#puts dots between some stuff to keep out the tags

[mwolf0epsilon]

"Star Wars isn't dead y'all are just haters" "Disney saved Star Wars" "It's the Woke Agenda that ruined Star Wars"

My mans, Disney single-handedly destroyed the Sequel Trilogy despite the Force Awakens being the gateway to something potentially fantastic; MCU'd the Mandalorian (a story which originally had nothing to do with the Prequel and OG Trilogy aside from sharing a universe and exploring a sect of a completely different culture/ideology); ego-boosted both Filoni and Favreau to the point where their OC Verse is not only canon but openly disregarding the Star Wars Universe Bible/Lore; gave us a snippet of what an extremely misunderstood indigenous culture is actually like (instead of portraying them as the savages one of the white leads mislabeled as animals that deserved to be slaughtered) only to then wipe out the tribe we got to know for no reason other than shock value thus alienating indigenous/poc viewers in the most disrespectful way possible; completely threw away the entire message of TCW (that being a clone does not make you incapable of being your own person who has their own thoughts, ideals, moral compass and overall identity) by making TBB (a show that does have it's strong points in set design, soundtrack orchestration and overall sound design, but is extremely weak on both characterization and storytelling because they either make the meaningful plot points stretch too thin or focus on the wrong character completely) their go to show marketed for kids instead of the actual kids programming that people shit on for being for, surprise, kids; constantly disregards valid critique from their consumers (to the point where infighting in the Fandom has gotten extremely ugly) that people either give up on interacting completely or simply vanish and take all their things with them (because no one seems to understand where these critiques come from, or how being unable to admit your special little show is imperfect is actually not a good thing for both you and others).

This isn't even accounting for the fact the Fandom seems to have doubled in it's overall toxicity since Disney took over. Which is par for the course when a mega corporation takes hold of something that started out extremely political in nature anyway. The Cash Cow machine needs feeding after all...

[stestir]

Heres my rant about Amethio age discussion and why I think the age range excuse is stupid. I should probably keep this out of the main tag, but I'm tired, sick, and angry, so idc.

Big really angry rant under the line.

So please can anyone explain to me why everyone thought that VAs comment about Amethio being a teen means hes between 13-19 and also 100% CAN be a 19 years old?

Cause English says that a teen is between 13 and 19? Well we all know that English has a lot of stupid stuff in it, so doesnt really count. Plus, quick reminder, this is anime. Japan. The meaning behind teenager could be very different here.

The difference between 13 and 19 years old is so contrast that giving Amethio this range in the first place is moronic. A 13 years old still needs to ask their daddy to go out with their friends. 19 years old already expected to pay taxes, move out of the house, is probably already on a antidepressants.

And the thing is, Amethio doesnt even act like a 19 years old! He acts like a 14 years old emo that tries his very best to look serious and is desperate for attention.

The whole his beef with Friede is a big ass example of this, that Anime just shoves into your face! Amethio becames irrated immediately after Friede stops giving attention to him, everything in his actions screams "Take me seriously!" He wants to be seen as a professional serious trainer by someone who has authority [ Friede ] and is hurt when it doesnt happen. Its literally how neglected children act.

Also the whole excuse with "B-but hes working with Explorers and has his own subordinates that he commands" GUESS WHO ALSO A MINOR BUT IS A BOSS OF A SHIP? ZUKO. The literal icon of redemption arcs. He also was casted away in the age of 13 and had a whole small army under his command. Does that make him an adult? NO. Both Amethio and Zuko are clearly special, thats why they both are forced into a weapon by their respective parential abusers [ Ozai / Gibeon ], and given some special privileges to make it seem that thse abusers love them, when in fact they are just using them.

He doesnt look like a 19 years old either! His body type barely resembles one of Friede or Spinel, both being a clear cut adults. And before someone says "Well I think that Friede looks 20 and that Amethio is just a really twigy guy" no hes bloody not! Reminder, this is pokemon, we have Lusamine and Cyrus that look like 20 and 40, but actually the opposite. And the thing is, Amethio closely resembles Silver with his body! Whos, yk, A CANONICAL 13 YEARS OLD.

What is more hysterical to me is when the Interviews AND Anime itself start to make parallels between Amethio and the kid Trio, whos, yk, OBVIOUSLY KIDS. Like- in both interviews before the big arcs the boy was compared to Liko & Roy [ And Dot, by extension. ] Amethio was literally called a kid alongside the kid Trio, [ One of the kids that still havent found their dream ] which not only makes him a minor, but also puts him the same age group with Liko, Roy and Dot!

And Anime situation is even more comedic. Khem khem. Literally an episode that got out not so long ago, 44. Amethio is called a spoiled brat by Sango [ Which already makes him a kid, but alas ]. Guess who was also called a spoiled kid? LIKO. BY MOLLIE IN THE ABROLIVA EPISODE. Liko, whos canonically we seen as a child child in the episode 18, was called the same thing as Amethio. I get that Anime tries to make parallels between them in general, but that doesnt matter to me now. The most important thing is - they are both viewed as a kids. Yk. MINORS.

Ending this, I'll say - Amethio is a barely 14, maybe at maximum 15, and he is sure is not a 19 years old. I'm sure hes in the same age bracket as Liko, Roy and Dot.

Also AmeFriede is the worst ship that deserves its own place in hell, alongside AmeSpinel. I hate both of these. They are bad from all perspectives.

[ Also, this is the angriest I felt lately, so I wont probably post any other rants like that. This is just me being beaten down by flu and projecting my anger towards this shitty and stupid "discussion". ]

[stardomtrash]

this utami person looks like an absolute badass. any matches you'd recommend to someone unfamiliar with her work?

You’re damn right she’s an absolute badass :D And heck yeah I can give you some recommendations. I consulted with a few friends to make sure I didn’t forget anything. Some of these I haven’t seen but they came highly recommended. I’ll try and give a helpful rundown where possible :)

In no particular order…

So the unequivocal best match Utami has had is the 5.5* classic with Syuri. It’s LONG, and it may not be a good one to jump in with first, but definitely keep it in your back pocket. It’s 5.5* for a reason. (x)

Alternatively, Utami had a much shorter but all-killer-no-filler match with Syuri in the Gold Rush PPV last year. Really great match between two of the best to ever do it. (x)

Utami vs Mayu Iwatani for the IWGP semi finals. Again, it’s just two fantastic wrestlers giving it all they’ve got. (x)

Utami vs Tam Nakano in the 5 Star GP. Good thing about the 5 Star is the short time limits, so if you need good intro singles matches, they’re a great place to start. You'll also get to see Utami Nakano. (x)

Utami vs Saya Kamitani for the White Belt. I think this was better than the singles they had for the Red Belt, but I think that might be sentimentality for me. I’d only just gotten into Stardom and this was the first match I was HYPED for and watched live on PPV. It’s still a great match, and considering Saya and Utami are partners, coupled with Saya’s unrelenting desire to complete her one goal of besting Utami, it’s a great dynamic. (x)

Utami vs Momo Watanabe in the Oedo Tai/Queen’s Quest best of 5. This is DEFINITELY just me but it’s one of my all-time favourite matches. It presents Utami as an underdog against a heel that she bitterly hates. It’s only short (it's only the first 20 mins, don’t let the 1hr video length scare you) but it’s great if you want to see Utami fighting uphill. (x)

Utami vs Mayu Iwatani for the Red Belt. I haven’t seen this match (I keep meaning to) but I have it on good authority it’s a banger. Annoyingly this match doesn't exist in isolation, just a part of a whole PPV, so skip to 1:56:08 to get to it. (x)

Utami vs Maika for the Red Belt. Maika has been determined to make Utami her rival and these two put on a killer showdown if you like the power fighter vs power fighter style. (x)

Queen’s Quest vs Oedo Tai cage match. This is a massive storyline match that is the culmination of the increasing drama between Saya and Utami. I wouldn’t recommend it until you’ve seen at least some Saya/Utami stuff before (heck, just take a look at the tags on my blog as a crash course lmao) otherwise you’ll miss out on The Feels lol. (x)

Following on from that, when making this list people said I should include Aphrodite matches (that’s the team name for Utami and Saya), but from the matches I’ve seen personally I couldn’t think of One Match that stands out. I got a vote for their match against Konami and Jungle Kyona for the Goddess Belts, which I haven’t seen but really should, so I’ll put that one forward. (x)

Alternatively, since I haven’t included any Goofball Utami moments in this list (except Utami Nakano), the match between Utami and Saya vs Gokigen Death and Riho is a vibe. Utami is madly crushing on Riho at this point and Saya (who has been in love with Utami since Day Dot) is smarting about it. (x)

Last but not least, her debut match against Jungle Kyona is one I haven’t watched but heard good things about. A way to show you she’s been kickass from the start :D (x)

Thank you to everyone who helped me craft this list!

[halfbakedspuds]

Thanks to @oh-no-another-idea for the tag

9 people 9 questions

Last song you listened to:

If we're including game OSTs then its

Otherwise it's

Favourite colour:

I dunno what it's called in English, but we call it 'Grou', which is like a halfway point between grey and blue.

Kinda like this.

Last movie/tv show you watched:

I don't really watch that many movies and shows anymore (no time) but I'm like 70% sure the last one I watched was X-Men '97.

Sweet/Spicy/Savoury:

Savoury, but if you give me spice you must spice properly.

Relationship status:

I've seen spiders less single than me, if that's any indication.

I'm not opposed to the idea, but given how this year is going: trying to start a relationship can wait until after the finals when I won't be putting the stress of an unfamiliar situation on myself on top of the stress of performing in an incredibly difficult and important exam cycle.

Last thing you googled:

"1792 US presidential election candidates"

There is a reason for this beyond me forgetting the name of George Washington... probably...

Nah, I'm kidding, it was to figure out who he ran against, which just opened up a whole new can of worms on how strangely the early US government worked.

Current obsession:

Boolean algebra: trying to teach myself from a mathematical perspective how binary data actually ends up being useful to computers. It's interesting so far but I am no way fit to teach this stuff.

Last thing you cooked/ate:

Vetkoek with biltong and some other things in. It sounds like a horrid combo, I know, but it's so good when made right.

What are you working on:

The same old projects as always, but I've got a (currently nameless) new one starting to brew that's set in a post-apocalyptic fantasy world that's been keeping me busy every day while waiting for my exam sessions to end.

So funny story, I actually don't have 9 people I can tag, so here's a no pressure tag for those I can and an open tag for anyone who wants to hop on:

@honeybewrites @illarian-rambling @thatoneterrariaplayers-vault @pizzamanstan @pb-dot @orion-lacroix

[collectorcookie]

fandom/game vent

tw: csa

Uuugghgggh. Idk why but nothing feels right lately.

On one hand, the enstars fixation died down A LOT. Great for my bank account tbh, i don't wanna spend another cent on gacha games. My brain is free🎉🎉🎉

And rather than feeling this pressure of "omg i must grind new events and get new cards" or "omg there are so many event stories i missed out on" or "i must grind every single new song on all difficulty levels for dia" i just. Don't do that anymore lol. I actually just play the songs whenever i actually feel like playing any and i read only the stories that actually interest me. Which definitely aren't a lot tbh. (still waiting on that knights climax tl) but yeah i'm basically reading 0 stuff from engstars.

So if you wanna break free from a gacha game sucking your soul, I think the reason why the enstars fixation died down so much for me is a combination of

burning myself out trying to get cards

getting bluetooth headphones (which basically make it impossible to play the game with headphones)

turning the BP game notification off

Engstars TLs getting worse than fan TLs

Obviously i still have basic but since i can't read japanese, i can't stress myself over reading new stories because i can't read anything at all. Yaaaay. I have evolved into a casual player.

Now. On the other hand. The new fixation. My beloved wizards. Mahoyaku.

I'm gonna be so honest, i kinda hate it here.

Don't get me wrong, i love the game, i love the story, i love the characters. But the fans. The fans man.

Like with enstars fandom, i started out with tumblr, and sure, i had to occasionally block some people and filter out some stuff, but that was it. That was enough for me to be able to chill and actually be comfortable in the enstars fandom space on tumblr.

Now, there are basically no mhyk fans on tumblr. Ok fine. Guess i'll go on twitter instead. So i made a twt account.

I truly cannot explain to you how much i should not have done that.

Like, ok, LOTS MORE fanart which is great. Fantastic. Lovely. However, a lot of proshippers. Many many proshippers. Like i do not have that much experience in fandom spaces in the first place but i swear the amount of proshippers is disproportionately large in mhyk fandom, on twt at least.

Ok another warning for talk about csa if you somehow didn't catch the one above

I think it's obvious from my blog here alone how much i like northfam, especially Snow and White. To be so honest, Snow and White were the biggest hesitation for me to NOT get into mhyk because we all know the "child looking character is actually over 2000 y.o." is NEVER handled well in fiction. Well, i ended up reading mhyk anyways, and to my relief, s&w's child forms do not get sexualized ever. Thank god.

But like mentioned before, this is not the case for the fandom. Not only do i always end up finding people shipping s&w together, but also many other of my faves, like oz and arthur (foster father and son) or mitile and figaro (student and teacher). Which i do not want to see ever, and the thing with twt is, you can't tag and filter stuff like on here. And even after being on twt for...idk how many months, i STILL end up seeing stuff i would like to stay 4869761093 lightyears away from.

I've been trying to do everything, from blocking to muting words to clicking the three dots on each individual post i don't want to see for the "please don't show me stuff like this". AND IT STILL HAPPENS.

Idk man...as a csa survivor myself it feels so hopeless...like is it really worth it here if i'll just keep finding stuff that triggers me? Is it worth meeting new people and constantly being on edge if this new fan thinks being proship is ok?

I really did like making fanart for fandom purposes, it made me draw a lot more, but between my dying interest in enstars and mhyk fandom thinking the stuff that has and will put me in therapy for decades is hot. I don't feel like interacting with fandom that much anymore ngl....and that makes me genuinely sad. Idk maybe this is a depressive episode that will go away but i feel so tired for now....hobbies are supposed to be fun....

[lord-shitbox]

part 2 of this ask

📝Process for hurt mezu drawing 

here are the steps i dug out of an art server's wips channel lol

1. initial sketch

2. refine sketch. thats lines now babey. (omitted "the sleeves are KILLING ME WAHHH" stage that led to this)

3. grayscale, to use with gradient map (this is a more polished grayscale than I started with, i dug the working file out to get better images)

4. find nice gradient map (ended up being the same one I'd used for the piece i made right before. the goal is to make what's essentially an underpainting, not to color the whole thing with one map)

5. tweak and add colors that arent in the map with hard light layers & also sneak in a layer for special effect and atmospheric/ scenic perspective while you're at it

6. shading & more finishing effects. pretty much all of the shading was done with hard light layers! the only non-hard light layers I used for the shading were the particle effect layers & like one faint glow layer to fix some values. blood was done with linear burn

✨Inspiration for hurt mezu drawing 

the coloring method (grayscale -> saturated gradient map underpainting -> additive color adjustments) is something I tried out with the piece i'd made right before (the one where gozu is holding mezu from behind) & turned out really well, so I wanted to keep going with it

I also wanted to draw them angstily again because it'd been a very long time. like half a year at least. angsting them is very enriching for my soul so I try to do it regularly, this one was overdue

subconsciously referenced the poses in the initial sketch from this old thing (feb 2021). i love doing this. all my for-fun works recycle old elements in some way. my favorite game is "what old art reminds me of what im doing rn" im so good at digging stuff out of my archives for it. everyone loves when i do this

the gangi-kozou panel also

i went through a "shade in bold red-orange & dark blue with hard light layers" phase in like..april/may of 2021. i still like that stuff a lot so I wanted to revisit it

💚Things you like about hurt mezu drawing

repasting the link there but the sixth image in the process is essentially the final so you can just look at that

the colors are nice!! I'm real happy with using more saturated colors n I think the warm vs cool balance works really well

the sleeves (man being dramatic on the sand meme)

no like fr look at the 2021 piece's kimono sleeves vs the one I just did 2.5 years later. so satisfying

Gozu's expression came out nice

i think the claws and flash lines successfully added Emphasis to Gozu's expression & the piece overall

the poses … the drama …. the brush textures are also good

⏳Things you’d do differently with hurt mezu drawing

add in a liiitle more contrast...aka use a wider range of values. Some lighter lights and darker darks. I miss my 2021 hard neon lighting

a bit more distinction between the characters and the background also

the composition isn't bad but it could be better. Should've thought more about the way the eye would flow around the image in the drafting stage (solid b&w color block thumbnails are good for this)

Moar Sparkles. (I put a solid amount of large & low opacity light bubbles in there & some finer brighter dots especially around the claw stems, but I think more clusters of tiny bright lights on the characters themselves would've gone hard)

💌Some favourite feedback on art

as the wise man Austin Kleon once said: keep a "praise file" of all the positive feedback you get (if you've never read "Steal Like an Artist," you must). so. i am prepared for this question hold on

tastes like sugar glass

multiple people have told me my art is soft & dreamlike

jayce you reblogged my touchstarved art with nice tags on april 10th ive got that saved love uou

umm theres a lot...anytime someone keysmashes or feels emotional because of my art i get happy ,,, lys messaged me about the hurt mezu piece that made me happy also,,,,,there is so much joy in the world

[myassbrokethefall]

xf rewatch: squeeze and conduit

(As if this wasn't already apparent, I'll warn you that any off-the-cuff posts I manage to spew out as I rewatch are going to be rambly, unorganized and rudderless. I am tagging all of these "xf rewatch rambling." And I will be kind to us all and put in a cut.)

Eps 3 and 4, and we're still building some real foundational XF DNA here. Squeeze of course is our first MOTW and it's all nicely laid out for us: Colton and the jackass squad are all like, hurrrr it's ol spooky mulder he thinks a flying saucer did the murders, and even Scully is like, so whaddya think, these are the stretchy fingerprints of ALIENS? And it gives him a great opportunity to say, please Scully, I have range, we don't ONLY do UFO episodes cases on this show in this basement, sometimes we might have a "week" where we are investigating a "monster"! That will keep us busy!

It's also really interesting to see Mulder interact with the rest of the federal law enforcement universe for the first time, and how he plays into it in a smartass way, but how it really is relentless (with Colton in particular like physically blocking him from the crime scene even before he calls off the stakeout). Mulder doesn't get really mad about it until it gets to the point where he knows they've let a killer go and no one will listen to him about that. He's just such a fundamentally Good man, and it's a lovely thing to once again see through Scully's eyes how he is not the unreasonable one here, that despite his willingness to connect the dots to make a picture that is Beyond the Realm of Science, he IS, in fact, connecting dots, he's not just making shit up, and none of these dudes making fun of him are actually listening to him. I am loving watching how they draw his character in these early days.

Then with Conduit we're back into UFO stuff and it's our first Gordon/Gansa ep. This is the first episode I don't know like the back of my hand, although I remember it pretty well (and I don't know Squeeze AS well as Pilot and DT). It is quite solid, and MUCH more based on Carl Sagan's Contact than I remembered. As I rambled to a friend earlier today and will now do here again probably even less coherently, this whole thing was great for me until it falls apart at the end with the pieces of paper forming the portrait of Ruby. Despite this being a nifty reveal, the portrait is just SO GOOFY!!, and it is just a step too far for me. The aliens are sending numbers through the TV to Ruby's little brother — sure. And he's compelled to write them down and they turn out to be, in binary, the aliens repeating back to the humans what they've heard in transmissions from Earth, in what is assumed to be a way of reaching out or saying hello (this is what happens in Contact). I love all that, it's very spooky, it's a fun side-swerve when M&S get interrogated by the NSA because Kevin was accidentally transcribing top-secret military info, and it is undeniably a great moment when Scully goes upstairs and looks down and has the realization that it's a picture of Ruby. But... how can the 1s and 0s be BOTH encrypted satellite transmissions AND the precise sequence that makes a physical picture of Ruby's face? Also, is it like, a school portrait? Why is she smiling so hard? Did the aliens tell her to smile and snap a photo of her on the spaceship? Are they reading Kevin's mind and that's how he pictures her, with a giant cheeseball grin? It just kind of falls apart for me and it is silly enough that it breaks the momentum of the episode. 

On the other hand, I get that they wanted to make it unequivocal that the aliens were communicating to Kevin about Ruby specifically — and to make that explicit tie between this situation and Mulder's memories, as expressed in the hypnosis in the (very emotional) last scene, about Samantha's abduction: the voice saying that she's ok and she'll be returned to him. This is a touching consistency that I never really picked up on before, that it is the aliens' MO when abducting a kid to make an effort to let a nearby loved one know that they don't have to worry. So working instructions for how to arrange the papers on the living room floor into their tv transmissions in order to make a giant Sears portrait of Ruby is another way of delivering this ultimately benevolent, hopeful message, I guess. 

You couldn't keep it this way indefinitely, but I really do feel wistful about these early days when there was such a sense of wonder with the possibility of aliens, and so much unknown, before it all got bogged down in super soldiers and magnetite and consortiums and viruses and black oil and impregnating people with science against their will. You can FEEL Mulder's agitation and urgency in wanting to get Ruby's story and his agony at being blocked from it, and yet also understand Darlene's refusal to let this crazy-sounding stuff that has branded her a kook her whole life define her daughter's life as well. Just good stuff.

I will note though that there have been 4 episodes here so far, 3 of them dealing with UFOs, and in all 3 of those they have done the thing where you think you're seeing UFO lights and then it turns out to be a vehicle Very Much Of This Earth. I think you could give that one a rest for a little while, show. 

Let's get real, this is all prelude to Jersey Devil, up next. Yeah baby. 

[byjillianmaria]

dead darlings tag

Tagged by @sarandipitywrites!! check out their dead darling here.

Tagging @stories-by-rie @cwritesfiction @lady-redshield-writes @lullabyes22-blog @roselinbooks-official @incandescent-creativity aaaaand whoever else wants to do this!

There's Magic Between Us went through a LOT of changes before it got published. Eden grew a whole different backstory, a subplot about a missing uncle got axed, a subplot about a magic treasure got added, and Lydia's knowledge of Fae Nonsense was severely more limited!

As such, a lot got left on the cutting room floor. I'm not too precious about any of it, but I was always a little sad to lose this scene where Lydia plays guitar for Eden. It doesn't really make sense to have in the final draft — Eden became the kind of character who wouldn't have time for this distraction, and Lydia became the kind of character who wouldn't have the patience to learn a whole song, anyway — but it was such a fun little romance trope to have while it lasted.

I also included some developer's notes, for funsies.

“What’s that on your back?” she asks. “Oh!” I run my free hand along the strap across my waist. (Note from present-day Jillian: I think this was meant to say shoulder or chest? That's a first draft for you.) “That’s my guitar. I just brought it for fun.” “Do you play?” “A little! I can show you when we sit down.” Sure, I only know the basics. But I know a few songs—enough to woo people who want to be wooed, I’m pretty sure. Or at least fill a few quiet moments between friends. I could be down for either, depending on how this plays out. “That would be nice.” Eden points ahead of her. The trees widen out into a clearing with a large pond. A few willow trees dot the shore, long branches reaching down. It’s one of those that she points to. “Under that tree is one of my favorite spots to sit. I bet it would make a good picnic.” “Dude, totally.” It looks like something out of a postcard. In the shade of the willow branches, the warm summer air cools just a little. It’s a comfortable place to lay out the picnic blanket. “You’re right, there is a lot of cool stuff here.” Eden smiles, smoothing the burgundy skirt of her button-down dress over her legs as she sits. “I’m glad you think so.” “Yeah! Thanks for showing it to me. If you’re ever in Chicago, I’ll be sure to return the favor.” Eden looks down at her lap, hair falling over her forehead. “I’ll keep that in mind.” I’m not sure if it’s bashfulness that changes the air between us or something else, but suddenly the silence sits heavier and less comfortable. I rush to correct it. “I’ve got lots of sandwich making stuff in here, and candy and things. You can pick what you want.” I swing the guitar around into my lap. “Lunch and a show!” This makes Eden smile again, which makes me happy. “Aren’t you going to eat?” I flap a hand at her. “I can eat in a second. I promised music!” “I guess you did,” Eden says, a laugh clinging to the edge of her voice. And so I play for her, while she rummages through the basket and puts together a sandwich. I’m not a great guitarist or a great singer, either, but I can carry a tune well enough that it isn’t unpleasant to listen to. Besides, the trick to doing anything is to do it with confidence. I play one of my favorite songs to perform, a love song by a straight guy. (Note from present day Jillian: what is she playing? I have no idea. I have a playlist of music she likes, but there's few men and even fewer acoustic songs.) I very purposefully don’t change the pronouns when it comes to talking about the girl he fell for. Look, between the pansexual pride bracelet on my wrist and the constant flirting, no one’s ever accused me of being subtle. Eden doesn’t react to the pronoun use, either positively or negatively. Which doesn’t necessarily mean anything. I just know that I get a little excited whenever someone does something gay, even if I’m not interested in them. It’s like finding someone wearing a shirt for a band you like, or something. A moment of connection and understanding, however brief. I won’t be shattered if Eden doesn’t like girls, of course. But I’d be lying if I said I didn’t want to know.

[bramblemantle]

question meme thing, tagged by @nosongunsung11 ( o/ !!)

tagging: uhhhhhh let’s say @lupathemoth and @a-little-monotonous ! as well as anyone else who’d like to use this format

share your wallpaper: it used to be ace attorney for a really long time, now it’s blaseball. i don’t tend to change visuals often

lock screen is this artwork of Parker by @ HORSEIZONTAL on twitter

home screen is this Jaylen artwork by @ 0re

my laptop lock screen is that title screen artwork of Revachol from Disco Elysium, home screen is this, don’t know what the original source is but it’s on a lot of wallpaper sites. miiiight be wallpaperstock dot net ?

last song you listened to?: i’m listening to music all of the time but as i’m writing this i’m listening to Hail To Whatever You Found In The Sunlight That Surrounds You by Rilo Kiley. in general i’ve been listening to a lot of the Garages and Paramore. so i’m also linking Ignorance bc i keep getting it stuck in my head

currently reading?: i’m rereading the Animorphs series for the first time in years! this is actually the first time i’ve read the series in its entirety, as my personal collection grows sparse after book 30 so there’s some i’ve never read. i’m currently on book 36 out of 54! (plus the extras in there whenever they fit chronologically)

last movie you watched?: uhh i don’t watch a lot of movies. technically Sing i think? i was playing totk and sitting with my 7 y/o brother. he wanted to watch Sing but he got distracted before the end of the movie and turned it off. if we’re talking about movies i watched for me then there’s a good chance it was the new Puss in Boots movie or Into the Spider-Verse but it’s been like a couple months

craving: toasted bagel. butter on it. the good stuff. the creamy kind of butter. tim hortons does it right. also i could go for some dark chocolate

what are you wearing right now?: uhhhh some kinda kapris (?) with grey flower and triangle patterns, and a muscle shirt (?) i was just gifted with pride flags on it. it’s hot as balls. if it weren’t hot as balls i’d have on one of my fave tees, and my Houston Spies bomber jacket or one of my beloved long coats

how tall are you?: 5’2” and a half, which i only found out last year when i finally asked at a visit with doctors

piercings?: nah i’m too much of a baby abt the pain and don’t want to deal with maintenance, but they look cool as hell on anyone

tattoos?: same as above but i’m more likely to be tempted into getting something small someday

glasses? contacts?: i’ve been wearing glasses since elementary school, they’re an all day necessity for me. i gotta get new ones, i’ve had these lenses for years and the frames for even longer whoops. the prescription definitely doesn’t line up anymore

last drink?: iced capp from tim hortons hehe. i don’t consume a lot of caffeine but that shit slaps and cold drinks are a must in this weather

last show?: i also don’t watch a lot of tv! uhhhhh i’m drawing a blank. there’s a chance it was Centaurworld but that was a WHILE ago (and i’ve been thinking of rewatching it soon)

favourite colour?: purples and teals. also browns when there’s a saturated accent colour with it

current obsession?: split between Blaseball (the brainrots been going strong since october) and several different groups of ocs. and also Animorphs i missed Animorphs so much i love Animorphs. fundamental to my childhood. i’m getting back to my roots

unrelated obsession?: not quite sure what this is asking! but Tears of the Kingdom is Up There as well, i’m trying not to rush through the game but i’m finding it very hard to put down ^-^’

or actually if that question is asking about obsessions not tied to any fandom. it’s prehistoric animals and/or bats :]

any pets?: there’s a lot of animals i know and interact with throughout the week. i live with a dog (old chihuahua named Prince) and 3 cats (Charming, Bella, and Mr. Kitty). of those, Mr. Kitty is My Cat part time. he loves my granny a lot too, he’s always either in my room or hers, snuggled up near one of us. he’s one of my best friends he’s so important to me :] my silly little guy

do you have a crush on anyone?: i still am not sure what that’s supposed to feel like and if i have ever felt it before but no i don’t right now. just love and admiration for my pals 🫶

favourite fictional characters: there’s so many my guy. i have a tag for blorbos that live in my brain. the ones on my mind a lot recently are a bunch of Blaseball players, the kids from Animorphs (in particular Rachel, Tobias, and Cassie. the latter two were always tied for favourite when i was a kid but i’ve also found a new appreciation for Rachel as well. man. these kids), the iterators from Rain World, the satellites from 17776/20020, Emmet & Ingo from Pokemon, the list can go on and on and on

last place you travelled?: uhhhh i don’t get out much! i haven’t left the valley i live in for years. i don’t know how far away ‘travel’ has to be to count as travel, the last trip i’ve been on might have been a family vacation into the states? in any case i didn’t go anywhere noteworthy in the past year or more

[jovenshires]

Hey the new Ianthony edit? Made me emo as fuck it really had me in my feels very cool.

I didn't see it on the 'smosh' tag? Idk if that's intentional thought you should know if it's not <3 -dot hell anon

TYSM i had so much fun making that one so im glad <3333

ah yeah... that was intentional. old habits die hard i guess? this got a little away from me so i put my extremely long rant under the cut, but tlwr: i try not to tag a lot of shipping stuff as /smosh.

see, i'm not new to the smosh fandom, but i am relatively new to THIS version of the fandom. i came back a couple of months ago but my real heyday was in like. 2018-2020. and we had pretty set rules for how we went about things, and one of the BIG ones was to never put anything ship-related in the main tags (those tags being cast names and the main smosh tag itself).

this was for a couple different reasons; first of all, some of the actual smosh staff was on tumblr (the official smosh blog for one, and i think one of the cast used tumblr at the time?? not sure on that one though as i Cannot remember), and we didn't want them to have to view rpf of themselves in spaces just generally meant for posting about them/their company. like say courtney, for example, goes into the 'courtney miller' tag - there's a difference between seeing a post about her bit in the new tntl and a post about them. fucking ian nasty style. not that there's anything wrong with the latter, just that i am very conscientious about not showing the real person fiction to the real person(s) in question, as was a lot of the smosh fandom.

second of all, not every smosh fan is into rpf. our venn diagram is not a circle. there was a time when i was not a part of the venn diagram. it's why i try to tag every post with 'shipping' and/or 'rpf' when it even vaguely hints at the stuff, so that not everybody has to see it. this isn't exclusive to this topic - i would do that for anything divisive. so, yeah, casual smosh fans scrolling the main tag probably don't want to see my silly ship edits, and i get that!!

since i've returned we obviously have a much different fandom culture - the old smosh blog shut down years ago and i'm fairly certain none of the cast checks tumblr anymore (and if they do and they're reading this: i'd like to apologize and beg for them to block me for both of our sanities). i've also made a few exceptions to my own rule, such as with the incorrect tweets bc i think those can mostly be written off as jokes and the lil au edits though i regret that at times. (i've been considering un-tagging those for a while tbh.) i've also realized recently that the tag 'smosh fic' just gets sorted directly into the 'smosh' tag which is. a pain in the ass. that's not what i said tumblr and you know it. so some of my content has been filtered in there. but you'll notice with the lil clips and text posts i post and stuff i almost never tag it as 'smosh' because. i just don't need people to see it ya know. i've got my people here and that's enough for me <3

that is all to say by the way that the new fandom culture is not BAD. as we all know, i'm very pro-rpf, so seeing rpf out there is great (as long as you know it's not tinhatting etc etc). we also have a very diverse community now with a lot of interesting ships and great fics that i would never have found without casually scrolling through the smosh tag!! it's also easier nowadays to block tags than ever; casual fans can just block the 'shipping' tag and have (relatively) easy access to the smosh tag. so please all of you keep doing you - i'm not your mother and i don't expect you to listen to lil ole me where i live perched up on my soap box. BUT idk if i personally can get over my hang-ups about tags.

[divorcedmalewife]

Tagged by my absolute fav, @noirbats, thank you bee ilysm <3

❥ name: Marissa! Or, Rissa for short. But only online tho. For some reason, I'm uncomfortable with irl people calling me Rissa lol.

❥ sign: Gemini sun, Aries Moon, and Gemini Rising (yes I am that bithc)

❥ height: 5'6"

❥ time: 20:11

❥ birthday: June 1! First day of Pride Month babey lets go

❥ fav band/artist: oof that's so hard, just choosing one. I'll go with the safe option of Fall Out Boy. been listening to Folie a lot.

❥ last movie: Santa Claus is Comin' to Town! It's my fav Christmas movie. (next to A Christmas Story)

❥ last show: Mmmm I think Between Us! love those gay little swimmers.

❥ when I created this blog: January 2013? I think? Tori when did you create your blog cuz we made our blogs literally a day apart

❥ what I post: whatever I damn well please. Mostly fandom stuff but also memes and animal pics.

❥ other blogs?: none that are active! keeping up a side blog is a lot of work that I am not willing to put in lmao

❥ do I get asks?: not really! I don't make my own posts all that much but I've gotten more asks this year than any other year.

❥ followers: 714

❥ average hours of sleep: um on a good, usually 7? but I get days where my brain is like "no sleep" but also "only sleep". My roommate says I was cursed with sleepy bitch syndrome. and he's so right

❥ instruments: none! i played the clarinet in middle school but I didn't like our band teacher so I ended up not pursuing music.

❥ what I'm wearing: comfy black pants and a white sweater with black polka dots. and socks with little foxes on them!

❥ dream trip: I'd like to travel a lot of places! i guess the most realistic one for me is I want to see the Rocky Mountains. I have lived in the US all my life and I've never been west of the Mississippi river.

❥ fav songs right now: I'll name a few from my current favs playlist! 1.) Headphones Baby by The Vaccines; 2.) Deadlock by Go! Child; 3.) The First Time Ever I Saw Your Face by Gordon Lightfoot; and Disloyal Order of Water Buffaloes by Fall Out Boy.

I tag @torsamors @daethsticks @pcrrycox @katebushgirlfriend @vaughndotexe @princegerard @wizard-rat and anyone else who wants to do it! Just say I tagged you!

[autumnalwalker]

Empty Names - 16 - Mall Rats

Author's Note: Checking back in on Sullivan as we wrap up this set of POV cycling. A shorter chapter again to balance out the last couple. That said, I'll be taking a brief hiatus from the chapter update schedule for the next month or so to refill my chapter buffer queue and take care of some IRL stuff. See the tags for more spoiler-y commentary in the tags. Word Count: 4,730 Content Warnings: Dead bodies. Blood. Brief mention of the injuries that made those bodies. A fight scene. Mild body horror.

<-Previous Chapter Masterpost Next Chapter->

The young man staggers backwards, eyes wild with fear.  His shoulders bump into the glass door and he scrambles blindly for the handle, finds it, slides the door open, slams it behind him, and runs. 

He makes it all of five meters before reaching the edge of the penthouse’s balcony.  The lights of a city he was never allowed to learn the name of swirl far below. 

“If you’re going to jump,” says his pursuer in the same awful, chipper voice he’s used all throughout the night’s deeds, “at least take this with you first.  I do believe it belongs to you.”

The young man turns around to find Sullivan Bridgewood nearly within arm’s reach and holding out the limp, hollow, feathered skin of a crane.  His skin.

“That’s -“ the young man stammers, “But you - you - All of them - How did you - Why?”

Sullivan takes a step closer and the young man flinches.  He rolls his eyes and places the crane skin on the ground.

“Yes, it is.  Yes, I did.  With lots of practice.  Because my friend asked me to help you and because I enjoyed it.  Now then, do what you will with yourself if you like, but my job here is done.”

With that, Sullivan spins around on his heel and saunters back inside.  He doesn’t bother to look up from opening the speed dial on his phone at the flap of wings behind them.  The phone on the other end only rings twice before picking up.

“The last one’s just been set free,” Sullivan says without preamble.  It’s a lie by implication.  This had been the last of the bound and sold magical beings on the list he had extracted from Logos, but he’d had to skip over one along the way.  The sorcerer had amnesticized himself following the sale as part of one of his early deals and all that Sullivan could recover was that Logos had suspected he was going through a third-party intermediary, so no lead to follow there.  But his friend doesn’t need that failure on their conscience.

“Thanks,” his friend’s voice says tiredly, “that’s a load off my mind.”

Sullivan slides into a bunyip-leather upholstered chair and begins rifling through the private desk of a very-recently-ex CFO of a Backstage pharmaceutical company.

“You’re welcome.  Maybe you can get some sleep now.”

He pries open the false bottom of a draw with a knife, revealing a phone and a tablet.  He picks them up and puts them away to peruse their late owner’s secrets at his leisure later.

“Maybe.  Eris finally talked Lacuna into going home to do the same a few hours ago and Ashan’s resting again, so I suppose I could spare an hour or three before they’re all back to run the analysis on that tattoo of Ashan’s in the morning.”  The unspoken “but…” lingers in the electronic airways between devices.

Sullivan stands and strolls out of the study, admiring the futile handiwork on the walls of now-silent guns to keep his voice casual.

“Would you like me to come back for the night?” he offers.

“No, I’ll manage.  I should let you get back to the Lachlan case.  You said you thought you were closing in on him?”

Sullivan flips over the body of one of the hired thugs now leaking much-needed color into the painfully modern white carpet and plucks the business card from its wallet. Smartdream Security.  Interesting.  He’ll need to look up what other corporate ties they’ve got later and figure out how they’d gotten word he was coming.  Sure, he’d just spent the past twenty six hours dealing with other high-profile targets dotted around the globe before getting around to this particular rich asshole, but to put together the pattern and deploy security in that time is still impressive.  Ultimately futile, but impressive.

“Yes indeed,” he replies.  “Credit where it’s due, our alchemical acquaintance was able to give quite the invigorating runaround with all his proxy portals and diversionary world hops thanks to that headstart of his, but the trail goes through Echo Plaza and there’s only one person there he could have gone to see.”

“Echo Plaza?  I thought that place would have faded out and dispersed by now.”

Sullivan steps around and over another pair of cooling corpses to see if there are any books on the shelf or art pieces on the wall worth taking back with him that aren’t blood-stained or bullet-riddled.

“It came close but the vaporwave and mallcore booms a while back - it’s a music thing, ask the techie about it - gave it one last gasp and the hardcore regulars are doing what they can to preserve their petty slices of the cosmos.”

“I see.  I’ll leave you to it then.  Just try not to rough anyone up too badly while you’re there.”

“Of course not.”  Unlike with this job, Sullivan had given his friend his word about certain aspects of his conduct ahead of time.  It had been long indeed since the last time his friend had simply explained a situation and left with no implication other than that they wouldn’t ask questions about what Sullivan chose to do with the information.  It was certainly one way to keep their conscience clean.  “Sleep tight,” he adds.

“I’ll try.  See you later.” 

The line goes silent but there’s no click of a hangup.

Sullivan moves to the kitchen, checks the freezer, and finds it surprisingly boring.  No stashed electronics, frozen potions, or preserved body parts.  He grabs a carton of ice cream, kicks another body out of the way so that its partially-crushed head won’t hold the door open anymore, and closes the freezer.  

Returning to the balcony, he leans over the railing, balances the carton on it and begins scooping out ice cream with a knife.  Much like the city vista below, it’s night black and speckled with glazed bits that reflect the glowing veins of light that run through it.  At least the penthouse’s late owner had good taste in something.

He glances back over his shoulder and blinks through his filters.  No significant signatures other than the already-ransacked saferoom.  He returns his gaze to the view, eats his looted ice cream and waits with his phone still up to his ear.

“Su?” his friend’s expected voice finally whispers.

“Yeah?”

“Am I a bad leader?”

“Of course not, everyone loves you.  They’d follow you anywhere.”

“But should they?”

“Hey, what brought this on?”

“This is twice now that Eris and Ashan have come back in bad shape, and every quest so far we all wind up separated.”

“That’s just a new team going through the growing pains of getting used to working together.  The point is they came back and it’s not been anything they couldn’t recover from, and you’ve been able to help everyone you’ve tried to help.  That sounds like a resounding success to me, especially for the early stages.”

Silence.

Consideration.

Waiting.

“Has this happened before?”

“Do you want me to answer that?”

“No.  I don’t think I do.  It’s just…”

Sullivan’s grip on his phone tightens.

“Just what?”

“I’ve been thinking about the gaps more than I should lately.”

“And?”  They should barely be able to think about them at all.

“The list of reasons I’d want to leave them empty is pretty short, isn’t it?”

The ice cream carton tumbles down to the streets far enough below to be another world.

“You trust me?”

“For happily ever after.”

How bitter the old joke between them is.

“This isn’t going to be another gap.  I would have tried harder to talk you out of it if I thought there was a chance of that.”

“Thanks.  I needed to hear that.”

“That’s what I’m here for.  Now get some sleep.  You’ll feel better in the morning.”

“I’ll try not to dream.”

*******

Sullivan’s footsteps echo throughout the empty shopping mall and mix with the slow, distorted music playing from unseen speakers.

Echo Plaza, a place that becomes more aptly named with each passing year.  

A mere three decades ago this place would have been teaming wall to wall with shoppers from Backstage and beyond.  Wide-eyed newbies who mistakenly thought it would be a good place to ease themselves into things.  Paratech hobbyists looking for the newest offworld imports to reverse engineer.  Teenage witch covens staking out corners of spellbookstores and food courts.  Offworld travelers taking advantage of their multi-day anchor world hub layover to go sightseeing.  Fairies playing tricks from the cover of palm fronds and aerial shrubbery.  Naiads presiding over the grand fountains and granting small blessings in exchange for the coins thrown in. The list went on.

Back then, when the ideal of the shopping mall as cultural centers of commerce and socialization occupying a prominent place in the collective consciousness brought Echo Plaza into being and sustained it and its occupants with an effervescent zest for life, vendors would kill for a storefront on the young pocket dimension's main concourse.  Quite literally, as Sullivan knows from personal experience and paychecks.  In those days just being here would make everything feel exciting and wondrous.  In these window displays the kitsch became cool and the mildly uncommon became alluringly exotic.

Now there are more marble statues than people.  The grand fountains are all long dry.  Food court menu screens proclaim cryptic messages over blue error backgrounds.  Shadowy suggestions of mannequins linger in gutted boutiques at the edge of a flickering neon haze.

The golden age of the shopping mall has passed, and even the subcultural revival of the concept is inextricably intertwined with emptiness and signal decay.  None but the most stubborn of holdouts are willing to invest property in a pocket dimension on its last legs before dissolution.  Only the most dedicated seekers of aesthetic and pursuers of the niche bother to put up with the permeating air of nostalgia and melancholy.

Ironic then how the recent fad for so-called liminal spaces has made the place easier to access than ever for those few who care to look.  And for those desperate to disappear.

The first sign that someone who thinks they’re being stealthy is following Sullivan comes in the form of a blurred oil slick of color at the edge of his peripheral vision flitting from empty store to abandoned kiosk to dry fountainhead.  The rapid muffled footsteps from the second-floor walkway above give away the second stalker.   When he reaches the bridge connecting the two sides of the second floor and smells the third mall ninja hiding in the shadows beneath, he waves to his would-be-ambusher and calls out.

“Nice job kiddos, real sneaky.  Now run along and find someone else to mug before you do something stupid.”

“You  are quite observant stranger,” says the twenty-something in a blank trenchcoat and fedora who steps out of the bridge’s shadow, “but that alone will not be enough to save you now that you have trespassed on our holy training grounds.”  He pulls open the flaps of his trenchcoat to reveal dozens of the tackiest knives Sullivan has ever seen holstered in loops sewn into the garment’s inner lining.  “As you can see, I am well armed and have no intention of letting you go further.”

“You have no idea who you’re talking to, do you?” Sullivan says.

“An intruder who’s about to become a training dummy for my blades,” knife jacket retorts.

“You stand in the presence of Sullivan Bridgewood.”

“Who?”

“Sullivan Prince perhaps?  No?  How about the Golden Death?  The Xanthous Reaper?  The Assassin in Yellow?”

“Is that supposed to impress me?  All I see is a scared little man trying to bluff his way out of a fight with made up titles.”

Sullivan touches his fingers to his face and shakes his head in exasperation.  “Void Without, what ever is Anthony teaching you kids these days?  For shame.  If you’re going to go into a profession, at least make the effort of learning the historical greats in your field.”

“That’s Master Antimatter Bloodflame Drips Down The Katana That Cleaves The Horizon to you!”

“That’s one of his names, yes.  He’s also Swordmaster Death Annihilator, xXx_AnimePantySlasher_69_xXx, and Anthony Lewinski the weeblord.”

“You would slander our master so?  I may have been willing to let you walk away but now you force my hand with this dishonor.  Ready yourself for I will not hold back.”  Declaration made, knife jacket tips his fedora then draws a knife with a dragon-shaped hilt and flame-shaped blade in with hand and a two-pronged dagger with a glass eye in the crossguard and a grim reaper for a handle in the other.  The reaper’s scythe looks poised to stab its own wielder's wrist the moment he twists it wrong.

Sullivan rolls his eyes.  “Kid, you couldn’t stop me from walking away if your life depended on it.  Lucky for you and your two friends trying to hide behind me however, I already promised I wouldn’t kill anyone else this week so you all get to walk away from this lesson alive.”

“What lesson?”

“Where my names come from.”

The single step Sullivan takes forward moves him out of the path of the neochrome shuriken that misses his head and embeds itself in a marble Venus statue’s neck.  A glance back over his shoulder spots another young man, this one dressed in oil slick spandex under neochrome body armor and running at Sullivan with his arms sticking out behind him like airplane wings.  The exposed blades strapped to those arms are the same pink-and-blue swirl as the rest of him.

From above, the third assailant shouts “Sneak attack!” and leaps down from the bridge.  Sullivan sidesteps and a pair of sharpened black paddles crash into the floor.  Painted in white on one paddle is “S3X-007.”  The other reads “L0V-R34.”  Dressed in all black, this one might almost pass for a proper ninja if it weren’t for the baseball cap brim sticking out from under his cowl and the prominent brand logos on his gloves, socks, and sandals.  And of course, the yaoi paddles.

Knife jacket and oil slick reach Sullivan at the same time.  They quite nearly cut down one another when he bends backwards and limbos beneath their outstretched arms.  While those two recover, yaoi paddles takes another go at him, rectangular blades swinging fast and wide, propelled forward by far too many spins, flips and verbal sound effects.  Overall, the spectacle reminds Sullivan of a helicopter failing to take off.  Silly as it looks to him, he supposes that against any normal opponent the plethora of openings would be covered by the sheer speed of the attacks.

Sullivan toys with the trio for a little while more, luring strikes into walls and scattered statuary, catching and dropping thrown knives and shuriken, and all around letting it sink in just how little any of them can do to touch him.  Carnette had given him a whole rambling lecture once on how metaphysically interesting she found the combat style back when Anthony first developed it.  At the end of the day it all came down to believing you were cool so hard that some combination of the Autogenesis Principle and a mage’s reality warping activates, causing poorly designed weapons to become deadly and laughably bad technique to become terrifyingly effective.  Easy to underestimate and horrifically embarrassing to lose to.

Of course, it carries the glaring weakness of utterly falling apart the moment the practitioner’s confidence in his own hype is shaken.

Knife jacket’s next jab with the grim reaper tuning fork is blocked by a plain and functional stiletto catching it between the prongs.  

“Now this,” Sullivan lilts, “is a real knife.”

A mere flick of the wrist is all it takes to snap the twin cheap metal blades and force the reaper’s ornamental scythe into knife jacket’s forearm just above the wrist.  The mall ninja falls to the floor, shouting in pain and clutching the puncture wound.

“Oh spare me the tears, I didn’t even nick an artery with that one.”

That which is beneath Sullivan’s skin begins to ripple and writhe before the shout behind him of “Sneak attack!” even sounds.  By the time the square blades of “S3X-007” and “L0V-R34” swipe through empty air he’s already perched on top of the second floor bridge’s railing.  The stiletto is replaced by a curved dagger carved from bone.  Sullivan makes a show of licking the blade with a tongue suddenly grown green and forked.  He leans forward to tumble down from his perch, leaving a pair of rainbow shuriken to clatter and bounce off the railing he leaves behind.

Space twists for him again mid fall, landing him on his feet half a dozen meters from where he ought to have fallen on his face.  He reaches an arm over oil slick’s neochrome-plated shoulder from behind and rests the tip of the bone blade on the boy’s neck.

“Remind me,” Sullivan chimes, “what’s that phrase the youth today like to say in situations like this?”

“Nothing -” oil slick stammers, “nothing personal, kid.”

“Oh, but it is,” Sullivan croons.

A prick of venom and oil slick’s eyes roll back in his head as he convulses, falls to the floor and goes still.  With a tilt of his head, Sullivan gives yaoi paddles a sidelong glance.

“I do believe it is your turn.”

The last mall ninja standing lets out a high-pitched battle cry and takes a running leap toward Sullivan, giving his best impersonation of a helicopter yet.  Sullivan takes a step toward the oncoming spiral of blades and slams a palm into his chest mid spin, causing him to crumple and send the paddles skidding across the floor in opposite directions.  One of them upsets a plinth and topples a marble bust.  The black-clad youth recovers, gasps, and extends a hidden blade from his wrist.  He rears his arm back to stab at Sullivan’s and then shouts as the fingers gripping his chest dig in and sharpen into teeth.  The fingers multiply and Sullivan’s palm wraps around them, becoming a lamprey’s jawless circular mouth attached to a shiny black and boneless arm.  Eyes open where there were once knuckles and wings unfurl from where there was one a wrist as rings of teeth tear through fabric to find flesh and blood.

The shouts and struggles from Sullivan’s victim grow weaker as the few spots of exposed skin go paler.  He begins to whimper and beg.

“You really ought to consider cutting back on the salt in your diet,” Sullivan responds with a smirk.  “Your electrolyte levels are simply atrocious.  Ruins the taste.”

The bang of the gunshot is loud enough that the echoes continue for the several seconds that Sullivan subsequently spends staring at knife jacket in disapproval.  He’s managed to stagger to his feet and is now aiming a pistol engraved and painted with flaming skulls at Sullivan in a shaky one-handed grip.  Sullivan tsks.

“Don’t you know it’s poor form to bring a gun to a knife fight?  I’ve half a mind to have a word with Anthony about his students’ etiquette after the rest of my business here is done.”  He lowers his victim down to the ground and a bullet bites into his shoulder.  “Rude,” he says flatly.

His arm is human again upon standing up.  He takes a step toward knife jacket.  The next bullet breaks the glass in an empty storefront behind him.  Knife jacket begins backing away, eyes wide.  Another step.  This bullet hits just below the knee, tearing a hole in Sullivan’s slacks.  He does not stumble, and no blood leaks from the wound that is presumably hidden by the fabric.  Another step.

“Get back monster!” knife jacket shouts.  

One of the next four bullets manages to clip Sullivan’s shoulder near where the first one hit.  Another step

“ ‘Get back monster?’ Is that really the best you can come up with?”

Another step.  Between the ripped fabric of ripped puffy white shirtsleeve the wound is visible.  Something dark and not blood emerges and pulls the skin shut and seamless.  That which was glimpsed beneath the skin ripples and writhes.

Another step and the meters between them are crossed in a singular motion.  Skin settles, a foot hooks around an ankle and pulls, a body falls, a hand grabs a wrist, and a forehead presses itself to the hot barrel of a gun.  Sullivan’s other hand drops three bullets and a roll of bandages into knife jacket’s lap.  

He leans down closer still and says in a chipper voice just above a whisper, “Patch yourself and yaoi paddles over there up before the two of you bleed out.”  He moves his other hand to cup over the finger still on the trigger.  “And when you see Anthony later, tell him that he owes Sullivan Bridgewood new clothes.”

The hand begins to squeeze.

*******

“I tell you Eustace,” Sullivan says over the chiming of a store bell, “kids these days have no respect for their elders.”

“Maybe if you tried looking your age it would go better for you,” chuckles the balding, liver-spotted man behind the converted boutique’s counter.  “How have you been my man?  I haven’t seen you since the wedding.”

“Oh, you know how it is Eustace; several years of marital bliss all too soon followed by heartrending bereavement.”

For a lingering moment the boutique is silent save for the muffled music leaking in from the mall outside and the hum of stark white fluorescent lights doing their best to remove every shadow from every surface of every grey-and-white chequered floor, wall, and item of decor.

“Gods,” Eustace snorts, “I see your sense of humor is as wretched as ever.  So what is it this time?  Tried partying the bereavement away too hard and woke up in bed with a mob boss’s spouse again?  Kill an offworld prince on vacation?  Or is tax evasion and fraud more your game these days?”

Sullivan clasps a hand over his heart should be with an exaggerated gasp.  “You wound me, Eustace.  I’ll have you know I remain steadfast in my loyalty to my dearly departed wife, no matter how many old flings dream otherwise.  Can’t a man simply drop by to see how an old acquaintance is doing?”

The old man gives a short, hard, single syllable of a laugh.  “The day you make a friendly visit without an ulterior motive is the day the Veil falls.  So what’ll be, eh?  I figure you can afford the full deluxe suite with your dead wife’s money.  Soulbound pocket dimension, with luxury accommodations, self-sustaining fishery and gardens, complete with constructs to wait on you hand and foot while you wait for trouble to blow over.”

“Still trying to resell that one, are you Eustace?”  Sullivan shakes his head.  “No, I’m afraid I’m not in the market for that kind of purchase today, if you take my meaning.”

“No.  I don’t think I do.  And I don’t think I care to.”

“Oh come now, Eustace.  Surely you must remember.  Lachlan Whelan?  Little gnomish looking man about yay tall?  Hunched back?  Technically human but autogenesis did a number on him, the poor sod.  Twitchy and smelling of ammonia and bromine?  Probably in fear for his life?  Would have been in the last couple weeks.”

“Absolutely not.”

“Eustace, Eustace, Eustace,” Sullivan purrs as he leans on the counter, “I thought we had an understanding.”  Face-to-face this close, the waxy sheen on the safehouse broker’s skin is far more apparent.  As is the fact he never blinks.

“Being a repeat customer and referring my services does not entitle you to information on my other clients.”  Eustace says sharply.  “If anything, you’re the one who owes me by this point.”

“Not even just this once, Eustace?”

“No!  Half my business is staked on my reputation for discretion.  If I lose that I lose everything.”  The creeping anger in his voice is at odds with the calm expression still on his face.  Sullivan hums with amusement at that.

“Oh, I know that quite well.  Like I said, we have an understanding, don’t we Eustace?”  Sullivan leans in closer.  “And understanding like that goes both ways now, does it not?  I know how your profession works, and you know how mine works.”

“Threats now?”  Eustace scoffs.  “If you understood me half as well as you say you do you’d realize that this isn’t even my real body.  There’s nothing you can do here that can hurt me in a way that matters.”

“That’s quite the interesting theory you have there,” Sullivan lilts.  “I’m sure my dearly departed wife would have quite a few things to say about that.  Eh, Eusta-”

“Enough!”  Eustace slams the counter, failing to make Sullivan flinch.  “Yes, that’s my bloody name, you don’t have to keep saying it over and over.  Do you think you’re being endearing?  Gods!  I swear you get creepier every time you darken my doorstep.  Now get out.. of… my… shop…”  His voice goes low as the words trail off in dawning realization.

Sullivan’s ever-present smirk grows a degree wider.

“It’s true, isn’t it?” Eustace stammers, “What they say she did to you.”

The smirk shows teeth.  Even through the wax figure proxy body, Eustace shivers.

“Who was it?  A hex witch?  A contract demon?  Some poor fairy that just wanted a Name of its own?”

A tongue slithers out from between the teeth and traces the smirk’s outline.

“Just a scumbag sorcerer with a passing fair grasp of nominal magic,” Sullivan answers, “the sort that no one will mourn his passing and at least a few will celebrate.  I’d say I even did a good deed removing him, but the truth is I was just handed the leftovers after associates of mine had thoroughly dealt with him.”

“And I thought you were a soulless snake before.  Fine!”  Eustace retrieves a notepad from a drawer, slaps it on the countertop and begins scratching it hard enough with a pen to be audible.  “The location of the safehouse I sold Lachlan Whelan,” he says as he rips off the top page, flips it face down, and slides it over.  “It’ll burn as soon as you read it, so memorize it the first time.  Now get out of my shop and don’t come back!”

Sullivan takes the paper, holds it up, and catches the ashes in a handkerchief that he subsequently pockets.

“A pleasure doing business with you, as always,” he says, pushing off of the counter.  Halfway to the door he spins around on his heel and adds  “By the by, if it eases your conscience any I’m actually going to save dear mister Whelan’s life.  This is one of my friend’s jobs, not one of mine.”

“It’s for Road?”

“Have I ever been known to have another?”

“Seven hells, man!  You could have just opened with that and I would have handed the damn address over.”

“Oh, I know.”

“Then why the wheedling and the threats?”

Sullivan shrugs theatrically.  “I wanted to see if I could still get a rise out of you.  You should have seen your face, even through the proxy dummy.  The real thing must have been just priceless.  Did you really think that I - what? - ate people and stole their magic?  Ooohhh, out of all the wild rumors to come out of my marriage and that’s the one you jump to?  And did you really think I’d be fool enough to seriously threaten so useful a contact?”  He chuckles and shakes his head.  “Don’t ever change Eustace.”

The exhale of relief comes through the wax proxy better than Sullivan would have expected.  When Eustace speaks, the anger is still there, but it’s duller now.  “Let the door hit you on the way out.”

Sullivan gives a flourishing bow and walks out the boutique backwards, making a show of bumping into the door to open it.

A bit of showing off in front of the youth to keep his name out there, a most entertaining spot of catching up with an old contact, and directions to what should be the last step of his hunt.  All in all, not a bad trip to the mall.  Perhaps he’ll swing by the food court on his way out to see if anyone’s still selling anything esoteric or aesthetic enough to be worth eating.

<-Previous Chapter Masterpost Next Chapter->

[protokirby]

Had some bizarre dream. It was nightmare-like definitely, though it didn't feel that way during the dream. The dream was one of those kinds where I'm not one of the characters. I'm simply viewing the scenes and can't interfere with anything like it's all a movie. I call those spectator-mode dreams.

So. A bunch of pokemon characters were teleported to the digimon world. One of them discovered that if they were killed by a digimon, they gain the powers and parts of the appearance of the digimon that killed them. So one by one throughout the dream they would throw themselves in front of the first digimon they thought looked cool. I don't remember who, but someone went to be killed by a raremon. The average person may ask "why?" but to me and whichever idiot went for it, raremon looks cool as flip.

Dot from the pokemon horizons anime was there. She saw a parasimon and went "I want that". Everyone else fled in terror while Dot stood in its path. There were vibes that everyone else could detect that Dot couldn't apparently. Because that thing did not give her an instant death. There was a portion of the dream that was maybe a good 2 minutes of the sound of screaming and agony while the view was over a group of other characters, some with digimon features, some without, huddling behind something. Then after that mess was over, for some reason instead of Dot having parasimon features, she just was transformed into Bean from spore 2008. Her disappointment was immeasurable and her day was ruined.

I don't remember a lot of what else happened but later I saw that Crispin looked like he got tag teamed by these two

Crispin was whatever horrific death worth it to become the coolest digimon hybrid in the squad? Did you really need to approach these things just to look so epic? And he did look epic. For sure. Maybe I should draw it. But that is questionable behavior even under the circumstances of the dream. I did not see the death but it might have been crazier than what Dot went through except this time having the mercy of being instant and also . getting the intended change in appearance.

Ummm normally in-dream character deaths would mess me up but dreams in spectator mode don't seem to do anything with the dream continuity. So it's not too crazy I guess(?) I would still prefer the imaginary friends keep off the lawn while it looks like I'm starting to have daily nightmares. I hate that daily nightmares can be brought on by stress. Brain, why do you try to process problems in a way that starts more problems? The idea of losing more imaginary friends to the nightmares makes me feel so sick I might vomit. In fact I think I'm going to just. not sleep. Yeah. I'm not going to lose Crispin or anyone else like I lost Leon and Hop. No the fart I'm not. No way. No sleep, no nightmares. Sounds good to me.

So I'm going to stay awake until the ant-pocalypse is over and until a secret other monster of a problem gets a solution. Those are the two main things. The second thing I would rather not talk about, but the ant infestation is so bad??? One of those FARTS woke me up while trying to get vored and I grumpily and sleepily threw it across the room instead and. It is hard getting back to sleep knowing I'll inevitably be woken up by another ant on me.

I put ant poison out and all that. I'm a pacifist, but I have breaking points. After they get all that I can be free of them for a week or two but more show up after that and it feels like I can't get a break. I would be fine with the ants if only I could find a way to tell them to stay off of me and my stuff. There is no peace between me and their forces the way things are now

[sesshy380]

🧸, 🦷, 🌿, and 🦋 for the truth or dare ask!! ^^

🧸 ⇢ what's the fastest way to become your mutual?

Just start randomly chatting with me. If I don't reply right away, it's usually because I'm busy, but I will reply when I get the chance. If it's been a few days, throw me another rando message. It's entirely possible that my squirrel brain took a glance at it then got distracted and forgot (and without the notif dot, I won't think to check).

If we've been chatting on occasion, but then it's been a few days and you wanna reach out, do it! I am terrible at initiating things, because I brain tells me I am being annoying (I'm sure that's majority of the people here). If your brain does the same and keeps you from sending those rando messages to me, you're not. I have low energy days that sometimes limit my socialization, but it takes a lot for me to find someone annoying. Your competition for 'who is more annoying' is a 15yo that will walk into the room and recite John Cena speaking in Mandarin over and over and over and (that's him being mildly annoying)

🦷 ⇢ share some personal wisdom or a life hack you swear on

This one is for making mashed potatoes when you have low energy. It involves knowing ahead of time.

Figure out when your higher energy period is and get the prep work done. Peel, cube, rinse off dirt/excess starch (I do a double rinse), then put in a bowl or the pot you plan to use with cold salt water that covers and put in fridge for later. I've done mine the day before on occasion, and even had one time where something came up so it had to sit in the fridge for an extra day. I don't recommend 2 days in advance on a regular basis, but it can be stretched that far if needed (I suggest replacing the water in this instance before boiling).

When it comes to mashing, electric hand mixers work great. You get a nice creamy texture, though you can leave a few lumps if preferred.

Accidentally added too much liquid during the mashing process? If you have dry instant potato flakes, sprinkle and mix a little at a time until you get the desired consistency.

🌿 ⇢ give some advice on writer's block and low creativity

Don't beat yourself up (easier said than done, I know). Do something else for a bit. Your brain will scream on occasion to work on your stuff. Make the attempt to at least look. At one point something might just click.

Maybe you wanna write something, but it's not The Thing™. Do it. Write the randomness that appears. Get it out of your system. Maybe it's not your usual style. Maybe it's incoherent gibberish. Hide it away in a doc labeled 'Gibberish'.

Maybe you're stuck on a scene that you want to go a certain way, but the characters want to do something else. Let them. You can copy/paste everything that will still be relevant for the original plot and pick back up later.

Sometimes you get stuck trying to carry over from a previous chapter, then while cooking a grilled cheese you realize that chapter doesn't even have to be there. Don't delete it, just store it away. It might come in handy later. Sometimes that's the only reason the block existed in the first place. (That totally didn't happen to me)

🦋 ⇢ share something that has been on your heart and mind lately 

There are times I feel like I'm letting my readers down with not having any recent updates to TKB 2nd chance.

Add to it that my longfic has also become a 'I will post when I have something', and I'm afraid my longtime readers will think I've become another of those longfic authors that lost interest in their own story and will discontinue writing it.

That is absolutely, positively, not true.

I love my longfic. It's my baby. I'm just starting to get to the part where I feel some readers might start noping out. The tag is there, but it's worded in a way to avoid spoilers. The hints are also there, but I am having to consistently remind myself 'I'm writing for ME'. The end I have in mind is a bit of a cliche, and the dynamics between characters will not be any less string-board.

And I'm frustrated because I don't have anyone that I can discuss future chapter ideas with that has even a clue what's going on. It's one of those stories that you can't simply mention a character name and think you understand their dynamic with other characters, because despite being somewhat canon compliant, it's more parallel timeline with a whole different pre-history. It's the 'What if' of What-if's.

Ask Game here

[ahollowgrave]

hello i'm back. with some??? tips??? you can reblog on a whim! if you come across your own post on the dashboard, you can just reblog it again! Or you can toss it in the queue, or schedule it! you can also go into your archive and find your posts and reblog that way! if you're worried about 'spamming' then feel free to make a tag that people can block! i use 'SRB' which stands for self reblog. many people use this tag or one similar or one all their own. if you don't want to think about it at all, i highly recommend scheduling your post for a few days/hours/weeks/months out from when you first post it. this shuffles the post into your queue (if you use one) for whatever time and date you pick. you can just pick wildly, you can math it out, whatever makes you comfy and ends with your work being put back on the dashboard. also, if you don't know what the Queue or Scheduled Posts are here is a quick break down:

Some quick explanations from the Tumblr Help Desk:

Queued posts help keep your blog active by staggering posts over a period of hours or days.

Scheduling a post sends it to your queue with a specific publishing time instead of following your regular queue posting program.

(If you're using xkit I assume you know how to queue and schedule posts, so this is for the folks who don't!)

Whenever you make a post for tumblr dot com, you get a big blue button that says Post! But it also has a drop down menu! (Oooh, drop down menus!) See below:

In this menu we have the following:

In this case, we are focusing on "Add to Queue" and "Schedule." Please note that this menu is the same when you are reblogging as well! If you hit "add to queue" the post will automatically enter your queue (more on this later) but if you hit Schedule it will give you a pop up where you can pick the date and time you want a post to... post. Or reblog, in this case!

I just kind of scroll randomly on both of these menus and let it go. Once a post is Scheduled it can be found in your queue! If you already have a queue set up, the schedule post will be put between posts for the date/time you selected -- regardless of your queue rules. And you're done! You don't have to think about reblogging it yourself! In a few hours/days/weeks/months you will SRB your own post and put it back on the dashboard! And we get to see it again! Or maybe even for the first time!! A win for everyone!!!!!!!!!!!!

But Pigeon, you cry, how do I get to the queue!? No fear, my friend! The queue is but a few button clicks away. On the left hand side of the desktop you'll find these buttons! We want to click Account. This will unfold all your blogs, or just show your blog if you somehow only have one:

(Don't look at my following don't worry about it I'm fine)

Now. Your queue is set up individually for each blog! So, click the blog that you want. This will bring you to a screen like this:

I'm sure we're familiar with this screen! This is how you access your follower count, your drafts, and of course your queue. Click on queue and it will bring you to a screen that should look something like this in the middle:

Up top are our queue rules! As you can see, my queue is set to post 10 queue'd posts a day between the hours of 11am and 11pm US Central Time! (You probably see me post a lot more, this is because I have a lot of free time (sometimes) during the work day! So I am reblogging on top of the queue. Not always! But often!) These rules only apply to posts you have queue'd! But, again, this is where you Scheduled posts will show up! For example, as you can see the next post in my queue will post on Friday at 3:21 PM Central time. If I scheduled a post for Friday at 3:25 pm I would find that immediately after this post. I am not a technical writer by any means but if you didn't know how to use these features before I hope you know now! Not everyone uses the queue, in fact I think most people don't. But I love it! I mostly use mine to reblog my own stuff, for aesthetic posts, but I also toss in other people's writing and screenshots and other content all the time! I, personally, love when a post of mine gets reblogged weeks later because it was sitting in someone's queue. It's always a little bursts of notes on a screenshot or writing that I loved and it often leads to me reblogging my own stuff!! I don't want to tell anyone what to do or how to use tumblr dot come. This is a social media site and you should be having fun here! But tumblr is one of the last social media sites that does not have an algorithm to run users dashboards. It does have algorithm type things that are opt-out, and many veteran users have, so it is important to 1. Reblog things you like! No one sees your likes unless they have that feature turned on or your likes are public and they're snooping. Likes are nice and I've never scoffed at seeing one and I'm sure no one else has! But Reblogs are what get a post under more eyes, you know?

2. REBLOG YOUR OWN WORK! You can determine how often and what you reblog of your own work!!! Did you post at a 'weird' time!? Reblog it! Did it not do as 'well' as you would have liked? Reblog it! Are you just super proud of the work you did? RE! BLOG! IT!

Anyway. This is so long, but I love you and your work and I'm so glad you shared it!

hey come here

reblog your own work. reblog it as much as you want. the dashboard is chronological (mostly) so you gotta put it back out there!! ok bye

[suprcalifraglistc-blog]

 but  tip  of  the  top ,  cream  of  the  crop ,  is  mary  po.ppins  &  there  we  stop !     my  fourth  &  final  character  is  the  jewel  of  my  heart ,  mary  po.ppins  who ,  honestly ,  is  the  ultimate  Mom  Friend .     i’ve  got  influences  for  her  from  movie ,  stage  musical ,  &  even  bits  from  the  book  so  bare  with  me  &  here  we  go  with  the  info  under  the  cut !

 PRACTICALLY  PERFECT  IN  EVERY  WAY !

 known  by  all  of  us  for  her  very  long  &  hard  to  spell  word ,  her  lesson  on  what  helps  medicine  go  down ,  &  obviously  being  the  most  famed  &  perfect  nanny  in  the  world .     she  typically  blows  in  ( literally )  to  wherever  she  may  be  needed  with  a  strong  wind  from  the  east  &  will  serve  as  a  nanny  to  children  of  troubled  families .     she  teaches  lessons  important  not  just  to  the  children  but  their  parents  as  well  until  the  family  is  mended .     at  this  point  the  winds  will  change ,  coming  from  the  west ,  &  mary  will  leave  without  a  word ,  content  that  her  work  there  is  done .    mary  is  quite  the  conundrum ,  though ,  if  you  put  too  much  thought  to  her .     why ,  how ,  &  what  she  does  is  something  she  never  explains .     however ,  it’s  not  to  worry  about  because  why  you  may  not  have  an  explanation  for  it  you  can  assume  that  whatever  she  is  doing  is  the  best  possible  thing  to  be  doing .     best  thing  to  do  is  not  question  her  &  just  accept  her  it  makes  things  much  more  delightful  with  her !     

 MARY  +  PERSONALITY  :     mary  is  never  cross  nor  cruel  nor  unpleasant  in  just  about  any  fashion .     she’s  kindhearted ,  polite  at  all  times  &  any  place ,  no  nonsense  even  when  things  have  no  sense  about  them ,  rarely  judgemental ,  observant  &  attentive ,  extremely  clever ,  & ,  really ,  the  list  goes  on .     one  thing  you  can  fault  her  on  ,  however ,  is  that  she  is  quite  vain  as  she  is  quite  aware  of  how  wonderful  she  is .     she’s  whimsical  but  yet  still  very  proper  &  elegant .     she’s  a  very  refined  person  even  when  doing  things  you  wouldn’t  exactly  call  refined  such  as  dancing  atop  a  roof  with  chimney  sweeps  &  you’d  be  surprised  how  polished  she  can  still  manage  to  even  when  her  face  is  covered  in  soot .     she’s ,  as  the  measurement  on  her  personality  tape  measure  tells  her ,  practically  perfect  in  every way .     however ,  being  practically  perfect  is  not  as  effortless  as  mary  makes  it  seem .     the  hardest  part  being  that ,  as  she  says ,  “practically  perfect  people  never  let  sentiment  muddle  their  thoughts” .     mary  strays  away  from  being  sentimental  &  forming  strong  attachments .     she  knows ,  after  all ,  that  it  would  be  foolish  to  grow  sentimental  to  people  she  will  inevitably  leave  once  the  wind  changes .     due  to  this  she  rarely  gets  extremely  close  to  people .     she’ll  make  friends ,  she’s  wonderful  at  doing  that  seeing  as  she’s  delightful  to  almost  everyone ,  but  she  practically  never  opens  up  to  people  about  herself  &  strays  form  lasting  attachments  as  to  not  let  her  heart  muddle  her  mind .    

 MARY  +  MAGIC   :     as  we  know  mary  is  capable  of  some  form  of  magic .     what  the  full  extent  of  her  magic  is ,  however ,  we  don’t  know .     things  mary  has  been  shown  to  have  done  include  but  are  not  limited  to  giving  objects  sentience  (she’s  done  this  with  jane  &  michael’s  toys  & ,  in  the  stage  version ,  statues)  as  well  as  moving  objects  with  but  a  snap  of  her  fingers  (some  kinda  telekinesis  i  guess  is  what  you’d  say  that  is) ,  flying  (via  help  of  her  umbrella  usually) ,  speaking  to  animals ,  creating  solid  structures  from  clouds  (she’s  sitting  on  a  cloud  the  start  of  the  movie  &  in  step  in  time  creates  stairs  to  the  sky  from  a  smoke  stack) ,  bringing  drawings  to  life  &  going  inside  them  as  well  as  bringing  others  with  her  into  the  drawings ,   &  transporting  to  fantastical  worlds  (bit  more  of  stuff  like  that  in  the  books) .     also  one  of  the  most  wild  accounts  of  her  magic  is  (and  i’m  not  making  this  next  part  the  fuck  up)  in  the  stage  version ,  in  the  second  act .     mary  returns  to  the  banks  household  where  they  have  replaced  her  with  mr.  banks’  old  nanny ,  ms. andrews :  a  cruel  &  horrid  woman  who  threatens  to  harm  the  children  for  running  away  &  feed  them  disgusting  medicine .     mary  has  a  sort  of  nanny  face  off  with  her  & ,  without  moving  from  the  stairs ,  mary  somehow  controls  ms. andrews  to  chug  the  entire  bottle  of  her  own  disgusting  medicine .     afterwards  the  lights  go  red  as  a  large ,  human-sized  bird  cage  rises  from  the  floor  (or  comes  out  the  wall  depends  on  what  version  you’re  seeing)  with  smoke  also  coming  out  beneath  it  &  mary  controls  ms. andrews  to  go  inside  the  cage  then  the  cage  sinks  back  into  the  floor  until  it’s  gone  along  with  ms. andrews  shrieking .     again ,  mary  never  moved  from  the  stairs  during  this  she  controlled  ms. andrews  entirely  with  her  mind .     so ,  yeah ,  shit  i  guess  mary  can  physically  control  others  with  her  mind  as  well  as  fucking  ...  damn  people  to  hell ?     because  i  literally  don’t  know  what  else  you  would  call  that ?     point  is  while  mary’s  magic  is  usually  used  for  fantastical  &  fun  purposes  . . .  she  is  powerful  &  i  suggest  you  not  mess  with  her .     from  all  that  we’ve  seen  she’s  done  it  can  be  assumed  that  mary  possess  potentially  reality  warping  magic  or  something  close  to  it  &  she  has  very  good  control  over  it .

 MARY  +  ORIGINS  :     where  did  mary  come  from  &  what  is  she  are  questions  that  have  haunted  me  for  years .     she  has  family .     in  the  book  she  states  that  uncle  albert  is  her  uncle  though ,  as  many  people  refer  to  him  as  uncle  albert ,  it’s  unclear  whether  that  is  simply  many  people  refer  to  him  as  their  uncle  or  if  he’s  an  actual  relative  of  hers .     he  is  shown  to  have  some  sort  of  magic ,  though ,  as  he  floats  when  he  laughs  &  can  cause  others  to  do  the  same  & ,  in  the  book ,  he  makes  a  mention  to  mary’s  mother  saying  that  she  would  befriend  cows  which  shows  that  uncle  albert  is  close  to  her  family  &  it  suggests  that  mary’s  mother  had  magic  as  well  &  talked  to  animals .     mary  possibly  comes  from  a  line  of  people  with  magic  though  she  seems  to  be  the  most  powerful  &  in  control  of  them  all .     i’ve  read  a  description  once  on  a  disney  website  that  said  mary  was  “a  good  fairy”  yet  in  the  book  she  does  give  some  sort  of  explanation  to  her  powers  saying  that  all  children  are  born  with  magic  like  hers  but  as  they  get  older  they  lose  that  power  &  forget  about  it  but  she  simply  never  lost  hers.     in  effort  to  mesh  these  together  i’ve  come  up  with  the  idea  that ,  yes ,  all  have  magic  at  birth  but  only  the  rarest  few  can  retain  it  after  childhood  &  that ,  in  mary’s  world ,  those  people  are  what  came  to  be  known  as  faries .     those  who  have  kept  their  magic  outside  of  childhood  are  thought  to  be  faries  since  they  were  able  to  do  that .    so ,  while  she  doesn’t  directly  call  herself  it ,  mary  is  a  good  fairy .     she  also  has  a  distinct  connection  with  the  wind  as  it  seems  to  direct  where  she  goes  &  when  she  leaves  ...  i  don’t  have  anything  for  that  perhaps  it’s  just  being  her  so  in  touch  with  the  world  &  magic .     she  also  seems  to  have  been  doing  her  nannying  job  for  quite  sometime  &  has  wisdom  beyond  her  physical  age .     with  that  i’m  going  with  that  if  you  manage  to  retain  a  considerable  amount  of  your  magic  into  adulthood ,  your  lifespan  is  expanded .     not  immortal ,  but  expanded  so  that  you’re  younger  longer  as  you  age  slower .     so  who  knows  how  old  uncle  albert  is  or  if  her  mother  is  still  alive  &  how  old  she  is  &  mary  is  much  older  than  she  appears .     because  that  makes  sense  to  me  &  i  like  it .

 WHERE  I’VE  TAKEN  HER  FROM  :     after  the  story ,  &  probably  then  some .     she’s  helped  the  banks  &  gone  to  other  homes ,  wherever  the  winds  take  her ,  &  now  the  winds  have  simply  blown  her  here  &  they’re  not  changing .     therefore  mary  believes  this  is  just  where  she’s  meant  to  be  though  this  is  the  first  time  the  winds  have  simply  brought  her  somewhere  with  no  job  to  do .     with  no  charges  to  take  care  of  she’ll  still  find  her  own  things  to  keep  her  busy  but ,  for  once  in  her  life ,  she  doesn’t  quite  know  what’s  going  on .

BULLET  POINT  RECAP !

 mary  is  a  very  wonderful  person  but  she  is  a  bit  vain  bc  she  knows  it

 mary  is  “practically  perfect  in  every  way”  but  doesn’t  let  herself  grow  personally  close  to  people  nor  does  she  let  herself  get  sentimental  bc  “practically  perfect  people  never  let  sentiment  muddle  their  thoughts”

 mary’s  magic is  fucking  powerful

 like  she  possibly  has  powers  capable  of  reality  warping 

 thank  god  she  uses  these  powers  to  help  children  rather  than  like  fucking  take  over  the  world  holy  shit

 she  sent  a  woman  to  hell  yall  what  the  fuck

 mary  comes  from  a  magic  family

 everyone  is  magical  at  birth  but  you  lose  your  magic  &  forget  about  as  you  grow

 mary  did  not  lose  it  or  forget  about

 people  like  mary  who  dont  lose  their  magic  are  what  faires  are  in  mary’s  world  so  mary  is  a  sort  of  good  fairy

 when  you  dont  lose  your  magic  when  you  grow  into  an  adult  you  age  slower  making  you  younger  longer  so  mary’s  older  than  she  looks  &  has  been  nanning  probably  for  decades 

 mary  knows  she’s  supposed  to  be  here ,  as  this  is  where  she  was  taken  to  by  the  wind ,  but  doesn’t  really  get  why  there’s  no  specific  nanny  job  for  her  to  do  here .

THIS  IS  THE  END !   TIME  FOR  SHORT  HEADCANONS !

 WHAT  BERT  IS  TO  HER  :    bert  is ,  easily ,  the  closest  to  mary .     there’s  still  a  lot  he  doesn’t  know  about  her ,  as  she  does  her  best  to  keep  him  at  arm’s  length ,  but  he  does  know  her  more  than  others  &  is  who  she  spends  most  her  free  time  alongside  when  she  can .     however ,  the  more  time  she  spends  with  bert  the  more  she  finds  herself  becoming  fond  of  him ,  far  more  fond  than  she  is  of  most .     while  she  won’t  admit  it  bert   has  earned  a  special  place  in  her  heart  &  she  looks  forward  to  those  second  tuesdays  off  when  she ,  no  children  by  her  side ,  gets  to  see  him  &  spend  the  day  with  him .     she  limits  herself  to  only  those  second  tuesdays  to  have  this  personal  time  with  him ,  though ,  because  any  more  time  &  sentiment  may  just  muddle  her .

 MARY’S  NEVER  PHASED :     she’s  literally  never  shocked  or  surprised  or  lost  for  words .     there’s  only  a  few  things  that  could  possibly   be  capable  of  rendering  her  speechless .     VERY  few  things .     this  isn’t  just  because  she’s  the  most  perfect  person  alive  but  also  because  she’s  honestly  seen  &  been  put  through  some  SHIT .     she’s  a  nanny  for  troubled  families  &  not  all  those  troubles  are  limited  to  things  like  a  father  who  ignores  his  children ,  is  run  by  the  stress  of  his  job ,  &  has  no  time  for  his  family .     whatever  mary  is ,  she  is  surely  a  saving  guardian  angel  to  some  children  out  there  who  she’s  been  to .

 MORE  POSSIBLY  COMING  LATER !