#it wasn't weird in context but now it is

[taketwoinink]

weirdest dream you’ve had recently that you remember

bruh I had one last night and AS I WAS HAVING IT I remembered this ask and thought "man, I should tell Fae about this tomorrow"

I was doing a homework assignment and I think we were supposed to be making models of cells? Most people were taking like fruit or cakes and making their models out of those

I'm extra so

I was making mine out of organs

Yep

I stole someone's heart? and we put in this replacement thing made of plastic so they wouldn't die. and I was buying people's blood during some field trip thing like behind a car and it was super shady and also got really messy. There were some other organs we got too... for some reason all of them were super tiny and not normal sized. like the heart was only the size of my palm. We might have had a liver or a kidney... we had this table set up that we were putting them on and we were doing this outside. And we were going to cut them up and shape them to look right. So they'd actually look like cells instead of organs. And I wanted an organ for each type of cell I needed to model. Like we were doing cells on the heart muscle so I had a heart, needed blood for the blood cells, etc.

And I was really convinced that my teacher would be super impressed and give me extra credit and was kind of smug like oh hey I'm doing this authentically and all of you are just using food hahaha losers

AND PEOPLE WERE HELPING ME?? like they were giving me their organs and I think my dad was there and he was helping me harvest them and there were other people handling the display

...I have no idea what my subconscious has going on but I'm a little concerned for it now

[egophiliac]

new chapter 7 installment dropped how we feelin????

YOU DON'T UNDERSTAND

THAT'S HIS DAD

[fictionadventurer]

I'm a couple days behind on the Chesterton Challenge, but in light of @isfjmel-phleg posting that piece of Tietra's backstory from the Blackberry Bushes series, I decided to skip ahead to the "mother" prompt and post this attempt at a kyrielle about her situation.

Kyrielle for Tietra

The world is locked in awful war At last, to end it I must be Forever wedded to the foe O God, be merciful to me

I come within a foreign court My name changed by a king's decree My past erased, what else remains? O God, be merciful to me

My husband's death leaves me alone Suspected as an enemy By those who hold my daughter's crown O God, be merciful to me

They aim to shape my daughter's life In ways with which I can't agree I must retreat to save her soul O God, be merciful to me Caught fast between her world and mine With foes I can't defeat or flee How can I save myself and her? O God, be merciful to me

[sysig]

The most fun you can have, barring the pain and torture (Patreon)

[ehlnofay]

It’s not until she hears Sissel’s knees hit the floor that Efri is jolted back into her body.

She blinks, whipping her head around. Sissel is kneeling, bracing a palm on the ancient stone pavement, at the barrier – no, the barrier’s gone, it’s just Sissel on the floor. She lifts her head and meets Efri’s eyes; her hair is wispy and wild, the little plaits meant to keep it neat come loose and tumbling, her eyes wide. The barrier's gone, but still, her pale face is lit up blue.

“Are you okay?” she asks. She doesn’t speak loudly, but it echoes in the great stone chamber.

Nine, Efri doesn’t know.

She blinks again, looks down at her hands, clinging to the metal stick so fiercely that her joints ache. (Her own stick, her nice wooden one, is still on the floor somewhere, where it slipped out of her grasp when she hit the wall.) The lumpy heavy end of it, the clobbering end, is still resting on –

Not on. It’s in the thing’s head, fitted neatly in the opening of its dented helmet, the horns spiralling over the floor. There’s a tooth, perfectly preserved, by Efri’s foot.

One by one, she unwraps her gloved fingers from the handle of the metal stick, letting it drop to the floor with a clang so loud it makes her wince. Kazari is nosing at her side. (When did they let go of it? When did they get so close? She must have missed that. She feels out of the loop. Her heart is juddering like fish on a line, battering like some frightened trapped thing at her ribcage, and her breath is coming fast and heavy.) Absentmindedly bringing up a hand to press over her sore shoulder, she says, “’M fine. Not too – barely touched me.”

Kazari turns and spits on the floor. Efri blinks. She does it again, tongue lolling out of her mouth, face very disgruntled – and oh, Efri gets it. She does not glance down at the thing at her feet; she doesn’t need to, she knows what its arm looks like, chewed almost to pieces even through its banded armour. (If she hadn’t been so busy being scared of it, that sight might have made her a bit scared of Kazari. But not now, when they’re trying to hack and spit the taste of dead man arm out of their mouth.)

Efri unclips her canteen from her belt and holds it out. “Here,” she says. Her voice is rough. Her heart is racing too much to let constructing sentences be easy. “Not much, but –”

Kazari stands still while Efri tips half of the remaining water onto her tongue, and then Efri watches her swilling it around in her mouth, trying to bathe all of her teeth in it, before she spits it again on the floor at the dead thing’s feet.

The water is still clear. That’s something, at least; the dead man was too old to still have blood in him. Or maybe he was embalmed, drained of it hundreds of years ago, thousands.

“Are you okay?” Efri asks Kazari when they’re done, because they were the one doing most of the fighting, who was closest. They tip their head, shift their weight – wince when they put weight on one foot. Their lips peel back from their teeth. Their clothes on that side are singed.

Efri points it out. “Your robe,” she says, which makes it sound much fancier than it is. She’s too tired to think of a better word. She rubs a hand over her face, pushing the hair back over her forehead, says, “I’ll reinforce it for you when we get out.”

Kazari noses at Efri’s shoulder – the shredded fabric of her dress, the fraying edges stained with blood. Efri says, “I know. I’ll have to sew that up too.” Over her shoulder, she calls, “Kazari’s leg’s hurt, I think.”

“There’s blood on you,” Sissel replies. She peels her hand off the floor and leans back on her heels.

Efri touches her shoulder again. “’S fine,” she says. “Just a scrape. The blood’s drying already.”

It’s really sore, actually – the flesh abraded and tender, an ache sinking deep into the muscle – but it’s normal sore, the kind of sore you really should be after being thrown into a wall. It doesn’t feel sprained or dislocated or anything like that.  Just like it will be bruised a whole rainbow of colours come tomorrow.

Kazari noses at it again. She leans too far forward and falters on her maybe-hurt leg – rights herself, wincing, and rolls her shoulder. It gleams, just for a moment, and she nearly stumbles again. Efri puts out a hand to steady her. (It doesn’t really accomplish anything – Efri’s strong, but she’s not that strong – but it’s the principle of it.) “What was that spell?”

“Pain relief,” Sissel says from behind her. “I think. Doesn’t actually fix anything, but.”

“You’ll be okay ‘til we find someone?” Efri asks, and Kazari nods. She presses a hand against their shoulder and nods back.

They both turn to look at Sissel, then, who’s just kneeling on the floor, sitting on her heels.

“You all right?” Efri asks her.

“All right,” Sissel confirms. She doesn’t look at them. “Didn’t even come near me.”

She’s staring.

Efri crosses the floor to stand with her. (She needs to lean on Kazari – her legs are too wobbly, and she doesn’t want to touch the dead thing’s stick, doesn’t want to look for her own. Kazari limps a little on their sore front leg.) There’s a moment of total, humming silence – all of them still and staring, necks craned back, looking up at the thing.

Whatever it is.

It’s a ball. Big and blue and shimmering, it floats above a wide crystalline dish set into the floor, spinning on an axis. Just spinning and spinning and spinning, endless motion. Its smooth surface is cut through with dark wavering lines, etched with lettering, and it doesn’t quite glow but it doesn’t not glow, either, the light moving across it silkily, like clouds in a blue sky. It looks like something that should be humming – a low pitch in their ears, an eerie shiver dancing over their skin – but it’s silent. Inert, maybe, but for the spinning.

“What is it?” Efri asks. Her voice cracks as she speaks. She looks down at Sissel’s face, staring as though mesmerised, illuminated by the room’s dim lighting – the fires that should not still be burning down here, the luminous not-glow of the ball.

Sissel says, “I don’t know. Something important.”

Hovering above the dish, it spins, and spins, and spins.

“Is it what the ghost was talking about?” Efri asks. She tilts her head and squints at it. It doesn’t – well, it looks strange and unearthly and powerful, but it isn’t doing anything. And it hadn’t been clear what the ghost was talking about, exactly, according to Sissel, just that it was something important – but what else could it be?

Sissel, still watching it, shrugs. “I don’t know,” she says. “I think so.”

Efri watches it with her, brushing a bit more hair out of her face. It’s sticking to her sweaty forehead. She feels a drip of not-dry blood running down her arm under her sleeve.

Kazari is staring at it too – just as confounded as the rest of them. Efri sees the light in their irises shifting as the ball spins.

They’re not learning anything from staring, the ball staying strange and mysterious as ever, so Efri raps her knuckles against her sternum to steady her breathing (it’s slowed a bit – not normal, but closer to it) and climbs up onto the stone rimming of the dish. Kazari, behind her, lows in consternation; Sissel catches her breath, a noise like a creaking door. “Careful,” she says.

“Promise,” Efri replies, and places her feet very, very carefully on the glassy blue flooring. Nothing happens. She doesn’t step on the dark curved lines as she treads toward the ball in the centre, slow and wary as if she were approaching a skittish animal. Nothing happens.

She reaches out, and, with just the tips of her fingers, she grazes the ball’s surface.

Nothing happens.

It’s cool to the touch, and smooth, like polished metal or not-frozen ice or delicate glasswork. It continues to spin gently under her fingers, warming her glove with friction, no smudges left on its clouded face.

 It really feels like there should at least be a tingle running up her arm, a strange and unfamiliar current, a spark. But it’s just Efri, standing with an arm outstretched, pressing her hand to a ball.

“It’s not doing anything,” she reports, and Sissel clambers up onto the dish with her, fitting her palm to its gently hovering underside. Kazari balks, begins pacing agitatedly. Efri frowns. “Why isn’t it doing anything? Shouldn’t it be doing something?”

“It’s important,” Sissel says definitively. There’s ancient dust on her fingers, but none of it seems to transfer. “It’s something really special, I think.”

Efri shifts restlessly. She shifts her grip and tries to grab onto the dark ridged curves ringing its surface, but they slip easily away from her grasp as though her touch was no barrier at all. “But what does it do?”

Sissel shrugs.

Behind them, Kazari lows.

Efri drops her hand and grabs Sissel’s wrist. “C’mon,” she says, and when Sissel frowns at her, “We’re not going to learn anything about it this way. We have to look for clues!”

Kazari makes a more impatient noise. (Efri thinks she found a clue.)

Sissel gives the ball one last searching look and lets Efri tug her away, off the weird blue dish and down to where Kazari stands on the stone floor, at the head of the table where the dead man sat. Efri sniffs loudly and tries not to think about it too much. The table is smooth polished stone, worn a little away with time; Efri trails a gloved finger over the edge and directs her attention to where Kazari points with their chin.

There’s something carved into the surface, the edges blunted and shapes softened by however many years it must have been since it was put there. Efri squints, trying to make it out. She has to stand right up on her tiptoes to get the right angle to see much of it in full.

“That’s not letters,” she says eventually, frowning. She’s pretty sure she knows her alphabet well enough by now to know that. “Is it magic?”

Sissel shakes her head. “I don’t know what it is. It’s not like magical writing I’ve ever seen.”

Efri looks at Kazari, who also shakes her head. “Maybe it’s a different sort of lettering,” she theorises. It must have been written a long time ago, if it’s from back when the city had people. Onmund’s been reading all about it for ages, and he’s told her a bit – Saarthal was the city of Atmorans, populated by proto-Nordic people. All complicated history stuff. But they weren’t quite the same as Nords today, he said, so it stands to reason they had different writing, too. They’re supposed to be uncovering and cataloguing artifacts (at the thought, Efri glances back at the hovering ball and swallows an inane bubble of laughter) so she suggests, “Maybe you can copy it and we can show it to someone. I’m sure there’ll be someone at the College what knows what it is.”

Sissel, also standing on her toes, nods dutifully. “What will you do?”

The chamber they’re in is cavernous, and about empty but for the ball in the dish, the altar and chair, the body on the ground. “I’ll check him,” she says, and points. “See if he has anything on him that’s special.”

Sissel follows her finger and grimaces.

She digs out her note-paper and her stick of char, and Efri assumes it’s clues time, but when she turns she feels a hand grip her elbow. She looks back over her tattered shoulder at Sissel’s face, her furrowed brow.

“Promise you’re really okay?” she says, voice anxious and solemn.

“Promise,” Efri says, twisting her arm to touch her friend’s hand. Sissel presses her lips together and lets go of her arm.

Kazari trails after Efri to look at the dead man.

First thing is the metal stick. It’s magic someway, Efri knows – he waved it and threw her into a wall, flung spells with it – but she’s not sure how. Doesn’t know enough about enchantments. Didn’t need to, to use it; when Kazari clamped down on his arm she just ripped it from his grasp and –

She doesn’t quite exactly remember, actually, except for the bitter tang of adrenaline in her mouth and nose, the horrible grunting and scuffling sounds, the heft of the stick in her hands. Impact, over and over and over, against something that had a little more give each time.

Efri scrubs a hand over her mouth and grips the handle of the stick. It takes effort to wrest it out of the thing’s face, caught as it is by the edges of the helmet, and when it’s finally yanked free it’s – actually not as bad as she might have expected. There’s no blood, and the corpse was so desiccated it already didn’t even really look like a person anymore, so it registers less as someone with horrible violence done to it and more as a really gross art piece. It’s not nice. She doesn’t like the twisted, gaping mouth, teeth embedded wrong-ways in its tissue and scattered like coins over the floor. And one of the eyes, which had glowed unearthly blue, is now a dull, rotten black, squished like a plum in its socket.

It's worse the more she looks. She sniffs and turns away.

“This is magic, right?” she asks Kazari, testing the weight of it in her hands, the cool surface of the metal, and they nod. “A good artifact?” she adds, and they nod again, emphatically. Efri sets the stick aside and kneels.

It wasn’t wearing any clothes, really – or if it was, they rotted away. She touches the rusted armour gingerly, tries to avoid brushing her gloves against the shrivelled skin at all. Whoever it was had expensive taste, it seems – there’s jewellery in a shockingly well-preserved beard, pendants around the neck, armbands. Efri asks Kazari if each thing is enchanted. No to the armbands, no to the beard-ring, and then, pressed against the wizened chest where the flesh contours to the ribs, she finds some kind of necklace, sharp-edged and thrumming. Kazari nods to that, and, face scrunched up like an old fruit, Efri reaches around the ancient neck to slip it off.

She tucks it into a belt pocket with the tripwire necklace they found at the weird wall.

“Done,” Sissel says. She folds her paper and slips it into her own pouch. Her footfalls on the echo-y stone floor as she approaches the body for the first time are almost silent. “Did you find anything?”

“Necklace,” Efri replies, watching Sissel’s face pinch at the sight of him. “And – stick.” She scoops up the metal stick and holds it out. “He did spells with it.”

Sissel looks at it warily. “Is he a draugr?” she asks, glancing back down at his mashed-up face.

“I mean,” Efri says, “he’s got to be, right?” She’s certainly never seen a draugr before, but what else could it be?

(Calling it a draugr makes her shiver, the set of her shoulders quaking. She’ll stick to dead man.)

Sissel shudders. She reaches out to grip the handle of the stick, and Efri’s not sure if she’s taking it or just trying to keep herself upright. “I can’t believe that happened,” she says. Her voice sounds, suddenly, fragile. “I can’t believe we’re alive.”

“Me neither,” Efri says. She presses the tip of the stick into the ground so Sissel can lean on it, stands a little unsteadily.

Kazari, with a hushed murmur, telegraphs something. Efri recognises the head incline of understanding – she’s familiar with that word, that idea – and, after a moment, the flickering ear of doubt.

“They’ll have to believe us,” she says with conviction, because she means it. “We’ll show them. They’ll see for themselves.”

Kazari presses their nose to her head.

Efri clasps her hands together. “We’ll go tell someone now,” she declares – though it’s easier said than done; they were lost in the ruins ages before they even found the crumbling wall, the halls, this horrible wonderful chamber. But they’ll get un-lost eventually. They’ll get out eventually. Surely. They have practice enough with walking. “But first – help me find my stick.”

[self-shipper-snowdrop]

I am in the airport heading back from vacation why do I see notifs for comments asking me to DM them

[unproduciblesmackdown]

billions also comedy gold presenting winston as a scapegoat for abuse culture fans when it's like but hey it can't be actual scapegoating if you Enjoy It or consider it Justified or experience Reassurance from Its Opportunity For A Group Cohesion Substitute For A Cohesion Based On An Inherent Equal Degree Of Belonging, The Absence Of Which Allows For, Encourages, Reinforces, & Rewards Scapegoating

it can't be Bullying if someone's Weird or you Just Don't Personally Like Them or Nobody's Actually Stopping You, Maybe At Least If They Don't See Too Much Of It, Maybe Others Are Supporting It

it can't be Abuse if you're just doing things Normally or are Following Rules or Aren't Feeling Malicious And Aren't Getting Divine Revelations Otherwise and probably it's just that a lot of abnormal people are being whiny &/or unfair &/or the Real malicious ones. kinda just like how that scapegoat is the real person ruining everything and really just forcing you to treat them like this

[taylor]

still reeling over the fact that almost 2 months ago the guy i was talking to (not dating, but definitely 'seeing') took another girl TO MY AND MY ROOMMATE'S APARTMENT to FUCK HER ON OUR AIR MATTRESS while i was ON VACATION THOUSANDS OF MILES AWAY

honestly. how do i get myself into these situations

[thesnacken]

Uhhhhhhh

[legionofpotatoes]

can't believe I just spent three hours watching a movie about masculine anxiety in the nuclear family model, told through cartoon alien tribes wearing Mãori tattoos

[skrunksthatwunk]

"hey HEY what do you have in your mouth!!! sit SIT. SPIT IT OUT GIVE IT—" but instead of talking to a dog it's me about my parents using the word overstimulated as nothing but another way to make fun of our anxious traumatized dog for doing things they find inconvenient or unreasonable or illogical (and, by extension, everyone who uses the term for legitimate reasons). (WHAT IS WRONG WITH THEM!!!!!!!!!! AND ALSO WHERE THE FUCK DID THEY HEAR IT BECAUSE I DON'T USE IT AROUND THEM On Purpose BECAUSE I KNOW THEY'D BE ANNOYING ABOUT IT!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!!)

[desired-misery]

Whumptober WIP | Leon's POV

[warnings: vague allusions to Leon being worried about being outed as trans; references to (offscreen, assumed) homophobic and transphobic comments *warnings apply to under the cut]

On the topic of who knew about how fucked up he was, Leon’s thoughts jump to a question he hasn’t figured out how to ask until now. He risks it—  

“Krauser didn’t know about that, did he?”

Adam glances at him again, clearly caught by surprise. “Know what?”

Leon takes a few seconds, not sure if he really wants to know—

“That after Raccoon City, I was… you know.”

“Not unless you told him, he shouldn’t have.” Adam’s voice gentles, lowers.

It isn’t reassuring because Leon cannot stop himself from thinking along that same line, about the other medical information he keeps hidden—

“Did he know, uh, the other thing? Is that in my files?”

Adam’s confusion is obvious, but then realization hits. His voice gentles further. “No, that’s not general information— that’s between you and your doctors, Leon. And anyone you decide to tell.”

Leon thought that would be the answer he wanted… but it isn’t.

“What brought this up?”

Nothing but insults he has heard before— it’s not like Krauser ever said anything as disgusting as what Leon heard from the soldiers at the compound. They were doing it to get under his skin, that was all.

“Dunno. Had lot of time to think the past couple of days.”

Adam waits to see if Leon will cave and give up the real reason. Leon does not; he just spent an unknown number of hours playing this same fucking game with information he had less personal attachment to.

“I haven’t heard you mention him since—”

“I’m not talking about that traitor.”

Adam glances at him. Leon keeps his eyes averted.

“Okay,” Adam says.

Leon turns his body to face the door, adjusting his seat so that it is leaned back as far as it can go.

“Wake me up if you stop for food.”

Even though Leon can’t see him, he feels Adam’s eyes on his back multiple times. Even though it hardly takes more than a few minutes to fall asleep, a hundred thoughts run through Leon’s mind, all things he would love to not fucking think about ever again. It’s not like it matters— Krauser is dead as fuck, for damn real this time. Leon shoved Krauser’s own knife into his heart, felt it shudder and stop for good. 

Leon’s last conscious thought is more of a wish; that Adam doesn’t act like himself for one fucking minute and does not file away this moment of weakness as an interesting tidbit to bring up later for deeper analysis.

[defiant-firefly]

(I've had my chatty medicines so you get a post about this)

There is something distinctly and uniquely alienating and bizarre about hearing people say 'Easter Sunday is the most religious day of the year'. Like, when was this?? If it's so religious and so so so important, how come no one thought to tell me it was religious until like four or five years ago?

Yeah it's kinda funny but I'm also sat there every time like "what the fuck are you talking about". The assumption I was raised Christian and am Christian via culture is really funny though cause like. Bro I have no fucking clue what any of this stuff is about.

My parents never taught me the majority of this shit. Anyone else assumed I already knew about it. This Easter talk I've been hearing about a weird amount more than normal is all new to me and making me think of all this shit lmao

[cesium-sheep]

a cursory search suggests only a couple songs that made it to the internet have used the "meanest motherfucker in the valley" version of the bible verse and it's entirely the wrong usage for me both times based on the lyrics around it (being some big dick swinger cool guy killer, as opposed to having blood in your teeth and some of it is yours)

they forget the fucking shadow of death. the aspect of prayer, but it's not god you're prayin to anymore. there is something to fear but you're not afraid of it because you're a mean motherfucker and you'll go down swingin. you'll keep staggering on broken and bloody until you get out of that valley or you die.

it's not the same fucking vibe at all.

[homunculus-argument]

I would not say that I'm a scary-looking guy. I don't dress particularly alt, just pretty basic dad rock band tees, black skinny jeans with a chain, plenty of assorted jewellery and accessories, dyed black hair and seven piercings around my head, but this is apparently enough to make old people give me A Very Long Stare. But this post isn't about them.

Today I was walking homeward, and there were these two kids (about 8-10 years old?) standing in the middle of the road. They stood there talking, one was on foot but the other one had a pastel pink bicycle, which she had apparently unintentionally stationed horizontally across the walkpath, so the two effectively blocked the whole way. So I kept my eyes on the girl with the bike the whole time I approached their happenstance roadblock.

Now, the finnish culture is both a high context culture and an introvert culture, which means that finns regularly behave like weird animals. A prolonged, maintained eye contact directed at a stranger is a mild, but certainly clear, aggressive gesture. Not as outright hostile as verbally telling them that they're in peoples' way and should move, but intended as a stern gesture to correct them anyhow. The way that dogs sometimes do that very specific low growl at misbehaving puppies, just to say "I have no intention to hurt you, but you better cut that shit out."

And the girl with the bike kept eye contact with me the whole time I approached, while pulling her bike out of the way in a pointedly slow, deliberate way. Looking down or away and moving the bike hastily would have been an apologetic gesture, and this kid clearly wanted to let me know she wasn't yielding just because she did, in fact, move out of the way. And once I was just about to pass, she said "hi?" to me, in a mildly confused and disgusted tone. Not confused by my intentions themselves, but by my evident audacity.

While this may not seem like anything odd, as I mentioned earlier, finns are an introvert culture. Talking to strangers unprompted is rude, a downright hostile act, more aggressive than prolonged eye contact but not as hostile as physically touching a stranger without warning. And I was caught off-guard so badly that I just said "hi" back to her while not slowing down as I passed them.

So just this week, I've had two random old people stare at me like they've correctly identified me as a Manmade Horror Beyond Their Comprehension, and this little girl dressed head to toe in pastels with a pink bike and sparkling unicorn backpack just glared right back at me and stared me down like Can I Fucking Help You.

[dameronswife]

my favorite most petty thing to think about after finally cutting ties with my incredibly toxic ex best friend is thinking about how much she would hate that I'm a self shipper. She would have hated it soooo much and I'm just like too bad for you!!!!! I'm having fun [blows a raspberry]