#like for a lot of people willow did make them feel seen and i don’t wanna dismiss that

[mossflower]

I rewatched the epilogue of WaD, and yeah, in one of the smooth animatons, her body was skinnier, which sucks because I like that scene :((((

but in the rest of the 4 minute ending, her body looked bigger than Luz's Amity's and Gus's and she looked big like usual, so hurray for that! I dislike that the crew was lazy on that because now people are gonna start making excuses and skinny washing her :/

oh okay cool!!

[heybrownieboy]

CHAPTER THREE: WAS THIS ONE POINTY?

POV: Written. 2nd Person.

— Word Count: 1,196.

Author’s Note: My first written part :) If there’s any grammar or spelling mistakes, I am sorry. I don’t have a beta reader so I might miss things while proofreading.

Achoo!

You groaned, pulling your face out of the elbow you just sneezed into and sniffled a little.

“Someone’s talking about me,” you mumbled.

Nicholas and you sat outside in JYP University's main courtyard. It was one of the nicest days there's been this year. The sky was a clear blue, only a few fluffy white clouds could be seen and the sun was high overhead, casting warm rays down on everyone below. The two of you had been lucky enough to snag one of the few benches under the courtyard's massive weeping willow. It offered the perfect amount of shade from the sun and much to your pleasure, a great view of the gorgeous three tier marble fountain that sat directly in the middle of the courtyard.

“We’re outside in the middle of Spring,” Nicholas chuckled. “You sure it’s not just the pollen? Or is this another one of your 'psychic intuition’ moments?”

You pouted a little. "It better be my psychic intuition. I don't feel like sneezing all damn day."

You adjusted the chain of the cross necklace that hung around your neck. It had just been returned to you, not even fifteen minutes prior to this. Earlier you had offered it to Nicholas when you meet up with him outside the chem lab's bathroom. The taller man took it with a grateful look, proceeding to then mutter something about having to "incorporate one into every outfit from now on" if he was going to continue to be your "emotional support bitch". That had caused you to break into a fit of laughter and you thanked him for his "services".

Nicholas laughed. "Maybe someone is talking about you then," he said. "Maybe someone walked past the bathroom earlier and heard you threatening someone with holy water. They're probably gossiping about you to their friends right now."

"The only reason I had to pull out the holy water was because that thing didn't want to leave!" you protested. "It just stayed in the vent staring at me. And then got angry when I pulled out the vile! You felt how hot it got in there. It left like some pissed off little kid that didn't get its way."

"It did get hot as fuck in there for a moment," Nicholas agreed. "Was this one pointy?"

An image of the entity you saw earlier popped into your head. You grimaced. "Yeah," you said. "It was just tall and... sharp, like a lot of them are."

"Why was it here anyway? I thought demons don't come out in broad daylight?"

"I mean, they definitely prefer the night. But, just because the sun is out doesn't mean they're powerless. Plus, Lily and the others were definitely on to something earlier. It was probably here to attach to someone."

"A university does seem like the perfect hunting ground for those things," Nicholas said. He took a sip of his iced Americano. "Jake was one lucky bastard that it didn't choose him.”

"Nah," you said with a wave of your hand. "That guy radiates nothing but good energy. He has a pretty strong aura and a sound mind. So, it'd actually be harder for it to attach to him."

"Okay yeah that makes sense..."

You swirled around your iced latte mindlessly as you listened to Nicholas talk. But, soon you noticed how quiet it went. How quiet nature went. The light breeze that had been blowing over campus a moment ago, stopped and all of the birds in the area had gone completely silent.

That's when you felt it. Your whole body went rigid and your eyes peeled away from Nicholas. His voice began to drain in the background as you looked for whatever you had just felt.

Then, as soon as the fountain came back into view is when you saw him.

The man stood in front of the fountain, facing you and Nicholas. He completely ignored all of the other people moving around him, his blood shot black eyes locked in on you. He had a strong build and beautiful, almost cat-like features. The blue plaid pajama set he wore was practically in shambles— torn up, covered in mud, and splotches of blood. His whole body was littered in cuts, bruises, and bumps. The deep gash that wrapped around his neck made you wince. It was ragged, dripping puss from infection, and surrounded by a large, splotchy purple bruise. It made you wonder if he was strangled to death by a rope of some sort.

But, as you fully took him in, that is when you noticed them. Chains. Each one of his wrists and ankles had thick chains and all four of them were connected to massive iron balls at the ends.

What the hell?

What kind of spiritual debt does he have to warrant every one of his limbs to be chained down?

Your eyes connected with his and you could almost feel the dominance. His stare was just as intense as the heavy aura rolling off him. You immediately sat up a straighter, the feeling of intimidation hitting you head on.

He is human... right?

Wait...

Why does he look so familiar?

"Y/N? Yo! Earth to Y/N!"

Your eyes snapped towards Nicholas, slightly alarmed. He tilted his head at you, a look of confusion scrawled across his face.

"What's wrong?" he asked.

You blinked at him a few times, feeling almost like you were in a daze.

"Y/N? What did you see?" Worry laced his voice now and he shifted closer to you on the bench.

You stayed silent though, your eyes slowly traveling back over to the fountain.

"He's gone," you muttered.

"He's gone?" Nicholas questioned.

"A man. He was standing at the fountain, staring at me..." You trailed off, eyebrows drawing together.

Why?

Why did he look so familiar?

Nicholas's eyes scanned over your face. “Y/N...” he said, reaching out and placing his hand on yours. “Are you okay? You look and sound really out of it.”

He was right. You did feel out of it. Something about that man threw you completely off kilter. It didn’t help that his aura was so… dominating. So intimidating.

“I’m okay,” you said. “I feel a little out of it, yes, but I’m okay. He had a really strong aura, that’s all.”

"Was he human?" Nicholas asked, warily.

"I don't know. Maybe?"

You clicked your tongue in mild frustration.

Why can't I remember who he is?

Think Y/N, you chided yourself silently. Think! Where have you seen him before?

Suddenly, a flurry of memories popped into your head— dozens of past news segments, reporting on two missing people and flyers stamped on every corner around the city.

"Oh my god," you breathed, a cold chill running down your spine.

Slowly, you turned back to Nicholas, your eyes wide and pupils blown. He tensed immediately at your expression, his hand beginning to grip yours.

"Nico," you said, voice grim. "It was one of them. It was one of the men that disappeared last year."

Nicholas stared at you in shock. “What?” he croaked. “Which one?”

“The older one. Lee Minho.”

< Previous | Next >

Of Chaos And Spirits Masterlist

Taglist (Open): @lily-loves-kpop @f9clementine

©️heybrownieboy 2024

[sidecharactersdomatter]

I’m going to be completely honest for this post. I’m currently neutral and not interested in shipping Huntlow at all.

The main reason being that the post series finale and critical side of the fandom kind of ruined it for me and I’m also on the Anti Huntlow Shippers’ side.

The next is that to sum up Huntlow, is that as of Any Sport in Any Storm, Hunter gained a crush on Willow, Hunter but later down the road in For the Future she later became attracted to him after Flapjack’s death when he gained his palisman’s speed. Then in Watching and Dreaming and that one Disney chibi series episode (that I don’t even plan to watch) confirmed they were together, and their haters did not like that at all.

Mostly because when they’re on screen they’re shown not to have a lot of chemistry, interactions and shared interests with each other than being offended with the slander of “half a witch” which isn’t really seen with Hunter since he didn’t make a lot of appearances in the first half of Season 2 and his attraction to Willow wasn’t really reciprocated from her. And this assumption’s coming from a person who shipped Hunter with Edric before Any sport and any storm came out, and us the audience were supposed to expect they would become a couple, feels like instantly lowering expectations without permission or something.

Plus Hunter and Willow were confirmed to be Bisexual and Pansexual after the show ended and we’ve never seen them attracted to other people in their sexuality that made it true.

What I would’ve done was introduce Hunter as a new student at Hexside in the beginning of Season 2 and his time at Hexside could build up a friendship with Willow and Gus, the three would become classmates, and maybe he and Willow would’ve gotten closer through their new bond. As of right now we’re shown that Willow and Hunter are somehow together in the series finale.

Tl;dr to conclude despite having confirmed sexualities in a livestream after the series ended, Huntlow was basically straight baiting and is an example of Disney’s propaganda of constantly enforcing heteronormativity.

[forgiveness-in-the-misery]

Xander is genuinely an interesting character. It’s complicated because a lot of people now just see him as aged poorly or Joss 2.0 and completely ignore the actual show itself and why he is the way he is.

Between the books, not the comics, the actual books and the TV show you come to learn incredibly important things:

Xander had a goth phase for a while that is brought up in the books.

Xander struggles with depression and loneliness.

Xander’s bedroom was in the basement as far removed as a kid could get from their parents.

Xander’s parents fight frequently and violently.

Xander’s father is a cruel drunk who treats his son like an abomination.

All of the above literally explain why Xander is the way that he is….and current fans blatantly ignore and avoid that and it is mind boggling to me.

He wants to joke constantly and make awkward comments and jokes especially if he’s anxious or scared or uncomfortable. He seemingly doubts people aside from Willow could ever like him for himself so he settles for the role of being the clown. He wants to be seen and understood and loved and when Anya eventually offers him this he panics due to the fear that he will turn into an abusive monster like his father and ruin her. Xander ruined his relationship with Cordelia for essentially the same reason, the fear of ruining things, of dragging her into his family and this life that would result in depression and resentment for her. He cheated on her with Willow because Willow is the only person who knows him and knows his family situation and she is safe and comfortable and familiar and kissing her knowing she has loved him most her life at that point was manipulative and misdirected and wrong on his part…..but look at his home life.

The boy never saw what a relationship is meant to be. His parents were hateful and resentful. He didn’t grow up seeing love and he has a deep fear that maybe he can’t actually love somebody.

Even his relationship to Buffy feels like deep down she is who he wants to be more than wants to be with. She’s brave and strong and witty and smart and resourceful and can easily come across like she doesn’t have time to care what people think of her.

And because of the toxic masculinity of the 90s and the shit his own father tried to beat into him about being a real man….he resents that. He feels humiliated and resentful that this girl is everything he’s been told he should be. It’s why he gets so up in arms about Buffy breaking it off with Riley, because Riley is the type of man Xander grew up being told is a real man and he idolizes that.

Spike and Angel don’t fall into this role. Spike ironically enough like Xander we learn was soft and gentle and loved poetry and kind things and was mocked and teased by people for being the way that he was. Spike became a vampire and became blood thirsty but even seeing him with Dru through the centuries the gentle lover never died with his humanity, it comes out more and more as the show progresses and frankly it comes down to vampires have no need to care.

Once you have lived hundreds of years and may live hundreds more then the concept of gender norms and sexuality come to be meaningless human concepts.

Xander is this sort of tragic character who is trapped under so much fear and anxiety and grew up in a time when the worst things you could be is a woman or gay and he wanted badly to be masculine to be a hero to be brave and manly and all of that and it frequently ended up with him distancing from his friends, losing women who did love him and tried to understand him but he never let them close enough.

So anyway I really wish people would look at story more than 2023 social norms in a show made back in the 90s/2000s and also I wish the show had made Xander gay.

[ice-cap-k]

Owen Had a Cough

Hey! Got a new story for part of the 2024 MCYT Horror Gift exchange ( @mcythorrorgiftexchange ). This is for the amazing @some-stupid-wannabe-artist. I hope I did your request justice. It was honestly a lot of fun. Been a while since I bothered with Rats.

It's longer than my old whumptober stuff, so feel free to read it on AO3 here: Owen Had a Cough

____________________________________________________

Owen had a cough.

It wasn’t that surprising, since Scott had found the other rat passed out at the entrance to the boiler room. His friend had been down there for a long time, breathing in air that had been festering in the quarantined room. The basement had been downright hazy with all of the airborne spores. And Owen, well, Scott figured the bigger rat had gotten off lucky if all he had to show for such a stupid stunt was a little cold. 

He told Owen what would happen if someone went in there. The larger rat could be almost impossible to sway once he set his mind to something, so of course he decided to set his sights on fixing the infestation down there. First the bugs, then the fungus. Scott just wished his best friend had told him. Then he wouldn't have found him crawling on his belly four days since the last time they saw each other.

Other than that, though, the tinkerer seemed alright. He had apologized and admitted Scott had been right. Those words would have been like music to Scott’s ears if he hadn’t been worried half to death for the sake of his friend. Owen promised to never go down there again, which had given Scott some sense of relief, and life moved on. 

The cats were still a problem. The people living downstairs still chased them and their friends whenever they ventured out of the attic. And just today there were tiny little termites they’d gone to the effort of rehoming. But hey, life in the attic was full of surprises, so even that was typically atypical. Despite looking half dead on his feet the morning before, the large rat was starting to bounce back.

He was even leading the way as they raced back up to the attic with the others. Claws scrabbled at the red carpets lining the halls. The trash talk was flowing freely, and the bathroom was in sight.

“Oh, come on. I’m already at a tactical disadvantage with this dress,” Martyn huffed. His claws hooked over the edge of the side table. Owen was already pouncing off the edge towards the mouse hole in the wall. There was no catching up now so Scott turned to help haul Martyn up. Willow and Crow passed by beneath the table legs, still aiming for the doorway. 

“Thanks, Scott,” Martyn breathed. He smoothed out the wrinkles of his maid’s dress with padded fingers as Scott leaned against a nearby plant pot. 

The ceramic was cool against the fur lining his bare back and the hall was quiet, save for the excited squeaks of the returning rats. The cats were nowhere to be seen. The human residents were busy elsewhere. They were free to enjoy themselves without worry for a little while.  How everyone else wasn’t tired yet was beyond Scott. His lungs hurt from all the running on top of all the laughter. This place was making him soft. 

“Of course,” he said absently, mind already back on the race. Even if he wasn’t physically keeping up, his eyes followed Owen as his best friend leaned out of the chewed-out hole. 

“Oh no you don’t!” he squeaked as the two smaller rats passed beneath him. 

Scott flicked his ears back as he watched Owen launch himself from the wall. His arms and legs splayed as he dropped. A star-shaped shadow passed over Willow and Crow. The two rats had just enough time to look up. They were already running, but Owen’s aim was true and he crashed into Crow with a pained WHUMPF! Both of them went rolling tail over ears across the floor, knocking over Willow in the process and leaving all three of them sprawled and groaning. 

It was just a bit of roughhousing. They were rats. Scott himself had leaped off the tallest bookshelves in the library and safely landed paws first on the tile more times than he could count. Despite knowing that, though, concern drove him forward. He pushed off the pot and was leaning over the edge of the table in an instant. His eyes raked over the three for signs of injury. His ears twitched at the rustle of fabric behind him. Martyn was there, looking over his shoulders.

“Is everybody ok?” he called.

“I’m okay,” Willow called back almost immediately

Crow managed to untangle its limbs from Owens. It rubbed at its head with a paw, claws parting strands of red and black fur until Scott could almost make out its eyes. “Owww-ow-ow-owww,” it groaned.  “That really hurt. I think you bruised my tail. What were you-”

Its words were cut off by a drawn-out, wet cough. While Willow and Crow brushed themselves off and stood up straight, Owen only rolled over. He curled up into a ball, pulling his knees up to his chest but unable to keep them there. His arms wrapped around his heaving midsection as his whole body shook. 

His coughs were like nails on a chalkboard to Scott. Wet and shaking, they wracked his friend’s lungs and rattled his ribcage with each one. 

It was easy to forget that Owen wasn’t at one hundred percent until moments like these. They weren't short either. The gaps between stolen intakes of breath were long and drawn out. The coughing fit seemed to last an eternity if eternity could be packed down and contained in the span of minutes.

“Are you okay, Owen?”

“Try taking deep breaths.”

“My mum used to say it helps to put your arms up over your head. If you can hear me, try that.”

Owen did try. It was a feeble attempt, but his arms only left his torso long enough for the tips of his fingers to reach his shoulders before another wheeze sent him curling back into himself. 

So yeah, Owen had a cough. 

Martyn whistled. His voice was quiet in Scott’s ears. “He really is getting sick. I suppose that’s what you get for not drying off after a dip in the pond.”

He didn’t answer. Only slipped off the edge of the table to rush to his friend’s side. 

Let the others think that. If Owen hadn’t told anyone else about going past the plastic sheets in the basement, then it wasn’t Scott’s place to tell that story. Owen would be so angry if he thought Scott went around telling people things he might be too embarrassed to talk about. 

“Come on now, Owen. Let’s get you up. You’re okay.” 

His friend didn’t protest as he looped his paws under the taller rat’s armpits and pulled. Now he could feel firsthand the way every muscle in Owen’s body tensed and untensed with the dwindling coughs. The way his lungs practically vibrated around the fluid there. Getting Owen upright helped. His lungs didn’t have to work so hard to keep up. Scott let him go to see if he could stand on his own, and the hacking noises subsided. He looked tired out from all that effort, but at least his breathing had returned to normal.

“How are you feeling?”

“Better.” He sounded tired too. 

“Ya sure,” Crow asked. There was still an edge of annoyance in its words, but it was duller now. Its tail was no longer whipping around frantically. Rather, Crow and Willow were standing close and shifting uncomfortably from side to side. 

Owen nodded. The corner of his lips pulled back into a half smile. “I’m sure. Just needed a second, but I’m good.”

“Good. Then apologize.”

“What!?” Owen looked affronted. “Why?”

Crow crossed its arms in front of its chest. “Because you cheated.”

“Did not.”

“Did so!”

“Did not! I was just being creative and came up with a new way to beat you both.” Owen’s smile lengthened to a full-blown grin as he looked from Crow to Willow. “Besides, neither of us made it to the attic so it’s not like I won at your expense.”

“You could keep going,” Martyn chimed in from where he was still standing on the tabletop. 

“Ah… I think it would be a good idea to call it a day,” Scott insisted. He wrapped a paw around Owen’s arm and gently tugged. “Let’s get behind the tub and up to the attic.

To his credit, Owen didn’t argue back or struggle. He looked too tired for that. Instead, the bigger rat let him tug him along and then kept going toward the top as Scott let him go. The tile was cool underfoot. The smell of floral soap was sweet and fresh. The path behind the tub was clear, almost like the bathroom itself was welcoming them home.

“I think that might be for the best. It’s been a long day,” Owen finally admitted, standing a little straighter as he strutted across the room. “It doesn’t really matter who wins anyhow.”

“Yeah, but I totally would have won,” Crow muttered, and Willow giggled. 

Scott smiled. This was much better. He and the others were just about to follow Owen when the sound of scrabbling caught their attention. It was coming their way. Everyone tensed, turning to see the source of the noise.

So help Scott, if that was a cat on its way-

A familiar purple shape came bobbing down the hall towards them. Scott felt himself let go of the breath he hadn’t meant to hold while the others began to relax around him. 

“Took you long enough, didn’t it,” Martyn shouted with a bark of a laugh.

The rat came to a stop behind Scott and doubled over. His breath was coming in heavy pants, despite the slow jog. The loser of the race that was no longer taking place. “Hey,” Acho finally managed to sputter as he reigned in his breathing. “What did I miss?”

___________________

Scott padded down the steps leading from his home to the main floor of the attic. 

His flower garden was still alive, despite the incoming cold, and the vegetable patch he had managed to throw together was one of the rats’ main sources of food now that snow covered the ground. The sunlight coming through the attic windows was just enough for his plants to keep growing, and it made his new home feel a little bit closer to his old one. 

Now that he had more than enough food for himself, he was consistently helping to keep everyone fed. Just earlier this morning he and Owen had sat down together for lunch. Scott had thrown together all the food. Now he was stepping away from his cooking pots with chicken soup, ready to be passed out to anyone looking for a warm meal.

He handed out full bowls to Oliver and Sniff, then Shelby, then Jimmy. With each rat fed, Scott had a nice chat to catch up before saying goodbye and moving on. When he stopped by Eloise’s art gallery, he was surprised to find El and Bek arguing inside.

“I’m sure he didn’t mean it like that,” Bek was saying. She leaned against the wall in between frames of paintings, watching El pace back and forth. 

Not daring to say a word, Scott reached out and wrapped his knuckles against the side of the open doorframe. Thump thump thump.

The two rats looked up in surprise, only to relax as they realized it was only him. “Hey, Scott.”

“Hi!” He stepped into the room. “Brought some chicken soup.”

Bek’s ears perked up. She pulled away from the wall with a smile. “Oooh! That sounds quite good right now, actually.”

“I brought plenty for both of you. Here.” He held one bowl out to El. “And here.” Then he shuffled across the hollowed-out room to pass another to Bek. Both brightened as they took it.

“So, is everything alright?” he asked, glancing back and forth between the two. “You two looked pretty serious a second ago.”

Bek shrugged. She slurped loudly, drinking the broth directly from the edge of the bowl in loud gulps. Scott tried to offer a spare spoon, but she didn’t take it when he held it out.

“Bek, please…” Eloise groaned.

The shorter rat lowered the bowl and smacked her lips. “Sorry. I don’t think anything’s wrong. El’s just being weird about things again.”

“I am not,” the taller rat snapped. “If anyone’s being weird, it’s Owen.”

Scott rolled his eyes. “Is it his cough again?”

“No.” She said immediately, then hesitated. She silently weighed her words in her head, tail flicking restlessly before she amended, “Okay, yes, technically. He was definitely still coughing today, but that’s not the real issue this time.”

The cough wasn’t the issue? What scheme could Owen possibly be getting up to this time?

Scott folded his arms in front of his chest. “Then what was the issue?”

“He’s being weird. He’s acting really weird and I don’t like it. Me and Bek got back from a pantry run and when we walked into the gallery, Owen was just… I don’t know. Sitting in a corner in the lower level?” She flung her spoon towards the open door leading to the scaffolding platform and still bare white walls that were waiting for future masterpieces. “Like, there was nobody else here. He just had his head resting against his knees, arms wrapped around his legs, like he was taking a nap. The light was off too, so I didn’t see him right away.”

Bek shivered. “Gave me a real fright, when you turned the light on and he shot to his feet. You screamed.”

“So did you,” El shot back. “Neither of us saw that he was here until the light came on.” 

Scott tilted his head. That certainly was… unusual. “Okay. Yeah. You’re right, that’s weird. What was he doing?”

“See!” Eloise straightened. She dropped the spoon back into her soup so she could scratch at the side of her head with free claws. “That’s what I asked him. All he said was that the dark felt nice, and then he rushed out.”

“Felt nice…?”

“We’ve been trying to figure out what he meant by that for the past half hour,” Bek added. “Eloise’s convinced the human girl slipped him some potion that’s turning him nocturnal-”

“We’ve already had to deal with potion issues.  I don’t understand why you think it’s so far-fetched. I still vividly remember getting turned into a CAT of all things!”

“But I think whatever cold he caught is just making him tired.” Bek finished.

He waited patiently for either of them to continue. For them to take the conversation somewhere else, or break into laughter and call it all a joke. When they didn’t, he awkwardly twitched his tail. They were both looking at him expectantly, waiting to see how he would reply. “Uh, I think Bek might be onto something.”

“See!”

Eloise was still balancing the bowl of soup in one paw, but she threw the other into the air and groaned. “Fine. Sure. I know mine sounds crazy in comparison, but neither of you saw his eyes. I swear, they were glowing when he looked at me.”

Bek scoffed. “Eyes don’t glow.”

“His did,” El insisted. “I swear, they really were glowing. Owen’s eyes aren’t supposed to be bright blue like that.”

Her words sounded sincere. There wasn’t a teasing bite, or smile pulling at the side of her lips. No twitch in the corner of her eye from struggling to keep a straight face. She was serious.

Scott’s tail went ramrod straight. “Blue? You’re sure?” 

She nodded. “Absolutely.”

“Did either of you think to go after him to check if he was alright?”

The two girls exchanged side glances before turning back to him and answering in unison.  “No.”

Of course they hadn’t.

Scott brought his paw up to his forehead. He pressed his palm against the center of his forehead as if it could chase away the headache that was starting to develop there. He took a deep breath in and sighed. “Which way did he go? I think I’m going to go check up on him and make sure everything’s alright.”

“He turned right when he ran out the door,” El said. “Not sure where he went, since he didn’t stick around long enough to let us ask. We’ll go with you and help you look for him.” She stepped forward. The now cold bowl of soup was placed on a nearby shelf next to the bowl Bek had just finished emptying. 

“We will?” Bek asked.

El nodded once more. “We will.”

Scott was grateful for the help. He didn’t argue as both girls followed him out of the gallery. With more eyes searching, they checked high and low across the attic. As they went, Scott dropped off more bowls of chicken soup and asked around if anyone had seen which way Owen went. It was Oli who eventually pointed them in the direction of the little food mart. 

Sure enough, Owen was inside the brick build rummaging through the chest inside. He pulled out a rather limp-looking bunch of lettuce leaves and began to nibble as they spotted him. 

“Owen,” Scott called. He rushed to the door with Bek and El hot on his heels. His best friend turned, eyes wide. They were notably not blue.

“Hey guys,” he greeted, waving the lettuce in his paw at them. “What’s up?” 

 “We were looking for you.”

“Yeah!”

 Eloise shoved her way forward. “What is wrong with you?!?” She had to squeeze into the small mart to do it, and the room was starting to get too cramped. Bek tried to follow, but she was too wide to fit in the small space and quickly gave up. Instead, she pressed herself against the glass window and watched with ears pinned back against her head. 

“Wh-” “Eloise and Bek told me that they saw you napping in the art gallery,” Scott supplied. 

“Oooooh, so that’s what you mean…” He looked a little sheepish as he put the leaves in his paw on top of the chest. “I wasn’t napping. I was just, you know… enjoying the dark.”

Eloise planted one paw on her hip. “You know that makes no sense whatsoever, right?”

“Don’t know what to tell you. It just felt nice. Good on the eyes, and the wall felt cool. It’s not like I thought much about it-” Before Owen could finish his sentence, Scott could hear the breath catch in his chest and rattle. The big rat doubled over, and both Scott and El backed away to give him space. Owen kept his elbow firmly over his mouth as the watery coughs took hold. When he finally managed to reign his breathing back in, he lowered his arm and opened his eyes.

Scott could have sworn he saw the briefest flicker of blue. Or maybe green? Something bright and alien to Owen’s dark eyes. But the color was there and gone in the blink of an eye. Had he just imagined it? Perhaps it was a trick of the light?

“Well, maybe you should go back to your clock and take a nap,” El snapped. She looked disgusted as she backed out of the room. “Get some good rest and get over that cold.” 

Owen let himself slump against the side of the food chest. “That… that might not be a bad idea,” he admitted. “The going back to the clock part. No promises on the nap.” 

Where seconds ago Owen had seemed content and full of life, the sudden coughing fit appeared to have drained all of that out of him. He looked tired now. Drawn out. Like some of the color had leached right out of him. It hadn’t even been that violent or lengthy of a fit. He often had much worse as of late.

Not to be put off by Eloise’s reaction, Scott readily offered his paw out to Owen. “How about we all go back to your clock? I’ve got plenty of chicken soup you can have if you get hungry.”

“That does sound pretty nice...”

Owen took his offered paw, and Scott tried not to focus on the way Owen’s fingers felt clammy and cold between his claws.

____________________

Christmas time was getting close and the attic was abuzz with excitement. Plans for a Secret Santa gift exchange were underway. All the rats were finding themselves a part of the holiday season rush as they prepared their gifts. 

Martyn had taken charge of this one. He had set up the whole event, convincing everyone that the best way to celebrate the Christmas season was with homemade gifts from the heart. He had set up the raffle to decide who would be giving their gifts to whom. He was the one who had set up the post box outside of the bar for everyone to submit their names for the event. He had even done up the entire building in some of the most over-the-top seasonal decor Scott had ever seen and the farm rat was loving it. 

Tis the season, and Scott was embracing it as much as anyone. He had already planned on giving a gift to everyone, but there was no way he was going to turn down the opportunity to join in on a Secret Santa. That just meant that the name on his list would get two presents instead of one. Scott was ready to go all out for it. 

Yes, it seemed like the holiday season had started to help some of the rats calm down and put to rest some of the old squabbles that had been going on for some time now. They had something to focus on, nice deeds to do, super cute decorations to put up, and the occasional visitor coming in from the cold outside to make their day a little more topsy turvy. That was where most of the excitement came from nowadays: the random people who just sort of showed up. Other than them, life in the attic was pretty peaceful.

So Scott was surprised when, late one night when he was ready to drop off his note at the bar post box, he heard frantic shouting and horrible retching noises. 

He froze about ten paces away from the bar. His fingers clutched tight around his book as something slammed and there was another shout. What on Earth was going on? 

He swiveled his ears to get a better listen. That was Martyn’s voice. What he thought was incoherent shouting turned into panicked, somewhat broken words. 

“Oh geez. I can’t believe… Ugh! Oh, come on! Why you… I just- You know, you’re lucky I don’t bar you from the bar again. Keep it in the can. That’s it. Deep breaths… There you are. Oh! Uh… Good lord! That’s so gross. You know, I’ve already got one crime seen taped off at this establishment! I don’t need another!”

Martyn’s babbling was repeatedly broken up by the sound of someone gagging and the splash of something wet hitting metal. 

Scott crept forward on soft paw steps. He was not sure what he had stumbled upon, but Martyn sounded close. Keeping his tail low to the ground and book against his chest, Scott inched his way around the side of the building until he could make out Martyn’s back in the dim lighting. 

Martyn’s ears were pinned against his head. His tail twisted with discomfort, and his eyes were looking everywhere but at the figure slumped over the tin can next to him. He was rubbing his scarred arm back and forth along their back like he was trying to comfort them, but the motions were stiff. 

Another retch split the air. Another sound like a garden hose being switched on, and the figure’s shoulders heaved. Martyn flinched. 

“You didn’t even have anything to drink,” the barkeeper mumbled.

“Is everything alright?” Scott called.

Martyn patted the other person’s back once more before turning to face him. He looked queasy himself. “We’ve got a bit of a mess in the bar right now,” he said with a grimace. “I wouldn’t suggest going in there at the moment.” 

“And who is that? Are they alright?”

“It’s Owen,” Martyn said simply. 

Sure enough, the next gag turned into a cough so ragged it sounded like ripping fabric.

“And I’m gonna be honest, I don’t know if he is alright,” Martyn continued. “He came here asking about details for the Secret Santa. Seemed fine one moment, and then threw up all over the entryway the next. And the counter. And my back room when I tried to bring him out here.” He gestured towards the bar’s back door. There were a few wet spots near the doorway that Martyn pointed to that Scott didn’t want to focus on too closely. “And before you ask, I didn’t pour him so much as a glass. Alcohol’s got nothing to do with this one.”

“I can believe that,” Scott nodded. He dared to inch closer. A sour smell hit his sensitive nose when he came within a tail’s length of the two other rats. Sure enough, it was Owen. His goggles had been tossed to the side, out of the way as his head hung in the tin can Martyn was using as a rubbish bin. His clothes looked crumpled and wrinkled. His tail and ears hung limp. “Oh, Owen,” he breathed, already pitying his poor friend. 

“Hey, Scott…” Owen’s words echoed and warped around the edges of the can. His voice sounded small.

“Are you feeling worse?”

“I’m fine.”

Martyn snorted. “Tell that to my carpets.” 

Owen’s ears drooped a little bit lower. “Sorry about that.” 

The apology seemed to take Martyn off-guard. Owen didn’t normally apologize so easily. Not without a couple of jokes or light teasing mixed in for good fun. It made Scott want to ask his friend ‘What’s wrong with you,’ but he knew he probably wouldn’t get an honest answer, let alone an honest one. 

“That’s alright,” Martyn finally said, giving Owen another gentle pat on the back. “I’ll just clean it up-” Owen pitched forward into the can again and dry heaved. Martyn yanked his paw away and stuck his tongue out, clearly struggling not to gag as well. “I’ll clean it up later. Blegh!”

Scott stepped up to place his paw on Owen’s shoulder. His grip tightened slightly when Owen’s heaving stopped and his friend relaxed into his grip. “You go ahead and clean up your bar now, Martyn. I can stay out here with him for a while.”

Martyn’s blue eyes narrowed at him. He almost looked relieved as he glanced back and forth between Owen and Scott. Only the twitching of his tail tip hinted at his hesitance to leave Owen while he was still like this. “You sure?”

“It’s fine. He’s my best friend. I can watch him.”

That seemed to be enough to convince the barkeeper. “Thanks, Scott. I’ll come back out here once I take care of Owen’s mess.”

“I didn’t mean to,” Owen grunted into the can.

“I know,” Martyn said before stepping back into the bar and pulling the back door closed behind him. 

The back of the bar was quiet for a moment. The only noise was the slight scrape of Owen’s nails against the bin and the rise and fall of their breathing. Scott was half afraid that if he tried breaking the silence, the pause in Owen’s coughing and retching would end and all of his troubles would come rushing back. Instead, Scott lowered himself onto the floor where there didn’t seem to be any suspicious-looking puddles. He crossed his legs out in front of him and pressed one shoulder against Owen’s side. 

It was Owen who broke the silence first. “Why are you here, Scott?” His voice didn’t sound so small this time. 

Scott shrugged. “I was going to turn in my book for Secret Santa when I heard the commotion.”

“Oh…”

“You?”

“Something similar. I wanted to talk to Martyn about the chances of someone not being able to make it to the gift exchange.” 

“What did he say?”

“That a gift could be given to someone else who can give it to the right person on the day of. Or we could just arrange to swap gifts with a delivery. I didn’t get the chance to ask him about when it would get delivered.”

“Oh.” 

They fell into silence once more. A moment passed where Scott could feel Owen shiver. His muscles locked up and claws dug into the rim of the can. Scott braced himself for the sound of gagging, but it never came. Owen’s breath quickened, then gradually slowed back down. His muscles untensed, and the threat passed. As he relaxed, he let himself slide down the side of the can to sit next to Scott. 

When Scott looked over, his dark eyes flickered blue-green in the low light.

“I really think I might be okay now,” he said slowly. “I think the worst of it has passed.”

“You should still stay right here, just in case. I don’t think you should be taking any chances right now.”

Owen winced. “I think that’s fair.” 

“You’re sick.”

“Maybe,” Owen huffed. Even now, he couldn’t sit back and accept that it might be true. “I could have just had something bad to eat.”

“What have you eaten so far today?”

Owen’s face instantly fell into a regretful frown. “Or maybe not. It probably wasn’t the food.”

“Why? What all did you eat?”

“The last thing I ate was the dinner you offered me.”

Scott had prepared a nice picnic basket with cabbage rolls, fruit salad, and ratatouille. They had enjoyed a nice outing on Owen’s balcony, bundled up against the brisk winter chill. They were all dishes Scott had made countless times before. None of them could possibly have made Owen that ill. 

Before Scott could ask him about lunch, the other rat hunched his shoulders and started coughing once more. It was gargled and sharp. The ripping noises that shook his lungs were enough to make Scott want to pull his chef’s hat down over his ears to keep the sound out. As the sound of Owen's hacking grew weaker and eventually died out, Scott watched Owen turn to spit into the can. 

“Your cough doesn’t seem to be getting any better,” Scott mused. 

“I know…” he said, annoyance and exhaustion evident in his voice. “It’s such a pain and it won’t go away.”

“Have you been resting?” 

“As much as normal.”

“Any more weird instances of hiding in dark rooms?”

“Scott…” Owen’s tone was bitter.

“I’m not going to complain. Getting a few more naps in would be good for you. So have you?”

“Maybe, but it’s not napping.”

“Uh-huh.” Scott didn’t believe him. “It’s winter, Owen. You never really stopped to slow down after you went into the basement. I think if you want it to get any better, you should take a few days and stay in bed.”

Rather than complain, or wave Scott off and say that he was fine, Owen seemed to seriously consider his words. His arm snaked over his waist. He clutched at his stomach like it was threatening to spill its contents again. “Do you think that would help?”

“I don’t think it would make anything worse to try.”

Owen brought his head up only to let it fall back against the can. Thunk! “Aw, but it’s going to be boring staying in bed all day.”

“Don’t worry about that. I’ll come to visit. And so will the others. We’ll keep you busy while you take it easy.”

“You promise?”

“Promise.”

“Good. Can we get out of here now, then? I think I want to go home.”

Scott pointed to the paw still wrapped around Owen’s waist. “Are you feeling any better?”

“Honestly…yeah,” he said. The grip he had on his stomach loosened. “It doesn’t feel like my stomach is on the edge of bursting anymore. It kind of feels stable now, you know?”

“Mm-hm,” Scott hummed. He bumped his shoulder once more against Owen’s and then unwound his legs so he could stand up. “I’ll go tell Martyn we’re going to get you home.” 

The barkeeper hadn’t made his way back out to them yet. Scott had a feeling it would be a while before Martyn finished cleaning his bar up. While Owen and Martyn didn’t always see eye to eye, Martyn would probably appreciate being told that they were leaving. The alternative would mean heading out without saying a word and letting Martyn come back to an empty back of the bar and no clue whether Owen was alright. Considering how he had been trying to comfort Owen when Scott first got here, it was probably safe to assume Martyn would appreciate the heads-up.

That and Scott still had his book to drop off. He was already here, after all.

Owen thumped the back of his head against the can once more. He tilted his head back so he could smile appreciatively up at Scott.  “Thank you.”

“And I’m going to ask if he has a bag or something we can take with us, in case you get sick again on the way back.”

The smile fell into a frown so suddenly, that Scott couldn’t help but laugh.

He brushed his dungarees off as he stood. His tail, cramped from being sat on for so long, gave an experimental wave to work the pins and needles out. Then he picked his way past Owen and the can.

Some morbid curiosity took hold of Scott at that moment. Before he reached the door, his gaze passed over the rim of the rubbish bin. It was still pretty dark, but he could make out the wet shine of the puddle at the bottom. 

Scott was no doctor, but he guessed that the dark red tinge to it wasn’t natural. Not considering what Owen had claimed to eat most recently.  Nor were the fleshy, glowing cyan chunks floating on top.

___________________________

Owen was finally getting some rest. 

Scott didn’t even have to beg him to stay in bed. He didn’t have to pester his friend with apologies and nervous requests to stay put. Owen didn’t fight him on anything anymore and didn’t complain about being cooped up in his room at the top of the clock.

That’s how bad it was.

It had Scott on edge.

The farmer rat couldn’t sit still. He busied himself coming over to visit all the time. Owen’s clock wasn’t messy, but Scott busied himself trying to clean some of the lower levels. He chewed on chunks of wood and wool, shaping them into nice things he could work into his Christmas gifts for the others. And when he ran out of ideas for things to do with what was already here, he took it upon himself to bring his hobbies closer and reduce his number of trips away from the clock.

Owen didn’t have a kitchen, but that didn’t stop Scott from hauling over his pots, pans, or even an entire stove so he didn’t have to stray too far to cook up a few meals. 

Most bowls and platefuls went to the many rats who came to visit their bedridden friend. It gave them a chance to stick around longer if they had a meal at the ready. Some meals were brought up to Owen. Soups proved especially difficult to carry while climbing up the gears to Owen’s room, but Owen was always grateful to Scott for bringing them. A few dishes were whipped up purely for himself. A rat’s gotta feed himself, too. 

Every time he poked his head into the dark bedroom, he would catch a flicker of blue-green before Owen registered that he was there and would greet him. Once, Scott made no attempt to make his presence known when he entered the bedroom. He didn’t knock against the door frame or call out, assuming that Owen would simply spot him in a moment or two. He did not. Scott waited, and waited, and watched as Owen simply stared at the blank wall. There was nothing to see. It was too dark for him to make out the natural grain of the wood. His unfocused eyes stared, and now Scott fully believed Eloise’s claim that Owen’s eyes glowed in the dark. 

And yes, Owen still had the cough.

A couple of days on bed rest seemed to have no effect on the malady. If anything, it was worse. They kept a thimble on the side of the bed at all times now. When Owen felt a coughing fit coming on, he would reach for the bucket and hold it close. As the coughs shook his body, he would sometimes cough up… something.

The first time Owen coughed it up, they hadn’t thought to have the thimble nearby. His friend had done the best he could and leaned over the side of the bed when something solid and wet went splat against the wooden floorboards. Scott had to clean that one up. Whatever it could have been was solid. Soft, but solid. Pulpy. It was always an unnatural mix of teal and orange.

Funny. He normally liked those colors together. Now though… This wasn’t cute.

The night behind the bar had been dim, but he still recognized it as the stuff he had seen in the tin can.

Scott had no clue what it was supposed to be.

After that, Scott made sure Owen had a thimble at all times. He instructed his friend to cough into it whenever he could. Then Scott could take care of the mess later. 

That proved to be somewhat difficult. Not even trash rat would bother with it. They were banned from tossing it in his dumpster. Scott was left to try digging shallow holes in the frozen ground outside to bury it or burn it in the family room fireplace when the coast was clear of cats.

He came back from one of those expeditions to find Eloise and Bek standing outside Owen’s clock.

“How’s he doing?” El asked as he approached.

Scott shrugged. “He’s still sick. Still coughing.”

“That bites.” Bek kicked her bare foot against the floorboard with a frown. She cast her gaze across the rest of the attic, eyes lingering on their neighbors’ homes. “It’s a shame there are no doctors up here.”

“I agree. None of the home remedies that we used on the farm are working.” He patted his palm against the thimble. Claws clicked against its side on impact. “I just got done emptying this for, what? The fourth time today? You don’t suppose the humans downstairs have some medicine?”

Eloise tilted her head. “That work on rats? I doubt it.” 

“Want some help?” Bek offered. 

El reached into her pocket and pulled out something that looked like a covered bowl. Through the see-through top, Scott could make out a bright red-ish orange liquid sloshing around. It was thicker than water or juice. As she held it out towards him, something spicy made his nose twitch. “Yeah. As I said, no doctors here, but I had a thought,” she said. “How about a home remedy? Back in the city, there were these places that sold food. And in their kitchens, they had all these pretty bottles of tasty sauces. There was one my family would use whenever we got sick. Called it hot sauce. Burned going down, but it helped clear the sinuses.”

Scott tilted his head. “He’s coughing, El. Not sneezing or blowing his nose. I’m not sure that will work.”

“Aren’t those things normally connected?”

“Are they?”

“Probably,” Bek chimed in with a noncommittal shrug. 

Scott’s tail lashed as he considered his options. That stuff smelled pretty strong. She called it a sauce, so it was like food. “He’s supposed to eat it?”

Eloise nodded. “We would put it on our dinner.”

At worst, they could run to get Owen some milk if it was too hot. He didn’t think a bite of something spicy would necessarily make the cough worse.  

“Sure,” he relented. “I guess it’s worth a shot. Come on. Let’s run it by Owen and see what he thinks.” He waved towards the opening at the base of the grandfather clock and started padding towards the entrance. The three of them shuffled inside, only to be greeted by the muffled sound of coughing. Scott sighed. “There he goes again.” 

“He sounds worse,” Eloise said, tipping her head to look up past the levels of gears lining the inside of the clock. 

“It’s dark, too,” Bek noted. “Is he doing that thing where he hides in the dark?”

“He’s still in the bed. Not hiding,” Scott supplied. “But the dark seems to help.”

She clicked her tongue. “Rather odd.”

He wasn’t about to disagree. 

The two girls waited long enough for him to grab a bowl full of chicken soup from his pot. They could put the sauce into that for Owen to try. Then they scrabbled up the gears to the sound of Owen’s hacking and wheezing. It drowned out the sound of their claws scraping against brass and nickel. It took a few leaps, and both El and Scott had to help Bek pull herself up the last ledge. 

Owen was still coughing as they reached to top. Scott’s ears drooped as he heard a pained wheeze between intakes of breath. He could tell the sick rat was getting tired. 

“Owen!” Scott called as he led the two girls toward their friend's room. “You alright? Eloise and Bek came by.”

“Hey th-” Owen couldn’t even finish up the greeting as they stepped into the room. He was curled up in bed, gripping the covers as he leaned over and shook with each raspy breath. Scott picked up the pace until he was at the bedside, holding the thimble out for his friend. Owen took it with a shaking paw. He gripped it in his lap, but this bought appeared to only be a cough. 

When it finally began to slow, Owen took a deep, deliberate breath, and breathed out a “Hi.”

“You look worse than something one of the cats coughed up,” Bek said bluntly. El smacked her shoulder and Scott pinned back his ears, but Owen smiled at the jab, so the farm rat didn’t audibly gasp in horror like he wanted to.

“I’d rather take getting chewed out by the cats at this point,” Owen said, his voice all but shot. 

“No you wouldn’t,” Scott corrected. Owen didn’t argue. 

“Well,” El started, holding out the covered bowl of hot sauce for him to see. “I brought something with me, that might be able to help.” Again, she explained what was in the bowl. How it was spicy and full of flavor. How at her old home they would use it to help clear their stuffy noses and make it a little easier to breathe.

Then Scott showed him the bowl of broth he brought up. “I brought some soup we could mix it into if you think it’s worth a shot. It should tone down some of the flavor and make it easier to eat.”

Owen wrinkled his nose. “Not the biggest fan of spicy food, but if there’s a chance it’ll work then it’s worth a shot.”

“You sure,” Eloise and Scott asked at the same time.

He nodded and reached out towards the bowl in Scott’s paw. “Got a spoon?”

Of course Scott brought a spoon. 

Eloise popped the cover off her bowl and tilted it. Scott brought the broth underneath the rim to catch a few drops before swirling the angry orange sauce in. Since El was the one who knew about the home remedy, he let her judge how much to put in. She let a few more drops dribble into the broth before pulling back her bowl and covering it back up.

“That should probably be enough,” she said with a flick of her tail tip. “Don’t want to overdo it.”

“How spicy is it,” Owen asked nervously.

“It is hot sauce, so pretty spicy.”

Owen slunk a little deeper under the covers. “What if it’s too hot?”

“Well, you want it to be hot if it’s going to work.”

“Uh… Actually… I don’t know about this anymore, guys.”

Bek snorted. “Don’t be such a baby.”

“I am not! Fine.” In the blink of an eye, Owen snatched the soup bowl and spoon out from Scott’s paws. “This better work,” he grumbled, before ladling a spoonful of the liquid into his mouth.

Scott held his breath for a moment as he watched Owen swallow. His friend blinked rapidly at the taste, clearly uncomfortable. But he went for another spoonful and downed that as well. He handed it back to Scott with more than half the broth left. 

“Feeling any better?” Bek asked brightly.

He held up one claw as if asking her to wait. His face contorted against the heat. His breathing became heavy and drawn out, but that was good, wasn’t it? Those were the deepest breaths Scott had heard Owen manage in a while. 

“Did it help?” he pressed when Owen didn’t answer.

In less than a second, Owen’s demeanor changed. He went from tense patience, face screwed up with discomfort at the taste, to twitching and thrashing silently. So silently, in fact, that they even couldn’t hear him breathe. 

Scott’s blood ran cold.

Owen wasn’t coughing anymore. Wasn’t gagging. He was wheezing. Gasping. Ribcage rattling. Convulsing. his back arched. He writhed beneath the blanket so wildly that it knocked the covers from the bed entirely.  Both paws went to the base of his neck and gripped at the soft tissue there, claws raking along the exposed surface. Angry red marks flared up against his skin, visible beneath his fur. 

“Oh my god he’s choking,” Bek shrieked.

Her words hit Scott hard, knocking his brain back into action. “H-how?!?! It was just chicken broth!” He didn’t understand. There weren’t any noodles or chunks of chicken or vegetables to worry about swallowing. 

He dropped the bowl and spoon in his paws, not caring when they clattered to the floor and sent broth splattered everywhere. It didn’t matter. What mattered was getting his best friend breathing again. Scott reached under Owen’s armpit and hauled the other rat closer to the side of the bed where the rest of them could reach him more easily. He bucked in Scott’s grip. He almost completely lost his hold on the other rat’s arm as Owen kept reaching for his neck. Not sure what else to do, Scott started pounding on Owen’s back with the base of his palm, praying it would knock his airwaves free. “What could he possibly be choking on?!”

“No no no! You’re doing it wrong.” Bek shoved him to the side and took over, wrapping her arms around Owen’s chest from behind. The back of his head nearly smashed into her forehead as he struggled to breathe, but she gripped tight. “You gotta do it like in the movies.” With that, she started pounding her fist up and in just below his sternum.

Scott was grasping at straws. Reacting instinctively without knowing what would help or why. Let alone how this could have gone so wrong. He rushed around the bed to the other side so he could face Owen. He passed El, who still stood shaking against the wall. He’d ask her to help, but what could she do, really? 

Scott crawled up onto the bed with Owen. He intended to hold Owen’s paws to keep them from knocking into Bek as she continued to attempt to force out whatever was caught in his throat. Before he reached out, though, Owen shifted his paws from scratching at his throat to clawing at the sides of his mouth. 

There, just visible past the foremost incisors, something was glowing at the back of Owen’s mouth.

Something teal. Something orange.

Thoughts of the fleshy thimblefuls Scott had been doing his best to throw away swam to the forefront of his mind.  The glow shook and strobed with every desperate attempt for air. The lumpy shapes the glow emanated from shook and wobbled as Owen opened his mouth wider and wider. Scott’s muscles locked up. He couldn’t have willed himself forward if he wanted to. Couldn’t think straight enough for it to occur to him to try. He watched as Owen tried reaching into his own mouth with desperate claws and scraped at what was inside. 

Bek gave another heave, knocking Owen’s paw away from his mouth with enough force for his flailing claws to rip a tear in his lip. Something hooked on his claw came loose, and with a wet plop, it fell onto the bedspread in front of Scott. 

It looked like part of a mushroom cap. 

A very familiar teal mushroom with glowing orange splotches. 

Something clicked in the back of Scott’s numb mind that this was probably what had been in those thimbles, although less smashed up and not swimming in bile. This cap was far more sturdy. He could still make out the delicate edges of gills lining the underside. The damaged end was blackened and wilted. The entire piece still glowed, despite being severed from the rest of the larger body. 

He had warned Owen about those awful mushrooms. 

Why couldn’t his friend have just trusted him and gone through with burning it?

“It’s not working,” Bek cried. She let go of Owen, cradling her wrists. Bruises were already becoming visible there beneath pale fur.

Scott blinked. 

Owen was reaching with one paw for his mouth again. The glowing shapes there were clearer than they were a second ago. More sharply defined. Larger. Scott could hardly believe what he was seeing as caps pressed against the backs of Owen’s teeth, threatened to grow out right past his lips. Owen was grabbing at them. Clawing at them. Pulling fistfuls of crushed mushroom stems and caps. Scott reached forward with a half-baked thought to help rip more away, but Owen smacked his paw away before he could get close. Owen’s other paw was reaching up towards some unseen point on the ceiling with eyes that were glassy and blank. Color flickered in the pupils. 

Orange, teal, orange, teal, orange, teal…

Scott whirled to look at Eloise. “GO GET HELP!!!”

She hadn’t so much as moved from her spot by the wall. At Scott’s words, her shocked face blanched. She was shaking in fear and reached for Bek like the smaller rat was a lifeline. “WHO DO I GET!?!”

“I DON’T KNOW!”

POP!

Owen fell limp.

Scott turned back to stare down at his best friend, too frozen in shock to move, dread pulsing through his veins where his heart stopped beating. “Owen…” he whimpered. The name sounded fuzzy to his ears through the radio static of his own thoughts. 

Owen’s chest was moving. Barely, but it was. Scott could see it rising and falling with short, shallow breaths. 

“Owen, please…” 

Please what? Answer? Survive? Be okay? 

The two girls gripped at each other. They stood in front of the entrance, their shadows falling over Owen in the bed. Through their quivering dark shapes, Owen’s eyes blazed.

Orange, teal, orange, teal, orange, teal…

“No more of that.”

Scott pealed his ears up away from where he had pinned them flat against the back of his head. “Owen?” His voice cracked. Owen’s voice sounded… hollow.

The fallen rat’s chest twitched. His arms drew in closer to his sides. His legs spread out over the sheets. Scott scrambled away to make room for his friend as a foot passed by where he had been kneeling on the bed. Every movement was agonizingly slow. Pained. 

“W-what d-do you mean?” El stuttered. “Y-you gave us a r-real fright, there.”

“I mean no more of that.” Owen’s voice sounded empty. Distant. Scott couldn’t make out his friend’s mouth moving in the dim lighting. Not at this angle. Considering what he had just seen, it was shockingly clear considering all the mushrooms he had to be talking around. “Whatever that was, it burned. No more burning us.”

One of Bek’s ears swiveled. “Uh… ‘us’? What do you mean ‘us’?”

With a long, labored heave that looked unnaturally limp, Owen’s head lolled back as he pushed himself up shoulders first. He sat up. 

Orange, teal, orange, teal, orange, teal… 

“Us.”

It wasn’t just Owen’s eyes that glowed anymore. They were vacant. Glassy, empty eyes with irises that flashed back and forth. But below his eyes, crawling out from the cracks in his mouth, flowing down with the line of blood escaping the cut on his lip, curling around his front teeth, were mushrooms. Many, many, many mushrooms. 

“We won’t let you burn us again,” came Owen’s voice, but it wasn’t Owen. It couldn’t be. His mouth didn’t move. His shallow breathing, now growing even shallower, hadn’t hitched or changed. Rather, with each rise and fall of the syllables, the glowing orange splotches strobed brighter. 

“No more heat. No more burning.” 

Orange, teal, orange, teal, orange, teal. Bright, dim, bright, dim, bright, dim. 

“Just the damp. Just the dark. Like me. Like you…”

He turned to Scott, but he didn’t actually look at Scott. Those eyes stared straight ahead. The pupils were so dilated, he couldn’t be focusing on anything in front of him. His head tilted, ears falling limply with the motion. 

“Hey Scott.” The mushrooms blinked with the hollow words. “You were helping me. Now I think you should help us…”

Owen lurched forward, reaching out for the nearest one of them. His claws brushed Scott’s arms and Scott leaped back. 

“Aaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaaa!”

He shrieked. Behind him, Bek and Eloise screamed as well. They scrambled back as Owen pushed forward out of the bed. Every movement was sluggish and stilted. His muscles quivered with distress and his legs shook as he stood up, but he WAS up. And he was coming right for them. 

They bolted. All three dropped onto all fours and scrabbled through Owen’s house as fast as their paws could carry them. 

This was a nightmare. It had to be. Scott knew the mushrooms were dangerous, but whatever this was had to be something else. However, when Scott slipped on the carpet in the hall and slammed shoulder-first into the wall, the pain sent dark spots dancing across his eyes.

Dreams weren’t supposed to be this painful.

The three of them were halfway down the gears when Owen’s distant voice met their ears. It still had that hollow ring to it. “Come on Scott. Come on guys. You wanted to help me, right? Then come back. The dark is better.”

Scott clenched his claws and dared to look up. He couldn’t see Owen past the ledge. 

“Scott… Eloise… Bek… I thought you wanted to help?”

A shiver passed down Scott’s spine. Owen didn’t sound any closer. He wasn’t chasing them. He let go of the gears, allowing himself to drop the rest of the way to land heavily alongside the girls. The three of them looked up 

“Are you still there, guys?”

El placed a finger over her lips and glared at Scott and Bek. She flicked her eyes off to the side and waved in the direction of Owen’s mudroom. It didn’t take much to figure out what she meant. Scott and Bek shared a glance, then nodded and followed her around the corner. 

As soon as they were all packed into the cramped room like sardines in a can, Scott pulled the door closed behind him. She dropped the finger from in front of her mouth. 

“What do we do!? What do WE DO!?!?” she whispered frantically.

“I DON’T KNOW!”

They all scrambled, moving back and forth as much as they could in the small space as they talked over each other in a panic.

“Is he coming!?”

“I don’t think so.”

“It didn’t sound like it.”

“I don’t think we can be sure.”

“The door’s closed even if he was.”

“That just means we’d be trapped.”

“I don’t think he’s coming, though.”

“What even happened?”

“It’s those mushrooms,” Scott babbled, words flowing out of his mouth as quickly as they passed through his head. “Those were the mushrooms from the garden that we burned. I’d recognize them anywhere. They were in him! My god, his mouth was full of them. He was coughing them up all this time and I didn’t even realize-”

Eloise cut through his panicked rambling to grab him by the shoulders and give him a shake. “You’re the expert here on those things. Did you know they could do that?”

“Of course not!”

“Okay,” Bek started. “So a bunch of angry mushrooms were making Owen sick and now he’s…” She opened and closed her mouth a few times, but could not find the words. She helplessly gestured to the mudroom’s ceiling, approximately in the same direction as Owen’s room. “That. Now he’s like that. Didn’t the mushrooms from the garden get burned?”

“Yeah,” El hissed. “That took care of them last time. Should we try that again?”

“And do what?” Scott wanted to shout, but he strained to keep his volume down low. “Set Owen on fire?!?”

El blinked, her face going blank. “Right. Might need to think of something better.”

“What about what he said,” Bek said, her whisper now bordering on becoming a shout. “He said that something burned.”

“Yeah, the hot sauce,” El said dismissively. “I’m sure it was spicy and hot and everything I said it would be but that doesn’t actually help us now because it doesn’t actually burn things like a fire, now does it?!” 

“But he- it- they- whatever that was- I don’t know?! It didn’t seem to like it.”

“So you’re saying it caused this?”

“Those mushrooms were already in his system,” Scott admitted. “He was throwing them up for a while now. Whatever this is was already in him.”

“So the hot sauce made it worse? It pissed some bloody mushrooms off and made Owen…” Eloise didn’t even know how to finish her sentence. She threw her paw up in the air and turned. She pressed one of her knuckles against her forehead. 

Scott ran through everything he knew about the fungus in his head. From his early days on the farm, where he had seen the brightly colored caps from afar, to the blight they caused, and the wildlife that choked on their spores until they couldn’t breathe. The awful way it spread in the dark, closed-off spaces. Places like the basement.  

Places like Owen’s lungs. 

He shook his head. Now was not the time to dwell on that. 

At the farm, the only thing the farmers could do was burn it. Gather it up in a neat pile and set the whole thing ablaze. Even if there were a few mycelium roots below the surface, if they set the fire close enough to the patch, the heat still managed to leach through the topsoil and kill it off. 

Hot sauce didn’t put off real heat. Not like that. But the mushrooms reacted to it. He didn’t know if his parents had ever tried any irritants against something like that. Acid wasn’t necessarily available to a family of rodents working the field. 

He thought of the partially blackened piece of mushroom Owen had clawed out of his mouth. 

“Okay… I think… I think your hot sauce might have helped, actually.”

El pulled her knuckle from her forehead and looked at him from the corner of her eye. “You’re joking.”

“That’s what I was saying,” Bek exclaimed. All pretenses of keeping her voice down were tossed out the window. “It was mad about how hot it was. What if hot flavors work just like hot fires.”

“That’s ridiculous.”

“Probably. But I saw a piece break off that looked burned, and I know for a fact Owen hasn’t been around a fire for some time. I don’t know if it works like some sort of acid, but it did something.”

“Yeah,” El huffed. “It made him like THAT . Worse!”

Bek rolled her eyes. “That just means we didn’t use enough.”

Scott pointed to the smaller rat. “What she said.”

Bek didn’t seem to be prepared for him to agree with her so easily. Her eyes flew wide and her tail went ramrod straight. “What?!”

“I think you’re, right, Bek. I think we need to try using more.”

“But you- I thought- I can’t believe-” Eloise sputtered. Her paws waved uselessly in the air, grasping at straws. Finally, she gave up on trying to find an argument and slumped forward. “Fine.” She pulled the small covered bowl out. “I suppose it doesn’t hurt to try.”

“Great! Now we just need to figure out how to do that,” Scott said as he leaned his back against the door.

Knock.

Knock.

Knock.

“Is it nice and dark in there?”

All three rats stiffened at the sound of Owen’s voice filtering through the cracks in the door. Scott’s heart outright skipped a beat as he pushed off the door, trying to put as much distance between him and the door as he could. Considering the small mudroom, it wasn’t much. He hurtled into Bek and Eloise, who were pressing themselves through the hanging coats and boots against the furthest corner of the room. Something fell at his side. He tore his eyes away from the door long enough to see Eloise’s covered bowl of hot sauce bounce once off the floor and go rolling.

Squeak… click!

The doorknob turned and swung open. Blinking orange lights strobed across the room as Owen stepped inside. 

“Well, would you look at that?”

Orange, teal, orange, teal, orange, teal. Bright, dim, bright, dim, bright, dim. 

“It is dark in here. I knew you guys wanted to help.”

“O-Owen…” Scott said shakily. He pressed himself further into Bek and Eloise’s sides. “I-I thought you were upstairs in y-your room?”

“But you guys came down here,” he said through a mouth that did not form the words. His blank eyes passed over the room. “You can’t help when you’re down here and I’m up there.”

“Help with what,” El demanded.

“Us. And you.”

He took a stilted step forward, and every fiber of Scott’s being screamed at him to run.

“Go! Go! Go!” He squeaked, shoving Bek and El aside. Owen stood between them and the door, but he couldn’t stop all of them if they tried to go around them. 

Of course, that didn’t mean they would all be able to get out scot-free. 

Because Owen’s claws wrapped around the strap of Scott’s dungarees before he could make it past. 

His best friend’s paw gripped like a vice. His grip was so white-knuckled tight that it shook as he yanked. Scott was too busy trying to run forward to get a good grip on the floor with the soles of his feet. They slipped out from under him and the farm rat found himself suspended for a moment, staring at the retreating backs of the girls before his back hit the ground. 

Owen’s flashing eyes appeared over him. 

Orange, teal, orange, teal, orange.

“Hey, Scott,” the mushrooms glowed down at him. 

Scott tried to pull away, but Owen still had a grip on the strap. Out of the corner of his eye, he spotted the bowl Eloise had dropped. It was still covered and clean on the wooden floor, right there next to a set of boots. Scott reached for it. His claws brushed the rim, only for the strap of his dungarees yanked back once more. He couldn’t budge an inch as Owen forced the strap down against the wood planks, pinning him to the floor. The bowl rolled uselessly out of his line of sight.

“What are you doing,” Scott squeaked, voice small. His ears tried to swivel back to lay against his head, but they could only press uselessly against the floor. 

“Helping us,” the mushrooms in Owen’s mouth blinked. “Don’t worry, Scott. It’s not so bad. A little time, a bit of coughing… you’ll barely notice.”

Dread clawed at the pit of Scott’s stomach. Owen was still looking at him blankly, but the mushroom caps in his mouth flared. The gills widened, revealing dotted dark pores between their inner layers. Scott could make out the dark spore particles between them. The dread dug those claws in and yanked.

“Owen! Owen please- I don’t- I- I- Please don’t-”

“Take this!”

Owen tore his glowing eyes off Scott. The moment his head tilted back, the open end of a bowl hit him square in the center of his face. Rivulets of red-orange liquid sprayed out along the side of his head. It caught in his hair and dripped down his jaw, and when the bowl fell away, his entire face was covered in Eloise’s hot sauce. 

Bek stood in the door frame, wide-eyed, arm outstretched in front of her, utterly shocked that she had hit her mark.

The squeak of pain Owen let out made Scott flinch. He wanted to curl into a ball and cover his ears against the sheer agony that would have shredded Owen’s voice box if he was actually using it. Scott instead dug his heels into the floor and slid back as far as he could. Claws wrapped around his shoulders. To his relief, Bek had rushed to his side. She and El each took an arm and helped him up while Owen backed away. The slow, pained movements were now even shakier as he reached to wipe at the sauce covering his face.

Wherever the sauce touched the mushrooms, the stems and caps twitched and shriveled.  Steam hissed, bubbles popping along their wet surface as the lukewarm liquid wreaked havoc on them. Burnt, dried-out stems fell from between his lips and crumbled against the floor. 

A rather large mushroom broke free, falling to the floor. Owen let out a gasp. The sudden breath was heavier than what he had managed since the mushrooms appeared, and it triggered a cough. The same kind of heavy, burdened, full-body cough Owen had been struggling with for so long now. Scott could see flecks of hot sauce get sucked in from the edges of Owen’s lips, and full splatters of reddish-orange peppered the walls as the air was forced back out. He was gripping his throat again, but it wasn’t the desperate, clawing grasp from before. 

With each cough, more and more blackened bits came tumbling from his mouth. With each cough, his chest expanded more and more. He managed to pull in more air. Let out more ragged breaths. 

Bek and El’s grips on Scott’s shoulders tightened when Owen collapsed down onto his knees, shoulders stooped, and his stomach heaved. Scott didn’t react. Only watch. He had been around Owen’s vomiting spells longer than the two girls. He watched the puddle of bile and fleshy lumps that spread across the floor with cold recognition. 

The chunks of what he now recognized to be mushroom pieces bubbled and boiled in the puddle, withering away amidst the swirls of undigested orange hot sauce. 

Owen heaved again. And heaved. He kept going until there was nothing left, and even then he dry-heaved once or twice before he fell back into a weak cough. It was an exhausted cough. One that barely even managed to shake the rat’s shoulders. One that made his elbows waver as he tried to hold himself up off the messy floor. A few more flecks of orange and teal fell from his lips. 

The coughing stopped. 

It felt like an eternity passed in the time Scott, El, and Bek sat there, watching Owen pant. They were holding their breath. Didn’t move. Didn’t speak. Didn’t react in any way, as if the moment was so jagged and sharp that any change might cause it to break. Or to break one of them. 

But if nobody broke the moment, than there was no way to know if it could be fixed.

“O-Owen?” Scott flinched as the sound of his own voice startled him. It cut through the quiet like a knife. He would have reached out to his friend. Risked that bit of movement, but Bek caught his wrist before he could go far.

Both she and El held him back. Their eyes were brimming with fear and concern, both emotions warring over what was best. Should they help Owen? Stay away from him? 

“Are you back to feeling like yourself?” Bek asked carefully.

Owen looked up. 

Orange, teal, orange, teal, orange, teal…

“I…” He took a deep breath. A small, tired smile pulled on the corners of his mouth as the flicker in his eyes finally guttered out. “I feel better…”

Thump!

Owen’s shaking arms finally gave out. He slumped down to the floor. Eyes fell closed. His body went still outside of the rise and fall of his chest.

And for the first time in a long time, Owen’s breathing sounded normal to Scott’s ears.

[theoneandonlygothicrainbow]

Why Claiming Hunter is Beyond Redemption Because of What He Did in Any Sport in a Storm (and other episodes) Doesn’t Make Sense

Before I start this essay, I just want to make it clear that I have nothing against people who dislike Hunter or Any Sport in a Storm. Both of them mean a lot to me, but I understand that everyone has preferences and there is nothing wrong with that. However, I wanted to write this essay because I’ve seen a couple people state that Any Sport in a Storm makes Hunter a terrible person, disregarding information in and outside the episode. Again, you don’t have to like Hunter, but stating that he’s a terrible person is objectively incorrect.

What people need to realize is that Hunter, for his whole life, was desperate to prove himself to Belos, his fellow Emperor’s Coven comrades, and even himself, that he was worthy of being a valuable member to the Coven he was in. He was also used to obeying orders all his life, and the whole “recruitment” thing was an “order” given by Darius. We know Darius didn’t mean it that way, but Hunter interpreted it as such, because his environment is so awful that he doesn’t understand social interaction well. We see that this in this episode, Thanks to Them, AND the deleted scene from Clouds on the Horizon. People act like Hunter went out of his way to do this like Eclipse Lake. He didn’t. He only did it because he interpreted it as an order from Darius.

Willow blaming herself is framed as the wrong approach. It makes sense if you know her character. Willow always blames herself when she feels that she failed. And Hunter didn’t mean to make her feel this way at all. It helps Hunter realize what he did was wrong. She was also never about proving herself to Hunter, only the professor. She helped Hunter show the team because she knows from her conversation with Hunter that he needed help.

It wasn’t about proving herself to Hunter. It was about giving Hunter a new perspective and helping him. Hunter clearly cared about the team. He thinks the Emperor’s Coven is good. He thought the team would thank him for it later. The way he speaks is off putting but it’s because Hunter is bad at social interaction. He doesn’t understand how friendships work and he has good intentions for them, even if he was also looking out for himself. The exchanges with Gus and Skara prove this. And he thought that task would help him get his sigil. But even then the episode clearly shows that Hunter values doing the right thing, and once he realized what he did was wrong, he fixed it immediately. Again, he was ordered to do what he did. Disobeying an order like that is huge in Hunter’s position. And Hunter was willing to take a potentially lethal strike from Darius as well as accidentally show his Palisman in order to protect the team. He was being incredibly selfless and he admits he was at fault this way. Sure he doesn’t directly say “I’m sorry” but sometimes actions speak louder than words.

As for Willow forgiving Hunter? First of all, she doesn’t completely forgive him. You can see she’s upset with him at the end of ASIAS, but she wants to give him another chance. She hopes to see him again (“52 weeks before Caleb’s next day off”) when Hunter is out of the Coven. We see that Willow is still skeptical of him in Labryinth Runners, along with the rest of the team. They care about him because they know he cares about them, but no one tries to vouch for Hunter until he brings up the breathing thing, which was the proof Willow needed. After Hunter helps Gus, THAT’S when the school trusts him to talk about the Day of Unity.

Second of all, Willow’s softer response makes perfect sense if you know the episode and her character. Willow understands that Hunter was in a messed up situation due to their exchanges, and she tries to help him because that’s her main goal in life. She wants to “be strong to protect the ones she loves.” She relates to Hunter because he wants to prove himself, just like she did.

There are two other things that people seem to forget as well:

1. Hootys Moving Hassle. In that episode, Willow peer pressured Luz to do a conjuring at Hootys House so she can prove herself to Amity. Willow was in the wrong and she realizes by the climax of the episode, just like Hunter in ASIAS. She would understand why he did what he did.

2. Amity did something wrong to Willow and it took YEARS for Amity to make amends, all the while Willow was bullied. Hunter found out what he did wrong and fixed it very quickly. He took responsibility faster and Willow would appreciate that because of her experience with Amity.

And this all from just Any Sport in a Storm. We’ve seen sympathetic moments from Hunter in Hunting Palismen and Eclipse Lake as well. Even if Hunter didn’t end with being the complete good guy in those episodes. In Hunting Palismen, we see him bond with Luz and despite him about to betray Luz, he instead decides to back down and let Luz take the Palismen, even though he needed them to please Belos. We see this further when the first thing he tells Flapjack is “you shouldn’t be here, it’d be bad if Belos saw you.” Again, he clearly values doing the right thing.

Eclipse Lake is definitely Hunter at his worst and least sympathetic, but what it shows is that Hunter is in a dire situation where if he doesn’t prove Belos, he’s as good as gone. That’s why he betrays Amity to get the key and threatens Luz for it. The threats Hunter makes are not out of malice. If they were, he would have started with them in almost every situation he was in. He only uses threats when he has no other option. So trying to claim Hunter is a bad person for said threats doesn’t work.

I feel like people also need to realize that Hunter was more than willing to put himself in danger in order to keep people safe in both Labryinth Runners and Thanks to Them. Hunter literally exposed himself to a group that would have taken him back to Belos AND sacrificed himself in an attempt to take Belos down. You could also throw Clouds on the Horizon and Kings Tide in there as well with how much he protects Willow and Gus in the background.

Has Hunter done bad things? Absolutely. I’m not justifying those actions. But frankly he clearly has earnest intentions AND has done so much good to help his friends that holding his character back for said bad actions just doesn’t make sense anymore. I feel like a lot of people are just blowing them out of proportion or neglecting to see his character progression.

[patheticbatman]

Part Two

I’m very proud of these dolls, and I’m also leaving them at my parents’ house, so I did a little photoshoot with some books as background so I can have nice pictures of them.

This is the second post, so check out the first for more info!

First up we have Pocahontas (real name Matoaka) with Elatsoe, by Darcie Little Badger. It’s a why-dunnit, not a who-dunnit, about a Lipan Apache girl who has some serious ghost powers. Pocahontas was a tough one, but I decided to go with a book I love about a modern Lipan Apache (Indigenous) girl, written by a modern Lipan Apache (Indigenous) woman. I know a lot of people have strong feelings on both the real life Matoaka and the cartoon Pocahontas, and how she symbolizes a lot of sad and terrible changes for Turtle Island. So I thought putting the doll and this book together would provide an interesting contrast, one that the real life Matoaka may find horribly interesting.

Second is Esmeralda with At Night All Blood Is Black, by David Diop (the French title means Soul Brother - I believe that the title is a play on the English Idiom, At Night All Cats Are Grey, meaning you cannot see meaningful differences in the right circumstances). It’s a very interesting though sorrowful novel about a Senegalese Tirailleur (Infantryman) who was sent to France during WWI. I don’t think Esmeralda would read this normally, but if she was in a sad mood, I think the theme of fluctuating humanity during conflict, and being a Person of Color in France (even centuries later!) would interest her.

Third up is Mulan with Lady of Ch’iao Kuo: Warrior of the South, by Laurence Yep. When I drew pictures for Mulan’s poem (years ago now!) I headcanoned in my explanation that Mulan and Lady Xian, princess of the Li Xian people in modern day Guangdong, were close enough in history that they *might* have met and been friendly. Mulan is typically from further North and West than Guangdong, and would be part of the colonizing side in this case sadly, but I feel like they would respect each other as fellow powerful women.

Fourth is Melody (Ariel’s daughter) with A Song Below Water, by Bethany C. Morrow. I think she’d go into the book with certain expectations, like I did, about the plot, and then get drawn in by the real story. Let’s just say the cover gave me assumptions that lead to a great twist for me personally. Also, I think Melody would relate to the mystery of her magical parent’s true background. The book celebrates the lesser known fantasy species, and approaches the danger of traffic stops, police brutality and protesting for Black people, and how that intersects with being a woman, with care and love. If they ever make a live action Little Mermaid 2, I feel like that would also speak to Melody.

Fifth is Kida with The Ones We’re Meant To Find, by Joan He. Kida is from a fantasy ancient civilization, and this book depicts a sci-fi futuristic one, but there’s more similarities than one might initially think. Both exist due to the hubris of humanity, and in reaction to serious pollution topside. And both explore (or at least mention) a relationship between two women separated by the change in their civilization, and with a boy who seems to know too much. I’m not sure Kida would necessarily read this story, aside from its attractive and exotic (to her, at least) take on the world above, which she has not seen for millennia, but this story is similar enough to Kida’s movie that I felt it fell under the adaption category instead.

Sixth is Jane (from Peter Pan 2, Wendy’s daughter) with Peter Pan on Scarlet, by Geraldine McCaughrean. The Disney movie is NOT based on this book, but both do mention Wendy’s family being affected by a World War, though this one has WWI and the movie has WWII. Interestingly, both have a sympathetic Hook initially. ‘Twas a lovely read, and in my opinion matched the original book based on the play.

Seventh is Giselle with The Wind in the Willow, by Kenneth Grahame. I just felt Giselle would enjoy the idea of cute talking animals (but not so much the war storylines of Redwall) so I put her with this book.

Eighth is Tiana (<3) with Wildwood Dancing, by Juliet Marillier. Funnily enough, I do actually have the *sequel* to the book her movie was based off of, but I’ve never read the original, so I decided it doesn’t count. But this is my favorite mixed up fairy tale novel that features a Frog Prince storyline, so I went with it. The villain is also a greedy butt who doesn’t care for his own people, and the protagonist is often underestimated, due to her appearance and gender. In any case, I love this book so much that I illustrated the first chapter, lol.

Ninth is Rapunzel with Rapunzel’s Revenge, by Shannon, Dean and Nathan Hale. I loved this adaption since I was a kid (honestly more than Tangled) and I’m pleased to finally own it.

Last is Merida, with The Edge on the Sword, by Rebecca Tingle. The book is about a warrior princess a thousand years ago in what is England today, with a forced engagement storyline, so I figured this would be right up Merida’s alley.

Part One

Part Three

Part Four

[lampmanliveblogs]

Called it. Big guy whose name I didn’t bother to remember totally called for an Abomaton back-up. You can see in the background that both Edric, Barcus, and Mattholomule have been incapacitated, and so has presumably the rest of the resistance.

I don’t know if it’s just the framing of this shot, with the Abomaton in the doorway like this, or if this thing is supposed to be bigger than the standard models we’ve seen. Either way, it does a great job of telling us, the audience that this is bad news.

When hunter comes in contact with Gus’ sphere, he is assaulted with flashbacks to previous episodes. Most prominently Hollow Mind, but also Hunting Palismen.

So it seems that whatever it is Gus is doing, it can show a person unpleasant memories from their past, not just his own, like I initially thought. So maybe there wonät be a secret super tragic backstory to Gus after all… I hope.

Okay, not a secret tragic backstory, thank the Titan. i think the present and near future hold more than enough trauma for Gus, no need to inject some into his past.

This was such a nice scene between Hunter and Gus.

We’ve seen before that Gus struggles a lot with feelings on inadequacy (I can’t believe I spelled that word right on the first try) and self-doubt. A lot of it seems to come from him being considered a gifted kid, naturally skilled in a particular magic, to the point where he moved up a year in school.

As we saw in the flashback at the beginning of the episode, this led to some other students taking advantage of him. We can infer that when he moved up a year, he lost the friends he had previously, which left him a very lonely kid. That was until he met Willow, who was a genuine person that didn’t just befriend him for his smarts.

To make things worse, I get the feeling that he may also suffer a bit from imposter syndrome. Imposter Syndrome is basically when a person doubts their own talents or skills and it often comes with a fear of being exposed as a fraud. Gus was told that he was talented and smart, but all he could see was all the times he screwed up or made a mistake or when he got tricked.

He got tricked by his fellow classmates, he got tricked by… whatsherface… Bria! Bria and her gang tricked him to help them find the Looking Glass Ruins. And now he got tricked by Adrian’s illusion of Willow. 

So from Gus’ perspective, he is nowhere near as smart or talented as people keep telling him and he blames himself for that. But of course he makes mistakes, he’s a kid. Heck, most adults struggle to keep themselves together. Not me though.

To draw some parallels to Hunter: Belos kept telling him he was special and the Titan had great plans for him, that he was gifted in that sense… when in reality, all he ever wanted was to keep Hunter loyal and from asking any questions. His lot in life was not to reason why, but to do and die.

What was it Hunter said in Eclipse Lake? ”There is nothing worse than disappointing someone who thinks you’re special.”

Gus pocketing Adrian’s amplifier mirror thing will probably be important later. It’s a surprise tool that will help us later!

(the next shot immediately after this one shows the Abomaton destroyed, the big guy glued to the wall, and two students that weren’t there before have joined in on the festivities. Adrain is nowhere to be seen)

Hunter, much like Eda did at the beginning of the series, doesn’t know what a hug is. Which makes sense, Belos isn’t exactly the affectionate type. Honestly, Willow & Gus should be happy Hunter didn’t think it was some kind of wrestling grab and his combat instincts kicked in.

[everlasting-rainfall]

Just reread your ocs and I missed them 🥺

Hope we see more of them , Im actually curious have you made any new ocs ? You mentioned something about Kid 🤔

ooh have you got any art on Saffron maybe even Willow?

I wonder how did she get pregnant by Maria , did Maria ask Ivankov to change her into a man or is Maria secretly a futa?

For Willow I find her very interesting , I wonder though what’s gonna happen to her when Roger gets Executed , Rouge died at childbirth ( will Willow be Ace second mother 👀)

Does Willow get a bad ending like Roger did or will she be sailing the seas with shanks or buggy maybe she be staying with Rayleigh and shakky ?

last thing to say is that I hope your doing ok 💗

🌺Anon

Aww, that’s so kind of you to say, flower friend! It makes me happy to hear that you missed my OC’s, it makes me feel like they’re really good characters!

Anywho, yes I do actually have other OC’s! Multiple actually! I have a lot of fan-kids but I never intend to post about them on this blog as I don’t think that those characters should be present on a blog like this, it would make me feel weird personally

But as for my adults, I have 20+ of them! There’s quite a few of them and I mentioned in another post who they are but just in case you didn’t see that or haven’t seen it at the time of this post then lemme repost who they are alongside their S/O

Sleepyhead Estelle and Caesar Clown

The Snow Woman Talvi and Dalton

Infiltrator Thalassa and Magellan, Sadi-Chan, Domino

Investigative Reporter Honey and Big News Morgans

Time Traveller Paislee and Joyboy

IRL Girl Vanessa and Baccarat, Whitey Bay, Wanda, Hina

Clothing Designer Morticia and Law, X-Drake, Hawkins, Sanji

NSFW Star Nova and Oven

Travelling Selkie Lorna and Laskey

Community Leader Esther and Garling (DON’T LOOK HIM UP IF YOU DONT WANT MANGA SPOILERS)

Glass Artist Soleil and Cobra, Pell, Chaka

IRL Artist Ariel and Kalgara, Herb, Noland, Acorn (Noland’s Wife)

Something Something Water Ember and Sabo, Ace

Morticia’s Model Unnamed Goth Bunny and Penguin, Shachi

I know that I have mentioned Kid but his S/O is one that I’d rather not talk about so unfortunately you’ll never get to see them so my sincerest of apologies but anywho… Let’s get into it!

I don’t actually have any art on them that isn’t made in Gacha but I do however have aesthetic boards that I’ll post at the bottom of this post! I hope that you enjoy them!

!-MINORS DO NOT INTERACT FOR ANY REASON-!

!-POTENTIAL TRIGGER WARNINGS-!

Futa, Strap-On’s, Impregnation, Abuse, Isolation, Death Mention, Dream Crushing, Hallucinations, Dark Fairycore Imagery

!-POTENTIAL TRIGGER WARNINGS-!

!-MINORS DO NOT INTERACT FOR ANY REASON-!

So when it comes to a lot of female characters that I ship with my OC’s, I like to imagine what kind of children they would have together and also I have an easier time writing and imagining sex with someone who has a dick and someone who has a pussy versus two people who have pussies

As a result, Black Maria getting Saffron pregnant is usually explained via Devil Fruit shenanigans or just isn’t explained at all, Black Maria isn’t the only one either as Ulti is also capable of getting Saffron pregnant and each of Saffron’s S/O’s want to be able to make her have their babies

But yeah basically, that’s why so it’s safe to assume that if I’m writing fictional women having intercourse with my OC’s then it’s either strap on or just that they have a dick so that’s the explanation

I guess in unexplained scenarios, those two scenarios of Ivankov changing the female into a male or them secretly being a futa could work but typically I try not to think too hard about it beyond weird side effect of Devil Fruit or something as then I think too much about it and the smut idea that I had winds up going nowhere

I think the furthest that I’ve ever thought about it is that after sex, the dick just kinda goes away and now there’s just two women but anyways that’s enough of that sort of talk now

Willow is by no means then strongest member of the Roger Pirates like she’s pretty tough, don’t get me wrong but she’s nothing compared to the people on Roger’s crew and considering the bounty on all of them it caused some pretty strong people to be after them

So considering that it’s very likely that she has a bounty on her head, it’s likely that Willow could get a bad ending where she’s captured by an enemy and locked up but considering Rayleigh is also her husband, I doubt that she would be locked up for long

I have mentally played around with the idea of Willow returning to the island where they found her after Roger’s execution only to find her father gone so she lives out the rest of her days in solitude but absolutely none of her S/O’s would allow that so her only bad ending winds up being beaten to death by her father after she didn’t meet Roger and them

As a result, she’s likely alive and in scenarios where Rayleigh and Shakky raised Ace then I can see her acting as another mother to Ace like if Rouge is 1st Mom and Shakky is 2nd Mom then Willow is 3rd Mom plus honestly I can see her telling the best bedtime stories about witches flying through the night and using magic

In scenarios where Ace was raised by Dadan then I can imagine that Willow might be Rayleigh and Shakky but she might also be with Gaban, I can’t really see her as being with Shanks and Buggy like I can see her remaining in contact with them but probably not going with them as despite having a love for running through the woods at night and wanting to be a witch, Willow actually does value calm times

Speaking of Witch by the way, I forgot to really expand upon her so I’ll give a quick explanation as to who she is and why she matters when it comes to Willow and her character

Basically when Willow was young, Willow wanted to be a witch so badly when she grew up to the point where she would pretend cast spells and run around with a broom but her Dad crushed her dreams and forced her to give up on that in favor of being a farmer who takes care of all their needs

These years of isolation and living with only a shit father to keep her company caused Willow’s mental state to take a hit so this prompted the creation of what is kind of like a hallucination and it’s an entity known simply as Witch who embodies everything that Willow wanted to be when she grew up but couldn’t

Witch is her entirely own separate being as she appears to be able to react to things that Willow can’t actively see but despite that, she comes from Willow and refuses to elaborate beyond that on what she is and where she came from

However luckily Witch is incapable of interacting with anything, she can’t even touch Willow and is basically a ghost as she can’t touch anything or be seen by anyone as even Rayleigh doesn’t know when Witch is around however he is aware of her existence

No one but Willow can see Witch but the Roger Pirates are aware of Witch’s existence due to Willow telling them, Witch also encourages her to be a version of her that she wants to see like if Willow happens to disobey someone or take that extra minute on a break from her duties then Witch encourages it

But she’s also a bit of a little shit as she enjoys scaring Willow and just popping out of the weirdest places, Witch has gotten a lot calmer though ever since Rouge chewed her out and trust me as being chewed out by a beautiful lady who can’t see you but is clearly pissed at you is terrifying

And that’s it! Here are the Aesthetic Boards that I promised you as well!

[toriasimmons]

entertainment journalism and content farming

If it wasn’t apparent by now, I’ve parted ways with Comic Book Resources. There are no hard feelings, and it’s mostly just because I got a full-time job and the payoff wasn’t worth squeezing it into my busy schedule (and, quite frankly, said full-time job has been… taxing on my mental health for reasons I’d rather not get into yet). I kept thinking maybe I’d have the spoons to do more, but I didn’t, and that’s probably okay in the long run.

Now that I’m not part of the company, though, I wanted to say something about something. It’s not particularly original, and it can apply to media beyond specifically entertainment-focused news/features websites, but, I dunno, I wanted to talk about it.

Content farming. 

That’s what I’m talking about.

So much of the focus in media production (particularly websites and videos) is on SEO (search engine optimization) and getting clicks and staying relevant. This can be good if you’re interested in trending topics, because you’ll definitely be able to find what you’re looking for, but it also means a lot of rehashing, keyword-stuffing, appealing to the lowest common denominator, and disinterest in weird or niche or obscure topics. 

This isn’t just a CBR problem. I’ve seen it across entertainment journalism sites and trending pages on Instagram and YouTube. I’m sure it’s prevalent elsewhere, too.

If your goal is to produce content to get money, then I guess this is effective enough. You get clicks, you get hits, you get money. (And when I say “you,” I mean the site owners/higher-ups: make no mistake, the people producing the content are making laughably little money. More on this in a second.) But it harms the quality of the content you produce, in my opinion.

Some of my favorite articles that I wrote for CBR got laughably little attention. I’m not sure if this is because they weren’t actually interesting to a lot of people or because of algorithms or because the higher-ups thought they wouldn’t perform well and didn’t promote them as much or what, but it’s very frustrating. 

The article I wrote about Doctor Strange in the Multiverse of Madness and the MCU’s motherhood problem was genuinely something I was really proud of, and I thought it was pretty relevant and important, but for whatever reason it got a fraction of the reach or hits. The article I wrote about the Dark Willow trope (also pertaining to Multiverse of Madness, but also discussing Daenerys, Willow herself, Nico from Runaways, and how they tried to tease that they were doing this with Rey from Star Wars) got a big bunch of hits, but for some reason they went in really hard on parts of what I was discussing (Buffy, Star Wars) and underplayed Multiverse of Madness itself in the headline/image/etc. and when I dared to read comments on a repost link all of them were from dudebros who said that I was desperate to be persecuted and called me an infant for not understanding that stories have conflicts. Am I saying that CBR framed it the way they did because they knew it would make people mad and in doing so underplayed the actual point I was trying to make? Not definitively, but in conjunction with the other half of that point (the other article) performing so poorly, it does kind of feel like they prioritize controversy over content or trying to actually take interesting stances.

Now the money thing.

When I started for CBR they paid per word (fractions of pennies) and per hit (fractions of pennies). They moved to a purely per hit model (still paying fractions of pennies) and offered incentives for posting dozens of articles in a short period of time. I don’t know if you know this about entertainment journalism, but if you want to write 30+ things a month, even short things, you would basically have to spend all of the hours you weren’t writing watching things. And watching current things, and watching things you could make a lot of points about.

It’s basically impossible to write for a site like this and make more than pocket change (unless, again, you’re literally just consuming media and cranking out articles and doing Nothing Else). That’s my point. And per the above, even if you were really proud about, say, an article you wrote about a female character deserving better, it might (would probably) still perform drastically less well than an article about whether Iron Man or Thanos would win in a farting contest.

Freelance rates in general aren’t great; creators in general are undervalued and underpaid. I’ve done some cursory research, though, and it’s considered pretty standard to charge between .20-.30 cents per word… for a 1000+ word article. That means that even the low end of that would net you $200 per piece.

In my time at CBR, I made a paycheck that went into the triple digits once.

I wasn’t writing a ton of articles. I was doing a couple a week for a while, and it was during that period that I hit the triple digits. But using industry standards, that would be an okay job. Maybe like $200-400 a week, $800-1600 a month. I don’t think I made $1600 the entire 2+ years I wrote for them.

This isn’t a secret. The pay rates are in the job ads and stuff. (Standard industry pay rates are not, but those also aren’t a secret.)

Once I had a real job, the motivation to crank out articles and make roughly per two-week paycheck what I make in an hour or two at said job dwindled. The push to focus on Trending Topics (some of which, frankly, I don’t give a shit about) and stuff headings/articles with keywords and pointless backlinks and social media embeds didn’t help.

And yeah, I admit I didn’t directly quit for a while. But I’ve had some shit going on and it honestly hasn’t been at the forefront of my mind. We parted amicably enough, so I’m not too worried. (And it’s not like I’m going to use anyone at the company as a reference, since I didn’t actually work with anyone enough to know more than their names, pronouns, and job title, if that.)

I am grateful for the opportunity at CBR. It’s super cool that I got an official byline and that I got paid at least pennies for doing something I like. But the way that they produce content and the way I want to produce content don’t really mesh. Maybe (hopefully) I’ll find a freelancing/writing gig that’s a little more in line with my creative process and interests, and now I have a clearer idea of what those are.

And maybe let’s start paying artists better and prioritizing the content of the content. That too.

(For the record, this wasn’t edited or thought out. It’s just some thoughts I’ve been thinking.)

[radfae]

plz give us your opinions on the new toh ep queen <3

okay i apologize in advance bc i’m like almost done writing this while i add this disclaimer and i’m realizing it’s VERY ramble-y and my adhd brain keeps rapidly switching topics but i hope this makes sense HAHA

IT WAS GOOD! it wasn’t nearly as gut-wrenching as the last one but i do appreciate some good ship action (raeda and huntlow tugging on my heartstrings fr). a lot happened this episode and i feel like a big theme was character development and personal exploration, we saw that a lot with hunter, but most of all luz and willow! it makes me really happy to see luz get her palismen (palisman??) finally and string bean is so adorable! i was team snake btw so i’m happy with this outcome. a lot of people say that boscha was really annoying this ep but honestly i didn’t think so? i mean, she was a bit, but she’s clearly not a villain here; she’s just a traumatized mean girl teenager handling things badly. she’s developed some pretty bad abandonment issues from losing her grudgby team to the collector, and ended up taking those out on amity, which isn’t…great, but people are treating her worse than belos this episode lmao?? but ANYWAY i’m very happy to see hunter again <3 and i’m happy that his development is moving in a positive way. not everyone is happy about him having magic from flapjack, but i think it’s nice; it reinforces that flapjack is still with him, even if he’s not physically present, which is a nice sentiment. and like i am sorry he is going thru it or whatever but i MISSED him being an annoying angry boy,, and OH MY GOD “you mean a lot to me too” “cool, happy to help” KILL ME NOW?!?! THEY’RE SO ADORABLE.,,,, and i’m glad they focused on willow here too because it made me like her a lot more than i did previously. and ok going back to raeda the “i just like to come out and see raine” i don’t remember if that’s exactly what she says but eda literally risking being caught by the collector who still thinks she’s the owl beast just to see raine,, AND RAINE’S LOOK IN THE BEGINNING WHEN SHE GOES INTO HARPY MODE…… omg they’re in love. and i’m choosing to say raine is a lesbian bc it makes my heart happy. switching gears completely to camila,, just,,, in general,, her being a mother figure to so many of the kids and her conversation with luz to amity saying “you and luz are a lot alike”,, i love her so much i cannot believe there was a point in which she was controversial in the fandom. i’ve always been a camila defender. OKAY BUT THE ACTUAL EPISODE ANYWAY the collector is obviously being set up for a redemption arc of sorts; they’re really pushing the idea that he’s just a kid and doesn’t want to really hurt people, and it’s clear that he really did care about king (defending him from the coven head i forgot her name sorry lol, respecting his boundaries with his rabbit and not touching it, calling him his best friend, immediately not trusting belos when he said king has it out for him) and that’s why he’s taking his ‘betrayal’ so hard. i did NOT expect him to team up with belos ngl, i thought that this episode would be them defeating the collector and next ep would be belos, as like a first and final boss type of thing, but this is like. so much better lol. AND SOMEONE ON TWITTER POINTED THIS OUT BUT belos is ALWAYS looking down on people, specifically at hunter; there’s always a specific camera angle to showcase it, but in this episode, in his weakened state belos finally looks up at someone: caleb. belos has always been in a position of power in every relationship we’ve seen with him so far, EXCEPT for caleb. caleb is the only situation in which he’s been the dependent. which is really being showcased here and i liked the imagery,, and i’m curious as to why belos chose raine in particular? like obviously this is going to be used for some raeda plotline which i personally don’t mind actually but like. obvious excuse for ship angst is obvious. but i hope there’s some other reason than just “let’s make eda upset hehehehe” u know what i mean. oh and raine mullet,, pretty. if i had a nickel for every time belos possessed someone and they got a mullet i would have two nickels which isn’t a lot but it’s weird that it happened twice right.

i’m excited to see how things go with the collector next episode (new noceda sibling real?) and i’m excited to see king, eda and luz’s reunion! i really need eda and camila to meet like NOW. i also really hope that hunter is the one who gets the final blow on belos, like sorry to luz or whatever i know ur the protagonist and that’s your moment but he DESERVES it. and obviously luz isn’t going to stay in the human realm indefinitely but with her mom i’m wondering how they’ll work things out; maybe there will be a more stable portal and luz and camila will be able to pass through both worlds and visit as they please? or will camila just stay in the demon realm with luz? idk!!! i can’t wait for next episode but knowing we’re officially on our final hiatus and that the cast just finished recording for the last episode is also :’D a bit miserable. sad to see it go but excited at the same time

[zoe-wrote]

i sometimes say that i give good advice because i’ve felt every emotion. i think it’s true.

i just put on QKThr by Aphex Twin. I remember listening to this song and thinking it sounded like falling in love before i’d ever fallen in love. now i have, and it does. pretty much exactly like it.

i supported straight friends through breakups years ago before i even knew i was queer, but i knew loss. i knew pain.

the word ‘empath’ is used in such a way which makes it twist up all foul in my mouth but i don’t know how else to describe the experience of watching an action movie, and sobbing because i can’t stop thinking of the protagonists’ tragic backstory and how traumatized she’ll be after this. i can’t watch the fight scenes without picturing the grief the families of the dead will face. i look insane, and sound pitiful when trying to explain how on earth the fast and furious has brought me to tears.

i spend hours a day thinking of my loved ones’ inner worlds. i don’t know how common that is. my world view is very much shaped by expressions of pain.

i remember during one of my last few weeks in Dublin, i was walking down Nassau street on the way to the bus stop sobbing to Síofra about the Rwanda bill. I had just seen a post of the booklet refugees currently are receiving in the UK when assigned to the program, and i broke down in grief. the feeling flooded me— to think of a world so cruel that a person who has fled everything they know and love in return for safety and has risked it all again by seeking asylum status and thus informing authorities of their presence will be put on a plane with a vague promise of a future in a country they do not know and had no plans in, to have their lives uprooted constantly and to have anti-immigration advocates dehumanize them to the point that they are no longer afforded autonomy, the one thing intrinsic to human desire which they abandoned everything to retain.

síofra wiped my tears and held me tight, squeezing me as she said she didn’t know either.

no matter how much political theory i learn it still doesn’t make sense to me how one can truly abandon humanhood to that point, no matter the reward. the concept of leading one’s life without emotion as the defining sense baffles me. i genuinely can’t grasp how people are able to become so cruel. i can’t grasp how those people sleep at night. i’m not sure they know how many souls they’ve broken, or if they would care if they did.

the playlist i’m listening to now is called ‘hiding under the willow tree’. it’s not done yet but i’ll share it. i guess i like it when i can safely let people peek into my mind. i hope someday soon to be more open in sharing myself. i know i seem exceptionally open, but there’s a lot i keep to myself. people always seem baffled when i share just a bit more; “you’ve lived so many lives, zoe.” i’ve heard that many many times.

i’m gonna do something new. i’m gonna share some poetry of mine. a few excerpts and one full one. i’d like to tell you my love story with my wonderful wonderful girlfriend through lens of what i wrote when i hurt the most. i spent what felt like eternity preparing for us to end. i wish i didn’t. i’ve given up on that.

it’s not gonna work it’s not gonna work it’s not gonna work it’s not gonna work it’s not gonna work IT’S NOT GONNA WORK IT’S NOT GONNA WORK

it won’t work. it can’t happen. we can’t happen.

it **won’t** work. it **can’t** happen. we **can’t** happen. **it** won’t work. IT can’t happen. WE…

how much pain

could i have absolved myself from

had i never vowed to prevent it?

how many nights

could i have slept through more soundly

had i never plotted the ending?

i spent hour after hour

predicting our pain

trying to peek through my eyelids

in lieu of a crystal ball

i was determined to bypass delusion

gritting my teeth and muttering until i screamed

somehow i heard ‘i’m leaving’

every time you said ‘i love you’

dear god wouldn’t it have been nice

to hear that you loved me instead.

——————————————-

——————————————-

finally, i’ll share the lines of a song which means more to me on every listen— but paraphrased. these were texts i sent today. i’m bad at lyrics, better at retelling the emotion.

i want to kisksiksiskisskisskiskisskissskissskissskisskisskisskisskisskieskisskisskisskisskissjjsjiskkisskirsskirsskirss

your eyes again

i don’t want talk about anything

i don’t want talk about anything

i wanna listen to the sound of you blinking

i want to listen to the sound of your thinking

[apencilandpen]

:)

Been talking with a few different people about Taylor Swift lately and it’s just been interesting. Because, I’m a fan, I’ve liked her for a long, long time. She put out specific music at just the right time that I needed it multiple times, and a lot of her songs are really important to me. So everything we’ve been talking about comes from this place that includes the history I have with her and her music.

I have these two friends who don’t know each other who both went to her show in Atlanta, and talking to them separately, they had two Very different takeaways. One’s a big fan, and we talked about her experience and her favorite part. Her favorite part was the “Willow” stage, which she described as having “insane witchy vibes.” But I’ve seen pictures from that, and as my sister says, Taylor Swift just looks like she wants to be Florence Welch so badly. And also, you can’t have “insane witchy vibes” for a song that asks a man to wreck your plans. Or when your make up is a cat eye and a red lip. Like, you can, but you can’t get on Florence’s level. 

And then my other friend and I were talking about ���Vigilante Shit” and that stage the other day and I watched a video and it’s fine? Like it’s cool I guess, but it’s basically just blocking with some sitting and posing on and with a chair? I had so many friends text me when Midnights came out being like “omg you’re going to LOVE vigilante shit, it’s so your vibe.” And I can totally see how they’d think that. It’s dark girl boss revenge pop with strong Gotham Rogue/Catwoman energy, which was very much my vibe in high school. High school me probably would’ve eaten it up. But now I can’t help but be like “okay this is the same vibe as no body no crime, except that song was better.” AND THEN I rewatched the “I Did Something Bad” stage from the Reputation Tour in 2018 and like that stage is awesome! It’s powerful, it’s impactful, it’s got grit and tooth and anger and purpose. The “Vigilante Shit” stage and song just doesn’t have that for me, nor does it have the storytelling strength of “no body, no crime.”

Like, she’s had her controversies, but Taylor Swift is just so palatable that “insanely witchy vibes” and “Vigilante Shit” just fall flat for me now. And I like her! It’s a weird feeling because now, whenever my old friends text me about Taylor Swift, it reminds me that so many of my older friends don’t actually *know* me anymore. They love me, but we’ve been apart for so long that they don’t know me. And I know for a fact I do this too, so like I get it, but still. I’ve grown since then, and I think I’ve outgrown Taylor Swift in a way - at least this current version of what she’s doing. And most of her stuff are love songs, which I’m really not into at this point in my life, so it’s like a double whammy. It’s weird. I have this history and gratitude to her music, but I’m also like, moving beyond that. It doesn’t feel like *me* anymore, and that’s a weird thing to try and articulate. It’s a weird thing to realize you’ve outgrown someone whose music grew up with you.

[emeraldbabygirl]

Bruh it’s getting to the point that my blog is so messy and such an eyesore and I hate my fics so much that I want to just deactivate. Either completely or start fresh. Like I rarely tag reblogged so sometimes my own posts cause I get lazy and just don’t feel like tagging and then later on when I try to find a post I can’t cause I didn’t tag it or I did and I can’t remember what tags I used or the tags don’t register so I have to search through multiple other posts just to find the one I want

And my blog has like a cute pfp and header and colors but all my posts are just chunks of texts with the same plain ass font and my master list is the most basic master list I’ve ever seen and some of the links are broken and I can’t find the posts to fix them so they stay broken.

I don’t have a layout with easy to get to posts, I don’t have cute lil fonts and details in my posts, I don’t put links within links like what some people do with their masterlists and I know I originally made fics and posts for myself and then I started putting tags in but half my posts I’ve made over the past couple months I feel are a complete waste of time even if I reblog them myself, they aren’t even good posts like the content is a complete train wreck I talk about so much in some posts when it’s supposed to be like one topic and then I have the audacity to get “upset” or “disappointed” when my posts get no notes at all or like 2 likes or a reblog. Like I should be grateful people even bother to look at my dumb shit and say “I like that.” Like I have over a thousand followers and I notice the same like 2-5 people in my notifs that like or make any interaction at all with my posts. Idk what the others are doing but I just ugh. And I constantly feel like I have to make posts on everything and I have to constantly be on tumblr and I have to message people and I have to do this and this and I like when I took breaks from tumblr but my mind is constantly running and I want to share my thought cause sometimes I imagine people liking my posts and stuff. Idk I’m just ranting which I do a lot. And like I notice blog that have lil tags for when they ramble and things and I had that with the 3 brain cell hour but that’s not a thing anymore.

I totally get the destructive feeling of wanting to cleanse your account and get rid of everything and start fresh with a new identity but there are some things on this blog that I want to keep to look at later if I want. I have most of my gifs backed up but now I can’t back anymore up cause my computers are both dead and I can’t charge them cause there’s something wrong with the cable. I think Cooper chewed it like he did my last two pairs of earbuds.

And and because in complete Willow fashion I have to spill everything, I get days off where I want to catch up on a comeback of write a little or watch a series or do something that makes me feel like a mature adult but my day off gets here and I do none of that. I revert to channel surfing all night and into the morning when there’s nothing of interest on. And I watch like one video then “feel the need” to come here and share whatever my thoughts are and I feel like in a way, some of the things I do, if they are recent habits, have before so “organized” that they aren’t really organized and it’s not like “oh do this if you want whenever you have free time” it’s “this is what you should do on your day off as your free time” and then it doesn’t feel like free time. But then..ok I’m gonna stop now cause I do my want to get into literally everything even tho I really just dump shit on this account.

Tl;dr: I think I need another break but I just want to focus on one fic and I want to clear out my drafts of unfinished fics and I want to get away from the internet and social media. But I also wish I could learn how to make my blog more appealing to the eyes and make things that maybe will invite more people to my blog, I want to start making cooler looking layouts and things and learn how to make gifs but I’m obviously so lazy anyway which is another problem. And I don’t like to spill everything about me online, unless I’m talking to someone I trust I’d rather have my blog be less personal like I don’t want everyone to know everything about me but sometimes I just want to spill everything.

[raisedbythetv89]

Both of these theories are clearly designed to absolve angel of any wrongdoing or responsibility or make him out to be sympathetic victim rather than an abuser: “he’s mentally ill! (Which if it was DID - it’s fucking not lol - neither personality would have any memory of what the other did which is clearly not the case like y’all just took the most popular mental illness in media and slapped it over him when it doesn’t even fit (doesn’t with dru either) - this coming from someone with an actual psychology degree)

Or “it’s not really his soul it’s the soul of the LIVE WOMAN doing the cursing!” when they literally say those little soul orb things summon someone’s soul “from the ether” aka not from a live person and if no one else knew that how would willow be able to put THAT SOUL back both times if it wasn’t even his???

Look if that’s what fans who love him need to do in order to justify all the inconsistencies go right ahead! It’s why I tagged my original post with the ANTI angel tag I wanted to call out more of his bullshit with other people who do not like him rather than start a fight with people who do I’m never trying to change their minds and I’m fine to let them be but I absolutely will not be accepting that because one it makes no sense and two angel/angelus’s BEHAVIOR isn’t inconsistent IT’S HIS NARRATIVE “actions speak louder than words” means if someone’s behavior doesn’t match their words their words are bullshit and trying to manipulate you and you need to pay attention to their behaviors. Angel did the same thing to Buffy “Angelus” did to Dru…. With or without the soul the harm he does to women he supposedly “loves” is the exact same

Like genuinely this is so terrifying to see these two fan theories because angel IS an abuser, angel and angelus are not two different people, their core personality traits of selfishness, cruelty and psychologically fucking with people are the same with more or less killing and physical torture. Angel is just successfully guilted and shamed out of his worst behaviors but his true nature of using and abusing people and preying on young innocent girls and then abandoning them once he’s finished with them still comes through because shame and guilt don’t actually change people and these kinds of reasonings or excuses are the ones I used to use with my own abusers and I’ve seen others do with theirs for why when they hurt me “it wasn’t the real him” “he was just in a bad place” “he’s just dealing with a lot of trauma” and therefore I shouldn’t attribute the worst of their behaviors to the “real them” when I absolutely should have been 💔

“Angel” was created specifically to manipulate Buffy into believing he really was different from Angelus and could be trusted and part of that is playing the victim to his own behaviors. “Don’t you feel soooooo bad for me that I have to live with myself after all the harm I’ve caused?? I feel AWFUL!” which again back to my original point WHY would Angel feel as bad as he claims to for what Angelus did if they really were two completely separate beings! Answer: they’re not!!! They’re one and the same Angel is just Angelus being controlled by shame and guilt and the only reason he feels guilty it because angel IS angelus who is also formed by the core traits of Liam because liam didn’t care about anyone but himself and didn’t respect women like all of his behavior is extremely consistent and makes complete sense the only thing that doesn’t is his lie that Angel and Angelus are completely separate and anyone who doesn’t have “but daddy I love him” googles on can clearly see that.

If Angel and Angelus are two different beings why does Angel feel THAT GUILTY for the crimes of Angelus hm?????

Spike has his soul less than a year and yet when Robin tries to kill him for killing his mom Spike is like “I’m not that monster anymore your beef is with a creature that doesn’t exist”

Angel just tells Buffy he doesn’t kill humans since he got the soul (which is later even shown to be a lie lol) he never says anything along the lines of I’m not the monster who did those things anymore BECAUSE HE IS and playing the victim while still secretly being the villain is honestly just a whole different insidious kind of evil.

Angelus is a psychopath, Angel is a vulnerable narcissist which is just lower on the lack of empathy/using people for your own selfish gains scale but they’re on the same scale!!!! They share so many common characteristics just with different levels of severity

Like we all already knew it was all bullshit angel was spinning but just finding further evidence of all the ways his story is inconsistent around this

[fandom-monium]

Best Friend’s Brother AU

BFB Au

Cleaned up a bunch of doodles i did for this au. In this au:

modern, human, no magic au

boi has raccoon eyes in EVERY universe

boi has flapjack themed socks in EVERY universe

he wears a lot of black. and yellow. but mostly black bc its practical. easy to clean, easy to style. It goes with everything.

Hunter and Luz are siblings. Hunter was taken in before Luz was born

him and Luz fight. A lot. As siblings should

For reasons, the Nocedas move to Bonesborough just before Luz starts high school. Hunter's adaptable he doesn't care

their first day at Hexside, they split since he's 2 years older, and soon Luz becomes fast friends with treehugger Willow and eventually mythology-obsessed Gus

Hunter reluctantly gets befriended by the Blight twins. They're friends now, there's no escape

Hunter got his left ear pierced when he was in middle school. The pain traumatized him so it's just the left. Doesn't get more until 2nd year high school. Can't stand the idea of piercing his right tho. Not sure why

Now a solid friendship, Willow feels comfortable enough to visit Luz's house

Was NOT aware the cute but intimidating new student from school lives here and thinks she's got the wrong house

she doesn't. He welcomes her in, explaining Luz went out for a minute but should be back soon.

They're both pretty shy at first. On Willow's end, they've never talked and this boy is older, not to mention he seems to be friends with Amity's older siblings. Not the best line up. For Hunter, he's only seen her in passing, only heard Luz brag about "my bestie, Willow" this and that. Neither of them have much to go on, but this is his sister's best friend, this is her best friend's brother, and they are gonna make an effort because they love and care about Luz, and they understand getting along is important for her.

So they talk. Small talk, but they talk, slow and a bit awkward as teenagers are. "Oh, what track are you in?" "Into any sports?" "Whats your favorite color?"

Hunter hates small talk and meeting new people is terrifying; it's not so bad bc he recognizes Willow and it's only her, but she notices he's getting more nervous. She opts out of the conversation first, giving him a reassuring smile, "Sorry if I'm keeping you. I'll just wait here till Luz gets back."

And he is NOT having it. How dare this v cute girl come into his house, under his roof and be all considerate and accommodating??? No. No he will not be bested like this.

He waves her off and returns her smile, continuing the conversation with renewed vigor.

Luz returns just as Willow's starts going more in depth about her more exotic plants (she mentioned she has her own little green house at home and Hunter has never been more intrigued). She is v much elated to find her bro and best friend are getting along. Sadly, they have to end the conversation there, and as they part, Hunter going up to his room and Luz tugging Willow to the next room, they exchange a "Nice meeting you!" "You too. See you around..." but it's actually nice and both look forward to the next time.

While they don't hang out at school, they start talking in the halls whenever they pass each other. The Blight twins say nothing when they notice Hunter taking the long route to their next class.

Willow frequents the Noceda household. A lot. In her defense Luz is needy and constantly needs love and affection, so she's invited everyday. But even Luz has a life outside the house, has other friends and school activities to attend to. So she ends up resting at the house like a pitstop, doing homework and stuff, waiting for the bus or for her dads' to pick her up (sometimes Hunter will keep her company)

Hunter falls first in every universe.

BFB!Hunter | BFB!Willow