#may 15: nightmare

[lisbeth-kk]

May Prompts (15) Nightmare

The Luckiest Girl in the World (chapter 15)

Summary: Rosie tells us about her family's sanctuary that is 221B, but also about wars over board games. In the end, it's the story about someone else who also needs a safe haven.

Fifteen Years Old

I felt oddly protective of our home from an early age, and I didn’t want it invaded by my friends. Not that I was ashamed of all the bric-a-brac, Papa’s experiments, or how different it was to other homes I’d visited. It was just...our space, a safe haven where we all could lower our guards, Papa in particular. Over the years, his fame had increased exceedingly, and his derisive façade kept journalists and fans at bay. The moment he entered 221B, he discarded said façade by hanging his coat on the peg.

Another thing to consider, were the battles that always ensued whenever one of us challenged the others to a board game. Having an outsider witnessing that…well, we’d surely be sectioned for life if that were to occur. 

(More likely, the person would be granted vicious dreams for eternity.)

But as Papa points out; there’s always something. In this context, someone.  My friend Liwia. Her parents were Polish, and moved to England two years before Liwia was born. They were Catholics, and having to adjust to a society that was more liberal toward queer people than Poland, took its time. When Liwia came out to them as a lesbian the year prior, they’d tried to pin it on her friendship with me. I was after all related to quite a few of the sort and Liwia’s parents seemed to believe the ludicrous lie that queerness was contagious.

It took them some months to get over it, but once they realised that Liwia still was her normal self, they discarded the original idea of sending her to Poland to live with her strictly religious grandparents. Neither of the Barczykowskis was prepared when said grandparents announced that they were visiting London that summer, staying for at least a fortnight. 

***

Dad and I were in the middle of a Scrabble war, when Papa came home. Not that we realised it at the time. We were too engrossed in arguing.

“It’s bloody unfair to use all the medical terms and diseases you can come up with to win, you know!” I exclaimed accusatory.

“Oh, come now, Rosebud,” Dad teased, looking as pleased as the cat that ate the canary.

“Don’t you dare Rosebud me,” I said through clenched teeth. 

Dad only used that pet name when we were at war over the board games, and it rubbed me up the wrong way.

“Children,” Papa chastised, barely able to suppress his glee.

“You’re home,” we said in unison.

I waited for the inevitable eyeroll and his obviously, but none came.

“We have a guest,” Papa said and waved a hand, and that’s when I saw Liwia standing by the sofa wringing her hands, a look of despair in her eyes.

I leapt to my feet and walked over to hug her tight.

“What’s wrong?” I whispered into her hair.

She explained about her grandparents, and with just one look over at Papa, receiving a nod, I turned back to assure my friend that she could stay at Baker Street for as long as she needed, if her biased grandparents started to make her life a living nightmare.

“Thank you, Mr. Holmes and Doctor Watson,” Liwia said politely.

I could literally see the relief wash over her, the tension in her shoulders dissipating and a tiny smile forming on her lips.

“Please, call us John and Sherlock,” Dad said. 

Then he turned his attention to me with a devilish grin.

“Does this mean you declare defeat, Rosebud?”

“You wish!” I snarled and left Liwia’s side to go into battle with my father.

(Before you go all bananas on me - this will continue tomorrow...)

Also available on AO3

@calaisreno @totallysilvergirl @keirgreeneyes @raina-at @helloliriels

More tags in the replies.

[ghostofnuggetspast]

Not Yet

Nightmare has a regular drop At Watson's house she lands atop Her gifts of bad dreams Always lead him to screams She knows her duty and won't stop

Check it out on ao3!

@calaisreno @totallysilvergirl @weeesi @friday411

[ghostofnuggetspast]

I'm pretty suspicious of water myself. Maybe John's on to something

The Deep / 221B

Words: 221 / Prompt: Nightmare

John’s never been afraid of heights. He’s jumped out of airplanes, climbed mountains, stared down into a cataract. Seeing Sherlock fall traumatised him. He avoids Barts, but doesn’t fear elevators or airplanes.

His worst nightmares have always been about drowning. It’s something he can’t explain.

He knows how to swim, how to stay afloat, treading water. But the dreams that wake him, screaming, always find him in black water, cold bottomless depths.  

As a child he loved the beach, would run through the surf, chasing his sister. They waded, sand squishing between their toes, looking for crabs and jellyfish. 

But he shuddered to pass a water tower, imagining himself in the dark tank where he couldn’t find a foothold or even know which way was up. He would swim, finding no surface, until his lungs ached. 

Now, in his dreams, it’s always Sherlock sinking below a dark, glassy surface, and John who dives in after him, his heart frozen with terror when he can’t find him.  Sherlock is lost to him, sinking to the bottom, already dead. 

He wakes, thrashing like a drowning man, gasping and weeping and inconsolable.

“John.” 

His lungs still heaving, he stills, lies panting in the sheets, now cold with his sweat. 

“John, wake up. You were having a nightmare.”

He gropes, feeling for a warm body. 

--

Tagging in the replies!

[anisohtropy]

since Alhaitham knows over 20 languages fluently (which itself is very autismcore), he probably dreams in different languages once he’s actually able to dream. It’s disorienting at first because it swaps between them wildly because dream logic but eventually it settles into single language dreams and he’ll wake up thinking in that language without noticing until he says something to Kaveh, who’s like I don’t actually know as many languages as you and Alhaitham says some shit like that’s not my fault, just learn

Relatedly, Alhaitham’s been writing love letters over the years in various languages both living and dead and when Kaveh finds them it’s a whole thing 

[thetomorrowshow]

Whumptober 26 - Nightmares

title: almost unintentionally

fandom: hermitcraft smp

continuation of days 8 and 23, the sleep cycle au!

~

They’re holding him down.

They’re always holding him down, tying him up, hurting him—

They snap a muzzle around his face and he thrashes, he can’t he won’t, they can do anything to him but not this—

He can’t see, blinded by fear, but he knows, somehow, that he’s in the room with the burning floor. He gets a moment’s respite, a moment to claw at his face with mittened hands, before he feels the floor begin to heat up beneath his bare feet—

Ren wakes with a gasp.

For a moment, he thinks he’s still back there, on that stupid folding table with those idiots coming for him, ready to hurt him and restrain him and for what?

He snarls, and snaps his teeth, and raises his hands to defend himself—

But there’s no one there.

He’s alone in his bed, the sheets wrapped tightly around his body. The shadows around his bedroom are innocuous, and none of them hold the faces of his tormentors.

That’s . . . what, the sixth nightmare in six days? He needs to get a grip.

Ren kicks his legs free of the sheets and sits up, pushes his sweaty hair out of his face. It’s still dark, which means he should probably try to get back to sleep, but he feels sticky and overstimulated and a shower sounds really nice right about now.

He strips quickly, his soft pajama pants dragging like sandpaper against his legs. Really overstimulated, then. He might need to break out the weighted pillow for this one.

He picks up his communicator, but doesn’t check it. He just carries it with him, in case someone needs to reach him in an emergency.

Ren leaves the light off in the restroom when he limps in (his feet are still recovering from their burns, curse them, and each step is less than pleasant), just turns the shower on and waits for the water to heat up until standing is uncomfortable, then steps into the tub, settling into the shower chair that he’d borrowed from Scar.

The hot water falling onto his shoulders and head feels heavenly, switched to the highest pressure possible so that it practically drums into his skin. Ren sighs and melts under it, runs one clawed hand through his hair.

They hadn’t even wanted him. Not really. He was just bait, bait for Doc and Tango to follow.

Bait.

Ren’s fingers clench in his hair.

He’d gotten off easy, all things considered. Some bumps and bruises. Scratches on his face. A broken rib, quickly healed by a potion. Some burns on his feet that kept him on bed rest for a couple of days, but nothing major.

(Nightmares, every night, reliving the captivity.)

Better than Tango, who hasn’t spoken to anyone since.

Better than Impulse, who had been tortured the entire week and forced to stay awake.

Better than Mumbo, malnourished and trembling, left there for two months, no one searching for him.

Better than Doc, his entire goshdarn arm missing, his horns shaved down to nubs, his mechanical eye mangled, his molars pulled and more.

Xisuma wants them all to go to therapy. Probably for the best, but Ren feels a little like a baby, pulling up with his tiny problems compared to the others. So what, he’s got a couple of lousy nightmares. That isn’t the end of the world. That isn’t worth wasting some professional’s time.

Cleaning himself would probably be a good thing to do in the shower, so Ren grabs some shampoo and squeezes it into his hand, massaging his scalp aggressively. He didn’t check the bottle, but when he smells roses he realizes that he grabbed Bdubs’s shampoo. Good, it’s better for his thick hair.

He likes the smell, too. It makes him think of Bdubs, of his tight hugs and chipper smile. It smells fresh, not too overwhelming.

It’s calming.

He rinses it out, eyes closed to allow for the suds dripping down his face.

He hadn't bathed during his captivity. His body had grown grimier and grimier, sweat staining his days-old clothes, his usually well-trimmed beard getting scratchy and stubbly. He'd hated it, hated the feeling of his clothes against his sticky skin, hated that he couldn't do anything about it.

He rubs a bar of soap along his skin now, as if cleansing himself of the memories. The shower chair makes it a bit awkward to wash everything, honestly. He should get around to returning it to Scar soon, now that he's no longer in the phase of needing to wrap his feet in plastic to keep the wounds dry for every shower. He's pretty much recovered, six days after the ordeal.

He spent longer there than it took for him to heal.

Isn't that weird?

Isn't it weird that this whole thing elapsed two weeks, and nothing more?

Ren shakes himself—physically, even, his hair slapping against the wall of the shower. For him it lasted two weeks. Impulse is still having trouble sleeping, Tango hasn’t been seen by anyone. Doc won't be alone. Mumbo doesn't talk.

He doesn't even have it bad.

He wishes he could fall asleep under the spray of the shower. He feels calmer here than he has in days, worried over nothing serious.

But he can’t hide in the shower forever.

Even so, he takes a couple more minutes, just sitting there and basking in it, before he reluctantly switches off the shower, the last couple drops bouncing off his chest. Then he stands, grimacing at the wet seat against his bare skin—fine while the shower was on, unbearable now that it’s off.

He rubs his wrists while he towels off. There’d been divots in the skin there when he was first rescued, but they’ve filled back out with a health potion and time. They’re still a bit bruised, but no longer tender to the touch.

Barely anything.

He limps back to his bedroom, grabs a fresh pair of boxers out of his dresser. It’s the last pair—he’ll have to do laundry. Might as well do it now, seeing as he doesn’t exactly plan on going back to sleep. Heck, then he’d have a nice, toasty, good-smelling pile of laundry to flop onto. That might lull him into sleep.

Knock-knock-knock-knock.

Ren scrunches his eyes closed for a moment. What time is it? Is it still early enough to reasonably ignore visitors?

He squints at the wall clock—three in the morning. Yeah, it is.

But he won’t do that.

He grabs a t-shirt out of his dresser and pulls it on over his head, clumsily sticking his arms through the holes. It’s a little bit small—probably belongs to Scar. Then he makes his slow way out of his room and to his front door, which he opens without checking to see who might be there.

It’s Doc.

Doc, his horns missing, his arm unfinished, shadows of bruises still painting his face.

Doc offers him a half-smile. “Hello.”

“How’d you know I was up?” Ren rasps, and he suddenly realizes he hasn’t drunk any water since getting up, making his voice still heavy with sleep. 

Doc lifts his communicator (in his organic hand, his mechanical arm not entirely reconstructed). “You stopped being AFK. Did you move your communicator?”

Ren doesn’t think about how that means Doc was already awake, watching the server list. He just shrugs, turns around to head back to his room, leaving the door open in his wake.

Doc follows him in, his footsteps heavier than Ren’s, all the way back to his bedroom, where Ren starts grabbing the various articles of dirty clothing strewn about his room and throwing them into the half-full laundry basket in his closet. Doc doesn’t move from the doorway, simply observing.

“Did you just shower?”

“Mhm.”

“Mind if I use your shower? Scar said you have his chair.”

Is that what Doc came over for? Ren shrugs.

“Go for it, dude.”

Doc leaves, and a few moments later Ren hears the sound of the shower running again, so he finishes gathering up the clothes and throws them all into the washer.

It’s too early to be doing chores, but Ren’s already started, so he picks up the dirty dishes in his room and takes them all to his kitchen sink, where he starts scrubbing methodically.

There aren’t too many. He finishes it quickly (though not quickly enough, his feet aching where he stands) and finds himself sitting on the edge of his bed, staring at the dark floor.

He’s tired.

He’s been tired since they got out, and it doesn’t seem to be letting up any time soon.

The shower turns off.

Ren sighs, runs a hand down his face. He needs to shave. It can wait until morning proper, but he doesn’t like the stubble on his cheeks.

How long will the laundry take? Probably thirty minutes. Have thirty minutes passed? No, it would beep its freaking head off to let him know.

He’s so tired.

After a couple of minutes of staring at the floor, he hears the restroom door open. He listens idly to the rustling of Doc making his way back to the room, then the way the floorboards creak under his weight as he crosses the bedroom.

Doc rummages through Ren’s dresser without asking, pulling out a shirt and throwing it on awkwardly, his half-completed robotic arm still wrapped in dripping plastic. The shirt is one of Doc’s own, and he growls frustratedly as he shoves his arm through the sleeve, then tears off the plastic and balls it up.

Doc misses the trash can when he tosses the plastic, but he doesn’t try again. He just comes round to the other side of Ren’s bed and rolls in, shoving the blankets away.

“You need to sleep,” Doc grumbles. “Lie down.”

Ren sighs.

Then he complies, slumping back against the pillows. He only resists a moment before leaning into Doc’s slightly damp shirt.

Doc takes it one step further, wrapping his good arm around Ren and holding him there. The heavy weight of his arm feels nice, and Ren buries his face into Doc’s shoulder where the neckline of the shirt has slipped slightly, letting him shove his nose into Doc’s fur. It smells like citrus, orange and lemon, good and clean.

“Keralis,” Ren mumbles.

Doc hums. “Couldn’t find my bodywash.”

“Probably just as good. He’s always bragging about how expensive it is.”

“Rich bastard.”

Doc’s chest rumbling against him is comfortable, homey. Ren’s eyes droop; he yawns.

“Haven’t been able to sleep so well,” Doc admits quietly, in the darkness of Ren’s room. The washer whirs somewhere in the distant background. “Nightmares.”

Ren’s been having nightmares, too, but he can’t help but feel guilty. They can’t be anything compared to Doc’s.

“About what they did to you,” Doc continues, and Ren freezes.

What?

“What?” he says aloud, pushing back a bit to see Doc’s face. “I—but I was fine!”

Doc’s eyes are closed, his brows furrowed. “I saw you,” he says, after a long moment. “They showed me you. With—with that muzzle on. I know you hate those things.”

“I—”

“What they did to me hurt,” Doc says. “What they did to you hurt, too.”

“It’s . . . it’s different,” Ren says weakly.

“I don’t think so.”

Ren sighs. “I don’t want to argue about it, dude. I’m too tired.”

Doc shrugs. “Okay. We’ll talk in the morning. But you went through hell, too, dude. You don’t have to feel bad for us just because you think we had it worse.”

Typical. Typical Doc, always guessing exactly what he was thinking.

Ren doesn’t respond to that.

He just snuggles back up against Doc and lets himself fall asleep.

When he wakes up a couple hours later from another nightmare, terrified and ashamed, he’s still in Doc’s warm hold.

So Ren lets himself doze. They both deserve a lie-in, he thinks.

The laundry can wait until later.

[ghostofnuggetspast]

😶🥺😮‍💨😣💀

You weren't kidding yesterday, wow.

Nightmare - May Prompt (15)

+

cw: major character death

+

“S’alright.”

“Oh god, no. Please. Don’t do this.”

This cannot be happening. This is worse than the worst versions of his nightmares, the ones where he’s shot to death in Afghanistan, where he doesn’t hand Sherlock his phone, he doesn’t move into 221B, he doesn’t fall in love, the ones where Sherlock jumps and stays dead. 

This is Sherlock actually dying in John’s arms. 

“You’re Sherlock Holmes, you’re indestructible,” and the first tear leaks out of the corner of his eye as his voice breaks. His heart’s already done, a portent of things to come.

Through the pain Sherlock laughs, mostly a gurgling gasp now. Many injuries are survivable. This one is not. John knows they won’t be getting Chinese at the end of Baker Street tonight. 

“I wish,” is all Sherlock says. His eyes droop a little, anchored still on John. He’s tired.

John presses firmly over the wound until his fingers turn white, then stain a deep red.

“You’re not going to die. You can’t die.”

Sherlock breathes. Slowly smiles. 

“Sorry, John.” His fading moonlight eyes. “Human…human being.”

A love like theirs will live beyond the next moment, will transcend the singular second when one of them has to leave the other behind. 

Their love is not forever. 

What they have reaches far beyond a word like that.

+

Today is my birthday! For me, today, tell someone you love 'em.

Thank you to @calaisreno for the fun prompt series! Tags in replies. Thanks for reading! <3

[dandelionjack]

if the conclusion to russell’s ‘pantheon arc’ will be that the doctor eventually gets named the ‘god of life’, i’ll be so disappointed. that’d feel so cheap and underdeveloped, and factually inaccurate since he’s more linked to death and endings than anything. if he has to be the ‘god of’ some conceptual domain (i dislike that phrasing anyhow, it’s simplistic, but that’s just a personal pet peeve), it should be either of the following:

god of change (central theme of the show)

god of hope (my personal favourite contender)

god of stories (lol, yeah, I KNOW. it works, ok?)

[snowjemmer]

Uh oh! Had a PTSD realization while stoned and playing overwatch

[ghostofnuggetspast]

May prompt and WIP Wednesday! Nice. Not nice for John though. Poor man.

So. This is part of two things.

May 15 Prompt: Nightmare, from @calaisreno’s prompt list. Check out their wonderful prompts!

AND

It’s a sneak peak for my current WIP: A Gentleman’s Shrine. You can find the post of what this fic is going to be about here.

Warnings: PTSD and Violence

A little context: This story takes place after WWI in England. John is on his way to the Noble Legacy Gala (explained in the post that I linked), and he catches himself in a nightmare.

•*•*•*•

It’s constant. Redundant. Persistent. Ceaseless.

Never-ending.

John only hears his panicked breaths, higher than normal. Dust is caught in his throat, gunfire is ringing in his ears. His sweaty hands are clinging to his rifle like it’s his one and only. Both German and English intertwine and he’s not sure which one he’s supposed to speak. He doesn’t believe he can speak.

Before John knows it, he catches a soldier’s head being pierced by a bullet, another taking the wrong step and his body detonates, blood splattering everywhere. He can’t move, or more like he doesn’t want to move because what the fuck is this?

This isn’t what he signed up for, it’s not. This doesn’t feel prosperous or close to honor. This doesn’t feel like he’s fighting for anything, let alone his country.

No, he is in the presence of hell. The Western Front is where men turn into something equivalent to animals, fighting for land they will never step foot on. It is where intelligent minds turn into a sequence of survival instincts. It is where all humanity comes to an end.

“Get up, Watson!” John barely registers a strong hand pull on his arm, hoisting him up and out of the mud mixed with blood. “You’re gonna die if you don’t–”

Whoever was speaking to him is shot to the floor, his limp body hitting the mud John was just near unconscious on. Limping away, John stumbles through the trench, looking for…something. Or was it someone? Was he even looking for anything in the first place? What was he searching for? What was he after? What is the point?

Someone charges after him with a close—combat knife, and John holds his rifle up and shoots. He shoots the man. He’s dead. He’s–

No. No, no, no. What has he done? What has he–

John kneels down next to the man, checking vital signs, as if that will accomplish anything. He hears him mutter something in German, but John doesn’t understand, he doesn’t understand anything. Realizing he’s doing everything in the wrong order, John tries to press down on the wound and attempts to stop the flow, but it's no use. When a river begins, it doesn’t cease.

John sobs, repeating an apology that won’t do any good. He’s a doctor, he’s trained for this, he can help. He can help, he can sort this out and get this man to safety because he has a family at home and they’re waiting for him. They’re waiting for him and John’s made their wait worth nothing.

This is wrong, this is all wrong. He wants to go home. He wants to go back to Mum and Harry. He doesn’t want to forget the feeling of sitting at the dinner table and eating his mum’s soup.

Keep the pressure, keep the pressure. Don’t let this man die.

He doesn’t want to forget the voice of his sister, cracking jokes and hearing his mum scold her for the inappropriate ones.

The man is dead, but John doesn’t stop the pressure. He will never stop. He will never stop apologizing, and he will never forget the man muttering in German, “Please, God, let me live.”

——

John screams as he wakes, jolting up in his seat. He takes several deep breaths, trying to calm himself, return to a leveled mindset that he didn’t have during the war.

“Sir?” a man’s voice asks. “Sir, are you well?” He puts a hand on John’s shoulder and John flinches away. Realizing his rude behavior, John forces himself to lose the tension in his body, shifting in his seat. He swallows.

“Uh–yes. Yes, I apologize. I…” John looks around the train, seeing the other participants staring at him with horrified expressions. Mothers hold their children tightly and fathers grace him with disturbed looks. John forces his eyes to the crew member, who seems unsure of what to do in this position. “Only a nightmare,” John dismisses, clearing his throat.

“Should…we move you to another cart?” the man asks, eyes flickering to the other people seated.

John’s jaw clicks. “No, this isn’t to happen again, I assure you. I’ll be fine here.”

With hesitance, the man nods. “Alright, then. Would you care for any refreshments?”

“No,” John says. “Thank you.” The man leaves and John’s face burns. He’s made a fool of himself, he never should have fallen asleep, no matter how long the journey is.

Everyone in the cart begins to forget about the outburst, going back to their conversations or finishing their small meals. John rests his head on the back of his seat and stares out the window, watching plains of grass pass by and sheep being heard.

John should soon be arriving at the next train station soon enough. He closes his eyes, wondering what his life has become.

*•*•*•*

I hope you all enjoyed this little sneak peak! I saw the prompt for today and thought it was perfect for this. This fic is currently in the works and I promise that it includes a lot of research, not just assumptions or blind facts, haha. So I’m certainly trying my best ❤️

Tags: @a-victorian-girl @whatnext2020 @totallysilvergirl @thegildedbee @with-a-ghost-mr-holmes @jawnn-watson @blogstandbygo @lisbeth-kk @holmesianlove @7-percent @itsonlytext @chinike @peanitbear @helloliriels @keirgreeneyes @ghostofnuggetspast @dw91165 @jolieblack @gwendelaneyisjohnlocked @cortina @kettykika78 @johnlockbbc

(Let me know if you want to be tagged in the future)

[vampfucker666]

i keep trying to look for bulk packs of doll shoes because i have so many shoeless wonders in my collection but most of the ones im finding have just the ugliest fucking over the top decorated heels as 90% of the shoes included. man i just need some pumps.

[queeranarchism]

Adulting advice: if you think you can’t do a thing because you tried it as a child or teenager and you sucked really badly: try it again.

You may not notice it, but as an adult you continue gaining motor skills, insight, problem solving skills and above all patience and resilience in the face of failure. Also puberty can be a nightmare. For some of us it’s just harder to do things when we’re full of insecurities, low impulse control and focus, heightened emotions, etc. A thing that was hard for 15 year old you might not be hard for 25 or 35 or 45 years old you.

I thought I was the absolute worst at sowing because I tried to learn it in my teenage years and failed spectacularly at the most basic tasks. Turns out I just didn’t have the patience and focus for it yet. I tried it again recently and it didn’t take long at all to learn how to make my own clothes. (And oh my, being able to make any outfit I want in any fabric is a queer superpower.)

It really sucks that we’re told quite early in life what our talents are and we end up assuming that there are some things we’re just not good at, when the truth is that learning as an adult is just completely different from learning as a child.

[sennamybeloved]

⛧ SELFSHIPTOBER 2024 ⛧

HELLO ALL! welcome to another year of selfshiptober. i've noticed this is pretty much the 'official' selfship tober event now, which honestly warms my heart! i love seeing what this wonderful community does with my prompts :)

this year, i'm doing things a little differently. EACH DAY HAS TWO PROMPTS ASSIGNED TO IT. the first set is SHIPPY, while the second set is SPOOKY. you may either COMBINE THE TWO PROMPTS TOGETHER or CHOOSE ONE OF THE PROMPTS. the spooky prompts are a bit on the grittier side and probably won't appeal to most, so if you'd like to only use the first set of prompts and completely ignore the second, be my guest! on the other hand, if you prefer the gritter prompts, you can only use the second set of prompts, you can do that too! if you want an extra challenge, you can create a piece that incorporates both of the day's prompts. you can also change your approach depending on how you feel that day!

there are no hard rules for this. YOU CAN START WORKING ON THIS CHALLENGE EARLY, but i encourage you to wait until october to post anything. YOU CAN ALSO CONTINUING WORKING ON IT AFTER OCTOBER ENDS! you can drag this shit out into december for all i care. just DON'T OVERWORK YOURSELF PLEASE.

without further ado, LET US PROCEED TO THE PROMPTS!

#1. confession  |  night.

#2. blanket  |  flame.

#3. embrace  |  blood.

#4. apple picking  |  fog.

#5. all dressed up  |  blade.

#6. carnival  |  haunted.

#7. rain  |  infection.

#8. swim  |  terror.

#9. music  |  masquerade.

#10. warmth  |  claws.

#11. comfort  |  recovery.

#12. married  |  ritual.

#13. party  |  magic.

#14. date night  |  vampire.

#15. games  |  hunt.

#16. candy  |  illusion.

#17. heart  |  feast.

#18. pining  |  violent.

#19. shared hobby  |  potion.

#20. trust  |  experiment.

#21. snuggle  |  nightmare.

#22. kiss  |  scars.

#23. movie night  |  slasher.

#24. baking  |  empty.

#25. rest  |  bandages.

#26. beautiful  |  grotesque.

#27. decorations  |  cemetery.

#28. brush  |  forest.

#29. pumpkin  |  lantern.

#30. flowers  |  snow.

#31. halloween  |  death.

TAG YOUR CREATIONS AS #SELFSHIPTOBER 2024 AND TAG ME IF YOU'D LIKE ME TO SEE! i cannot guarantee interaction as i struggle socially, but i promise i'll look at everything! HAPPY CREATING ♡

[ghostofnuggetspast]

You both suck so much at communicating. Uuuuuuugh John, reign it in. Sherlock, take a deep breath and apologize ffs

May 15 - Nightmare

We're at a crossroads! Eek! Time for timelines to start merging. It's gonna be a bumpy few days. Enjoy!

~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~*~

"When were you planning on telling me?" John's fury was written on his face, in his stance, in the tone of voice. Sherlock lowered the phone and turned to look at the man in the doorway.

"John." 

"You're going to run away again. Is this all you ever do?"

"I don't..." 

"Don't what? Actually want to stick around? I let you be a part of my daughter's life! How are you going to explain this nightmare to Rose?"

"John." Sherlock stared at his friend. Unable to find the words in the face of such anger. 

"I heard it all, Sherlock. I know you're leaving us."

"I... it's not what you seem to think." John took a step forward. Sherlock willed himself not to move backwards despite his brain reminding him that the last time John was this angry...

"So 221 isn't up for sale? You've not just accepted an offer." Sherlock swallowed and looked away. "So it's exactly what I'm thinking."

John turned and walked back towards the door, his back rigid, his steps clipped. 

"I trusted you. But all you ever do is leave me behind." Suddenly, John was back, forcing Sherlock back up against the wall. John's fist connected with the wall beside Sherlock's head. "Fuck you, Sherlock." 

As John left, Sherlock merely stood, staring at the plaster, broken. 

All for @calaisreno's May Prompt Challenge. Read the whole fic here

[caramelcactus]

fck the canon lore really. This shit fr makes feel abnormal amount of grief over fcking fictional pixelated children. I VITALLY need my babies alive and happy well not entirely but at least alive. Gonna use that AU as my haven where Evan is not tormented and is being protected instead like a precious baby he is, Michael despite his tough guy persona being a overprotective older brother, and Elizabeth fangirling over Circus baby (bcs animatronics aren’t murderers here) and is in general a sweet considerate little girl ( ˊ̱˂˃ˋ̱ )

∘₊✧──────✧₊∘

Though I made a big brain move here. All the deaths( I mean Aftons) that happened in games are just trauma-related nightmares in this au. Animatronics are normal in real world, but are murderous in nightmares

✦ I mean bite of 83 is something Evan could theoretically see in dream because of his fear of animatronics and separation anxiety after losing his mom

✦ William, apart of his untreated/undiagnosed bipolar disorder with severe manic episodes, has PTSD after springlock incident and it haunts him even in his dreams

✦ Michael may be the one with most nightmares because he’s scared of losing his family. Like my guy has his parents divorced, Charlotte whom he treated like his sister suddenly dying which amplified his protectiveness towards Evan and Elizabeth out of intense fear to lose them too, then his mom disappearing the exact same way, his dad being mentally unstable and denying it, and two little siblings he’s hella protective of and has to look after. Not to mention school and peers problems. It fucked him up a lot and he’s only 15. His nightmares are result of his severe stress and trauma

[mostlysignssomeportents]

Sandra Newman’s “Julia”

The first chapter of Orwell's Nineteen Eighty-Four has a fantastic joke that nearly everyone misses: when Julia, Winston Smith's love interest, is introduced, she has oily hands and a giant wrench, which she uses in her "mechanical job on one of the novel-writing machines":

https://gutenberg.net.au/ebooks01/0100021.txt

That line just kills me every time I re-read the book – Orwell, a novelist, writing a dystopian future in which novels are written by giant, clanking mechanisms. Later on, when Winston and Julia begin their illicit affair, we get more detail:

She could describe the whole process of composing a novel, from the general directive issued by the Planning Committee down to the final touching-up by the Rewrite Squad. But she was not interested in the finished product. She 'didn't much care for reading,' she said. Books were just a commodity that had to be produced, like jam or bootlaces.

I always assumed Orwell was subtweeting his publishers and editors here, and you can only imagine that the editor who asked Orwell to tweak the 1984 manuscript must have felt an uncomfortable parallel between their requests and the notional Planning Committee and Rewrite Squad at the Ministry of Truth.

I first read 1984 in the early winter of, well, 1984, when I was thirteen years old. I was on a family trip that included as visit to my relatives in Leningrad, and the novel made a significant impact on me. I immediately connected it to the canon of dystopian science fiction that I was already avidly consuming, and to the geopolitics of a world that seemed on the brink of nuclear devastation. I also connected it to my own hopes for the nascent field of personal computing, which I'd gotten an early start on, when my father – then a computer science student – started bringing home dumb terminals and acoustic couplers from his university in the mid-1970s. Orwell crystallized my nascent horror at the oppressive uses of technology (such as the automated Mutually Assured Destruction nuclear systems that haunted my nightmares) and my dreams of the better worlds we could have with computers.

It's not an overstatement to say that the rest of my life has been about this tension. It's no coincidence that I wrote a series of "Little Brother" novels whose protagonist calls himself w1n5t0n:

https://craphound.com/littlebrother/Cory_Doctorow_-_Little_Brother.htm

I didn't stop with Orwell, of course. I wrote a whole series of widely read, award-winning stories with the same titles as famous sf tales, starting with "Anda's Game" ("Ender's Game"):

https://www.salon.com/2004/11/15/andas_game/

And "I, Robot":

https://craphound.com/overclocked/Cory_Doctorow_-_Overclocked_-_I_Robot.html

"The Martian Chronicles":

https://escapepod.org/2019/10/03/escape-pod-700-martian-chronicles-part-1/

"True Names":

https://archive.org/details/TrueNames

"The Man Who Sold the Moon":

https://memex.craphound.com/2015/05/22/the-man-who-sold-the-moon/

and "The Brave Little Toaster":

https://archive.org/details/Cory_Doctorow_Podcast_212

Writing stories about other stories that you hate or love or just can't get out of your head is a very old and important literary tradition. As EL Doctorow (no relation) writes in his essay "Genesis," the Hebrews stole their Genesis story from the Babylonians, rewriting it to their specifications:

https://www.penguinrandomhouse.com/books/41520/creationists-by-e-l-doctorow/

As my "famous title" stories and Little Brother books show, this work needn't be confined to antiquity. Modern copyright may be draconian, but it contains exceptions ("fair use" in the US, "fair dealing" in many other places) that allow for this kind of creative reworking. One of the most important fair use cases concerns The Wind Done Gone, Alice Randall's 2001 retelling of Margaret Mitchell's Gone With the Wind from the perspective of the enslaved characters, which was judged to be fair use after Mitchell's heirs tried to censor the book:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Suntrust_Bank_v._Houghton_Mifflin_Co.

In ruling for Randall, the Eleventh Circuit Court of Appeals emphasized that she had "fully employed those conscripted elements from Gone With the Wind to make war against it." Randall used several of Mitchell's most famous lines, "but vest[ed] them with a completely new significance":

https://law.justia.com/cases/federal/appellate-courts/F3/268/1257/608446/

The Wind Done Gone is an excellent book, and both its text and its legal controversy kept springing to mind as I read Sandra Newman's wonderful novel Julia, which retells 1984 from the perspective of Julia, she of the oily hands the novel-writing machine:

https://www.harpercollins.com/products/julia-sandra-newman?variant=41467936636962

Julia is the kind of fanfic that I love, in the tradition of both Wind Done gone and Rosenkrantz and Gildenstern Are Dead, in which a follow-on author takes on the original author's throwaway world-building with deadly seriousness, elucidating the weird implications and buried subtexts of all the stuff and people moving around in the wings and background of the original.

For Newman, the starting point here is Julia, an enigmatic lover who comes to Winston with all kinds of rebellious secrets – tradecraft for planning and executing dirty little assignations and acquiring black market goods. Julia embodies a common contradiction in the depiction of young women (she is some twenty years younger than Winston): on the one hand, she is a "native" of the world, while Winston is a late arrival, carrying around all his "oldthink" baggage that leaves him perennially baffled, terrified and angry; on the other hand, she's a naive "girl," who "doesn't much care for reading," and lacks the intellectual curiosity that propels Winston through the text.

This contradiction is the cleavage line that Newman drives her chisel into, fracturing Orwell's world in useful, fascinating, engrossing ways. For Winston, the world of 1984 is totalitarian: the Party knows all, controls all and misses nothing. To merely think a disloyal thought is to be doomed, because the omnipotent, omniscient, and omnicompetent Party will sense the thought and mark you for torture and "vaporization."

Orwell's readers experience all of 1984 through Winston's eyes and are encouraged to trust his assessment of his situation. But Newman brings in a second point of view, that of Julia, who is indeed far more worldly than Winston. But that's not because she's younger than him – it's because she's more provincial. Julia, we learn, grew up outside of the Home Counties, where the revolution was incomplete and where dissidents – like her parents – were sent into exile. Julia has experienced the periphery of the Party's power, the places where it is frayed and incomplete. For Julia, the Party may be ruthless and powerful, but it's hardly omnicompetent. Indeed, it's rather fumbling.

Which makes sense. After all, if we take Winston at his word and assume that every disloyal citizen of Oceania is arrested, tortured and murdered, where would that leave Oceania? Even Kim Jong Un can't murder everyone who hates him, or he'd get awfully lonely, and then awfully hungry.

Through Julia's eyes, we experience Oceania as a paranoid autocracy, corrupt and twitchy. We witness the obvious corollary of a culture of denunciation and arrest: the ruling Party of such an institution must be riddled with internecine struggle and backstabbing, to the point of paralyzed dysfunction. The Orwellian trick of switching from being at war with Eastasia to Eurasia and back again is actually driven by real military setbacks – not just faked battles designed to stir up patriotic fervor. The Party doesn't merely claim to be under assault from internal and external enemies – it actually is.

Julia is also perfectly positioned to uncover the vast blank spots in Winston's supposed intellectual curiosity, all the questions he doesn't ask – about her, about the Party, and about the world. I love this trope and used it myself, in Attack Surface, the third "Little Brother" book, which is told from the point of view of Marcus's frenemy Masha:

https://us.macmillan.com/books/9781250757531/attacksurface

Through Julia, we come to understand the seemingly omniscient, omnipotent Party as fumbling sadists. The Thought Police are like MI5, an Island of Misfit Toys where the paranoid, the stupid, the vicious and the thuggish come together to ruin the lives of thousands, in such a chaotic and pointless manner that their victims find themselves spinning devastatingly clever explanations for their behavior:

https://www.bbc.co.uk/blogs/adamcurtis/entries/3662a707-0af9-3149-963f-47bea720b460

And, as with Nineteen Eighty-Four, Julia is a first-rate novel, expertly plotted, with fantastic, nail-biting suspense and many smart turns and clever phrases. Newman is doing Orwell, and, at times, outdoing him. In her hands, Orwell – like Winston – is revealed as a kind of overly credulous romantic who can't believe that anyone as obviously stupid and deranged as the state's representatives could be kicking his ass so very thoroughly.

This was, in many ways, the defining trauma and problem of Orwell's life, from his origin story, in which he is shot through the throat by a fascist: sniper during the Spanish Civil War:

https://www.rjgeib.com/thoughts/soldiers/george-orwell-shot.html

To his final days, when he developed a foolish crush on a British state spy and tried to impress her by turning his erstwhile comrades in to her:

https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Orwell%27s_list

Newman's feminist retelling of Orwell is as much about puncturing the myth of male competence as it is about revealing the inner life, agency, and personhood of swooning love-interests. As someone who loves Orwell – but not unconditionally – I was moved, impressed, and delighted by Julia.

Tor Books as just published two new, free LITTLE BROTHER stories: VIGILANT, about creepy surveillance in distance education; and SPILL, about oil pipelines and indigenous landback.

If you'd like an essay-formatted version of this post to read or share, here's a link to it on pluralistic.net, my surveillance-free, ad-free, tracker-free blog:

https://pluralistic.net/2024/09/28/novel-writing-machines/#fanfic

[thedailydescent]

📚Book Raffle for Laila and Hashim!📚

"In those beautiful days, we used to meet in the morning and in the evening with delicious coffee and talk about our dreams for the future in order to build a new house or start a family and have a child, but now we don't meet on anything..."

Hashim and Laila (@hashimsafadi) are a couple from Gaza desperately trying to raise funds to evacuate safely, but unfortunately, despite campaigning for more than five months, have only raised €1,668 of their €30,000 goal. I have spoken about this couple before on my blog here, here, and here.

They have also been shadowbanned on Tumblr, and are unable to send messages or tag people. Because of this, I've decided to host a book raffle of behalf of them.

I am raffling off my copy of The Divine Comedy- Collectible Deluxe Edition - ILLUSTRATED Leather Bound Hardcover. It was purchased at the House of Medici in Florence, and is still in mint condition.

If you donate:

-€5-€9.99 to Hashim & Laila, you are entered in once,

-€10-€14.99, twice,

-€15-€19.99, three times,

-€20-€24.99, four times,

-€25+, five times.

Send me proof of donation by dropping it in my submission box (if I follow you or we're mutuals you may message me). The donation must have occurred between Oct 5-Nov 5. Nov 5 is the last day to enter and the winner will be announced on Nov 6!

Currently, Hashim and Laila are without proper shelter and have been suffering from the heat, rain, polluted drinking water, and skin diseases. They have already been displaced several times. It is vital that they have a safe place to stay in for the upcoming winter.

Please help them out.

This fundraiser has been vetted by Pali Pals (@victoriawhimsey).

You can also follow Hashim on Instagram here and here for further updates.

For further reach, reblog and tell me in the tags:

@heritageposts @neechees @jezior0 @schoolhater @aria-ashryver

@90-ghost @appsa @notalk-justthought @sar-soor @riotdyke

@vakarians-babe @vakarian-shepard @sayruq @riding-with-the-wild-hunt @commissions4aid-international

@ghost-and-a-half @4ft10tvlandfangirl @flower-tea-fairies @tamamita @turtletoria

@thatdiabolicalfeminist @fiishboowl @tooquirkytolose @2spirit-1spoon @kropotkindersurprise

@xinakwans @charlesoberonn @vague-humanoid @mysharona1987 @memewhore

@mens-rights-activia @paper-mario-wiki @workersolidarity @queenangella @troythecatfish

@the-bastard-king @palipunk @neptunerings @earth-dad @papasmoke

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@sapphling @cowboycostume @thelastbacchae @heir-of-the-chair @woodwool

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