#maybe ill make a comic series of it

[areweevercameraready]

snippet two :>

A/N: me: oh no, AO3 is getting DDoS'ed :( and i just finished a chapter of beliefs so I can post another chapter! damn me: me: wait i can post another human chapter

anyways, please stay off AO3 for the time being and here's a post with more information, but they're facing extreme server overloading and opening AO3 pages makes it harder apparently. i don't know, i'm a communicator, not a programmer, so i'm just passing along what i know.

anywho! here's another snippet of the human au i'd been writing. if you would like to read the first part, here is the first snippet, which also has some more background on the au. check here for descriptions of the human au.

this is likely to be the last of this big story i'll be posting. i might post some of the oneshots i have in this au, as i have a few that are sorta unrelated to the plot that i'm comfortable with posting, but...well. we'll see. i finished chapter 13 of more than beliefs so i've 1) begun writing chapter 14 finally and 2) might post chapter 11 soon :D not having anything to do with my life right now is good for catching up on sleep debt and writing fanfiction! yipee!

i hope you enjoy!

Words: 7,265

WARNINGS: having a panic attack and being sad, not much more i don't think but if there is, let me know and i'll make note of it!

(in lieu of a diving image, please take this human au meme LOL)

“So. Bartender. Your name’s Eric, right? That’s what Marl’ said.”

“Mhm,” Eric hummed. 

“Thanks for driving them home. Marlowe would’ve flipped tomorrow if he woke up and realized he’d left the car somewhere else. He’s gonna flip either way, though, since the idiot teaches tomorrow morning,” David snickered a little, leaning against the car door in a casual manner. 

At the very least, the flippance was making it more evident that David wasn���t, like. Mad at him. Or something. Eric nodded again before remembering that David was now driving. “Uh. Yeah. Would have been a kinda problem.”

“Mm,” David hummed. After a few beats of silence, he added. “You got anything to do tomorrow?”

Tomorrow? Why was he asking? “I, uh, have work at four. At the bar. Other than that, no,” because truthfully, he was only scheduled five days a week at the restaurant.

He tried to get his shifts at the restaurant and his shifts at the bar to not line up, but five days a week at both jobs meant there wasn’t ever a chance of that happening. When he did need a full day off, though, for parent-teacher conferences especially now that Gavin was going to school, he managed to get the exact days precisely. Which was probably because he was so punctual and dependable. Which was what he tried to be. But sometimes, he worried that wouldn’t be enough, so he always clocked the days he’d need two months in advance. 

Tomorrow was just a lucky day though, to just have one job and not both. Often they stacked. Sometimes they didn’t. 

“Wanna meet up for lunch?” David’s proposition cut through Eric’s tangential thoughts. 

He turned to David again now, a slight frown on his lips, before asking, “For lunch?” as if he hadn’t heard properly. 

David nodded. “Yep. My treat, for bringing my boys home safe,” he shot Eric another grin. “Also you like, haven’t at all told me where the fuck to go. I’m assuming it’s closer to downtown but unless you just wanna keep driving in circles….”

Fuck. Eric looked out the window for real now, trying to figure out where they were. It was the highway going into town. “You’re going to want to take the Concord exit,” he said. 

“Okay,” David said. “But, yeah. Lunch.”

“Lunch,” Eric repeated, quickly averting his eyes back to the dashboard. “You and me and lunch?”

He didn’t really want to look directly at David, but just in case David like. Grabbed him. Or something. Eric wanted to see him in his peripheral. He saw David shrug. 

“I mean, yeah. You ever been to Lucy’s on Main? Such a great diner, I used to go with an old girlfriend every night almost,” David pulled off the exit. 

“Right. And then left at the, uh….fourth light.”

“Gotcha. Lunch. At Lucy’s on Main?” 

Lucy’s on Main wasn’t the fanciest place, but Eric had only been once, and that was for Gavin’s fourth birthday. He liked their theming, even though it wasn’t an actual children’s diner or anything, and Eric was never one to deny his brother when he asked for something achievable. 

If he could, he’d get Gavin the world. Snatch it right out of God’s hand

Going there with a stranger, though….if David wasn’t dating like, at least two other people, Eric would be worried this was a flirt attempt. And he wasn’t really in the mood to be romantic. He kinda wanted therapy first? And he hadn’t thought about romance in a while, not since his boyfriend in high school. Now he was an adult with responsibilities, he couldn’t just ditch school and smoke weed by the train station with Schmidt. 

This was just some guy being thankful, though, right? And he wasn’t doing anything tomorrow….and the idea of food, especially free food, was pretty enticing. A guaranteed meal would be nice. And at this point, he didn’t think this was going to be a trap. He knew Lucy’s on Main. He wasn’t...this was awkward, but it wasn’t like he was going to get mugged or anything.

The silence dragged, just a bit, and David sighed. “If you wanna say no, you can. I just know this’ probably way outta your ways, and you seem like you’re not gonna kill me and steal my car, so it’d be nice to hang out once and say thanks.” David sounded tired, too. 

Though that explanation was pretty straight forward. Eric nodded slowly in something like understanding. If David was worried Eric was going to be mugging him, and Eric was worried that David was going to be mugging him….well, he could just be saying this to get his guard down. Eric knew he consistently looked like his guard was up, more often willing to fight than he wasn’t, but maybe that was off-putting here. Maybe he was the scary one, here. 

Ah, the mom friend override. 

“No, I, uh. That’d be cool,” Eric said, then cleared his throat and continued. “Thanks for the offer. Would noon work?” 

“Yeah, sure,” David smiled as he took the turn onto Concord Avenue. “Meet you there?”

“Sure,” Eric said. “You can pull over anywhere on this block.”

He gestured out the window. His building was maybe two blocks down, but, well. He didn’t want to take this dude all the way to his apartment. 

Did he?

No, no he didn’t. Also, his days of one night stands were like, two years long gone. Eric wasn’t about to bring a whole adult (WITH TWO BOYFRIENDS, MIND YOU, AT LEAST TWO) to his tiny apartment at almost four in the morning with his kid brother sleeping in the same bedroom. Like, sure as fuck that wasn’t happening. Regardless of how pretty David looked in the moonlight. 

Yeah, he was tired as fuck if he was just going to start mentally waxing poetic about how pretty these boys were. Eric looked around at the car, out the window, then back at David. Who was watching him with a smile ever so slight, almost knowing, almost cocky. 

“What, you want a goodnight’s kiss too?” he joked. 

Eric snorted, shaking his head. “Nah, I’m just….” Confused. 

This was all so much, in one night. 

He had a hundred fuckin’ dollars in his pocket? 

And David’s boyfriend’s phone number? This dude just drove him home, too, for nothing, and was going to take him out to lunch tomorrow? 

“This’ a lot more social interaction in one day than I get most months,” Eric joked, almost confessed really, and shrugged. “It’s also four in the morning.”

“Huh, would you look at that,” David looked at the clock and pulled a face, as if he’d just noticed the time. 

Wouldn’t that be a riot? What the fuck was he doing awake, even? Eric snorted, hiding his eyes behind a hand as he laughed. “Stop no, it’s too-it’s too early for this,” he said between laughs as David began to chuckle a little himself. 

“Damn right. You head home, get to bed, and make sure you’re up at at LEAST noon!” David waved at Eric as he got out of the car, into the night air. 

It nipped at his nose, much colder than he thought it’d be. Granted, he thought he’d still be warm from the bar, too. Eric turned around, waving at David as he whipped a completely not-legal U-turn in the middle of the road, then headed back where he came. It looked like David was going to wait until Eric got into a building, which was kind of nice of him, but once Eric stood still and waved, he hit the reverse. Which was also fair. And also part of Eric’s plan. 

He didn’t exactly….Now okay, tomorrow morning this was all going to register as flirting. Eric was going to take off his shirts and lay down in his bed and watch Gavin sleep for maybe fifteen minutes before passing out himself out of just exhaustion while wearing his bartending slacks and without actually being beneath his pillows. He was going to not think about the implications behind the three men’s actions until tomorrow morning, while making breakfast, and he was going to be quiet enough in thought for Gavin to ask if he’d done something wrong while they were on their drive to school. 

“No, Gav, you’re fine. Peachy, actually, sweet pea,” Eric said, while he and Gavin waited at a stop light. 

Gavin was supposed to hold the motorcycle’s safety restraints while they drove, but more often than not he ended up holding Eric. He had his own safety jacket and belt buckles, which Eric installed as soon as he found out they were a thing. He’d gotten the bike before he’d gotten Gavin, and he wasn’t giving the bike away. 

“What’re you sad about?” the kid asked. 

The light was still red, so Eric leaned one arm back and gave Gavin one of their bike hugs. Positioning was always awful, but Gavin knew the drill, so he snuggled his helmeted head beneath Eric’s arm for a moment and hugged him tighter. 

Now, though, how to like. Explain this to the four year old.

“A friend asked to go to lunch together today,” was what Eric landed on.

Gavin gasped, excitement filling his voice in a way that almost made Eric feel bad. “A friend?! Yay!”

“Yeah, a friend. I’ve got those,” Eric joked. 

“Daddy’s got one friend,” Gavin said with his own snicker, and Eric laughed, too. 

“Daddy’s got more than one friend,” he said, and for a moment, thinking about the phone number written on the bill at home, he meant it. 

Gavin seemed happy with that explanation and with those jokes, and Eric was as happy as he’d let himself be. He dropped Gavin off and promised to pick him up later, told him to have a good day, that he loved him. 

Kid’s school got out at 1:38, which would be a fair reason to leave lunch, if it got like. Unbearably awkward. Which was a real possibility, if you asked Eric. Wasn’t last night awkward enough? This dude really saw Eric at his normal messiest states at four in the morning and decided that the best decision was to spend even more time with him. Granted, he was in his pajamas last night, and he seemed pretty out of it, too. It might be nice to have a real conversation outside of being ground into dust levels of tired.

Also, it wasn’t Eric’s worst, and he thought he’d held it together pretty well considering the outlandish circumstances. In nearly any other case, he would have gone running for the hills at the mention of having lunch alone together with a stranger, or even being handed a bill with a fucking phone number on it. He’d been hit on at the bar before; everyone likes the stoic type bartender, until he starts rejecting advances. Then he gets the drink thrown on him and slurs thrown his way, which like, really? The owner’s queer and they think it’s going to be okay to say slurs? Idiots. Eric knew it was a situation better than that kind of shit, but he didn’t know what made him say yes to these advances. Something about the genuine-ness of it all, maybe. 

And these like. Were definitely advances. There were no ifs, ands, or buts. He didn’t process it fully last night, but now that the lunch date was starring him in the face, he could see it for what it was: a date. 

Three people, though. That was three extra people to disappoint. And, if he really thought about it, Eric didn’t know if he could, like….handle that. On an emotional level but also on an anxiety level. 

Still, to not show up to lunch and flake would be rude, and he may be a coward but he was anything but rude. 

Eric took some time between dropping off Gavin and heading to the date to prepare. He had tried while putting his hair up, a looser ponytail rather than the pinned bun he had for either of his jobs. Usually, he’d’ve preferred to keep it down, but. Well. It got everywhere. It was kinda scraggly, probably 90% split ends. Good to have it out of the way.

He threw on a quick t-shirt, a pair of black jeans, and his regular leather jacket. If this was really just lunch, then it was a one and done kind of situation. Not much else for him to do, other than lay down and try to nap for an hour before heading out.

Lucy’s on Main was fairly crowded for lunch on a weekday, in Eric’s opinion. People were waiting outside when he got there. And he didn’t see David waiting amongst them, so he put his own name down for a table and went to go stand outside. There was a couple sitting on the bus stop bench, though. Smoking. It’d been a few years since he managed to kick his nicotine addiction, but he wasn’t exactly fond of the scent of smoke anymore, so after a moment of taking in the wind and hyping himself up to talk to a stranger, a whole ass stranger, he went back in. 

And that was when he heard a “YO! ERIC!”

Eric jumped, turning around towards the inside of the diner. Most of the tables were filled, and one had a guy with his arms up, waving him down. Literally. Waving him down.

“HEY!” David called out. 

Eric saw him crack a smile as he recognized him, as Eric waved back just a little. They were turning heads a bit. Just a bit. 

He told the host that he was with “that guy” and made his way over, sliding into the seat opposite David. And he tried to kind of avoid looking at him, because being yelled at across a public space was never something Eric was too fond of. As soon as he sat down, though, David waved in his face. 

“‘Sup, Harley,” David said. “Nice bike.”

“Thanks.” Eric looked up, briefly, then froze. And looked up again.

David’s hair was down, though it’d been brushed and was pinned back with a bobby pin or two. He was wearing a puffy varsity jacket and a t-shirt underneath, the varsity jacket covered in patches that seemed to be hand-sewn on. There was a pin, too, on the jacket’s collar, with the inclusive rainbow. Cute. His glasses were cute, too, framing his face in a way that made his smile look a bit wider as he also looked over eric.

He….Well. In last night’s dark, he hadn’t really caught what David actually looked like. He was smaller than Eric but they had similar styles almost. There was something comforting casual about David’s posture, though, and in the way he leaned back against the booth’s seat. 

Surrounded by hot men. Eric turned away as the waitress came over, hoping he wasn’t blushing as much as he thought he was, and ordered himself a plate of fries. Before she left, David interrupted.

“Nah, you can order more, dude. I’m paying,” he reached over and motioned towards the waitress. “Get a milkshake at least, Lucy’s shakes’re the fucking best.”

Now, Eric didn’t really want to be wasting someone else’s money, and the plate of fries was definitely more than he’d been planning on having today. But David was watching him. And Eric couldn’t really say no. Not when he was being watched like this. A burger did sound good, too, but….

God, he didn’t want to make David spend money on him. Eric stuffed his hands into his pockets slowly, playing with the edge of his phone’s case. “Can I, uh. Can I get a chocolate shake, too?” he asked. 

“M’kay,” the waitress said with a knowing smile. 

“And make his fries the bigger size! I’ll steal some,” David grinned at the waitress, who chuckled at his antics but wrote down the change. 

And then she left. 

Eric leaned back in the seat, and he didn’t really know what to feel. In a weird way, it was good that David just started to converse, then and there.

“Like I said, cool bike. What kind is it?” he said, as if he knew of it. 

“Uh,” oh, jeez, the bike. “It’s a 2005 Night Train.”

“Sheesh, a Night Train! And she’s still running? Do you do your own maintenance?” 

“I, uh. Yeah. Yeah, I do. Maintenance and modifications.”

And that got him talking. Which, like. Was hard. On standard, getting him to converse was hard. But then David mentioned his old bike, how he used to have a 2002 Softail Deuce, how he always found it hard to maintain. Well, ‘course it’s hard to maintain if you don’t keep checking on it, especially after not riding it for a bit. Eric installed the second seat and had to buy her new brakes, just in case and to help with smoother rides. 

He talked about how he kept his parts and mechanical tools in a case in his apartment. Usually he’d keep it stuffed under the coffee table, better than leaving it out in the garage. 

David said it was cool, that he knew enough to maintain the bike himself. Yeah, Eric just liked keeping up with it and making sure he knew enough about it. He didn’t know any mechanics in the area well enough to trust them to actually take care of it as well as he could. Plus, if anything went wrong, he’d know what the situation was. He liked knowing that. 

It was nice, to talk to someone about these things. Eric didn’t notice his tension easing up with David. It was almost natural.

David mentioned having a bike. What did he do with it? He had to get rid of it, he didn’t take good enough care of it. Sold it to someone before he moved out here. He’s originally from Michigan but relocated for work, since it’s better to be near a lot of galleries. Selling the bike helped pay for life after college. 

What did he work in? Art. He worked most in oils, something like a modern impressionist kind of painting. The big one was sculpting. He liked to chisel, but marble was kind of hard to come by. He’d gotten into wood carving, though, since the house was nearby a forest. He’d take down a tree somewhere on their property, replant a few saplings, then bring it in pieces into his workshop to carve. It was in the basement, but they’d set up a ventilation system well enough. He did like painting realism sometimes, as a hobby, though.

Eric didn’t know anything about art. He would love to see his works, one day. 

Well you could swing by. I don’t think anyone’d be home to mind. If you wanna hang out some more.

“Who’s home?” Eric asked then, almost confused. 

David blinked at him a few times, trying to process what was confusing, before realization entered his face and he snapped his fingers. “Shit, yeah. I’m supposed to….yeah. So, uh. Me and the boys wanted to get to know you more. ‘S why Princey and Marl’ were at your bar.”

“Oh.” What? Who the fuck are the boys? “Who’re the boys?”

“You’re gay, right? Just want to clear that up, ‘cause this is about to be so fuckin’ awkward if you’re straight.” David sipped his milkshake expectantly while Eric made a face, and before Eric even answered, David snickered. “Sorry, dumb question, you don’t need to be gay to like, get this. I dunno if anyone told you directly, but Phillip and Marlowe and I, and Cadence, and another dude you haven’t met named Draco, we’re all in a relationship. Poly, gay, all that. We’re all in a relationship.

“And like, we aren’t gonna reel you into a relationship with all of us. Cadence just said you were nice, so’d Marlowe and Phillip,” David put his hands up—Eric’s face must have been some kind of slack jawed, but he was more trying to decipher what David was saying than paying attention to himself. “We thought it’d be cool to meet you. Well. I thought it’d be cool. Like, as friends and stuff. And like, we move like a pack. I don’t wanna speak for the others on what they’re thinking, but I just wanted to make sure you knew like, this isn’t a date, not for me. But like, I dunno. You’ve got everyone’s interest now.

“So if you’re like, wondering why a bunch of randos’re meeting up with you out of nowhere, it’s because you seem cool and we all share one braincell that befriends people at the same time. We all wanna meet you. I dunno what everyone’s specific desires are past that, I just kinda wanna get to know you, but I think we could be friends. That’d be cool.” David leaned back, indicating the end of his explanation, and picked up his almost empty milkshake to sip from as Eric digested all of that new information.

“Oh. Okay,” Eric’s voice sounded hollow, even to himself. 

Was that like getting stalked? Was he just getting stalked now, but a frat house of gay dudes? Was that what was happening? He didn’t know. His ears were kind of ringing a little as he tried to process that. 

So he’d run into a gaggle of dudes who wanted to be his friend. All of them? They’d talked about him—of course they’d talked about him.

One of them was fucking famous? Eric didn’t know what being friends with a famous person was like, but he didn’t want cameras in his face all the time if that’s what it meant. 

Was he even good enough for that? Eric wouldn’t have considered himself friendship material for any regular person, not to mention multiple people at once, one of whom was famous.

He had a lot of concerns, off the bat. 

“It’s kinda a lot to explain. Mostly, we’re just gonna be annoying, since you seem cool and we wanna be friends. If that’s okay,” David said. “That okay?”

What would they want out of him? He didn’t have money. He barely had a personality, if you asked him. There wasn’t anything really to gain from being his friend. 

Why the fuck were these people interested in him? 

Eric barely heard him. He just. Starred. For a moment.

That was when Eric became acutely aware of where they were. Of who he was talking to. That this was...well, it was a casual conversation, but a proposition to come home. He had to—he checked his phone, it was 1:10, holy fuck. He had to pick up Gavin soon. Like, now even. He had to go. 

He had to go.

He just had to. 

“Okay. I,” what was he doing here, what did they want out of him? There was no way— “I need to go.”

David raised his eyebrows but said nothing of it. His smile faded. “Okay. Go ahead, I’m handling the bill,” his voice was a lot more gentle now, as if the fervor he’d spoken with earlier had been sapped out of his bones. 

Eric almost missed it. 

He’d been lulled into a false sense of security, out of talking about fucking motorcycles and art. He stood, one fast motion that is more abrupt than he should be, and turned down the hall. He could apologize. David seemed nice. So did Phillip. Marlowe. Cadence maybe even. It might be nice, to talk to some more people, to get to know them. 

Gavin had said earlier that he had a friend. He could stick his neck out there. Reach out to people. He had a phone number. He could turn around and talk to David right now. 

David had looked real sad when Eric left.

Instead, he walked down the hall and out the door. He tried his best to breathe evenly, because panic driving the bike was never smart, and in doing so he just. Swallowed. His feelings. 

Eric took a big gulp of air, actually, and grabbed his bike’s helmet. Already, he was just zoning out. He was going to go pick up Gavin! Then, he was gonna make sure the kid was doing his homework. And then he had a shift at the bar. 

What would they even say about Gavin? 

He revved the bike’s engine and pulled out of the parking lot without looking back. 

His brain was static empty by the time he pulled into the parking lot at Gavin’s school, a whole ten minutes early. He didn’t have to leave that fast. But he couldn’t just stay there. What would he do? Go back and talk to David? Face that kind of unknown? He...he couldn’t. He’d stormed out like something was wrong, and wouldn’t David be mad for that? He didn’t know him much anyways. He didn’t owe him anything, either. 

If only he could convince the guilt weighing in his stomach the same thing. 

When the school bell rang, Eric perked up, taking Gavin’s helmet out from where it gets hooked and clipped onto the back seat. He drummed his fingers against the top. 

His kid came bursting out from around the portables, running around to where Eric usually parked. Gavin threw his arms up in the air when he saw Eric, so Eric threw his arms up as well. He climbed off the bike and squatted down, holding his arms open enough for Gavin to launch himself into a hug. 

They did this just about every day and Eric didn’t see himself ever getting tired of it. Gavin snuggled his face against Eric’s shoulder and shouted “HI THIEF!”

“Hey, kiddo,” Eric said with a sigh. The nickname was a dour one, but it was hard to train Gavin out of it. He’d gotten upset about enough things, today, and he was waiting until they got home to do something about the rising panic he was literally just barely tamping down. 

He helped Gavin onto the motorcycle’s seat, strapping him in while he asked how school had gone. It was a Thursday. Gavin had math tests on Thursday, which he loved. They were doing fifty in a minute with addition, which the teacher said Gavin was really good at. Better than reading time, since he was bad at focusing. The teacher suggested he get Gavin checked for reading disorders or attention disorders. But Eric didn’t have the money for something like that. 

Still, it was nice hearing Gavin talk about how happy he was to finish the fifty. He was the first one done. “You’re such a smarty pants,” Eric joked, patting his hand on Gavin’s helmet once he got it strapped on. 

“Mm,” Gavin frowned at that one, then shrugged. “Not really. I just like the numbers.”

“You’re good at the numbers, too,” Eric reminded him as he sat himself back down, too. “What homework do you have tonight?”

“Wait wait, but I wanted to know,” Gavin grabbed Eric’s sides, balling his hands up around him. “How did lunch go?”

Lunch. 

Gavin was asking about. About how lunch went. Eric was really glad he wasn’t looking at him, because there’s no way he could have hidden how much his face fucking fell at the question. 

“It, uh. Went alright.” Eric put his own helmet on, not turning around to see Gavin. “I’ve got work tonight, so I’m going to cook dinner when we get home, and you’ve gotta do your homework. Okay?” 

He didn’t want to talk to his four year old brother, of all people, about that travesty of a date. It wasn’t even a date. It fucking felt like a date. 

He didn’t want to hang out with anyone. He didn’t even want to have to talk to any of them, not if they were going to all pile up on him and what if anyone ever started taking offense to him? He didn’t want to join their group. And he probably wasn’t even good enough for it. 

He didn’t want to think about how he’d walked out on David.

Shut the fuck up about it, Eric. You’ve gotta go for a bit of a drive. Then you get to panic about this.

“Okay,” Gavin’s voice was quiet, a little sad. Probably because Eric wasn’t answering his question. Usually Eric gave him an explanation before a nonanswer. But he didn’t need to. And Gavin wouldn’t understand. Eric could think of a thousand reasons why not to talk to Gavin about that. 

“It’s fine,” Eric said, as if he could comfort Gavin with that harsh statement. And he revved his engine before he could hear Gavin’s response, if any.

The drive was quick. Some kinda force must have been on Eric’s side because every light was coming up green. He parked the bike in his unit’s garage and Gavin hopped off fast, beating Eric to the door, and disappeared inside. 

Usually that was a surefire sign the kid was upset, but at the moment, Eric couldn’t really find it in himself to care. Nor fault him, really. Eric was on edge, was being pretty unreasonable. 

On the flip side, he had to make dinner. It was 2 p.m. and he had to be at work at 4, so he had to leave at 3:30, and he had to make sure Gavin was doing homework. A conversation like this could take hours. He didn’t have that kind of time. And he’d have to understand himself why this was all happening. Why he was doing this. What was so terrifying. 

Eric didn’t have the time nor the energy to confront that. So he wasn’t going to. 

Quietly, he trudged into the kitchen, jumping when the door to the bedroom slams closed. Gavin, most likely. He usually did his homework in the kitchen, but, well…

Eric slung his jacket over one of the kitchen chairs and went to work cooking. It was always a tossup, leaving Gavin home alone. He was a smart kid. Eric told him not to touch the stove or the oven or touch any of the knives on their stand, and Gavin had never done anything like that. Eric also would punch in his phone number on the landline phone and colored in the “call” button with green sharpie. If anything happened, Gavin knew to just hit the green button. That’d call Eric, and he could always get home within ten minutes. If anything super bad happened, Gavin knew to hide in the closet. All of the neighbors on their floor had been asked, please, to call him if something happened to the building or his unit. 

That was the best he could do, really. He didn’t have the money nor knew anyone well enough to let them watch Gavin. Once, he tried to leave Gavin with the neighbors, but he’d somehow escaped their apartment and gone back to Eric’s. The kid was attached, the neighbor had explained. And Eric didn’t really want anyone watching him in their apartment, when he wouldn’t be there. 

Sometimes, the kid will do the dishes for him. Once, Eric was pretty sure Gavin cut his hand while trying to wash a knife, but Gavin said a bully got his arm caught on a door hinge in a fight. That was a specific enough lie that worried Eric that maybe both had happened. Poor kid had to deal with living with him, bullies on top of that?

He made pasta with some marinara sauce. It was a solid batch, and if Gavin didn’t finish it, then Eric would have some. He’d already eaten more than enough at lunch, though. And he was used to being hungry by now. 

He stared at the cooking pasta with a blank expression. 

Once dinner was ready, Eric checked the clock. Twenty minutes before he had to leave. Which was pretty standard for him, save for how he now had to go into the room where Gavin was hiding so he could change. He wasn’t about to go out in what he’d consider his nice clothes, to a bar where he could get thrown up on.

He stopped in front of the door. And took a breath. 

“Dinner’s ready whenever you want it, Gav,” Eric said, voice soft as he also knocked on the door. “Can I come in? I’ve gotta get changed to go to work.”

“Sure,” came the soft reply.

Eric braced himself internally, pursing his lips a bit as he pushed open the door and peeked in. Gavin was curled up in his bed, backpack and shoes kicked off on the ground besides it. The blanket was pulled over his head, probably curled up into a ball under the sheets. 

He could just throw off his clothes and change real fast. But Eric only got his shirt off before Gavin’s head popped out. 

“Did your lunch make you sad?” he asked. 

The question made Eric freeze. Part of him wanted to turn around, growl at the child to shut the fuck up and stop asking. It would be easier, to be cruel. But he could never...he didn’t want to be his parents, and when the kid was worried about him? That kind of idiot’d do that. 

“A little,” Eric responded, trying to swallow the guilt that arose when he was reminded of how sad David had looked, how his smile had disappeared in the instant Eric stood up. 

“Does Thief not have any more friends?” 

Eric put on a black t-shirt and started taking off his jeans. “My name isn’t Thief, baby,” he tried to keep his tone level.

Gavin wilted a little. He hated it when Eric reminded him, but Eric hated that name, and it was going to be better to train Gavin out of it now rather than later. “Sorry, Daddy. But did your friend make you sad?”

He sighed. Persistent fucking kid. 

Too good for Eric, always worried about him. Sometimes, Eric wondered if Gavin got that from him, too. Always just a little too worried for it to be healthy.

He heard Gavin flinch back into the sheets, so he turned back around. Gently, Eric scooped Gavin up, blankets and sheets and all, and kissed his forehead. “A little,” he answered. “He was a new friend. I don’t think he meant to make me sad.”

“Okay.” Gavin snuggled a little more into Eric’s arms, and he felt Gavin hold onto his shirt. “Did you make him sad?”

Heh. “A little. We were both a little sad,” Eric gave him a squeeze, rocking slowly. “It’s okay, though. Sometimes you make yourself sad. Sometimes other people get sad. Being sad is okay. It’s—”

“It’s about what you do after you’re sad,” Gavin finished. Probably excited he remembered it. Kid’s always been bad at focusing, anyway. 

It’s something Eric’s told him before, quite a few times. He wished he could hide his panic and depression and honest despair from Gavin, but in a two room apartment? He didn’t want to leave the kid alone in the apartment, too. As little as he could. Gavin had seen him panic and Eric had pulled himself together to stop Gavin from worrying too much. The three year old kid had too big of a heart in him for Eric to keep making him sad, too. And now he was four. 

“Yep, you’ve got it. Smart baby.” Eric lifted him as Gavin reached his arms up, giving him a tight hug around his neck and shoulders. 

Gavin’s arm went around his head at that weird angle, where it was the only place where his arms could feasibly wrap around. “Are you gonna make it better?”

“I’m gonna try.” 

That seemed to be good enough for Gavin, because he gave Eric a kiss on the forehead, too, and then made a motion to go down. So Eric set him back down on the bed, ruffled his hair, and went back to changing his pants. 

“I set up dinner on the table, it’s noodles.” He always tried to get the ones that looked like sea shells, because Gavin thought they were fun. “After dinner, you can leave your plate on the kitchen counter and do homework at the table. I’ll be back before bed time, okay?”

Shift was supposed to be shorter today; he’d be off at 9, and it wasn’t like it was that long of a walk.

“Okay!” Gavin waved his hands. “Have fun! I love you!”

Eric, clothes changed and keys in hand, waved back. “I love you too!” 

He closed the door to the apartment, locked it from the outside, and hurried down the stairs. “I’m gonna try,” he mumbled again, quiet to himself.

The phone number. 

Eric still had the bill in his other pants’ pocket. He never took it out. 

It’d been a while since he, like. Had friends. And had to socialize. 

David likely told all of them that Eric had just walked out on him. He didn’t know what they thought of him. 

But he had to try. Right? 

At the very least, Phillip had seemed nice. Phillip had seemed like he knew what Eric’s anxiety looked like. And maybe that’d be….

Eric could try. There wasn’t a harm in that. 

Work went smoothly, both works. No one went too crazy at the bar and Eric left when the next shift lead came, just in time to catch Gavin brushing his teeth before bed. He’d managed to tuck the kid in, clean the kitchen, and even managed to fall asleep at a reasonable time. When he woke up, he took Gavin to school, then immediately went to his second job. Things were going well and, when he dropped off Gavin, the kid had wished him good luck in calling his friend.

Eric held onto that until his lunch break at his other job. During lunch break, he went across the street to a coffee shop, ordered a dirty chai, and took his phone out. He’d taken a photo of the bill’s phone number, wasn’t about to wave a hundred dollar bill around in public, but the picture was good enough. 

Here goes...well. Nothing, really. Everything. And nothing. 

Just call the damn number.

His finger hit the call button before he could think any more about it, and he waited. 

It took two rings for Phillip to pick up. 

“Hello?” he asked. 

“Hi.” 

That was when Eric realized he had no fucking idea what he was going to say. What, was he calling to say sorry? This was Phillip’s number, not David’s. Did he want to hang out with Phillip? What do adults do when they quote hang out unquote. He didn’t want to do anything that’d involve money too much, he wasn’t able to pay for a dinner or something. Did he even want to meet up with him, in person? And he had so many questions about the arrangement, of the what, five men in a relationship thing. Did all of them want to talk to him? Why? 

“Oh, Eric. Hello! I ha-I hadn’t expected you to call,” Phillip laughed a little, a sound that eased the tension off his shoulders. “Are you...What did you want to ta-to talk about?”

His voice sounded light. That was good. He didn’t sound mad. 

“I, uh. I just wanted to….” 

There was a pause. So Eric just took another sip of his coffee and said, quickly, “Did you want to go to a museum? Or hang out or something?” 

A museum. 

Eric hadn’t been to a single museum in the whole fucking city. 

What the fuck was he thinking. 

Phillip must have either pitied him or was picking up what he was trying to suggest, because that was when he responded, “Oh! If you want to-to walk around and ta-talk, we could go to the-the university’s botanical gardens.” 

Botanical gardens? And walking around might be nice. Eric’s never been to the gardens. To be honest, he didn’t know they existed, and also didn’t go to the city’s university. It was a little farther away from the downtown and it wasn’t like he got an education past high school level anyway. 

He’d always wanted to go into mechanics, what with working on the bike and all. It just never worked out. 

Flowers seemed nice. 

“Sure! That, uh, I’ve never been but that sounds nice,” he said.

“They are qui-quite pleasant,” Phillip hummed quietly, then added. “If you don’t mind, would it be alright if I exte-ex-ex-if I invited Cadence as well?”

Cadence. Cadence, the famous one?

“Is he, uh….is he allowed to like….” Eric, frankly, had no idea what protocol was around famous people. “Sure?”

Phillip chuckled quietly, just quiet enough for the phone to pick it up, and said, “He’s definitely allowed to be in publi-public, if that’s your worry. Being famous doesn’t make it illegal to be in places. He’d wanted to see you again, but, well. Bars are cro-cro-crowded. If you want, I won’t.”

“No, no, it’s okay. Sure. I’d, uh. That’s cool.” 

Why did he sound like an awkward teen? Why did this sound like asking someone out to prom? Eric was going to lose his mind. 

Thankfully and graciously, Phillip seemed to understand his plight. David must have spread the word of him being an anxious mess because, to some extent, Phillip was planning this date for him.

Not a date. Just hanging out. Still weird for him, but markedly less weird.

“When’s the next weekday you’re free?” Phillip asked. 

It wasn’t that hard of a question. “Monday,” Eric responded.

He didn’t have either job. Well, that was a lie, but he was picking up another late shift at the bar. He didn’t have to be there until eleven. 

“Great. Monday at ten?” 

“Works for me,” Eric said. 

Phillip hummed in approval. 

Eric almost wanted to ask about David. If Phillip heard. Things had been going well, for the most part, until David explained the polycule situation. And something about that had just made Eric’s chest seize. 

That was so many people to disappoint. They’d discussed him. Eric never liked being the point of discussion, for any people. So the idea that this group of people who were all dating had talked about him to the point that the others wanted to meet him was surreal. 

Plus, he couldn’t help but be wary of the insinuation that they just wanted to be friends with him. Phillip was very regal, pretty and polished. Cadence was so fucking handsome it was unfair. David had been handsome as well, beautiful in a casual way. Eric was too fucking gay for this. He hadn’t seen Marlowe in much other than lowlight, and while the dude was drunk, but even then Eric could tell the dude was adorable. It was un-fucking-fair.

There was a….worry, deeper down. That while they might not want him in a romantic way, he’s just going to be a nervous gay wreck the whole time. 

“See you then, then, Eric,” Phillip’s voice held something of a smirk, and then he hung up. 

Eric lowered the phone, starred at the call screen for a moment or two before things began to click on his head. He was going to hang out with Phillip. And Cadence. 

They didn’t hate him. 

That was a good start.

[illustratedartist]

Ask Me About My Mask 🎃🐦‍⬛💉

First request for my 400+ follower event is done!!

I KINDA went my own direction with this, I saw this funny image with wolf shirt verison of this and it reminded me of Scarecrow from Asylum lol. So naturally I decided this has to be how I draw AA Crane from now on XD

Thank you @jennoirwolf for the request and supporting me! When I was in my Crash Bandicoot phase she was one of my absolute favorite artists! I remember going through all her comics and doodles on her DA and being so inspired. SO it honestly blows my mind that she likes my stuff 🥰 definitely go check her out!!

[xxplastic-cubexx]

give me some whiskey and ill draw The Most Thing i can come up with

bonus:

[hypogryffin]

Hey, do you have the next part of idiots in inaba in mind? Just asking because if you post it in the next few months, it will be an annual event, and I think that'd be funny.

(this is part 4 of my anne in inaba au, you can find the previous posts here: [part 1, part 2, part 3])

[kaiserouo]

[helenapologist]

im gonna explain this to the best of my ability but i think if we’re gonna get a “Cesare rescue/helps out/releases Steve” and they have a little heart-to-heart moment, they’re conversation is gonna be like those Crowley and Aziraphale conversations.

like the ones where Aziraphale is like “oh you’re actually good person and nice and stuff” and crowleys like “NO I AM NOT NEVER SAY THAT AGAIN” but like, more tailored to fit their personalities yknow? like there would be an acknowledgment that Cesare is objectively not a good person- he lies, hes mean, he can, will, and has used people for his own gain but like,,, he’s not the worst person in the world??? he still has empathy and is kinda just a product of his unfortunate circumstances.

what i imagine is steve kinda having a “you’re only human” sorta convo. and Cesare will not know how to handle it and it’ll be emotional and sappy and ARGHHH DO YOU SEE MY VISION

[zetsu--bou]

The Chronicles of Akashi Household: Masaomi, Shiori and the faucet

Introductions:

Next

[samarecharm]

If i start posting dc stuff on here, it means i lost the fight w myself. The demons won. Im sorry

[subway-boss-jericho]

I don't think I'll ever be a proper Content Creator because of the way my brain works, but my biggest goal is to somehow make a story that makes someone so mentally ill about a thing that they can't think straight. As I do. Every couple weeks or so. Someday it will happen and I will do skitter around dancing and cheering wildly on the subway platform in my brain

[scatterpatter]

Based on something Elec Man said in one of your posts, is Gemini man involved in the Decopunk au?

I WASNT EXPECTING AN ASK ABOUT THIS ONE OMG!!!

Havent really thought much about Geminiman! We have down what we want our main characters to be doing, but havent really thought too hard on a lot of the other robot masters

That being said, I was about to jokingly say he can be a private eye, to reference The Megas song about him

... But then I realized. Its a Decopunk AU (AKA Steampunk with a dash of 20s art deco aesthetics). With a plot point involving corrupt political officials, eco-terrorists who have their identities unknown for a large chunk of the plot, double-agents, etc etc. Its literally the perfect setting to introduce a private eye

Soooo hes a detective now XDDD

[ask-whitepearl-and-steven]

Is shattering permanent in the comic (especially with the force fusions and cluster) or can it be fixed down the line like future did? Asking for your opinion on this too bc I found out about it in Future and it makes me feel weird (bc now it feels like any SU stuff and shattering has no consequence or tension, so haven’t been able to read or write stories). Maybe I’m seeing this wrong? Would love your thoughts

Hmm...

So to answer your first question: The comic for WDAU works on the same rules as canon does. I have no intention to over-write anything canon clearly stated to be true.

The ability to put back together shattered gems is definitely a part of that.

So yes, theoretically, even in WDAU, gems being shattered is not 'the end' because they can be eventually re-instated through the work of the diamonds, IF they someday decide to Change Their Minds like they did in the original series.

That being said...

I want to talk a little bit about something you said, because it tickles my brain in an interesting way:

"now it feels like any SU stuff and shattering has no consequence or tension"

And the best way to talk about stuff, I've found, is to ask questions about our underlying assumptions. So my questions for you (all) today are:

For us humans, death certainly IS a constant that remains ever-permanent, and thus it's easy to compare it to shattering and draw that parallel... but is that a fair comparison?

In fiction, death is often circumvented and there still remains reasonable tension in things like magic-heavy worlds, vampire novels, sci-fi where almost any sickness is eradicated, etc. Is this not quite similar to what shattering is for gems?

Is the perceived permanency of shattering the only reason it feels like a heavy consequence?

Are there OTHER consequences of being shattered that make it just as interesting, if not more than, to be explored as a plot device?

Must there be an ever-looming threat of something horrible and permanent happening to make a story good?

There isn't a right or wrong answer to these questions, necessarily. I'm not posing these in order to lead you to a singular, 'absolutely correct' conclusion or way of writing.

For some stories, death DOES need to be permanent in order not to make light of what the characters go through! In some forms of writing, there IS no other way around that consequence.

But I daresay SU is not one of those stories.

Let me put it this way - 100 years ago, medicine had only BEGUN to develop into the thing we know it as today. Sure, there were therapies and treatments for diseases, broken limbs, poisonings, etc. Some of them were quite good, even! But overall, the death tolls back then from basic illness were MUCH higher than they were today.

Pnumonia, Malaria, Syphillis, Smallpox, Bubonic Plague, AIDS.

These were things that people died from, with near CERTAINTY, for the LONGEST time. They were considered the road to a permanent black screen.

And today? Even though they are still, without proper intervention, JUST as deadly, we now have new tools and vaccines to combat them. Hell, if you get vaccinated fast enough you can get bit by a rabid dog and live to tell the tale, unscathed! Rabies used to be a one-stop-shop to the afterlife.

Despite this, we still view these diseases with appropriate fear. They are still dangerous - in the right conditions.

In the right conditions, the consequences for a LOT of things can be permanent. If permanency is what you're looking for.

So alright, the Diamonds can heal shattered gems now. Booooring. How easy it is to fix any shattered gem! What a simple solution to anything tragic.

But................... will they ALWAYS do so?

In fact...will the Diamonds ALWAYS be around?

Will the gems who got shattered always be picked up, piece by piece, and be brought back to them, perfectly preserved? Or will they lose pieces of themselves along the way - literally?

And what NEW consequences can we think of, when we stop thinking of the permanency of death, and start thinking of the Impermanence of those tools that keep us here longer and longer?

Just food for thought. 👀

[genericpuff]

Lore Olympus Episode 265 Betrays the Series' Own Messages of Consent

I've been keeping it on the down low lately with new episodes of LO, both for the sake of my mental health and because LO itself has just become so... pointless and boring. There's only so much to say when nothing is happening, and in that regard, I will preface this with a "congratulations" towards Rachel, because she's finally found a way to best the "haters" - make the comic so boring that there's nothing worth talking about to begin with.

At first glance I thought this was going to be another one of those episodes. Good job, Rachel, you managed to pad out another episode with pointless fluff to get you closer to that looming end date. Just keep dragging, just keep dragging, just keep dragging-

But the longer I sat on it, and read the comments and posts about it in discussion circles, the more I've realized that this episode in particular has a load of issues that I don't feel good just sitting on and not talking about. Primarily because, over the course of about 90% of this episode's length, we see Lore Olympus - and Rachel - slyly undo everything that ever mattered in its subtext about consent, healthy relationships, and strong communication.

Granted, Lore Olympus has never exactly been the poster child for those things, but it's trying to be, so we're going to dissect it with an equal amount of scrutiny. It wants to be taken seriously, so I'm going to take it seriously and criticize it seriously.

CONTENT WARNING: EPISODE 265 SPOILERS AHEAD, AS WELL AS DISCUSSION OF SEXUAL ASSAULT, MENTAL HEALTH, GROOMING, AND SYMPTOMS OF MANIA, PROCEED WITH CAUTION

Episode 265 opens with an attempt at plot progression, returning to Morpheus who, last we checked, had been targeted by Kronos as the cliffhanger for Episode 259 before being shoved aside entirely for multiple episodes worth of Demophoon, pool-fucking, and a vision from Hera.

Honestly, I won't waste my 30 image limit on the episode's opening sequence because it accomplishes absolutely nothing. And by the time it starts to try and state what that goal is, it transitions away, because Rachel has the attention span of a squirrel on meth and having Morpheus state what her plan is would just be too much dedicated writing for her at this point, she needs another week at least to figure it out.

So instead we get exactly what was promised in the FastPass previews - the entire episode is spent, yet again, on Hades and Persephone, with the exact same topics, conclusions, and terrible sex as the pool scene.

Seriously, this might be a nitpick, but I'm so tired of Persephone not being allowed to swear. We've seen other characters swear. We've even had Kronos call her a "dumb fucking bitch". But this "girlboss" character who we're supposed to believe has "agency" can't be allowed to swear even when they're in an ACTUALLY STRESSFUL SITUATION? You know purity culture isn't exclusive to sex, right, Rachel? If you're gonna deconstruct it, maybe don't have the poster child of that deconstruction be relegated to a church girl? She's literally the Queen of the Underworld - adjacent to the ruler of Hell - let her fucking swear LMAO

Anyways, we see very quickly that Persephone is still feeling the ill effects of her anxiety that she was feeling in the last episode. Anxiety that, by the way, caused her to pass out. Please keep that in mind, don't let it escape.

And what is she stressing over? The genocide? The fact that they still don't have an actual solution to the ongoing "plague"?

Nah. The sleep dive. She's stressing over her husband doing the sleep dive again and - like last time - turning into a dad-possessed monster.

As always, the fear and anxiety is in no way linked to the actual devastation happening outside - it's just concern for the main male lead, because that's all Persephone's character and thoughts and opinions and "agency" can revolve around.

But uh. Remember that scene where Hades got possessed by Kronos and literally strangled her? Remember that scene I just asked you to keep in your brain about her panic attacks getting so bad she's been passing out?

Hello? No? Okay. Next.

I hate, I loathe, I detest this dialogue. Not because it's cliche as fuck - it is - but because the whole "I trust you, it's just xyz I don't trust" shit has been overplayed and debunked as a plausible response in relationship communication for years now.

We talked about this back during our discussion of Leuce - how it shouldn't matter if Persephone doesn't trust Leuce because ultimately Leuce can't do anything to her or Hades' relationship if it's built on as much "trust" as she claims it is, trusting Hades is all that should matter full stop - and it repeats itself here, albeit with Hades' dad instead of his canon first wife. This is a copout. Relationships actually built on trust can definitely still be worried about the issues posed by other people, but if you trust your partner, if you truly trust your partner, that's it. That's where the sentence ends. No shit you don't trust Kronos, we've been over this song and dance multiple times before and while he's definitely a bigger real threat than Leuce, your distrust for Kronos has nothing to do with how you're communicating with your partner who knows there's likely no other way and a solution has to be found. Nothing's being accomplished at this point from Persephone moping around and having sex with her husband, and he's showing 10x more initiative in actually finding a solution - even if it means putting his own safety at risk - than Persephone.

I didn't edit any of that, those are the legit real panels. Literally what the fuck is this dialogue, my tinfoil hat theory about LO being written by ChatGPT is becoming more and more plausible and I hate that, my crackpot theories shouldn't actually become reality.

Is there an owl in here?

LO is just spinning its wheels over the exact same conversation and points that have already been made. Nothing is being accomplished here, it's just more moping and going over the same problems - the centre of which being "what about H x P's relationship?? :(((("

All of that repetitive meandering and moping for "okay fine but if anything feels weird, get out" "okay". It, again, accomplishes nothing that couldn't have been accomplished during the pool scene.

And now we get this line. "I experienced greed in that way, and you do not possess it." Don't be alarmed if you were confused, I was confused too, as were many people in the discussion circles. Thanks to the ULO Discord, I realized she was talking about Apollo. She's literally comparing him to Apollo.

"After all this time, I can't comprehend you causing me harm. I've been at the receiving end of harm so I would know" is literally all she's trying to say. And even with it translated... I don't really like the implications of it at all. This has been a problem since S1, but there's always been this subtext in LO that because Hades didn't rape her, that somehow makes him less abusive or a better partner for Persephone than Apollo, that's all the SA has really been trying to achieve.

But Hades is abusive. He's intentionally pursued women who are in a crisis. He's trapped women in financial dependency. He's sabotaged women from having power and status on the same level as him.

And now, we're about to see actual abuse from Hades - the subtle kind that demands co-dependency, but is still abuse, full stop - but it's being framed as "romantic".

"Being an Originals creator was my big chance to prove myself, and I flopped"- wait sorry I misread. We're talking about Persephone failing at being Queen. Yeah, she definitely flopped. And it goes to show her true intentions in wanting to be Queen, now that she's hit rock bottom and isn't putting on a brave PR face - she wanted to become Queen not to make the Underworld a better place, not to be an example of being a better ruler among a gallery of scumbags, but to "prove" that she could belong and be one of the big guys, that she could be more than just a cereal box mascot.

Don't get me wrong, I can absolutely get wanting to rise above the odds and "prove" to everyone that you can be more than people's perceptions of you, but becoming the literal ruler of a realm that you then go on to destroy due to your own hubris, just to whine and cry about it and have your husband and your colleagues and your friends carry the burden of that destruction on your behalf... therapy would have been a better first step to overcoming those insecurities, not taking control over the lives of innocent people.

Especially when Persephone DID have status and power before becoming Queen, it just wasn't the specific kind of status and power she wanted. She was only a trust fund child with a huge net worth, a full-ride scholarship, and everything she could ever need provided to her with little struggle to get it - but she didn't have control over other people so it just wasn't good enough.

This is the perspective and attitude of a 19 year old who never matured. Who never could mature because she transitioned from her mother's control into Hades'. There were far better ways to prove herself, ways that we had seen her try to do, only to drop so she could pursue her co-dependent relationship with Hades - she gave up her schooling, gave up her apartment (which we only see her use maybe 2-3 times), gave up so many of her connections and support so she could be with Hades.

This is the result of 5 years of real-time grooming that we're seeing play out.

No, you are just saying them because she's your wife. You'd be saying it to Minthe, or Leuce, or Hera, or any other woman in Persephone's position because it's not about taking accountability, it's about keeping these women in a position of submissiveness and co-dependency, by giving them reassurance that nothing they ever do is wrong and that he's the only one that can give them that freedom from consequences.

And then we get the reinforcement.

I'm gonna spare you all the cringe of the actual sex scene (and yes, they do straight up go into having onscreen sex and it's... not hot at all), but here's some of the dialogue spoken by Hades during the entire sequence:

Again, let's remember the actual situation that led up to this and the position Persephone is currently in. For the third time Persephone has "accidentally" killed thousands of people. Over the past few episodes we've seen her try to realize how so many of these problems have been her fault and she clearly doesn't know how to make things right (and Rachel has made it obvious how much she doesn't want you to agree with this kind of self-awareness because much of it is being said through the mouthpiece of a rapist). And now we have Hades, reinforcing the thought patterns that would prevent her from growing and learning and changing. In this, a comic that's supposed to be "feminist", a comic that's trying to preach the importance of consent, a comic that's trying to make us believe this is a healthy, consenting relationship with strong communication skills.

These are literally grooming tactics. Hades is reinforcing the same thought patterns that will prevent Persephone from acknowledging her errors and mistakes. People are dying and Hades is telling her that if anyone has anything to say about it, they deserve to die anyways. The same man who literally rewarded her with sex for vandalizing a nymph's home is now telling her that she's not cruel, but kind:

Hades might not be Apollo, but he literally choked her out less than a week ago while possessed by his dad, and for the last SEVERAL episodes he's had the starry skin making him resemble who? Oh yeah, his dad.

Hades is literally holding Persephone in the same position Kronos did, while she's experiencing a literal meltdown that she's trying to stuff deep down - in fact, exhibiting a LOT of symptoms of mania - and initiating sex.

Doesn't this feel a little familiar?

Oh right, but he asks her if she's "still okay" mid sex only AFTER initiating chokehold sex with her without her consent and love-bombing her, so it's fine, clearly.

I remember being 17 years old and reading Fifty Shades of Grey for the first time, and even then understanding fully how toxic their relationship was. I can only hope the teenagers in Rachel's comment section can realize that as well, but judging by the comment section, I'm not holding out hope. This is literally "fifty shades of fucked up" material, and what's worse is that I can't tell if Rachel genuinely thinks this is healthy, or just doesn't realize how unhealthy it's coming across as. Even beyond how "cringe" this sequence is, it enters into the realm of being deeply uncomfortable and unsettling, and it needs to be talked about, Rachel can't be let off the hook for this especially when this is supposed to be, again, a comic that's intending to "deconstruct purity culture" and teach young girls about consent and boundaries.

And that's it, that's the end of the episode. It reads like the manifesto of a villain in the making at the hands of a predator, like Anakin being manipulated by Palpatine - "so long as you're with me, you'll have all the power, all the glory, and everyone else will be crushed underneath your heel."

Is that really the message we really want to come away from LO from? That it's fine for husbands to initiate sex with their wives through trauma-bonding and reinforcement of toxic thought patterns rooted in grooming because... they're married? That being a "girlboss" means sabotaging and abusing anyone who you perceive as a threat?

Is Hades really that much different from Apollo? Because so far, the line between his actions and Apollo's are seriously starting to blur. The parallels between Persephone and his past partners - Minthe and Hera - have always been clear, but they've never been quite so loud as last night's episode.

This is Hades' play, the play of a groomer and an abuser who depends on making their victims dependent on them - taking advantage of women while they're in a crisis.

For Minthe, it was financial - she had lost her job, blamed it on him, and he found a way to "solve her problem" that strategically put her into a position where she had to continue to financially depend on him for what's assumed to at least be a year or longer, through her apartment, her bills, and her job.

For Hera, it was emotional - she had chosen Zeus over him, and instead of addressing her marital concerns within the marriage, she participated in an affair with Hades in an attempt to have what she could have had if she had chosen Hades instead, a man who resembles her own abuser. Not only did this put her into a much more vulnerable position than him - if the affair was found out, Hera would have suffered the consequences far more than Hades - but it's also manifested itself into Persephone, who Hera has been using as a stand-in for herself, even going so far as to manipulate Persephone's image and how she goes about her decision-making, from intentionally pulling the strings to get Persephone a job with Hades so she could get closer to him as a "test" for Hades, to forcing Persephone to wear a wedding dress she wanted her to wear over the one Persephone had actually picked out herself.

And now there's Persephone, the newest addition to the cycle of abuse and untreated trauma, the true culmination of Hades' years trapping and manipulating women - financially dependent on him, emotionally dependent on him, and only where she is because she's made her entire identity revolve around him.

I'm not going to psychoanalyze Rachel in any way, I don't want anyone to think that this is permission to do so because Rachel's personal life is her own and I want to examine the material rather than the person. But so much of LO gives me such a gross impression that Rachel herself never matured past middle school, that she never grew beyond the mindset of being a 13 year old girl who felt like the entire world was against her and that no one could understand her, that she never gained the perspective most adults do by the time they're 25 at minimum after they've entered the "real world" and had the lived experiences that make you realize "wow, that girl I hated in high school for stealing my crush from me probably wasn't as bad as I thought she was and we were all just teenagers trying to navigate the hellscape that is adolescence."

And instead of actually analyzing those thought patterns and mindsets, Rachel is instead reinforcing it in her own audience of 13 year old girls and teenagers who will only hopefully maybe outgrow it and not just repeat the cycle themselves.

And this isn't entirely on Rachel's shoulders. It's on the shoulders of E.L. James, of Stephanie Meyer, of Colleen Hoover, of every "young adult" romance author who's peddled this strictly heteronormative "submission culture but not like the 1950's kind I swear" crap, that women should only aspire to find the richest man they can bag in their pursuit for power and after that everything in the world is owed to them and any problem they have can be solved by riding dick. Trauma? Solved. Genocide? Solved. The very real consequences of your own actions that affect others to such a degree that it will be felt for decades? Solved. Just ride that dick and get that money, girlboss.

Just like 50 Shades of Grey, if Lore Olympus was any other story, it would be a tragedy. It would be a masterclass in understanding and showcasing the signs of emotional abuse, financial abuse, grooming, trauma-bonding, love-bombing, and enforcing co-dependent habits for the sake of trapping people. It would be a precautionary tale to young girls to stay alert and be wary of older men, that men like Hades are depending on girls to fall for their tricks, their praise, their affirmations that they're so mature for their age, that they're not like other girls, that they would just be so set for life if they spent all their time and attention with them, so that they can "have it all".

I can only hope that even a third of the young girls who read LO naturally grow up, gain perspective, and learn that LO isn't the pillar of healthy relationships and consent that it tries to be. It's certainly a common thing to see these days, for people to join the UnpopularLoreOlympus / #antiloreolympus community with sentiments that they started reading it at age 14 and then (thankfully) learned that what LO was preaching wasn't healthy.

But for every other girl who doesn't realize this, it's reinforcement of the same cycles - the cycle of women being only objects for sex, pitting themselves against one another, confusing gender empowerment with abuse towards others, and making their entire identity revolve around a man and justifying it as healthy so long as it makes them rich and powerful.

Even if Rachel some day gets her own head out of her ass and realizes what damage she's causing in her audience, like Persephone committing genocide, no amount of self-awareness will undo the consequences. She'll still have the awards, the money, the accolades, everything she's gained off the backs of Greek myth, feminism, and good faith from an immature audience who doesn't know any better and isn't being given the tools to understand.

Even if she realizes that, that's something she's going to have to live with for the rest of her career.

And it's a fucking tragedy.

[welldrawnfish]

lunch doodle from my series popsicle girls which might be a comic or maybe ill just try to learn animation and make a pilot. her name is seasalt

[anonymouscheeses]

Sneak peak...

Some information below cut for those curious about my new au... vvv

This. IS A EVIL RILEY AU HAHARARARA 😈😈

Im so mentally ill.

I. LOVE. RILEY! So i decided sjnc3, im still in my inside out hyperfixation, y not make a comic/story for this stupid 3 am thought! (I dont know how i came up with this. I think it was during the middle of class...?)

This is goinf to be like outside in (iykyk) but obviously not the same. Its just got a dark thing going oj that may or may not be Joy's fault depending on where i wanna go with this so, Riley is gonna be messed up, its ohtside in but later in the timeline and she didnt get a lobotomy lmao. And other differences im too lazee to list! I gope you like my concept and stay for the ride 🥺🥺🙏

So, im not sure when the full concept comic will come out, maybe next month? Maybe in a few weeks idk im pretty lazee when it comes to big jproects lmao. Uhh, i think that's it, if you have any questions feel free to put an ask in my inbox or comment/reblog this post with the question!

And yes...

Val is going to go through so much pain..

(Also should i make this its own blog like i did for my ask blog, this wont be an ask!char series thing *maybe* but still, or should it stay here on this acc(i could make fanart 4 my own au and post it outside of the blog to seperate their associations with eachother properly... idk tho it seems a bit dramatic lol whay fo u thinm?)?)

(Updates on my tiktok: same @ but the username is riley andersen)

[str4ngr]

STARTERS [ SIMON 'GHOST' RILEY ]

cw: none, strangers to lovers, first meeting, not beta read, might be military inaccuracies because im not in the military, medic! fem!reader. notes: i've worked so hard [exaggeration] to make this look cute but ik its gonna devolve in 0.5 seconds. this is part one of a series. words: 1,065.

"This won't be easy."

A fair warning, a meager one too, from your new, technically, superior, Kate Laswell. You had accepted her offer as a combat medic, seeing as their next mission was supposed to take months. But those months weren't even this year, they were the next.

This year, it was your mission to become familiar with your crew, have a starter and a taste.

Considering you've dealt with plenty of irritable, ill-mannered patients in the E.D. before, it shouldn't feel so stuffy when you enter the base. You I.D. card was scanned, and you were permitted entry past the intimidating security guard who's eyes nailed you like you were his prey. You might've been.

Heels clacking, you rushed to your new office,

MEDICAL WING

A sign read, in red, right above your head. You wanted to feel like you were walking into a new life, but the stares and exhausted attempts at a smile the veteran nurses tossed you made a breath you didn't realize you were holding leave.

Luckily, offices were assigned, and yours was on the first floor.

Empty and quite sad, you tossed your backpack and purse onto your desk, which didn't even have a chair, and put your hands on your hips. Laswell had told you that they wouldn't be back until evening, it was morning.

It felt like walking into your first job, gingerly taking your steps to the staff lounge where you introduced yourself to the nurses who were lounging. They returned the gesture graciously, luckily understanding of your nerves.

Soon enough, your actual superior came to greet you, smiling and laughing with the rest of the staff as she raved about you. As soon as basic information was given, you were tossed out of your nest, bidding you a good flight. The ED never waits for anyone after all.

⚬

As your first day ended and your night began, you sat in your office, which you finally got a chair for, to sift through paperwork. Boring things never really last for long, and as much as you'd like to one-go your work, it definitely wasn't happening. Especially when your sweet nurses and the other doctors bombarded into your office, playfully asking, more like dragging, you to come with them to the mess hall.

It's impolite to say no, isn't it?

It was fun. It was like being in high school again, smiling and giggling before everyone leans into to whisper, bursting back out into laughter. Oh, and it was juicy. Real juicy, juicier when they mentioned him.

"Ghost?"

You ask, tilting your head as you raise a brow, "What kinda' callsign's that?" There was a strange inkling of familiarity of the name, just right under your nose. The nurse who was telling the story went wide-eyed, grinning at you,

"Oh, honey, he's the one with the skull mask."

The mask. The fucking mask.

Everyone could see it, how you face paled like snow, your head dropping as you gawked at them. They all laughed at your reaction, it was quite comical, though they found it funnier for reasons different than yours, teasing, "I haven't even said the story yet!"

Well, Laswell did. God, were you stupid? He was from Task Force 141! They all, allegedly, saw him in the gym, allegedly lifting double his weight, and allegedly you were blushing at the idea of the number, allegedly. And that was essentially the whole story. The nurse beside you poked as he cooed at you,

"Aw, does the doctor have a crush on her first day?" Laughing as you smacked his arm playfully, a stupid grin on all of your faces. The conversation moves on, talking about the soldiers that got into a fight, and how funny it was when one got a rhinoplasty. It felt like you were half-present, like a fever dream as your thoughts swirled together. Maybe your shift was a little too long.

But you couldn't stop thinking about him, your fork spinning the lukewarm pasta as you blandly laughed with your caffeine-high colleagues. Was he really that fascinating?

You couldn't stop thinking about him, your fork spinning the lukewarm pasta as you blandly laughed with your caffeine-high colleagues. Was he really that fascinating? Your mind ran with every though, you hadn’t even seen him today, and yet here you were imagining him, strong, tall, muscular. And of high status? he sure seemed like the pear most imaginative women would like.

But you can't expect him to be a perfect romance lead, especially the more you listened, seeing as he was quite the topic.

Everyone else seemed to just know him, know him in the sense that he was a figure of admiration. The strongest, the fastest, the most intricate, coolest man on one of the greatest task forces affiliated. They knew every little intricate detail of his service. But you didn’t. You don’t even know what they mean by a ‘skull mask’, was it a full skul? does he do face paint like a 3-year-old? You've never seen him, not that you were reluctant to the chance to.

Maybe you were insane, especially since there was the entire rest of the task force for you to get familiar with too. Well, he was one of them so you should go one by one, right—

"Ya' like to talk, dinnea ya?"

You twitched at the voice, "Scottish," You thought to yourself, "John 'Soap' MacTacvish." Laswell had some comments about him, mostly about his inability to speak understandable English, and his refusal to get a military standard haircut, aka he has a mohawk. But it wasn't just the Scot, the devil answered when his name was called.

Simon 'Ghost' Riley.

It was almost as if he knew who you were the moment your eyes met, like a fuse set off between you. Brown eyes, deep like dark chocolate, and cold like the tundra, and more magnetic than any other man you've ever seen, he stared at you, speaking to his friend,

"Seems like they do, Johnny."

Gravelly and low, almost inaudible if it weren't for your fixated ear, his voice whispered to Soap, his eyes never leaving yours. Soap, or Johnny as Ghost had so endearingly called him, grinned, plopping beside you,

"Aye, yer that new medic Laswell's been talkin' 'bout?"

You blink a couple times before you smile, nodding as you introduce yourself. Soap smiles back, polite yet inked with a bit of his eccentric personality, taking your hand into a firm shake. You smile up at the masked figure,

"You must be Ghost, right?"

He gave a bland grunt, not that you expected much more from a quiet man. Soap grinned, ignoring Ghosts lack of proper manners to introduce himself. With small conversation, they left, almost.

Although he walked away, he never left your mind, and you never left his.

⚬ ☠︎︎ ⚬

i think i'm just gonna set the reader to female bc ik i'm eventually gonna do suggestive bits so it'll be easier in the long run. lmk if you have any ideas for simon. [or the others i wrote about!!] also lmk if i should make a taglist. [part two]

EYES THAT HOLD SECRETS

directory

[bloominglegumes]

earthspark season 2 head in my hands,,,

maybe ill delete this later but i want to just get some thoughts out

spoilers below

ok i absolutely love what they set up in season one, every member of the malto family was used so well to compare and contrast with the experiences of the cybertronian characters familiar to us, these tired war veterans and resentful past allies ,,, like one of the big ones in my head right now being their choice to use bumblebee, The Kid Appeal Transformer, making him switch out of being a soldier and into a mentor (not sergeant, not commander, just unqualified older sibling-type position) for a herd of kids who have practically no concept of war and its implications was so so juicy. it's been repeated in practically every bit of transformers media ever that bumblebee is the designated little guy, the friendly one, the autobot who most easily makes friends with aliens, we've seen it in g1, in idw, in bayverse, tfa, tfp, cyberverse, i'm sure there are more versions that i can't think of at the moment

what they did to bumblebee in earthspark was essentially still put him in this best friend role, but the twist was how bumblebee did not even want to be there and didn't know a thing about kids and i loved it and i know many other people loved it as well.. even if the earthspark characters were roughly developed from their g1 base, this bumblebee was so clearly more used to being on a battlefield than just hanging out, he struggled with interactions that weren't like the 'ready to jump into a fight in an instant' dynamic that he was used to, though still having that sort of fuzzy playfulness that bumblebee is always written with ykyk

i think the writers made some really fascinating choices in taking some darker elements like in the idw comics and sort of filtering it for the audience through the malto family, but not baby-padding the real emotions behind the characters' experiences if that makes sense?? take megatrons grief and guilt for instance, the presence of the kids didn't diminish the reality of what he'd done or the consequences, but they sort of worked like a frame to have megatrons actions recounted in a particular direction. thrash's unwillingness to deal with the aftermath of a war the terrans had no part in was so.so real, ik i say it all the time but it was, the characters and the relationships between them were written with this real and intimate nuance that i really wouldn't normally expect from a show targeted for kids, not to mention the very clear and loving representation for poc, lgbtq+ identities, immigrant experiences, disabled ppl,,,

dont even get me started on the visuals, the sound design, the animation quality,,, i've only loosely been in animation college for a bit, i know there's still so much i don't know, but for sure i feel like earthsparks quality was pretty insane for regular series episodes

plus their character designers knew what they were doing + went so hard in the best way,,and the action scenes were beautifully choreographed, every character had their own unique movements and fighting style (think of the soundwave fight in decoy or megatron + optimus against skywarp + novastorm in age of evolution) in a way that i think definitely rivalled tfp in its intricacy and life-feeling. the camera work was stunning, the acting was on point and consistent for each character, the 2d effects were vibrant and gorgeous and so full of life, i'd say earthsparks effects are one of its most distinct stylistic choices and its so so excellent and i adore every smoke cloud and smear and electric zap and ghgruhgf

which is why it breaks my heart seeing season 2 open with such a noticeable decrease in quality,, breaks my heart that they didnt receive enough of a positive reception or whatever exactly it was that led to the earthspark team having to trim down and cushion their story

i still think earthspark is a really fun transformers show with a delightful cast, amazing voice actors, and i don't want to bash any particular member of the crew for things beyond their control. there's no doubt in my mind that the current team on earthspark is full of incredibly skilled artists, and i'm sure many people, including myself, will continue to enjoy the series going forward,, i'm just. disappointed that its not the best that it could have been.

a lot of season 2's writing just felt like.a regular kids show??? feels almost similar to cyberverse's fluctuation in tone throughout each of its seasons, s1 was full of generically-kid-friendly humour and gags, then sort of shockingly plummeted into that whole arc with starscream and the allspark monsters,, like, either direction would be fine and fun, but it's just the sudden change that makes it oofy for me ;-;

from just looking at the visuals, the character animation is less crafted and careful than it is in season 1,, i can really only describe it as it now being closer to what i'd think of as 'regular tv animation, made to be released on a schedule', rather than 'oh my god look at that secondary action replay replay now'. the characters movements are stiffer, less weighted, less natural-feeling, and if you're looking for it, it's clear where they loop animation or sort of sneak their camera shots to simplify actions, like a few fight scenes that had sections simplified into slowmo hit poses rather than being fully animated,, again its more or less fine for any other tv series, but it just feels off after being used to the look we had in s1

then the character animation goes hand in hand with the character writing + the dialogue, also just feeling like a lot of the original story they wanted to tell has been padded up and swaddled with more lighthearted, universally acceptable, safe plots. the goals and obstacles that came up in each episode didn't have the same emotional depth as in s1, where the main leads of each ep gained some sort of insight after their experiences + had some sort of vulnerability exposed, yknow yknow??

there are still traces of some juicier bits in there, like for instance i really like the section with the quintesson executioner causing mo to begin doubting quintus prime's intentions, then later the titan being all 'quintus is a prime and you should respect him' in a decently menacing way,, and i am glad that they had hashtag call out starscream and reminded him of their earlier conversation, i really hope they do something with those, but my point still stands that there were few parts of s2 i felt had some deeper meaning that can be built upon in the future.

i feel like the decision to make a timeskip was somewhat of a cop out as a means of explaining away how robby + mo have full control over these cybersuits now, how the maltos aren't shown having any more intra-family or identity-related conflict, how the decepticons all decided to follow starscream and go right back to fighting, etc etc, like 'oh well a year passed, things happened, this is just how things are now' like??? what happened to all that delicious heavy emphasis on growth and the choice to become better as a person and connecting to other people that was in s1,,

i know the decepticons wouldn't all have suddenly decided to buddy up with the autobots, but timeskipping a year and just reverting to the typical autobots vs decepticons dynamic we've had forever, without ever again really showing the thought processes of any of the characters in depth regarding the return to hostilities, when they just spent the whole previous season establishing how everyone is handling the aftermath of the war,,,, its like they've suddenly been turned back into generic cartoon villains instead of the unique individuals with their own thoughts and motives that they were introduced as,,

[diverting for a sec here im also just so sad that theres been nothing to fuel my enjoyment of megatron being very estranged from his high command,, barely anything to fuel the divorced-remarried 3p megoplita dynamic like,,,,, starscream praised soundwave and shockwave both individually, op and megatron had another one of those finishing-each-others-sentences moments, op called his and elitas relationship "complicated" and i love that, but please i'm begging here elaborate,,,give me more drama to work with,,]

even when there are like.objectively horrible scary things happening, like mo going 1v1 against the quintesson, cosmos being fully conscious trapped in alt mode for 15 years, jawbreaker essentially fusing with aftermath and getting betrayed and all their cavewater stolen (is that not an issue??) ,, i feel like the characters are remarkably.unreactive???? maybe its just another timeskip cop out, ~a year has passed so they've gotten used to it~, except they all still clearly behave like the children they are,.

and it seems to be turning earthspark from being, in my opinion, one of the most emotionally charged + mature transformers series out there rn into just. i'm going to say it again, it's just starting to feel like a generic kids show, unless whoever controls this show at hasbro can get it back to the high standard it started itself at.

i've read news of nightshade's pronouns being cause for negative reception, and some reviews of s1 say earthspark is too 'woke', that kids shouldn't be watching shows pushing that type of agenda. i'm not sure if that's the main reason for this big change in s2 for the much 'safer' writing, or if there's more that i'm just not aware of right now, but like. man. i hate.creativity trying to survive capitalism the show is about love and family and cool robots wtf is wrong with people who genuinely hate that

i know i won't make much of an impact with just this post, i doubt anyone is still reading this,, but seriously, earthspark is clearly a love letter made by tf fans for tf fans, in such a wonderful, gorgeous package, and it really breaks my heart so much to see all the great things established in season 1 practically go to waste. i haven't said this enough before, if you enjoy earthspark, please support it through official means however you can, leave good reviews or buy their stuff, just let the decision-makers know they can profit from making this show better,, i really hope it survives to complete the story they want to tell