a sly grin turning one corner of his lips up. "Guilty as charged, Tracy." 

The women came out from a lower door and walked up to them. Her face was lined with sun damage and her eyes were probably green once. But now they are more pastel grey. She poked the Ghoul in the chest with a gnarled finger. He chuckled at her, they clearly had met before. 

"I just started letting you radiation suckers back in two days ago. Why the fuck are you shooting up my paying customers?" Tracy gestured to the very dead men. "Who's gonna clean this up now?"

Coop chuckled, patting Tracy on the shoulder. "You and I both know that the roaches, irradiated or not, will have those bodies picked clean by morning."

The woman glowered at him, her hands on her hips. "Supposed you're right, but can we not shoot up anyone else?" She cussed some more and spit something on the ground.

"Well if your customers were more respectful to my companion here I wouldn't have to blow them away." 

The woman's eyes narrowed and she looked over at Lucy. Graying eyes or not, the woman looked as if she could read her thoughts. 

Lucy immediately extended her hand, "Hi, my name is Lucy. I am so sorry for shooting up the place. They did draw on us first." She left out her last name, something the Ghoul had mentioned. Always keep important information to yourself. 

The woman rolled her eyes, waving her hand dismissively. "One less asshole, well guess four. Come on, let's get you two rooms and some grub."

They followed after her, already people were starting to emerge to come to pick over the dead. Lucy tried to not think about the fact they'd probably end up as food for some of the dwellers.

***

Despite Tracy's sour appearance she seemed to be fond of the Ghoul Coop. Happily, giving them both good-sized plates of chicken and something that looked like potatoes? Whatever it was it tasted good and Lucy for the first time in over a week actually ate until she was full.

There was also water. Apparently, the settlement had a spring nearby that they used for drinking water. Tracy was more than happy to tell the tale of how Coop had liberated the well for the settlement. 

“Nothing much was left of the raiders once he came through. Got us clean water and a little peace and quiet. Well as much peace as you can in this waste.” The lady said, patting Coop on the arm.“He can be a pretty big pain in the ass most days. But if there are some caps and moonshine in it he's not bad.”

Coop chuckled, “I promise to only darken your doorstep when raiders are about.”

Tracy patted his arm, “Well let me not keep yah. I have a few rooms available. Lots of folks scattered when the brotherhood knight came by.”

“When did he come by?” Lucy asked, her heart beating in her chest. It was the first time she had spoken beside, ‘Yes Ma'am’ and ‘the food is good’ 

Tracy narrowed her eyes, “Two days ago I'd say. Stole a power core from a few Traders. Bastard. Why? Are you looking for him?”

Coop cleared his throat. “Something like that. He has some information we need.”

Tracy looked between both of them for a moment. Her eyes narrowed as if she was trying to figure out exactly what they were hinting at. 

“Mmhm. Well, he was heading east.” She fiddled with an old scar on her hand. “Do you want a room with one or two beds?”

“Two beds.” Both Lucy and Ghoul reply.

*Thank you for reading and all <3 are very appreciated. *

*Chapter three *

[dame-zoom-a-lot]

Week one submission for @steddiesmuttyseptember Thank you @stervrucht for beta reading! The first draft was rough. Any grammar / flow mistakes are my own. Tags: Human/Monster Romance, Mention of blood and knife play, Top Eddie Munson, Bottom Steve Harrington, Soft Dom Eddie Munson Prompts used: make-up sex, service dom, mile high club, pillow princess 

Word Count: 3700 (approximate) Rating: M Excerpt: “So, anyway. You’re supposed to be my top priority and I fucked it up. And… I’d really really like to make it up to you.”

“How?”

“I want to draw you a nice long bath first,” Eddie says, slowly stroking up and down Steve’s thighs, going in and out of his shorts. “I want to wash your hair, soap you all up, lotion you, do all the skincare routine for you that you’ve had to miss during tour.”

“That sounds… not terrible,” Steve muses. There’s no way Eddie actually got all the stuff required for his skincare routine.  Eddie hasn’t needed any skincare in forever. The man is covered in some sort of water-proof fuzz. Even the hairless patches of scarred skin heal from anything within a day or two. But Steve can play along for tonight. “After that?”

“Then I want to lay you down on the bed, all relaxed and pampered, and give you a deep, deep massage.”

“Since when do you know how to give massages?” Steve says laughing.

“Dude. I was sleeping on the ground for months! It was either learn or fight off the Demo-jackasses with a kink in my old-man back!”

“Hmm…” Steve’s pretty sure Eddie wasn’t massaging his own back in the Upside-Down, but he did decide to play along. “Alright. Then? After the massage? We just have a good Christian sleepover? Leave room for Jesus?”

“Well no, I was thinking that I’d tie you up.”

“Mhm? Mhm. Mhm?”

You can read on A03 here

“Right, I understand that Eowyn is a big draw. But as I said before, your backstage doesn’t have enough space for—”

“Bullshit! There’s plenty of room for a fucking dog! Cleveland got to have her. You’re saying my venue isn’t good enough? She’s just running across the stage!”

“No, Cleveland had plenty of room for us to—”

“I’m going to tell the label you’re ruining the show you piece of shit!” The asshole on the other side of the line, John? Dick? Lil something? Screams and slams down the phone. Steve’s ears ring. He can feel the beginning of a headache. He needs to go find a quiet place to lay down before this turns into a migraine. But he’s in the middle of a tour. His bedroom is a bunk in the crowded tour bus. He hasn’t had privacy in weeks. He’s ready to chew someone’s head off.

The entire Corroded Coffin crew barges into Steve’s sad makeshift office—a picnic table about ten feet away from the tour bus.

“Eowyn won’t eat,” Gareth says accusingly.

Goodie is close behind him. “You gave her the same thing again Steve. Where’s her beef kibble?”

“We’re out of that,” Steve says, trying to stay calm. Eowyn gets antsy when he sounds upset. “She’ll have to make do with the food we have. We can get her a different bag tomorrow.”

“You’ve given her the same food for days!” Gareth explodes. “You know she likes variety! How would you feel if you had the same thing every fucking day?”

“How would I feel? I’d feel the way I have over this entire fucking tour where I had the same fucking thing every day Gareth! That’s how I’d feel!” Steve finally screams.

Eddie just stands off to the side uselessly. Not standing up for him. Not fighting his boys. What’s new? Steve gets up and goes out of his way to push into Gareth and Goodie as he marches away. He’s done with this. Fuck this. Fuck this tour. Why the fuck did he let this band of assholes talk him into bringing a whole ass husky on a metal tour? ***********************

“Steve?”

Steve burrows deeper into the blankets in his tiny bunk on the tour bus. He’s pretty sure he’s overdue for Eowyn’s second daily hour-long run. He should be clipped behind her right now, letting her pull him along on a run around the isolated track he’d managed to find around where they were staying. His head throbs. He feels scrubbed out, rubbed raw. Mostly, he’s ashamed. “Sweetheart, can you please look at me?” Eddie begs. Gentle palms trace the back of Steve’s neck and into his hair. Steve hates how he automatically relaxes and leans into the touch. Maybe it’s because the skin-colored fuzz that grows all over Eddie now is so soft. Maybe it’s because that’s a reminder that Eddie is safe now, back with him in the right-side up. Whatever the reason is, it’s really cramping his tantrum. “I told the boys to run Eowyn themselves for once. And I booked a hotel room for you to stay in tonight so you can take a breather. Can you please let me take you there?”

It’s a sweet gesture. But it’s also a little too late. Where was this when Steve was fending off angry venues who all wanted a piece of Eowyn, Eowyn—the lovable, needy bastard, and all the various needs of the entire tour crew, including the band? Besides, Steve’s not about to cry in front of people like some ten-year-old. Steve burrows deeper into his flimsy sheets instead. It smells like sweat and stale air.

Eddie and the band might be pissing him off. But. But he literally signed up for this. Begged for this job really. Only got the job because Eddie vouched for him to the label. And he’s humiliating them both. Steve summons all his self control from his Scoops Ahoy and Family Video days. He sits up to look at Eddie and puts on his best customer service smile. Eddie flinches.

Steve resists the urge to throw the sheet back over himself so he doesn’t have to watch Eddie see right through him, fake smiles,  fake confidence, fake strength. “Sorry I made you feel like you had to do all that,” he says instead. “I’m alright. Can you cancel the hotel room?”

“No,” Eddie says firmly. “I mean, maybe? I’m not going to find out though.” Eddie licks his lips the way he does when he’s panicking. He gently cups Steve’s face, eyes shiny, voice shaking. “Please, please let me do this? I’m so sorry. I shouldn’t have let Gareth talk to you like that. It’s going to eat me up alive Stevie. Please. I’ll stand guard. The bus will be standing when you’re back. We’ll get to our next venue on schedule. You deserve a break. Let me give it to you.”

“You’re standing guard?” Steve asks, confused.

“Well, we’ll need one responsible adult to guard the bus right?” Eddie says with a vague smile. Steve scoffs involuntarily at the idea of Eddie being a responsible adult. Eddie’s face falls. “Ok, so maybe I’m not quite the responsible adult the bus deserves, but I can be the adult that stepped up. And besides… I’ve been an ass. I figured you’d want a break from me tonight as well.”

“And sulking by myself in a hotel is going to be a break?” Steve asks, incredulously.

Eddie’s mood immediately shifts. He gets right up into Steve’s space with a delighted grin. “What was that sweetheart? You forgive me? You want little old me warming up your bed?”

“You’re not off the hook that fast you asshole. That room better have a couch,” Steve says, flicking Eddie gently on the nose.

“Aww Steve, my love, my only, let me on the bed. I’ll show you a good time, the best time. The ye olde Munson special.”

“Aren’t you the one who’s always insisting that ye is pronounced ‘the’?”

“That was the old me, full of misguided loyalty to my band and random medieval facts. I’m the new me now, full of chagrin and excitement that I’ll finally have a chance to pamper you the way you deserve.” Eddie kneels and takes Steve’s hand, pulling it into a kiss. “Shall we?”

**************

Steve tries not to think too hard about how much Eddie must have spent on this room. Corroded Coffin has been doing ok, just about enough to pay the bills. It’s not rock star money. He’s definitely not making enough to get a room this nice in a five-star hotel. Steve takes a deep sniff and wonders if Eddie got them to spritz the room with Steve’s favorite vanilla and mahogany scent.

He throws himself into the soft plush sheets and thrashes around, luxuriating in sleeping on something so clean again. He tries not to freak out about how Eddie left right after showing him the room. He did say he’d be right back. Said he needed to grab something.

What was he grabbing? A pink slip? Was this some sort of severance, a last hurrah before Steve gets fired for throwing a tantrum in public?

Fortunately, Eddie comes back before Steve can spiral any harder. He’s carrying a small bag in one hand, and a very familiar duffel bag in another.

“Did you… bring our kit on tour?” Steve squawks.

“In my defense,” Eddie says sheepishly, “I’m nothing if not unreasonably hopeful. How else would I be in this line of work?”

“What,” Steve sputters, shaking with laughter. “What were you going to do if the whole hotel thing didn’t happen? Make everyone look away for a hot second?”

“Excuse you! I would have made everyone look away for at least five minutes!” Eddie says with mock indignation. “Now can you please stop making fun of me so I can focus on adding us to the mile high club?”

“What?”

“We’re in the mile high city, my heart. I believe that-” Eddie drops the duffel bag on the hotel room’s floor. Steve’s dick twitches at the familiar thump. “-qualifies us for the mile high club? Unless… you’re attached to the traditional definition? And if so… I…”

Eddie hesitates, nose wrinkling.

“Fuck it. Stevie, baby, we’ve had sex in much worse places. I will happily add an airplane bathroom to one of those spots for you.”

Steve leaps off the bed to pounce on Eddie so he can mock retch on him. “Don’t you dare make me cum in an airplane bathroom. We’re counting this.” “Oh thank fuck. Let’s get this show started then.” Eddie rummages through their ‘bag of holdings’ and pulls out a familiar coil of rope. Steve’s stomach flips with anticipation.

“How do you want me?” Steve asks, plopping down on the floor. He could get back on the bed. But then Eddie wouldn’t get to throw him on it, and where’s the fun in that?

Eddie hums, head cocked the way he does when he’s trying to condense like five paragraphs of rambling thoughts into reasonable sentences.

“Eds? We doing this tonight?” Steve asks, running his feet gently over Eddie’s leg. Eddie squeaks.

“Well Steve, sweetheart, darling.” Eddie joins Steve on the floor then plops his head down on Steve’s lap. “I was thinking… I’m trying to make it up to you, for being such a shitty boyfriend.”

Steve shrugs, running his hand along Eddie’s soft, fuzzy face. “I’m not going to pretend that I’m not mad. But I get it. Those guys stuck by you after you went AWOL for nearly a year then resurfaced as a cat-seal-human hybrid. And this is your career…”

Eddie sits up abruptly so he can grab Steve’s wrist and moves his hands to Eddie’s chest. Steve can feel Eddie’s razor sharp talons against skin. It’s not drawing blood. Not yet. But it’s a reminder of all the times when Eddie did, the times when Eddie let Steve feel the sharp pain of claws going through skin, the times Eddie dragged his claws over his body, covering him in beautiful specks of blood and pink lines that would last for hours. Eddie lets the silence drag on, tightens his grip a bit so the claws are digging almost deep enough to break the skin. Steve feels his shoulders relax as his world narrows down to Eddie—his eyes, his claws, his grip.

“Steve,” Eddie says finally.

“Eddie?”

“My career means fuck all compared to you.”

“I…”

“I mean it. I’ve failed you spectacularly if I’ve been making you feel like you deserve anything less than being my top, top priority.”

Steve shrugs as his world widens again. It feels bad to say that yes, Eddie hasn’t been making him feel like a top priority this tour. Or any type of priority. Especially when Eddie’s saying that that’s a spectacular failure. It’s not like Steve isn’t used to this.

“And don’t you dare say something like how you’re used to it in that casual tone,” Eddie growls, “I’ll cry on you. I’ll get snot all over your perfect hair. Watch me.”

“Ok, ok!” Steve says. There’s a knot at his throat that’s threatening to turn into tears. But he’s not going to do that. He’s a grown ass man. A grown ass man who’s running a tour. A grown ass man who’s supposed to be the safe rock in Eddie’s supernaturally fucked-up life.

“So, anyway. You’re supposed to be my top priority and I fucked it up. And… I’d really really like to make it up to you.”

“How?”

“I want to draw you a nice long bath first,” Eddie says, slowly stroking up and down Steve’s thighs, going in and out of his shorts. “I want to wash your hair, soap you all up, lotion you, do all the skincare routine for you that you’ve had to miss during tour.”

“That sounds… not terrible,” Steve muses. There’s no way Eddie actually got all the stuff required for his skincare routine.  Eddie hasn’t needed any skincare in forever. The man is covered in some sort of water-proof fuzz. Even the hairless patches of scarred skin heal from anything within a day or two. But Steve can play along for tonight. “After that?”

“Then I want to lay you down on the bed, all relaxed and pampered, and give you a deep, deep massage.”

“Since when do you know how to give massages?” Steve says laughing.

“Dude. I was sleeping on the ground for months! It was either learn or fight off the Demo-jackasses with a kink in my old-man back!”

“Hmm…” Steve’s pretty sure Eddie wasn’t massaging his own back in the Upside-Down, but he did decide to play along. “Alright. Then? After the massage? We just have a good Christian sleepover? Leave room for Jesus?”

“Well no, I was thinking that I’d tie you up.”

“Mhm? Mhm. Mhm?”

“Dude, I just felt your dick twitch. You’re adorable.” Eddie leans into Steve’s crotch to blow raspberries into the fabric.

“Anyway, I was thinking. I would tie you up real nice and loose, but only enough so you don’t get all in your head about repaying the favor or whatever,” Eddie says, gesturing vaguely. “Then I’ll suck you off with the breeder dildo up your ass. Make it vibrate. What do you say?”

“But… what about you?” Steve asks. He hates how quiet and uncertain he sounds.

“Baby, please. Just for tonight, can it be about you? Just you?” Eddie says, “If it really bothers you, just think of it as payback for all the times you had to jerk me off by yourself before we figured out how to deal with my talons.”

Steve wants to say no. It’s not fair. But Eddie’s deep brown eyes are hypnotic. “Ugh, alright.”

“Yes!” Eddie says, punching the air, way too happy for a man who just decided he wasn’t getting off for the night. “Now, please undress to your comfort level while I go run the bath.”

******************

Steve looks on in disbelief. All his products are laid carefully out by the foot of the tub so there’s no risk of them falling into the tub. The water’s even the perfect temperature. There’s bubbles.

“Where did you get all this?” Steve asks, touched.

“Well, after I yelled at the boys for being unreasonable dickheads, I ran out to the city.” Eddie lifts Steve easily and gently lowers him down into the tub. “And I know what products you use because err… I like to sniff them? When you’re gone? They smell like you?”

Steve looks at Eddie, an eyebrow raised. Eddie squirms a little. The bathroom is damp. The tub’s steam wafts over Eddie, wetting down the fur so it forms beautiful cowlicks and waves. The bright light of the bathroom bounce off the scales scattered across Eddie’s body, making them glitter. The hairless patches of scar tissue only accentuate the gorgeous strangeness of all that is Eddie. He looks ethereal, shy, adorable. Steve feels the last of his anger melt away at the sight of Eddie’s clawed hands nervously curling and uncurling.

“Oh my god,” Steve hears himself say.

Eddie turns his head. If he weren’t covered in fuzz, he’d be blushing.

“No no, don’t get all fluttery on me now. That’s insane in the best way. You’re such a perv.” Eddie flashes a shy but pleased smile.

“I mean, have you seen my boyfriend?” Eddie says, gesturing at Steve in the tub. He squeezes himself behind Steve. He pulls Steve into his chest and Steve rubs his back into Eddie’s torso, relishing in the contrast between the fur and ridged smoothness where there’s no hair, just scarred skin.

“And the water’s perfect too,” Steve sighs, settling deeper into Eddie.

“Oh is it?” Eddie chuckles, “I’m glad I called Robin then, even if she did threaten to bury me.”

“Why… does she know my bath temperature?”

“Was she not supposed to know that?”

“No? Though… she probably just gave you her perfect bath temperature, which apparently is also mine because of course it would be.”

“You know what? I’m not going to think too hard about that. Anyway. Yeah, so I was going to set up the hotel room like this for you as a surprise. But I like this better.” Eddie kisses Steve’s hair. “Thanks for letting me in with you. For… giving me a chance.”

“You deserve all my chances.” Steve closes his eyes and relaxes into the water as Eddie runs water over his hair. Eddie clears his throat loudly.

They don’t need words while Eddie pulls off Steve’s entire bath routine perfectly even though he has to work with his knuckles because of the claws. By the time they’re done, Steve feels wrung out in the best way, the way he does after Eddie’s been playing with him for hours. When they’re done, Eddie helps him out of the bath and even dries him off. He probably doesn’t need to pay quite that much attention to Steve’s asshole and balls, but he’s not about to complain.

****************

“You still want that massage and blowjob?” Eddie asks as he lays Steve on the bed, carefully placing his head on a pillow.

“Mmmm…” Fuck, thinking is hard. “I’m real tired. So I’m worried I’ll fall asleep if you give me a massage. But… I do want you to tie me up.”

“One big boy sausage coming right up,” Eddie says, gently kissing Steve on the forehead. Steve stretches out while Eddie grabs the rope. Then he stretches out a little more because he likes the face Eddie makes as he watches. By the time Eddie comes around to the bed, Steve can see that Eddie’s fully hard. But Eddie doesn’t touch himself at all, choosing to use both hands to wrap Steve in ropes instead. Soon, Steve can feel the pressure of the ropes all around him, pressing exactly where he likes them. Eddie stands back and admires his handiwork.

Steve wiggles around and flutters his lashes coquettishly. Eddie giggles.

“Do you want the breeder dildo still?” Eddie asks, smiling fondly.

Steve hesitates. Eddie looks so tired. He’s already taken an hour so just for Steve’s bath and that was after he’d been running all over to find Steve’s products. “You don’t have to,” he says.

Eddie frowns. He retreats to go grab the toy. Standing at the foot of the bed, Eddie strokes himself a little so he can gather his precum. He mixes it in with the lube he slathers onto the toy’s length. Steve watches.

“I do Steve,” Eddie leans down to suck at Steve’s neck, grazing down a little. Steve shivers. “I do have to. Right now. Tomorrow. Every day.”

The knot returns to the base of his throat. Steve throws his head back to force it down. Eddie takes advantage, running a canine over the extended length of Steve’s neck. Eddie preps Steve blindly, keeping his mouth on the moles along Steve’s inner thigh as he slowly and carefully works him open with dildos of varying sizes. His talons occasionally nick at the soft skin around Steve’s rims–at first by accident, then a few more times on purpose when Steve moans at the hot, pleasant burst of pain. By the time Eddie pushes the dildo in, Steve is already shaking. Eddie turns the vibration on low and licks along Steve’s cock as Steve writhes and whines.

Eddie swallows Steve’s entire cock in one go and it takes all of Steve’s self control not to buck up into his throat. Steve seizes up. That sends the dildo up higher so it’s vibrating directly into his prostate. There’s too much sensation. It’s too good. Eddie’s hot, soft mouth bobs up and down. Eddie’s hands roam everywhere. The dildo is setting his nerves on fire. All of it chinks away at Steve’s control over the growing knot in his chest.

Steve sobs when he cums. Eddie nearly spits out Steve’s cock in his hurry to get to Steve’s face. “Baby, what’s wrong? Did I do something?” Eddie wraps Steve, bound and with the vibrator still quietly whirring in his ass, into his chest. When Steve doesn’t stop crying, Eddie moves his legs so he can use all limbs to wrap around Steve. Steve sobs harder. Eddie clutches Steve harder, crooning nonsense words. Steve feels Eddie’s dick go from fully hard to soft in record time against his thigh. It reminds him of a snapping turtle for some reason. Steve starts laughing hysterically in between sobs.

“Sorry, sorry,” Steve gasps, laughing and crying. Jesus, he can feel his nose running but he can’t do anything about it because he’s still trussed up in Eddie’s arms. He feels flayed open. The only way out is to cry through it. The realization is weirdly calming. “It’s not you. It’s just… today was a lot and that was a lot of sensations.”

Eddie, thankfully, lets Steve continue hiding in the safety of his chest. “So it was like a release?” He nuzzles into Steve’s hair. “Come to think of it, I think this is the first time you’ve cried around me.”

“I don’t, you know, cry. And it feels especially unfair to cry at you when you’ve literally been through hell and back.” Steve says, sniffling. “Besides, I have a hideous cry face.”

Eddie pushes Steve’s face away from his chest at that, the bastard. “Who dared make fun of your cry face?” He whisper-shouts in his signature medieval bard voice. “It’s so pretty.” Eddie starts pecking all over Steve’s face. “So shiny.” Another peck. “So handsome.” He licks this time.

“Dude, my nose is running,” Steve says giggling, trying to move his head away. He squeals when Eddie grabs his hair to hold his head in place. But Eddie isn’t laughing along. He looks at Steve with that dark look that won’t allow Steve to hide behind quips and self-deprecating humor.

“Steve Harrington,” Eddie says slowly. “It’s not unfair to feel things around me. I want you to.”

There’s silence. Steve swallows. Eddie continues to stare. The tug at his hair gets a little mean, perfectly so, enough to knock away at the last shred of Steve’s dignity. Maybe it was never dignity.

“What if it’s too much?” Steve whispers.

“It’s not too much,” Eddie whispers back. He loosens his grip. The tug turns into gentle caresses. Eddie pulls Steve back into his chest. Steve nuzzles into it, rubbing the snot all over his face and Eddie’s remaining nipple. “Please trust me on that?”

“I’ll try.”

[thecubspeaks]

It rains, just like Gale's knees promised, but not until it's very late. It would be the perfect moment to break up the party, but instead they huddle beneath one of the tents, Shadowheart and the druids taking turns to dispel the water when it pools too threateningly on the fabric roof above them, Wyll and Karlach on duty darting out into the rain from time to time to fetch more wine and whatever bits of food have remained sheltered and dry. Shadowheart has been free with hugging, dozens for everyone, and she knows it surprises them all to see her so openly affectionate, and she doesn't care. She introduces a fuming Tara to the owlbear cub and tells her he'll be coming home with them, and as the night draws on so long that she passes through drunken sleepiness and comes out the other side in a different, giddy kind of haze, she curls up against Gale's side and doesn't care that everyone sees him playing with her hair, idly tracing her hipbone with his thumb. Six months ago, when she was so anxious of being seen by the rest of the camp, feels like a lifetime away.

"Have you caught a cold?" she asks, amused, the third or fourth time Gale pulls away from her to sneeze.

"You've gotta get him out of that tower more, Fringe," Karlach says, sprawled out next to Scratch on the ground. "Can't even take a few hours in the rain anymore."

"Your endurance has eroded severely," Lae'zel agrees solemnly. "And it was never impressive."

Gale pinches Shadowheart. "Don't you dare."

"I said nothing!"

"You were preparing to. I could see it in your face. You-- eh--" He breaks off with another sneeze. "Pardon me!"

Shadowheart has used no magic today, so it's easy enough, despite the late hour, depite her head buzzing with wine. She straightens up and cups his face in her hands, whispers against his lips-- vincere est vivere-- and kisses it better.

+

Gale will never be what he was. Mystra does not say it when she takes the orb from him, she does not need to. His lost power will not return. But he has built new power. He doesn't mind, he says. The hard-won, he says, is the better loved.

His body, too, will never be what it was. That is slower to unfold. But come winter he's often sick-- often only small inconveniences, but twice that winter he wakes her, sweating and flushed with fever, and he begs her pardon again and again while she tells him her magic is more powerful in moonlight anyway, and in the morning he makes breakfast and says no more of it. After the second time, even after she heals him and one night while he's sleeping secretly tries it again, a cough rattles around in his chest until the spring comes.

He aches more, too-- his knees, his back, but also, she suspects, a twinging pain in his chest, where the scar used to be. She catches him rubbing it when he thinks no one is looking, just like he used to. She catches him wince.

"I'm much older than you, you know," she teases as she rubs his back one night, an evening stroll cut short by pain, and now they're home again.

"Ah, but I remember it all," he replies sagely. "The weight of memories-- it's not just a saying, actually. Terrible for your joints."

She pulls his hair and he flips around and tackles her onto the bed, and she thinks how neither of them ever knew before that you could be in love with someone who makes you laugh.

+

In the smothering dark of winter, Shadowheart reads the books she stole from the cloister. It's like a compulsion, some nights-- to hole up and secret and read her whole life laid out like an experiment. At least it's information, if it never can be memory.

Spring comes, and she says to Gale over breakfast, "In one of her diaries, the Mother Superior wrote that I always talk about going traveling. So I think we ought to give it a try."

"Oh, and we'll be taking her word on these matters, will we?" Gale says. "Far be it for me to suggest the destruction of knowledge, but... had I known you'd kept those books, I would have advised against it."

"She had no reason to lie, not in a private journal," Shadowheart says, irritated. Tara, sensing disagreement, jumps off of the windowsill and darts away.

"I simply don't think any good will come of trying to grasp at what you imagine your childhood self might have wanted, rather than thinking about what you want, here and now."

"I want to travel," Shadowheart says stubbornly. "If it's the academy you're worried about, we can wait until the summer. And it needn't be rustic, if you're really opposed. I've never even seen Daggerford, or Neverwinter. And then, once we've gotten the feel for it back--"

"I can't," he bites out.

"Blackstaff Academy will not burn to the ground in your--"

"I mean I can't," he snaps, sharper, and stands. He drags a hand over his face and then sits back down, already the sharp edges pulled back in. "I'm sorry. My love. But I-- I can't. I don't think I would stand up to the journey, I'm afraid. Perhaps a teleportation circle to Daggerford or Neverwinter for a day or two, but-- journeying again. Even taking the open roads... I don't think I can. No. I know I can't."

Shadowheart swallows back a healer's urge to fix it, a lover's urge to chastise herself for not seeing.

"Then we won't," Shadowheart says simply.

"No! Please, you must. I won't have life with me become just another cloister to pen you in. I would never forgive myself."

"I'll think about it." She reaches a hand across the table to him, and he takes it. "For now, I'm not ready to leave you behind."

"I don't want to hold you back."

His hand feels thin in hers. She squeezes it. "It's not about you, Gale. It's your cooking."

He laughs, and stands-- I can take a hint-- pancakes today, I think?-- and when he's distracted by Tara's abrupt return at the smell of melting butter and burns his fingers on the stove, Shadowheart can kiss it better.

[missy-the-dragon]

Today I share my finished (Main) Slugcat Gijinkas. I hope you enjoy them! I made the designs to be as androgynous as possible, however you are free to refer to the slugcats with any pronouns you'd like.

I'll share their design notes under each image :3!

Spear Master- I wanted to go for a pretty intimidating look while also keeping a sense of elegance and professionalism because above all they really are just a glorified mailman. Their hair is tied up so they can get a good shot with their spears and they wear dark colors to be able to traverse without being noticed. The mask up on their face is for fashion and to cover up the fact that they simply don't have a mouth. All of their communication is through sign language and their eyes and eyebrows.

Hunter- They're on the move. Constantly. CONSTANTLY. So I gave them clothes to travel in. Pants that tie up easily a pouch for small items and the world's probably worst smelling tank top ever. I forgot their rot initially so that got added. I wanted them to have a pretty stern rbf kinda face. And also their hair is chopped up like that from both self inflicted horrid haircuts and pissed lizards. Also their ears are permanently affixed into alert mode. Good upper body and lower body. Scars from plenty of conflicts. They have dimples and thicker brows.

Gourmand- Someone who pursues food and specifically hunts for it on their own. I wanted their clothes to be comfortable but also convenient but also professional. But they're honestly a fashion crime and they know it. Their clothes under the button up shirt are easy to move in and the apron doubles as a cloak. They're usually not THIS well dressed and usually have a bit more protection on considering they hunt stuffs to eat whether it be literally or just foraging. They're also pretty muscular in the upper body but their legs are a tad noodly. But I think you should know they would probably body half the slugcats with physical prowess alone. Shorter hair for convenience because hair in your food isn't pleasant. And a short chunky tail because it's cute. They were tricky but I just designed what I thought would be fun in this case and they're based on my old culinary teacher slightly. I think I will give them new clothes sometime though.

Artificer- They're litterally at war w scavengers like. They need to be well dressed for that. The black under their shirt is actually pretty thick for withstanding blows and there's a brace on one of their arms (I feel like constantly exploding fucks up ur nerves y'know?) to keep their aim steady with spears n bombs. Also their tail is bent at a werid angle! Still functional but it has a lil knot in it. Under their clothes there are vents in their body to release heat. They're one of the older slugcats. Gnarly claws on their hands and feet.

Rivulet- Rivulet was hard for me because I was sure what I wanted to go with when I was doing them. I gave them kind of a more sporty active build made for swimming. I thought it would also be interesting to give them a camera. But this was mostly me just clowning on their big eyes. Under the jacket and cargo shorts they are wearing the world's goofiest swim attire. Floral print and all. Their ears are also ALOT smaller than the other cats.

Saint- They were incredibly fun for me design wise but I struggled to figure out what kind of body type to give them. Their hair is in a thick braid and their bangs cover their eyes. They also still have a sticky tongue. I decided not to draw their eyes open. I think it's more fun to leave an interpretation for them on what you think they look like. I gave them a robe with wool on the inside so they aren't cold.

Survivor (I know it's spelled wrong I'm tired)&Monk- My friends said to not separate them so I didn't. I've always imagined survivor as the taller slimmer sibling with a average build and Monk with a bit more weight on them and a bit shorter. The braids in their hair are from each other. I gave them simple robes to wear something flexible to move in but also comfortable for travel. They're basically supposed to be opposite in every way. A little fun bit is that monk's bangs is supposed to look like the final karma symbol.

I'm done! I will eventually make a post with the last two slugcats which are Inv/Enot and Nightcat but I'm not sure in their designs yet. Until then thank you for reading all of this and taking the time to look at my art and design! And reblogs in this post are greatly appreciated!

[blu3cl0v3rs]

Child's Play Alt AU

Watched Child's Play, so heres my alternate AU because this episode hurts my feelings >:,(

Alright, so instead of pushing the whole "age up Lloyd because he's losing his childhood anyways" vibe, we're making it "Lloyd's still a kid, let him live his fucking life instead of having him train 24/fucking 7".

Here's my thought process on how Child's Play will go:

Ninja go smol

They find Lloyd

Instead of immediately finding out about the Grundal, they fuck around and be kids

Near dusk, they spot the Grundal

They go to Mother Doomsday, the whole competition and Grundal fight happens

Right before Nya and Wu show up, the Ninja draw the Grundal away from Lloyd

They fucking apologise for forcing Lloyd to act older than his actual age as they think the Grundal's about to eat them

Wu and Nya show up, chuck Tomorrow's Tea at the Ninja, and everything's back to normal

They go back to the Bounty and hang out with Lloyd as he reads the latest issue of the Starfarer comic series

Now for how this will affect the rest of the show:

For the rest of Season 2, we'll see Lloyd relaxing a bit more, and the Ninja spending more quality time with him. Because I am a firm believer that Misako should've apologized along with explaining herself, she apologizes to Lloyd, who is more skeptical than in canon, although he accepts. Other than Lloyd being less comfortable with Misako's physical affection and not calling her mom, the season progresses the same.

In Season 3, Lloyd won't be paraded around like a celebrity, but instead he'll be at Sensei Garmadon's monastery, helping out with training and demonstrations. Wu's academy will not happen, instead the Ninja will be paraded around like celebrities, although bugged a lot about when the Gold Ninja will show up for an interview. The season progresses the same, but the love triangle will not happen, but instead I'll create a different conflict.

In Season 4, we have a few year time skip, accentuated by Lloyd looking older (how he looks S2 - S7), and the Ninja looking a little different. Cole gets longer hair, Kai gets longer hair, Jay stops straightening his hair (shown by a straightener being in his bathroom) and later on stops using makeup to cover his freckles (short clip of him using a makeup wipe to remove the concealer), Nya gets longer hair (but no ponytail. I'm anti-Nya's ponytail. It's more like a half-up half-down), and they all get their new outfits. Everything else in the season is generally the same.

In Season 5, it generally progresses the same way. We see some of the possession from Lloyd's point of view. We get a lot more verbal conflict. Misako and Wu get confrontations with possessed!Lloyd. More of Kai and Lloyd's relationship is shown. More of the parallels between Kai, Lloyd, and Morro are utilized. Kai also gets his eyebrow scar from Morro. Morro manages to escape the Preeminent, freeing Lloyd and Garmadon from the realm he was trapped in before leaving the Realm Crystal with them and flying off.

In Season 6... * clicking noises, hmms, and strutinizing faces ensue * yeah, scratch that. Instead of Season 6, we're actually just gonna have a "special" of sorts, where it's all actually from Nya's perspective as she slowly builds up rage from the bullshit that is sexist media, until she explodes and unloads all of it onto the Ninja, where they decide "yeah, this has been getting too much" (Lloyd's being constantly overwhelmed by interviewers and paparazzi, Jay and Cole are still being bugged about the love triangle even though they've said many times that it was resolved, Zane has had too many creepy encounters with obsessed fans, and Kai... actually, Kai's been loving it and the Ninja are 0.002 seconds away from banning his Chirp account). So, they rebuild the monastery instead of doing it in Season 10.

Day of the Departed progresses the same, but instead Morro shows up with the help of Nelson (‼️ my boy) to sorta save Cole, but ends up getting revived as well. He fucks off again. Cole is rightfully confused. It will feel somewhat ooc for Morro, and that is the point. I might explain this in a spin-off fic.

In Season 7, Krux and Acronix get sorta "controlled" by their power, a reference to Wu's line in Season 2 to Lloyd where he's all "Learn to control your powers before they control you". They want complete control over time and to basically merge with time itself (foreshadowing to Season 14, perhaps?). Also, the title of Sensei is not forced onto Lloyd, but instead Cole starts stepping up more as leader and sort of teacher. Other than that, the Season progresses the same.

In Season 8, we get to see what Garmadon's been up to, which is just training kids ike he was in Season 3. Lloyd is visiting. They end up talking about how Wu might actually be gone, and what the Ninja would do after that. The Ninja also meet up, and there is a brief mention of Nya and Kai spending time with their parents. The season progresses the same storyline of Harumi's manipulation, but Lloyd's actually a bit suspicious of her. He doesn't remove the mask from its pedestal, and the fight ends with Harumi knocking Lloyd into the pedestal which knocks the mask off, then she grabs it and scampers off like the morally grey little shit girlboss she is. She doesn't kidnap Misako, but rather imprisons her after she tries to get Garmadon back, who Harumi actually kidnapped. Instead of resurrecting Garmadon, she brings out his Oni side using the masks, making him lose control.

He can't feel any positive feelings, and only has the urge to destroy. Lloyd confuses Garmadon, because he feels nothing towards his son, so he just wants to destroy him. Harumi and feral Garmadon (that's what I'm calling him) take over Ninjago City, Lloyd loses his powers, and the Ninja are sent to the First Realm. Yay! Also, feral Garmadon is essentially Emperor Garmadon, but more animalistic and doesn't disown his son. He can talk though.

In Season 9, it's basically the same thing, but it's more focused on Lloyd learning to trust himself, his judgement, and his leadership. Morro is there and... kinda helps?? Idk, he kinda redeems himself. Also, Maya and Ray are there because they were coming to surprise visit. Yes, this means Ray-Maya-Morro dynamics, and Ray and Maya interact with their daughter. In the end, Mystake fucking drags Garmadon instead of dying, and they lock Garmadon up until they can find a way to revert him back. Garmadon does not give a cryptic warning.

Season 10 does not happen. Idk what you expected.

Season 11 happens, but without the "Ninja slacking off for months" schtick, because it felt like a copy-paste of Season 1. Instead, they're searching for ways to turn Garmadon back, and hear about this super powerful sorceress from ancient Ninjago times, aka Aspheera. Also, Aspheera never tries to overthrow the throne, Wu simply teaches her Spinjitzu, but FSM finds out and just fucking buries and seals her. That's why he's the Deceiver. Other than that, the season progresses the same.

Season 12 is all the same, but Lloyd has better design choices. Also, Morro's there in the background bc I said so.

Season 13 is all the same. I love this DnD campaign season.

I might slap a oneshot series here (chronologically, will not be a part of the actual fic itself) about the journeys the Ninja go (haha, Ninjago) on between S13 and S14.

Season 14 is the same, but Maya brings Morro along to the monastery as well. Sorry Nya, you're merging with the ocean.

Season 15 is probably going to be rewritten. I'll publish another post and link it here once I watch S15 and write it in this AU.

Btw, I'm calling this my Never Grow Old AU

[tjodity]

Do you have any shape shifter headcanons for dsmp and why…

UMM!! My ideas for character designs are smooth and constantly shifting so let me think..

ok im putting this under a line i had more thoughts than i expected

I go back and forth on Tubbo being a shapeshifter. Yuker made a good comic on the idea. If not I think he's just a human guy who tends to change his appearance a lot, either based on people who have had a big impact on him or to chameleon. He mimics Tommy's appearance a lot in his early days out as transmasc, so he cuts his hair short and wears a lot of outdoor-oriented and kind of styleless clothing. Throughout the early SMP and L'Manburg he came into his own personality wise, but also slotted into the more formal environment. He grew his hair out more but kept it brushed and wore lots of button ups. During Manberg he completely bleached his hair and started wearing suits. He also lost a ton of weight and stopped styling his hair. As president he wore a cracked segment of Schlatt's face from a stone bust to obscure his scars and partial blindness. His suit coat is too big so he wears it like a cape. By the time of Snowchester he has sort of a crisis about looking like other people and dyes random patches of his hair pink and blood and wears almost entirely utilitarian clothing.

I could maybe see Dream as a shapeshifter? I think it could lead to some interesting things if he didn't literally have a mask, but was just always mimicking other people so no one knew what his actual face looked like. On the other hand I like making Dream a fairly normal guy before he started to take a turn during the elections, with any inhumanity being a conscious choice of presentation on his part.

I have some ideas about Niki but it's not quite shapeshifter. She was originally this sort of mechanical angel, like one of those automatons from the 1800s, with plating over internal engines and clockwork. She starts out looking like a very traditional christian angel, but paints herself and starts wearing clothes to appear more human-ish. She has a lot of fun messing with her appearance. This also has the effect of her appearance and humanity being kind of an exposed nerve when people insult her over it. When she's spiraling alone in the hidden city she sort of takes her entire shell off and just looks like if you took the guts of a grandfather clock and had it move around like a skeleton. She tries to make herself very menacing after joining the Syndicate, but it does not do great things for her sense of personhood. I think after she gets her shit together she'd whittle herself a new exterior.

(^^ she kinda starts out looking like these but made of gold and wrought iron)

I know people headcanon fundy as a shapeshifter a lot but I don't vibe with it. I really like anthro designs of him, and there's more canon backing, but I'm also infatuated with characters that are just. real furries. meaning humans who dress up and draw animals. There aren't enough of those as characters and I feel like with Fundy it could be poignant for his struggle to be viewed as an adult and then the struggle to really have any consistent relationships in his life and the distance he feels towards humanity do to his isolation feelings of abandonment and straying from even grounded time and space. To me he's a guy who got really into furries when he was younger, was mocked relentlessly for it, repressed it into complete denial by the time of L'Manberg onward, and then got back into it with encouragement from his girlfriend who wears a fursuit everyday in public for fun (also its absolutely a sex thing for H but she lets Fundy have it as a not sex thing. mostly)

I think there could be something to be said for Puffy being an anthro-to-human shapeshifter and how it relates to the building pressure she feels to sort of 'save' everyone around her, whether that's as an untrained therapist or the leader of a resistance against a god or the girlfriend of a very destructive woman. Maybe her sheep/monster form is her more comfortable form but she uses it increasingly less as she feels the need to sort of be 'perfect' and is more frequently human.

I think Mexican Dream was probably just some poor shapeshifting monster that felt bad for Tommy and worked with what was around. Maybe he was some kind of sea monster derivative of a siren that was just passing by. God sends his most helpful soldiers to be brutally murdered five minutes after their introduction.

The only main character I guess I could see as a shapeshifter is maybe Quackity? I think breaking down how that fits with his character is above my paygrade but I think generally with how much of his character is about presentation and a lot of his story is sort of trying to fit into different places before Las Nevadas. I imagine his shifting is pretty smooth, like an animation rather than something with blood and bones below skin shifting. But who knows maybe that's a performance in of itself. I think most of the forms he takes are pretty human but when he's in full Las Nevadas I-don't-care-about-people-quit-your-job-join-my-emo-country mode he does like a chimera thing. Lion mane around his neck like old royal fashion snakes coming out of his wrists dove wings everywhere. It's incredibly taxing so he usually just does it for commercials and threatening people.

[jam-as-in-mashed-strawberries]

man this was just supposed to be a jon hair timeline 😔

extra notes and headcanons under the cut cuz um. its a lot and i'm a grade A yapper

Jon: i always kinda oscillated between whether or not he'd look so professional before kinda just decided that he really wouldn't. he's a pretty practical guy in terms of like clothes, i feel. so, when he got promoted, i just kinda imagined him throwing on a suit jacket n calling it a day (the t-shirt for the season one bit says PUSSY MOBILE in case anyone wanted to know lol). also i thought it was a little weird how i never really saw anyone draw jon with burn scars beyond the handshake, since he was put into a coma by a nearby explosion. i'm not sure how well i translated those scars into my drawings but hopefully it's clear? anyways, to me he's a slightly below average height skinny guy with a kinda big head (literally and figuratively)

tim: he's just a short guy with a mullet (that overtime he lets grow out) and a big gut. no extra notes about him just know that i love him from the bottom of my heart and i hope he's kayaking peacefully in heaven

sasha: she's kinda nerdy looking i feel, very relaxed n casual about the way she presents herself, kinda like tim in season 1. i feel she's the tallest of the four (just an inch or two on martin) with an average build. the Not!Them comes across as more indifferent than casual, and is just a bit slimmer than OG sasha and is about tim's height; i always thought of her as the oldest of the bunch. i miss you ms. james even though you had like 4 episodes you actually spoke in

elias: most boring man on earth. i know everyone likes to give him cool little eye accessories but i could never see it. he's just really normal-looking. could pass by him on the subway and not give him a second glance. the only thing that stands out is that he's slightly short (but still taller than tim)

martin: i imagine him as fat man who is almost as tall as sasha, and he wears bright clothes and keeps his appearance nice and tidy up until jon's coma and his mother's death. he dresses nicer for his new position, but he doesn't really keep his personal hygiene. in season 5, despite the apocalypse, he tries to go back to how he used to be, but he still ends up with physical marks of the lonely, like his white streaks and dulled eyes.

basira: i spent way too much time looking at police uniforms for her and daisy and the tie still didnt come out right lol. anyways, she's an average height, slightly stocky woman in my head. after she resigns from the police force, like martin and time, i kinda imagin her being a bit more quick and less careful about her daily routine, which is why her hijab is in a wrap-around fashion. the beginning of season 5 kinda follows this, but after daisy dies, she tries to kind of go back to how she usually wore it.

daisy: she's a tall woman with a muscular build that she loses after her time in the buried. she becomes a lot shakier and uses a cane as she tries to regain her usual movement. she ends up cutting her hair since there was just way too much filth and mud to get rid of. when she gives into the hunt, the only part of her that looks human is her armss, while the rest of her becomes this weird wolf thing. i still haven't got a solid image of her body at this point, but she moves on all fours, not necessarily animal like, but it falls into that uncanny valley where it looks she is but is she really? (<- what is he even talking about ?!)

melanie: side thing but i wasn't really a fan of melanie at first, but i've grown to really like her. it's kinda like how jon feels about her, seeing the self through the other, yk? anyways, she's got a similar build and height to jon (if just like 2 cm taller). she also wears her own merch a lot, even when GHUK ends, which is handy during the apocalypse cuz she's got a change of clothes ready to go !!

georgie: she's of average height and is somewhat fat. she's a lot like melanie in that she likes her change her hair style a lot, but both of them kinda fall out of it during the apocalypse. she also wears a lot of patterned clothing. (which i'm also now just realizing i forgot to add her earrings but i've uploaded the same canas 3 times now so just pretend she has them on lol)

agnes: probably the hardest for me to get a solid image on, and the only thing I could really get was her warm pallette cuz uhm. you know.

gertrude: honestly this keeps like a big of a copy of all the gertrudes i've seen floating around lol. no real notes on her. the same kinda goes for nikola and micheal.m

jane: she's a corpse with worms eating away at it's host. most of her appearance is based on the fact that she's probably rotting, adn the drawing i made was after the time martin saw her and when she attacks the institute. there is not evidence for the flesh of her jaw being gone i just thought it was metal.

gerry: much like his hair, his makeup is also similarly done a little badly. and ofc the look wouldn't be complete without piercings.

annabelle: or as i like to call her. the smugler. like that she looks smug not that she transfers illegal goods. i like to think she always has this slight and subtle smile on her face, even when she's upset.

[cyrenescreams]

Hii cyrene do you have any specific details about the designs of the characters in a 101 reasons? (Totally not looking for art ideas)

Hi Ýr! You asked so I’m going to use this an excuse to ramble <3 under the cut for convenience 

This is like current timeline I guess 

Quackity

longer hair.  it’s definitely at least shoulder length by now 

Definitely used like Bobby pins to keep his bangs out of his face 

Beanies obviously both the plain navy one and the embroidered red one 

I’m very fond of the track suit skin so he definitely wears those. He probably just claims it is easier than picking out clothes that actually match 

Lots of moles and beauty marks because obviously 

Reading glasses I can’t explain this one but it is true just plain wire frames that he hates but his boyfriends love 

He more or less only wears longs sleeves which covers it but he absolutely still wears the friendship bracelet 

Karl paints his nails but they never match any sort of theme because he doesn’t really care 

Charlie 

glasses 

His hair is sort of shaggy but not overgrown 

He definitely had braces at the start but got them off at some point 

On that same note he was the kid who exclusively got neon green bands on his braces 

The worst gamer tee-shirts you have ever seen. Only bad puns 

He cuffs his jeans to show off his fun patterned socks 

His socks while all having fun patterns never match 

He also wears his friendship bracelet

He’s a converse guy 

Definitely has some scar on his cheek from a dumb dare that he did as a kid. It’s a fun reminder of better times 

Foolish 

he wears the friendship bracelet and also like fifty others that Ponk made 

Also keeps a hair tie on his wrist for his partners 

His hair is definitely growing out but not quiet to the length that Quackity’s is yet 

Plain tee shirts and jeans 

He has no style and cannot be bothered to develop one 

His clothes definitely all fit a bit awkwardly because he refuses to get new ones 

He has a chip on his front tooth from playing football 

A beauty mark under one eye. Why? Who knows 

Messiest hair ever. He definitely run his hands throw it a lot when thinking and just totally fucks it up 

Probably some little scars on his arms from the car accident and playing sports growing up

Fundy

freckles everywhere absolutely everywhere on his face that’s it though

Some boring short hair cut 

He definitely had his ears pierced as a kid and still wears boring studs because he likes the piercings but doenst want to draw attention to them 

A hoodie and zip up guy. Always wearing like three layers of baggy clothes 

Black or dark blue are his go to colors 

Doesn’t wear the bracelets because he doesn’t like the wrist feel but will occasionally wear necklaces 

He seems like a silver guy 

Crooked teeth because same 

Sam

freckles everywhere part two 

Definitely has a little gap in his front teeth 

Hearing aids 

His hair has definitely grown out quite a bit. Maybe a bit longer than Quackity’s 

Has a severe case of roots always showing because he’s too lazy to dye it right away syndrome 

Faint scars on his arms and face from the accident 

Also a hoodie guy 

He can match colors and patterns on his clothes but usually just wears plain colors or green. 

The sort of guy to wear his sneakers into oblivion. They have only luck and ducktape holding them together 

Just the main boys to keep this from getting too long but as always I love to ramble 

[iwasforcedtomakethisbytum]

State appearance headcanons and explanation for headcanon

Well my headcanons are mainly aesthetic choices with little reason other than i think it looks nice the outfits are mostly the same except simplified

Gov I've only started drawing him recently, he's mostly canon complaint other than having blue eyes in my most recent drawing because he frankly doesn't have many colors other than black, and i made him being a tad chubby, because i don't often draw fat characters so after my first time, i started drawing him fat because it's honestly kinda cute i give him a beard too

Louisiana has probably the most consistently simplified outfit because i simply don't remember how it looks and i refuse references, i draw him as a black man and i usually give him those beads that people often put in their braids because i think it looks cool, i also vaguely headcanon him based off my brother (not inlaw yet but in spirit) and I'd like to draw him with a cane or wheelchair eventually because of that, i do need the practice of drawing those

California i imagine being buff because of his former governor Arnold Schwarzenegger, although I'm bad at drawing buff people, i like giving him a darker skin tone, and he has longer curly hair, i think i originally did it because of him being considered a hippie, also when i draw his ears being visible i give him some lovely percings, occasionally I'll give him golden eyes because it's pretty, i also usually give him ripped jeans

Florida i usually forget his glasses on his hat, i definitely use the brightest colours on him, i draw him with shorts usually, if anyone is given scars it's Florida, i draw him as a white person but i made him really really tan despite him being a redhead, and i made him one because I've heard some people say redheads are soulless so i figured it made sense lol

Nevada I've drawn one time, I've given him really short shorts i believe and i changed his outfit to a tank top because i felt it fits better with the headpiece, the T-shirt looks awkward, honestly he looks kinda ugly in canon ngl, i also don't imagine him with a feminine body type i imagine him having some muscle, i think it looks nice

Texas i usually draw as a really skinny dude, i don't know why honestly i feel like i started doing it that way because i felt it made him look even taller, and usually i give his boots pointed bottoms, it makes him look like he's floating whenever i draw him, he has fairly tan, skin definitely not as tan as he could be, he's very white but still, i draw him with sorta longer light brown hair, depending on the length it could be slightly curly, or straighter than him. When i remember i give him a cross necklace, when i draw her as a lady i give her a long skirt because i think she'd really value hiding her body, i also draw him with a square head because of that one moment in the series :)

Alaska I've only drawn occasionally, since i headcanon him and texas as brothers they have similar genetic traits like hair and skin, i forget how i draw his eyes, i feel blue if i had to guess, i imagine him and texas are the same height but he's much more fat, i usually give him a T-shirt and shorts, i draw him with a beard unlike most characters because i suck at drawing them

And new york i usually draw with a slightly skinner body, i remember once seeing someone draw new York as black for the first time and thinking "yes yes i love that actually" so i nowadays always draw him black, he also doesn't have any or much of any hair under his hat, i also draw him fairly short because he sorta reminds me of my sister and she's 4'11 i believe

I've never drawn Colorado before i don't think but i do like seeing the people who draw him with short curly hair i think it's cute

Austin when he is a separate person from Texas I've drawn him like a mix of him and California because i like the headcanon of Austin being in Texas's custody after the divorce. He has percings with crosses and very short curly hair, his skin is lighter than California but darker than texas, and he has a similar headshape and body to texas, but he has a more emo style, but this does make me think, who is giving birth to him? because i draw him like he's their biological child, and i see them both as biological males, idk for all we know states preform magic mating dances to have kids

[cloudwhisper23]

Trick or treat ✨ฅ(•ㅅ•❀)ฅ

Depends on your interpretation of a treat, Pix. You get an excerpt.

The new school was interesting, at least in Chris’ opinion. Sure, people still gawked at his scar all the time, but it was so much better than where he was before. His English teacher immediately assigned reading partners, explaining that discussing the readings was just as important as drawing conclusions individually.

Chris glanced at his reading partner with disinterest. Her name was Millie Fitzsimmons, and she did not speak sign language. Her last name reminded him of Jeremy, which was the only reason he bothered to take an interest in her at all.

She was staring right back at him, seeming very interested in his dyed hair and scarred face. Chris didn’t take it personally. He did look interesting to an outside observer. His hair hadn’t really grown back yet either.

Millie leaned toward him as she spoke, “So, Chris. What types of books do you like to read?”

Chris tapped his pencil against his notebook for a moment, considering her question. His mother’s house had a wider selection of novels, and since she was gone all the time – albeit seeming more apologetic than his father or sister had been – he was allowed full access to her bookshelves.

Chris wondered if she was the reason his father’s house had absolutely no books or interesting material. It explained a lot, especially after he’d found his own name scribbled in the front cover of several books. He determined that they were definitely above his age-range when he’d originally read them, probably explaining his nightmares.

Finally, he remembered that Millie was waiting for a response. He shrugged, writing, “A bit of everything, to be honest. I prefer short stories to anything else.”

He wished he could explain better. That he loved seeing how writers wrote such wonderful stories without needing a whole book or even a series to capture it all.

While Millie skimmed the words he’d written, Chris quickly added, “Poe’s my favorite author though.”

“The Cask of Amontillado” was Chris’ favorite story to read since the Bite. The implied betrayal and potential for the narrator’s guilt at having killed Fortunato was all too familiar to Chris.

“Edgar Allan Poe is your favorite author?” Millie raised an eyebrow, mildly impressed. “What’s your favorite work by him?”

Chris stared at her for a moment. Should he be completely honest? Truth be told, no one had tried to hold a conversation with him this long before. He gave a so-so gesture before writing, “If I have to pick one, I’d say ‘The Cask of Amontillado.’ What about you?”

She hummed for a moment. “I’d say… ‘Annabel Lee.’ The love shared between her and the speaker transcends heaven and hell, Chris. Isn’t that amazing?”

Chris shrugged. He found the poem depressing, truth be told. He couldn’t even imagine understanding what it could feel like to care for someone like that, only to lose them to others’ jealousy. But Jeremy would, a voice muttered in the back of his mind. He frowned slightly as that came up. It was private information, and whomever Jeremy chose to be with was none of his business.

Millie was carefully watching his expression, and she frowned back at him. “Do you hate romance or something?”

Chris shook his head. He wrote, “I just don’t get it.”

“Huh. Maybe you should read more,” Millie said, patting him gently on the shoulder as the bell rang for the end of class.

He decided he didn’t really like Millie, after that moment. Maybe it was something he should’ve blamed the Bite for instead of her overwhelming emotional attachment to a piece of poetry, but really. Did people actually develop obsessions with other people’s relationships?

Unfortunately, the rest of his morning didn’t go very well, and he found himself stuck eating lunch with Millie that day. And the next day, and the next day.

He didn’t understand how the entire school just decided they weren’t worth the effort of getting to know, and he expressed it in his letters to Fritz. Fritz would write back, saying the social circles must’ve closed before he was ready for it.

Chris always scowled after he read that. So eventually, he gave up, instead asking Fritz how Susie was doing. Funnily enough, his responses to that were much lighter and more cheerful. Fritz had succeeded in getting her to spend more time with him at lunch, and apparently, they ate together every day.

Fritz talked about how much she loved baking and how cool she found his ability to run. Fritz was excited about his friendship with Susie, and Chris was certain he wanted to push it further. If he’d had any advice for Fritz, he’d tell him to slow down and make sure they were close enough that their friendship could handle it if things went downhill. But Fritz was his best friend, so he just pretended to be happy for him.

The next week, he decided to be nicer to Millie about her whole thing with romance. “So,” he wrote in his notebook during lunch, something Millie never ate. “I’ve attempted to figure out what you mean by the transcending romance, and I just don’t get it.”

Millie frowned as he started eating. “Well,” she said with severe emphasis, “I prefer the stories where they’re willing to die for each other. When one dies for the other, you really see how things are. Like, depending on how they grieve, you can tell whether they actually loved each other, or if something was amiss.”

Chris considered that for a moment. “So if they don’t mourn properly, they don’t love each other?”

“Exactly.” Millie’s frown faded. “See, you kind of get it.”

Chris frowned. “Well, if that’s how it works, then my family probably would prefer if I was dead.”

Millie stiffened. “What?”

Chris shrugged. “I don’t mean my mom. I just mean that my dad and my sister probably couldn’t care less if I was alive. So I left to live with my mom.”

“Oh.” Millie blinked at him. “I thought you meant they’d try to kill you or something.”

“Well, someone actually did do that too,” Chris wrote. “But it was an accident.”

“You’re a strange guy, Chris.”

Chris just shrugged. He didn’t really care either way what she thought. Pointedly taking a bite of his sandwich, Chris successfully ended the conversation.

“Got any plans for winter break?” Millie asked him a few days later.

Chris considered the question for a moment, before shaking his head. “Fritz wants me to come visit, but I don’t particularly feel like going back there.”

Especially since Fritz was talking about all the kids who’d gone missing. Each time it happened, Fritz sent a letter dedicated to all the information he knew about the kid who’d gone missing. Every time, Chris could tell right away, and he’d put it in his desk, unread. Fritz wasn’t sending those for a response anyway. It was just a way to cope, or so Chris believed.

He sent letters back asking about school and Fritz’s relationship with Susie. Fritz constantly shot back encouragement to come visit and see for himself, but Chris didn’t think he was ready to go back.

[aroaceleovaldez]

okay I said i’d talk about my praetor ocs so here they are. my guys. If you follow Deadangelos you’ve probably seen a lot of them already but get ready for the in-depth version because they’re probably my favorite OCs i’ve made purely for the askblog and they’re very fun to me.

Behold: Dee Keystone (child of Janus) and Cadeyrn “Cade” Avitus (legacy [grandson] of Summanus), the praetors before Jason and Reyna!

(Explanations under the cut cause this got long)

They were made with two main shticks in mind: A.) Reverse-engineering Jason and Reyna to figure out what their predecessors might have been like based on their own personalities, with the idea that they might have tried to model themselves based off of mentor figures, and B.) A personal headcanon of mine that the Romans tended to favor promoting demigods who could potentially fit the Great Prophecy description but with a much wider concept of what “a half-blood of the eldest gods” could potentially mean. At least until the Titan War ended. When the war ended they just presumed Jason was the prophecy kid and they were a year off about his age and all was good.

I brainstormed a bunch of praetor designs for this and ended up picking these two (and one of the other scrapped designs became Athanasius “Mac” Macbeth, one of the centurions of the 5th cohort before Jason and Reyna) cause I felt they worked best and also i just liked their designs. They’re a bit older than I imagine most praetors would be just cause I personally figured it’d make the most sense for the Romans during the Titan War to be drawing in reserve forces from retired legionaries, and so those in the legion who would normally retire just kind of stayed until the war ended. Ergo, these two being possibly the oldest praetors Camp Jupiter has ever had. (Their ages/years in the legion is specifically them in TLO, since that’s the time they’re mostly showing up on the blog.)

Cade is very specifically meant to mirror Jason and Thalia a ton (ergo Comparison Thalia) - Summanus is the Roman god of nocturnal storms and sometimes considered just a sort of variation of Jupiter. My thought with him is that his family lives in New Rome and they fostered Jason when he arrived (because who better to raise a baby who can short-circuit camp’s entire power grid with a sneeze than a legacy family who all also have lightning powers and have raised electrocuting toddlers before?). Plus, Cade just so happens to be extremely similar to Thalia, so baby Jason latched onto him pretty immediately and Cade ended up his big-brother figure. Also yes, I did make extended families for basically all the roman ocs I’m making for this event; Cade has an aunt and two cousins. Cade’s appearance is also purposefully reverse-engineered from Thalia and Jason - his hair is supposed to look a lot like Jason’s except Jason always has a cowlick sticking up (and later gets an undercut, which is why Dee has a half-shaved head cause xe’s reverse-engineered too) with the idea that it’s symbolic of Jason trying to live up to Cade’s legacy but he can never quite be the same, because It’s My Askblog And I Can Flesh Out The Underdeveloped Characters’ Backstories If I Want To. (Jason getting an undercut later and how that relates to Dee is Dee as a child of Janus represents decision and paths and I will get into more detail later on the blog about how Dee specifically represents to Jason what decisions he makes about what path he wants in life and him getting an undercut during HoO/between series is kind of a symbol of him moving away from the original path laid out for him at Camp Jupiter and forging his own path instead. This OC breakdown is actually just Jason character analysis/headcanons in disguise.) Cade also has some face scars to mirror Jason’s scar on his lip. His SPQR symbol is just a lightning bolt over a moon for “nocturnal storms.” Cade also happens to be the same age Thalia would be if she hadn’t been turned into a tree and then became immortal. This also means him and Dee are the same age as Luke. That’s probably symbolism, idk.   ¯\_(ツ)_/¯  

If Cade is primarily Jason’s mentor figure, Dee is primarily Reyna’s. This is extra fun cause Cade is kind of the more serious between the two of them whereas Dee leans a bit more towards Jason’s brand of not-quite-golden-retriever energy, so they kind of swapped there. The “9yr” thing is how long both of them have been in the legion specifically - for Dee, that also includes moving into Camp Jupiter in general, but for Cade it’s just the legion cause he was born there. Yes, this is more parallels to Reyna and Jason (Jason being raised in CJ versus Reyna joining later). Also again, Dee’s hair is meant to somewhat parallel Jason’s undercut he gets later. I really put way too much detail into these guys. It’s fun though.

Some more fun little things!:

Dee has a girlfriend who’s a rogue. and also a daughter of Arke. aka a Greek demigod. That part is extremely complicated so I won���t get into it right now but the short version is: Comedy of Errors (Arke is the twin of Iris, whose Roman name is... Arcus. They’re both goddesses of rainbows. Everyone is confused.) They met during the war and it’s very cute (except for The Horrors but we can ignore that for right now).

The 5th cohort centurion guy i mentioned earlier, Mac, is a legacy of Dis Pater and also dating Cade.

As a legacy of Dis Pater, I like to imagine Mac is the one who gave Jason the coin weapon he originally had.

There’s a whole background New Rome political drama that bleeds into the plotline involving the praetors, Mac, and Mac’s cousin (a guy named Brennus Brinley, a legacy of Bacchus and former augur/Octavian’s mentor). It’s all very complicated and way too detailed for something that will basically never get addressed on the blog but it’s very fun to me.

Currently on the blog I’m doing a flashback event of Jason’s backstory/time at Camp Jupiter and we’re in the portion explaining the Roman side of the Titan War and Dee just basically got told to fake their death cause they found out Brennus is working for the Titan Army so. That’s a whole thing. Why is Brennus working for the Titan Army (something that will definitely never get the chance to be explained on the blog)? See aforementioned political drama. Yeah his family is just trying to get power. So he threatened the life of a praetor during battle which is a horrible idea really but whatever. It’s fiiiine. anyways Cade is sad about that now and I should be working on the next set of panels to explain the rest of what happens with that whole mess.

The interesting part though is I very lightly got to touch upon what Dee’s powers are as a child of Janus and it’s basically just xe can see potential outcomes of a scenario or different paths that are most likely to arise as the result of a decision:

Like here’s xem having xyr life threatened and deciding what to do about it. And xe saw one option had like, waaaay more death, so they picked the other one.

(Also if you’re wondering “Wait, is Dee wearing a CHB necklace?” again, see: Xe’s dating a greek demigod in the Titan Army. It’s complicated. Short version though, said greek demigod was formerly a camper and gave her beads to Dee. Dee still doesn’t know about CHB though. Xe just thinks xyr girlfriend is from New York.)

Cade’s powers I don’t get to go into as much detail about in the plotline I have but generally - he just has lightning powers. They’re a bit more muted than Jason’s though they get stronger at night, obviously. But also because he’s a legacy he’s not as electric-proof so he can’t really do a ton without getting injured himself. He’s more electric-proof than most people though, which is why he’s able to mentor Jason without getting absolutely fried. Also his mom is a cloud nymph which doesn’t really have any impact on him powers-wise and also isn’t super relevant but I think it’s fun and also if he ever grew out his hair/beard it’d totally get wispy like clouds or fog. Again that’ll never come up on the blog but it’s fun to me.

Lookit him. Cloud hair. What a guy.

Anyways that’s all I can think of for right now but feel free to ask about these guys or tbh any of the ocs from Deadangelos because I am always happy to ramble about background characters that I put way too much thought into that will definitely never be addressed.