#she just lost fucking everything

[daemon-in-my-head]

Minthara:

Also Minthara:

I just can't with her dialogues, like. She goes from slurs to tadpole sexting to incredibly raw. And then there's just these conversations. Which are just a bazillion times more painful when ya know what's actually going on. Sure rip my heart apart Larian, not like I need it anyway.

This hurts so much.

'You're broken, but I decided I will fix you.' - Minthara Baenre what the hell

Also just this. Just look at this. How the fuck am I meant to be normal about this.

I just can't. Like yeah they're all tragedies in their own right but Minthy and Durge take the absolute cake (pun unintended).

I'm so sorry I'll return to normal in... let's be real probably not until 2029 or perhaps never.

[swiggity-swexual-i-am-asexual]

As per usual, it’s DP crossover with (probably) DC, although you could probably adjust it for other fandoms

ANYWAYS

A little kid and his mother are trick or treating in another city, perhaps at some kind of event rather than knocking on doors, and the kid is dressed as Phantom. It’s very adorable, with his little ghost-shaped bucket and clearly homemade and already stained costume—listen, white only works if you can just fly over street grime or phase it out of your clothes—and his slightly I’ll fitting wig. The kid is SO happy to be out and about dressed as his favorite, and maybe even showed it off to Phantom back in Amity Park before his family left.

The hero, insert whoever you wish here, is probably in civvies and just enjoying the event. The kid, meanwhile, is so glad when people ask who he is so he can explain, and so- the hero gets to hear ALL ABOUT the local town hero who is probably pretty small time despite the kid’s clearly exaggerated stories. The hero certainly never heard of him, but the kid’s mom confirms that Phantom really was the town hero, despite some mixed reviews of the poor guy.

“Did you manage to show him your costume?” the hero asks.

“Yeah! We went down to the cemetery to leave flowers and I got to show him my costume.”

Wait. Cemetery? Maybe it was part of theme, because Phantom had to be named that for a reason, but… it sounded like…

The kid ignores the suddenly VERY still hero and instead turns to his mom. “Momma, do you think we should bring him candy? He doesn’t get to trick or treat like we do, and I can work super hard to get him a bunch!”

The kid’s mom just smiles. “We could, but maybe we should bring him something homemade. I bet he’d like something more filling, teen boys like him have a hollow leg.”

The kid wrinkles his nose. “Like Vernie with the pizza bagels?”

“Like your cousin, yes. We can make some cinnamon rolls and take them to his memorial, maybe bring some of the apples from your grandpa’s garden…”

The hero is pretty much forgotten as the two-part family wanders off, not quite intentionally forgetting the hero is there so much as the hero somewhat accidentally ended the conversation when they just froze and didn’t ask anything further.

Not that the hero didn’t want to. But they’d learn something very serious.

One—there was a small town hero they’d never heard of. Two—that hero was apparently a teen. Third—most pressingly, the teen hero was both beloved enough to have kids dressing up as him and dead enough to have a grave.

This… might require some phone calls.

[star--nymph]

Vivienne's fear being 'becoming irrelevant' isn't something that's linked explicitly to her pride, no matter what Solas says about her (and the irony of Mr.Pride himself saying that should not be lost on you), it reveals what and who Vivienne truly is.

She's a survivalist.

Because we don't spend as much time in the Free Marches or Orlesian circles, we don't get to experience what being a mage is in these cultures. In Ferelden and Kirkwall, a mage is a lesser being without freedom no matter what they do--but in the Free Marches and Orlais specifically, mages are commodities that are given freedom so long as they play an entertaining enough role. They can explore the world if they have a noble patron, if they catch the right person's eye. They are, in a way, two sides of the same coin--refusing mages agency and forcing them to relay on higher powers. Vivienne lucked out, as sad as it is, when Bastion fell in love with her; she found someone who was contrarian enough to recognize her as a full person and also someone with power that could help her rise through the ranks. This is not to say that Vivienne on her own wasn't an exceedingly talented and intelligent individual--by nineteen she was already the youngest full fledged mage in Circle history and she was skilled enough to make herself an enchanter. But, I can not emphasize this enough, none of that matters if she didn't also play the Game and impress enough people.

Vivienne could have been the most brilliant mage in the history of Thedas and it means nothing if she was overlooked by nobility.

So when Bastion made her his mistress, she gained not just a lover but also a means to an end. Now she can use her magic to protect herself. Now she can roam where she wants and not be question for it because she's Madame Vivienne. Now, she can walk into the Orlasian court and belong there.

And what happens? Celene notices her and makes her the Court Enchanter, a position that has always been the equivalent of a jester. Vivienne took that title, ignored that it was essentially a glorified insult to who she is, and made it a position of power. She made the Court Enchanter into an advisor, a political rank. She had done the impossible and made mages an actual political entity in the Orlasian Court, something that wasn't seen outside of Tervinter (not counting what players can do under very specific conditions if they made mages in DAO and DA2).

All that, however, only continues as long as the court recognizes her as something worth their attention. Vivienne needs to maintain her act as Madame De Fer, The Lady of Iron, the Court Enchanter, The Jewel of the High Court, because the second she just becomes Vivienne, it's over for her. The assassins coming raining in, her name gets devoured by rumors and gossip, and she'll be found dead at bottom of the stair case with a dagger in her back if she's lucky.

So of course when the Circles fall apart during the Rebellion, she clings to that Loyalist Mages to maintain that structure--of course she moves her pieces to the Inquisition, knowing that if the Circle DOES fall, she at least as another place for herself and mages latch onto--of course when she hears that Celene replaced her with a new Court Enchanter that appeared out of no where, she grows to resent Morrigan.

Like, Morrigan literally pops up out of thin air, makes herself invaluable to Celene, and then plants herself in the place Vivienne had to claw her way up to and create so she could survive. Would you not be resentful when your life's work is usurped by some random witch of the wilds because she happened to charm the Empress? Everything Vivienne strived for all whisked away because the court find a gem who glimmers ever so slightly more than Vivienne.

So yes, Vivienne fears becoming irrelevant because the world has made it so that irrelevance for an Orlesian mage means death.

[khakirnelm]

i love that even though phoebe never gets to be with melody, never gets to interact with her in many ways, she will now forever do so in every way. phoebe will look up at the sky and see melody in the sun and the stars and the moon, see her in the clouds and the grass and the ceiling. she will bust ghosts with melody's essence etched into the proton pack and carved into her suit. she will simply be and melody will be a part of her. like, melody is now eternally attached to phoebe's foundation.

[silverislander]

smth abt the way vi is so firmly stuck in the past is driving me absolutely nuts. she can't get past jinx growing up and changing, she repeats the self-destructive patterns she was following in prison the moment she's left alone, she is literally fighting the exact same people over and over (sevika + big guy whose jaw she broke) just to hurt herself. she cannot let herself move on bc that would mean admitting that things changed

[sluckythewizard]

YOU JUST HƎARD IT FROM [HIS MOUTH] FOR SURƎ!!!

[achingly-shy]

ALSO the end of the episode when jemma is telling fitz that he’s the real hero because he was beside her the whole damn time in the lab and was giving her hope when she had none and then she kisses his cheek and walks away and he sits there smiling and then that smile slowly turns into more of a thinking contemplating oh shit face AND THEN HE KNOWS HE NEVER GOT OVER IT HE NEVER GOT OVER HER

[galactaknightyaoi]

It's my OCs' first birthday today, yippie!! They're enjoying their birthday with some tiny company and a horribly baked cake. But it's the thought that counts!

These are Pai, Aurelio, and Lizzie. They are a couple and run a diner together in the low suburbs of Halcandra. Their shop also serves as a safe space and shelter for other Star Borns just like them.

They also tend to take in the more little ones of their kind, soon after they've first formed. They look after them and teach them stuff, before letting them go to live independently. But they're always welcome back in their house! Be it for shelter, or a nice cup of coffee.

More about them under the cut. Be warned it gets kinda long.

Pai's ability is Cook. When he was little, he used to use his ability to make food to share with his whole neighborhood as a way of uniting everyone.

Since then he's been steadily building towards a goal, to open his very own Diner. He wanted to create a space for his community to thrive in, though he was severely disadvantaged in such a large city.

He's not one to give up and he always looks on the positive side of things. He tends to spoil the kids they look after with treats, and has a hard time saying no, so he often takes on more than he can handle.

He is the one that looks after the well-being of the kids, and generally, things that require a bit more... Tact. He looks after them when they're sick or injured, which is how he ends up meeting future GSA founders Arthur, Erebus, and Anansi.

Aurelio grew up in a scrapyard with 6 others of their kind, being kept there as guard dogs for the paranoid old man who owned the place. They were encouraged to fight each other for fun, which is how they got the scar across their face.

When they got too big and troublesome, most of them were kicked out of their home and left to fend for themselves.

Aurelio's Spear ability eventually landed them a job as a Knight for Halcandra's elites, where they worked alongside a few of their friends. Their job was to guard the meeting room and defend their assignment from threats.

A few years into this job, they and other soldiers were given a mission. A pair of dragons were nesting at the bottom of the Haldera Volcano, they had to get them out. Dragons are calm if not provoked, so relocation shouldn't be difficult...

As it turns out, the dragons were a mated pair. A male and a female, and they were viciously protecting their egg clutch.

In the battle against the dragons, Aurelio was injured and burned by fire, but their natural fire immunity allowed them to be one of the few survivors. Nevertheless, the Knights were successful in their mission and managed to drive the dragons out.

The 4 eggs that weren't crushed during the battle were passed off to the Ancients for research. They became the Guardian Angel Landia later on.

She was forced to retire from Knighthood at age 31. Due to the lasting effects of their injuries, Aurelio is the one who spends most of the time with the children. For better and for worse.

Because of their childhood, they have very skewed ideas of how to treat children. She'll often put them in dangerous situations unintentionally since she has no frame of reference to tell her that taking kids out to the Gator Pond isn't a very good idea.

Aurelio teaches the rougher life lessons. They've been through quite a bit, so they want the kids to learn how to defend themselves, and to be careful and not have others take advantage of them.

She does most of the disciplining and the one that gives timeouts and other such punishments. She is of the opinion that sometimes rough love is necessary to set someone straight. She's calm and loving, but a bit stuck in the old way of doing things.

Lizzie, real name Angeliz, is a 2-time college dropout who grew up upper class despite her species' disadvantage. She never had many friends growing up, since other kids didn't really like her, and resigned herself to being what her parents wanted her to be.

She tried to study medicine but quit after 2 years. Not wanting to further disappoint her parents, she went into law. Which she also hated but tried to commit to finishing despite how miserable it made her.

Meeting Pai and Aurelio helped her get through the year, but after Aurelio was injured, she quit law and started living with them. She helped Pai balance his business with taking care of Aurelio and eventually used some of the money she still had left to give Pai's Diner the little push forward it needed.

Despite the many etiquette classes she took as a child, Lizzie completely lacks social skills. She's a total disaster, especially when talking to someone she likes. Once she gets comfortable, her true personality starts to shine through.

She's a huge slob and kind of vulgar despite her cute appearance. She's easily angered and does not like to be teased, which makes putting up with bratty kids more difficult for her.

She tends to treat kids as little adults instead, which causes her to not be very mindful of their sensitivities. Even when in a good mood, trying to do her best, she always ends up saying the wrong thing and makes everything worse.

She handles the business aspect of their Diner, crunching numbers and reading over legal documents. She's really smart and knowledgeable, so she's the one who tends to teach kids reading, writing, and math.

Her ability is Bubble. She never used to like it, it was silly and useless to her, so she kept it hidden for years. After meeting her partners and becoming happy, she's started blowing bubbles more frequently. The kids love them.

[carlyraejepsans]

toriel... what are your toriel takes today

i have a headcanon that toriel has a hand-washing compulsion where she does it wayy more thoroughly than needed, instinctively trying to scrub under her claws even when they're perfectly clean because she can still feel the phantom of dirt under them from the time she dug chara's grave.

[hood-ex]

Cass looks like a vampire

Nightwing #106

[silo1013]

salvaged from the office fire in 1998

[ifyougoillfollow]

you know, we talk a lot about characters and/or relationships (of all kinds) being 'doomed by the narrative' around here, and how haunting and gut-wrenching that can be, especially when it so often takes the form of death and destruction and tragedy.

and we should keep doing that, obviously. death and destruction and tragedy kick total ass.

however. can we please spare a thought for the clowns trapped in that same (burning) room?

after all, what is a comic relief character if not doomed by the narrative to always act like a buffoon despite any and all circumstances, all for the sake of relieving narrative tension?

how must it feel, to have everyone around you dropping dead, losing limbs, losing loved ones, and otherwise being on the receiving end of unending torment - and all you can do is stand there and prattle off another zinger at your allotted time?

and what if you lose a loved one yourself, o jester mine? what if - hear me out - you lose multiple loved ones? what if it never ends? what will you do then?

well, if you're lucky, you'll get to mourn for all five of the seconds you're allowed to before the size thirty shoes go back on and the narrative moves on to other, more plot-central characters.

if you're not - well. it's a good thing clown makeup is waterproof, isn't it?

anyway, shout out to all my comedy kings out there doomed to play perpetual funnyman to their more plot-central counterparts despite being in undeniably comparable pain. you may be doomed by the narrative, but you are beloved by me <3

[bellamyblakru]

idk why but the trope where character a changes the routine or something in the daily life of character b and character b complains and gets annoyed at the new addition and then suddenly one day character a gets genuinely upset and stops doing said thing which then makes character b all ☹️wheres the thing i miss the thing but has to pretend they want it back and is only doing it for character a’s sake when we all see its just them being in love or whatever is something i fucking LOVE to see?? every time???

[wavesoutbeingtossed]

.

[onward--upward]

several sentence sunday <3

hello friends! taking a tag-back from beloved @eusuntgratie thanks bestiiieee

did you guys guess that this was gonna be challengers? congrats! it is indeed more challengers yayyy <3 you guys are gonna be so sick of me until i finally finish this tashi pov xoxo

She’d brought their sexual tension to a head on purpose, and she had assumed that they were going to act on it, once she left them to their own devices. But then they had still showed out for the final, fighting for her number like it was the only thing that fucking mattered.  It was attractive, of course it was. They were both handsome, competent guys, and Tashi had never really wanted before, not in the way that she wanted them. And she’d assumed, at the time, that the two of them must have just fucked it out the night before. Maybe they got it out of their systems, somehow. But no: her boys are fucking idiots, apparently. She’d asked Patrick about it once, way back in college, after she made him come in two seconds flat by talking about Art while he was fucking her. “Was it that good, then?” she’d asked, curious.  “Hm?” he’d tilted his head against her dorm-room pillows, oddly puppy-like. “Yeah, you rocked my world, baby.”  She’d snorted. “Thanks,” she grinned. “But no, I meant with Art.”   Patrick went unnaturally still, so much of a non-reaction that it was telling in of itself. His silence lasted a heartbeat too long. Then: “What do you mean?” His tone was forcefully light.  Tashi raised an eyebrow, doubtful. But then… no, as she was looking at him, at that familiar expression on his face, the realization had slammed into her all at once. “You’re fucking joking,” she’d said, shoving off of his chest. “You didn’t fuck him?” 

no-pressure tagging cool people if any of you have stuff you want to share xx @shitouttabuck @insecuregodcomplex @firenati0n @lemmeaskthedevil @beyourownanchor6 & anyone else !!

[soldierandawar]

hey, so, did ya'll know that the dems appealing to the white centrists has actually worked before and actually does work in most cases? did ya'll know that a lot of people who voted actually thought Kamala was too liberal? that majority of folks think she's an extreme radical? did ya'll know that? i feel like ya'll don't know that.

democrats always get heat for not appealing to the far left (rightfully so, IMO), and they will never and have never had as perfect messaging as they did with President Obama in 2008. but the far left is not and never will be a reliable base. every time they lose an office, they move even further right because...well. that's what's winning. but even in that, the Kamala Harris and Tim Walz combo is the most progressive ticket we've had since i've been able to vote, and maybe in my lifetime (though i don't have enough knowledge to make that case.). but the majority of the country lives in the center. they're more likely to catch those white centrists than they are the average leftist, no matter their campaign.

what's interesting, and I feel like most people are skipping over this, is that donald trump is winning the electoral votes and the popular vote. let that sink in for a second. do you know the last time a republican won the popular vote? in fact, he picked up voters that he lost in 2020, and why do you think that is?

i'm not saying that the democrats are perfect. you won't see or hear me praising them, ever. i've got my own beef with the party and its representatives, and there are about a thousand things they could've done better. that said, this is a big-picture situation, not a small one. Kamala Harris didn't lose just because of her stance (or non-stance) on Palestine. she didn't just lose because she didn't appeal to far left voters. she didn't just lose because of strategy. there was a national far-right swing. things are not the same as they were in 2008. people have been emboldened again. bigotry is loud and proud again. anti-trans and lgbtq bills are everywhere. they're taking important history out of schools. even if she made all the right moves and said all the right things, the race still would've been up in the air because Kamala Harris stands for everything that even the most "progressive" people don't want.