#this has taken longer than it should have

[glitteringdust]

Bc I'm sick rn, Lucanis taking care of Rook while they have a fever?

Rook sat in front of the dining room's fireplace, blanket wrapped around her shivering shoulders as Lucanis stirred the pot on the stove.

She'd taken a blast of raw magic head on earlier in the day, according to Bellara. On the group's return to the Lighthouse a torrential downpour left them soaked to the bones by the time they'd stepped through the eluvian. Rook had been the worst off but was unwilling to admit it.

He'd already tried bringing her back to bed more than once—she would return to her spot near the fire not long after, no matter what he did. It was safer for her to remain close, if she was so determined to return.

Stubborn. Should be in bed.

It was clear the demon agreed with Lucanis on one thing, at least.

“You should be in bed, Rook. You need to rest.” He sets the spoon down, leaving the soup to simmer a while longer as he makes his way to her.

“It's magical sickness, it'll pass soon enough.” She looks up at him, blue eyes big enough to drown in. He would almost believe her lie, if he did not see the fatigue etched into her face.

“Until it has, you should take the advice you give me. Rest.” He holds his hand out towards her.

“In that cold bed all on my lonesome?” She takes his hand, lets him pull her up close, “You could help make it warmer, you know.”

So close, he can feel the heat radiate from her.

Warm, very warm indeed.

As intriguing as it was for Spite to see something new, Lucanis knew Rook needed hydration and rest. A cool cloth on her forehead to help the fever. He needed to do something.

Bargaining would have to do.

“If you promise me you'll try and sleep, I'll hand over dinner privileges to Bellara and be your personal bed warmer.”

A small grin, yet he can tell she's satisfied with her victory.

His small bed in the pantry is closest, and more practical than walking the distance back to hers. He sends her to it while he goes to inform Bellara that dinner duties were now hers. When he returns to the pantry, Rook is lying down in his bed with the blanket pulled up to her chin.

Her gaze meets his immediately, and she smiles, “You came back.”

He slides his boots off, one at a time, “Of course I did, I'm a man of my word.”

He has no intention of sleeping. It's the one thing he tells himself as he lays down beside her. But then she settles in closer to him and entwines her fingers with his. Her breathing becomes a rhythmic pattern as she drifts into what will be a fitful kind of sleep. There was no leaving, now.

Proximity was contagious.

He should try to sneak away, see if Harding had the plants needed to make a tonic for fever. Or at least make more coffee, since the one he had was now abandoned in the kitchen. He certainly shouldn't be growing drowsy from the warmth of her, the comforting smell of cinnamon. He needs to stay awake…

…

…

When Bellara comes in later to announce dinner is ready, she can't bear to wake them.

[topazy]

Tomorrow’s promise

Pairing: Daryl Dixon x reader, Rick Grimes x sister reader

Warnings: Swearing

Chapter: 4.08

Your feet were aching, and the lack of sleep from the past few days was catching up with everyone, including Jace, who was starting to cry. You would need to stop walking soon to feed him; he was becoming too heavy to feed and carry at the same time, with most of his weight pressing onto one shoulder.

When a concert watch tower comes into view, you let out a sigh of relief, “We should stop here for a little bit.”

“No, we need to keep going.”

Glenn was so focused on finding Maggie he wasn’t taking anyone else into consideration. You understand why he wants to keep going, but you’d need to stop for a break at some point. Everyone stops walking aside from Glenn and Tara.

“Hold up!” Abraham shouts after them. “We’re stopping here. Tired is slow, and slow is dead.”

“It’s barely noon.”

“I don’t give a monkey's left nut. None of us has slept more than a couple hours straight since we went all Casey Jones. This place looks safe.” Seeing Glenn’s reluctance, Abraham sighs. “I get, you have to find her, but Rosita and I have a mission too. We’ve got to get that man to Washington. Plus, your friend looks like she could use a rest; no offense.”

“None taken. But he’s right, Glenn. A few hours of rest will do us all the world of good. I don’t want you passing out again.”

A walker suddenly falls from the top of the watch tower and nearly lands on top of Tara. Abraham pushes her out of the way before stabbing it in the head, but she slides forward on the mud and hits her knee on the ground.

Rosita rushes over to help her up, but Glenn beats her to it. “Do you want to stop or keep going?”

“No, keep going. I’m good.”

He seems satisfied with that answer. “Look, if she can keep going, then we can all keep going. Or you guys can stay here. We don’t need you, and you don’t need us.”

“Glenn!”

Rosita shakes her head at him, “wow, you’re an ass. Tara will do whatever you say because she thinks she owes you. Man up. Stay here for a few hours.”

You and Tara hadn’t exchanged words since you confessed what happened to her girlfriend, but watching the brunette slowly limp towards the train tracks made you furious. “Glenn, Tara can barely walk. What happens if walkers catch up with you? She needs to rest.”

“We’ll do what we always do and fight them off.”

“These people saved us when we needed them. The least we can do is wait a couple of hours, at least until Tara isn’t limping.” Your lips press into a thin line; you could tell by his facial expression he was desperate to argue against what you’ve just said. “I need to feed Jace; do what you want, Glenn, but I’m staying here until everyone is able to walk.”

He looks genuinely hurt. “We can’t split up after everything we’ve been through.”

—

After breaking for roughly two hours, everyone is more alert after testing their feet and having a few slices of fruit from a tin that you shared. Jace was no longer crying, and Tara wasn’t limping.

You reach a tunnel on the tracks that had another message from Maggie telling Glenn to keep going.

“I don’t like the look of this.” The inside of the tunnel was pitch black, and in the distance you could hear the faint sound of walkers snarling. “There needs to be another way; this is too dangerous. We have no idea what’s inside there.”

“We could walk around it,” Rosita suggests.

“No, that will take at least a day. If Maggie went through it, then I’m going through it. We’re close.”

“Shut up a second,” Abraham says, pointing out the sound of walkers. “You hear that? That there is a long, dark tunnel full of reanimated corpses. I don’t have full-on certainty that I can get Eugene through there alive.”

“I’m with Abraham; I’m not taking Jace in there. If he cries, we’ll be surrounded and will never get out. I’m going to take the extra day to go around the tunnel safely.”

“Maggie is waiting for us on the other side; she’s your friend,” Glenn snaps, the frustration of his desperation showing.

“Yeah, Maggie is my friend, and Jace is my son. She would want me to prioritize him.

“I need to go to her.”

“I get it; I really do, but I need to think about what’s best for him.” You hug Glenn, “I’ll see you on the other side, yeah?”

Knowing there was no point in arguing with him, Abraham opens his pack back and takes out a few cans of food and gives them to Glenn. Tara steps forward, “I’ll go with you.”

Glenn seems uncertain, almost emotional about what to do. “Y/n, please come with me. We can make it through; our people will be waiting on the other.”

“I’m sorry but I can’t.”

You share one more look before him and Tara disappear into the tunnel. Your throat starts to tighten as tears well in your eyes. You didn’t want to lose Glenn as well, but both of you would do what you thought was right. Forcing a smile, you wipe your eyes and turn to face the others. “Well, I guess this is where we part ways if you guys are going back for that truck we passed.”

“No,” Abraham places his hand on your arm. “What you told Tara takes balls. I can respect that. We could use someone like you to get Eugene to Washington, but I know you need to find your people first.”

“So…?”

“We’re going to help you find them,” Rosita smiles. ”

—

“Ma’am, I don’t think he likes me.”

You laugh seeing Eugene holding Jace so awkwardly. He only needed to hold for a minute so you could redo your laces that have become undone, but Jace wasn’t happy about it. Abraham and Rosita were sitting on rocks, watching in amusement.

“Mommy.”

Jace holds his arms out for you to take him again; his cheeks flush red from upsetting himself. Just as you go to take him, you hear rustling in the bushes and snaps of branches. You listen for a few more seconds and realize it’s coming from behind you. Spinning on your heels, you raise your gun and point it at the person standing behind you.

“Sasha…”

You put your gun pack into its holster and pull her into a hug.

“Sasha?”

“Bob, Maggie!” She yells, “Y/n and Jace are alive.”

—

“Are you sure this is a good idea?” Eugene asks uncertainty. Abraham went back for the truck you passed, but instead of going in the opposite direction, he used it to drive into the tunnel to go after Glenn and Tara. Since Eugene was a terrible shot had one job, and that was to hold Jace inside the truck.

“Just don’t drop him!”

You slam the door shut and then start firing at the walkers that Glenn and Tara are surrounded by.

Once the walkers are down, Tara comes over to you and squeezes your good shoulder. “Thank you.”

“Don’t mention it; you’re one of us now, and that’s what we do. We save each other.”

—

After spending the night camping out in the tunnel, you make it through to the opposite side by midday. When the place you have been searching for comes into view, you almost struggle to believe it’s real. “This place looks like a fortress.”

Terminus looks like it was once a warehouse, but now it has been turned into a community. It had small, flourishing gardens scattered across the outside of it.

Abraham nudges you with his elbow, “Do you think your brother is in there?”

“I hope so.”

“I left more messages telling our people where to find us,” Maggie says. “If you guys saw it, I’m sure they will as well.”

[astrangergivingthestrangewelcome]

We do talk about this here but it's kind of taken a backseat to complaining about Mina and Dracula: I wish adaptations would do a better job showing Mina's grief for Lucy. I wish that the novel Dracula did a better job of showing me this grief for Lucy. To be honest. It's there, but... I want it to be more there. Mina's grief for Lucy should be more palpable than anyone's. She's known Lucy for longer than any of the men. She has so much more to grieve. I don't need it to be a grief Olympics but I just. Usually we'll get like one singular beat of grief from Mina and then she's never mentioned. Frankly, I want Mina out for revenge. It wasn't just an accident. Her best friend in the entire world was slowly and torturously killed over a span of weeks culminating in a final night where she was assaulted multiple times alone and terrified at night after having her protections stripped away from her one by one. Where is her rage? There's that one line in the novel about how thinking about Lucy makes her pity for the Count dry up in her heart, but then that is not explored further. She should want to tear out the Count's heart as much as Jonathan does.

[chaberkowepole]

Okay it took me a day to finish formulating this. And I realise people have already been saying it, but I still need to get it off my chest.

Unsurprisingly, Jinx gets punished by the narrative for being violent against the status quo, by having to redeem herself with a sacrifice and losing her life.

They have her apologise to Caitlyn while Caitlyn does not have to reckon with her actions (gassing civilians, perpetrating authoritarianism) whatsoever

While the council and the power structures can continue with slight tweaks (diversity win! Now a token Zaunite is on the council!)

The barriers and fences were being taken down so the Zaunites can fight, bleed and die for Piltover. Right. Only once they're needed they get recruited. How long will it take for them to be dropped like a hot potato once they're not needed as flesh-shields any longer?

We get a shot of an enforcer helping a grandma. (There's some good in them, see? Nevermind that we could critcise the power structure they're supporting, it's about an individual's soul first and foremost and if that's pure then it's all fine, right? /s)

You couldn't get more ironic than this.

It's reinforcing the status quo over and over and over again.

Violence is natural, you see. But only if it comes from the top. Then it's justified, necessary and forgivable. When it comes from the bottom it's crazy, degenerate, extreme and to be atoned for.

Season 1 set up a beautiful chessboard of social struggles and complexity.

Season 2 threw it all overboard in favour of platitudes and support of conservative centrist ideals.

I am not at all surprised, this is the way media has been going the last years. But that doesn't mean we should stop demanding better.

[profoundlyfaded]

So another Emmrich post, mulling him over - I can’t help it, he’s written really well and there are a lot of layers to tug at.

Today it’s his magic, specifically, Death Whispering and why it links to his fear of death. This is an incredibly rare type of magic that can’t be taught, rather manifesting within an individual.

How magic works in Thedas, and how it manifests, is an individual experience for mages. In Dragon Age: Origins, Wynne talks about her magic manifesting while in a fight with with a child who was bullying her. She manifested fire, and was subsequently taken to the Ferelden Circle. From the way she describes, and later with Anders, there is the suggestion that magic manifestation is sudden and can’t be predicted. That said, these two characters are from Ferelden and as a nation are afraid of magic. This is a very Southern Thedas Andrastian view of magic. But trauma, as in Wynne’s case, causes outward, violent manifestations of magic that can no longer be contained. I use the term violent due to it being uncontained as opposed to actual potential harm because I think Emmrich experiences a violent manifestation of power in the form of Death Whispering.

Navarra has a much more open attitude to magic, specifically where death is involved. It’s a celebrated art - how other forms of magic are viewed is unclear, but necromancy is celebrated. This incorporates all the skills we’ve historically seen in game around the use of spirits and communing beyond The Veil. Given what Emmrich tells us in the game, be it to Rook directly or in other conversations, he’s known he was magically inclined since a very young age; by comparison, Wynne and Anders both experienced their magical awakening at 9 and 12 respectively.

Given Navarra’s reverence of spirit magic, I suspect that Emmrich has been interacting with spirits since before he was orphaned. If the populace revere this type of magic, it’s entirely possible that his parents were delighted with this development - it would set him up for life away from difficulties of Working Class living. But they died, he is orphaned and he manifests Death Whispering as an ability.

It makes absolute sense - suddenly alone in the world, Emmrich is given the ability to call out into the wider beyond and draw back those last whispers of the dead. Probably as a result of stretching out to find his parents, to receive comfort and have all those unsaid moments.

I’m not crying, but you are.

His parents are probably the two people he’s never been able to Death Whisper - his remark that their graves are a shrine rather than actual graves suggests that his parent’s bodies were unrecoverable, both physically and spiritually. But he’s still reaching out for them, as indicated by his regular visiting to their graves decades later.

Emmrich has a lot of unresolved grief and trauma around the loss of his parents; and manifesting Death Whispering as an ability must be kick to the stomach when he can’t use it to comfort himself and fulfil his needs.

Emmrich treasures this gift, and he should. He puts it to noble uses - settling wills, questioning murder victims but also, providing comfort to those by recovering lost last words. He tells us in the Romance Scene that when he speaks with the dead, their echos abide with him; thoughts and passions, hopes and desires, but also surely, the deep echoing loss that the departed may feel comes with that.

While there is something beautiful and ethereal in that, he’s exposing himself to trauma but from both sides of the coin. This strange talent probably fuels his fear of death in many ways through unacknowledged vicarious trauma. Emmrich has the power to know that regret continues for the souls of the departed - there is no peace on the other side. Lichdom, however, would free him from that - another reason to walk that path.

And he is a man of regrets; he talks openly of having wished to have been married earlier; regrets regarding Hezenkoss; regrets for not having his parents growing up. I wonder if he fears that he would become a manifestation of despair in his death? All that compassion and quiet strength stripped away in the raw reality of the great fade and death.

But his fear of death comes from knowing the truth, that everything continues after, able to be draw back into the body and relived.

Again, I’m not crying, but you are.

[gabessquishytum]

PA anon's fic about alpha student Dream stalking and impregnating omega professor Hob is so, so good! Like, it's kind of unethical, but in such a hot way? And (please consider 1K+ words of mildly controlling/manipulative fluff) Dream takes such good care of Hob during pregnancy, doesn't he? Hob's an omega and he should know some of these things, true, but he's never been pregnant all his life and he's never even conceived (lol) of it till Dream, and really, all the things he had learned as a then-younger and still-perceived-as-fertile omega have become out of date. And since he's such a busy, hardworking professor, dealing with the hormones and the pregnancy brain, Dream is the one who plunges in, arms deep, and does all the research for him. He knows exactly what the stages are, what vitamins are needed when, how to soothe Hob for pains and flares in the here and now, and how to help Hob in the longer term for the marathon that is pregnancy. Dream also entertains casual ideas about not just this child, but the next, and the next. It's not something he's brought up with Hob yet, and really they should wait to see what kind of toll this pregnancy has on Hob's older-than-usual body, but...it can't hurt to think long term. And so it begins. The very first thing is medications, one day, just popping up in neat little sets all over Hob's kitchen counter and workplace desk and lecture podium, each labelled with his name, what symptoms they're for, how much to eat, and how often. A bottle of mineral water sits beside each of the pill sets, just in case. There are a whole variety of them - for headaches, nausea, body aches, feverish flares. The whole lot of things any pregnant omega would go through. Then, vitamins. In tiny little vitamin organizers, right beside his various stashes of medication. There are so many, Hob's given up on reading the labels and understanding them. He doesn't even know what he needs, and what he's eating - he just does. *That's* how much he trusts Dream. And some of the vitamins are very necessary, and very much recommended, of course. Many things are needed for their baby, and to strengthen Hob's immune system, sleep, and digestion. Things like that. The rest of it, well, it's discretionary. And if Dream pumps Hob full of what's just slightly more than necessary... if Hob's hair and body hair and lashes are getting fuller and finer and ever more doll-like, if his skin is getting shiny and dewy, his body plump and soft, and his brain just a little more humble and pliable than what his hormones would achieve on their own...well.

Who can say it's a bad thing, when it means Hob allowing himself to be taken care of more easily? When it means less of a protest, when he comes through the door all burdened from his day, and Dream tells him to just let everything go and trust him? When it means he melts more readily into Dream, putting down the need to be self-sufficient and independent that's been conditioned into him all these years? He'll cling and whine in the doorway until Dream picks him up, bridal style, relieving his poor, swollen feet of their weight, and carries him all the way into the nest Dream's built for him, where he can eat and cuddle all night without worrying his little head about anything else. Dream's so good to him. He would never do anything to hurt him. After medications and vitamins, comes the food. Dream, who has low-key moved in by now, having not wanted to move an omega away from familiar surroundings and essentially his nest during a pregnancy, does a thorough inspection of Hob's kitchen. Look, Hob cooks, and in fact he's a great home-chef, but he's going to have different needs now. Most of what he has is fine, but Dream upgrades some of Hob's appliances, swaps out everything that's processed garbage, donates whatever he doesn't want his omega eating, and proceeds to stock the fridge up with fresh, new, nutritious whole foods. Look, the food industry is tricky. You have to be exacting about these things. That's exactly what he tells Hob, when the pregnant omega whines tearfully about wanting some of his favorite treats. It's garbage! It's ultra-refined! Dream says no at first and hands Hob an avocado with cashew butter and flax seeds. But Hob insists it's an emergency, and Dream relents in the end and stocks up on a box of Hob's favorites for times like these. Dream prepares all his meals, too. He has Hob on a very strict diet, though you know wouldn't know it from how good it tastes and even looks. Every lovingly packed lunch (Hob's stomach is too tender for a proper breakfast) is just packed with vibrant colours and flavour. And it smells so good, even from a distance! Many a comment has been made about his gorgeous lunches, and it's become a thing for a handful of students and faculty to camp by him during lunch and wait for him to reveal the meal of the day. Oohs and aahs and compliments inevitably ensue. The attention's a little too much! It's all getting rather embarrassing! Don't get him wrong, he loves everything Dream's done for him. It's so thoughtful and well-organized. But it's just that it's all so *public*, and it makes his students and colleagues have a certain view of him. He wants to insist that he'd taken good care of himself before, and he's not now some spoiled princess!

But his protest never lasts long. Nobody's judging him that way, and everyone's cooing over him and praising and celebrating his circumstances. Everyone keeps telling him that he's such a lucky, deserving, omega, and that he looks so good when he's all pampered and relaxed.

And Hob frets and frets over whether Dream's spending too much time and money and just too much on him, but always gets shushed and told that Dream's the one who's lucky. Hob just needs to sit back and enjoy it all. And enjoy it he does, secretly, even when he doesn't always get his way on some of the smaller things. He enjoys having things handled for him, so that all he needs is to do what he's told. He enjoys being told no, on some of his lesser habits. It's all for his own good. It even makes him a little hot when Dream's being strict, and treating him like a child he needs to be firm with! It just makes him so wet! Finally comes the exercise. It's a given by now that Dream will have a say over what he does during his day and how. He swaps Hob's schedule around (writing letters to the faculty head about expedient family needs) so that Hob gets late morning and early afternoon classes, the very best combination which groups his work periods together. This leaves his morning and evening hours free, which Dream promptly fills with a bevy of healthful, nourishing activities. Mornings are for light jogs, barefoot trail-walking, weight training, or yoga and stretching in the nearby park. Evenings are for strolling, spas, indulgent belly massaging, occasionally more weight training, and more, of course more, stretching. Dream intends to keep all those muscles and ligaments and tendons healthy and flexible for many more pups. All of Hob's activities are accompanied by Dream. Of course, he's there to make sure Hob gets his form right, and just in case anything happens. Many a student or teacher has caught sight of them doing yoga in the college courtyard and coo-ed at the sight, or entered the gym and run away quickly, red around the ears, at the too-intimate sight, smell and sound of a sweetly sweating omega puffing away at the weights, his alpha growling praise and encouragement into his ear. And again, this is all a little too public for Hob, but it's well within his alpha's rights to train him in a public gym. Even the doctors agree that it's doing him good. All his previously fair stats are within excellent range now.

Hob doesn't know yet, but with every passing day he's becoming healthier and plumper and ever more docile. He'll stay this way not just during the pregnancy, but for life. Dream can't get over how good he looks and how excellent things are like this, and he fully intends that Hob will stay, pupped or not, as his spoiled, behaving, beautiful omega doll.

HELL YES WE WIN AGAIN, MORE STUDENT ALPHA DREAM/PROF OMEGA HOB!!! Here is the link to PA anon's fic, in case anyone missed it <3 this is SUCH a good little continuation, I love all the small details. Dream’s incredible care and devotion to his omega. And oh, the sweet, gentle bimbofication...

Of course Hob has these moments of sharp lucidity where he wonders what the hell he's doing. He has a career that he practically sold his soul for, and he had the respect of the faculty and students! Now they treat him so differently. Like he's nothing more than a silly little pregnant omega, like he's worth nothing more than the pup in his belly! But the truth of the matter is, Hob is beginning to find his work a little too straining. He finds the usual regime of meetings and grading papers dull and straining. Why would he want to do that stuff when he could be with Dream? Shopping for the pup, or studying the parenting books, or snuggling up for a naked massage... before he knows it, Hob is looking forward to his parental leave more than anything in the world!

Sometimes he looks in the mirror and doesn't recognise his fecund, soft form. He's so chubby and round with the pup, his hips and chest are so much larger than before. He looks so different, and he knows that these changes are probably permanent. He's already accepted that he'll have another pup after this one, so he'll be pregnant again... there's no way he can "bounce back". The truth is that Dream seems to like him even more when he's plump and squeezing into his clothes. He says that Hob is doing such a good job for their pup. Dream is so proud of him!

And Hob is... Happy. How could he not be? His life is pleasant, and Dream takes such good care of him. Hob never has to worry about a thing. He just really hopes that he can be the omega that Dream deserves...

[diamondkat]

Regarding Alastor being redeemed, I have been seeing some posts regarding how it can happen that trigger an instant ick reaction from me. I have taken time to think about why I keep having such a strongly negative reaction to it. The first thing I took into consideration is that I really do not want my current favourite bad boy to become good. I am first and foremost a villain fan and his becoming good has a high chance of ruining the character for me. This means that there is a chance that I would dislike any theory that ends with Alastor redeemed. A lot of time you see people making arguments for why a ship or character should not be liked when the real reason is they personally don't like it and the reasons are merely support. I try to make sure I am aware of my personal bias.

Regardless of my personal bias, I have decided that there is one particular theory regarding how Alastor can be redeemed that I hate from the bottom of my heart. It is the theory where Alastor after being humiliated, degraded and losing everything including his pride has no choice but to accept Charlie's care and change for the better. Sometimes it involves betraying the hotel first, but generally involves him being unable to deal with the challenges that he faces. I am sure how this works in the minds of those who like this theory makes perfect sense. He can no longer rely on himself, he sees that he isn't capable of anything and now has no choice but to become what Charle wants him to be. I hate it so much. I have kept turning it over in my mind and I think I have figured out all the reasons why separate from my bias.

First, suffering doesn't make people better. It just doesn't. The theory seems to require enough suffering to rewrite Alastor's personality and make him Charlie's puppet. It also reminds me of William Shakespeare's The Taming of the Shrew. The story of how the proud woman was broken down to make her obedient. She might be "better" but it also felt to me like she died and became a puppet. He would be "redeemed" but that wouldn't be Alastor. It would just be something that looks like him. I just feel like fans of Alastor who like this theory don't realise that he would lose everything that pulled them to him in the first place if this happened. Some could not deal with him being less energetic in the main show than the pilot due to him being bored. How would they deal with what would essentially be a hollow creature wearing his face trying to become good because there is nothing left in him?

Second, with a proud character you can't brute force them into letting people in. Part of the idea of the theory is that after he is humiliated and suffers in front of them, he will drop his smile and be forced to let others in. That doesn't make sense to me. We have already seen in S1E8, how Alastor deals with things not going his way. He holds onto what little control he has by refusing to drop his smile and holding onto his pride while going through a breakdown. The best way to get someone like Alastor as far as I am concerned is to deal with him the same way you would deal with a wild animal. Slowly lower their guard. I think Charlie is already doing that whether Alastor knows it or not. Besides, pride is an important part of the character. Pride is part of what drew me to the character in the first place. The kind of pride that makes a person think it is okay to say, "If I wanted to hurt anyone here I would have done so already" in front of the Princess of Hell, is part of what drew me to Alastor. If he lost it, the character would likely immediately lose all appeal to me. So, there is some personal bias there.

It would make sense to me if the theory was more about Alastor learning that he can rely on others and doesn't have to depend solely on himself which leads to him opening up and letting others in. However, the theory leans very heavily into suffering as a way to make him a better person and a complete erasure of everything that makes up the character through suffering to make him into someone who wants and is worthy of redemption. That's fine for fanfiction but I hope it never becomes canon.

[sezja]

Finally

[poorly-drawn-mdzs]

Culture Shock

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[demphix]

Tumblr OC suggestions done, gonna move on to the Bluesky ones.

[waywardstation]

One last store update! After this I will begin sending emails to a subscriber list.

You can input your email of choice for my shop newsletter into this google form here.

A quick summary of some things:

I was unable to finish orders by printing their shipping labels by today, despite what I said last week, because of health issues that had to be addressed instead.

More of my product order was messed up, had enough items to fulfill every order but I’ve been left with ZERO extra stock on a couple items to put into my shop after.

I got enough interest in the Halloween keychains and stickers so I will be making them.

Full explanations below ^^

I have now packed every single order and reviewed all of their contents. However I was unable to send them out today as at some point last week I became very unwell. I’ve been going downhill for a while but it has never gotten to this degree this fast before. I still don’t really know what caused it and so I had been unable to pack over the weekend and couldn’t get all the shipping labels printed for them today.

I will be printing these labels out and taking chunks of the orders to the post office over the next few days.

But the more I’d packed the more I’d realized more of my product order had been messed up. I had ordered extras of everything and yet some of the products that I ordered just BARELY fulfilled every order — I had to use some of the initial samples to fulfill every order but rest assured they are the exact same as the products in size and quality. I have exactly ZERO of some products left over for shop stock when I’d ordered 10-15 extra of every item (as well as TOO MANY of some less popular products that didn’t need all these extras) which sadly means a few items will not be in stock when I open the store back up. I may put discounts on the unwanted extras I received because of this.

While I would expect by default to receive the products in the quantity that I ordered, I also understand that I ordered hundreds of products all in one order, and that is only one order that is being fulfilled out of the many other orders they get daily. I myself did not count out every single product to check because of the sheer amount of everything that was ordered — I had ordered over 500 keychains alone to fulfill the preorders and the entire order has taken up a full room when all spread out. But I still did not count beforehand and would only find out once I’d run out of a certain product, so I accept this is partly my responsibility too. This should not happen again as I never expect to make an order this big again, I had only done this for shop startup, and I will be making another order to restock these products. But it’s still sad it happened.

I apologize for this and I appreciate all of your patience once again. I am explaining all of this as I believe you are owed information about what is going on seeing as you’ve put money into this, and I myself said they would all be sent out by Monday. I just want to be transparent ^^

And one last thing — many of you wanted Halloween merchandise, so I will be moving forward with that! (I’ve decided they will not be glow in the dark though, as I’d have to make every vibrant color instead transparent for the glow to come through, and I believe the designs would suffer too much without these colors)

I have ordered from this manufacturer multiple times before over the years and they’ve always gotten it right with more reasonably-sized orders, so I am confident these will not have the same problems as this preorders period has.

Thank you again very much for your support and understanding up to this point!! <3

[goldkirk]

.

[loverboybrightsideghost]

not really formulating any thoughts right now but i am thinking about victor frankenstein and his well-adjusted childhood and how the very thing that led to his downfall was that he got excited about a book, an idea, and his father dismissed his interest so quickly and so casually that victor kept on that path, rebelling against his dad's dismissal of him, and if not for that, who knows if victor even would have went on to create the creature.

[shireduchess]

resigning myself to the possibility that won’t hear from the boy again and as much as that’s okay, I’ll be fine, life just moves the way it does, I am sad about it, and I have to know it’s okay to let myself be really sad about it

[goldensunset]

weh. i did say i’d stop playing and start doing real life responsibilities at 9pm

[dyslexic-mess]

I had a really cool idea but I can't find a rock band cover of the can-can so...