#to hell with stain's philosophy

[caladblog]

A BASIC GUIDE TO VICTORIAN CLOTHING, FOR FANDOMS

wherein VICTORIAN CLOTHING is understood to mean "common clothing from the 1830s to the end of the century, in fashion as set by London and followed to a greater or lesser extent in the rest of the British empire"

This is very much meant as a starting point or a cheat sheet, not a comprehensive historical essay, for people who want to know what the Fuck is happening under that morning coat and/or dress the size of a kitchen table. I've also included a little bit on likely materials and colors so you can add some texture to your fics.

Here's the rule of thumb: Victorians loved LAYERS, BUTTONS, and DECORATIVE SHIT. When in doubt, slap several layers of clothing on your guy, button 'em all together, and flourish the hell out of the top layer. Congrats, you have dressed a Victorian.

Read on for details! And check my reblogs for a note on trans characters. A Part 2 on Mending/Laundry is in the works, because it had a much bigger impact on Victorian dress at all levels of society than it does on modern fashion and I think it's worth talking about.

UNDERWEAR FOR MEN:

a warm and comfortable and easily washable undershirt (typically called a vest) with sleeves that went down to the wrist

drawers, also warm and comfortable and easily washable and covering the whole legs, fastened with buttons or ties at the waist and ankles

pair of socks

If you cover your whole body in this base layer made of undyed, unfashionable, who-cares-if-it's-stained fabric, the sweat and dirt of your body stays on this easily-washable layer and spares the outer layers of clothing that would be damaged by hot water and soaps, or at least that was the philosophy.

The most common fabric for this underwear was flannel, as it was cheap and fairly soft. Bands of cotton could be stitched to the inside of the wrists, ankles, waists, and collar if you found the wool itchy. Socks were almost always knitted wool, holes or thin spots mended with darning whether you were poor or rich.

UNDERWEAR FOR WOMEN:

the chemise / shift: a simple, short-sleeved cotton tube that fell to the mid-thigh

other underwear requires a bit of a history lesson, sorry. At the beginning of the century, you wore like 85 petticoats and no bloomers. Then crinolines--a sort of metal cage skirt that held your dress away from your body to obtain the fashionable wide silhouette--were invented in the 1850s. It was great, because they replaced 30lbs of underskirts, but also inconvenient, in that hoops of steel are inherently bouncy. To preserve modesty (and also warmth) women began wearing bloomers, open in the middle and buttoning at the waist and either at or below the knee. These were also made of plain cotton and only occasionally decorated with a bit of lace-- for all your underthings, male or female, you wanted to be able to 1) make a bunch of sets quickly and cheaply so you could change every day without needing to launder as often and 2) use cloth that could be laundered easily.

stockings were longer and more decorative than men's socks, made of wool, cotton, or silk. White was popular at the beginning of the century, but bright colors and patterns became fashionable in the middle, and conservative black stockings dominated the end of the era. Wool fabrics were the most common, warmest, and cheapest; silk stockings were for very wealthy and fashionable women as they required the most care. Near the end of the century stockings were suspended from the corset, but up til that point stockings were held up by garters tied above the knee.

MIDDLE LAYERS FOR MEN:

shirts, with much longer tails than the button-up shirts we're used to, with a buttoned slit that only went about halfway down the chest rather than all the way down the front of the garment. Lots of volume in the sleeve around the armpit, buttoned up at the cuff. At the beginning of the period, rich men's shirts were checked or patterned while working men's shirts were white(ish), but this swapped over the course of the century as colored fabric became cheaper. (It hides stains better.) The gentleman's shirt from midcentury onward was a crisp, bright white.

As a middle layer, parts of it (like the cuffs and front) could be seen in public, but you absolutely could not go out without a waistcoat and jacket. You only removed your jacket and showed your shirtsleeves at the end of the day, amongst your family.

Trousers were held up by braces / suspenders that went over the shoulders, not belts that fastened around the waist, and you did NOT let them show. They were meant to be covered entirely by waistcoats.

MIDDLE LAYERS FOR WOMEN:

As a very carefully tailored and shaped garment that couldn't really be washed, corsets went over the shift. All women wore them, even laborers, even prisoners and people in workhouses as part of their (institution-provided and deliberately demeaning) uniform. They were viewed as necessary armor to support your weak internal organs, and the physically upright posture they created went hand in hand with moral uprightness in the Victorian mind. They could lace up in the front or back, and the boning could be made of steel (cheap and sturdy) or whalebone (springier and therefore a bit more comfortable) or wood (if you are truly broke AF) or even just stiff cord (mostly for young girls, in which they were called stays).

camisoles (also called vests or corset covers) were tailored shirts worn over the corset, and could be either extremely decorative with embroidery and lace or plainer and made for warmth.

then you've got the crinoline, tied at the waist, a skirt made of steel hoops as already described.

then a couple of petticoats, decorated at the hem for fashion, layered for warmth and to hide the crinoline's hoops.

OUTERWEAR FOR MEN:

trousers, made of cotton or wool. The big differences between Victorian trousers and today's are 1) zippers hadn't been invented yet, the flies were buttoned and 2) the modern waist sits around the hipbones, while the Victorian waist was at the bottom of the ribcage.

jackets, made of thick heavily felted wool that was decently wind- and rain-proof. Darker colors in jackets and trousers lasted longer, so light-colored cloth was mostly worn by the young and rich (or those who wanted to look rich) and flashy.

waistcoats were where the fashion REALLY was. As the back was always made of plain cotton not meant to be seen, even poor men could often afford the cost of the fabric needed to make a neat waistcoat. The front could be made of embroidered silk for luxury, wool for added warmth, or printed cotton making full use of the brilliantly-colored (and relatively cheap) dyes that had just been invented. It's a little bit like people today wearing simple suits and shirts paired with wild socks.

OUTERWEAR FOR WOMEN:

and here you finally get to the f*cking dress. I couldn't possibly go into all the variations on dresses in this era, but I can say that bright colors and patterns were common for women of all classes (but were also part of the ever-present anxiety about people acting "above their station", if a maid dressed too fashionably). The design of the sleeves and the decoration of the hems changed regularly with fashion, as did the precise shape of the feminine silhouette, but the bodice was always tight and the skirts were always full. The average woman would spend more money on flourishes--ribbons, lace, other trimmings--than the dress itself, largely because the average level of skill in sewing was so high that they mostly bought the fabric for the dress and cut & sewed it themselves.

ACCESSORIES FOR MEN:

the collar was not an integral part of the shirt! It was detachable and had to be washed, starched, and ironed separately. Laborers didn't wear them, just a loosely-tied cloth around their neck, but a stand-up collar was necessary for anyone working in a business setting whether you're rich or making really terrible clerk's wages. Turned-down collars like the ones on most of our shirts today were informal and for wealthy men at leisure.

a stock or necktie, ideally black silk. Modern neckties weren't around yet, but the century moved slowly towards that and away from cravats.

gloves. Especially when status was a concern, so, men outside the home not engaged in business and servants waiting on their masters. These were tight-fitting, pale in color, and damn near impossible to launder and mend.

ACCESSORIES FOR WOMEN:

a shawl, often. Your lower half would be covered in stockings and plentiful skirts, while your upper half would only have a few layers that were usually made of cotton, so freezing your tits off was unfortunately common.

gloves. Like men's gloves, these were also status symbols worn when visiting your acquaintances or waiting on your masters. The vast vast majority of servants were women, and the rough labor of washing and cleaning fell to them, so these gloves also covered the evidence of that rough work.

HATS/BONNETS:

Everybody wore a hat when out in public. It's just what you did. The type of hat varied based on fashion, occupation, and social standing, but you had SOME kind of thing on your head when you left the house.

SOME SPECIFIC CLOTHES:

Fishermen wore knitted jumpers instead of jackets. Laborers out in the country (muddy when it rained, dusty when it didn't) wore gaiters, which were basically just rectangles or tubes of cheap-ass sacking that tied around the ankle and below the knee to keep the mud / dust off their trousers. Surgeons and people who worked a lot with ink (clerks, stationers) had sleeves, which were tubes of canvas that tied around the wrist and elbow to protect their shirtsleeves. The advantage of sleeves and gaiters is that you can remove them, toss them in a bucket of water, and beat the shit out of them to wash them without worrying about rips or tears OR getting the stains (mud, ink, blood, etc) onto your other clothes.

Maids and other laborers didn't wear crinolines, but they did wear a corset and a couple of petticoats under their dress.

More prosperous laborers might still own a collar / crinoline, but only wear it to church on Sundays or other occasions that called for nice dress.

When at home and not working or entertaining visitors, both men and women would wear slippers that could be super fancy or very simple or your kid's first sewing project, etc etc. Depends on your preference.

Men would sleep in long, loose nightshirts and women would sleep in long, loose nightdresses. Practically speaking there wasn't much difference between these garments; both might be decorated a bit with embroidery or lace. Rich people would have finer fabrics, fashionable people would have more decoration, poor people might just sleep in whatever combination of day clothes is the most comfortable. Fairly straightforward.

TO RECAP

MEN: vest + drawers + socks > shirt > trousers + braces + collar > waistcoat + stock or necktie > jacket + shoes or boots > hat

WOMEN: shift + bloomers (optional) + stockings > corset > camisole > crinoline > petticoats (minimum 2) > dress > shawl > shoes + bonnet

===

SOURCES

How to Be a Victorian, by Ruth Goodman

Inside the Victorian Home, by Judith Flanders

Episode 342 of Antiques Freaks, Historical Costuming for The Terror (2018)-- the first ~8 minutes talk about men's clothes in general, then they go into naval uniforms until minute 15ish.

[hotricebowlsoup]

it's you and me, that's my whole world

(evamon, 6.3k, non-despair college au where damon and eva fight over the same study seat. read sequel here)

i.

There’s a quiet corner in the Grand Library of Eden’s Garden Academy that Damon really likes. It’s a wooden table next to a stained window, almost hidden by a large Greek pillar diagonally to it. Adorned with plastic ivy leaves and vintage warm lamps, the cozy corner has served as his study paradise ever since he discovered this secret place a month ago.

The Corner (with a capital ‘C’, mind you! (dubbed by him and his genius linguistics)) was incredibly peaceful and worked wonders on Damon’s productivity. So, it’s kind of a surprise that no one else knows about this place. Or, at least, no one else is in the Corner whenever he wants to study there. It’s his unlabelled territory, his secret sanctuary.

Then one day, after a philosophy lecture, he goes to the library as usual and finds a girl in his Corner.

To be fair, Damon supposes it’s about time another person finds out about this hidden spot. The library is nearly packed everyday with studious students, scrambling to find a comfortable spot to study in during the shared break hours. If anything, having another person intrude was long overdue.

But what pisses Damon off is that the girl is sitting in his seat. His table, his chair. Being in the Corner is totally fine. Sitting at the same table, opposite or beside him is alright. There are 3 other chairs to be used, so, whatever. He can tolerate that— but get the fuck out of my seat, ma’am!

He’s clearly been standing rigidly, facing his Corner with a glare, for far too long that the girl looks up at him.

She looks back down after 2 seconds, completely unbothered.

Damon’s head is going to burst.

“Excuse me,” he marches up to the girl, unpolitely speaking, “That’s my seat.”

“It doesn’t have your name on it.”

What kind of highschool ass remark— Damon feels a vein pop. What the hell, sure.

“I’ve been sitting in this seat,” he crosses his arms, “Everyday. For the past month. And I’ve never seen you in this Corner before.”

The girl, completely absorbed in her revision materials, doesn’t bother looking up at him at all.

“I just thought you should know,” he harrumphs. “Yeah. That’s my seat. Go find another.”

“Interesting.”

Damon feels his patience slithering away very quickly, even if he didn’t have much to begin with. “What is?”

“You say you’ve been sitting in this exact spot every day, for the past month,” the girl speaks, soft and low, her pen never faltering in its rapid scribbling. “So have I.”

“That’s… not possible.”

She finally puts her pen down and looks up at him, square in the eye. Her eyes are a steel grey behind her spectacles. “I’ve been here everyday for the past two months, in fact. By your logic, you’re the one intruding.”

Damon blinks, and blinks again, and lets out an intelligent “huh?” from his lips.

The girl sighs, and reaches in her bag to pull something out. She hands him an A5 sized paper, with a schedule printed on it.

He whips his phone out, pulling out his own timetable. His eyes dart back and forth between the two, and realises…

“Your breaks are totally different from mine,” he murmurs, “We don’t share any free periods at all.”

“Then that’s why we’ve never run into each other.”

He tilts his head back up, “I study here in the late afternoons and evenings, too. Do you not?”

“I do it in my dormitory room,” she stretches a hand out, gesturing for him to return her printed schedule. “away from nuisances like you.”

????????????

Damon’s eye twitches, but he’s far too prideful to take the L and leave. So like the perfectly composed, dignified, and accomplished Politics major that he is, he sits. Slams his ass down. At the same table, right in front of the girl. The thief. Who stole his seat, of course.

“You’re lucky I’m not bothered enough to kick you out,” he grumbles.

“How very benevolent of you.”

Ignoring her reply, he just takes out his study materials, trying to immediately immerse himself in them. Although, five minutes later, and he admits he’s not as focused as he should be.

Probably, he thinks, eyes flickering up to peek at the girl opposite him, because of the unwanted company. It’s not even that the girl is distracting, or unnecessarily noisy. But the soft scribble of her pen, the rustling of paper against paper, and the low breathing of another human being near you becomes deafening in the silence.

It does get uncomfortable to work in the presence of another, after doing things alone for so very long. 

Damon isn’t used to it. He hopes the girl goes away soon.

Roughly an hour passes, less productive than Damon would’ve liked. Leaning back, he roughly rubs his palms over his eyelids, letting the little stars take over his vision. His revision is getting nowhere.

“You’re far too distracting,” the girl across him mumbles, “Maybe this is why you’ve had this corner to yourself; nobody likes studying with you around.”

“I don’t usually act this discomposed,” he retaliates, “Not with unwanted company around.”

“But I was here first, was I not?”

Damon clamps down on his tongue, refusing to release a colourful string of words in this sacred sanctuary.

“You’re lucky,” the girl smirks, small and dastardly, “I’m not bothered enough to kick you out.”

He slams his hands down on his notebook, slightly wrinkling the paper. “You—!”

“Quiet,” she says, almost teasingly, “You’re still in the library.”

Damon fully crumples the page of his notebook.

The damned thief lets out a small snort from across him, but stays nonchalantly buried in her work. Damon only bridles further.

Okay, thief, he seethes, IT IS SO ON.

ii.

To his utter dismay, when Damon arrives at the library panting and sweating, his favourite Corner is occupied yet again. By the same nuisance, in the form of a walking and talking human girl.

This time, she even dares cross her right leg over her left, dainty and elegant. As if she hadn’t committed an extremely demeaning and outrageously monstrous crime against humanity.

Defeated once again, Damon plops down in the seat in front of her. 

The only acknowledgement she gives of his (loud) entrance is a small hum, unsatisfying to Damon’s ears.

He feels like a child, purposely making unnecessary noise when he takes out his study materials. And yet, unperturbed, the audacious Miss Thief stays collected and focused in her studying.

Damon is by no means an athletic person, but he kinda wants to smash this table in half, even if at the cost of a broken arm.

Fine. Whatever. She can keep the nonchalant pretense all she wants; he’ll break her eventually, like he does with all his academic rivals.

“Something’s been on my mind since the last time you took my spot,” he begins as yet another attempt to be a distraction. To break the high-and-mightiness that Miss Thief magically possesses. “If we don’t have any shared breaks, how did we even meet?”

“My spot,” she corrects him in a huff. “To answer your question, my class was cancelled that day.”

“Ah. And I don’t suppose it got cancelled today, again?”

Miss Thief lets her pen hover above her paper, and ultimately clicks it shut. “It got delayed.”

“How convenient,” Damon says dryly. “Surely you’re not making excuses and skipping lectures to prove a point to me.”

“No one has hobbies nearly as boring as you do.” She quips back.

Either this girl is really really good at getting under people’s skin, or Damon is just really really easy to get riled up. And God knows when it will be that he admits the latter.

He takes off his gauntlet.

Leaning forward, he hisses as lowly as possible, “You wish you had my hobbies. You wish you were the best speaker of Eden’s Garden’s Debate Team, accomplished and irreplaceable. You wish you could speak eloquently and argue about topics like science, ethics and so much more. You wish you were top of the class in the Arts. You wish you were me.”

The gauntlet is thrown.

Miss Thief is anything but blown away from his outburst. But shockingly, she puts her pen down, and gives Damon proper attention for the first time since they met. Her eyes bore into his, steel grey intense and sharp. And she leans closer, even closer, that their faces are a hair’s strand away.

The gauntlet is picked.

Without missing a beat, she replies in the same tone, “And you’ll never be me. You’ll never be someone who’s actually relevant in today’s society. You’ll never be guaranteed a high paying, stable job in the future that shapes society greatly. You’ll never be the only person that the Mathematics Faculty in this school trusts to go for competitions, nationally and internationally. You wish you could be a fraction of who I am.”

The gauntlet is worn, and used in the first punch. It resounds.

Then, the arena goes dead silent, save for the deep breathing from both competitors, still a hair’s strand away from each other.

Miss Thief, unexpectedly, is the one to break the limbo. “...And you think debating’s a hobby ?”

“Yes,” Damon replies, too genuinely to be offended. “If we go by the dictionary definition of ‘hobby’ then yes, I do derive pleasure from researching humanitarian topics and presenting them in arguments that my opponents cannot refute.”

“That’s… not fun in the slightest.”

“You’re one to talk!” he rapid-fires. “Math? That’s your hobby? You like those stupid triangles and alphabets?”

“It’s not my hobby!” Miss Thief flushes hotly, the first time she’s lost composure in front of him.

“Debate competitions are extremely normal, but math competitions… what are you, a freaking mathlete?”

When she shuts her mouth, blushing an even darker colour, he finds he’s hit jackpot. “You’re kidding.”

“Don’t,” she hisses, “Even.”

The smirk on his face widens. Miss Thief’s face comically changes from red to pale, devastation settling in.

As if the roles were reversed, she slams her hands down on her notebook. It’s even louder than the sound he made last time. “If you tell anyone, anyone at all, I’ll kill you—”

“Quiet,” Damon whispers, the satisfied smile on his face stretching from ear to ear. Oh, he’s been waiting to say this. “You’re still in the library.”

Miss Mathlete lets out a very, very high pitched wince, and buries her face in her hands. He can almost see the smoke coming from her ears.

And when she peers at him through the cracks between her fingers, he meets and challenges her killing glare, elated that the loathing is mutual.

iii.

Miss Mathlete doesn’t show up for quite a many days, fortunately. Damon gets his beloved seat, and his beloved silence, and his beloved composure returned to him.

But on the one day he needs his favourite seat the most, the Devil pulls it from under him and hands it to his pupil, Miss Mathlete.

Today is not a good day for Damon at all, and he seriously means it. In this week alone, he’s required to submit three essays and two group presentations. And none of his teammates, those bastards, are pulling their fucking part. The least he could get, he thinks, is his comfort seat, the one with vintage warm lights and plastic ivy leaves.

So he believes he’s not overreacting when he sees her in his seat and feels the need to jump off the seventh floor.

The bane of his existence jumps out of her skin when he unceremoniously slams his books on the table. Sliding into the seat across hers once again, he doesn’t hold back the audible grumble as he flips through his notes and yanks his laptop open.

“Someone’s in a bad mood,” the worst person on Earth ever mutters.

“It’s Submission Week,” he grits out, being as nice and quiet as he possibly can, “so don’t even start.”

Miss Mathlete is a lot of things, but never an unreasonable toddler. She is a fellow student and victim to the Submission Week at the end of every academic wave, hence the empathy. Yet he finds it pleasantly surprising that she quietly complies and continues her own business.

The comforting silence becomes unhelpful very quickly, unfortunately. Because the glaring light from the stained windows is hitting in all the wrong places, and the AC is too biting on his skin, and his handwriting’s all wrong, and so is everything. And Damon is so, so tired, and he wants nothing but to sink in the ocean and let it swallow him whole.

A stray thought crosses his mind. This wouldn’t have happened if he was in his rightful seat.

He looks up, disgruntled, at the person he was thinking of. The mathlete loser scrolls at something on her tablet, completely absorbed in whatever the hell she’s looking at.

In fact, she’s so focused on it, he kind of feels guilty for wanting to ask her to get out of that seat so he can have it instead.

Never in the past two weeks would Damon have calmed down at the thought of letting the damned girl have the damn seat.

It is, he breathes in and out slowly, feeling his brows unfurrowing, just a seat. It’s literally just a seat we’re fighting over. How silly of him!

For the first time in three days, he returns to his work, relaxed and determined.

And then, he hears it.

Coming from Miss Mathlete’s tablet is a small sound, a gunshot. Not a real one, of course— a high pitched, childish “pew!” distinctive to literally everyone not living under a rock. A sound you’d recognise if you were cultured enough. A sound you’d recognise if you spent way too much time with Cassidy Amber.

A sound you’d recognise if you were playing Galactic Shooter: The Rise of Martians.

Damon snaps his head up so fast that his head spins. Etched on his face is the most betrayed expression anyone has seen on him, and he shows it to the person he’s only known twice.

You’re playing a game.

A brainless, online shooting game.

In the seat I work best in. While I’m opposite you, struggling with five assignments at once.

And while Miss Mathlete doesn’t look the part of an empath, even she knows when there’s a silently fuming teen in front of her, practically trembling with rage and dismay, and when there isn’t. She raises her head slowly, eyes wide, suddenly fearful of the boy in front of her.

Said boy who doesn’t know how to express all the emotions hitting him at once, his mouth opening and closing over and over again like a goldfish. Said boy whose only words in that moment are “You…!” and “Game!!!”.

Said boy who appears to have just given up and slammed his head, face down, onto the very hard wooden table with a very painful ‘bang’.

The Devil’s pupil winces. She’s finally figured out her partial fault.

As for the boy, the pain of his (probably) broken nose is nothing compared to the utter despair he feels.

Clenching a fist beneath his seat, he swears he’ll show no mercy to bespectacled girls with steel grey eyes ever again.

iv.

Eva misses the chaos.

Another week or two goes by, without any cancelled classes and hence no more run-ins with the weird guy who’s apparently a Politics major. The blond haired, green eyed Draco Malfoy lookalike, the haughty prince with an audacity bigger than his brain.

Like a lone crow, Eva is used to the silence, incredibly so. She’s gone her whole life doing practically everything by herself, which she’s more than capable of.

Peace is returned to her, a blessing she took for granted once. There will be no more distractions, no more bantering. No more unnecessarily loud rustling of paper and clacking of laptop keys. There will not be another warmth opposite of her, whose breathing is too loud to stay focused and eyes too bright to look away. Eva has been missing these things since he sat with her, and she should really appreciate the rare instance she has now.

But throughout the past week, she knows she cannot lie about the number of times she looks up from her work, hoping to see a familiar sneer walk in.

They’ve met for three days. Three, and Eva misses him for more.

An hour goes by in complete silence. She goes back to her work grudgingly, having lost hope that he will burst into the Corner once again. Coincidences never happen more than three times, after all.

Then a small thud is heard. She almost misses it. Another small thud. A soft pitter-patter becomes more audible. It’s getting louder. It’s getting closer.

Eva looks up. She doesn’t know what face she’s making. She doesn’t know her hands are shaking. She cranes her neck, trying to look beyond the large Greek pillar. She can’t see anything, and she should get out of her seat if she wants to look closer, but she cannot will her legs to move.

Because what if it’s not the nuisance who’s brought more movement in her life in three days than the entirety of her highschool life? What if it’s not the damned blond hair and green eyes that she’s grown to recognise, hate, and miss? What if it’s not the person she should hope to never see again, but desperately craves today?

The pitter-patter is loud enough. So is the uneven panting she definitely recognises.

When the Audacious Prince’s head finally emerges from behind the pillar, Eva hates the way her heart slams against the wall of her chest.

Trying her hardest to feign nonchalance, she slowly sets her pen down. It shakes in her loose grip. “You lost to me again.”

And then, damn it all, he actually smiles, tired and amused, at her provocation.

Today, the Audacious Prince doesn’t slide into the seat across hers, dislike evident on his face. Instead, he takes the seat on her right, and Eva just only remembers that this table is a four-seater.

He hunches over the table, burying his head in his crossed arms. Even with his lithe figure, even with the ample amount of space provided by the table, his shoulder manages to brush against her arm.

“What the hell are you doing?” she whispers, almost a laugh.

“Hiding.” he answers, muffled by his sleeve. He stays like that for a few beats, while she watches in astonishment, before jerking his head up again. Then, ignoring any of Eva’s protests, he snatches the jacket hung over her seat, and puts it over his head. He takes a few of her books, too, checking that they have ‘Mathematics’ on the cover before propping them up. When he’s done, he goes back into hiding, behind the books.

Another set of pitter-patter arrives. It’s even louder than the Audacious Prince’s, if even possible. A lively, red haired girl emerges from behind the pillar, looking around frantically.

Okay. Eva gets it now.

When she approaches, Eva clears her throat and puts on her coldest face.

“Heyaaa, hope I’m not interrupting!” Lively Girl begins, bright and spunky. “You haven’t seen a Damon Maitsu around here, have you? He’s about this tall, clearly bi, but we haven’t had the Talk—”

“You are interrupting.” Eva snaps, conscious of the shoulders shaking next to her. The Prince is incredibly terrible at holding his laughter in.

Lively Girl’s face falls into a pout. “Oh, okay. Sorry ‘bout that, guess that's a ‘no’.”

She runs away with the same vigour she entered the Corner with. When the pitter-patter subdues, the boy Eva now knows as Damon Maitsu raises his head cautiously.

“Thanks for that,” he sighs, ruffling his hair, “She's, uh, quite the handful, don’t you think?”

“Sure is,” she answers, peeking at him in her peripheral vision. “So are you, though.”

Another sigh. “No, I’m definitely the more normal one between the both of us.”

“Then you must be thinking wrong.”

A snicker from him, and then silence. It’s comfortable, Eva finds, but it makes her all too conscious of the fact that he’s still sitting right next to her, that their knees are almost touching, that their shoulders are almost brushing.

“She’s not a bad person, though. She’s… my friend, even if she tried to force me into her organised-on-a-whim schoolwide gaming tournament.”

Eva feels a twinge in her heart. “You have good friends.”

“You’re frowning.”

She falters, bringing her hand up to touch her lips. Was she?

Damon stares at her, unjudging. “Do you not have any…?”

The silence is no longer comfortable. The presence on her right, while warm, becomes a blur. And Eva feels like the skin on her is wrong, and the workings on her notebook are wrong, and the air is feeling wrong, and—

She slams her notebook shut, unable to stay. And she packs up her belongings, frantic and desperate.

Damon only looks up at her, confused and worried. “W-wait, where are you going?”

“You can have the seat.” It doesn’t matter anymore. I need to leave. Go. Go. Go. Run. Run. Run. “You win, Damon.”

The last of Eva’s belongings is thrown into her bag, messily arranged because of her hastiness. She takes off right away, never looking back, never saying another word.

All that resounds in their Corner is the quick pitter-patter of her footsteps that get softer, softer, softer… and then, no matter how much he cranks his ears, Damon hears them no more.

v.

Miss Mathlete never shows up again.

“Stop being dramatic, stupid,” Kai Monteago groans extremely loudly, ruining Damon’s depressing narration. “It’s only been a day, Damon, goddammit. A. Day.”

One (1) day since his study buddy ran out the library, and one day since Damon went home almost brokenhearted, recounting the entire Corner saga to his influencer roommate.

“Ugh,” Kai plops down unceremoniously, in the seat Damon likes the most. “Give it some time, okay? You said you only meet when your schedules get wonky, so it's totally normal if she doesn’t show up today.”

All Damon does is stare forlornly at the seat Kai is on, and thinks of steel grey eyes. Kai recognises the look in his eyes, and groans again, louder than before. “Dude, you’re fucking kidding. You miss a girl this much?!”

“I don’t miss her,” Damon mumbles, and Kai can almost see the mushrooms sprouting on his head. “She’s super noisy. I’m glad she’s gone.”

“Yeah, right! And I’m Donald fucking Trump!”

“You’re not, though?”

“Did you not get the joke??!!!”

Kai sighs. Damon has always been kind of a loser, even with his academic achievements and many friends (who forcefully adopted him, by the way, because he insists that they’re weirder than him even though everyone knows he’s the most pathetic among them). But really, to see him sulking over the absence of some math girl he shared a table with four freaking times is a whole new low.

His roommate is totally fucked. Kai thinks Damon would look much less pathetic if he were run over by a truck.

So he leans forward, concocting a plan to wipe that frown on his friend’s face, because he’s such a kind person. “Okay, stop moping. I’ll help you get her back, even if the chances of you doing that after accidentally insulting her lack of friends is like, zero point zero zero zero zero one.”

“You just pulled that number out your ass.”

“I’m not Miss Math Girl, damn it!”

Wrong word choice, apparently, because Damon groans at the mention of her and throws his arm over his eyes.

“Why’d you even bring me here, anyway?” Kai crosses his arms. “Did you miss having someone to study with you that much? Like, what if your girl walks in and sees me with you, and decides to leave forever ‘cause she thinks you don’t need her anymore?”

Damon leaps forward, eyes wide. He’s totally considering that scenario. This fucking idiot.

Kai slams his fist on top of Damon’s head, hoping to knock out whatever demon might’ve possessed his roommate.

As the latter rubs his head in pain, the pink haired boy ignores the “what was that for??” coming from his roommate, and thinks. Thinks deeply. Damon is so not himself right now. And no matter how funny, or how irritating it might be for poor old Kai Monteago, it’s actually very very worrying to see the one person you know with infallible purpose and drive suddenly… wither.

And Kai is no idiot. Damon may return to their shared dorm room every night, and kick up a big fuss about the girl he simply hated. The girl he met four times and kept in his head for longer. Damon may do all these, complain even louder, tug his hair harsher…

…but he will never get rid of the soft, endearing look he doesn’t know he has when he talks about steel grey eyes.

Kai isn’t stupid. He’s seen those eyes before, many many times. He’s seen it in his own reflection, when he stares at a text so long the screen blacks out, so he knows.

Kai Monteago is a lot of things, but he is not stupid and he does not leave his friends alone in their perils.

“What did you even talk about? Like, before the part where you found out she had no friends?” he leans back, eyes trained on Damon’s blond mop.

Damon looks up, surprised at Kai’s patient tone. “...uh, Cass? I think?”

“Cass? Math girl knows her?”

“No, but I ran away from Cass yesterday. ‘Cause she was trying to force me into her gaming tournament, remember?”

“Ohh, yeah. You ran off immediately, and she screamed like a chicken and chased after. It was so funny.” Kai twiddles with a strand of his perfectly conditioned hair. “But what’s that gotta do with Math Girl?”

“I hid with her.”

Kai sits upright, listening very intently. “You what?”

“Hid,” Damon swallows, almost ashamed, “next to her. In this table?”

“Damon, what the fuck.”

“Hey, don’t— wait, I went off track. I told her about Cass’s game tournament, and then she said I had good friends—”

“Aw, she’s so right.”

“Shut up, Kai. And then I asked her if she had any, then—”

“YOU ASKED HER IF SHE HAD FRIENDS???” Kai full-on yells, still in the library. “ARE YOU A FREAKING IDIOT?????”

“NO! I mean, that’s not what I said, but—” Damon ruffles his hair roughly, like a dog. Kai watches, gaping in a way that can only be described as disappointed, as he pulls on the strands of his blond hair. “Ugh, forget it. I should’ve just stopped talking at the game tournament thing.”

And then Damon buries his head in his arms, not hearing when Kai scoffs “yeah, you totally should’ve”. And he turns his head to the side, then to the other side, before going back to the first position. And his restlessness is still not going away.

And then he remembers.

“Game tournament… game?” he mumbles, brows furrowed.

You’re playing a game.

A brainless, online shooting game.

A sound you’d recognise if you were playing Galactic Shooter: The Rise of Martians.

Damon snaps his head up so fast his head spins, again.

If Miss Mathlete plays games… and he wants to find her… and his friend so happens to be hosting a schoolwide game tournament…

…

He couldn’t… could he…?

He slams his palms on the table, jumping to his feet. Kai repeats the action subconsciously, having been scared by his sudden outburst. “Kai, I’m a fucking genius.”

“Uh, congrats?”

Damon doesn’t stay long enough to hear it.

Kai watches as he scurries away, a hopeful shine in his eyes. He thinks it’s the happiest Damon has looked in the past 24 hours. When the blond haired boy’s footsteps fade to nothing, Kai slumps in his seat, covering his eyes with his palms. He doesn’t move for an excruciatingly long time. Then he exhales, deep and shaky.

He’s a good roommate, and friend. He really is.

He tells himself that even though his heart’s been pounding for a green eyed boy ever since they shared a room many, many months ago.

+ i.

The Audacious Prince never shows up again.

For the past hour, Eva’s been blankly staring at her notes, the Greek letters and numbers swimming into an unreadable blur. It’s not that she doesn’t understand them (the great Eva Tsunaka, not understanding? Who do you think you’re talking about?), but she finds that even the simplest of equations on her working papers take her longer than a two-mile run.

Because every time she looks down to her notebook to meet white paper, the only thing that forms on it is sharp green eyes.

Eva groans deeply, and slumps onto the table, mushing her cheek against the paper. She fiddles with the hem of her skirt, just sitting in silence in her little Corner. The only sound she can hear is the ticking of the clock; not even the very muffled murmuring from outside the Corner, where there usually were other people doing their own studying. Although, she supposes, there’s a lot less people today now that Submission Week has ended for many students.

A tick passes by. It’s so quiet, so dreadfully quiet.

The lone crow looks around, trying to hear very carefully for sounds of life around her. But the sky is grey and cloudy, and the roads are lonely, and the crow can only sit on the branch, waiting and waiting. For someone who was alone much longer than she was accompanied, she really, really misses the warmth of another.

After all, when a traveller drinks from an oasis for the first time, would he not desire to do so again?

Eva sighs, and sits up. Reluctance slugs her body. If she was going to be alone here, she might as well return to her dormitory.

As she packs her belongings, she drops a pencil to the floor. She bends down to pick it up, and before she rises, she sees it.

There’s a small piece of paper taped to the underside of the wooden table. It’s actually kind of big, but you wouldn’t see it if you weren’t bending down like Eva was now. This wasn’t here before.

Eva prods the paper a few times, then gingerly peels it off the table underside.

When she brings it up under the light, she sees writing on it. Dark blue ink, large and curvy. The author has an endearing habit of connecting the letters in his words.

It reads, To Miss Mathlete.

Eva lets out a gasp, her fingers trembling. She needs to read this. She knows— hopes it’s from the only person she can think of.

To Miss Mathlete.

Before writing this letter, I got called an idiot amongst many other things by my roommate, and for once, I can’t disagree with him.

I sincerely apologise for the remark I made the other day. It was insensitive of me, and I’ll admit I regret saying that a lot.

(I’ll also admit that I am biting back A LOT of my pride to write this letter, so I ask that you’ll have the benevolence to not insult me immediately after reading.)

I’m not good at being company, much less socialising to begin with. On the fateful day I walked into my (mind you, MY) favourite study Corner and saw you there, I knew I wouldn’t forget you ever.

In a bad way, of course. At that time, I wanted nothing but for you to leave. Then, somewhere along the line, within the three more times we met and bantered… I felt like it was a blessing in disguise.

Because in those four days we sat together, bantering and studying, I have grown to like your company. Truly. And when you are not across from me, bantering and studying, I wish I were doing those things. 

So go ahead, call me a fool. That’s what I feel like now, missing someone I don’t even know the name of. But I will have you know I want to change that, as well as apologise in person for my rudeness.

If you want to (or don’t, whatever), come with me to my friend’s schoolwide tournament. The one I told you about. It’s on the 18th, after five. You like playing games, don’t you?

I hope to see you there. I really do.

Yours, Damon Maitsu

-

Miss Mathlete doesn’t show up.

The gaming party is lively and impressively well set-up, for a team that consists of one energetic girl and one equally energetic dirt racer. (“Damie, you have too little faith in us!” “Yeah! Tell him off, Broskii!” “No thanks...”)

And the students lounge, booked specially for this occasion, is booming. Tons of people everywhere. Mark Berskii’s music is blasting at full volume, and both participants and spectators alike appear to be having the time of their life in the student-initiated tournament. 

Deep down inside, Damon is proud of his friends for actually pulling it off, he really is. But the only person he wants to see is not here.

His heart pounds in his chest, and he can’t feel his fingers. Did she… maybe not find the letter I left?

Damon looks at his watch for the twentieth time that evening. It reads, 6.08 PM.

He stares, and stares, and stares, until he sighs, long and quiet. And stands in his spot for a moment, looking down to the floor. After a few beats, he runs a hand through his hair, then rubs his drooping eyelids and cold cheeks.

He’s not even a gamer himself.

Damon goes outside the lounge, the booming music and excited yells becoming muted. Pressing his back to the wall, he tilts his head back and closes his eyes, sliding down until he sits.

For a short while, the sound of crickets and the rough feel of the cement floor soothe him. Then, coming from the corner, is a soft pitter-patter.

This time, it doesn’t get softer. This time, it gets louder, approaching him, and eventually stopping somewhat near him. Damon doesn’t know where. Damon doesn’t dare see where. Or who.

Clothing rustles, and the mysterious person kneels beside him. There is a delicate breath on his left ear. Soft curls tickle his neck.

“You’re in my seat,” Damon hears, and his lips twitch up. And then he smiles, bigger, brighter, so very elated.

Before he can stop himself, he throws his arm over his closed eyes and straight up laughs , deep from the bottom of his lungs, body shaking.

Turning to the left, he finally opens his eyes. Miss Mathlete kneels, a small smile gracing her features. They both stay there, rosy cheeked and still smiling, a hair’s strand away from each other.

Damon’s heartbeat drowns out the muffled booming of Mark’s music.

“Why,” Miss Mathlete starts, almost a chuckle, “did you tape your letter to the underside of the table?”

“I don’t know. I didn’t want anyone else to see it?”

“No one else uses our corner,” she deadpans, and chuckles again, “Damon.”

She says his given name, for the first time, with such tenderness that he chokes up.

“It should,” he swallows, “stay that way.”

“You must really dislike having competition. Your opponents must find you insufferable.”

“You know it's not that,” he mutters, still looking into steel grey, “And do I have to ask you for your name, or will you tell me yourself?”

“Didn’t you promise something else in that letter?” she teases. Damon groans.

“Ugh, right, I did. Okay.” he takes a short breath, in and out. “Once again, I am really sorry for insinuating that you don’t have friends.”

“You’re not actually wrong, though.” Miss Mathlete twirls her side bangs. “I don’t really have any.”

“Whuh—” he splutters, “You’re making me apologise for being right?!”

“But it is a fact. Ever since I was a gifted child, ever since I was high school valedictorian…” She tilts downwards to hide her face, almost bumping her head on Damon’s cheek. “Even till now, I don’t have someone I can truly call my friend.”

He looks at her, eyes half-lidded, gentle and aching. Miss Mathlete rocks back and forth on her toes, not quite ready to meet his gaze again. Damon takes a deep breath, and steadies himself.

“Eva,” he tests, as softly as he can.

She whips her head up swiftly, eyes wide. “You… you knew all along?”

“My roommate’s friends with your roommate, apparently.”

“Then…” she trails off, not understanding. “Why did you still ask to know my name?”

“I wanted to hear it from you .”

Eva Tsunaka stares at him in the eyes, steel grey searching green. Then, a few seconds later, she looks back down and resumes rocking back and forth. Damon can see the tips of her ears turn slightly redder, though. His own cheeks are feeling rather warm, too. This is way too embarrassing.

Desperate to break the silence, Damon offers, “I’ll introduce you to my friends. They play games, too.”

“…Like Galactic Shooter?”

“Yes, that darned game, whatever.” He rolls his eyes. “You’ll get along swimmingly, I can tell. And then I’ll be tortured on a larger scale, sandwiched between multiple idiots, forced to listen to an extended 120 minutes of dumb game mechanics.”

“Good.” The smile returns in Eva’s voice. Damon, very subtly, brightens. “You’ll keep being humbled, one way or another.” 

Damon doesn’t protest at the shade thrown his way. He never feels the need to.

As the warmth of another’s finger brushes against his own, he finds that he really likes looking at steel grey.

[jahnavisurenda-21]

Hazbin Hotel||Alastor X Reader||Stress Relief

Take a deep breath, before you yell at some poor face who just happens to have the misfortune to walking in to one of your days, where everything seems to be going south.

This seemed to have taken one of the most bizarre turns you could have ever imagined, you had no idea why you had agreed to such a trivial, petty matter.

Oh! Now you remember it was Charlie, who had clasped your hand looked at you with the doe eyes which reminded you of some of the Korean shows you watched as a teen and young adult.

You would admire the eye makeup, the most because once your dad who had been a makeup artist had told his philosophy of makeup to look absolutely flawless, the eyes and lips should be standing out the most.

Totally irrelevant, you didn't understand the point of recalling this faint memory of your dad. You wished you could just go back to your suburban house, in the mountainside feel the spring flowers touch your skin again, you can't believe you once hated them.

Well, you always, miss what you once never cherished and lost.

"Coming this far, can't believe all the messed-up hotel mess is on Y/n." Angel dust once told Alastor, "The civil examinations study there and study even after your dead!"

"A what now?" Alastor questioned, "Oh! you didn't know? Not very bad now, are you?" Niffty asked, climbing on Alastor.

"What exams?" Alastor had asked once again, pushing Niffty from his shoulder,

"You always are the last person to know about anything are you? Don't you have like special powers or something which you can spy on anyone?"

Alastor looked at them like he was just about to lose his smiling grin, but of course smile is the best makeup.

"So, you know right Heaven is facing some economical crisis they spent so much time providing the 'perfect after life' guess the angels forgot money doesn't exactly grow on trees." Angel said sarcastically. But some hints of satisfaction could be made out.

"How exactly is this related to Y/n now?"

"You seriously don't know anything." Vaggie interjected, "When you had mysteriously run of in one of your 'expeditions' Adam the asshole came to the hotel, not for the execution apparently in the weekly magazine or something in heaven there was about a mysterious economist, or a business manager who was really good at managing expenses and could stabilize the afterlife."

"Well that turned out nicely did it not?"

"Ugh!" Vaggie hit her head, "No you egocentric, piece of shi--"

"Don't try that with me." Alastor warned,

"Yeah yeah she's really good." Angel finished, "It was tracked to Y/n, now heaven knows that Y/n is still choosing to be in hell, Now they want her there in heaven."

"To help them manage there life."

"Y/n has to write a civil exam the hardest one, or else they would attack the hotel."

"Well they don't know who they are messing with."

You sniffled, "Can't do this anymore." You murmured, "Want to die."

"Now my dear, is that a word you should use when you are literally saving the hotel?" Alastor appeared like the shadow, like always.

"Alastor?" You slowly poked your head from the blanket, "Why dear you're a mess!" Alastor said moving next to you on the bed,

"Can I put my head on your lap?" You asked, he nodded cheerfully.

"So why did you agree to this my dear?"

"I didn't want to fail everyone the extermination is already scheduled earlier than expected I didn't want to crush Charlie's dream."

"You're working really hard, without sleeping, isn't that concerning? It's concerning me."

"Thank god your here!" You said,

Alastor put a hand on your tear-stained cheeks.

"It's time for a little rest. Dear."

"I can't the exam is in three more days I think, I don't know how time works in hell."

"If That Adam guy keeps bothering you, I'll just remind him why I am here."

You laughed, "I'm sure you will."

You kissed his cheek, "Thank you."

"Never forget to smile my dear, and now take care."

He switched of the lights, and saw you instantly hold him close before cuddling up to him, he really knew how to make you loosen up a bit.

[brucewaynehater101]

Love the blog! I have been thinking about what would be interesting ways for Jason to slowly adopt a 'no killing' philosophy. I want it to do nothing with Bruce Wayne or the Batfam (the self realisation is so so so much better,, plus I don't want it to be like... him forsaking his philosophy for... just family stuff, it has to be more) and I've been loving reading ur blog for the past few days so I was wondering if u have any thoughts on it.

I really liked Beast World's approach on it 😭😭, smth like that!! I also like the approach of how killing is actually vvv hard on Jason, and how he maybe uses it as sh sometimes. Interesting stuff methinks !!!!

Hi 👋 Thank you ^^ Very interesting premise!

Tw: Death, purposefully giving someone permanent disability, torture (?), let me know if I need to add more

I do think this depends on Jason's characterizing, but the main problem with Jason switching over to not killing is his main ideology with it:

The prison system is not adequately preventing hardcore repeat offenders from committing heinous crimes

It feels... Disingenuous if Jason just stops killing without this major flaw being fixed. Yes, maybe you could go, "It is not your job to harm yourself like that for everyone else," but he is a Bat. Giving their entire being to the cause is what they do.

In order for Jason to stop killing, he would need proof that other methods are working. Here's a few suggestions:

Blackgate/Arkham reform [and no one escapes for over a year]

Inhumane procedures/failsafes against high-risk criminals (such as bomb in the head, loss of limb, impairment, heavy medication use, brainwashing, etc.) [Wouldn't be killing, though]

Legal system fixing [would take years to implement, though]

Dangerous criminals shipped off to the Phantom Zone or some other virtually inescapable place

Some of these methods are impossible without the batfam, though :/

There is one ideology I can see Jason adapting in the meantime, however.

If they die, they stop suffering.

As long as someone puts the little notion into his brain, it will get the ball rolling. He would start to morph from killing shots to permanent injuries. Not only would this affect their quality of life, but their medical bills will become expensive. It's also a permanent reminder of what they've done (I'm not arguing for this method. This is a reflection of what might change his mind to refrain from killing).

As he slows or stops killing, he may find this to be preferable (lessens the blood staining his hands).

I also think the Outlaws could help him with these realizations. They may kill as well, but that would allow Jason to have open and honest communication about the costs.

Jason could also use his tactical prowess for designing personal hells for every person he deems worthy of it (like the real disgusting jerks out there).

In the end, he would refrain from killing unless he deems it necessary for his, his teammates, or civilians' safety.

As far as using killing being a form of SH, I can agree with that idea depending on the circumstances/how it's interpreted.

We could see how killing takes a literal tax on his soul, but I'd prefer to analyze how killing harms his relationships/support system (not talking about his friends. We stan them and their unwavering support).

The Bats, his family, are actively against killing. This is not an argument of whether they should or not. This is a statement about their boundaries. Jason knows that the Bats are against killing and that maintaining a relationship with them while killing would be extremely arduous, or, in some iterations, impossible.

We could argue whether or not Jason should even be part of the Batfam (for his own sake) or how he may have hoped they'd love him in spite of that. We could debate on how much Jason's independent actions should affect the Bats considering their vigilante status vs their family status.

Those are all separate but vital arguments.

Bottom line, Jason knew/knows that killing is a HUGE point of contention. How the others react (and, in some cases, they react horribly) is besides the point.

So, if Jason is trying to play nice with his family by not murdering anyone, he could easily jeopardize himself/his relationships by killing again (this is not a discussion about how the Bats react/what Jason deserves). In one action, he would destroy everything.

I've seen a lot of fics where Jason renegades his agreement due to one of his family members being hurt. He ends up killing again due to the severity of the perpetrator's actions against his loved one(s). This is fabulous angst.

However, I haven't really seen one analyzing Jason killing again because of his low self-esteem. After months of not killing, he relapses in an effort to push everyone away from him with the eventual goal of impersonating a dumpster fire.

In this scenario, Jason kills again to scream, "Look! Can't you see? I am the monster I think I am. I don't deserve love/kindness. I don't deserve you."

Thus, him killing in these circumstances is actively harming himself and fucking up his life. A good batfam would communicate and help him through this. A bad batfam would allow Jason to distance himself or, worse, provide the punishment he feels he deserves (i.e. being banished from Gotham, being locked up, etc).

But, overall, I agree. Jason shouldn't change his methods just for his family. It's an important piece of his identity as a vigilante. He, as a murder victim, believes that death is justice for those wronged. While not all victims would agree to this, it is how Jason feels. He no doubt would be relieved and less fearful if the Joker was dead.

[noahthesatanist]

The Arrogance of Modern Cynicism: How Jaded Nihilists Misunderstand History and their Myth of the ‘Dumb Past’

As one of my followers just pointed out humans have always been the same. If someone can pick up a Bible today, read it, and decide Yahweh is a tyrant who deserves nothing but hatred, then you bet your ass someone a thousand years ago could do the same. The only difference is that we live in a time where atheism and Luciferianism are safer to express openly These people believed in demons, believed in Hell, believed that if they didn’t take every possible measure to keep people from straying, something real and horrifying would happen. They weren’t cynically clutching their pearls for power alone they were doing what they thought was necessary to keep civilization from collapsing into chaos. the next thing out of these people's mouths will be the classic “Oh, but people back then were just ignorant and scared of everything! It was all superstition!” Yeah? You mean the same people who built cathedrals so intricate we still struggle to fully understand their construction methods? The same people who pioneered entire fields of philosophy, medicine, and mathematics? The same people who figured out celestial mechanics without computers? Shut. Up. People have always been intelligent, always been thoughtful, always been capable of deep belief, and the fact that modern nihilists want to sit on their high horse and act like they alone are enlightened enough to see through it all is just... pathetic. How did they build the pyramids with such precision that they align with celestial bodies? How did they transport multi-ton stones across vast distances without modern machinery? You can spout whatever “theories” you want, but the fact remains—we still don’t fully understand how they did it. The same goes for Göbekli Tepe, Stonehenge, and countless other megalithic structures. We still don’t fully grasp the engineering behind some of these. The flying buttresses, the acoustics, the way light plays through stained glass it wasn’t just art, it was calculated perfection. And guess what? The builders didn’t have fancy computers to run simulations; they used raw mathematical genius and sheer skill. Ancient civilizations mapped the stars with shocking accuracy, tracking celestial movements to a degree of precision that modern astronomers still admire. The Antikythera Mechanism, an ancient Greek analog computer, could predict astronomical positions and eclipses decades in advance. How? We barely even understand how it was made. Ever heard of Machu Picchu? The Inca built it so well that its stones fit together without mortar, resisting earthquakes for centuries. Meanwhile, modern buildings collapse in a decade if they’re not maintained. Who’s really the “more advanced” civilization here? The truth is, we haven’t surpassed these people we’ve just become different. They were masters of hands-on ingenuity, while we rely on pre-built systems and automation. They understood the rhythms of nature in ways we’ve completely lost. They built civilizations that lasted for thousands of years while we struggle to keep infrastructure from crumbling in a few decades.

But sure, let’s pretend they were just dumb and scared of everything. Let’s act like we’re so much smarter because we have Wikipedia and AI while being completely dependent on fragile supply chains, digital infrastructure, and outsourced knowledge.

Newsflash: If modern society collapsed tomorrow, the people who really understand the old ways he ones who can build, hunt, craft, and think outside the narrow confines of technology would be the ones who survive. And guess what? A lot of those people still hold beliefs that the modern world sneers at.

Because intelligence isn’t about how much technology you have access to it’s about how you use what’s available to you. And in that sense, the past was full of brilliant minds who built the world we now arrogantly look down on.

Show some damn respect.

It’s just another form of arrogance, another delusional savior complex except instead of wanting to “save” people for religion, they want to “save” people from it. And guess what? Nobody wants your help. Nobody needs you to come in and “fix” them by stripping away everything meaningful in their lives. Not now, not ever. You aren’t some enlightened intellectual handing out clarity like a missionary handing out bibles—you’re just another condescending, self-important coward who can’t handle the idea that people actually believe in something bigger than themselves. that people have always been capable of greatness

[donutwatches]

MHA 2.17 - Climax - part 2

This is a first watch of MHA, no spoilers please.

Imagine talking to sunshine boy Iida this way. Stain's philosophy has enough logic to be compelling, but his standards for heroes are impossibly high. No one is perfect and heroes should not be murdered for having human flaws.

Todoroki is out here spitting vocab AND truth. I do not even have to understand a word he just said to know he is laying out facts.

Ah yes, this is Shoto- You Have Been My Friend For 5 Minutes, And Now I Will Roast Villains To Their Face For You- Todoroki.

He is only a high school student. He is still learning! He is so harsh on himself. His brother was injured in a forever life-altering way and lashing out is normal. I got chills watching him stand back up to fight!

Ah yes, this is Tenya - You Have Been My Friend For 5 Minutes, And Now I Will Run In Front Of Flying Daggers For You - Iida.

This is so smart! I love it when this show comes up with such creative uses for quirks.

GET WRECKED! This had the best action of the show thus far. It got bouncing in my chair.

I have nothing to say about this screencap. It is just funny. Look at these three idiots. Look at them.

He got humbled by 3 high school kids. They iced him, literally. Being wrapped up in ice like that would hurt like hell. GOOD.

Click here for part 3

Click here for the masterlist

[chipen]

i been thinking... i been thinking thoughts.

atsuhiro is something of villain royalty - being the great great grandson of the peerless thief. with the rise of heroes through the generations however, by the time the sako family gave birth to atsuhiro himself - i think society had shifted enough that any allegiance towards the bandit king is more kept hush, hush. while the sako's still maintained oji's last philosophies - his parents likely thought it was a 'moot point' to attempt to steal from the heroes and dismantle hero society as aggressively when the world was so deeply entrenched. atsuhiro didn't tho!

while the whole family was gifted on the entertainment front - atsuhiro is probably the most gifted. exceptional with stage magic, escape artistry, gymnastics (aerial and otherwise), silks, even the trapeze and singing - atsuhiro lights up a stage whenever he steps on it. he knows it too.

stealing is... very easy for him. not only because of his quirk but frankly atsuhiro is smart. painfully so. he could pick pocket someone who is watching him do it, and still get away with it. THAT SAID -

atsuhiro's philosophies still follow oji's 'robin hood-esque' motifs - but with an edge of darkness. he doesn't have the same capability of stealing from the rich ( wealthy heroes, support companies, etc ) to give back to the poor. instead atsuhiro is more interested in stain's and shigaraki's belief system. he is EXTREMELY driven by the belief that the hero system is corrupt right to it's very core, and he has proven again and again and that he'll go down swinging just to make his point

that said though he definitely has stolen shit and used the money for either league supplies, or done his due diligence in charity gifting ( usually prisoner reform political parties, orphanages, pet shelters )

atsuhiro is no saint though. he has killed heroes and villains alike and tends to do so in rather brutal ( yet somehow painless ) manners with his quirk. it is very possible for atsuhiro to manipulate his quirk in such ways ( if given the proper openings ) that he can literally compress an organ into a marble. so that's fun.

he knows he's handsome. he knows he is the drama. he is the moment, and he's arrogant about it to boot. he has used his charm, his wit, his seduction, his romanticism, and his good looks to his advantage more times than he can probably count.

atsuhiro loves the league very, very much. they are his family - and he undoubtedly misses them everyday.

he thinks best jeanist's outfit is dumb as hell.

[dykegore]

𝙊𝙍𝘼𝙉𝙂𝙀 | 𝙇𝙤𝙫𝙚 𝙌𝙪𝙞𝙣 | 𝘍𝘌𝘔 𝘙𝘌𝘈𝘋𝘌𝘙

✧ warnings: brief mention of murder/blood, mention of pedo, fluffy as hell

✧ summary: Love, your girlfriend, discovers that your philosophy professor has been trying to make moves on you, and she fixes that problem for you. You come home to a night all about you.

You didn't hate college, but it most definitely was not your favorite aspect of life. You had a good social life, a decent circle of friends, and you were smart. The biggest downside of your college was definitely your philosophy professor. He was an attractive man, you had to say. He was wealthy, and loads of students wanted him, but to your demise, he, wanted you.

You could sense his motives quite easily. He would give you great grades on your assignments, even when you noticed you did something wrong. He'd call on you constantly, and would excuse you if you were late or even absent. You decided not to push it, but one day, you knew it would be different.

Love, on the other hand, was completely aware of this. She had listened to every single detail you had said about this man, and picked up anything slightly off you said. She remembered one day you told her how he put a hand on your thigh, and how another time he would rub your head ever so slightly during a conference with him. And she hated that, so, she had to put an end to it.

She got off of her work a bit earlier that day, to drive over to your college. She wore a basketball cap, and an oversized flannel. It was fall, after all, she had to dress the part. Love stationed herself in the bathroom, after easily getting into the campus. They should really work on their security.

She would walk into a stall, and would close it behind her, awaiting for the bell to ring. As she reached into her pocket to get her phone, her fingertips skimmed another object in her pocket. A pocketknife. Small, but effective, she thought.

Only about three minutes after the bell rang, Love stepped out into the bustling hallway. She'd look down, keeping her hat over her head, as she made her way to the philosophy classroom. She may or may not have been researching your campus just a night ago.

She got into the classroom, and there he was, your professor. He was sat behind his desk, probably grading. As Love quietly shut the door behind her, she got a whiff of a familiar scent. Your perfume. The notes of musk, sweetness, and some form of wood filled her senses, and her body would almost instantly loosen up at the scent.

"Oh, Hello Ma'am. Do you... need something?" The professor would say, looking up from his work, leaning into his chair. Love would purse her lips. She'd walk towards him, reach into her pocket, and before he could speak another word, his blood had stained the white papers on his desk, and her orange flannels sleeve.

You hung your coat on the little rack by the door of Love's house, which was basically yours at this rate as well. The moment you walked in, the scent of freshly cooked food, candles, and Love's scent took over your mind. She was cooking you your dinner. A smile uncontrollably covered your face. As you walked further into the house, you peaked into the kitchen, and saw Love hard at work in the kitchen, she has something cooking in a pot, which smelled delicious.

"I really don't deserve you, Lovely." You would say with an amused smile as you approached her, and embraced her in a hug from behind, resting your head on her shoulder, peaking over to see what she was making. Beef stew, your favorite thing to eat in the fall. Especially when she made it.

"Mmm..." She would hum in response, a small blush on her face. "Don't boost my ego anymore dear, that may be dangerous." She'd joke as she'd turn her head slightly to kiss your forehead. Her free hand that wasn't stirring would find itself on your waist, holding you close in a possessive nature. She wore an orange tank top, her scent causing your eyes to go half lidded.

"Go get cozy in bed sweetheart. Pick out a movie and i'll bring you your dinner. It's a room service kind of night, isn't it?" Your girlfriend would say with a little smile on her face, before she'd land a playful slap on your ass. "Before I have to ask you twice, despite how much you may like that. She'd tease.

You would jerk a little at the slap before an airy giggle would leave your lips. "As you wish," you would say. You'd wriggle out of Love's hold, and would excitedly walk upstairs. You'd instantly change into your favorite pajamas. It was a black silky two set, Love had a matching red one as well. You'd remove your makeup, and would let your hair down, before you would settle into Loves comforting, soft mattress. You could almost fall asleep just now.

Just a few minutes later, Love would walk upstairs, carefully holding a marble tray with two bowls on it, as well as some tissues and utensils. "For the princess," She'd say with a little wink as she settled the plate onto your lap. A blush adorned your face as you looked down, seeing how much work she put into this meal. Love would dim the lights, and would pick up a lighter, before walking around the room, putting on three different candles. The room now had a beautiful orange aura to it. Of course, the average lesbian household had 3+ candles in each room, as they should.

Once she was done with her pre-movie ritual, she would crawl into bed with you, seeing you were already enjoying your food. A proud smile would cover her face as she watched you eat as if you've never eaten before. She'd kiss your cheek before starting to eat her own bowl.

"So... was your day alright hun?" She'd ask as her free hand would snake around your waist, You had already finished, due to your fast pace. You leaned on Love's shoulder, and would be adorning her soft neck in kisses before you spoke, reluctantly pulling your lips away from her skin.

"Fine.." you would say, before recalling your meeting with your professor. He had his hand on your thigh under the table the whole time, and there was this hunger in his eyes. "I mean, Mr. Colben was weird as usual but... Nothing out of the ordinary." You'd say with a small chuckle.

Love would be listening to you speak, as her hand would rub your back lovingly. The words would send a shiver of anger down her back, before she'd chuckle ever so slightly.

"don't worry hun, I'm sure it won't happen again."

"how do you know?"

"I just do. So, Legally Blonde tonight?"

a/n: i know i didn't have many orange things here but like realistically speaking what the hell is orange?? Anyways enjoy murderous momma Quinn <33

[byjove]

I’m agnostic or perhaps an atheist but simultaneously Episcopal. My parents are both atheists but my maternal grandmother is a staunch baptist and my other side of the family is evangelical and Methodist. I grew up in the Bible Belt attending several different churches on different occasions. I didn’t grow up Episcopal but I was sent to an Episcopal boarding school.

It was a miserable experience but oddly enough, the only highlight was going to chapel once a week on Wednesdays. I hadn’t really understood the allure of religion of any sort before then. And then under stained glass window, with incense burning, drinking from a chalice full of wine, I realized the appeal. I felt fancy and very glamorous, yes, that was some of it. But praying in those antique pews was like meditation. A time I could get my thoughts together. I felt, I don’t know, wanted and whole in that church in a way I never had in any other church I’d been to growing up.

I was used to the way evangelical preachers went on soapboxes about sinners and hell, homosexuals and atheists worming their ways into our lives. Us vs. them. We’re good and they’re evil. I’d sit in the pew in my little uncomfortable church shoes and wonder when it would be over so that I could eat. Knowing in myself even then that I was transgender, I liked men and women, thinking was an atheist. I was an 11 year old sinner. It didn’t matter because I didn’t believe his words and I couldn’t believe anyone would willingly come here to listen to this man say this shit. I couldn’t understand how religion could be helpful to anyone if it was this.

When the episcopal priest approached the pulpit in her beautiful robes, she did not yell at us. She read to us from scripture and then dissected and discussed the meaning and interpretations of the words and parables and stories. It was almost like English class, literary analysis, which I’ve always liked. Her preaching wasn’t about her, wasn’t about anger at a perceived enemy, it was about interpreting God’s will, the morals and complex advice provided in scripture, how to apply it in our lives. I was amazed. It was like philosophy, like advice instead of scorn, like brightness instead of dark.

[yourtouchismidas]

I’m absolutely obsessed with all of the Gigi blurbs you’re spoiling us 😩 would you wanna write anymore about Matty and ruins girl? How even after all the shitty stuff, they’re still in love? I’ll take any fluff and or smut you wish to gift us 😍

I feel like the last blurb I posted was quite fluffy so let's go smutty because why the hell not. So.

CW: Smut

You're on tour. Matty is about to go on stage, ten minutes from now, and he is pacing, nervous. He's wearing a white scoop neck top and you can see the skin underneath it, ink of tattoos poking out, already starting to glisten with sweat. It's been a while, hard to touch each other, let alone anything else, when you're on a tour bus, and running around after a toddler. You're kneeling on the floor next to Gigi, while Ross is pretending to drink tea that Gigi has pretended to pour out a plastic cup, and wearing a princess crown, as well as his ear piece and his shirt for the show.

You're supposed to be watching your daughter, but you're watching him. Matty. You're watching the V of his chest while he moves, the curve of his arms under his t shirt, the twitch of his chiselled jaw as he runs something through his mind. His mind. You want to cut it open sometimes, see the inner parts of it, the glitter, the darkness, the words, the philosophies. You want him to speak honeyed dark words into your lips, you want him to sing about you and only you, desperate for you, crying out for you over the mic with gravel in his voice, you want his lips on your neck, his sweat on your chest... you want him, right now, this second. Your chest aches with it. Your skin burns.

"Ross can you watch Gigi for a few minutes," you say quickly, getting up before he even says yes. Which he does and you know he would. You walk over to the father of your child. Your man. Yours. He's got his back to you and he's mumbling and you stand close to him, just close enough that he can feel your warmth, your energy, the buzzing of you, and you can feel his.

"Can I talk to you for a second, Matty?" You say.

You snap him out of whatever thought he is thinking. He sees you. Properly for the first time in a while. Distracted. He looks at your lips which are pouted and stained red.

"Sure," he says, smiling. You turn on your heel and go into his dressing room. He follows.

"I'm about to go on, are you okay? Am I in trouble?" He says.

"Close the door," you say. He does. He's quiet. Looking at you. Eyes bright. Curls soft.

You look at him dead in the eyes, and say, sultry, "You are in trouble. Yes."

Matty breathes in hard, breath hitching. Swallows. He knows what's going on. What you want. What, with those few simple words, he now needs, more than anything, or he won't be able to continue, won't be able to perform, won't be able to think about anything else.

"Fuck," he breathes out.

You push him gently against the door, hand on his chest and stare up at him.

"Fuck," he says again, but it's a moan this time, and he leans his head back against the door, eyes closed. You can feel him getting hard already. And you've barely even touched him yet.

"You want it then?" you ask. He moves forward to touch you. To please himself. To take control.

"No no," you say, pushing him back again. "You want it then?"

He whimpers. Nods. Eyes still closed. He's already thrusting his hips, tiny movements, involuntary, trying to get some sort of relief from the desire you have already caused him. You hold him back, pressing a kiss on his neck, then another, then another. Chastely. You run one hand across his dick, rock hard now, hand barely there, just a whisper of a touch. His chest caves into itself as he feels it.

He doesn't try to move. He doesn't try to touch you. He knows you're in control. He knows he's at your mercy.

You lead him to the chair and push him down into it. He looks up at you, raptured, his chest heaving. You climb on top of him, straddle him, push his arms up and pin them down with your hands. You kiss him, hard, deep, bite his lip a bit which makes him shudder, then you start grinding on him, slowly, hips moving in circles and side to side. It feels amazing. You tip your own head back, hair cascading down your back, and you let him lift a hand to touch the thin ends of it with the tips of his fingers, while he watches you, and then pin his arm down again when he moves his hand to your side and slides up. Instead, you slide out the top half of your dress and keep grinding, watching his face as he gets more and more desperate, and as it feels better and better for you. You moan.

"Please," he whispers. You ignore him. Carry on. Until he raises his voice. Louder. Harsher. But with the whimper behind it.

"Please," he says again. So you undo his belt buckle, pull aside your underwear and slide him inside you. He cries out. You start riding him, and you let his hands go, and they do, desperately, all over your body, your waist line, your ass, your tits, he runs them all over you, watching you and you ride him, when the pleasure isn't too much that he has to close his eyes. You feel it too, the growing depth of it, the climbing of it, and you're close you're getting so close and you know you're about to...

"Baby," Matty stammers, "I'm sorry... I can't... I can't help it, I'm gonna..."

You thrust, same rhythm, because you're so close too and you just need to do this, to get there, to carry on, you can't stop, you need this, you need him.

"Hold on for me," you say. And he grabs the flesh on your hips with his hands, tightly, physically holding on while he tries to stop himself from going over the edge.

"I can't baby, I cant" he says, "I need to come," and then his whole body is shuddering, and he is groaning, deeply, loudly, and watching him pushes you there too. The feeling explodes through your body. Loud. Deep. Hard. You tighten around him. His fingers are pinching you at the waist and it tingles through you like the rest of what you're body is feeling and then you're both done. Panting. Sweaty. You collapse into his chest.

"Fuck," Matty breathes into the space behind your hair, then again into it, "Fuck."

"I just needed you so bad," you say.

"Mmm," Matty mumbles, an aftershock of shudder going through his chest.

When you watch him onstage later, he winks at you from the middle of it, from the pool of spotlight. Girls in the audience scream for him. They want him like you did. Do. But you had him and they can't. You have him. He's yours. And you can tell, by the way he looked at you while you were fucking, and the way he looks at you now, from the stage to the wings, helpless, that he knows it too. He's yours.

[ultragift]

FROM: @scribby-wibby TO: @melancholystorms It's a real shame that philosophy and artistry had fallen out of sphere during the latter years of the Final War. Had the world been more receptive, they wouldn't have missed the philosophies of a certain Dr. Julia Ritzer who proudly proclaimed that all problems could be solved with a ladder. Need to reach a high shelf? Ladder. Need to pass a test? Take a ladder to your professors house, break in, and find the answers. Nations warring over land? Ladder, obviously.

The quintessential dilemma of this very philosophy was taking place long after Dr. Ritzer’s death, where a drone swore at it's swordmachine who was currently struggling to scramble up a steep jut of rock in Greed. Fun fact: drones are capable of complete speech, serving as messenger pigeons during the 22nd century, but have an abhorrent temper, therefore only speak in censored swears.

Enter stage right, our morally inept protagonist on sabbatical. V1 watches the two bicker from the velvety shadows, draped gracefully over the desiccated terrain. Thick cuts of building stick out of the sand like broken teeth. Why two machines sought to scale a lone pillar in the middle of perpetual midnight was beyond V1’s reasoning. Perhaps Dr. Ritzer’s ideology was not precisely about ladders, but just upwards movement previously unseen; a bush-beaten way of reaching upwards instead of pushing forward; To build bridges into the heavens.

V1, who was attempting with little success, to build bridges between its brethren, approaches the pair with outstretched arms in what was supposed to be a peace offering. Of course, when one of your arms is a also a gun, this offering is swiftly misinterpreted.

The swordmachine wheels around with it’s blade unsheathed, upheaving the sand around it into a dusty whirlwind. V1 dodges to the left, narrowly avoiding a shot from the drone locked onto it from above.

V1 in turn unsheathes a small flag, which used to be white but was stained a burnt red from… well, an inability to abide by what the white flag symbolizes.

Fun fact: swordmachines are colorblind. There’s no reason for this. It’s a learned behavior from dogs, supposedly.

The three come to a screeching halt, all with their weapons still raised. V1 wiggles the flag again. The other two machines relax marginally.

Peering up at the lip of the pillar, V1 sticks out a thumbs up in their direction with it’s arms akimbo.

It takes an exaggerated step towards the pillar, hunches down, and leaps up. it’s feet scrape against the side briefly before it jumps again. On the third meeting of V1s feet with the pillar, it realizes this method may be ineffective. Less than halfway to the top, V1 skids down the pillar like nails across chalkboard. It hits the ground rear first with the grace of a beached whale.

Despite not having eyes, the swordmachine looks unimpressed. The drone beeps once, low and drawling.

V1 gets back onto its feet and extends it’s finger as if to say wait. It reaches behind and pulls a small device from it’s wings, making a series of clicks.

The incredulous looks shared between the drone and swordmachine is cut short by a sharp brilliance of light cutting through the dark sweep of desert.

“Machine, I thought I had told you not to call on me unless it was a matter of utmost importance.”

V1 cocks its head in confusion. Apparently losing a game of checkers counts as a matter of utmost importance to the former judge of Hell, but assisting its denizens doesn’t.

V1 circles its finger between itself and the two other machines before pointing to the top of the pillar.

Gabriel sighs petulantly: “I am not a chauffeur, Machine.” He lies.

Regardless of Gabriel’s anti-chauffeur attitude, he grips V1 and the swordmachine’s head like ski poles, with the drone nestled in the swordmachine’s hands, and transports them to the top of the pillar. The view is staggering. Concrete strewn across the sand like crumbs, various twisting architecture catching the moonlight to create a field of glistening needles.

More perplexing that the view, is the circular table with two chair tucked beneath in the center of the platform. The swordmachine pulls out both the chair and sits in one, while the drone awkwardly hovers over the other.

“What.” Gabriel speaks, his voice creeping along the edge of anger, “why would you need help getting up here again if you already moved a whole furniture set here before?”

The swordsmachine and drone look between V1 and Gabriel as if to shoo them away. V1 pats its companion’s arm in condolence as his wings begin quivering in disbelief.

It takes a large step off the pillar, leaving Gabriel no choice but to follow.

[theprayerfulword]

October 25

John 17:21 Jesus said, “As You, Father, are in Me and I am in You, may they also be in Us, so that the world may believe that You have sent Me.”

John 13:35 Jesus said, “This is how everyone will know that you are My disciples, when you love each other.”

Hebrews 10:25 Let us not give up meeting together, as some are in the habit of doing, but let us encourage one another — and all the more as you see the Day approaching.

1 John 1:7 But if we walk in the light, as He is in the light, we have fellowship with one another, and the blood of Jesus, His Son, purifies us from all sin

Romans 10:13 For whosoever shall call upon the name of the Lord shall be saved.

Galatians 4:6 And because ye are sons, God hath sent forth the Spirit of his Son into your hearts, crying, Abba, Father.

May you not be lax in doing the work the Lord gives you or in carrying out the assignments of the Spirit, for while others are designated to bring disaster and punishment upon the world, you are given the gospel to share so that the lost sheep may be found and the harvest gathered in before the storm strikes. Jeremiah 48

May you seek for and strive after a repentance and reformation on a national level so that God's judgment may be avoided, but be certain that you maintain a personal repentance and revival so that you may be prepared for it as you walk in a respectful awe and humble obedience towards the Lord. Jeremiah 48

Though nations strive with each other and men of might exert their authority over others, may you always respect the rights of the poor and stand up for the cause of the destitute, protecting the widow and nurturing the orphan, for God Himself will see that His righteous judgments are accomplished in the earth and will call all men to account for their actions. Jeremiah 49

May you preach the Word; be prepared in season and out of season to correct, rebuke and encourage – with great patience and careful instruction, though they will not put up with sound doctrine. 2 Timothy 4

May you keep your head in all situations, endure hardship, and do the work you are given, discharging all the duties of your ministry. 2 Timothy 4

May the Lord stand at your side, giving you strength to fully proclaim His message, and deliver you from the lion's mouth, rescuing you from every evil attack. 2 Timothy 4

Know the truth, My child, and it shall set you free. The undeniable truth is that you were born into an inheritance of the flesh and of sin that you cannot escape through your own efforts or will-power, any more than a leopard can change his spots to a tiger's stripes. Man's greatest efforts to create a paradise on earth are doomed from the beginning because the seed of selfishness and sin are always present in his works. Man's highest philosophy can never carry him beyond the effects of his baser nature for there is no way to separate his actions from his intentions; his heart is drawn continually toward evil and spirals ever toward death. The eternal truth is that I have overcome the world, defeating death, hell, and the grave, and overturning the kingdom of the evil one. I have the keys to your shackles, and I have opened the door to your prison cell. I am the Truth, the Way, and the Life, and no one comes to the Father but by Me. I formed all of creation, and after it fell, staining with sin that which I had pronounced good, I followed the path by which I was able to redeem it. I, who am holy, became the offering for sin; through Me, by your faith in Me, as shown by your obedience to Me, you are born anew to life instead of death, to righteousness instead of sin, to pleasing the Father instead of enmity to God, to good works which have been foreordained instead of works of the flesh which have their part in the lake of fire. Know the truth, the whole truth, and nothing but the truth, that you may be free from the lies and half-truths designed to steal, kill, and destroy that which the Father has declared clean, accepted in the Beloved, and holy. Walk in the light as I am in the light, and know the fellowship of the Father, the Son, and the Holy Spirit, in the company of the Body of Christ.

May you sing for joy to the Lord and shout aloud to the Rock of your salvation, coming before Him with thanksgiving and extolling Him with music and song, for the Lord is the great God, the great King above all gods. Psalm 95

May you bow down in worship and kneel before the Lord your Maker, for He is your God and you are in His flock. Psalm 95

May you sing to the Lord with all the earth a new song which praises His name and proclaims His salvation day after day, declaring His glory among the nations and His marvelous deeds among all peoples, for the Lord is great and most worthy of praise. Psalm 96

May you fear the Lord above all gods, for they are but idols of the nations but the Lord made the heavens; splendor and majesty are before Him and strength and glory are in His sanctuary. Psalm 96

May you ascribe to the Lord glory and strength which is due to His name, bringing an offering as you come into His courts to worship the Lord in the splendor of His holiness as the whole earth trembles before Him Psalm 96

May you say among the nations that the Lord reigns, for He will judge the peoples with equity when He comes, He will judge the world in righteousness and the peoples in His truth as all of His creation rejoices – the earth will be glad, the sea will resound, the fields will be jubilant and all the trees will sing for joy at His appearing. Psalm 96

[dramatisperscnae]

Headcanon - Bruce Wayne

The Code

Batman’s no-kill code is well known – and occasionally scoffed at – among the cape-and-cowl brigade. It is an ideal he strives to live by, and one he encourages – and usually expects – others to hold to, particularly those he trained and those he actively works with. He holds to this code for several reasons, among them being:

he does occasionally require the assistance of the GCPD, and if he – as a vigilante and thus technically a criminal himself – actively kills in the line of duty he will lose any and all goodwill he has earned from them

he does not want to stoop to the methods of his enemies. There is, on occasion, only a very fine line that separates the Bat from those he fights; not killing is a part of that.

Most, if not all, of the martial disciplines he has studied and mastered often come with cultural philosophies regarding the sanctity of life. To betray those philosophies would be to stain the legacies his masters left him.

If his hands become stained with blood, what makes him any better than the man who gunned down his parents in that alley?

That said, there is a well-known book in which is written ‘let he who is without sin cast the first stone’. For Bruce to demand no killing, ever, for any reason, would be the height of hypocrisy; he has taken life in the past, though seldom willingly and always in self-defense. [for canonical evidence of this, see this post by The Real Batman Chronology Project] He is well aware of this, and aware that there are times when his code may well cause more harm than it avoids; after all, Bruce himself will freely admit – and has admitted –that the world would indeed be a better place if the Joker was dead.

Killing is, and always will be, a hard line for Bruce. He knows how easy it would be for him to become a killer, how simple. How all it would take for him to become the villains he fights is to allow himself to pull the proverbial trigger on the basis of helping, of trying to do good and removing major threats like the Joker or other shown-to-be-irredeemable villains from the world for good. The road to hell, as they say, is paved with good intentions.

Nowhere has he seen this most clearly than in the fall of Hal Jordan in the wake of Coast City’s destruction. Watching a man Bruce had come to respect and trust – and even, though he might never admit it, to see as a better man than him – become something like Parallax, willing to tear the entire universe apart in the name of trying to fix things, was a sobering experience, and pushed Bruce to hold even tighter to his code and demand others do the same.

Even so, as idealistic as Bruce can be at times, he is nothing if not a realist. In his line of work, in the kind of battles he fights, there will be death. It’s unavoidable; no matter what he does people will die, and if it comes down to the choice between his life and his opponent’s Bruce will choose himself. He has to; it’s pure instinct. He can, will, and does try to avoid that choice as much as possible, tries to mitigate the damage and prevent death with all the skill and power he has, but, well.

Sometimes even the Batman can’t avoid lethal force in self defense.

It will always – always – be a last resort, when literally all other options have been exhausted, and it will never – ever – be in cold blood. It may simply be – and often is – a mere chance of fate, the luck of being the one on top when two men fall off a roof in mid-grapple.

Because of this, he will allow certain compromises, if one can call them that: those who work with him, while actively working with him, are expected to maintain and uphold his no-kill code; likewise, any hero or vigilante who wants to work in Gotham City is also expected to do so. Outside of his city, and when not actively on a team-up? He’ll expect them to try, but will be less exacting about the degree of success. In either case, a death during a mission is not necessarily a deal-breaker; self defense is a thing, and while Bruce holds himself to extremely strict standards he can be surprisingly lenient with others even on hard-line matters such as this...so long as the killing was not done with active intent or malice aforethought.

Straight-up murder someone, though, and you best pray he never finds out. No matter who they are.

[sarkos]

To this day, these churches still draw from the spiritual legacies of Christian missions and receive funding from off-reservation congregations under that definition. Global Ministries of the United Methodist church spent over $11m in 2022 for missionary services. Wels spent $661,018 just for the Apache missions and over $23.5m for all missions, as laid out in its most recent report, from 2023. Wels first came to Arizona in 1892, five years after the Dawes Act. When it was clear that exterminating the Apache people would not be possible, the federal government engaged Christian denominations working with the military to force the assimilation of the Indigenous people. RH Pratt, the superintendent of the first “industrial” boarding school under this policy, coined the term that embodied the philosophy behind these institutions: “Kill the Indian in him, and save the man.” pews and stained glass Federal boarding school policy allowed the military to forcibly remove Apache children from their families and send them to industrial schools in an attempt to militarize and alter their identities. They were forbidden to practice their religion or speak their language, and reports of physical and sexual abuse were common. Many children never returned home. If an Indigenous child was found outside during school hours, Indigenous police were appointed to snatch the child and deliver them to a school under the US military’s jurisdiction. If a parent sought to hide their child, they could be imprisoned or cut off from food and other necessary daily supplies. Apache children were kidnapped and taken as far as Pennsylvania, where they were forced to fully assimilate into Anglo-Christian society. Their clothes were burned, their language forgotten. Many children died of disease, neglect or abuse. And while the number of deaths is not yet known, it is believed that Apache children comprise a quarter of the graves at Carlisle Indian Industrial school. To think that 1800s attitudes towards Apache children have changed would be a mistake. Outside of the Wels mission, volunteers of other denominations drive around in colorful buses and still pick children up throughout the reservation, whether on the side of the road or other public areas. They take them to play games and learn about their version of Jesus and then drop the kids off again where they found them hours before. Parents are not always told or asked permission.

They took part in Apache ceremonies. Their schools expelled them for satanic activities | Native Americans | The Guardian

Great-Grandad survived Carlisle. In his words, “It was a hell of a way to meet Jim Thorpe“

All of this is why my reaction to someone telling me they’re Christian is the same as “Would you like to hold this blue-ringed octopus?”

[hidingoutbackstage]

Uhh I’m in a creative block so I can’t give you a specific prompt per se, but something Chamberfield 👀 for love and yuri?

Hell yeah peace love and yuri (putting beneath a cut so as not to clog anyone’s dash but yuri should NEVER be hidden <3 so pls read)

Claire was a special kind of homesick. The kind where she was sitting here, in her two bedroom apartment, at the table eating cereal she’d gotten from the grocery store down the street, while wearing cozy pajamas. In all perspectives, she couldn’t be more home. And yet here she was, missing home desperately, because home wasn’t the two wooden chairs where one slightly rocks and the other creaks when sat on, home wasn’t the couch from a a garage sale with a few cigarette burns and various stains, home wasn’t the nightlight in her bedroom that she’d had since she was a child to keep her from waking up terrified and screaming in the dark.

Home was a person, a person who was currently halfway around the world, a person who Claire could feel as she wore said person’s cozy sweatshirt, as she gazed happily at a framed photo of the two of them on the windowsill, as her sloppy handwritten grocery list hung from the fridge with a heart shaped magnet. Despite the lingering feeling of her presence, Rebecca, Claire’s home, was not here, and Claire was getting sick with yearning.

Claire sighed, finally picking up her phone. She told herself she wouldn’t do this today, but to hell with it. She was missing her girlfriend more and more by the day, and she was growing sick of wanting. She flipped open her phone and went into her contacts. To hell with international cell phone charges too.

Of course Becky picked up, because it was Claire who was calling her. Claire half-expected her significant other to lecture her first about being unable to go a day without talking to her, but that never came. She simply answered the phone with a smile apparent in her voice. She called Claire “darling” as she always did, in that sing-song way she was so fond of that made Claire’s heart melt a little bit.

Bashfully, as if they were teenagers, Claire admitted to Becky why she had called. It was probably a given to both women, but Becky “awww”ed like it was the first time she’d heard Claire say the words “I miss you.”

They made idle chit chat. How was Philosophy University? It was good. How was work at home? It was boring. Have you heard from Chris lately? No, have you? No. Watch anything good recently? Not really, you? Not really. Tried out a new recipe for eggs. Oh how was it? I think I added too much oregano. Oh well, maybe next time. Maybe I’ll make it for you. Sounds perfect.

“I really miss you,” Claire blurted out. She dropped her spoon in her mostly-empty bowl of cereal, making a satisfying clang as it fell.

“I really miss you too,” Rebecca said automatically. “I wish I didn’t have to be out here so long, but-”

“Becky, you don’t have to explain anything. It’s work, I get it,” Claire said with a huff. “I just wish work didn’t separate you from me for so long.”

“Well, that’s what these phone calls are for, isn’t it?” She was trying to be gentle, Claire could tell.

“I know, I know,” Claire groaned. “Gd, I’m so clingy. I don’t know how you aren’t sick of me.”

Rebecca just laughed. “Darling, you know I could never get sick of you.” She made a little kiss noise through the phone. “I love you too much.”

They’d been saying those words for years, but sometimes they’d catch Claire off guard and fill her with youthful giddiness. “Yeah, I know.”

“You should distract yourself more when I’m not there.” Ah, Becky. Always a problem-solver. “Go out and do stuff with your other friends.”

Claire snorted. “What other friends? The ones that are as busy as we are?”

“Work friends, then.”

“Is this your polite way of telling me to fuck off and stop calling you, my dear?” Claire teased. Rebecca scoffed.

“I’m trying to help my lovely wife come up with some things to do in her spare time,” Rebecca said monotonously, clearly not even realizing her verbal blunder. Claire did, though, and straightened up to attention.

“Wife?” she blurted out. Rebecca was silent for a minute. “Hun?”

“…Listen,” Rebecca started, and Claire just burst out laughing.

“Oh, hun, you can’t just call me that and expect me to stop missing you!”

“I think of you like that sometimes, okay? We live together, we’ve been dating for a while, I…some of my students have asked if I have a boyfriend, and…”

“Becky, you are so cute,” Claire teased. “It’s fine. That was adorable.”

Rebecca sighed. “Can I hang up now or will you hate me forever? I’m supposed to be meeting with the university director in a few.”

Claire snickered. “Go on, my wife, go do your school things. I’ll just be here thinking about it for the rest of the day.”

Rebecca sputtered, and Claire could picture the woman’s cute blushing face. “I love you. Bye.”

“Bye, my wife!” Claire called giddily as she hung up.

The sharp pang of homesickness in Claire’s heart had faded, replaced by the soft, warm embrace of love.

[narcoticwriter]

what are your thoughts on garou? 👀 (now that i think about it, he definitely seems like the type character you’d be drawn to)

My thoughts on Garou can be summarized as such:

He's serving more than most of Saitama's supporting cast in terms of character development (watching him interact with people outside of his goal, reading his fights, and looking at other's development)

He's not as heartless as others will lead you to believe (will not let a kid die for no reason, and will go as far as to protect what he perceives to be 'innocence')

He's based principled as hell and he sticks to it (doesn't go after people for no reason or 'killing for the sake of killing', akin to MHA's Killer Hero Stain)

One of his philosophies is that one should help themselves instead of relying on others to pick them up (I read the manga)

Whenever he falls, he gets back up (I read the manga extensively and holding out hope for Hellish Blizzard seems to be masochistic at this point)

He not only rejects heroes in society, but monsters as well, to the point that he's slowly becoming something more dangerous than all of them (a villain, perhaps?)

He is out here by himself by choice.

I could go on, but I can't go on an absolute craze at the moment. On a related note, I also really enjoy Genos and Sonic. Maybe Suriyu gets a crumb. Also, Munen Rider is the best boy. King and Saitama's friendship is quite nice, too.

If you know about the Zombieman and Child Emperor dynamic, do we agree that it's the best thing ever?