#really gets her grooving

[epickiya722]

I just think Ashido's fight song would be "Evacuate the Dancefloor".

[wantonlywindswept]

10/10 fox day: forgotten fox bit

to celebrate fox day you get more of the next section of the forgotten fox au, which contains...zero fox actually present x_X

i am trying okay

---

Bucket, for the crimes of having an excellent sabacc face and a hip that seized up when moving any faster than a light jog, was often stuck manning the Guard HQ front desk.

They didn't get too many natborns coming through these days, at least, now that the CSF were forced to do their own jobs and had taken over guarding the prison. The Guard was back to being a protective, high-level military force instead of doing all the domestic policing and drudgework they'd been relegated to. They were still beholden to the Senate, but things had gotten better since Palpatine died and Organa took office, even if some of the Dome's denizens still saw them as little better than droids.

So Bucket didn't have to deal with that at least--he could, he got his name from being able to fit his demeanor to whatever the situation needed it, swapping faces like you could swap a helmet--but he did still have to deal with the regular comers and goers. Thankfully, that was mostly clones, plus the new addition of the pack of Jedi healers that descended on medbay once a week.

Interesting bunch, the Jedi. A lot more personable than Bucket had thought they would be. Surprisingly calm up until you admitted to using a soldering torch to close an acute laceration. 

(It wasn't even a recent injury--it happened so long ago that it was already healed. But now Master Nema gave Bucket the stink eye whenever she saw him, like she was trying to determine how medically stupid he'd been in her absence.)

"--figure what they were going on about?"

Bucket snapped to attention as the exterior doors slid open, a placid expression settling across his features. He turned toward the voice--only to relax when he caught sight of the visitors.

"Just something about another shift in the Force," Marshal Commander Cody said, offering Captain Rex a shrug. "It's not as bad as when Palpatine died; nobody passed out this time, at least."

"Small mercies," Commander Gree observed, bringing up the rear behind them. He had four takeout containers cradled in one arm, and by the smell they were from the offensively good noodle cart that parked near the base of the Rotunda. Bucket took a deep, envious breath and decided he was definitely going there for latemeal.

This particular group of GAR troopers--along with Commanders Bly and Wolffe--were a familiar enough sight at Guard HQ. They didn't visit often, almost eternally deployed to the front lines, but whenever their leaves lined up they usually made an appearance. Bucket had never seen all five together at once, but maybe that would change now that the war was over and battalions were being called back to Coruscant.

"Commanders, Captain," he greeted, standing up behind the counter to salute. His second for the day, Kelari, hastily copied the action. 

Cody waved the formality away with the sign for 'at ease', nodding at the two of them in turn.

"Sergeant Bucket," he greeted. "And I don't think I know..?"

"Private Kelari, sir!" Kelari chirped. She was still painfully shiny, wide-eyed and awestruck as she stared up at the Marshal Commander, and Bucket allowed the gaping with fond indulgence. 

She was one of their most recent acquisitions, part of a squadron that arrived after the death of the Chancellor. The group didn't have any direct experience with the war or the suffering that came with it, and the entire Guard were doing their damndest to make sure they never would.

"Private Kelari," Cody acknowledged, one side of his mouth ticking up. "Good to meet you."

Kelari beamed; Bucket shooed her away so he could get back in front of the security screens. 

"The Jedi up to shenanigans again?" he asked as he pulled up the admittance forms. 

Rex sighed, heavily, and Cody shot him an amused look.

"Let's just say," Gree said, "That it will be nice to avoid more half-coherent explanations on how the Force works in the future."

Bucket snorted, starting to fill out the usual info. The Guard never got a Jedi--and with the reveal of Palpatine being a Sith, they now knew why--but he had to admit he was glad they never needed to deal with the often-inexplicable Jedi tendency to rely so much on some invisible cosmic power.

"Captain CT-7567," he recited idly as his fingers flicked across the keys, "Commander CC-2224, and Commander CC-1004, here to see Commander--"

Bucket blinked at the 'reason for visit' box. 

This batch of clones had been visiting the entire war, either by themselves or together, whenever their rare leave allowed. They came often enough that if Bucket wasn't the one that would suffer the datawork hassle later, he would have just waved them on through. 

He was familiar enough with them to know that Cody's infamous scar came from a sparring accident, that Gree had three half-finished xenobiology research papers that he hoped to someday publish, and that Rex had been forcibly adopted by the CC clones without being allowed any input in the matter. He knew that Wolffe had three implanted teeth from multiple attempts at biting trainers through their armor as a cadet, and that Bly sometimes mixed up his letters and numbers and had almost been decommissioned as a result.

And Bucket had no idea what to put in the box.

He slowly lifted his gaze from the half-finished form to meet Cody's eyes. 

Missing memories weren't that uncommon, in the Guard, but as Bucket watched confusion steal across Cody's face--as that confusion shifted into rising unease and panicked alarm--he didn't think it was just a Guard problem, anymore.

[buttercup-art]

AAAAAAAAAHHHHHHHH OMG OMG OMG-

[frankenfartstein]

cowgirl liz + vic

[tres-fidelis]

((I really really really REALLY have been craving some threads with Jayden going into the Metaverse for the first time. Or just her generally getting used to Mementos and her newly acquired powers and dealing with her Persona. The itch has been VERY STRONG LATELY!!!))

[cosmicsgrove]

you know what while i'm in the mood to post for like the first time ever, take some art i did like a month+ ago!

[poorlydrawnwhispangle]

So i was gonna finish the drawing for Tangle's birthday but just due to recent adjustments on new medication and stuff i only had the energy to sketch and write a bit. most of my mental energy can write at the moment tbh and while i would be happy about that the current fic im writing is not a birthday fic and is actually a whispangle comfort fic related to the metal virus 💀 happy birthday tangle! a plushie from your partner, cake, and nightmares related to your virus trauma!

(wont count this as a day because it's an overall mess akjdhfksjgf)

[arvoze]

do the beast dungeon protags have names? I noticed you only tag them by their species (I want to know more about them smiles)

unfortunately I took this and ran with it as a summary instead of "yeah this is their names"

yes! well, half and half. sudowoodo is quite literally just called sudowoodo, but the nuzleaf is called locke! every now and then, some of my pokemon just don't receive names, because nothing seems to fit in my head (and I like to think that some pokemon just don't feel obligated to go by any particular name). locke is named after, well, i'm sure you can figure that out (nuzlockes LOL)

their team is called "two guys", cuz they're two guys. despite this, they'll eventually recruit fries (zigzagoon, she/her), unnamed veluza (might just be called veluza, undetermined pronouns) & unnamed geodude (she/her). they rarely work as a full team (locke fucking hates everybody), they're more of just A Group (the "team" is still sudolocke, others just tag along or split off). they all live in the same kind of vicinity and all have a similar life goal/interest: some kind of life involving pursuing... flower maintenance. of some kind.

the above is primarily sudowoodo's dream. he wants to find a legendary seed and grow a legendary tree/flower, and deal with everything else along the way; he doesn't go into dungeons to rescue people (that's a plus), he's solely focused on his own personal task. locke has absolutely no goals and aspirations, originally sticking around sudowoodo after hearing about his goals because he thought it was *so* stupid, that he just had to be there to watch sudowoodo fail (in actuality, he had absolutely nothing going on in his life. it's true he followed sudowoodo just to mock him and piss him off, but locke ended up becoming genuinely attached, fully taking on sudowoodo's dream as his own. though he would never admit to any of this to anyone other than sudowoodo lol)

the pair are yaoiful in a situationship kind of way. like they're in love but they're uncertain about it and neither of them would necessarily call eachother boyfriends/say "i love you" all that often if at all/so on so forth. everyone around them just assumes they've got something weird going on. genuinely have no idea how to describe how these two feel about eachother LMAO

(fries just thinks a place full of flowers is Cool, veluza would like a chill place to finally relax that will also be considerate of fish mons, geodude herself has plants and moss growing on her head so seeing other mons dedicate their time towards nurturing a space like this has her wanting to get involved as much as possible; this curated space is like a home to all five of them. the intent is for it to be a pretty decently-sized place they'll all come to manage, kind of eventually becoming like a flower garden/nature reserve/all that)

unfortunately things turn a bit south when sudowoodo & locke end up in silverwood tangle (forest), a wrong place wrong time situation. this becomes the introduction of beast dungeons themselves (mystery dungeons helmed by ultra beasts). this is where the meat of everything begins which i won't get into here because i've already rambled overtime but SHDHDGSGF i know people are typically around for VV and not DC:BD (bluesky feed numbers are a big tell of this), but they're my silly guys and i like em :-]

[gentle-hero-blog]

hrrmmmn. it/its pronouns for computer Adam and he/him for human Adam as a treat for meeeeee

[bluefuecoco]

finished my snorunt hunt after FOREVER (but luckily no more phases).

My tinkatuff hunt went MUCH quicker. Sub 60 find

SHE IS SO SMALL!!!!! WHO ALLOWED YOU TO BE THAT SMALL!!!

[micrathene-w]

He reaches out, but doesn't touch until I nod permission. His hands move over our child are so gently.

"Fork sea lions, you look beautiful," he says, lifting those hands away slowly.

I feel the need to head off any possible return to flirting. "Felix, I'm guessing Felicia already told you, but -"

"The new girlfriend?" he interrupts. But as I told Malia, he doesn't look at all offended. "Yeah, she did. Gotta say, I wasn't expecting that one. I'm happy for you, though!"

[faebriel]

hgs brainrot has returned due to tbosas .. speaking of hgs here’s an ask abt the hgs au: if things were totally different, and Wilbur were to be a 12 victor, what do you think a possible mentor-tribute dynamic would look like between him & Niki? I feel like it would be similar to Snow & Lucy in the way that he’s just going out of his way to cheat n help her

anon u have in fact struck jackpot because this is a concept i was spinning some thoughts abt before bee mentioned avoxes and we went OOOOH at that!!! so yes i have considered rainduo as a mentor-tribute dynamic and would love to talk about that concept too :]

so for this concept i think wilbur and niki would be close friends throughout childhood from 12, and then in their teens wilbur is reaped and, well, no one has particularly high hopes (he's a writer and a musician at heart, not a fighter) but through sheer trickery and dumb luck, he makes it to the end of the games. wilbur pulled some pretty fucked up tricks to win - when you can't use brute force, you have to use your brain - and partly due to the trauma of the games, partly due to his shame and survivor's guilt, he sinks into the capitol and relishes a new life there as a socialite. to him, the old wilbur died in the games and the new one has taken his place - to niki, and to his other friends in 12, whatever the games did to him made him into every vapid heartless capitol victor there is.

or. niki has her doubts. they all saw how horrible the games were, but surely there is some part of him left, some part that's hurting, even if it's buried deep?

anyway.

like og spin of the au, niki is reaped and this sucks - this time she does expect wilbur as her mentor on the train, and she expects some kind of warm welcome (maybe even an apology for leaving them so suddenly and silently? an explanation?) but she gets jack shit. wilbur is jaded and cruel and unrecognisable and niki entirely hates it. this is the part where i REALLY WISH we got some time of those two beefing with each other directly in canon (or at least interactions while niki was So Mad at him) but it's okay we fly blind. niki feels abandoned, lonely, thrown off of her kilter - she expected an ally in this place, but she doesn't recognise the person wilbur has become. she doesn't recognise his shallowness (...much), his ruthless advice for the arena, the way he doesn't seem to care for anything. she's scared and now she's lonely and it pisses her off - their mentorship is fraught. here are some thoughts from discord on that:

i tend to think of niki as a bit naïve before l'manberg or even doomsday - i think this is an au where this streak would come out real strong, and niki is stubborn that she can get through the games without losing herself. stubborn that she can stop things, that she can protect people. i don't think wilbur is cold enough (or, really, can bear to say aloud) to say that her odds in the arena are slim enough as it is, but he definitely tells her that she's making enemies and that her odds of survival dwindle with the more trouble she causes.

beyond that... hm. niki's trust in wilbur is almost unshakeable until nov 16, even when she outright says she doesn't recognise him anymore. i think she'd reluctantly listen re: don't burn down any buildings, but she would grow bolder each day she had to stay in the capitol. she gets more honest in front of the cameras. she makes more friends in training, and not the ones wilbur recommends. she throws barbs at him every time he makes one of those callous, cold-hearted comments about other tributes and rankings and odds. and besides, she's going in the arena this time, not him. she needs to practice her bravery.

it's like... she hasn't given up on him. she thinks the old wilbur is in there somewhere. (she is wrong. that is not how trauma works.) but she won't hold her tongue just because she

for extra angst points could definitely play up the whole 'feeling abandoned' angle between them as niki goes into the arena - probably due to how fraught their friendship gets leading up to the games. niki wants to focus on them and their friendship, wilbur has stringently cut off (almost) everything from 12 and refuses to let her in; he tells her to behave for the cameras, she tells him she never will. i think the last point in that screenshot would also make for a super tasty argument where niki feels wilbur has gone astray, that he's abandoned 12, and that he'll probably do nothing but sit on his ass and watch her die and he can't even bring himself to care about her anymore, can he? just more fodder for the arena. and honestly, i think wilbur would passively agree with most of that - he values niki's opinion, after all, even now, and if she says he's rapidly descending into a lost cause then she must be right. and it's niki, so she will be fine, and he goes to his bedroom that night and tries to pretend he is sleeping perfectly fine instead of feeling paralysed with fear.

okay now onto the games - YES HE SO WOULD. or at least i think he would go out of his way to help. as for cheating - he's a recent victor for 12 and i think he would value tommy (no doubt a link to him... i think they'd be in touch in this au also) too much to risk the punishment falling onto him as well. i get the vibes this is a games closer to 74th than 10th, so there are far fewer opportunities to cheat and the consequences of getting caught are higher. but schmoozing up sponsors? making stupid ass radio interviews or whatever to talk up niki's odds? sharing anecdotes from their childhood - some real, some entirely fabricated - across capitol airwaves to stoke their sympathy? 100%. with less to lose in this au, i think niki would be far less inclined to play nice for the cameras - i hope you starve, she spits at one of them, and wilbur appears on a talkshow two days later as she scrambles for survival in the arena to talk up how she always saved loaves from the bakery for the poorest mothers and children in 12. he borrows and begs and swindles to the point where it feels like cheating. but hey, this new wilbur is capitol-branded. he knows how to play the game.

if anything he probably sinks into the game a little too much. self-preservation is not his forte. probably wracks up a few heavy debts and favours to owe, but those are not priority until niki is out of the arena, alive. as long as she wins, and as long as the family he has isn't in danger, he will manage. wow it would suck if at some point those two goals became impossible to co-achieve. anyway

i kind of see niki's victory in the arena being similar to the one in the main au - if only because planning out an entire games is hard for meee >-< . she walks in bolder and braver for sure, and with a less strategic pick of allies, but they all get picked off and she spends a few weeks so terrified she can barely sleep and then she ruptures some fuel line and sets the arena alight with a fire that burns brighter and more ravenously than it should. but she wins, and she's airlifted out of a filthy, muddy creek she had resigned herself to die in, and wilbur barges his way through as many peacekeepers so that he can actually see her with her burnt skin and hair and unfocused eyes and trust that what was on the screens wasn't a fluke, and that they made it. and then it's just a matter of surviving the after.

i'm sure there are some other random quirks or tidbits i can think of re: this take on a c!rainduo hunger games au but these are my base thoughts!!

[hella1975]

i love when you make your environment absolutely perfect to Get Shit Done like i had a nap i ate food and made coffee i put the big light on i got in comfy clothes i made sure i was warm enough i got all my stuff out. and then executive dysfunction goes 'watch this!' and you get nothing done forever and ever

[artdumpss]

old doodles of my girl Rina that I'm still so in love with

[nachosncheezies]

Thinking about season 8 (my beloved 😍) and something in how the awkwardness and trauma and DISTANCE after resurrection was a perfect tool to keep everyone themselves. Mulder could've been overprotective, overbearing, overinvolved, borderline obnoxious about the whole pregnancy thing. I think that if he was there the whole time it would've been a very fine line to walk, story wise, to do that without taking away from Scully as an individual. Scully in the field, Scully being a rebel, Scully doing whatever the fuck she feels like. Not to say it wouldn't have been interesting if they had successfully navigated that interaction between his guilt complex/overprotectiveness and her fierce independence. But the tension between Mulder saying 'Scully no' and Scully saying 'Scully YES' and mulder saying '...okay Scully you are my partner I support you' but watching her like a damn hawk was something they had kind of resolved and moved on from after the cancer arc and esp after Emily. By taking Mulder out of the picture she was only mother henned by people she would always have said 'thank you for your concern, get rekt' to. They set her up to go through most of it without the one person she MIGHT listen to hovering beside her, and sidestepped trying to figure out who desk job Scully would be in a world where Mulder is still chasing monsters. They didn't have to figure out who monster chaser Mulder would be in a world where he wouldn't call his partner for backup when something really cool or scary was going on. Scully didn't take a desk job or play it safe. Mulder only had to go fetch her and send her home once, and it was after she had already conceded to her doctor (but then, just like we'd expect from either of them, she went back to the lab to help save her [other] partner. And he knew recognized it and recognized that this was her and said okay I'll get it done. It was good for a one-time. Probably not good for a whole season) We never had to watch them have that fight.

[inferno-silentdragon]

Quick birthday doodle for Mari : D