#only some of them are scary

[idontknowreallywhy]

Resurface 35 - Reappraise

Story to date in order (Tumblr / AO3)

Previous chapter

ART!VIRGIL KLAXON

Perhaps if you hadn’t read them before these two chapters (here and here) may make more sense of what Virgil has been drawing.

And if you missed the wee!Earth&Sky flying machine adventure, that is contained in this one and this one.

But now, onwards! Virgy-boy still has some demons to exorcise and needs Scooter to help him. Points to whoever spots the cameo from an old friend 😈

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The view from Virgil’s balcony was very similar, but subtly different. They weren’t adjacent - both John’s often-empty and Dad’s always-empty room lay between - and the shift of a few metres to the left meant the light reflected off different facets of the damp rocks of Mateo and the shadows changed shape. The sea met the shore at a marginally different angle, the light refracting through the shallows and hitting the greener end of blue. Two of the trees visible from Scott’s were hidden by the curve of Roundhouse Peak.

Scott hadn’t noticed any of this before Virgil pointed it out. What he did know was that on his own the breeze was stronger and there was fractionally more sky. On a hot day he’d always advocate for the cooler, more exposed position. Where he could see as far as possible. Where he could breathe.

But on a cooler evening, there was something comforting about how the sun’s residual heat radiated from the stone and bathed Virgil’s preferred haven in a warm glow.

Virgil had added to the warmth that evening by opening a bottle of Scott’s favourite scotch which he’d clearly stashed away at some point. Had it been one of the others who produced such a thing, Scott would be waiting for ‘The Favour’ or ‘The Difficult Question’. In Gordon’s case, quite frequently ‘The Confession’.

Virgil, however, often just did it to be nice. And Virgil knew that, unlike Dad and himself, Scott preferred his liquor without rocks. He took another sip and rested his head back with a contented sigh, allowing the liquid to rest on his tongue.

“Scott?”

“Mmmmhmm?” The heat spread through his sinuses as he breathed over it.

“Can I ask you a favour?”

Oh!

The whiskey hit the back of Scott’s throat and his eyeballs burned. Virgil seemed hesitant which mean this was going to be important! He coughed and croaked out a hurried confirmation:

“Always.”

Virgil, staring out to sea, appeared not to notice his brother’s nasal passages vaporising which, again, indicated something was Up. Scott scrubbed at his eyes with a sleeve and with an iron will, forced himself to get a grip of his respiratory system. He was about to say something else encouraging when Virgil suddenly spun to face him and in a voice of utmost seriousness stated:

“It’s a weird one.”

Scott raised an amused eyebrow.

“I can do weird.”

“Would you wear it again?”

The other eyebrow joined it with vigour.

“Wear what? If you’re asking about Halloween and that cursed Superman costume, Alan beat you to it and it’s a hard no. I might be persuaded to consider Batman but only if you’re Robin.”

Virgil snorted and swirled the ice in his glass. The not ungenerous measure he’d poured himself having already disappeared.

“As you very well know I don’t do tights. Not after the Christmas debacle.”

“I think you made a lovely elf.”

“You’re deranged.”

“Yeah but you love me.”

Virgil threw an ice cube at his head before conceding: “I do. Yes.”

He then frowned.

“Scooter, are you CRYING?”

“Nope. No no I’m just… enjoying this with ALL my senses.” He raised the glass and winked.

Virgil narrowed his eyes as if invisibly scanning his brother, then with a quirk of an eyebrow seemed to conclude there was no sudden emotional devastation and released him from scrutiny. He looked back out towards Mateo and tracked the petrels swooping to and from their rocky nests.

Scott followed his line of sight and started a little. There was a small cave at the base of Mateo which was invisible from Scott’s balcony. How had he never seen that before? He was about to point it out when he realised he’d distracted Virgil from his question.

“If you didn’t mean Halloween… what are you asking?”

“Your uniform. The, uh, air force one.”

“Hell no. I’m planning to burn it. That’s not part of my life anymore.”

“That doesn’t sound very environmentally friendly…”

“Alright bury it then. Shred it and bury it. No… shred it, dissolve it in acid then bury it.”

Virgil blinked. “Have you been watching murder mystery reruns again?”

“They’re relaxing.”

“Riiiiiiight.” Despite the feigned disbelief, Scott knew that Virgil had been the one to add three hundred and thirty-six hours worth of ‘A Century of Detective Classics’ to the family server and he knew Virgil knew that he knew that he’d done it as a cunning way to tempt Scott into some downtime. Devious little brothers… who… needed reassuring, immediately.

“It hurt you so it’s got to die. Don’t worry. I don’t even want to touch it again. If Grandma hadn’t spirited it away somewhere to clean it would be gone already.”

“Oh.” Perhaps imbibing scotch straight into his brain had slowed him down, but Virgil didn’t seem as reassured as Scott had intended.

“Don’t you need it for Ash’s dinner? You should go to that, it’s important.”

“I’ll work something out.”

“Oh, ok.” Virgil went quiet again and Scott realised he’d given the wrong answer somehow but wasn’t quite sure how to change it.

“What’s on your mind, Virgil?”

He sighed and cracked his knuckles one by one, making Scott cringe.

“Would you… um, would you wear it once more if… I… for me to… uh…”

“For you?! But… I don’t understand! It made you so unwell? I thought you hated it?”

“I did. I do. But… I don’t want to carry that fear anymore, I can’t be scared of CLOTHES. It’s… I just can’t. It’s ridiculous. And, well… and I was thinking perhaps if I was prepared… if it wasn’t a surprise… it might… I might not react quite so badly? My last memory of it wouldn’t be… uh… so heavy? And maybe I could finish my book.”

“Your book?” Now Scott was really bewildered.

Virgil put down his glass and disappeared into his suite, returning swiftly with one of the large black ring-bound pads of thick art paper the like of which Scott had seen many times. This one was more battered than most and his little brother clutched it to his chest for a moment then cleared his throat awkwardly as he sat down.

“I found it when I was hunting for a sketch I wanted to work up for the exhibition next month. Some of them aren’t… very nice. I was going to just throw it away but Gordon thinks I should complete it… finish the story.”

“Gordon’s seen it?” Scott wasn’t actually jealous, he was relieved to discover - the little snakelike green monster’s appearance seemed to have been limited to the ‘other’ version of himself. But he found himself kind of intrigued that their fish brother was apparently giving art advice these days.

Virgil rolled his eyes and growled quietly. “You know what he’s like… I foolishly tried to hide it when he burst into the room and of course he noticed and he wouldn’t let up until I showed him.”

“May I see?”

Virgil chewed his lip and nodded. Scott shuffled his lounger closer such that they were shoulder to shoulder and felt his jaw drop as Virgil opened to the first page and he saw a vivid recreation in pastel of his toddler self proudly holding a tiny baby Virgil, Mom and Dad hovering in the background. The baby’s fingers were wrapped tightly around his thumb and Virgil had sketched several enlarged views of their chubby hands in pencil along the bottom.

He turned the pages slowly and Scott saw several scenes he definitely recognised from childhood photographs and some he thought must have come from Virgil’s memory. They paddled in a watercolour sea together, rode their bikes in oils, Scott dangled upside down from a charcoal tree with chalky Virgil underneath, arms stretched upwards. There was a cartoon school bus with a dimpled stickman waving from the window.

He smiled as he recognised the two of them with the flying machine on the roof, although he remembered it as much sturdier than the painting suggested. The faded but detailed cross-section taped in to the next double page disabused him of that impression. This one was covered in his own scrawly handwriting. Scott chuckled and raised a hand to the scar on his jaw.

“Oh DEAR, I’d thought it was a much better design than that!”

“Hmmmm.” Virgil rumbled “The basic concept was sound but the materials and our duct tape-biased construction methods left something to be desired and yeah… your “math” was a touch… shaky…”

Virgil smiled and turned over to another cross-section, only this time of a much more elegant design which was surrounded by small sketches of joints and diagrams showing balanced forces, each with the appropriate calculations painstakingly recorded in Virgil’s neat handwriting.

Scott gasped as he realised that this… this could work. Who was he kidding - it was Virgil’s design - of course it would work.

“You fixed it!”

“I did. I felt… bad that we never tried again and you didn’t get your moment.”

“My moment?! Virgil! I nearly killed us both!”

“You were only eleven.”

“Even so…” Scott tried very hard not to think of all the occasions since then when he hadn’t had ‘being only eleven’ as an excuse but the more he tried the more of them bubbled up in his memory like some kind of noxious gas polluting his only fresh water source. No. They were past this now… it was better. Things were changing. He was changing.

“I guess I had this idea that I could build it and if… if you ever came back…” he shook his head “it was just a silly…”

“No.” Scott interrupted, grabbing his arm and pressing his forehead into the side of Virgil’s head. “Not silly. Thoughtful. Ingenious. Seeing the potential in an idea and making it work? Very… YOU.”

Virgil gave a small smile and turned back to the book. Scott felt himself blush at page after page of sketches, all of himself - as a wide eyed child, a cocky teenager winking, a laughing adult flipping pancakes… even a few where he had apparently sprouted falcon wings, one where Virgil had them too.

Scott couldn’t imagine how many hours these must have taken to create

“When did you do all this?”

As soon as the words had left his mouth he knew it was a stupid question. Virgil shrugged and turned the page.

“When you were gone.”

Scott put his arm around Virgil’s shoulders and squeezed as he turned again, seemingly keen not to linger on any one image.

A blazing sun burned out of the page, the wall of colour marred only by a silhouette of the falcon-winged man, clearly falling, curled in on himself as the wings trailed limply behind, the dark shapes of lost feathers becoming larger and more detailed towards the top. No prizes for spotting the reference there. The real sun, heading swiftly towards the horizon seemed to lose most of its heat and a modern day Icarus-but-for-Many-Miraculous-Escapes wondered yet again how he could have been so blind.

If that one gave him a chill, the next made him shiver, the warmth from the whiskey had now entirely dissipated - a faint pencil outline Scott holding a heavily shadowed Virgil in his arms. Then… there was that same Air Force Grad photo, reproduced in a dozen different styles. The last one almost photo-realistic but crossed through in heavy red pen.

Virgil tried to skip several pages but Scott gently took his hand and turned back. He recognised the image of the crashing jet, over and over… pencil drawn, painted, scratched with a blade into a thick black layer of wax crayon. There followed a page solely of fire. Skeletal outlines of fighter jets. Storms. Crowds of agonised faces. An incredibly detailed map of Bereznik decorated with vicious-looking black insects.

The last few pages shocked Scott the most - all the pictures were drawn on scraps of paper, and then glued in. The largest was a drawing in black ballpoint pen of an almost unrecognisable bearded stranger in a hospital bed, covered in bandages and tubes. There were smaller pencil studies of bruised hands, a foot, an ear, eyebrows over sunken eye sockets, a nearly skeletal chin with a scar… his scar. Scott swallowed hard - he’d looked that bad?

One smaller image stood out as it had clearly been screwed into a ball before being flattened out to stick on to the page. Scott’s younger self winked and laughed up at him from behind the creases, one arm wrapped around a huge box of popcorn, the other hand reaching out of the page towards him. Virgil had clearly got hold of a blue ballpoint pen for this one and had skilfully used it to produce a rainbow’s worth of blue shades. The picture somehow gleamed at him and Scott felt the green serpent stir in his gut. He bit the side of his tongue and motioned for Virgil to turn over to the next.

The very last page contained only the sky in vivid shades of blue with light wisps of cloud: Virgil’s starting place.

Scott swallowed hard as he realised Gordon hadn’t been giving art advice at all.

“I put it away when dad brought you home.”

“It’s… Wow…”

“It was an outlet.”

“I’m sorry.”

“It wasn’t your fault, Scotty.”

“Not all of it. Some things though.”

He pulled his brother close again and planted a kiss in his hair.

“So how do you want to finish it?”

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Next chapter

[dunmeshistash]

There's too many monsters to pick the favorite but I think there's only a few spooky(?) ones. So I wanna know

*doesn't need to be scary looking just which one makes you scared, if none of them makes you scared which one would be a good scary movie monster?

[ithinkdogshouldvote]

Rouge-like tendencies, courtesy of grandpa

[emry-stars-art]

Okay listen. When I decided to give squid Jean (squean) bite marks/scars last year I was just making it make sense that he lived with a pod of orcas who thought it was super fun to scare him and threaten him, I didn’t know tsc would come out and make that detail somehow 100x worse

Someone get this kid to Whalemack and Abby stat :( thank you Renee

Find the mer aus masterpost here

[dykedvonte]

I think it’s so ironic that the Pony Express escapes a lot if not all blame in discussion. I can’t even say I am excused from it but it’s just how hard people circle back to the characters alone without considering the environment they were made to be in.

Why would they design a ship where only two of the rooms lock? Not the bathroom? Not the sleeping quarters? We assume that all the companies in the universe are this shallow and careless to their workers but we explicitly know the Pony Express in extra vile. They are fed processed slop pack they can’t even really cook and the ration of those pack is meager at best. They hired and made people with a plethora of conflicting demeanors and beliefs work together on a mission where cohesion is important if not an outright necessity and punish them for not being happy about it. There’s no social protocols, not chain of command other than Captain’s word/choice and the only way to enforce that is with a literal firearm. They don’t allow them to celebrate freely and even took away leisure activities that would make them less stir crazy. They are only allowed a few hours of sleep despite their being no other real responsibilities or work on the ship, no matter the position or its importance. With any crew, with any level of synergy, this was a powder keg waiting for a spark.

I’m not saying characters that made mistakes didn’t make huge ones, but I think part of the horror is that at least for some (this is targeting Jimathan) those mistakes are partly made by a force of the hand. There’s a running theme of lack of choice and being forced into something and the very nature of how The Pony Express expected them to function plays a big part.

[libertyeveningsun]

I only make textposts for Willow why am I suddenly making textposts for OFMD?

[theflowerofthecommonwealth]

Hancock: “The Halloween scares this year have been fun and all, but let’s not forget that the scariest thing on earth is when Dad calls your full name. If he ever does that- then know you best say your prayers and get on your knees to beg for forgiveness.”

Nick: “Mr John Hancock! Why in Sam Hill is the kitchen covered in smoke???”

Hancock: (Puts his hands in his pockets) “Chem lab gone wrong… sorry Papa Nick.”

Nick: (Jabs his finger to the person next to the ghoul) “Mr Deacon John Doe, you better not have been sneaking around last night spying on the old folks!”

Deacon: (Holds up his hands in surrender) “Hey- in my own defense, you never know who could be a big fat faker in disguise!”

Nick: “And Miss Piper Wright, how many times do I hafta tell you that posing as a Gunner with a temporary tattoo on your forehead is not a safe or even reliable way of getting the latest scoop?”

Piper: (Rubs her hands together) “Eeeeuuuuuhh… I was hoping that you would over look that…”

Jasmine: (Watching this all play out from the sidelines)

Nick: “Can’t hide from a Detective, Pipes. Especially one that cares dearly about you.”

Piper: “Aaaw… and sorry, Nicky.”

Nick: (Points to Cait next) “And you, Miss Cait.”

Cait: (Snaps her bubble gum in her mouth) “Hm?”

Nick: “I have a lot to say to you- but we’d be here all day. However, don’t think that I’ll forget this!”

Cait: (Actually shudders for once at his tone) “Okay, you rusted bucket of bolts that strangely enough I give a shit about.”

Jasmine: (Tilts her head slightly at all the drama)

Nick: (Now turns to his daughter) “Now Miss Rosalinda-Marie-Esperanza-Gloria-Pacita-Estrella-Brookes-Romero-Valentine!”

Jasmine: (Drops her hands to her side with wide eyes at her full legal name)

Hancock: “Dang baby sister- that’s quite a mouthful.”

Deacon: (Raises a brow and whistles) “Is that your name or your address?”

Jasmine: “That’s my real and full name… My family talked my mother into it… She had a big message she wanted to put in my name…”

Cait: “Most people don’t even HAVE a last name to begin with. Like myself.”

Jasmine: “I know… I know- and I have THREE last names because of Nick’s that added to my other two.”

Deacon: “Wait- so why do we call you Jasmine?”

Jasmine: “Because people used to tease me with a song, saying that one day a boy will sing it to me in order to woo me.” (Starts dancing adorably as she sings) “Rosalinda, divina mujer hermosa. Que perfumas como aroma de jazmín.”

Nick: (Crosses his arms and taps his foot) “Don’t think that you’ll get away with this just by being cute.”

Jasmine: (Puts on puppy eyes) “But Daddy, am I cute???” 🥺🥺🥺🥺

Nick: (Heavy sigh) “Very cute indeed- but also you’re a very naughty troublemaker. What the hell were you thinking when you snuck away to take on a Super Mutant camp on your own?”

Jasmine: (Looks up in thought) “I was thinking… That I would give them all a scare of the lifetime for Halloween by slaughtering them one by one in a bloodied murder bath!”

Cait: “That-a-girl lass!!!” (High-fives the teen)

Nick: “For the love of God! Don’t encourage this!”

[coriander-candlesticks]

Hail Apollo and Hermes for helping me get my ass in gear to take care of a couple financial things that have been stressing me out for a while! ...and for the reminder to not impulse spend.

[hellogoodbyeitsme]

Broke: Damian is bad at being a Robin because he's too violent

Woke: Damian is bad at being a Robin because he's afraid to hurt people

[robotpussy]

like everybody has been ignoring that these movies are copganda by saying "oh so because there is a police officer in the movies it's copganda? just being blind to this because they admire the movie.... you say spiderverse and the MCU are military and copaganda and everybody is on your case telling you to shut up and it's not that deep... if you can't fathom that you can critique the stuff you like I'm sorry for you.

and i know this is twitter and on top of that comic fans on twitter (have mercy) but these people don't even know what the fuck propaganda is if they think we're calling spiderverse police propaganda because miles and gwen's dads are police officers and it stops there.

nobody likes to think of themselves as liking propaganda but that's the fucking point.... it's propaganda because it almost just slips by you. it's not always in your face, it is unknowingly being told to you!

[fraternum-momentum]

the internet was cut off and i ran out of data so i asked my brother if i can connect to his hotspot and downloaded dol on my phone,,,,,,,,,

[jrueships]

zesty lowkey just another way for str8 ppl to say faggot / faggy and get away with it

[pyrosomatic-metamorphosis]

something about qbad mentioning how much horror he put red team thru every time purgatory gets brought up... something about how proud dapper was of him.

like this is just my late-night read but- it feels like guilt qbad is trying to twist into pride. he keeps needling away at it. “i killed them all, over and over and over again.” “they were hunted by a monster.”

it’s like- reassurance. like a nail he’s trying o beat into his head. he’s had SO much trouble with legitimately hurting his friends, despite making that vow all the way back when the eggs first went missing, despite all the tree talk and the promises to save the kids no matter what. He never faltered with elq, and that protected them. He keeps faltering now. Sometimes he doesnt remember the code, or cucurucho, or skeppy. But that doesnt matter, right? Because he’ll protect the eggs. He’ll be the monster. he is the monster. he can and he will protect them even as his seams start ripping and he keeps breaking further and further apart. even at his worst, he’ll do whatever he needs to protect the eggs.

he’ll be the monster. wont he?

[plasterhound]

.

[scarycranegame]

anyways its really funny constantly being bombarded with cute, fluffy f/o imagines on my for you/tags you follow tabs because its just like.

tumblr: "imagine cuddling your f/o! imagine going on a coffee date with your f/o! imagine your f/o comforting you! your f/o loves you so so much! they love everything about you! imagine being super niceys to your f/o and it makes them fall even more in love with you!" etc etc.

me: "i want to dissect my f/o lol"

[popcornkwantum]

FINALLY GOT TO FINISH THIS :D

I tried to stick to the cover art as close as possible, except for the characters designs

I was a bit less picky with the colors of the kiddads, since they would be covered by yellows/oranges anyways, but here they are without the dice colors:

Also just ignore the fact that Grants freckles turn green under the dice color for some odd reason. And I forgot to add Sparrows and Larks freckles :( but I finished this literally half an hour before I left for my trip, so I won't be able to add those anymore for a month. Just pretend really hard they are there