#not sure who i am taking

[starry-bi-sky]

I am loudly pushing the batdad agenda i am loudly pushing the— DPxDC Prompt

“Woah. You look like shit."

Granted, that’s probably not the first thing Danny should be saying to the guy that just bit the curb, but in his defense; he’s not running on 100% right now either.

The man -- tall, towering, and broader than Danny is tall -- whips around on his heel, black frayed cape flaring out impressively. Danny would've whistled in appreciation, but he takes the time instead to wipe the back of his hand across his mouth, smearing the blood running from his nose across his cheek.

"Sorry." He blinks widely, not even flinching as the man with the horns zeroes in on him. "That was rude of me. I have a really bad brain-to-mouth filter; Sam says its what always gets me into trouble."

And she's not wrong either, per say. His smart mouth is what landed him in this situation -- with blood blossom extract running through his veins and cannibalizing the ectoplasm in his bloodstream. Thanks Vlad.

The man grunts at him; a short, curt "hm" that shouldn't make Danny smile, but he does because he's somewhat delirious and probably concussed. The man keeps some kind of distance, sinking towards the shadows of Gotham's alleyway like he dares to melt right into it.

If it's supposed to scare Danny, it doesn't work. Danny's never been afraid of the dark; he's always been able to hide himself in it. He blinks slowly at the mass of shadows.

"You look hurt." The shadows says, blurring together around the edges. Danny squints, and licks his lips to get the blood dripping down his chin off. Ugh, he hates the taste of blood.

"I am." He says, "My godfather poisoned me. M'dying." The agony of the blood blossom eating him from the inside out looped back around to numbing a while ago, so all he feels is half-awake and dazed.

"Hey," Danny stumbles forward towards the man, a bloodied hand reaching out to him. "You-- you're a hero, right? You're not attacking me; which is more than I can say for most costumed people I've met." Maybe it's a poor bar to judge someone at, but he's already established that Danny's not in his right mind.

The man makes no change in expression, but Danny realizes blearily that it's hard to tell with the shadows on his face. He stays still long enough for Danny to latch onto the cape -- stretchy, but almost soft under his fingers.

He looks up blearily into the whites of the man's eyes. "Can you help me? I don't-- I don't wanna die." Again. He doesn't wanna die again. He blinks slow and lizard-like. "I mean- I'll probably get to see mom and dad again, but I told them I'd at least try and make it to adulthood."

There's a clatter down the street, and Danny's ghost sense chills up his spine and leaves a bitter, ashy taste in his mouth. He immediately knows who it belongs to even before the deceptively gentle; "Daniel?" echoes down the way.

"Daniel? Quit your games, badger, Gotham is dangerous for children."

Danny's mouth pulls back, and blood spills against his tongue. "Please." He rasps, and grabs onto the shadow's cape with both hands. "Please. He's going to kill me. Please--"

"Daniel? Is that you?"

His lips part, dragging in air to plead with the darkness again. He doesn't need to, the whites of his eyes narrow, and the cape whirls around him before Danny can blink. Soon swaddled in shadows, the Night lifts him up, and steals him away.

[oh-gh0st]

i heart these rivals so much. maybe they'll kill each other. maybe they'll kiss. maybe they'll make ou

[catilinas]

The wind blows their ghosts to the ground

line (loosely a translation of iliad 6.146-9) from memorial by alice oswald, embroidered onto a ginkgo leaf i found on the ground

[magpie-trinkets]

continuing that "maya tries to contact claire" post, i present you the post-Spirit of Justice follow-up

[comradekatara]

a really defining moment of aang and sokka’s relationship is that sokka literally lets himself get beat up for aang’s amusement and entertainment like a day into knowing him. like he is literally letting aang drop him onto the ground from a not insignificant height over and over again just to see aang smile and laugh. he is putting his own safety and physical wellbeing at risk because it makes aang happy. and there’s a lot we could get into here about how sokka fundamentally views himself and his body as a vessel through which to provide services to others instead of a whole human being in his own right, but what matters for the purposes of this post is that it’s very immediately established that sokka will do anything to see aang enjoy himself, to the point that he will quite literally put up with physical abuse without complaint to make aang happy. so when people are like “it’s crazy how sokka is so smart and yet loses all his braincells whenever he’s around aang,” it’s like yeah, teenage boy adhd2adhd communication will do that, but also a large part of it is sokka contorting himself into an image that he thinks aang will appreciate, because he knows just how valuable preserving aang’s childhood joy and laughter is.

and what’s beautiful is that through actively becoming this person for aang’s benefit, he also actually starts to internalize the sentiment. through the process of letting himself be silly and goofy for the sake of making aang happy, he also absorbs some of that sillygoofy happiness and regains some of his own childhood joy and laughter and sense of wonder he truly thought he had lost forever. he’s not just helping aang retain his childhood, but aang is also helping sokka regain his sense of humanity. the sokka of book 3 is someone who enjoys “wacky, time wasting nonsense” and throws beach parties, a far cry from the sokka of book 1 who thought fun and joy were luxuries no one could afford. his selfless love for aang is also self-affirming, helps him to embrace aang’s point of view, to love himself slightly more than he otherwise would have. because to love aang is to necessarily let kindness into your life; it’s to learn how to be free.

[s0fter-sin]

soap's whole deal being sniper and demolitions gets me going bc on the surface they sound so different but when you get into it, you realise it's bc soap's smart

sniping is all math; calculating distances and wind interference and bullet drop. something i think people overlook is he was listed as a sniper first so it can be implied that he's better at it than demolitions. he does more sniping in both campaigns than demolitions work; in capture or kill, ghost specifically calls on him to take down the aq snipers

and demolitions is math with a hit of chemistry; knowing what mixes with what, knowing how much to use, recognising environmental factors and adjusting accordingly. it's not just about the boom; so much work goes into contained/ planned explosions. especially when having enough power for a breacher charge and not bringing down the whole building is the difference between mission success and failure

the chemical bombs he makes in alone can't just be any old cleaners, they have to have the correct reaction to each other; he just knew off the top of his head what would mix with what to create what reaction. he would also potentially have to recognise them by sight/smell bc they would’ve been written in spanish

soap would also have to know architecture; recognising structural integrity and weak points so he knows exactly where to plant a charge to bring it down and how it'll come down

he has an incredible soldier's mind people just forget that bc he's sociable which itself is a skill

we know he tends to buck against orders he doesn't agree with like when he pushes back against ghost in capture or kill and shepherd when he tells them to release hassan

he gets closer to people and sees if he can trust them and that's when he follows them without question. really think about how he talks to alejandro and rudy; he asks about their home and alejandro's family and rudy's relationship with him. those aren't questions you ask a stranger after a few hours of knowing them. that's not even touching on his relationship with ghost

he also deliberately brings people of higher ranks down to his level; talking informally with ghost and giving him a shoulder punch, addressing alejandro (a colonel!!) by his first name and rudy by his nickname despite literally just meeting them. he personalises all of them and it’s in direct opposition to the reason most characters do that; it’s not due to insubordination or lack of respect, the more he respects and trusts someone, the more casual he is with them

he digs into people; he wants to know what makes them tick and that determines if he can one, trust them and two, follow their orders. once he decides that, he's the ultimate soldier; he bleeds loyalty which makes him vicious when that loyalty is taken for granted

he isn't naive or bubbly or insecure; he's an incredibly smart and aware soldier. he's aggressive and bloodthirsty and loyal and intuitive and i love him so much

[shitpostingkats]

Alabasta Ace is so funny.

Like the strawhats keep commenting that Ace is so polite and restrained compared to Luffy but like. This dude drags himself out of the ocean just to thank them for looking after his brother and offer to help wash dishes. Mans asks "Are these guys bothering you?" and proceeds to blow up an entire fleet with his bare hands. He trips over himself to make sure all of Luffy's crew likes him and no, really, you don't mind that he's a weirdo???? That we, I mean he, are feral little insane guys who take up space and emotional labor and are kind hard to handle? Really???? Cool cool cool hey just a reminder I can help out with anything that needs doing. I got lost in the desert but donnut worry in the 0.6 seconds since you last saw me I have somehow acquired water and provisions for several weeks. Don't ask me how!

Peak oldest sibling behavior.

[mumblesplash]

as if he needed more ways to be everywhere at once

[puppetmaster13u]

Prompt 81

Danny blinked at the small children Ellie was holding the hand of, looking quite proud of herself. The small children- between ten and twelve so somewhere similar to Ellie’s age- who both practically stank of magic and Gods. 

He took a deep breath, pinching the bridge of his nose even as Dan cackled while opening the door more to let them inside. “Alright, what’s your name, kids?”

“B-billy…um, Billy Batson...” “‘m Percy! Percy Jackson.” 

“Nice to meet you two- any idea where in your family you have a god or two, because one of you definitely smells like Zeus and I’m pretty sure Poseidon and I am not dealing with either of my half-brothers.” 

[findafight]

Robin chose Steve. Robin made the conscious and deliberate decision that she could and would trust Steve. She already liked him! She had fun working and bantering with him! They were already on their way to being weird little bffs and the torture just expedited the process. Steve chose Robin just the same! He thinks she's fun and cool and likes her so much! He chose to be honest and open with her too, putting himself out there.

Even though their interests on the surface level don't match why wouldn't they share them? Steve clearly caves when Robin wants to watch a movie he doesn't think he'll like, Robin can watch a March madness game or five.

Stop trying to take away their bond oh my god people can be close to more than one person!!! Their best friend doesn't have to be dismissive or mean or whatever in order for a romance to be special to them!

[stromblessed]

Mizu's spectacles, and the levels of her disguise

In drafting some more Blue Eye Samurai meta posts, I find myself writing out the comparisons between what Mizu can and cannot hide about herself, and how that affects how she moves through the world.

Like, I get the jokes about Mizu's glasses, if only color contacts had existed back then, etc. etc., and I think (hope) that most viewers don't take the glasses jokes seriously, as in "I don't care about the suspension of disbelief because BES is a cartoon." But I wanted to write these thoughts out anyway without burying them in a text post about something else.

I think the points I'm going to lay out here are viewed very differently by different people, so please feel free to add to this post, reply, or put your thoughts in the tags!

Not only do Mizu's glasses not actually help her that much, there's surely more to Mizu's mixed race appearance than just the color of her eyes.

In my view, this was pointed out in episode 1:

I'm willing to bet most of us were expecting young Taigen to say "blue eyes," not "ROUND eyes."

Obviously this is still about Mizu's eyes, but not even spectacles can hide their shape.

I don't think the show is obligated to point out everything about Mizu's face that isn't quite as Japanese as the people around her expect. Though the creators have said that they specifically designed Mizu - and her clothes - to read both as "white" and as "Japanese," as well as both male and female. I think there's more about Mizu's features that read as "white" than just her eyes.

This is where my own headcanons start entering the picture, but it's my impression that people can just tell that Mizu looks different, whether or not they can put a finger on exactly how.

There's the little girl who looks at Mizu and then hides on the way into Kyoto:

When there's more to your face you'd like to cover up than just your eyes, big hats are a big help!

By the way, most of these examples have to come from the first half of the season, since by the second half, either Mizu is too preoccupied with fighting henchmen, or everyone Mizu is facing knows who she is already, and she therefore has no reason to hide her mixed race identity.

It's worth mentioning that the mere fact that Mizu has to hide multiple aspects of her identity - her mixed race and her sex - results in her having to choose clothes that really, really cover her up, which doesn't win her any favors either:

(Zatoichi reference, anyone?)

If it were as easy as, for example, tying her glasses to her head and wa-lah, nobody would ever know she was half-white - then (1) Mizu would've just done that long ago, and (2) Mizu wouldn't be so on guard and on tenterhooks 100% of the time the way she's depicted in the show, even when her glasses are on.

Her spectacles sure don't help her in the brothel, which is full of observant women who are trying to seduce her, meaning they get good long looks at her:

Mizu never takes her glasses off, but they still send a woman to her who has light eyes, thinking that must be what will interest a blue-eyed man:

No wonder Mizu gets mad after this, lol

So Mizu never takes her spectacles off in the brothel, it's dimly lit inside, and the women can still tell that she has blue eyes. I'm getting the sense that Mizu putting on her spectacles isn't a guarantee that people suddenly can't tell that she looks different.

And yet no one spots that she's female.

Mizu can hide her breasts, can wear her hair in the right style, can hide what's between her legs, can walk and talk and behave like a man - and she's been doing it for almost her entire life, to the point that not only is she very good at it, but the threat of being found out as female is deadly, but isn't presented in the show as omnipresent.

Let me explain.

She threatens Ringo for nearly saying the word "girl" out loud, because while she's constantly ostracized for being mixed race, being a woman traveling without a chaperone, carrying a sword, and disguised as a man will get her killed or flogged or arrested or some combination of these things.

But in addition, it's been drilled into her since she was a child that if she is discovered as female, the combination of her being mixed race and female will identify her as someone extremely specific, someone known to some bad people, and she will be killed:

I think of it as Mizu thinking to herself, "Being found out as mixed race means I'm treated badly. Being found out as mixed race and a woman means I'm dead."

Mizu's hair is cut as a child. But she isn't made to wear a big hat, or cover her eyes somehow, or anything like that. Because hiding her sex is a more successful endeavor than hiding her race.

Ringo finds out she's female by accident, but once Mizu accepts the fact that he won't rat her out, she relaxes pretty early on in the season. Because the threat of being found out as female is mitigated pretty much 99.9%, since Mizu has gotten so good at being a man. And also, because most of the time, people see what they want to see. Even if Mizu's face makes her stand out as "not 100% Japanese," no one in the world of BES looks at Mizu's clothes, her bearing, her sword, hears her voice, and will ever in a million years conclude that she is a woman, because expectations around gender roles in the Edo period were so rigid and so widely enforced.

One detail that proved this to me is after the Four Fangs fight:

Ringo takes off Mizu's clothes so he can stitch her up, then leaves her clothes off even after he's done. He doesn't even throw her cloak over her as a blanket or anything. There's a little a straw (pallet?) as a divider there on the left, but anyone could just peek around it and see Mizu and her chest bindings. (I think it's mostly there as a windbreaker.)

And Taigen is right there, but he doesn't give a shit:

Opinions probably vary hugely on this, but my impression is that because the show doesn't make any kind of deal about Taigen being in the room with Mizu here, my guess is that Mizu isn't in any danger of Taigen thinking she's female. Even when I watched the show for the first time, I assumed that Taigen had seen Mizu out of her clothes here, and that he thought nothing of it.

Eat your heart out, Li Shang (Mulan 1998). I actually do think that this scene is a direct and purposeful side-eye to that movie, lol

There's obviously some nuance to how "severe" being mixed race is compared to how "severe" being a woman is for Mizu:

After all, Swordfather can't bear to listen to Mizu confess to being a woman.

So a Japanese man can go wherever he wants, whenever he wants in BES. A Japanese woman has limited options: marriage, religion, or a brothel. A mixed-race man is an eyesore in this story. A mixed-race woman is a death sentence.

May as well eliminate the female aspect, and do what you can about the mixed-race aspect. Because that's just realistic.

Meaning Mizu can avoid the strictures Edo society places on women. But she can't avoid the repercussions that come with being mixed race. And I truly don't think that it's just because "there's no brown contacts yet."

[judasisgayriot]

there's so much to unpack here (@predoom found this while I was searching for a different video from this time! <3 <3 thought it needed to be immortalised...)

[khihi]

if you dislike rpf and think a normal response to someone just having fun with rpf is to steal their hard work and paste it on a more public platform where the real people in question are more likely to see it then i don't think there's much help for you, i think you're probably just addicted to performative morality and are more of an asshole than you realise

[ryllen]

this PSA is brought to u, by first year farmer ・゚ *✧

[pallanophblargh]

Color! Composition still wonky, but this was done mainly to see how I liked the colors and such. I can reposition and resize birds/leaves/etc another time. And get a decent proper hexagon drawn up.

This has been an exercise in not letting perfection hold me back. I have to start getting back into art somehow, right?

[calicos-clones]

I don’t think people realize how freaked out fanfic readers get when their favorite author(s) doesn’t update their ongoing schedule ON TIME.

And it’s not cause we want the chapter…it’s cause we’re so fucking worried about the Author.

Like— OMG ARE YOU OKAY? YOU’VE BEEN GIVING US THE TRAGIC UPDATES OF YOUR LIFE IN THE NOTES THE PAST 10 CHAPTERS?! WHY STOP? ARE YOU DEAD? DID YOU GET STUCK IN THE WALL LIKE YOUR CAT?? HAVE YOU EATEN?? HAS YOUR BRAIN EXPLODED??

Readers no longer care about the story when they don’t get their usual update. We panic and flag S.O.S as we track down our wayward author who has been both blessed by the universe with a creative mind and cursed all the same with the worst luck.

So any authors who are reading this please understand— when we comment “hey are you okay?” in your comments. No, we are not asking about the chapter.

We are legitimately concerned for your wellbeing. Do not force yourself to shit out a chapter just to appease other ppl when you yourself are not in the mental state to enjoy it or even write it to begin with.

TAKE CARE OF YOURSELF DAMMIT