#or at least inflict it all on you

[xxplastic-cubexx]

obligatory beach divorce doodling

bonus rough cover redraw of x-men #41 (1995) But Beach Divorce below cut

[i-dreamed-i-had-a-son]

There is a brutal contrast in how Megatron and Optimus's stories end. Optimus nobly surrenders his spark, along with the Matrix of Leadership, having been sent off by his dear and trusted friends after giving them a fond farewell. He has accomplished his life's greatest goal; now he is able to rest. He dies willingly, at peace, bringing hope and giving life to the next generation by restoring the Allspark.

Megatron had already been killed, and was told that he can never join that very Allspark. Having been enslaved, and only released because of Optimus's actions, he is now reanimated, inhabiting his own corpse. His only remaining ally, who has constantly betrayed him, does not understand him. He flies off, alone, having lost all his forces and failed in his mission, and realizing that his life's greatest purpose was misguided. He is left, we can only assume, to live a hellish and hopeless life--a shell, consumed by the past.

And he did not tell Optimus goodbye. He knows that Optimus will leave him behind, will obtain the heaven he can never enter. He gives him the parting gift of his repentance, to acknowledge this. But in his refusal to say farewell, there is an echo of his own wretched endurance. He does not get to rest. Megatron will remain, eternally alone--eternally waiting for a reunion that will never come.

[worstloki]

there is a difference between being born to a throne, maliciously vying for a throne, stealing a throne, and having a throne thrust upon you when you are already in the midst of an identity crisis. And I fear Loki's place in the line of succession has people unable to differentiate between any of these

[shibaraki]

the symbolism of the entire todoroki family now being scarred to varying degrees……….

[itsclydebitches]

I woke up this morning thinking about how Trent's "I'll leave you be" is textually him leaving Ted alone to read his book in peace. However, subtexually through the lens of him being in love with Ted -- and notably as their last face-to-face interaction -- this can be read as Trent acknowledging that his feelings are not returned. The season is coming to a close, I have no reason to stay at the club any longer, you're heading back home to Kansas, and if my book -- the one I'd intended to make you laugh throughout the first 43 pages, the book named after you -- hasn't landed and changed your mind about leaving, nothing will. At least, nothing at this point will help you see/reciprocate my romantic affection, especially now that your decision to leave is impacting your reception of my "dorkiness." What was once something you embraced and celebrated is now something you want toned down. I get it. So this is me finally backing off. I'll leave you be, Ted. Goodnight. So long, farewell.

In this I will--

[turkeyinnovember]

thinking abt how he spent his birthday in the inbetween

[the-paris-of-people]

The past couple days online have been... interesting. I consider myself a leftist, think capitalism is corrupt, and think that it needs to be seriously reformed/overthrown. I admit that while I've thrown around phrases and terms like "burn it all down" and "the revolution needs to come" out of frustration without actually thinking about what a revolution entails: excellent organization, unity, and strategy to defeat the United States, the world's largest military superpower which has inflicted political and social destabilization across the majority of countries around the world. There also needs to be superb infrastructure and community to support the disabled, elderly, and poor populations who rely on government assistance and programs, healthcare, and accommodations while this so-called revolution rages on.

All I've received from the far leftist movement are lectures from condescending intellectuals who rattle off academic citations regarding ideological theory rather than practical, tangible steps to advocate for change in our local and regional communities. I have not seen one of them actually discuss conversations they've had with their friends, family, or Americans about what they want to see reflected for the future of the country. I have not seen one of them discussed how destructive, detrimental and traumatic a Trump presidency was for social prejudice and morale in the United States. I understand that for many marginalized groups they've been living in a facist state for centuries so the possibility Project 2025 doesn't galvanize them to see the two parties differently, but I don't think it is fair to white leftists falsely equivocate the election of both parties for the entire American population at all??? Or like at least specify the issues you're referring to in which you view both parties as the same????? Literally one TikTok creator who I used to follow talked about how true leftists are so much better than liberals because they aren't waiting for a presidential candidate to save the world NOW due to the accelerated apocalypse due to climate change but when asked how to change the world they suggest sharing ideas of your future utopia with other leftist groups. How the fuck is sitting around talking about living in a walkable community is great considered "saving the world now"? How are you going to dismantle and restructure American infrastructure to create these communities? How are you going to remove existing racial and social tensions to create a community where everyone lives happily side by side? Do people not consider reality at all?????

And is it not wrong for people to have a fucking sliver of optimism and hope at incremental change that's achieved within the corrupt bipartisan system of American politics, even if they know it's propaganda??? Is it wrong for people to have a singular fucking moment of relief in feeling like their values, beliefs, and lives will be better protected and THEY can advocate for change better??? Is it wrong when there's a couple months until the most pressing election in recent history for people to make the choice they feel will reduce the most amount of harm???

[daily-linkclick]

daily link click: 3/22/23

teaching maths

[actual-changeling]

if you do not follow/haven't seen my recent posts, i really recommend you read this one and this one before continuing, just to make it hit the right way.

also reminder that i have an ao3 right here (and it's not all pain, promise!)

sorry in advance :)

-

the more time passes, the easier it is for joel to talk about sarah. it still hurts, always will, an old bullet buried in his heart surrounded by scar tissue, but except for a few memories, words don't make him bleed anymore. tommy tentatively starts bringing her up once he notices that joel no longer flinches when he mentions her name, and it feels good to breathe life into their shared experiences, his brother the only one who comes close to understanding his pain but also the joy that colored their years.

ellie asks, too, just as hesitantly as tommy at first, but soon her curiosity takes over and not a day passes by without a question in-between sentences about his past. joel answers all of them, stories spilling from his lips and spinning themselves into a sarah-shaped web that he can share with her.

"she played soccer, right? when did she win her first competition?"

there's a few sports teams in jackson, and of course the soccer one caught her eye, making joel dread all the twisted ankles and bruised shins he was going to have to tend to. getting grass stains out of sarah's uniforms had always been a task and a half, and eventually they both stopped caring about it and just watched them pile up, turning white fabric a greenish-brown.

joel opens his mouth, the coffee cup in his hand hovering above the kitchen table, and then he stills, every muscle in his body turning to ice.

ellie's joel? is drowned out by the ringing in his hears, knuckles turning white and gripping the porcelain so tightly he can feel it crack in his palm, and he must have stopped breathing because his vision is growing fuzzy, black dots scurrying in his periphery.

joel lets the cup fall more than he sets it down, stomach turning, bile rising in his throat, because ellie asked him a question about sarah, his sarah, and he doesn't remember the answer.

it can't be, right? just a small gap in his memory, nothing big, it'll come back to him in an hour and he'll tell ellie about it later. but the panic squeezing his chest is real, terror slithering up his neck and curling around his ear whispering what else did you forget?

more than ever before, he tries to think back to all of it, from the first time he held her in his arms to the moment he buried her, and something odd happens to him when he finds that so much of it is. blurry. frayed at the edges, burned holes and white blotches obscuring important and unimportant details alike, memory an old role of film decomposing in the back of his mind.

the color of her baby blanket (blue, it had to be blue, he can't see), the first movie he watched with her, her favorite book in primary school, the way he did her hair on the first day of kindergarten, the friendship bracelets they made together, the posters on her wall, the dress she wore to her first dance (purple right? right?), memories surfacing as his panic cracks him open like an earthquake, and joel tries to cling to them, nails scratching at the parts that should be there but aren't until he tastes blood, desperation growing and growing because he is forgetting her.

"joel you're scaring the fuck out of me right now what's wrong?"

ellie's voice is distant, and he hates worrying her, hates the almost hysteric edge beneath it when she repeats herself, hands squeezing his shoulders, softly, first, then harder when he doesn't respond. all of the years that he didn't even know she existed, memories she has that he never will, all the firsts and buts and what ifs and failures that define a childhood, their innocent light fractured into vivid fantasies by the stained glass window of life. he has had all that and more with sarah, clung to it in the after to remind himself that she is real, that he is still a father even with his daughter buried by a nameless river.

it is all he has left of her, the childhood she never got to outgrow, and it's fading in a mind that has mourned her for longer than she got exist.

not for the first time, joel wishes he hadn't flinched, his brain worthless if it allowed sarah to fade away. without ellie bound to his heart, he would have tempted fate again for that alone.

-

"who hurt you" too many people to count and luckily tumblr lets me make it everyones problem

[thegreatestheaver]

reblog to slap her bald head

[sillimancer]

yknow when my therapist closed last week's session with a "so next week is the election please talk to me before considering dying" talk I kinda brushed it off but now it's two days away and there it is, that funny feeling once again.

[soupnessopp]

yikes naoya

[57sfinest]

actually i do want to make this a post. it’s so interesting to think about harry from other people’s perspectives, especially if they’re people who were around him before martinaise. because the thing about harry is: he’s a spectacle. there is not a single person left to him who genuinely *cares*. but there are people who take an interest for interest’s sake. harry is the car crash that people can’t look away from, and it’s such a rich lens to view him through.

let’s exclude jean, judit and trant because there’s already enough you can say about them as the sole remaining members of the major crimes unit. think of the other officers who worked at the 41st. whether they worked in c-wing with him or not, they were exposed to him. they had to be around him in some capacity. as a lieutenant, he was “responsible” (i use that term loosely) for overseeing a number of subordinates under the rank system. 

like put yourself in the shoes of a patrol officer at the 41st. you know harry as, in a word, unstable. a deeply unreliable man of extremes with alarmingly few personal attachments to keep him in check. he’s also practically untouchable as long as he keeps getting results, which he does, at a cost. so there’s never any point in formally complaining about him- he’s never going to be corrected or fired, so you just do one of the following: 1) keep your mouth shut (if you’re polite or playing it safe), 2) only bitch about him out of earshot (if you’ve got something to say but you’re nonconfrontational), 3) start shit with him but in a “playful” way that is secretly sincere (if you’re ballsy/have known him long enough), 4) or start shit with him for real (if you’re jean, or have a death wish). 

and the thing about the last two of those options- *especially the 3rd, which seems to be the favorite of his fellow C-wingers*- you have to know him VERY WELL to pull it off without ostensibly getting your nose broken (or worse). you have to know his moods and his triggers and what exact cocktail of bullshit he’s displaying that day so you know where the line is for this particular shift. whoever figures it out first passes it along to everyone else- hey, you can fuck with him about dating today, but don’t bring up the drinking or last week’s case or he’ll go ballistic. and it’s just like... he’s a specimen. you may not know him on a personal heart-to-heart level, but you know him the way a zookeeper knows their tigers, or the way the falconer knows their hawk. you know when to feed and when to back away with your arms up. it doesn’t make things better, but it stops them getting worse. (for you, anyway).

then martinaise happens and if he comes back- his instability is still there, but it’s not the same. you don’t recognize the way he’s acting. maybe some things are not as bad as before, but all of it is different and it’s impossible to get a read on it. you have no idea how to approach him now, or if you should approach him at all. there’s a new layer to his unreliability and it’s somehow even scarier than before. there’s a tiny tiny calm in his storm, finally, and you don’t know when it’s going to break or what’s going to break it. you hear he’s finally actually kicking the booze and maybe you just scoff and move on, or maybe you let yourself root for him. really it all depends on how long you’ve known him, how many times you’ve seen him *try*. how sympathetic you are to his conditions and how patient of a person you are. how many times he’s hurt you (because that number is rarely going to be zero). no matter what, you’re going to be left wondering. you don’t know how much of him is gone. you don’t know how much is going to come back. you’re not sure how much of each you *want*.

[pleafyistired]

this thing i do when i have not consume anything about a media but this guy who makes art about that media is really good and im gonna follow them. And also its probably because of the sunglas- [I AM SHOT DEAD]

[cyarskaren52]

It was so wild to me watching Latinos at those rallies saying they had family members who were here illegally and that they would be fine with them being deported.

Latinos went on TV & declared yes deport my family.

WTF are black people supposed to do to fix that?

answer : Not a damn thing. They’re gonna have to learn on their own. You’d think seeing Latino babies put in cages would’ve been enough but here we are.

[c10v3r]

my coping mechanism is drawing women kissing /SILLY