#she just loves him too much to feel him

[buglover77]

ACROSS THE SPIDERVERSE SPOILERS

I cannot get over how Miles is Gwen’s safe person.

Miles is so her safe person that she CANNOT SENSE HIM. Her body physically cannot register him as a threat. Her spider sense does not tell her he’s there when invisible because HER BODY CANNOT BE ON GUARD WITH HIM. GRRRRR.

She can sense him across universes when he’s in danger but she can’t sense him when he’s five feet away because his intentions are so…not malicious. And she feels so safe with him. And trusts him so completely. That she literally can’t sense him.

[datcravat]

It seems there's a new lawyer in town!!!

[wyvernity]

been thinking about the sinnohtrio lately......plus misc other stuff

also, casual ko-fi drop!! get something in this sketchy style starting at $10 woop woop

[ghost-proofbaby]

OH SAY LESS 14 WITH ASTARION PLEASE

so this is my first time publicly writing and posting astarion, so please be gentle. higher word count solely because i felt the need to add lore because, ya know, first time writing him! also, i changed the line just a tiny bit to better fit the character and scene. ALSO, uh... this is a little fade to black. i'm sorry. it just got too long.

14. "Oh, you're hard to please."

warnings: foreplay, sorta fade to black smut (it's there if you squint your eyes), an ungodly amount of pet names, mentions of past sexual abuse and healing from it, technical game spoilers, not edited, 18+ so minors do not interact

pairings: astarion x afab!reader (no pronouns used)

wc: 4.4k+

join the smutty party! send me one of these smut dialogue prompts with a character

How long had it been since Astarion had actually enjoyed sex? Craved it, even? 

If he recalls correctly, it had to have started to become tainted well over a century ago. Somewhere between the first and the third victim, when he’d realized how every single beautiful soul he had entrapped were simply being lured to their own death. And then, the sour taste left in his mouth only became more pungent the longer it went on, the more he came to the realization of just how used he felt. His body was no longer his own – it technically hadn’t been his from the very second he’d emerged from his own grave, and Cazador had been waiting for him – and everything about the act became an old rehearsed dance that he’d grit his teeth through. A chore, something to make his stomach churn, something to regret. A means to an end. 

Plainly put, it had been a while. 

But then you happened. You, who hadn’t blinked an eye when the first time you met him, he’d literally threatened you with a gods damned blade to your throat. You, who had repeatedly trusted him, even when it had been an objectively stupid thing to do. You, who had always offered him the utmost patience and genuine understanding, to the point in which if he thought about it too hard, he’d probably cry. You, who had led your group of misfits with brain worms right into victory, with plenty of personal demons defeated along the way. 

Personal demons including Cazador. 

Maybe that’s when things changed for Astarion. He’d already fallen for you before your group had reached Baldur’s Gate, he’d already gotten to know your body intimately before ever laying eyes on that ridiculously oversized brain you somehow made look easy to defeat. But that had been different, hadn’t it? He hadn’t really wanted to do that (not meant as an offense to you – certainly not after all was said and done), but had thought he needed to. To gain your trust, to gain your protection. And in the end, it turned out he never needed to do such a thing. You’d never said it outloud, probably at risk of making him feel even more regret after you’d learned all his secrets and darkest corners, but he knew. 

And knowing that you didn’t view him as something purely sexual, as a means to an end, as an item to use – well, it had the opposite effect of his request to no longer be viewed in that light. 

“What are you doing?” he says as he quickly looks up from his current book he’d been pursuing the moment you’d entered the room. He hardly cared for the words on the page – he just needed a way to pass the hours until you were available again. 

It was a hard habit to kick. Being so codependent on you, even with the end of the world resolved and the gift of safety being handed over to him on a silver platter. 

“We received mail,” you’re grinning wickedly as you hold up an embellished envelope, delicate fingers pinching the parchment as if it were the greatest gift to ever exist. He’d argue the real gift at hand was the last three months – time spent with you, in a place he can call home. But nothing could impede on your good mood as you throw yourself down on the mattress beside him, “From Withers, of all people!” 

His brows shoot up for just a moment before his face twists up with something akin to distrust, “Withers? What in the Hells does that sack of dust and bones wan-” 

“A reunion,” you cut him off, the look on your face warning enough against his attempt at an insult. “He’s reaching out to all of us to bring us together for a celebration, to check in on everyone, let us see each other again. Apparently, we were the easiest of the bunch to find.”

Astarion quickly lets out a tut as he snaps the book shut and discards it on the bedside table closest to him, “Well, we certainly need to fix that. Soon enough all of those little shits are going to end up on our doorstep, preaching about the power of friendship and how they want to check in on us.” 

You snort at that, laying flat on your back with your hair wildly spread out in a makeshift halo behind you. The sight causes something to stir within him, his gut twisting as he watches the way your knees knock together before slowly falling apart, your legs settling down as flat as the rest of your body.

He hadn’t taken you since that night at his grave. Before the epic final battle, before the two of you had made the decision to settle down somewhere for some well-earned peace and quiet. 

The moonlight dances past the open curtains, and his breath catches in his throat at the way the blue shadows dance across your skin. It almost reminds him of the first time he’d seen you fight. It hadn’t just been the blood splattered across your cheeks that had really gotten the better of his curiosity (even if that’s what he had told you when you asked), it had been the sunlight. Those rays of gold that had mingled with your own aura of warmth after you had helped the tieflings for the first time. 

You put the sun to shame, truly. And he missed it – Gods, did he miss it – but he was content to bask in the peace of night for a few months more before he finally cut you loose from the leash to begin your next phase of adventures to find him a cure. You had promised him you would, had already dedicated plenty of free time to research, and all you really needed was his word to begin. 

He’s selfish. The two of you can find a way for him to walk in the sun once more another day; all he wants right now is to bury himself in your warmth, to slot his body between your thighs, to hear every breathy gasp and the way you’d practically sing his name-

“Star?” you’re looking up at him from an awkward angle, eyes owlish and chin tilted painfully far back as you clearly await an answer to a question he’d been too lost in a daydream to overhear, “Did you hear me?” 

He clears his throat and adjusts the pillows behind his back, keeping him propped up as he admires you, “Of course I did, darling.” 

“Then what did I just say?”

“Something about how we’re absolutely not going to this reunion, yes?�� 

Your smile is nothing but patient as you flip onto your stomach. He watches the way your shorts ride up your thighs, how the top of the soft fabric bunches at your waist. His fingers practically twitch with the need to weasel their way under it, to press his cold fingertips into warm flesh and hear you preen. 

Whenever you’re ready, you had whispered to him one night shortly after saving the world. Just tell me when, and I’m yours. 

He was ready. Insatiably ready, really. 

“Very funny. I said we should go, though. It’d be nice to see everyone again, wouldn’t it? All our friends?” 

You’re still talking about this damned reunion. Astarion has half the mind to figure out a way to summon the insufferable skeleton right here, right now, and drive a dagger into his bones until he’s truly nothing but dust. Solely for the distraction. 

“Your friends, my dear,” he corrects gently, “We both know they’re only overly fond of one of us in this relationship, and it certainly isn’t the one that they repeatedly threatened to stake.” 

The furrow of your brows is impossibly cute – he knows that look of determination. It’s the same one you wore when he mentioned it was likely that the two of you would never find a cure to his condition. 

“Our friends,” you insist, “Karlach adores you, Star. And Wyll has always been proud of you, whether he told you as much or not.”

“And what of Gale?” 

Your lips twitch at that, “Gale… certainly wouldn’t stake you on sight.”

“Ah, yes,” he flourishes, trying to keep his eyes from wandering anywhere but where your hands press into your cheeks as you prop your face up to speak to him, “Not staking me. The ultimate sign of kinship.” 

Focusing is a losing battle when you roll your eyes, and he finds his mind overtaken with insatiable lust again. Imaginative ways that he could have your eyes rolling for him under different circumstances. 

“You’re not getting out of this. They are your friends just as well as mine – so argue all you want, but we’re going to the reunion.” 

“Are you sure there’s no other way I might be able to…” he pauses with intent, finally lifting one of his docile hands to your cheek, letting his finger graze the skin with a feather light touch before it travels back into the mess of your hair, “Persuade you otherwise?” 

You almost fall for it, too. Your eyes flutter shut, your head tilts into his touch as if you were starved for the connection. But even with the lack of sexual intimacy, you both know there hasn’t been a day that has gone by in the last three months where Astarion hasn’t found a way to get his hands on you.

Holding your own, resting his cheek on your shoulder, spinning you like a child in the kitchen – he had quite the sudden arsenal of romantic gestures that didn’t involve old wounds. It had been awkward here and there, some of them landing and some of them leaving you both looking like fools, but he was trying.

Almost as hard as he was currently trying to not jump your bones. 

When you recognize the innuendo for what it is, however, you harden immediately. Your shoulders set, a frown settles, and your eyes open with set determination he knows he can’t falter without speaking plainly to you. 

“No.”

“No?”

You’re quick to lift yourself up onto your knees, putting distance between yourself and his hands, “The days of weaponizing sex are over. I don’t even want to joke about that.” 

And, oh, he’s finding himself in quite the mood tonight, because as soon as you’re retracting, he’s following. As you settle on the haunches of your calves, he’s lifting up from his reclined position, leaning forward so that his face is breaths away from yours. 

“I mean it,” you warn, narrowing your eyes and holding up a finger in that small space between you two. 

He tests his luck, wasting no time in snapping his fangs just millimeters from your skin. You both know he wouldn’t actually bite you, but it still humors him to see the way you whip your hand out of his reach. 

“Were you not the one who insisted that we ask before we bite?” you snap, and his smile only worsens. Like a cheshire cat, like a child never scorned by the world – he’s radiant and basking in the moment. 

He lets out a small hmph before saying, “You’re no fun, my dear. Come on – just play with me for a moment, won’t you?” 

Your face softens at his teasing tone, and he can see the way he’s withering away your defenses one by one. There was once a time where he’d done it with malicious intent, but this time around, it’s with nothing but good intentions. 

If you asked him, he’d go as far as to swear it on his own grave. 

“I’m sorry,” you apologize as if you’d done something wrong, and it makes more than half of his own playfulness drain from his face in absolute displeasure. Before he can so much as open his mouth to scold you about unnecessary apologies, you’re continuing on, “I just… After everything we’ve been through, it’s not something I find particularly joyous to joke about.”

What a rare thing, to have found someone to bare your soul and all your burdens to, and watch them offer to help you shoulder the weight without second thought or regret. 

He’s never met someone like you in all his years, and he might never again. 

“And if I told you I wasn’t joking?” he asks slowly, carefully, trying to choose each word with the utmost care, “I’m not weaponizing – I’m offering.” 

Whenever you’re ready. Just tell me when, and I’m yours.

He was ready. Very, desperately, sorely ready. 

The topic of the reunion is all but forgotten as you process his words, nose twitching as you decipher all that’s he laying out before you. “I want more than an offer.” 

“Excuse me?” 

He can’t help the small laugh that leaves him as he sits up properly, leaning into your space fully now with one hand pressing into the mattress just beside one of your thighs. He can feel the heat radiating from you, smell your blood rushing to your head as you try to be sensible. It’s a pitiful excuse for an internal war; all he has to do is close that conveniently small distance between your lips with his own, and you’ll have lost all sense of logic. 

“You’re…” you trail off, searching his eyes as if he holds the answer you’re currently looking for, “You’re sacred to me, Astarion. You must know that. And it will take much more than some joking offer to convince me to have sex with you when I know-”

“I’m not joking,” he’s nearly whining, letting his forehead fall forward to press to yours, “Gods, I am not joking about this. Cross my heart and hope to die again.” 

If he has to beg, he will. 

He’s spent two hundred years in an insufferable position of pure misery, pure shit, and the realization that he’s finally free has everything clicking into place. Proof of the change exists solely in the fact that he could have resorted to his tired old seduction routine from his life before to get what he wanted, but instead, he’s trying to just communicate. 

It was a novel moment. 

But he could appreciate it later, when the crotch of his pants wasn’t becoming increasingly uncomfortably tight and he wasn’t watching you closer than prey. When his stomach wasn’t so tight with desire and anticipation, just waiting for your word to indulge. 

“Do I need to beg?” he sighs, his lips brushing against yours ever so slightly from proximity. He catches the shiver that runs up your spine. “We both know I’m not particularly fond of it, but if I have to get on my knees for you- well, actually, that’s the entire point of what I’m asking.” 

You laugh at that, and his gut twists again, because it’s the most beautiful sound he’s ever had the opportunity to hear. Something more breath than any vocality, something sharp and spelling out the loss of words on your tongue. 

Your silence is enough for him to push it all a step further. Forehead still leaning against yours, he properly presses his lips to yours this time, slotting them between softer than a feather’s caress. Finding home as he can physically feel himself steal your breath away. His fangs just barely nip your bottom lip, unintentionally but still eliciting a delicious reaction of a gasp that makes him graze you a second time just to feel the way you’re leaning into him more, becoming absolute putty in his hands. Pliable for his taking, and Gods, he wants to take you. 

Something snaps. 

All hesitation has vanished as he grabs at your hips quickly, making use of the way your brain has gone blank from a simple kiss in order to lay you out below him. He moves you with ease, incredible speed in slotting himself between your legs before he’s caging your entire body in with his own. The squeak that leaves your lips from his manhandling affects him even more than your gasps had, a low growl shaking his chest as he kisses you deeper. Tasting, begging, searching – he wants this, but he needs to know that you want this just as badly. 

Your hands find purchase on each of his shoulders, squeezing tightly as if needing something to tether yourself to. You pull him in closer for a second, eagerly returning the kiss, almost feverish in the way you drink him in. But the next, you’re pushing him away, a game of want and sensibility still clouding your judgment impossibly. 

You always were stubborn about things like morals. And, well, it wasn’t very moral to just jump right into sex with your traumatized boyfriend who had explicitly said not to view him in terms of sex, was it? 

It was Astarion’s own damn fault. 

He could have just acted like a normal person, initiated a normal conversation in which he renegotiated his boundaries. But you’ve been on his mind all day, and he’s long since proven since the very day that you met him that he has little to none impulse control. 

“My, my,” he murmurs, pulling back from the kiss, eyes wild, looking at you with even more hunger than he had the first night you’d given him a taste of your blood in camp, “You’re just an impossible thing to please, aren’t you? Do you want me near, do you want me far? Tell me, my love, what do you want?” 

He settles all his weight onto one of his forearms as the other slowly brings his hand to your side, caressing over the soft fabric of your shirt – a shirt he’s quickly realizing is actually his own. He recognizes those flowy sleeves, that lacing across the chest, the off-white tone that had seen better days. Given all its wear and tear, he’s almost sure that it’s one of his shirts he had grown most comfortable wearing during the nights of your adventures against the Netherbrain. 

It’s cute. A sort of domesticity that he can ponder over later, when your legs aren’t hanging on his hips and your breaths aren’t coming out staccato as he hovers just out of reach from you. 

“I want whatever you want,” you whisper. Your eyes flutter open, looking at him with pupils so dilated they could swallow him whole. 

“Let me be very clear, then,” he hums, cold fingers creeping their way to the hem of the shirt, slipping beneath with practiced ease to find the smooth skin of your hips below. They dance and skitter up, up, up until he’s brushing against your ribs, “I want you. I want that warm cunt of yours, I want to feel every gasp and breath as your walls squeeze around me. I want to fuck you until you’re unable to walk on your own two legs, until you can only remember my name. I want to watch you come undone, my dear, and for it to be my own undoing.”

Your lips quiver in anticipation, and he feels your thighs tighten their hold on him, “Such pretty words. And… and no ulterior motives? No sense of obligation?” 

“None at all,” he smiles, a predator closing in on his prey, “I’m choosing this. If you want it, if you’ll have me, then I’m ready, pet.” 

Pet. The nickname rolls off his tongue, and he can imagine your walls fluttering just as your eyes do. 

Your hands lift from his shoulders to bury in his hair instead. One cradling the back of his head, the other resting on the nape of his neck as you toy with a snowy curl. It unfurls him further, has him humming lowly as he dips down to recapture your lips and bring you into him even closer. Closer. He needs all and any space between the two of you to become nonexistent. To feel every inch of your skin pressed to his, to allow you to physically curl up into his chest just as you had his mind all those moons ago, to make a home in a room with your name on it already somewhere between his third and fourth rib. 

“Do you really have to doubt if I’ll have you, my love?” you mutter against his mouth, smile breaking the kiss momentarily before he’s back with a vengeance. You don’t care – you’re apparently in a chatty mood, dodging his kiss to get your last words in, “There’s been a space in my heart for you since the moment I first met yo-”

“Yes, yes, very romantic,” he interrupts urgently, suddenly tugging your shirt up, “But, truth be told, love? I’m hoping there’s a space between your legs for me at this moment.” 

You snort, eyes pinched shut as you attempt to shake your head at the ridiculousness of the words that just left his mouth. At any other moment, you might point out how the outrageous comment is just another defense mechanism, veering him away from having to acknowledge the gentle sentiment behind your own words, but now’s not the time. When you open your mouth, probably to say something exactly along those lines, he rolls his hips down against yours, pinning your lower half deep into the mattress. You feel just how hard he is through his trousers – it’s impossible to miss, but he’s deliberating being sure that you feel it as he lets the tips of his fangs sink into your bottom lip. 

The resolve of fighting against his wishes is quickly dissolved. One thing after another, and Astarion has you bare beneath him before any other distractions or annoying conversation can send the two of you further off track. Your, his, shirt is tossed to one side of the room. Your parents fly to the other side of the bed. Only once he has the entire spanse of your body nude and vulnerable to him does he take the time to pause, to look down at you with absolute adoration. 

“Gods, you’re beautiful.” 

He’s said those words to you a million times before. Consistently greeting you with them, muttering them in the dead of night, whispering them as he kisses you awake. But they never lose their weight. And certainly not now, as he’s looking down at you like it’s the first time he’s ever seen that freckle on your chest or the curve of your stomach barren before him. 

“Please, if you’re comfortable with it…” you start, voice laced with desperation, but he shakes his head. 

He’s full of interruptions tonight, “Consider me comfortable with anything unless stated otherwise for this moment, my sweet.” 

“Take off your clothes, Astarion.”

His giddy smile should annoy you. That smug satisfaction in finally, finally getting his way as he undresses himself at almost twice the speed that he had stripped you. And yet he knows you’re enjoying yourself just as much as he is. You’re reveling in drinking in the bare caricatures of his body, every inch and every curve exposed to you just as you are to him. And when his cool skin meets yours again, his body sinking right into that space between your thighs that you’ve granted to him, you let out a short gasp that reminds him that you want this just as badly as he does.

You’ve waited just as long as he has. 

It almost mirrors that night on his grave. The slow descent of his body against yours, the way he slides a leg up to spread your own even further for him as he crawls his way back home to your lips. Unlike that night, however, he isn’t taking quite as much care, his movements far faster and far more needy. 

He’s been waiting long enough. He’s denied himself long enough. 

It really doesn’t matter when the last time he had enjoyed sex had been, because all that he cares about is that here and now, in this moment with you, there’s not a trace of imperfections to taint his enjoyment. 

Cazador is dead. The brain has long since been defeated. You are both safe. 

As he sinks into your heat, the only thing on his mind is that contentment, overwhelmed with the feel and smell of just you. 

He’ll never be a slave again. Never be viewed as something to simply be used and disregarded again, if you have any say. And one day, some day, he’ll even feel the warmth of the sun again. Thanks to you.

But until that day, the warmth of your love is enough.

When you sigh his name out so delicately, jaw all but unhinging itself in bliss as your back arches in reaction to his touches, he knows he’s made the right choice. 

And he supposes he lied, in a way, earlier. 

You’re not that hard to please – not when it comes to him, at least. Not when it’s his hands trailing along your skin, not when it’s his lips and fangs nipping at every opportunity. And certainly not when it’s his name that’s being chanted like a prayer from your lips in time with every thrust, every stroke, every single movement with the sole purpose of making both of you come undone. 

Astarion no longer questions when the last time he enjoyed sex was in the aftermath of it all. With you, pressed into his side, sweaty forehead nuzzling his chest, the only thing he cares about is the next time he’ll be able to do so. 

“We’re still going to that reunion,” you murmur, half asleep, fading away from him quickly to fall into blissful unconsciousness. 

He almost doesn’t breathe in fear of disturbing you. He’ll waste the night away, laying here, still as a statue for your comfort. 

It’s no surprise when he refuses to put up a fight, instead his hand simply drawing soft stars across the back of your bare shoulder blades as he sighs, “Yes, dear. We will. Now sleep.”

“I love you.” 

The words tumble from your lips so carelessly, so easily and without hesitation, he nearly shakes you awake to hear them once more. Again and again, he needs to hear them, to be reassured that you feel for him as ardently as he does you. 

But he has the rest of your forever to hear them. So he lets you sleep, sending you away with a simple press of his lips to your temples as your breathing evens.

“And I love you, my dearest sun.”

[momentomori24]

This is the most devastating thing they could've pulled here. These aren't flashbacks. Maria was killed before she ever got to see the earth that she loved so much from afar. They never got to explore the world together the way they always wanted to.

These are fantasies. Dreams that never got fulfilled. Glimpses of everything that could've been but never was. Shadow isn't reminiscing on his past-- he's getting lost in flashes of that happy, content future him and Maria never got to have. What if I just cried.

[ryllen]

You know I am surprise Sebek that is never jealous to anyone who is close to Yuu. It is a boys school and I can imagine some have crushes on her.

[khevras]

Golden Wind/Vento Aureo Spoilers

Video Transcript

Bruno: I'll be forced to cut ties with you. A traitor stands alone on an island of isolation. Your failure will be yours and yours alone.

So recently I've decided I really wanted to rewatch golden wind after reading the rest of the parts, and since this time I wanted to give more focus to the animation, I decided to watch it in dub. As a result, when I got to this part in ep3, I realised the dub had elected to change what exactly Bruno had said, stating the words above instead.

This struck me as a bit of a wierd change until I then realised how much this moment foreshadows Fugos 'betrayal' at San Giorgio Maggiore; by having the only one not betraying the boss being the one who suffers what Bruno predicted.

I feel like this foreshadowing is honestly amazing, and also hits home at how Fugo feels later on in phf when thinking back to his actions as the pier. I feel like he really does think of his lack of movement as a failure towards Bucciarati, one he has to atone for and I think it's really interesting.

On top of that, I find it really fun how accurate Brunos words are to the situation as a whole, and I find it quite ironic that the one who suffers them isn't even betraying the boss like Bruno is describing, but rather Bruno himself.

Overall, I really like how this singular line foreshadows a moment episodes later, and how I can bring up how Fugo's opinions and feelings on the event are reflected in Bucciarati's words.

[buttercupshands]

thought about this thing for a while

it was extremely interesting to just analyze myself and get like a tier list in my head

[drenched-in-sunlight]

I know you mostly focus on the Marika/Messmer relationship in your works (which can i just say i fucking ADORE IT IT'S SO GOOD GAAAH) but i wanted to ask, what do you think of the other parent? Who do you think Messmer's (and by extension Melina's) father is and what his relationship is with him? Is it Radagon? Godfrey? A secret third option perhaps??

im glad you enjoy my work!! as for your question, i think Messmer and Melina are like... parthenogenetic offsprings?? they are born of Marika only, which is why the game groups them in as brother and sister and they are the ones inheriting everything closest and most personal to Marika.

but i don't necessarily think they know each other exist, or at least it's my personal headcanon that Melina was born after Marika shattered the Elden Ring (at which point Messmer was already stuck in LoS, so he didn't know).

i actually think Marika only split into Radagon on the eve of Liurnia war, when Messmer had already been a grown young man fighting alongside Godfrey for a while. so technically, Messmer existed before Radagon. but on paper i guess the guy could be counted as Messmer and Melina's dad? cuz he's Marika still? (ugh my head)

but imo to Messmer and Melina they don't consider him their dad (and he doesn't consider them his. i lowkey think Messmer and Radagon despise each other 😭). they only regard themselves as Marika's children. at the same time, Messmer respects and trusts Godfrey, which is the closest he'll ever regard anyone else as a father figure.

[royalarchivist]

Jaiden: Cucurucho, you have a lot of power, right?

Cucurucho: ...I don't know. Maybe.

Roier: Ah... Yes, you know, don't act like a dumbass, you have it. You have it, man. Eh?

Jaiden: Is there a way for us to protect all the Eggs? Do you know? I don't want anything to happen to the Eggs that happened to Bobby.

Cucurucho: Ha ha ha

Roier: WHAT? [Smacks Cucurucho]

Jaiden: [Bops him] Headpats.

Cucurucho: Maybe.

Jaiden: [Continues to bop him] Headpats. C'mon, I can get it out of you! Headpats! Chin scratches! Belly rubs!

Roier: [Joins Jaiden in bopping Cucurucho, chuckling and laughs]

Jaiden: Yeah? He's comin' around!

[Jaiden and Roier both laugh]

[benoitblanc]

no no you guys don't get it. the x files cancer arc was, excuse the pun, a fucking white whale of a tv plotline that would not have worked nearly as well on literally any other show. it was a complete hail mary. the writers' room nearly didn't make it happen because they were worried it would fall too deeply into soap opera territory. and on any other show, it would! but the x files is about four key things: mistrust in the government, faith in both science and the otherworldly, building a life around trauma, and the fine line between love and codependency. it is the only show where the entirety of this situation- a government experiment on an unwilling young catholic leads to a terminal illness that is counteracted by a literal scientific miracle in the eleventh hour due to her partner's refusal to accept her impending death- could both happen at all and happen well. none of the themes in the cancer arc were new to txf at all. they'd all been lurking, to some extent, in the background since the pilot. the cancer arc wasn't merely milking a left-field catastrophe for the drama, it shoved the overarching themes of the show to the front and said look. look what these people are to each other. look how impossible it is to face the darkness alone. regardless of when the plotline was conceived, it was always going to happen. it was the only way the story could have ever gone. they were always doomed from the beginning

[dent-de-leon]

How much did Caleb Widogast’s heart ache for Mollymauk? How much did he truly love Tealeaf, that he was the person to both bury him and get on his hands and knees to dig up his grave with his bare hands all these months later??

Caleb Widogast dug Molly’s grave. He was the one who dug him back up. With his bare hands, on his knees. Having no qualms about disturbing Molly's grave because, "I'm already going to hell anyway"--the implication that Caleb believes he's already damned, beyond salvation. But Mollymauk was still worth saving.

Caleb buried him with a letter, telling Molly to come find them if he wakes, daring to dream of the impossible, "The man dug his way out of a grave once, if he is to be believed...He's done it once, maybe he will do it again. Do we stay here, do we try to find...? I don't, I--I have read of miracles..." How much it tormented Caleb to have to leave Molly behind.

Several months pass. Jester offers to resurrect Caleb's own parents--the one thing he's always wanted--and he still asks her if she could bring back Mollymauk instead. Dreaming of the possibility of reunion, being the most vocal of all the Nein to push for a resurrection, "[This] could be a conversation, or a reunion." And Jester--always so earnest and full of hope--still tries to temper his expectations, to make sure he doesn't get his heart broken if Mollymauk doesn't return to them.

The Nein feeling entirely at a loss, directionless. Hopeless and heartbroken in Aeor. Jester drawing a card from Molly's tarot deck for guidance, for some bit of comfort after Lucien's coldness. It's pure luck, just chance, but the card she draws is the Magician. "The Magician. So, Molly drew this card for you, Caleb. It looks like you." Caleb seeing that, seeing himself drawn in Molly's hand, and everything falls into place.

He knows where he needs to be. "I have been trying to make sense of everything that's happened in the last few weeks--every day--and I am not seeing it. But...I know that we're supposed to go where Molly is. Otherwise, we would not have seen the things we've seen. We wouldn't be the Mighty Nein."

He dreamed of “reunion,” went all the way to Cognouza because saving Mollymauk was worth it. Always knew where this road was going to lead. "Why did we come this far, if not for this?" "But what if...? Why did we go so far, and fight so hard?" Caleb pleading with Mollymauk's caged soul again and again, begging for him to hold on, to keep fighting. He wasn't beyond hope, they could still save him. "Please don't give up. You can find your own life again. There will be time for that later."

"That wasn't me," Lucien vehemently insists, his will still trying to dominate Caleb's in this world of sheer dreams and manifestation, endless possibilities. "He's gone, and you will all die and join me." "Bullshit," Caleb says, and keeps resisting him again and again, keeps shattering his control. And he pays dearly for it. Lucien kills Caleb for his endless loyalty to Molly, for daring to still try and save him. Caleb, who breaks through Lucien's control again and again, who has the most profound effect on him and Molly when it all comes crashing down.

"He's gone. Let him go. Let it all go..." The last Eye Lucien branded him with--it appears right over Caleb's heart. Did Lucien do that just to spite him, as a way to try and shut out Molly's feelings--

Essek never knew Mollymauk in life, didn't have to grieve him after all the pain Lucien caused. But when he sees Caleb say goodbye, watches Caleb return that forehead kiss from so long ago--sees how much Caleb loves him--that's what makes Essek break down. "Essek gets up in a huff, walks about twenty feet away," storms off and cries over the unfairness of it all, over seeing Caleb and the rest of the Nein lose someone so dear to them.

Of course Caleb is the one who limps to Molly’s side in the end and casts the ritual to resurrect him. Tealeaf reeling from Greater Restoration, wakes in a daze and goes, "Oh...I was having the nicest dream..." And it's Caleb who reaches out to him--asks his name, tries to help him stay grounded. Caleb being the one to assure Kingsley that, "Well, first of all, you are among friends." The way King replies, with absolute certainty, "I know."

Caleb continually holding out a hand to Kingsley, asking him to stay. "Well, let's take him at his word. Perhaps this is your first time meeting us. It's our second time--third time--meeting you. Stick with us." Assuring him that he'll always have a place with the Nein, that Caleb is happy to have him back--whoever he comes to be. That Tealeaf will still always be theirs. "We have a habit of taking in strays." Kingsley being so easily charmed by Caleb and flirting with his Magician immediately, falling so quickly for this person who gave everything to bring him home.

It was always going to be Caleb. He didn’t stop dreaming of getting Molly back from the moment he put him in the ground. He was never going to let him go—

[limonjarritos]

If I keep quiet, my tail gets noisy!

[cankersaurus]

Toxic Yaoi

[autumnoakes]

okay but going back to zagreus and melinoë for a second... i think when they meet they're going to have a LOT to work on with each other if they're going to get along. zagreus likes to push boundaries and he doesn't like leaving things unresolved if there's something he can do about it and melinoë is a LOT like hades in so many ways (temperment and sometimes her tone in particular). they're going to get on each others' nerves. they're going to drive each other up the wall. they're going to need time to get to know each other and understand each other and they might not get the chance to during hades 2 (what with mel's task seeming pretty nonstop. i know she's a goddess but girl don't you get tired???).

[fuumiku]

Who’s taking who too lightly now? Playfighting my beloved

Rabbit Marcille and stoat Chilchuck, yay for rabbitstoat au, for no reason for funsies! This is here that I reveal humanoid monsters are my top favorite thing to draw actually. I really like centaur Marcille x satyr Chilchuck so this is kinda in the same vein~ I was gonna do weasel Chil at first but then friendo said a stoat’s personality fits him more and I said yes chief I trust you w my life. Speaking of, my own Chil stoat-sphinx design is partially inspired by said friend’s here!

Chilchuck playfighting and trying to "teach her a lesson" bc she's not taking him seriously so he pounces on her and pins her down but she's just giggling and smiling and beaming and suddenly she’s bigger too she’s not just a ball of fluff all stretched and it all makes him feel a little something. Chil wanting to get back at her for her teasing but he can’t go too hard on the threatening bc he’ll want to pounce on her one way or another if he gets too caught up in it whooops 💞 Timeless marchil staple, put that man in situations

Smaller predator x bigger prey animal is very fun, thank you lucky-fy’s dunmeshi beastars au for making me think of them that way… It adds to it I think, that sort of "well even if I do want you you’re out of reach" bc like even if the predator does manage to kill it it’d have a hard time eating it all right away and idk idk…. It’s that "No. No she’s offlimits" he says at himself bc ‘it wouldn’t work out’ even if it feels right… The sort of going against nature in both that they wouldn’t want to kill each other and that the dynamic shouldn’t be going this way around, and that despite everything pointing to how they shouldn’t be able to work out they can still make their relationship into what they want it to be. -gestures- Metaphors. Well sorta gdbdga in this AU I just think about them frolicking in the fields on sunny days then having tension once in a blue moon and that’s it lmao. "I can’t return your feelings because I’d only hurt you in the long run" "🧍‍♀️bruh be for real". Chilchuck guilt & longing meanwhile Marcille is just chilling having the time of her life, either blissfully unaware or just waiting for him to get his head out of his ass

It’s like how Chilchuck is so tall for a half-foot, within half-foot circles he has no problem being seen as very much a man and a rather well-ofd handsome one at that, but as soon as it’s with other races the dynamic is completely changed and he’s kinda stripped of that aspect of himself in social dynamics. No weasel or mouse would belittle the graveness of a stoat as a predator but wolves and foxes and hawks may laugh at them yk what I mean. Sighh sigh sigh sigh. Them. He’s her rotten soldier, her sweet cheese, her good-time boy

Making their way in the dungeon like "you see this shit Chilchuck?"