#one open ending for the people

[hel-phoenyx]

New Year's Eve, part 25 (and final)

There we go, it's finally the conclusion !

Next post about this will be a masterpost with everything ever post around that. There may be some one-shots related following that whole ordeal, but you can safely assume the main "plot" is over now.

So let's conclude this in a good way~

---

So.

I'm back at work.

Arm doesn't hurt anymore. Think it should, but I spent my vacation high on painkillers.

I'm on therapy. My therapist was a bit startled to see me coming for our... Second ? Third ? Session with an arm in a sling, but didn't comment on that until I did. Felt surprisingly safe.

Haven't got any peep from the family I send my paychecks too, but hey. Have other things to care about.

And now I'm finally back in the middle of my files and taking care of the ones I want to follow, instead of patrolling around the city for the whims of a madman.

a lot of things happened, during that vacation.

For starters, I saw Tyr again. Outside the hospital. Even if he was still a bit cold, he looked happier. Maybe because he was sporting the most phenomenal amount of hickeys I have ever seen on a man, and I still got pictures of Gustav after his wedding night and on his honeymoon on my phone.

Figured out where they came from. Aarni, that was with me, too, since she teased him all evening. I only rolled my eyes and did the occasionnal snarky remarks from aroace to demi, nothing else.

It was good to see him snort at at least half of them.

I haven't told him what Domhildr told me. Keeping that for the next time she pisses me off. People say I've softened, but in truth, I really, really enjoy the fear on her face. Did I, did I not ? Heh.

Tyr would tell me he wants her to tell him about her secrets herself.

And Sigismund wouldn't believe me anyway, would he ? Or he wouldn't care.

No matter. I never waste blackmail material. Maybe she will take me a little more seriously, now that I can say a word to wreck her life.

That's good enough of a revenge.

What else... I've seen my godson, too. Haven't in a long time, he looked happy to see me, as opposed to Kriss. But Kriss only sassed me for two hours so I guess she's warming up to me again. That's good.

Haven't talked to Idalia since that protest. Apparently, she was expecting me to take care of her, in custody. That's what I usually do. I wonder if the others told her I got hurt. I don't know if it's her who threw that brick, or that metal pipe. I don't think I will ask.

And I'm back at work with a bandage on my arm and some work to do.

With an... Unexpected partner.

I go and knock on his (their ?) door. A "come in!" is my only answer, I roll eyes.

"Oh com'on, Sigismund, you don't even get up to greet me ?"

"I'm working, Fenrir."

I still open the door, and there he is, indeed working. His hair is down, a little more styled than usual, and on his neck I sport what look strangely like...

"Oh, dear gods, not you too."

"What ?-"

He says putting instantly a hand to his neck. Yeah, yeah, be self-conscious as much as you like, it will be a change from Tyr.

That won't stop me from laughing at you.

Even if I close the door because if Amandine hears that, I won't ever hear the end of it.

"A hickey ? Really ? Some girl I know couldn't contain herself or what ?"

And there he blushes. Eh eh. It's even funnier than teasing Tyr. Tyr is used to it by now.

"Please, not any further comments."

"Fiiiiiiiiiiiiine. We have work to do anyway. But friendly advice, wear a turtleneck next time~"

He pouts. Someone didn't appreciate the friendly advice ?

"For a sex-averse aroace, you look strangely invested in this."

Yeah, I've made my real coming-out to a few of the cops. Those I could trust. Couldn't bear to be called gay any moment longer. It's not better, but at least those who understand understand, and as for the others... I would be called gay anyway, so.

"I just find it funny. And I have very sexual friends. Including your metamour. I think you know your girlfriend enough to understand what I've witnessed..."

Blushing again ! Damn, I haven't had this fun in ages.

"Alright, back to work. We have people to interrogate, today. You coming ?"

".... What ?"

Seriously ? He forgot ?

"The sect file, pretty boy. You're paired up with me for this investigation. or I'm paired up with you. Whatever."

"I didn't know...."

"Or you were so cloud-headed that you forgot. I did told you. Fine by me. I'll check if our witness has come, if not, I'll wait for you in my office anyway to pool our clues. See ya !"

I turn around, hand on the door. Can't open it, tho. I'm stopped by a hesitant voice, behind me.

"... Hey, Fenrir."

"What ? Wanna apologize for forgetting about our splendid partnership ?"

Silence.

"... I wanted to thank you, for. Well. A lot of things."

That.

Was unexpected.

I don't know how to react. And it may be a little awkward how I'm shifting my weight from foot to foot. But hey.

I guess I'm smiling.

"Bah. Don't mention it."

I think it's the first time in a long time

Someone thanked me for something.

I hear a laugh, behind me.

"Also, if you can drop the "pretty boy" nickname, I would appreciate it."

That's already more of my alley.

"So what should I call you ? Pretty girl ?"

He coughs, but I don't let him any second to retort. He'll tell me whatever if he wants to, anyway.

"Okay, if you have time for chatting, you have time to come with me. Com'on, let's go see if our witness has arrived."

"... Alright, fine. Who is it ?"

My smile gets wider.

"Iekaterina Le Patriote."

[thebarrows]

put them in a room together and no one will come out alive (●'◡'●)

[anewp0tat0]

Black Butler Amino, Black Arts Magazine - Holiday Party

it doesn't quite look like a holiday party from here, but what I imagined as a humble little piece is~~ Ciel and Lizzy sneak away from the big bustling midford Christmas party and raid the kitchen desserts, like they did when they were kids(it was Lizzy's idea, Ciel clearly hasn't been himself since he returned, and she wanted to bring him back).

[jakeperalta]

I know it's an anthology track not the main album but I think how did it end would be such a good opening track. like "we hereby conduct this postmortem" as the opening line... "come one, come all, it's happening again, the empathetic hunger descends" as a call-out from the get go of "I know you might be listening for gossip fodder and I hate that but here it is anyway to make sense of as you will".... going from "I still don't know, how did it end?" into the rest of the album which delves into the how and why and everything that followed....... it just makes sense

[andy-clutterbuck]

The Ones Who Live | 1x01 - Years

[danny-chase]

Things every Dick vs Tim Red Robin fallout gets wrong no matter who's side they take

1. They still loved each other

2. Dick went after Tim after Tim stormed out of the cave. He didn't just leave it at that

3. They didn't have 0 contact, Dick called Tim back to Gotham for Blackest Night. They weren't talking because Tim didn't want to talk

4. Alfred gave Damian the Robin costume initially without Dick's knowledge, and his first mission as Robin was saving Tim's life after he got beat up by Jason (again). He apparently left this mess for Dick to clean up, and I don't think anyone ever told Tim that's how Damian ended up with the mantle

5. Dick helped in the process of bringing Bruce back to the current time, Tim presented his evidence when he got home, and Dick checked it out and solved the time puzzle in Bruce's ancestral home. Tim didn't magically pop back with Bruce after doing everything by himself, it was a coordinated effort that involved the Justice League

6. Tim and Damian started to get along. Not during Red Robin, but during Batman: Gates of Gotham

7. They were both grieving, Dick just masked it better

8. Tim didn't feel like he could ask for help because he knew sounded insane (and was feeling/acting insane). He was doing one of those 'i push away everyone i love because i hate myself' things, which he also did to Steph (who he fired as Spoiler under god knows who's authority) and Cassie. Dick wasn't special in this treatment, and he can't force Tim to stay, so he trusted Tim's judgement and let him leave. It is a "Tim's a sad boy" comic, but he's also very much a part of causing his own problems

9. They still loved each other. They never stopped loving each other. They never hated one another. Both in this era asked the other "Do you trust me?" And the other replied "Yes" and did the thing they asked. *shakes everyone who's ever written about this* that's the whole point, it's about miscommunication, and being in a bad place, but having what you need where you started waiting for you the whole time

[canisalbus]

Machete and Vasco are so pomegranate-and-the-hand-that-slices coded. To me.

Pomegranates are seen as messy, bloody, inconvenient fruits. You slice or tear or bite and in return for your effort you come away underwhelmed, disgusted, and stained too deep to wash. The consumption of a pomegranate is a violent act of defilement, for both the fruit and the eater.

But that is because most do not understand how to open a pomegranate. They have little patience for the precise carving. They see no point in coreing the fruit gently, no reason to be reverent as they pull the quarters apart. When done correctly, opening a pomegranate leaves little mess. Your fingers will still stain, your knife will still slick, but there will be no pool of crimson drowning both you and the fruit.

The seeds are only sweet to those who understand the merit of a light hand and intricate slicing. Why put in so much effort for a food so bitter and clearly armored against consumption? Surely it must not yearn to be eaten.

(^insane about silly catholic dogs)

.

[vaguely-concerned]

just had the thought 'in the end the most important thing varric taught rook was how to make a home for, with, and in other people' and then I had to go lie down on the floor and clutch at my head in unceasing agony for a few hours, as you may well imagine. hawke and the kirkwall crew........ in the end you kind of saved the world a bit in the most characteristically indirect and chaotic of ways. not by anything in particular that you did or achieved or accomplished (lmao imagine!), but just by -- having existed, and by the love that was always there, despite it all, in all its imperfections, even when no one was saved by it in the end. you're not here right now and you're not quite haunting the narrative but I hear your voices bickering and arguing and laughing from the other room. (and so, I think, does varric. all the time.)

'did you think you mattered, hawke? did you think anything you ever did mattered?' yeah actually, varric says with da2 and keeps saying through the series. you were here. and I loved you. and as it turns out that mattered more than almost anything in the world, no matter how long it lasted or how fucked up it was at the time or what else happens, because varric manages to pass that feeling, that intangible... home, that echo of you all as you were together, that love, hopefully the best parts of it, on to someone else for them to bring with them on their journey, with their family. and maybe the world will be kinder this time. you never know. merrill's line of 'Everything affects everything. We were born, a bunch of things happened, and now we're in a mess with our friends.' varric's greatest fear of becoming his parents. even through the wreck and the ruin of the world, ghosts upon ghosts upon ghosts of love -- malcolm hawke, who we never even see, but his life touched hawke's and hawke's touched varric's and varric's touched rook's and rook is passing it on to the family they're creating. the unbroken legacy of love shines through in ways that are stronger and stranger than any magic. help

[the-woman-upstairs]

Really beholden to the idea that at least part of why Louis was fascinated with Daniel initially was because of his project of interviewing citizens of San Francisco, documenting their stories and voices, in much the same way Louis was trying to do with his photography in Paris.

[lovesickeros]

☆ de fontaine

{☆} characters furina {☆} notes cult au, imposter au, drabble, gender neutral reader {☆} warnings angst, suicidal thoughts, hurt / no comfort {☆} word count 1.4k

This wasn't fair. This wasn't fair. This wasn't fair!

She thought, for one moment, she could put the mask down and breathe – for one moment of daydreaming, she thought she could just be Furina. She thought she would finally get to live the live she should've had in the first place, the life she threw away to play God to an audience who saw her as nothing but a circus animal, dancing to their whims. Furina just wanted to be selfish for one brief and fleeting moment..and it was gone before she could even grasp it in her hand. A comet soaring past far out of her reach.

She can barely keep her hands from violently shaking as she looks down at them – broken and bloody and more a corpse then a person – and she feels so numb she can't even feel the rain pelting against her back. None of this is fair, she wants to scream, why is it always me? But her voice is silent beneath the torrent of rain. She wonders if the ocean would take her if she sank into it's depths – just for a moment, she wonders how it would feel to finally be able to sleep at ease.

Furina is tired.

But Furina is nothing if not useful, isn't she?

So she forces her feet to move, dragging against the stone beneath her heels, and drags their bloodied body into the nearest empty building, letting the rain do the work of washing away the smeared blood following her path. The smell makes her feel sick, the feeling of it sticking to her hands and gloves makes her lightheaded, but she persists. Because Furina is useful, because Furina won't let them die out in the rain, because Furina won't stand by and just let them rot on the streets like some..pest.

Furina wants to go home. She wants to sleep and she isn't she if she wants to wake up, this time. But she keeps going anyway.

Because it's all she's ever done, and the habit sticks.

An Archon she may not be, not anymore, but the expectations of five hundred years still linger like eyes on the inside of her skull. They watch her, pry and prod at her thoughts, mocking laughter and judging eyes following her as she forces herself to dance to the song they weave with glee. Furina never stepped off that stage – she's still there, she thinks, watching the crowd stare at her in disdain as the curtain call looms above her like a guillotine. She still hears Neuvillette deliver her damnation and salvation with a trembling voice, still feels her hair stand on end when electro crackled like the crack of the whip, Clorinde's blade aimed at her like a loaded gun.

She's trapped on that stage and she never left, not really.

She hates it. She thinks she hates them, but it's not their fault. They didn't ask for this, didn't ask for everyone to turn against them, didn't ask for her to save them. Neither did she..yet here they are, she thinks.

She tries to tell herself she's in control this time, though. She can stop performing her part in this horrible, bloody play any time she wants. It makes her feel better, just for a little while, if she convinces herself she's still Furina, painfully human.

And Furina has always been good at lying.

It's the believing that's the hard part.

There isn't time for her to wallow in her own self pity, though. They're still bleeding out onto the dusty, creaky floorboards of some random, broken down house and she's just standing there as the blood stains the wood. She can fix it – she's good at fixing things. She's done nothing but fix things – try to, anyway – for five hundred years. She can fix a little wound, how hard could it be? Her hands are clenched so tight they ache as she kneels down, wincing at the creak of the floorboards beneath her heels– she hesitates just long enough to wonder if she's making a mistake before she peels away just enough of the outer layer of their clothes to see the deep, bloody gash across their chest. She tries not to think about it – it's deep, too deep, and she feels dizzy just looking at it, but she's handled worse, right?

Furina can fix it. That's what she's good at.

She doesn't feel so confident when she tries to wrack her brain for..something. Five hundred years, and a little wound stumps her? No, she had to have learned something, right? She's decidedly not trying to buy time because she's panicking, parsing through hundreds of years of memories like flipping through a book. Furina isn't made for this, not really – she's running on nothing but adrenaline and she's really not sure what she's doing, but she's trying. And just like before, it won't be enough, will it?

She'll fall short again – she'll be too late to fix it before she's alone again.

Furina was an Archon..used to be. What use would she have for that sort of knowledge? Which makes her predicament all the more harrowing and bleak. What was she supposed to do?

Furina had heard it first hand, that vitriol in Neuvillette's voice. She isn't sure she's ever heard him that..angry before. She's not sure he would listen to her if she tried, either. And that scares her more then anything. All of Fontaine was up in arms about this..imposter, yet here she was, staring down at them bleeding out in front of her, and she was trying to save them.

Why? Why is she throwing away her only chance at normalcy for a fraud? Why didn't she just turn them in?

They were dying – that should've been a good thing, shouldn't it? So why didn't it feel like it?

"Why you?" Her voice breaks as she speaks in harsh tones, grabbing the front of their shirt in trembling, bloodied hands. "Why now?" She wants to scream, to demand answers they can't give, to claw back the reprieve she was promised after five hundred years of agony..and all she can do is sob into their chest, pleading for an answer that will not come. "Why me?"

Silence is their answer, and it hangs heavy on her trembling shoulders as she cries.

Of course they don't, she thinks bitterly, no one has ever answered her pleas spoken in hushed sobs. Not her other self and certainly not them.

Furina has always been alone. Furina will always be alone.

Because Furina never left that stage, never left that moment when she looked at herself in the mirror and took up a mantle too heavy for her to bear. She always finds her way back eventually. There's no one on the other side anymore – she stands alone on a stage, waiting for an inevitable end she isn't sure will come.

"Please," She pleads through tears and choked sobs, clinging to them like they are all that keeps her from sinking. "Please don't leave me, too." The words burn on her tongue – how pathetic is she that she craves companionship from the bloodied body of the imposter? Perhaps she's truly lost her mind after all these years..perhaps she's finally gone mad. She must have.

But their presence is like the first feeling of gentle warmth upon her skin as the sun crests the horizon, like the gentle lap of tides along her heels, the sway of branches and leaves as the wind blows through them like an instrument all it's own. They are the soothing sound of rain against the window as she watches the dreary skies in fond longing, the first bloom of spring as color blooms upon the landscape like paint had been spilled across the hills and valleys.

They are like the faint spark she carefully nurtures and stokes, so fragile even the smallest wind could blow it out like a candle. She cradles it within her palms, pleads with whoever will listen – prays that someone finally listens, because if not for her, then for them.

She's failed to protect too much already, let too many people with so much trust in her fall between the cracks of her fingers like grains of sand. She won't let them go – she can't.

If nothing else, if she couldn't be saved when she begged for salvation from that five hundred year long agony, even if she never got that chance..

Furina will make sure they do.

[icewindandboringhorror]

Pages from trying to keep a little sketchbook-scrapbook type thing going for two weeks lol. I gave myself specific rules in hopes they might all end up more cohesive/consistent seeming, but alas, scribbly chaos reigns, it seems

[thelilylav]

We only see each other at funerals

(On Jason, Thalia, Nico, Bianca, and their parallels/connections)

The Titan's Curse (Rick Riordan), @/anxiousmaya_, Right Now (Gracie Abrams), The Battle of the Labyrinth (Rick Riordan), Joan of Arc (Mary Gordon), The Lost Hero (Rick Riordan), Episodes Toward and Elegy for Halley's Comet (Lindsey Drager), Jason Grace (Riordan Wiki), The Gods Show Up (Michael Kinnucan), The House of Hades (Rick Riordan), What the Living Do (Marie Howe), The House of Hades (Rick Riordan), Planet of Love (Richard Siken), The Blood of Olympus (Rick Riordan), Tangerine (Nolune), The Blood of Olympus (Rick Riordan), The Blood of Olympus (Rick Riordan), I Bet On Losing Dogs (Mitski), The Burning Maze (Rick Riordan), @/abhorarchive (Twitter), The Burning Maze (Rick Riordan), Seventeen (MARINA), The Burning Maze (Rick Riordan), @/rollercoasterwords, The Tyrant's Tomb (Rick Riordan), @/the-overanalyst, Where Things Come Back (John Corey Whaley), Grit (Silas Denver Martin), Softcore (The Neighbourhood), The Tower of Nero (Rick Riordan), Frost (Mitski), @/moonbends, I'm Your Man (Mitski), Sun Bleached Flies (Ethel Cain), The Tower of Nero (Rick Riordan), Three (Sleeping At Last), My Art

[dykedvonte]

I was rewatching mouthwashing, and I ended up thinking of the different reactions that Curly and Jimmy had in doing their tasks. How during the scene of Anya evaluating Jimmy and showing dread towards the idea of doing his evaluation, Curly was the one that offered to take it off her hands. He had no issue with adding more to his plate, because he knew - or well, thought, he knew that Jimmy wasn't going to "bullshit" with him since he's known him for a long time. When Anya hands Curly a note from Swansea, Curly goes to check out what the issue is and he takes care of it without a complaint, the only "complaint" he has is how this incident could have damaged the pods. Which is reasonable, those pods are their only way to be saved if anything tragic happens on the ship. However, in comparison to Jimmy being asked to do things, he's passive-aggressive about it. When Anya asks Jimmy if he could help her out with Curly's painkillers, he tells her that people should be worth their titles, specifically using her title as a nurse when she asked him for help and then when she says forget it, since he made her feel insecure, he still goes "Oh no, I'LL take care of it" as if he was doing a chore, a favor for her. Then, there's that part where he blows up at her for things that she didn't even ask him to do - more so the others asked him about it, like the code scanner, him deciding he needed to find the axe for the foam, and then, there's the medicine part (which when she does ask, and she reconsiders - going to do it herself, he takes that away from her). Jimmy complains about the tasks he has to do and he treats it like a big issue, a "woes me" that he has to do this and that - wanting the praise of the capital without actually doing any work. While Curly doesn't complain about it, in fact, he even mentions that he's aware of how well he is doing at his job as a Captain during that cockpit scene with him and Jimmy. If Jimmy only had to do a small amount of tasks to get irritated and annoyed at being captain, while Curly didn't which I feel like encapsulates their personalities. Curly understands what he's doing is a job, it's a responsibility, why would he complain at any point for doing what he's suppose too? Why would he be upset at people asking him to do tasks? While Jimmy on the other hand, isn't used to it at all and it's different to what he's had before and he's realizing that he doesn't actually like doing the work he has too. I just wanted to ramble about it even if it seemed kind of obvious xd

It’s obvious but it is a thing people miss or understate when trying to find parallels in Curly’s and Jimmy’s relationship/personalities.

Like the way people portray it as neither taking responsibility when it is almost split down the middle of Curly taking responsibilities and faults that shouldn’t be his and making himself unequipped to handle the ones that are while Jimmy refuses to handle the responsibilities he has because he wasn’t expecting the work that comes with them.

Not a lot to say but people forget that another thing the game comments on is prioritization of issues and responsibilities and how the guys fail at it in one way or another in the situation.

[nagasleeps]

a little training break

[eriochromatic]

Maybe the poison drips through

Succession 4x10 “With Open Eyes”

[quietwingsinthesky]

it’s that no one ever believed him that gets to me the most. this is a society of telepaths. and yet when the doctor finds out that the drums are real, he’s surprised. the master is surprised, elated, by the confirmation that he’s hearing something that’s really there, that this thing that’s been following him and hurting him for so long is real.

after a certain point, given that the master is Really Fucking Good at mind control and such, you have to imagine that no one could just pick up on the noise in his head with a little general telepathy. he had to choose to let the doctor in to share it. and. and okay. we need to put aside him striving to be The Best At Controlling People’s Minds in the context of him having his mind violated as a child because if i think about these two things in relation to each other i’ll throw up.

but there has to have been a point before he was so accomplished that he couldn’t have defended his own mind as easily. that he couldn’t keep someone, anyone, from delving into his head and hearing the drums. which means i must conclude, because we find out who put them in his head at all and it’s the most powerful guy on gallifrey, that when he was younger, the people around him did know. they could hear the drums. they could figure out what was done to him. but they did nothing, they said nothing, they told him he was hearing things. because if the lord president wanted to use a child for his own ends, who was going to stand up and stop him? easier to sweep it under the rug. and the master lived with that for so long that finally having just one other person hear the drums was a shock to him.