#sometimes something just goes right

[dycefic]

Tom Saves The World

Everyone knows that it’s super-heroes who save the world. They fight the aliens, or the monsters, or the bad guys. And mostly, that’s true.

But not always.

I’m a psychic. The thing is, my range isn’t that great. I don’t have much detail more than about 36 hours out, 48 for something really big. I’d had a nebulous sort of bad feeling for about a week before this one finally hit, and it was big. Something very tough and very supernatural was going to come up out of the harbor of Nova Roma, and the death-toll was going to be high. Crazy high.

I did all I could. I told the Unaligned Supers Job Placement Agency, and they put the word out to everyone on both sides of the Line. The Henchman’s Union don’t like natural disasters any more than anyone else, and they’re often quite helpful against eldritch horrors and stuff like that. Things that don’t hire henchmen and ruin the property values.

The trouble was, nobody big was around. The only really big team of heavy hitters on the West Coast were away dealing with some sort of doomsday cult - I never was clear on what that was about - and Guarde and Dog Fox were out of touch and even Mx Frantique was out of town at someone’s wedding. It was going to happen in less than two days and we couldn’t find anyone to help and I was seriously considering calling in some kind of bomb threat or something to get people away from the docks, at least.

And then, about eighteen hours out, it just… went away.

Which never, ever happens.

My powers might be short range, but they’re reliable. I don’t get stuff wrong, and I hadn’t been able to find any way to prevent what was going to happen, or even been able to identify anyone who could. But someone did. Someone had done something to stop the threat, something that happened literally while I was opening my car door. When I reached for the handle, thousands of people were going to die. By the time the door was open, there was no threat at all.

At first I thought it must have been a ranged thing. Like, whatever I’d been seeing (all those teeth, I saw them in nightmares for months after) had been distracted by something tasty on its way here and gotten off track, that it’d come up somewhere up or down the coast. My range isn’t that big, either. Anything outside about thirty miles might as well be on Mars for all I know about it. So we kept a watch out, and warned the chapters of the Union and the Agency in other cities.

But nothing happened. Nothing at all. I couldn’t explain it, and I was really unpopular for a while. Supers do NOT like people who cry wolf. There’s enough freaky shit we have to deal with without someone panicking everyone with a dire prophecy that fizzles out.

Thank all the gods that Tunny showed up. Nobody’s really sure what Tunny actually is - sentient fish creature, some kind of really mutated human, an alien, or what. She changes her story a lot. But she’s pretty friendly, especially for a twenty-foot-long horror-movie-mermaid-thing with four arms, so when she came into harbor to pick up some supplies a guy from the Agency went out to tell her what I’d seen. I’d gotten a wharf and dock number, so she went down to check.

I don’t think anyone had ever seen Tunny scared before. Her English wasn’t good enough to really explain what she’d found hibernating down there, but it was something very old and very powerful and very dangerous, and if it’d been woken up my vision would just have been the start of the crisis.

She rounded up a bunch of whales to help her move it, once she was sure it hadn’t been agitated and wasn’t likely to rouse if moved carefully. They towed it out before dawn, not wanting to scare the civilians, and when I saw the footage from the helicopter the Union sent up, when I saw how big the swell was, how many whales were pulling, I swear I nearly crapped myself. No wonder I’d been getting hints a week in advance. Somehow we dumbass humans had built a whole fucking city almost on top of some kind of Ancient Old… THING, and eroded the sea-bottom until it was exposed, and if someone hadn’t done whatever it was we’d all have been dead long before Tunny arrived. And not just all as in ‘all of Nova Roma’, it could have taken out half of the continent... or all of it.

It took me years to find out what happened. YEARS. It turned into a kind of hobby, tracking everything that might possibly have come into contact with Wharf 38 on that particular day.  

And what I found, eventually, was a city employee named Thomas Briggs.

I’d found out early on that 38 wasn’t in good repair. Not that bad, but not great. It was old, things were getting a bit saggy in a few places, but there’d been no sign that anything was likely to fall off on the day. It had sat there for a couple of years after the crisis that never happened,, doing its job without problems then been rebuilt without any drama at all.

Entirely, completely, and totally because of Thomas Briggs.

The story, when I finally pieced it together, went like this.

There’d been some project or other to build some sort of high-budget science project over on the other side of the harbor, hanging it off’ve Pier 8, the furthest out on that side. Something about tracking sea-life or ships or something. My conversational English is near perfect, I’ve been here for years, but I don’t speak science nerd in ANY language. It’d all been approved, some university was covering most of the cost, it was all gonna be fine. And it was gonna be over on 8 because that side of the harbor is the shallow end. It’s where the sailboats go. All the big stuff that would block visual sensors and deafen the thing with engine noise was over in the thirties, in the real deep water.

They were almost ready to install the thing when a bunch of rich dudes suddenly got their panties in a bunch over having a big sciency tower thing ruining the view from their yachts, and tried to get it moved.

To, and I’m sure you guessed this, Wharf 38.

Which was completely insane. It wouldn’t be able to do its job over there, it’d be way more in the way, and (although they couldn’t have known it) the installation would definitely have woken up the Thing sleeping by the wharf and we all would have died. But rich dudes with yachts don’t care about that stuff. They’d bitched out and bribed up their friends on the city council, and those friends had done their thing, and the scientists had been left in the dark, and it’d almost gone through. They’d figured to install it right away, so that when the science guys found out it’d be too late and they’d either have to pay a lot to move it or just use it where it was.

Enter Thomas Briggs.

Mr Briggs, Tom to his friends, didn’t give a crap about the yachts or the science. He was a senior money guy for the commercial wharfs, the one who figured out things like how much money they’d take in in a quarter, and what the repair budget should be, stuff like that. He found out about this thing two days before the disaster would have happened, and sat down and did the math.

Then he sent out an email to the guys trying to push this through, and he ripped into them like they’d threatened to knife his mother. I got my hands on that email, and I didn’t understand a lot of it any more than the council guys would have. It was ALL numbers. But at the top he wrote it out in plain English. Pier 8 was new, and rated to handle the weight of the thingy. Wharf 38 was going to be scrapped in a few years, and it was NOT rated for that kind of structure. Pier 8 had plenty of room around it. Wharf 38 was already a tight fit for the big commercial ships, and adding a structure sticking out on one side would block off at least half of the wharf to those ships completely.

Bottom line, putting the thing on Wharf 38 would cost the city hundreds of thousands of dollars more per year than putting it on 8, AND the city would have to eat the cost if 38 collapsed under it which it could easily do, AND the city would have to pay to move it in a couple of years anyway when 38 was due to be rebuilt.

And he cc-ed every important person he had an email address for, including the mayor, the anti-corruption people, and several reporters.

He must have sent that email right when I was opening my car door.

The whole plan collapsed right there, and some people got fired. There was no news story because the whole plan got killed before the reporters even got to the right office. The installation was started on Wharf 8 a few weeks later and I never connected it to a commercial wharf on the other side of the harbor.

One email, and a man who I never could have located in time, a man who had no powers at all, a man who was just conscientiously doing his job looking after the city’s money saved the city, and the continent, and maybe even the world.

Who could have predicted that? Not me, that’s for damn sure.

I can’t deny that I went home and got drunk off my ass that night. Just thinking about how close that had been made my hands shake. One man. One honest man who’d done the math.

I put the word out, once the hangover wore off. What had happened. That Thomas Briggs was the reason we were all alive and everyone better make his life real nice from now on, because he’d done what none of us could do and nobody but the supers would ever even know it.

He’s got a lot of luck coming to him, I can tell you. We don’t forget debts like that.

And I knew that’d freak him out, because honest men don’t like it when people start doing them a lot of favors for no apparent reason, so I tracked him down at the little bar where he likes to have a quiet beer on Friday nights before he goes home. Hell, I was the one who’d gone through it all, back then. I should get to tell him.

I sat down beside him at the bar and looked at him. I saw a thin, small, balding man who looked like he worried too much and didn’t get enough sleep, with lines around his eyes. Yeah, he looked like a man who’d do the math. “Thomas Briggs?”

He blinked at me through his glasses. “Yes? Do I know you?”

“No, you don’t. My name’s Barkhado Omar, and I’ve been looking for you for a long time.” I offered him my hand and he shook it, still looking confused. Which was fair, ‘cause I doubt a lot of seven foot tall Somali women came up to him in bars even when he was young. He’s got to be close to retirement now.

He frowned. “Looking for me? Why?”

I smiled at him. “Tom, let me buy you a drink and tell you about the day you saved the world.”

It’s usually us who save the city, or the world. We have all the intel, all the advantages, all the powers.

But sometimes it’s not. Sometimes it’s someone like Tom Briggs, doing the right thing at the right time and never knowing that he changed the course of history.

Wild, huh?

--

This story is a direct result of me and my ex chatting about how different the entire Marvel Universe would have been if Jean’s first ‘resurrection’ - being found in a life pod under a wharf, IIRC - had happened at like... any other time. Earlier. Later. It would have changed SO MUCH.

And we speculated about how it could happen, how someone just puttering around in middle management might have unknowingly saved countless lives, prevented Madelyne’s corruption, the legacy virus, all of it, just by postponing that particular set of repairs a bit longer.... and I couldn’t resist writing a version of the story in which Tom does, in fact, save the world.

#short fiction #dyce's supers universe #comics inspired #sometimes something just goes right #horseshoe repair

[s0fter-sin]

i need ghoap frantically making out against a door finally taking the leap on their feelings. need ghost grinding against soap, expecting to find him just as hard as him, only to feel nothing

and in all his wisdom and experience, he concludes soap was tortured and never told him

he’s trying to think of a delicate way to say he understands, that he’s been through it and it doesn’t change anything about how he feels (and who the fuck touched him so he can hunt them down and rend them limb from limb)

meanwhile trans!soap’s just trying to find the best angle to grind his cunt on ghost’s thigh

just it never even entering ghost’s head bc he’s never known a trans person but he has met plenty of people who’ve been tortured - himself included - so of course that’s his logical leap

soap takes off his shirt and he sees his top surgery scars and ghost asks if he wants him to kill the one who did it and soap just hums like, “actually, man did pretty good, they healed real well,” and ghost’s just teary-eyes with awe at how well he’s coping, “looking on the bright side, that’s my johnny.”

imagine he thinks johnny was fully castrated but sees he’s determined to still have a sex life with him so he buys packers and straps to help him bc hell yeah healing and soap’s just like, “holy shit i’ve never had such a thoughtful partner before, such a sweet man, lt.”

#he a little confused but he got the spirit #its so good bc it can be super angsty of ghost really dreading whats been done to his sergeant and trying to make it right #or just go full crack treated seriously and have fun with it #i love just completely oblivious ghost #in any military context hes the smartest guy in the room #he always knows the play and has more experience than anyone #but stick him in the normal world? man is Lost #ghost just thinks hes had some kind of reconstruction surgery after being tortured and accepts thats what johnny looks like #bc hes never seen a pussy before #it takes years for soap to actually come out to him bc he just never thought to #hes seen him naked theyve literally slept together what else is there for him to say #then he shows him like a family album or something and ghosts just like ‘why arent you in any of these i only see girls’ #and he just goes ‘hang on a second’ #soap gets one of his sporadic periods one night and panics a little thinking it would weird ghost out or remind him that hes not cis #but ghost just thinks its a normal part of such a thorough reconstruction that hed bleed sometimes #and doesnt question it when soap grabs a pad out of his drawer bc ‘thats such a good way of handling the discharge my johnnys so smart’ #just really supportive ghost for the wrong reasons #coming out of my cage and ive been doing just fine.txt #we’re a team. ghost team #soapghost #ghostsoap #simon ghost riley #ghost cod #john soap mactavish #soap cod

[gooperts-gunk]

im so crazy over the tragedy of everything q!bbh does being under a demon pretense even though he's a fallen angel.

do u think he just accepts the demon label because it's easier. do u think he believes it too, and catches himself in his thoughts with "oh, right. im not exactly that". and maybe he believes that he did this to himself? do u think what he did was to protect himself or someone? no matter the fall, he still has so much kindness to give and his brain just isn't wired the way a natural-born demon would be, he can't hold back instincts when time demands it, maybe that's why he fell in the first place.

and when he's finally bad, not good, it's treated like the end of the world, without empathy on why he would act out. do you think this keeps happening? the same scenario, multiple times, every timeline? he has to be used to it. so he has to take it in stride. he's good until he lashes out under extreme pressure, and suddenly he's called demon. and once again he's what heaven made him out to be. what he made himself to be, his brain would ruthlessly provide...

i don't think he wants to be that, though he hides secrets behind secrets of which neither identity is a home... but i don't think he wants to have to change, either. and i don't think that's wrong of him.

...you collapse atlantis ONE TIME and all of a sudden YOU'RE the bad guy and SURE it was FUN but REALLY now,--

#lots of expansion on this in tags beware #this is a draft from 2:40AM the day before i just felt something within me and i needed to write about fallen angel q!bbh angst NOW #this post is brought to you by q!bbh in purgatory and post-purgatory i will never forgive you purgatory 1 #no one can bear to have a healthy conversation about q!bbh's behaviors let alone TO q!bbh. BUT IF Q!BAGHERA WASN'T STUCK ON THE ISLAND... #i miss u bbh + baghera interactions let me see u soon pls #he isn't impossible to communicate with ur just not jiving with his autism right u can get through to him i swear BUT TOO LATE he DIED #now he doesn't remember!!! (unless that part of the library is recovered) u lost ur shot!!! (ur issues with him will rise again) #now every time bagi goes “'cause he's a demon” with bbh i go OH MAN SHE DOESN'T KNOW IT'S MORE... it hurts how flippant it is sometimes #because WE KNOW OH MAN WE KNOW IT'S MORE and this concept of him being fallen adds SO MUCH CONNOTATION to EVERYTHING he does #it isn't just DEMON THINGS it's GOD MADE ME THIS THINGS and i just can't wait to know WHY what did you DO!!! #your instincts are to be nice though cautiously detached when your life restarts so WHAT DID YOU DO IF YOU ARE NOT INHERENTLY BAD??? #goopert talks qsmp #qsmp #qsmp badboyhalo

[raycatz]

I'm not including a situation where someone might be injured because in that case I'm thinking the bed goes to them by default or they are nominated for it. anyone who wants to be chatty goes to join the living room floor gang.

What are your thoughts and headcanons? Do you have thoughts on how the boys tend to approach assigning beds in inns? Who do the chain choose to sleep near when camping and why? What are their dynamics like when settling down for the night and getting ready for the day?

In "Mirror Vs Open Closet Door: Fight!" by Gintrinsic (here) Four refers to the chain's decision on how to split up between inn rooms as the "Link-per-room ratio" which I find very funny. He, Sky, and Time also talk about their thought process behind why they do or don't want to sleep in a room with some of the others which I find fun and interesting.

So! If you have thoughts and want to share them! *gestures to the post!*

#linked universe #linkeduniverse #alrighty! now for my answers- #for the ranch question I think it varies which is why I'm asking in a poll. What do you think happens most often though? #each answer is a fun scenario so it's difficult to choose #but I think they'd try to act politely around Malon and Time for the first couple visits with straws or rock paper scissors #or showing generosity by offering the bed to someone else. (I bet Malon saying they're charming is quite the incentive #for more possible compliments. The chain as a whole would want to prove her right xD ) #Once they're more comfortable in the house though I can totally see Wind and Legend making a mad dash for it while Wars yells after them xD #Wind probably ends up sharing with Four a lot since they're the littles #or Wind snuggles in with Wars Legend Wild etc #Wild and Twi/Wolfie have claimed the spot on the floor by the fireplace. #For inn rooms / castle rooms / camping - I tend to group them by how they're grouped a lot already #but a lil mixed up #Time - Sky - Wars are the good rest trio. they want a good night's rest please let them get their beauty sleep. often joined by Four #Wars goes between this group and wherever Legend is depending on how chatty he is that night. #Twi - Wild - Hyrule are snuggle/proximity buddies #Legend is attached to Hyrule's hip or sets up near Warriors to gossip and gripe. I can also see him setting up near Wild #in the eye of the storm as it were or just an interesting place to be. Wild and Hyrule can get to chatting about everything and anything #so if Legend wants background noise (Hyrule and Wild podcast omg)- #or a conversation he can be half a part of and jump in and out of while getting ready for the night or in the mornings- #this is a good place to be. add Wind and things get a bit more chaotic. #Wind gravitates to Wars and Legend too when curious and chatty. He gravitates towards Time when he wants something calmer. #Four tends to be near Sky or Twi or to Legend's group for the same reasons #I can see Four and Twi having a little book club going during downtimes where they talk about what they're reading. Sky likes to listen. <3 #Wind thinks they're nerds but so is he and he can't resist a good story so he orbits and sometimes settles in and peppers questions. #it's funny that Time Sky and Wars want to sleep the most but Legend follows Wars to chat (and ends up bringing people with him xD ) #there could be some conflict there oooo #Twi is by Time #it's almost a circle but with clusters of sleeping bags near on top of each other and filling the gaps

[dailykugisaki]

138 | id in alt

Being delirious leads to mistakes, one of those mistakes is not noticing a curse on your back and attached to your neck. AND. it's ugly.

#dailykugisaki #jjk #kugisaki nobara #itadori yuji #I WAS BUSY AGAIN. ASS. my chickens remain out bc im tired of their bullshit right now #Kugisaki can like physically handle curses she just dosent wanna #i like to think at one point they can into a smart acid spitting curse which caused Kugisaki to just start throwing hands with Itadori #everyday i live reminding myself that i kill gojos and Fushiguro's on SIGHT. in fortnite. this goes for Montagues too bc hes greasy #basically everyone #i have a hater streak #i like to think that gojo just stands in front of random higher ups cars to stop them from doing anything. SOMETIMES HE BRINGS HIS STUDENTS #harrass the rich! harrass and bite and rip at the hands barring you from living YAAAAAAAAA #Kugisaki needs to curb stop the fuck out of something i have decided

[socksandbuttons]

when i made an underrem 'height' chart BUT theyre like smallified versions SO I CAN DRAW THEM BETTER AND CONSISTANTLY THUS NOT A VERY USEFUL CHART.

#like i can tell u how tall dream is vs asgore undyne is slightly shorter than dream #alphys and nightmare are around the shortest (not including the children) #muffet is JUST slgihtly taller than them. TSIURIS HEIGHT IS AN ENIGMA SOMETIMES WE'LL GET TO HER LATER #gaster???????? MY AVERAGE MAN??? good LUCK me #grillby has yet to even be in this au by the way hes not EVEN HERE i dont what to do with him yet so #(more designwise i mean. i dont need a story for him in this i have ENOUGH) #mettaton is like... maybe average sized i dont KNOW hes short than dream and undyne taller than muffet and MMM #WE DONT HAVE NUMBERS BTW U JUST HAVE TO G U ES S #its just cause im bad with heights so. i need a comparison to understand Tallness #anyway um i dont what brought this up i think i was thinking of something else #i really should share undyne or something cause i love her casual outfit cause HELLO beautiful lady THAR SHE BE #alyphs has every right to crush on her are U KIDDING #muffet is so proud of that woman (but also impressed how oblivious she can be about the swooning ladies) #underrem #goes in the tag because im just typing things now

[justablanketreally]

ill never be over morty fake crying to rick that he’s worried jerry might kill himself just to get rick away from him for a bit

#like there’s so many layers to that one reveal #morty knows rick cares about him but not enough to respect his boundaries #so he goes for emotional manipulation because hey rick has sometimes been nice when morty cries (see: meeseeks and destroy) #but it has to be the right kind of emotion it can’t just be something rick can dismiss or brush off or flippantly fix #and morty knows the divorce has been forcing rick to confront some harsh truths #so he goes for that #leveraging the small amount of control he has #goddddd its so messed up #rick and morty

[rocicrew]

im !! on main again abt naomi and the concept of agency. it's subtle, as in she's never actually voiced that's the problem but after everything with marco, after everything she would do for marco once, she truly lashes out any time anyone makes choices for her or for her own good. personally that's where i see the big fracture with her and amos even if she loves him even if he's the first person she considered family after marco. amos undoubtedly would and has killed for her. except she knows what it's like to have your hands filled with blood for someone else. amos may not see it that way but it doesn't make her feeling of responsibility for him any lighter— something she never wanted in the first place. what happens on ganymede is especially telling of that, it's the first time he stops her and she lashes out, using the sedatives even if she comes to regret it. same thing with holden and the sample— she feels powerless in their decision so she hides the fact that she thought the belt should have it and she hides that she kept it even if again she comes to regret the way she went about it. hell even on their fight about the disabled missile, she's furious he chose for her until holden says this was something he couldn't live with. it's then she listens truly listens and says her side on this too. because the decision stopped being just for her at i don't have it in me.

#naomi nagata #nothing just being emo abt naomi again on main #im not actually sure i fi ished my thought process there but shh #technically it's also what burdens her relationship with drummer #yes she's been forced into a positio n that she had to ask something of drummer #but if she were not cornered if it was not the only way to do the right thing she wouldn't press #drummer would do anything for her & she doesn't want that #it scares her still #bc what happened with marco always hangs above her like a shadow #sometimes darker something lighter but shs can't will it away and it leads her to things she regrets #or at least the ways she goes about them #bc at times like those she still feels like an animal in a trap and the only way out is with something drastic

[angorwhosebabyisthis]

i feel like i should start making more of an effort, when i talk about something in a piece of media being Upsetting to me, to distinguish between 'cathartic' upsetting and 'gave me psychic damage' upsetting. sometimes i mean OUGH OW MY FEELINGS THIS FUCKS ME UP IN A MEANINGFUL AND RESONANT WAY, MY LIFE IS ENRICHED FOR BECOMING AWARE OF IT and sometimes i mean that it is genuinely distressing and i want to shake the creators and ask what the fuck they were thinking

#whosebaby talks #blog policy #this goes double when it comes to pieces of media to which i have both reactions lmao #i worry sometimes that not being clear about it makes it come across as if i'm saying 'something containing upsetting subject matter is Bad #when in fact a lot of upsetting subject matter is critical to depict; diversely so and often #and i am fiercely protective of the rep that resonates with me #which a lot of people are extremely quick to label as A Disrespectful Depiction absolutely no matter how it's done bc they want it erased #and use 'well it's only valid if it's done *respectfully*' as the Shirley Exception; with no intention of ever letting one be Allowed #but in spite of that there *are* absolutely fucking horrible and incredibly disrespectful ways for Upsetting Subject Matter to be depicted #and that deserves well-informed discussion and criticism; starting from an understanding of the actual purposes of fiction #and what infrastructure and language and framing and technique is used to achieve those purposes #and sometimes the purposes of a particular use are fucking awful! and executed in ways designed to cause real damage + get away with it! #so when i'm talking about something being Upsetting in the psychic damage sense; i'm referring to that #and the fact that not only is it infuriating and upsetting to witness that process in action #it amplifies the already deeply emotionally loaded subject matter; which may already require selfcare to engage with even when cathartic #and then yanks away the catharsis and just leaves you blasted in the face by uncushioned unvarnished Oh Right This Horrible Thing Exists #Thanks for Shoving My Face Straight into Boiling Acid Asshole #anyway complicated feelings about it but yeah i feel like i should try to be clearer lmao #(this isn't just about depictions of SA; and abuse in the sense most people think of first when they hear the word) #(although it comes up in that context often) #(see: Big Screan at pretty much everything with the talking animals in sd/mi but especially the fucking asylum lmao)

[suncaptor]

never trust any narrative about medicine that talks in 100% absolutes.

#like it does not work that way. #there's degrees of safety and side effects and likelinesses that should be weighed compared to alternatives #sometimes the risk is so low it's not super worth even worrying about but negating risk at all is still a form of misinformation #you tell someone 'there's a tiny miniscule chance you could have x disease but even if you do we are researching ways to handle and fix tha #potential side effect but if you DON'T take it the chance you will have y disease is idk 10.000 times higher' #MUCH more convincing than 'this is 100% safe and necessary considering y and you're stupid to question if it's safe at all' #especially when like. the latter is literally factually untrue so there WILL be proof against it right. #the proof against it does NOT mean it's going to be statistically relevant to the general population #but if the only people who are taking it seriously are also people spreading misinformation! #then that can just be. weaponised. #whatever #incoherents #this goes for treatment not just preventative too like. if someone says ANYTHING is 100% safe well! though if you're actually #like with a doctor and they say something's VIRTUALLY completely safe that's different I am more talking about studies #bc the doctor is using language of what things actually would matter to you as a general person in their populace #however you're still entitled to know potential side effects even if they're rare and usually that's something a pharmacist legally can #explain and will be listed in the paperwork around it

[bleaksqueak]

There's one weird page in chapter 3 where the coloring came out so weird, it looks like none of the other pages, and it drives me a little crazy. But, you know, whatever lol done is better than not-done. I have a huge buffer, I *really* should get to posting. I also want to get to posting bc (well, I want to, I like reading update comments more than you can know)...and bc I keep getting asks that have a few things that are quite literally in chapter 3, so I sit here looking at them, going (marge thinking sounds)

Well, here, have two unrelated statements that look amusing put together.

#there is also an omake comic paula did that goes before chapter 3 #so I really should just start posting lol #solivaga #I think my brain is slightly scarred by when I started posting my buffer last time I quite literally had a weird stalkernotquitestalker #situation pop up right when i'd started #and the whole mess after that ate thru my buffer #like wtf man lmao #here though for anyone reading the tags #I'm either going to cut some of the double pages up into singles or double (and a couple of triple) pages will be the only update for the #week they land on #do you prefer the single page pacing and two pages a week #or the doubled up pages for better pacing one post a week #bc I really like manga pacing where some actions are allowed to breathe #but those make poor single week updates #so I usually double them up together with their setup or payoff #it's the one true downside to webcomics #pacing generally demands every page has something very interesting on it #and i'm like dangit bobby no sometimes I just want a page of a character doing jazz hands

[dizzybizz]

in my head im doing seven different things at once

in reality im doing none of them

#in my head im drawing n playing 5 diff viddy games n watching 2 diff animes n reading 4 diff things n catching up on drawf vods n #ok more than 7 then... #YOU GET EHAT IM SAYING RIGHT. LIKE THERE ARE ALL THESE FUN THINGS I WANT TO DO. THAT I COULDDD D DO BUT WHEN I GO TO DO THEM ITS NOT ENJOYA #BLE. #AND THEY CANT KEEP MY ATTENTION AND AUGHHHHGG i hate >:( when this happens bruh #this also goes for non fun thinvs ofc #its just so frustrating when its something you would normally get so much enjoyment out of and you cant?? yknow #sometimes i think i should get more than 2 hobbies #dizzyoriginals #is ghis just depression..

[bisan-is-trying]

Me joking with my mom while cooking: aren’t you super proud of my cooking skills!! There's no match for me!! Im unstoppable!!

Mom in a solemn voice: but im really disappointed in you

Me: ????

Mom: pursuing your Master's degree, it seems like you no longer care about continuing your studies, it’s like you've frozen that idea.

#way to kill the vibe mom #she is still disappointed that unlike my bachelor's education #i didn't immediately jump to a random university and study whatever random major they gave me #even though i could’ve gotten a neat scholarship and studied something i really liked at the time #at the time i had no idea what im soig and where i wanted to go so i just followed along #but im not suffering through getting a master's degree for something i dont even care about #what she doesnt know is i have a plan. i have been following the plan ever since graduation. #if plan goes perfectly im supposed to start applying either this year or the next #she has no clue sometimes i stay up really late thinking about all the decisions i made and things i can no longer change #i dont want to do the same mistakes again #also its not like i can really afford it right now without a proper scholarship #i get she wants me to be the best at everything but the way she goes about it always makes me feel like a failure #mom...

[wwxwasright]

the best part of tgcf is that it understands that 17 is NOT old enough to have enough of a nuanced view of the world to be a god with the responsibility it entails. like yeah no wonder xie lian’s first ascension ended the way it did when he was a teenager who had never experienced any significant hardship in his life.

#everyone telling xl he’s too young to be doing this and him realizing that they’re right and he really does t understand much is something #that can be so personal #like if i was a god at 17 (or even now!!) i can’t pretend i wouldn’t make the exact same mistakes as xl #it takes all those tropes from the ya fantasy/distopian books i used to love about teenagers saving the world #and knowing better than the adults around them and goes. actually sometimes the teenagers aren’t always right and it’s true!! #xl tries his best but sometimes you really just don’t have enough experience or know enough about the world to do the best thing #not mdzs #tgcf #m posts #xie lian #tian guan ci fu

[end-orfino]

ahhhhhh i remember why i dont read comics & books and watch movies as much as I should. Because they make me lose it

#i get suddenly hit with a tsunami of inspiration and an urgency to Make Something #but the urgency isn't about the process of making it's about I Have Stories To Present Too. I have to See Them Realized. #and that hit of urgency is obviously far too short lived to make anything. esp since it comes in a set with a feeling of 'wow this- #-thing was so great' that transforms into intensified perfectionism of No No What Im Doing Here Isnt Good. What Is This. Disgrace- #-to my idea AND to what inspired it AND to my self proclaimed status as an amateur storyteller #which turns into artblock. so like low chances that ill even get a singular good drawing made during this #and the multiple comic or script or whatever ideas that appear in my head during this are out of the question entirely #oh and all of this appears next to the normal feelings caused by a good story like attachment to the characters and having to process it- #-for a while and if its very good then even sometimes rarely i get the need to make fanart #so all of this combined just leads to me not being able to do anything for a while and feeling awful about it. #fun./sar #i wish i was a normal artist people here are so resilient and do stuff even though they dont want to or they DO want to #because idk they enjoy being pissed bcs of a thing not turning out right and they dont mind how tedious it can get- #-and they enjoy sacrificing hours&days&months of their lives without a guarantee that anyone will appreciate it accordingly and itll pay of #its probably the resilience though #im weak like a dried twig both mentally and physically #this sounds like i never enjoyed drawing&writing ever. and to clarify thats far from true. i frequently enjoy it #just never frequently enough and consistently enough to actually make something more 'worthwhile' or linear #it's like a wind that comes & goes that i have no control over. #i try to keep telling myself that in the past i struggled to make anything 'bigger'....& know i even made animatic shitposts #this sounds so stupid god. an animatic shitpost being an achievement. #its not an art skill achievement its a fighting tooth and nail with my own self to actually finish it because its a struggle almost every- #-time achievement #what im saying is im trying to tell myself that i already improved. im doing more than i could have done in the past. #even if the process is so slow and i dont know when ill advance again #if ill advance again. i just gotta believe i guess? thank u parappa

[bookwyrminspiration]

every time I mention anything about my relationship (a qpr) this one classmate of mine is like 👁️👄👁️ damn fr? like not judgmental just amazed and it’s so funny

#qpr #qpr pride #the thing is she’s the one who usually asks questions about it #(because it naturally comes up sometimes she’s not interrogating me or anything) #and she’s like wait so? you do this? #or like how does this work for you? #and i answer and she goes damnnnn #i love it #or she’ll ask me something about relationships related to her love life #and im just like shit dude idk #and she goes wowwww damn that’s right that’s wild… #love her <3