#this fic just grew and grew and grew

[emyn-arnens]

And Dark Things Silent Crept Beneath

Prompt: Mirkwood + the shadows grew long in the forest + hunting for @tolkienhorrorweek (tagging @tolkienocweek as well)

Summary: “The wood was full of the rumour of him, dreadful tales even among beasts and birds. The Woodmen said that there was some new terror abroad, a ghost that drank blood. It climbed trees to find nests; it crept into holes to find the young; it slipped through windows to find cradles.” — The Fellowship of the Ring, "The Shadow of the Past"

Something preys upon the Woodmen of Mirkwood.

Rating: T

Word Count: 7.9k

Warnings: Infant death, suicide

Do not venture into the forest alone.

Keep to the Old Forest Road and do not stray from the path, no matter what catches your eye.

Do not look into the eyes of any creature that watches you from the gloom.

And never, ever wander past the eaves of the forest after nightfall. You will not return.

These were the rules of the Woodmen, and so were the children of the forest taught from the time they bounced upon their parents’ knees. The rules kept the Woodmen safe, for as long as they minded the forest, the forest minded them. It was an uneasy partnership, but it had held for many generations (barring the troublesome youths who sought to prove that they had no need for the safety of the rules, and who had soon learned otherwise). The Woodmen kept their end of the bargain; the forest kept its.

It had held until the first of the young livestock had been killed, dragged away in a trail of blood in the dead of night. It had held until the killings continued, and the malevolence of the forest—or of some creature within it—could not be denied.

Read the rest on AO3.

[frownyalfred]

I’m sure someone has written it by now but on the off chance they haven’t…I need a fic where Jason never learned how to swim and it never came up when he took on the Robin mantle (maybe he lied, by omission, or maybe it truly never came up in conversation) until a patrol gone wrong where he gets thrown into Gotham Habor and almost drowns. Bruce has to teach him how to swim while dealing with his own guilt over never fully verifying if Jay could swim, because he grew up rich and had lessons in the pool out back and never fully put together — until that awful moment, seeing Jason’s head disappear underwater — that swimming isn’t often an instinct, but something that absolutely has to be learned. and practiced. and they both have to untangle their prides and guilt and do something as simple as jump in the pool together and swim.

[otaku553]

I have an agenda.

Long hair teenage sabo.

[tanglepelt]

Dp x dc idea… more of a mini fic 108

Dani is melting in front of Danny’s eyes and Danny is panicking. He reveals that he and Dani are halfas. Begging his parents to help stabilize Dani. That he couldn’t watch her melt away. his parents don’t take it well. Chasing him out of the lab.

He barley got Dani and him out with minimum injuries.

Danny had no access to proper supplies, and risks going to vlad.

Offering to be the perfect son if he saves Dani. Making him promise she would be safe and stable. Telling him all that happened. That his mom wouldn’t accept him, she didn’t even accept Danny.

He has a bad feeling when vlad eye flash red and he agrees.

After a few test the fruitloop announces he got the dna necessary to stabilize her. That he will easily synthesize the necessary components. But he wouldn’t hand over the cure unless Danny proved what he said. That he was capable of following orders and being the perfect son.

He was Holding a vial of some liquid. Telling Danny to drink it.

Vlad wouldn’t kill him right?

So he drinks the mysterious liquid. Last thing he heard was that when he wakes up he and his sister would be safe. Which confused him. Why was Jazz involved.

When he woke up things were too big. Why was everything so big? Looking around they were in a cage… on with no roof. Then he saw Dani. Dani was small. Tiny a mere toddler. Maybe 5 at the most. Wait. No no no. He was the same size.

Vlad: i hear you’re awake little badger. How unfortunate. I was hoping to move the three of us before hand. It’s not as if you’ll remember any of this. I was planning on erasing it once we were across.

Vlad was standing in front of a portal. Not his ghost portal. One separated and with a deficient design.

Vlad: this dimension simply isn’t safe for my little family. I recently recorded an artifact that will allow us to jump dimensions. One time use unfortunately. With no stable portal not even your allies will find us.

Yea. No. That’s not happening. Danny didn’t agree to be turned into a toddler. Nor loose his memories.

He wasn’t going with the fruitloop. He just had to phase out of here. He couldn’t get himself to fully phase. Only a hand.

Vlad who hadn’t even looked up from the now glowing portal: “even you should have realized your powers aren’t working. It’s why i needed more dna samples. To fix both my children. Far to young, body’s to frail to handle them all. You’ll slowly grow into them.”

The fruitloop finally turned to face him and Dani. Approaching them. Picking them up. Did he really just pick him up?

No.

This was not okay with Danny. So he started hitting, kicking and squirming. All while Dani stayed asleep.

Vlad: Daniel behave. Act more like your sister. The portal is only one way trip. You wouldn’t want to be left behind now would you.

The fruitloop was only getting close to the portal. He had to act.

One way trip… Act more like his sister. Act like Dani.

So.

He hit the man as hard as he could. Until the man let go and essentially threw them to the ground oh so close to this new dimension. He didn’t have time to think.

They were so close to the portal.

He just grabbed Dani chucked his shoe at vlad to unbalance the man and fell through the portal.

**

Jonathan and Martha Kent certainly weren’t expecting two toddlers to fall out of the sky into their field. It certainly wouldn’t be the first time they took in two children.

Their oldests could do with some younger siblings.

Even if they did have to coax the two twins?siblings? inside with pie later that night.

[triglycercule]

nightmare viewing the murder time three as little toys but more in like a little spoiled kid kinda way. because it would be funny and if you take into the account that he was like 6 before getting corrupted and do some mental loopholes it would be even funnier. like these are his dolls (killer dust and horror) and this is their barbie dreamhouse (his castle). they all have to stay in one room because nightmare needs to keep his toys in a toy box. the toys only ever come out when he wants to play but oh damn it they keep on breaking out!! silly toys,,, and then he locks them into the room again.

nightmare serves them food with plastic tea cups and plastic plates and there is no food. there is no tea. they have to imagine the food because dolls can't literally eat. there are food containers and stuff in the house but its all just a bunch of empty boxes. horror starts tweaking out after he scavenges the kitchen and finds a cereal box and milk carton that have NOTHING in it (why keep empty boxes?????)

they have to go where he wants them to go. nightmare gets to dress them up in whatever he wants because theyre his dolls they can wear anything he wants. it gets incredibly embarrassing when the trio is forced to wear pink pretty dresses and fight like that. or they have to go around the castle doing stupid fucking roleplays and it gets weird because theyre being forced to reenact a bullying scene and nightmare's giving them the death stare if they don't get it right (is this projection. this must be some form of coping mechanism dust theorizes)

and then you know nightmare's not exactly the best toy owner so he loses a few of his dolls here and there. maybe they get destroyed when he was playing a bit too rough with them! (killer dies in battle for like the 29th time) but its okay because he can just go back on down to the store (something new) and buy. wait no. steal another doll and then put it back in his dreamhouse and BOOM he has a full set again!! so sweet so cute. his dolls don't have consciousness what are you talking about theyre begging to be let go?? that's all just your imagination. what do you mean you're asking about the several slowly dying bodies with removed arms or legs in his dungeon. oh that's just where the broken but not yet destroyed toys go dw theyre fine its humane

[tanoraqui]

I’m not personally a headcanonner of Maglor living in Rivendell in LotR under a new name, but if he is, I adamantly believe that he is not Lindir (“song guy”) but rather Erestor (tentatively glossed “lonely brother.”) Tragic humor or bust!

[autisticrosewilson]

Um if you write Jason having to get drugs for Catherine I want you dead btw. Not only does it tell me you assume the average drug dealer would give the hard shit to a very small child and then not supervise them at all (classist stereotype that all drug dealers are inherently evil + lazy writing with no grasp on reality) and you genuinely think that Catherine was CONSTANTLY high, as if that's even possible without overdosing far sooner than she did. That's without even getting into the bad mom Catherine propaganda.

[welcometogrouchland]

I feel like for the first few years of guardianship Darius and Hunter really struggle to figure out how to refer to each other.

Like it's easier for Hunter, he pretty quickly settles on "guardian" for explaining their relationship to other people and just referring to Darius by name when talking to the man himself. Overtime the phrasing gradually warms, becoming "foster parent" and eventually, once Hunter's already an adult old enough to move out, "Dad".

(Sidenote: he doesn't move out til he's in his mid to late twenties, bc he's under no obligation too, Darius low-key doesn't want him too, and the two of them want to make up for lost time in a sense, since Hunter only had 2 years of legal dependency on Darius before aging out of the system. Darius adopts Hunter retroactively as an adult)

Darius on the other hand has a real conundrum on his hands for those first few years. He has a lot of options! But "ward" is too formal and makes it sound like Darius picked him up off the street like after his parents were murdered, "apprentice/student" isn't really accurate considering the focus of Darius and Hunter's relationship has less to do with Hunter learning magic and more to do with Hunter being housed and fed. "Kid" and "foster son" are there...but...

Look, Darius isn't going to refer to Hunter more familiarly than Hunter refers to him! He's not gonna make it WEIRD. He's not a dad, because Hunter doesn't want/need him to be (and also parenthood is scary <3). Darius doesn't know the first thing about being a dad, despite how his friend group teases him.

Eda and Eberwolf are the two who are worst about it. They torture him with how 'fatherly' he's allegedly being (allegations Darius will DENY til his GRAVE!!!) And Eda specifically compares his journey to hers, saying it always starts off with you referring to them as your apprentice (again, Darius doesn't plan on doing that), as your roommate (...kinda weird in Darius' opinion? But okay Eda), or even your pet (????HELLO???). But eventually, they always become your dumb kid when you least expect it.

She's had a couple cups of appleblood by this point, but Darius knows on some level she's right and he's steadfastly ignoring that fact, even as Eber continues to refer to Hunter as his "cub" (kinda cute but Darius doesn't know how Hunter would feel being compared to an animal). The only people who are even remotely reasonable about all this (besides Lilith who's a bit disinterested in kid talk) is Raine and Alador, who both sort of neutrally, a bit awkwardly refer to Hunter as Darius' Boy.

Darius referring to Hunter as "my boy" is funnily enough what sticks the longest before it evolves to son boy. Hunter's crushing it at a derby match? Darius is whooping and cheering, yelling "THAT'S MY BOY!!!" At the other parents in the stands. Hunter is doing something dangerous or inadvisable where others can see him? "Darius, your boy-" "AHH! MY BOY". Hunter, a year into his stay with Darius finally comes clean about everything to do with him being a grimwalker, and is afraid that he's going to go back to seeing him as just an inferior replacement for Darius' beloved mentor? Darius (who has just had to process some of the most bonkers, emotionally heavy information in his life) gently, hesitantly puts a hand on his shoulder (the 'good' one Hunter doesn't mind people touching), and says that Hunter's much more than that. He's Darius' Boy and he's not going to kick him out or get angry or love him any less for things out of his control. It's good. They're good.

Like I said, it evolves over time and 'boy' becomes somewhat obsolete as the two get caught up in the joy of finally feeling able to explicitly refer to each other as family. But unlike "guardian" or "ward" the word never gets fully retired. Even when Hunter is 30 and is arguing that he's more of a man than a boy now, he is still getting referred to by Darius as "his boy", the way some parents never really stop calling their adult kids baby or kiddo (Camila and Eda respectively btw).

Hunter makes one of those corny matching shirt sets at some point for a father's Day gift when he's 17/18, where the two shirts say "if lost, return Boy to me" (Darius) and "I'm Boy" (Hunter). Hunter mostly did it so he could own a funny shirt that says "I'm boy". Darius openly weeps upon seeing them. Like Oh my Titan he's boy. He's my boy. Oh wow

[justaz]

merlin au where merlin keeps excalibur and returns to camelot to serve under gwen as court sorcerer after she repeals the ban. merlin remains for years, unaging, even as gwen dons wrinkle after wrinkle and spouts grey hair after grey hair. eventually, gwen passes without an heir and since merlin holds arthur’s sigil, he ascends the throne and leads camelot for years. eventually invaders come and slaughter the people and burn the fields etc etc and merlin goes out to fight. he fights like a demon, which is what they call him with his unnatural abilities and golden eyes, and merlin chases them from his kingdom - only, they slaughtered everyone within the citadel. there is no camelot, not anymore, not without her people. merlin should’ve seen this coming as her one true ruler has been and will always be arthur. he waves a hand and puts out the fires and restores the buildings to their once gleaming glory then takes excalibur into the center and drives it into the stone. with the force and power behind it, merlin raises the earth around the kingdom and buries it away from further invasions.

he leaves the kingdom hidden beneath the earth and travels up to the surface to explore just how far the continent spreads. then theres new continents across the ocean and he explores those as well. he watches as the world expands and grows and learns and advances but humans go too far and begin to destroy the world and create weapons of mass destruction and threaten each other with war. merlin assumes arthur will come back considering the destruction of practically everything but he doesn’t. tensions rise and snap and in the blink of an eye, humanity is chased back to their caves. with the loss of technology and modern ideas, humans revert back to their roots and connect with the elements which means they reconnect with magic. it takes another few thousand years for these humans to achieve the level of civilization merlin grew up in his first few decades of life.

different tribes are settled across the land but, thats the thing, over the course of the last few millennia (lets pretend land moves super quick plsplsplsplspls) the separate continents have collided with one another and practically the entire mass could be considered albion. he’s not even sure where the original land resides now. sooo he’s not even sure where camelot resides now. he really should’ve set up some beacon so he could remember but its been thousands upon thousands of years. sue him for his memory being a little foggy. he wanders from tribe to tribe and learns from their new magic while acting as a physician which a lot of them consider him some sort of miracle healer considering his advanced medical knowledge. it’s a win-win tho, he learns new magic and they don’t die. everyone is happy.

then during one such visits to a tribe, he finds a man of twenty summers with a head of golden hair like a crown and sunkissed skin from working outside all day and bright blue eyes that look like the very sky was captured in his gaze. merlin stands for a while and watches him dig around in the dirt, sweat gleaming on his brow, and his muscles rippling as he works. merlin can feel the countless years falling from his shoulders, he feels lighter on his feet, and pure happiness bubbles in him. a grin wide enough to split his face pulls at his lips.

he can’t help himself from stumbling over toward his long lost best friend, his body awkward and gangly with excitement and when he calls out to arthur his voice seems younger than it has in millennia and he vaguely notices that his appearance of wizened old healer melted away to his twenty year old body. arthur looks up with a polite yet confused smile and greets him followed by a question and merlin is faced with the realization that arthur doesn’t know him, doesn’t remember him. merlin manages to keep a thin smile on his face as he reaches out with magic and finds an injury in his knee from years ago that must’ve been bothering him and excuses his use of arthur’s name as someone sending him to find him and help heal the injury.

anyways merlin and arthur become friends and set off on an adventure of gathering the knights of the round table from various tribes/villages and they eventually stumble upon gleaming white stone that merlin belatedly realizes camelot was built with. the knights all take turns tugging at the sword but it doesn’t budge, not until arthur reaches out and tugs as if expecting it to be y’know stuck in stone only it slides out like butter and he knocks the hilt on his forehead and knocks himself out it out. with the sword tugged from the earth, it rumbles and cracks and splits and a hidden kingdom arises from the dirt, gleaming white and shining in the sun. they stare in amazement and awe for a moment before they grow confused and distracted. then arthur turns to merlin and says his name in an all too familiar way and merlin starts sobbing bc arthur is finally back

[warren-keplers-funk-band]

i'm trying to function like a normal person but it keeps hitting me at inopportune moments that buck kissed a man last episode and i fully stumble and bluescreen for a few seconds each time

[murdockhawkeye]

this is *maybe* a bit of a stretch but i still find interesting to think about? don't know if i have everything right

but

i feel like with the elemental opposite duos - emma & rikki, cleo & bella - you could reasonably say their arcs'd mirror each other in a way

like

emma and rikki have issues with responsibility/expectations but on opposite ends of the spectrum

emma was a gifted child, everyone had high expectations for her and she tried to meet those expectations the best she could. she’s responsible emma, who makes sure everyone is looked after, and everyone “knew” was going to become a top athlete, because look at all those trophies on her shelf

and then rikki on the other hand, was alone for “her own good.” she admitted to elliot that no one really liked her growing up, so when somebody did, it made her feel weird and she pushed them away. she stayed away from other people, made sure they never had any expectations of her

they both avoided disappointing others, by going to opposite extreme lengths

and then they overcame these issues, with emma facing a sudden change in her life (becoming a mermaid) that meant she had to give up her swimming dreams and disappoint the people in her life (that had to suck for her, honestly.) she had to come to terms with that - but then, she also found a whole new world that she’d never have been a part of, if things had gone the way she planned

and as for rikki - her biggest change wasn't the tail, but becoming friends with emma and cleo. had she'd her way and zane’d never gotten cleo stuck on that boat, she’d never become friends with them. rikki had to learn the hurdles of friendship and of keeping them, like when she mistook the different kinds of fish, when cleo and emma didn't support her relationship with zane, etc. they had their issues - but in the end, they were there for rikki, and rikki was there for them back. she'd have never gotten that kind of solidarity, had things gone the way she thought it would

and then there’s cleo and bella

bella - unfortunately, didn’t have much in terms of development, since the writers prioritized will’s relationship with her over expanding her character background+ for some reason ??

so i'm just mostly going to talk about cleo here first - but i'll get to bella in a second

cleo by s3 is a very confident and self-assured person; but she didn't start out that way. she was insecure, somewhat naive. she grew up overshadowed by her two best friends, the both of them being gifted in their own rights - emma, the young up and rising athlete, and lewis the science genius, they were sure to go places. cleo, on the other hand, was overlooked. she didn't have much going for her - except for adequate grades and a love of the marine life that was hindered by her fear of water

and then cleo became a *literal* mermaid. either she was going to avoid it or overcome it. in the end, she didn't just overcome her fear of water, but she also took a risk by taking that job at the marine park, where she'd be working right by the marine animals. she let her fear control her before, and she wasn't going to let it stop her from wanting to pursue things anymore

(funny, she started out with a fear of water, then became a mermaid. she struggled with her grades, then became a science genius)

bella, much like cleo - had her own issues when it came to the kind of attention she got, but the other way around. her first appearance, she was being catcalled. same ep, nate is drooling over her. they've made her beauty a point throughout s3. even cleo and rikki's brought it up. it. could not have been easy for her to deal with that, especially with her secret in mind

seeing that, even with the different issues when it came to attention, i think they'd still have had the same feelings about it. a younger bella, probably would've been similarly insecure/anxious as cleo had been - until she learned to be more sure about herself and grew into the bella we know and love today

(we should've gotten way more lore and background about bella, agh)

tldr; emma and rikki have same feelings but opposite reactions (people pleasing and people avoiding.) cleo and bella opposite situations but same feelings (overshadowed and center of attention)

yk, rikki was right in a way i think about the "universal law," but like, more about keeping in balance and not about trios. emma and rikki balance each other out, cleo and bella were *meant* to balance each other out. but in s2, bella wasn't there - charlotte was

do i blame the antagonizing of charlotte and cleo's out of characterness on the writers, or do i blame it on some magical semi-canon mermaid universal law about balance

blaming it on a mermaid universal law sounds more fun, and could have interesting implications. (though the writing grates me, still)

[arggghhhsstuff]

when annabeth said "He was living on borrowed time. I was loving him on borrowed time." i never recovered from this actually

[sodafizzyart]

Meant to draw something more explicit but I couldn’t get through the exposition

[eywaseclipse]

I think this is the last AU recom Neteyam edit I have.

[essektheylyss]

hi hello hi I need to scream for a sec but I HAVE A SHORT STORY IN A PRINT ANTHOLOGY! like a real actual physical book!!! the anthology as a whole is about resource scarcity and specifically the moment a resource runs out, and true to form I wrote a funky thing about time and grief and messy familial relationships and gardening. cuz what is there to do when something ends other than to keep maintaining your plants.

this isn't even to say you should totally buy this thing but if you do want to check it out, it's available for preorder

[gaycinema]

can’t wait to see jayce ekko and heimerdinger stuck in a fucked up little arcane-fueled timeloop next week. i wonder how many times jayce is gonna have to try and fail to stop/reason with/eventually kill viktor and how it’s going to slowly tear him apart until we get the jayce who had to march into the commune and shoot viktor straight in the heart with no words lest he fail again🥰