#snippets for context

[alfheimr]

the selkie sea captain and the seashell that sings a song of home.

i started this comic last year before my hand surgery and finally got around to finishing it! whew! i wanted to finish it in may because i intended this as a sort of mermay thing but now im realizing im not sure if selkies count for that. well, they do in My Heart.

[butterflyscribbles]

Adrenaline⚔️

Starting to try and puzzle piece the lore together with some in between doodles. Tang and the gang (Sandy and Pigsy) have to go rescue baby MK from Spider Queen after a surprise ambush leads her to capture him and Wukong.

These two comics lead to this point [X][X]

The aftermath [X][X]

[fearandhatred]

the rapture

it's a holy thing, in theory, a glorious celebration, where those who believe rise to meet the lord in the air. it's a day of joy, in theory, and maybe even of vindication for those who have always believed.

but no one thinks about how it's like to see the dead rise again—bodies clawing their way out of bolted wood and six feet of packed earth, bodies decomposed and maggot-feasted, nails stained with rot and dirt. no one thinks about the violent lurch of their bodies being jolted into the air by the stomach, gravity flinging their heads back down to earth as they struggle in vain to find footing on molecules and gas. no one thinks about those who don't make it.

no one thinks about the screams.

crowley hadn't thought about any of these things. he certainly hadn't thought about the angels that would be called back to heaven along with the believers.

here they stand dead in the middle of absolute ruin, the promise of heaven the only thing left to look forward to on the wasteland of this earth. the sky has opened up like the eye of god, watching over her people for the very first time, and crowley's black wings against the beams of light only remind him that he doesn't belong up there with the rest of them. crowley wraps his arms tight around aziraphale, squeezes his torso like he can maybe keep aziraphale with him through sheer will or, laughably, demonic intervention. like love could ever be enough. like love could stay.

around them, the cacophony of wails and mockingly exaltant trumpets scorch the earth in their intensity, clashing and agonising even—especially—for them, and words make no sound. but they hold on to each other, even as they shrink into themselves against the noise of the undying. i don't want to leave you either, aziraphale doesn't say, but his hands dig into the cotton of crowley's sleeve, and crowley hears the words through his fingertips.

he feels a stronger upward resistance against his embrace now, and he clings tighter, steadfast, even as aziraphale's grip falters. but he knows he can't hold on forever. he knows that nothing ever lasts.

trembling with something unspeakable, he lifts his arms from aziraphale's torso and covers the angel's ears with his hands. he feels more than hearing aziraphale's resulting sob, and he spreads out his wings to wrap them around their bodies. a shield, a comfort, a goodbye.

it's okay, the gesture says in silence. i'll see you in another lifetime.

[potionbarrel]

science team-tober day 8: misfire

(you can read the accompanying fic for today's prompt here!)

prompt list | science team-tober sideblog

[prince-liest]

Vox today: the guy who's probably fucking his secretary

Vox alive: the secretary that was getting fucked

[buddiesmutslut]

Can we be real, for a second?

People aren’t pissed bc a Buddie scene was cut during the Madney wedding episode.

People are pissed that the team used an entire scene to draw people into that episode & THEN dropped, through an actor interview a day before release, that it was cut.

They’ve been treating the song they were supposed to be singing like a state secret. Oliver was talking WEEKS ago about this episode and doing “one of the scariest things he’d ever done” on the show about the karaoke. There was subtext there & stuff in the bachelor party that was hinting more with the storyline Eddie is on.

For the last 3 weeks, they’ve been using THAT SCENE in every promo & teaser & interview to keep fans interested, and THAT’S why people are pissed.

We all know that e6 is about Madney, nobody is disputing that.

The promo team hasn’t done a very thorough job of showing us that though. They’ve showed us Buck & Eddie, & now they’re cutting (at least, inferring from what we’ve heard by the people who have already seen it) a substantial amount of that out.

THAT is why people are upset. If they hadn’t been making such a big deal about this scene being in the episode, it wouldn’t be such a big deal now that it’s been cut out.

Tell me you don’t understand context without TELLING ME you don’t understand context 🙄

[vaultureculture]

October kickstarter update info in the tags <3

[bloggerspam]

Phantom Pains - Chapter 10 Snippet

Part of Jazz’s errands around Gotham didn’t involve the GIW at all. 

She glances behind her once more, refraining from counting the shades that follow her through the city, making sure to keep her song low but insistent, almost yearning. 

Who she is now, what she’s taken up the mantle of in place of Danny, means she cannot simply live in the Realms like she so dearly wants to. 

As a halfa, as a Phantom , she has certain responsibilities she must fulfill if she wants to be left alone. 

This is one of them. 

Gotham is a cursed city. It is hardly the first to be so, and it will never be the last. 

What makes Gotham unique is simple: its curses are alive . 

Its curses live within its people, day in and day out, seeps from the gargoyles that adorn the city buildings like crowns, embedded into the very ground it sits upon, builds itself into each and every brick of each and every damned building that plants itself within the city limits. 

Gotham is a cursed city. Its people are bewitched by the nature of it: ugly and horrible and sad and dirty. 

Its people cry every night, hurt every day, repeat the cycle of violence and greed and toxicity and still, still . 

The people love their city. 

They love their city, the good and the bad and the terrible in between, and then they never leave . 

So part of Jazz’s errands around Gotham was to take them away, to take them home . 

To the Gotham that isn’t Gotham, the Bludhaven that isn’t Bludhaven. 

To the Realms. 

Read the whole chapter here.

[velvetrambles]

I'm so sorry for this

[edwards-exploit]

i'll wake up in a new life (down by the seaside)

so.... guess who's been cooking up an au!

[xxplastic-cubexx]

hi i don't have the specific comic issue, but i do have this panel (in response to charles being a screamer). enjoy.

First person who finds this issue name gets a crisp and uncomfortably-cold handshake from me

[write-it-motherfuckers]

Person A: "Are we even allowed to be in here?"

Person B: "I don't know, I stopped caring about their bullshit rules after they repaid my loyalty and devotion by framing me for their own misdeeds."

Person A: "...What if someone recognises you?"

Person B: "Recognise me? Ha! I was nothing but a faceless tool to them, I might as well have been part of the wallpaper! Honestly, I could probably walk right up to them and introduce myself with my former name and those fools still wouldn't realise it was me."

[harpieisthecarpie]

Okay not to be analysis georg over Alien Stage but I adore the ROUND 7 (Till vs Luka) art that dropped recently so much. And thus I will be analysis georg

(cw: I lightly and nonexplicitly reference the abuse Till suffered under captivity, including the heavily implied sa.

This is mostly contemplating Till's psyche, how Ivan's impact on Till contrasts the aliens, and art as rebellion against dehumanization. With that comes the possible triggers of Till's story.)

Till's closeup is what compelled me to post at all, because it's a very deliberate choice that speaks to his emotional state going in, and contrasts him strongly against Luka

This is long btw

The closeup focuses on the lower half of Till's face. It draws attention to his mouth and headset mic by mimicking a camera's depth of field to emphasize the yawning space between them, while using the metallic mic as a lure. The lighting sharpens the mic while softening Till.

The emphasis on Till's mouth (and mic) is indicative of a stark emotional shift from Round 6, where crushing hopelessness left him passive and barely singing.

Metatextually, the story being told by completely diagetic music videos ties strongly to the contrast between the aliens who've made the voices of the enslaved humans a commodity and the humans who are only given a voice through song.

There's a reason why music has been used for both propaganda and rebellion throughout our societal conflicts. You can only scream so loud before bystanders tune you out; music compels them to listen.

And I think that dichotomy between authority and autonomy, between the artist as product and as person, within the universe of Alien Stage is going to be delved a lot deeper into with 7.

Till having a hands-free mic and green strap over his shoulder leads me to believe he's going to be playing guitar again. Which we've seen him use for acts of rebellion before.

I saw someone saying the headset was a sign of his isolation, but I see it as him reviving the angry hope he'd extinguished using Ivan's memory. From what I've seen, Till never seemed happy when he had a standing or handheld mic. He's a creative, hands-on guy whose art and rebellions come from when he is able to use those hands.

Drawing, guitar, fighting... there's a reason he was singularly stripped of autonomy in ways we haven't seen happen much elsewhere (that physicality reminds me of Hyuna, I wonder if Luka will notice that). The caging, bodily restrictions, and physical degradation and assault from the aliens singularly target his personhood.

Even in the closeup art there's that possessive ownership, that clear replacement of Person with Commodity. His tears (or sweat) have been pointed out and remarked upon by the aliens. Yet the shot leaves out his eyes, which are often tied to personhood in literature because of how humanizing they are. Dilation, movement, eyelid position, blinking. It's hard to look into a creature's eyes and not understand there's a mind behind them.

The aliens commodify the emotion through his tears but deny the humanity behind them. They dissociate music as art with an artist behind it, even while intuitively knowing how an artist's lived experiences can create compelling music. The aliens want their product, they don't care that art isn't just entertainment to consume. They don't recognize the power music can have. They don't value it enough to truly understand it.

I wonder if this could be analagous to anything in the real world. Hm. Nahhhhhh. ANYWAYS

Till is creating what the aliens want, but the closeup has the same color palette as when he and Ivan were running away during the meteor shower. That shine on the mouthpiece even looks like a falling star.

The meteor shower was a moment of tension. A held breath before a breaking point: you can escape or you can stay trapped, but whatever decision you make you can't ever take it back.

It doesn't matter whether Till believes his last decision to stay was a mistake, he was a different person when Ivan took his hand. And he was changed again when Ivan kissed him before making that stage his death bed. Their death bed, perhaps, since something in Till had to die in order to be revived.

And Till is the only one in that arena who has the memory of running with Ivan under a cascade of falling stars. He is the only one those colors mean anything to. The aliens may be commodifying his tears, but they have no grasp on the emotions behind them. There is something within Till they cannot take, breathed into him by Ivan.

Ivan may have believed his love for Till was shallow, but he gave it freely. One of the reasons I even ship them is because Till has spent all his life in captivity getting pieces of himself carved out by aliens trying to consume his soul, and while Ivan can certainly be fucked up... he has always lain his insides out on a silver platter for Till. Given even the ugly bits over, despite knowing they'd be disregarded.

Till was strangled more visibly for how his humanity spilled out, but Ivan had been slowly suffocating because he refused to let them free. He accepted the role as pet (entertainment product dress-up doll) to keep his humanity safe. He played into the aliens' desires because he refused to give them any parts of himself that mattered.

But he still wanted to be seen, still needed to be known, so he gave them to Till.

And now Till is on that stage again (that had eaten Sua and Mizi and Ivan), carrying fragments of his loved ones that they had slipped into his palms. Quiet moments of joy and despair and fear and love. Bits of themselves they never allowed the aliens to have, that made a home in Till.

And what is love, surrounded by an entire society that refuses to acknowledge your humanity, other than an act of rebellion?

Which I think will be very interesting to see juxtaposed against how Luka seems to be portrayed. With an earpiece seemingly feeding him information, in the cool tones evoking a memory of Hyuna, whose closeup doesn't even deign to glance at his face.

(Though- not to overanalysis georg- it's interesting we get a glimpse at his seemingly gloved fingers. And that their color palettes are both interrupted by a small bit of green. Till's by what I think is a guitar strap, and Luka's by the center of his earpiece- and its sound.)

[cowboylikeyouu]

i have such a way with words 😍

[vinelark]

happy friday! here is a little bbts chapter 5 proof of life

When Tim comes down again his mouth is full of blood—bitten cheek—and his whole head throbs, an almost fizzy numbness flooding through his jaw in the sudden absence of pain. He struggles through another wheezing breath, wincing at the familiar sensation of torn muscles around his rib cage. “Ah,” Checkered Shirt is saying. “There does seem to be a localized paralytic effect. That last placement may have been counterintuitive; my mistake. But as we discussed, that’s the beauty of mistakes in a setting like this. The opportunity to learn from them.” Tim tips his head. Clumsily spits a mouthful of blood on the metal floor—evidence, he thinks hazily, if he moves me—and finds his tongue. “Funny how you still haven’t gotten what you want,” he half-slurs, “considering how many opportunities you keep having.”

[redroomreflections]

Paint It Black Snippet

Note: I think a small scene from a chapter leading up to the story being halfway finished and posted is fun. If you don't want to know or see skip this. I just like having stuff available on tumblr and not Google Docs.

Another note: It won't be another WIP I post and abandon I promise. It will be finished and fleshed out before I truly post. I just like to share my writing with people. I'm the kid who can't wait to show you the gift I got you lol.

anyway =)

The girls scramble to their feet, and the atmosphere is suddenly charged with tension. Natasha stands, her heart racing as she casts one last glance at her bed. It could be the last time she sees it.

She follows the other girls along the hallway and into the observation room. As Natasha steps into the observation room, the sterile smell of antiseptic and sweat hits her, a familiar scent that has become synonymous with the Red Room. Rows of hard plastic chairs line the walls and the air hums with a mixture of anxiety and anticipation. Recruits whisper among themselves, but Natasha’s gaze is immediately drawn to you, standing amongst another group of girls.

Your posture is confident, though Natasha can see the tension in your shoulders. You stand tall, facing the front, your hair framing your face as you watch Madam B approach the center of the room. The older woman radiates authority, her heels clicking sharply against the polished floor as she strides forward.

“Welcome, recruits,” Madam B begins, her voice smooth but chilling. “Today, we’ll be evaluating your progress and pushing your limits. In the Red Room, we don’t just teach you to fight—we prepare you to survive. You will learn to harness your skills, not just for the mission, but for the kill.”

A shiver runs down Natasha’s spine at the coldness of Madam B's words. She’s heard this speech before, the hollow promises of strength cloaked in a veneer of empowerment. But beneath it all lies the stark reality of what they’re being trained to do.

Madam B scans the room, her gaze sharp and calculating. “Today, I need a demonstration of what you’ve learned. Y/N!” she calls, her tone suddenly commanding.

Natasha’s heart drops as you step forward. “Yes, Madam B?” You reply, your voice steady.

“You will demonstrate your fighting technique against one of our newer recruits. Let’s see if you can handle the pressure.” Madam B gestures toward a girl Natasha recognizes from the dorm, one of the less experienced recruits who hasn’t had much training yet.

A ripple of surprise goes through the group of recruits, and Natasha can see the uncertainty on your face. But you don't hesitate, and within seconds, you're both standing in the middle of the room, squaring off against each other. Natasha's mind is racing, and she can feel her palms beginning to sweat as she watches the scene unfold.

Madam B stands to the side, observing the two of you closely. The recruit lunges, and you duck and weave easily, the two of you falling into a natural rhythm. Something is mesmerizing about the way you move, your movements precise and controlled, as if you're dancing rather than fighting.

Suddenly, the recruit lands a blow to your abdomen. You stumble but regain your composure quickly, and retaliate with a swift kick to her leg, knocking her off balance. As the fight progresses, you start to gain the upper hand, landing blow after blow until the recruit is backed against the wall, defenseless.

Your fist flies forward and lands squarely on the recruit's jaw, and the sound of bone crunching echoes in the small room. The girl crumples to the ground, and Madam B rushes forward, her expression unreadable.

As the scene unfolds, Natasha's heart races. There's a sudden, intense pressure in her chest, and the hairs on the back of her neck stand up. Something feels wrong, but she can't put her finger on what.

"Kill her," She demands from you.

"What?" You ask.

"You heard me. Kill her. That's an order."

There's a beat of silence, and then the recruit lets out a strangled cry. Her hand reaches up, blood dripping from her mouth. "Help me, please!" she whimpers.

For the slightest second, you hesitate. Your hand tightens around the knife tucked into your belt, but the movement is barely perceptible. "No," you finally reply, your voice steady. "I won't."

The room erupts into surprised mutters and gasps, and Natasha watches in horror as Madam B strikes you across the face. "Disobedience will not be tolerated!" she shouts, her voice raw with anger. "You've been spoiled. You think your place here is valuable."

Natasha's eyes are fixed on you as Madam B's blows fall faster and harder. She can't look away, even as the room is filled with the sickening sounds of fists and boots connecting with flesh and bone.

Finally, the blows stop, and the room falls silent. Natasha's heart is racing, and she can't seem to catch her breath.

Madam B turns toward the rest of the group. "Widows," she says, her voice dangerously low. "We must be ruthless in our pursuit of perfection. Only those who can handle the pressure are fit to serve the Red Room. Anyone who falters will be eliminated."

The meaning of Madam B's words is clear: those who can't survive will die or be killed. There was a difference in both. Natasha's stomach churns, and she takes a deep breath, trying to steady herself. She can't let the fear get to her, not now.

Suddenly, you groan and sit up. Your face is bruised and swollen, blood running down your chin.

Madam B looms over you, her eyes cold and unsympathetic. "Y/n, you have failed to meet the expectations of the Red Room."

"That's enough," A voice with chilling authority causes every head to turn.

The room goes silent. The General approaches, his gait slow and deliberate, his eyes never leaving yours. He looks down at you, his face betraying no emotion.

"She's my best girl. She deserves a second chance," He states.

"With all due respect, General, I believe she is a liability. Her disobedience is a threat to the program."

The General doesn't flinch. "Let me worry about that," He says. His tone is firm, but there's a hint of something else—an underlying anger that's impossible to miss. "I've already given my orders. Y/n is a valuable asset. She's not going anywhere."

Madam B's expression remains unchanged, but there's a subtle shift in the energy of the room. She gives a curt nod, her displeasure evident.

"Yes, sir," She replies, her tone clipped.

Natasha feels like she can finally breathe again, the tension in the room dissipating.

"As for the rest of you," The General continues. "This is your first and final warning. Don't disappoint me."

With those words, he turns and leaves, his footsteps echoing through the silent room.

The moment he's gone, Madam B snaps back into action, barking orders and arranging the next fight. Natasha can't help but look at you again. She wants to reach out and help, but something holds her back. You're a liability.

And for some reason, Natasha doesn't want to be caught in the crossfire.