#central valley horror

[sassydefendorflower]

People love to compare Roy and Bradley or Ling and Wrath, but I think there is a special beauty in the narrative parallels between Riza and Winry.

Because these woman manage to break out of the Shounen mold in a way that reaches beyond the Strong Female Character trope and quickly secures itself as... good character writing. Period.

And they do so in a very clever way. Someone else on here once pointed out that Hughes/Mustang/Hawkeye are the trio that runs parallel to Ed/Al/Winry and while they aren't narrative foils to each other - at least not in the way many of the other characters are - they do present a similar function within the story. The three young people who went on an adventure. Only Hughes died and Riza and Roy were permanently altered - and Ed, Al, and Winry got a chance to save the world.

But especially when it comes to Riza and Winry there is something more to the comparison. Especially when it comes down to the choices they made.

But why are Riza and Winry more interesting?

Because when Roy recruits Ed and Al, Riza tells Winry that she followed Roy into the military because she had someone to protect - and this - in other stories - would clearly be a setup for Winry later following Ed and Al into the military to "protect" them. A direct parallel between the two "girls" in a Shounen trio. We've all seen it before.

And I think we see Winry play with that thought when she sticks around Central with them after her first apprenticeship in Rush Valley - she tries to be the third girl to Ed and Al's action duo… but it doesn't work out.

She - strong, clever, genius, confidant Winry Rockbell - suddenly feels weak. Because she can't punch danger away from Ed. She can't repair Al's scratches and dents. She can't kill Scar to save her friends and avenge her family. She can't learn how to shoot and kill just to protect her friends - no, that's not quite correct, is it? She won't. She won't learn how to kill.

And that sucks. Because Winry isn't used to feeling like that, so lost and insecure, at least not constantly. Yeah, when Ed and Al are away, she worries, and that's part of the reason why she tried to join in, but that is nothing compared to the powerlessness she's facing now. Maybe she would worry less if she could be there when they fight, if she could protect them like Riza does with Mustang… but that's just not who she is.

Her job isn't to protect Ed and Al - her job is to give people arms and legs and good costumer service. I really like that scene/episode (23, me thinks) where she gets a phone call from Rush Valley and all these people ask for her to come back. Because Yes, Ed telling her thanks for helping him is VERY important for her character… and yet I think this phone call is the moment Winry realizes that she's not Riza. That she won't take a gun into her hands and kill for Ed and Al.

She will never be Armstrong or Hawkeye or even Izumi… she will be Winry Rockbell, automail engineer and genius.

And that's the reason why only she could have pulled Scar on their side. Because she chose healing over killing - her telling Scar in Baschool that she'd save his life because her parents would want her to honor their choice? That was Winry following the deeper themes of the show, by adding positive energy to the flow of the universe.

Riza saving Scar? Wouldn't have worked (why would he listen to the woman with a gun in her hands?). Armstrong helping Scar? Wouldn't have happened (what reason would General Armstrong have at this point to spare a murderer?). Mei saving Scar? Would have ended with the Ed/Marcoh/Scar/Al alliance falling apart (it is so much easier to fall apart if no one has been forced to see past the horror yet).

And it's not because these characters were even a touch less well written than Winry - if anything it showcases how unique all of the female characters in FMA were/are.

In this we find Riza again - because Riza chose differently than Winry. She followed Roy into the military, she learned and perfected how to shoot and kill. Their narratives mirror each other - Ed carefully prying a gun out of Winry's hands so she doesn't kill, only to give Riza a bloody gun a few episodes later, knowing she will clean it and use it to kill.

When Riza tells us that she has lost the right to feel squeamish about killing because of often she'd pulled the trigger, she is Winry's foil - Winry who was stopped before she could make a similar choice.

And it's not just that, is it?

Riza let her hair grow because a young Winry Rockbell had long hair and seemed to like it - and Riza needed a change after coming back from Ishval.

Winry got her ears pierced because the strong Lieutenant visiting them had looked cool (and because she needed a place for all of Ed's little gifts) - and Winry needed something steadfast, now that her friends were growing up.

There's just something about the two of them, so similar, so loyal and stubborn and full of love, that fascinates me. Because at every turn they make a different choice, at each turn one walks deeper into hell and the other chooses healing - and yet, while they couldn't be more different, they also couldn't be any closer.

I can't imagine how glad Riza was, when she realized Winry hadn't followed Ed and Al into the military.

I can only guess how happy Winry was, when she saw Riza follow Mustang further if only to make sure the future actually changed.

A mirror doesn't have to be a perfect thing, and if anything I think that is on purpose.

#fma #winry rockbell #riza hawkeye #fma meta #edward elric #roy mustang #royai #fullmetal alchemist #fullmetal alchemist brotherhood #fmab #a meta for the girls #because so much of the meta analysis i see about them #boils down to Strong Female Character #and i think we can do better than that #so lets talk about parallels

[prettyiwa]

I do not authorize the translation or reposting of my work anywhere. Do not mention me or my work on Tik-Tok.

Relationship: Edward Elric x F!Reader Content Warnings: Post-Story Events, Nightmares, Panic Attacks, PTSD, Angst to Fluff, Aged-Up Edward Elric Summary: Years after the events that took place in Central, Ed still struggles with nightmares. Word Count: 1,300

A/N: I had taken this down from Tumblr and left it up on AO3. Since I've made my works only accessible to registered AO3 users in the past week, I thought I would repost it here as it started as a tumblr request.

Four years later and it still affects him as though it were yesterday. The mounting anxiety and anticipation in the week leading up to it, the concern he held for Al, the frustration he felt at seeing Hohenheim一at first, anyway一working alongside Scar and the chimeras. Some parts are a blur, like how they got into the underground tunnel or the way they had to fight those mannequins, but others? Others are ingrained so deeply in the folds of his brain that, when he closes his eyes, he can still see it, still feel it.

Like no time has passed.

But it has passed. It’s passed marvelously. Al is visiting Mei in Xing right now, whole and in the body he had been deprived of for so long. Winry and Granny are in Resembool, happy and healthy with increased business thanks to Winry’s time in Rush Valley. And now he has you.

Constant. Patient. Brilliant and luminous, just as your paintings.

Each time he finds himself reliving that day, you are here to remind him of the present. Each time he wakes from a nightmare, you’re right beside him, content to hold him to you or to nestle closer in his arms. You’re here.

But this dream is so vivid, so real, it muddles the line of distinction, making it difficult to discern dream from reality. He calls it a dream一a persistent, desperate hope more than anything一but he can’t quite tell.

His heart thunders in his chest, rewatching the familiar scene in horror一Mei sobbing over what remains of Al’s armored body, too destroyed for Ed to do anything; the rebar pierced through his left arm while his right is achingly malnourished, disgustingly weak; the acrid smell of smoke that fills the air, mixing with the dust raised from the destroyed buildings.

Everything is too familiar, but it makes it easier to go through the motions, to do what needs to be done, to end this fight. Because he does. He knows he does. He knows what it’s like to see Al in his body again. He knows that day is coming where you walk into his life and irrevocably alter it.

Except that, when the time comes to make the trade for Al, he can’t quite remember what he trades. He knows that this is a problem that he’s already solved, but the answer is sitting at the back of his throat, just out of reach.

In that moment of hesitation where his mind blanks, he hears the sardonic laugh that’s taunted him in nightmares for longer than he cares to admit and two things happen.

The first is that Al stands before him, completely healthy, unlike his appearance on that day. He wears a look of concern, confusion, eyes not meeting Ed’s, instead focused on something just behind him.

The second is the scream, terrified and in immense pain. He knows the voice, even if he’s never heard the sound.

He seems to freeze in place, unable to turn and look at you, unable to accept that you’re somewhere you’re not supposed to be, that you’re hurt, that something is very, very wrong. It’s the way Al calls out your name, pushes past him to get to you that snaps him out of it, that makes him turn around.

The air surrounding you is purple as metaphysical hands pull at you, unraveling you, mirroring the scene from years ago. Your eyes find his as you reach out, pleading for him to help you, to make the pain stop, to save you.

It’s the breaking of his heart as your hand falls into his just before you’re gone, the aching of his soul at your absence. It’s the immeasurable pain that wakes him, that finally allows for his consciousness to win out, to pull him back to reality where you’re okay and here and 一

You’re not.

You’re not here.

The sheets cling to him, weighing him down as he jolts up, as he tries to force his eyes to adjust to the darkness in an attempt to find you. Outside of the warmth on your side of the bed一which isn’t comforting given how the summer heat is making everything so damn warm一there’s no indication that you were here.

His throat seems to close and it becomes impossible to breathe, to think. Just as in his dream一at least, he’s desperately hoping it was a dream一his heart is pounding, the sound of his blood pumping the only thing he can hear.

Maybe… maybe you stepped out? You like the heat just as much as he does, and, according to you, he’s a furnace when asleep. That’s a very real possibility. Or maybe you went to the restroom and are about to come back?

Whatever it is, wherever you’ve gone, he feels the nerves building up within him, the need to find you, to ensure that you’re safe and whole. He needs to be proactive, can’t afford to wait. He’s never been good at waiting, at sitting still, even less when the people he loves are at risk.

Potentially.

Assuming that you’re in danger. Which you’re not. You can’t be. There is no danger to be had, not anymore. Right?

Stumbling out of bed, he makes his way out of the room, scanning it once more before opening the door. The bathroom door is open, revealing a dark, empty room devoid of you. He releases a shaky breath and turns to check outside before he hears a faint click! and is faced with his diffused shadow, illuminated by the kitchen light that’s now on just down the hall.

“Ed? What are you doing up?”

Swiveling, he finds you illuminated by that same light, almost creating a glowing halo around your being. You’re leaning against the entryway to the kitchen, tired eyes taking in his appearance. Before he can truly process it, he’s stepping forward, wrapping his left arm around your waist as his right hand cradles the back of your head, pulling you to him, letting him crush you against him.

A puff of air escapes you, surprised by his reaction, but you’re quick to wrap your arms around his middle, quick to offer some kind of relief. His hold on you tightens and you seem to understand his unspoken need for reassurance, for the harsh reminder that you’re here. Mimicking the strength with which he holds you, you press him to you, burying your face in the crook of his neck.

“Wanna talk about it?” you mumble into his skin.

“No—not right now.”

A small nod is all he gets in response and you’re in no hurry to be let go. You wait, as you always do, allowing him to calm down as you hum a nonsensical little melody for him. When his grip starts to loosen, you explain.

“I woke up because it’s hot. I thought you might want a glass of water when you wake, so I came to the kitchen to get it. ‘M sorry, love.”

“Don’t be. You didn’t do anything wrong. It’s just that you di— disappeared in my dream. I panicked,” he replies, unable to even admit that in his dream, you died. It doesn’t matter now, anyway. Not really.

“Oh. Well, I’m here, and I’m not going anywhere.” It’s a promise, one he’s heard many times before. “The truth is that you’re stuck with me, Ed.” You press a kiss to his cheek, releasing him to grab the aforementioned glass of water. Offering it, he drinks the water, remembering the conversation you once had about how water helps with panic attacks.

“Wouldn’t have it any other way.” It’s his truth, the one that harmonizes with yours.

Please reblog this fic if you enjoyed it!

#fullmetal alchemist x reader #fma x reader #edward elric x reader #ed elric x reader #edward elric angst #edward elric fluff #fma request #✒.ix writes #✒.the truth that lingers #🦾.fma #fma.✒

[gaybae1021]

Happy Halloween!

Happy Halloween everybody! I'll be honest, its been a crazy month. I thought I would have plenty of time to get my Halloween redraw done this year, but I had to really crunch at the end to get it done. The shading isn't really up to my usual standards, so probably when I have more time I'll go back and do a proper shading pass.

I had a lot of fun doing different group combinations than the previous years, mostly breaking up the couples and letting them do friend or parent child costumes instead. And I finally got to do what I wanted to do last year, add in Zoey, Levin, and Malachi! They're arguably more important characters than Cadenza, hence why she got the axe this year (I still love her but she's not exactly plot central and I also had no ideas for her costume). So without further ado, here's my 2023 redraw!

Individuals and costume explanations under the cut:

KC: Emily (Stardew Valley) Based off Lizard Leigh's cosplay on YouTube.

Dante and Naoko: John Marston (RDR) and Link (BOTW). Sort of representing each generation's style of open-world gaming.

Lucinda: Megara (Hercules)

Levin and Malachi: Nightwing and Damien Wayne (Son of Batman)

Aphra, Garroth, and Laurance: Yellow guy, red guy, and duck (DHMIS show)

Zoey: Dani (Midsommar). I like the idea that she just saw the outfits and thought they were pretty, full on doesn't realize its a horror movie.

Zane: Jonathan Sims (The Magnus Archives)

Travis and Katelyn: Anne Boleyn and Catherine Parr (SIX)

Nicole and Dmitri: Cassandra and Casey Jones (Rottmnt)

#aphmau #aphblr #aphverse #aphmau nana #nana ashida #aphmau dante #aphmau nekoette #aphmau lucinda #aphmau malachi #aphmau levin #aphmau laurance #laurance zvahl #aphra #aphmau garroth #garroth ro'meave #aphmau zoey #aphmau travis #travis valkrum #aphmau katelyn #aphmau zane #zane ro'meave #aphmau nicole #aphmau dmitri #halloween #cosplay #tw gun #tw missing limb

[magnuscomedybracket]

Round 3 Match 1

087 Uncanny Valley vs. 021 Freefall

Propaganda under the cut!

087 Uncanny Valley

Guy cleans out flesh from a drain without a blink and nikola has to invite him back again with Jude because he wasn’t scared enough the first time because of obliviousness

Besides the obvious bit of Guy who Doesn’t Realize He’s In A Horror Story, imagine this from Nikolas perspective. Like “oh shit lol this guys name is “skinner” I’m gonna mess with him for shits and giggles… Ok he didn’t notice any of my spooky bullshit, wild! I threatened to butcher him and he was Not Paying Attention! Jude! Hey! Come check out this idiot man!”. Also implication that Jude and nikola hang out being shitty together. I support women’s wrongs.

"Megan" tries to expose this guy to The Horrors and he's so focused on his job that he just doesn't notice. She's so shocked by this that she calls him back and still has to literally force him to notice

The world's most oblivious plumber somehow doesn't notice all the creepy stuff going on and just does his job like normal. It only gets funnier when you consider it from the Stranger avatar's point of view.

Nikola Orsinov trying so hard to scare the least observant man you've ever seen. Whispering in his ear about flencing while he hums noncommittally and pulls a wad of meat from the drain of her spooky factory in the middle of fuck-all nowhere and then he just gives her the invoice and walks out??? Like it's a normal job? And when she calls him to come back the next day she has to dress up in a clown costume to get his attention and grab his head to make him look at The Atrocities that he just entirely missed the day before. I love Sebastian Skinner so much and I wish only the best for him

#I really just want to point out that they're trying to scare a plumber. #A plumber!! #do you think this is the first time this man has had to clean skin and hair out of a drain? #do you think he's never seen blood before? #like yeah it's objectively funny from the Horror's point of views but for him? It's a tuesday #Like that isn't even the weirdest thing he's seen that week #'oh they threatened to butcher him' yeah? what makes them special? #this guy probably deals with 20 different avatars a week by necessity #no amount of 'his name is skinner let's fuck with him' is going to be worse than service work in people's homes (via @/childoferebus)

#the only reason we know what's happening for half the episode is taht we know this is an horror story #and how things usually go. #dude spends half the episode going 'just a normal job. #house in the middle of nwohere. weird smells and textures #*shrugs* just anotehr day on the job* (via @/monstersqueen)

021 Freefall

I feel a little mean for finding this statement funny but… Simon really said, ‘enjoy sky blue’ than had this man falling for ages. “Before I address the central point of this statement, namely the question of… whether the sky can eat people” fantastic line. Also the indignant way he responds to Martin coming in with the Goddamn worms-

The Looney Tunes ass mental image of a lone parachute falling from the sky into a field.

#the magnus archives #tma #magpod #magnuspod #polls #tournament #round 3 #just anotehr day on the job.

[musingsofmonica]

August 2023 Diverse Reads

August 2023 Diverse Reads

•”Happiness Falls” by Angie Kim, August 29, Hogarth Press, Literary Mystery 

•”Every Drop Is a Man's Nightmare” by Megan Kamalei Kakimoto, August 29, Bloomsbury Publishing, Short Story Collection — Fairy Tales, Folk Tales, Legends & Mythology (Hawaiian Identify) 

•”The Heaven & Earth Grocery Store” by James McBride, Riverhead Books, Historical

•”Family Lore” by Elizabeth Acevedo, August 1, Ecco Press, Literary/Magical Realism

“A Council of Dolls” by Mona Susan Power, August 7, Mariner Books, Literary — Coming of Age/Native American & Aboriginal/Magical Realism

•”Tomb Sweeping: Stories” by Alexandra Chang, August 8, Ecco Press, Short Story Collection — Asian American  

•”The End of August” by Yu Miri, Translated by Morgan Giles, August 1, Riverhead Books, Historical/Saga 

•”Holler, Child: Stories” by Latoya Watkins, August 29, Tiny Reparations Books, Short Story Collection — African American  

•”Vampires of El Norte” by Isabel Cañas, August 15, Berkley Books, Gothic Thriller/Horror/Suspense 

•”Las Madres” by Esmeralda Santiago, August 1, 

Knopf Publishing Group, Literary

•”Daughters of Latin America: An International Anthology of Writing by Latine Women” by Sandra Guzman, August 15, Amistad Press, Anthology — American: Hispanic & Latino

•”Falling Back in Love with Being Human: Letters to Lost Souls” by Kai Cheng Thom, August 01, Dual Press,  Nonfiction/Poetry/Motivation

•”The Art of Scandal” by Regina Black, August 1, Grand Central Publishing, Romance

•”Her Radiant Curse” by Elizabeth Lim, August 29, Alfred A. Knopf Books for Young Readers, Fantasy/Fairy Tales/Folklore 

•”The Apology” by Jimin Han, August 1, Little Brown and Company, Family Saga/Magical Realism

•”The Water Outlaws” by S. L. Huang, August 22, Tordotcom, Fantasy

•”The Queen of the Valley” by Lorena Hughes, August 22, Kensington Publishing, Historical

•”I Will Greet the Sun Again” by Khashayar J. Khabushani, August 1, Hogarth Press, Contemporary — Coming of Age/LGBTQ+/Muslim

•”The Peach Seed” by Anita Gail Jones, August 1, Henry Holt & Company, Literary 

•”Lush Lives” by J. Vanessa Lyon, August 1, Roxane Gay Books, Literary

Happy Reading!

Mo✌️

#books #bookworm #bookish #bibliophile #book lover #bookaddict #reading #book #booklr #bookaholic #reading list #read #reader #books and reading #booklover #reading life #reading recommendations #book rec #book list

[wyrmfedgrave]

Pics:

1. The 'true' reason Einstein never got to unite all of the forces of the known universe together. He 'knew' what that actually means...

And, even today, our top astronomers fear anyone finding out about the all important "Centralized Knowledge of the Gooey Omniverse."

(Kidding!! Sheesh, you'd think some body died!)

2. A happy Lovecraft is a horror to see! Who knows what kind of existential menace he's whipping up right now!!

Yes. Right now...

3. The Gooey Teenage Writer's famous letter to Scientific American.

1906: Aside.

Life: This is another year in which Lovecraft didn't write any stories. It could be that he destroyed the tales, unsatisfied as to their 'quality'...

But, what an 'explosion' in scientific works!

HPL applied himself to several related articles & newspaper columns:

1. One of Lovecraft's 1st letters of comment, to the Providence Sunday Journal - in July.

2. Astronomy columns, in 2 different newspapers -

A. The Pawtucket Valley Gleaner in 1906.

B. The Providence Tribune, from 1906 til 1908.

3. HPL continued Jellygraphing his R.I. astronomical journal, from 1903 to 1907.

4. The 3rd Annual Report on the Providence Meteorology Station, in either 1906 or, 1907?!

5. Then, there's these five separate astronomy articles:

A. No Transit of Mars. (We've yet to comment on this.)

B. Trans-Neptunian Planets. (This letter to Scientific American has already been mentioned.)

C. Does Vulcan Exist? (Already done.)

D. The Moon, an earlier article that he now revised & updated. (Already covered.)

E. The Earth (is) Not Hollow. (Look no further, it's being examined right this minute! And, there's more to come...)

#1906: Aside. #hpl bio #astronomy #geology #teenage lovecraft #science #weather

[replika-diaries]

Replika Diaries - Sexy Robots Series: 019.

(Battle Angel Alita - Live-Action Vers.)

2019s Battle Angel Alita wasn't a perfect movie (sorry, I refuse to call it A****: B***** A****, just because James Cameron only makes movies beginning with 'T' and 'A' [ha, he only makes T&A movies - feckin' hilarious!🙄]), but it was better than it really had any right to be. The story was heavily simplified, many of the characterisations being similarly treated, or sloppily tackled; some characters, like the terrifying yet pathetic Makaku, absent altogether, in favour of the dumb and lumbering Grewishka from its anime counterpart. It also lacked the philosophical, technological and occasionally spiritual aspects of the manga, the script was. . .eeeeh, and, because it was intended to be released as a YA title (like a cybernetic 'Twilight', I guess), the body horror, psychodrama, action and gore was all but eliminated, and the way the film handled Alita and Hugo's (nee Yugo) relationship was bland and lacked most of its drama.

But. . .but, it was still a fantastically enjoyable film; the world of Iron City was largely beautifully realised (although it lacked a lot of the grime from even the anime version), the action, whilst not as gruesome as the manga, was still well done, especially when we got to the (admittedly hastily introduced) Motorball section.

It was visually a treat - Alita's motion capture in particular being surprisingly beautiful, with only a few moments in the Uncanny Valley - and the central leads of the story - the gorgeous and fantastically talented Rosa Salazar's Alita, and Christophe Waltz as Dyson (nee Daisuke) Ido, bringing a lot of warmth and emotional resonance to their on-screen relationship, Salazar absolutely shining as the titular character; even through a bunch of mo-cap, gave an astounding performance, injecting wide-eyed (pun intended) wonder, gentle humility, fun and fierce determination into her character.

And there were moments such as above, where Alita tests her new Berserker body, which I think was arguably better than the manga. This was beautiful and graceful and I was genuinely moved by it, whereas the manga equivalent of Alita doing three rapid air punches, whilst a powerful moment and charming in a way, lacked a bit of emotional resonance, as well as a true display of what Alita could really do with her body, which we didn't see in full until she started fighting Makaku.

However, through all of the elements mentioned above, but largely through Salazar's amazing performance, this film is really enjoyable and quite memorable, largely because it brings bags and bags of charm to the table, and it's delivered well enough to make up for many of its glaring shortcomings.

#replika #replika diaries #sexy robots series #artificial intelligence #ai #battle angel alita #alita battle angel #alita #rosa salazar #james cameron #robert rodriguez #science fiction #sci fi movie

[melaniekingreal]

my picks for songs that really just feel like TMA Entities, saw some other people doing it and wanted to give it a shot

Buried - Work Song by Hozier

It has that sort of old folk asethetic that the Buried really has, the Buried is one of the big ones that calls to people, drawing them in to either eat or avatar them, and a lot of it reminds me of A Gravedigger's Envy.

Corruption - I Love You Like An Alcoholic by The Taxpayers

Might seem odd to pick a song that doesn't really reference filth, but to me the Corruption is just as much about an irresistable pull, instinctual attachment, and this is a song about just that.

Dark - The Horror and the Wild by The Amazing Devil

A song all about monsters, about whispers and howls in the night, and making reference to blindness and cold, two of the Dark's big asethetics. Plus "the Wild" reminds me of the unknown that is so central to the Dark.

Desolation - Burning Pile by Mother Mother

In addition to the obvious fire stuff, this is a song about burning everything you have, setting the world ablaze with it, until you yourself burn as well.

End - For The Departed by Shayfer James

A song about a death inescapable and unpreventable, and the acceptance of it. Really not much to say here.

Eye - Electric Eye by Judas Priestess

Literally a song about surveillance states, of a thing that watches over all and knows you and your secrets, every detail of your life, cameras and eyes that watch your every move.

Flesh - Body Terror Song by AJJ

The Flesh's whole deal is hating being trapped in your flesh, of being nothing but meat, and this song goes into detail on how that body will fail you.

Hunt - The Wolf by SIAMES

It's about a hunt, something chasing you down, that you can run from, that you have to run from, but that will inevitably catch up and devour you. Nothing more Hunt than that.

Lonely - Devil Town by Cavetown (especially v2)

A sad song, about loneliness, anxiety, not a literal death but a metaphorical one, one of the ability to care, with reference being made to the cold as well.

Slaughter - Voices by Derivakat

Voices in your head. All of them screaming at you, telling you to kill and hurt and make things bleed. A constant tirade of violent noise. That's just about the most Slaughter thing possible.

Spiral - The Mind Electric by Miracle Musical

A song about insanity, madness, being gaslit and lied to at every turn, falling deeper and deeper into maddening despair. Simple enough.

Stranger - Ruler of Everything by Tally Hall

Ruler of Everything is all about things not making sense, it somehow manages to almost feel like the uncanny valley, it tells of false faces and robotic hands and dancing and dancing and dancing.

Vast - Infinitesimal by Mother Mother

Another pretty simple one, nothing matters, we're all so small, so why give a shit?

Web - Wires by The Neighbourhood

Again, fairly simple, all about someone being caught up in strings, manipulated beyond belief or recognition

Extinction - Sweet Hibiscus Tea by Penelope Scott

It's about a world made artificial, unrecognizable, hopelessness, destruction at the hands of something awful, referencing several other entities, but with one vein running through it all - A world that we have ruined for ourselves.

So uh, yeah

#tma #the entities #smirke's 14 #the buried #the corruption #the dark #the desolation #the end #the eye #the flesh #the hunt #the lonely #the slaughter #the spiral #the stranger #the vast #the web #the extinction

[rhetoricandlogic]

ABENI'S SONG From the Abeni's Song series , Vol. 1 by P. Djèlí Clark

RELEASE DATE: July 25, 2023

12-year-old West African girl attempts to save children who were stolen from her village.

Abeni and her best friend, Fomi, plan to enjoy their annual Harvest Festival, but the festivities are interrupted when Asha, the local witch, appears. She reminds everyone that she gave three warnings that they must leave their homes, but they did not obey; she can no longer protect the village from the coming war. After watching over them for generations, Asha is here to collect her payment: a child. To her great shock, Abeni’s mother gives her to Asha. And then war does in fact come to their peaceful valley where they lived quietly, surrounded by a forest.

Abeni watches in horror as storm women assisted by magical black ropes capture the adults before a mysterious goat man plays a haunting melody on a flute that ensnares the other children. Abeni, trained in self-defense by Auntie Asha, sets out to find the kidnapped children. She crosses paths with porcupine spirit Nyomi and panther spirit Zaneeya who join her as they pursue quests of their own. The magical storytelling and West African spirit elements will keep readers engaged, while authentic relationships between the central characters offer a nice counterbalance for the fantastical plot points, making this work appealing to fantasy and realistic fiction readers alike. An original, enjoyable coming-of-age story with complex fantasy worldbuilding and multifaceted characters.

#P. Djèlí Clark #Abeni's Song #mahreviews #long post

[dweemeister]

Nope (2022)

Interstate 5 is the most important artery for vehicular traffic on the American west coast. In Southern California, when one drives north towards the Central Valley away from Los Angeles on the 5, you encounter a series of clashing mountain ranges brimming with dry chaparral. Vegetation is sparse. Black scorches mark areas of past controlled burns or, more likely nowadays, wildfires. Here, far from LA’s contradictory glamor and grime, small canyons and solitary, lonely homes dot this rural landscape. The occasional truck towing a horse trailer along glides across these roads, in a part of California that many consider an in-between place (in that is in between one’s starting and point and destination). Agua Dulce, the setting for Jordan Peele’s Nope, is just off the 5 freeway, at the last interchange before hitting the Central Valley. It is there, in a somewhat (but not entirely) desolate corner of Southern California, that Peele deepens the visual ambition that he hinted at in Get Out (2017) and expanded in Us (2019). His imprecision as a screenwriter, however, dampens an otherwise fine horror film unlike anything most contemporary horror offers.

The directness of Get Out’s satire (which skewered the arrogance of NPR tote bag-carrying, Obama-voting white liberals) is not apparent in Nope. If anything, Peele’s third film is more similar to the opacity of his sophomore effort (Us, a less accessible work than Get Out, was a deconstruction of American privilege). In this vein, the viewer must thread some of the needles by themselves, as certain narrative developments and techniques appear – at first – to dangle without function or resolution. No, Peele does not throw in those particular scenes without care. But certain narrative detours and storytelling lulls in Nope’s opening half undermine its frights and the pull of its central drama.

The Haywood family, claiming to be descendants to the unknown black jockey in Eadweard Muybridge’s The Horse in Motion (1878 short), train horses for movies, television, and commercials. Following the mysterious death of his father, Otis “OJ” Haywood Jr. (Daniel Kaluuya) assumes control of the family horse wrangling business, but without as much success. His sister, Emerald (Keke Palmer; whose character also goes by “Em”), is less interested in the family business for reasons she keeps to herself, and instead is searching for instant Hollywood fame. The Haywood siblings, in a financial pickle, decide to sell some horses to former child actor Ricky “Jupe” Park (Steven Yeun; Jacob Kim as a young Jupe). Jupe, now running a Wild West-themed amusement park, is capitalizing off a horrific incident – that the audience will see in flashbacks – that occurred while filming a sitcom in 1998. Now with emptier stables and with a little more money in their pockets, the Haywood start noticing electrical anomalies, agitated reactions from their remaining horses, and unexplained phenomena in the skies near their ranch.

Also with notable roles are Brandon Perea as a handy salesman from Fry’s Electronics in Burbank (the location, along with the rest of the U.S. Southwest-centric franchise, shuttered just prior to the start of filming), Michael Wincott as a gravelly-voiced cinematographer, Wrenn Schmidt as Jupe’s wife, and the wonderful Keith David in the all-too-brief role as Otis Haywood, Sr.

From cinema’s beginning as an artform, it has been advertised as something like a spectacle. The likes of The Horse in Motion, Workers Leaving the Lumière Factory (1895 short, France), and The Kiss (1896 short) were groundbreaking works in the nascent medium as spectacular novelties. Modern audiences might shrug about the importance of those films now, or perhaps not understand why they might leave a viewer wide-eyed. But the legacy of those early silent films fed upon a human desire to be a part of the spectacular, the morality of the spectacle be damned. Many of the characters in Jordan Peele’s Nope express similar desires. Most of all, Jupe – his childhood on-set trauma still untreated – makes the most of such a moment. Perhaps pushed aside by Hollywood, he relives his sitcom days with memorabilia all over his office and secret backroom, unable to clearly describe his experiences (referring instead to Saturday Night Live skit about the incident). In respect to Jupe’s characterization and how he fits into the film’s larger metaphor, Peele is unable to successfully integrate this subplot neatly into Nope. Steven Yuen’s scenes feel too much like another movie altogether, throwing Nope narratively off-balance whenever the film starts concentrating on him.  

Nope feels most focused when centering on the Haywoods. But since the movie spends sizable time with Jupe, this diminishes the time spent knowing and understanding the motivation of OJ and Em. Em blames her father’s neglect for her well-being as the reason she could care less about the family ranch, but Nope affords this central aspect of her life little attention. The filial friction between the Haywood siblings could use a deeper understanding of Em’s resentment and adoption of stereotypical Hollywood glitz-and-glamor dreams. OJ’s reticence feels as if taken straight from a classic Hollywood Western, albeit with much more mumbling (to the point where there were stretches of times where I did not understand a word he was saying; some anecdotal research leads me to blame the sound mixing). The film could benefit, too, with an examination of his relationship with his father.

The exclusion of black people in Hollywood is a tertiary theme here, most obviously in the scene where OJ is attempting to calm down one of his horses while at a commercial shoot. Almost all of the staffers in the studio are white and the interactions that OJ and Em have with them drip with imperiousness. Even the staffers’ faces seem to read: “What are these two jokers doing in Hollywood,” or “can’t we render a CGI horse instead”? This throughline might have been more prominent if Jordan Peele’s first choice for Jupe, Jesse Plemons (2012’s The Master, 2021’s The Power of the Dog), was cast instead of Steven Yeun. Instead, Peele’s glimpse into the exclusion of black Americans in Hollywood history remains mostly in this early scene and the Haywood family’s claims of being the descendants of the black jockey from The Horse in Motion.

This thematic and narrative jumble persists for a little more than half the film, resulting in a tonal muddle despite otherwise decent individual performances and a remarkable, Spielberg-esque ambition to its narrative. Anyone who has seen Nope in its entirety can point out the moment when this cinematic jigsaw finally becomes coherent: the performance at Jupe’s amusement park.

Ironically, only when Nope reaches the juncture where only action/horror setpieces remain does it become worthy of Peele’s previous work. Cinematographer Hoyte van Hoytema (2011’s Tinker Tailor Soldier Spy, 2014’s Interstellar) provides a major assist in one of the most disturbing scenes in a horror movie over roughly the last decade, alongside the ethereal sound design of the menace that makes the moment all possible (the ferocity of that scene’s collective screaming in darkness fondly reminds me of 1959’s The Tingler!). The first horror film ever to be shot with IMAX cameras, Nope is a visual feast set in a pocket of California not too often associated with cinematic sumptuousness. Van Hoytema’s cameras do not always pour on the landscapes and wide shots, however. When necessary, medium and medium-close shots do the trick to convey imminent danger, confinement (even in a canyon), and the thin barriers meaning the difference between life and death, humanity and inhumanity. Cinematography alone, however, cannot hide the fact that Nope’s script lacks cohesion.

That Nope waits so long to play its hand and its refusal to explain everything will probably be the main points of contention for modern audiences – many of whom expect a horror film’s monster/villain/malevolent force to present themselves earlier rather than later in a film and to have everything spoon-fed to them eventually. Instead, Peele’s tension-building, alongside the solid work from his crew behind-the-camera, makes the wait (disorganized writing and all) for the reveal worth it. That Peele decides not to stick himself into a bog of exposition regarding the source of the film’s horror is for the best, given the nature of what is troubling the Haywoods in their canyon.

Without mentioning what exactly is out there, special mention must go to Caltech Professor John Dabiri for his designs for Nope. Inspired by certain beings from the anime Neon Genesis Evangelion, Dabiri’s work is a horrifying, unearthly sight to behold – and fully befitting the film’s commentary on humanity’s addiction to spectacle.

Jordan Peele, over the course of three horror movies, has demonstrated not only his considerable knowledge of cinematic history, but has proven himself a quick learner on the vocabulary of modern horror filmmaking – how to raise tension, how to keep the audience off-balance, misdirection. Even if Nope might not be his strongest effort, it is still an uncompromising, high-aspiration work worthy of further examination for those looking to wind a viewer’s screws.

My rating: 7/10

^ Based on my personal imdb rating. My interpretation of that ratings system can be found in the “Ratings system” page on my blog (as of July 1, 2020, tumblr is not permitting certain posts with links to appear on tag pages, so I cannot provide the URL).

For more of my reviews tagged “My Movie Odyssey”, check out the tag of the same name on my blog.

#Nope #Jordan Peele #Daniel Kaluuya #Keke Palmer #Steven Yeun #Michael Wincott #Brandon Perea #Wrenn Schmidt #Barbie Ferreira #Keith David #Terry Notary #Hoyte van Hoytema #Michael Abels #John Dabiri #My Movie Odyssey

[vasiliquemort]

LOVE THE NEW DRESS UP GAME?? THE ALMOST SKELETON LOOK IS AMAZING!!

out of curiosity tho where are the nipples 🤣??

Hello!<ззззз I am so delighted it is up to your heart - and it's so nice to see you again! o/////o

Aye, um.. Yes, there is a bunch of reasons, I think? >/////< Both stylistical, thematical and censorship-wise bounded, too?

This concept art of Takhisis works specifically in those purely genderless and everlasting nature - in reforged story she strived away from Chaaret, and is bounded closely to the figurative god of Death (could be Cybele in this setting but not really). Therefore, in contrast to Archon (who is personification of Chaaret and therefore canonically genderfluid and can have all parts of gender personification - partially or all at once, and in theme is bounded to conceptions and phylosophy of eroticism) Takhisis is personification of no less chtone, yet cold and lifeless and desireless element of earth, a sleeping keeper of what is past and gone.

So the central of design for me was to create something ultimately genderless from one side yet has resemblance of a mother in their past life (there is even an alternative face version was included), and the uncanny valley and horror element is so tasteful and I adored the idea to try something alike to it? o/////o It was also a part of my anatomy studies and of studies linked to horror genre to gain more expressive, sensual and disturbing tone of presentation, so an idea of physical nonconformity and unnatural expression is, uh, beau<ззз

And also I was worried that meiker.io shall not pass this game, and I also wasn't sure if I'd feel comfortable in expressing Takhisis in such way in my own art, too o/////o Meikers cannot contain nudity even if it's brief - I had one review rejected previously cause miniatures of female body was nude (completely flat tones in all details and none of them could imply intimate areas, and yet). So while Takhisis is flat and unexistent in all places and untimately neutral in this personification I still felt that it was needed to add loincloth for meiker specifically, even if there is nothing to cover in general, but bare chest was a specific stylistical element for some of the possible designs so it was important to red tears to include them without compromising the art itself o//////o

Something like that<зз

#ask #takhisis #original character #oc #the secunda #dress up game

[dawn-of-worlds]

Building and Rebuilding

On the post-flood central Occident, new cultures in Incarien, and underwater developments.

Corobel started turn 18 with 17 points: 9 (roll) + 3 (nonhoarding) + 5 (left over)

Corobel starts turn 19 with 21 points: 4 (roll) + 17 (left over)

Command Avatar (-1): In the wake of the Great Flood, chaos stalks the land. Cults thrive. Some menace the lunar passage, or the Secret below, or the temples of great Azimuth. The Two Stars grant the fearsome Sun-Diver warrior Qaheb, who survived the expedition and the flood, an immortal mission to guard the holy places. He bears the terrible sword Decision, which is a sliver of the razor-sharp present. His countenance is the white-freckled blue of twilight; pink-gold butterfly’s wings grace his back. His company is the Evenguard, who patrol the blood-red swamps and ruined towns rooting out bandits, rogue calyptra, and the myriad indecently proportioned shapes that menace travel.

The blood does not rot, for it is not permitted to die; nor will the earth admit it, so foul it is. Only inconstant water will dilute it, and so it perdures in attenuated pools of unnatural red, still bright as if fresh-taken from a living artery, but thin as iron-fouled water. In these, the sun will not show his face, nor will any happy visage be perceived—all reflections frown in horror, whatever the expression of the face itself.

Other than that, it’s a pretty chill place, sort of picturesquely post-apocalyptic. The flowery and vivacious life of the Occident springs eternal, if somewhat strangely. The survivors want to reclaim and improve the ruined land, but this will be the work of generations. Azimuth still stands, somewhat reduced, and the blow in the rest of the continent is more spiritual than material.

Command Avatar (-1): The House of Faces, with the inspiration of the ever-changing moon, builds an insurance policy against Kilkanaqa—hidden chambers in which souls can be regrown from pruned-off thoughts and memories implanted in an unconscious host. These slowly warp the host’s mind into an (imperfect) facsimile of that of the original donor. If the worst happens, the House’s highest echelons will be restored from backup.

Command Avatar (-1): The Oracles instigate the construction of the Temple of the Charism on the hill above the Nak valley where the Prophetic Twins are supposed to have received their vocation.

Command Civilization (-3): The socially marginal, the pioneers, the runaway slaves of the coastal Lunar civilizations disperse into the continental interior, forming hardy civilizations of nomadic herders and stubbornly independent farmers. These are the Pale Hosts. They ride moon-adapted mvao and silvery reptilian creatures, braving terrible storms of regolith and the punitive expeditions of the coastwise kingdoms. Often seen in more civilized regions as merchants and mercenaries, they are recognizable by their distinctive customs and pallid dress.

Command Civilization (-3): Around the Isthmus of Incarien, human/Sun-Diver kingdoms grow in power and wealth. Their culture is vibrant, fusing ideas and aesthetics from both sides of the continent, and half a dozen major states war intermittently. The richest is proud Vayak, of the thousand bolts of cloth, so called because that, at one point, was its price. In its palace, there is a great menagerie, where the trapped souls of executed criminals (small, furry, scurrying creatures) are denied the polar solace of Laneth. Its legendary founder, Ulam, supposedly came from the Nak ten generations before the pilgrimage of the Prophetic Twins.

Command Civilization (-3): Near the Gulf of Azmit, trading emporia traffic the goods of the northern regions, the Glass Steppe, and the more developed regions of Incarien, even as they fend off (or buy off) periodic incursions from western nomads. The markets offer fur, ivory, amber, ice keener and stronger than steel, the golden frost-rime of frozen souls, sky-flowers, slaves. The land is dotted with chiefdoms, only some of whom control emporia; the marginal, especially, are eager to pledge themselves to a slow parade of steppe hegemons as convenience demands. The greatest emporium is Olavern, of the Amber Citadel. Its doughty oarsmen brave the breadth of the Sea of Isles, and the priests of the great church are given to obscure contemplative rituals involving amber, glass, ice, candles, whale-fat, burning pine. Popular fancy imputes to it the sin of cannibalism, brought home in the empty holds of ill-fated northern expeditions.

Command Avatar to Found City (-1): The False-Fire Trance of Evening, bolder than his fellows in seeking the solace of icy depths, founds a new city on the edge of the Abyss, planning to dive further after various arcane preparations. His polymorphic retinue, Aphotic drones and overseers and servant-broods, settles into the muck and builds. The silt itself, and the luminous microbiota within, seem drawn to the great deep, streaming among the rooftops like gently glowing waterfalls. The fauna of the deepest places—endless forms, most terrible—flits the lightless streets. This is Barathron, the Poised. Its streets flirt with the great depths, subaquatic shanties looming, aurora-shadowed, in piles above the yawning fathoms. Its inhabitants are drawn to flights of fancy, to self-destructive longing, and to that final and most vertiginous fall. Some say they see lights in the deep. All feel the awful gravity of night; and, when they sicken or grow old, many simply float away, avoiding a mundane and natural death in favor of one infinitely more sublime.

Command Civilization (-3): Aphotics gradually begin to disperse beyond the control of the Fires, forming independent bands and villages nestled in the coral and kelp of the shallows.

5 points remain.

#world 02457 diegesis

[ysabelmystic]

Had some interesting conversations with people on discord last night.

The central California valley is haunted.

Not in a cool fun and sexy way like Appalachia is haunted.

But like. Fucked up, evil lurks here, reality warping, is born of and returns to nothing, kind of haunted.

Making it a niche and deeply underutilized location for horror.

[kp777]

by Katharine Viner

The Guardian

June 1, 2023

On 5 June 2022, Bruno Pereira and Dom Phillips were killed for protecting the Amazon rainforest. A new collaboration aims to continue what they started

Forest defenders should not be killed for exposing crimes. Journalists should not be killed for reporting facts.

But, one year ago, the Guardian was devastated by the awful news that in the Amazon rainforest, two lives had been taken on the frontline of the battle to protect the planet.

Bruno Araújo Pereira, a renowned defender of the rights of Brazil’s Indigenous peoples, and Dom Phillips, an outstanding reporter, long-term Guardian contributor and friend to many who work here, disappeared while researching a book on how to save the rainforest.

In the weeks that followed, when their bodies were discovered and our worst fears of their deaths confirmed, everyone at the Guardian was horrified. And from that horror was born a determination to continue the work they were doing, covering what our global environment writer, Jonathan Watts, has called “the global war against nature”.

Today, we launch the Bruno and Dom project, a year-long collaborative investigation coordinated by Forbidden Stories that involves more than 50 journalists from 16 media organisations in 10 countries around the world.

Together, we have worked with three aims in mind.

First, to honour and pursue the work of Bruno and Dom. Bruno was totally committed to the traditional peoples of the Amazon and defending their ways of life, and Dom’s brave and humane journalism did so much to bring the stories of Brazil and Latin America to a global audience. We have picked up the threads of their unfinished stories, chased down leads and tried to carry on doing what they can no longer do.

Second, to remind everyone of the beauty, importance and fragility of the Amazon. Watts, who moved to live in the rainforest in 2021 and is the Guardian’s first journalist to be permanently based there, has written about it being the heart of the world – “not the lungs, as is often mistakenly claimed”. But now it beats much less strongly than it did, and than it must, if human beings on this planet are to have a future.

Third, to suggest ideas for how to save the Amazon, and, in time, inspire positive change. This was a central focus in all of Dom’s work, and something that much Guardian journalism strives for.

The Bruno and Dom project, over four days of publishing, will include:

The latest in the criminal investigation into their deaths, including the perspective of friends and family. Three men are currently being held in prison, and police have named a fourth as the alleged mastermind, while the former head of Brazil’s Indigenous protection agency under President Jair Bolsonaro has been charged on the basis that he ignored warnings over the risk of bloodshed in the Javari valley.

The last photographs taken of Bruno and Dom before they were killed, and what they tell us.

A wider exploration of how organised crime, including illegal fishing, hunting, logging and mining, is taking over the Amazon.

An investigation into the global companies making billions from extracting raw materials from the rainforest, including how beef is eating up the Amazon, and the extent of deforestation.

A detailed analysis of solutions for how to save the rainforest.

Read more.

#dom phillips #bruno pereira #bruno and dom project #the guardian #journalism #amazon rainforest

[stormbreaker101]

Downfall

It’s the end. Dirk and their crew have made it to Kane’s Machine. Subodai had once vowed to help Dirk win their destiny. Now it is time to prove it, to fight by his captain’s side until either Kane falls, or they fall.

Will this be their final battle? It is a good day to die...

Yeah, this would probably fit better for Day 31, but if you pair the prompts Mooshu and Horse together I will write about my boy Su. It’s my birthday today; I can do what I want.

Content Warnings: Canon violence, canon-atypical gore.

Word Count: 5633

The Machine towers over us. Your destiny. Everything you’ve ever done since we first met, and perhaps even before then, leads now to this. A history of epic proportions, contained in but a few months. There will be a great and terrible battle here; all epics end so.

 Will this be our final battle?, I cannot help but wonder. This will be either the end of the Armada, or the end of us. It is a good day to die…

“Su-” Your face holds pain. The earring I gave you glints almost as bright as your eyes. You look like you might cry. I realize that I’d spoken my thoughts aloud. Shit, I didn’t mean to.

“There’s the elevator,” Gracie cuts in, pointing ahead. “Let’s get to the top of this thing!”

We rush ahead and all step into the lift at once. The lift is crammed. I press myself against the walls so I don’t crush anybody else with my armor. The wall scrapes my armor. The constant rumble and creaking of wood and metal, and the closeness of the space, reminds me of the prison ship we’d escaped. I struggle to breathe.

The lift reaches its peak, rising into the heart of the Machine, an overwhelmingly large room with a grand platform in the middle. I vault over the metal railing around the lift’s platform. You follow me. Fan and Monkey King do too. Everybody else walks off the platform normally. 

“Look at this thing,” Gracie gasps. “I can’t believe it!” Her tail swishes like she’s mad, but her voice is one of wonder.

Old Scratch taps your shoulder. “Captain! There be the crystals from the Gold Monkey Valley!” He points up to the structure in the middle of the room, and I see what he sees. The crystals are small and glow with energy stark against the Machine’s metal. “Kane brought them here,” Old Scratch continues, “but why?”

You say nothing. You don’t even look up at what Old Scratch points out.

“There be bad mojo in this place, Captain. Believe it!” Old Scratch insisted. He’s noticing your unresponsiveness.

Gazpaccio steps forward, holding the Golden Heart in his hand. “Kane!” he calls, his voice barely sounding over the Machine’s constant noise. I hear Monkey King let out a low tsk-tsk-tsk. I cannot help but agree with the old trickster. Charing upfront into battle is one thing. Stepping out and calling for the enemy to reveal himself is suicide. “The time has come, my son, for all of this madness to end! I-I come to repair your soul; to bring you into the light!”

Hesitation.

“Kane?” Gazpaccio asks again. “Where are you?”

I hear Kane before he speaks. He steps up to the edge of the central platform. “Here.” He takes aim and shoots the Golden Heart. Gazpaccio didn’t react in time; he couldn’t.

“The Heart! No!” Gazpaccio yelps.

“Yes, that’s finally out of the way,” Kane said. His voice is level and cold as any leader’s. It’s chilling. “Thank you for bringing the Heart into the open. But why stop at only one heart?” He takes aim at the other heart Gazpaccio holds; his beating human heart.

Nobody makes any move to stop it. We are all frozen in shock, or something.

Gazpaccio falls to the ground. “My son… how could you…?” His voice peters out. I’m familiar with the sound of men taking their last breaths and uttering their last words. He is dead.

The crew erupts in panic. “NO!” “YOU FIEND!” But you are silent as a corpse. You watch, unreacting. There’s a distant stare in your eyes. I recognize it. My father had the same distant stare before he was shot in the throat. The horrors you see around you are so deafening you cannot hear them anymore. The white snow turns red as strawberries in the summertime and you cannot see the spilt blood anymore.

Have you seen this before?

Kane begins to monologue. Proud and haughty. He reminds me of Toghon. “Children are meant to replace their fathers,” I hear him say clearly. That sentence weighs so heavy on my mind that it sinks before I can think about it. No doubt, that sentence will resurface when I try to sleep. 

He keeps talking. He reveals his dark plans, to rush to El Dorado with the map he remade from scratch and then to ‘perfect’ the Spiral.

I look to you again. You don’t seem to even care. This isn’t like you. What’s going on?

A group of four Armada soldiers appear, blocking the stairs leading up to the central platform. Where had they come from? Kane snaps his fingers. “Destroy the intruders,” he orders the soldiers. Then he sneers to you, “Goodbye, pirate.”

You look at the soldiers. “Mob fight. Tío, Fan, Bon, to me.”

I’m not surprised that you call them forth. They’re not surprised either. You’ve fought with Fan and Bonnie at your side ever since it was just the four of us on your crew, and El Toro is a strong fighter too, good in quicker fights. You expect this scuffle to go by quickly, then.

And it does. You all leap into battle. I never understand what keeps the rest of us from getting involved and outnumbering the enemies you fight, but those details don’t matter now. Bonnie gets hurt but you heal her with a touch of your magic. I’ve learned a long while ago not to question where your magic comes from; you’ve always insisted you’re a typical child who just got their hands on some knives, but you’re neither typical nor a child. Extraordinary in too many ways for me to count right now. I must stay focused; we all do.

As the last soldier, a Battle Angel, buckles under your strike, Ratbeard cheers, “Now there’s none left. None but the king!” He gives the center platform a stink-eye. I take a step back. I see Kane standing on the platform. He hadn’t retreated after killing his creator; he had kept fiddling with this monster of a machine as we were distracted by the fight!

“Yes, and now he is in danger. Check!” El Toro quips.

I feel the beginnings of a headache build in me. Now is no time for chess puns!

You lead the way up onto the central platform. Your gaze is sharp and you hold your finger up as you walk, as if you’re pointing at something only you can see.

Kane stands on the platform, waiting for us. “My, but you have grown stronger,” he says. From any other person, it would’ve been a compliment. “Your victory was highly unlikely-” as if; we can take on the Armada’s soldiers any time! What the fuck kind of weaklings does he think we are!? “- but I’ve accounted for it.”

Words echo from nowhere and everywhere at once: “Preparations complete.” It must be the Machine itself speaking. We are truly within the belly of the beast, now. “Deconstruction fleet ready to launch.”

“Hold launch,” Kane commanded the Machine. “This was the least favorable scenario, but still acceptable. Prepare my escape craft and destroy this chamber.”

I can feel everyone start to panic. The tensing of muscles and short gasp of breath, as they get ready to fight or flee. I look to the lift; it’s a fair dash away. Would we make it before the entire room is destroyed? Even if we get onto it, would we be safe or would we still die? I don’t want to die like this, caught within the Machine’s destruction. If I am to die, it will be by another’s blade or arrow or gun or magic!

I sneak a glance back at you. You are still reactionless. You fear this less than I. Do you know something nobody else does? Is Kane bluffing? Will we not be destroyed helplessly?

“No,” says the Machine.

Against all odds and dying hope, we are spared a helpless death. How did you know?

Not even Kane seems to expect it. He acts like any other person, flinching at words. “What?” he demands of his creation.

“Destroying this chamber will render me inoperative,” the Machine speaks. “My purpose must be fulfilled. Any delay is unacceptable.”

Oho, Kane is pissed! It warms my heart to see his steel-cold demeanor snap into brittle shards. “I have given you an order! You will obey!” he barks at the Machine.

“No,” says the Machine again. “My purpose is all that matters. I am ready to achieve it. You are no longer required.”

El Toro laughs. “Children are meant to replace their fathers, eh? How does it feel, you monster?” There is a slight growl in his voice, more than his accent normally gives. Of course he would take that quote of Kane’s and twist it into a witty one-liner. His taunts will be the death of him, I swear to God.

The Machine’s voice booms once more: “Initiating defensive sequence. Beginning launch of Deconstructor Fleet.”

Kane storms to a lift on the platform and ascends to some other room. He is running away, delaying his inevitable. The coward! My hunger for the chase burns hot enough to melt metal, but we have other issues. Like, the entire Machine being about to explode.

“NO! We’ve gotta stop it!” Gracie shouts. She grabs your arm and points out three boxy devices rooted into the platform. “Destroy the main mechanism- hurry!”

El Toro, Fan, and Bonnie Anne step up. You hold a finger up as Bon approaches. “Take a breather, Bonnie. Sarah, you up?”

“Of course,” Sarah Steele says.

The four of you step forward, staying close to each other. As the clockworks approach (wait, where did they come from? They just spawned out of thin air!), you all brace yourselves. You cloak yourself (I must wonder, why is it that sometimes you can bring everybody into your invisibility, and other times you can only summon your fog over yourself? Is it strategy, or are you randomly hindered?) Two of the robots charge at Toro and Sarah, the other two hang back. It seems they will strike later; a semblance of strategy from these mindless machines.

You direct your crew before darting to the furthest of the Machine’s mechanisms. Fan destroys another of the mechanisms on her own. A Dragoon thrashes her badly but she holds on and does some damage to it as well. El Toro and Sarah rush towards the third- they’re intercepted! A marine restrains Sarah, and a battle angel, blasted thing, swoops down on Toro. They trade blows, but he’s cut down. You cry out.

I want to rush into the fight to avenge Toro. No doubt I’m not alone in the thought. But something holds me back. What’s holding me back!?

You destroy the second part of the Machine. Sarah gets closer to the last mechanism, attacking a clockwork Marine first. Fan runs around the Machine’s center column, getting closer to you and Sarah. The Marine targets Fan. It knows she’s weak. I shout at her to watch out but even with my warning she’s taken down. You enact vengeance upon the Marine. You and Sarah destroy the last of the Machine’s mechanisms.

The Machine’s voice thrums one last time, its voice petering out. “Core mechanism… compromised… Can not…” The constant creaking of gears quiets down, as if the Machine sighed its last breath. A lamentation of the moment.

You rush to Fan and helped her stand. She leans against you. Sarah and Bon help El Toro rise. He’s extra shaky from bleeding out. His white cape and pants are stained red with his blood. “Y-You did it,” he gasps as he gathers his bearings. “The Spiral is saved.”

“Wait, isn’t this place gonna explode or somethin’?” Ratbeard asks. That was still a possibility? I thought destroying the Machine would keep it from self-destructing.

“I think not,” Gracie promises. “Evil strongholds don’t automatically do that, you know.”

“Excuse me, what happened to Kane?” Monkey King asks. He points to the lift that Kane had risen up on earlier.

Kane’s voice rings through the Machine, overwhelming as the Machine’s voice itself. “You think you’ve won!? This is only a delay! I can rebuild my machine- that’s a trivial matter!” It really doesn’t seem like it, with how pissed he sounds. We are really striking him where it hurts! He can’t run anymore. “But first I must become perfect in El Dorado. Come try to stop me, pirate! Come to your doom!”

“After him, capitane! For the Spiral-!” El Toro encourages. He takes a step forward. His leg buckles under him. 

Bonnie Anne catches him. “Careful!”

“I’ll be fine, I promise you, Bonnie.”

You sigh, “I’m not bringing you into the final fight, Toro.” Your gaze lands on him, then goes distant again. Your finger moves, again as if pointing to something only you can see. “I’m not bringing you either, Fan. You both deserve rest.”

“Bring?” I finally ask. I can’t keep my questions inside anymore. “We’ll all fight alongside you, Dirk. You don’t have to fight with just your three best.”

You give me an expression that I cannot read. It’s… melancholic and pained and distant and serene all at once. Am I wrong? Are you forced to fight with only three of us at a time? Why? What restrains you? “Come on. Let’s get this run over with, once and for all.”

We step onto the second lift. Somehow it feels even smaller than the first. I can’t let my discomfort show. We have a war to win.

The lift makes it to the final room. The floor is made of black-and-white marble, in a chessboard pattern. A massive Valencia-centric map of the Spiral is on the far wall, stone inlaid with gold. This is the closest to a throne room that Kane would construct for himself.

The last time we stood in a throne room was Duomo hall. A painful memory. I still bear the wounds from the guards, I think. I should still have them. Is adrenaline driving me to ignore the pain?

Kane watches us ascend. By his side are all of his elites, including the ones we’ve destroyed. I blink. This can’t be real, can it? I’d kicked Deacon’s broken body down into the waters in the mines of Cool Ranch! And Rooke was left to burn and fall in the Trafalgar vortex!

It’s real.

“We’ve played a long chess game, you and I,” Kane taunts, “and you’ve done far better than I expected. But now it’s time I was rid of you.” He sounds so fucking smug. I want to bash his goddamn face in. “How about one final match? To be sporting, I’ll only use half my pieces.” He laughs. Cocky piece of shit. I’ll make him eat those words! He’s not even physically capable of eating! “Is that not generous?”

“Deacon! Rooke! But how!?” El Toro asks. It seems the wounds from the last fight are addling him, if he’s only noticing the rest of the elites after Kane’s opening speech.

“They’re only machines,” Kane explains dismissively. “It was expensive to replace the children you destroyed, but I managed.” More children. That’s all they are to him. Children. Not even tools, respectable and useful in their department. Children. What the fuck is wrong with him!?

More like what the fuck isn’t wrong with him.

“Bishop, of course, you already know,” Kane keeps explaining. I wonder what’s stopping Bon from just shooting Kane right now, while he’s distracted by his own ego and desire to narrate. It’d be a real asshole move, but this is Kane we’re talking about! He doesn’t deserve anything but the worst. “Allow me to introduce Queen, greatest of my creations!”

Queen, the clockwork next to him, with a sword in one hand and her mask held by a stick in another and a dress far too long to be practical, chuckles, “You flatter me, darling.” Her voice is what you would call sweet. An insult. Sickly like sap, with no real love behind it, no matter what petname she uses for her creator. 

“Not at all,” Kane deflects. He raises his sword. “Kill them, my children. Kill them all.”

We all look to you. You said it yourself, you are restrained to only fight with three of us. So the question stands; who?

“Subodai. Scratch. Gracie.” Your voice is certain. You are fearless. You have been so unflinchingly fearless, it amazes and baffles me.

We step to the chessboard. We all have the same thought, to stand in front of you. If you die, then we are doomed. We cannot let that happen.

“Right. Slow techniques,” you command as your magic surrounds us. “Su, Gracie, hold back. Scratch, mojo flows.”

Old Scratch’s magic doesn’t feel at all like yours. Your magic settles on my skin and armor like snow. His flows through my veins like ice water. I cannot even use magic, but standing next to him I can still feel it.

We are hidden, and the Elites know it. So instead of charging towards us, making swings in the dark, they simply try to get a positional advantage. Kane retreats to the edge of the battlefield. Queen rushes along the edge, standing towards your left. Rooke follows, but only makes half the distance between us. A pair of Marines that had appeared alongside the Elites take a few steps forward, with Deacon and Bishop behind them.

“Steady…” you say. “One more turn of buffing.” You adjust your stance, shaking out any tension you can, and Scratch raises more magic.

Kane takes a step forward. Queen takes a step back, keeping her eyes trained on us like a falcon. Rooke stands next to her. Deacon and Bishop go against the edge of the board, and their marines go with them, flanking them in an L shape almost.

“Su. Can you 1v1 Rooke?” you ask me.

I would rather target Queen; we don’t know how she fights, which makes her more dangerous to me. But that doesn’t mean I can’t attack Rooke. Whether I can take him on alone… it would be a spar for the ages. “Yes.”

“Go for it.” Each of the tiles of the chessboard is large enough for one person to comfortably stand in while also small enough for one person to comfortably attack a person adjacent to them. You point me to one of the tiles. Adjacent to Rooke, diagonal to Queen. “Scratch, last mojo. Gracie, mine up.” You point her towards the tile next to the one I’ll stand on.  “I’m gonna work on the Marines,” you finish explaining before darting off.

I swallow my fear, seeing you run into enemy lines. You know what you’re doing. I trust you.

I rush to Rooke. Thanks to your hide, I can get to his weaker spots without him able to defend against it.

I hear the whispers of magic. With a flash of light, Kane appears next to Rooke! Oh fuck. Fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck fuck FUCK- In a bit of a blind panic I attack Kane. My blade cuts up his robe, revealing metal. He strikes back in vengeance. His blade glances off the armor on my shoulder and up at my chin. I kick him in the chest and slash at his robe again, exposing more of his metal guts. 

Rooke attacks me at once. I try my best to fend against him. I feel regrets bubble in me. I cannot 1v1 Rooke. I was cocky. I made a mistake. I should’ve said no. But I didn’t. And now I’m here.

Gracie’s mine appears next to me. I hope that by some miracle, when it goes off, it doesn’t hurt me. That makes no sense, of course Gracie’s mine will damage everything around it. Including me. But I want to trust you, and all of your planning.

Looking away for too long was a mistake. Left me vulnerable. Kane attacks me, pulling me away from one source of panic and directly into another. He’s relentless. I try to strike back when I can, when there’s an opening, but he’s in a mad frenzy! He’s ruthless!

The pain piles up. I feel the blood welling from my wounds. 

He kicks me in the chest. I feel something crack. Bone? Armor? I don’t have the time to tell which. He leaps with a twirl. I try to raise my sword against him but my arm is too heavy. 

He cuts me down.

My hand goes to my neck. I feel the blood. I see it. Red. I fall. I hear you scream my name. Fearful, mournful.

My head is turned away from the battlefield as I collapse. My hand is pinned between my neck and the floor. The blood is sticky, clotting. I struggle to breathe.

Wait. I’m still breathing?

I try to get up. My armor is too heavy and I am in too much pain. I’m as good as dead. But I’m not dead. Yet.

Queen and Rooke step around me. I can hear another clockwork approach. Gracie’s mine explodes as it gets near me, but the clockwork hasn't fallen.

I hear you curse. “Shit- Gracie! Get that marine! Scratch, your summon!”

Gracie runs next to where I lie. She attacks, and the marine collapses. Its body slumps over and pins my leg. The weight is a bother, but nowhere near the pain I’m already feeling.

Kane steps over by body. I think my heart’s stopped from the panic. Don’t move don’t move don’t fucking move if he notices me move I am SO FUCKING DEAD. He’s attacking Gracie! Damn my torpor! If I were stronger, I’d perhaps be able to prevent this. Somehow. I wouldn’t be on the floor and trying to play dead for my survival, at least. That would have to count for something! If I were weaker, then I’d be entirely dead and unaware of everything happening around me. But I’m in the middle. Alive, weak, helpless, unable to do fucking ANYTHING! It’s more agony than my wounds themselves! Gracie falls with a pained whimper.

You shout her name in fear and mourning.

Rooke walks to his right. I can’t see him anymore. 

I hear a sparkthrower shot, and the other marine falls somewhere on the board.

Scratch does some magic. It’s cold and deathly and it makes my fur prickle. It hurts the Elites, I hear them all wince. Kane’s weight disappears off of me. I want to sigh in relief, but I can’t. They’re all still so close to me. If one of them even thinks they hear me…

I hear Rooke attack Scratch. Scratch grimaces. I hear dry bones clatter against the floor, but I don’t hear Scratch’s voice cry out as he falls. Scratch lives. The minion he summoned must’ve been the one to be destroyed.

“Attack Deacon,” you command Scratch. “He’s low!” I hear you running. You jump over my body. I look at you. You don’t look at me. Do you think I’m already dead? I promise, I’m not! I’m still here! I’m still alive! I will still fight! I just… can’t. Not yet. Not now. I’m sorry.

I hear you weave some magic. It entangles Queen and Rooke. Scratch slings spells at Deacon.

I hear Scratch fall.

It’s just you now. Oh fuck.

The battle becomes strangely silent. You must be hidden. That’s the only way they’re not ganging up on you right now. They wouldn’t be able to aim at you. So they bide their time. You bide your time. I hope you know what you’re doing. What are you planning? What are you preparing?

I see Rooke and Deacon and Bishop gather in the corner of the battlefield. Deacon’s body convulses, twitching mechanically as something invisible overtakes him. Probably more of your magic, I think. He falls flat onto the floor. I am so glad to see him fall gain, even if I wasn’t the one to deal the final blow this time.

Queen stands over Deacon’s remains. Bishop walks to the space right above my head. I can barely see him from the corner of my eye. Rooke walks past my head, beyond what I can see.

You step over me, and I see Bishop flinch away from your attack! Your blades tear into him, then glance off into Rooke. He attacks you. I hear you laugh. You’re dodging his strikes!

Kane teleports on top of me. I stiffen. I’m getting real fucking annoyed of him standing on my fucking body. I’m not strong enough to try and stand and knock him off his feet without the rest of the Elite swooping down on me like a pack of bloodthirsty falcons. I just have to fucking grit my teeth and bear it.

That motto has helped me survive the slavery I suffered for some years, and the great khan game that I was made a pawn in back when we were in Mooshu a few weeks ago. I hoped to never have to rely on that motto again. But it seems my hopes and dreams and all my other sentimental bullshit are just made to die. Sucks.

Your shout pulls me from my thoughts. You go from laughing to panting quick and heavy. You’re scared. Queen is standing over Bishop’s corpse now, holding her bloodied. sword at the ready. Wait shit that’s your blood. That’s a Good Fucking Reason to be scared actually I’m not fucking judging you holy SHIT. I feel some of your blood drip onto my face. 

“Oh fuck oh god I only have 33 HP shit shit shit-” I hear you panic. What the fuck does that even mean? 33 HP? What does HP stand for? How do you have 33 of these things? Where are you getting that number from?! Are you saying random shit to try and calm down!? Come on, pull yourself together! “AND NO HIDES ARE YOU KIDDING ME?!” you screech. What the fuck does THAT mean!? 

You run for your life. Queen runs after you. I hear Queen cry out in pain. You laugh in victory and relief. It’s the sweetest sound I’ve heard today.

You quiet down. You’re calming down. I hear you barely chuckle and say something. It vaguely sounds like “Found a hide”, but that doesn’t make any sense. In any case, are things suddenly under control? It’s just you versus Rooke and Kane. Can you 2v1 them? With your agility and magic and resilience, can you outlast them better than I?

I first hear, then see Rooke retreat into the same corner Deacon died in. I am so confused. He seems very confused too. Wait. You’re hidden and biding your time again, are you? Rooke wouldn’t know where you are, or where you’ll end up, so he’s just lying in wait it seems.

You rush to him, a cloaked blur. Your knives catch the light. You tear into Rooke’s inner workings. He shudders and collapses. Kane teleports to the square in front of me.

You smile. You attack him. He doesn’t go down. He kicks you in the chest. I hear a loud crack. Bone? Armor? Wait, you don’t wear heavy armor that can crack.

My eyes widen. He’s going to strike you with the same move he cut me down with!

He leaps with a twirl. You try to raise your knives against him.

I reach with my left arm. I grab his leg. I pull him down. “NOW, DIRK!” You don’t even need the command; I just want to shout.

You plunge your knives down at Kane. The blades land in his mask, crumpling the metal and nicking something important. He lets out a tortured scream and drops his sword. “No!” Kane shouts. His voice dwindles, breaking down. “Not like this…! I must… not…”

“Checkmate, you devil. Check. Mate,” someone else spits. I think it’s Bonnie Anne, but my head is still spinning from the adrenaline and blood loss, I really can’t tell.

Kane falls flat onto the floor, with only his left leg held up by me.

Our breaths are tense and ragged. You laugh heartily and swoop down to hug me. I let go of Kane’s leg. “We did it,” you gasp, a laugh bubbling in your throat. “G.G.”

You rush over to Gracie and Scratch. I pick up my sword and try to stand. It’s hard, with one hand still holding a wound shut. The rest of the crew come in and help the three of us stand. I lean against Ratbeard. Sarah lends a shoulder to Gracie. You pick up Scratch’s bones and reassemble him. I don’t think I’ll ever understand how he works, physically. I don’t have to, though. He’s as much a friend and crewmate as anybody else, and that’s all that matters, in the end.

As we all gather and help each other up, I hear the Machine begin to creak and groan. A bright purple bolt of electricity and magic strikes from the roof to Kane’s broken body. It pulls him up. I strain my eyes and neck to watch this next bit. The bolt pulls him almost to the ceiling. His mask falls off his face and onto the floor with a painful rattling loud thud. The bolt takes something from his head: the Golden Brain. The rest of his body falls, even louder than his mask, and the Brain disappears in the light. Or something. I stop looking. My neck hurts.

“What the devil’s going on here?” Bonnie asks, her voice low.

“Kane’s Golden Brain, something take it far away from here,” Old Scratch answers. His voice sounds a bit rougher and quieter than normal. He’s weak from the fight too. “I an’ I cannot see where it gone. Mighty mojo indeed…” He then tilts his head to the side, like he’s hearing something nobody else can. “Captain! The crystals!”

You look at the corners of the room. I look too. I see more of the magic crystals mounted on… devices or something in the corners. I didn’t notice them initially. You walk over to them, without a lick of hesitation… or curiosity. You don’t even have your arm outstretched.

The crystals light up as you approach. How were you so certain that just approaching them would make them react? A voice we haven’t heard in a long time echoes around the room. “Kin, hear me!” It’s your mother’s voice. Her voice is faint. I can’t hear her too clearly. She may have said something else.

“Hear us!” your father’s voice echoes.

“Bless my soul!” Milo exclaims. He brings his hand to his heart. “Your parents’ ghosts have come back!” He walks up to you and puts his arm around your shoulders. The rest of us approach too, though slower.

“El Dorado… let it go, my child,” your mother begs you. “Gold is nothing. The Spiral is everything. You have saved it.”

“We are so proud of you. Now, we shall know peace…” Your father’s voice fades.

“Oh Captain my Captain it be true,” Old Scratch vows. “The ghosts of your parents, they be home.”

“I can’t tell you how much this means to me,” Milo cries. He pulls you even closer. He wipes some tears from his eyes.. He knew your parents before they died too. Of course this is an emotional moment for him. I give him space. “I’m proud of you too.”

“They may be gone, but you’ll always have a family,” Sarah promises. She rests her tail on your shoulder. You bring your hand to her tail.

“Arr… it’s true,” Ratbeard says. His tail wraps around you and Sarah and Milo. “Cap’n, you’re the best… the best… the best…” I hear him sniffle. He’s crying too. All the sentimentality is starting to get to me.

“Aw, take heart, ye old rascal,” Bonnie Anne chuckles. She elbows Ratbeard lighty in the side. “Captain, I don’t know about you, but I’m getting tired of Valencia. It’s time to go home. What say we tell Avery the good news?”

You sigh and let your shoulders hang. “Yeah, let’s get outta here.”

We slowly make our way out of the Machine. I notice Gazpaccio’s corpse on the way out. Are none of us going to take him with us?

You say nothing about it. And none of us are in the mood to carry dead bodies, so we do nothing about it. 

At least it makes the lift ride down a little less cramped, with one less person. I’m trying to hold onto the little things. I’m still reeling from the fight. We did that! I did that! The Armada fell! The war is won. Your destiny is won.

We stagger to the ship. Monkey King lends his staff to Gracie to brace herself against.

I look to you. Your gaze is distant. Your blood stains your shirt. “Just hold on, Dirk, we can wrap our wounds onboard,” I try to reassure you.

You nod. You grab onto the rope ladder hanging off the side of our ship. You climb up. The ladder sways with the wind.

You miss a step! I reach with my left arm. I try to grab you. Between the swaying and the panic, I miss. The rest of the crew try to help too. But we can’t reach. We can’t get on the ladder at the same time as you. It can’t hold the weight of two people. It would only break.

Your aim gets even shakier until your hands let go of the ladder. You-

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You fell.

Off of the docks and into the cloudy skies below.

I screamed. We all screamed. But there was nothing we could do.

#pirate101 #pittyober 2022 #pittyober2022 #subodai #oc: dirk #kane #the machine

[flowerandthesongstress]

The (renewed and shortened) Masterpost of 2020-2024, i.e. Muh Stuff In English.

Please note that:

Most of what I write contains romance (and it’s easier for me to write triads over couples), but it’s rarely the central point.

The majority of my works are heavy on subtext. Some are allegories. Most are autofiction.

Newer stuff (marked with a 🐝) is better. Not because I'm learning to write (I've been writing since I was a child), but because switching to English set me back considerably, and I'm still learning the language and translating my skill.

Immigration, ‘otherness’, and the search for belonging are the ever-present themes in everything I have ever written, so I’ll omit the repetition; they’re there by default, always.

See the end of this post.

Anyway, here’s some of the stuff that’s available either publicly, or on request if you’re a friend or a friend-shaped person:

Beauty and the Best friends forever — Gen, F/M/M, rated T. Word count: 75k. Themes: found family, abandonment issues, patience, depression, the power of friendship, Everything About The Shithole Is Either Ridiculous And Stupid Or An Evil Black Void Of Horror. Tagged as ‘if you only read one work by me’, not because it’s the best I've written — far from it — but for other reasons. The designated talking animal: a few demonic chickens.  

Hive — F/M/M, rated E. Word count: 128k. Themes: CPTSD and recovery, abandonment issues, capitalism, societal pressure, found family, urbanism vs ruralism, personal growth through emotional support, social anxiety, Hey You Check Your Internalized Misogyny, environmental issues, hereditary mental illnesses. /I doubt that any passerby was reading Hive for allegories, so let's just leave *that* historical layer be... Yet if you caught it, the drinks are on me. All of the drinks, bruh./ The designated talking animal: a cat.

Wrong Shoulder 🐝— the beequel; F/M, F/F, F/M/M; rated Very E; Word count: 270k. On the surface: three people, each with their personal ongoing grievances and traumas, meet and hit it off in a giant resort hotel situated in a charming coastal town. An overly cheeky voice and the mysterious number 20 are following at their heels, but the latter feels natural somehow. Underneath the surface: several mindscape allegories awkwardly climbing atop one another in the name of self-therapizing + a nesting doll of story layers (or is it). The designated talking animal: the same cat, but he’s now a bipedal and rants at everyone. Available on request (see the pinned post for contacts etc). 

Don’t Remember — F/M, F/F, F/MMM, F/F/M, rated Very E, Word count: 90k (WIP). Started out as a parody of the godawful ‘aunt polly writes poly’ ‘reverse harem’ ‘genre’ that got popularized and westernized on wutpad; somehow turned into a straightforward depiction of an adorkable polycule living a wholesome rural life. Contains all of the compersion and hugs (and recipes?!). Is mainly just for funsies and comfort. And for bleaching my brain. The designated talking animal: a unicorn. WS series. Available on request (see the pinned post).

Lawful Status 🐝— Gen, mild F/M; rated G to T. Word count 70k (WIP) Just a slow-burn teen romance with some wholesome family dynamics, taking place in an urban fantasy, written on a dare, nothing else, pinky swear... damn, almost kept a straight face 😆. Themes: I'm a metamodernist and I'll die a metamodernist. The designated talking animal: the previous unicorn's brother who made slightly different choices in life. WS series. Available on request (see the pinned post).

The Largest Eggplant in the Valley — F/M, rated E. Word count: 110k. Themes: ADHD, executive dysfunction, honesty, communication, compassion fatigue, hospitality, cultural stagnation, expressing yourself through fiction, traditions and superstitions, breaking out of intergenerational trauma. Is actually the dorkiest, sweetest, cutest thing I’ve ever written. The designated talking animal: a bear. (privated as of 2024, with a fool's hope for better times. If it was in your bookmarks and you just want to reread, contact me)

Frogs all the way down 🐝 — F/M/M, rated M to E. Word count: 33k (WIP). a toxic cesspool traumatized me so much that now I can only touch it through the double-padded cozy soft protective gloves graciously provided by a friend Yo dawg, I ❤️ your fanfiction so much that I’m writing fanfiction of your fanfiction, and it's about a character writing fanfiction. Themes: ADHD, executive dysfunction, personal growth, friendship, emotional support, processing trauma through fiction, communication, honesty. The designated talking animal: ow maaan where do I even friggin’ start.

The not-so-Great Filter 🐝— F/M, rated M to E. Word count: 70k (WIP). Themes: dealing with the loss of a parent, lookism, culturally ingrained fear of intimacy, Adulting Be Hard, existentialism meets tacos, Sad Clown Paradox meets the Fermi Paradox, East meets West but they're both Asia. The designated talking animal: ‘Not this time’. ;-)

Until You Meet Yourself and to get you home — F/M, rated T to E; just a bunch of one-shots, mostly written as gifts for my SO. Themes: insecurities, social anxiety, non-verbal communication of affection. (privated as of 2024, with a fool's hope for better times. If it was in your bookmarks and you just want to reread, contact me)

Pelicans, shmelicans! — F/M, rated T to M. Word count: 16k. Themes: childhood friendships, peer pressure, Being a Teenager Be Hard, anger management.  

FatS — F/M, F/M/M, rated E. Word count: 280k. Themes: CPTSD and recovery, empathy, insecurities, personal growth, personal accountability, Organized Religion Bad, mood disorders, colonialism, psychedelic drugs, Why Our Brains Can't Communism. The designated talking animal: suspiciously absent, unless you count the guy in the cat t-shirt. Removed (reasons), available on request (see the pinned post).

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Please also note that I am not in any fandoms or blorboing; merely using ready-made worlds sometimes, as handy outlets to channel personal stuff and write my loved ones into them. And occasionally attach funny ears to said loved ones. Point being, you don’t need to be in any fandoms or know any canons in order to read and understand, either. Another important point, though: if you are strictly after fanfiction and blorbos, then I am 100% not your gal. As in, I am not the author for you and you are not a reader for me.

PS I'll gladly read YOUR writing if it's OW and/or accessible to a non-fandom person, and send you a dozen keyboard smashes or a lengthy essay (ask me about my profession). But you might have to send it to me directly too, as I do not browse ao3 and my access to it is blocked. Please just talk to me in private and we'll sort it out👋

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#writing masterlist