#might post the version without the big shadow over it

[anicehomicidaltree]

WELL LISTEN TO THIS, HE SHOT AND HE MISSED

totally didn’t draw the entire other half, decided I hated it and covered it up with black. nuh-uh I have no idea what you’re talking about

also totally didn’t forget his wings shhh

[theavianlady]

...tw? Tw.

TW: Gore, Blood, Injury, uh...Pain and Sadness-

@psychologicalwarclaire

Ha ha! Tis I! I was the anon!

(Cue dramatic exclamations of disbelief)

Ahem. Tis the anniversary of Spider's Web with Strings Attached, and I wanted to make something! Go and read the fic if you haven't already; it's incredible.

Lots of ramblings and other versions under the cut (if anyone wants to see any other parts with or without different lighting and stuff that I didn't include, just let me know; I'm happy to share).

===============================================================

This is the first (almost) completely original thing I've drawn digitally! Poses are really hard for me, so I'm super proud of this. No tracing, only references!

...so. Many. References.

Except for the bricks, which I'm not counting, because bricks are scary. And the chains. I used a brush. Chains are scary too.

I started July 28th, and then spent almost 40 hours across various canvases planning, experimenting, and actually working on this. Not including research. It took me absolutely forever, but I regret nothing.

Except for the fact that I spent over 6 hours just shading bricks. I didn't even draw them! I took a pattern for the grooves from google and filled it with black, (rotated and edited for some variance in their cells), and then did the red lighting and some shadows you can't even really see. For 6 hours.

I tried to draw their spider brooches many times, but I could not get them to look right (especially from a side angle), so I gave up. Let's all just pretend they're there until I come back later. Eventually. Maybe. Oh, and Leo's chains. At the time of posting, I really just want to get this up and posted, so they're not shaded, but again, I might do it later.

I wanted to have this set when they're both in their separate cells, right after Viper was, uh...in the cell with Leo. So, Donnie is all stitched up and healing, while Leo is...not doing great (not certain about the timeline, because I'm paranoid about everything, so it's probably fine). But, I wanted to convey what happened to Donnie, so I drew that weird glowing spine thing to indicate some kind of mystic healing something. I don't even know.

It didn't turn out as well as I wanted it too, but I'm probably biased. Because there was so much gore on Leo's side, Donnie's looked boring. I couldn't figure out how to do the lighting. The values could be better. It could do with more time spent on the shadows. Etc, etc. I'm a perfectionist.

===============================================================

Uh, in order of posting, behold!

1. Big version.

2. Big version without lighting (except on the bricks) or Japanese characters.

3. Close up of magic spine representation thing because I'm proud of it.

4. Close up of gore-covered-Leo because I'm also proud of that. I have never drawn such...messy gore before.

Fun fact, the group of layers all of that was on is called "Bad Stuff".

5. Close up of Donnie's shell stitches without the spine thing, because I worked hard on those. It was also pretty tricky, because I couldn't find any references for large stitched wounds. Only open ones. If anyone knows any good places for references like that, t'would be greatly appreciated.

Also, they don't usually stitch puncture wounds, because it could trap infection, but I feel like with something so large and deep as dragon teeth it would be necessary? So I tried to include those.

But also, would they just stitch the skin in such deep wounds? Is there still a gaping hole under the skin? Do they also stitch muscles with the dissolvable sutures or something? I'm like, going to go to med-school just so I can draw more accurate wounds and stitches and stuff.

6. Close up of Leo without the gore because he's pretty and I'm really proud of the plastron. And the right forearm armour piece. I couldn't get the other ones to look as nice, much to my dismay.

The Japanese characters write out to Omae wa hitoribocchi da, which translates to You are alone. I think. Google Translate says it's You are all alone, but translation services that I trust slightly more, like Reverso.net and ChatGPT (the most reliable of sources, I know) just say You are alone.

Omae is the equivalent of anata, for those familiar with Anata wa hitori janai. They both mean you, but omae is more...condescending, from what I can tell. Informal and rough, often used to express disdain or superiority.

Wa indicates that anata or omae are the subject of the sentence.

Hitori is present in both, meaning alone, though from what I can see, hitoribocchi is more...desolate and painful. It's a more emotional term for being alone.

Janai kind of means is not, or are not, while da is just like...closing the sentence. A firm, declarative ending particle.

I tried to paste the actual Japanese characters from different translation services (I am not fighting with using a keyboard from another language), but Tumblr wouldn't let me. Boo. So, you can all suffer with my English-Japanese. Also, don't trust anything I say. I'm learning Japanese on Duolingo, but I've only just started and it gets way more complicated. So, pretty much anything I just said could be wrong. I just did a lot of research.

If anyone does speak Japanese, and knows a better way to convey this, please tell me. I crave knowledge and accuracy.

I should get like, a personal human translator. No AI or program can truly understand a language like its people. Especially comparing Japanese and English. From what I've learned, there are a lot of words that could be translated many ways, depending on exact feel. It's complicated, and I'm scared to get farther into Duolingo's course.

===============================================================

I also just discovered yesterday that today is also the anniversary of the Rise Movie, so yay! Happy Anniversary to the movie that literally changed my life. And Curly, you're awesome. It's authors like you keeping this fandom alive, so thank you!

[lime-bloods]

thoughts on Scratch's Parlor that don't really lead anywhere in particular:

I saw someone point out that these final three chapters consist of two different pool balls separated by what looks like it could be a sprite-oriented intermission, and that this might be taken as suggesting two takes on the Doc Scratch confrontation - the 8-ball chapter representing the version where Vriska is in control, and not the cueball. I'm torn on this.

one the one hand, I think it would be a really compelling elaboration on the "recovery isn't linear" theme for Vriska's therapyquest to not involve beating Scratch at all! (in my search for sicklyseraphnsuch's post I saw someone refer to this as scars "healing around" the trauma and moving on, which I thought was really good but immediately lost the post. shoutout if that was you.) this chapter didn't end like previous fail states; the time loop didn't repeat (Scratch specifically says no do-overs!) and we end on a level-up screen, which brings a level of finality to the interaction.

on the other: having Vriska spend some time working on herself, hanging out with the sprites like they asked, and then be able to re-approach the same situation with a new mindset and ultimately come out victorious would be a great demonstration of her ability to grow and solve problems without brute force. after all, while Vriska did level up this month, she didn't fill out her echeladder like she has in previous chapters, and her previous failures to advance in the time loop have all ended in death, either by Tavros' lance or being eaten by her mother... so maybe that's all "no do-overs" means? Scratch won't kill her, so she won't get to play this conversation out again, but that doesn't mean she can't come back and initiate another dialogue entirely, try to overcome him a different way... if Vriska needs to learn to grow without burning her candle, maybe she just won't earn any new levels in sprite chapter, and she can come back and finish what she started for the big finale?

both options clearly have thematic value, which is a great position for a story to be in.

I absolutely see the appeal of the common theory, too, that the 8-ball chapter will feature Vriska confronting herself (possibly in the form of the alternate (Vriska)). but I also think the events in Scratch's Parlor cast the idea of Vriska confronting a younger version of herself in a totally new light... one thing I realised upon reading the linked post is that the final chapter is of course represented by an 8-ball because the 8-ball is the ball the player has to pocket to finish the game. but Vriska is already in a pocket in the form of a black hole: so for Vriska to sink the 8-ball here means what, exactly? to sink another Vriska into the hole so she can be free? leaving a younger Vriska behind while the alpha continues on into adulthood would be a potent symbol of growth, for sure - but it would also be a repeat offense.

say that is the path we go down, though; the big finale to Vriska's therapy is a confrontation with herself. it occurs to me that there's an alternative - but equally nonoptimal - consequence to journeying into the underworld and confronting the shadow-self. and it's one that anyone who's seen Twin Peaks will already be intimately familiar with: what if isn't Vriska who sinks {Vriska} into the pocket to win the game? what if the "Hell Tier" Vriska who escapes from the Plot Point is in fact the shadow-Vriska? it would certainly put a dark spin on this particularly emphatic thread of philosophising we've followed in the pages leading up to now:

JAKE: [...] its nice to think that there might be countless janes somewhere out there who never stopped being happy [...] If i can believe in those janes, / i think i can let this one go. (p. 635) VRISKA: C'mon, we're not doing this again. You can't keep comparing yourself to her! She's a freak and you're like the least freakish person I've ever met. NANNASPRITE: [...] it's simply a fact of reality. [...] The past is always going to be the past. [...] And while in my twilight years of retired spritehood, I have often pondered the "could be." / Seeing that choice isn't innate to every iteration of Jane Crocker has assured me that I did indeed fulfill a path of potential to its fullest degree. I'm grateful to her for that... marginally. (p. 666)

of course, we've already seen this play out to an extent with the younger Vrissy, who Vriska evokes directly in her conversation with Momfang ("I didn’t have to go through aaaaaaaall of THAT to 8e strong. Vrissy didn’t!"). and something I've maintained ever since the the veil was finally pulled off the Plot Point is that there is absolutely no way Beyond Canon can possibly sustain itself if that damn black hole manages to produce yet another set of duplicate characters- OH SHIT

Due to principles of uncertainty regarding the existence of angels in a vacuum, each splits in to ANGEL/ANTIANGEL PAIRS. For each pair, one of the two escapes, while the other falls back into the black hole.

[emerxshiu]

FORGOTTEN LAND'S SECOND ANNIVERSARY :3

I AM SOOOO BACK

I started this drawing yesterday around afternoon and finished it just a few minutes earlier.

I went with a messier type of drawing instead of more clean like the elfilin one from yesterday, i find it fun doing it like this, mostly cause i dont have to worry about making it perfectly so i dont get as frustrated as normal. Id place this one as my second best digital drawing. im pretty sure i havent posted what i consider my best digital drawing here, tho i do have it in instagram, i might post it here one day, tho these two are way too tied up, i love how this came out, its not exactly like how i imagined it but its really close to it, and also itd say that since i dont tend to play around lighting that much, this was such a joy to draw and i cant help but stare at it a lot, at least until i start hating it because i made quite a lot of errors. i also changed my elfilis gijinka just a tad bit from last time, but its not that big of a difference, mostly.

ofc i had to draw elfilis for forgotten land's anniversary, i tend to deny it in my head but yeah they're my fave of the kirby characters even tho i hate them a bit. I wanted to draw some more doodles, like, elfilis eating cake, kirby car, a bunch of other stuff (not elfilin cuz i already drew him yesterday) but when i tried i couldnt draw anything more, guess this drawing burned me out a lot, huh?

you can definitly tell i spent all the efforts on him cuz if you look a bit closer to the bottom part you'll see its almost barely detailed, but i mean, they're the focus so make sense i guess for me not add that much detail there. um also, maybe because i dunno i had OVER 130 LAYERS jeez no wonder firealpaca was slowing down so much, i need to manage my layers better next time, tho i did do something i keep forgetting, wich is naming them (most of them at least) that was a real life saver

Also, antares (fecto elfilis' spear/cadaceus), as always, was a pain to draw, but this time its probably been draw the most accurate out of every other drawing ive made with it in it, i didnt notice it was like, a little curved when it reached the blade

some close ups since his face is a bit hard to see

silly :3

fun fact! actually, this is technically a redraw, somewhere around between february and march i started a fecto elfilis drawing for the first anniversary, but i couldnt finish it in time, and i never finished it

thats...quite the improvement! (i remember being so proud of it)

also his wings are like that cuz i did not want to draw the pattern, its way too hard, i literally copy pasted it, wait, i was talking about the 2024 version but i looked at the 2023 one and i just noticed it also has the pattern copy pasted, i guess some stuff never changes since i still abuse the ctrl+c ctrl+v to this day

Also i ended up making a huge error there, i was planing to add the phantom spears from orbital pulsar (the attack he does first when you battle them at lab discovera) but theres an innacuracy, when they do the attack, they always close their eyes, i had actually sketched him (well i mean both these drawings are basically the first sketch (2023) or second sketch(2024) with some color, shadows and lighting. i didnt do lineart in the 2024 one cuz i wanted to be a bit like the og i made (too bad i sketched that one with black since the og was sketched with white due to me drawing the bg first)) with his eyes closed but them decided to make them open for a reason i cant remember, maybe i thought itd look nicer? idk

ive had the idea of redrawing this for quite some month now so it was kinda already planned

background cuz i think it came out really pretty

doesnt have the little stars since without elfilis and the structures it looks fucked up. the actual sky in game is more blue, but the clouds have some orange, in the 2023 ver. i made the sky orange, and in the 2024 ver i wanted it more accurate, but i didnt wanna loose the orange sky, so i did a gradient. pretty...

also here's a screenshot i took when i was like halfway trough it, its barely noticeable but i changed his mouth in the final drawing

I really love katfl, like a buncha whole lot, its basically almost my first mainline kirby game. 100% the demo, finished the game in almost one day, i literally play it monthly, like, every month i put the card in my switch, start it up, get morpho sword, and go shred elfilis in lab discovera. i would probably not even be here on tumblr and the kirby fandom if it werent for it. and i love it so much i genuinly cannot express how much i like it and treasure it with words or anything

Thank you for reading my unnecesarily long rambles lol

I hope i'll post tomorrow and dont forget like usual

Jambuhbye!

[chamoemileclown]

How do you art, and where do you art?

hi my name is moe! i've doing digital 2d art since about 2017 and here's a big post about the how and where of it!

the program i use for my 2d art is firealpaca! the version i use is free to download with the exception of a popup ad that shows up when you start up the program! it's a great, very consistent, program that has updated a lot and improved since i started and i don't think i can vouch for it more. everything i include in this post applies to firealpaca specifically though you can probably do similar things in other programs im a college student on a budget and im very comfortable working with this program.

the three main brushes i use i got off firealpaca's brush marketplace! they're all free crayon brushes the first one hard one being the one i use for lineart, the second sort brush i use for sketching, and the third hard one i use for coloring. i think this might be the reason why i get some stuff about people associating my art with childhood/ children's illustrations, im a big fan of using texture where i can and these help to add a lot of visual interest.

seawatt jumpscare

you may see that my finish pieces don't have a lot of flat colors if you zoom all the way in. that's because i use a lot of noise to make the colors look less flat. it sort of reminds me of construction paper, gives a little bit of a fuzziness to it.

i have it set to color at usually around 50. i turn it down sometimes if im working on something smaller. my canvas sizes usually are about 1500 x 1500 just to keep a more consistent square shape across most of my drawings.

another thing i do to make my art pop is i duplicate my lineart layer, use protect alpha to color the duplicated layer another color that's usually brigther than the original layer, put some gaussian blur on it and add multiply or add to the blending on that layer.

with versus without the added layer! i have this set to add on 31% opacity and ill add more or less if i want the effect to be more or less subtle. it's not very noticable but i think it helps a lot with line clarity and can make something almost glow if you wanted that effect.

here's another example with a multiply layer (i turned up the opacity to give a better example) subtle and it fights a lot with tumblr image degradation but it makes me happy.

i also make a lot of use of halftoning as you can see in the examples above. I usually only use it to make shadows darker and highlights stand out but they're also really good at filling up dead space like backgrounds to make them more visually appealing

with versus without halftoning! in firealpace you achieve this by using a 8-bit layer (one highlighted) once you add the layer hit the gear icon by the layer and use that to modify the halftoning to your choosing

i usually have mine with a density of 40 but you can tweak it to your choosing. you can also change the blending type on these types of layers i usually just use multiply/ add and occasionally overlay. mess around with the opacity! make it more or less subtle! have fun!

halftoning is tricky to use in firealpaca however due to the way it works. usually i apply it with my soft crayon brush since it hangs around 35% opacity. you can get a more dense halftoning using more or less opacity on your brush and can go back and forth over the halftoning to layer more on. you can also layer two different layers of halftoning to create interesting effects

two different halftoning layers laid on top of each other ^

more opacity + two different halftoning layers laid on top of each other ^

when you go to combine all your layers however because 8bit layers when combined with regular layers lose their halftoning properties. my way around this when combining everything is going layer > merge all when going to finish up and convert everything to png.

that, for the most part is all the technical stuff. i wish i could tell you how i knew what colors to pick but for me i usually pick some variation of green and just go with it. i usually pick the lineart color with my background colors in my mind and go from there until i get bored. complimentary colors such as blue/ orange and red/ green are usually good picks.

did you notice the background/ lineart is green in this picture? that's because the red cancels it out. i sneak it in there sometimes C:

that's pretty much the how of it all, as for the where, usually my bed

that's all

[artist-issues]

Birds do it, bees do it, educated fleas do it,

let’s do it, let’s 

REMAKE THE LIGHT FURY

Toothless used to be a realistic creature, designed to balance on the visual knife blade’s edge between appealing and terrifying. He borrowed his coloration from panthers and manta rays and his movement from cats because they are real animals that master that cute-fierce combo, too. He could look menacing and then loveable at the drop of a hat. 

Then in HTTYD 2 somebody hit him with the Puppy Stick. I haven’t seen any better explanation of the visual problems with Toothless from HTTYD 1 to HTTYD 3 other than this Reddit user’s, so we’re just going to skip trying. 

https://www.reddit.com/r/httyd/comments/qasmwo/toothless_head_comparison_by_durkishdragon/

Read that. Anyway. Let’s move on to the Light Fury.  Everyone’s talked over and over the problems with the Light Fury’s design. So I don’t think I need to go into depth with that, either. Suffice to say, I believe that the way a character is designed should reflect their purpose in the story. She was never meant to be a species that was exciting to learn more about, unlike the Bewilderbeast or the Night Fury. She was just meant for cute interactions with Toothless. I think her design, sad as it is, reflects that lazy story direction. 

BUT NOT OUR REDESIGNS. And mine is no exception! If I’m going to change the story structure of HTTYD 3 (and I am) then the Light Fury has to change, big time. 

First we’ll talk about the species. 

We all know there are more than one Light Fury visible in the third film, and that’s the idea I hinged my little “fix it” re-write of HTTYD3 on in this post. I’m not going to restate it, but a lot of it focuses on Hiccup and Toothless discovering a whole Fury Flock who has migrated out of distant, hostile lands and is resting near Berk on their way to the Hidden World.

This way, instead of the Love Interest Fury just serving as Catnip that makes Toothless act dippy and cuddly, they actually have a purpose—because they’re tied to a mystery. They’re the whole plot. This way, instead of Toothless waking through the woods and happening upon a single personality-bland version of himself with no build-up, the Light Furies are a whole community and species that the story spends as much time on as they did the Night Fury in the first film.  Anyway. So while our heroes are uncovering all the interesting quirks and hierarchy of the Fury Flock, we’ll do the same!

So without further ado—bum-ba-da-dum, let me introduce you to—

The Sky Fury! 

(Click for better view)

Yeah, okay, I know it’s a different name and not too terribly different a design, but hear me out below the cut

I don’t think that just because Toothless, is straight black with faintly darker markings (basically only visible in the first movie) that means every other Fury has to be one solid color either. And why should it be white? Most white animals in the wild who don’t live in snowy environments straight up die because of their lack of pigmentation. It makes them a target and it lets reptiles get sunburnt.

But we all know that white contrasted with Toothless’ black has a certain appeal. It’s more visually interesting than a samey-same color pairing between him and any would-be Love Interest. So I kept the white, like most re-designers do.

And then I thought, well, why would Furies have to worry about being spotted by enemies���they’re up in the sky all the time anyway. So instead of having the Furies be completely black and only able to blend in with shadows and the night sky, our Furies will be mottled.

Their markings will be more visible to let them camouflage against cloudscapes in the daytime—and just like black panthers are simply leopards with overwhelming black in their coats, Sky Furies are kind of like what Night Furies might look like if you could fade back some of that intense black and see the patterns underneath. 

 So our Sky Furies are mostly white, but with hints of blue and stormy gray underneath. The youngest Sky Furies are sky-blue around their horns—which, yes, they have horns and spiny spikes, not just smooth aquatic ridges.  I basically leaned into what the original design for the Light Fury was supposed to be; rougher like an axolotl, with influences from a naturally-pale master of camouflage in the wild like the Snow Leopard or Clouded Leopard. We keep all the potential for cuteness without losing the fierceness.

Because you can’t tell me this:

Is nailing the fierce-end of the spectrum as perfectly as THIS DID: 

So the Sky Furies are called Sky Furies because one, Light Fury is a dumb name. It sounds super made-up. Like they were really just trying to rhyme with “Night.” But “Sky” Fury indicates that there’s more to know about this type of Fury besides the fact that they’re associated with Toothless. 

A few things about the Sky Fury Species:

- Only their two largest ear-flaps can move.

- They are better swimmers than Night Furies.

- They can camouflage, but they can’t echolocate.

- They communicate by clicking more often than roaring or other vocalizations. This is why their Old Night Fury leader calls to them by clicking his back spines together, open and shut.

- They have a complex social hierarchy. In one Flock, the leader’s rule is always obeyed; unlike other Dragon species, Furies aren’t susceptible to being “controlled” by an alpha. (This explains why Toothless was able to block out the Bewilderbeast in HTTYD 2. And we can just say he just needed some practice doing it, since he didn’t grow up with his own kind.) They just obey the leader in charge.

- Sky Furies must migrate from the Hidden World to Grimmel’s Land every thirty years. It is an instinctual urge, like Sea Turtles going on land to give birth or Manta Rays migrating. Theory has it their first nesting grounds were on the land Grimmel’s people built their village on top of. Ever since then, Sky Furies and Grimmel’s Tribe have been at intense war. This leaves them with no tolerance at all for humans—in fact, they’ve begun viewing people as a particularly impressive part of their food chain.

- Sky Furies are strategic, team hunters. Rarely do they set out to hunt alone. Part of their social hierarchy is that the first Fury to strike prey (being the fastest) is generally the first to eat. If a Fury is eating alone, it is because that Fury is being punished or outcasted by the others. 

- Sky Furies have almost always been led by Night Furies, because Night Furies can echolocate and sense the underground routes to the Hidden World. In return for this, Sky Furies often hunt for their leader during the daytime hours, the same way lionesses hunt while male lions protects the group.  - Sky Furies sing! This is the only way they use their vocalization abilities, and they only do it when they feel safe. That’s all I’ve got for now. More art to come—more on the specific Love Interest Fury, too.

[steddiebang]

The Rainbow Connection

Author: @hellfireloserclub l Artist: @_sweatypeaches l Artist: @hellfireloserclub Posting on Thursday, November 16

When Rainbow Graveyard made it big, performing as their alter egos Knocks and Munster, it should have been everything Eddie had ever wanted - sold out gigs, number one platinum selling albums, and a band made up of people he had fought through hell with at his side. The upside down might not have killed him, but Eddie never imagined that being on stage with Steve every night would be the thing that finally finished him. Eddie is not a person that was built to be loved, he has no idea what to do with the feelings that threaten to tear him apart. Since they dragged each other from the brink of death, he and Steve have been doing a dance to which neither knows the steps, building a life out of the trauma that follows them like a shadow, seeping into each and every crack it can find. Being a rockstar hadn't been in Steve's future plans, but it was impossible for him to deny Eddie anything, full stop. He’d helped Steve put himself back together when the upside down literally pulled him apart, and now he was pretty sure that Eddie had kept a piece of his heart and held it hostage. Steve was too much, loved too fast and too hard and destroyed everyone and everything he touched. But when he got on stage, Knocks took the wheel, and what Knocks wanted was Munster. They say that sometimes you can have too much of a good thing, and sometimes you don't know what you've got till it's gone. But how much of you is left when you're living as the personified version of your worst self?

Keep reading for a sneak preview!

Eddie looked good, and he knew he wasn’t the only one that thought so. Wherever they went these days Eddie turned heads, it was hard not to notice when it was happening right in front of you. 

Charm and charisma were always going to draw people into him, and now without the stigma he had back in Hawkins Eddie was thriving. 

Steve tried not to think about The Thing. The Thing with a capital T, that grabbed his heart and squeezed whenever Eddie was approached by someone in a bar or the service staff smiled a little too enthusiastically in Eddie's direction. 

Steve was just a good friend who ensured his people were safe. He had always been protective, forever the babysitter. Yet he didn’t feel the need to storm out of the bar and throw up when he caught Robin kissing the bartender. But when he caught Eddie a week later doing the same? It hurt, and it hurt in a way that hadn’t happened since Nancy had ripped his heart out and stomped on it. 

“Is Ed picking you up?” Wayne asked as they loaded the last of the tools onto the flatbed, having finally escaped Mrs Fitzgerald. 

Steve was about to say he wasn’t when Eddie’s van came around the corner, music blaring and windows rolled down. It came to a skidding halt not far behind Wayne's work truck, and Eddie was soon leaning out the window. Wayfarer's almost falling off his nose in his enthusiasm. 

“Get in Stevie, we’re going shopping.”  

“Who are you, Regina George?” 

Steve waved to Wayne as he climbed into the passenger seat, trying his hardest to not let his eyes rake over Eddies exposed arms, or the way the black tank top he wore stretched across his chest as he reached out to grab his lighter and ignite the end of the two cigarettes hanging from his lip, passing one over to Steve. 

It was becoming too easy to be around Eddie, he had slid into Steve’s life and now he was lighting his cigarette and walking around his apartment in the nude like he had been sent by a higher power to push all of Steve’s buttons. 

“Do I look like I would look good in pink?” 

Eddie waved to his uncle as he backed the van out of the street, ignoring the amused knowing look on Wayne’s face as they rounded the corner. Steve ignored the question, turning the station to something they could both agree on. Eddie nervously tapped his fingers against the beat during their favorite song.

Something was bothering the other man and Steve knew it was only going to be moments before he found out if it was going to be good or bad, Eddie only got this fidgety when something was playing on his mind. 

They  drove to the coast, the others would probably join them later, gather on the cliffs and talk till the sun dipped below the horizon. There would be no bars and no bartenders tonight, no need for the thing in his chest to show its ugly head, it could stay safe in the Eddie shaped hole. 

Parking up they clambered onto the roof of the van, both with overalls tied around their waists and their arms out catching the last of the sun. 

In this light, it was easy to make out Eddie’s freckles where they had started to form in clusters.

Steve was grateful for his sunglasses, they hid the way his eyes trailed the scars on Eddie's arms. His tattoos were multiplying at an alarming rate now Eddie had a stable income and hush money to fall back on. 

They were sitting close, they always were, it was like they fused at the hip most days. Eddie was almost in his lap where their knees overlapped leaning in as he threw his arms about as he talked. Always moving. A constant hypnotic presence that drew Steve closer each time. 

“So… hypothetically, if we were going to form a band…” Eddie seemed to chew the words over. “Argyle said he would be able to get us some gigs. His dad owns, like, a whole bunch of venues and bars, turns out the dude is like, mega rich. His dad owns a whole chain of hotels or something, and we were talking – over pizza, obviously –”

Steve let Eddie ramble, for all people that said Steve and Robin were the same, not many people got to witness one of Eddie’s full-scale verbal dumps, they often went on as long as Robin’s. 

Steve was happy to ride both of them out, nodding in what he hoped were the right places, enjoying the happy look on their faces when they were giving him new information.

Helping himself to a bottle of water from the bag between them, Steve listened to the twelve-point presentation Eddie seemed to have been working on since Argyle had put the idea in his head.

Steve already knew he was going to say yes, there was absolutely nothing he wouldn’t do if it made Eddie this happy.

“So what do you think?” Eddie was practically nose to nose with him now, he could feel his breath on his skin.

“Oh, I get to speak now? The mighty dungeon master deems the fallen King an audience?” Joking when Eddie was this close always felt a little too much like flirting. Steve shouldn’t have enjoyed the way Eddie’s cheeks coloured quite as much as he did.

“We all know I’m nothing if not your humble servant, sire. But yes, you may speak.”

“As long as we don’t call ourselves something stupid like zombie monkey spider brain, I don’t see why not?”

"Are you for real?" 

"Yeah I'm for real" 

Eddie threw his arms around him pulling him into a bone-breaking hug. Steve found he didn't want to let go. 

Read more on November 16!

[pencilnewt]

I dont think I have seen somebody draw as beautifully as you have, really.

The colors you use to draw make the photograph, as does the shadowing. And your ideas? Genius.

How did you learn all this great technique? Was that something you have always done or did you just start drawing?

I hope I could just tell you how amazing your art is to me (and many others)✨

thank you so much omfg!!

it’s definitely taken a lot of time and practice, i didn’t just wake up one day and know how to draw the way i do rn!! and im still learning all the time, im very self-taught!! gonna fish thru my instagram for a min and grab some screenshots of old art to demonstrate this in a sort of timeline but it feels very self-indulgent (which i try not to be too often haha) so it’s under the cut if anyone wants to see :3

i feel like im able to create something approaching the art i see in my head for the first time in my life and im SO grateful for any and all support people have given me while im doing that in a way i literally cannot express like i read EVERY SINGLE tag people leave on my art on here and it makes me want to fucking cry <3

quickly first of all i use CSP version 1 these days but over the past 9 years i’ve used nearly every free drawing program available - krita, 🏴‍☠️photoshop, firealpaca, autodesk sketchbook, ibis paint, medibang…

anyway some sketchbook drawings circa 2016/age 13 (earliest i have photos of, but i have one earlier sketchbook somewhere) at which point human anatomy was still an utter mystery to me:

got my first drawing tablet in 2017 - a little wacom intuos draw, which i don’t think they make anymore, but i still used it until about a year and a bit ago when i bought my xp-pen display tablet w my first paycheck. i think this was literally the first thing i drew on there:

a bit of a jump to 2019 (this is where i got my love for fuzzy chalky textures i think):

i try not to think about the dsmp era too much but that’s where i made some big strides (especially in my colouring) because i felt a lot of consistent motivation to draw!

& then spent a LOT of time doodling my dnd character over the past year & doing some other little reference studies when i could find the time between writing my undergrad dissertation etc. this helped me nail down drawing faces better than b4.

i’d doodled some hockey stuff on and of for the past couple of years but only started properly drawing or posting anything at the end of september!! gotta say a big THANK YOU to everyone who reblogged pens snoopy when i first posted him bc without the support from people on here i don’t think id have initially been so motivated to keep making this art that i’ve loved drawing so so much. and i’ve made friends & mutuals that i’m even more grateful for :3 1st vs most recent:

i have lots of things i wanna keep working on, here are some:

more detailed backgrounds & lighting (biggest barrier here is terrible Can’t Be Bothered syndrome)

recognisably simplifying/stylising people more!! i can do this a bit but my strength is defo semi-realism i feel

improving my composition/making it more intentional. this is the biggest reason behind making those stamp designs actually (could go into much more detail in another post about what’s behind lots of the hockey pieces i’ve made, if anyone would like to hear about that. there’s semi-often something im trying to specifically work on or practice)

more movement & dynamism!!

this is probably so obvious but i’m like. passively learning from looking at other artists’ work all the time as well as practicing. if i really like a piece of art i see online i’ll try and identify exactly WHY i like it so i can think about how i might improve my own art.

if you read this far i’m in love w you <3

[koroleva-nazyalensky]

I have my grievances with season 2, sure, but one thing they did do is conclude it in a way that I personally would have loved the Grisha Trilogy to have ended the first time around.

Like obviously, I would’ve loved more Darklina. BUT, we’ve been living off of crumbs for years now, and they made Mal less of an asshole in the show, so I knew we weren’t going to get much post war room anyways. I’m sad the tethered scenes got cut short (RIP this isn’t real—let me) and he didn’t die in her arms, BUT he didn’t say she was nothing so I’ll take that as a win.

That said, I’ve always thought that an intriguing aspect of Alina’s character development is her affinity for power.

In the book, it scares her how much she wants it because it positions her in league with the Darkling.

"You were meant to be my balance, Alina.  You are the only person in the world who might rule with me, who might keep my power in check."

"And who will balance me?"

She fears it, and quashes her hunger for it time and time again, for Mal, for her own sanity. And yet, she doesn’t get a choice when she loses it. That loss permeates through everything, even her quiet life in Keramzin.

“Sometimes he would find her standing by a window, fingers playing in the beams of sunlight that streamed through the glass…”

This quiet life she defaults to makes sense for her character because her agency in the books wavers frequently and she’s very affected by Mal’s disdain for her abilities (for like the first TWO BOOKS–). But is frankly, boring as hell for a former saint. And, like the Darkling in a way, I did think she could deign to accomplish more.

In the scenario she’s placed in at the end of season 2, not only has she distanced herself from Mal willingly, but she gets the chance to be Grisha without the Darkling looming over her. She uses Merzost to revive Mal, has full control over her powers with all three amplifiers at her disposal, and used the cut, completely destroying a Grisha under the influence of Jurda Parem. On top of all this, she has fully accepted her role as Sankta Alina and is on her way to be Queen of Ravka. 

Think about the implications of this. A big theme in the books is that *ouat voice* all magic comes with a price, dearie. If Alina gets to keep her powers, it’s implied that she also gets to keep her prolonged life. She is at an all time high, her impulse controls are dead and out at sea, and her inflated pride has the potential to lead her to THE MOST satisfying fall.

When she uses the cut (in the same way the Darkling does) the upshot and shadow in her eyes as her mouth upturns slowly–UGH I’m honestly living for it. And like, we know she needs something to do while the crows are out there ice court heisting right? RIGHT? I’m not saying this is where I saw this show going, but since we’re here in this HD fanfiction world why NOT have Dark!Alina? How would show!Alina, crack under the Apparat’s influence? Who’s going to be her balance when the Darkling and Mal are gone and Nikolai is literally dealing with his own demon?*cough* and falling for Zoya *cough* What would it take to get this girl’s hair white? And what do I have to do to get a Yurified Darkling in the same room as her?

On that thought, (pardon my unabashed love for drama, I am a Darklina girlie in this Malina world above it all) if we even get to some version of the KOS Duology, does this mean she’ll still be Grisha when the Darkling comes back as the Black Heretic? Will she be queen? A mad saint shunned in the same way he was? A self-fulfilling prophecy? How absolutely delicious would that reunion be? For her to stab the monster and then become him? She wouldn’t be able to look him in the eyes and take the high ground like she did in the sanatorium scene. Everything he tried to warn her about would come to fruition. They could face each other as equals who made some decisions and just like retire together for eternity. (My delusional Darklina shipping ass is brought to you by Start a War btw… I read it immediately after Ruin and Rising on ff.net the first time around, I highly suggest it if you too are suffering)

To get back to the point, were it not for the Duology and the Zoyalai of it all, I’d honestly be for the Sol Koroleva route all the way. I mean, look at her!!!

Don’t you just want to see her gain the world, and then lose it all in the time it takes the crows to break Matthias of Hellgate? You can’t tell me a season 3 with an OP Sankta Alina dealing with post-civil war Ravka wouldn’t be entertaining at the very least.

Like, of course at the end of the day I want Zoyalai endgame with blue ribbons and rings the size of an acorn, peep the url, besties. But GUYS come ON we know how these things go. Mal’s gonna come back, reign her in and they’ll eventually end up in that boring orphanage with a cat or whatever anyways. In the meantime, we could have so much fun!

If you approach the show as you would fanfic, it’s not as maddening. Trust me, I’m a Darklina shipper and a Zoyalai shipper– you can’t even get to one of those without stabbing and burning the other. I know the showrunners would sooner give us some random love triangle with Tolya and Inej (a topic for another day) than all this but a girl can DREAM.

In conclusion, I did not prematurely lose David for nothing, I need to know where they’re going with this, so please be more chill so we get that unhinged season 3, thank you.

[whistwhistler]

kacy wedding aesthetic hc's

i'd posted this on twitter but thought i'd also share on here (with expanded thoughts because of that dang tweet limit) but for whatever reason suited!wedding kacy has been living in my head rent free for at least twelve hours and needed to get it out there somewhere, so please enjoy this little curation of what i think kate and lucy would wear & do for their wedding (keep in mind, i'm also big on details - so be on the lookout as to how i'm tying both kate and lucy's looks together to complement one another!)

kate's outfit

without a shadow of a doubt, kate is wearing a white suit. the look is actually perfectly captured in the bottom left photo. it's still classy, elegant, but not traditional by any means. she'd wear a double breasted blazer, wide leg pants (as she already basically does on the show), she'd have a minimal floral arrangement, and classy, but not over the edge jewelry to tie it all together (again, as she already does in the show). i just think this elevates the look she's already pulling off, but in a way that's very different to what work whistler would wear.

1b. Shoes

shoes depend on the length of her pants and if she wants to be towering over lucy on their wedding day haha. but i imagine she'd wear open toed shoes - heels or flats (similar to what she wore when she won lucy back in tennant's backyard, and similar to the first 2 pics above)

1c. hair

maybe i'm still riding off the absolute elation 2x11 gave me, but i 100% am convinced that kate would wear her hair exactly how she did in 2x11. it's immaculate. it's giving. it's stunning. loose/relaxed waves tied back into a half-pony??!!!?? oh my GOD. i'll literally never shut up about this. also - circling back to jewelry, she absolutely would wear these hexagonal earrings. they are in their own unique way, a statement piece. holy. i'm not going to dive into the symbolism of a hexagon or the meaning of the number 6, but in your own time, check it out - you won't be disappointed

2. lucy's outfit

lucy is absolutely going to rock the all black power suit. i don't think she'd go the route of wearing a tie/bowtie, but i do think she'd do something along the lines of a mockneck-type shirt that has a nice silk or sheer material. pants would be a little more tapered - not as wide as kate's, and hemmed just above the ankle to give her some options on wedding day (i will expand on what i mean by 'options' in 2b.)

2b. shoes

lucy would wear some really really nice chelsea boots or loafers/mules (depending on if she wants height for their wedding photos but she also might not really care and i vibe with that. also, she's definitely the type to be indecisive about what shoes she wants to wear on wedding day, so she ends up buying both the chelseas and loafers because she already knows she may possibly lose a shoe and not have a backup shoe that matches the first pair so she'll have to settle for the second choice pair) for jewelry she'll probably keep it minimal as well - simple hoop earrings, perhaps a tennis bracelet (teehee), and her signature big a$$ watch.

2c. hair

i'd like to think lucy would do something along the lines of a slicked back, crisp pony BUT hear me out - middle parted!! because a middle part is so sexy!! (but also i don't know how well that would work with yas' hair because she does have a lil cowlick but also she could do a slightly off-centred middle part??? man idk i'm not a hair stylist i just think she looks really good here) and she'd do it obviously because it matches the vibe of the rest of her all-black outfit. it's slick. it's sleek. it's giving john wick but the lady version. and i'm here for it.

3. wedding bands

so i had posted this on twitter without explaining that these two photos aren't kate and lucy's rings separately - i think they absolutely would have matching bands. but either of these is the direction i think they'd go. they're minimal, not too flashy, but still lets everyone know that they got money in the baaaaaaank (another hc of mine: kate really likes gold jewelry and wouldn't go for anything less than 24k). realistically i think they'd go for the wedding band on the left - it's not too flashy for work, it's not overly thick or as ugly as some wedding bands are (i'm sorry but also not sorry), and it's just them. i don't know how else to explain it. buuuuut, in a theoretical world, they would have bought rings for each other like on the right as engagement rings (because we all know that when time comes to propose, they're both going to uno reverse each other when one of them proposes first because the other was absolutely planning to propose as well) AND THEN STACK THEM. BOOM. Gold band & Diamond encrusted band to give them the bling but still keep it lowkey. (I just don’t think they’re big Diamond rock people sorry)

4. ceremony venue

kate and lucy strike me as sentimental people (despite lucy being one to "pack light"). i think they're the kind of people who hold places that have a lot of meaning near and dear to their hearts. i like to imagine that they would use their little beach from 2x07 to do their ceremony at (and they would do a closed ceremony - they'd rent that entire beach out for family and friends). it's a place that's symbolic to lucy slowly conquering her fears and kate being steady, safe, and secure enough in their relationship that they would overcome that little obstacle. it's also a place where lucy learns to really compromise, because she knows that the ocean is something that kate adores, respects, and reveres: that despite it's vastness, there is beauty. there is life. and like their love for one another, it's wave after wave after wave. and it washes over them (hypothetically, because lucy still will never set foot in the ocean).

5. reception venue

again, with kate and lucy being private people and having a small guest list (by choice, they also hate being the centre of attention), i'd imagine they'd use tennant's backyard because of how special and significant the tennant home has become in their lives: finding ohana, being invited over for dinner or drinks, it literally being an open-door home for any of them whenever they needed; it's the safest space they know. it's also where kate won lucy back. full circle baby. (also julie is absolutely the wedding planner. she knows everyone else will be way too busy with work to even get down to the planning. so she creates moodboards and they quickly find that she has a knack for wedding planning despite her age).

that's all! thanks for coming to my kacy wedding aesthetic headcanon ted talk!

[uncleskyrule]

for the fic writer ask game, 1, 26, 30, and 41? :))))

1. What fic of yours would you recommend to someone who had never read any of your work? (In other words, what do you think is the best introduction to your fics?)

Oh boy, this is tough. I experiment with writing styles frequently, so idk if there's just one that could be a good introduction to them all. Still, I guess I'll go with this one: "alive again" (short oneshot of post-BotW Zelink being cute and silly).

26. Would you rather write a fic that had no dialogue or one that was only dialogue?

Lol since you sent this ask, I've written two entire fics without dialogue: "this one at last" (TotK Zelda's POV of waiting for LInk) and "you waited smiling for this" (HW Link's journey of self-destruction and then healing). I'm interested in trying out a dialogue-only fic, but I don't have any ideas yet. There has to be a reason why there's only dialogue, y'know? I don't want to just write it that way just because.

30. Have you ever written something that was out of your comfort zone? If so, what was it, and how did it affect your approach to writing fic thereafter?

Yes, and I'm so proud of it! I've never written whump or any kind of fight scene, and definitely have never mixed humor and angst before, so writing this fic was a challenge, but it totally worked! One commenter said that this fic felt like someone put Looney Tunes music over an action film, and the compliment hasn't left my head since. Without further ado, I present "holding out for a beedle" (BotW Link gets captured and tortured by Yiga but Beedle saves the day).

Maybe this fic affected my approach to writing by giving me confidence to explore more. Now that I know I can write a decent fight scene, I want to try to push myself to write something more in depth, like a spar between HW Zelink.

41. Link a fic that made you think, “Wow, I want to write like that.”

HAh, you think just ONE fic will suffice??? I had a hard time choosing from my bookmarks list but here are some that fit the bill:

I STOP TO SMELL THE BLOOD IN THE TREES AND FOR A MOMENT THE WORLD IS SO BEAUTIFUL IT BRINGS ME TO TEARS by @corpsentry

“Let’s say you’ve been asleep for a hundred years and when you wake up you’ve lost all your memories, but you defeat the big bad monster like you’ve been told to, because a girl told you to, and because you were in love with her. And after defeating the big bad monster she comes back, only she’s not the person she was a hundred years ago. And you’re not the person you were a hundred years ago. And yet every time you look at her, your chest hurts so bad you think you might be dying.” He looks up from his breadstick. “Am I dying?” “No,” Beedle says. “I think you’re stupid.”

among golden hues by @syilcawrites

[totk] Link and Zelda reunite (in one form or another)

on gods and deserts and children by @lemoncakedesign

he is the hero chosen by the goddess. he is the bearer of the legendary blade. he is the savior of a land. he is a child. he is a killer.

Hold your faith in death and don't breathe by @sister-dear

The thing Legend hasn’t told Sky, hasn’t told any of them: Twilight isn’t the only one with an item that lets its user change shape at will. The thing Sky hasn’t told any of them: his version of the Master Sword has a few special tricks of its own.

Old Car, New Roads by Anonymous (TT)

A hum of an old engine in distress fills the air as a dark lowrider pulls up in front of the rows of storage units. The beater pull to a jerking stop in front of his garage unit. The brakes lurch unhappily and Four cringes at the sound of the wheels. The whole car vibrates unhealthily before coming to a stop as the engine cuts out. The window rolls down with a squeak and Shadow pops his head out, arm leaning out of the opening. He's got dark sunglasses and the hood of his jacket pulled up to protect him from the midday sun. "So?" Shadow asks, smirk pulling at his lips, "What do you think?"

Thanks for the ask, Evie!

[apocalypticavolition]

Let's (re)Read The Eye of the World: Chapter 1: An Empty Road

Welcome back to my reread! As will always be the case but isn't usual yet because we're just getting started, this post has spoilers for everything ever and should not be looked at if you don't want to see those. In fact, just telling you that spoils this very post, so it's already too late!

The Wheel of Time turns, and Ages come and pass, leaving memories that become legend. Legend fades to myth, and even myth is long forgotten when the Age that gave it birth comes again. In one Age, called the Third Age by some, an Age yet to come, an Age long past, a wind rose in the Mountains of Mist. The wind was not the beginning. There are neither beginnings nor endings to the turning of the Wheel of Time. But it was a beginning.

A comfy paragraph that feels like home. Someone could literally plagiarize this and I wouldn't care because it's such a good way to start! More book series should try and have very consistent beginnings, it really adds a lot.

Oh, and I should probably mention chapter headers. This guy has the "Wheel and Snake" motif, which is a generic Plot kind of deal.

Note that I am skipping over a second prologue that was added to these books when they were (for some reason) trying to make a YA version of the series that cut each book in half. That prologue, "Ravens", is one I've never read (or maybe I have but only once) and features Egwene al'Vere a few years before the series begins. Maybe I'll circle around to it someday, but I'm very big on only accepting works as they initially were (barring fixing typos or outright plot holes) and not with a whole bunch of doodads attached.

...the wind blew east, out across the Sand Hills, once the shore of a great ocean, before the Breaking of the World...

Interestingly, the most likely body of water for this to be is actually the Mediterranean, not any of the oceans proper.

Gusts plastered Rand al’Thor’s cloak to his back, whipped the earth-colored wool around his legs, then streamed it out behind him.

Rand has a lot of associations with wind (Loial even notes it in-universe) and also the land, so it's appropriate that we get both here with the wind blowing through the earth-colored wool. Note as well that while the earth is protecting him (though not especially well), the wind has been turned by the Shadow into something hostile.

He felt a little foolish about wanting to reassure himself that Tam was still there, but it was that kind of day.

Considering his later thoughts about wolves and bears, it doesn't even seem that foolish. Take it from someone who just a few weeks ago was dealing with being separated from family on a Canadian highway that definitely had bears.

Without thinking he touched the nock of the arrow; it was ready to draw to his cheek in one smooth movement, the way Tam had taught him.

Tam's influence on Rand looms large over the series, which does set up the reversal in TGS and the breakdown it causes quite well.

Wolves raided the sheep pens and chewed their way into barns to get the cattle and horses. Bears had been after the sheep, too, where a bear had not been seen in years.

It's rather interesting to imagine what might have happened to Perrin if Moiraine hadn't taken him away. The wolves would likely worm their way into his head by about the time he met Elyas in canon anyway, only he'd be in such a different context it's not hard to imagine him going really off the rails. Someone who actually finishes what they started should write a fic!

With his thick chest and broad face, he was a pillar of reality in that morning, like a stone in the middle of a drifting dream.

And Tam's being a metaphorical pillar of reality is of course set up for the fact that by the end of the series Rand himself will be a literal one. It's really impressive how clearly Jordan saw the ending of the series; the Slog in my opinion is likely a product of his uncertainty in how to get there.

[Rand's mother] had been an outlander, and Rand remembered little of her aside from a smiling face, though he did put flowers on her grave every year, at Bel Tine, in the spring, and at Sunday, in the summer.

It's terrible being a mom for a protagonist, even an adoptive mother. Death is the best you can hope for.

But Tam had given his word about the brandy and cider, even if he had waited to make delivery until the day before Festival. Keeping his word was important to Tam.

"Belief and order give strength." If Tam had accompanied Rand on this journey, the whole thing would have been over in five days tops.

As Rand watched his side of the road, the feeling grew in him that he was being watched. For a while he tried to shrug it off. Nothing moved or made a sound among the trees, except the wind. But the feeling not only persisted, it grew stronger. The hairs on his arms stirred; his skin prickled as if it itched on the inside.

This is of course Rand's channeler sense for Shadowspawn. Does this mean he's already channeled at some point this winter, or do sparks like him get the various gifts before they start because it's inevitable that they will anyway? I wonder if Nynaeve (and maybe Egwene if sparks do get the spidey sense before channeling) has spent the last few days being itchy as all hell and not having a clue why. It would add another reason to her bad temper over being asked about the weather.

Not more than twenty spans back down the road a cloaked figure on horseback followed them, horse and rider alike black, dull and ungleaming.

"You're in the wrong franchise! Hobbiton's on the other side of the shelf, between Rosewater and Sounis!"

I get that Jordan had to channel a bit of Tolkien because it was the 80s and that's how you got published, but I have to say that sometimes I think he leaned a little too far into it. At least Myrdraal get weirder as we go.

There was only shadow to see in the hood

If Sanderson had been writing the series from the start, he would have rationalized that a Fade being able to step out of any shadow means it could step out of the shadow of its hood and then repeat the process to gain altitude rapidly, allowing the Shadow to orbitally bombard its enemies when the Fades stopped and fell back to Earth.

Abruptly a stone caught his heel and he stumbled, breaking his eyes away from the dark horseman.

Rand was a shy, awkward, inwardly beautiful teenage girl, just like you.

(Seriously folks, plot-convenient clumsiness is not gender specific and we should call it out in our boy protagonists too!)

Tam shook his grizzled head. “If you say so, lad. Come on, then. A horse leaves hoofprints, even on this ground.”

More proof of Tam being a good dad that even though Rand's talking nonsense, he checks it out. Of course, it wouldn't be surprising if Tam had experience with Shadowspawn somehow. Probably not though, since he was mostly involved in Illian and the Aiel War.

The wind that beat at Tam and him had not so much as shifted a fold of that black cloak.

More on the earth/air duality, with air being the masculine half tainted by the Shadow.

once he had even gone to the very foot of the Mountains of Mist, him and his closest friends, Mat Cauthon and Perrin Aybara.

Two complete nobodies who we'll never hear about again, naturally.

Today, though, the Westwood was not the place he remembered. A man who could disappear so suddenly could reappear just as suddenly, maybe even right beside them.

Maybe even fall on you from orbit!

Though I suppose the earth half of things being unfamiliar now does cut against the symbolism I'm envisioning, but I'll leave resolving that as a Freudian exercise for the reader.

Rand managed a weak smile. Of all things he might want to think about right then, the Mayor’s daughter was far down the list. He did not need any more confusion. For the past year she had been making him increasingly jittery whenever they were together.

18 seems a little late to be hitting puberty, Rand. Seriously, if it weren't for the narration earlier calling him and Tam "two men", I'd assume he was supposed to be 14-16 at this point.

“Remember the flame, lad, and the void.”

This technique actually does kind of work! I've used it a lot during painful dentistry and stuff. Sadly, I'm no good at remembering it when I'm in an emotional state, which is when it would be most useful, but maybe someday I'll learn.

(Probably not.)

Some said the land was too rocky, as if there were not rocks everywhere in the Two Rivers, and others said it was hard-luck land. A few muttered that there was no point getting any closer to the mountains than needs be.

Having recently been exposed to the "The Two Rivers is contaminated with radioactive fallout from the Trolloc Wars" theory, I have to note that this feels a bit like evidence for it even though I don't believe it in general - in particular, the cats having a weird number of toes happens all over the place in real life when they start getting too inbred.

goodwife

This is an interesting word choice! Goodwife (masculine "goodman"; abbr. "goody", from which we get "goody two-shoes") is an archaic form of address that started in the 1300s and died by the 1800s, with the English and Scots using it first and the Puritans later. It referred to women of high social status but non-gentry in Europe and in America we have no clue what exactly the Puritans meant except that it was respectful. Here in EF, the term likely either descends from the days when there were gentry to talk about, or has arisen in the Puritan sense.

Whether or not leaves had appeared on the trees, no woman would let Bel Tine come before her spring cleaning was done.

And here we come to Jordan's worldview again. The Two Rivers folk are meant to be pretty gender egalitarian, but here we see that they have the exact division of labor that the idealized American town does, with women doing interior chores and men doing exterior ones. This is treated as being inevitable, even though of course it doesn't have to be and in most real societies gendered division of labor is only ever a sunny day ideal and abandoned in part or in whole in rougher times like we're supposed to be in now, with spring a month late. Hell, even in a culture with similar gender norms to the west, ("Women care about the house, men do rough work"), you could easily see them ending up dividing things the other way, with women expected to thatch the roofs to maintain their nes- I mean homes and men beating the shit out of carpets because their big manly muscles let them get it done faster. See how easy it is to use sexist logic to justify the exact opposite of what western sexism usually does? (Fun fact: That's because sexist logic is almost completely arbitrary.)

It would be rather nice to see a generic Arcadian farming village that has radically different expectations for men and women while still being superficially similiar to the ideal homestead, really. Jordan missed an opportunity.

Tam spoke of damage from winter storms, each one worse than the one before, and stillborn lambs, of brown fields where crops should be sprouting and pastures greening, of ravens flocking in where songbirds had come in years before.

As a big corvid fan, seeing them always be associated with evil when they're really quite social and intelligent makes me sad.

[Wit] never seemed ready to start over, or to finish what he started the first time. Most of the Coplins and Congars were like that, those who were not worse.

Kind of odd to transition from "Life is hard out here and people who aren't willing to work hard can't cut it" to "Meet the Shithead and Lazyfuck Clans, the inbred hicks." It's realistic to have shittier families in communities, but usually these families in the real world at least have something going for them.

“What are we going to do about Nynaeve, al’Thor?” Congar demanded. “We can’t have a Wisdom like that for Emond’s Field.”

Wait a few days and the problem will take care of itself, Wit. Ten whatever-kind-of-coins-are-legal-tender-here says that he was probably the first to bitch about their village not having a Wisdom the second Nynaeve crested a hill and disappeared from view.

“You try meddling in Women’s Circle business, and see how you like eating your own cooking. Which you won’t do in my kitchen. And washing your own clothes and making your own bed. Which won’t be under my roof.”

Guess Daise married from outside the clan, since she seems like a relatively decent sort. Also note again the 1950s division of labor; plenty of dudes knew how to do "women's work" across history because even if you were lucky enough to always have a mommy-wife (yes that's exactly how icky 1950s-lovers are) on hand and never had to go to war or a logging camp or spend a few years in early adulthood fending for yourself, sometimes Mrs. Mommy would be bedridden from all the exhaustion of being a brood mare with unrealized aspirations and then you'd have to learn how to keep the household going anyway because hiring (or enslaving) a dark-skinned maid to do everything for you wasn't an option.

When they saw Tam, the goodwives of Emond’s Field went on point like hounds spotting a rabbit.

I feel like this is another bit of Jordan's local culture being mistaken for human nature. There's definitely gals who will try to set you up if they know you're single, but there's guys who'll pull the same stunt and neither gender has a 100% attempt rate unless compelled to by their society. Then again, for all of it being presented as the ideal, the Two Rivers community is definitely all about meddling in each other's business and assuming you're too stupid to breathe because you don't have the right kind of genitals, so I suppose it makes sense the women feel like they have to.

Worst of all were those who paused thoughtfully at about that point, then asked with elaborate casualness exactly how old he was now.

Based on later books, Egwene would have been pissed to hear about this. It's probably not canonical in later books though, since the exact details of their relationship change quite a bit in the first three.

Outsiders sometimes found it funny that the road had one name to the north and another to the south, but that was the way it had always been, as far as anyone in Emond’s Field knew, and that was that.

I struggle to think what rock these outsiders must have been living under to find the idea of a road changing names funny. It's the sort of thing that happens when two separate roads are brought together, and I know that the west is slowly decaying, but still.

No one knew when the custom began or why—it was another thing that was the way it had always been—but it was an excuse to sing and dance, and nobody in the Two Rivers needed much excuse for that.

It's a dick joke, ya hicks!

Or possibly a reference to the queen blowing herself up. That seems more dignified.

And to top everything, if the rumors could be believed, a grand display of fireworks was planned for the Green—if the first peddler of the year appeared in time, of course.

Another moment that feels a bit too Tolkien, with the book opening on a celebration graced with fireworks, but hey at least the Illuminators end up having a lot of plot relevance in this story, so it builds well.

At the south end of the inn, away from the stream, stretched the remains of a much larger stone foundation, once part of the inn—or so it was said.

I would guess that the foundation was once the local garrison in Manetheren, or at least a more prominent building for the village mayor. Maybe even a place where Andorians of import might stay, since it would have to be relatively recently ruined to have not been torn apart by the tree roots in the last few hundred years.

“An ill omen,” a scratchy voice announced, “no storks nesting on the rooftops at Bel Tine.” Cenn Buie, as gnarled and dark as an old root, marched up to Tam and Bran and leaned on his walking staff, near as tall as he was and just as gnarled.

Narrative doesn't treat Buie kindly either (and not unfairly), but he's not wrong here. Things are only going to get worse, especially here in the Two Rivers.

Ask the Wisdom when the winter will end, and she walks away. Maybe she doesn’t want to tell us what she hears on the wind. Maybe what she hears is that the winter won’t end. Maybe it’s just going to go on being winter until the Wheel turns and the Age ends. There’s your point.

It's interesting that while Cenn thinks Nynaeve is too young, his fearmongering here is based on the assumption that she is perfectly competent. This double think is quite distressingly common in certain circles.

Rand’s smile broadened; it did not sound as much like fun to him as it would have a year or two back, but Mat never seemed to grow up.

Again, this sequence feels like it works better with Rand and Mat being 14-16, with badger pranks seeming like something more fun at 12-14. I wonder if, a bit like GRRM, Jordan assumed he'd have some time skips in his story that would get Rand into his 20s from a younger age, and then abandoned the concept as the plot continued to demand immediate action.

“Funny how being scared takes you. You think strange things. I actually thought—just for a minute, mind—it might be the Dark One.”

Mat's not too far off!

“The Dark One and all of the Forsaken are bound in Shayol Ghul, beyond the Great Blight, bound by the Creator at the moment of Creation, bound until the end of time. The hand of the Creator shelters the world, and the Light shines on us all.”

Note that it's not quite true: not all of the Forsaken are bound, none of them were bound by the Creator (arguably not even the Dark One), and the Forsaken are all about to break free. Over the past few millennia the Forsaken have really had a glow-up.

“My mother always said the Forsaken would come for me if I didn’t mend my ways. If I ever saw anybody who looked like Ishamael, or Aginor, it was him.”

Considering that Ish is currently serving flaming looks and Aginor is decayed as all hell, this is again not all that wrong.

Now his name came up whenever a washline dropped the laundry in the dirt or a loose saddle girth deposited a farmer in the road. Mat did not even have to be anywhere around. His support might be worse than none.

While I do think Nynaeve and Egwene are too hard on the boy, it's important to remember that this is Mat's reputation at the start of the series: his own best friend doesn't want his public support on a major issue.

Rand stared wonderingly. No one traveled beyond the village by night, not these days, certainly not alone.

Why did Thom come in the dead of night? Taren Ferry should have been a perfectly good place to stop, and with things being like they are you wouldn't think him in much of a hurry to wander among the wolves even though he can take care of himself. Do we get an answer to this?

That alone is worth the expense of bringing him down from Baerlon.

Oh and Thom's been close enough that he'd know all the environmental dangers quite well, so that really just makes me all the more curious.

“You have a head on your shoulders when you choose to use it,” Bran said. “He’ll follow you on the Village Council one day, Tam. Mark my words. He couldn’t do much worse right now than someone I could name.”

We can see here that Rand really is a political thinker, though of course he's going to rise far beyond a simple village council.

“Oh, why not?” Mat said resignedly. “Like your da said, the quicker it’s in the cellar. . . .” Picking up one of the casks of cider in both arms, he hurried toward the inn in a half trot.

And we can see here that Mat really is good to his friends, even if he is a rogue.

And that's pretty much chapter one! Rand and dad walk down a road, Rand sees an incarnation of evil, dad gossips throughout the village, local crotchety old man and scheming youth spread rumors. Like the prologue, this sequence wasn't really particularly adapted by the show. We instead have:

Moiraine giving us a really awkward summary of the plot thanks to executive meddling.

And it's here I should point out how many different reasons season 1 needed to make changes from the book. There's executive meddling, there's plague, there's the inevitable changes from page to screen, there's stuff that is clearly about appealing to the director, there's stuff that seems to be about keeping Rosamund Pike onboard, there's... a lot. And Rafe gets the blame for all of it which is really unfair because properly speaking we should only blame him for the stuff that's about appealing to himself. Blame Jeff Bezos for this one, folks. Anyway then we get:

Liandrin (who isn't even in this book!) and her posse of Rad Red Bad Bitches hunting down... let's pretend it's Gorin Rogad even though the timeline doesn't line up at all, and also Gorin's imaginary best friend. Moiraine and Lan watch from above and decide to go to Two Rivers.

Lots of people who want to make everything about culture wars complain about Obviously Evil Witch Liandrin being Horribly Misandrist In Ways That Sexism Has Never Been Done Before in this scene and I don't have patience for that kind of nonsense either. The scene's kinda rushed I think, and I am even more flummoxed by there being rumors of anything out of the Two Rivers, let alone four ta'veren, but whatever, plot's happening.

Egwene gets her hair braided for the first time (a practice mentioned in this chapter) and then Nynaeve tries to kill her to prep us for the saidar metaphor.

Frankly this is also rushed - a real problem in this episode because they wanted extra time for the premiere but were told to go feed their mothers to the Myrdraal while Jeff Bezos swam in a bathtub filled with 50 dollar bills - and because of all the cuts this episode had for time it feels a bit weirdly out there, but again we really needed to make surrender as literal and visual for TV watchers as possible so I know what's up.

Our closest scene to the books is Rand and Tam taking the old road to town and Rand freaking out about something that he assumes is wolves.

It's very abrupt and Rand is kinda douchey with his "I used to be a sap" line. It also used to be the first scene in the episode (I remember the outrage when people found out they were skipping the prologue) but the execs clearly forced it to be shuffled around. Probably would have been longer too.

Cut to town. People are setting up for Bel Tine and the air is generally happy instead of nervous like the books. Rand and Tam unload in the tavern and then Rand drinks with his friends, Mat, Perrin, and somebody else! She beats Mat at dice, Mat begs his friends for cash to keep carousing while bitching that Perrin is a good husband and accusing Rand of being a sheepfucker, and Egwene arrives with everyone very happy that she lived after the murder attempt.

Generally I think it's smart to trim down the parts of this chapter after the rider even in an episode that isn't desperately trying to fit into an hour, and introducing Perrin alongside Mat is something that works well for TV because it's easier to have interweaving conversations in real time. It also isn't a bad idea to age the characters up some (Rand and crew have to be about 20 now, per Moiraine's comments while watching Gorin get gentled) and abandon kiddie activities like badger pranks.

That said, the generic wholesomeness of the town is gone and that one lady who has spilled booze all over herself needs to slow down, like geez, you don't even know if Egwene is alive yet so why are you clearly already sauced? Hell, why is Rand carousing if he should be worrying whether or not his girlfriend was dashed against the rocks? Why is the mayor just chatting with Tam like nothing is up? That river initiation ceremony cannot possibly have a 100% survival rate and I suspect very strongly that its initial placement in the script was very different and only patched together like this because they didn't have time because seriously.

Oh and this is as good a place as any to talk about the elephant in the room to clear out the wrong sort of people before they get any ideas: no, the Two Rivers is not the bastion of Racial Purity it is in the books (we'll discuss that more in the reread when it starts coming up beyond a single acknowledgement that Rand doesn't look like most other folk here), and fuck no that is not remotely a problem. Even ignoring the sheer difficulty of getting enough extras of any ethnic group (and guess what people, "white" is too broad a group in this context and does not constitute a distinct "look" like the Two Rivers people have, you'd have to do "Polish" or "Irish" or something and then you're still making casting everything else a pain in the arse), the simple fact of the matter is that Zoë Robins is perfect as Nynaeve, Madeleine Madden is perfect as Egwene, Barney Harris was perfect as Mat, and maybe someday Marcus Rutherford will grow on me as an actor or at least get a subplot that isn't stupid or both! Together they cover a very broad range of human ethnicity and getting rid of any of them (let alone *most* of them) for racial reasons would be pathetic and would hobble the show even more than Amazon and COVID already managed to do. Shame on you for suggesting it and good day - good here being a word meaning "I hope you achieve some semblance of enlightenment about how wrong you are, which would be very good indeed, now begone!".

And on that note, I really want to go and play video games now, so I'm off as well. See you next time with chapter two: Strangers!

[xxmisty]

First intro post for a verrrry long time!

Hello! 🌈

Bit out of practice for this but since I’ve started to get a few new followers again I thought I should make a quick post to say thanks for following and to kind of re-introduce myself since I’ve been away a little while. Tumblr’s been my online home since 2011 though so even when I’ve been away a while I’ll always come back sooner or later - I met my lovely partner here and this hellsite saved my life in a very literal way back in the day so it means the world to me 💙

I can’t help worrying that if you’ve just followed for the art you’ll get fed up with the absolute yard-sard of fandoms, nonsense and tumblr nostalgia I’ve been reblogging lately and I don’t want to put unwanted nonsense on your dash so I’ve set up a side blog which I’ll reblog just my art to. Feel free to follow that one instead! 💜 Art side blog: @johnmist 💜

But if we share fandoms (especially Torchwood - oh my god I am over three years into the biggest hyperfixation of my life and it’s showing no signs of fading!) or other interests it’d be nice to meet you - feel free to say hi!

My name’s John, some people might still know me as Mist, but all the best people call me Stringer (= my wife 🥰) I’m a 40-something trans, bi, disabled artist who’s tired of all the hate, horror and misery out there. I can’t change the world but I can try to brighten it just a tiny bit with some fan art of characters and fandoms that I love.

At the moment I’m struggling big-time with my health. I live with fibromyalgia, ME/CFS, severe crohn’s and UC, endometriosis, narcolepsy, migraines and recurrent meningitis so honestly, sometimes I have to disappear without warning. From one day to the next I never know what I can manage so I try to make the most of every good day, every good hour, every good minute and draw as much as I can when I’m able. Art is one of the things that keeps me going, makes life worthwhile.

Full disclosure, I’m currently going through the worst health of my life and finding it hard to cope this time. Somehow this is the one place I don’t actually feel guilty sharing so I may talk about it sometimes. I’m also autistic and like just about everyone on this site I also suffer from anxiety. I also am very much an adult and may post/reblog adult subjects so please don’t follow if you are a minor or know you’ll find topics such as sex, sexuality, my fetish and other mature content upsetting - be safe in your own space, and feel free to follow my art blog instead 💙

💜 Again.... Art side blog: @johnmist 😁 💜

A non-complete list of my other fandoms:

Doctor Who (classic and new), What We Do In The Shadows, Marvel (mostly MCU, particularly Runaways, Jessica Jones, Wandavision, Doctor Strange, Guardians of the Galaxy, She-Hulk and Cloak & Dagger), Red Dwarf, Homestuck, Ashes to Ashes/Life on Mars, YuGiOh, Splatoon, Animal Crossing, Xenoblade, My Hero Academia, Yakuza, 80s and 90s nostalgia and various other franchises that we dip in and out of from time to time 💙

My icon is my favourite OC, Kim, and I may post about my OCs now and again.

I’m horrible at self-promotion but I do have a Patreon and a ko-fi and am very grateful for any support; money is a constant struggle and every little helps �� If you’d like a hi-res version of any of my sketches in exchange for a ko-fi donation please drop me a message 🥰

patreon: https://www.patreon.com/xxmisty

Ko-Fi: https://ko-fi.com/xxmisty

Thank you for following - I hope you enjoy my art!

[unpleasant-ghoul]

Oh, hey, look! A post by me that's not about some video game!

I don't normally post shit that's still in progress. But I like the creature and i want to share because I might never finish it (kinda complex for my current skill. Might get too frustrated by the idea/ability difference and drop. happens often)

So, here. Here is it and the whole process of how such things came to be.

This is a pseudocentaur. Those things started for me a long time ago, and it's gonna be a lot to read, so I, ever-merciful, will hide the rest under a spoiler. Here:

So. A few years ago i was reading about Nuckelavee, started sketching, ended up with this:

You can tell from the human-for-scale interacting with it, that even then it had some vague shadow of being more than just a random monster. Not quite a character, but has a potential of getting there. You can also see that that version involved no actual horses, merely a vaguely equine thing that was truly the part of the pseudocentaur. And it was fucking massive.

For a few years it remained forgotten. Then a couple months ago I found it again and decided that I like it! It's neat! But it needs some love and also some actual thought put into it.

And so I started thinking on how's and why's and also on the matter of "does this have to be so big, when my love of things that are fucking ginormous has already led me to an ever-growing number of dragon OC's with absolute MINIMUM height at shoulders being 5. Fucking. Meters?"

So after thinking for some time and drawing for some time I got this page:

(as you can see, size of the creature reduced. Greatly. Also, has actual horse now)

And a much better idea of what the fuck we even have here. And I will share that idea with you whether you want it or not. I'm in a sharing mood. Suffer.

So!

Pseudocentaurs as they are now are parasitic creatures! They infect horses (other animals of similar size can be used, but results vary. Smaller beings can be infected, but don't survive full transformation. It can be used as a way of healing in a pinch, as long as the larva is killed just as the body finished repairing the pre-existing damage before going through the whole "neck splitting open" thing). But they're sapient and generally not evil, so they tend to have standards.

Most, unless there's no choice, prefer dying or even freshly dead hosts, since a dying one gets to continue living, even if it looks gruesome, and a dead one is, well, dead. So nobody's robbed of a whole potential life of Being A Normal Horse. In the case with dead hosts, pseudocentaur takes full control over the body, while with a living host it's usually basically an idealized, fairytale version of riding... Except without ever separating again. I say usually because they're as varied as humans. Some, despite it being frowned upon, take over perfectly healthy animals and essentially pilot them around without any regard for their own wishes.

On the matter of anatomy: the host's original mouth essentially disappears. You can see that: it's just an upper jaw, no tongue, no nothing. The head is not for eating anymore, just breathing (that mass on the horse head's close-up? Extended trachea!) and providing most of the auditory information, as the parasite's hearing is not all that great. And keeping an eye out for danger. Four is better than two! Especially with, again, a living host that can spot things on its own rather than being a fancy horse-shaped periscope.

Now, how does this thing EAT? Not with the parasite's mouth! That one's just for speaking. Not all even choose to have it at all. Instead, there is a circular, fanged, maw at the joint of the host and parasite's bodies. Food (and the body is repurposed for an omnivorous diet during the transformation) has to be shoved in there with the parasite's own hands (or with someone else's. It's not rude to scrape leftovers off your plate and right into your pseudocentaur friend's waiting maw). It's not the most convenient way to eat, but it is how it is. Do it or starve.

Beyond the splitting neck, the loss of jaw, the development of the maw, and the whole "you're an omnivore, Harry" thing, there can sometimes be no changes at all, or there can be some relatively subtle (compared to everything else) stuff: keratinous plating growing on legs, sometimes lengthening of the tail. Might lose some/all fur, might not.

Pseudocentaurs reproduce through two methods: true reproduction, making a whole NEW pseudocentaur is, well. You probably guessed. Two pseuds with living hosts of opposite sexes... Yea. Results in what at first is a normal foal, but bears the pseudocentaur larva in it and transforms after the horse is more or less adult. Those born pseuds are much more in tune with their hosts and, as I've said already, are fully NEW beings. New personality, no experience, they learn as they go. Like children! Except much cuter.

The other, and more common way, is releasing a "fly" made of one's own flesh to seek a new host. The resulting "new" pseudocentaur will have the original's exact personality and same memories up to the point of separation. It can be done voluntarily, or happen on its own if the current body is too damaged. If done voluntarily, the original continues to exist, so it's basically two separate instances of the same dude, just using different hosts and being in different places.

So, there ya have it. Pseudocentaurs. Base inspiration, as mentioned at the start, is the Nuckelavee, additional inspirations for the recent changes were Necromorphs and Illithids.

[ladylaviniya]

I know lots of people had a bad 2023 and there's really traumatising things happening in the world.

But I will be selfish and share the good things that happened in my year that drowned the bad:

1. Friendships have been made. I have been incredibly lonely since 2020 due to a plethora of reasons. I met my online bestfriend in person this year. I have made friends here on Tumblr over fandoms I didn't originally know about.

2. I learnt how to date and what men really mean when they're actually using an innuendo. This has led me to unashamedly put my standards high and my boundaries strongly walked.

3. I got diagnosed with ADHD, which has given me the opportunity and privilege to access medication that has significantly improved my mental health.

4. I got a new job that I actually love with a respectful boss! No more living paycheck to paycheck on government supports.

5. I get to live in a affordable flat with a roof over my head in a safe neighbourhood. No fearing for break ins and no worrying about making rent in on time.

6. I learnt how to balance giving myself a break and motivating myself. How to give myself real self-care.

7. I managed to get help, therapy that helped me find outlets and strategies to express my anger, anxiety, depression, rage and controversial thoughts without everlasting abundance of shame.

10. I survived my own mind long enough to turn 22 years old. Kinda a big flex 💪 telling my intrusive thoughts to fuck off.

11. I have reconnected to the happier version of me. I have embraced the joy I had when I was 13. When I got butterflies over actors and characters and the thrill of reading new fanfics.

12. Despite being shadow banned, I was able to create a new account and start fresh and happy. Tagging and organising posts.

13. My Abuser is still alive and well. She remarried and had a baby. But she finally changed her lastname from my fathers to her new husbands, cutting the important tie we shared. I want to say that I hope her daughter grows up and grows to hate, despise, and abandon her, even murder her...but I also don't care anymore. I think I'm healing. I'll never forget those horrors, but after over 11 years I think I'm accepting there's nothing I can do to get the justice back and even if I got my revenge entirely...it wouldn't have changed what happened. Those are words for the universe.

In a year I am sure there will be lots of things that might change my life again. But after so many years...I'm getting used to it. This year has been relatively peaceful. I pray we all have a peaceful and accepting 2024.

I'm going to reblog this and see if in a year how much life as changed. ❤️ A message to future me... You might be scared, you might be sad, but you are alive and loved and your creativity brings joy. You have survived before, you will survive again. There's always a way out of trouble with the right support and resources. Don't give up. Stay proactive. You can do it because you've done it before.

[futureh0g]

RULES/ABOUT BELOW. DO NOT REBLOG

1- Although I may be selective with following, anybody is free to send in a starter for a rp, so don't be shy!!

2- I will not interacting with any NSFW blogs, and any NSFW will not interacting with me. The main reason is because I am under the age of 18, so, if you don't want me interacting with you, feel free to block me.

3- Anybody over 18 is able to follow!! But if your rules state that you don't want any minors interacting with you, I won't follow back.

4- Sexual content, such as smut, will not be present. Inappropriate jokes are fine, just don't over-do it.

5- I have not been roleplaying for that long, and I don't have that much experience, so I will most likely make a few mistakes here and there. Please be patient with me.

6- I am extremely shy, so about most of the time, I will not follow first, or send any asks most of the time. Please don't take this the wrong way. I just have a hard time interacting with a lot of people

7- Do NOT GodMod. A.K.A, taking control of a muse that isn't your own. It's very annoying to me when people do this.

8- If you follow me, and I don't immediately follow back on my main, please don't take this the wrong way!! It just takes a lot of courage for me to follow someone new back for some reason :')

9- Personals are able to follow and like posts, but, please. Unless you have any rp side blogs, do not reblog or reply to any posts. This is not a Fandom blog

10- Every blog I have are multi-ship. I will have separate verses for every ship on a blog. Although, please talk to me if you want to ship one of my muses with your own

11- this blog is OC and Crossover friendly!! I love roleplaying with OCs and crossovers, SM FUN

12- Don't pressure me to do or continue roleplays. Please just. Don't

Ty for reading through !! More rules will be applied the more the blog goes on. Information for this version of Sonic, Shadow, and Fleetway will be listed below!! It is not mandatory to read, but it is suggested if you want to get a better understanding of them!!

ABOUT

Sonic is always seen as an adventurer, and he still is! Just a bit older now, but still energetic as ever! And by old, I mean 2000 years old. You might be wondering, HOW is Sonic even this old? Well, the amount of times he has used the chaos Emeralds in his life plays a big part for this! As the chaos energy infused in him, it gave him an enhanced body, along with a longer lifespan, and greater strength!

Speaking of strength, you might be wondering how strong Sonic actually is in the au! Well, to make it simple, he's as strong as he was in his super form when he was a teen, perhaps even stronger! He has great durability, and most likely able to one punch a motherfucker into space. He is able to kill a god without going super. Because of his out of control power, he is required to wear inhibitor rings around his arms.

Speaking of his power, Sonic is capable of killing a villain! And..has done it before. (Eggman). He has learned that just speaking to a villain and giving them a few encouraging words won't ever actually make them change if they're bad enough. So, he decided to just get rid of them! He's the definition of "Fuck around and find out". Don't be scared, as long as you aren't an irredeemable villain, you'll be unharmed.

As Sonic outlived all of his own friends, he has a LOT of more responsibilities, one of these being the new guardian of the Master Emerald, having a small cottage built on Angel Island to live in. He still adventures all the time, he just thinks of protecting the emerald as a small job for himself.

The only ones to keep Sonic company are Shadow, and redeemed villains, like Fleetway, Metal and Scourge.

Sonic is the one to make dad jokes a lot, and he is a great father figure to a lot of people. In fact, he adopted Silver in the future! How? Well, very simple. He found Silver in a cardboard box when he was a kid, said "hell no", picked Silver up, and the rest is history. Sonic is also a very wise person, having huge amounts of information crammed into his head! I mean, he was around for 2000 years. So, it makes sense.

He also carries Miles' Electric around with him at all times, somehow not damaging it.

Not much is known about Fleetway. All is said is that he managed to get himself redeemed a couple decades ago, starting a new life for himself.

He has his own separate body from Sonic now. Again, not much is actually known on how this happened, but all that can be said is that one time when Sonic was attempted to have his immense chaos powers ripped away from him, Fleetway managed to save Sonic from getting his powers removed, at the cost of almost losing his own life.

Without a proper host to contain himself in, Fleetway is more weak than he normally was, seen to be using a cane most of the time to help himself walk. Though, this doesn't mean he can't kill someone.

He's still a sassy bastard, just leaning more on the calm side. He also owns a coffee shop just to keep himself occupied, and let me say, this guy makes a mean coffee.

Shadow is..more or less the same. Moody, closed off, the usual. Really all that's changed is his appearance. And the extent of his powers.

After an unknown fight from a long while back, Shadow lost sight in his right eye, a large scar across his eye. He wears a visor to help his sight. It isn't perfect, but it gets the job done.

Shadow's powers have exceeded over the years, no surprise there. He knows how to control it easily, so nobody has gotten seriously hurt from his powers. Yet.

He also has quite the variety of weapons by his side. He carries a belt around his waist, that are able to hold about 4 guns at once. He also has very long gloves, which lets him hide blades under his gloves, just for any extra weapons.