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#one of them only knows bc she just happened to be there while i was telling the other dkfnlxnd
shiphappen-s · 1 day
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Ok so like brace yourself bc I haven't read the brick and I'm playing fast and loose w canon here but you know that line in Bring Him Home where Valjean is looking at Marius and is like "he's like the son I might have known, if God had granted me a son"
What if Marius and Cosette swapped places. Marius was always a sensitive boy and he always had his quirks and such (personally I HC him as autistic / on the spectrum but like again fully fanon/musical based pls don't come for me). And where those more vulnerable sides of him would have been mostly squashed under the care of his grandfather, valjean nurtures them. And Marius just looks at valjean like he hung the stars in the sky, he's everything Marius wants to be when he grows up. A man who can protect himself and his family while still being kind and generous and sometimes nervous just like he always is. This guts Valjean because he feels so unworthy of this love and innocent childlike devotion. Marius should want to be so much more than a convict on the run from the law, which actually results in him telling Marius about his past early on in an effort to quell this thing but only ends up making Marius love and respect him more lol. Anyway I'm getting off topic
Cosette who was never taken from the Thenardiers, who grew up hungry and cold and right next to Eponine. They had a vicious rivalry until their early teens but once Eponine stopped getting daughter privileges and started getting punished the same if not more than cosette they formed a quick alliance. Eventually they became thick as thieves, often dreaming about the day that Fantine would come for her child and cosette would convince her to take them both out of this hell. Eponine is eventually the one to find out what happened to Fantine. Learning that her mother died alone and cold and abused because of the thenardiers simultaneously broke and forged something in Cosettes soul. Eponine became more and more bitter about life and the world but Cosette could not watch idle as the thenardiers continued to ruin people's life. She starts stealing from them and distributing it to the poor, purposely botching their jobs under the guise of being clumsy/stupid, subtly taking their attention so that Eponine or gavroche could nick food or medicine or whatever they needed. This eventually puts her on the path to bump into the Les amis and she quickly joins them and rises in the ranks. Her and Enjolras, though from completely opposite upbringings, are a United front when it comes to ideals. She is merged into the inner circle and becomes close with all of the boys, becoming a mix of big sister and little sister to all the students in attendance. Grantaire gets on her nerves a bit but he's so similar to Eponine that she can't stay mad at him. Especially bc he's never cruel and she can see his point most of the time, it's just annoying to be interrupted all the time lol
Cosette would fall immediately for the shy well read rich boy who spends his days giving to the poor and helping the needy as best he can. Marius would fall instantly for the girl with fire in her eyes and bruises on her knuckles who speaks passionately about equality and freedom for all.
(There would also be no love triangle with Eponine here bc she's had her eyes on the good looking intellectual man who serves as the right hand of Enjolras. He helped her in a tight spot once and he didn't flinch at her state or even ask for any kind of repayment. She doesn't know his name yet as she hasn't crossed paths with her sisters group all that often but the people in that group sometimes call him the guide. She usually keeps her cards close to her chest on this kind of stuff but she's planning on tagging along to the next meeting of his so she can see this man in his element and determine if his kindness was a fluke or not)
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artificialbreezy · 3 days
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Matt as a twin dad has been planted in my head so, dad omens is back!!
disclaimer: all photos found on pinterest, none of them are mine. this is simply a work of fiction, none of this has happened. ever.
so many thoughts under the cut ◡̈
started as a simple kind of moment tbh
a nice date, he just got home. he’s gonna be home for a while, no touring. what better way to tell Matty you’re ready.
“Matty, i love our little life and our fur babies but i think im ready to try for a real baby.”
you didn’t expect the first try to work tbh
and you really didn’t expect such an early positive test
and you really don’t expect two babies
Matt though? he was so excited
he gets to have TWO BABIES?!??
he’s texting the omens group chat the moment at appointments done
“YOU BITCHES ARENT GONNA BELIEVE THIS!!! THERES TWO LITTLE DUDES IN THERE!!!”
thus the planning begins
he’s never leaving you alone, he won’t let you mom by yourself. he WILL be an active dad
and when he finds out they’re both girls??? oh brother is fucked
he’s crying so so hard
“honey we need to pick another name, we only had one planned for each one.”
you settle on “Mira Jean Dierkes and Meadow Brooke Dierkes”
whenever he talks to them, “why hello my sweet M&M’s how are we feeling today?”
he was really excited for a lotr nursery but when you guys settled on the names he said no way, we have to do a subtle little candy land theme
Davis comes to paint the cute little candies above each of their cribs
Noah is Meadow’s godfather and Lana is Meadow’s godmother
Folio is Mira’s godfather and Davis is Mira’s “godparent bc Folio fucking took the godfather name”
you decide on a c-section with your obgyn, she makes sure to explain you can have natural birth after this one but it’s not fully recommended.
“don’t worry, we only wanted two and well we got them”
the birth was smooth, Matt was holding your hand the whole time
he cried more than he’d ever tell the guys
Noah, Davis, Folio and Lana all camped out in the hospital waiting room
with gifts
and balloons
and flowers
and Lana made a huge goody bag for just you
Matt and you swear to never dress the girls identical, you refuse to let either of them feel unseen
he carries both car seats to the car on the way out, helps you into the car, helps you to the front door, helps you straight to bed and then he’ll join you and his little ones
as they’re getting older and their personalities are coming in
you can definitely tell that Mira is just like her dad, has so much interest in his work and his shows and his movies and his music and she just loves her dad.
“you’re my little shadow, aren’t you Mira?”
and Meadow? loves her mama, loves sitting with her while she crochets and loves sitting with her while she reads and Meadow has her own little book, loves being with mama.
Mira looks like her mama though
and Meadow is the copy paste of Matt
buys them valentine’s day gifts
takes them each on one on one daddy/daughter days
and group days
Matt likes to joke with them too once they’re 4-5, purposely mixed up their names
“Mira here is your peanut butter and jelly with no crust and extra jelly.”
“Meadow here is your ham and cheese, hold the cheese.”
and he’s just chuckle a little when he sees them switch plates
ugly cries on the first day of school
every year tbh
high school about takes him out
what do you mean they’re gonna date soon???
what do you mean they’re gonna drive soon???
what do you mean they only have 4 years left???
Mira would rather skip out on the dances but Meadow begs and pleads her sister every time
so now you’re dress shopping AND suit shopping
“i’ll go Dow, but i am NOT wearing a dress.”
“that’s fine, i think you and J- “
“MEADOW SHUT IT.”
Matt and you just look at each other, and know. Mira is seeing someone.
and you guys don’t know much on it, until picture time before the dance comes around and you see the oldest Ruffilo child and Mira closer than usual and that’s when Matt calms himself
“god at least it’s his kid, could’ve been way worse.”
“i mean, do you think Mira was really just picking a pick shirt for nothing?” Meadow would bring up
“they had to match her suit to her dress.”
Nick comes up and talks about it later, wondering how much you two knew versus them.
everyone’s just happy they’re happy
they’d stay together throughout high school, finally coming clean end of freshman year
they decide a college together (with Meadow picking a college not far from her sister)
and suddenly the house is empty and Matt’s standing in the door way of the girls’ area of the house holding their baby book
“can’t believe they’re all grown up, honey.”
“we did good Matty.”
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teddybeartoji · 16 days
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o wait before i start posting any pics.. i was thinking that maybe.. you guys could help me liquify this gender some more by switching up what you call me.... DON'T GET ME WRONG I LOVE . LOVE LOVE LOVE WHEN YOU USE HE/HIM AND JUST OVERALL LIKE MORE MASC STUFF THAT'S SOOO MMMMMMMMMSO FUCKING GOOD like i don't get to feel that irl at all so it really does make me so happy but i've just been thinking abt TRYING to switch it up more yk? does this even make sense...... . hhhh anyway i might won't even like it and i'll want to just go back to hehim but i wanna try... JUST TO SWITCH IT UP.
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bitchthefuck1 · 2 months
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you know what, I actually will talk about this because it's bothering me. The issue with focussing so heavily on syd and carmy's potential for a romantic relationship isn't that there's something inherently unintellectual about romance or whatever, it's that a lot of people seem incapable of doing that without immediately flattening the story and ignoring or intentionally misreading any and all nuance for the sake of that romance. Every scene suddenly becomes about how it impacts their relationship, every analysis is done through a romantic lens, every frame or line of dialogue becomes about finding some easter egg or hint that "proves" these people should start dating. Their dynamic is absolutely a fundamental part of this show, but if you can only see it as a will-they-won't-they, you miss so much of what the story is actually trying to say with these two.
There are good versions of this story where their relationship is romantic and there are good versions of this story where it isn't, but as soon as you decide them being together is "the point," you lose the ability to actually judge the story for what it is, not what you want it to be.
#like so much of their dynamic (esp but not exclusively in S3) has been about showing the ways that carmy's trauma and dysfunctional#attitude in the kitchen impacts other people and how even though he cares about syd and wants their partnership to work he keeps self#sabotaging and setting himself and by extension her and the restaurant up to fail and replicating the same toxic environments that#he grew up and trained in and this is very much consistent with his character and a natural continuation of the conflicts they've been#having since S1 but because him being shitty with her runs contrary to them getting together suddenly its 'ruining the story' and#out of character and only happening bc the writers just hate to see this ship winning and like. if you really think that i genuinely don't#know what show you've been watching bc it sure as shit wasn't this one. like it hurts to see him do this because you know#they could do something genuinely great together and that he's ruining a really good thing but this is also the reality of where he is rn#if he was just a good and supporting business partner and not deeply dysfunctional it would be wildly out of character#the problem w S3 wasn't that it 'ruined' their relationship it's that it had no clear focus overemphasized carmy's arc at the expense#of the other leads deprioritized the supporting cast while failing to give them their own arcs gave more screen time to#unecessary and uninteresting new 'comic relief' characters and let conflicts stagnate without resolving them or#letting them evolve over the course of the season.#this isn't exclusive to the bear this is a general trend ive noticed where as soon as the 'shipper' part of people's brains get activated#it's like they lose the ability to read the story any other way and it stops being about what's good for the narrative and starts being#about whether or not these two people kiss and anything that gets in the way of that is bad and anything that brings it closer is good#and it's usually whatever but it's really frustrating when the story ppl are doing that to is this good#it also makes people fundamentally incapable of treating any 'obstacle' to that romance in a way that isn't wildly meanspirited and#gross (esp bc those characters are usually women) which is exhausting. like no claire isn't evil or a 'pick me' or 'bad' for carmy#or a useless addition to the story or whatever other nonsense you guys have decided must be true to feel okay. she's a perfectly normal#character and their relationship is exploring some of the ways that carmy's inability to deal with or actually address his trauma#impacts the various relationships in his life. she doesn't even have to be a monster or a narrative mistake for him and syd to be#'destined' for each other or whatever. this isn't a middle school wattpad fic.#im definitely gonna get killed in the street for this but ive been looking for a good reason to spend less time on here so might as well#the bear#sydcarmy#sydney adamu#carmy berzatto
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fleshdyk3 · 20 days
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god i fucking hate my dad
#he came home today from a bike trip he went on and he's been arguing with me about honeybee the whole fucking day#he keeps saying just let her out let her run around! every time i put her in her pen to nap#and he refuses to stop her from biting him#and he got mad at her for playing with his socks when she'd just been playing with mine and he threw them on the floor of the living room#which first of all stop being such a fucking slob#and second of all what the fuck did you expect to happen? it's a soft new toy on the floor where she spends most of her time. where all her#toys are. very similar to the two soft items she's allowed to play with (my socks)#she's fucking 3 months old she doesn't understand the difference between my socks and his socks#and i keep telling him i know what im doing i was doing all the research while he went to buttfuck nowhere on his midlife crisis motorcycle#but he just wont fucking listen to me#and hes like oh youre at that age where you think youre right about everything and are so stubborn like fuck you actually#first of all im stubborn about this because its a living breathing puppy and his actions will affect her behaviour as an adult#and bc i know what im fucking doing. ive been an animal person my entire life. i did all the research. i did this exact same thing with#parrots for five years.#and hes like you cant just put her in her pen every time shes being a dog like no i fucking dont. i only put her in her pen when it's time#for a nap and she's getting overtired. you can't just let her run around until she collapses bc for one she never fucking will#second that's only going to make her energy threshold higher and then she'll be absolutely impossible to handle#and i told him that and that i read that on like every professional dog training source i read#and he said that might be true or might not be#like it fucking is bitch omfg#and then he tried to one up me like um i actually raised you guys for a long time i know what im doing#like a child is not a fucking dog. also my mom raised us lets be fucking serious. and look how well adjusted i turned out#and he told me to relax and calm down like i wasnt even arguing with him but i sure as hell will now#like dont tell me to fucking relax. when has telling anyone to relax ever made anything better. especially a teenager. especially a (for#simplicity's sake) woman.#and i told him dont tell me to relax and he got all pissy and stormed off#like literally fuck you#im my fathers daughter. im just as stubborn as he is.#rambles
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napstabl00k · 20 days
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Those sonic prime gjinkas from my day out today
#luriart#sonic prime#shadow the hedgehog#nine the fox#sonic the hedgehog#i guess. only twice. btw trust me on this his outfit changes w his shoes & gloves#rusty rose#thorn rose#knuckles the dread#prim the bat#prim rouge#<- ??????????#nine again. my son boy. why do all the sonic kids i wish i could adopt happen to be the type that would tell people kys#rouge the bat#just the once.#rebel the bat#rebel rouge#anyway okay so a] this was a lot of fun. i dont know if ive made this clear in my other gjinka posts but sonic's shirt says sega normally#but it reflects what he's thinking other times. Only for the jokes no one else seems to notice that the shirt changes#b] oughgh i have this obsession w the hair of these characters and making it make sense for them? nine has darker hair than tails bc tails'#hair is a] sunbleached and b] he bleaches it closer to his roots than nine#nine's hair is also greasier & straighter. it has less volume#my og amy has thick braids w heart shaped beads at the end but why the shit would the eggcouncil let her have Heart Beads???#shes their sick as hell robot. so her hair's grown out into dreads on their own. she has sort of a side shave but like. in the way that one#side is metal. thorn doesn't have the time 2 braid her own hair so she has half of it cut short and the other half grown out in a small afr#you'll never believe this but dread has dreads#prim actually gets rouge's natural hair!!! my rouge wears a wig and all the pieces that frame her face are gelled on#but if rouge [like. usual rouge] took her wig off she'd have a short buzz underneath. and i was so excited to draw it so i did#rebel keeps the wig. knucks is there at the very bottom but he has real tight braids#anyway one thing i was wondering while i was drawing is where the fuck did prim get the black shirt under her leaves shirt
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ehlnofay · 10 months
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It’s not until she hears Sissel’s knees hit the floor that Efri is jolted back into her body.
She blinks, whipping her head around. Sissel is kneeling, bracing a palm on the ancient stone pavement, at the barrier – no, the barrier’s gone, it’s just Sissel on the floor. She lifts her head and meets Efri’s eyes; her hair is wispy and wild, the little plaits meant to keep it neat come loose and tumbling, her eyes wide. The barrier's gone, but still, her pale face is lit up blue.
“Are you okay?” she asks. She doesn’t speak loudly, but it echoes in the great stone chamber.
Nine, Efri doesn’t know.
She blinks again, looks down at her hands, clinging to the metal stick so fiercely that her joints ache. (Her own stick, her nice wooden one, is still on the floor somewhere, where it slipped out of her grasp when she hit the wall.) The lumpy heavy end of it, the clobbering end, is still resting on –
Not on. It’s in the thing’s head, fitted neatly in the opening of its dented helmet, the horns spiralling over the floor. There’s a tooth, perfectly preserved, by Efri’s foot.
One by one, she unwraps her gloved fingers from the handle of the metal stick, letting it drop to the floor with a clang so loud it makes her wince. Kazari is nosing at her side. (When did they let go of it? When did they get so close? She must have missed that. She feels out of the loop. Her heart is juddering like fish on a line, battering like some frightened trapped thing at her ribcage, and her breath is coming fast and heavy.) Absentmindedly bringing up a hand to press over her sore shoulder, she says, “’M fine. Not too – barely touched me.”
Kazari turns and spits on the floor. Efri blinks. She does it again, tongue lolling out of her mouth, face very disgruntled – and oh, Efri gets it. She does not glance down at the thing at her feet; she doesn’t need to, she knows what its arm looks like, chewed almost to pieces even through its banded armour. (If she hadn’t been so busy being scared of it, that sight might have made her a bit scared of Kazari. But not now, when they’re trying to hack and spit the taste of dead man arm out of their mouth.)
Efri unclips her canteen from her belt and holds it out. “Here,” she says. Her voice is rough. Her heart is racing too much to let constructing sentences be easy. “Not much, but –”
Kazari stands still while Efri tips half of the remaining water onto her tongue, and then Efri watches her swilling it around in her mouth, trying to bathe all of her teeth in it, before she spits it again on the floor at the dead thing’s feet.
The water is still clear. That’s something, at least; the dead man was too old to still have blood in him. Or maybe he was embalmed, drained of it hundreds of years ago, thousands.
“Are you okay?” Efri asks Kazari when they’re done, because they were the one doing most of the fighting, who was closest. They tip their head, shift their weight – wince when they put weight on one foot. Their lips peel back from their teeth. Their clothes on that side are singed.
Efri points it out. “Your robe,” she says, which makes it sound much fancier than it is. She’s too tired to think of a better word. She rubs a hand over her face, pushing the hair back over her forehead, says, “I’ll reinforce it for you when we get out.”
Kazari noses at Efri’s shoulder – the shredded fabric of her dress, the fraying edges stained with blood. Efri says, “I know. I’ll have to sew that up too.” Over her shoulder, she calls, “Kazari’s leg’s hurt, I think.”
“There’s blood on you,” Sissel replies. She peels her hand off the floor and leans back on her heels.
Efri touches her shoulder again. “’S fine,” she says. “Just a scrape. The blood’s drying already.”
It’s really sore, actually – the flesh abraded and tender, an ache sinking deep into the muscle – but it’s normal sore, the kind of sore you really should be after being thrown into a wall. It doesn’t feel sprained or dislocated or anything like that.  Just like it will be bruised a whole rainbow of colours come tomorrow.
Kazari noses at it again. She leans too far forward and falters on her maybe-hurt leg – rights herself, wincing, and rolls her shoulder. It gleams, just for a moment, and she nearly stumbles again. Efri puts out a hand to steady her. (It doesn’t really accomplish anything – Efri’s strong, but she’s not that strong – but it’s the principle of it.) “What was that spell?”
“Pain relief,” Sissel says from behind her. “I think. Doesn’t actually fix anything, but.”
“You’ll be okay ‘til we find someone?” Efri asks, and Kazari nods. She presses a hand against their shoulder and nods back.
They both turn to look at Sissel, then, who’s just kneeling on the floor, sitting on her heels.
“You all right?” Efri asks her.
“All right,” Sissel confirms. She doesn’t look at them. “Didn’t even come near me.”
She’s staring.
Efri crosses the floor to stand with her. (She needs to lean on Kazari – her legs are too wobbly, and she doesn’t want to touch the dead thing’s stick, doesn’t want to look for her own. Kazari limps a little on their sore front leg.) There’s a moment of total, humming silence – all of them still and staring, necks craned back, looking up at the thing.
Whatever it is.
It’s a ball. Big and blue and shimmering, it floats above a wide crystalline dish set into the floor, spinning on an axis. Just spinning and spinning and spinning, endless motion. Its smooth surface is cut through with dark wavering lines, etched with lettering, and it doesn’t quite glow but it doesn’t not glow, either, the light moving across it silkily, like clouds in a blue sky. It looks like something that should be humming – a low pitch in their ears, an eerie shiver dancing over their skin – but it’s silent. Inert, maybe, but for the spinning.
“What is it?” Efri asks. Her voice cracks as she speaks. She looks down at Sissel’s face, staring as though mesmerised, illuminated by the room’s dim lighting – the fires that should not still be burning down here, the luminous not-glow of the ball.
Sissel says, “I don’t know. Something important.”
Hovering above the dish, it spins, and spins, and spins.
“Is it what the ghost was talking about?” Efri asks. She tilts her head and squints at it. It doesn’t – well, it looks strange and unearthly and powerful, but it isn’t doing anything. And it hadn’t been clear what the ghost was talking about, exactly, according to Sissel, just that it was something important – but what else could it be?
Sissel, still watching it, shrugs. “I don’t know,” she says. “I think so.”
Efri watches it with her, brushing a bit more hair out of her face. It’s sticking to her sweaty forehead. She feels a drip of not-dry blood running down her arm under her sleeve.
Kazari is staring at it too – just as confounded as the rest of them. Efri sees the light in their irises shifting as the ball spins.
They’re not learning anything from staring, the ball staying strange and mysterious as ever, so Efri raps her knuckles against her sternum to steady her breathing (it’s slowed a bit – not normal, but closer to it) and climbs up onto the stone rimming of the dish. Kazari, behind her, lows in consternation; Sissel catches her breath, a noise like a creaking door. “Careful,” she says.
“Promise,” Efri replies, and places her feet very, very carefully on the glassy blue flooring. Nothing happens. She doesn’t step on the dark curved lines as she treads toward the ball in the centre, slow and wary as if she were approaching a skittish animal. Nothing happens.
She reaches out, and, with just the tips of her fingers, she grazes the ball’s surface.
Nothing happens.
It’s cool to the touch, and smooth, like polished metal or not-frozen ice or delicate glasswork. It continues to spin gently under her fingers, warming her glove with friction, no smudges left on its clouded face.
 It really feels like there should at least be a tingle running up her arm, a strange and unfamiliar current, a spark. But it’s just Efri, standing with an arm outstretched, pressing her hand to a ball.
“It’s not doing anything,” she reports, and Sissel clambers up onto the dish with her, fitting her palm to its gently hovering underside. Kazari balks, begins pacing agitatedly. Efri frowns. “Why isn’t it doing anything? Shouldn’t it be doing something?”
“It’s important,” Sissel says definitively. There’s ancient dust on her fingers, but none of it seems to transfer. “It’s something really special, I think.”
Efri shifts restlessly. She shifts her grip and tries to grab onto the dark ridged curves ringing its surface, but they slip easily away from her grasp as though her touch was no barrier at all. “But what does it do?”
Sissel shrugs.
Behind them, Kazari lows.
Efri drops her hand and grabs Sissel’s wrist. “C’mon,” she says, and when Sissel frowns at her, “We’re not going to learn anything about it this way. We have to look for clues!”
Kazari makes a more impatient noise. (Efri thinks she found a clue.)
Sissel gives the ball one last searching look and lets Efri tug her away, off the weird blue dish and down to where Kazari stands on the stone floor, at the head of the table where the dead man sat. Efri sniffs loudly and tries not to think about it too much. The table is smooth polished stone, worn a little away with time; Efri trails a gloved finger over the edge and directs her attention to where Kazari points with their chin.
There’s something carved into the surface, the edges blunted and shapes softened by however many years it must have been since it was put there. Efri squints, trying to make it out. She has to stand right up on her tiptoes to get the right angle to see much of it in full.
“That’s not letters,” she says eventually, frowning. She’s pretty sure she knows her alphabet well enough by now to know that. “Is it magic?”
Sissel shakes her head. “I don’t know what it is. It’s not like magical writing I’ve ever seen.”
Efri looks at Kazari, who also shakes her head. “Maybe it’s a different sort of lettering,” she theorises. It must have been written a long time ago, if it’s from back when the city had people. Onmund’s been reading all about it for ages, and he’s told her a bit – Saarthal was the city of Atmorans, populated by proto-Nordic people. All complicated history stuff. But they weren’t quite the same as Nords today, he said, so it stands to reason they had different writing, too. They’re supposed to be uncovering and cataloguing artifacts (at the thought, Efri glances back at the hovering ball and swallows an inane bubble of laughter) so she suggests, “Maybe you can copy it and we can show it to someone. I’m sure there’ll be someone at the College what knows what it is.”
Sissel, also standing on her toes, nods dutifully. “What will you do?”
The chamber they’re in is cavernous, and about empty but for the ball in the dish, the altar and chair, the body on the ground. “I’ll check him,” she says, and points. “See if he has anything on him that’s special.”
Sissel follows her finger and grimaces.
She digs out her note-paper and her stick of char, and Efri assumes it’s clues time, but when she turns she feels a hand grip her elbow. She looks back over her tattered shoulder at Sissel’s face, her furrowed brow.
“Promise you’re really okay?” she says, voice anxious and solemn.
“Promise,” Efri says, twisting her arm to touch her friend’s hand. Sissel presses her lips together and lets go of her arm.
Kazari trails after Efri to look at the dead man.
First thing is the metal stick. It’s magic someway, Efri knows – he waved it and threw her into a wall, flung spells with it – but she’s not sure how. Doesn’t know enough about enchantments. Didn’t need to, to use it; when Kazari clamped down on his arm she just ripped it from his grasp and –
She doesn’t quite exactly remember, actually, except for the bitter tang of adrenaline in her mouth and nose, the horrible grunting and scuffling sounds, the heft of the stick in her hands. Impact, over and over and over, against something that had a little more give each time.
Efri scrubs a hand over her mouth and grips the handle of the stick. It takes effort to wrest it out of the thing’s face, caught as it is by the edges of the helmet, and when it’s finally yanked free it’s – actually not as bad as she might have expected. There’s no blood, and the corpse was so desiccated it already didn’t even really look like a person anymore, so it registers less as someone with horrible violence done to it and more as a really gross art piece. It’s not nice. She doesn’t like the twisted, gaping mouth, teeth embedded wrong-ways in its tissue and scattered like coins over the floor. And one of the eyes, which had glowed unearthly blue, is now a dull, rotten black, squished like a plum in its socket.
It's worse the more she looks. She sniffs and turns away.
“This is magic, right?” she asks Kazari, testing the weight of it in her hands, the cool surface of the metal, and they nod. “A good artifact?” she adds, and they nod again, emphatically. Efri sets the stick aside and kneels.
It wasn’t wearing any clothes, really – or if it was, they rotted away. She touches the rusted armour gingerly, tries to avoid brushing her gloves against the shrivelled skin at all. Whoever it was had expensive taste, it seems – there’s jewellery in a shockingly well-preserved beard, pendants around the neck, armbands. Efri asks Kazari if each thing is enchanted. No to the armbands, no to the beard-ring, and then, pressed against the wizened chest where the flesh contours to the ribs, she finds some kind of necklace, sharp-edged and thrumming. Kazari nods to that, and, face scrunched up like an old fruit, Efri reaches around the ancient neck to slip it off.
She tucks it into a belt pocket with the tripwire necklace they found at the weird wall.
“Done,” Sissel says. She folds her paper and slips it into her own pouch. Her footfalls on the echo-y stone floor as she approaches the body for the first time are almost silent. “Did you find anything?”
“Necklace,” Efri replies, watching Sissel’s face pinch at the sight of him. “And – stick.” She scoops up the metal stick and holds it out. “He did spells with it.”
Sissel looks at it warily. “Is he a draugr?” she asks, glancing back down at his mashed-up face.
“I mean,” Efri says, “he’s got to be, right?” She’s certainly never seen a draugr before, but what else could it be?
(Calling it a draugr makes her shiver, the set of her shoulders quaking. She’ll stick to dead man.)
Sissel shudders. She reaches out to grip the handle of the stick, and Efri’s not sure if she’s taking it or just trying to keep herself upright. “I can’t believe that happened,” she says. Her voice sounds, suddenly, fragile. “I can’t believe we’re alive.”
“Me neither,” Efri says. She presses the tip of the stick into the ground so Sissel can lean on it, stands a little unsteadily.
Kazari, with a hushed murmur, telegraphs something. Efri recognises the head incline of understanding – she’s familiar with that word, that idea – and, after a moment, the flickering ear of doubt.
“They’ll have to believe us,” she says with conviction, because she means it. “We’ll show them. They’ll see for themselves.”
Kazari presses their nose to her head.
Efri clasps her hands together. “We’ll go tell someone now,” she declares – though it’s easier said than done; they were lost in the ruins ages before they even found the crumbling wall, the halls, this horrible wonderful chamber. But they’ll get un-lost eventually. They’ll get out eventually. Surely. They have practice enough with walking. “But first – help me find my stick.”
#little girl has a kill count now!! more at 11#for context: I altered stuff leading up to the discovery of the eye#efri and sissel went off to play in the undiscovered halls of this ancient archeological dig site#on the grounds that efri has a great sense of navigation and they'll find their way back to the group no problem.#(efri has a great sense of navigation in the wilderness.)#(introduce her to a series of roads and buildings and she is lost in the sauce.)#their friends split up to look for them after they've been missing from a while (wandering around with great interest and no sense of place#(incredibly lost)#kazari happens upon them right as they've found a necklace at the end of a dead-end passageway that - when dutifully grabbed#for archeological research purposes - ended up triggering the wall to crumble or disappear or otherwise remove itself from the equation#and efri wasn't going to just. LEAVE that opening there.#come ONN kazari that's weird!! we can't just leave it!! what if it closes up and we never ever find it again and there's incredible secrets#that the college never finds! what if we never know what's through there!#we HAVE to know what's through there!#so on they go.#and so ensue the horrors#they pass a lot of dead bodies before the main all but those ones are all immobile#also sissel is the only one to receive the psijic projection warning. which she explains to the others as a ghost telling her secrets#which efri accepts bc this seems like the kind of place that would for sure have ghosts#and kazari goes sure that tracks this place is fucking creepy can we leave now (<- is also curious but HAS to put on a show of reluctance#because clearly no-one else is going to)#(permanent babysitter of kids with the worst self-preservation instincts imaginable)#(she is so strong. living every childcare worker's nightmare)#ANYWAY#:D#normal type stuff#posting because it matches the artwork I'm also posting! look at that thing!!!#fay writes#oc tag#efri
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possamble · 6 months
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Question to a fanfic writer: do you think that, in Marcille’s research ways *And* her love for romance novels… would result in her writing some in-universe fanfics of her own? Like, maybe she hypes herself up on something and get disappointed, or maybe she finds some character decision isn’t as ideal as she thinks it could be? Or it’s as simple as she wants to play around with the characters and see what happens?
I can’t help but imagine a scenario where she’s struggling with some romantic trouble irl and she’s struggling with deciding on what to do, but then the answer slaps itself upside her head when she rediscovers her fanfics and how she LITERALLY made a character or two do the exact romantic decision she needs to do? It would so silly but yet I can’t help but find it so charming. Hell, just the imagery of her writing romance fanfics of her own At All is just… delightful to me hehehe.
you know I've been rotating this in my head since I saw it this morning and. I went through a wild journey of opinions before I realized... Marcille wouldn't think about fanfiction like we think about it. In the modern age, yeah, she'd be a complete tumblrina -- but we're talking about a 17th century-ish fantasy setting.
Writing before the digital age was a physical commitment to investing ink and paper into your thoughts -- and this is even before mass production can make pens and notebooks kind of whatever to buy and use on a regular basis. I'm sure the situation wasn't dire, but I really can't see Marcille, perfect honor student, using her allotted supply of stationery at the academy on super frivolous things.
Fanfiction has been normalized incredibly fast in the past few decades. Think about now normal and popular D&D is nowadays compared to how much people looked down on it 20-30 years ago. Fanfiction was a freakass nerd thing to do until relatively recent history, something that was even considered offensive to the original creators.
Remember, we've already seen Marcille react to adaptations with disgust. She's kind of a hater and an elitist fan. She also considers herself a Reputable Academic. In a setting where a digitized culture hasn't reframed fanfiction as an act of appreciation and creativity, she would absoluuuuuuuutely think that fanfiction was complete loser shit.
If she did write anything about her favourite books... She'd. She'd be one of those assholes who writes huge scathing reviews of Dal Clan translations into Common. She'd be the fantasy equivalent of those Weebs/Japanese elitists on twitter tearing through every single localization choice in anime and JRPGs and being so so annoying about it.
If we're being charitable, we could say she'd be able to appreciate non-faithful translation choices that still do a good job of carrying over the original spirit of what was said. But I think we also have to acknowledge the possibility that, at her worst, she'd really really be like those guys who were malding about the Unicorn Overlord localizations so hard the (correction: Final Fantasy Tactics Creator, not the Unicorn Overlord devs) had to step forward and ratio them. (The silver lining is that she'd never get published in the arts review newspapers/journals that she submits her essays to. those poor editors just have to deal with her being persistent.)
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froggods · 6 days
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still thinking about how pike is a way better love interest than angel (and spike) and should have followed buffy to sunnydale.... mentally rewriting buffy season 1
#xander and willow and giles are still there in the rewrite but angel is Not. i simply do not care#xander is jealous of pike and wiloe thinks hes cool. and a little scary#pike doesnt go to sunnydale high w them but drops by after school on his bike to visit buffy#and he joins her for hunts every night but also ! he makes an effort to support her in wanting to be a normal girl and -#- and showing up for like her cheerleading stuff even tho its not his scene and he doesnt get it or like these people#but he gets that its Important to buff and he really likes her (just like how he showed up at the dance for her in the movie)#anyway i think he dies in the season 1 finale trying to protect buffy from the master#both bc i think thats something that he would do/would happen bc of his feelings and being human#and also because i recognize that a Big Part of the show is that buffy Cant have Good Lasting romantic relationships#but i think pike would have been sooooo good to have around and have as her love interest in the show#someone who knew buffy before sunnydale and already knows that shes the slayer and is enthusiastic about her saving the world from vampires#and actively helps her w that bc hes not scared. and also knew merrick#and also makes an effort to support buffys wants/needs to be normal WHILE ALSO being like hey. i know you dont want to be the slayer and you#and you want to be a normal girl. but youre not and youre the only one who can do this and youre AMAZING so come on. well do it together#buffy the vampire slayer#op
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hella1975 · 1 year
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some people really still treat drugs like it's a fun little thing and im trying SO hard not to get mad about it
#like okay so the set-up is this my flatmate (F) is chronically ill and is on immunosuppressants as well as a fuckton of other stuff#and she started smoking weed bc it's the only thing she's ever found that even touches her pain#ive NEVER had a problem with that ive never had a problem with WEED even IVE done it a couple times#but me and her have VERY different attitudes towards drugs#i came from a hometown where we were between two notoriously drug-high towns/cities and we get caught in a lot of the trading#between those towns so naturally my town just generated a fuck ton of dealers starting when they were like. thirteen years old#i saw it through my entire year i was exposed to class A drugs when i was like. fifteen at parties and shit#it's HUGE in my town i seriously can't express how much it's crippled the youth of my town#like my childhood best mate's brother literally got glassed bc he got into debt with dealers it's just everywhere#so that alone makes me very wary of drugs and like. the novelty of them is just NOT THERE for me at all i actively dislike them#AND THEN there's all the kids in my year that have died bc of substances. there's the phone call when i was AT A PARTY#that my seventeen year old cousin had OD'd. like that just summed it up for me it's so prevelant that i was at a party with drugs#while he was dying. so yeah wholeheartedly i couldn't give a shit about drugs i wont touch anything stronger than weed and even that#im not keen on. my flatmate however? she DOES drugs like she smokes regularly and she likes edibles#but she doesn't come from a druggy place so it's a weird combo of me (doesn't do drugs) knowing more than her (does do drugs)#and bc she's the one who actually does them she pure WONT LISTEN TO ME#and do u know what happened last night? this girl on IMMUNOSUPPRESSANTS got completely fucked#like drank 2/3 of a big bottle of vodka within an hour. and then she fucking went and did ket#and i literally was like 'that would be an awful idea anyway but ket you're REALLY supposed to not mix with alcohol'#like obvs mixing any high class drugs is bad news but ket is renowned for going bad with alcohol#i think it's bc it shuts off the opposite side of the brain that alcohol does? so taking both increases risk of shutting the whole thing of#or smthn. like people forget than an overdose isn't always fatal and i think bc they associate overdosing = dying#they assume the risk is EXTREMELY low especially when ur young and feel untouchable#AND THEN she smoked some weed as well. like i literally sat sober with her and her mate the entire time and again in the kitchen#bc i thought id distracted her from the weed and sitting with her she thought i was just hanging out#like NO BITCH IM MAKING SURE YOU DONT KHOLE BC YOU WERE TOO STUPID TO LISTEN TO ME#and i hardly slept last night bc i convinced myself when i woke up she'd be dead in her room#and we had such a nice day planned today like it's super sunny and me F and another mate are spending the whole day at the park#but she's just cancelled bc she feels too shit and im just. TRYING not to be angry about it#WHY ARE SOME PEOPLE SO DUMB
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juniestar · 3 months
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Oh my god one last thing my ex took me to outside lands and when we tried to watch lana del rey he laid down on the grass and had a “panic attack” (this was after months of him talking about how he didn’t like her) so we went to see foo fighters after a bit and he was FINE
#LANA i know his sister works for you BUT TRUST MY WORD AND GIVE ME A FREE TICKET PLEASE…#MY FIRST TIME SEEING YOU WAS RUINED GIRL… she was so good too like i was saving her songs to spotify that night#im reliving all this because i found out a lot of his exes and ex friends hang out together and two of them invited me so it was me an ex an#d an ex friend just swapping stories and first of all. he said he got cheated on by this girl and she NEVER DID IT (HE would have emotional/#angry outbursts at HER though) (allegedly he’s acknowledged to her that the cheating never happened too) and 2. this is obviously making me#mentally rehash everything again. i feel so bad for his current girlfriend and also for the person i ‘’stole’’ him from though i really hesi#tate to blame myself after hearing about his patterns. first of all he wouldve done this with anyone who was vulnerable around him and secon#d i was the only reason he was at all honest with them. he was fully planning to gaslight this ex and me and his dad had to convince him not#to. they look like theyre happy now and im very happy for them over that. oh my god that man was evil he told me for WEEKS about every time#his then partner had talked shit about me while i made clear that i didnt care and wasnt very interested but he kept going. god i cant belie#ve this was my life a year ago.#the one thing i can say is that i out freaked him because throughout our short relationship i made him so insecure that a week after i told#to never speak to me again he called me asking if he really was ugly.#I CANNOT BELIEVE I HAD TO TEND TO A GROWN MAN WHILE LANA DEL REY WAS RIGHT THERE BECAUSE HE WAS SO OPPOSED TO BEING AROUND HER. LANAAAA#times like these i get so mad i dont know what to do but ultimately remembering that he has not achieved any of his goals because he refuses#to face himself really helps me. god man IVE achieved some of his goals and i wasnt even trying to#a really awful part of all of this was all of the friends who knew him taking his side. because they didnt know him well enough to know what#he was actually like.#i was talking to my ex friend of four years and she was like not to blame you but he was probably really vulnerable from his time with [ex p#rior to me]’’ because he’s been going around alleging that that ex was abusive. and she was implying i took advantage of him. so i had to go#into detail about what an awful awful person he was and the sort of state i was in when this relationship took place. hannah lee you are#not seeing your little jehovah’s witness heaven.#anyways redirecting this energy im very happy with the way my life is and the way i am now. and im grateful for it i would not have ever bee#n able to imagine having the sort of peace and motivation i feel now. life feels like it can and will change for the better and it keeps pro#ving that right all the time#it just hurts sometimes having that as my first experience and not even being able to vocalize what was wrong bc i just didnt know hurts#oh i forgot one of his besties can see my account bc we’re sort of mutuals. i doubt he’s looking he did the whole unfollowing the ex bc she’#s allegedly amoral thing after the breakup but if he is hi isaac#he did on rare occasion show me selfless kindness but ultimately your best friend is a creep. i don’t want to be involved with anyone from#our school but I hope you know this and I hope you’re proud
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chussy · 8 months
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just realized that my dad actually basically attempted to kidnap me the summer before 7th grade and I didn't even interpret it as such until now because it was so in line with his general shittiness that it didn't even stand out
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non-un-topo · 1 year
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Why does instagram keep giving me videos about grandparents like does it want me to fall on the floor sobbing today
#they're all gone! none left now#idk what happened this week but i've been trying SO hard not to think about my nana at all#it’s just a constant don't think about it don’t think about it don’t think about it#i did have a really violent nightmare about her the other night. that fucked me up...#maybe it's because i talked to my mom and she mentioned her for a minute. neither of us know how to talk about it.#i literally can't even think about it i'll start crying.#should visit my partner's nonna and nonno... but i will cry. still we need to see nonno because he's very unwell.#i can't fucking believe i found out my nana died and then immediately went to class.#mentioned it to my professor and the whole class gasped and asked if i was okay or if i needed to leave.#but if i didn't go to class then i would have just been home alone...#crying in front of my favourite prof a few days later was... yikes. but it was okay. she felt like a grandma to all of us#she was sincerely sorry. esp because that class was called 'women and aging'#she spend the entire year telling us to ask the older women in our families their stories#and now i have none left. didn’t get to ask.#i don't know why i didn't call when i wanted to#i can't think about it#glad my mom told me that she feels totally disconnected to family too. bc lately ive felt very alone.#like my nana getting sick and dying brought them together but only for a short while.#feels like we have no extended family and it's fucking me up a lot. im just glad im not the only one
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sugarsugarmp3 · 7 months
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i turn 21 on monday and i just know im not going to enjoy this weekend at all...
#BIG vent in tags#the last two months have been honestly some of the worst of my life i am always always thinking about this rly shitty thing happened#and now i have to go home for my birthday weekend which i know i should be happy about and it is a good thing#but i just really dont want to go and i feel like a bad person for feeling that way#im doing better than someone i know and i need to go home and be there for them#i wanted to be in my apartment and relax with my friends#ive had 4 midterms this week and i am just exhausted with everything#and its not like it being my brithday will make my weekend bc thats literally impossible#and i feel so shitty about feeling this way bc im not the one who needs help right now and my bday shouldnt even be a priority in my family#bc we have bigger problems rn#but i still wish it was better. plus today sucked#i just am always awkward with people and i wish i was better at social stuff and ive felt rly lonely bc i only hve a few good friends#and trying to make friends is so impossible bc it seems like i keep doing the wrong thing and not being able to vibe with people#rn im just thankful for labs bc having constant lab partners are the only social interactions i get in almost all my classes#this girls would sit next to me in genetics and we would talk but i hvent seen them in a few weeks and i dont know their names#and im not great with faces so i cant even go up to them if i see them and i wouldnt even know what to say if i did#i see the same people in my classes but im sure they think im weird bc ive never talked with them but i always accidentally make eye contac#and one girl in 4/5 of my classes i sometimes talk with but i dont even know if she likes me and i acciendetnally made eye contact with her#while waiting for a lecture to start but then made no attemot to talk to her bc i thought itd be awkward and she probably thought i was#ignoring her#its just this week. its been so so shitty i dont know how to change thus
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bhalspawn · 2 years
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if im honest i like king alistair w a warden queen! theyre happy ur honor!!!
#ACTUALLY im taking over the wardens story now. looking for a cure to the calling? whatre u talking abt#theyre supposed to have 30 years or so!!!!! granted alistair has only been a warden for 6 months or so when he says that but#and maybe joining during a blight also speeds up the taint but actually it doesnt ive decided. theyre FINE#anyway. alistair is fine bc of the therein bloodline ig? like how fiona is cured somehow bc of it#and.... dare i say..........#They Have A Child Sir. everything's a okay#ugh but the thing w morrigan. can u imagine wanting a child but knowing its unlikely to happen while one of u has one w a woman they cant#stand and the other still feels incredibly hurt#bc of the fact the morrigan knows the whole time#and i get it!!! morrigan is young and her mother is Flemeth and this is what she's been told to do and she becomes friends w the warden#knowing this so like. i see how torn she must be#she calls her a SISTER while knowing this and i can see it must tear at her but how can you just tell them that#oh it hurts. oh its bitter#i mean the betrayal of howe and then loghain has to make morrigans seem much harsher than it really is#and i dont think of it as really a betrayal from an objective pov but in the situation its already a lot what w the landsmeet and the news#that a warden has to die#i mean its all got to hit hard. there's no way ANYONES comin out of this in a healthy headspace#alistair thinks of his son he will never meet and rhia thinks of a stepson she never wants to meet and UGH.#i think they shouldve handled the whole thing differently. like morrigan should speak to both wardens instead of one#when u speak to just the hof and they have to go to romanced alistair it seems. unfair#ANYWAY!!!! IM NORMAL ABOUT IT#wytxt
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myownprivatcidaho · 2 years
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thoseve yall who were here a year ago might remember that a year ago He was liking tweets like "idk how people can cheat when im in love im obsessed😍" and "the honeymoon stage rlly doesnt die if youre with the right person🥰" and he was liking stuff like that up till recently now shit like this is in his likes something is BROKEN in him
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#i feel bad. i dont even mean it in a conceited way but i cant help but feel like a bit of this is my fault#hes so bright eyed and ambitious that the idea of him losing any of that idealism is nothing short of a goddamned tragedy im sorry#yes this is the guy who lead me on (unintentionally???) and flirted with me for a year despite seeing TWO people during that time#the latter of which became his girlfriend (who i told Everything to ...)#and like. he never apologized he never explained what was going on or why he acted like a fucking simp for a year#but basically we're not talking now and we're on bad terms and angry at each other#(me because. well yall were there for that . hes angry because i ratted his flirty ass out )#god that all stings so bad i havent talked about the details of what happened to anyone......#but yeah i just. even still after all this time i hope he stays bright eyed. the idea that he wouldnt is heartbreaking in and of itself.#that one crush situation lol#idk if theyre still together. it was early novembet i reached out to his gf and laid the whole thing out for her#& she said theyd 'take it from here' (??????) and was uncomfortable with me and him communicating with the knowledge that THAT ALL happened#even while they were together. i told her i could respect that (even though i wanted to ask her who the FUCK she thought she was. anyways)#and then i reached out to him one last time to clarify i wasnt dredging it up for retaliation or to break them up but bc she genuinely#deserved to know. then he sorta said fuck my feelings and then reiterated what his gf said that we shouldnt be talking anymore#its been radio silence since then from bothve them. if they did break up id feel bad (cause how COULDNT i?) but if they didnt.#that means the only factor that changed here was. well. his 'relationship'/chances of a relationship/flirtationship/friendship with me.#i dunno. im not gonna act like i have all the facts and im not gonna act like he hasnt screwed me over#but getting back to my main point. imagine knowing him and watching him lose his idealism. try not being heartbroken over that.
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