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team-council-two · 1 year

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Are there uhmm honorifics in russian? Like sir or ma'am or Herr? I'd like to know some family related ones, some business toned ones, and like, friendly ones between friendly friends.

Thank you for your time, kind admins

I love this question so much! This is gonna be long, oh my god. I'll start with some general information and then give some specific examples.

"Ты" and "вы"

So, unlike English, Russian allows two ways of addressing people instead of one.

"Ты"/"ty", which I'm going to spell as "T" to save time, is a casual "you", suitable for talking to a friend or colleague, to a family member, to a child, or to a stranger that you are reasonably sure is considerably younger than you.

"Вы"/"vy", which I'm going to spell "V", again to save time, is a polite "you", suitable for addressing a stranger, a person in a position of power such as a teacher, or a higher-ranking colleague, or someone presumably older than you.

This distinction is quite important.

Using T where V is required will make you sound disrespectful. People can actually get offended, especially older people who can very reasonably demand that you "don't T" them.

On the other hand, using V where T would be more suitable can create a very uncomfortable situation. The person might feel distanced, or worse - think you're mocking them, using a polite manner ironically.

Why does this matter?

Because using T or V defines the entire, uh, manner of your communication! Some words won't apply to people you're on V-terms with, and others won't apply to those you use T with!

Basically, I'm going to try and separate various honorifics and forms of address into these two categories and then try to fit various TF2 characters into these categories as well, based on what kind of manner I think Heavy would use with them.

It's also worth noting that using a certain manner with someone doesn't always mean they're gonna be using the same manner for you. For instance, a teenage student would always use V with a teacher, but a teacher would almost always use T.

So what does Heavy use?

Well, we know from the Russian dub of the game that he uses T with Medic.

He also uses V with the Engineer. I find it fascinating because they're about the same age and exactly the same rank - they're both mercenaries on equal rights - which means Heavy uses V out of pure respect and admiration.

He would definitely use V with the Administrator.

And with Miss Pauling too, even though she's younger than him. She's his boss, after all.

He would definitely use T with Scout.

With all the others it could go either way. He would definitely use V when they first met, but would eventually switch to T, as it often happens.

Oh, btw it pretty much never happens the other way. Using T is considered something of a "next step".

If you headcanon Pyro as nonbinary, Heavy might use V to avoid gendered language, but I won't go into details here.

Why is that important? He doesn't speak Russian to them.

Well, no, but he thinks in Russian! And he would think in T/V terms, too. And that would define the language he would use with them.

I promise the specific examples are coming, bear with me.

Let's talk about names.

"But I know all about names" no you don't.

Okay, as it functions in English, a person has a First Name, a Middle Name (or several), and a Last Name, which is their family name - "Tavish Finnegan DeGroot". Or, well, you could go about this even simpler and skip the middle name - "Dell Conagher".

In Russian middle names traditionally do not exist. I say "traditionally" because who knows what the young folks are up to these days, but by the proper naming conventions that would definitely be really important at the time Heavy was born, there are no middle names in the Russian language.

Instead, we have a patronymic. Well, a lot of them. A patronymic is your father's name with a proper ending attached to it. Think last names such as "Johnson" and "Stevenson" - yup, those were patronymics some hundred years ago.

How does that relate to honorifics?

There are a lot of ways to combine a First Name (F), a Last Name (L), and a Patronymic (P)!

L-F-P is the proper official model. It's not really used outside really formal business or legal procedures, such as getting married or getting sued. Or. Well. One of those two things, really.

F-P is the usual polite structure. If a Russian stranger wanted to be polite with Heavy, they would say "Михаил Whatever-you-headcanon-his-dad's-name-to-be-ович". If someone wanted to talk to Zhanna in that same manner, they'd have to say "Жанна Her-father's-name-овна". It's a very Gimli-son-of-Gloin kind of structure.

Some parents also use it mockingly to lightly scold their kids. "Яна Father-овна, what do you think you're doing?"

I just realized you probably need me to translit all that. Oh god, uh.

Mihail Whatever-you-headcanon-his-dad's-name-to-be-ovich.

Zhanna Her-father's-name-ovna.

I'm gonna type in Latin letters from now on. And I promise specific examples are coming!

Calling someone by just their patronymic is considered friendly and very, uh, familiar. Casual-like. Somewhat rude, even. You have to really make sure you're allowed to do that before you make an attempt.

A name typically has a full and a short form, much like in English. James - Jim, Mihail - Misha. Except in Russian, there's an even shorter short version, used only when addressing the person directly. It's used all the time, you should make sure to use that in writing, otherwise it sounds really unnatural.

Okay, great, can we get some SPECIFIC WORDS now?

Yeah!

Let's start with the ones you already know.

Well, it's the Soviet Union. How about "comrade"?

That one's fine, if overdone. It was really in use back then.

Except it doesn't really mean a comrade, as in "friend" of some sort. It's typically all very official, followed by a last name or a rank.

Yeah, a rank. Like a military rank. Soldier would be "Comrade Sargeant" - "товарищ сержант".

"Comrade Medic" would be a thing, too, as long as they're not too well-acquainted.

Pretty much any "Comrade Class" would work, except "Comrade Scout", because we're using T for him, remember? It doesn't go with a T! I told you it was important, ha.

Beware though, nobody says "comrade" these days. Ever. Not a thing.

So it's not like "sir" or "ma'am"?

Ah, no. Afraid not.

The closest to "sir"/"ma'am" I can think of is гражданин/гражданка, which is - don't laugh! - "citizen".

It's almost always followed by a last name, but never by a rank or title, so it wouldn't really work with the mercs. It's only for civilian context, you see?

We also don't pepper it into our regular speech. Where you'd say "yes, sir", we'd just say "yes".

I'm actually having trouble with this at work. I'm so very much not used to saying "sir" and "ma'am". It's not that I'm being disrespectful, but I constantly forget to say it! Argh.

Oh, "citizen" is also not in use anymore. Unless it's some police procedural on TV.

How do you address someone you don't know, then? What if you need to get someone's attention and you don't know their name and patronymic?

Well, just "мужчина"/"man" and "женщина"/"woman" is fine, really.

"Девушка"/"girl" and "девочка"/"girl (child)" if she's young.

"Молодой человек"/"young man" and "мальчик"/"boy" if he's young.

They're fine. They're only rude in English. We say them all the time. "Woman, you dropped something!", "Man, could you hold the door, please?", "Boy, where's your mom?". It's fine. It's polite, I promise.

What about family?

Ah, that depends on the family.

Here's a funny example from my own family. I have a grandma on my father's side. Well, my mother - her daughter-in-law - calls her "mom", but addresses her with a V, as a way of being respectful. I, on the other hand, although way younger, use T with her because she's my grandma and she doesn't mind at all and that's how she taught me to talk to her.

So it all depends on the kind of dynamic you have. The level of respect, the traditionalism of it, how old your folks are and how much they go outside.

Bear in mind you can absolutely cuss a bitch out while still using V.

And friends?

"Bro" migrated into Russian some years ago. We have the whole "брат-братан-братишка" (brother-brother (informal)-brother (small) shtick but it's a little, uh, complicated. It gets mocked a lot. There's a bit of a subculture around the people who say it.

Really, we just call people by their names. I'd love to see more of that in fics. Heavy wouldn't go "sis" @ Zhanna, but he would say "Zhann", as a shorter and more casual form of address. She'd call him "Mish". We love to see it. They're besties.

That's still not very specific though.

Ah, well, here's a few odd examples.

"Мужик"/"muzhik" is something Heavy would say. It means "man", but, like, in a casual and friendly manner. I say that to my friends who are men. He would say that to everyone but ONLY once he's on T-terms with them. I told you it was important. He wouldn't say it to Scout though. Maybe in a moment of transgender affirmation. Once. But never again.

"Чувак" is "dude" but it fucking sucks to say, idk, 0/10, would not say that. Adults never say it tbh. Kids these days don't say it either.

"Madam" (from French) was popular way back in the day. "Madmuazel" aka a bastardization of "Mademoiselle" is also out there but more sarcastic. Both used with V.

"Чел"/"chel", short for "chelovek" ("human") - another version of "man", basically. With T.

"Парень", "приятель" - guy, pal, pally, dude, fella. Can be genuine or sarcastic. Both male and used with T.

"Тётя" or "тёть" - kinda like ma'am but disrespectful. Literally means "aunt", figuratively - any woman who's any amount of years older than you and a bit of unpleasantness to have around. Not to confuse with "тётя [name]" which is literally "aunt [name]", in an affectionate way and not necessarily towards family.

"Дядя" or "дядь" - a male version of that. Also on both cases the second version is less respectful.

"Начальник" - "boss". Goes with T better than with V, ironically.

"Народ" - "people". Can be either really epic or really casual. A way to address multiple people.

"Братва" - "brotherhood" (derogatory). Sounds like. Uh, it's hard to explain. You guys remember Shark Tale? When, in Russian it's called Underwater Brotherhood, with that specific word for brotherhood. It has that kind of energy.

That's about it! There's a good Wiki page about these things, I recommend skimming through it, though some terms are a bit underexplained there in my opinion. Thanks for asking, and sorry if this post reads a bit haphazard. I'm rusty.

#heavy language post #the council has spoken #tf2 #tf2 heavy #oh this was so much fun!! really enjoyed this ask!!!

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wolfclaire · 7 months

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Ohh, alright. Tbh I always just viewed Celestials people blessed with divine powers (and knowledge on how to alter code in some cases) who just wander around the Multiverse for fun, not necessarily malicious or heroic. People who are technically God or Saints or some other higher being but didn't choose to deal with the responsibility of being one

Though, even though you're not gonna necessarily include Celestials, I do hope that you sometimes made HC9 Gem a bit eerie and offputingly knowing sometimes as a little treat in the few scenes she's gonna be in

People "blessed" by Gods/Deity I like to call "Champions". They have their powers boosted up, they are forced to follow followers of their religion. I always think of fanon Technoblade when talking about Champions or people being blessed by a God/Deity - he was chosen by Blood God, he has voices in his head against his will that scream for blood......... Also, Technoblade never dies.

I would say Saints are a little bit less powerful than a "God" (not Saint Pearl, she just likes "Saint" as her name than a "Goddess"). Normal saints were chosen by their Gods/Deities, or were remembered by their people for the good they did, and are above Champions in the power-sense.

So, just to recap, from the most powerful to the least powerful (not counting Admins cause at the end of the day, all admins are mortal; and not counting how good they are at coding, its just different from being to being) its: God/Deity; Saints; Angels; Champions

#alone together #alone together ask #anon ask #lore

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eldritch-spouse · 2 years

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I would love to know what Krulu and Admin’s first time together was like! Did their relationship start sexual, or was it something more business-like or simply a higher and their worshipper? Somewhere in between?

TW: Dubious consent in one instance.

It was actually extremely chaotic, believe it or not.

It happens quite early on, I'd say about one or two weeks into Krulu taking you as a host.

I've described somewhere before that these first months or so where he's out of the pocket void prison are spent in an uneasy, extremely dangerous tension. Krulu is still half-feral at this point, he's getting used to stimulus he was deprived of for ages. He's finally hearing things properly, seeing colors again, feeling touch, experiencing emotions other than pain, numbness and the never-ending hunger that ate him alive.

He's rebuilding his entire, heavily damaged mental state. This means the higher is extremely emotional, vulnerable and overwhelmed all the time.

One such thing that he's finally experiencing after who knows how long is a sliver of happiness, comfort, well-being. And in his muddled brain, you are the entire source of it. You're the lesser that's cooperating with him, the being whose body can handle him safely, the one that ate for the two of you when he was too weak to do anything, the one who's speaking to him, trying to make sense of his jumbled ranting and ground him when hysteria starts clawing at both your nerve endings. You're his one saving grace right now- And Krulu is so out of his mind, that he figures the only way to reward you in a manner you can comprehend is to give you orgasms.

It starts as a very odd petting session where you're cradled like a doll, but his many hands quickly start plucking everywhere and you're brought to orgasm after mind-melting orgasm while the deranged god waxes poetic about finally finding a good lesser and being free, how he forgot the taste of air and the warmth of others, and pleasure- Oh how he misses the most trivial of carnal stimulus, he's always so hungry for everything and you always feed him so well. You're a good lesser, you're doing very well, he might keep you, make more noises, scream scream scream more for him-

It's safe to say this is a very frantic, impromptu encounter, you definitely pass out at some point as he uses your body to milk every ounce of pleasure he was unable to have in the void. While definitely traumatic regardless of your feelings towards Krulu at that point, it's something he'll later on mend (in his own superiority complex-based manner, without verbally apologizing because that's a "no no" for Siadar).

From then on, there's a period of time where sex acts are clearly announced, and well, you did eventually agree to the terms of being his host, so you knew that this type or worship would come along at some point. Krulu attempts to keep it an almost detached affair, but his own lesser kink comes back to bite him in the ass and he ends up being very talkative/enthusiastic the more he gets to engage in this. Especially whenever he realizes you're also deeply aroused at being wanted by a god.

It steadily becomes a more "normal" sexual relationship from then on, involving the typical flirting and foreplay you'd expect out of two people in a relationship, but always marked by the consensual power imbalance that defines and influences a heavy portion of your dynamic with Krulu.

Once he's one hundred percent comfortable and trusting of his vessel, he starts expanding both your sex lives towards more experimental situations, such as sleeping with members of the staff team here and there.

#Krulu oc

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crystalelemental · 2 years

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Unit Teambuilding - Courtney

I am still not over the fact they added a Zone to the general pool. Like, thank god for that, but also what an unexpected twist for just before anniversary. And Ground Zone! We now have reasonable precedent for Rock and Ice Zones! God, I can’t wait. Maybe one of the last two will be an Ice Zone Glacia alt? No?

General Overview Okay look. I’m no fun. I don’t really care much about Courtney. She’s a cute design but I can’t remember anything about her? I feel like calls for the admins were always more a matter of “They should get in when they can with their boss,” rather than any real desire for them, but Courtney being the exception feels entirely like a design thing.

And yet, here she is, with a single tool that makes her borderline mandatory: Ground Zone. In the general pool! This is insane on its own, but I think it’s...pretty justifiable when you look at the Ground-types available on an F2P budget. Clay and Hapu. That is...sad. Everyone else is limited availability, so I guess it’s an act of mercy that their Zone setter isn’t also limited. To be frank, Zone alone is enough to make Courtney viable, but she has some really nice tools that complement the Ground types currently in the meta. Usually, we have to talk about whether the Zone setter does anything else to support their chosen typing, with abilities ranging from Cynthia’s “Technically yeah” to P!Marnie’s “Oh god it’s unreal how much she can help with” to Teatime Ingo’s “this is largely a disaster.” Courtney got Defense Crush on Bulldoze, an AoE move, and every single Ground-type is physical. Done deal, wrap it up. Yes, Courtney is an unreasonably good partner to the Ground types in the meta.

Conceptually. While she offers a lot of nice tools, like the defense debuffs and Team Wise/Sentry Entry at 3/5, there’s the major issue of Defense Crush being only rank 2 prior to mega evolution. This means it is supremely inconsistent as a supportive tool, and if you want consistency, she has to take first sync. Not every Ground type wants that. Yet if you don’t get her consistency, you run the risk of her being just a Zone bot, and contributing next to nothing. Speed debuffs are, broadly speaking, worthless. The enemy effectively never moves so slowly that they can’t queue up their next move right away. On very rare occasions, when they’re aiming for a 3-4 bar move, it might slow them down. Might. But speed-based debuffs exist almost entirely for multipliers, and while this is a cute method to improve Cakewalk, none of the Ground-types she should be paired with have it. In fact, she herself doesn’t even have it. As a result, Bulldoze is weaker damage with a nigh-meaningless debuff attached, and an inconsistent chance to activate the good skill. Worse, it’s three gauge. Consider that your Ground-type strikers tend to be slow, and pack their own three or four gauge moves, and you have a recipe for gauge issues that absolutely need to be alleviated.

Team 1: Courtney, Ingo, Cynthia This is one of those “Finally, I have them all” moments for Cynthia. Sandstorm support that buffs offenses and speed, and now Ground Zone. Cynthia’s finally come together into the biggest cluster of a sync demand you’ve seen. Courtney wants first sync for guaranteed defense crush, but Cynthia also kinda wants it for the higher power on Mega Garchomp, but what about Ingo getting it for double damage buffs? It’s a whole disaster out here. In general, you’d probably want Ingo first if he’s EX, as the double EX buff is more valuable regardless of anything else. Lacking that, a single defense point drop is not sufficient to override Mega Garchomp’s raw offensive presence, so Cynthia should sync first. Meaning that Courtney, in this scenario, is pretty much never going to sync.

With that knowledge, I’m going to start my big push: Courtney works best with Defense Crush as a lucky skill. Courtney will rarely, if ever in some cases, take first sync. Defense drops are nice, but they’re not as good as an EX support sync buff, or the transformations of other Ground-types. But you still want those defense drops, otherwise what’s Courtney really doing aside from applying a field effect? Defense Crush as a lucky skill is the best way to gain more consistency in her primary role, and can even get really lucky and debuff defense by 2 in one action. This is probably the best application of Courtney as a supportive partner to other Ground-type strikers, and it’s exactly what I’ll be going for myself.

Team 2: Courtney, Maxie, SS Morty/Marley Supporting her boss, Courtney takes Maxie’s ground-type damage to ridiculous extremes. Sun and Ground Zone support is already insane enough, but thanks to SS Morty, we have a backup Sun setter that gives them good gauge control, and alleviates energy on Maxie’s grid by handling crit rate for them. This does kinda completely forego Courtney’s attack, but in favor of...she easily takes first sync to get that guaranteed Defense Crush 9. With that, Maxie just goes nuts.

As another option, Marley can save a ton of energy on Maxie’s grid, but removing the need for Critical Eye on Dire Hit+. And since he’s not going to be using sync so Courtney is more consistent, this means putting all his points directly into offense. Marley, as it turns out, is also one of Courtney’s best friends. Team Sharp Entry means Courtney doesn’t need MPR on her trainer move to cap crit, and the rapid speed buffs mean she’s far less worried about spamming Bulldoze for debuffs.

Team 3: Courtney, Marley, SS Serena Let’s say you prefer SS Serena as your Master Fair Ground type. Marley. Again. Marley caps speed, has Team Sharp Entry to save Serena a turn and let her apply Restrain pre-sync, and can block status for potential gimmick checks. Serena always takes first sync (so again, Defense Crush 2 is a good Courtney cookie skill for those extra chances), and will plow through the stage easily with Ground Zone up.

Team 4: Courtney, Skyla/Sonia, Giovanni I was debating how to optimize this one. Giovanni and Courtney are both slow and gauge hungry, so you need the speed buffs. Skyla specifically benefits Courtney’s sync multipliers, but otherwise leaves her reliant on attack and crit bonuses from her own trainer move. Sonia handles Courtney better, but isn’t as optimal with Giovanni because of how slow the needed speed buffs are. Basically, it’s not as clean as you’d hope. Courtney can support SS Giovannit, but it’s probably her worst pick.

Team 5: Courtney, Sonia, Clay You know what, forget that noise! It’s time for us to focus on Courtney as her own person, not the backup to someone else’s success! Courtney has a really good sync nuke, and the repeated defense drops means even Bulldoze can potentially deal damage. Sonia, again, is pretty optimal, covering attack, crit, and defense, all of which Courtney needs. Sonia also buffs team speed for gauge control, and can help with Defense Crush when she shifts into attacking. I have Clay here, but realistically you can pick whoever you want, it’s not like Courtney needs anything all that specific. A good Leer Eggmon would do the trick. But I bring up Clay because one day, Clay will get a grid. And that grid will involve Cakewalk. And if you really wanted to, Courtney and Clay now have Double Bulldoze to minimize speed before first sync. I’m just saying, it’s an option.

Final Thoughts Courtney’s not half bad, but I think her biggest hangup is being slow, and inconsistent as a debuffer. She begs for gauge support, especially with all her Ground-type allies being horrendous gauge hogs with limited speed as well. If you don’t have speed buffs, I’m pretty sure Courtney just doesn’t work. Defense Crush 2 as a base passive also really hurts a lot. It’s just not consistent enough to provide exceptional support to her allies. It’s why I think Defense Crush 2 is such a good lucky skill; it enhances her odds as a debuffer for the partners she supports. And support is more her focus. Her sync nuke is far from bad, hitting about as hard as Bertha’s if Bertha doesn’t have Ground Zone. But Cynthia’s been waiting ages for this, while Maxie ascends to a whole other plane of existence on Ground Zone. Like, a huge reason his attack stat got to be so much bigger than Archie’s special was that multipliers like this didn’t exist, and now that’s no longer true. As long as gauges are covered, it’s hard to consider Courtney anything less than optimal as a partner for him. She’s just...inconsistent.

But you know, I’ll take it. I know it’s weird that she’s the only admin in the game, and that it’s 100% from design and that one Evolutions episode, but I’ll take it. Because at the end of the day, this saves me specifically. I’m free. Flying and Ground Zone are both in, on units I’m okay with. There is officially no possible reason for me to ever have to pull Landorus-Therian. This must be what inner peace is like.

#pokemon masters #courtney #unit teambuilding

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dreamsclock · 3 years

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Dream cracking and telling Quakity how to revive people but hes babbling in a an old Deity Launage he couldnt even translate if he wanted to, trust me he wishses he could, and Quakity cant understand him buy ay thr same time knows Dream isn't talking nonsense and so why cant he understand what the hell is this??? Each word seems to strike deeper and deeper fear into him.and he swears hes hearing n seeing shit he knows isnt a potion effect so he shuts Dream up and leaves him to cry and beg for something, neither of them know what it is, Dream just keeps saying he did what Quakity wants and cant seem to elaborate past that, n Quakity goes off to stew alone in the words that make his skin creep as old entities that hold the world together gently tug on his soul and mind if to tease their power to rip it apart like a pickaxe through skin and Quakity has has a screaming ranting amd honestly sorta scared n desprate fit at the nothing and vowes he doesnt need Dream and he'll leave him to rot alone forever and just forget about him and npt pass on his story so his memory will die sooner, amd things go still. Like how it was when he died still, and Quakity is both relived and to scared about what might happen if he ever breaks that promise. And what that means for the bet...

oh ym god so this has inspired me so much ,, sorry from the slight deviation from your ask BVSDKSD !! the basic premise of this au is that the revive book is only supposed to be known by the admin, in this case, c!dream, and it’s this knowledge that drives people to madness and death. for c!schlatt, he chose to die before the knowledge killed him, and in this au, c!quackity gets the knowledge from c!dream, walks out of prison shaken up after receiving the information in a language his MIND doesn’t know but his BODY is terrified of,,, he breaks down under the weight of the words and power, and this is how c!sapnap and c!karl find him. at this point in the au, c!quackity has been sleeping for three days, and his condition has only been worsening.....

this would be fun to continue if people like it, so feel free to ask me to if you wanna !! :D i’m tagging it as -> mirak au (which is a word from my conlang that means mercy!!). if you want any translations for anything q says, lemme know :D

warnings: sickness/fever, ‘possession’ (in that q speaks in different languages and doesn’t act like himself), blood, mild horror elements

Quackity’s skin is warm. Too warm. Warm enough that even Sapnap frowns, unsettled by the change in his fiancé’s temperature.

“He doesn’t feel good at all,” he murmurs, face pinched with worry. He hasn’t been sleeping well since Dream has been put in prison, and Karl watches him now, wonders how many hours Sapnap will spend watching over a feverish Quackity tonight. “He’s way too warm. Touch his forehead.”

Karl smooths back the hair plastered to Quackity’s forehead, touches it gently and recoils. Sapnap is right. It’s far, far too warm; cursing the gods and anyone of a higher power who cares enough to watch over them, he sits down on the bed, fiddling with the cuffs of his hoodie. “Get him some water, maybe? Or- I don’t know, something cool. We need to try and bring his temperature down. He’s burning up.”

Sapnap, reluctant to leave Quackity’s side, fidgets, until his shoulders slump and he gets back to his feet. “Be right back,” he murmurs, vanishing out the door and leaving a trail of smoldering footprints in his wake, “if anything changes...”

The words hover in the air between Karl and the silence and Quackity. If anything changes...

“Pīyet kī,” Quackity moans out through a shattered throat and bloody lungs, “pīyet kī.”

Karl’s hand finds his fiancé’s. “It’s okay, Q,” he whispers, heart aching, “you can do it. Please. You have to pull through.”

He doesn’t know what the ancient words are that Quackity speaks, but he recognises the language. It pulses under the In-Between constantly, thrums in his soul whenever Dream XD appears - it’s the language of the gods, which means Quackity is involved in far, far darker things than they’d originally thought. They’d found him covered in blood, shaking and sobbing, at the edge of the forest. It’s impossible to know what had happened to him - if anyone knows anything, nobody is talking. Their only hope is Quackity waking up-

If he wakes up, that is. In his feverish, unresponsive state right now, it’s hard to imagine when that will be.

“Water.” Sapnap shuts the door quietly behind him, and Karl almost smiles faintly. The water is only lukewarm when he takes it from his fiance - he’s been trying to keep his natural tendency to heat up anything he touches under control for Quackity, and in any other situation, Quackity would make a big deal about it and ramble about how wonderful Sapnap is, and he’d throw himself over both their laps to laze around for the rest of the day, and they’d... They’d be happy. “Has he... you know...”

“He’s been quiet,” Karl says, lying through his teeth and glancing back to Quackity’s shivering form. His cheeks are hollow. “Hasn’t said anything else. But-”

Quackity’s back arches and a long drawn out noise leaves him. Horrified, terrified, the cup slips from Karl’s hands, both of their attentions going to Quackity.

“Sōl- Sōl mirak na,” Quackity sobs, begs, through gritted teeth, “mirak.”

Karl hears that word a lot, whispered into his ears on his travels through time. Mirak. He thinks it means mercy, and he doesn’t think the gods talking to Quackity know the meaning of it.

“What are we supposed to do?” Sapnap’s voice wobbles.

Karl can’t look at him for fear he’ll burst into tears. Instead, he pushes Quackity’s body back onto the mattress properly, hands trembling, trying his best to keep his fiancés both steady.

(There are strange markings on Quackity’s body that hadn’t been there before. Karl tries to ignore them. There’s a lot about Quackity recently he’s been trying to ignore.)

“We keep him alive,” he says, quiet, “because there’s nothing else to do.”

Nothing else to do until Ranboo can get here to try and help them figure out what’s wrong with Quackity. Nothing else to do until Quackity breaks out of this fever by himself. Nothing else to do until they learn more, and Karl has never felt more useless.

“Mirak,” Quackity whimpers, blood leaking from his lips, “ghria ki.”

Karl squeezes Quackity’s hand tightly in his, and pretends he doesn’t understand what Quackity is begging for.

#> my asks !!#> my writing !!#-> karlnapity my beloved #-> mirak au #tw sickness #tw fever #tw torture #(in ask)#-> my friends !!#-> darkikyu #tw possession #tw coma #tw blood #tw horror

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bondsmagii · 3 years

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Have you interacted with Bright's author? If that's the case, is it true that he is a pedo who also doxxed kids and abused his power as an admin? I know you hate talking about the foundation's wiki, but I used to think duckman was an honest and good person, and now that I'm finding out about these things I would like to know if they are true and block him asap ://

listen I try and stay away from that cesspool because I'm a child of god but... yeah. it's true. I would recommend blocking this dude because they're a total creep.

I know for a fact that they doxxed at least one minor because they bragged about it on their blog. they contacted the kid's parents for some minor issue on the wiki, but it was absolutely not about real concern at all because they were bragging about it on their blog and acting like they were cool shit for doxxing a kid so like. :/ not cool.

as for the pedo shit? I have personally witnessed and heard several more accounts of them being inappropriate around minors, some as young as 14 years old. even when asked and then told to stop, they would persist in talking about highly sexual things. I've also personally witnessed them making highly inappropriate "jokes" about young kids and teens (jerking off to pictures, feeling up a 13 year old's boobs, etc -- all in character as Bright, but like. jeez.).

finally... the wiki administration has literally been confirmed to be sexually grooming minors. this is undisputed fact, and most of higher adminship know about it and cover it up. in the most recent fallout Bright was not one of the names mentioned, but... Bright's been around since the early days. they have never shown or expressed any desire to "retire" from adminship. yet in the aftermath of all this, Bright quietly retired. I'm not saying they were asked to step down in exchange for keeping a scandal under wraps, but I'm just saying that's what it looks like, and I'm also saying that from what I know about Bright's attitude towards sex and what's appropriate around minors, I would be very, very surprised if they weren't directly involved.

#wiki apologists do NOT interact #i can't take the anime villain speeches tonight i'm too pretty #scp shenanigans #asks #anon

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agent-057 · 3 years

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Actually yes! There are those who have bigger souls than mortals, but smaller than gods. They are a family bloodline who are seen as holy and divine. They act as pontiffs of the church. The current one is named Josephine. They are male but their parents raised them as female along with giving them a female name since when they were born, their blood was considered the purest and holiest they've seen so they wanted to raise him closer to the actual goddess the kingdom is named after, Rosemaria. Who's the goddess of souls and life. The one who "birthed" mortals and the other gods. (Not technically. All she did was fracture her soul and gave life to things that had none)

Anyways uhh, I'm getting sidetracked.

The pontiff divine bloodline are also HUGE. Josephine is the tallest in their family tree, standing at 10 feet tall, Or 3.048 meters.

But the difference between them and mortals isn't much. They just see themselves as higher beings because of their stronger connection to the gods. Even though their whole bigger soul fragment was just an accident on Rosemaria's part.

But those in the bloodline do have inhuman strength besides the height.. Josephine can wield ultra great swords with one hand if he wanted and swing them like straight swords. Very causally.

(Oh god admin, pls dont be mad qwq. Once I get talking about projects of mine I can't stop talking, so I hope this isn't to long qwq.)

" Oh wow. You've really put a lot of thought and effort into this, haven't you? Well, feel free to come by whenever you wanna talk about your project more! I got nothing to do around here, so I'm happy to listen to you!"

" I like the Josephine already! A super tall person with great strength is super cool when they're given a proper life story and personality. I know he's just a fictional character, but I bet the Jötunn back in my home would've liked him!"

"Sounds like Rosemaria is on the good and holy side of things, so I'm curious..."

" Is there an evil equivalent in your world? Any major characters with some divine power that are considered unholy?"

------------------------------------------------------------

♡ Oi. Don't you dare apologize. That right there is some good stuff you've created.

#housamo #Anon #Hati #event: hati #♡ love that good shit

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alolanrain · 4 years

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I have this AM!au HC where Ash’s life was basic shit until he left Pallet Town.

Like I’m saying that his teachers and everyone else was up front in saying his mom was a “shit easy worse” for having two sons with the man who left her and that she’s also “a pathetic accused for a women” because she can’t keep Ash’s bastard father home with her. Shit gets worse when Silver is dumped at her door.

When Red becomes Kanto’s new Champion after ten years everyone in Pallet Town doesn’t call him a “real” Champion because he’s selective mute, autistic, and has ADHD. So like he’s not “normal” so that makes him not a “real” Champion. They even celebrate when Red disappears into Mount. Silver for like 2-3 years until Green, Blue, Gold, and Silver D R A G his ass back down and to Delia’s house.

Ash is also getting called a pathetic excuse of a kid/son. Just an absolute waste of space. Gary objectifys because that’s his damn brother-in-law but he gets pressured by everyone in town to start hating Ash. So he doesn’t really hate Ash but is to afraid to go against a whole ass town at the moment.

When Ash turns 5-6 that’s when shit gets REAL bad. He and Gary watch as their brothers and half the other Pokedexer’s are killed right in front of them, by Giovanni personally and his main group of grunts/admins. They make it out alive but everyone in their family is dead except Delia/Professor Oak/and Daisy.

Everyone in town RAMPS the hate up for Ash and Delia. They don’t physically touch Delia but they do to Ash when at school. So now Ash is getting beaten up by older kids and his hands slapped by rulers by the teachers. At the age of 8 he’s pulled out of school and personally taught by Professor Oak, which puts a damper on his research but it’s completely fine by him because Professor Oak doesn’t want to see this kid become into the next new villain whe he leaves town at the age of 10.

Professor Oak purposely gives Ash Pikachu, even when Ash is the first kid at his labs like 3 hours before the initial “wave” of kids, even his own Grandson is still sleeping in bed, knowing full DAMN well that Pikachu is extremely higher leveled then the rest of his yearly supply of starters. For once Professor Oak claps Ash on the shoulder, and instead of reminding Ash to take the league slow and to waste as much time before inevitable coming “home”, Oak tells Ash to burn the league. Burn through Kanto like Red and all the others did. Make your brother proud by shredding every trainer in your path and come home a Champion so you can shove it into everyone’s face and tell them just how fucking WRONG they are.

Ash is already acting like an over exerted collage student who could be killed by God itself and would only say “took you long enough, motherfucking asshole” at the age of ten. So he stares at Professor Oak and wordlessly takes the Pokeball, also full knowing by the sticker on the ball that it’s not a normal starter, and takes the words to heart.

Like I said before, Ash is basically a human God even after the age of ten and the only reason he doesn’t take over the world from there is because it’s too much paperwork and physical work. But that doesn’t mean Ash tears through the league anyways and beats Lance on live television. Eyes burning bright and uncharacteristically scathingly angry and motivation to watch Lance’s team burn to the ground. Lance just raise’s an eyebrow at the last name of this over powered boy and nods his head. He would have guessed that Red’s little brother would be more powerful then the dead Champion. He’s just more shocked that Ash refuses the Champion title on live television but turns towards the camera and calls out a good chunk of people from his home town and tells them to fuck off and eat shit now that they’ve been provin hella wrong.

Now THAT makes Lance very curious and he dives deep into Ash’s Home town history. Disgustingly finding all this aggression towards Ash’s family and how unorthodox the entire school system is. He personally comes down to Pallet Town because he’s “curious about the town Ash came from” and everyone does a 180 when Lance is there. Talking nice things about Ash’s family and all that. Lance gets to the school just when a teacher is starting to berate another kid about how “worthless” they are because they have asthma and ADHD and how they’ll never be “normal and perfect like everyone else in town”.

Lance naturally acts out in anger and immediately calls the school to shut down and basically black lists the entire staff. This also forces parents to now shuttle their kids over to Viridian’s schools now and that staff had the heads up from Lance about everything. And their LIVID. They all loved Green Oak as their old Gym leader and just how dare they trash his husband and his family through the mud. The shit the kids try to start there gets shut down fast and hard. The school system in Kanto as a whole gets revaluated and more cracks in the system are sewn closed and stuff a lot of schools were ignoring are getting reinforced.

This is all happening while Ash is away with Misty and Tracey, he tried telling Brock that shit would burn between him and Professor Ivy but no Brock didn’t want to listen to him, and is completely blissfully unaware of how Pallet Town is going up in flames because now a shit ton of people are complaining how it was unfair that Champion Lance shut down their only schools and now they have to shuttle their kids AAALLLL the way to Viridian when their kids are now getting Bullied!

Hint: they kinda are but aren’t really. Other people aren’t taking their shit like teachers used to do in Pallet.

Delia and the two Oaks are just completely enjoying to utter shit show because a lot of entitled rich parents are starting to complain about Lance and his actions online and the Kanto League replies to them all on almost every social platform about how horrible it was in Pallet Town and just how they can see Green/Blue/Red/Ash/Gary wanted time leave so badly because the place was so toxic.

So Lance just burns most of Pallet Towns residents down and isn’t even sorry. He also makes it really open and clear just how happy he is that Ash has actually taken up the Orange Isles Champion Title and will be joining the Champion line up and become his new secondary Champion. Ash just laughs and says Lance was just nice enough to burn Pallet Town metaphorically to the ground when Ash has been pushing himself to not actually start arson in his younger years. People take it as a depression joke but Lance and Ash’s friends completely know he wasn’t kidding at all.

Also if Lance finally gets to meet Delia and maybe they start hitting in each other, then that’s just a bonus point to the both of them as they enjoy the anger from the rest of Pallet Town.

#wolfy talks/writes #ash ketchum #misty #brock #delia ketchum #professor oak #gary oak #daisy oak #red #green #silver #blue #pokedexers #tracey #pallet town #arceus’s mothman!au #lance/delia #champion lance

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gothdaisyjohnson · 4 years

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One last game of Tag? Agents of Shield #PartingShot

I’m stealing this from @dannyrand because it’s such a cute way to say good bye!

Here are the rules :

With this tag game, I want to know the answers to these five (5) questions and then tag 5 or more mutuals. Wasn’t tagged but want to join? Join in! Everyone is an essential part of this fandom!

Where were you in life when you first started watching AOS?

I was 22 and had just graduated college! I moved back home after finishing school, and I was working retail part time. My sister recommended the show to me. I’m actually not really into the mcu at all (lmao) so I kind of blew it off like “oh yeah maybe I’ll watch it” and then she just put it on and made me start it then and there. It was incredible to fall in love with this show when I was at such a weird point in my life, and it gave me something to focus on when things were pretty very much in flux.

Where are you now?

I’m 27 now and my life is compleeetely different. I’m not living at home anymore (thank god) and I’m working full time as a higher education admin. I’m also less involved in fandom in general, which is sad but also good! aos led to me becoming a gif maker, which I literally learned how to do because when I first joined the fandom I went into the edit tags and there was a TRAGIC lack of Daisy content, so I gave it the old “if you want something done you have to do it yourself” treatment and learned how to make edits! It makes me so happy to see other people hosting daisy appreciation weeks and running daisy focused blogs now, but it’s also strange to not be involved in those things any more.

What character development arc (or storyline in general) did you love the most?

You all know the answer to this.......................... it’s Daisy. Daisy’s character development is wonderful from start to finish, and we get to see her mature and grow into herself and become a leader and a hero. If we’re talking specific storyline, what’s more beautiful than watching Daisy go from fearing herself and her powers to accepting the beauty in what she can do? Being different can mean making a difference!! From day one she’s someone who is caring, empathetic, and wanting to help, but seeing her focus those wants to repeatedly save those around her is wonderful. And of course we can’t ignore the family aspect of her arc! Her goal at the start of the show is to find where she came from and who she belongs to, and in the end it’s her team who fills that spot for her 😭 who among us can resist that sweet sweet found family?

What will you miss the most?

First and foremost, I’ll miss Daisy Johnson. I’ll miss the lessons she taught me, the strength she showed, the power she had in being kind and caring. As a character, Daisy means so much to me, in a way no other character ever has. And of course I’ll miss everything about the cast! Obviously they’re not going anywhere, but the love they had for the show and the fans and the way they shared everything they could with us was just so special. Being in the aos fandom definitely came with some drama (as all fandoms do) but being a part of a community that got so excited together over things like jokes from the cast was really really incredible.

Favorite Quote?

“Everyone deserves the chance to be who they are” and “Being different can mean making a difference” for sure

I’m gonna tag @morganalefays @anniehathaway @valkyriethors @marvelthismarvelthat and uhh I can’t think of many other people who are still very active so please do it if you want to even if I didn’t tag you! I want to see what people say!

#partingshot #emily for ts #agents of shield for ts

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in-class-daydreams · 4 years

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Parlay | (Kuroo x Reader) | Chapter 6

- Pairing: Kuroo Tetsurou x Reader (ft. Roommate Kenma)

Word Count: ~1,600

Genres: Fluff, angst if you squint, general buffoonery

CW: Swearing, mention of intoxication, more secondhand embarrassment

Summary: (Y/N), a first-year student attending Tokyo U, is living with her best friend, Kozume Kenma. Little did she know, her life would be turned upside down after being exposed to Kenma’s volleyball teammate and close friend, Kuroo Tetsurou. One wrong move, and the parlay’s stakes only get higher each time.

Chapters: First | Previous | Next

With Oikawa on the court, and with the opposing team so unprepared for him changing the team’s dynamic, the whistle blew soon enough and Tokyo U had secured their victory. The team lined up in front of their school’s spectator section and said their thanks. (Y/N) noticed Kuroo’s eyes roaming the stands as if he were searching for someone. Stating they had a history exam in the morning, Shusei and Tamaki said their goodbyes, though not without Shusei lamenting not getting to meet ‘them hotties’ with (Y/N).

“Kenma! You were so cool today!” The setter caught her in his arms when she nearly tackled him outside the locker room. She continued poking fun at him as he blushed and looked away.

“Hey, hey, hey, who’s this cutie?” the eccentric spiker from before came up to them with the Pretty Number 6 beside him. Kenma sighed at his loudness.

“(Y/N), this is Bokuto Kotarou and Akaashi Keiji.”

(Y/N) bowed, “It’s a pleasure to meet you. Both of you played beautifully today.” Akaashi thanked her politely for the compliment while Bokuto struck a power pose.

“Oya, you’re Kenma’s friend? You wanna come get drinks with the team after this?” Bokuto asked. (Y/N) shook her head in embarrassment at the idea of spending time drinking with a group of guys.

“Oh no, I couldn’t intrude on a team event. You guys should celebrate your victory together as a team, not with some spectator,” she protested.

“Please, you wouldn’t be intruding,” Akaashi spoke up. God, even his voice was pretty, “The event isn’t so exclusive. We’d love to have you.” No one can really resist a request from the pretty setter, so (Y/N) reluctantly agreed.

“All right! The cutie is coming to our party!” Bokuto leaned in, “But don’t think I’m reducing you to ‘cutie’, and please don’t hesitate to tell me if any of my nicknames for you make you uncomfortable.”

(Y/N) smiled at his sweet words and told him he’d done nothing to make her feel unsafe. He gave her a grateful smile in return. The sound of squealing reached her ears once more, signifying a certain someone’s appearance.

“Ah, and who might this cutie be?” the newcomer asked teasingly, holding out a hand for her to shake, “It’s been a while since our court was graced by a girl so pretty~”

Playing along, (Y/N) took his proffered hand, which he turned and brought up towards his lips. Iwaizumi’s large hand came into view when it smacked into the Oikawa’s face.

“Stop being greasy!” he scolded.

“But Iwa-chan, it’s just (Y/N)-chan!” Oikawa whined.

“I don’t care. Don’t flirt with girls that way. It’s not classy.”

“He’s right, Tooru. Your charms have gotten a bit cheesy since we last saw each other.”

“Ehhh? (Y/N)-chan, how could you say that?!”

By then, Kuroo was freshly showered, and ready to have a drink and relax. Exiting the locker room, he saw (Y/N) surrounded by his teammates.

“(Y/N)-chan, how could you say that?!” he heard Oikawa cry. (Y/N)-chan… -Chan? -CHAN?? Did she and Crappykawa know each other somehow? He frowned at the way she giggled at the brunette’s antics because… because she was flirting with him right in front of Kenma, of course! But, man, Kenma didn’t look concerned at all. In fact, he looked completely relaxed. Kuroo wondered if there was something he was missing.

“Sksksksk.”

“I’m tiktok famous!”

“Bitch lasagna~”

“WHAT ARE YOUUUUUUUU?!?! AN IDIOT SANDWICH???”

“AN IDIOT CHEF MAKES FOR AN IDIOT SANDWICH!!!!”

“Apple bottom jeans.”

“Boots with the jeans.”

“Shawty got jeans, jeans, jeans--”

“No, it’s ‘SHAWTY IMMA PARTY ‘TIL THE SUNDOWN’”

“Uhmmm nooooo….it’s ‘yo nice skirt’ get it right sksksks.”

Ah, boys. They are an enigma. College guys were just tall 8 year olds with muscles and student debt. Drinks was being hosted by the tall, intimidating, taciturn spiker that introduced himself politely as Ushijima Wakatoshi. The man in question was lounging near the minibar. The apartment was clean and modern, if not somewhat minimalistic.

Bokuto and Nishinoya, the energetic libero she’d met upon arrival, were somehow already shirtless and… having a flexing match, maybe? (Y/N) wasn’t entirely sure. It hadn’t been 20 minutes since they’d arrived, and (Y/N) had the sinking feeling that both of them were doing this completely sober. To the right of the large studio apartment, Kenma, Kuroo, and Oikawa were playing Pario Marty 8.

“Wahh, I wanted to be Peach!”

“Just be Rosalina!”

“But Tetsu-chaaaan, I wanna be the O.G. badass!”

Akaashi walked up to the counter and sat down beside her. He offered her a drink, which she declined, saying Iwaizumi was bringing her one. Settling into his seat, Akaashi followedr her line of sight to the group of idiots yelling at each other across the room.

“They’re always so loud like this. I’m not sure why,” he sighed.

Iwaizumi appeared to (Y/N)’s left and sat down as well. “Probably because they share one tiny brain cell between the two of them. Kenma has his own that he refuses to share.”

(Y/N) thanked him for the drink he handed her. Amused, she asked, “A whole brain cell? How many do those two have, then?” She gestured to the shotgunning challenge Bokuto and Noya were having.

“Zero,” her companions said in unison. The three of them laughed. They made small talk together about their majors, the match they played earlier, the tea house. (Y/N) thoroughly enjoyed the pretty setter’s company as well as getting to spend time with Hajime-kun again. Despite the overall chaos in the room, there was a certain warmth that came from spending time as a group like this.

“So it’s only 12:30 and Kuroo’s overly competitive ass has had EIGHT drinks already, right?” Bokuto had come down from his adrenaline high, humbled by his tragic loss to his much smaller opponent, and the owl-haired boy was content with embarrassing his his close friend, “Bro thinks he’s just tearing it up on the dance floor, but by then he was just kinda swaying a little, but it’s all good because he’s hot (no homo), and this group of college girls is in a booth makin’ eyes at him because, again, even if he’s deliriously drunk, he’s still hot as funk (no homo times two). Eventually, one of the girls struts over - all confidence and long legs and dang - anyway, they flirt a bit, and he gets invited to their table (tfti). I end up sitting at the bar and getting a drink, and when I look over, my boy is sloooowly leaning in, and I’m like, ‘Okay, Tetsu, get it!’ The girl’s friends had left the booth the give them a little privacy, but they’re still kinda watching from afar because, friends, yanno, and the girl has her eyes closed and she is ready for this kiss aaaaand...” Bokuto stopped for dramatic effect. “Homeboy misses her face entirely and faceplants into the table, dead asleep.”

His audience erupts in laughter and the wild-haired boy’s expense. Speak of the devil, as he walks up right as Kenma is starting his own story.

“At lunch today, (Y/N) was taking his order and--”

“DON’T TELL PEOPLE ABOUT THAT!” Kuroo screamed in horror. His teammates laughed even harder. Enjoying catching their scheming teammate off-guard, they pressed harder.

“What did you do, Tetsu-chan? Did you get lost in (Y/N)-chan’s eyes?”

“I bet he did that ugly laugh and scared her off.”

“Maybe he flirted too hard and got slapped.”

They took turns smacking Kuroo on the back, making the boy bury his head in his arms. He felt a smaller, softer hand, not like any of his teammates large, beefy hands, running its fingers through his hair. The tension in his shoulders immediately dissipated until he realized that only a few people had hands that gentle and only one who would actually comfort him right now.

‘(Y/N), I appreciate the thought right now, but if you keep touching me, I’m going to dIE,’ he screamed internally. His teammates ended up dragging (Y/N) away from him to play some sort of game he wasn’t really listening to the name of. As those delicate fingertips faded away from his scalp, he looked up discreetly to find (Y/N) already looking at him.

She gave him a smile, that smile he was beginning to see whenever he closed his eyes. He smiled back, but his eyes dropped to where hers and Oikawa’s hands were intertwined. The (Y/N) Kuroo had been spending time with as of late didn’t seem like that kind of person, but he knew men could be sharks, and he needed to make sure he wasn’t one of them.

For the sake of Bro-Code, and for the sake of Kenma’s relationship, Kuroo decided he had to really try to distance himself from her.

He had to, before he found himself in too deep.

(A/N): Hello everyone!! Things will start to take a turn that will make you wanna slap Kuroo through the screen...but for those of you who are Oikawa stans (I am too), we’re planning an Oikawa x Reader as well :) Once again, thanks for all the support it really means a lot to us! See you soon!

- Admin Kiwi-Chan 030

Friends and Best Friends help you out when you’re drunk, but only best friends expose your ass afterwards. Hope you enjoyed!

- Admin Mango-Chan

Taglist: @joyful-jimin @nekomas-kuroo

#haikyuu kuroo #haikyuu #haikyuu!!#haikyuu imagines #haikyuu scenarios #kuroo x reader #kuroo tetsuro x reader #kuroo tetsurou #iwaizumi hajime #oikawa tooru #ushijima wakatoshi #nishinoya yuu #bokuto kotarou #akaashi keiji

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theholycovenantrpg · 3 years

Photo

CONGRATULATIONS, MIMZ! YOU’VE BEEN ACCEPTED FOR THE ROLE OF RAPHAEL.

Admin Rosey: I never really thought that Raphael’s application would be so f u n to read. Macabre? Absolutely. Impassioned? Of course. But hilarious to the point where I was giggling? Definitely unexpected but that is what made this so enjoyable and it is ultimately why this application received a r e s o u n d i n g yes from each of us. There was a perspective that I always envisioned for Raphael but was never able to articulate it myself until you laid it out, word by word, with this application, Mimz. Raphael is such a multi-faceted and character that holds so much potential, and the way that you wove it into every aspect of the application made this so fun to read. Thank you so much for taking the time to produce such a wonderful application! Your faceclaim change to Kendrick Sampson has been approved. Please create and send in your account, review the information on our CHECKLIST, and follow everyone on the FOLLOW LIST. Welcome to the Holy Land!

OUT OF CHARACTER

Alias

mimz

Age

Personal Pronouns

she/her

Activity Level

i’ll typically check the dash every day, and i try not to keep replies stewing for longer than a couple of days! that said i can be a little slow, especially around exam seasons.

Timezone

pst

Triggers

REMOVED

How did you find the group?

miss minnie bleubeard’s blog

IN CHARACTER

Character

raphael, with a fc change to kendrick sampson

What drew you to this character?

short answer: divine amorality sexy HAHAHAHA

long answer: there was something i read a little while ago about some of the best surgeons being able to dehumanize their patients to a rather frightening degree. there’s a level of abstraction that you need in order to not let your empathy get in the way of the practice of medicine; ultimately, a body is a body is a body, right? and then there’s the moral quandary of healing - it is a doctor’s duty to heal, but what does that actually mean? to what extent is a doctor’s duty to relieve suffering? to obstinately prolong life? if the body heals but the mind still ails, is a person healed? what i’m getting at, here, is that in some ways the healer is the most dangerous character of all.

when i read raphael’s bio, there was a quote in that article from a surgeon named david cheever that came to mind: “as a result of anaesthetics, the surgeon ‘need not hurry; he need not sympathise; he need not worry; he can calmly dissect, as on a dead body.’” to me, raphael is an explosion and expansion of this concept. raphael is, quite literally, a medical ethicist’s worst nightmare, and to me, that’s absolutely fascinating. without sympathy, what separates a healer from an educated control freak with a god complex? with raphael, we can extend this concept to its furthest extreme. raphael isn’t even human - how could he even begin to sympathize with an experience so foreign to him? why would he worry about something trivial as human suffering when it essentially exists as a theoretical concept to him? divine beings have no reason to play by human rules, and as a creature raised by god’s side raphael was so far removed from the concept of human suffering that it’s sort of a no-brainer that he developed a sick fascination with it, like a child who managed to con their parent into buying a grand theft auto game and is obsessed with running over pedestrians because the stakes never quite feel real. it’s a perspective i’d absolutely love to explore in a group rp setting because the nature of rp means that it’s kind of...completely unsustainable? like as writers we’re shoving these characters together, which means that raphael will have to be exposed to mortals. there’s room for a lot of character development there, and it seems like something extremely interesting to explore.

BUT HERE’S THE THING⁠—and this is where the character gets really fun, in my opinion. i’ve talked a fair bit about god complexes already, but when applied to raphael an interesting question is raised: how much is a complex, and how much of it is actually being divine? what really made me want to get my grubby little hands on the reins of raphael’s story was seeing the disconnect between the way his connections are written from raphael’s perspective versus the other character’s perspective. it’s a fun little hubristic shade that makes him an unreliable narrator and infinitely more interesting than a simple morality thought experiment. i think it’s easy to see raphael as this super cool, all-powerful master manipulator (i think that’s a pretty accurate take on his self-image, in fact), but he’s not the only player in this game. for every pawn he’s trying to move, there is someone else trying to use him in a similar way, and i don’t know that he truly understands the ramifications of that. see, i think it’s easy to reduce raphael to the points i discuss in the previous paragraphs because that’s what he wants you to think of him. but this is a world of gods and superpowers and magical political intrigue and game of thrones doesn’t exist so nobody can tell him that he’s on the path to becoming a cersei lannister (admittedly i haven’t watched got so this reference might not be right but i feel like it’s right so uh. yeah!). maybe i just like to see arrogant men getting knocked down a peg? this might be a projection of that. i dunno. i just know that there are quite a few mind games and mental gymnastics to untangle with raphael and that’s fun. he’s fun.

also. i would like to once again reiterate: divine amorality sexy. it’s not good, to be clear, and i don’t condone it, but i’m just saying.

What future plots do you have in mind for the character?

WHEN THE CITY CRUMBLES AROUND YOU AND YOU HOLD ITS VESTIGES IN YOUR HANDS, WHOM DO YOU BLAME?

i think Raphael’s big character arc revolves around a simple question: how far are you willing to go to achieve what you want?

ostensibly, it’s an easy answer: very far. but when your desire is antithetical to your very purpose, when chasing it puts you at odds with the thing you’ve worked to build, do the goalposts move?

(the correct answer is that raphael did not build caelum. he simply destroyed god.)

let’s say, hypothetically, that raphael gets what he wants. the world is thrown into war and chaos and destruction, yadda yadda, raphael gets his blood and his suffering, great. he’s lived through this before (a couple times, actually), so you think he’d realize by now—eventually, the dust will settle. people will tire of suffering. and where will that leave raphael? how many times will you remake the world to watch it burn? can you ever be fulfilled chasing a temporary high?

(the correct answer is no, but raphael is an immortal being. more importantly, he is a patient one. he will wait a million days for rome to be built, if only to witness the single day in which it will burn.)

i think raphael needs to reckon with these questions. i think he’s lived far too long with his mentality unquestioned and that has made him both insufferable and a major threat to society. this is a long and pretentious way to say that raphael honestly kind of needs a hobby whatever the thc-verse equivalent of therapy is, but i think any sort of positive character development is contingent upon a recontextualization of suffering and chaos and raphael’s masks.

of course, this isn’t to say that introspection will only lead to positive character development. perhaps a raphael who looks deeper into his psyche will come to understand that his desires outweigh his role; perhaps such thoughts will push raphael over the edge of propriety and into something more outwardly despicable. no matter what, though, i think that the direction of raphael’s character development will be largely shaped on how he decides to prioritize his⁠ roles and goals.

FOR WHOM DO THESE HANDS HEAL?

let’s discuss the archangels, shall we? despite it all, raphael genuinely loves his brothers. i would argue, even, that raphael believes that his scheming is in service to the other archangels; he’s not blind to the way complacency has softened the angels. at this point, the only true threat to the angels is themselves—if michael wants to to unlock a state of sanctifying grace, it will happen at the hand of one of his kin.

i spoke earlier about raphael’s goals ultimately being futile. this is largely because they are diametrically opposed to michael and gabriel’s goals, and while raphael knows this intellectually, i don’t think he’s quite thought about what the long-term implications of that conflict entails. he’s so caught up in the conflict between michael and gabriel that he’s neglected to consider how he factors into the dynamic. could he be the common ground that brings michael and gabriel together? could he be the final straw that breaks them apart? he is excited for the fighting, the fallout; but has he stopped to consider what the long-reaching effects of such a rift may be?

raphael is breaking his family apart because he loves them. will that be enough, when he is sent to pick up the pieces? whose side will he fall on, if he is to pick a side at all?

DID PYGMALION FALL IN LOVE WITH THE BEAUTY OF HIS CREATION, OR THE BEAUTY HE CREATED?

i said this in the previous section but i’d like to reiterate it: i think a big reason raphael is Like That is because the stakes have never quite felt real to him. raphael’s a pot stirrer, but he’s not a creature of action. to this, i say give him real stakes. to be honest, i don’t know exactly what that entails, because i could see a number of ways in which tangible pressure manifests itself for raphael. perhaps his meddling with michael and gabriel steps too far, and his brothers perhaps the angels become suspicious of his maneuvering, in which the spider is drawn into his own web of intrigue. maybe we apply positive pressure, where the ails of the world require a healer and raphael is tapped to higher purpose⁠—and higher power. maybe raphael will find himself tempted by the very demons he holds in contempt.

the point is that raphael has largely been a character who acts through others. even now, we see this through his grooming of romilda, with his subtle manipulation of michael and gabriel. i want him to become a more active character, either by his own volition or by his hand being forced.

similarly, i’m extremely interested in seeing how raphael navigates the political elements of this verse. i expect it stings a bit to be the only archangel not given a position of leadership; perhaps he holds lingering resentment toward zadkiel for being given a role raphael had expected to receive. does he subtly undermine zadkiel’s leadership? i want to watch him play up tensions with the vices, to hide a vicious war-hawk perspective under the guise of a concerned healer. i want him to smile in abaddon and samael’s faces and plot their suffering in his mind. i want to see the snake slither in the grass, to return to his original form as a spider spinning a web of intrigue across his court. yes, i want a more active raphael, but i think the political drama is ripe for development, as well.

WHEN I SPIT UP MY SINS AND BEG FOR REPENTANCE, WHAT WILL COME UP?

this one’s a long shot, but i could maybe...see...raphael……..falling. i can guarantee you that the idea has never even crossed raphael’s mind, and that he would literally rather be smited than be cast out of caelum, but i can see it. i think he might be happier, actually; if he fell, he could really lean into the chaos and suffering thing without any compunction.

of course, this is something infinitely easier said than done. were raphael to be cast out of caelum, he would have nowhere to go. infernum would never take him⁠—he’s made far too many enemies among their ranks. he could wander the holy land, but he’s far too proud to bind himself to its existing social systems. (he wouldn’t be able to look gabriel in the eye.)

raphael would have absolutely nothing.

but he would also be free.

that’s right, i think that a horsemen-style liberation arc would be an absolute banger for raphael. again, i don’t think it’s feasible unless a very specific set of circumstances happen, but just imagine a raphael with nothing to lose, free to go absolutely apeshit. his only prerogative is to make sure you have a bad day. he is free to sow whatever chaos, whatever suffering he so wishes across the land. WHEW.

Are you comfortable with killing off your character?

yes, but i don’t see him going down easily.

IN DEPTH

Driving Character Motivation

entomological curiosity, in short. consider: why did god leave the apple in the garden of eden? why do humans keep animals in glass cases? why do children burn ants with magnifying glasses?

raphael wants to observe the world. a good healer must understand his patients at a fundamental level, and such truths are only revealed when the subject is broken down to its basest parts. you see, raphael was weaned on temperance and virtue; there is a lush decadence to emotional extremes that he finds most fascinating. they are debased. they are crass. they are wantonly sentimental, in a garishly beautiful way.

but this is not all. he wants to stave off boredom, and these are the tools he has to play with. for all of his machinations, raphael is a simple being. raphael has no grand ambitions, no lofty ideals, and that is what makes him so dangerous. he wants to be amused. he wants to be stimulated. he wants to observe a world in which things happen.

ostensibly, this is not as selfish a motivation as it may seem. as a healer, raphael knows something that many do not: serenity cannot exist in perpetuity. it is impossible for the world to remain unchanged⁠—even if the change is not evident, it is happening. an eternal peace is all but a stagnation of the kingdom; the only thing stagnation breeds is degradation. the angels are weakening because they are not being challenged. michael and the virtues may be doing extensive research to find an alternate explanation, but raphael knows this to be the truth.

of course, the irony underlying the selfless explanation of raphael’s motivations reveals the truth of the matter: it is a farce. perhaps it is a lie that raphael has even convinced himself he believes, but it is farcical nonetheless. raphael claims he wants to invoke change because stagnation is dangerous, but riddle me this⁠—if this is true, why has raphael never changed? centuries upon centuries have passed, and the world has changed around him, but raphael himself has remained largely unchanged. he is the orchestrator of change, not its agent nor its subject, and that is just the way he would like things to stay.

Character Traits

CHARISMATIC - there’s a reason very few have cottoned on to raphael’s true nature, and it’s not (just) his pretty face and magical girl-esque aura. there’s something effortlessly captivating about raphael, a pace to his cadence that has you hanging on to his every word, a lightness to his smile that makes you want to coax it out whenever and however you can. everything about raphael puts people at ease, except for his eyes, which tend to put people on edge if he’s not careful. he’s not gregarious or the outgoing sort of charismatic by any means, but he does manage to exude an overwhelming charisma.

PATIENT - it’s important to remember that before raphael turned on god, he waited for him. raphael performed healings for centuries and never raised a hand against his father in that time. think of all the angels that fell, that rebelled; raphael was not among them. no, raphael played the dutiful son, allowing his resentment to fester and boil deep underneath his skin, but never to surface. for centuries he served loyally, biding his time. remember: lucifer fell. raphael did not. which one killed god? as i mentioned in the plot section, raphael will wait a million days for rome to be built to witness the single day it burns. prolonged suffering is perhaps the most beautiful of all. fortitude goes hand-and-hand with patience.

INTELLIGENT - in a few ways. raphael is well-studied, with extensive knowledge of biology and chemistry and history and politics. raphael is emotionally intelligent; he hides his true nature behind a veneer constructed to meet expectations. he may not be as talented as gabriel in this regard, but it is a skillful construction nonetheless.

MANIPULATIVE - i mean. yeah.

ARROGANT - he thinks he’s smarter than god???????????????? tbf god was a bit of a headass in this universe but we’ve all read enough tragedies to know where this kind of hubris ends up going.

CRUEL - there’s a bit to unpack here. i’d argue that there are two types of cruelty: malicious cruelty and callous cruelty. raphael is certainly capable of both, but i think he embodies the latter. with certain notable exceptions, raphael’s cruelty is rarely personal; it is a thoughtless sort of cruelty, the type inflicted upon beings considered expendable. raphael is selfish and petty and powerful, and these traits coalesce into a casual cruelty.

In-Character Para Sample cw: light gore

Look at how they look at him. God’s good little lambs, lined up all in a row, passive and pliant and patiently awaiting benediction. Patiently waiting for Raphael.

Raphael hates them.

No. This is false. It is difficult for Raphael to muster up stronger feelings toward mortals than a vague sort of amusement, the sort of affinity one might have for a particularly stupid kit when it does something surprisingly clever. In this regard, he understands that he differs from his kin. Gabriel, in particular, has developed a particular fondness for the mortals. Why anyone would wish to strip mortals of their most fascinating behavior⁠—to the point of openly defying their Father⁠—is beyond Raphael. He has given up on trying to reason with his brother on the matter.

The first supplicant is beckoned forward. They pray to the Lord and Raphael touches their forehead with one palm, cups their chin with the other. His fingers splay carelessly around a throat all but bared to him and the ceremony is so mechanical Raphael allows his thoughts to wander⁠.

How easy it would be to tighten his grip. How beautiful it would be, to watch the lamb’s naive adoration flash into fear, to watch fear darken into betrayal and resentment and the most beautiful emotion of all: despair. He can feel the pulse at his fingertips. It would quicken in a stress response, he knows. It would quicken, then it would pound, and then maybe it would stop. It all falls to Raphael’s whim. In this moment, Raphael holds their life in his hands. They have all but laid on his sword for the promise of absolution and when they look up at Raphael with their dumb, trusting eyes he can see the sparkling tracks where tears once fell, down the hollow of a cheek into the pool of a collarbone. He finds himself overcome with the desire to trace the fall with his tongue. “Give me your pain,” he murmurs. Let me taste it. Let me understand.

He takes it. He does not taste it. He does not understand.

He releases the mortal. Those beautiful tear tracks are already fading. “The Lord be with you,” he says, and perhaps he even means it. His Father’s gaze burns into his back, even from a world away. He’d laugh at the irony, were he free to. Is this the weight you so desire? he wants to ask the devotee. No, Raphael knows the truth: God’s love is a shackle. God’s love is a leash and it is holding Raphael back from his fullest potential.

“And also with you,” the lamb responds. Their head is bowed obediently in prayer and they shuffle away, appropriately awed. The next supplicant is beckoned forward.

The light of Raphael’s presence obfuscates the darkness in his eyes.

—

Later, much later, Raphael finds himself studying his hands. He flexes them, balls them into fists, stretches his fingers as far as they will spread.

How easy it would be to tighten his grip.

The hand is at once an individual unit and a summation of individual parts. The hand contains twenty-seven bones and thirty-four muscles connected by over a hundred ligaments and tendons. Wrists connect to metacarpals, which connect to carpals, which taper off into delicate phalanges. Individually, each of these parts are largely useless; were Raphael to take a scalpel and drag it through a tendon, across the joints, the strings would be cut and the puppetry would cease to dance. You would be left with a small pile of carpals and metacarpals and phalanges, loose strings of muscle and tendon. At times, it is difficult to fathom how such mundane component parts are the instruments of extraordinary acts.

Raphael flexes his hand, watches bone shift under skin. If he remembers correctly, mortals have an idiom about knowing your hands, or something along those lines. He will not pretend to be familiar with mortal culture. Did you know that, wings aside, mortals and angels all have the same bone structure?

Of course you did. It is common knowledge that God made all beings in His image, or so the story goes.

This is an easy answer, but one with interesting implications. Let us extrapolate. If mortals and angels are essentially biological mirrors, and each are made in the image of God, does that mean that God will bleed like His creations? Slide a scalpel across God’s knuckles—will His puppets cease to dance?

Raphael could find out. It would take only a single blade, sliced through a single tendon.

Now, Raphael is not so arrogant to believe himself the blade. He would not even consider himself the hand. Such a role requires a particular kind of conviction—

( —and that sort of conviction is made manifest in bitter disillusionment⁠—the sort inflicted upon Michael. How easy it would be to find himself in his brother’s ear, whispering of their Father’s capriciousness and the unnecessary cruelty that resulted for the poor, poor humans— )

( —and that sort of conviction is made manifest in righteous anger⁠—the sort inflicted upon Gabriel. How easy it would be to find himself in his brother’s ear, whispering of their Father’s neglect and the unnecessary cruelty that resulted for the poor, poor humans— )

( —and that sort of conviction is made manifest in a whetted hunger⁠—the sort God gifted to each of His angels. Hunger breeds hunters and heaven is full— )

—that Raphael simply cannot embody. Rage has never been his forte.

Consider, however, that the hand is controlled by nerve impulses. A spark is all the hand needs to transform from a collection of bone to an agent of action. Yes. He clenches his fists. Here are the bones, the veins, the tendons, the muscle. Angels and mortals all share the same bone structure.

Does God?

Extras

pinterest.

raphael has classically beautiful wings. i’m talking TEXTBOOK cherubic angel wings, with the sweeping white feathers and all. raphael kind of hates them, though he takes a great deal of pride in them.

raphael doesn’t have a signature weapon. he’s proficient with blades, yes, and fights with a surgeon’s precision, not the strongest nor the fastest but eerily efficient in his blows. but he is a healer—at the end of the day, his empty hands are all he needs. (his empty hands are what you should fear.)

raphael hates the heretics pro forma but. but. he cannot deny a certain...fondness for them. the heretics exhibited such dedication to a futile cause; they believed their suffering to be something noble. it’s a laughable notion, certainly, but a sentiment so distinctly human it’s almost charming. should they wish to return, to throw themselves on the knife over and over and over, well. raphael shall not complain. he shall smile beatifically, perhaps abate their suffering, even⁠—and watch them do it again.

in a modern au, raphael is a reality tv producer. ok actually he’s probably a surgeon but i think he’d make a very good reality tv producer. alternately, there is a universe out there where raph fixated on like...baking, or k-pop, instead of suffering. those are good timelines, i think. maybe not the k-pop stan timeline.

raphael is the living embodiment of that dwight schrute “we need a new plague” meme.

#accepted #accepted: raphael

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storyunrelated · 3 years

Text

NaNo 2020 - Conclusions

So I didn’t finish this year. Whatever. Any time I have quote-unquote ‘finished’ it’s been a steaming pile of shit anyway, so did I really lose anything? Did I? Really?

No, the answer is no.

But did I learn anything?

No, the answer is no. Again.

What ideas bloomed this month though? Ideas that might charitably described as having sprung from NaNo in some way, shape or form?

Everywhere Be Dragons

The original idea that I abandoned. Schlock, standard sci-fi. Lasers and shit. A retired man and his electronic friend who is presently in the robotic body of a bird go off to try and find out who injured his nephew. Turns out its some guy from some podunk evil space empire with a sword that can some summon chrome space dragons that can fly through space or some shit. Whatever. Garbage garbage garbage

Here’s a bit. The first lines, in fact:

Alarmingly naked, David Bellamy strode up to the largest of his windows and flung back the curtains to let what he hoped was the glorious sunshine of another sedate, mellow day flow in and bathe his more personal regions.

Being a man of leisure now he had the time available to do this sort of thing.

Awful.

Anyway, next.

And now for something completely different

Some admin schlub who works for a nebulous evil organisation ala SPECTRE is tasked with sourcing twenty-five red, plastic wallets by next week. It should be easy. It is not easy.

This was a very threadbare idea based on something I actually had to do, leading rather naturally to the thought “Wouldn’t this mind-numbing task be funnier if it was happening in an evil organisation?”. High-concept stuff.

Here’s a bit:

“Why am I doing this? This isn’t anything to do with me?”

“It’s nothing to do with me, either, but they passed it to me and I’m passing it to you. I’m higher up than you so now it has something to do with you. It is, in fact, now your problem.”

“What happened to Bill anyway?”

“Dead.”

“Dead?”

“Yeah, him and a bunch of others. Whole chunk of procurement, in fact. Super agents, last month.”

“What had procurement ever done to them?”

“I don’t think they were aiming for there specifically, they just got in the way. Think they were trying to hit the weather control department - they’re underneath them.”

“Oh yeah, yeah. Poor bastards.”

“Yes, well, now you’re here to carry on their fine work. Next week. Red. Sort it out.”

“But-”

“You’re a resourceful man, I’m sure you can manage.”

That’s literally all I did before I got bored.

Next!

Bad Wizards

I was reading about The Sword of Truth and I was reading about how Confessors worked in The Sword of Truth and it was this super-weird combination of an absolutely terrifying sounding power being the implications of which were ignored in a super-weird way.

Basically a whole class of women can ENSLAVED ANYONE THEY TOUCH FOREVER and this ability isn’t something they use it’s something they have to concentrate NOT TO USE and the purpose of this class of women is to...

...basically go around and brainwash/murder anyone they deem isn’t being honest and good. Oh, and they decide who’s honest and good. And there’s no question that they’re honest and good.

Oh and there’s no men with this power. Why? Because any male infants born with this power are murdered by their brainwashed loveslaves ARE YOU FUCKING SERIOUS.

Very odd. Very very odd. But easy fodder for villains, so I just thought “What about people being charged with coming up with ways of trying to fix this or go against it?”.

Then I did a bit where two guys are visiting a dead guy in a dead city. I don’t know why.

Much to his displeasure Percival was once again accompanying First to the city of Erhart, home to the court of Baldric the Everliving. Percival did not like the court of Baldric the Everliving. He didn’t much like Erhart, either.

He did not like the silence, the utter and complete silence. He did not like that, despite all of the citizens having died, there were no bodies anywhere, nor even a hint of violence or struggle to mark their passing.

(Not that heaps of corpses would have made him feel better, obviously, but knowing that they had died it was eerie not seeing so much as an upset teacup to indicate that this might have been the case. It just didn’t seem fair to them, somehow. Like they’d passed on without a fuss, without so much as a whimper.)

He did not like the way the empty windows seemed to stare at him. He did not like the way the streets were so dusty. A dirty street he might have been able to understand, but to have such a layer of dust, lying as thick as snow, untouched by the elements, undisturbed by any living footfall other than their own periodic visits - it just made him uncomfortable.

Everything about Erhart made him uncomfortable, frankly, from the mere thought of it, up through the physical reality of it all the way to the ruler of it, who he was going to have to go and talk to. Again. Nothing about this day was good for Percival.

BORING! NEXT!

Worse wizards

Uh, another idea, less related to anything else I was reading - I think? - but more, uh, what if there was a horrific ruling class of magical people who were for all intents and purposes utterly untouchable.

Can kill you soon as look as you, mess around with your brain and your body just for kicks, come back from death easy as anything and only get more powerful as the years go on. One of them has a huge tower held up solely by their willpower, whatever. They’re a horrible, immovable fixed point in society.

Then one day mechanisms and techniques start showing up that can kill them and ignore their powers. Just out of nowhere. And these methods are super-simple to do and also start to spread.

What happens?

Lame lame lame lame lame.

“Did all of you miss what I told you at the start? The nature of what was used to kill Dennis?”

Blank looks. They had listened, but they had promptly forgot. It hadn’t seemed important.

That it was important and that this should have been obvious had passed them by. John gritted his teeth and straightened up, reaching around to a nearby trolley and - carefully - picked up a kidney-shaped dish resting on it and bringing it around so they could all see its contents. In the dish rattled several small, dark, sharp bits of what sounded to be metal. These the wizards peered at.

“He was killed by something that not only ignored his magical protections and ignored them completely, might I add, but which also then drained his body of even the merest trace of magic and severed whatever connection there might have been between his mortal shell here and anything beyond the material. Did you listen that time? Would you like me to say it again? Would you like me to go slower?”

More blank looks, though some were starting to get less blank. Some were getting confused. Some were getting worried. They’d actually paid attention this time.

What was I THINKING?!

Indulgence

This was me just doing a re-write of one of my secret, shameful pieces of fanfiction, with the fanfiction elements removed. Because why not?

[REDACTED]

Nope, not even a little bit.

Stupid! Next!

N/A

Some random thing in first person about following some rambling lady across some bridges and getting some weird book I don’t fucking know.

Where did all this water come from, anyway? And where did it go? I could see the vast lakes below us, of course, stretching off as they did towards wherever these caverns terminated, but did those lakes drain anywhere? The flow of water from above never ceased, and yet the levels below never rose. What maintained this equilibrium? Or was the scale involved simply so great that no change could ever or would ever be observed?

I do wonder why I wonder about these things sometimes. The answers to these questions wouldn’t benefit me in any way.

Yet still I wonder.

Who ccaaaaaarrreeeessss? Next!

Delicious Godmeat

A long, long time ago in some faraway land in another universe or whatever there was some vague, vaguely benevolent overgod. They had of children and they looked after all the normal people and blah blah all was well.

One day those children decided to devour their parent and split up their power between them, so they could care out their own little demenses and rule things the way they thought they should. So that happened.

However, the biggest, juicest bit of godly meat went missing somehow, much to their chagrin. They looked and looked but they never found it. Because it fell through time and space in a way that’ll never be explained, and ended up here. And now, by accident, some random young lady touched it.

Whoops! You’ve got a chunk of a dead god stuck inside you now! Better go free the land of those rapaciously evil children, absorb their power and try to bring some goodness back to this land! Whatever that means! Figure it out! You’re basically a demigod now!

Have fun battling the alien feelings of a dead deity and an ever-increasing level of godlike power!

“Sooner or later you’re going to have to make a choice knowing that whatever choice it is you end up making it is going to make a lot of people very, very upset with you.”

“Can I just do nothing?”

“Sadly, no. Someone in your position chooses not to decide, that’s still making a choice.”

“Gah! I can’t win!”

CONCLUSIONS

Awful. Awful awful awful awful. They’re all awful. They’re all terribly. Sweet Jesus what a waste of time, every last one of these is a stinking, rancid turd now fouling my Google Docs with their stench. Awful awful awful.

Know what’s missing in all of these? Well, lots of things, but you know what crucial element hobbles each and every one of them from right out of the gate?

No fucking characters! Just a half-baked idea shoved out and left to die in the sun! No-one involved I give even the merest whiff of a shit about! Not a one! And no situation I care about either! None of these do anything for me! They leave me cold! And everyone in them leaves me colder! Frozen!

A setting isn’t worth shit if you’ve got no-one to do anything with it! Settings just sit there, inert, characters make it happen! Characters make the story! AND YOU’VE GOT NO CHARACTERS YOU WORTHLESS SHITHEAD! YOU’VE GOT NOTHING! JUST THE SAME WORDY BASTARDS OVER AND OVER AGAIN! JUST A THOUSAND COPIES OF YOU! I HATE ME! THAT’S USELESS!

I’m dead inside now!

Well, deader than I was before!

Awful! Awful awful! Eurgh!

Oh well! Same time next year!

#NaNo 2020 #NaNoWriMo #Amwriting #Writblr #Writeblr #Writing

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thegodshavehorns · 4 years

Text

A Study in Maltheism

Atheos: Greek. Meaning “Rejecting the gods, rejected by the gods, godforsaken.” From which we derive the modern “atheist.”

“This world could not have been the work of all-loving beings, but that of devils, who had brought creatures into existence in order to delight in the sight of their sufferings.”

- Freddie Mercury, probably

Your name is Rose Lalonde, and you are the most-hated student to ever blight the halls of Our Lady Who Is Without Mother or Father Academy for Girls—or Our Lady Without, for a title that’s less of a mouthful. Those less well-read in theology are sometimes confused by the school's name, since the Book of the Zodiac teaches that all the gods are motherless and fatherless. However, the Seer of Mind, patron goddess of the Academy, is considered an orphan in a more ecclesiastically profound way than the others, although you're not sure why. Regardless, you can safely say that you spend the majority of your time at this prestigious institution in the engaging study of just what it is that you have to do before the administration has no choice but to expel you.

As of yet all of your efforts have been fruitless. Your blasted mother is far too influential of a figure for anyone here at the school to want to cross her. She is an alumnus of the school herself, an orphan girl who went on to take her higher education at the Canon Order of She Who Measures, and now she is a high-ranking admin for SkaiaNet Laboratories, which everybody knows—but nobody says—carries out research for the gods.

She is, for all intents and purposes, untouchable, and she has made it clear on other occasions that she intends for you to finish out your education here no matter what you do. Even if you should manage to burn the whole campus down, you would no doubt spend the rest of your childhood in some solitary schoolfeeding cell but you would still get your education. This came much to the disappointment of the principal, who once slipped you a box of matches during a parent-teacher conference when your mother caught the action and told you both that it would do no good.

You and the principal don't exactly like each other, but common goals have a way of making allies out of the blackest enemies. Not that you’re actually black for her, of course. Even if you were so... affected by the gods, you’re sure that you wouldn’t be directing caliginous feelings in her direction. Or anyone’s, really. You think that you'd deny yourself a kismesis just to spite the gods.

That kind of attitude is exactly why you’re in detention, of course. You wrote an admittedly scathing essay, well-constructed and thoroughly-argued, that couldn’t have been more scandalous had you named it Ninety-Five Proofs that the Teachers Are Engaging in Lewd Acts with the Students, with Details of Their Exact Activities and nailed the pages to somebody’s door.

Actually, now that you think about it, that doesn’t sound half-bad for Round Two, and you get out your pen and paper to begin drafting an outline when there is a crackle over the intercom. You ignore it, more interested in your burgeoning next project—you’ll have to make some adaptations to account for the switched sexes, but you think that you’ll be able to draw on some material from your last creative piece, The Circle of the Sword, whose sleaziness was matched only by its blasphemousness. It was about an all-boys school, and one for wizards, but you can fix those details. It helps that you were inspired by some of your peers at Our Lady Without to begin with.

Your thoughts are interrupted when you hear your name through the speaker, spoken in a uncharacteristically tight and anxious tone, and look up.

"-TO THE PRINCIPAL'S OFFICE. I REPEAT, MISS LALONDE, DO NOT KEEP HIM WAITING."

...Odd. You haven't done anything new that is worth calling you to the principal's office. And who is 'him?' Still, hope springs eternal, in this case hope of being expelled, so you sigh and pack your things up to go to visit the principal. You know the way there by heart.

The principal's door at the end of the well-trodden corridor is ornate and heavy, but it swings open while you are still several feet away, revealing Principal Garland, her forehead shiny with perspiration and her eyes looking half-crazed. "Finally, you're here. Come in, Lalonde." The principal reaches out for you, and lips curl into a fearful smile as she looks over her shoulder. "She's here, my Prince."

Prince? Curious, you peer around Principal Garland to see who it could possibly be, and your bookbag drops from your hands.

You are so, so dead.

You haven’t seen a god before in person, only a recording of a speech by the Mage at one of your mother's work functions, but you still don’t need to think about it to realize who’s standing in front of you. Despite your best efforts, the school’s theology lessons and your mother’s own drunken rants and recollections have sunk deep into your mind, and his names and titles start spilling into your awareness almost by reflex. Standing there, casually leaning against Principal Garland's desk, is The Stormcrow, He Who is the Evening and the Morning, The Aquatic, The White, Thrice-Formed Eridan Ampora.

And though your lizard brain wants to vault out the window and run for the hills, you manage to stay calm. You compose your face. You quiet your mind, as you learned to do in morning meditation. If you mess this up you won’t get a second chance. There’s a reason they call this one The Wrathful.

You stand there, bookbag at your feet, and keep your voice as steady as you can. “Hello, Prince of Hope. To what do I owe this honor?”

He scoffs in your face. “Don’t give me that bullshit, Rose Lalonde. That’s not you at all.”

He's not wearing his god-hood. You know from your mother that most of them hate that kind of formal and ritual attire. Instead he is dressed in the most ridiculous and ostentatious get-up that your eyes have ever suffered to behold. You know for a fact that he doesn’t need those glasses, much less a slightly-cracked set, and his yellow-and-white scarf is almost longer than he is. Emblazoned on his frilly purple shirt is the Aspect of three sets of stylized, curling wings, the symbol of his divinity.

You feel the blood drain out of your face, because you just noticed what he’s holding. It's a stapled sheaf of paper, and it has your name, signed in your distinctive loops, across the top.

Principal Garland drags you into the room, your mind reeling and your every instinct screaming to run, not to go closer. How did he get your essay? Did...did the school send it to him? Why, why would they—

"Lisa," he says, and it takes you a moment to realize he's addressing the principal. "You can go, now."

Principal Garland gapes at him, mouth flopping open like a fish. "I, this is... Yes, sir." She bows stiffly, then straightens and leaves, but before she shuts the door behind her she spares you a single look of pity.

You are now trapped in the principal's office with one of the most feared of the gods.

“I read your paper,” he says. "I liked it. Every last word.” And then he flips through the pages and begins to read from one of them. “As was well-said by John K. Roth, ‘Everythin' hinges on the proposition that the gods possess—but fail to use well enough—the power to intervene decisively at any moment to make history’s course less wasteful. Thus, in spite and because of their sovereignty, these gods are everlastingly guilty and the degrees run from gross negligence to mass murder.”

He smiles, teeth sharp, and you want to run away. Maybe...maybe if you throw something, if you distract him, you might be able to get past him, away from him and the school both. Run away, change your name, never think too hard when the gods are present in your mind… They’re not omniscient. You could do it.

But all your plans fall apart and you can only stare in horror as he continues to read, at first pacing back and forth, then walking behind Principal Garland's desk and sitting in her chair. “The gods, those Supreme Fascists, as Paul Erdos called them, are nothin' more than despots and liars. They are powerful, but Euthyphro demonstrated that power alone does not a god make. They made the universe, but like a clockwork device it now runs on its own, and by their own admission it would continue to function without their interference. They are landlords who charge too much rent, they are authors who don’t know that they should step back and let their work speak for itself. They are not inherently good, as anyone can realize after thirty seconds of meditation on the Dark Carnivale, and they are not worth worshippin'.”

Shit. The gods don’t make a habit of killing heretics, but…sometimes there are deaths. Sometimes they make exceptions to their unspoken rule.

You swallow, and glance around the room again for anything you could use as a weapon or distraction. Certificates of scholarly excellence? The landline phone? A lamp? At least you have the desk between you and him, but—

“Breathe,” he says, but you barely register the sounds. “I said to fuckin' breathe,” he says again, and your frantic thoughts are swept aside by violet. You’ve never heard the Tinge before, but you understand it now, how deeply it cuts to your core. The purple in his words is like nothing you have ever experienced, and all of a sudden you could not deny, even if you wanted to, that what is talking to you possesses a wholly different nature than your own. You take a deep, shuddering breath. “There you go. Much better, Rose. Your mother raised you wwell.”

You are such a mess. You would have liked to have at least died with dignity, but no. You sit down in one of the upholstered chairs reserved for prospective parents and turn away, hyperventilating.

“You seem to be missin' the part where I said that I liked this.”

“You are as c-capable of sarcasm as the rest of us,” you reply.

“You’re thinkin' a' Sollux. I guess I can dally in it once in a while too, but I don’t deal in lies.

You know that. I particularly liked the part where you deconstructed Richard Dawkins, by the way. Sometimes I wish we could pick our theologians, but we try not to interfere that much.”

“Then what d-do you want with me?”

“I want to take you under my thrice-formed wings,” Eridan says, opening his arms and gesturing grandly. “You’re a very special girl, Rose. I don’t make a big deal out of it, but people like you are my soldiers. There’s more to this game than you know, but you and I, our job is the same— we tell the gods when they’re fuckin' up.”

“So… I’m not going to die?” You're special? And not only is he not going to punish you for your heresy, but he's going to reward you? It seems too good to be true.

He smiles and shakes his head, steepling his fingers. “I’ll bet you’re tired a' this school. Am I right?” You nod vigorously, and he continues. “I can teach you more than these schoolmarms ever dreamed of, if you want.”

Ah, there's the catch. “You want me to be a disciple. Like my mother.”

“Consider it a partnership, more. Even the scientists and the teachers, they look up to me.” He stands and leans forward over the desk, suddenly taller than seems natural. He looks you square in the eyes, pink meeting purple. “But I want somebody to look at me. Keep me honest, as I do for the other gods. I’ll teach you everythin' I know, just as fast as you can take it in, and in return you promise to speak your mind about it all.”

Eridan looks away, and you blink. You hadn’t realized how hypnotic his gaze had been until he was no longer fixing you with it. You close your eyes and breathe, the deep violet afterimage still dancing behind your eyelids.

When you look back up, he's at the door. “Just consider it,” he says, and then he leaves you to your thoughts.

#rose lalonde #eridan ampora #first meetings #our lady without academy #homestuck #fanfiction #revised #godstuck fic

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