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nonsensicalramblings79 · 8 months

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The Rime of the Ancient Mariner and parallels in OFMD

2.7k word meta

If you haven’t read my other post about why I’m talking about albatrosses in the first place, read the first part of this and come back! All of this will make the most sense if you read all of the parts I’ve written – I’ve split them up for ease of reading, because holy shit this is long.

TWs: animal death, blood, eating animals, starvation, emotional abuse, physical abuse, gunshot injuries, suicidal ideation, canon-typical mental health problems

MAJOR OFMD SPOILERS THROUGH S2E03

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Let me start out by saying that yes, this is anachronistic – this poem wasn’t written until 1798. I also don’t care: Oluwande is wearing crocs, Stede’s “corpse” is crushed by a piano whose maker won’t exist until 1863, Blackbeard’s got his whole leather-daddy getup, Zheng Yi Sao won’t be born until 1775 – OFMD plays fast and loose with historical accuracy, and I am never going to dismiss an OFMD theory because the timeline doesn’t match up :P

Now that that’s out of the way, a little bit of background information. Long summary incoming.

The Rime of the Ancient Mariner is a poem written by English poet Samuel Coleridge. The story is told through the words of the mariner, who has recently survived some horrifying ordeals, soon to be told to a poor unsuspecting stranger who just wants to attend a wedding. As the story goes, the mariner set out with his crew of 200-some-odd men, and everything’s going just peachy until some storms pick up and drive them toward the South Pole. Stranded and lost, the crew fear for their lives, until an albatross appears. At the same time that the albatross appears, the storms clear, the helmsman is able to make their way through the ice of the South Pole, and a southern wind picks up, pushing them back north. The albatross follows the ship, but the mariner believes that it is somehow responsible for the mists and fog that now surround the ship, so he shoots the bird with his crossbow. At that point, the fog and mists actually do clear up (by coincidence or otherwise) – and the crew praise the captain for taking down the bird.

But it’s a fickle crowd – soon the wind stops blowing, and the ship is becalmed; the crew blame the Mariner for killing the bird that had been their good luck. They sit in the middle of the ocean for days or weeks, dying of thirst. They cannot even speak, they’re so thirsty – but they make sure that the Mariner knows that he is to blame for this by tying the albatross’s body around his neck and forcing him to wear it like a grotesque necklace. Eventually, everyone on the ship except the Mariner dies (there’s a bit here about Death and Life-in-Death rolling dice to see who lives and who dies – the important part is that none of the crew survives).

Finally, the Mariner is left alone on his ship of corpses, which strangely do not smell or rot. He wishes he could die, but he doesn’t. During this time, he begins to appreciate what there is left to appreciate – the life around him in the ocean, in the air, “all things both great and small” – and the curse is lifted from him. The albatross detaches from around his neck and sinks into the ocean.

From this point on, the story goes about as you’d expect – the curse being lifted, the wind picks up again, setting the Mariner speeding back home (though, perhaps unexpectedly, his crew gets to come back as zombies for a short while to man the ship until it reaches land again, at which point they die again. RIP). As the ship is coming upon the Mariner’s homeland, it sinks like a rock to the bottom of the ocean – a hermit happens to see the Mariner floating out there and comes to pick him up, thinking he’s dead. When the Mariner opens his eyes, the hermit believes him to be the Devil himself (I mention this only because I think the wording of “Demon? I’m the fuckin’ Devil” lines up perfectly with this).

As penance for shooting the albatross (as if all of this so far wasn’t enough), the Mariner spends the rest of his days wandering the earth, telling his story and making random wedding-goers sad.

HOO BOY, that was a lot. (A whopper, one might say.) Thanks for sticking with me so far.

Now, some of the parallels between this poem and the events of OFMD are more neat and tidy than others are. The biggest parallel, obviously, is the link between the albatross and the “impossible birds” that Ed references in S2E01 – the entire reason I started reading this poem to begin with. The links between the show and the poem are not ones that I think the characters in the show (Ed) are consciously making. I think these allusions more reflect the themes and symbols that the writers and directors want us as the audience to pick up on. Therefore, the “impossible birds” conversation in canon is not talking about albatrosses in the sense that they are commonly referenced in literature, as the proverbial weight around one’s neck that represents guilt – but we can still talk about that symbolism outside of canon.

And talk about it I will.

For those of us who have watched the show, it probably goes without saying that Ed’s got a fair amount of guilt, shame, psychological trauma, etc. that he carries around with him. So if we’re going to invoke the albatross metaphor following S2E3, what specifically can we say is Ed’s “albatross?” There are a few candidates that immediately come to mind. It could be his guilt surrounding a) his father’s murder; b) Lucius’s attempted murder; c) the abusive, toxic relationship that he carried on with Izzy; or maybe even d) himself.

That last one is a little esoteric, so let me explain. Ed hates himself – aside from all the self-destructive tendencies as evidence, he admits it out loud in his dream with Hornigold in S2E03. I wonder if the albatross that is hanging around Blackbeard’s neck is Edward – the real Edward, the one that is more than just his fame, his terrifying persona, his violence-as-a-form-of-love tendencies – the Edward that Stede fell in love with. I wonder whether Ed’s guilt surrounds more than just how he’s hurt others, but how he feels he has killed a truer, better version of himself, and that he can never regain it. In line with The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, killing this “albatross” of a better Edward didn’t just kill him – it killed everyone around him as well. And now, after he has borne the blame of others for having gotten them into this situation, he is forced to wear…himself. The guilt that weighs him down is the knowledge that there is a version of him that was loved, that Stede loved, and in his eyes, he has killed that version of himself.

I want to take a moment to acknowledge a post (or several posts) that I saw several months back in relation to season 1. In these posts [Link1, Link2], smarter people than me drew a connection between a metaphorical albatross and the black cravat that Stede gives to Ed – and that Ed continues to wear until he and Stede change into their privateering academy garb. Something both of those posts touch on is how the cravat represents Stede, and I think that is completely true; however, I posit that the cravat represents the fact that Ed is lovable.

Something that’s been pointed out in the past 48 hours since these episodes dropped is that Ed is not wearing the cravat during the first parts of season 2. Only when he essentially decides to kill himself via storm do we see him once again wearing the cravat (the cravat is also noticeably absent from the purgatory dream sequence).

What exactly this means is still shaky to me – in my mind, Ed does canonically see the cravat as a reminder of his “real” self, and he puts it away and tries to hide it while he’s still…well, functioning is far too strong of a word, but at least not actively suicidal like we see at the end of episode 2. I think hearing Izzy supposedly shoot himself is what pushes Ed over the edge into being actively suicidal; perhaps at this point, some part of Ed is still hoping against hope that he can convince himself not to do it, to wait for Stede. Alternatively, it may be that if he dies here, he wants to take the idea of a “better him” with him.

In the sense of the cravat representing the albatross (meaning the cravat presence is not a choice of the characters, but of costume design), the cravat being missing during the batshit-insane-high-on-rhino-horn Kraken era may represent him not actually feeling the guilt of losing himself during this time. He may have actually convinced himself that a lovable version of himself never existed, and he’s living guilt-free. The guilt comes back when he hears Izzy shoot himself – he’s reminded that he caused this by killing a version of himself that Izzy trusted and even loved, in his own fucked-up way. From then on, the cravat is back on – the guilt is back, and it’s strong enough to induce the kamikaze-type rage we see in the storm.

(Important to note here that while I stand by this interpretation, I’m not sure how it fits with the fact that Ed is wearing the cravat just after the Krakening – the moment when he’s looking back on the island that he just abandoned the Revenge crew on in S1E10.)

I’m leaving this one for myself to come back to later on the off-chance I have some sort of epiphany.

Oh wow, you’re still here?? Probably time for a water break. Go on, the rest will be here when you get back. And there’s unfortunately quite a lot more that still needs to move from my brain to this Word doc.

Ready? Ok.

So that’s one possible interpretation of what Ed’s “albatross” is – I won’t spend time on other possibilities because what I’ve laid out here is the interpretation that I most strongly subscribe to. But all that is only really addressing one part of The Rime of the Ancient Mariner. Granted, it’s the most important part, symbolically, but there are some other parallels that I want to address that together convince me that the writers of OFMD are actually, specifically referencing this poem.

Obviously, there’s a parallel in that both the happenings of the poem and OFMD occur on actual, physical ships, captained by the man who ends up “shooting the albatross” and being rightfully blamed for it. Both of these ships suffer because of the dead albatross – physically, both ships are taken through devastating storms, and both ships are falling apart. The ship in the poem stops moving indefinitely because of a becalming (all wind and ocean currents stopped); the Revenge stops moving indefinitely because Ed removes the wheel. Both ships suffer casualties – in the poem, everyone dies, and on the Revenge, those crew members may be physically alive, but they are haunted by it. The poem makes note of the fact that the crew died of thirst – while this doesn’t seem to be a main concern on the Revenge, the show does show us, rather graphically, that they were beginning to starve, having to catch and eat raw seagulls to survive (note that dead birds are also a recurring theme in OFMD, leading me to believe even more that albatross references are intentional).

There’s an interesting pattern in the poem concerning dead people – specifically, how they don’t seem to be entirely dead at first. Firstly, the crew that die of thirst drop dead, one by one, on the deck of the Mariner’s ship. However, the poet notes that the bodies did not decompose or smell. Later, these bodies are resurrected by whatever sea spirit chooses to spare the Mariner’s life, using the bodies to man the ship and sail it back to shore. When they are done with this, they drop dead once more, staying on the ship as it sinks to the bottom of the ocean. When the hermit finds the Mariner floating in the ocean, he thinks him dead, before the Mariner’s eyes shoot open (similar to a certain someone at the end of S2E03).

In season 1, I can’t think of any instances wherein someone was presumed to be dead, but actually wasn’t, aside from Stede’s fuckery. However, this theme has come up at least 3 times in season 2 so far: Lucius being the obvious one, then Izzy, and finally Ed himself (and if I’m understanding correctly, Ed was actually, literally, cold-in-the-ground physically dead, not just “presumed dead.” This might be clarified in a future episode). That seems…intentional.

Side note: how long was Ed supposed to have been dead? Days? Didn’t anyone notice that he wasn’t, like, rotting? Especially when “the smell of rot” has been something that very consistently shows up in the show when it’s relevant (see: Lucius’s finger infection, Ed being able to smell Izzy through the walls of the ship).

One more thing: the last thing that the Mariner sees when leaving the shore, and the first thing he sees when he gets back? A lighthouse. Now, could that just be a coincidence, with lighthouses being a very common image in sea-based stories? Sure. But I’m choosing to believe that this poem was chosen (and yes, I say chosen – as in the writers took inspiration from this poem) specifically because it has so much imagery in common with OFMD.

These are admittedly tenuous links between the poem and the show, but they are links, so I’m including them.

The last thing I want to mention about this poem is how its “moral,” if it can be said to have one, is to treat living things with respect – you as a person do not live in a vacuum, and your actions have consequences for others, not just yourself. And I think this sentiment lines up incredibly well with a line that Jim has in S2E02:

…

There was a time when life meant something on this ship. When we lived for each other.

…

According to Jim (and according to literally everything the show has been telling us), the ship was a safe place when the people onboard cared about each other. Fang mentions that Blackbeard didn’t even react when Ivan died; Blackbeard callously shoots his first mate, with the intent of having him killed; he doesn’t even care about his own life and whether he lives or dies. Just like in the poem, this is the issue that needs to be resolved in order for the curse to be lifted – the Mariner (Ed) needs to rekindle an appreciation for life. In the poem, this is a simple “every living thing is special” kind of epiphany – I get the feeling it’s going to be a much more complicated journey in OFMD, especially since the show as a whole is somewhat irreverent concerning the deaths of non-recurring characters. For Ed, I imagine it’s going to be more of an appreciation for his own life – not the value of life on the whole, but the value that his life holds.

So. That’s a lot of words that I just typed – I’m hoping at least some of them made sense. Huge thank you to anyone who made it this far! This is all I’ve got on this particular poem, but I’ve still got more things I want to say about another poem called L’albatros (Charles Baudelaire) and how it relates to Ed and his perception of himself. It’s a huge stretch to say that this poem exists in-universe and Ed has read it, but it makes sense to me and I want to get my thoughts down on (virtual) paper – I’ll link to it in the original introductory post (link to that at the top of this post!).

Let me know what you think!! This silly, stupid pirate show will be consuming my thoughts for at least the next several months, and I’m dying for some reciprocal opinion/info-dumping. Inbox is open!

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alternis · 9 months

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several days ago my brain did some calculations and beamed into my conscious thought "if third eye au tim is parallel to both cass and red hood Jason maybe he should have cotard's syndrome after shiva saves his life. he's self aware that it's an irrational delusion, but other than compartmentalisation and meditative techniques there isn't a lot he can do bc mental health care in the dcu is Real Bad"

(cotard's syndrome is a set of related delusions that the sufferer is dead/missing body parts/etc, sometimes called 'walking corpse syndrome')

its a thematically a blending of cass's death wish and Jason's "I died and came back" thing (since Jason doesn't die in this au so tim fulfills a symbolic parallel of his role as a ghost from batman past reminding him of how he failed them),

except rather than seeking death or revenge it turns inward (since Tim tends to live in his own head when stressed. a withdrawn tim is a struggling tim). like, he isn't seeking death. because on a subconscious level he's convinced he already died and is somehow still functioning. anf he's not going to put himself in dangerous situations because he thinks he deserves it, like cass, or seek revenge for his death like Jason. he's very high functioning. but it means he's also weirdly chill about the concept of dying and accepts that shiva is going to kill him some day and doesn't do a lot to avoid that future since internally it doesn't feel like a big deal.

but he definitely doesn't want to kill anybody ever again, consciously because a) his personal moral compass and b) to him his death and the act of killing zsasz are intrinsically linked. but also, on a subconscious level, being dead is terrible and he doesn't want to inflict it on another person.

it starts immediately after he wakes up from surviving the Very Traumatic Exsanguination where he absolutely would have died if it weren't for shiva's healing techniques and getting him a backalley blood transfusion (and possibly his heart gave out/had to be manually restarted for Symbolic Purposes), and is just. unobtrusively laying beneath every decision he makes going forward. it really doesn't help that death isn't a permanent condition in dc, and the more public resurrections there are the more he's like. well shit maybe this isn't such a Weird Situation.

this idea slowly permeated from the back of my head out into third eye canon

potentially, and I'm still trying to figure this one out, a version of the evil future titans plot happens but tim figures out in a private conversation with one of the evil future titans (via deduction from how they treat him as neither a potential threat nor potential ally) that in their future he's dead, and is just very chill about that concept even when he asks for more details and finds out that it'll be three months from now but none of them will be able to prevent it because none of them know the details. he just vanished, and later shiva admitted to having killed him.

so of course rather than start preparing a daring counter move (he already used up the poison gambit) he just gets his affairs in order and waits for shiva to contact him, and when she does vanishes into the night

except at this point in the timeline danny temple/krait is a reluctant teen titan member, tracks Tim down and interrupts the fight (a very bad idea! that is shivas least favourite thing!) but, unlike Tim, he has actually planned for how to prevent shiva killing his bestie/long time crush ever since he found out that she trains people in order to Duel with Them to The Death when they're at their peak prowess. so he manages to take a wounded Tim back to a secret kobra bunker and after some Dramatic Talk tim reveals the whole. 'doesn't really care about dying because he's felt dead since the day she saved him and every time he looks in the mirror all he sees is his own corpse staring back at him' thing. yes he knows it's irrational and delusional. of course he won't tell the other titans. he figured out the secret identities of half the justice league as a teenager and was trained by the world's deadliest martial artist, he cant let anybody know he's got Flaws or Instabilities bc then he'd become a potential threat (somewhere, batman feels a moment of strange validation over his paranoia towards his allies on the justice league. he shrugs and goes back to spying on green lanterns text messages)

after he finally accepts his condition may benefit from actual treatment he can go ~mad scientist~ and seemingly start secretly researching mind control/brainwashing technology but when the team confronts him it turns out he's just trying to treat his own mental health condition diy style bc he justifiably does not trust the psychiatric professionals of the dc universe. he gets a secret villain lab setup as a treat. as an enrichment activity. he and krait take apart stolen kobra technology to reverse engineer it together instead of going on normal dates

#one time I had an experience where i was convinced i was secretly an ai in an android body and it affected me greatly #and also still currently have ocd. dealing with delusional thinking whilst aware it's delusional thinking. yeah I'll project that onto Tim #third eye au #does this makes sense? maybe not. compels me though

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transingthoseformers · 10 months

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Sorry to come in here with another AU, but while working on the next part of my "RodiTarn knew each other since Hot Rod was born and dated AU" I realized that I created a split timeline now.

Because Tarn found the Rodimus corpse, the Lost Light 1 never picked it up and because Tarn was in mourning the Lost Light 2 wasn't killed because no Brainstorm call.

So I had to figure out a.) What made Rodimus leave the room? and b.) What happened to the Lost Light 2? And b.) answers a.).

WHAT HAPPENED TO THE LOST LIGHT 2?

We're gonna say Elegant Chaos happened there instead of Lost Light 1 only with a different cast and this time Chromedome is the one who died injecting to kill Overlord, so no Overlord duplicate. Brainstorm looked at his friend's widow and made the same decision that saving everyone was new goal. But now he didn't have the Dark Cybertron distraction or friends like Skids, Getaway, Nautica, or Chromedome interrupting. Only occasional visits from Rewind.

Only Drift and Brainstorm know that it wasn't an engine accident that Chromedome died in, because Brainstorm made Drift promise to keep it secret to "preserve their memories".

Brainstorm of Lost Light 1, meanwhile, due to the lack of encountering the Lost Light 2 and Rewind reunion immediately ends up making a deal with someone and as part of the payment he includes Megatron's green Spark.

(Yes, Stormy sells children.)

This Spark ends up in the hands of Brainstorm 2, who is in the same place to buy parts but has roped into paying lying about what the parts are for. No the seller doesn't question it, all robots look the same.

Brainstorm 2 is able to pull the trigger in this timeline, and it is Rewind 2 who protests losing him.

Whirl 2 still acts as midwife with Drift 2 assisting.

Temporal shenanigans do not end as smoothly though because the distruction of the cases interferes with the engines and they end up jumping to another dimension though not in the same way as the split rather they rip a whole through a la Astrotrain from Cyberverse and end up in that dimensional deadzone in Cyberverse meeting a version of the Arc who they help get to there place and them to another dimension.

(Percy breaks the locks.)

They spend hundreds of years trying to get back and lose and regain people. Some find places in other dimensions or die.

The Lost Light 2 goes down but Cyb!Astrotrain is recruited to help the reduced crew which ends up consisting of IDW1!Drift 2, IDW1!Rewind 2, IDW1!Pipes, a version of Earthspark!Cons: Starscream, Nova, Skywarp, Soundwave, Ravage, Shockwave, Cyb!Percy, Cyb!Astrotrain, Cyb!Dead End, Cyb!Soundwave, TFP!Soundwave, TFP!Lazerbeak, etc.

They do get back to their home dimension but then see Lost Light 1.

WHAT MADE RODIMUS LEAVE THE ROOM?

Ultra Magnus telling him Drift was back.

Will this ever come up in the timeline?

The next part is from Megatron's perspective, and things are about to get weird. Because LL shenanigans are great and now with a collection of people who decided to stay instead of leaving with Astrotrain to keep exploring the multiverse.

Who exactly I am still deciding, but Megatron did at one point have to interact with three Soundwaves, all of whom were pissed and considered him different levels of traitor.

Wait

Waiiiiit

Waitttttwaitwaitwait

I'm still trying to get a grasp of what's going on because shit goes from 0 to 100 quickly when you deal with alternative versions of the same character/crew

And I'm failing because my neurons are like silly string today

#maccadam #transformers #au #transformers more than meets the eye #transformers cyberverse

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daz4i · 1 year

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ok spoilers for chapter 88 and onwards ahead for the 2 followers i have who avoid bsd manga spoilers!!!!!!!

stop reading here I'm warning you

ok so. I've seen ppl discuss whether or not akutagawa will survive post vampire apocalypse thing. and i wanna offer my 2 cents

while i do agree with the people saying his death scene was kinda perfect and super satisfying, i think that's only true when you look at it in a vacuum rather than in the context of the whole story, and mainly his 6 months deal with atsushi. and this is why i think there's no way he will perma die before this showdown happens, or at least when we get close to it in the timeline (which I'm p sure we aren't, it's been maybe 2 months at most since they made that deal i think, and that's me being generous with my calculations)

giving that exact time frame of 6 months is too specific to not have a proper payoff. akutagawa can't die yet (like. if it was some vague promise to last as long as it takes for atsushi to become stronger or smth, this would've worked. but the number has to be important. otherwise it wouldn't have been so explicitly stated and iirc even repeated later on)

so this is established. now I'm gonna get into fanfic territory bc this is what I'm thinking about instead of sleeping

i think being unvampirized - either by bram or dazai or however this'll go down - won't just make him his normal, alive self. tho, this last chapter confirmed the vampires can self heal, so maybe this is how it'll go, but i want the angst of it not counting bc it's also part of the ability or w/e, so if the ability cancels out then so will all of its effects. bc i said so. and this is the only way my idea can work.

so anyway now we've got this more corpse-like than usual akutagawa on hand. and atsushi is freaking out. i wanna say everyone has grouped back up together, ada and mafia even maybe, so they all see him freaking out, too.

some of them are confused - weren't you two enemies? yes, you worked well together, but was your bond really that deep...? - is what they think. some of them get it, tho.

in his panic, atsushi locates yosano, practically begging her to heal akutagawa, he's not dead yet, but he's very close to that, and she can help

there's this moral dilemma for the ada, remembering how some of them were directly hurt and injured by akutagawa, and how the mafia is still very much their enemy, and yosano is also having these thoughts. fukuzawa is still missing and can't deliver the final decision on the matter

but atsushi seems so distressed, over this man who tried to kill him so many times. he is mumbling about how akutagawa hasn't killed in awhile, how he tried his best not to hurt anyone, how he's atsushi's partner now.

if atsushi wants him to live, how can the ada say no? and so, yosano uses her ability to save him. the first thing he sees once he's fully conscious, is atsushi's face above his, tears in his eyes

and. this is all i have for you. they reunite - properly - and it's very sappy. love wins.

#disclaimer this isn't actually how i think it's gonna go #HOWEVER i did try to keep it relatively realistic #i do want atsushi to call akutagawa his partner at some point in this arc tho.#dan rambles #~imagination edition~

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navysealt4t · 7 months

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HI JAZZY I HAVENT BEEN IN HERE IN AAAAAAGES HELLO!! ^_^

okay so for one. this fic is tearing out my heart. uhm. forgive the Nonsense. this is part of my planning / concepting and it isjust. stuck in my brain. it gets so much worse but like also i just. i feel the need to share this

Mapicc is the first real case of it happening in the group, and it shakes everybody because really, nobody saw it coming. Sure, he was a bit reckless, he didn't always use the safest tech, and had a tendency to get it from shady places, but that didn't explain how or why he suddenly turned on all of them. Zam, Ro, and him, they were close. They were Team Awesome, for god's sake! The first team that Zam ended up with after the M.O.B. went to shit, and Mapicc was one of the two leading the whole operation. Ro was shaken a lot more by Mapicc's disappearance, and when he later on returned, completely acting wrong and not at all the way he was supposed to, nobody really knew what to do about it. Zam tried to talk to him, only to realize he wasn't responding to external stimuli correctly, mostly just staring blankly and not exactly understanding. He looked at them, he was aware enough to know where they were and who they were, but he couldn't, or didn't want to, respond to them. No matter how hard they tried to shake him from it. It was horrible, and it completely tore apart the team, especially since it ended up just being Ro and Zam at the end. Even though they were close and relatively understood each other, they liked each other's company, there was nothing fully keeping them together or in the same space proper. Ro held onto a lot of Mapicc's jewelry and smaller items after he disappeared; Zam didn't keep anything, especially not after Mapicc turned up a month later and was like a rabid dog at his door, begging to be let in but immediately attacking him upon being let inside. It was a horrible, traumatizing experience.

^ i am actively being plagued by this group. ALSO the fact that like. ro doesn't have the heart to kill mapicc (and because really that's the only thing anybody can think to do in these situations) so he just. desperately keeps trying to bring back his friend. he looks at the not-all-there-practically-a-corpse of his best friend and has to make sure he lives through the day. even when mapicc bites the hand that feeds.

it's horrible and i love this and i need to include it more in the main fic but i CANNOT work it in without absolutely killing the pacing and timeline. woopsie. (this is all backstory Things and it shakes the whole story. even if they dance around it.)

OH AND ALSO! unrelated song that i love so dearly that frequently has me in tears ^_^

HAUNT ASK HAUNT SNIP HAUNT SNIP!!!!!n!!

OUUGH??? YES. ohh you just love a group of fucked up traumatizedguys. i’m so eepy to form uhh words and thoughts but something about this is biting my brain…

also i hateee hate hate when i wanna include something so badly but it just. does Not fit in with the fic </3 worst thing ever

#asks #beloveds <3 #haunted ghouls

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harley-style · 2 years

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Reading the Homestuck Epilogues 3 (parts 21-30)

Hey guys I'm back on my bullshit! Here's hoping it goes well lol but we all know that's just a pipe dream.

Anyway, here's the previous part!!

Now onto the chaos!

A coffin is still fukcing heavy and you're telling me Jake and John ALONE can carry the fucking thing? omg.

I feel like Roxy is not treating this funeral the rightul respect and somberness it deserves, but is it just me or...?

Aradia and Sollux! and they really don't give a shit about most things dont they. Aradia only came here for the corpse party and honestly, slay

I get heart palpitations when Dave calls Jade babe. also poor karkat he's at the back. noooo

Wait. Is teen dead jade from fucking MEAT??? or is she the one from. uh. the caliborn narrative takeover thing. listen its been a while since i read the later homestuck ok i barely remember what happened in act 6

LOL YES AWKWARD ROSE RIGHTS

Jane. Jane you fucking moron.

Karkat literally do not rise to the bait I am begging

"sometimes i wonder what it'd be like if he was still here" FAMOUS LAST WORDS

SO IT IS MEAT JADE

MOTHERFUCK

please god just let john and terezi be together their dynamic is SO GOOD

oh they're 26 now awesome

OH NO JANE WHAT THE FUCK

okay i know it's bad to blame everything on jane but I HAVE A FEELING SHE'S INVOLVED

WHAT OKAY WHAT THE FUCK

POPULATION CONTROL IS ONE THING BUT WHAT THE FUCK IS THIS BULLSHIT ABOUT NOT ALLOWING TROLLS TO ADVANCE POSITIONS THAT"S BULLSHIT

oh? OH???? RESISTANCE POG????

okay fuck everyone else rebellion leader karkat is my bitch now

why is eridan fuschia is this a typeset error

john you're a moron (affectionate)

:((( what happened to "not taking your shit" roxy :((((

Save Tavros From Evil

yknow what i hate about candy davejade rn is that they keep everything buried and pretend everything's fine. like jade baby at least push dave or pester rose about what's wrong with dave like....?? idk! but not this!!!

okay. what the actual shit jane. yknow what? you're a bitch! you're a full on bitch and i hope you get what's coming to you. what the FUCK am i hearing from you? that is NOT how you treat your friends/datemates!

fuck you guys im reading a bunch of aus to cope wit this mess of an epilogue

okay i love and support whatever john's trying to do but this plan is. not the best.

I just skipped over an entire conversation because i cannot deal with that rn. someone tell me what happened during the time john tries convincing tavros to leave the crocker household

WOW OMINOUS

johnrezi/junerezi rights :((((

:(((((((((((((((((((((((((((((((

KARKAT!!!!!!!!!!

Huh. That's a less brutal capital punishment than I was expecting. Still horrifying! but I expected more blood. which was kinda dumb of me lol.

REMEMBER WHEN KARKAT USED OT BE SO EMBARRASSED BY BUCKETS??? MY BOY HAS GROWN

Kanaya Is Right Karkat Call Dave That Bitch Is Dumb Enough To Run To Your Side The Instant You Ask For Him

But Bat Your Pretty Eye For Extra Simping

MEENAH

let's kick it karkat lets goooo

NO THE FISH PUNS ARE COOL

That is a whole ass page of words sir

John :(

"epilogue six" what the fuck does this mean

these kids are thirteen w h a t

ARE KARKAT AND MEENAH TOGETHER????

okay aradia has a point its extremely ironic for karkat to reach the peak of his heroism in a world that objectively *does not fucking matter* and the "meaty" timeline where everything "DOES" matter is where he's... well, we all know.

oh no,,,,the davejade wedding,,,,this hurts.

THIS HURTS DAVE IS STILL LOOKING FOR KARKAT

okay everyone seems to be like, convinced meenah and karkat are a thing but are they REALLY? karkat hasn't come out and said anything specifically.

HE RIPPED HER PHOTO NOOOOOO

lock industry?????

Vriska's back everybody say hello

"is it the prince" IM SORRY WHAT

when WHO falls???

jake what the fuck happened to you. oh my god you don't deserve this. leave her. leave jane's stank ass.

ah. i remember karkat talking about how he wasn't to blame for mr. crocker dying, in hs2. guys id apologize for spoiling myself like this but i think you'd understand: this post-canon thing is pain. everything hurts. if i want spoilers im getting spoilers.

GUYS. NONE OF THIS WOULD HAVE HAPPENED IF YOU DIDNT BUTT YOUR STUPID GODLY SELVES INTO THE MIX. THE FUCK ARE YOU BLAMING THE TROLLS FOR. JANE.

oh boy.

WELP THAT'S PART THREE FOLKS. WOW I HAVE SO MANY FEELINGS I WISH TO UNFEEL. THE BLOOD OF MY DREAMS HAVE BEEN SACRIFICED TO THE GODS OF PARADOX SPACE AND NEVER AGAIN SHALL I SEE THE LIGHT OF DAY.

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thebonerpit · 1 year

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I need to talk about Dragon Age Absolution because yeah I’m late to the party but I finally watched it...

First of all, I can’t get over the utter ridiculousness of Hawke failing to kill not one but TWO villains. Like. what the FUCK lmfao. This poor man/woman. And poor Varric too, holy shit. But I am a bit confused because Varric was viscount of Kirkwall at the end of DAI right? Was this already happening and he somehow just didn’t notice?? (There was also some weird timeline fuckery with Hira saying her family was killed by Venatori when she was a small child but now she’s at least 20 and the Venatori didn’t even exist until DAI. DA4 cannot be 15+ years later, that would be bananas.)

I was kind of spoiled for the Meredith reveal but I didn’t know she was fully aware and talking and controlling red lyrium templars?!?!?! I thought she was just gonna be the red crystal and that artifact was going to wake her up but I guess she’s already awake, so maybe it’s to give her a body again? IDK IDK.

Unfortunately I didn’t love Miriam. She’s just the type of character I don’t generally like... kinda 2edgy4u y’know? I mean she’s basically a female Fenris but the difference is we had a whole-ass game to get to know him and see his personality emerge and see him work through his trauma but this entire series was over SO fast that I never felt like I knew her at all. I knew Hira was going to betray them because there was absolutely no fucking way Fairbanks was the real traitor and if you played Inquisition you probably knew that too. It sucks he died but at least he wasn’t a bastard. Oh and speaking of Hira I just find it so funny that she was like “yeah I asked the Inquisition to go WAR with Tevinter and they said NO can you believe?!” and I’m like YES I can believe, what the fuck? Are you kidding me?? You think the Inquisition - who are already being scrutinized and accused of being power hungry and are dealing with mountains of other things - are going to start a war with one of the most powerful nations in Thedas? I have to laugh.

Rezaren had the personality of a piece of wet bread and I was zero percent interested in his whiny shenanigans. Although I do appreciate how he thought that keeping the reanimated corpse of his dead slave around to chat to every now and then was NORMAL. Horrific. I actually really liked Tassia though! Because for almost the entirety of DA we’ve sort of been told that Tevinter templars are weak as kittens and are basically pointless, but Tassia was a certified boss swinging that hammer around. It was weird that we never saw her use any templar abilities though (unless I missed it?) so maybe that is sort of frowned upon in Tevinter.

The real winners here are OBVIOUSLY Lacklon and Roland omg babessssss. Roland was by far my fave character. Optimistic and heroic with just the right amount of sass so he wasn’t boring. Qwydion was... ugh ok I am on the fence with her. There were a lot of parts where I really did like her but imho they just made her a BIT too silly. Like running away screaming from the demons... girl... you’re a badass mage, what the hell was that?!

Anyway overall I give it a solid 7/10. I think I was just so excited to see something new in the DA world again /sobs, so I can overlook some of the faults. I am both terrified and excited for DA4 because I thought we would be mostly dealing with Solas and his bullshit but now we have Meredith + red templars invading Tevinter which is already struggling to repel constant Qunari invasions?? Things are not looking good for Tevinter tbh and if that means something bad happens to Dorian I will RIOT.

#dragon age absolution #tbptalks #this is a massive braindump lol #also me seeing .2 seconds of cullen in the background of one scene: A CRUMB

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chronologicalhomestuck · 1 day

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karkat pov liveblog: hivebent, part 4

karkat sees something very upsetting on his computer while on gamzee's planet. they dont have the viewports yet so this must be his sburb player. wow his hair kinda looks like anime badboy hair vents right now lmao

rip sollux :(

karkats dismay here is really sad when you get to it like this. like oh wow yeah. he tried so hard to make this work. he got so far. but sollux didnt QUITE make it. look he was SO CLOSE. he had his totem ready to make his entry item and everything!

damn thats harsh jack. cmon stop slapping him his bestie just died horribly. check out gamzee's cool rocket unicycle! looks like a wweird fishy guy is bothering both of them...i think we are skipping that from this pov tho.

very understandable reaction from karkat. that corpse looks pretty nasty! but hey at least sollux is ok.

CG: THIS IS AN EMPTY THREAT, BECAUSE IF YOU MADE A BOARD AT ANY POINT ON THE TIMELINE I WOULD BE ABLE TO SEE IT RIGHT HERE AND READ THE WHOLE THING ALREADY. CG: WAIT... CG: OH GOD, YOU ACTUALLY DID. GC: Y3SSSSS! GC: FUTUR3 T3R3Z1 1S LOOK1NG PR3TTY COOL R1GHT 4BOUT NOW >8]

i dont remember how much i should know about this right now (had i read this in the order it is written) but it is fun feeling like these characters trying to deal with this timeline shit.

CG: LOOK I DON'T CARE ABOUT THE FRUITY RUMPUS ASSHOLE FACTORY. CG: WHAT'S ALL THIS ABOUT GOING AFTER THE QUEEN'S RING. GC: W3LL GC: TH3 TH1NG TH4T 1S 4LL 4BOUT 1T 1S GC: W3 H4V3 TO GO 4FT3R TH3 QU33NS R1NG GC: 1T 1S 4 N3W M1SS1ON CG: BUT WE'RE STILL IN THE MIDDLE OF TRYING TO PULL OFF REGISURP WITH JACK. CG: WHY DON'T WE TAKE IT ONE MISSION AT A TIME. GC: Y34H 4BOUT TH4T GC: TH3 WHOL3 PO1NT 1S TO D3STROY TH3 R1NG SO J4CK DO3SNT G3T 1T CG: WHY WOULD WE WANT TO DO THAT, JACK'S AN ALLY. GC: 4LSO GC: TH3 M1SS1ON SORT OF 1NVOLV3S 3X1L1NG J4CK TOO GC: >:|

regisurp is still in progress, but looks like it has been...terezisurped >:]

CG: THIS IS BULLSHIT. CG: WE'RE NOT EXILING JACK, HE'S COOL. GC: K4RK4T, H3 1S NOT TH4T COOL! CG: YES HE IS, HE'S A TOTAL BADASS WITH A FUCK TON OF BLADES AND SHIT, AND HE'S HELPING US OUT.

we did see jack speaking to karkat as his exile a few pages ago, so we know he needs to get exiled...but karkat is not on board with this plan!

CG: THE BOTTOM LINE IS I AM NOT GOING TO EXILE JACK BECAUSE YOU BELIEVE YOU CAN SMELL MALICE OFF AN INTERPRETIVE DANCE. GC: K4RK4T, H3S 4 J3RK! GC: H3 H4S ST4BB3D YOU ON MOR3 TH4N ON3 OCC4S1ON! CG: SOME OF THOSE STABBINGS WERE ACCIDENTAL! GC: >8| CG: OK, WELL I KNOW FOR A FACT THE THIRD TIME WAS ACCIDENTAL.

he has been stabbed by jack several times, and on purpose at least twice. and yet he still thinks they are besties. what is wrong with him.

CG: ANYWAY YOU'VE BEATEN THE SHIT OUT OF ME A FEW TIMES YOURSELF. GC: BUT 1 D1DN'T DR4W BLOOD!

getting a bit blackrom there, eh?

GC: 1 M34N 1 COULD H4V3 TO S4T1SFY MY CUR1OS1TY >:] GC: BUT 1 D1DNT 4S 4 COURT3SY TO YOU GC: S1NC3 YOU ST1LL W4NT TO K33P 1T 4 S3CR3T FROM M3 L1K3 4 P3TUL4NT L1TTL3 W1GGL3R >:P CG: HEY I PROMISED I'D TELL YOU. CG: I JUST CG: WASN'T READY OK GC: W3LL GC: 1TS OK GC: 1 KNOW WH4T COLOR YOUR BLOOD 1S 4NYW4Y >:]

as sweet as this is... very interesting, terezi...

GC: 1 F1GUR3D 1T OUT MYS3LF CG: HOW GC: 1 GOT 4 CLOS3R LOOK GC: R3M3MB3R >:] CG: NO GC: PFFF YOU 4R3 PL4Y1NG SO DUMB, YOU KNOW 3X4CTLY WH4T 1 4M T4LK1NG 4BOUT

...very interesting indeed...!

CG: I CLEANED UP MY WOUND AND CHANGED MY SHIRT BEFORE I EVEN MET YOU, I'VE BEEN EXTREMELY CAREFUL. CG: SO YOU'RE GOING TO HAVE TO FILL ME IN. GC: 1T W4S WH3N 1 GOT CLOS3 3NOUGH GC: TO SM3LL 1T UND3R YOUR SK1N GC: PL34S3 K4RK4T, DO NOT PR3T3ND TH4T YOU FORGOT 4BOUT OUR L1TTL3 MOM3NT CG: WHOA CG: YOU MEAN CG: DURING CG: FUCK. CG: OK SHHHHHHHHHH SHH SHH SHH...

🤨🤨🤨 now what exactly do u mean by that karkat. 🤨🤨 yall make out? 🤨🤨🤨

CG: WE CAN TALK ABOUT IT IN PERSON. GC: HOW "1N P3RSON" DO YOU M34N?

🤨🤨🤨🤨🤨🤨

GC: YOU H4V3 NOT 3V3N S33N SK414 Y3T CG: HOW AM I SUPPOSED TO WAKE UP. GC: 1 DONT KNOW! GC: SOM3TH1NG D1FF3R3NT DO3S 1T FOR 3V3RYBODY CG: HOW MANY OF US ARE AWAKE NOW?

its gonna be a while before that happens, buddy. and not under great circumstances, either.

GC: HOW 4BOUT 1F GC: 1 T3LL YOU 4LL 4BOUT TH4T STUFF N3XT T1M3 W3 4R3 "1N P3RSON" >;] GC: 1N F4CT, 1 W1LL T3LL YOU WH3N YOU W4K3 UP! GC: UNT1L TH3N 1 W1LL K33P T4BS ON YOU 1N YOUR TOW3R WH1L3 YOU SL33P L1K3 4 L1TTL3 HON3Y P4J4M4'D PUP4 N3STL3D 1N H1S COCOON CG: WAIT LET ME GUESS. CG: DO I LOOK ADORABLE????????? GC: 4CTU4LLY GC: YOU LOOK K1ND OF L1K3 4 B1G P1L3 OF SM3LLY B4RF CG: WOW, WHAT THE FUCK. GC: OF COOOOUUUUURS3 YOU DO, DUMB4SS >:]

gosh, i love them. i forgot how much i love them

GC: DONT WORRY 4BOUT TH3 R1NG M1SS1ON GC: YOU C4N ST4Y BUSY W1TH R3G1SURP GC: 1 W1LL ORG4N1Z3 TH3 N3W M1SS1ON MYS3LF

and so both missions begin to be carried out simultaneously! regisurp will still be in action, while terezi plans to destroy the ring and exile jack...i suppose they dont conflict yet?

ill be back after dinner with a conclusion to hivebent >:]

#homestuck #liveblog #homestuck liveblog #pov: karkat #hivebent #hivebent: karkat

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pesterloglog · 5 months

Text

Caliborn, Dirk Strider

Act 6, page 5071-5075

uu: BETTER HuRRY uP.

uu: YOu CAN'T ESCAPE THE MILES.

uu: NO ONE CAN ESCAPE THE MILES!

TT: Why do you keep saying that?

TT: Are you trying to turn it into some sort of Thing?

uu: IT ALREADY IS A THING. INASMuCH.

uu: AS FACTS ARE THINGS.

uu: HERE ARE MORE FACTS THAT ARE THINGS.

uu: YOu ARE GOING TO DIE SOON.

uu: YOuR WHOLE uNIVERSE IS GOING TO DIE.

uu: BECAuSE.

uu: YOu CAN'T.

uu: ESCAPE.

uu: THE MIIIIIIIIIIILES.

TT: Sorry, it's not going to start being a Thing no matter how much you say it. Give it a rest.

uu: NO.

TT: What I don't understand is how the attack is making its way here from Derse.

TT: Is that even possible?

uu: WHAT.

uu: JuST BECAuSE THE SAME THING IS HAPPENING THERE.

uu: YOu THINK THERE IS CORRELATION. BEYOND SOME SORT OF CIRCuMSTANTIALLY SIMuLTANEOuS. FuCKRuBBISH?

uu: YOu'RE SO DuMB.

TT: So, you know why this is happening?

uu: YES.

uu: THESE MILES ARE FROM JACK. WAY OuTSIDE YOuR uNIVERSE.

uu: THE MILES ON DERSE ARE FROM ANOTHER GuY. WHO'S JuST. SITTING IN A CASTLE SOMEWHERE PROBABLY.

TT: That doesn't actually explain a whole lot, but ok.

uu: SOMEONE COMMISSIONED JACK. SORT OF.

uu: PuT OuT A HIT ON YOuR ENTIRE uNIVERSE. AND ALL ITS INTERNAL ITERATIONS.

uu: DON'T YOu THINK THAT'S FuCKING AWESOME?

TT: I thought you didn't know much about our story? You usually like to brag about how you don't care about details like that.

uu: I MAINLY JuST SKIM PAST IT ALL WITH DISGuST. EXCEPT FOR THE PARTS.

uu: WHERE PEOPLE DIE.

uu: I COuLD READ THOSE.

uu: OVER AND OVER.

uu: AND ALSO MAYBE THE PARTS.

uu: WHERE PEOPLE "KISS"?

uu: IN THE WAY THAT WHEN YOu CHANCE uPON SOMETHING.

uu: uNSPEAKABLY AND VISCERALLY ABHORRENT.

uu: IT GETS HARD.

TT: Does it now.

uu: TO PRY YOuR EYES AWAY!

uu: YOu DIDN'T LET ME FINISH.

uu: TO PRY YOuR EYES AWAY.

TT: Oh.

uu: HEY.

uu: WHY ARE YOu GIVING ONE OF YOuR HuMAN "THuMBS uP".

uu: INTO THE SKY.

uu: IS IT AN INDECENT GESTuRE.

TT: I guess you would probably think so.

uu: OH YES.

uu: I THINK IT'S PROBABLY TRuE.

uu: KEEP SHOWING ME THE NASTY.

uu: I DEMAND A STEADY DIET OF RIBALDRY AND. *SHuDDER.*

uu: POIGNANT EXPRESSION.

uu: EITHER KEEP THAT uP.

uu: OR MAKE SuRE THAT.

uu: THE CORPSE PILE.

uu: DOESN'T STOP FROM GETTING TALLER.

uu: OR BOTH. IDEALLY.

uu: BOTH WOuLD BE GREAT.

TT: Your staccato babbling is just so choice today. But I really have to go.

TT: Got to escape all these goddamn miles, remember?

uu: AAH HAA HAA!

uu: YOu CAN'T!

uu: YOu CAAAAAAAAAAAN'T.

uu: ESCAAAAAAAAAAAPE.

TT: The miles. Right.

TT: Bye.

uu: BuT SERIOuSLY. WAIT!

TT: What.

uu: I WANTED TO GIVE YOu SOMETHING. A "PRESENT".

TT: What?

uu: IT'S A TOKEN OF. uH. "THANKS". uGH.

TT: For what?

TT: Can we seriously move this along.

uu: FOR HELPING ME. WITH THE THING YOu JuST HELPED ME BuILD.

TT: God, what are you talking about.

uu: FOR YOu IT WAS YEARS AGO. BuT FOR ME. SOLICITING YOu FOR ASSISTANCE WAS QuITE RECENT.

TT: Oh, alright. I remember now.

TT: You're always all over the timeline and somehow expect people to know what you're talking about.

TT: So what's the present?

uu: BEFORE I GIVE YOu THIS TREASuRE. FIRST YOu MuST DO SOMETHING FOR ME.

TT: Man. You really do struggle with human customs, don't you?

TT: When you're about to give someone a gift out of gratitude, you don't then start negotiating with them and ask for shit before handing it over.

TT: Just fuckin' give it to me already.

uu: NO. DO WHAT I SAY FIRST.

TT: Ok, what do you want me to do to collect my awesome prize you're allegedly thanking me with?

uu: YOuR JuJu.

uu: REMEMBER I TOLD YOu TO BRING IT TO THE ROOF.

TT: Cal? Yeah, I remember.

uu: SHHHHHHHHHHH. DON'T SAY ITS "NAME" YOu IDIOT.

uu: NOW TAKE OuT THE JuJu.

TT: Ok. Now what.

uu: NOW THROW IT IN THE FIRE.

TT: Screw you.

TT: I'm not chucking the C-man into a flaming ocean.

uu: IT IS THE uLTIMATE ABOMINATION.

uu: YOuR JuJu MAY BE DEAD AND HOLLOW. BuT SOMETHING TELLS ME.

uu: THAT MIGHT MAKE IT EVEN MORE DANGEROuS.

uu: DISCARD IT AT ONCE. TREASuRE BEYOND COMPREHENSION IS YOuR REWARD.

TT: No.

TT: Keep your treasure.

uu: AH HA HA. AS IF IT IS NOT INEVITABLY DESTINED TO FALL FROM YOuR HuMAN FINGERS.

uu: AND BECOME ERASED AS YOuR uNIVERSE DIES.

uu: DIDN'T I MENTION.

uu: A JuJu CAN NEVER BE TRuLY COPIED.

uu: IF TWO APPEAR TO EXIST. SuCH AS ONE IN REALITY AND ONE IN YOuR DREAMS.

uu: IT IS ONLY AN ILLuSION. EITHER NEVER TRuE. OR SOON TO BE CORRECTED.

uu: THERE CAN ONLY EVER BE ONE.

TT: Well, I'm not tossing him, so that's that.

uu: YOu WILL THOuGH.

uu: ANYWAY. YOu TOOK IT OuT.

uu: I WILL DEEM THAT COMPLIANCE ENOuGH.

uu: AND REWARD YOu WITH MY GRATITuDE.

uu: I THINK INSTEAD OF THANKS THOuGH. I WILL CALL IT. A "BIRTH DAY PRESENT"?

TT: It isn't my birthday.

uu: NOT YOuRS JERK.

TT: Oh. So it's your birthday today?

uu: IT WILL BE.

uu: IF EVERYTHING GOES ACCORDING TO PLAN.

TT: How cryptically meaningless.

TT: And you continue to struggle with human customs. You don't give other people presents on your own birthday.

TT: Anyway, just tell me what it is.

uu: IT IS A "WORK OF FINE ART".

uu: THE VERY FIRST I HAVE EVER ATTEMPTED.

uu: YOu WILL FIND IT SuITABLY CONVEYS OuR SPECIAL BOND.

TT: Let's see.

uu: http://tinyurl.com/DIRKTHISISuS

TT: Uh.

TT: What the fuck am I looking at here?

uu: DON'T YOu SEE?? IT IS uS! YOu AND ME.

uu: WE ARE GETTING PERHAPS A LITTLE TOO. *FRIENDLY.* IF YOu WILL. HAA. HAA.

TT: I... really don't see.

TT: What do you mean? This fucking scribbly bullshit is us? Are we shaking hands or something?

uu: WHOA! WHOAAAAAAAAAAA! DuDE. HAHA. FuCK.

uu: YOu HAVE AN EVEN DIRTIER MIND THAN ME. I'M FuCKING OuTCLASSED BY YOuR REPREHENSIBLE IMAGINATION ONCE AGAIN.

uu: I CAN'T SAY I'M SuRPRISED.

TT: So, it's just us? What about The Bitches?

TT: I thought you found a scarcity of The Bitches to be all but unacceptable.

uu: THE BITCHES AS YOu CAN PLAINLY SEE HAVE BEEN FAR FROM NEGLECTED. LOOK.

uu: THEY'RE RIGHT THERE ASSHOLE. THE BITCHES APPEAR TO BE. *AHEM.* RATHER ENJOYING EACH OTHER'S COMPANY???

uu: OOOOOOOOOOOH.

uu: SOO GNARLY.

uu: TO IMAGINE. WHAT FILTH MY OWN HAND HAS WROuGHT.

TT: Yeah. Gnarly is about right.

TT: This is utter shit. You know that, don't you?

TT: Please don't tell me you are actually incapable of understanding how bad this drawing is.

uu: WHAT. NO. FuCK YOu.

uu: IT'S PRETTY GOOD. AT LEAST FOR A FIRST TRY.

TT: If you actually think this even qualifies as a drawing, I'm going to have to say you are literally the worst artist who has ever existed.

uu: WHAT THE FuCK. THIS IS HOW YOu TREAT. MY "BIRTH DAY THANK YOu GIFT"??

TT: That's not a thing either.

TT: You must have some wires crossed between your left brain and right brain. Like a weird perceptual disorder. Or something like that.

TT: It's actually kind of fascinating that you think you achieved something visually coherent or recognizable.

uu: THIS IS OuTRAGEOuS.

TT: Anyway. Got to go.

TT: Your drawing blows.

TT: Later.

timaeusTestified [TT] ceased pestering undyingUmbrage [uu]

#homestuck #caliborn #dirk strider #homestuck act 6 #page 5071 #page 5072 #page 5073 #page 5074 #page 5075 #homestuck act 6 act 3

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sserpente · 3 years

Photo

A/N: Ohh, the first of many to come! This Imagine is a typical case of “Loki wraps everyone around his fingers in 0.3 seconds” and RC is a Loki fangirl. Enjoy, everyone! ;-)

Words: 2496 Warnings: SPOILERS FOR EPISODE 1 OF LOKI, angst, mentions of murder

A/N: Besides, I really wanted to write about Loki seeing Frigga’s death and blaming himself. *sad sigh*

If you took that match and lit it… how fast would the many stacks of paperwork on your desk burn? You eyed the matchbox curiously. Fast enough for it all to turn to ash, before the fire extinguisher came on and transformed the entire office unit into a swimming pool? Oh, that was even better… all of the paperwork drowning, washed away a little spark.

Hunter B-15 would have you reset for that. But it would be so much fun, no?

“I know what you’re thinking. I’ve thought about it before but it’s not worth it. Trust me—the paperwork would just double.”

You looked up, finding Mobius standing right in front of your desk with a few documents in hand, an honest smile on his lips. You sighed.

“What do you want?”

“Are you settling in well?”

You scoffed. “Hardly… how are any of these people…” You raised your hands, gesturing around the office unit, “…content with their lives here? Have they ever even seen sunlight? I am dying of boredom. I’m starting to think it would have been better to be reset after all.”

“No, don’t say that. You made the right choice.” He said, speaking your name. “Come on. I would like to introduce you to someone.”

You raised your eyebrows at him, sighing once more but complying nonetheless, your mind drifting off as you followed him through the endless hallways, walking past dozens of Minutemen and TVA officers handling the same boring paperwork that you had to do.

Mobius had found you approximately a year ago. You were a Variant—a left-over from a timeline reset, so to speak and it was obnoxiously hard trying to understand why you were and when you were. All you remembered was an explosion, being hurled through what had felt like space and next thing you knew, you had ended up here, wearing an ugly grey jumpsuit. All because you had tried to find a way back home. It mattered little that you had left corpses behind.

You’d never asked what Mobius had seen in you but when he had offered you an alternative to being reset, you had accepted. Anything was better than death—even a life behind the desk. You still remembered what your life had been like before, of course. Meeting friends, going out to party, reading fantasy books, going to the cinema and swimming… you even missed your former job.

The TVA was boring, yes. But at the very least, it gave you access to every living being in the multiverse—and that included the very god you now found standing right in front of you in the cafeteria, lifting his chin in a desperate attempt to radiate arrogance.

Your lips parted. Oh my God.

“Not boring, right?” Mobius whispered.

“Not in the slightest.” You chuckled to yourself, never taking your eyes off of the God of Mischief until finally, a charming smirk spread on his thin lips.

“I am Loki. You may have heard of me.”

You chuckled once more. “It’s hard not to hear of you.”

He frowned at that—a frown which did not falter even once you sat down at one of the round tables and you finally introduced yourself as well.

“Why is she here?” Loki asked.

“She is here because she regularly considers burning this whole place to the ground and because she’s bored.” You answered for Mobius, raising an eyebrow at Loki.

“I am like you. I’m a Variant.” You explained. “Only I didn’t try to take over the world.” You added with a sly smile. Loki glared at you in response. Mobius cleared his throat and spoke your name in a taunting manner. He was the only one still standing.

“We spoke about this. Let’s be nice.”

“I’m always nice.” Crossing your hands before your chest, you leaned back in your chair and eyed the God of Mischief up and down. He was even more handsome up-close, especially with that suit Mobius had given him. You did prefer the Asgardian leather though… and that green cape… the golden horns…

“So you are Midgardian?” Loki probed.

“You mean human? Yes. I am.”

“I’ll go get us some coffee,” Mobius announced, shooting you one last warning look as if you were the more dangerous one out of the two people he left behind, before wandering off towards the coffee machines (the only blessing in this godforsaken place, truly). As soon as he was out of your reach, you turned to Loki.

“Which one are you?” You asked him bluntly, leaning forward on the table to get a proper look at him. You didn’t exactly care you were being rather rude. Loki was by far the most interesting thing that had happened to you in the last three months—well, maybe except for when Casey almost choked on a piece of his eraser last week.

“What is that supposed to mean?” He retorted.

“Right, sorry. What’s the last thing that happened to you? How did you hop off your timeline?”

Loki scoffed and rolled his eyes. “The Avengers appear to have been toying around with time travel. Right after the battle…”

“New York? The battle of New York?” You interrupted. He nodded curtly.

“…well, let us say things did not work out all too well for them.”

“You got away.” You concluded, grinning at him.

“What about you then?” He asked, probably out of hostility more than genuine interest or let alone politeness.

“I don’t remember.” He gave you an incredulous look. “Really, I don’t. But I did… let’s just say I didn’t care how many dead bodies I left behind in my attempts to get back home. One grows desperate when caged for long enough. You would know of all people. I never thought I’d turn into a murderer but here we are.” You scoffed. “It’s ironic though… the same thing is just happening all over again now. I don’t even remember the last time I was outside, breathing in fresh air.”

“Maybe I could change that.” Mobius tossed in, returning to the table with three steaming mugs of coffee. “You used to be a history teacher, no?”

“Why are you asking me? You know that.”

“It was a rhetorical question. We could use your expertise.”

“Oh yeah? Now, all of a sudden? You sentenced me to spend the rest of my life behind a desk and I haven’t seen the end of it in over a year. What changed your mind?”

Mobius smiled. “You don’t trust me.”

“No. Obviously not.”

“Well, then Loki and you have something in common here.” He winked at you, making you roll your eyes. Mobius knew, of course. You had been fangirling over the God of Mischief like a teenager and had kept devouring the footage on his timeline until you knew it by heart. It was comforting, somehow. Knowing that you were not the only one who had made bad decisions out of grief, anger and loss of control.

The fact that you were exceptionally calm right now was a scam. On the inside, you were bursting with energy. Part of you even longed to throw yourself into Loki’s arms and give him a well-deserved hug. It was just that you would never admit that.

“Look. Loki—this Loki—is going to help us.”

“I wouldn’t put it past you. He’s a huge fan.” You said, pointing at him with a smirk.

“Last time I checked so were you.” He shot back, making you smile.

“Yep…”

“Let’s get to work. I have a lot for you two to catch up on.”

Two hours and another coffee later, Mobius finally finished his lecture. Your head was fuming and you had the faint feeling that Loki’s was too, even if he refused to show it.

Mobius had filled you in on all of the details. The Variants they were currently hunting down, the recent timeline breaches resulting from it and how they intended to fix it all. You still weren’t sure how your help was so necessary all of a sudden… but you certainly appreciated the change of scenery.

You flinched when Mobius spoke your name, your eyes burning from all the files he had spread out on the table before you. “Why don’t you accompany Loki to his room? I’ve got some more work to do before I call it a day.”

The God of Mischief snorted while Mobius handed you a set of keys with a unit number on it. “You mean my cell.”

“It’s a room!” Mobius insisted. “It’s a room. It’s getting late, you’ll need your energy for tomorrow.”

“I thought time works differently around here.”

“It does. That doesn’t mean you won’t need sleep. Here,” Mobius handed you the time twister. “Take this too. Just to be sure.”

“Fine. Come on then, Trickster. I’m tired.”

Loki gave you a glare. He stood reluctantly, and you could practically feel him exchange another heated look with Mobius before following you back through the maze of hallways and towards the main elevator. Mobius hadn’t been lying, it wasn’t a cell. In fact, the unit number on the keys was on a rather fancy floor too. Well, he was a king… and a god.

“And so the hunter is alone with his prey,” Loki growled when the elevator doors closed, a mischievous smirk playing on his lips. He glanced at you from the corner of his eye, his hands clasped behind his back as if he wasn’t at all fazed by his situation.

You rolled your eyes and chuckled. Damn, there was the Loki you loved.

“Don’t think you could threaten me. I’m not afraid of you. We’ve all done our fair share of bad things. Else we wouldn’t be here.” You spat half-heartedly, crossing your arms before your chest.

Loki narrowed his eyes at you. “Killing strangers? I killed my own mother.” He snarled.

“This isn’t a contest, you…” You stopped, looking up at him and only realising now what he had just said. “No. No, you didn’t.”

“Yes, I did. I saw.”

“Who the fuck told you that?”

The God of Mischief took a moment to reply. “Mobius. He showed me what happened in what you call the sacred timeline.”

“Mobius showed you your tape?” You frowned. “He never does that, he… well, did you watch the entire one?”

He squinted. “Why, was I supposed to rub it in?”

“No… that’s… Loki, you sacrificed your life to save the world. After this, Thor freed you and you went to Svartalfheim together to defeat the dark elves. You took revenge. Thor thought you died after Algrim stabbed you in the chest but you survived and then… you took the throne of Asgard. And why wouldn’t you? No one would have wanted to go back to that cell full of solitude and loneliness. Odin was particularly cruel with how much he wanted to isolate you… not even Frigga was allowed to visit. That’s why she used her powers to talk to you.”

You paused, taking in his indignant and shocked expression. “Mobius failed to mention that your other self, your… well, the original… blamed himself for Frigga’s death too. That is simply not true. You didn’t kill her. Malekith did. For Heaven’s sake, Loki, don’t let him manipulate you! That is just what he wants so you will help him!”

“I don’t let anyone manipulate me! I am the God of Mischief, I am not manipulated, I manipulate!”

“Are you quite sure about that?”

“And what of you?” He mocked, his voice hoarse. “You claimed to have spent the past year behind a desk after leaving a trail of corpses behind you!”

“So?”

“Mobius doesn’t trust you either, does he? The same thing is just happening all over again now,” he repeated your own words back to you, approaching you with slow and menacing steps; but you stood your ground, glaring up at him bravely.

“You know I believe that he knows you were about to do something exceptionally stupid, resulting in you getting reset. This—me—you—is but a distraction. A pathetic attempt to keep you in check, to keep you under his control.”

Fuck. You swallowed thickly, biting your lower lip. Was he right? You did wonder why Mobius would pretend to need your help after all these months of endless paperwork… did he suspect anything? That you were on the verge of losing your shit, burn this whole place to the ground?

The elevator doors opened and once more, you walked side by side in silence.

“You know I’m right.” He said when you unlocked the door and stepped inside. You had swiped the key card twice before it finally beeped and the red little light on the automatic lock turned green.

“Probably. I wouldn’t trust Mobius and the rest of the TVA as far as I can throw them. If you think about it… I’m just a prisoner here. But I have a choice—if I’m ever fed up with this, they’ll just reset me.”

“And then what?”

“Then I’m dead. Gone. Forever.” Loki stepped closer to you, towering above you like a giant. It was a fitting description. He was a Frost Giant, after all.

“Now that would be a rather tragic ending to your story, wouldn’t you agree?” He paused. “Thank you.” You frowned at him.

“For what?”

“For this.” Loki smiled, holding up the time twister he must have taken from your pocket in the elevator already. Shit. Panicking, you reached for it, only for him to snatch his hand away faster than you could blink. His blue gaze never left yours when he removed the collar and tossed it to the ground, his fists clenching.

Your eyes widened. Was this it? Was he going to kill you? You knew he didn’t need any of his powers to end someone’s life… Loki was a god. He was strong enough to crush you with his little finger.

Killed by your idol… the object of your desires even. You hadn’t just once masturbated to the thought of him. Oh, what an ironic way to go.

Much to your surprise, however, Loki offered you his hand and tilted his head.

“You are either with me or you are against me. But know that there will be deadly consequences if you are the latter. Betray me—and you die.”

Swallowing thickly, his blue eyes locked with yours, freezing you in place. “Tell me that it was determination and mischief that I saw in your eyes.” You shivered when he spoke your name, your heartbeat speeding up. “Join me.”

Your lips parted. What? He wanted… you to join him? Yes. Yes, yes, yes! Yes, you wanted to join him. Yes, you wanted to leave the TVA behind. Screw Mobius. Screw everything!

You smirked, nodded and took his hand. “Fine. Let’s get the hell out of here.” Lucky for you, you still had those matches in your pockets.

A/N: If you enjoyed this Imagine, I would appreciate it so much if you considered supporting me on Kofi! ko-fi.com/sserpente If you can’t, that’s alright, I’ll be just as happy with a like, a reblog or even a comment! ♥

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nonsensicalramblings79 · 8 months

Text

L'albatros and parallels in OFMD

1.4k word meta

If you haven’t read my other posts about why I’m talking about albatrosses in the first place, as well as the literary significance of referencing them, read those and come back! All of this will make the most sense if you read all of the parts I’ve written – I’ve split them up for ease of reading, because holy shit this is long.

This particular post is what I will deem as less likely to be supported by canon than the one talking about The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, but I still want to get this out because regardless of whether it’s intentional or not, L’albatros sums up a lot of what I feel Ed is thinking regarding his life and his place in the world.

For future reference, I’m writing this on 10/8/2023, so I’m only working with season 1 and the first three episodes of season 2. More than likely, extra information concerning my theories will come up when new episodes are released – I’ll see about reworking these posts then if necessary.

TWs: suicidal ideation, depression, isolation, canon-typical mental health problems

MAJOR OFMD SPOILERS THROUGH S2E03

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

Just like in my post about The Rime of the Ancient Mariner, I’ll clarify that yes, this is anachronistic – this poem wasn’t published until 1859. I also don’t care: Oluwande is wearing crocs, Stede’s “corpse” is crushed by a piano whose maker won’t exist until 1863, Blackbeard’s got his whole leather-daddy getup, Zheng Yi Sao won’t be born until 1775 – OFMD plays fast and loose with historical accuracy, and I am never going to dismiss an OFMD theory because the ~timeline~ doesn’t match up.

L'albatros is a poem written by French poet Charles Baudelaire that describes the plight of the albatross – a mighty king of the sea and sky, with massive wings that dwarf other seabirds (no, for real, these things are gargantuan – its wingspan is wider than most humans are tall) – who is well suited to its environment, but only its own environment.

The poem is originally in French, and while there is an English adaptation of it, when I quote from the poem, I’ll be drawing from the original text and translating it. I think that method best captures the original intent of the word choices.

So, the poem starts out by describing a common pastime of sailors – catching albatrosses that fly alongside their ships, bringing them down onto the deck and keeping them from flying away (how exactly they do this is not made clear in the poem). The poem describes the downed birds as pitiful, clumsy, and ashamed/shameful (French: honteux). Their great big wings trail beside them as they try to walk, dragging like oars. Here are the first 2 quatrains, if you want to try to read them or translate them.

Souvent, pour s’amuser, les hommes d’équipage

Prennent des albatros, vastes oiseaux de mer,

Qui suivent, indolent compagnons de voyage

Le navire glissant sur les gouffres amers.

À peine les ont-ils déposés sur les planches,

Que ces rois de l’azure, maladroit et honteux,

Laissent piteusement leurs grandes ailes blanches

Comme des avirons traîner à côté d’eux.

The third quatrain essentially describes, from the perspective of an onlooker, how utterly stupid this bird looks. He is gauche – a word you might recognize from its English usage – which is translated as “awkward,” but I would argue that in the case of describing humans, this word also can be translated as “socially inept.” That’s important, I’ll come back to it later. The bird is veule – a word that translates directly as “weak” or “spineless.” He, who was so beautiful just a short time ago, is now comical and ugly.

Ce voyageur ailé, comme il est gauche et veule !

Lui, naguère si beau, qu’il est comique est laid !

Continuing the third stanza, the sailors poke and prod at the albatross, making fun of how he has been crippled by having landed on the deck of the ship.

L’un agace son bec avec un brûle-gueule,

L’autre mime, en boitant, l’infirme qui volait.

The fourth and final quatrain makes a link between the author of the poem and this albatross that he observed. To me, the wording here is really what drives home the connection between Ed and the poet/the albatross, so I’m going to translate each line.

Le Poète est semblable au Prince des nuées

The Poet is similar to/like the Prince of the Clouds

Qui hante la tempête et se rit de l’archer

Who haunts the tempest and laughs at the archer/bowman

Exilé sur le sol, au milieu des huées

Exiled on the earth/soil/ground, in the midst of jeers/booing

Ses ailes de géants l’empêchent de marcher.

His giant wings keep him from walking.

Quick clarification - I’ll admit that there’s a huge assumption that I’m making in that the writers of OFMD decided to reference this specific poem in this extremely tangential way, despite the albatross here representing something entirely different than its normal meaning in literature. For the sake of argument, I’m going to assume for the rest of this post that they did do that, and that this poem exists in-universe over 100 years before it was written in real life. Ok? Ok! :D

So at this point, if you’re familiar with Our Flag Means Death, you may have guessed that the connection I’ve drawn is between the narrator of this poem (the Poet) and Ed. In my mind, at some point in his life, Ed has read this poem, and he has also heard that little factoid about albatrosses spending their entire lives away from shore (and read my first post if you need clarification on that!). And over the course of his life, and especially the past several months, he’s come to associate himself with the views he’s cultivated of the albatross – never meant to leave the sea, never meant to be a part of life on shore (“polite society”), and he would look stupid and silly if he tried. This is a view he’s held since childhood – as we see with his conversation with his mother in S1E06 –

…

We’re just not those kinds of people.

…

And it’s a view that Stede had started to put a dent into during their time together. Where Ed says he’s not a good person, Stede vehemently defends his good character. Where Calico Jack says pirates don’t have friends, Stede tells him that he’s his friend. That Ed wears fine things well, that he’s quite sophisticated. All things that Ed has never allowed himself to believe could possibly be true – until he met Stede, he never even considered that he could “land” – and for a few precious weeks, Ed believes him.

And then Stede leaves. After Ed has laid himself bare, more vulnerable than he has ever let himself be in his life, after Ed has exposed who he really is – the only person who has ever wholly accepted him leaves. And Ed is left floundering, like the mighty prince of the sky trying to walk on the deck of a ship. That fourth quatrain brings a lot of scenes from the show to mind – here are some examples.

The Prince of the Clouds, who haunts the tempest.

The one who is exiled on the Earth.

In the midst of jeers. (recall the use of the word “gauche”? I believe that in this case, the “socially inept” definition applies even better than the simple translation of “awkward”)

His giant wings keep him from walking.

The way this poem describes the plight of the albatross is nigh on exactly how Ed is supposedly seeing himself post-breakup. He just was never meant to have the kind of life that he wants; he’s extremely good at one thing, and one thing only – violence. He will never have any other life.

This is why I think Ed has read this poem – because he references the albatross as a “bird that never lands,” and in the poem, this bird just so happens to also be seen as stupid, ugly, and gauche when it is put into any situation other than what it excels at. And regardless of whether this is actually intended to be a canonical reference or even if it was completely unintentional on the part of the writers, this poem holds a special place in my heart because of how well I believe it captures Ed’s emotional situation.

So, thanks for making it this far – I’d love to hear some feedback if any of you have anything to add! As always, my inbox is open, feel free to DM if you want to do any reciprocal info/opinion-dumping about the beloved Pirate Show!!

#ofmd #ofmd s2 #ofmd s2 spoilers #ofmd spoilers #ofmd meta #ofmd s2 meta #blackbeard ofmd #ofmd blackbeard #stede bonnet #gentlebeard #blackbonnet #literary analysis #albatross #metaphor #our flag means death #our flag means death s2 #our flag means death meta #our flag means death spoilers

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delicrieux · 3 years

Text

—MAKE YOU SAY “OH” EXTRAS: TINDER

extra meaning non-canonical occurrence; can be placed anywhere in the “make you say oh” timeline after couple (cha. 14) and before the final “oh”.

pairing—corpse husband x f!reader warnings—tinder profiles, tw: men, swearing. word count—2.6k. format— written. ─── ❥ req by nonnie: y/n makes a youtube vid/live stream where she's just swiping through her tinder acc and corpse literally blocks her lmao

author’s note—akldsljfs this was such a funny idea i could not not write it lmao

ultimate masterlist. myso masterlist

You have pulled the biggest brain move by setting up both a facecam and a screen recorder on your phone. All is beautifully displayed and visible during the stream. Your fanbase is particularly intrigued on what exactly are you planning on doing today, seeing as your tweet of “strea” had been a bit vague, if not downright ominous. No emojis. No elaboration. You couldn’t even be bothered to finish the word. Truly, a mystery. Everyone tuned in and are currently waiting with bated breath.

A few of your fans must sense upcoming doom because the overall mood in the chat turns from optimistically intrigued to...evil. It’s an entity all on it’s own now, clawing at you through the screen with various renditions of laughter and devil emojis. A few eggplants thrown in there for good measure, accompanied, naturally, by the scandalous water drops. At first the common consensus is that you’re biting the bullet and going through your camera roll on stream. Definitely an idea worth considering, though you frankly don’t know what lies at the start of the 11k photograph journey, and you are afraid to check in public. Could be a harmless meme, could be a salacious pic you had saved of an OF star. It’s really a gamble. Either way, you would definitely get banned. You might still get banned. Why do you insist on doing shit like this?

Because it’s funny. Because you’re kinda stupid. Because it’s just so absolutely laughably easy to do.

A smile quirks your lips, and while it is not explicitly smug, the look in your eyes sure is, “Greetings,” You utter lowly, dimming the lights--the budget for this stream! Ugh, you went all out, “my children.”

mother i crave violence

sensing evil energy rn!!

i do not claim the energy in this video for myself or anyone else watching this 💖💖

^with peace and love shut the fuck up

“I know y’all lowkey hoes-” Upon your words the chat splits into two: one side eagerly agrees (even shares a few OF accounts! How helpful, supporting small businesses!), whilst the other feverishly insists on innocence. You make a face stuck somewhere between offended and bewildered, “Now c'mon now-I know you. I know you all. We’re the same, don’t-what was that?”

You try to scroll back to the comment but it’s loss in the sea of incoming messages, “I swear to God I just saw-”

Corpse_Husband: i love late night streams it’s not like i have anything better to do.

“COOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOOORPSE!!!!”

rip headphone users

i cant feel my face when im with you by the weeknd but instead of face its my fucking ears

yall think full vol on pc is better?my parents woke up 😭😭😭😭

To think he’s spending his last waking moments for today with watching you (he probably still would have anyway, because you do not posses an ounce of shame or self-control and pester him relentlessly)! It makes your heart sing, and suddenly, a traitorous, fun hating idea barges it’s way through the crowd of incoherent buzzing and states: don’t do this. For some reason it also has the voice of Rae. As if that would work in guilt-tripping you- Rae never succeed, and her fictitious rendition in mind won’t fare much better either.

Still, you thought about it. That must count for something. Corpse will understand, won’t he? Why don’t you want to upset it in the first place? Men look so funny when they lose their shit, like hello, don’t you have anything better to do? But the image of Corpse just sitting there, hurt, distraught, leaving you on seen because he’s in his sad boy hours leaves a sour taste in your mouth.

queen rly went from 🥺😊 to 😕 u ok bbgirl?

Corpse_Husband: no pouts cutie

akjdjoeijdfse cUTIE??? deadass boutta r.i.p.

Well that succeeded in eliminating everything from mind, doubts included. If this was an anime, the scenery would shift into something roseate, with flowers and bubbles and sparkles all around you along with a halo or two. Alas, not an anime, rather reality. The led-lights, however, seemingly possessing a will of their own, slowly turn from deep violet to pink. You smile brightly, like the absolute dumbass you are, and you are met with a ray of heart and blushing emojis. You are just so cute, a real cutie! Still in your disguise adorable state, you swipe your finger on your phone screen, the grin never leaving your lips.

There, among the plethora of apps, nestled sits a red square with a white fire plastered on it. The delicate calligraphy on the bottom reads: TINDER.

The mood changes once again- you’re giving the roaches emotional instability by how quickly everything flips over- and the chat spams eggplants vigorously; some, of course, bravely fight against the thirst.

nooooooo i thought y/n is gonna stream in a god honoring way!!!

^pack it up girl defined

“So, Charlie and I-” You note a few awfully curious comments and squint, “-yes, we talk a lot. Charlie is a really good friend of mine. We’re best friends. Brothers. Sisters. Cousins. The whole fucking family tree-no, that sounds weird. Delete. Anyway, Charlie, being the absolute fucker he is, said, hey, you know what would be funny? And I was like, nooo, what would be funny, Charlie? And he says to me, he says, says, making fun of men on Tinder. And if y’all need any more proof that Charlie and I are platonic soulmates, then dunno, my children, my roaches, I dunno-I dunno what more to give you.”

You can’t be bothered reading the comments, there’s too damn many. You also need to save your reading comprehension for the actual bios. It has a time limit, that darn thing.

“Okay, so I made a profile earlier, but I hadn’t swiped on anyone yet-” Despite the fact, Tinder helpfully informs you that already 99+ people have swiped right on you, “So, this is me,” You show the pictures you have of yourself, and damn, not to be a conceited narcissist, but you look really good. Like if you saw yourself on Tinder, you’d super like instantly. “Uhm, so, my bio-my bio says: let’s sauce in the tub together, ya dig? splishy splashy, giggle giggle.”

i cant believe we are witnessing y/n trying to form a coherent sentence live

shes trying give her time

ya dig??? y not capeesh

what scene from the godfather is this lol?

“My anthem, is,” You laugh, covering your lips with your hand, “Corpsie, this is form you-” Proudly, you show that indeed, Corpse’s E-GIRLS ARE RUINING MY FUCKING LIFE is listed as your anthem on Spotify, “Hehe.” Yes, you say that aloud.

Corpse_Husband: you’re killing me Corpse_Husband: thanks baby Corpse_Husband: now delete tinder ❤︎

You ignore his last quip, deciding it’s finally time to get this show on the road, “Right, let’s do this shit. I’m not actually going to swipe on any guys that look, uh, decent? Yuck, can’t believe I just said that, uhm, because I-because I feel like some actually deserve a chance with someone? I don’t wanna get anyone’s hopes up, as I am currently in a long distance relationship with Chrollo. So I’m just gonna swipe on, like, frat boy assholes. Because I don’t care if I hurt their feelings. Quite frankly I don’t think they possess them in the first place.”

The chat voices their agreements. With the ground rules set, you, giddy, click on the first profile.

Does Tinder know what you’re doing, your plan? The FBI agent watching you through your phone must be working overtime, bless his heart. They must, because the the first guy to meet you is named Jason, and there he is, blond hair and blue eyes, holding up a fish the size of his torso. Marginally adequate in looks, pretty good muscles. A solid 7 bordering on 8. He’s the same age as you, 15 miles away, and he studies at some college you don’t care enough to look up. Bio reads:

I like to drive fast. Fishing is my passion, but if you can’t catch me by the ocean, you’ll catch me catching waves, bro! Love a good gym date. You do squats, and I’ll keep a close eye to make sure you’re doing it correctly ;) You probably saw me at a party. Leader of the The Phi Kappa Psi. I’m a Gemini, if that matters lol.

You, of course, read it aloud, dramatically; provide some constructive criticism-he seems nice, but he’s a Gemini, so naturally, you can’t trust him at all! Also, that gym date session leaves little to be desired. With your rant done, you swipe right, and shocker! (not), it’s an instant match.

“Okie, I still wanna swipe of some profiles, so I’ll see what he’ll text later-” For a second you wonder the legalities of this stream, but you’re having too much fun to think of it further, “guys, I won't get sued, right?”

NOW she considers it

well....

if you do, we’ll kickstart your lawyer dw <3

Onto the next profile. Kevin, 25, is seen fixing his car- or, you assume he’s mid-fixing it, you don’t really know why else he’d hold a wrench and be covered in oil. He’s shirtless, and the caveman part of your brain echoes something closely resembling AWOOOGA!, but...but!...blonde hair, blue eyes. You pout again, “I don’t...I don’t really like blond boys, ya know? With the blue eyes and all, it’s just not my thing, uhm, unless it’s like-like...Armin from Attack on Titan. Else I don’t care.”

Onto the bio:

You have to treat a car like you treat a woman: go on long rides, take the lead, but most importantly, keep her oiled up 😜

“What the fuck did I just read?”

The chat is equally confused. You swipe right anyway- another match. Too easy.

The stream continues without incident for a solid thirty minutes- all of your matches, expect a few that genuinely looked like normal dudes that really couldn’t write a decent bio to save their lives, had been blond hair blue eyed gym rats with ranging forms of misogyny. Some opened with asking for nudes out right, some asked about your day first before asking for nudes. You prefer the former. Straight to the point! You admire the gall.

But then, down the forty-five minute mark a profile popped up that made you still by your phone, your smile dying as your eyes bulged. Dear God. Lord in heaven. Who is this demonspiit lookalike and why is he so fucking hot? The neck tats, the skateboard, the clothes- holy shit, you gotta close your mouth before some drool dribbles out.

No bio, just his name, Tyler, and that he’s 23.

“He boutta be 23 in me.” You mutter, swiping right with lightning speed.

WHAT DID SHE SAYYYYY?????????

tyler is y/ns karma for relentlessly mocking that one guy that had a whole ass list on what his “female” partner should be

^he deserved it and also tyler seems like a typical fuckboi y/n grow a braincell

look at mom 🥺 her eyes are sparkling

It wasn’t a match right away. You somehow expected as much, but it still upset you. Simp behavior, pathetic. The stream continued bravely, and when Tyler messaged you a simple “yo” you totally didn’t sequel. You didn’t manage to text him back on stream: texting all those guys that you didn’t really find all that attractive was easy, but this...You’re a sucker for a man who radiates red flag energy. His whole profile is a red flag. He might just be a red flag himself.

What can you do? Suddenly becoming color blind is not easy. Once the stream ends, you unmatch with everyone expect Tyler. He you chat with for a bit, but a sudden craving for different company makes you abandon him, too. You don’t feel too heartbroken for him- you’re certain there’s already too many girls in his dms. You wish them luck.

Happily, you delete Tinder. You go to Twitter, notice you’re trending again- look at you go! Queen shit- and as you compose a thank you tweet, something strange happens. You go to text Corpse, but when you click on his profile you grow cold.

YOU’RE BLOCKED. You can’t follow or see @/Corpse_Husband ‘s Tweets.

...Pardon? You hop onto Instragram and-also blocked. Seriously? And you thought you’re one petty bitch. Corpse is seriously prissy about everything. Damn, if he didn’t like your stream, he could’ve just said so. Didn’t need to, like, block you from his internet existence. So not cool.

You try texting him but no text go through. Well how will you let him know you deleted Tinder just like he asked? You relieve your frustrations by punching your pillow a few times. Later, you apologize to her, you didn’t mean to hurt her, it’s not her, it’s you. Fuck, 5 minutes of exile and you’re already loosing your mind.

“Raeeeeeeeeeeee!” You whine loudly. It’s roughly 2am now, but you don’t care. You’re too heartbroken to care. There’s a thump from her room, but nothing else, “Raeeeeeeeee!!!” You wail, wallowing in self-pity on your bed. You hear a very loud, very annoyed sigh from her room, followed by angry marching. Your door is abruptly thrown open, and in the dim, colorful light you see her scowl.

“What?” She grits.

“Can you please tell Corpse to unblock me from everything?”

“What did you do now?”

“I made fun of men on Tinder.”

She pauses, “...That doesn’t sound so bad.” She surmises, voice laced with suspicion, “What else?”

“...There was one really hot guy that I kinda sorta talked to after--”

“Y/n.”

“-But I totally deleted Tinder and honestly he was pretty boring, so, like, uhm, please?”

She sighs, the servery of which implies she is holding the weight of the world on her shoulders, and instantly you know that you won. She taps away at her phone, “You owe me one.” She states, and before you can reply, she exits your room and slams the door behind her.

Grinning, you text his phone again. The message goes through, oh gosh, you’re so relieved you feel like crying. This has been, officially, the worst five minutes of your life.

You Y DID U BLOCK ME LOSER!!! MAJOR LOSER ALERT!! I DELETED EVERYTHING IT WAS A JOKE r u still mad at me? y u always mad at me i never do anything:(

my husband You’re my baby, how do you think I’ll react when I see you publicly simping for some asshole on Tinder?

Oh no, he used the words, he delivered the killing blow. You’re finished. Your heart can’t take such a workout.

Not that you would ever admit it to him, though!

You hehe ur jellyyyy u always dis jealous hehe?

my husband Not jealous.

Yeah, you might not be the brightest tool in the shed, but even you know that’s a lie. You send him an array of kissy emojis that he doesn’t have the decency to reply to. Then, completely unprompted and dead serious, you send him a simple voice memo, saying: “You really have nothing to worry about, you know? You’re my favorite, Corpsie.”

He responds via text, reiterating that he’s not fucking jealous and that he just doesn’t like when you show such outward interest in anyone but it’s not like he cares or anything. It’s just really, like, weeeeird to see his baby simping for another man like that totally ruins the whole dynamic!!! It was only natural that he should block you on every social media platform, including his personal number (which, like, was completely necessary! Doesn’t matter that his viewers can’t see it, it’s gotta be super believable!), and inform his followers of that, because it’s all a joke, like, for the dynamic, that Youtube grind, you know? Ya dig? No personal feelings were involved at all. He totally wasn’t upset that you found someone else cute, no way!

my husband I’m not jealous. Lol.

You ik u repeated tht like 50 times u trynna convince me or??? lmao

my husband No comment. ...You don’t actually talk to anyone else like we’re talking, right?

You no one else calls me their baby if thts wat ur wondering at least not to my knowledge lol im all urs

my husband That makes me very happy to hear:)

Yeah, it makes you very happy, too.

hope you liked it!! xx

#corpse husband #corpse husband x reader #corpse #corpse x reader #corpse husband x y/n #corpse x y/n #myso #make you say oh #imagine #imagines

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thecarnivorousmuffinmeta · 3 years

Note

This is a weird question, but what would happen if Edward slept with or raped Bella in Twilight and got her pregnant with Renesmee? I know that this is even more unlikely than her getting pregnant in NW, but well we're in the land of answers to unlikely questions on this blog

Well anon, I guess we're going here.

Specifically anon is referencing this post.

My Usual Up Front Note

Yes, I know, we all know this is outlandish but I have to do this. Otherwise this blog descends into me writing fanfiction, and I have an AO3 and FFNet account for that.

Edward is many things and it's no great secret that I think he... makes very questionable decisions all the time and should not be romantically entangled with anybody.

However, Edward is not a rapist.

In the original post I go over my thoughts on this but essentially the crux of it is that Edward does have his moral standards. He will not have sex with a woman without a) being married to her first and b) without her explicit consent. Which, Bella does give against his advice in New Moon, fully aware of all the consequences that Edward himself is aware of (neither knew Renesmee was on the table then).

I do not think, at least without a lot of terrible things and huge catalysts happening first, that Edward would rape Bella.

I certainly don't think they'd be having sex as early as Twilight. Bella's not yet eighteen, Edward has no immediate plans to leave her (likely telling himself he'll leave after graduation when the separation is more natural), and he has no plans to marry her.

Sex isn't even on the table in Twilight.

Come on, Muffin, Try

But, per the ask, Edward and Bella do have sex in Twilight.

I have no idea how this would occur without a substantial amount of sex pollen. So, sex pollen it is.

Edward and Bella are in the meadow, it's the happiest day of Edward's life as Bella now fully understands what he is and doesn't run in terror. It's the happiest day of Bella's life as beautiful Edward has just shown her his innermost vulnerable self.

The stupid lamb is in love with the stupid lion. Huzzah.

Just then, wafting through the sky, is a blossoming alien plant life that for some unknown reason is also an intense aphrodisiac. This likely affects the entire town of Forks, but never mind them, we're focusing on Bella and Edward.

Bella looks at Edward, Edward looks at Bella, chemicals in their brain are churning. And as many a fanfiction protagonist has found out: resistance is futile. Edward and Bella succumb to the sex pollen in short order.

Edward probably crushes Bella in the act of sex and ends up sucking her blood out of the grass like a vacuum cleaner while naked. When he comes to, there's bits of Bella's pancreas on his face. He sobs in despair, for he is the world's greatest monster who has raped the love of his life to death and then devoured her corpse.

He goes to Volterra to kill himself. Aro's not sure what to say to any of this, Caius judges Carlisle by association.

However, we're not in that timeline per the ask.

Instead, somehow, despite both parties being not at home, Edward does not crush Bella in the midst of intercourse. Instead, as the sex pollen fades, they get to stare at each other in the aftermath.

They're in a meadow, naked, their clothes are torn into pieces, neither Bella nor Edward is a virgin and both of them can barely remember having sex.

Edward likely flees with suicide on his mind.

He may not have crushed Bella and devoured her corpse but he did just rape her. His inner demon took over and tarnished the most wonderful thing in all the world: he is no better than the monsters he once devoured.

He's likely planning his flight to Volterra before he even gets to the house. All he needs is a change of clothes and a credit card.

And luckily for him, since the entire town just succumbed to sex pollen (including the Cullens), Alice is probably in too much of a daze to see what's about to happen. Edward is able to find some pants, purchase a flight, and runs.

Bella is left naked and alone in the meadow. And very, very, sore.

Eventually, she has to hobble back to the street. She probably gets lost, as she did in canon. Eventually, a search party is probably sent out for Bella. One of the Cullens probably finds her first and... holy god she's looking full on rape victim.

No clothes, shivering naked and dangerously cold, covered in bruises.

Carlisle has not seen Edward all day, sex pollen descended on the town, this is painting a very bad picture of what just happened to Edward and Bella.

Bella tries to insist she's fine. She's not. She's taken to the hospital. And then the bomb drops. Bella easily confesses to Carlisle that she and Edward had sex. Bella has had sex with no one else. She's given a pregnancy test, it comes back positive.

Bella is pregnant with Edward's vampire child.

Carlisle... does not know how to tell Bella. Bella takes it very well surprisingly. By which she doesn't at all.

She does not want to be a teenage mother, that girl in that small town, at all. (She also would be devastated to be thought of as Edward Cullen's rape victim, but Bella's oblivious to that whole part of this)

She also has her whole life ahead of her and never wanted kids or to get married. She's seen how that shit turns out.

On the other hand, this is Edward's child, how can Bella take something so beautiful out of this world? Also, Renesmee's probably working overtime.

Bella tells Carlisle, right there in the hospital, that she's keeping the baby. Yes, she knows that she will have to fake her death, that she'll never see her family again. Yes, she's carrying a child that Carlisle's never seen before, he's not an OBGYN, and there's no telling what will happen. Yes, she's aware she could die. She's doing this.

Well. Carlisle's life just got ten times harder.

He fakes her death in the hospital somehow. Bella Swan dies of internal bleeding from the rape and is carted out of the hospital. Charlie, naturally, comes to arrest Edward Cullen (despite the entire town being affected by sex pollen all at once) but Carlisle truthfully notes that Edward isn't there. He hasn't seen Edward since the day before.

Charlie is also probably working overtime as the whole damn town was raped and does not have much time to look into this. Though Bella will be top priority case.

Charlie leaves (likely to go get a search warrant) and Carlisle gets to breathe a temporary sigh of relief. That sigh of relief is very temporary. Alice comes in in a flurry: Edward has fled to Volterra to kill himself.

Bella, who comes out of the cupboard she was hiding in during Charlie's visit, asks, "What's a Volterra?"

Carlisle calls Aro, tells him to stall Edward until Carlisle can come and also, Bella's pregnant with Edward's child.

Aro has no idea how to take that, and confesses what Carlisle guessed: no, he's never heard of such a thing before. Well, Aro will ask around and try to see if this (or sex pollen) have ever happened before and why doesn't Carlisle bring Bella with him when he comes to pick up Edward.

(Remember, this is before Eclipse, and as such all the shady nonsense has yet to go down.)

The whole family vamooses in the middle of the investigation, Dr. Carlisle Cullen won't be allowed t exist for a while. They head to Volterra, where Edward, indeed, has been stalled and he and Bella reunite.

Though, when I say "they", it's probably the Cullens sans Alice and Jasper. Alice wouldn't want to tempt Aro too much and, since Bella's carrying Renesmee, her visions are pretty much useless anyway. She'll see them later.

Edward is not nearly as thrilled as Bella that she is carrying his demon rape child. However, no one's listening to him and Bella insists she's not aborting the baby. Instead, Bella is heartbroken and tries to assure Edward that he's worthy of her and that it wasn't rape (it was) she had a great time! And she wants his demon baby!

Caius can't believe this soap opera is in his house.

Well, Edward probably won't try to kill himself before killing Renesmee, but then Renesmee's gift works overtime and he's convinced vampires have souls and is somehow able to forgive himself all this madness.

Edward marries Bella after she turns and gives birth, everyone loves Renesmee and they decide she's not a demon and is worthy of life, and they eventually leave Volterra great friends with the Volturi.

Sort of.

Weirdest decades of Caius' life.

#twilight #twilight meta #twilight headcanon #twilight renaissance #edward cullen #bella swan #anti edward cullen #edward/bella #anti edward/bella #renesmee cullen #carlisle cullen #the cullens #aro #caius #the volturi #meta #headcanon #opinion

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lightrises · 3 years

Text

"Only in allowing her to pass..." — Hornet, The Radiance, and the means by which Hallownest turned its victims against each other

A quick note: I read Hollow Knight as an anti-colonialist text. As such I'll be touching on topics related to colonialism as it's depicted in the world of the game, and said analysis will reflect both a sympathetic take on The Radiance and a critique of The Pale King that won't pull its punches. If this sounds up your alley, hello and thank you for the read! Let us be sad about these bugs together.

———

So!! A while back I realized something about pre-canon that felt rather... "curious" is one way to put it, I think. To wit: for all the effort and scheming and determination The Pale King poured into trying to get rid of The Radiance, neither of his plans involved directly killing her.

Was that his long game? Well, sure, that seems clear enough. His tack changed from luring the moths away from their god and creator to a more literal form of incarceration once the infection became a factor, but at its core the end goal never really changed—The Pale King very sincerely wished to destroy Radiance via obsolescence. The Seer lends us foreshadowing to confirm as much:

[Image descriptions: Two screenshots from Hollow Knight, showing the Seer and Ghost in the Seer's alcove at the Resting Grounds. Across both screenshots, the Seer tells Ghost the following: "None of us can live forever, and so we ask those who survive to remember us. Hold something in your mind and it lives on with you, but forget it and you seal it away forever. That is the only death that matters." End description.]

(Which, by the way and given the context, talk about an extremely unsubtle allusion to cultural genocide huh!!! Whew.)

In any case, we're left with a whole bunch of machinations which build up to... well, two very roundabout attempts at committing deicide. That's kind of weird, all things considered! Why not just do the deed in one fell swoop and get it over with?

This could be for any number of reasons. Maybe the king was devoid of the means to instantly kill another higher being. Maybe his personal sense of scruples stopped him short of signing off on MURDER murder (although, y'know, the aforementioned genocide + eternal imprisonment = still cool and copasectic apparently!). Maybe the long drawn-out cruelty was the point. Maybe the idea of playing fuckign 4D chess with the circumstances was too delicious for him to pass up—that man did love to tinker and stick his claws where they sure as hell didn't belong—or maybe it was a little bit of All The Things. Who knows!!

But interrogating The Pale King's methodology on this count isn't what I'm here for, at least not really. The main reason I raise this question at all is that in her own way, Hornet did too.

"I'd urge you to take that harder path... "

See, going by The Pale King's actions and what The White Lady explicitly says, they both foresaw two outcomes wrt the infection: it can be allowed to spread, or it can be contained. At Teacher's Archives, Quirrel acknowledges the fact that Ghost is expected to do... something about this, but he doesn't elaborate on what HE thinks that's supposed to be apart from the obvious "Gotta bust into Black Egg Temple first". Hornet is the one person who presents to us—to Ghost—what's framed as a third option: confront and destroy the infection at its source.

And she doesn't bring it up like it's just another tactic for Ghost to consider, prim and indifferent to what they would do. She nudges them towards it, actively, up to the point where she throws herself into the fray against Hollow at a juncture that's uniquely dangerous to her and her alone just to make that option feasible.

Even when she's couching it in disclaimers that this is still Ghost's decision to make (and let's be fair, she's extremely not wrong about that lol), no one can pretend Hornet is unbiased. It's obvious in that buttoned-down Hornet kind of way that she is way the hell done with the increasingly tenuous stalemate that's kept Hallownest's desiccated corpse from collapsing in on itself. Personally it's hard for me not to read some Toriel Undertale-esque "My father was too entrenched in his own foolishness to pursue any course of action that would have DEFINITIVELY ended this" shade into her stance here, regardless of whether that's strictly true in canon.

And that bit—Hornet's hopes for an end to Hallownest's stasis, moreover her grim calculation of what needs to be done to get there—that's the bit I find super interesting but likewise tragic and depressing as shit, on multiple levels. In no small part because a) canon itself gestures towards Hornet feeling conflicted about the very plan she's pushing, and moreover b) she has at least two (2) damn good reasons to feel that way.

So, what do I mean by that? Let's look here first:

[Image description: A screenshot from Hollow Knight, of Hornet and Ghost inside the Temple of the Black Egg, standing in front of the unsealed egg itself. Hornet has been struck by the Dream Nail and her dialogue is displayed as follows: "... Could it achieve that impossible thing? Should it?" End description.]

As the curtain is about to drop on things one way or another, Hornet thinks,

... Could it achieve that impossible thing? Should it?

Now, looking at that last bit it's easy to go "Oh no, Hornet's worried that Ghost won't survive killing The Radiance!" And I do think that's part of it: Hornet is, categorically, not her father. By endgame it's clear she's not content to view her Void-borne siblings as tools to be used then disposed of. She's also well aware that as a healthy autonomous Vessel amongst the countless dead, Ghost is the only person left alive who has a fighting chance against The Radiance. Knowing someone is the only qualified candidate for the job doesn't make encouraging them to embrace a probable death sentence any less of a bitter pill to swallow, though. And odds are on that this sentiment extends to Hollow too, who IS going to die no matter what happens here. To put it bluntly, it's more than reasonable to conclude that Hornet hates the absolute fuck out of this.

But I don't think that's all there is to it either. Remember what I said earlier about The Pale King's bids for genocide? Well, it's not like the man deigned to limit his efforts to just the moth tribe.

"We do not choose our mothers... "

On top of everything else—an infected Hallownest being all she's ever known, the fact that she only exists because of the infection, the list goes on—Hornet has spent her life wedged into a position that's been uncomfortable and terminally unglamorous at best: she is both a daughter of her father's kingdom and of Deepnest.

Deepnest, which like the moths and many others was here long before the wyrm and his lady wife swanned onto the scene and the God Become Bug laid claim to everything the Light touched plus a considerable amount of change. THAT Deepnest, which has fought claw and thread to retain its sovereignty against same-said settler king, and for which Herrah not only surrendered her life but also agreed to bed her worst enemy, all in hopes of securing a viable future for her people (put a pin in that last part by the way, I'll come back to it soon).

Two Worlds, One Family (Ft. An Indigenous Woman Trying Her Damndest To Work With What She's Got Versus An Imperialist Who Only Signed Up For This Because He Needed The Political Favor THAT Badly, So It's The Height Of Dysfunctional Actually). Fun times!!!!

The baggage this entails for Hornet is gnarly enough without implications made by The White Lady and the pre-canon timeline of events and even Team Cherry's dev notes that the king may well have looked at baby Hornet, gone "YOINK", then ensured she spent the lion's share of her childhood reared within the pearly auspices of his Pale Court*. That would be rather advantageous for Him Specifically after all, the potential to mold a born foe into a future ally and even have her trained in combat under the same tutelage as her doomed sibling. And far be it from him to stop a grown Hornet—his own flesh and blood too!—from making Deepnest her forever home if she so pleased. He totally wouldn't be reneging on his "fair bargain made" by doing this one simple thing until Hornet came of age, not t e c h nic c a l l y.

If that is indeed the case, there's a non-zero chance Hornet's formative years were a hot mess of cultural alienation and being a good deal more privy than most to just how much of a bastard her father could be. There's an equally non-zero chance that at some point she stood or sat within earshot as The Pale King finally, finally dropped all pretense and euphemism to name the Light for precisely what (for who) it was.

See, in conjunction with the question that started this whole dang train of thought I've been asking this one too: Does Hornet know? When she speaks of confronting "the heart of [the] infection" does she know she's talking about not just a literal person but someone very specific? The Radiance, who god though she may be shares skin in the game alongside Hornet as a native woman screwed over by the same settler king, likewise deprived of her kin and saddled with a life gone horrendously pear-shaped?

I'll assume for the sake of exploring the possibility and because I think it's a likely one anyway that yes, Hornet does know. She knows, and despite everything can't help empathizing. She might even look at Radiance and see bits and pieces both reflected and slightly inversed in her own mother: Radiance was forced to the sidelines while her people—her children, the brood she was meant to lead and care for—died out under The Pale King's rule, and it's no stretch to assume she's at least as upset about that as she has been about everything else; Herrah too took drastic measures for her people's sake, trying to head off annihilation by relegating herself to the sidelines in an act that was as much calculated risk as an attempt to find wiggle room and leverage in the face of a nasty proposition.

A calculated risk that, if things continue as they are, might well amount to nothing as the rest of Deepnest gets eaten alive by the infection. It survived The Pale King's advances for so so long, only to fall here. Herrah's sacrifice would be for naught; the other tribes—themselves the king's victims—would keep succumbing to the infection too.

And this is where things fall apart.

"... or the circumstance into which we are born."

Let's be clear: I think Hornet is wise enough to know what's what here, that all the carnage and suffering falls on her father's head for starting this slow-motion trainwreck in the first place. Hallownest wasn't always Hallownest. This domain was Radiance's home first, along with many others. It was the worm-turned-king who rolled up on the scene unsolicited and decided this was a ""'problem""" that had to be """solved""".

But the fact of the matter is that he's gone and The Radiance is here, raging, seemingly inconsolable. Above and beyond being Deepnest's rightful heir, Hornet isn't in a position to countenance more splash damage even if the grief and fury fueling it makes perfect sense. She can understand without ever bringing herself to love Radiance, and she can bend her knee to practicality even if she hates the everloving shit out of it because the fact that it "has" to end this way isn't fair.

This lends itself to one last awful conclusion: that Hornet has probably considered and (rightly or wrongly) discarded the possibility that Radiance can be saved, at least not without dragging more collateral along for the ride. If even her mother and every other enemy to the king seemed to dismiss talking Radiance down as an option way back when... well. Why should Hornet hope for any better after things have escalated so far?

Again, it's practical. A practical net good is what Hornet strives for. And again, it fucking sucks.

For extra tragedy points, this makes Hornet's extended crypticness around Ghost followed by her last minute casting about for a reason to tell them "Wait, don't; not just yet" that she never voices even more of a gut punch. She can't bring herself to burden Ghost with the context that haunts her so, least of all when it might weaken their resolve to go through with what (she thinks) needs doing.

It's the "same song, different verse" which led to the mantis tribe and Deepnest being pitted against each other: Hallownest rigged the game so that two women who could have been powerful allies—who have a mutual vested interest in driving out settler rule—wound up poised as enemies instead. And how awful is that? The king for all his being extremely fucking dead still gets the last laugh, because outside of a miracle the game never manifests Hornet can salvage what her mother started and look forward to a future where Deepnest pulls itself back from the brink if and only if The Radiance dies.

Resolution comes at the price of a completed genocide. Add two more dead siblings to the unconscionable pile thereof, while we're at it. That's what it boils down to whether or not Hornet can bear to articulate it as such, and there's no grace or even a properly bittersweet ending to wring from this clusterfuck. And that is rough.

———

* This has been better explained elsewhere, but a quick rundown: The White Lady tells Ghost that Hornet and Herrah "were permitted little time together." On its surface this can be taken to mean that Hornet was still very young when Herrah was shipped off to Eternal Dreamland—except this doesn't jive with the fact that we meet Hornet as an adult. If the stasis kicked in once the Dreamers went to their rest, which in turn halted the aging process for every living bug in Hallownest, AND before all this Hornet experienced little by the way of quality time with her birth mother... I think you can see where I'm going with this.

To top it off we've got Team Cherry weighing in ominously from their dev notes on Herrah: "As part of the agreement for her alliance and her role as a dreamer, King gave her a child (Hornet). Was she allowed to keep this child or was she taken away?" This isn't confirmation by itself of course, but given additional canon details (see above): Can I get a "yikes" in the chat fellas.

#hollow knight #hornet (hollow knight)#hornet hollow knight #hk hornet #the radiance #hk radiance #herrah #hk herrah #hollow knight meta #sup folks it's been a minute since i dropped a whole dang essay but Here We Go!!!!!!

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eijie-cavies · 3 years

Text

Wen Kexing and the great divide.

So as we all know Episode 32 and 33 has left us with a plethora of questions and the fans are divided in terms of their view on Wen Kexing's plan. Tbh that is to be expected if you look at it. It was an asshole move to hide everything from A-Xu and leave him to find his soulmate's dead body only to find holy shit this motherfucker is alive still what the hell. And so a lot of the fans sided with the argument that Wen Kexing never learned and was acting like a selfish lone wolf. But today i am here to try to analyze the plan between Scorpion king, Wen Kexing and Ye bai Ye.

Please keep in mind i haven't watched the entirety of the show yet and so some theories here might not fit in with the rest of Kexing's explanation for the next episode.

Also thid will contain spoilers so please be warned.

Alright let's start. I will be dividing this analysis into parts. 1st part is the show's script and budgeting and why they chose the route that the went with.

2nd part is my theories on the heroes conference and why it was rushed as well as the timeline.

And lastly Wen Kexing's POV and the analysis for his plan and why he did what he did keeping A-Xu in mind as well.

A few extra bonuses is the romeo and juliet plot and why i think it had to be in the plot somehow.

So lets start, sit down and grab a drink for this you will need it.

1st part.

Scriptwriting and budgeting.

This show was supposed to have 45 episode and so the plot would have had more time to marinate and kick in if it weren't for the shortening of the epsiode.

With this in mind the scriptwriter had originally planned for this 45 episode and sadly we won't probably know what was supposed to happen if it weren't cut to 36 episode. But we do have Wolong nuts to thank for giving the drama sponsorship and making the drama into 36 rather than 32. If we had only 32 episodes in this drama everything would have felt too rushed and fast paced. And so to have to cut 9 episodes worth of plot the screewriter was put in a tight spot on how to cram three different events. Namely the kidnapping, the exposing of Zhao Jing and of course the wedding plot as well.

Thus the Romeo and Juliet plot was born. We will be discussing this plot in depth later on in the analysis. Nonetheless if they have had all the freedom and budget it would have been nice to see a plot of Zhou Zishu, Wen Kexing and The Scorpion King all work together to bring Zhao Jing down. For now let us work on the plot given to us.

2.) Timeline.

The heroes conference is a huge deal, this is where EVERYONE of big sects and names gather in the martial arts world, its the equivalent of the whole world witnessing everything. This event is a big part of the plan that the three accomplices had, if they didn't act right away Wen Kexing and Xie'er (Scorpion King) wouldn't have had the chance to expose Zhao Jing in the future, because like what the beauty ghost relayed, once the heroes conference is over Zhao Jing planned on killing Xie'er and eradicating the ghost valley. There would have been no other time to take him down, no time to wait for another heroes conference as Zhao Jing would have risen in power already, they would have been too powerful to stop and the merits he would have gained by then would be multiplies, the people wouldnt see him as evil anymore. Therefore it was crucial to strike at the time where they are most vulnerable and the seed of doubt was still fresh, if they had waited, everyone would have disregarded Wen Kexing as a mad man and praised Zhao Jing for saving them from the purges of the ghost valley.

And scorpion king? Who would believe him if he was the only one to take a stand? His Godfather no doubt would have acted as if he didnt know what Scorpion was saying and act innocent. Even if he was spared Scorpion had no allies other than Wen Kexing who's allies was also born out of the same hatred they had for Zhao Jing. Everyone was forced to act swiftly, it was an all or none kind of situation. Now if we backtrack to the previous episodes, not two episode ago Zhou Zishu was heavily injured because of the kidnapping and was given no time to properly heal before everything needed to be set. As you can see in episode 31 Wen Kexing was in a hurry to meet Xie'er, don't you think it was iffy that he would leave A-Xu like that if he was still injured? The Wen Kexing that we all know would not have moved a single inch from Zhou Zishu's side if he were injured. And this is because of a lot of things which we will be getting to in the third part of the analysis.

Now on the subject of the plan and how Chengling had somehow gotten a hold of it. Simple, Ye bai Yi. He is free to roam around, sending messages and talking to people behind the scenes, we never really knew what he did after he left Wen kexing at four seasons manor and the reason why he had agreed on the rushed reopening of the heroes conference. but if you think about it it fits with the timeline. Zhao Jing wanted to reopen the heroes conference and Ye Bai Yi was sure that they were out to hunt down the chief of the ghost valley. If you remember the letter in episode 27 you will understand.

Why did they get that letter in the first place when the four seasons manor wasnt even fully restored yet? The martial arts world didnt even know that Zishu was on the road to reopening it and yet he got an invitation. This is Ye Bai Yi's first clue and a nudge for Wen Kexing to take action. This leads us to part 3. Wen Kexing's plan.

3. Wen Kexing's plan.

Now the question is why didn't Wen Kexing think to tell Zhou Zishu his plan? Simple. He is heavily injured. Now i was stuck here as well because i would have thought, why couldnt he just trust Zishu of his plan? BUT you all have forgotten this.

Wen Kexing has asked this two times, he wanted tell Chengling already so the kid could process it before he could stage his plan and possibly even tell Zhou Zishu on how he can use the heroes conference as an event where he can expose Zhao Jing. But Zhou Zishu was kidnapped, tortured and injured. There was no time to tell him of the plan without him having to stop Wen Kexing from doing it. At first i thought this didnt make sense, Wen should have trusted Zishu enough to carry on without distrubance right? Well a very nice person in Youtube provided some very interesting and eye opening points for me.

And they are right, if i were Wen kexing i wouldn't want to burden Zishu of having to wait around thinking where i went off to, why do you think he told A-Xiang to take care of Zishu and promised to go back in one piece?

A-Xiang was also kept in the dark of the plan, the only plan she knew was that Wen Kexing is planning to have an alliance with the scorpion king and thats it. He didnt fully disclose everything either.

Wen Kexing's plan was simple, after he was regarded as "Dead" he probably would have went home to tell Zhou Zishu he was completely fine and it was all a ruse to trap Zhao Jing. BUT the problem was that Zishu set out to find him, Bei Yuan and Da Wu couldn't stop him either as they had no time to explain everything without Zishu panicking. Like i said this was all too rushed of a plan for Zishu to comprehend specially when he needed to heal as fast as possible.

What they could only do is give Zishu a medicine to ensure that if he ever did take out the nails he would still be okay. And that was the downfall of Kexing's plan. He didnt expect Zishu to have escaped his friends watchful eyes and go to the siege, ever wonder why Kexing said this when Zishu arrived?

He was trying to convince Zishu to leave, make him believe that Wen Kexing is out for blood. But Zishu didn't fall for it, instead he stayed which was NOT a part of the plan at all. There was nothing Kexing could have done now, the siege was happening and he could only play along and move forward. And if you look closely again just as they were about to attack Kexing, Ye Ba Yi came to fight Kexing at the VERY right time, and who fought Zhou Zishu?

The three ghosts WuChang, his subordinate and Happy ghost. Why didn't anyone else go for Zishu? They could have had the scorpions attack him but they chose the Ghosts who are a part of Wen Kexing's valley, mind you these three ghosts were there when they rescued Zishu wouldn't it just sound stupid if they were fighting Zishu to kill him? No. What they tried to do is separate Zishu from Wen Kexing. Ye Bai ye could have eliminated Wen in 10 moves, he said this himself. But they had this complicated dance that somehow landed Wen Kexing at the edge of the cliff and left Chengling to do the rest.

And so he fell and Zishu followed. If you look closely even Ye Bai Yi was surprised that Zhishu jumped. NONE of it was part of the plan. From the moment Zishu entered to the moment he jumped no one planned for it.

And if you are upset of Zishu having to see Kexing's dead body and breaking his heart, this again was NOT A part of the plan. Beauty ghost was there to protect the corpse, if the corpse had not been burned it would have been presented to the martial art world and Kexing would come back as a different person and telling them "They got it wrong. That corpse is the chief of the ghost valley, i am Wen Kexing the disciple of four seasons manor" and it would have been more belieavable. But plans went south, Zishu found the corpse further solidfying that Kexing (in his mind) is dead and so he took out the nails. Ke xing couldn't show himself to stop Zishu either, there was so little time and he couldn't risk himself be seen.

Some others had been in the dark of the plan as well, not just Zishu, and the reason Wen Kexing didn't dare tell him was not because he didn't trust Zishu to stay away and let the plan carry out, instead he know EXACTLY what this will do to Zishu. Wen Kexing's plan was to HIDE Zishu away until the conference ended. Because with Da Wu and Bei Yuan, there would have been no news about Ke Xing dying that would have reached their place and Zishu would have had all the time to recover as Ke Xing took revenge and finally come back home as a new person.

He NEEDED Zishu to stay away from the fight to help himself heal just enough to get the nails out.

His revenge done and his new goal to be with Zishu for the rest of their lives. But unfortunate events happened, Zishu found out and there was other way to go but forward.

Ever wonder why Kexing had this look on his face on episode 33?

He wanted so bad to explain everything but the spotlight was on him and this was the only time he will be given the chance to take a stand. This is now between him and the Zhao Jing. Like everything there was nothing to do but move forward.

Now for bonus part.

Romeo and Juliet plot.

Romeo and Juliet plot is basically person A percieved as "Dead" and person B endagering their life to the brink of death only to find person A was alive and well but Person B is for real dying.

Now tbh i wasn't a big fan of the Romeo and Juliet plot, this was the reason why fans became so divided and saying Kexing didn't learn his lesson therefore lossing their faith in Kexing and Zishu's relationship. He was pervieved as childish and selfish, And tbh they would have had so many plot devices that they can use to maximize full on plotting and bringing down Zhao Jing. But going back to my first point of the budgeting im guessing the scriptwriter had struggled to cram it all in. It was already episode 33 and they still had two more plots to cram in (the wedding and curing Zishu) so im not as upset as much. In the end the whole staff gave their best and poured their heart and soul into the drama. On an ending note i'll just let this nice person do the talking for me

Thank you for reading! If you guys have your own theories feel free to discuss or voice them out.

#wenzhou #wen kexing #zhou zishu #word of honor #shan he ling #faraway wanderers #analysis

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