#new void hell lore just dropped i guess!!!!

[foileadeux]

But we also need to bully pk for his big ass forehead smh u could play tic-tac-toe on that big ol thang

graffitiing ur dads corpse is based

[katieskarlette]

I watched the trailers and read the Blizzcon '23 stuff on WoWhead.

Meh. Not the spark I was looking for to rekindle my passion for the game.

(Morose lack of enthusiasm for 11.0, and Shadowlands postmortem below.)

Instead of getting hyped for upcoming content, it just makes me feel bad about how little I care anymore.

I used to be on the edge of my seat, palms sweating, happily freaking out about new cinematics and new expansion releases. I would plan ahead and take time off to watch the Blizzcon livestream, and stock up on food I could eat while glued to the screen. Today I got home from work and turned on my computer...and only then remembered that Blizzcon was today. After seeing the trailers and stuff I'm like, "Okay. I guess that's fine. Whatever." [Garrosh voice] Times change. [/Garrosh voice]

I didn't expect the news about upcoming expansions to knock my socks off, though. If Dragonflight, an expansion that was practically custom-made to focus on my favorite lore, didn't rekindle my love for WoW, nothing was going to.

That said, I'm still underwhelmed. I can't say that Alleria, Thrall, and Magni are characters I'd be super excited to hang out with. (It was a nice touch to have Thrall going gray, though.)

Xal'atath (sp?) is pretty cool but forgive me for being wary considering the track record for female villains in this franchise.

Anduin...very mixed feelings there. I'm glad he's back, and it was nice to hear Josh Keaton's voice again. I don't recognize him physically anymore, except those baby blue eyes, which is probably why the cinematic spent so much time zoomed in uncomfortably close on his face. I get that that's the point, that he's grown up and gotten grizzled, but he looks and feels like a completely different person.

I think part of the problem is that we didn't get to see him changing. He went from dropping his sword to resurrect an army and being stubbornly optimistic in BFA, to weary but still full of the Light in the cutscenes with Sylvanas in Torghast, to completely blank (save one glimmer) while under Zovaal's domination, to this broken, unstable, self-loathing shell of a man in the 11.0 cinematic. Even if we're generous and count the tiny conversation with Sylvanas at the end of her novel, we have to just imagine what happened to him in between then and now. It's okay to ask the audience to fill in some implied developments, but this is jarring. (I suppose it's possible we'll see more characterization in-game between now and then. I'm not optimistic, though.)

I imagine Anduin will go through an arc where the Light comes back to him, or he finds some kind of peace again and reclaims his throne, but I don't have the patience to wait around for it to happen, or the confidence that it would be done well.

I also can't separate the character's angst with the real-world consequences of Shadowlands sucking as hard as it did. Yeah, Anduin, you've been through absolute hell--so have we. You haven't recovered--and neither have I.

When they had him do the "Arthas pointing Frostmourne just left of the camera lens" pose, instead of going "Ooh, I recognize that! That was cool!" it just reminded me of all the times they did fanservice callbacks to the Lich King in Shadowlands, only to shit all over that part of lore. That's the last thing I want to be reminded of.

It was a bold move to reveal the names and story hooks of the next two expansions, but rather than whet my appetite it just removed the hope that "maybe the next expansion will be better." Nope, it'll be more of the cosmic bullshit that I don't care about: Light, Void, Titans, etc. It's okay in small doses, but it's not the kind of story that pulled me in and made me fall in love with the world.

I hate to say it, but this might be the nail in the coffin for me. I definitely miss the glory days of WoW when it was a huge part of my life and I got so much enjoyment out of it, but I'm beginning to realize that those days aren't coming back. When I think of all the hours and dollars I invested in the franchise it makes me want to cry--not that I regret any of it. I just wish the spark hadn't gone out for me.

I had been so immersed for so many years that maybe it was just time for it to run its course. The social climate has also changed a lot for me, from a thriving guild during MoP, to sporadic bursts of people logging on in Legion and early BFA, to a ghost town in mid-to-late BFA and SL. Strangers can be rude and elitist, making pugging more stressful than fun. I've also been concentrating a lot on my own original writing in the last year.

Those are factors, to be sure, but I do have to lay a lot of the blame on Shadowlands. I had gotten past so-so expansions before. Cataclysm wasn't the best, but all the Firelands stuff was fun, and some of my favorite dragons got screen time. MOP was freaking fantastic. WoD was a dud expansion for me, but there was enough to keep me busy and playing right up to the end. Legion was awesome. BFA wasn't great, and the loss of Teldrassil left a very sour taste, but it had good leveling content, some fun characters, and generally enough stuff going on to tide me over. It was going in a pattern of great expansion, not-so-good expansion, great expansion, not-so-good expansion, and that was okay.

Then Shadowlands came, and it was grimdark, overly serious, cosmic-scale stuff, headed by the most aggressively boring villain the series had ever had. There were a ton of new characters, and, except for Denathrius, Renathal, and Theotar (and Merileth and his slimes, in small doses), none of them interested me. The game systems somehow became even more fiddly, complicated and confusing time sinks than they were in BFA. The afterlife setup barely made sense, conflicted with past lore, complicated future lore, and was ultimately depressing as hell--you probably won't spend eternity with your loved ones, and even if you do, you'll probably end up as a blip of red energy that gets consumed and then cease to exist at all. That's just how I want to imagine all my favorite Warcraft characters ending up! (We probably didn't see Tirion Fordring because some blue guy in a toga needed his anima to grow better grapes. FFS.)

But the worst aspect of Shadowlands, IMO, was the way the pre-existing characters were done dirty--every single one of them.

I don't know you manage to take one of the greatest paladins of all time, then turn him into fiery overlord of the undead, and have him be boring, but there's Bolvar. Get that man a throat lozenge and some personality. Taelia got cameos in which they mentioned their relationship, but nothing ever came of it. He was a father figure to Anduin in the king's youth, but you wouldn't know it by what they did/said in SL. Going by BFA and SL, freaking Saurfang was more of a father figure to Anduin than Bolvar, who literally raised him for several years of his childhood.

Nathanos got an epic sendoff courtesy of Tyrande in the prepatch, then got teased a few times without ever appearing or mattering again.

Sylvanas was a mess. I don't need to get into details; we all know the trainwreck of a story. The concept of making her soul complete again so she had to come to terms with what she had done was a promising one, but it was handled so clumsily and briefly that it was ultimately frustrating.

The less said about the Jailer, the better. I wanted so badly to like Zovaal, but he was the most flat, boring, paint-by-numbers Saturday morning cartoon villain in the franchise's history. Not interesting, not sympathetic, not fleshed out, not funny, not charismatic, not sexy, not scary--none of the things past Blizzard villains had going for them.

Uther's story was one of the better ones, but because of how closely tied it was to Arthas' story, and the unforgivably bad way that was handled, it ultimately fizzled.

Thrall was...fine? The bits with his mom were neat, but I couldn't stop thinking about what a crappy afterlife it would be to constantly fight, spy, scheme, and play politics, all while the supposed love of her life is nowhere to be seen. Poor Durotan.

Baine famously, frustratingly, amusingly in an if-you-don't-laugh-you'll-cry kind of way, did jack squat in the entire expansion. I know his arc got cut for time, but regardless of the reason he was yet another character whose involvement in SL was disappointing.

Jaina was wasted. Her history with Arthas (and, to a lesser extent, Anduin) could have made for some memorable, heart-wrenching story, but instead she was just a generic sorceress. That was especially disappointing given the respectful, deep treatment her character got in BFA. I know not every character can have the spotlight in every story arc, but the complete lack of personality she had in SL was especially jarring in contrast.

Anduin's arc should have been interesting, but we never got into his head enough to really feel what he was feeling. We had that glimpse of his horror after stabbing the Archon, and he left his father's compass as a clue, but those were fleeting moments open to interpretation and not enough to offset the blank slate we got the rest of the time. Even that would have been forgivable, given the limits of storytelling in a game, but the thing that sticks in my craw the most is that constant, blatant Arthas parallels led to...nothing. Anduin would have been just as devastated to be mind-controlled into doing evil stuff even if Arthas had never existed. Arthas meant nothing to Anduin. The only time he met the man was as an infant. They weren't related. Nobody in-universe was comparing them. Garrosh compared himself to Arthas in the War Crimes novel, and Anduin fleetingly thought about Arthas when he befriended Calia in Before the Storm, but that's it. Even as hokey as it would have been to make Anduin secretly Jaina and Arthas' son, at least that would have explained two expansions' worth of in-your-face parallels between the two characters. But no. It all came across as fanservice--or fan teasing--and had no payoff.

Speaking of Arthas, arguably the most famous and recognizable character in the franchise (competing with Illidan and Scantily-Clad Female Night Elf #17 for the top spot)...

After being teased about his possible involvement or whereabouts all expansion long, after they milked every possible drop of nostalgia out of his story in an attempt to make SL palatable, after all the flashing red arrows calling our attention to parallels between him and Anduin, despite his importance to three prominent characters (Uther, Sylvanas, and Jaina), Arthas never did anything (boss mechanics don't count), never had a line of dialogue, never appeared in a form we recognized, got insulted and belittled by Sylvanas one last time, and disappeared in a flicker of blue plasma that was less impressive than a drunk frat boy lighting his farts with a match.

So yeah. Toss Shadowlands in the trash heap (except Sire Denathrius). It was so bad it tainted the entire franchise for me, so that I couldn't even enjoy the long-awaited dragonpalooza that followed.

Phew, that was a long rant, and the first time I've written about WoW in ages. I guess it just goes to show that I have deep roots in the franchise that come along with strong feelings--which makes it all the harder to accept that I may not even buy the next expansion. I suppose I'll weaken when the time comes, but I'm certainly not shelling out for the collector's edition or other bells and whistles.

But then the Li'l Wrathion in-game pet stares at me from another browser tab, and I think about the new Wrathion plushie, and I'm like...DAMN IT, why couldn't you have done this years ago? :(

Anyway, sorry to be a downer, but I'm kind of in mourning, in a weird way, as I come to terms with the way I feel--or more importantly, don't feel--about Warcraft now.

[illusory-torrent]

Why I prefer the Genshin Impact fandom to the RWBY fandom.

I'll start off by saying what many of us are thinking. It's sad that the ships are nearly the only thing the RWBY fandom talks about because the plot leaves so many in a state of dissatisfaction. I've seen so many RWBY fans and non-fans alike say, "Oh, I don't care about the plot, I'm only watching for [insert ship here]" or "I'm going to drop the show if [insert ship here] doesn't happen". For those who doubt me, please believe me, it's a thing. 

Now, when I say that the RWBY fandom only really cares for shipping, you might ask, "Is that not what every fandom does though?"

Well... yes! You're right. However, I think the RWBY fandom takes it to the next level. 

First off, the theory-making side of the RWBY fandom has completely died. I remember there being videos theorizing if Yang was part-dragon Faunus or Ruby being a fox Faunus. These days, the fandom's theories boil down to, "What's up with the void that Team RWBY fell into?" due to V8's ending, but back during V5-V7, there were hardly any theories being posted. Most people just don't care anymore. 

Second off, Miles and Kerry struggle with writing characters outside of pairs. Not just romantic pairs, but pairs in general. Most characters only have interacts with their team partners, their love interests, their familial relationships, and... that's it. Blake is a prime example of this. Her best interactions are with Yang (her team partner), Sun (her former love interest), Ilia (another former love interest), and Adam (her ex-boyfriend). Her worst interactions are with Ruby (her team's leader, whom she hardly interacts with) and pretty much everyone else. Even her interactions with Weiss are few and far between. Another example would be Penny. Prior to Volume 3, Penny's best interactions were with Ruby. Penny hardly interacted with anyone else in a meaningful way. She dies and Ruby's tearful reaction is focused on. Why? Because she's one of the few characters Penny actually had a relationship with! Penny comes back in Volume 7, and she still only really interacts with Ruby. Her only new relationship that's developed is with Winter... and we find out why. It's because when Penny is killed by Jaune, her maiden powers are transferred to Winter, the rightful owner.

Miles and Kerry being unable to write outside of pairs is why we only have each of our characters only interact with certain other characters. Before Jaune helped kill Penny, did he ever even have a real conversation with her? We'll never know! Has Blake even talked to Jaune before? No idea! Did Yang even care that Pyrrha died? Probably, but we viewers literally never see the two interact prior to Pyrrha's untimely demise.

This type of writing (whether intentionally or unintentionally done) promotes shipping culture. Characters interact primarily with their love interests (who may or may not also be their team partners). This is why RWBY's fandom is so focused on shipping. Hell, even Blake's VA tweeted at Clover's VA with a joke regarding this.

Clover's VA: Has anybody heard of this thing, “shipping?”

Blake's VA: Welcome to RWBY.

[Photo for anyone who needs proof, in case these Tweets are deleted in the future.]

Blake's VA even once had to make a post saying, "Y’all, you know I love my Bees, but not everything is Bee related. Some is just RWBY hype in general. Calm yo’self.". The fact she even had to clarify that not everything she posts about RWBY is related to a ship is astounding. Imagine having to tell your audience that not everything you post is related to a fictional pairing. 

The RWBY cast even had an segment on The Ship-It Show where, you guessed it, they talked about their favorite and least favorite ships. Their tagline even was that "Shipping is a creative expression, so don't limit your creativity!", which went over with the fandom about as well as one would expect. 

Finally, Miles Luna recently posted a Cameo video where he stated, "Just remember: shipping is fun and pretend, and it’s just supposed to be a good time. Don’t be one of those people that attack other shippers and get real mean and toxic. We’re all just here having fun with wonderful make believe characters and make believe worlds, and I think that is a beautiful activity, as long as you’re doing it responsibly and kindly." 

So as you can see, shipping is a big part of the RWBY community. I'd venture to say that shipping is the most important part of the RWBY community. And that's fine! Shipping in itself isn't a bad thing. It's only when it gets completely out of hand where it becomes a problem. And I feel it is becoming a problem in the RWBY community. Rooster Teeth, if you need your show-writers to remind the fandom that shipping is supposed to be fun, you have a problem. 

Well, how does Genshin Impact avoid that problem? The fandom itself is large and the game is quite popular, so how does it handle not becoming a complete shitfest shipfest? 

For starters, Mihoyo doesn't confirm any ships at all. This is for profit reasons, the game is a gacha game designed for players to spend money on their "waifus" and "husbandos". Characters have outfit customization for this exact purpose. Mihoyo benefits from keeping characters canonically single. This is why, while people think soon-to-be-released characters like Ayaka and Tohma are dating, many people also believe these same characters to be single. 

Second off, VAs are unable to give their opinions on certain ships and on lore. For example, the VA for Lumine, the main female protagonist, confirmed that Lumine was 15, before apologizing and deleting her comments. The VA for Childe signed some Childe x Lumine artwork to sell, but blatantly stated that he only really shipped Childe with Childe. The VAs avoid discussing unconfirmed ships/lore and, in this way, Mihoyo avoids controversy. 

Finally, Genshin Impact only recently came out. This means that the theorizing part of the fandom is still alive and well. There's plenty to theorize about since there's so much us players don't know about the story. Lore tidbits are celebrated by lore junkies, folks who want to theorize on the characters' backstories or on the protagonist's journey to find their twin sibling are more than welcome to do so. 

So while the Genshin Impact community engages in tons of shipping, none of the ships are more canon than any other. A Zhongli x Childe shipper might argue that their ship is canon because Zhongli gifted Childe some chopsticks, but a Zhongli x Ningguang shipper could easily argue back that Ninguang is a reincarnation of Zhongli's former friend/partner Guizhong. And of course, a non-shipper could look at both of these arguments and believe them both to be false.

I think this allows shipping to remain a fun and lighthearted activity in the Genshin Impact fandom. You can ship what you'd like, or you can just enjoy the plot and lore like a normal gamer. 

So where am I going with this? Well, my thoughts are that no matter what the fandom, there will always be shipping. There's always gonna be some degenerates (like myself) who see two cute characters and want them to get together. However, it's up to the creators themselves to decide where to go with ships or to even entertain them at all. Mihoyo, in my opinion, handles the Genshin Impact fandom's shipping craze much more successfully than Rooster Teeth handles the RWBY fandom. 

So what are your thoughts? If you're in both fandoms, which fandom do you prefer and why? Let me know!

[feral-lore-creature]

Devstream 165 Thoughts

(10/28/22)

Just my thoughts below the cut about the newest Devstream. :p Writing down my thoughts so I don't forget them.

!SPOILERS FROM NEW WAR ONWARD!

(1) Echoes of Veilbreaker

I like the naming theme that's been used recently! It helps keeps things in a recognizable pattern. It's also nice to see DE hasn't "forgotten" Kahl missions, or have tried to totally ignore complaints. Things have been pretty good since the new Team™ have been working on the newest updates in Warframe. The QTCC stuff is so cool.

(2) Duviri Paradox News

Thank GOD Digital Extremes pushed Duviri back. It may not be nearly as big of a quest as The New War, but I don't think it will be as short as the Veilbreaker quest. It's meant to be a large story/lore developmental quest, so It's amazing to seem them really slow down, and take their time. Take all the time you need, DE! Quality over quantity!

(3) Lua's Prey

This was a very smart decision on DE's part. It's a small bridge/intro update to what Duviri has to offer. Sometimes quests drop, and smack you in the face with info/change. It can feel clunky, or unnerving (like me, when I'm typing). I can't wait for this! Sounds like a good soon-to-be Christmas, Tenno! Jokes aside, the new survival mission looks very ✨Lore-ish✨ What is Lua reacting to? What's happening? Is Man in the Wall trying to use it as a portal? Weird black/white/gray void pockets?! I NEED ASNWERS! (I SWEAR TO STARS DE IF YOU DON'T GIVE ME ANY LORE/HITS TO TESHIN, MY BELOVED, THERE WILL BE RIOTS /j).

(SIDE NOTE: It's weird how completing The War Within immediately gives you access to the new nodes on Lua. I still think Teshin always knew more than he lead on, but how much DID he know? I guess, for now, It's just me being a theorist, lol.)

(4) Voruna

VORUNA, MY DEAR! COME TO ME! I WILL GIVE YOU LOTS OF PRETTY ACCESSORIES. I love her, and will cherish her forever, she's so beautiful, I can't wait for her to come out. For a less inane opinion, I genuinely first thought she was going to be a berserker, kinda like Valkyr?? I'm actually shocked she's as versatile as she seems to be. It's very interesting! Even being able to change your passive at the start of a mission? That's different, I'm happy they're going with this vibe. Also, new Leverian? Hell yeah! Lore hungry bitches for the win!

(5) Cosmetics

Xaku's deluxe looks glorious, I don't even know what to say about Lotus's new skin, stunning. Styanax's new helmet, and the Archon Shard ephemera look amazing. I REALLY want that damn Necramech skin.

[loominggaia]

New Fanfic by Anon: New York

Anon just submitted a new fanfic! This one had me on the edge of my seat, check it out:

“Seeing the post on the freelance good guys getting isekia’d I thought I’d drop this short little fanfic idea. On night Evan is on patrol with Lukus, Alaine and Elska doing their usual rounds when they hear a odd sound? Suddenly a giant, ethereally white vehicle comes barreling towards them at high speed! They attempt to run but not before Evan gets struck, having had no time to react. They stare in horror as the white machine sends evan flying and hitting the ground with a sickeningly loud thud.

The crew is mortified at having seen Evan getting ran over, seeing his unconscious body on the ground. Just before they can help the machine responsible backs up and opens its doors, Evans lifeless body starts floating into the back of the vehicle. The crew latch’s onto him and pulls hard, trying to resist the trucks hold and save their captain and close friend. Despite their best efforts the truck pulls him in, latching it’s doors shut with elska pounding furiously trying to break them down.

The vehicle speeds off with Evan as it’s prisoner. The three try to chase it down but with no avail, elska being the only one able to keep up. With great fury the centauress runs down the evil machine, determined to tear the ethereal contraption apart with her bare hands to save Evan. But as she’s gaining ground the machine speeds up, faster and faster until a portal forms in front of it and in a blinding flash of light the machine, with Evan inside, disappears without a trace.

Evan wakes up in a hospital bed, feeling groggy and not knowing where he is or where that weird beeping sound is coming from? He’s greeted by a human nurse, happy to see him awake. He figures he’s in zareen judging by the room and the weird medical tech attached to him but has no idea how he got their? only remembering getting struck by a unknown machine and blacking out. The nurse ask his name and goes to get the doctor so they may access the new patients condition.

The doctor comes in, another human. He ask Evan his name and tells him about their finds. He’s alright though has an alarming number of scars across his body, seemingly a heart deformity that recovered and other peculiarities but is overall fine and has no obvious signs of injury. The doctor then gets to what he’s really interested in, wondering who this strange man is that was found on the side of the road by passerby’s unconscious, in medieval armor with no wallet, phone, id or anything?

The doctor interrogated Evan heavily? Wanting to know where he came from, why he was on the side of the road? how he lost his leg and obtained so many scars? why he was dressed in medieval armor? Why he has no identification on him? Etc…? Evan answers each question honesty, really wanting to know how he got their himself. As he tells them about his crew and the freelance good guys but dodges the question on his leg, not wanting to reveal his status as a lycanthrope unless absolutely necessary.

The more he talks the more worried the doctor and nurse become, exchanging looks to each other that gets Evan concerned as well. He gets a massive shock to find out he’s not in zareen but some strange place called “American”, specifically New York. The doctor writes down that the patient is delirious; believing that mermaids, centaurs and dragons exist and believes he’s in some non existent country yet claims to be from another unknown country called “Evangline”. He was gonna a rough case.

On the Gaia side, Alaine and Lukus are freaking out as Elska tells them that the evil machine that stole Evan got away by teleporting. Returning to the hollow they break the news of Evans kidnapping to everyone’s shock and horror. Issac, Jeimos and a grieving, furious Zeffer joins them on the hunt for Evan. Guessing that the magic vehicle was of zareenite origin they gear up to travel to zareen to demand answers, leaving the rest of the crew behind to continue their duties until they return.

Evan finds himself still in the hospital, still confused as why he’s being held their? The doctors believing he’s suffered a serious brain damage or mental illness due to his “delusions”. The only answer they can come up with. Trying everything they can the hospital attempt to do background checks on Evan Atlas but continue to come up with nothing, wanting to confirm his identity and contact some family or close friends. Evan picks up rather quick that’s he’s not leaving anytime soon.

He also gets the sinking suspicion that something is seriously wrong. Everyone he’s seen so far is human and everyone acts like he’s crazy when he talks about his crew, job and adventures. The truth comes when doctors alongside immigration officers interrogate him and ask him to point out where this “Zareen” and “Evangline” are on a map. He’s absolutely confused as he doesn’t recognize anywhere on the map nor the language it’s written in, realizing that whatever happened to him he’s not on Gaia.

The rescue crew makes it zareen and immediate start searching for any sighs of who took evan. After a great search, causing a scene and nearly being arrested afew times their search turns up fruitless. However on their journey they meet a deranged looking dworf who’s heard their story and claims to know some information on the mysterious truck that stole Evan. They obviously don’t trust the crazy dworf but hear him out anyway, anything being better then their fruitless attempts so far.

The dworf divulges all he knows about the magic truck that stole their friend. Telling them it’s a mysterious supernatural, dimension hopping vehicle that that runs people over to deliver them to other worlds. He calls it Truck-Kun and shows them grainy photos and numerous testimonies and stories of humans who claim to be from another world being brought to Gaia. While sounding mad, Lukus, Alaine and Elska having witnessed truck-kun in action believe him with how it matches their encounter.

Multiple testimonies from these humans claim to be from a place called “Earth”, mentioning Japan a lot but some others places like America, Russia and so on. Jeimois with Zeffers help prepare one hell of a teleportation spell to take the crew to this earth place, hoping that’s where truck-kun took Evan. Jeimois has little faith in the spell, not knowing where earth is, the power requirement, and the extremely high probability of the spell failing and killing them all but goes through with it.

Having acquired enough magic ingredients and a big enough supply of magic crystals through “questionable means” Jeimos cast the spell. The rescue team is sent flying through the void between worlds at highly velocity in the portal, them all blacking out. When they come too their all thankfully still alive if abit groggy from the trip. They wake up in a field, looking out to see a massive city scape, the likes of which trump any they’ve seen before, that city being New York City.

Evan finds more trouble in his non consensual stay in the hospital as he’s transferred to the psychiatric ward for further evaluation. It isn’t any better when he finds out the full moon is coming and terrified of what he may do divulges the fact he’s a werewolf, trying to protect the staff and any other potential victim. This alarms his doctors as they believe his delusions are worse then they feared and they push off Evan panicked fears by telling him “werewolves aren’t real”.”

TO BE CONTINUED…? Thank you for this, I really enjoyed it! I’m impressed with your understanding of the LG characters and lore! I wish you weren’t on Anon so I could credit you properly. If you guys want to read more fanfics, I’ve been posting them under the ‘fanfic’ tag.

[feralphoenix]

BUT THAT DOESN’T MEAN YOU’RE NOT PREPARED TO TRY

if you’re following my blog or if you read my fanfiction, you may have seen me talking in tags or comments about how the radiance hollowknight was a pacifist. “feral, wtf?” you may have thought. “she’s the freaking final boss and tries really, really hard to kill you and all her attacks do 2 entire masks damage. where on earth do you get pacifism out of that???”

to you specifically i say, that’s an understandable reaction! the short version of how i got here was that i started thinking about the story implications of radi not inflicting contact damage and took a deep dive into game mechanics and lore. when i came up for air i had made myself Very Sad.

if this intrigues you and you would like to know more, come along with me, i am happy to point out the things i noticed and share the Big Sad around.

this essay is also available on dreamwidth for accessibility purposes, since my layout’s text may be too small for folks on pc with high-res screens.

CONTENT WARNING: This essay discusses pseudo-zombie plagues and associated body horror, colonialism and genocide, horrible things that happened in real life Australian history... you know, the usual topics that come up when I’m talking about Hollow Knight.

ADDITIONAL NOTICE: TPK fans of the “TPK meant well/was working for the greater good”/“TPK and Radi are equally bad”/“TPK is bad but Radi is worse” variety please give this one a pass, it ain’t for you.

finally if youre from a christian cultural upbringing (whether currently practicing, agnostic/secular, or atheist now), understand that some of what i’m discussing here may challenge you. if thinking thru the implications of this particular part of hollow knight worldbuilding/lore is distressing for you, PLEASE only approach this essay when youre in a safe mindset & open to listening, and ask the help of a therapist or anti-racism teacher/mentor to help you process your thoughts & feelings. just like keep in mind that youre listening to an ethnoreligiously marginalized person and please be respectful here or wherever else youre discussing this dang essay

BUT THAT DOESN’T MEAN YOU’RE NOT PREPARED TO TRY: The Radiance Doesn’t Deal Contact Damage And That’s Kind Of Fucked Up And Sad

The vast majority of hostile creatures in Hollow Knight deal contact damage: This is to say, if the Wandering Knight (who I’ll probably spend most of this essay calling by their affectionate fan name Ghost) touches a hostile creature, this harms them.

There are exceptions to this rule. The most notable and most oft-memed example is the game’s literal actual true final boss, the Radiance. Not only will Ghost not be harmed by running into any part of her body, but during her stagger animation, where she drops to the boss arena floor on her front with her whole body splayed out, Ghost still isn’t harmed if she lands on top of them! What’s more, this holds true for her full-power form Absolute Radiance, the secret final boss of the Godmaster quest/endings.

A lot of people find this amusing, because it’s a little absurd that a game’s final boss is an exception to such a consistent element of gameplay! Hence all the “haha moth too soft and fluffy for contact damage” jokes. It is objective facts that Radi is very soft and very fluffy, so it’s very easy to understand why people don’t overthink this too much.

Thinking about things I like in gross detail is unfortunately my hobby. When it comes to Hollow Knight this usually leads to me making myself really sad. I’d like to share the fruits of my theorizing with the class, so other people can be sad with me.

Now, from a game design perspective I can think of a lot of reasons why Team Cherry chose for Radiance not to inflict contact damage. Her hitbox only covers the central part of her body. Her limbs are large, so because of the way she floats, if she did contact damage she would be protected from nail strikes from below and to either side. This would give a player who prefers nail combat a punishingly small margin through which they could inflict damage without also taking a hit, potentially forcing them to adapt to a new and unfamiliar play style at the very end of the game. That’s not fun for anybody and tends to make players feel very frustrated.

In addition to this, Radiance’s attacks are all bullet hell-style spells. All of them except the floor hazards inflict two masks of damage, meaning if you want to stay alive and identify points where it’s possible to heal, you need to learn the spell patterns and dodge a lot. Radi is a large boss. If running into her hurt you this would make the bullet hell elements of her fight extra punishing.

So, I think the purely game mechanics reason for Moth Too Soft And Fluffy is in interest of keeping her boss fight fair, and helping players feel like they have a chance of actually defeating her.

Part of why we all love Hollow Knight, though, is that there’s not much in the game that only exists for purely mechanical reasons. There’s always some form of story or lore integration.

So what on earth is the story reason behind why Radiance doesn’t deal contact damage?

OTHER ENEMIES THAT DON’T DEAL CONTACT DAMAGE

Radi isn’t the only enemy (here defined as fightable/killable creature) in Hollow Knight who doesn't inflict contact damage, so let’s take a look at her fellow exceptions to the rule to see what we can learn.

Broadly speaking there are two categories of Enemies That Don’t Deal Contact Damage. The first is enemies or bosses who used to be hostile, but have become friendly to the player. For instance, when characters like Ogrim and Hornet are not being fought in boss battles, touching them won’t cause damage to Ghost. These story characters who Ghost has more or less reconciled with can’t be damaged by the player out of combat either.

In terms of generic enemies who used to be hostile but have become friendly to the player, we have the mantises of the Fungal Wastes and the Siblings/Ghost’s Shade. We learn from the game’s lore that the mantises Did Not Like The Pale King and were hostile to Hallownest, but that they established a ceasefire conditional on their keeping the people of Deepnest (who were also hostile to Hallownest) from leaving through the area’s main entrance/exit in the Fungal Wastes - essentially the two native kingdoms were pitted against one another by the Pale King.

Now, just because there was a ceasefire, that doesn’t mean the mantises take kindly to Hallownest bugs brazenly trespassing into their dang house; they will get in your face and try to kill you unless you have permission to be there. But once you’ve defeated the Mantis Lords in combat and proven yourself worthy of the mantises’ respect, they’ll let you pass through their turf unmolested. They are no longer actively hostile and don't deal contact damage.

(You're still able to attack them, though - maybe because you’d be locked out of receiving the Hunter’s Mark if you complete the Respect quest/achievement before you’ve successfully killed enough mantises? - and if you attack them, or if your pet charm familiars attack them, any mantises you aggroed will fight back and deal contact damage again.)

The Siblings, as well as Ghost’s Shade, are initially indiscriminately hostile. Our window into Shade psychology is limited, but we know that the Shade died violently and the Siblings probably did too; they may be lashing out. They’re also Void creatures, and Ghost looks a lot like the Pale King, whom we can guess from context clues pissed the Void off significantly by using it as his personal play-doh to make tools and toys with and also using its house as his personal garbage dump for baby corpses.

However, once Ghost recalls their past and breaks the mask of the Kingsoul charm to reveal the Void Heart at its core, the Void recognizes them as a part of it, and Ghost becomes able to direct/lead the Void to some extent. As an extension of this, the Siblings and Ghost’s shade become docile and can now be killed by any weapon in one hit instead of just the Dream Nail (which is made of Radiance’s Light and is the Void’s natural weakness). They don’t deal contact damage anymore either.

That’s it for “enemies that inflict contact damage at one point, but stop inflicting it after becoming friendly or neutral to Ghost”.

The generic enemies which don't inflict contact damage include shrumelings, maggots, maskflies, and lightseeds/lifeseeds. These enemies are incapable of inflicting any damage on Ghost whatsoever, because by themselves they are completely helpless entities with no natural defenses.

Shrumelings are infant members of the mushroom clan who are usually protected by adult fungi like shrumal warriors and ogres. Lightseeds and lifeseeds are harmless single-celled organisms. Maskflies are similarly harmless. Maggots, we glean from the Hunter’s Journal and dialogue from False Knight/Failed Champion, are the bottom rung of Hallownest’s society because they are weak and helpless, and are forced into menial and slave labor by other Hallownest bugs because they cannot defend themselves. The maggots’ plight is the whole reason why False Knight/Failed Champion stole Hegemol's armor in the first place, as he wanted to protect his people.

All of these enemies flee when Ghost approaches them. (Some maskfly groups’ flight triggers are set to specific areas on a map and won’t flee if you can avoid stepping on/passing through those areas, but this is clearly due to a programming oversight because their whole Thing is running away.)

But, there’s something interesting to be observed in the case of lightseeds and maggots: They can fight back against and harm Ghost if they use tools. The little flock of lightseeds you chase around the Ancient Basin eventually get sick of Ghost’s shit and take over Broken Vessel/Lost Kin’s corpse, which they puppet around to try to murder you. By doing so they gain access to Broken Vessel/Lost Kin’s considerable combat prowess and become very dangerous, contact damage included in the bargain. (The lightseeds’ doing this seems to evoke the vessel’s spirit, since they reach for Ghost when defeated. That’s not a gesture the lightseeds have any reason to make. The Lost Kin fight, by which the spirit seems to gain some form of closure, becomes available here too.)

False Knight/Failed Champion’s fights work on the same general principle. Now that he has a weapon he can attack Ghost, and his armor deals contact damage. The maggot inside the armor does not inflict contact damage; essentially both his boss fights consist of your whacking the armor until he’s stunned and pops out of the armor for a moment so you can hit his vulnerable real body, which is the only part of him that yields Soul when you smack him. In fact, his boss fights will last forever if you let him recover from being stunned on his own.

Between these two groups, Radiance very obviously doesn’t fit in the first, as she’s the final boss and is very vigorously trying to kill Ghost with various magic spells. You can tell from her Dream Nail dialogue that she’s furious about what the Pale King did to her and her people, and is afraid for her life. She is willing to use everything at her disposal to try to destroy Ghost so she can survive, go free, and get revenge for the Pale King’s crimes. If she could do contact damage to Ghost she would.

So, the only logical conclusion to make is that Radi falls into the second group of enemies that don’t inflict contact damage. She is physically incapable of causing any harm to anyone with only her body. Her magic is deadly as all get out and the 2 masks damage explosion noise probably haunts the nightmares of anyone who’s struggled fighting her, but without it she is helpless.

WHY CAN’T RADIANCE DO CONTACT DAMAGE?

It might be pretty hard to reconcile the fact that a character with Audre Lorde energy as potent as Radi Hollowknight’s is has a whopping 0 ATK. The biggest clues we get in terms of story context for her inability to inflict physical harm of any kind can be found within the culture of the moth tribe, who were her people.

Thistlewind, the backer-designed moth ghost who can be found in the Resting Grounds, tells you that the majority of moths were pacifists, and that individuals like them and like Markoth who learned to wield a nail were in the minority. Thistlewind appears to have learned to fight as a means of self-defense while they explored the crater area, and describes Markoth as having done so in order to “[brave] the edges of this world, hoping to uncover a truth long forgotten”. It sounds to me like Markoth was trying to recover parts of moth culture that were lost when their tribe was assimilated into Hallownest, or maybe even searching for Radiance or trying to learn what happened to her. (Judging that his corpse is hidden behind one of the Pale King’s shade gates it seems this didn’t go well. Thanks TPK.)

As far as fighting moths go there’s Marmu too, but she seems to be a special case, possibly raised in Hallownest's culture instead of with her tribe. We don’t actually get any sort of canon explanation for how a baby moth wound up as a child soldier who died defending the Queen’s Gardens, but given the overall tone of Hollow Knight as a game and all the colonization/Australian history parallel subtext, some horrifying possibilities come to mind.

So, if Thistlewind, Markoth, and Marmu are Outliers Lepidoptera and should not be counted, how did the majority of moths spend their time? According to Seer, who knows more about the tribe’s history than most (and to Quirrel, who points you to her if you defeat Uumuu before picking up the Dream Nail), the moths’ main prerogative was cultivating and developing dream magic. From the way the Seer describes dreams as a living history as you collect Essence, dream magic seems to be a parallel to the Dreaming (or Dreamtime), a spiritual concept in Indigenous Australian religion related to both history and myth.

To translate this into simple terms, the moths were by and large pacifists whose culture celebrated art, history, and spirituality.

Team Cherry tends to adapt at least some aspects of real-life bug behavior and biology into their sad cartoon bugs, so moths-as-pacifists tracks: Real moths do not really have any way to fight. They defend themselves from predators via their mobility and their markings, which tend towards either camouflage that helps them hide or bright markings intended to scare predators off by indicating they’re poisonous (therefore not good to eat) or look like the face of something much bigger and more dangerous than they are.

There's not that much we can glean about the moths in pre-Hallownest society aside from Seer’s dialogue, because Hallownest destroyed their civilization so thoroughly: Except in the Dream Realm (which is filled with Essence spirographs and the wisteria charms that decorate Seer’s room), their architecture can only be found anymore in hidden parts of the Resting Grounds and at the very top of the Crystal Peak where Radi’s statue and a fuckton of lore tablets Ghost doesn’t know how to read are located.

But, we know that the crater pre-Hallownest was home to a ton of diverse bug nations - the mosskin, the mushroom tribe, the mantises, Deepnest, the Hive, the flukes - and every SINGLE one of those had some kind of warrior tradition, as well as their own unique cultures. In the midst of all that it was only the moths who were pacifists, so from there we can tentatively assume that they were on good enough terms with their neighbors for there not to be any fighting. The mosskin in particular also had and still have a Higher Being on their side, though in the modern day Unn seems to be rather conflict avoidant to say the least.

And we know from Hallownest’s past dealings with the mantises and Deepnest that even having Two (2) Higher Beings isn’t enough to keep rival civilizations off your nuts if they hate you, so it’s improbable that Radiance just did all the moths’ fighting for them.

The only hint that the moths ever had beef with anyone at all is one of Radiance’s Dream Nail lines, “ancient enemy” - this is popularly theorized to refer to the Void and might be corroborated by the Void’s willingness to follow Ghost into Radi’s boss fights and fight alongside them. As the Void seems to be some sort of Higher Being/god of darkness and nothingness, and the Dream Nail’s only offensive ability is to kill Void creatures, the Void and creatures of Light appear to be in a position of mutual vulnerability. Some of the Pale King’s writings in his workshop, which identify the Void as a power in direct opposition to his, support this too.

It’s unclear whether the Void civilization and Radiance ever directly came to blows or whether they were just giving each other the stink eye over being natural enemies - personally I think the latter is more likely because the two civilizations existed on opposite sides of the crater*, and again, the moths were pacifists; plus when Ghost brings the Void along to Radi’s boss fight she is quickly and gruesomely overwhelmed by it.

What I am saying here is that if pacifism was such an integral aspect of moth culture, and Radiance epitomized her people’s culture, and she is 100% incapable of inflicting physical harm, she was probably a pacifist too.

DEEP DOWN YOU KNOW YOU WEREN'T BUILT FOR FIGHTING

Hallownest flourished for a long, long time between the Pale King and White Lady first establishing it and the initial outbreak of the Infection.

There’s no conclusive information in-game as to why this is. We can only guess: Maybe Radiance was so badly hurt or weakened by the moths’ assimilation that it simply took her That Long to become capable of the mass dream broadcast to Literally Everyone In Hallownest that would eventually become the Infection when Hallownest’s people tried to suppress it. Or, maybe it just took a long time for her to come up with a way to fight back. It’s possible that it took her a while to find the resolve to actually fight back, too, with her principles of pacifism in conflict with the necessity of defending herself and taking her people back. Maybe there was a change in the moths’ situation in Hallownest somewhere down the line that compelled her to step in - all the moths are super extremely dead at the time Hollow Knight starts, after all. Even Seer is eventually revealed to be a revenant like Ze’mer the Grey Mourner, only lingering in the world to pass on the Dream Nail and tell Radiance’s story. Maybe it was a combination of all those factors. Barring Team Cherry dropping in to explain this bit of Sekret Deep Lore, we are never going to know.

All we DO know for sure is that when we mosey into Hollow’s brain (and/or Ultimate Showdown of Ultimate Destiny our way to the top of Hallownest’s Pantheon) and challenge the literal actual sun to a fight, Radi takes the challenge with extreme prejudice and comes in swinging.

Something interesting I noticed while comparing the Radiance boss fights with the Pure Vessel fight is that some of their attacks are vaguely similar. Where warrior-mage characters like Xero and Markoth have physical weapons that they summon and manipulate with magic, Radiance and Pure Vessel both create nails and daggers out of Essence and Soul respectively. Both characters’ magical weapon attacks are similar in nature too: Some are used to create hazards that must be dodged or avoided, and some are fired directly at Ghost in radial patterns.

This begs a very sad chicken-and-egg question. Did Radi and Hollow develop these battle techniques independently of each other, has Hollow in their prime form somehow absorbed similar techniques to Radi through osmosis since they’re currently chained together by the brain... or is Radi mimicking and innovating on these attacks she knows Hollow can do?

All her other attacks seem very obvious for a light-themed character, after all: Beam attacks and blobs of light. A flash of bright light is also how she shakes off the Void the first time it tries to grab her, too, making for a strong argument that that’s the original natural defense she possessed, and that’s what she based most of her attack magic off of.

Making sword’s and knive’s from Essence when most of her people didn’t even handle these sorts of tools even at the height of her power and influence, though... that seems less like something that would come naturally to her. i don’t really know i don’t have a definitive answer or theory for this one it just Seems Possible and it’s fucking me up guys

Even the Infection - which began life as Radiance’s attempt to communicate, let’s remember, before it progressed to “The End Of Eva Disease Will Continue Until Someone Actually Listens To Me” and then finally Radi screaming “FUCK U LET ME OUT, GET THAT NEW SUNNY D BOTTLE THE FUCK AWAY FROM ME, HALLOWNEST EAT SHIT” during canon - does not appear to be fatal to living bugs until the tumorous growths grow so large they impede bodily functions, like real cancer. We can observe this phenomenon via a number of NPCs and enemies that are rediscovered as tumorous corpses after the whole Crossroads area becomes infected.

At least to me, all of this points to Radiance being a character to whom violence and causing harm doesn't come naturally, and who has resorted to these methods in desperation.

It actually reminds me a lot of False Knight/Failed Champion. It’s a very common theory among fans that when he stole Hegemol’s armor he killed Hegemol - this is a reasonable thing to believe, since Hegemol is the only one of the Five Great Knights of Hallownest who never appears at all in-game, not even as a corpse like Dryya and Isma. Like Radi, False Knight/Failed Champion is a character who rose up and turned to violence in order to protect his people, despite the maggots not being a belligerent species.

False Knight is one of the game’s first major bosses, sometimes the first boss that players encounter at all. And so Hollow Knight’s story bookends with two separate victims of a predatory system, one who lived within and was cannibalized by it, one outside of it who was deliberately targeted by the Pale King. Neither of them started out as a fighter, but both of them still adopted violence as a tool to protect themselves and their people. Radiance is as doomed as False Knight by the Pale King’s genocide, but just like False Knight, she has no intention of going quietly, and will rage against the dying of the light as only the literal actual sun can.

Cue Deedee Magno Hall voice clip. You all know the one.

*A footnote: There’s no conclusive evidence to tell us whether the Void civilization was contemporaneous with the other pre-Hallownest indigenous bug nations or whether it predated them. Mask Maker has a line suggesting that the Void civilization tried to expand throughout the crater in its heyday and that maybe this was linked to its collapse, but in general the Void lore is just too darn thin to draw firm conclusions - it’s like trying to speculate on the ancient stone age cultures of the Americas that came before pre-settler Indigenous countries when the only sources you can easily access are elementary school level US history textbooks. (To non-Americans: We mostly teach kids propaganda until they hit college-level courses and it sucks so much ass.) This is very realistic worldbuilding, but also please Team Cherry I want to know more about these ancient bugs who apparently got lost in the sauce

[lcnguor]

THE MEGA RP PLOTTING SHEET / MEME.

First and foremost, recall that no one is perfect, we all have witnessed some plotting once which did not went too well, be it because of us or our partner. So here have this, which may help for future plotting. It’s a lot! Yes, but perhaps give your partners some insight? Anyway BOLD what fully applies, italicize if only somewhat.

Mun Name: Mik      Age: 26       Contact: IM, discord, smoke signal, whatever.

Character(s) I rp: Nora, Spike. Which muse(s) inspires you the most atm?(for MM): Nora, most likely Current Fandom(s): Fandomless Fandom(s) you have an AU for:  pretty much everything I find around and hop on. My language(s): spanish, english.  Themes I’m interested in for rp:   Fantasy / Science fiction / Horror / Western / Romance / Thriller / Mystery / Dystopia / Adventure / Modern / Erotic / Crime / Mythology / Classic / History / Renaissance / Medieval / Ancient / War / Family / Politics / Religion / School / Adulthood / Childhood / Apocalyptic / Gods / Sport / Music / Science / Fights / Angst / Smut / Drama / etc. Themes/Genres you have an AU for: modern without supernatural, I do have some fantasy set up but eh. 

Preferred Thread length: one-liner / 1 para / 2 para / 3+ / novella. Asks can be send by: Mutuals / Non-Mutuals / Personals / Anons. Can Asks be continued?:   YES / NO   only by Mutuals?:  YES / NO. Preferred thread type: crack / casual nothing too deep / serious / deep as heck. Is realism / research important for you in certain themes?:   YES / NO. Are you atm open for new plots?:  YES / NO / DEPENDS. Do you handle your draft / ask - count well?:  YES / NO / SOMEWHAT. How long do you usually take to reply?:  24h / 1 week / 2 weeks / 3+ / months / years. I’m okay with interacting: original characters / a relative of my character (an oc) / duplicates / my fandom / crossovers / multi-muses / self-inserts / people with no AU verse for my fandom / canon-divergent portrayals / au-versions (as main or only verse). Do you post more ic or occ?:  IC / OOC. Are you selective with following others?:  YES / NO / DEPENDS.  

Best ways to approach you for rp/plotting:  ask, IM, discord, singing telegram, smoke signals, messeger pidgeos -- whatever dude. I will most likely talk and ramble a lot, I do like plotting and I squeeze my brains out to think in ways to rp with ppl. and I really suck at approaching others. really...

What expectations do you hold towards your plotting partner:  Ideas and somewhat more enthusiasm than me. I tend to shy away or feel very much awkward right off the bat if the person approaches me with not much to say or give. And honestly, some people really intimidate me because I am too hard on myself, so giving a bit of a pat on the back makes me relax more. I deal with a lot of anxiety and I know people run away the second I show it. 

When you notice the plotting is rather one-sided, what do you do?:  Mostly when I am doing the talk or coming with ideas or looking generally more interested. It takes effort for me to get on things and actually do stuff but if it’s not the other way around I end up thinking they got bored of me. I am one hell of insecure person. As for what I do, if after many tries of trying to reach another person and end up feeling rejected or ignored, then ... I stop. What’s the point of insisting if the other person would just be awkward or not spare you a word?

How do you usually plot with others, do you give input or leave most work towards your partner?:  well, I usually ask first what the other thinks or have in mind, if nothing, I either suggest or start brainstorming with the other person. I know some who have dealt with me at first I seem like a dettached person but not having ideas really makes me feel like I have not much right to talk. I want to give yet without impossing or letting it twist my arm. I know for a fact nora’s lore really doesn’t help shit for most things. 

When a partner drops the thread, do you wish to know?:   YES / NO / DEPENDS. - And why?: if the thread was meaningful and we were really into it , then I would ask but as for the most, I don’t really bother with it. Sometimes people just lose muse, and even if I was enjoying it, I don’t have the right  to force someone or ask why they stopped. thread dropping is normal, i guess.  - What should your partner do when dropping a thread?:  whatever they want. telling me or not is up to them, I don’t really mind. RP is not something SUPER serious like it should be just perfect. I try to convice myself of this a lot.

What could possibly lead you to drop a thread?:  either because it was old as fuck, I couldn’t find muse or because it was lost in the void of tumblr’s amazing tracking system. - Will you tell your partner?:   YES / NO / DEPENDS.

Is communication in the rpc important to you?   YES / NO. - And why?:  if I do not have some idea of who am i rping with and what they have in mind, then it’s nearly impossible. being purely IC is really uncomfortable and could lead to a lot of misundertandings. - Are you okay with absolute honesty, even if it may means hearing something negative about you and/or portrayal?:  yeah. mostly yeah -- I mean, I will feel bad, I do have feelings, but I will take it with water. - Do you think you can handle such situation in a mature way?  YES ( but I will feel bad anyways ) / NO.

Why do you rp again, is there a goal?:  connect with others, ramble a lot about characters, have fun. I’ve been rping since i was 12 ( back then it was not big deal your age apparently ) and having to connect with other people by making these plots and stories and just having a fun time is something that brings me joy. There’s so much that can be done. And exploring my muses with other muses influences is really helpful to fill the holes left due indecisiveness.

Wishlist, be it plots or scenarios:  I wish people joined my lore more. Having muses that could be in the same story department as Nora in particular, would be hella and inspire me more. There is so much I have. Explore nora’s power is also something I want but it’s hard -- it’s very invasive and not many would really like it, feeling it’s meta. For now, I don’t really have other muses and Spike has her little crew outside tumblr.

Themes I won’t ever rp / explore:  umm, it’s hard to think in something in particular. But mostly stuff that collides with nora’s story/character. but there is a lot I am willing to explore.

What Type of Starters do you prefer / dislike, can’t work with?: casual starters are my fab. It’s easier to figure out how  to go or stop and think. plotted ones also work. as for what I dislike or cannot work with, things that force my muse to not act how they would? not giving me something solid is hard to handle. 

What type of characters catch your interest the most?:  I really like out of the norm muses, something that you see and say /oh , look at that/. Aesthetically, story wise or personality wise, something that goes out the usual troup most would use. I do have a guilty pleasure for opposite to my muse characters --- something that would really show the contrast with one another.

What type of characters catch your interest the least?:  Very basic ones? or those who try TOO hard to be special. A character that doesn’t fit in the context they are in, esp. in fandoms. HEAVILY divergent characters that just basically turn them into OCs. I know I sound like a bitch but I am the type who respect canon and the actual author behind the character too much. Also those that I don’t know much about? as in, the fandom never managed to catch my interest or smth in that line.

What are your strong aspects as rp partner?:  I know where is the line between fiction and reality. And that what your character does it does not reflect as the person you actually are. I am pretty laid back and I understand people’s views and reasoning. idk. I draw a lot if I am super invested ?

What are your weak aspects as rp partner?: I am super sporadic and can go from being super active to flat out dead for weeks. my mood swings a lot with the amount of attention I get, as horrible as it sounds. I am very anxious as a person for reasons ( not IRL mostly, just bad experience from previous partners ). I promise a lot but do little? honestly I will just bad mouth myself if I keep writing this.

Do you rp smut?:  YES ( tho mostly on discord ) / NO. Do you prefer to go into detail?:  YES / NO / DEPENDS. Are you okay with black curtain?:  YES / NO. - When do you rp smut? More out of fun or character development?:  both? - Anything you would not want to rp there?:  ehhhh, idk -- i don’t do as much to know what I don’t like here.

Are ships important to you?:   YES / NO / RELATIVE. Would you say your blog is ship-focused?:   YES / NO. Do you use read more?:  YES / NO / SOMETIMES. Are you: Multi-Ship / Single-Ship / Dual-Ship  —  Multiverse / Singleverse. - What do you love to explore the most in your ships?:  the very nature of human relations. I am talking about Nora big time here -- there is a lot to explore in her relations and how she reacts and acts towards someone is very very contextual. How much she fakes, how much she is sincere, how much she struggles or how relaxed can be. force her to show her real self, which is very hazy even for her as a task. Be very poetic deep and also very shallow. I particulary see her as a character that REALLY depends on her relation with the other muse -- but generally speaking for any of my muses: I love to explore them as a pair and as individuals. - What is your smut tag?: the unfamily friendly. ( new tag (?))

Are you okay with pre-established relationships?: YES / NO. - And what kind of ones?: Anything? I am open to anything honestly. As long as it makes sense.

► SECTION ABOUT YOUR MUSE.

- What could possibly make your Muse interesting towards others, why should they rp with this particular character of yours now, what possible plots do they offer?:  Anyone who is denying their feelings, are peculiar as an individual or anyone who needs an insight of themselves and the world around them. Nora is a mentor type of character, she is here to be a support and help others explore themselves and learn. Also if you are a minor, she will most likely try to get close to help -- one must protect the good sad kids.

- With what type of Muses do you usually struggle to rp with?:  Stubborn, very fixated with things. Who would not open themselves to other perspective without thinking someone is trying to change them. Also she would struggle a heck lot with psychopaths and sociopaths, or anyone that “doesn’t have a face” for her. - With what type of Muses do they usually work well with?:  Curious people, struggling ones, kids in general -- people that are willing to listen to her opinions and try to improve in a positive way. Also those who are quirky in a way. 

- What interests your Muse(s) in general:  rabbits, literature, interesting people, the unknown, learning, relationships of all natures.  - What do they desire, is their goal?:  Live long without letting her particularity ruin her -- for her kind nobody makes it past the 50s and she wants that , to conquer her ability and prove that even with something like she is ( they are ), it’s posible to live and be happy. have a family of her own, yeah she is that cheesy. - What catches their interest first when meeting someone new?:  Their actions and the emotions that they are carrying on their back.  - What do they value in a person?:    sincerity, willingness, enthusiasm. - What themes do they like talking about?:  a lot of phylosophic stuff, deep topics -- as well to casual things of life. about people and society. - Which themes bore them?:  excuses and avoidance -- people who are willing to drop everything and give up.

- Did they ever went through something traumatic?:  the attempt of suicide of her mother. and the successfull suicide of many of her peers. - What could possibly trigger them?:  any sort of threat or violence towards someone who does not asked for it. esp. her peers and family. - What could set them off, enrage them?:  Immoral ones. Those who are willing to stomp on others just to success in their goal. - What could lead to an instant kill?:  is not killing, but touch a hair of her family and you are done. same for her friends and protegees.

- Is there someone /-thing they hate?:  gorgers, suicide, her tired face. - Is there someone /-thing they love?:   her family and dear ones --- to a fault. rabbits or anything related to it.

Is your Muse easy to approach?: YES / NO. - Best ways to approach them?:  any way is okay as long as is not threatening. - Where are they usually to find?:  during the night, in the streets -- during the day is either her workplace or her house. maybe a park near her apartment/location if she is feeling stuffy.

Something you may still want to point out about your muse?:  she is not a good person , she is willing to manipulate people and is constantly trying to impose her morals. but she is also very sensitive even if she doesn’t show it --- Nora does look tired for a reason , and one of them is because she cries a lot . 

CONGRATS!!! You managed it, now tag your mutuals! ♥

Tagged by:  @skyvar​ Tagging:  @batoushoujo​ , @obtainedloss​ , @lorddiiavolo​ , @evanesense​ , @sunpierce​ , @necrotrigae​ , @maljefe​ , @ethaeria​ , @calpio​ , @veiliisms​

[cogentranting]

Because I Would Not Stop For Death Pt 2.

Summary: My version of the ending of Supernatural, with a specific emphasis on Dean as the main character.

Also on: AO3 Accompanying Meta: X Part 1  

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Loss affects everyone differently. In the days and weeks and months following Dean’s death this was especially true.

To Jack it gave a hard edge. There was an anger and fierceness about him so like that of the Winchesters who had known so much loss themselves. It pushed Jack to reckless, relentless fervor. He tried tracking down the demons that had killed Dean, but to no avail. In the meantime, he prepared for the fight that they all knew must come, stretching and expanding the limits of his powers. And as he did so, he practiced his hunting skills as well, tracking down ghosts and demons and gaining for himself a reputation as a hunter of such prowess that he could only have been a Winchester. Which makes sense.  After all, it was avenging the death of a parent which first drove Sam and Dean as well.

To Castiel, loss brought weariness. Dean had been his first real link to humanity and with Dean gone he couldn’t help feeling that humanity itself was just less. He kept on, same as before, but shadows dragged down his eyes and hope’s light was a weak flicker. Even Jack’s growing power and passion could not quite reawaken in him any faith in victory. But for Sam and Jack he persevered. He’d rather fade away, slowly dragged through Hell, than let them down. He kept a watchful eye over Jack, paralyzed by the thought of such another loss, and spent his days in dogged pursuit of some secret bit of lore which might provide them with a new weapon.

To Sam, loss gave instability. A part of him had died and with it had gone his balance. He teetered erratically on the verge of a thousand states of being. Each day might bring a new version of himself. Would he be the lost little boy looking for his brother? Or the cold, driven machine seeking revenge? Some days he was rock and leader, others he seemed to be awkwardly shaping himself to fill Dean’s shoes. No matter how hard he strove he could not find his footing. A fatalism sunk deep into Sam’s heart and quietly he despaired of ever feeling truly whole again. But there was a fear too. A fear that if he gave in to that despair then Dean’s death would be in vain and everything he had left would collapse around his head. He would not press this train of thought too far, so mostly he didn’t think beyond the here and now, the tasks he set himself when he had mustered the strength to do so. Introspection made him feel he might shatter. The future was a dark void, the past an open wound. So sometimes he lead the charge, sometimes he trailed behind Cas and Jack, but always he kept his eyes locked on that Sisyphean task before them.

And thus the three trekked forward, gingerly navigating the shadows and haunted spaces that Dean’s absence left in their lives.

    If long ago, before he had the privilege of knowing death like an old song, you’d asked Dean what he thought dying and going to the afterlife felt like, he likely would have guessed that it was like losing consciousness and waking up again. Now, some 12 or 13 years after his first death, Dean knew differently. He was all too bleakly aware that death felt irrefutably and indescribably Other. So it was that from the moment Dean opened his eyes, he was under no illusion that he had somehow been saved. He knew with absolute certainty that he was dead.

He found himself sitting in a black office chair, a little too small for comfort, with an empty table in front of him. Beyond that were bookcases, stretching high above his head, and far beyond what he could see in either direction, each one labeled with a letter and bearing endless stacks of nearly identical thin black books. His feet squeaked against the starkly polished black floors as he scrambled to his feet, uncertain whether he should still expect to face enemies. Almost as quickly he relaxed. He’d been here before, two years ago. This was Death’s library. Nearly the same instant as his realization, Billie emerged from one of the many corridors of shelves. Dean thought he detected an even more severe look on her face than usual. However, four years hadn’t been quite enough time for Dean to begin to decipher her enigmatic expressions.

“Hello Dean.”

He gave a curt nod and shifted his feet, waiting for her to speak. She did not. “What am I doing here Billie?”

“You’d rather be in Heaven or Hell?”

“Do I get a choice? You open a new afterlife travel agency- choose your destination? Or have we come back around to that promise you made Sam. That you’re going to throw us into the Empty when we die.”

“Tempting as that may be sometimes, no. I thought I’d been pretty clear that we’re past that. ‘Larger picture’ and all that.”

“Right, right. New job, new outlook. I remember.” Dean was relaxing, gaining confidence. One might even have called him hopeful. Surely just being here was a good sign. And hadn’t Billie, after all, been an ally to them more often than not? “So uh,” he clapped his hands together. “If you’re not gonna turn me over to the angels or the demons, and you’re not gonna drop me in the Empty, can we just skip through this little pep talk or lecture or whatever you have planned and get me back down to Earth?”

“I never said I was sending you back.”

“So what am I doing here?” He barked impatiently. As confidence in his own situation had grown, the thought of Azazel in the Bunker had crept its way into his mind, along with thoughts of the revenge Alistair might want for the man who’d killed him.

“You’re here because you and I need to have a talk.”

“Great let’s get this heart to heart over with. Sooner the better. I need to get back to warn Sam about what’s coming.”

Billie came closer, impatience mixed with an uncharacteristic note of sympathy in her eyes. “You’re misunderstanding me, Dean. I’m not sending you back at all.”

Dean jerked his chin up and squared his shoulders. “I need to go back there. Sam, Cas, and Jack, they need me. They need to know who’s coming for them. And Chuck- Chuck needs to be stopped.”

“And you’re the one who’s going to stop him? Dean Winchester with a can-do attitude and handgun is going to stop God?”

“I’m going to try! And Sam and them, they need all the help they can get. I thought you were on our side in all of this! You’re the one who brought Jack back. You’re the one who backed us. You’re pulling out now!? You do one thing and after that you’re just ready to throw in the towel? To run and let Chuck have his way?”

Billie’s eyes narrowed. “You should watch what you say. You might come to regret it.”

Dean jabbed a finger in Billie’s direction. “You said that Sam and I were important. You said that we had work to do.”

“Argue all you like Dean. But I couldn’t send you back even if I wanted to.”

Dean scoffed. “You’re Death. You’ve done it before, and more. The Old Death even pulled Sam’s soul out of the Cage.”

“Circumstances have changed.

   Despite the endless hours spent in anticipation, the end caught them unawares, though not unprepared. It had been a long time since they believed they’d find any weapon to help them fight Chuck, but recently they’d begun to suspect that Jack was as strong as he would get (at least within Sam’s lifetime). So for some time they had been waiting, in anxious tension for the day when Chuck would make his move.

As for Chuck, he loved his parallels. So exactly ten years after Michael and Lucifer took their fighting stance in that very spot, Cas, Sam, and Jack found themselves standing on the dry dead grass of Stull Cemetery.

Storm clouds had rolled in, casting a pall over the stark field, and a few cracks of lightning tore the sky because, of course, Chuck had a flair for the dramatic. And this was Chuck’s doing—all of it. The field in Kansas, the fate of the world, the battle lines drawn. Team Free Will was down a man and felt it as if missing a limb. They’d debated whether or not to bring in backup—Jodie, Donna, Bobby, Eileen, whatever others they could find—but in the end all the arguments of who to involve and what good it would do were pointless; Chuck decided for them that it should be they three standing alone. It could be said that it was a mercy that Chuck brought so few to stand on his own side. Certainly, he could have raised a host of angels, demons, and monsters to back him. Instead he’d brought with him only Alistair, Abaddon, and Azazel, neglecting entirely the angels he seemed to have grown bored of long ago, in favor of an all-star grudge match. Still, Sam hadn’t been fooled into thinking the odds were any more favorable to them. And within the first minute of the fight, his judgment was proved right, as very quickly their best laid plans unraveled.

Time seemed to slow to a crawl and Sam watched as if in slow motion. Abaddon and Alistair were toying with Cas, who was bloodied and bruised. They circled like jackals as he desperately gripped his blade. Further away, Chuck had Jack in a similar position. Jack’s eyes glowed and he flung out an arm, but whatever he had attempted was nullified by Chuck, though not without effort. Jack looked tired and scared and every inch of Sam wanted to run and rescue the boy, as impossible as that might be.

Azazel wrapped a hand around Sam’s throat and lifted him from the ground. Sam made a desperate stab with the angel blade, but the demon caught his hand and flicked the weapon away. Sam struggled to draw in a breath. It was rare that Sam felt small, but staring into those yellow eyes he felt like a kid. A kid who’d grown up hunting and thought he knew everything there was to know about monsters. A kid who only really realized how out of his depth he was the first time he stared into those same yellow eyes. And just like when he was scared as a child, in that moment, all Sam wanted was his brother.

It was as if Azazel had read his mind. He grinned. “Oh, we’ve come a long way, Sammy. You and me, we were the start. And now we’re gonna be the end. I killed Grandpa. I killed Mommy. I killed Daddy. I killed Dean.” He paused for a moment to watch the rage and pain in Sam’s eyes. “And now, I’m gonna kill you, and put an end to the Winchester’s once and for all.”

           He flung Sam to the ground, where he lay gasping for air. He wanted to stand, to fight back, but his body wasn’t listening to him. Before he could recover, Azazel clenched his fist and Sam felt knives in his gut. He heard the cries of pain and fear from Cas and Jack as they fought their losing battle, and he felt the cold weight of helplessness. The yellow gaze bored into his head. Sam closed his eyes. Desperately, illogically, he thought, “if only Dean had been here, we might have made it.”

           An engine roared a heraldic cry. A sound as familiar as a friend’s voice. Across the field the two sides froze. The gleaming black Impala surged over the hill, like it had 10 years before. It looked like new. Not a dent. Not a scratch. No trace of the explosion which had destroyed it. It rolled gracefully toward the stunned combatants. In shock, they waited.

           The door opened. The field was hushed, but from the car rolled the exultant chords of a rock song. He stepped out slowly, calmly. A silhouette against the raucous music. He was dressed in a suit, every inch of it jet black, perfectly tailored. On his finger he wore a ring with a white stone, and he casually twisted it, as if from old habit. He stood and surveyed the field as they all watched him.

           Sam propped himself up on one elbow and cried, breathless with joy, “Dean, you’re alive!”

           Dean turned and caught his brother’s eye. He gave a wry smile. “Not exactly.” He held out his hand, and in it, there materialized a tall, rugged scythe.

   “Circumstances have changed.”

“What is that supposed to mean? Why can’t you send me back?”

“Sit down, Dean there’s a lot to go over.” Sulkily, Dean lowered himself back into the same chair he’d woken in moments before. Billie hesitated just a moment. “You’re right Dean. You are important. But not in the way you thought. Your role is no longer as a hunter.”

“As what then?”

“As Death.”

The anger that had been churning in Dean’s mind was snuffed out by the wave of shock and confusion. His mouth opened but he couldn’t make any words come out. Billie watched him gape, the gears of his mind practically visible. When it seemed that his eyes were focusing on her again, she continued.

“There are rules to everything Dean. Consequences and reactions that run deeper than any power you’ve seen. And one of those rules is this: if you kill Death, you become the next Death when you die.”

Dean floundered and found one idea to grasp on to. “But you’re Death. You said, when Death dies, the next reaper to die gets the job.”

Billie shrugged. “That was all you needed to know at the time. Think of me as an interim position. Five years is a long time to wait for a new cosmic power, and it could have been much longer.”

“This is crazy. I’m not Death! I can’t be. I’m not—I’m not-“

“The signs have been there for a long time. Much longer than five years.”

“So what you’re saying it was my- my destiny?” Dean scoffed, repelled by the thought.

“You might call it that. You’ve always had, shall we say, an interesting relationship with death.”

Dean started to protest but Billie cut him off with a wave of her hand. “From the time you were a child, you were surrounded by death. Your mother. The cases your father worked, the monsters you hunted. All the people you’ve lost since then.”

“That doesn’t mean anything. That’s the gig. The life. Ask any Hunter.”

“That’s because it’s only one piece in the puzzle, Dean. You’ve known death like no one else has. You know you should’ve died when you were 26? You were electrocuted, your heart damaged-“

“I remember. But I was healed. So?”

“You were healed, by a reaper. How many people do you think can say the same? That they were given life by an agent of death.”

“That preacher used the reaper to heal a lot of people.”

“Like I said, pieces of the puzzle. How many of those same people were supposed to die again later that year, killed by a powerful demon, but came back?” She went on before Dean could respond. “And then how many of them, would come back and work to save Reapers a few years later?”

Frustration bubbled in Dean’s chest as a hundred half-spun arguments about why none of that meant anything froze on the tip of his tongue.

But Billie pressed on without regard for him. “But that’s all small compared to the fact that you have died more times than anyone else. Everyone in your orbit picks that up a little bit. Sam, Cas, Jack, your mom… But no one matches your record. Gabriel saw to that with his little Mystery Spot game.”

“Yeah but those weren’t real-“

“Between Gabriel and the other angels and all their meddling, you’ve died a lot of times that you can’t remember, but that doesn’t mean they didn’t happen. And it means that you have the very rare distinction of having been sent to Heaven, Hell and Purgatory.”

Billie sat down on the edge of the table in front of Dean. Making him understand the full extent of his role in all this was so very, very important. “But all those are just precursors, Dean. Little warning signs. The old Death knew what they meant. That’s why he found it all so amusing. That’s why he let you summon him so many times. That’s why he trusted you with his ring when you first fought Lucifer.”

“If he knew, why wouldn’t he do something to stop it? Why would he hand me his scythe?”

“That larger picture I’ve talked about. It was always your destiny.”

Dean rolled his eyes. “I am so tired of people telling me all these things that I’m supposed to do.”

“There have been a lot of prophecies about you, Dean. Most have come true. But there’s a difference between prophecies that someone tries to make happen by taking away your choices, and a fate that you are destined for, that can be predicted, just because of the very nature of who you are. No one forced you to do these things. The choices you made brought you here.”

“Well what if I don’t want it? What if I choose not to be Death?”

“You already are. The moment you died, you became Death. And there’s no going back, no being human again. If you want, you can choose not to do the job. But you’ve seen what happens when Death doesn’t do what he’s supposed to. That’s why the old Death gave you his ring for the day all those years ago. It was your apprenticeship. To make sure that when the time came, you’d do the job right.”

           Billie’s voice had become uncharacteristically gentle, but now she straightened up, severe once more. “But there’s more to it than that. More you have to understand.”          

           Dean sighed and leaned back in his chair. “Well let’s get through it.”

           “You set everything in motion 5 years ago when you killed Death. That’s when everything changed and all this went from being destiny to a reality. And you don’t understand the extent of the change that happened when it did. Before you were dealing with ancient and powerful things—Lilith, the archangels, the Mark of Cain—but that action brought the cosmic into play.”

           “I killed Death, and that’s when Chuck and Amara showed up.”

           “Exactly. And that’s why you and Amara shared a connection.”

           “Amara’s connection to me was because I had had the Mark.”

           “Lucifer also once had the Mark, and it didn’t stop Amara from torturing him, now did it? No, she didn’t realize it, but she was drawn to you because Darkness and Death are connected. But right now it’s Chuck’s role in this that matters. Amara didn’t realize the significance of what you’d done. But Chuck did. And since then you’ve had a target on your back. I only learned that recently, or I would have warned you.”

           “A target? If Chuck wanted me dead he could kill me whenever he wanted.”

           “That’s just it. He didn’t want you dead. Because he wanted to prevent you from becoming Death, and there are only a few ways to make that happen.            When you trapped Michael, I brought you a book saying that the only way to stop Michael from destroying this world was to go into the Malak box.”

           Dean nodded. “But I didn’t and the world is still standing. The book was wrong.”

           “Because Chuck put it there, to manipulate you.”

“Because if I had gotten into the box, I would have spent an eternity trapped and possessed by Michael.”

           “You would never die, and never become Death. And that wasn’t his only attempt to stop you. The Equalizer gun. A weapon powerful enough to kill a being like Chuck, or Amara, or even Jack, is so strong that if used on a human, it would obliterate their soul. If you had used the gun on Jack, you wouldn’t just have died. You would have been so completely destroyed that you could not become Death. The soul bomb you planned to use against Amara would have done the same thing.”

           “But Chuck’s the one who took that out, if he wanted me destroyed why would he do that?”

           Billie shrugged. “I’m not sure. Maybe that one wasn’t planned, and he hadn’t figured out what you were yet. Maybe he was feeling confident and was afraid of turning Amara against him again.”

           Dean scowled. “But when I died, just now, it was the soul bomb. If that’s true I shouldn’t be here.”

           Billie looked smug. “The soul bomb didn’t kill you. Lucky for us, Alistair was a little overzealous with that knife of yours. It probably wouldn’t have killed you first, except that I exploited a loophole and reaped you, just a little bit early. Tricky timing, pulling that off. You’re welcome.”

           “Why does all this matter so much to him? What difference does it make?”

           “Because, that first time you talked to him, Death told you something else. Something very important.”

           The realization rolled over Dean like a thunderstorm. “He told me one day he’d reap God.”

           “Which wasn’t exactly true. Death will do it, but not him. You Dean. You will reap God.”

  The music shut off, leaving only the creak of the car door swinging shut. The demons fell back a few steps, unconsciously withdrawing from the aura of death which hung on Dean like the scent of a familiar place—from Dean it wasn’t ominous or evil, just potent, and quiet, and still. Chuck fidgeted, seeming as unsure of himself as his persona when they’d first met, when he’d been just a writer. And Dean… Dean fixed a cufflink, and then met the stares with a self-assured smile and lifted eyebrows.

            The world bent around him like the tense crackle of dry air before an impending storm. Even as they recognized him, his friends realized that Dean was changed.

When he was younger Dean had worn authority the way he’d worn his father’s old leather jacket. As he’d grown into it, that same authority had been announced and demanded with every set jaw, every dark eye, every sharp word, as over and over again the world tried to deny him his due. But there could be no denying now. No question of Dean proving and reproving himself endlessly. Now authority sat naturally in the curve of his smile and the fire of his eyes. Now it draped his shoulders like a cloak and adorned his head like a crown. Now he held his head high like a king. Sam almost could have mistaken him for Michael, but the light in his smile, paired with the anger in his eyes—that was unmistakably Dean. For the first time, Sam truly understood the reason why his brother was the true vessel to the Prince of the Host.

           Still, Sam knew Dean like his own breath and felt his presence like the beat of his own heart. So he felt deep in his soul the rightness of having his brother back and by his side. And though the man before him was indisputably different than anything he’d ever known his brother to be, in an odd way it was as if Dean was more himself than ever before.

“No. No no no no.” Chuck shook his head, a smile beginning to form. “This can’t be real. This is some sort of trick. You can’t be here. Dean can’t be here. I made sure of it. He’s gone.”

           Dean shrugged and gave his scythe a twirl. “Well, I don’t want to point any fingers but…” he pulled a face and jerked his head in the direction of the demon trio. “You know what they say about good help.”

           Rage and a trace of fear crossed Abaddon’s face. “That bomb-“

           “Didn’t kill me. I died of a knife wound.”

           The demons shifted uneasily, fully aware of the repercussions of that statement. Chuck’s eyes turned to steel, but he made no move. He only watched and waited for his enemy to make a move.

Sam scrambled to his feet as Dean strolled closer. Dean came alongside him. His eyes never left Chuck, but his voice dropped low and soft, no longer a king, but a boy checking on his kid brother. “You alright, Sammy?”

Sam nodded, a little breathless, a little overwhelmed by the sight of the brother he thought was gone. Dean nodded, at the same time checking in with both Cas and Jack via quick glances in each of their directions. “You’re gonna need something that can actually kill a Prince of Hell. Give me your blade.”

Sam held up the blade and Dean laid a hand on the silver metal. Instantly the blade turned stark black. “One kill,” Dean warned under his breath, already starting to move away from Sam. He circled around the edge of the field to where Cas was. Abaddon and Alistair had backed a few paces away, unwilling to move against the unexpected new enemy until a signal was given. Dean silently tapped Castiel’s weapon, turning it black as well. Unlike Sam, Cas could feel the grim import of the newly empowered weapon and suppressed a shudder. A weapon blessed by Death himself.

Dean had stopped his circling a few steps away from Cas, between his friend and the demons, directly across from Chuck. Tension crackled in the air, wrapping fingers around throats, and holding limbs locked in place. Like feral dogs they waited, hackles raised, teeth bared, legs stiff, but frozen in the moment before attack, each waiting for their respective alpha to make a move.

Chuck laughed bitterly. As Dean had set the stage, he’d been furiously trying to work out where his precautionary measures had gone astray. His hands went to his pockets and he bobbed his head. “This is Billie, isn’t it?”

“Yeah.”

“Just like the kid being back was Billie.”

“Turns out, Billie knows how to play the game pretty well.”

Chuck was growing huffy and agitated. “Let me guess, she told you some story about how this is your destiny. Become Death, reap me, yada yada yada.”

“That’s about the shape of it.”

“But you know that’s not how it works, Dean. I’m the author. Fate, destiny… they’re what I say they are. Every step you’ve taken, your entire life, has been because it’s the story I want for you. You really think Billie knows more than I do?”

“I think a soul bomb is a bit of an extreme way to try to kill one high school dropout armed with just a couple guns and a magic knife. I think that the old Death did a lot of things which didn’t make sense, but are starting to look like he knew a lot more than he let on. I think you looked real surprised, and real unhappy to see me get out of that car. I mean, it looks a whole lot like, you didn’t want me to be Death, but here I am. I’m Death. So yeah, I think maybe, you don’t get all the say in how this plays out.”  

“You’ve always been good at talking big, Dean. And you’ve got the look down—the suit, the ring, the scythe. But we both know that deep down, nothing’s changed. You’re still just that same kid, too scared of losing his family to realize that he’s fighting a battle he can never win.”

Dean looked thoughtful, and for a moment his eyes strayed toward Sam. “Yeah. I am the same. Now let’s end this thing.”

They struck as branches of forked lightning. An explosion of violence and long-brewing hatred. Jack threw himself at Chuck before he could make any sort of move toward Dean, and Chuck’s attention and power were forced back onto his grandson. Azazel and Sam were at each other’s throats once more, each feeling a compulsive urge towards the resolution of that decades-long conflict between them. Abaddon’s move toward Cas was shadowed a moment later by Alistair, who no doubt hoped to see the enchanted blade’s single kill spent on the Knight before he made his play. But he had gone no more than a step when Dean appeared between him and the duel.

Dean closed the space between them and took pleasure in the demon’s reluctant retreat. Even something as old and as powerful as Alistair feared Death. Dean leaned in close, decades of anger broiling storm clouds in his eyes. Alistair sneered in the face of his former apprentice, but it was the bared teeth of a trapped animal. Dean’s voice was barely more than a whisper. “You were right. I do owe you. Let me pay you back.”

It was quick. Not the long, artfully orchestrated revenge he’d once dreamed of, but a contemptuous swatting of a fly. His ringed hand grabbed Alistair’s bare wrist, there was short sputter of light, and the demon was dead.

Cas’s attacks were revitalized. He matched Abaddon’s fury blow for blow. In every movement his long history as a soldier and a warrior were evident. More terrifying by far was the zealous conviction which had led him, for good or evil, so often before, all of it now bearing down on Abaddon. A knight of Hell, a soldier of Heaven, and a fearsome battle. But at last Cas’s blade found its mark and Abaddon died, frozen in the twisted fury which had defined her.

Sam’s struggle with Azazel was shorter. Sam was thrown but regained his feet in an instant, charging Azazel. No fatigue touched him. The hunt for that demon had defined his childhood and cast a pall over his adulthood. And now at the end Sam had no space left in him for any more words or mercy in that story. He simply ended it. When the knife drove home, Sam watched the yellow fade from the eyes with mute satisfaction.

But Dean saw little of either fight. The full weight of his attention lay on the fight in front of him.

Winds whipped up, creating a swirling vortex of clouds far above the heads of Chuck and Jack. Cas and Sam staggered in the maelstrom but it did little to touch Dean. He passed through it as through a mist. Bolts of lightning shot down from the sky, striking Jack, but with a ragged war cry and a flick of his hand, they vanished. His eyes glowed a brilliant gold and Chuck staggered as Jack thrust his hand forward. In that same moment, Dean pointed and at his insistence a chain appeared, invisible save for a colorless distortion where the light struck it, binding Chuck’s arm to the ground. Jack launched another attack and with a gesture Dean manifested another chain, binding Chuck’s other arm.

Slowly the chains pulled tighter, forcing Chuck to his knees. Still the torrent raged around them and both Dean and Jack bore the signs of strain. Sweat streaked Jack’s brow, and Dean’s hand trembled slightly as he held it, both of them breathed heavily. There was a blink and everything went quiet for the three of them. The storm formed around them like a wall, grey and swirling, pulsing with bursts of lightning, impossible to see through, yet silent, as if they had been sealed away from the rest of the world. When he spoke, Chuck’s voice was deceptively calm.

“You can’t do this, Dean. You know you can’t.”

“People have been telling me what I can’t do my whole life, and I always seem to be proving them wrong.”

“Even if you win, even if you do kill me, what then?”

“Sam and Cas go back to their lives, Jack takes over running things up above, and we finally start to fix this world you broke.”

“You really think that’s how this is gonna go?”

Before Dean or Jack could reply the wall of storm behind Chuck cleared, like a window or a projection, revealing a view of Sam and Cas, both crying out in agony though the sound did not reach inside the vortex. Blood ran from their mouths and they dropped to the ground, the grass beneath them staining red. Dean pried his eyes away from the grisly scene, unsure whether it was real or not.

“I end you and that ends.”

“It won’t be any better Dean. The world will still be broken. There will still be monsters, and evil and people making all the worst choices. Except, without me wanting a good story, who’s to say that the good guy wins sometimes? And what keeps you from your destiny? Sooner or later, your fate will catch up with you.”

All around Dean the storm lit up with images from his past. Sam’s body dropping into his arms in the ghost town at Cold Oak. Sam shot in the chest by Walt. Sam dragged away by a nest of vamps in the other universe. Sam half dead from enduring the Trials. Sam falling into the Cage. Sam shot. Sam stabbed. Sam clawed, and bitten, and bludgeoned. And flashing by among all of these were dozens of what he could only assume were alternate visions of the future-- each one of Sam dying. Some bloody, some desperate, some drenched in fear. In each one, Dean standing over the twisted, broken body of his brother, his own eyes empty of humanity. Echoing over it all were a dozen different voices from Dean’s past, each repeating some variant of the same prophecy: you’ll have to kill Sam.

Chuck spoke again, softly. “You’ll kill Sam. Jack will kill Cas. And your humanity will die with them and then the two of you will be alone. For eternity. But it doesn’t have to be that way. I can prevent that. I can change your fates. Let you two live the life you want with your family. I’m the only one who can change that.”

A note in his plea startled Dean from his stupor. He looked down at Chuck and thought how small he looked. Dean readjusted his hold on Chuck’s chains and took a half step closer, leaning in almost imperceptibly. He smiled, but it did not reach his eyes.

“You know, Chuck… I’ve been a hunter long enough to recognize a demon deal when I hear it.”

The feigned sympathy and mercy vanished from Chuck’s eyes, replaced by hate and fear.

Dean straightened up. His hold on Chuck’s chains was stronger now. His voice was bolder. “Maybe I do have a destiny. But if it it’s there, it is what it is because of who I am, and the choices I make. And I believe in who I am.”

With a sweeping motion of the arm, Dean summoned his scythe. For one moment more he hesitated. “Fate’s a funny thing. Maybe it will come true. I’ll be with Sam until the end. Maybe my fate is that one day I’ll reap him. Seems likely. After all, I am Death. Sooner or later, everyone dies at my hands. Even you.”

At Dean’s nod, Jack let loose a primal scream. A wave of golden energy burst from the boy’s outstretched arms. The wave collided with Chuck in the precise instant that Dean’s scythe pierced his chest. Light exploded throughout the ragged little Kansas cemetery, bringing down the wall of storm, spinning a blinding tapestry explosion of stark white and brilliant gold, with a black core. And then there was quiet.

   They filled the bunker with people. Eileen and Jody and Donna and the girls and Bobby and Charlie and Garth and a dozen others, young and old. And they celebrated. Food, drinks, music, laughter, and a sense of victory more complete than anything they had known before.

Amid the old friends, Jack mingled as easily as he ever had. There was something sweet and simple and kind about the boy’s companionship that no amount of power could change. He was friend and son and younger brother to all of them despite his recent deification. All their eyes shone with pride as he recounted his ultimate battle. All of them knew, but none of them truly grasped what it meant for Jack. How could they comprehend trading jokes with the new ruler of the universe?

It was not the same case for Dean. They had all heard of his death months earlier, had all mourned, so they were overjoyed at his return. But like Sam, they all instantly sensed that he was changed. Far more changed than Jack was. Their ease grew with each passing moment, realizing that he was still Dean. His jokes were the same, his laugh as ready as ever, his smile just as warm. So before long, their time with him felt almost as natural as it had before. Almost.

There was still a barrier that they couldn’t surmount. A distance. Dean was no longer alive as he had been, and he belonged to another world now. He had become more, and in that there was a loss of that rough equality between them. The power, the understanding, the authority—they call suited Dean. But he had grown beyond an easy fit with his old life. So as the party wore on, Dean slipped into the kitchen on his own.

Sam found him there sometime later, a beer in his hand and an empty pie plate beside him. Dean looked up to greet him and smiled quietly. The muffled sounds of the party provided a soft backdrop.  Sam sat down across from Dean. For a while neither spoke.

It was Sam who broke the quiet first. “It’s never gonna be the same is it?”

Dean shook his head. “No. But it’s good. Jack is the new God. He made Cas an archangel. Heaven’s in good hands. Rowena’s got Hell under her thumb. Things are maybe better than they’ve ever been for us. “

“But you’re not really back are you? You’re Death now. And you have to do that job. I feel like I’m losing you all over you again.”

“Come on, man. I’m not gone. Sure I won’t be here as much. You won’t see me every day. But you ain’t gettin’ rid of me that easy. I’ll be around. As often as I can.”

“How often will that be?”

“Well, I’m not alone in it. I’ve got Billie helping me. With a partner, I figure it doesn’t have to be a 24/7 gig.”

“You still won’t be here. Not like before.”

“No.”

“It’s just that Jack and Cas are going to be in Heaven. You’ll be off… wherever Death goes.”

“I have a library.”

“Right. And I’m just wondering… what do I do all alone in this big empty bunker?”

“Well first of all, it’s not empty. You’ve got Eileen. And it only stays empty if you want it to. Come on, Sam, you know what you’re supposed to do.”

Sam scowled. “Ar-are you saying I should have kids?”

“No! I mean if you want to, but that’s not what I’m talking about.” He leaned in, confidentially, comfortably. “The Men of Letters, both British and American, the hunters from Apocalypse World, you’ve been dancing around this for years.”

“You think I should try it again.”

“An organization of hunters. Based out of here. Led by you.”

“I don’t know. It didn’t exactly turn out well before.”

“Yeah because ancient demons and rogue archangels were out to get us. But now. Now you have the world’s largest collection of lore. You have more experience than anyone. And your family is, hands down the most powerful family in the universe. It’s the perfect time, and you’re the perfect person to do it.”

The absolute faith conveyed in Dean’s voice was hard to stand against. Sam nodded slowly, his thoughts spinning with new possibilities. It was true; the thought had been with him for years. With the small push from Dean he could see it all falling into line. A nationwide network of hunters. Unified, organized, supported. Protecting each other, saving people. A brotherhood. “All the best of both hunters and the Men of Letters.”

“And with all of those salty hunters in there to help you? Trust me, half of the hunters in this country would sign on with you today if you asked. And hey, if anyone gives you any trouble, you just tell them that you raised God, and your big brother is Death.”

Sam laughed. “Sure. I’ll do that.”

“Ah. Speaking of that.” Dean reached into his pocket and pulled something out. Opening his hand he revealed three silver rings. The engraving on each one matched the markings on Dean’s ring, but they were simple bands, each without a stone.  Dean plucked one out and set it on the table between him and Sam. “That one’s yours.”

“What is this?”

Dean returned the other two rings to his pocket and sat studying his own ring. “Think of this like a signet ring. Or whatever they were called. You’d have a king and if he gave his ring to someone it meant that that person was under his protection or it showed that the king trusted him with authority or both.”

Under Death’s protection. Sam lifted the ring off the table tentatively. “What does it do?”

“As long as you’re wearing it, you’re very hard to kill. Not immortal. It won’t hold up to something like the Colt or an archangel. But short of that…” Dean shrugged. “Ground rules: only you can take it off once you put it on. You’ll still age. You’ll still die one day. And it was made for you, so you’re the only one it works for. Giving it away won’t do anyone any good. So don’t even think about handing it off to the first person who makes puppy dog eyes at you.”

“How did you-“ Sam stammered. The ring felt cold and heavy in his hand.

“Billie helped me make them. But it uh- involves a lot of pulled strings and loopholes and making exceptions. So in light of the bigger picture of all things, it’s really something I can only pull off for these three rings.”

Sam glanced at the pocket the other two rings had gone into. “And those-“

“Require another trip to deliver them.”

Sam didn’t press. His eyes were locked back onto the ring in his hand. “I don’t know if I can.”

“Sammy, listen to me. The only way I can do this, the only way I can go off and do what I have to do, is if I know that I can still have your back. If I know that you’re safe. The rest of the universe comes second to making sure that my little brother is taken care of.”

Of course he meant it. Dean’s life had been a one long series of acts proving how much he would throw away to keep his brother safe. Sam slid the ring onto his finger, and Dean gave a relieved smile. He leaned back again, his task accomplished. “And I mean it Sam, you need me, you call. I’ll be there.”

They sat there for several hours more. Sometimes in silence. Sometimes trading stories. Sometimes dreaming of the future—Dean’s new role, Sam’s hunters, all the changes Jack and Cas would make to Heaven. The boundary Dean had felt between him and the friends in the other room was not there with Sam. Sam was no stranger to Death. They were just brothers.

So they sat with each other until some sixth sense told them the sun was beginning to rise, and Dean stood up to leave.

Sam trailed his brother outside. Baby sat waiting on the side of the road. Sam’s eyes traveled over the car fondly, before he scoffed slightly and smiled at Dean. “You know, Death’s supposed to have a pale horse.”

Dean grinned as he swung the door open and leaned on the roof. “Nobody’s touching my car.”

They lingered.

Sam shook himself. “Well. We’ve got work to do.”

Dean nodded. “See you soon, Sammy.”

He got into the car and started the engine, reveling in its familiar growl. The rocks crunched beneath the wheels as the car turned onto the open highway.

In a moment, Sam knew he would go back down into the bunker, back to Eileen and his friends, and he would begin the next chapter of his life. But for a while longer he stood and watched the Impala drive away, listening to the fading purr of the engine. And Dean watched Sam in the rearview mirror for as long as he could, even as he cranked the volume up and sang along as loud as he could to the music spilling out of the car and onto the never-ending road.

[cloudy-coyote]

Necessity

(A/N: found this gif on google! HI IT’S BEEN A MINUTE YA’LL. Sorry lol I was very busy what can I say. But prepare for some writing spam 👅please let me know what you guys think I really hope you guys enjoy! 😊 )

Ch. 5: Beleive it or Not it’s Eva!

"Dean, this is pointless," Sam sighs.

Papers upon books, upon papers spread out over their beds and the table. They had their Police Scanner set up on the floor. Sam balances his laptop on his lap, with hundreds of tabs open. And Dean stands over the counter, preparing some coffee.

They've searched from everything to the lore of cursed objects---to the things that do the cursing, like Witches, Ancient spirits, and they can't find anything that matches up.

Their first thought the moment they heard about an animal attack was Werewolf, easy. Except the heart wasn't taken, and it seemed it wasn't even aiming for the chest. Like this thing just went ham on her body, for almost no reason.

So, because it didn't take anything, they thought they were dealing with something vengeful. Something that tried to kill her for a reason. Maybe a spirit, or some creature that felt wronged by her.

But, everything seemed to become more confusing once they talked to her. It wasn't simple, there wasn't a clear pattern. It was scattered, random events. Somehow all connected to her--- but done by God knows what.

Time-travel? That's a new one.

Cursed necklace? Well... they've dealt with that one before.

A cursed necklace, that has an invisible attacker and causes almost immediate death, including possible time-travel?

Not a fucking chance.

Sam couldn't help but feel like he was in some type of book--- like an episode of the X-Files. The utter absurdity with what they're dealing with is off the charts. The power this thing has is mortifying. Even when hunting a spirit, they can be in some serious danger. But with this? Something so lethal, how are they supposed to protect themselves from something they don't even understand?

He shuts his computer. Shoving it to the side with a groan. Dean eyes his brother, watching him succumb to his frustrations. He can't blame him, this case is seemingly hopeless.

They've been hunting together since they were kids. In some ways, Dean can see his Sam as he once was, just a little kid--just his baby brother.

No matter how many times Sam could wrong him, like abandoning him for Standford, he'll always protect him. He knows that. Because when he looks at him, he can't see evil. Even if the world is telling him he's the psychic visions mean he's some type of devil spawn...all he sees is a chubby-faced little kid.

Dean takes a sip of the crappy motel coffee, tasting like burnt water. He looks up from the papers to face his brother.

"You're right, this thing is strong," Dean agrees, "But if we figure this out? We might have an advantage."

Sam looks up from his hands, 'an advantage'?

"What do you mean?"

Dean sighs, moving Sam's laptop off the couch and plopping down next to him.

"That Demon that Dad's chasin', it's strong too. If we can figure out how to kill this thing, we can definitely kill that bastard."

"Kill a Demon? That's impossible," Sam retorts.

"There's always a way, Sammy. Dad taught us that."

He shakes his head.

Something just not sitting right with him. He couldn't comprehend how something as powerful as this entity or curse can't be found anywhere. Creatures not nearly as strong as this one have Ancient stories from all over the world. Vampires have myths from every ancient civilization, but this invisible killer? Nothing. That's the constant, isn't it?

Every time there's been an attack, it's practically deserted. It's like this thing is a void of desolation. No people, no sounds, no face, no evidence-- no Mythology, it makes sense in that light. But, it's too vague to develop anything further. That begs the question, what if it really is something like that-- like this creature is some sort of spirit of emptiness, erasure. That would mean, they really are defenseless in this situation.

Because you can't kill nothing.

"Killing a Demon is actually seeming more realistic than trying to kill this thing right now,"

Sam lays back into the couch, his head laying toward the ceiling, "Dean, this thing doesn't bleed, doesn't have a body, doesn't make sound, I don't get it---how can we kill something if it's not even a thing?"

"Well then we don't kill it, we just try and...stop it, I guess," Dean shrugs.

He shakes the confusion. He's been on a thousand wild hunts, with crazy, wack-job monsters, and if he would've let the fear get to his head then--- he wouldn't have come out alive.

Albeit, he's not the best at calming people down or consoling them. But, if he can keep his head screwed on straight, maybe it will help Sam relax.

With all the things going on with his brother, he doesn't need another thing to drive his mind in circles. He knows that if they have any chance with this thing, they have to be calm, they have to think clearly, and most importantly, they have to think realistically.

They might not be able to kill it, purge it, or do whatever the Hell to it-- but they can do their best to survive. He has to tell himself that he'll figure it out. Because truly, saying those things more times than once can help him believe them. And he can't have doubt at a time like this.

"So we're in the vicinity of 'Cursed Objects', right?" Sam asks.

Dean snaps back from his thoughts, nodding, "It's the only one that fits."

"But the curse isn't death by touching it, otherwise Eva would've died at her Baptism when they put it on her."

"No, no," Dean collects his thoughts, "When she got attacked, the necklace fell."

Sam nods along, "And at the diner, the necklace wasn't on her either."

"...But she was wearing it when we got there, when we sat down, don't you remember?" Sam continues. Dean remains silent as Sam starts to piece together the memory.

"-When we sat down Marlene complimented her necklace. And after that, when she was going through the details of her story, and she told us about it falling, I looked straight at the necklace, I remember it, Dean."

Sam can't help but wonder, what exactly made the necklace fall off. Both times it dropped off her body right before she was attacked, it was like the initiating factor.

"That waitress complimented her necklace? Huh, didn't hear that."

"You were too busy staring at her ass to hear her."

Dean laughs, a playful smirk tugging at his lips, "And what an ass that was."

"Dean, c'mon! " Sam shoves his brother.

"Why didn't I go home with her, again?" He asks, a cheeky grin still on his face.

"Because I stopped you. Honestly, can't you keep it in your pants, man? We're working on a case, and..." Sam pauses,

"Wait a minute... "

"What?"

"...She also disappeared."

"Well everyone did, pretty suddenly too," Dean says.

"No, but it was right after she showed Eva to the bathroom," His eyes meeting his brother's.

"Shit," They say in unison.

~~

Eva walks along the sidewalk, just a few blocks from the hospital.

The night sky seemed to have clouded up. She couldn't see very many stars nor the illumination of the moon, it was murky and dark. Downtown Willow wasn't that busy it seemed. It also wasn't that much...different.

In fact, it wasn't different at all, give or take the old cars; stores that would be replaced in the near future; odd advertisements. But besides all that, it was still her home town. It made her stomach twist at the strange familiarity because it wasn't quite right. Like in a dream where it resembles your home but... it's all wrong.

It only makes her wonder, is her house still there? Is some other family living in it? God, she couldn't bear to see that. Or, what if it's torn down? What if it's some apartment complex? She shivers at the thoughts. The last thing she wants is to have a breakdown in the middle of the street.

She was feeling something in between fury and exhaustion. She was pissed at the boys for ditching her--how the hell was she supposed to find them on her own? They left her nothing, absolutely nothing. But, on some level, she was so damn tired, she didn't even have the energy to get that angry. There was something else she couldn't quite put her finger on. She felt, well, weird. She wasn't really sure what it was.

She looks down the street to see a 24-hour Convenience store. The 'Open' sign glowing blue and red, standing out in the dark street. She doesn't have money, but she does need help. Doesn't matter if it's from a corner store. She shakes her thoughts of home away. Putting her legs in motion towards the end of the street.

Still in her nurse scrubs, she enters the store. The little bell rings when it opens. The small shop wasn't very busy. She saw maybe only one or two people in there, buying beers or cigarettes.

She went to the back of the store, mindlessly wandering the isles. She needed to distract herself. Sure, she wanted help, but she wasn't just going to ask anybody. She was planning to wait until someone who looks trustworthy comes in, not just a late-night drunk.

Plus, she wanted to gather herself a bit first. She didn't want to break down in tears in front of some stranger. Crying combined with the scrubs...they might assume she escaped from a psych ward. That would be a nightmare.

The shelves were packed with endless amounts of chips, pretzels, sodas, candy--- all the junk food, essentially.

Eva feels her stomach growl. But, she hasn't got a single dollar. She stares at all the foods stacked upon the shelves, her desire growing--- like that point when you get so hungry, your stomach starts to hurt.

"You lost, baby?"

The voice was deep, gurgly sounding. Just hearing him sent shivers down her spine. Detest gorging her mind. 'Not this,' she shuts her eyes. She thought having a breakdown was the last thing she wanted but, oh boy, she's changed her mind. The dear to God last thing she wants is to deal with is some desperate pervert.

When she opens them to reluctantly identify the man standing next to her, she regrets it. Making eye contact with him only made him smile. In some ridiculous irrationality that made him think, he's struck gold.

"No, but thank you, sir," She says.

She grits her teeth so hard, trying her best not to cuss at him, trying to remain polite. But, honestly, when has that ever worked?

He mistakes her niceness as a sign of flirtation. She sees it straight away in his eyes when he doesn't move away, doesn't blink, only becomes more engaged.

He's well over his 50's, and as he got closer his breath smelled like cheap booze and unbrushed teeth. She stepped away from him, turning around very dramatically, hoping he'd leave her alone. The smell of disgusting, bad hygiene stinging her nose.

Then again, did she really expect that to work?

She groans when he follows her, "You want me to buy you some drinks? Cause I can do that, sweetheart. I can show you a real good time," He calls desperately to her.

When she keeps trying to ignore his words and walk away, his grimy, sweaty hand latches on to her arm.

"Seems like somebody's got an attitude problem. Can't even turn around and say a 'thank you'?"

She turns. Her body rotating like a rusted screw. Her neck moving so eerily stiff, so slowly, that when she met his face, his smile dropped. She narrows her eyes, clenching her jaw hard enough to fracture it.

"I said, no thank you," She repeats through gritted teeth, "Touch me again, I call the damn police." She shoves his nasty hand off of her and turns back around.

"Bitch," He calls out, before walking away.

Her body was pulsing, both with anger and pain. She just escaped a damn hospital and now she had to put up with this sicko? At this point, she really began to feel the rage for being abandoned. Sure, the voice in the back of her mind suggests that they may have been in danger or that they were trying to keep her safe--but, she shuts that little voice up.

There's nothing she despises more than being left alone. She's without safety, without family. She has to defend herself against a gross drunk. She had to break out of the hospital by herself.

And the thought crosses her mind for a second, why even go back to those dicks? But--she can't just go anywhere, it's not safe. Besides, they're her only chance of getting back home. All of a sudden, she feels the fatigue hitting her a little stronger than before.

She hurries through a few aisles, before realizing she doesn't have anybody around her, literally. She makes her way to the register, approaching it.

Behind the desk stands a relatively friendly-looking man. He seemed to be in his mid-twenties, nothing creepy about his smile or his gaze. Just a cashier doing his job.

"Excuse me?" She asks. He looks up from whatever he writing down.

"Oh," His eyes soften, "Is that man still bothering you, I can kick him out if you want."

She smiles at his offer, a breath of fresh air. Based on his nice demeanor, she prays he'll help her out.

"Thank you, but actually I was wondering about something else."

"Sure," He answers, "What is it?"

"I don't have any money with me, and I need to call my--er, brothers, would you let me use your phone?"

"Yeah, no problem," He pulls out his silver flip-phone from his back pocket and extends it over to her.

"One more thing, sorry to ask, do you have a phone book?"

He nods his head, bending down beneath the counter and pulling the yellow-paged book out. He places it in front of her.

She flips it open, searching for Motels,--this 'Lotus Motel' on Semple.

Little Bed & Breakfast

Loaf and Tin Inn

Lot 48

Louis Trackman Hotel

Lotus Motel

"Finally," She whispers. She carefully drags her finger across the dotted line toward the number. She flips open the phone, looking at the time: 2:00 am. She quickly clicks the number into the phone's keypad.

She places it up to her ear as it rings. It rings again, again--- again.

"-Hello, Lotus Motel! Would you like to book a room?" The voice answers.

"Uh-No, actually, I'm looking for my uh- brothers," She rolls eyes at the stuttering, trying to pull herself together, "They checked into a room, and I can't remember the number. They're both tall, Sam is the taller one with longer hair and Dean is shorter with short hair, please- if you could tell me."

"Sure, ma'am just give me a second," He pauses, placing the phone down. She taps her fingers nervously, wanting to reach for her lost necklace.

"-Okay, it says here they're staying in room 29. Will that be all?"

"Yes sir, thank you," She ends the call. Eva hands the phone back to the owner who was only standing about a foot away from her.

"Get what you need?" He asks.

"Sort of, now I need a ride. Don't really wanna be walking the streets by myself this late."

She looks back to the window, seeing the darkness, the danger. That man in the store was just the beginning of it. Once you're outside at night, alone, female-- they don't care if you scream or yell, they'll attack you regardless.

"Here, take some bus fare," He opens the register, pulling out 2 bucks. He hands it to her.

"You really don't have to," She feels bad, not wanting to take his money. She needs it of course, but this man was already nice to her, now helping her even more.

"No, take it, you need it."

She looks up to his face. His eyes were sincere, he knew what was out there, and most of all she was only 18. He could see she was just a kid.

She takes it, gratefully smiling to him, "Thank you so much, sir. I'll pay you back for this."

And with that, she hops on a bus, straight to Semple street. In approximately 40 minutes, she'll be whooping some Winchester ass.

~~

"That's exactly what I've been saying, Dean," Sam shakes his head, "There's a reason this thing is hunting her, she has to have been marked in some way."

"What if it has to do with her blood? Her parents maybe," Sam suggests.

"No, no," Dean, gets up from his seat, "Then this thing would've been after them, attacked Mom or Dad, not her."

"Then it has to do with that necklace, that has to be the target."

Dean nods, "This thing must be connected to it, maybe some Ancient Spell."

"Wait," Sam stands up, walking over to his laptop and flinging it open, "Like the Hope Diamond...?"

"Hm," Dean tilts his head, "Whenever you lose possession of it, you die,"

"It's just weird...why did she hear footsteps that night? It doesn't match up with the lore."

"Yeah, and neither does the time-travel, Sammy,"

"We're missing something," Sam sighs, putting his head in his hands. He looks to his watch, reading: 2:40 am.

"Okay, let's start over," Dean suggests, "Her friend goes missing."

"Could be anything, ghost, Demon," He snorts, mumbling, "Hell, a Wendigo."

"Well if it was connected to Eva's necklace, to her attack, what options does that leave us?"

Sam tilts his head, intrigued by the thought. They both think in scribbles, trying to make some sort of relationship between the attacks.

"We know that the necklace dropped from her body that night-- like it triggered the attack. We know that when she lost it at the diner, she was attacked again."

"But that time we didn't hear any footsteps," Dean replies.

"Well, what if that night someone was trying to save her?"

This idea causes both of them to turn silent. Their brains soaring up into a frenzy of thoughts. They were thinking about how realistic that was. And if somebody actually was trying to help her, who the hell was it? That would explain why she heard footsteps running after her. Was that the reason she ended up in 2005---did this person send her here to save her life?

"What would even have the power to do that?" Sam whispers.

"I'm not so sure that this case is just about a cursed object anymore. We've got something bigger on our hands."

"If any of this is true, whoever was protecting her before isn't here now. I mean, she nearly died, Dean."

"Wait a minute," Dean sits up, his eyes alarmed, "If we know Marlene must've swiped the necklace at the diner, Eva's bound to get attacked again,"

There's a knock on their door that startles the both of them.

Dean's hunter instincts kick in. Both of their bodies freeze. They know pretty damn well it's not housekeeping.

Having been hunters their entire life, they know it's always something bad. They've learned to expect the worst. John Winchester, unfortunately, made many enemies. They grab their pistols, holding them up. Dean slowly inches toward the door, keeping the gun pointed.

There's a loud knock again.

"Who is it?" He demands.

His voice low, his arms still as a statue. He was prepared for anything. Demon, ghoul, skin-walker, you name it.

"It's Eva! Now open the damn door!" She yells.

Sam and Dean look at each other, 'Eva? How did she get here?' The voice was certainly recognizable, but they couldn't trust that. There are about a dozen things that can not only mimic voices but also take on her appearance. Besides, she should be in the hospital.

"Should I open it?" Sam whispers to Dean.

He nods, gesturing his pistol, for him to move forward.

Sam unlocks the door. His mammoth hand slowly pulling it open to reveal a girl. A girl who looked exactly like Eva. Sam tilts his head, his posture relaxing for a moment as he recognizes her. But, his face is washed with confusion.

"Eva?" He asks.

Dean doesn't lower his gun, "Sam, Holy Water,"

"C'mon it's clearly h-"

"-Holy Water Now!" He says raising his voice.

Sam rummages through his pockets, pulling out a little black flask. He unscrews the top,

"Did you guys seriously just leave me at a--" A splash of water hits her face.

"--What the Hell was that for?" She shrieks. Her hands, shaking with anger, come up to harshly wipe her face.

Dean lowers his gun, seeing no black eyes and no smoke. He opens his mouth to speak- but she stops him.

"--You two give me one good reason why I should still trust you after abandoning me like that!"

"Uh- well, Dean and I had to--"

"--Had to what? Do research? You couldn't do that with me in the room? Are you serious?"

"It was Dean's idea!" Sam adverts the blame.

Immediately, her face twitches, and she turns to the elder Winchester. Her eyes boring right through his wide ones.

"Look, I'm sorry okay? But, we had to figure out what this thing was, and that Doctor from before could've seen us and we would've been busted, kid!"

"Yeah, well imagine what would've happened if he saw me. I'd be locked up in an Asylum!"

"Probably Prison, considering it looks like you impersonated a Nurse," Dean eyes her up and down.

"Ugh! You don't know how close I was to getting caught! It was terrifying," She exclaims.

"Why did you come here if you're so pissed at us?"

"Dean," Sam shoves him.

"What? I can't ask a question?" Besides, it's what we're all thinking, he thinks to himself.

"Where else do I have to go? You guys told me you were going to help me find my family again, and that you'd keep me safe," Her voice falling to a whisper, "I trusted you guys."

"We're so sorry, Eva." Sam steps closer to her.

He gently ushers her inside and softly closes the door.

"This case is getting to our heads, we've never had such a confusing one," Dean admits, "Even after hours of research, we barely have anything."

"I know, it's scaring me too."

She moves some of the papers sprawled out on the bed and sits down. She sighs heavily, thinking about how her fear got the best of her. She didn't want to freak out on them, she felt bad about yelling. All she wanted was a sense of security.

She needed to know that she was going to find her family again and that her life isn't hopeless. But, the longer she thinks on it---in this completely different world--- she feels she might not ever be able to see them again.

"We'll figure this out, kid. Even if we can't gank this psycho, we can do our best to keep you safe," Dean places a hand on her shoulder. She places her fragile one on top of it.

"Jeez, your hands are freezing," He comments.

"Well yeah, it's like 30 out there, and I'm wearing scrubs."

"Speaking of that, do you have your real clothes?" Sam asks.

"Nope. They weren't in my room, and I had to get out of there before someone saw me."

"So...you're not wearing any underwear?"

"Seriously, Dean?" Sam groans.

"It's a joke, Sammy!" He grins, but his brother continues to glare, "Relax, 's just tryna lighten the mood a little."

She wants to laugh, but she can't really conjure up enough energy. She thought that if she found the boys, she'd finally feel safe enough to lie down. But, her brain won't stop the constant ache of sorrow. Her body feels incredibly raw, pushed to its limits. She remains tense, sitting stiffly on the mattress.

"Where'd you get the money to buy a pack of cigs?" Dean asks.

His eyes falling to her right hand, clutching the life-saving gift to her chest.

"I didn't. A stranger gave them to me. It's the only thing that saved me from being caught."

They notice the sad look in her eye. With their job, it's important to be observant. They need to be able to find the smallest clues, indications in order to track down creatures. Though, it's not something they can really turn off. All they can feel is pity. They really did leave her to fend for herself.

Eva's fingers start to unbearably cramp. She lowers both arms to her lap, gently cradling them. She can feel the rawness of the flesh, her bones and muscles were not yet healed. Throwing away those splints was vital, but now she really wishes she had them.

"Got any ice?"

Sam and Dean's eyes immediately fly to her arms. They were red and tender.

"What happened to your bandages?" Sam asks. She was covered in them when they were at the diner, and he's sure after the second attack she'd have even more.

"I had to take them off."

"Well you're dedicated, I'll give you that," Dean comments.

She only hums in agreement, her head still facing her lap.

Dean turns to his little brother, "I got the bandages, you get the ice."

They both stand up and scurry around the cluttered room. Eva tries to focus on something other than her hysteric mind. She can only hear the sounds of the boys moving around the room, stepping awkwardly to avoid the scattered papers and books.

She could hear faintly through the walls to the other rooms. A muffled television program, a few car engines, some murmuring voices down the hall-- it wasn't much, but it was something.

She gets sucked into her own head, wondering why she must feel so weird. It's probably because of walking through Willow while being in the past, that's weird, right? She feels her stomach twist, knowing deep down that something else was a little off. Must be that damn necklace.

Sam softly treads back to the bed she's sitting on. He holds a sock filled with ice, a thick knot at the end of it to prevent spilling.

"Here," He places the ice gently down onto her arms, "Sorry, it's all we had."

She exhales sharply when the cold object touches her tender skin.

"Thanks," She shudders.

Sam sees her hunching over in pain, and probably exhaustion too. She's sitting at the foot of the bed, due to the fact that it's the only clear space. He moves behind her. His large hands gathering all the loose papers and books and shoving them to the side. He makes a clear space for her by the pillows.

He props a few of them up against the headboard, fluffing them.

"Here," He nudges her.

She turns slowly, not wanting to strain anything. When she notices the empty space, presumably prepared for her, she smiles.

At this close proximity, she could smell the scent of his cologne. It was subtle and light, not like those overpowering ones people drown themselves in at the club. It was soft and smelled like something clean and woodsy.

He pulls back some of the covers before patting down the pillow one more time. She then pauses for a moment--trying to calculate how exactly she's going to get over there. Her body feels like it's going to shatter if she moves even in the slightest.

Though, she's embarrassed to ask for his help again. He sees her hesitation and before he can offer her some assistance, Dean pops back up.

He's holding quite a lot more than bandages. She sees a first aid box, some booze, a couple used slings.

"Before you left, did the doctors tell you what your injuries were?"

"I need to know what I'm stitching up," He adds.

She straightens her back, that's right, "They actually said I was...okay."

Dean and Sam both cock their heads at her. Their eyes nearly about to pop out of their sockets. What the hell was she talking about? She was practically dead the last time they saw her.

"You're...okay?" Sam gawks at her, "You're not serious, are you?"

"You were dead as a doornail, kid. No way you're fine."

"Really? I mean, I still have all my broken bones and stitches from before, but--"

"Nothing from the diner?" Sam interrupts.

"No...actually."

Both of the boys look to each other. This didn't add up.

"God...this thing, whatever the hell it is, just keeps getting more and more confusing," Sam groans.

All of a sudden they hear a voice. But not from a person outside the room. It was a radio voice--- the Police Scanner.

"Uh- we've got a 10-35."

"10-20?"

" 16 Mason and Carter."

Another voice responds, "10-101?"

"10-106. We're gonna need the Medical Examiner"

"10-4"

"What was that?" Eva asks.

"Major crime alert, a homicide," Dean answers.

Sam goes over to the radio, about to turn it off--

"Victim...Marlene Woods."

HOPE YOU ENJOYED! Let me know what you guys think xoxo 💋 

[sapphic-sppider]

i mean if ever an ask prompt to get a load of asks on, this is the one.  it’s also going under a cut because goddamn i do like to ramble about kirbo @carolofthedailydays @tsukuyomishirabes and @ them two anons i guess

1- Favorite character i got this three times, so i feel like three answers are warranted.  top of the heap is marx of course, my bastard son and favorite boss, whose moveset has inspired at least one move in every final boss arsenal in every kirby game since his soul incarnation in kssu.  and i’m still not over him being playable in star allies aaaaaaaaa speaking of, susie is an equally fun dream friend, but my reasons for liking her are completely different;  where marx has a very basic story arc, susie’s is complex (for kirby anyway) and lore-laden.  plus she’s gorl so like.  i gotta. rounding out my top three would be sectonia, and by extension taranza.  i won’t go into details, if you’ve played triple deluxe/dededetour, you know why, if not go play it, also it’s hip

2- Favorite final boss two answers for two asks;  i already went over them in the previous answer, but marx and sectonia are two very different boss fights.  marx i like mostly out of nostalgia, like, i played the everloving shit out of kssu, i know that bossfight front to back, and i still enjoy it.  sectonia on the other hand is set over three different forms, and i hate to use the word but it feels “epic” in the same way that star dream does, but without the starfox battle style.  plus the music...  oo we’ll get to that later

3- Favorite animal friend chuchu!  she’s adowabwe!  and her combo abilities are unique and strong, in most cases

5- Favorite main game nostalgia wants me to say super star/ultra, but honestly star allies blew me away in terms of how much fun i had.  recent kirby games have been very fun, but also maybe a bit too reliant on gimmicks?  like stomping around in robobot armor was fun, don’t get me wrong, and the background/foreground stuff in td was cute, but the main game in sa is like...  really good core kirby.  like if you’re going for 100% yeah you gotta switch around powers and spawn ai if you don’t have a co-op partner, but the solid classic gameplay combined with the ability to play all these fuckin old characters and the absolute lore bombs that get dropped later on...  it’s just about everything i wanted in a kirby game

6- Favorite spin-off game i’ve had a lot of good times with air ride over the years, and like a lot of fans i hope we see a remake at some point.  until then i’m content to putz around in city trial with my best friend

8- Favorite copy ability i’ve always been a hammer girl at heart, i like big burst damage, but suplex is just somethin i can’t pass up.  it’s just fun to YEET fuckers around, even if it is a subpar boss-fighting ability

9- Favorite song / 10- Favorite Final Boss Theme three asks for this one too, i won’t go into detail, but i will provide links Moonstruck Blossom Vagrant Counting Song of Retrospection/Soul 0 System VS. Marx okay i lied i will go into detail, why the fuck do most of the other dream friend morpho knight fights get these kickass titles like “The Maidens’ Battle with Darkness”, “Crowning of the Supreme King ~OVERLORD~”, “Deus Ex Machina at a Young Age” and yet marx is just left with “oh yeah it’s the star allies version homie we gotchu”  like??????

15- A song you would like to be remixed  zero.  why the hell they were able to seamless mix both parts of kdl2 dark matter into the dm clone fight in robobot, but for gooey’s morpho knight fight it’s just kdl3 dark matter?  the two pairs of fights are just as consecutive, dark matter blade bleeding right into true dark matter, and the hyperzone fights being just the same.  and i’m not counting the celebration pic theme, i want an actual boss remix.  hell i just want zero back in some canon form.  void is close but like, it’s still ambiguous...

16- A character you would like to see back ZERO PLEASE CMON GUYS THERE’S SO MUCH DARK MATTER LORE TO BE EXPLORED AAAAAAAAA

17- A copy ability you would like to see back see that’s tough because star allies has representation of a helluva lot of abilities, even if they aren’t necessarily copy abilities kirby can use.  even then, the other really unique abilities haven’t been gone for that long so like...  animal would be fun to see back, with some new tricks of course.  iunno i feel like i’m scraping the bottom of the barrel for this one, which is a good problem to have in this case

23- Any kirby-related memory you have i played a lot of return to dreamland with my best friend in college, and one of the bosses, mr. dooter, we’d just like...  say his name in increasingly goofy and stupid ways.  i dunno why that stuck with me but like...  fuckin dooter...  iunno i guess i just wanna get back to that.  which i mean, i guess i’ll get the opportunity to, since he’s comin into town for a week pretty soon.  so we’ll get to do all that again, only with star allies.  and a lot of other games.  ...fuck i didn’t think this’d turn into somethin this personal but like, kirby’s just that important to me.  got a lotta good memories with the series

[brothergrimmbo-blog]

Examining my love for Destiny 2 (A Rant)

So I guess I logged a lot of hours into Destiny 2 last year...

According to Playstation’s 2019 Wrap Up, I kind of fell back in love with Destiny last year and I have thoughts on why. This is by no means a comprehensive list of reasons to play Bungie’s fantastic space based looter shooter, it’s just me trying to figure out why Destiny 2 was my most played game of 2019.

My History with Destiny

During Playstation’s 2013 E3 press-conference, I was exposed to the glorious Destiny gameplay-demo. It teased the social elements of an MMO packaged as an expertly crafted first-person-shooter (FPS) experience, all brought to me by one of the most exciting developers in the business, Bungie.

“The guns have names and power levels,” I thought, “I’m in.”  

I purchased the Digital Deluxe Guardian Edition or whatever it was called (the first time I’d ever bought any kind of special edition for a game), and upon release I was almost immediately disappointed. I beat the main campaign in one sitting and felt the ending was underwhelming to say the least. The early days of Destiny were confusing as all hell and frankly, a little dry in the content department. I played a lot of Crucible, but other than that, I never really played through strikes or most of the PVE content in general once I beat the jumbled main story. At the time, I didn’t see the point of logging in, so I didn’t. I put away my Warlock Bonds and stopped playing entirely. And then Shadowkeep happened.  

Enter Shadowkeep

I jumped back in with the Shadowkeep expansion and New Light revamp. Bungie’s tweaks and updates to the game really reinforced the idea that “the world of Destiny” is alive and it will move on with our without me. Main characters have died in my absence. Fallen heroes have been resurrected. The Traveler is broken now? And also sticky portal monsters are a thing. I decided to jump back in, intrigued and hype as all hell.

I still have a lot of catching up to do lore wise, but I’m actually excited to experience it. I’ve loved diving into the robust and so-far extremely friendly Destiny community on Youtube and Reddit, so I know my questions will have answers. The overarching story in Shadowkeep -in addition to the smaller, character-focused quests (like last week’s Devil’s Ruin Exotic Quest)- keep me in the loop way more than Destiny 1’s Grimoire cards ever did.

Destiny in 2020

In terms of “What to do” in Destiny 2, it can be initially overwhelming, but here are the basics:

The Playlists

There are three basic game modes presented as “Playlists”: Strikes, Crucible, and Gambit. These playlists serve as quick and easy “Jump right in”-style fun, catered toward cooperative, competitive, and...Gambit (Destiny’s unique mix of co-op and competitive gameplay). If you want a more chill experience, you can explore or patrol the solar system. In between shooting sessions, you’ll meet your friends, organize loadouts, and talk to bounty vendors at The Tower, Destiny 2’s social hub.

The Tower

In concert with these game modes, you’ll complete daily and weekly bounties obtained from vendors across the multi-planetary map and The Tower. Bounties might task you with using a certain weapon-type, killing a particular boss, collecting specific materials or performing different in-game activities. Once bounties are complete, you can redeem valuable currency, or engrams (Destiny’s randomized loot drops). In addition to bounties, you have the opportunity to acquire and complete meatier quests for more specific, powerful rewards. Quests come in multiple steps that can be as simple as finding specific items in the world to completing the most challenging activities in the game. They come in a wide variety of both difficulty and time consumption, but the rewards have been worth it so far.

The Loop(s)

The gameplay balances the box-checking nature of quests and bounties with great space-shooter gameplay to establish a loop that is both addicting, and rewarding. For example:

Lets say you just got a handful of daily bounties and a few weeklies. You need to get 10 kills with a hand cannon, 10 kills with a solar weapon, and 10 kills in the Crucible. Play one game of Crucible with a solar hand cannon, get 10 kills and you just completed three bounties. Before you head back to the Tower , you’ll realize you need to complete one more bounty for the weekly quest so you play “just one more game” to complete “ just one more bounty” and now it’s 3 in the morning and you have a slew of new gear you just have to try out, and thus the cycle continues.

This extends to the moment-to-moment gameplay as well, it’s not just “shoot the bad guys.” Guardians have special abilities according to their class (Hunter, Warlock and Titan) as well as their elemental subclass (Solar, Arc and Void). Even within those subclasses, there are branching ability trees with different playstyles. Want to fly around and rain fire from the sky? Go top-tree Dawnblade. Want to be a spirit-bombing vampire? Go bottom-tree Voidwalker. Balancing ability cooldowns with gear upgrades makes every second of gameplay count. Throw in some environmental puzzles and some floaty platforming and you’ve got Destiny in a nutshell.

Here’s to another 93 hours

The constant loop of long-form quests, quick-bounties, and an ever-flowing stream of loot keeps me engaged more than any other game on the market. There’s a lot to do without a specific goal in mind, and it doesn't even take into account quests for exotic weapons and armor pieces, story specific events, raids, and seasonal events. There is so much to do in Destiny it’s almost impossible to get bored. Tied together with Bungie’s excellent shooting mechanics and “space-magic” vibe, Destiny 2 is going to continue to take up way too much of my time and I am totally okay with that.

[heir-of-puns]

Homestuck Volume 10, One Year Later Retrospective!

Creata, by Seth “Beatfox” Peele: A very very good track to begin the last album. It just kind of embodies everything beautiful and epic about the finale of homestuck. Its beginning section is used in Collide, which brings you right into the first moments of the final battle and then, when you’re ready for the big hit and transition into Oppa Toby Style, the full version slams you with a full-out orchestra. Another thing I really really love about this one is its use of Song of Skaia. The original theme (Skies of Skaia) is used throughout the album, which I didn’t expect to be sure, but it works perfectly. We kind of forget about how important Skaia and universe creation is to the plot/lore of homestuck (which I think may have been one of the problems with Act 7 and our reactions to it but I won’t get into that).The lyrics are gorgeous too. Definitely check out the original Song of Skaia album by Mark Hadley and Tarien Ainuvë. I guess my only gripe is that the song is pretty obviously not a live orchestra or choir. That said, Beatfox did a damn good job with it. I would love love love to see a full orchestra/choir perform it.

Train, by George Buzinkai: The transition from Creata to Train may seem a bit jarring, but if Creata went straight into Of Gods and Witches we wouldn’t have time to relax. Train is just super fun, as are all of George’s songs. Speaking of, check out a bunch more songs like Train here! Also that track art tho. Not one of the strong tracks, but it doesn’t have to be with so many heavy-hitters.

Of Gods and Witches, by Tensei: Oh man, just. Goddamn. I just love this song so much. And what a beginning. The string part slams you full force and just when you think you’re getting comfortable with Jade's Pirates of the Caribbean Quest, Tensei’s classic guitar comes in. The swashbuckling nature of this one is a surprising choice for Jade, but every Jade song is a good Jade song and she definitely deserves such an awesome track. One gripe is that Doctor is referenced which has no connection to Jade but...whatevs I’m kind of weirdly obsessive about leitmotifs for whatever reason. I think Tensei said he did it to make the song 4:13. Worth it. This is one of my favorite strife-y tracks in the music canon for sure.

Beatup, by Clark Powell and Astro Kid: Beatdown is a song with a very interesting history in homestuck, not only because of its associations with Bro and his rooftop...ahem...training of Dave, but also because it was unfinished versions of Beatdown which caused the whole Bill Bolin thing. So Beatdown being featured so heavily on the album is a fun callback to the good ol’ days. And this is such a good version. That base. Makes you want to play it as party music or something. With the track art featuring both Dave and Dirk, I like to think of it as Dave’s reclamation of Beatdown, alongside his rooftop talk with Dirk and the reclamation of his identity since Bro’s death.

You Killed My Father (Prepare to Die), by Team Dogfight: Another one of my faves, though that doesn’t mean much because at least half this album are faves. This is pretty much number one on my list of songs I really want someone to do a full fan animation to, a la Rex Duodecim Angelus. Team Dogfight is amazing both as a group and as individual artists. Yishan Mai/Catboss (drums, mixing) has done tons of LOFAM music, including the Dance tribute songs (MeGaDanceVania, Dance-Stab-Dance, and Emissary of Dance) and so many others I can’t list them all. Listen to his solo stuff (especially Jar of Feelings), you won’t regret it. Will Ascenzo (orchestra, choir) has got to be one of my favorite musicians of all time. Her stuff is just...oh man. Check out Rust Apocalypse for more hs content, and also all of her original albums. DJ最テー (guitars) did Violet Prince and Iron Knight I believe, two tracks which have very much been growing on me lately. I just realized viaSatellite (bass) did Clockstopper (with infiniteKnife) which is my absolute favorite Dave song in the entire canon. David "Dirtiest" Dycus (synths, composition) and Ian White (trumpet) have also done tons of great LOFAM stuff. This song is just so fun and epic and cinematic. A+ yo.

Sound Judgement, by Malcolm Brown: First off, sick transition. Second, say what you want about the end of Terezi’s arc, but the fact that she got her own badass song on the final album says something about how amazing she is. Malcolm Brown is just the king of cinematic pieces, and this one is no exception. It does such a good job turning a pretty simple leitmotif (The Lemonsnout Turnabout/Terezi’s Theme) and making it super epic, which is a word I will keep using throughout this retrospective because I can’t think of another one. The main tune (hook?) of this one is also beautiful and emotional, both as the bells at the beginning and end and as the orchestra/guitar bit at the climax. Its use of Harlequin is obviously a reference to her fight with Gamzee pre-Game Over, though Harlequin is coincidentally also used in reference to John. So it fits both her pre- and post-Game Over arcs. 

Aggrievocation, by Mark Hadley: Considering how much it was used in Volume 5, I feel like we’ve forgotten about Aggrieve. Or maybe it was just me, whose intro to Rose’s music was almost all Chorale for Jaspers references. Aggrievocation was therefore another unexpected surprise, and damn I love it. It makes a nice little trilogy, too, with the original Aggrieve and Aggrievance from Vol.5. This would be my favorite badass Rose song if At the Price of Oblivion and Dance of Thorns didn’t exist

Stride, by Kalibration: I’m surprised neither official nor fan musicians have capitalized on the fact that Dave makes his own music in-canon. While we all know if he were from post-2009, he would deal exclusively in vaporwave, I like to think that Stride is the kind of thing he makes once he finally gets good. And considering the track art, I love the idea of him and Dirk making it together. This song exists in canon for all I’m concerned is what I’m saying. Also, this would make a great walk-around theme for either Dave or Dirk. This is the first of two great Moonsetter remixes on Vol.10, which is yet another happy surprise on this album. Moonsetter seems to have become a kind of hybrid Dirk/Meteor tune considering its original track art on Vol.9 and its use in Vriskagram. But we all know that Moonsetter is the official Gay theme now and I embrace that wholeheartedly. I...still have no idea where Showdown actually comes in though?

Skaian Overdrive*, by Thomas Ferkol: Ah, that good ol’ asterisk. Legend says that the music team video released in tandem with the album claimed Vol.10 included a track called Skaian Starstorm, which someone eventually realized was not the name of this track and was in fact an Astro Kid song from LOFAM 2. In correcting himself, Thomas (or whoever put it together, so probably RJ) placed the asterisk in the song title, which of course means that it is included as part of the title on the bandcamp page and on downloadeds. Who can say for sure if it was intentional or not, but I appreciate that we’ve all just accepted it as part of the title, either as a wink-wink or without knowing the backstory. Anyway, this is a great song for the Battlefield. I love Thomas’s metal stuff.

Freefall, by RJ Lake: It took me embarrassingly long to realize this was, in fact, a remix of RJ’s early version of Cascade (Beta). Cascade (Beta) itself has got to be one of my absolute favorites (which, again, doesn’t mean a whole lot) and this version is so much fun. It’s funky, epic, and I really really love those drop/clap bits. And it’s so great seeing a Cascade remix on the final hs album, harkening back to what was probably, for good or bad, homestuck’s apex.

Moonsweater, by David Ellis, Alto and Tenor Saxophone performed by Malik Refaat: My roommate is a jazz snob from New Orleans and he heard me playing this and came over to my side of the room to say it was really good and ask who it was by. Which, I think, is a major victory for homestuck music and a moment of pride for me. So apparently this is a great song even by jazz snob standards, which is sick as hell. Overall, just a fun bouncy song and another cool use of Moonsetter. And it’s nice to see the Midnight Crew featured on the album, whether they have anything to do with the song’s origins or not. Yeah the song is a bit long, but I can forgive it. Question though: is it sweater like sweat or sweater like the item of clothing? Plz advise. One is significantly weirder than the other and I assumed it was that one until recently. Another mystery which doesn’t need solving but heck if I’m not gonna try and solve it anyway, so nice work.

Castle, by George Buzinkai: Another fun, simple track from George. Again, check out his album of similar stuff I linked to above, and support George with your money and appreciation! The track art makes me think of this one as a song for the post-retcon Meteor Crew sneaking through Derse to save Jake and Roxy.

Skaian Happy Flight, by Seth “Beatfox” Peele: A fun remix of Skaian Ride, harkening back to the old days of Vol.5. A bit of a filler piece, but a fun one. Beatfox said he intended this one as a tribute to the music from the Never Ending Story. As such, notice the little Hussie riding Falcor in the background of the track art.

Voidlight, by Thomas Ferkol: Mmmm the more Calliope tracks the better. Thomas said this one was written as a tribute to Callie’s void bubble and her loneliness hiding in them which, yeah it works perfectly. I also like to think of this one as a theme for Alt-Calliope too, though, not only because I am starved of Alt-Callie Content, but also because those themes of loneliness Callie experiences in the void are mirrored really poignantly in Alt-Calliope’s characterization in-comic. A beautiful piece overall.

Beatdown DX, by Curt Blakeslee: As I mentioned earlier for Beatup, it’s neat seeing Beatdown come back full force on this album. Especially this one, which is a straight-up remaster of the original by its original creator. It’s awesome, especially considering that I don’t think he’s done anything else for the comic since the original Beatdowns from way back when. The original is purposefully harsh to reflect...yeah...but this one finally puts it to its full potential. The amazing track art (brought to you by the creator of Terepy herself) really drives the point home about what Beatdown represents for Dave’s character. I like to think of this one as how Bro sees the song/rooftop battles. Heroic, clean, fun, badass, classic video-game style. And we see from the art that what Bro is doing is none of those, and the original reflects Dave’s perspective on what was going on: harsh, dissonant, aggressive, violent. I do wish that this was included before Beatup on the album, since it represents the exact thing Dave reclaims with that version, as I mentioned earlier.

Solar Voyage, by Marcy Nabors: Oh man. This song. This song is such a great tribute to some of the most iconic songs in homestuck. Starts out with a pretty much one-to-one rendition of Ruins, then hits that sick-ass drop and flare beat, then that guitar. Oh man, that guitar. I wish I could make people feel the way that guitar makes me feel. And then to top it all off, another tribute to the iconic Explore. Three classics which work beautifully together. Also this one is a collaboration from pretty much everyone: Arrangement by Michael Guy Bowman, Marcy Nabors, Clark Powell, and Erik Scheele , Piano by Erik Scheele, Guitar by Tensei, Vocals by Paul Henderson and Marcy Nabors, Drums by Jamie Paige Stanley. The whole gang. And then that transition to.......

Feel (Alive), by Luke Benjamins and RJ Lake: This fucking song, I swear to god. It gets me so pumped. Every single time I listen to it I bounce along. I usually prefer songs with leitmotifs for added Emotions, but this has got to be one my top completely original pieces in the music canon. It goes so hard, it doesn’t even need a subject. The track art makes it a Meteor Crew (plus Jade) tribute, though, so I like to think of it playing as the Meteor is hurtling towards the Alpha session and their imminent doom, with everyone having lived three years of emotional turmoil and pubescence. Truly a masterpiece.

Breeze, by Erik Scheele: Yeah it’s a bit of a filler piece, but it’s a classy filler piece. I just imagine John chilling up in the clouds, free and relaxed. Maybe he packed a lunch for a little sky picnic. I don’t think it was written with John in mind but it’s called Breeze, so I dub it a John piece, so there. And then a tantalizing transition into...

Starfall, by Jeremy “Solatrus” Iamurri: I know we all thought of this one as just a little transition piece into Ascend originally, but after listening to it over the course of a year (!) I’ve grown to really love it. Solatrus has some amazing and unique stuff and out of everything he’s done, including solo albums, this is probably my favorite. I still can’t quite place exactly why I love it so much, there’s just...something about it that’s beautiful and ethereal and just really really cool. I like that the artist decided to go with a tribute to both Rose and the Reckoning for this piece, as it really works for both of them for similar reasons as above. It’s another one that transcends a subject, though, and I am a-okay with that. And then that transition into...

Ascend, by Tensei: No final album is complete without a big tribute to some of homestuck’s most classic tunes. I am such a sucker for those kind of songs and this one is just so much fun. That base drop though. That’s a good base drop. I can never help but laugh, however, at Tensei attempting to use it to make Johnradia canon which...a) is a boring ship b) the art doesn’t even suggest they’re romancey it just gives cool feelings about badass god tiers extending a hand to those who have Ascended and c) the song was, of course, used in the Credits and constitutes our current, but probably final let’s be serious Last Music in Homestuck, and the only ship we associate with it now is Rosemary getting Rosemarried which I think is a very poetic backfire for Tensei. But credit where credit is due, Tensei is still one of my favorite artists and he really delivers a super fun tribute to everything homestuck. 

Lilith in Starlight, by Malcolm Brown: Yeah, there isn’t really anything about this one that hasn’t been said a bunch of times. It’s so great having a full song dedicated to Rosemary. Including Blind Justice Investigation (I am not typing that out in Terezi’s quirk), Do You Remem8er Me, Black Rose/Green Sun, Sound Judgement, and others, it truly makes Malcolm Brown the musician king of gay homestuck ships. Yay Malcolm. But seriously, this is a beautiful piece. Gorgeous references to Rose’s and Kanaya’s themes (have I mentioned how much I love Black/Rose Green Sun? I really love Black Rose/Green Sun), and a fun, dancey rhythm which always makes me think of it as Rose and Kanaya’s wedding dance number. Imagine them spinning each other around as everyone claps and oohs and aahs. Good content.

Thanks for Playing, by Max Wright: Ya know, I never give this one the credit it deserves. This is a beautiful piece of music and combined with the track art, it really hammers in the emotions of the end of homestuck. There they all are, staring into the distance as the universe they’ve just created comes into being. Emotions. I really need to appreciate this song more.

Renewed Return, by Marcy Nabors: Man, who knew Warhammer of Zillyhoo could make me so emotional. This might be my current favorite on the album, though that changes monthly tbh. Especially since this is a real live orchestra and choir! I love that!!! It includes some great overlooked pieces like Calamity and Revered Return, too. Man I’m getting tired. But this is such a great song, and kind of the emotional climax of the album for me. Whether it has much to do with Jane or not, it’s just another great song for the end of homestuck and all the emotions that entails. And this has got to be one of my favorite renditions of Doctor. Rereading the lyrics, it really does seem like they were written for Jane and her resurrection powers actually. Resurrection is a theme throughout the comic in multiple forms, and paying tribute to that through Jane is so great, even regardless of her unacceptable lack of songs.

THIS Pumpkin, by Alexander Rosetti: And topping off the list of surprising returns of old songs, here we have a full-on orchestration of Pumpkin Cravings of all things. The original is such a fun little tune, and not one you would expect to work so well with an orchestra. Alexander Rosetti said the style was very much a tribute to Danny Elfman, which yeah I totally see (hear) that. It’s also great seeing a piece for Problem Sleuth on the last album for the media masterpiece it directly lead to. And finally...

Conclude, by Seth “Beatfox” Peele: It’s interesting that rather than go with a big epic finale, the album takes a softer route. It starts out as a more soothing Creata, then hits you (me) right in the emotional soft spot that is Showtime (Piano Refrain). The first track of the comic, featured in the last track of the last album. And then of course there’s no forgetting Homestuck Anthem. When not focusing on the piece, it can be a bit boring honestly. But when actually listening to it, it really is gorgeous. Kinda reminds me of John Williams’ Star Wars stuff actually, now that I think about it. An excellent finale of a finale of a finale.

There you have it, Vol.10 One Year and Several Hours Later. This took a really long time. Plz appreciate my hard work and the lack of sufficient sleep I am getting tonight.

[sasquach-scratches]

Thoughts on M’rissi and Beyond Reach so far

Cause tbh I’m probably dropping them, but we’ll see.

M’rissi’s Tails of Trouble

First Impression: Skeevy as fuck.  Potentially good.

After playing it:

Still kinda skeevy.  Lots of NPC’s want to bang her for some reason, and a lot of the PC’s lines come off either this way or overly doting.  Your first encounter with her is saving her from being raped.  Why is it always rape?

Speaking of PC lines, they’re not neutral.  At all.  It’s probably to be transparent about what “route” you’re going after, which I guess is fine since no one wants a “Glass Him” option.  But like, I’m playing the Lich Kitty post MQ.  A lot of what’s available for him is out of character.  Not good if you, too, care about this sort of thing.

M’rissi herself is...honestly kind of adorable, which worries me because see the first bulletpoint.  The overly-feline reactions might be a bit much, but eh.

The lore involved is...honestly plausible?  Though the plausibility of one specific part might subjective, and it’s hard to get into without spoiling anything.  (It’s about her appearance).  Certain things make sense after getting to some points in the story, though.

Probably meant to be taken at a slow pace, given that you’re sent all over Skyrim for each quest stage.  You can’t really have conversations with her, though, at least initially.  She does comment on certain things, though, which is neat.  However, I am not a patient person, and neither is Aza.  Also he can teleport and has nothing better to do.  I mentioned it was his old, finished save from 2012, right?

Beyond Reach

First Impression:  Saw it on the Nexus thanks to a translation patch.  Looked boring and low-quality.  The Daedric Realm looked like the physical incarnation of that one Linkin’ Park song.  The Scuttling Void?

Second Impression:  Saw a streamer play it and decided it looked somewhat interesting.  Still thought it was overly bleak and unfun, not to mention, again, low quality.  Put it on my “will try later list.”  *hits the Track button*

Third Impression:  “Welp I’m in the middle of downloading the update but what the christ?”  Apparently there was a really offensive (in a “not even bothering with the 4th wall” way to boot) side quest in the mod that’s since been removed (about 2 years ago) and the author had actually come forward and apologized for.  Honestly made me very skeptical about the rest of the mod, to say nothing of the mod page having a “Modelers Wanted” sign in big bold letters.

Current thoughts:

Well, where do I begin?  The mod’s a lot bigger in scope than jailbait cat, and I’m not actually very far in the main quest, but here we go.

Where in the fuck am I?  I left from Markarth, and ended up on the west side of the new land’s map, where an arrow pointing northwest leads back to Skyrim a-la Solstheim.  How...how in the hell did that happen?  I eventually returned to the starting point and found that a gate leads back to the one near Falkreath in Skyrim.  First of all: WHAT?  How’d we go from Markarth to Falkreath?  Why was the quest started in Markarth?  Leftover from starting in Evermore in an earlier version?  Second of all, that gate is nowhere near the Reach, and if anything it’d lead to fucking Elinhir in Hammerfell (the region of Craglorn, if it’s still recognized as such by the 4th Era).  Is there a really long road that cuts through Craglorn that’s cut out from the travel between the two points?  PROBABLY NOT, cause it not only comes from above, Evermore is on the east side of the map.  You basically start out halfway to flipping Wayrest.  Somehow.

Set pieces tend to be between “aesthetically pleasing” and “poorly put together.”  I clipped through several places in the cave south of The Divide.  In general a lot of things seem half-assed and from the stream I saw, some parts relied on tell over show because apparently the mod was ALSO forced to remove assets from other games.

If there’s one good thing about the mod, it’s the atmosphere.  It may make me want to slit my wrists, but it does fit the general tone of the entire Reach.  Haven’t been to Evermore yet, but what little scraps of Breton/Reachman lore I’ve seen checks out for the most part.  I zoned out during the explanation of the origin of the...Witchmen?  The sickly looking wild Reachmen.  Only complaint I have is the Nord ruin in the south.  Apparently Dragons can procreate?  And a half-dragon was born?  ????

tl;dr: Beyond Reach is shaping up to be Falskaar 2.0.  EDIT: Turns out the mod’s creator is looking for writers as well as modelers, meaning it’s probably best to just dump this mod now as an overhaul is planned. I might play more M’rissi later but who knows.

[jmkitsune]

lyraeon

replied to your post

“took me 7 years…but i finally finished Dream Drop Distance :3I somehow...”

Not to be like that but I'm fairly sure all of KH is so convoluted that nothing shy of actually watching a playthrough or at least the cut scenes COULD spoil any of it :P

I know you said- not to be like that but I’ve seen A LOT of people shitting on the convoluted story with KH3 just released and I’ve kept quiet til now cause  “meh whatever let em think what they want” this is not meant SPECIFICALLY AS “rawr don’t shit on my game series” but more a “I hear people...but a lot of people are looking at it...MAYBE too myopically)

so yeah sorry Ly...this is not directed at you...but also yeah XD I have been wanting to say something like this since....well probably a LOT longer than I know because I’m surrounded by people who either SHIT ON the series OR admit- they just button mash and thats it- they dont care and it breaks me inside as a story teller SOOOOOO INCOMING RANT TO THE VOID

I’m going to be honest, 

I’ve played the games since release, and I streamed BBS, KH1, 2 CoM on twitch (play throughs are on yt for anyone who wants to binge those :D- shameless self plug here) and JUST finished Dream Drop Distance (when I streamed the other ones I played in chrono order not release) so as of now I’ve played from BBS-3D in chrono and release order, I still gotta do the last two parts of 2.8 before starting 3.

and before I dive too deep I’m gonna preface this all by saying

when people say its convoluted-

YES it is, no question, this is a series told OVER a decade spanning many games. Its gonna be messy for a lot of people especially those casual gamers who don’t play games for deep story they play to escape. I get ya- this isn’t for you, have fun gaming ^.^

BUT is it SO convoluted it takes too much to understand if you WANT to? 

ok now that I made sure to not DESTROY people’s dash boards--- ON WITH THE SHOW

I don’t think so

I’d even argue FF7 and KH series ON THE WHOLE (like when mapped out beat for beat story wise) so far are pretty equally convoluted but yet EVERYONE LOVES FF7 in spite of its extremely deeply convoluted story. 

I think the MAIN difference was that FF7 relied heavily on explicit unreliable narration. In Cloud being the (redacted reason for spoilers) protagonist (seriously, it may be an old game but I’m not gonna spill the beans go play it to find out, this allowed for A LOT of exposition to be given naturally and also for “plot holes” to be filled in as the game progressed when we see “what really happened” when we did. I truly think that HINDSIGHT and that revealed knowledge is why SO MANY clamor that FF7 is the BEST in the Final Fantasy series when to many- its really not, its a great game but certainly not the best (as seen from the STARK as fuck divide in the fanbase over it’s expanded chapters (crisis core, dirge of cerberus, Advent Children, etc)

KH does not do this entirely, they instead rely on a “childlike” narrator (which is still unreliable but I’d argue a different kind) Sora is 14/15 in the first game, so through HIS journey alone we’re seeing the world from his perspective and ITS A LOT TO TAKE IN but even in DDD everyone kinda points out ...SORA IS A BIT OF A DUNCE lol I attribute the story telling to that, cause in BBS when we play as Ventus/Terra/Aqua- its not as confusing sometimes, cause these players are older, so the world is already understood by them, nothing is really NEW, whats new is their personal blossoming philosophies conflicting with the world they are now thrown into

they’ve studied it but never PARTAKEN in it vs Sora...who literally wakes up in another world carrying magic mcguffin after a giant mother fucking eldritch creature with a gaping hole in it’s torso swallows HIS home world (its not spoiling it’s literally the tutorial/prologue of the game)

the other thing- where FF7 had 3 discs (which back in the way back days) was SHOCKING (until Star Wars came out with their 4 disc KOTOR/KOTOR 2 for the PC) like 3 discs for 1 story? wtf man?

KH so far in their series has had - 

BBS (3 character’s stories over the course of I think a few weeks)

KH1- 10 years later following a new boy with no prior knowledge of what was going on prior to his story, and this takes place over nearly a year

358/2 days- runs relatively overlapping with Chain of Memories, buut starts 7 days before due to the fact it starts in the final act of KH1

KH2- picking up where said above two games leave off, wrapping up the arc of the Organization and reuniting Sora/Riku/Kairi together at home another year has passed

Coded (not needed but is part of the main timeline) happening I’m guessing in a SHORT as fuck span of time

Dream Drop Distance- taking place between 2 and 3 as a bridge cause it shows Riku and Sora finally hitting a maturing point- they take the tests to be LEGIT keyblade warriors

7 main games over 7 “discs”  honestly I like that what they did for us was gave us over time the 

1.5, 2.5 and 2.8 remixes cause that condensed ALL that into “3 discs” (JUST LIKE ff7- also mind you, the thing I’d even stress- imagine if Square Enix tried to compress ALLLL this story back when KH1 started, like it’d be too much, this story needs to be digested slowly. LIKE another LONG running series (that for the most part - MANY PEOPLE love (Game of Thrones? Homestuck? ANY anime that started back in the toonami days and isn’t done (look at you Dragon Ball) 

GRAND stories take time, video games just were normally NOT that format to showcase such a spectacle...hell Final Fantasy which is like...what? nearly 20 games (including side ones) but only...2 of the “main numbered” games have sequels, the rest are not connected plot/world wise. 

being a writer I probably could do all that Kingdom Hearts has done in the form of 

the five act plot vs the 3 act structure we are used to (see Dramatic Structure)

normally people are used to a 3 act structure (Exposition, Rising Action, Climax)

but so far I see KH serie as a 5 act structure (below)

Exposition - BBS (explaining the world and following 3 people well versed in it for the reader to fall into it and be ready for the next step)

Rising Action - Kh1/358days/CoM (Sora is plucked from his world and thrown into a larger one, on the way he learned about the dark and the light, growing and preparing to fight it as he feels he is part of something bigger than himself)

Climax - KH2/Coded/3D (this part is guess work) we see the “end” of Sora’s growth, the boy we started with is grown and all in, we see him and Riku raising up to their peak to fight the darkness only for the ending of 3D to reveal that the end isn’t the end,

Falling Action <- this part here I think is going to be ALL of Kh3, the falling action, that stripping away of all things built up with the end in sight

Denouement/Resolution/Catastrophe- and here is where the series will end...however that is be it ONE MORE GAME or...the climax of KH3? I dunno we’ll see

SO YEAH....long story short...Kingdom Hearts IS LONG but like ANY OTHER long standing story with deep, and expansive lore- consumption can’t be done in one go. It’s not for casual consumption, at least the story isn’t. Many people play it and give ZERO shits about the lore/story/etc....and honestly I can’t with those people I literally don’t comprehend it but thats on me not them

BEFORE I LOSE MY TRAIN I END THIS RANT HERE