#the love of the creators oozes from this show and that in itself is a gift

[vero-niche]

no, actually. the fact that miri couldnt win alone, nor could she win with only kazuki. they only won once rei was there too. rei is just as essential to the family as kazuki is and neither could manage without the other. and rei and kazuki couldnt have moved on from their pasts and heal without miri. its about having the right family its about the healthy codependency its about the love shared its-

[kalevalakryze]

Jedi June 2023

going to bite the bullet on this one too! My baby deserves to be let out into the world after all the work I put into her, and the way she made me love Mace Windu again.

Characters: Mace Windu, Original Jedi Female Character, Mentioned Depa Billaba, Mentioned Quinlan Vos, Mentioned Master Yoda

Warnings: None!

Relationships: Mace Windu & Original Jedi Female Charcter

Chessaf’re’krudo was often nervous around her Master. It was reasonable, considering the Legacy of Jedi Master Mace Windu, creator of the Seventh lightsaber form and renowned member of the Jedi Council. It wasn’t even anything necessarily about his actions that had put all the younglings in her crèche on edge, but more of the legacy and the stoicism.

                Mace Windu was a Korun man who’d trained Jedi Master Depa Bilaba, and how could she ever live up to the legacy that she must have left behind as his apprentice? Really, Chess could believe the only reason she was assigned to him was because she was purple like his jaded saber, and man, wouldn’t that suck?

                Her fidgeting must have pulled the man from his meditations, because the young Keshiri could feel his eyes leveling on her, only daring to crack her eyelids open once she managed to put her breathing to an even tone. Red eyes met brown in a tentative glance, before she found a particular divot in his robes she liked enough to stare at over eye contact. “Are you nervous, young one?” HE finally broke the silence of hyperspace, and as his legs uncrossed, Chess’s did too, only to be tucked into her chest.

                There was no point in lying to a man like Mace, not when he practically oozed the force from his very cosmic being. “Yes, master, We’re told many stories in the crèche about finding our crystal,” IT was easier, to blame her nerves on their trip to Ilum than on the weight she felt against her bony shoulders. Her chin rested on the top of her knee, and she picked at a piece of dirt that hitched a ride on the sole of her boot.

                “Trust in the force, Chess, and it will show you the way.” Was his only answer, and the padawan’s cheeks puffed out, because that definitely wasn’t the assurance she wanted, even if it was all the answer a Jedi needed. “Tell me about the force,” He questioned not unkindly as he mimicked her position, one leg stretched out and the other bent, tucked against his own chest with one arm.

                “it’s what makes up the-“ The padawan was cut off by a raised hand and a look she couldn’t place. “Is that wrong, Master?”

                “What does the force feel like to you? If you don’t mind sharing, I find that understanding how we each interpret our sensitivity may give an insight to how we can follow its’ path.”

                It took a moment, as Chess allowed her eyes to close, her legs extending against the durasteel floor of their small ship, resting against the tops of her thighs as a small tremor seemed to take over her hands. “The force feels… like my body is vibrating, like my bones want out but the force tethers them together, because it is the will of the force that I am whole. Like a constant tingling of my skin that doesn’t warn of danger, but like, like being reminded that it will be there to guide me home every night.” A small smile graced dark violet lips as her head turned upwards and the tremors in her hands paused. “like looking onto the path the force has put me on, and knowing that as long as I follow it’s light, there is nothing to fear, because the force guides me away from darkness.”

                When she opened her eyes, her Master seemed to be watching her carefully, and her cheeks darkened in embarrassment. “I’m glad to hear that the force feels like that for you, my Padawan. It is always wise to maintain a strong connection to the force and the light it provides, but be mindful, the Dark Side can disguise itself as many ways, and try to twist your beliefs into thinking it is the best option. Trust in the force, and in those of us around you as well. Master Yoda has been there for me on several occasions when I needed help sorting out how I could best conduit the Force,” Chess’s jaw had dropped at that, because, Master Windu needed to seek advice on the force? It didn’t seem real.

                “For me, the force is tricky,” His leg lowered from the bent position to extend outwards, until he was nearly mimicking Chess’s position again, though his palms stayed still where they rested on his knees. “I see the Force through Shatterpoints, moments that are vital to the world around us, where the Force shines a light on a person, place, or thing, where it shouts ‘hey, I’m over here, motherfucker!’ and I am to find a way to decipher what the best course of action is.”

                Maker, if Chess wasn’t already intimidated by the sheer power and legend of the man, learning about his ability to detect vital events only increased the feelings of awe. “Some Jedi can detect the echoes of an objects path. Master Quinlan has this ability as well. Do not forget, my young Padawan, that it is not a power or gift we have that makes us strong, but the will of the Force,” He assured when he noticed his Padawan’s face falling. She certainly didn’t get any cool powers from the force, and how was she supposed to amount to his legend as a member of his lineage when she wasn’t born powerful, and she certainly didn’t know the Seventh form yet.

                “And, Master Yoda’s only gift is his age,” Her Master pointed out, obviously allowing some humor into the conversation, causing the young Padawan to bubble with laughter. It was certainly true, Grandmaster Yoda had nine hundred years on them all, plenty of time to attune himself so strongly in the force.

                “Thank you, Master. I think I needed that,” Chess finally pushed herself to her feet, offering her hand to the Korun, who’d accepted it gratefully, before tugging her down to send her off balance and pull himself to her feet gracefully. Again, the Padawan burst out laughing, even as he helped steady her, Ilum’s surface coming into view as they exited hyperspace and drifted in the atmosphere.

[denimbex1986]

'I've been putting off writing about "Ripley," the enthralling if not exasperating new series that's been generating hot debate. Oscar-winning writer-director Steven Zaillian (he wrote "Schindler's List") takes his time pulling you into the tale of Tom Ripley (Andrew Scott), the con artist who steals the identity of Dickie Greenleaf (Johnny Flynn), the trust-fund baby he later murders.

Sound familiar? That's the problem. The culprit is 1999's "The Talented Mr. Ripley," the best known of the five films based on Patricia Highsmith's 1955 novel of the same name.

Shot in Italy in glorious color and starring Matt Damon, Jude Law and Gwyneth Paltrow oozing youth and sexuality, Anthony Minghella's film had a livewire vibe that kept audiences in thrall.

"Ripley," also filmed in Italy but shot in the artful, black-and-white glare provided by master cinematographer Robert Elswit ("There Will Be Blood"), is a far more sinister affair. And Scott, charming as the "hot priest" in "Fleabag" and heartbreakingly lost in "All of Us Strangers," lets a chill invade his performance that holds Ripley at an emotional remove.

In short, this new "Ripley" is a slow burn that turns a two-hour movie into an eight-hour series, not to pad out a story but to invest it with a resonant power all its own. It comes close to achieving that goal even when the plodding pacing of the early episodes tries your patience.

Having moved up the book's time period from the 1950s to the 1960s, Zaillian starts the show with Ripley living in squalor in Manhattan doing forgeries and identity thefts. He's strictly minor league until wealthy businessman Herbert Greenleaf ("Manchester By the Sea" creator Kenneth Lonergan underplaying beautifully) hires Ripley to track down his son Dickie in Italy.

The goal is to persuade sonny boy to come home. But one look at the lush life that Dickie is living on the Amalfi coast with girlfriend Marge Sherwood (Dakota Fanning) and it's love at first sight for Ripley. Not necessarily for Dickie, though a sexual attraction is implied, but to be him.

Marge's resentment grows as Ripley worms his way into her life with Dickie. She knows Dickie is supremely untalented as a wannabe artist and sees through Ripley's flattery of his nonexistent skills. What is real is Ripley's obsession with Italian artist Caravaggio, a convicted murderer who was constantly on the run from the law—shades of Ripley's future.

Equally suspicious is Freddie Miles, a school chum of Dickie's, played to the obnoxious hilt in the 1999 film by the late, great Philip Seymour Hoffman. Here, the role is undertaken with sly, quiet conviction by the terrific Eliot Sumner.

Without going into spoiler details, Dickie and Freddie will both become victims of Ripley's deadly scheme to pass himself off as Dickie. Traveling through Naples, Rome and Venice, Ripley is stalked by Inspector Pietro Ravini (a sensationally canny Maurizio Lombardi) whose cat-and-mouse game with Ripley energizes the last episodes with vise-tightening suspense.

Equally as vigilant as the Inspector is Marge, a cards-to-the-vest character that Fanning plays with just the right notes of grit and guile. Still, in a series that prides itself in denying empathy to any of its characters, the shape-shifting Ripley takes the cake for most inhuman humans.

And that's the frustration of "Ripley."

For all its magnificent surfaces and mesmerizing writing, directing, and acting, this portrait of evil rotting in the sun feels cold to the touch, detaching us when it needs to draw us close.

What's the good of danger when you can't feel its heat?'

[frostyreturns]

Frosty Ruins Dead End Paranormal Park

This cartoon looks fucking terrible. I hate the way this cancerous shitty and ugly animation style has become so common. It is appalling just to look at it and it's not just that the drawing is bad the actual movement and animation looks cheap and shitty too. Flash cartoons from the early 2000's looked better than this and I mean that without a hint of exaggeration. Not only is the animation awful but the characters are ugly too. Ugly characters...drawn badly and animated poorly. Like they give everyone these round orange noses that makes them all look like horrific uncanny valley human muppets. And I legitimately think they were designed that way because the artist actually can't draw noses. I think that’s a safe assumption because everything looks so poorly drawn. 

Now the crux of why this show is a cancerous and vile blight on entertainment is that it appears to be a show created for the sole purpose of being lgbt propaganda for children. Watching it I can't imagine anyone working on it did any of this for the purpose of earnest entertainment. It's main character is a gay transgender teenager for the sake of introducing children to homosexuality and transgenderism. The park is run by a drag queen to introduce kids to drag. In the second episode like all groomers they seek to separate the kids from their family, they do this by showing the trans character leaving home to live at this gay theme park to seek a new start in their trans lifestyle. In another episode they have groups of children sleeping over at this gay horror park where they summon a demon thing, there is so much summoning of demons in this show it’s ridiculous. Literally just fucking leave kids alone, fuck off I'm so tired of this shit. 

That's not where the inappropriate for children elements end,the show is also too creepy for the age group this is targeted to. There are demons, a possession ceremony with a giant flaming demon that possesses a dog, some weird slenderman demon that oozes a milky white substance from its face. The one demon talks about how it would fun to kill the dog...this isn't child friendly content but it's presented in a child friendly wrapping, to me that makes this show fucked up. In another episode they have a skull that forces them to confront their deepest fears...again not content meant for children. Creepy shows for kids used to involve stuff like werewolves and mummies, now it's demons and deep existential horrors conjured by their own minds...it’s fucked up. 

Kids don't need to be watching a show where characters have HIV and nobody should be watching a show where the messaging of the character is that its okay to sleep around when you have a potentially deadly life altering disease thats transmitted sexually...without telling anyone beforehand. It's not just a bad show, it's not just annoying social politics the creators are actively vile and heinous people seeking to groom and corrupt children.

After watching this and seeing how godawful this pile of shit they want to call a cartoon is I thought I'd do something I don't normally do when writing a review...go look at other reviews. I wanted to see what positive things people could possibly have to say about this...because I can't see a single redeeming quality anywhere in the show at all. Of course the only praise I seem to see for it are political. They praise the show as diverse and queer. That should be telling in and of itself because there are certain people who should be tripping over themselves to excuse all manners of terrible dogshit in this show just for identity reasons. And yet all they can come up with is that they love that the character is trans. They can't even bring themselves to say it's a good or funny show with a trans character because it simply isn't. It's a horrible show and they know it, but they have to say they love it because the character is trans.

It's at the point where they are not just making bad shows, they are actively ruining cartoons. These kinds of shows are so common and available that it's going to become what kids think of when they think of cartoons. We grew up with great cartoons and there would be some you didn't like but most were good... but kids today are growing up where all the cartoons being made look horrible, are boring, unfunny and political. Kids are going to get tired of this and just not watch cartoons anymore. One day kids will look back and hear their parents talk about liking cartoons and wonder why their parents ever liked something as gay as cartoons. Yet again the woke crowd of retards are killing industries with their parasitic, incestuous and cancerously terrible control of said industries.

Not only should you not watch this and not let your kids watch this, cancel Netflix for having this on their service and putting it in the kids section. This show has many demons in it but the worst ones of all were the ones who created it.

[tyrantisterror]

The ATOM Create a Kaiju Contest 3-D: Entry Roundup

You’ve been patiently waiting for the results of the ATOM Create a Kaiju Contest 3-D, and now... you have to wait a bit longer, but at least you’ve got an entry roundup with lots of sketches and a good bit of feedback for all the entrants!  My goal is to get the finalists illustrated in a week or two, and after that, the grand prize winner will be announced.  But, for now, the official entry roundup!  After the cut:

I should note that while I sketched these in the order they were submitted, my scanner saved the documents with random names, so they’re a bit jumbled.  You know, just in case you’re like me and would get confused noticing that it’s almost in chronological order but with some entries jumbled around.

@bugcthulhu’s Obsideban was designed as a counterpart to Rohobaron - the Black King to Rohobaron’s Red King, if you will.  Or, well, Black Queen in this case, as Obsideban also takes her personality from the “delinquent girl” archetype in Japanese media.  Bug’s designs always ooze personality, and I had a lot of fun translating this big, gnarly retrosaur into my own style.

@toothlessloveshiccup‘s Argonox is the first - but far from the last - monster in this breakdown that brings in a bit of fantasy influence to ATOM’s roster.  A golden-fleeced ram with a vicious streak, this sheep is both treasure and dragon at once.  And while it wasn’t written in the monster’s profile, given the Yamaneon-rich nature of its wool, Argonox might be able to replicate the healing power of the golden fleece too!  A very fun mammalian kaiju and excellent entry.

@highly-radioactive-nerd submitted Gunmetal Jeeves, a robot butler who can gigantomax temporarily create a holographic/hard light version of himself to fight kaiju.  That detail was a late revision added to the entry before the contest’s deadline, made after the creator realized that ATOM allows for some truly ludicrous bullshit, which is something everyone should exploit when making entries for this in my opinion.  Also, this is a robot butler who can size shift.  Revel in its awesome absurdity!

Ultranerd submitted Rajasaurus, a dimetrodon-like synapsid kaiju with electric powers.  His origin specifies that the electric powers are a result of the volatile nature of the Yamaneon deposits he mutated under, which is an interesting idea.  That’s another theme that cropped up a lot in this contest’s entries, actually - people really wanted to play with what Yamaneon can do.

Case in point, @polygonfighter’s Yamaneolith takes the Monolith Monsters homage at the heart of Yamaneon even more apparent.  I like the implication that there is a second mineral-based lifeform at the root of this Yamaneon cluster’s anomalous behavior - a parasite, perhaps?  It brings up some interesting possibilities.

@ariccio50 submitted Kukulkuzana, and damn is this a cool spin on the body plan of my martians.  I made a few changes here and there (splitting its tail into two is probably the biggest one), but tried to keep true to the original design, because holy hell is it gorgeous.  The idea that this is a mountain-dwelling creature is really intriguing to me, as it looks like a sea creature, but at the same time, that flexible and low-slung build WOULD work pretty well in mountains, and it’s just the right mix of plausible weirdness that makes for a fun alien design.

@akitymh submitted Aramzados, a Venusian monster that’s basically an organic hot rod car.  I like the idea of organic machinery being the gimmick for Venusian kaiju, and Aramzado’s does it subtly enough to not feel like that gimmick is the sole thing going for it.  I especially love this monster’s stange, apparently mouth-less blade-beaked face.

@virovac submitted Rurzar and Zar Rider, a Beyonder kaiju and mecha (respecitvely) that were both modified and repurposed by humans reverse engineering Beyonder technology to make, like, a motorcycle-saurus essentially.  It is a delightfully absurd concept, and a very, very detailed one (13 pages of description).  There’s a dark undercurrent beneath the sillyness, though, as this pair show that humanity might still be following the same path as the Beyonders before them.

@dinosaurana brings us Krangor, a humanoid monstrosity of living kelp!  The goal here was to create a Jack Kirby-esque monster dude, complete with the gibberish name and all.  He’s also made out of kelp, which feels very classic 1950′s monster-y despite me not being able to think of any monsters that were explicitly made of kelp.  I love him.

@kiryuthechimera submitted Genkakurah, a psychic retrosaur with some draconic features.  Though his substantial powerset is probably the biggest distinguishing feature of this kaiju (given that most ATOM kaiju pretty much have the same standard powers), what really draws me to him is that reptilian pseudo-beard.  It’s just a fun detail!

@glarnboudin submits Tiratola, and see, there’s that fantasy influence again!  Even more explicitly dragon-y than Kraydi, Tiratola still manages to toe the line between sci-fi and fantasy enough to fit ATOM as is while still cementing its ties to my own slice of fantasy fiction.  Man it’s good I’m doing a Midgaheim book next, huh?

@dragonzzilla submitted Scuttlebutt/Argonautilus, a hermit crab kaiju who lives in/with a hollowed out mecha.  That’s a twist I can’t recall ever hearing before, and the idea of a kaiju and a mecha having an equal partnership that doesn’t involve one being grafted to the other is really intriguing to me.  A very unique concept!

@evolutionsvoid submitted Fleagor, an enormous flea who has no idea what to do with itself now that there’s no creature large enough for it to parasitize.  I love that concept - it takes the core idea of the giant bug kaiju archetype (i.e. unsettling the audience by showing how terrifying small, “insignificant” creatures would be if our sizes were reversed) and really turns it on its head.  The name also plays on the Universal Monsters, who were a huge part of 1950′s pop culture thanks to their movies being re-released in that era, so all and all this one is very on brand for ATOM!

@skarmorysilver submitted Lilacorn, another entry that plays up that Midgaheim/ATOM connection.  Reinterpreting the mythological unicorn as an Cenozoic wooly rhinoceros-inspired monster gives it a very unique look, both in ATOM and in the general world of unicorns, and she has a bad-girl with a heart of gold personality to boot!

dracosaurus-rex submitted Florasaura, a two-headed plant/retrosaur hybrid monster.  I love me some plant monsters, I love me some retrosaurs, and I love me some rhyming the word “flora” with other words that contain similar vowell sounds, so this one has me written all over it!

@downtofragglerock submitted Sauroguana, a delightfully odd flying retrosaur.  There’s a great deal of charm to the original illustration that this sketch doesn’t quite capture - it’s a deceptively simple design with a lot of personality in it, and with those unique leg-wings it really doesn’t need a whole lot of frills to stand out.

Draxi submitted Brakan, an unimpressive burrowing retrosaur kaiju whose mastery of illusions allows it to convince other kaiju it’s actually a big, super-powerful badass that’s the ultimate fighter in the universe.  It’s a delightful parody of the concept of a fan self-insert god-mode character, with a really fun story built into it to boot!

@quinnred submitted O.N.I.A.C., a mysterious cocooned kaiju whose chrysalis has been turned into an organic computer of sorts by the people studying it, and seems to possess a fairly advanced intelligence for a kaiju.  It’s a really bizarre and ominous idea, with built in intrigue given how vague its nature is.  Is it just a kaijufied butterfly/moth who got stuck mid transformation?  A relative of the Mothmanuds?  Something else, perhaps equally alien?  Good story potential here.

shadyserpent submitted Vespilitor, a bat/retrosaur hybrid made by the nefarious Spooks Organization.  A mercurial prankster whose tendency to stir up trouble never crosses the line into maliciousness, he’s the kind of monster who would make a great foil to a lot of ATOM’s cast.  I’d especially like to see him in a prank off with Ahuul - it’d be like Bugs Bunny fighting Daffy Duck, but on a kaiju scale.

@multiversefan submitted the Yamaneon King, a nomadic kaiju whose refusal to settle down causes problems as he stirs up trouble at kaiju sanctuaries all over the globe by showing up unannounced and stirring up the locals.  He was basically designed to be a monster that the kaiju sanctuary initiative would struggle to deal with, which is a good idea for a post-ATOM Volume 2 story conflict.

Sir K submitted Jadeera, a kirin kaiju that can actually forcibly convert most of its body to Yamaneon to enter a dormant, statue-like state in a loose homage to King Shisa.  Though the fantasy elements are far more present than I usually prefer for ATOM kaiju, I think it should be noted they’re pushed that far for a purpose - a theme in Jadeera’s entry, which continues where its creator left off with their submission to the previous ATOM create a kaiju contest (Yokaigon), is that the world of kaiju is more complicated and challenging than many are willing to accept, which is a theme in ATOM itself.  Yokaigon’s more supernatural/occult powers are based on the ghost parascience of my setting, which ATOM has delved into a bit (Pathogen being the big example), so it’s not as out of left field as some might think.

@cerothenull​ brings us our final entry (unless some got lost thanks to tumblr’s shitty tagging system), the flying spider Naeranti.  She’s a kaiju spider who uses silk to make complicate hot-air balloons, more or less, and that’s just delightful.  ATOM could always use more spider-monsters, and with a really unique gimmick backing up a wonderfully distinct look, Naeranti is sure to stand out among her fellow giant arachnids.

Well, that’s the roundup!  In a week (or two, depending on how much my hand cramps) we’ll have the five finalists, and sometime after that, the grand prize winner!

[supernaturallyobsessedchic]

You’re Not a Monster

Dean x Reader

a/n: I’m putting an authors note here because I don’t know how to tag the reader. She’s a werewolf shapeshifter. She shifts into a wolf like in all of my A/B/O fictions I’ve written. Basically it’s Twilight shit that I write my werewolves. XD Don’t mind me.

Bingo Masterlist

Mobile Masterlist

Warnings: STRONG ANGST, Language, SPN level gore and blood, scary situations, Fluff end to the rescue.

Summary: Dean discovers something different with the reader and it changes their relationship. Is there anything worth saving after Dean learns the truth.

Word Count: 2,609

Square: Quote A (“How about we put the gun down and let’s talk about this?”) @supernatural-jackles​. SPN Tell me a Story Bingo.

a/n#2: This is not part of the Finding Him storyline.

a/n #3: My dumb ass forgot to credit the creator of this gif, I space out and forget, I’m not dumb...but credit for the gif goes to @supernaturalfreewill​

~

“Shit.” She muttered, as she morphed back into her human form to find a very furious looking Dean looking back at her.

They were on a wendigo hunt, when a wendigo almost had a upper hand on Dean, she had morphed into her white wolf form to get out of a tight situation with another wendigo.

Wendigos, though fearless of their prey. But when they are the prey, it’s a whole other ballgame. They began to back off of the hunters. But Dean fired off two flare guns to kill the two wendigos before they got away.

“Dean, I can explain.”

He grabs his colt, loaded with silver bullets. Aiming it at her.

“Dean.” She begged.

“We talked about everything.” He shouted. “Whatever happened to that? When were you gonna tell me about this?”

“Well, how about we put the gun down and let’s talk about this?” she suggested with a shaky voice.

“Talk, now.” He demanded. Ignoring her suggestion. Keeping his gun up and pointed at her.

“Well, my mom was human, and my dad was a werewolf. I don’t know what else to really say.”

“You fucking morphed into a giant ass wolf!”

“I’m not that big honestly.”

“Y/N!”

“Half Breads like me are smaller than the pure breeds. And a certain gene causes the morphing. Most werewolves don’t morph, you just see the fangs and the claws. My kind morph.”

“Now answer the second question.”

She swallowed thickly. Still nervous and scared of the man she’s trusted and loved for years.

“I was never going to mention it to you because I was scared of this. I’m still scared of you finding out somehow some way, and killing me in my sleep.”

For the first time in the night, she saw her flash across the older Winchester’s face.

Faint foot falls can be heard, Sam entered the cave room where they stood. Sam seeing Dean aiming a gun at Y/N.

“Dean, what are you doing?” Sam shouted at the scene.

“She’s a monster, Sam. And she’s lied to us, all this time, she’s lied to us!” he shouted.

“That’s not true, Y/N, tell him.”

“What can I tell him?”

“Dean, do you count how many times she’s had our backs?” Sam asked. “There was that werewolf case in Minnesota when the pack leader cut you up pretty badly. She murdered that son of a bitch and saved your ass. And then there was that witch in Mississippi, the witch turned you into wolf, we couldn’t move you around the city like a normal dog because people knew a wolf from a husky. She managed to find the counter spell, turn you back to human. Then there was that ---”

“I get it Sam, but she could have told me she was part fucking wolf!”

“She had all that time still, all that time to kill us and she didn’t.”

“It doesn’t matter Sammy.” He says, lowering his gun looking at her with disgust. “I can’t trust her.” He says to her.

“Dean please!” she begged tearfully.

“Don’t.” he snapped.

She snapped her jaw shut and she just let her tears fall freely.

“Find your own way back to the bunker, I expect you to be out before morning.”

They stood in the cave room in dead silence despite Y/N’s sniffles from her tears.

“Don’t ever come back.” He warns.

He holsters his gun, and turns to walk out of the cave. Sam couldn’t say anything to Y/N to make her feel better before she silently walked out not far behind his brother.

 One year turned into three, the Winchester’s and Y/N stayed apart but still kept up on hunting. That is until one hunt brought them together again.

It started with hearts being ripped out of college students in the Navajo desert.

Y/N was the first to investigate, one of the students place of death was just outside of an old reservation, a cave dwelling in northern Arizona.

Odd, I smell wolf, but I smell something else. She thought.

She heard a screech from a monster inside the cave dwelling.

Not wolf, wendigo. She panicked. Realizing she was unprepared.

The wendigo showed itself to her, being three times her size, head nearly reaching the caves ceiling.

“Oh, your one of the first wendigos…” she says to herself. Thinking out loud.

It let out another ear shattering screech. Y/N covered her ears desperately to save her hearing. But the wendigo drew its hand back, landing a hard swing of it’s claws. Knocking her across the cave dwelling, hitting the wall hard. Hearing a loud crack, she landed hard on the ground. She felt something warm and sticky ooze out of the back of her head.

She saw the wendigo crawl towards her before her world turned black.

 Weeks later, more bodies turn up, picking up the attention of the Winchester’s.

“If this is werewolves, why was the most recent death out in the desert?” Dean asked.

“Maybe their hold up in the old caves the Navajo natives stayed in? I don’t know Dean, but it was a little over two weeks ago. And their saying a person went missing last week, they were probably looking into the same thing we are.”

“Well, let’s go gank this son of a bitch, stop the bodies from dropping out here.”

With that, they loaded up the Impala for the 50 mile trek to the Navajo Cave Dwellings.

 “This looks so cool; I wonder how the Natives lived in these things.” Sam says fully mesmerized.

“Alright nerd, focus.”

Sam just rolls his eyes. As they searched higher along the cave dwellings.

“Oh my god no,” Sam breaths. His heart dropping to his stomach.

“What?” Dean asked, not far behind from Sam.

When Sam took off running, he managed to catch a good glimpse at what he was running to. More like who he was running to.

“Y/N!” Sam shouted.

Dean took off at his heel running to her side.

“Her wounds are weeks old; she may not make it Dean.”

“Don’t talk like that, she’ll make it.”

“Y/N, baby, can you hear me?” Dean asked, trying to cup her head, his fingers dragging across dried blood. Pulling away, Sam seeing the dried chips of blood on his hand.

“Can wolves like her heal?” Sam asked.

“I don’t know, I never looked into it.”

“Dean, what if she’s gonna die?”

“Sammy, listen to her heart, listen to her breathing, she’s still here with week old wounds. If she didn’t die yet, she’s not gonna.”

Sam began to investigate her wounds further. Seeing the infected gash on her stomach and chest.

“She’s running a bit of a fever Sammy; we need to get her out of here.” Dean says, after running a hand on her forehead.

“Dean, these are Wendigo wounds.” Sam says, pulling up her shirt. Causing the injured girl to groan.

“Easy, Y/N, you’re safe, we got you.” Dean soothed.

“Dean,” she groans. She seemed like she was awake, but her eyes weren’t opening.

“Hey sweetheart, it’s me. You’re okay.”

“Wendigo,” she whispers.

“I know baby, we know it’s a wendigo now.”

“Giant…Wendigo…” she mutters before her body goes limp in his arms.

“Giant wendigo?” Sam asked.

“Could be a hallucination?” Dean questioned.

There was a distant screech in the dwellings.

Sam looked on within the dwellings, and he caught first glimpses of the Wendigo.

“Um, Dean, we might have to abort this one.”

“Why---oh fucking shit.” Dean says following Sam’s gaze seeing the size of the Wendigo crawling out of the Dwellings.

“Sam, that death that was out here, was it even a werewolf?” Dean asked.

“Nope, they ranked it up to animal attack.”

“Then lets get Y/N, and lets get the hell out of here.” Dean says, scooping Y/N up with little to no effort. “Fuck this, lets get!” Dean shouts.

The Wendigo lets out a ear shattering screech. The boys didn’t stop, they hurried as fast as they could out of the cave.

A hand of the wendigo crashed near them, the impact causing them to fly out. Sam flying off left, rolling, and hitting a wall. Dean lost his footing, rolling down the walkway, loosing Y/N from his hold, his back hitting the wall of the pathway. And Y/N stopped halfway on the path.

The roll had dazed Dean a bit, before he noticed the Wendigo was moving to land his hand down to crush Y/N.

“Y/N! NO!” Dean shouted helplessly.

At the sound of Dean’s voice was enough for Y/N to find a small ounce of energy to wake and morph.

Her wolf form let out whine at the pain from the infected wounds. She stumbled to get her footing to jump towards Dean. The wendigo missing her just mere inches.

But the effort proved to be too much for her to handle. She collapsed onto Dean’s lap with a whine and huff. The wolf totally unconscious again.

Sam was first up rushing to his brother.

“Dean, we can’t fight this, it’s too big. And Y/N could be dying from those infections. Let’s get.”

“Help me carry her, she morphed.”

“I’ll grab her tail end; you grab her head.”

They did as planned, and they rushed back to the Impala. Laying the wolf in the back seat. Dean hurries to the driver seat, Sam already in the passenger seat. Dean turned the key in the ignition, roaring the engine to life. He puts it into gear, and he peels out of the canyon where the Cave Dwellings sat, driving full speed to the motel.

 Eventually she morphed back to her human form in her unconscious state as she laid healing in the older Winchester’s bed.

Dean was not letting up; he was going on two nights of no sleeps. He had not moved from his spot by her bedside.

“Dean.” Sam says entering his room.

“I’m not hungry Sammy.”

“Dean, you know when she wakes up and when she finds out you doing this to yourself she’s gonna kick your ass, you know that right.”

“Let her.”

“Dean.” Sam says with a sigh.

“I was so angry with her for her not telling me everything. But she did have a point, “hey guys I’m part monster, don’t kill me.””

Sam stayed silent. Letting Dean just talk it out.

“She would have a reaction to silver, I never looked into, I never asked her. And I pointed a gun at her. I was literally two seconds away from killing the one girl I loved. When there was nothing wrong with her.”

“Dean, your trust with her was broken. You took the time away to reflect, and you saw neither one of you were in the wrong.”

“I overreacted.” Dean says, rubbing his eyes to push the sleep away.

“You did, and there’s nothing wrong with it. She’s the most understanding girl I think, I’ve ever met. I’m sure she’ll forgive you Dean.”

“You remember that witch case?” Dean asked.

“The one where you were changed into a wolf?”

Dean nodded. “Remember you asked why a wolf?”

Sam nodded.

“It’s because of her. Somehow, some part of me knew she was a wolf. She’s my soulmate.”

“Your soulmate? So, changing what spell did that witch use on you anyway?”

“She kept saying something about me walking around this world lost and alone. She said the spell would turn me into the spirit of my soulmate.”

“Wolf, because she’s part wolf.”

Dean nods.

She stirs with a groan pulling the boys attention away from their story to her.

“Sam, did you ever look into her healing process, is it different to us?”

“It is, she heals faster. But her wounds were infected. I gave her, her a shot to help her body fight the infection. Her color is coming back, she’s looking better.”

“She does.” Dean agrees, letting out a yawn.

“Dude, get some sleep.”

“I’m fine Sammy.”

Sam rolls his eyes as he exited his brother’s room.

 She woke up to the familiar scent of the Winchester’s, but the scent of one of the brothers was stronger than the other.

Dean.

She woke up in his room. Feeling a weight on her hip, she sits up slightly seeing him use her hip as a pillow. And he was sound asleep.

His arms looked as if they were trying to hold her as best as he could from where he sat.

She tried to sit up more, but a sharp pain stopped her. She winces.

“You might want to stay in bed, you were banged up pretty bad.” She heard Sam say in Dean’s dark room.

“Wait, what? How?” she asked, trying to understand. Remember.

“We were hunting werewolves, when one death of a victim took us to where you were.”

“Did you guys?”

“Oh, hell no. That fucker was way too big. I don’t think one flare would kill it.”

“You didn’t try?” she asked.

“No, we were more worried about you. You were in pretty rough shape.”

Dean stirred, snuggling closer to her, rubbing his head into her hip.

She ran her hand through his short strands of his hair.

“He was really worried about you, believe it or not.”

“I could feel it.”

“I guess that’s the soulmate thing.”

“What?”

“You remember that witch case, when Dean was a wolf?”

She nods.

“The spell used; Dean says the witch used a spell to turn him into the spirit of his soulmate. And he turned into a wolf.”

“That’s a thing?”

“I guess.” Sam shrugs.

In his sleep, Dean let out a big yawn. Almost pulling him out of his deep slumber.

“Dean.” She says.

“hmm.” He says sleepily, not opening his eyes.

“Come to bed.”

With his eyes still closed, he works at pulling off his boots, taking off his flannel, shirt, and pants. Leaving his boxer briefs on. He pulls the covers off of her, and snuggles in close to her, wrapping an arm around her middle. And snuggling his head into the crook of her neck.

“At least he’s a sleep.”

“I know, like I said, I felt it. I could feel that he was going to wake up sore if he was gonna stay like that.”

“You two make thee most cutest couple, I’m just admitting that right now.”

“Did I just hear Sam Winchester refer to us as cute?” she smirked playfully.

He rolled his eyes. “Yeah, yeah. It’s just good seeing him happy again.”

“I know, I—”

“I know you could feel it, I’m heading to bed now darlin’, good night.”

“Night Sammy.” She yawned, letting the older Winchester snuggle more into her. “Night Dean, I love you.”

She woke up feeling a hand play with her hair, petting through her long strands atop her head.

She hums, snuggling into the hand. Hearing him chuckle. And felt warm plump limps kiss her forehead briefly.

She opens her eyes to a pair of beautiful green ones. “Hi.” She says softly.

“Hi, sleep good?” Dean asked.

“Better than I had in years.”

“I bet,” he says, giving her another peck on her head. “I called Garth, I’m having him get your things and we’re moving you back in with us.”

“I take it I’m welcome back?” she asked carefully.

“You are welcome back, soulmate.” He says snuggling back into her making her giggle.

“Are all caught up now?”

“I think we are.” Dean admits. “Can I ask you something?”

“Hm?”

“Never again, no more secrets, no more mistrust. Never leave me again.”

“I don’t plan on it Winchester.”

Their lips crash into one another in a passionate, much needed kiss.

~

Tags:

@pandazombie69​, @luci-in-trenchcoats​, @supernatural-jackles​, @becs-bunker​, @mlovesstories​, @winchesters-favorite-girl​, @jayankles​, @jeaniespiehs20​

~

Copying and reposting someone else’s content is plagiarism and illegal. This work is property of supernaturallyobsessedchic. ALL RIGHTS RESERVED. These works contain material protected under International and Federal Copyright Laws and Treaties. Any unauthorized reprint or use of this material is prohibited. No part of these works may be reproduced in any form or by any means, electronic or mechanical, including photocopying, recording, or by any information storage and retrieval system without express written permission from the author / publisher. An electronic reference link to the original posted work may be provided for purposes of promotion or assistance of publication by the readers discretion, if proper credits are given to the author in the re-post. 3/8/2021

[frozenartscapes]

New Dawn - A World Without Gods (SS/Modern!AU)

I discovered this as a draft I had started months ago and realized with fit in nicely with this AU. So, let’s call this the first chapter of A World Without Gods. 

-- -- --

Byleth had encountered many who begged in their final moments of life. The Ashen Demon had heard pleas, bargains, desperate cries for mercy. Sometimes she accepted if the offer was good. Most of the time, she ignored the words spoken to her. Sometimes, her victims had the honour in them to die with dignity, speaking not a word and merely holding her impassive gaze as she struck them down.

She had never heard anyone plead to take their life. Until now.

The Emperor’s breath came in harsh, agonized gasps. Blood oozed from her wounds, spilling on the marble floor around her. Her shoulders sagged, her body buckled, as she struggled to prop herself up with her sword. The immense weight of the world on her shoulders had finally crushed her.

Byleth met those violet eyes that were once so filled with fire and passion, that reflected the strength and courage of the woman she once called her student. But her heart clenched seeing those eyes now. They were dull, and fearful. The fire had gone out, instead just a smouldering pile of ash in the dark. Even the colour seemed weaker.

Seeing Edelgard like this stirred something in her silent chest.

“Claim...your victory,” Edelgard told her through heavy breaths, struggling even to speak. Their battle had been hard on both, but worse on her. “Strike me down. You must.”

Her voice trembled. Weakness. Sadness. Fear. Such things were all present in a voice that once had so much power and authority. Byleth finally could see past the horned crown, the monstrous axe, the royal regalia - Edelgard was so small.

“Even now, people are out there killing each other,” Edelgard continued, a new desperation creeping into her tone, “You must put an end to this.”

A flash of rage surged through Byleth, then. She thought about demanding whose fault that was, pointing out that the war never would have happened had it not been for the Emperor with a power complex. But then the rage subsided, and she was able to see it: guilt.

‘She thought she could win,’ she realized, ‘That it would all be worth it if she just...’

“Please...” Edelgard whispered, “My teacher...” Those violet eyes met hers again, and Byleth could see the tears forming in them. “Your path...lies across my grave.”

‘This must be done,’ a voice in her mind reminded her, ‘She’s not that little student anymore. She’s made peace with it. Do it now, before she changes her mind.’

Byleth tightened her grip on her sword, and took a step forward. Her feet felt heavy, dragging against the ground in protest. But she closed the distance, and lifted the Sword of the Creator high above her head, preparing to bring it down and extinguish the life of the Flame Emperor.

She closed her eyes. She couldn’t look, didn’t want to look. Never had she been forced to kill someone she so desperately didn’t want to kill.

But she didn’t have a choice.

“I wanted...” Edelgard’s voice came out so small, so helpless, so mournful. “I wanted to walk with you...”

Byleth’s eyes opened, just a crack, and she dared a glance down.

It wasn’t the Emperor who knelt before her. It was a girl, a mere child, beaten and broken by a life of darkness and war and loneliness. She had her eyes screwed shut, waiting, waiting for her miserable life to end.

Byleth let the Sword of the Creator fall to the floor with an unceremonious clatter. 

Edelgard’s eyes opened at the sound, but before she knew what was happening, someone was down on their knees before her, pulling her into a tight embrace.

Byleth heard her breath hitch. Edelgard had become a statue in her arms, frozen in shock and confusion. Byleth merely held on, and waited. She waited for the protests. She waited to be pushed away. She waited for the struggle against her. She waited for another fight, for that sword to surge toward her.

For a few, agonizing seconds, nothing happened.

“Why?”

If she wasn’t holding the Emperor so close, Byleth wouldn’t have heard that question.

“I’m sorry, Edelgard,” she uttered, feeling tears forming in her eyes for the first time since she had lost her father, “There must be another way...”

“No.” Edelgard’s response came too quickly, too harshly. “There is no other way. I must be destroyed. I...I deserve nothing better.”

“I don’t believe that,” Byleth told her softly.

“But...” Edelgard struggled against Byleth’s hold, and managed to push herself away just enough for Byleth to see her face. Lilac eyes filled with pain and sorrow met cool, ethereal green. “I can’t do this anymore,” Edelgard admitted quietly, breathlessly, “Please. End this. I...I’ve lost...”

Words went unsaid. Byleth didn’t know the whole story but she knew some of it. Edelgard had lost the war, she lost her Empire, she lost her armies and commanders, she lost her people, she lost the few who supported her - some of them to Byleth’s own blade. She grimaced: Hubert had put up an especially fierce fight.

Guilt surged through her. Edelgard was alone. Largely because of her.

“I don’t deserve it. To live. I...” Edelgard’s voice was so small, so helpless. “If you truly wish to grant me mercy, then you will end my suffering now. Please, my teacher. If no one else, let it be you.”

Byleth wished with all her heart that she still could use the Divine Pulse. Because she would have, in that moment, sent herself all the way back to the Holy Tomb, back to her decision that changed everything.

‘I would have chosen to protect you,’ she thought, ‘I should have chosen that.’

But maybe it wasn’t too late.

“Edelgard... I want to help you,” she said, taking the Emperor’s chin in her hand and tilting her head up, “My biggest regret is hesitating when you needed me. I...I didn’t know where my heart lay then, and I’m sorry it took so long for me to realize... But it’s not too late for you.”

A dry, humourless chuckle escaped Edelgard’s lips. “Have you always been so blindly optimistic?” she asked in a low voice, “It’s been far too late for me for some time now.” Their eyes met, and there was no life left in hers. “You and I both know that this isn’t how it really happened.”

Byleth felt her blood run cold as the realization struck her. The delusion began to fade, and the nightmare began to shift into a memory. A memory of what really happened.

A drop of blood slipped out from under her crown, right in the centre of her forehead. Then the crown itself split, as if it had been cleaved in two. More blood began to flow.

Byleth woke up before the grisly truth was revealed in full.

-- -- --

“Morning Professor!”

Byleth smiled as best as she could at the chipper security guard. His name was Alex, and despite the seemingly mundane nature of it, he loved his job working at the Imperial Palace. He was always there at the start of her day, when she would sign in to work. And his big smile and eager energy always helped get her through the day, especially after rough nights.

“You sure you’re sleeping ok?” Alex asked with concern, taking note of the dark bags under the Professor’s eyes, “No offence, but you look like a zombie.”

Byleth couldn’t help but chuckle at the irony. “Just the usual stress keeping me up,” she lied, “There’s that new exhibit about art and the Empire opening soon and we’re not nearly ready, yet.”

“Well, don’t work too hard!” he said teasingly.

She swiped her keycard and gave a confirming nod. “I’ll try,” she said with a wave, “Oh, before I go: any news? I think Frank mentioned something about a new hire...”

Alex thought for a moment. “Nope. Nothing to report,” he stated confidently.

Byleth blinked, and for a brief second, she was back in the past. Eight hundred and fifty-five years. Talking to another cheerful guard with a similar dedication to his job.

“You...ok, Professor?” Alex asked with a tilt of his head, “You look like you’ve seen a ghost.”

“I... Never mind. Just need some coffee,” Byleth replied, snapping out of her memories with a shake of her head.

She gave Alex a wave in parting, and headed off to her office.

The Imperial Palace was Enbarr’s most valued museums. Each day, thousands of tourists would flock into its elegant halls, taking in magnificent paintings, ancient weapons and tapestries, or wandering the extensive manicured grounds. Not long after the war, it fell to ruin. The Last Emperor was dead and buried, and the opulent grandeur of the marble palace seemed to spit in the face of every peasant in Enbarr. So it was ransacked. Priceless artifacts were stolen, banners and tapestries set ablaze, stone and metal smashed just to let out the anger at those selfish rulers.

Byleth saved what she could at the time. It would be centuries later that she would set foot in the palace again, this time as a generous donor of a large collection of historic artifacts and paintings to the new National Museum. Now the Palace was a gift back to the people of Adrestia, having been restored to its former glory and many of its treasures brought back through gifts and expensive purchases. It would be free to enter, operating by donation and a healthy sum of money granted by the government. And suddenly it was no longer a dark and gloomy ruin sitting on a hill, looming over Enbarr like its shadowy history. It became a point of pride, a place that showed off exactly how powerful Adrestia had once been, and how anyone could see it with ease.

The Old Empire was dead, but this new Palace represented the heart of the New.

The next couple centuries passed for Byleth in a blur. She lived all over Fodlan, each life bringing a new job, a new home, new friends. She had long gotten over the strangeness of immortality. Moving onto a new life was easy for her now, though some things still hurt her un-beating heart. She had friends, but was never truly close to anyone. The odd romance had sprung up from time to time, but they never lasted.

She couldn’t bear to weather another heartbreak like her first.

She would occasionally visit the Imperial Palace sometimes, once or twice in a lifetime. It became easier to do as the world modernized. Travel to such a large and important city like Enbarr had aways been prioritized. But she could never have fathomed to the extent.

The first time she took the train right into the heart of the city was exhilarating.

Enbarr was one of the first cities to install streetcars, making transit much more accessible for everyone.

Then came cars, making travel within the city even easier.

And then there were airplanes. To think, humanity could create something so big and so heavy but able to carry so many people and bags across the whole continent in a mere couple of hours! All without magic, at that.

She never thought she’d find herself living in Enbarr until it just...happened. A couple of years ago, she relocated to start anew once again, and like some kind of twist of fate, ended up as a tour guide for the museum. And she built herself such a stellar reputation as a well-researched academic of the place, she was promoted to curator in no time.

And she was happy, for the most part.

She got to her office and pulled out her laptop from her bag. She sat down at her desk, glancing briefly out at the beautiful view of the fountains sparkling in the sun, before getting to work.

Several hours later, and it was time to go home. But before she did, there was something she had to do, first.

It was the anniversary. A date no one celebrated, but also one only historians knew or cared about. It happened so, so long ago now, and though a pivotal moment in Fodlan’s history, it had so little impact on modern society that no one was ever really aware of it. To everyone else, it was just a date on a calendar.

To Byleth, it was the worst day of her life.

The Throne Room was one of the Palace’s most renowned locations. It had been largely kept preserved as it was, its massive grandeur shown off in its original glory. Obviously some things had been done - the tapestries and banners needed to be replaced, electric lighting had been installed to better illuminate the cavernous space, and the intricate marble floor needed constant restoration work.

But there was one thing that had been added to the space that never was there before. It was a strange thing, something so small and simple, sitting alone in the centre of the floor, before the throne.

A candle, burning with an enchanted flame that would never extinguish.

The museum was closed, so the hall was empty when Byleth arrived. And that solitary candle was alone in the vast, looming space.

Byleth stood before that candle. The floor under it was clean, reflecting the small flame in the multicoloured tiles. Eight hundred and fifty years ago, there was a pool of blood there instead. Eight hundred and fifty years ago, Byleth fell to her knees after pitching her bloody sword as far away from her as possible. Eight hundred and fifty years ago, she held onto the body of a woman she had once loved, still loved, until it had long gone cold and Byleth had cried until she physically couldn’t anymore. Eight hundred and fifty years ago, Byleth realized she had made a terrible mistake there was no going back on.

Eight hundred and fifty years ago, Emperor Edelgard von Hresvelg, last of her name and warmongering tyrant, was killed by the saviour of Fodlan, the Enlightened One.

“I’m sorry,” Byleth whispered to the candle, “I wish things had been different. I wish I could have saved you.”

Every year since she started working at the Palace, Byleth would visit the candle on this day and make the same wish. Sothis was long gone, having been merged with Byleth for centuries. And yet even with the divine power of the Goddess mixed with her blood, there was nothing Byleth could do to make that wish come true.

But then the lights flickered. Odd. There must have been a power surge somewhere...

They flickered again, then shut off completely, plunging the Throne Room into darkness. Only the minimal light from its ancient windows and that solitary candle chased away the darkest shadows.

And then all hell broke loose.

There’s a flash and the world seems to spin on its axis. The candle at her feet is blown out by a strong gust of wind. And as Byleth recovers from the initial shock, she practically falls over when something even more insane registers before her.

It’s the Emperor, on her knees, breathing heavy and body battle-worn. Just like she looked when…

Through her heavy breaths, Edelgard pants, “There you go, again…my teacher… Hesitating…”

She looks up, finally, to see a completely different Byleth standing before her. No Sword of the Creator, shorter, styled hair, strange-looking clothes. And completely dumbfounded.

“Professor… What’s going on?”

[livingecho-arch]

@bransles​  // CONTINUED FROM OLD BLOG !

this is rich. wine dripped from from his tilted glass with each drop in tandem with the rhythm that had dug itself into every inch of hyrule. the bones of every beast who’d fallen in the nearby fields with new life breathed into them swayed to the music — some shaking their shoulders in groove, others tapping their feet, waiting for any command from the necrodancer to show their guest what it meant to dance with death.

unfamiliar and obviously not hylian. had he been younger and more curious of the world, the necrodancer would have loved to chat him up. pick and pry for information of the land he hailed from. now, he merely saw some freakshow speck of dust waiting to be wiped away.

and such pride oozed from him! he didn’t even have to open his mouth yet, and he could feel that high amour propre; he would be fun.

“oh?” he hummed, nothing short of pure amusement in his voice, “but how could i deny such a gracious request. here, allow me just a moment —”

he stood from his throne and stepped down from the dais, heels clacking loudly against the marble like an audience clapping in beat. he raised his arms, and with a conductor’s cue to stop, the music came to a halt.

and so did everything else.

with no rhythm to follow, nothing and nobody would be permitted to move. their hearts wouldn’t even have beat.

then, with a flick of his wrist, he music resumed. louder, almost deafening. yet, the necrodancer’s voice seemed to carry over it.

“are you brainless? what makes you think you can waltz in here and ask anything of me?”

the teacher stood his ground . that smile never leaving his blue - tinted skin that showed those pearly white fangs . his tail whipping side to side with the melody with glee . this would be fun . beating a man into submission with words alone was something that brought pure joy to him . golden eyes glanced to the side at the skeletal monsters that seemed quite excited . must want to rip him apart . too bad they would never get the opportunity to do so . 

than the music stopped -- 

his heart halted , lungs frozen in their final breath & that smile now forced to remain . how in the name of vahymn could one man hold this ability ?! he needed to know -- shame the man seemed less keen on talking . 

once the music returned , so did his breath . slender fingers came up , adjusting his glasses . the glare shining off of them in beat . this man was a curious one . what was his magical range ? he seemed to be long distance but that could very well be the curse he had placed upon the land . vis would need more time to figure this -- lest things get messy . 

‘ on the contrary , i am the creator of three colleges , one of which i teach at . perhaps i could enroll you to teach you how to address someone proper . you mother seemed to fail you in that regard . ’ another step forward , arms crossed & tongue itching to speak . 

‘ first lesson for free -- give someone your name . example : i am vis von hellbert of varule . alpha in caste & headmaster . i have seen the birth of a nation & crafted laws my land leans upon . written textbooks & have bent history to my tongue . what have you done -- crafted a little musical ? ‘

[dingberg]

Who are your artistic inspirations? Are you interested or find inspiration in classical art or strictly modern artists?

Good question, and here comes a long answer because I guess that’s just what I do.

As you can probably tell from looking at my art, I take most of my inspiration from more modern artists (at least as modern as animation and whatnot started being a thing). I definitely appreciate classical art in that those artists figured out most the stuff out that we do today and the sheer amount of skill and creativity it took to do what they did with the much more limited resources and knowledge they had at their disposal. I have learned a lot from the classics and take some amount of direct inspiration from them (and plenty of indirect inspiration). For example, my tendency toward employing higher contrast with lighting and color to make my stuff “pop” more has been inspired in part by classical chiaroscuro paintings. But in general, I find myself much more interested in modern, more stylized stuff (especially character / narrative driven art), and thus find myself taking more inspiration from them as a result.

Getting off the topic of modern vs classical, I’d say I draw a little inspiration from a lot of different artists rather than a lot of inspiration from a few artists. I’ll often discover a new artist that has a style I really like, study their stuff and figure out exactly what I like about their style and learn how to do it myself, then get get distracted and discover ANOTHER new artist and repeat the process over again. Sometimes it feels like I can’t really make up my mind and just want to do everything.

As I’m sure nobody is surprised to hear, I’ve been a fan of anime/manga style art for a long time and take a lot of inspiration from those artists, mainly the more uniquely styled ones that get really creative with character design and stylization and all that. I think the most recent example would be Horikoshi Kouhei, creator of My Hero Academia. I started reading the manga a few years ago, I think, and I immediately recognized that he shared almost all of the sensibilities I already had with regards to character design, stylization, writing, and a bunch of other things. And it only sweetened the package that he’d also add little snippets between chapters with notes about his process and what his thoughts were with designing different characters and other elements. So I naturally started looking to him as an example I could learn from of “doing pretty much exactly what I like to do, but more professionally and on a much larger scale". Some precise examples of inspiration I’ve taken from him are adding more solid black to my art to make shadows pop more, and adding notes to my character designs with details about who they are beyond the design and some of my thoughts that went into making certain design decisions. Some other examples of anime/manga that serve as major inspirations for me are Gurren Lagann (stylization and exaggeration of action and lighting), and One Piece (exaggeration of character designs and giving characters fun little “quirks” to their design and personality to make them more interesting and unique). Samurai Champloo is another interesting one that inspired me with its melding of stylization with some degree of realism to get something that looks natural while still allowing for plenty of fun to be had with designs and action, and combining elements that really contrast with each other for an interesting result as well as taking inspiration from unlikely sources, like how Samurai Champloo itself is an unlikely combination between ancient samurai and modern hip-hop.

However, I also take a lot of inspiration from western artists as well. Skullgirls is a game that I bought exclusively because I absolutely adore the character designs, art, and incredible animation of the game. I don’t even really like fighting games, that’s how much I was sold on the art and characters. I was introduced to the game through the devs doing a thing they called “Whiteboard Wednesdays” during development of the game, where they posted picture of all the random doodles they did during the week, and I followed the game’s development ever since. I also have a bunch of animation sprites and sequences from the game saved to my computer to go back to and study every now and then. Seriously, check the game out if you haven’t heard of it and you’re a fan of 2D animation, that stuff is incredible. Don’t Starve has a really unique and interesting visual style that does an excellent job if giving the game a very distinct tone. Team Fortress 2 is also a HUGE one for me. One of, if not my favorite game of all time, due in no small part to the phenomenal characters that are as fun and cartoonish in their personalities as they are in their designs. For that matter, the official TF2 (and L4D) comics are wonderful examples of translating these game characters into a 2D, narrative-driven format that’s also oozing with style.

Those are just a few of my “big name” inspirations, but I honestly think most of my inspiration comes from other artists I find on social media or meet by other means that either work freelance or just do art and post it for fun. There are so many artists floating around beyond just the ones you see in games, TV or comics, and each of them has something unique to offer that no other artist has. Plus, I really enjoy seeing a lot of the miscellaneous stuff that makes up an artist, like their works-in-progress, little doodles they did in an afternoon, or the humorous little anecdotes they add onto their posts. I think the first person I ever followed and the person that inspired me to try my hand at sharing my art online was @thejohnsu. I’ve always loved his offbeat sense of humor and have been inspired by his weird process of coming up with something simple and letting it just absorb whatever odd ideas his brain happens to conjure up while he’s developing it until he eventually ends up with some crazy, creative character or situation that nobody else would have ever dreamed of. Another one of my early inspirations is @gashi45, mainly just for how insanely stylish his art looks in all aspects. Colors, shape design, expressions, it’s a complete package of in-your-face style, and he was the reason I started my quest long ago to leave my comfort zone, experiment, and really push myself to find my own unique style that really shows who I am as an artist. I actually followed these two all the way back on DeviantArt, which is where I really started as an artist online. And these are only a couple of the many artists that inspire me. Every artist I’ve followed on social media has inspired me in some way, major or minor, and even a ton of artists that I never ended up following for one reason or another.

Anyway, I hope that sufficiently answers your question.

(…I really need to work on being more concise with my answers, this is really gonna clog up people’s feeds).

[scratchybeardsweetmouth]

Iain Glen Knows Why You're So Thirsty For Jorah Mormont on Game of Thrones

By Madison Vain April 29, 2019  Photography [and Videography] by Tyler Joe

Excerpt:

Ser Jorah Mormont crossing the wide terrains of Westeros on horseback is a familiar sight for fans of HBO's Game of Thrones. But for actor Iain Glen, who’s played the role now for seven-plus seasons, it’s hardly his favorite mode of transportation. “I always find a bicycle,” he says, sitting in a Midtown Manhattan green room, speaking about how he prefers to get around since the show catapulted its cast into the stardom stratosphere. It’s simply the most practical—not to mention safest—way to travel, these days. In some locations, especially Spain, he notes, fans don’t hold back when they spot the lovelorn lord. “They’ll attack you,” he says. “They’ll just grab you and start snogging you without invitation.” It's not exactly a violent response, but it does make getting around difficult. “They just want to hold you,” he continues. Cue: a set of wheels. “I don’t know what it is,” he admits, “They stop looking. They don’t associate actors with bicycles. So [I] just always sneak out the back, get a bicycle, and find a hickey restaurant on the outskirts of town. That’s my modus operandi.” New York is a bit easier, and he insisted on arriving at our April interview on foot even though a few blocks away fans have been camping outside of the hotel where the Thrones cast is staying for the premiere of Season Eight. Fans in the city recognize him, but let him get on his way. “It's lovely, actually,” he admits, laughing. “It reminds me of London.”  Historically, the attention has been confusing for Glen's younger children. (He has one son and two daughters.) His youngest is six and, as the actor says, frequently taken back by the approach of strangers. He chuckles, recalling her questions: Do you know that person? Why do people keep speaking to you? Why are they calling you Jorah? But for Glen, it's welcome. He says his wife actually put it best: “Who would not want someone to pat you on the back and tell you you're fantastic a few times every day?” For many of Glen’s young costars, Game of Thrones marked the very beginning of their careers. (Bella Ramsey, who plays Jorah’s cousin, the spunky Lyanna Mormont, hasn’t even seen most of the series on the account of only being 15 years old.) But the 57-year-old Scot has been working consistently across film, television, and theater for decades. One of his fondest memories of New York, he says, almost wistful, was when he and Nicole Kidman starred in Blue Room on Broadway in 1998. He lived near Central Park and spent his down time perusing the Met, freely.   “It’s a great deal to take on when you’re that young,” he says of co-stars like Maisie Williams and Sophie Turner who began filming as young teens. “But they all seem to be managing incredibly well.” And, as only an actor seasoned by years of rejection can, he quips, with a laugh: “And, if I’d been Kit’s age or Maisie’s age when I started, I certainly wouldn’t be complaining!” A wizened perspective actually made him more measured in his acceptance of the role, initially, he recalls. “When you accepted the job, you had to commit for, I think it was four years,” he says. “And they wouldn’t tell you if you were gonna die.” Glen said his team pressed HBO for details: “I asked for a breakdown, going forward, season by season.” His quest turned up few details, but something about the little he learned inspired him. “Listen, you go out for stuff, and there’s some things you really want and some things you don’t,” he says. “I really wanted this. I remember saying to my wife that I had a funny feeling about it. I felt like it was going somewhere.” As we all know now, he was right. The show is watched obsessively, by millions. (The Season Eight premiere drew a record 17.4 million viewers, making it HBO’s biggest night ever for streaming.) And in the age of Netflix binges where watching on your own time is the norm, it remains a can’t-miss, Sunday night event. That reality is a treat for the cast, as much as the viewers, assures Glen. A long career means the actor is exponentially more aware of how special it is to have been involved. “It’s very unusual to come back to something again and again and again,” he muses. “The life of an actor is very ephemeral. That’s what we’re used to; getting thrown with a bunch of strangers and getting to know each other really quickly and then saying, ‘Right, I’m gonna completely forget about that and now I’m going to jump into something else.’ Certainly, in my experience as an actor, I’ve never done anything like this. And to come back to something that everyone is saying is just going fantastic, that’s a very binding thing in itself. That was very winning.” much has been made over the years about some of the brutal shoots the cast has had to endure each season. (See: the Battle of Winterfell, which required 11 weeks of freezing, night shoots.) But for the most part, Glen was lucky. “In the early seasons, I was part of the Dothraki/Daenerys storyline,” he explains. “We were always on the move, always traveling. But we were always coming into rather fantastic, gorgeous, sunny warm spaces. We were filming the bit that the crew always looked forward to each season, before they went back to shitty, wet, cold weather.” And then came the greyscale. When the disease had gotten to its worst, Glen spent eight hours with the costume department, getting a full prosthetic outfitted on him before each shoot. “It was like coming in at midnight and being ready to shoot at eight, to then do the ten-hour day,” he recalls. “It reminded me of some of the drugs I’ve taken. At university, I was pretty spaced out—but in a nice, helpful, acting way.” It was also during this time that Glen thought his run on the notoriously deadly show was coming to an end. “I thought my number was up,” he admits. “[Creators] Dan [Weiss] and Dave [Benioff] really enjoy fucking with the actors—not giving them any sort of clues. So I asked them both individually, because I couldn’t get the answer.” He still came up short. “One of them said ‘I’m not saying.’ The other, when I said, ‘Do I survive the greyscale?’ said, ‘You do this season.’” (Turns out, the actors know just how you feel, wondering about their characters’ fates.) Ser Jorah is not Jon Snow. He doesn’t have a hero storyline and he's not a contender for the Throne, so it wasn’t a give-in that he’d earn such a passionate fanbase. And yet the Jorah fan accounts on social and thirsty fan fiction on the internet has run wild over the years. Glen attributes it to his devotion to Dany, the Mother of Dragons. (Even, yes, when he betrays her.) “In a chaotic, mad, dangerous, and violent world in which people are generally out for themselves,” he begins, “the purity of his desire to support her—to be there for her—is a nice contrast to the rest of the show. For the first two, three seasons, it was about this desire to express that from his point of view, but never doing it.” He follows up, “Do you know what I mean?” Um yeah. Jorah as the head of House Friendzone is the material that’s spawned, to be exact, a gajillion memes since the show’s 2011 debut. The way he looks at her, even now, oozes with a desperation that viewers can’t help but melt over. “I think they modulated their journey really beautifully throughout the seasons,” he says of the writer’s attention to Dany and Jorah. “I think they found a really compelling root through it, where for you, as an audience, it's hard to stand from the outside. And I'm not the best person to ask, but people tell me, that you have such a mixture of emotions watching. At first you think, ‘Oh please, go on and say it!’ But then very quickly it's, ‘Oh god! You shouldn’t have!’” On a show that has to divide time between so many characters each week, there’s an inevitable risk that some storylines will feel one-note or under-developed. Glen’s refuses this in his portrayal of the former slave owner mightily, instead bringing a weightiness as well as a readiness to recognize internal conflicts to his turns on screen. “It’s like real life,” he says of his careful approach. “Isn’t it? With people that we fall madly in love with, there’s always a moment of, ‘Fuck, I never realized you were such a shit when I fell in love with you.’” It’s been a delight, truly, for audiences. But Sunday night, the pensive stead’s run finally came to an end. After leading legions of troops into the Battle of Winterfell, near the end of the one-hour, twenty-two minute episode, he fulfilled his final mission: protect Dany with his life. He lasted as long as the battle and Dany held him as he drew his final breath. For the fans who've loved him, they know it's exactly how he'd have hoped to go. [...] “I feel very happy with his story arc,” Glen tells me. “When we read all six episodes before we started at the beginning, in a big room in Northern Ireland—Belfast—I thought the writers had managed it incredibly well and thoroughly, in terms of looking after everyone. It’s one of the hard things when you write big, sweeping, epic dramas like this. How do you look after everyone’s storyline, individually?” We’ll continue to see as Season Eight continues its March towards a May 19 series finale. Glen is adamant that the sheer scale of the production will stick in his memory bank forever. “I felt like a kid, coming into set and seeing some huge, monumental fucking castle—and arriving at bases with so many vehicles, so many extras, so many horses. There’s a side to that which is just really thrilling.” But the moment he’s actually most fond of a shoot from Season Five when Ser Jorah, following a brutal journey with Tyrion Lannister, offers his life to Dany in the Fighting Pits in Mereen. It took several days—and five or six other fighters—to film, something Glen loves, but it was what was going on behind the camera that he enjoyed most. “My family was there,” he recalls. The crew dressed his then seven-year-old up as a mini Ser Jorah and let her call the shots alongside director David Nutter. “They put her in the gear and put scars on her face. It was so, just great.” Looking ahead, Glen joins the DC Universe. Earlier this month, it was announced that the actor would take on the role of Gotham City’s most notorious billionaire, Bruce Wayne, on Titans. It’s unlikely that that show—or any role—could eclipse Jorah’s rabid fandom but that hardly bothers Glen. “I’m proud of the product and I’m proud of any association with that,” he explains. “You can walk around thinking, ‘Didn’t you see my Hamlet?’ or ‘Where were you when I did Henry VI at the Royal Theater Company?’ but you’re wasting your time. [Thrones] is kind of the Holy Grail, to be critically approved but have a massive following? That’s the ticket.”

[thereasontherumisgone]

The Wayward Boys ( pt. 6 )

( pt. 5 ) 

Taglist: @thatgaydemigodnerd 

And now the story can begin, all the players are gathered and soon they will need to take up their roles and play the game well. The Creator, The Glitch, The Demon, The Knight, The Agent, The Genius and The Hacker are all finally in one place, safe from the threat of their own worlds, nothing could follow them here. It’s as secure as the void itself. 

Where they were was the last part that existed of the Godly plane that Godric, Petyr and their friends would rule from, specifically this was Petyr’s part of that plane, a massive life fill forest that seemingly went on forever to the naked eye, but if you were willing to wander for a few days, you’d find yourself walking in circles. In the center of this forest was one giant tree, safely comparable to The Leaning Tower of Pisa, if it was upright and with a width to support it’s tall structure, definitely big enough to live in and Jay only proved this theory the closer he got to the tree and noticed the smaller signs of something living in that tree, small windows, vines seemingly tied together to form a swing that sat close to a large hole near the branch, oh and the lanterns and the sound of a certain Doctor calling out from above. “Oh hey buddy it’s nice to see you-- Oh god I lost the spider where is it-?!” Before disappearing back into the small window in which they appeared. 

“I see they’ve all made themselves somewhat comfortable.” Jay found himself commenting as he followed Petyr into the tree, they were now heading up a stairway seemingly crafted by the tree itself. 

“I forgot Doctor Oakes doesn’t like spiders. . .To my knowledge they’ve killed three already, which saddens me.” Petyr let out a sigh but shrugged not long before continuing upwards and both remained quiet until they got to a door, where Petyr paused. “I may have forgot to mention a few things. . .” 

“Oh god of course you have. . .what have you brought me into this time?” Jay rubbed the bridge of his nose and Petyr opened his mouth to say something, then closed it again and showed the facial expressions of a man trying to deliver bad news without the receiver of the bad news just walking away. 

“Well. . .The Agent that I told you about is Agent Aleksander Parker. . .Fully brought back from the dead with only minor difficulties.” Petyr started off and monitored the look of ‘What?’ on Jay’s face turn to confusion, realization, sadness, back to confusion but with a hint of disgust. 

“You- You did what to him?!” Jay exclaimed but quietly as to not alert anyone on the other side of that door. 

“Found his body, brought him back. . .Someone drew smiley faces over his nipples for some reason. . .Listen it’s just been a messed up day and it’s only going to get worse.” Petyr sighed again.

“What else? If there is anything else?” Jay asked, only two seconds later to be regretting it when the doors were pulled open and Jay was greeted by his doppelganger, who had the most smug look on his face as he pulled both Petyr and Jay into the room. 

“Hey ol’ buddy, ol’ pal, long time no see!” James said excitedly as he pat both of Jay’s cheeks which was returned by Jay flashing glowing blue eyes as his way of quietly threatening the other. “And still as friendly as ever! I missed you so much! When was the last time we spoke? Banks hostages or--?” 

“When you were in Super Max, not going to ask how you got out or who helped you.” Jay took a step back from James and sent Petyr a look. 

“It was either him or Legohead, Legohead makes your friend here look normal.” Godric spoke up, previously was just sitting in the corner with a drink that looked similar to whiskey and a book, classy. 

“Don’t compare me to that weirdo.” James huffed. “By the way you look like shit.” He looked back at Jay. 

“Can someone please explain why we’re all here now? Now that Petyr has returned with Mr Barkley.” A person with a mask that had some voice modulator on it spoke up and Jay mentally took a guess. The Hacker. And he was correct. 

“I agree with Mr Seven, I only know the basics of why I’m here and as much as I love you Plant Man, I am a busy person.” Addison said as they sat stitching up a jacket that was a little too big and worn for Addison’s typical look. 

“Wait what about the weird zombie guy in the other room?” A young red head said, raising his hand slightly. “Was he kidnapped also or is he. . .” The kid gestured vaguely in Godric’s direction. “His project.” 

“Mr Parker has had a long day, he’ll be caught up when he’s rested and when he starts functioning at a slightly higher level than confused 8 year old.” Godric answered, still reading his book.

“Okay beautiful, thank you, continue talking.” The kid looked back at the group and nodded to Petyr.

“Thank you,” Petyr started. “You’ve all been assembled here today because Godric and I need a team of capable people to stop the end of the world, we chose you all not because of your impeccable lack of survival instincts or reluctance to work with outside parties, but because when faced with a challenge or a threat you can all get the job done in your own ways.” The god explained and a man with tanned skin and dark hair rose his hand. “Yes Mr Marquez?” 

“Yeah not my question but one from my uhh. . .roommate.” He spoke. “But why is there a kid here if the world is going to end?” 

“The kid can kick your ass.” The red head said with a frown, Mr Marquez, more commonly known as Rusty held his hands up. 

“I’m sure that could happen but my point still stands.” Rusty said and Petyr looked at Cody and gave a nod, then Cody was covered in his golden armour which allowed Jay to put together that the kid is The Knight so this Mr Marquez and his roommate must be The Demon. 

“How about now?” Cody’s voice said from inside the armour, Rusty had a wicked smile and mumbled something to himself that sounded like ‘Just scare him.’ from where Jay was standing before Rusty’s upperhalf was quickly overcome by a large shadowy creature which began to take form, limbs growing from a strange mixture of a black ooze, dark hairs and shadows quickly took the form of something out of a horror film, long hair covering most of it’s face and it’s back arched over to look down at the small human in the shiny costume and it let out a shrill screech before disappearing. 

“Oh my god you’re possessed by the girl from The Ring.” James commented from across the room. “So what’s the deal? You wear her for Halloween and she wears you for the rest of the year?” James asked, Rusty glared at him. 

“Alright Punk Edit, what can you do?” He asked and James grinned, about to stand up when a blue light forced him back down. 

“If we’re all done comparing ourselves, some of us want to know why we’re here.” Jay said, one hand in his pocket while the other had a faint blue glow around it. “Here how about I share the gory details on all our powers? Seven over there is a telepathic hacker who is very shy about people knowing his actual name and all that shit, Dr Oakes doesn’t have super powers but is one of the strongest people in the room from what I’ve seen so far, James can fuck up reality and I go around fixing it.” Everyone was quiet and Rusty held his hands up, taking a step back while at some point during Jay’s rant Cody’s armour had disappeared. 

“Uh. . .Well Hi I’m Cody Miller and my superpower is that I have a very. . .symbiotic attachment to some sentient magical armour that lives in my body. . .It identifies as he and answers to Reigner.” Cody spoke up, mainly looking at the floor. 

“My old work colleagues used to call me Rusty so. . .I’m Rusty and I’m possessed by a demon that yes, is a woman and please refrain from making those jokes.” Addison stood up from their seat and took a step forward. 

“Addison Oakes, I’m super rich and super smart, pretty sure I’m here to be the medic which I’m cool with. . .” They spoke with a nod. 

“Just refer to me as Seven the computer nerd.” Seven mumbled from across the room a Godric stood up. 

“Godric, old god of Death, here to be your mentor for the weeks ahead.” The God decided to join, followed by his friend. 

“I’m Petyr, God of. . .a lot of things, also a mentor.” 

“James Barkley, not from this universe but if anyone is ending it it’s me and it’s out of spite.” 

“Jay Barkley, from this universe, recently just quit my job and hoping to help.” 

[crusherthedoctor]

Sonic Villains: Sweet or Shite? - Part 12: THE HARD-BOILED HEAVIES

There are some villains I like. And there are some villains I don’t like. But why do I feel about them the way I do? That’s where this comes in.

This is a mini-series of mine, in which I’ll be going into slightly more detail about my thoughts on the villains in the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise, and why I think they either work well, or fall flat (or somewhere in-between). I’ll be giving my stance on their designs, their personalities, and what they had to show for themselves in the game(s) they featured in. Keep in mind that these are just my own personal thoughts. Whether you agree or disagree, feel free to share your own thoughts and opinions! I don’t bite. :>

Anyhow, for today’s installment, we’ll be covering the rotund oppression squad of Sonic Mania, and celebrated improv artists among the Badnik community: the Hard-Boiled Heavies.

The Gist: Sonic the Hedgehog and Miles "Tails" Prower were heading to Angel Island in pursuit of a mysterious new jewel that their nemesis, Dr. Eggman, was on the hunt for. Unfortunately for them, a squad of Egg Robos had already beaten them to the punch, because literally everyone in the Sonic universe is faster than Sonic. Upon being unearthed, the jewel in question - the Phantom Ruby - wasted no time in working its magic, and with its unexplained distortion efforts, it sent Sonic and Tails (and Knuckles) to Green Hill.

Also, it gave the Egg Robos more than a few nifty accessories.

The king was on his own with finding the tip of his scepter though.

Thus began a new adventure that proved to the non-believers that this franchise can in fact work beautifully when the characters have gameplay mechanics in common with each other and aren't going around picking up guns and turning into werehogs. Sonic was on a mission to get to the bottom of the Phantom Ruby shenanigans, but his upgraded opposition, dubbed the Hard-Boiled Heavies, did whatever they could to stop the hedgehog's pulse, which largely involved making use of old Badniks in refreshing and exciting new ways... much like themselves.

This is a more compelling take on Arthurian legend than the entirety of Black Knight.

All the while, Eggman carried on using the Phantom Ruby to his heart's content to make things even more difficult for our heroes, like teleporting them away as often as a Kirby final boss, and giving Metal Sonic a brand new Final Smash. Eggman planned to use the Titanic Monarch, a giant robot that made the monsters in Shadow of the Colossus look vertically challenged by comparison, to achieve his lifelong dream of taking over the world. Complications arose however, when the leader of the Heavies decided he wanted the Phantom Ruby for himself. Sadly for him, this was not an Adventure Era title, meaning Eggman actually fought back, and on equal terms at that. Sonic, with his super form, was forced to take on Eggman and the King at the same time.

In a stunning revelation, Sonic defeated them both. But not before the Phantom Ruby itself teleported the hedgehog away one last time, to a different time completely, where he would experience a different journey altogether... Then he came back, did the whole thing all over again, and now he's cracking a cold one with the boys (and King, for some reason).

Fucking 4Kids censors at it again.

The Designs: The Heavies are still Egg Robos at their core, so they share the same general body structure. Don't assume that makes them indistinguishable however, for they've been given a lot of bells and whistles that play to each of their thematic motifs, right up to their weapons of choice.

Heavy Gunner is a robo-bobby:

"You're nicked, hedgehog... But before you're sent to the chair, are there any pencils you'd like me to sharpen for you?"

Heavy Shinobi is a stealthy ninja, despite being neon green:

He speaks entirely in fortune cookies.

Heavy Magician is always dressed to impress:

These guys certainly do make me feel like magic.

Heavy Rider is a rough n' tough knight of the round table... if that table was Eggman's:

She dances when'ere she's able.

And the top dog, Heavy King, is suitably imposing without trying too hard and looking accidentally hilarious in the process, unlike certain other villains in this very series:

Why did he watermark his chest hair?

His Majesty also gained a second form during his final battle, which sacrificed his legs for size, power, and high quality Tee Lopes rips.

And a chimney for his head.

These designs already go far to give the Heavies their own sense of individual character. As you'll soon notice however, that's only half of it...

The Personalities: You can laugh all you want, but these Egg Robos in a game with no dialogue whatsoever managed to show vastly more personality than many of the villains in this franchise WITH dialogue. Look at this shit right here, and tell me they don't immediately ooze charm like it's nothing.

Pictured: Love at first sight.

And this extends to your confrontations with each of them. Gunner is crafty, and willing to sacrifice his own men to cover his ass, but the panicked look on his face when things go south for him is very relatable.

"Wait... I'm in a Sonic game...? ...For Sonic fans...? ...Oh god..."

Meanwhile, Shinobi puts up a cool and suave front, and never hesitates to go in for the kill, but he's not above playing around for the sake of his own cockiness.

Magician is a bubbly showoff, always popping up to mess with the heroes at a moment's notice. But she's also rather affable, and well-mannered to her mortal enemies.

Almost makes up for the Strangelove hands.

And Rider is perpetually in the midst of a cocaine rush, as her thirst for thrill and fun never sleeps. Yet she appears to have great affection for her pet Motobug, Jimmy.

Finally, King is a no-nonsense frowny face with a Sean Connery accent who is sick of his fellow Heavies' shit, who can nonetheless back himself up as the group's undisputed leader.

They may be fairly straightforward, but through the subtleties of their animations, there's a lot of life put into these guys, and their characters don't start and finish with their default trait like so many before them. You don't need to be Shakespeare in a Sonic game. You just need to be memorable and entertaining while fulfilling your role. And the Heavies do that with considerable ease.

The Execution: This might come as a surprise to you, but I love the shit out of the Heavies.

How can you hate this???

You have to understand that an overwhelming number of villains in this franchise not named Eggman have not only ranged from mediocre to terrible, they've also had a tendency of feeling the same as each other. When it's not a giant monster with little backstory of genuine interest, it's a guy dressed in all black who does evil for evil's sake. And that's without adding the recolours and their penchant for gaining disproportionate fandoms simply for being recolours.

Why is it, then, that a group who are all based on the same robot succeed where those villains fail?

Well, I'd argue there's a few elements at work there. The obvious one is that they're simply better implemented, and they leave an impression through their boss encounters and animations rather than whether or not they played tonsil hockey with Shadow or Amy in a fanfic. Another factor is that unlike other villains, they were never hyped up to be the Raddest, Baddest, Greatest Enemy of All Time for Sonic, and thus they didn't run the risk of not being able to live up to that claim. They were allowed to simply exist and do their own thing, as one addition to help compliment an overall package.

You could also argue that their status as a group works in their favor too, as it helps to make each of their traits pop out that little bit more. And they're honestly really clever with their strategies, like how Magician transforms into forgotten characters to spice things up, or how Shinobi's shurikens aren't actually shurikens, but rather Asterons, one of the most notorious enemies in the series. And need I mention Rider using a goddamn Motobug like it's a steed? These characters could have been very throwaway, but there's a surprising level of thought put into how each of them work, and giving them a characteristic spin that works to Sonic's tastes, and considering this is the same franchise that gave us a bad guy named Black Doom, I'd say it's worth noting.

"...Please explain why Boobie Bots Weekly is in my search history."

So yes, in this world where Dooms and Mephiles's's's's's's have been running rampant, the Hard-Boiled Heavies share their creator's honor of making a name for themselves. And as much as I have a fondness for the Deadly Six in spite of their issues (Zazz and Zor are still hilarious, fight me), I will agree without argument that the Heavies are a much better execution of the quirky boss group format on the overall side of things. And I swear to GodJesus and the Bear, if they never make a single appearance past their debut, I will be a very sad panda. If they can give Silver and his tiresome schtick countless second chances (and failing to make it interesting every single time), they can sure as hell give these juggernauts another go.

But until then, at least we still have Mania. Now if you'll excuse me, Shinobi's about to teleport behind me. Hope it's nothing personal.

Crusher Gives the Hard-Boiled Heavies a: Thumbs Up!

[writingarchangels]

Lost & Found (Michifer)

Pairing: Michael/Lucifer

Characters: Michael, Lucifer, Chuck & Amara

Word count: 1.7K

Triggers: scared & sad Lucifer, I guess? Pain, hurt, angst with a happy ending

Square: Amara

Mod tag: @heavenandhellbingo

Jealous at her brother's creation - the first Archangel - The Darkness decided to give this 'creating' a try herself... but the end results are not as she hoped. Yet this terrified blinded creature might just end up becoming quite something after all.

I want to try doing that too, The Darkness thought as she was watching her younger brother fussing over the thing he had recently created. God had called it an 'Archangel' – whatever that might mean really – and seemed to be pretty darn proud of it. When she had tried to get a better look at this so-called Archangel, God had pulled it away and out of her sight. All she managed to see of it were wings. Blue wings.

Because her brother was being a dick and wouldn't allow her to look at this being, she had gone off in a fit of rage and went to try to create something on her own. She just wanted to be able to call something her own – and possibly rub it in her brother's smug face that she could do more than only destroy.

How hard can it be?

~~

Creation is hard, The Darkness discovered early on. No matter what she tried, or how she attempted to do it, she never quite got it right. The first twenty tries or so her creations simply exploded or spontaneously combusted before she could give them life. It took her another hundred attempts to be able to create something that lived at all. But even then, they just kept on dying no matter how badly she tried to keep them alive.

Frowning, she looked down at the hunched shape before her, waiting for the inevitable moment it would die too, but that did not happen. For a while, she simply waited to see what would happen, but nothing seemed to happen. While it wasn't exactly moving around – even though she had given it limbs and even wings – it did stay alive. It didn't come close to her brother's creation, but it was something and it came from her.

Curiously, she kneeled in front of her creature and poked it in the hopes of receiving a reaction. A terrified screech came from the creature and it scrambled away from her as it made itself as small as possible, six pink wings wrapping around a shaking body. "I'm not trying to harm you," The Darkness frowned, wondering if it was even able to understand what she was saying. Did it even recognize her as its creator? Did it even know that it directly came from her?

"Can you even understand me at all?" She tried again, trying to speak in a gentler tone now.

The creature did not show any signs of understanding her. It pulled further away from her and it was scrambling and feeling around as if it was terrified of something. Of what, she didn't know. Taking a closer look at the creature, she realized that it was blind and unable to perceive anything. Its eyes were looking ahead but unable to perceive anything.

The Darkness frowned, reaching out to her creature to try to help it. She figured she would be able to fix its eyes. However, the moment she touched it, the creature screeched and hit out at her with its pink wings. Startled, she dropped it, which made the creature attempt to dart away, limping as it did so. The Darkness was disappointed to discover that her mere touch had nearly destroyed its seemingly sensitive skin with black goo oozing out of the areas her hands had touched. It had ripped the skin right off. It might be alive, but it seems to be rather frail. It probably won't survive long on its own, she thought to herself, growing disappointed at yet another failure at creation. She would never be able to achieve what her brother did.

Looking down at the fumbling creature with the broken skin and trembling wings, she tried to think of what to do with it. Should she destroy it or simply leave and abandon it? Whatever she chooses, the result would be the same; it would die. But would she be the one to strike it down? Watching it trembling and fumbling around like that, she wasn't sure if she could. And if she destroyed her creation, wouldn't that only end in proving to her brother that she could do nothing else but destroy?

And thus The Darkness left and abandoned her frightful and flawed creature to its own fate.

~~

It hurt. Everything was hurting. A silent cry leaving his lips, the newly born creature curled in on itself, every movement of its muscles splitting open his skin. But it hurt more when he wasn't curled up he was quick to learn, so he pushed through it. He lifted the long things on his back – he didn't know what they were, but they felt soft and comforting, and so he placed them around his broken skin.

There was a voice, presumably speaking to him, but each time he flinched away from the voice. And then the voice touched him, and it hurt. And so, he had cried and tried to get away. He grew scared of the being he couldn't see but who could hurt him so easily. And then the voice left, and he was all alone. And he wasn't sure what was worse.

He laid waiting for a while, wrapped up in the soft things that grew out of his back. But no one seemed to go to him again. Feeling completely lost and having no idea what to do, he cried silently to himself as his tiny body shook.

~~

Michael twisted in his father's hold as his tiny fluffy wings flared out. He had been sensing it for a while now, a feeling deep in his very being – as if something had taken hold of his grace and was tugging on it.

He needed to know what it was. Therefore, the tiny angel jumped out of his protesting father's arms and went to investigate. Or planned to, at least. For his plan was disrupted by his father grabbing him again. "Michael, don't wander off. It's dangerous out there," God told him with a light scowl.

"But there is something out there and they need my help! I can sense it!" Michael retorted, struggling against the arms holding him.

"Michael," God started to say, "there's nothing out there. Let along something that would actually need help with anything. So please, just calm down."

"No!" Michael protested.

Seeing that the tiny angel wouldn't calm down anytime soon, God sighed and decided he might as well let Michael have his fun. "Very well," he said, "go look for this creature, but I will be going with you." He wasn't about to let this Archangel he had spent a lot of time on wander off on his own and possibly get lost in the dark. Michael clearly wasn't about to let that be said twice and jumped out of his arms, blue wings fluttering, and then he was off, apparently knowing where to go. God was left running after the angel.

~~

He wasn't alone anymore. Curling in on himself, he tried to make himself as small as possible. He might be overlooked that way. It didn't seem to work, for something seemed to sit down in front of him. "Father, what is it?" A voice called out. Stilling, he listened, shocked that he seemed to be able to understand it at all. He couldn't understand what the first voice had said – the one who had hurt him – but he could hear this one just fine. Another voice spoke, another voice he couldn't understand. But it sounded displeased. He winched away, afraid that this voice would end up hurting him as well.

"I like him!" The kind voice spoke. "Can he be my friend?"

The soft things on his back shuddered and he lifted them oh so slowly. He kept them around himself, but he listened. Something was placed over him and he tensed up, expecting there to be pain, but it never happened. What was placed over him was soft and warm, just like the things on his back, and he found himself leaning into it and taking comfort in their presence.

The other voice said something, and then there was a bright light, which even he could partly see with his blind eyes. He shrieked and flinched away. A noise of protest came from the kind voice. "Father, no! Please don't hurt him!" The voice called out. He was aware of something leaning over him, but they didn't touch him.

"Let him live!"

The light dimmed, and the other voice replied with something. Shaking fearfully, a tiny noise came from the small creature as he attempted to hide in the soft material that was still draped over him. "I will take care of him and raise him if I have to, but please, save him and give him a change."

The light came closer and instinctively, he tried to get away. It was scary, and he didn't want to get hurt. "It's alright," the kind voice told him, "he's going to help you and make you feel better."

You promise that? He couldn't speak the words aloud, but the other being seemed to understand him just fine. He didn't know how it worked - but there seemed to be a kinship between them. They understood each other and deep down, both felt just as lost and scared as the other did.

"I promise."

And so, he decided to trust him and allowed to light to gently touch him, to fuse with his being and create something new. Something beautiful and fair. Something which would never have any equal whatsoever. The pain disappeared as his skin got stronger. Eyes tinting a bright red, he would be able to see the world and the wonders it contained. Created from both light and darkness, he had been lost and stumbling... but then he was found.

Gingerly placed in a pair of outstretched arms, he twitched slightly with his eyes still closed. He needed a moment to get used to his new, stronger form. "Take good care of him, Michael. He has been through a lot, so he will need a lot of love. Do you know what to call him?" A voice said, and he realized that it was the voice belonging to the light.

"I get to name him?" The one who held him, Michael, asked.

"Of course."

Almost carefully, he opened his eyes and blinked up at the face hanging above him. The sparkling eyes and a loving smile. His own pink wings fluttered happily. "I think I'll call him Lucifer."

Lucifer tilted his head as the other replied, "Why's that?"

"Because he's my light."

Tags: @luciferstempest @gabrielsbackbitches @jgvfhl @staycejo1 @blakechaos08 @qslucid @i-miss-balthazar

IF YOU WANT TO BE TAGGED AS WELL, JUST ASK!!

[nicksthoughtsonthings]

Mad Men (☆☆☆☆)

Year: 2007 - 2014

Creator: Matthew Weiner 

Spanning the sumptuous glamour of 1960′s New York, ‘Mad Men’ impresses as an intense character study of Don Draper, the enigmatic creative director of an ad agency, as we follow his spiral into depravity, alienation and, ultimately, redemption. The series also has a multitude of colourful characters, on their own difficult moral paths, to enjoy on the way down. To the phantom reader who wishes to watch this series but doesn’t want spoilers, I’m sorry to say, but everything will be revealed from here onwards...!

There are 90+ episodes of Mad Men so there’s a lot of plot to discuss. It’s also been a long time since I’ve watched the earlier episodes so I’ll be discussing in terms of the overriding thematic elements, rather than particular plot lines, to give an essence of what the show is really about.

The show’s central tenet is identity, and coming to terms with your identity. It exposes this theme quite literally, in the fact that Don Draper is not who he says he is; he is Dick Whitman, and after a turn of events in the Korean War, he assumes the identity of a fallen comrade, Don Draper – the real Don Draper. This matter is a source of drama in the early seasons, but this idea of identity continues to be pervasive throughout the whole series, and not just for Don Draper; it overshadows every character in whichever ‘role’ they play. 

Consider Bert, the sage individual who sits as a founding partner in Sterling Cooper – as well as Sterling Cooper’s many other guises throughout the programme – and his response to this revelation: "The Japanese have a saying: a man is whatever room he is in, and right now Donald Draper is in this room". This is characteristically Bert, who provides a voice of calm and reason throughout the show. It lets Don off the hook, but it exposes the great idealogical battle in this programme: do our past actions define us, or don’t they? Don leads a double life literally, but many of the other characters have double lives in one way or another. The older characters are of the age to have fought in World War II, and the joys and comradeship, as well as fear and prejudice, continue to bubble under the surface of their characters and guide their action. 

No character exudes this more than Roger Sterling, the great wit and charmer of the series, brilliantly played by John Slattery. Sterling is a philanderer as well; a drinker, twice divorced, wealthy, insecure – not unusual traits to find in the men which inhabit the world of Mad Men. His memories of the War are fond; and despite his inexorable charm towards clients, he stands firm on rejecting the business of Honda, a Japanese company, on the basis of his fallen allies. He cannot forget who he was then, and who he still is today. The partnership status, the reputation, the money and ‘the room’ have a limited effect on who Roger Sterling is at his core. So while Bert’s words of wisdom provide a soothing balm to the viewer and to Donald Draper, we know it can only be temporary, and whatever Don has left in his past will have to be confronted for true catharsis. “for the past is never dead. It’s not even past” (I will never pass up an opportunity to use this quote).

For men of Roger’s generation this era sits in stark contrast to the horrors of war, and this provides a nice interplay between the two periods. But the beauty of the 1960′s setting – apart from the sublime aesthetics, which I will deal with later – is that each societal role was in a state of flux. It was an era of great cultural, social and political change in America. As such, the evolution in the identities of blacks, gays, hippies and women – and all other outliers in mid-century America – is traced with sensitivity throughout the programme; and even if the evolution traced is more a regression, the show has the ability to make you empathise fully with these outliers, and reveal the prejudice as both horribly old-fashioned and deeply offensive. One character who struggles against the misogyny of this era is Joan Harris, whose femininity is frequently alluded to by the men in the office, or in one important moment, used by the office to court commercial favour. She is a sad character. For all her business savvy, she will never be taken seriously. This sad realisation is captured towards the end of the series, after another callous sexual advance by a superior, and we the audience are just as exasperated as her. The 1960′s was, of course, the defining era for free-love and liberal progress, but at the same time it was still a world ultimately ran by Roger Sterling’s and Don Draper’s. The clash between these two worlds fuels a lot of the drama in this programme, and exposes many of the attitudes of the time as flawed.

Towards the end of the series one could feel jaded with the choices of Don Draper. He consistently cheats on whomever he’s with at the time; he drinks himself into a stupor regularly, and even brings down other characters with him (on this point there are too many to name, but two that stick with me are Ted Shaw and Lane Price); and finally, his credentials as an ad man are tested when his creativity seems to be dwindling. He starts out as an enigmatic, charming character, and at the end he is pitiful. As difficult as it was to watch, this was necessary. You need to feel contempt for these characters, and unfortunately this requires repetition and a certain affection for the other people he harms. Only then do you feel the weight of his personality disorders, of which there are many, and the frustration. He gives his car to a young boy whom he sees himself in in the final episodes: “Don’t waste this”. The mask is slipping, as the mistakes of Don Draper at last take their toll. This life of excess can satisfy no longer, and he goes to California, where his life as Don Draper began, for closure. 

The final scene is deeply satisfying; Don is sitting down on the grass, with a number of other lost souls, at a retreat in California. It is a moment of peace after a traumatic day of owning up to his actions to the important women of his life (on the phone with Peggy and Betty). His job is as good as gone, and his life in New York a distant memory. In this moment of calm there is a slight smile, and the screen cuts to a coke advert – apparently one of the most successful ads of all time – as a bunch of hippy types, of all races, sing with a bottle of Coke. It’s Don’s ad. In this moment of tranquility and genuine bliss, his thought is how to commodify it for Coke. At his core he’s an ad man, and it’s this which can give his life a purpose. All the excess and debauchery was, hopefully, just a poor coping strategy for a traumatic childhood. 

I think that is basically the sum of the programme. There are endless character arcs to choose but ultimately the people in this show are looking for meaning and purpose and demand the right to find this meaning on their own terms, and down whichever avenue they choose. No one gets killed, there is little melodrama outside the necessary amount for a TV show which needs people to tune in every week. It’s simply a series which confronts and displays the true drama of our personal and working lives. For this alone, it is worth watching.

N.B. From grand themes such as identity and meaning, it feels almost shallow to discuss the design of Mad Men, but this is an important part of its appeal. The sets are large and ooze that 1960′s cool. The apartments; the furniture, the cars, the suits, the restaurants; there is meticulous attention to detail ensuring the illusion of 1960′s New York is not broken. More than that, the design and textures of the interiors tell you a lot about each character. Roger Sterling has a monochrome office in later seasons which notably more thought out than others in the office. It suggests more of an interest in the luxury of the business than the business itself. Similarly, when the team leaves for McCann at the end the corridors are dark, tight and suffocating; the direct opposite of the light and airy space of Sterling Cooper, and a subliminal reminder of the enormity of McCann and the oppression of the new takeover. Overall, it’s a charming and beautiful world to spend 50 minutes in.

8/09/19

[zombriekid]

Night Off [Dabi/Gender neutral reader] 

Series: Boku no Hero Academia 

Summary: a slightly injured dabi interrupts your night off

  There’s a Dabi in your window.

  It’s your first night off in over a week, there’s a stream of Bob’s Burgers eighth season waiting for you on your tv, your little convection oven is done reheating your leftovers, you’re pouring yourself a mug of freshly brewed coffee, and there’s a grown ass man named Dabi climbing through your kitchen window. 

  He’s straddling the sill, one foot in the kitchen one foot out on the fire escape, and his blue eyes don’t take long to find you. The left side of his mouth pulls up into some semblance of a lazy grin and you internally congratulate yourself for not cringing. “Hey airhead.”

  Any ounce of surprise you’re feeling is immediately replaced with irritation; he knows you don’t use that moniker anymore, you made that pretty freaking clear the first time he confronted you! And you’re ready to remind him of that, ready to use every curse word in both English and Japanese to chew his ass out when your brain finally catches up to your eyes. 

  He’s covered in shallow, oozing cuts and large, blooming bruises that you know will turn purple later.

  God, you already feel tired. “What the hell, dude?” You groan.

  The zipper glides around the corners until the case is fully closed, and you toss the med kit on to a side table. Other than the bottle of rubbing alcohol the kit itself is completely empty of any real medical supplies and it’s all thanks to the little shit sitting next to you. Not that the jerk cares, judging by the way his body is just sagging into the cushion of the love seat, but still he owes you so many band-aids now.

  (At least three months worth now, actually, and a part of you wonders when this became more of a regular occurence.) 

  “Can’t do much about the bruising but your cuts should be good,” you say as you allow your posture to match Dabi’s.

  “You expectin’ a kiss or somethin’?” He asks, his tone monotonous and bland.

  You can’t help the snort that escapes your nose. “From you, hell no. But I would like to know what happened.. and who did this.”

  “Aww. Cause you care?”

  “So I can thank them for kicking your ass.” 

  This time it’s his turn to scoff but he doesn’t do much beyond that; he chuckles a few times at the antics of the animated Belcher family (Dabi understands English? How did you not know that?) and gives his neck a scratch or two but otherwise he’s quiet.

  “Is it a don’t ask/don’t tell sorta thing?” You glance at him from the corner of your eye after you ask the question, and of course he doesn’t do shit to respond. “I mean regardless you owe me a new first aid kit.”

  His silence persists. Your heart slowly kicks up its pace. 

  “Is it serious?” And still he says nothing. You’re outright staring at him now, torso twisted in a way to ensure that he’s all your looking at with one hand ready to grab his shoulder. “Are you in danger?”

  When he doesn’t acknowledge you you almost fly into a “Mom/Dad Friend” mode. The hand that’s ready to grab him does and though you’re afraid of any potential, more serious injuries that might be hiding under his clothes you still wind up shaking him a little. (You’re worried for his wellbeing, and you don’t know when that became a thing.) “Dabi?!”

  The twenty something year old villain rolls his neck until his patchwork face is looking at you, and just like the shit eating cat that ate the canary, he’s wearing a big ol’ smirk on it.

  You can feel yourself physically deflating.

  “Sure ya don’t care, airhead?”

  The apples of your cheeks and tips of your ears grow warm, and when the asshole gives a few snickers- at your expense of course- it takes every ounce of your willpower and strength not to throttle him.

  First time not having to close the restaurant in god knows how long and you gotta spend it with this idiot...

  With a one-shouldered shrug sent your way, he turns his attention back to the television and says “nah,’s just fuckin’ with some two-bit no-name hero,” here he looks at you in his peripheral. “Don’t worry, I won.”

  You don’t ask him what exactly that means but you have a feeling that you’ll be seeing it on the news in the morning. The sudden, tragic death of an upcoming hero will probably be mentioned in passing, briefly mentioned by the news anchor before they move on to a hotter topic, and that’ll be the end of it. You quash any old residual instincts that boil up from Dabi’s words.

  No need to try and be a hero again.

  Moments pass by, the television quietly playing in the background; your mug of coffee is sitting on the table in front of you, untouched and totally forgotten until now; the leftovers of a greasy burger and fries are next to the mug, and though you were absolutely famished just an hour ago you don’t really feel like eating anymore; and then there’s Dabi’s intense, blue eyes, still on you and still looking for the chips in your neutral disposition (a game he often plays, and there’s never a clear winner.) 

  Ultimately you decide that his “fuckin’ with” a small time hero has nothing to do with you- and yeah, it bothers you that your reaction is so lukewarm but... well, if you care about the one then you gotta care about them all. And you’re not a hero, not anymore. So you turn away from Dabi, away from his inquisitive stare, and he breaks the silence with another chuckle.

  Half way through the next episode of Bob’s Burgers, a headache born from caffeine withdrawal starts to bud in the back of your skull, so you bend to grab the mug from the coffee table. However, the moment your fingers graze the cool porcelain you realize that your drink is a. now cold and b. you’re going to have to get up to reheat it.

  “Goddammit...” you grimace. 

  You’re about to hoist yourself up on to your feet, soles already loudly protesting, when the villain’s left hand comes into your personal space. His palm is up and his fingers are out, and you realize that he wants your mug.

  “You know where the cups are at. If you want some then go make it.” You say with irritation.

  “Just give it.”

  “That’s how mono gets spread.”

  “I’m not gonna fuckin’ drink it.”

  Perhaps against your better judgment, you hand the mug over to him. His long fingers curl around the bottom and from the tips tiny blue flames flicker to life. You’ve never actually seen his quirk before, and you can’t help but to equate the color to that of his eyes. (Startlingly you like it.) 

  Dabi holds on to the cup until steam rises from the lip then holds it out to you.

  “Thanks...” you mumble as you grab the mug. The porcelain is warm now and it feels so wonderful against your (perpetually) cold hands.

  The expression on his scarred face doesn’t change, maintaining that same bored aloofness that you’re so familiar with. He acts like he doesn’t hear you, though it’s probably more like he just doesn’t care, but still the fact that he used his quirk to manually heat up your coffee for you makes you smile. You settle back into the love seat- barely recognizing that the two of you are practically hip to hip- and sip at the hot beverage.

  “You still owe me a new first aid kit.”

  “Will you shut the fuck up?”

  The next time Dabi shows up on your fire escape, he’s sporting some new (minor) injuries and a red case with a white, blocky cross on the front.

  “Hey airhead.”

a/u: listen. listen. i know that i said that i was done with writing, but then this cocky burnt chicken nugget came into my life and now here we are. bnha is a great series with great characters and of fucking course the first bit of fanfic i do for a. this series and b. in fucking forever is about a hot topic villain. so sue me. ain’t much of a content creator but holla at ya girl if you want more.

[lindsaynsmith]

10 Mind-Bending Cosmic Horror Films

10 Mind-Bending Cosmic Horror Films https://ift.tt/2NMS16d

A peek behind the curtain: this bracket gave us the most trouble out of all the 31 Days of Halloween lists. Definitions were tossed around, examples were given — but the more we tried to define what made a “Cosmic Horror” film, the more confused we got. Which is, of course, deeply, hilariously ironic.

Cosmic Horror is tied in the popular imagination to horror’s racist uncle H.P. Lovecraft, who defined it as “the fundamental premise that common human laws and interests and emotions have no validity or significance in the vast cosmos-at-large.” But things start to get confusing when you realize that Lovecraftian Horror and Cosmic Horror aren’t the same thing. And likewise, that merely being set in the cosmos does not a cosmic horror make. All told, Lovecraft’s definition is best: that cosmic horror fundamentally involves a terror predicated on the dislocation and dwarfing of human sense and understanding. Simply put, it is the disorienting horror of bumping up against something you don’t understand. That you can’t understand.

If gazing slack-jawed into the unknowable sounds like a fun night in, have we got the list for you. Keep reading for a look at the top ten cosmic horror films as voted on by Chris Coffel, Kieran Fisher, Brad Gullickson, Rob Hunter, Jacob Trussell, and myself.

10. 2001: A Space Odyssey (1968)

The dawn of man. We get by with a little help from our friends. Our ancestors took a little bit of knowledge from beyond the infinite and transformed it into a killing blow. From our ability to take the life of another we rose out of the primordial ooze. Our great intelligence transformed into a series of potential catastrophe. A bone club launches into space and orbits the earth with enough firepower to obliterate our third rock from existence. With one small step, we create artificial life and become victim to its judgment. 2001: A Space Odyssey is a staggering work of cinema in which Stanley Kubrick and Arthur C. Clarke track humanity’s evolution through its great leaps in terrifying technology. Will we ever be worthy of the intelligence gifted upon us? Are our great brains doomed to descend rather than ascend? Is the Star Child a momentous triumph or just a next stride to doomsday? We are but apes forever reaching for the moon – Brad Gullickson

9. The Endless (2017)

What’s effective in The Endless is what is unknown, and for a large part of the movie, everything is unknown. What happened at this UFO death cult so many years ago that made two devotees leave? What is lurking out in the woods that have caused so many earthly anomalies around the community’s campgrounds? And why has no one aged? At the core of Justin Benson and Aaron Moorehead‘s sci-fi/horror tale are two brothers attempting to make up for the arrested development of their lives, but the scope of the story explodes as their work melds with their past filmography in a wholly unexpected way. Fatalistic and heady, The Endless is a curious look at thoughts and ideas just beyond the spectrum of our imaginations — Jacob Trussell

8. Event Horizon (1997)

A surface glance at Paul W.S. Anderson‘s Event Horizon might seem to argue against its inclusion on this list as rather than face an unknown the characters here are faced with hell. But in addition to the mystery of the black hole — is it a purely scientific anomaly, or is it a gateway to true evil?— it’s clear that these are hells of their own design. They can’t understand or comprehend their fates, and that fear of the unknown is exactly what terrifies the crew members. What is hell, after all, but the things that cause us our own greatest pain? It’s different for each of us, and as characters are subjected to a glimpse into this void their attempt at understanding comes in the form of unique suffering — Rob Hunter

7. Picnic at Hanging Rock (1975)

Peter Weir’s gauzy Aussie period piece might not have any of the traditionally tentacled cosmic horror hallmarks. But upon closer inspection, it absolutely fits the bill. Hanging Rock concerns a group of boarding school girls who disappear during a school outing. Time gets funny, and as if drawn by some magnetic force, they climb the outcropping and never return. Whether the girls were raptured, lost, or suicidal remains a matter of mystery. It’s a lack of certainty that Weir never resolves; that, instead, exposes the fragility and impotence of the film’s authority figures in the face of the unknown — Meg Shields

6. Uzumaki (2000)

Based on the manga of the same name, Uzumaki is an overlooked gem that didn’t gain the international recognition it deserved during the J-horror boom of the late 90’s and early 00’s. While the rest of the world was transfixed on the nation’s cinematic ghosts, this weird movie about a small town population being turned into spiral-shaped monstrosities flew under the radar. This is a nightmare on film— but that’s the beauty of it. The horror that unfolds is otherworldly and unexplainable, but it merely enhances the notion that the universe works in mysterious and terrifying ways. The inhabitants of the town in Uzumaki are tormented by the unknown and the film never clearly states why or how it’s happening. One day we’re all going about our business. Then, before we know it, we’re snails. – Kieran Fisher

5. The Cabin in the Woods (2012)

Taking a meta approach to filmmaking is a risky proposition. There’s always the possibility the film veers off into the mocking parody territory and if you’re dealing with a genre film that can elicit a negative reaction from the hardcore fans. Drew Goddard and Joss Whedon tiptoed this tightrope perfectly with the wonderfully entertaining, and incredibly bloody, The Cabin in the Woods. This is a movie that takes all the horror tropes that have been established over the years and uses them just as we know them while also managing to flip them on their head. It’s geared specifically towards those that love horror movies and those that hate them. As the film playfully toys with every genre convention imaginable it tries to get to the bottom of why all those terrible things that happen in horror movies happen. Turns out there are some evil gods that need appeasing. I knew it — Chris Coffel

4. Annihilation (2018)

If the crux of cosmic horror is a dizzying sense of established order coming apart at the seams— Annihilation takes the cake. Some unknown thing has landed in the wetlands. What it wants, and why its presence has caused reality to fold in on itself, is a mystery. Its presence has turned madness into a matter of proximity. By the end of the film, we’re none the wiser about the entity’s intentions or the kaleidoscopic fractals at its epicenter. What we’re left with is disorientation; vertigo after bearing witness to the collapsing of all things — Meg Shields

3. The Mist (2007)

If you’ve spent any amount of time in a busy supermarket then it’s highly likely that you’ve felt like insignificant meat in the grand scheme of things. But when you’re trapped in one because there’s a spooky mist outside that’s harboring creatures from the unknown… well, that’s pretty brutal as well. This is also the basic set-up of this Stephen King adaptation from Frank Darabont. It’s a simple story about monstrous invaders in many ways. At the same time, it’s also shrouded in mystery and ambiguity and feels apocalyptic. And while the overarching terror may be cosmic, the film also told us that the real horror was George Bush’s America. The shocking ending also contains some of the funniest gallows humor you’re ever likely to see. It’s such a shame that the TV show isn’t very good. — Kieran Fisher

2. Pulse (2001)

No film, whether from the horror genre or not, has captured the concept of loneliness with as painful a precision as Kiyoshi Kurosawa‘s Pulse. The film gives new meaning and power to the word “haunting” as it shows us a world where even the undead have come to dread the feeling of being alone in the universe. Ghosts are forcing their way back into our world, the living are committing suicide, and the world is crumbling beneath the weight of misery and ambivalence towards this thing we call existence. The film is equal parts terrifying and fascinating, but both feelings are layered with the depressing fear of not feeling anything at all — Rob Hunter

1. In the Mouth of Madness (1994)

Words are dangerous. With the click of a keypad or the flicker of a pencil, lives can be made or unmade. But the creator at the desk is not you. Do you read Sutter Cane? Crack the spine and discover your place in the universe. Skip to the end – you’re both the pawn and the star of your own story. In the Mouth of Madness is the closest cinema has ever come to capturing the existential dread upon which H.P. Lovecraft built his church. While others have attempted to directly adapt the unimaginable/unshowable horror of “The Lurking Fear” or “The Call of Cthulhu,” John Carpenter wisely sidestepped direct reference by focusing on his engine of cosmic paranoia. From space, humans are but a speck of insignificance, and yearning beyond such lowly station can only result in catastrophic knowledge. You are less than a fly. You’re a meaningless accident of biology. At best you are the butt of a joke to a creature raising its foot above your head – Brad Gullickson

Read more entries in our 31 Days of Horror Lists!

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via Film School Rejects https://ift.tt/23tjcnD October 19, 2018 at 10:05AM