#“maybe we CAN survive”

[reasonsforhope]

Future Crunch just paywalled their good news for "Energy" and "Technology"??? Which it looks like is about half of all their Good News?? (x)

I'm not particularly surprised because I WAS wondering how they made enough money to stay solvent, but I am dismayed

Partly on my own principles and partly because this kinda feels like it does/should go against their whole ethos??

Like if your big mission statement is "If we want to change the story of the human race in the 21st century, we have to change the stories we tell ourselves" (x) ....maybe you shouldn't paywall those stories???

That sounds very counterproductive and like you're taking access to good news away from a lot of people who need/want to hear it the most??? Esp in people in countries whose currency is much weaker than the US dollar??

#not news #I debated about posting this bc it's technically kinda bad news #but future crunch is one of the highest quality sources of good news I've found #in terms of breadth and research #and especially for non-US and non-Western #they pull a lot of their good news from WHO reports and the like #it was maybe the biggest site/influence in terms of catalyzing me to go “wait maybe we CAN do this” #“maybe we CAN survive” #so it's a huge shame and I feel obligated to comment on a fellow (if way bigger and very different) Good News Outlet #part of me is tempted to subscribe for my own sake and to be able to post the articles they post about to this blog #if you're not familiar with future crunch it's a giant roundup with 1-5 sentences per topic #so I could easily link to the things they link #but a) again I resent this on my very strong freedom of information / anarchist adjacent principles #and b) not til I get a new day job lmao #me

[axolotlclown]

We need to remember that Shubble stated that Wilbur would manipulate and gaslight friends and family. With this, we must be patient with streamers that were close to Wilbur. This was likely surprising and shocking for them. They may need time to come to terms with what has happened.

I have been vocal about how important it is for men to be critical about abusive behaviors. However, Wilbur had many close friends—some would even consider him family—and now they may feel they hardly knew him at all.

There is a deep stress felt by viewers. It is difficult to think we have given any amount of time or money to an abuser. Could you imagine a close friend right now? The pain and betrayal must sear. They need time to understand what has happened and come to terms with it. Many of them may not be live in the coming days (weeks even).

That being said, as time passes, criticism may be necessary. Complacency is not an option. Men that are willing to ignore abuse to protect an abuser are just as pathetic as the abusers themselves.

Let's give this situation time to breathe. I ask that we give patience and courtesy to those close to Wilbur at this time. But please do not forget that this happened. There may be a few streamers hoping to lay low and then drop a collab in a few months. Do not let them. This is too important.

#for now #the best thing we can do is spread awareness about abuse and offer support to domestic violence victims #i also want to add #that any previous art made about him was made with pure intentions #obviously its up to each individual to decide where the line is #but maybe lets not support him monetarily moving forward #that seems to be the move #anyway #please be kind to each other and give each other space #especially domestic violence survivors that may be here with us #and those who may have realized they were/are abused from shubbles story #i want to offer her and everyone around as much support as i can #if any domestic violence survivers have any stories they want to share #my dms and askbox are open #if anyone suspects that someone in their life may be abusing someone #this offer is open to you too #we need to talk about this #thoughts of dante #wilbur soot #shubble #im tagging this under shubble even though the post isnt really about her but i want the tags of this post to reach #whoever needs to read them

[hanadoesstuffwrong]

Thinking abt the air nomads:

What if, after the war, once the dust has settled a little, Aang goes back to travelling, hoping that maybe he can find at least some trace of surviving airbenders. As an added bonus, he gets to do more of the exploring and wandering that he had to put on hold.

Toph goes with him ofc. She only just got a taste of real freedom and it was overshadowed by ever-present impending doom. While she's on speaking terms with her parents, she isnt quite ready to be back under their roof on a permanent basis. The rest of the gaang have their individual homes and responsibilities that they get back to, though they join for the odd field trip or adventure when they can.

So anyway, they're touring all over the world and over the years they notice just how displaced so many people have become. EK citizens who barely escaped the blaze but lost everything; FN military now decommissioned with no idea how to carry on; people looking for a new start in the hard-won peace. Maybe it starts with Toph heading back to Earth Rumble, where a group of young runaways scrounge for cheap fights to make a little money.

At each turn they find more and more people with no homes to return to and no family to protect them; runaways escaping the roles the war forced them into. Gradually, Aang and Toph start to see that they aren't so different from themselves. They just want a new start.

So they decide to give them one. They clean up the temples and set up villages in the surrounding areas (helps to be master earthbenders), where people can arrive and stay as long as they need. Travellers and refugees pass through in droves, sometimes choosing to stay and rebuild their lives there, sometimes continuing in their wandering with a guarantee that they'll always have a place to return to should they have the need.

Over time, the lemurs grow in number and even some flying bison calfs (hybrids with a relative species maybe?), can be seen in the skies. Whenever the founders visit, it isn't the same but Aang feels a little more at home.

The first time someone asks Aang to teach him his philosophies, and expresses his desire to become a monk, how can he refuse? Maybe it's a former soldier, somebody who's done terrible things, looking for a path to redemption. So Aang teaches him, and then he teaches others. And though they may not be airbenders, they are as earnest and faithful as any nun or monk Aang knew before. The temples become filled with new faces: Firebenders, Earthbenders, Waterbenders and non-benders all wearing Air nomad orange and yellow.

Aang always feared that it would be his responsibility to have airbender children, and the idea of forcing that on someone he loved terrified him. Maybe that's why he waited so long before acting on his feelings for his best friend, his travelling companion, his fellow-village builder and temple-restorer. How could they have a truly happy relationship with this pressure hanging over them? He wishes he could be content with the new way of things that he and his friends have created. But he knows that he can't be the last airbender forever...

Nobody knows why some children can bend the elements and others can't. Is it blood? Is it blessing? Is it the land in which you're born? Or is it the simple allocation of fates decided by the values and norms you're raised believing in? Is it enough to be surrounded by the culture and beliefs of the Air Nomads? Nobody knows...

All they know is that nobody sees it coming when the six-year-old daughter of two non-bender villagers from the Earth Kingdom and Northern Water Tribe sends herself flying twelve feet into the air with a sneeze.

#oops it became a taang au how did that happen #i just think it wld be neat if the air nomads worked more like irl monks/nuns #not necessarily celibate but still made up of people who choose to follow the way of life #instead of the iffy implications of all monks/nuns having no choice because they were born airbenders #i dunno it's iffy to me #taang #my posts #atla #atla headcanon #do we need to rewatch Ice Age 2 ppl?? #repopulation is not a good reason for two people to be together! #avatar: the last airbender #i do also think that given them being nomads the fire nation probably want able to wipe the air nomads out completely #bu they just had to survive in hiding/ in a very diluted form #maybe like the sun warriors do #airbender!Ty Lee my beloved #also wld reflect the themes of unity vs division well if there were more than just airbenders among the air nomads #like how a waterbender can be a ruler of the Fire Nation or a Firebender can run a tea shop in the Earth Kingdom #toph x aang #edited cos someone got upset at my introduction and while i reckon they were willfully misreading i didnt want anyone to misconstrue #to clarify -> any child of aang's wld be an air nomad but there's no guarantee they wld be an airbender #esp if he had a child with an earth or waterbender #and we see how this had a negative effect in canon #hope that clears things up xx

[uncanny-tranny]

And another thing that gets me about the human condition is how we weren't even meant to survive this world alone - humans with humans. We chose to trust certain animals, to nourish them, to be symbiotic with them, to love them like we love ourselves. I think a lot of people talk about how selfish it is for humans to take advantage of animals, but I think that's too simplistic. It's closer to friendship - if you do not foster the relationship, then it simply won't go anywhere, and I think the implication that animals can't ever know anything for themselves, for their survival, is also human-centric and selfish (selfishness not inherently being a bad thing).

It's just nice to know that we want to be around people - we want to be around comfort and security and safety so much that we now have animals by our side. Every time I cuddle with my cat, I think that we weren't meant to survive this world alone; she is shaped to fit in my chest, and my arms were made to wrap around her.

#positivity #and i know many people are like 'but we domesticated animals for what they could do for us 😞' and that's not the full picture... #...YES we fostered certain relationships with animals because they are skilled and they are qualified so to speak... #...but we also must prove ourselves in order to keep our end of the deal. would an animal really WANT to do their work if they... #...weren't taken care of? ESPECIALLY if they're stubborn in nature? #it just seems human-centric to think that all animals are at the mercy of us and could NEVER think or feel #and even then!!! we won't ever KNOW because they have different thoughts and feelings and perspectives we won't KNOW ABOUT #maybe we should just bask in the company and love that animals give us without worrying about committing Awful Heinous Sins #YOU ARE A PART OF NATURE. YOU ARE ALSO AN AMIMAL. YOU CAN SURVIVE WITH OTHER ANIMALS #when you take the time and care to learn about animals you can even relate and feel for them and understand a little better #i just love that humans tend to pack bond so intensely that it doesn't just apply to other people #our instinct to love and care is a good thing. our pack bonding will help us survive. #to live is to be 'selfish'. it is you IMPERATIVE to be selfish

[frodo-of-the-nine-fingers]

i think the actual disconnect between nie mingjue and jin guangyao is that nie mingjue is dying and knows he's dying and has to stick so so so closely to his morals and virtues or else it'll have been for nothing and then he'll have to come to terms with the fact that maybe he didn't actually have to die after all vs jin guangyao who wants to live, he wants to live and be safe and have all the things he was told he could never have-was told he was never good enough to have-and will do almost anything to make it so. and these are two like irreconcilable point of views right (and both Correct and Wrong at the same time) and so they can't understand each other because they aren't even having the same argument and neither of them can see that

#nie mingjue #jin guangyao #nieyao #it's good!!! #i think nmj never expected to survive the war against the wen too maybe so after he's both floundering and STILL dying #characters that didn't HAVE to die like that but did anyways because societal/family/narrative pressure etc >>>>>>> #⚰️ #I've been told it's real sweet to grow old #i think there's also this disconnect between the two of them in the story as a whole re that steinberg quote i posted earlier about kleos #nostos (glory seeking vs home coming) #where jgy is the kleos or glory seeker and nmj SHOULD be the nostos (@ #(and he IS to an extent) but also he ISNT because again he is dying-he knows hes dying you cant extract that from his character #and so there SHOULD be this conflict here from that but there just isnt because nmj isnt filling that role properly and i think that's part #of why jgy cant understand him #jgy is the kleos but nmj isnt a glory seeker (not outside of like the war and he's not doing that for glory etc) but he's also not nostos #he's theseus in the king must die #(sorry for referencing a bunch of shit in th tags pls pls pls ignore my rambling to myself about characters that are barely ever on page/ #screen and so we can never actually fully contextualize them because we dont actually know them but oh boy oh boy can we try) #so like what does a guy who will (allegedly) give up anyone and anything domestic to gain/retain status do against a guy who otherwise #would be the opposite and unwilling/unable to sacrifice anyone for these things do when said guy does neither 🤷‍♀️ #mine

[be-bi-do-crime]

watching ajtl is like being told that you will be kicked down the stairs of a 500 story building, accepting that you will be kicked down the stairs of a 500 story building, then getting kicked down the stairs of a 500 story building, screaming crying and throwing up while tumbling all the way down, and finally arriving at the bottom to get a pat on the shoulder and a bandaid that says "congratulations for surviving" 😊

#a journey to love #一念关山 #unpopular opinion maybe but actually the ending wasn't that bad since the narrative was doomed from the beginning. i cried a lot but i had #a good agonizing time. i only wish we had a special ep to show us yizhou with their kids & explain how tf they survived their BRUTAL deaths #also i will not lie i needed more of ltg and yy #show me their 10 year timeskip selves!! #all in all its a great drama that i recommend!! i rated it 8.5/10 and i havent rated a drama in a while so that says a lot #i miss my ruyi already... ill see if i can finish that fic im working on for her

[statementlou]

So I see folks pointing out that Louis' circle A tattoo is more likely an aesthetic choice than an announcement of a political commitment to anarchism, and saying basically that that maybe makes him a bit of a poser and I mean- I GUESS. But I don't like to look at things that way and I don't think it's useful. As I see it the subversive sexiness of the symbols of resistance have ALWAYS been gateways for people who are drawn to the struggle in vague ways and that's GOOD. Aligning yourself with those values is good no matter the reason, in my book, especially given the wretched options available out there, but also the journey doesn't necessarily stop there. Gatekeeping queerness victimizes people who are just trying things out and starting to discover that it may run deeper than just trying on a new look who should instead be welcomed and helped along their path, and I fail to see how gatekeeping political affiliations is any different (plus how counterproductive to actual movement building is that?)

ANYWAY. What I really want to say about Louis is that while I KNOW that Louis is probably not secretly a theory reading anti-state communalist anarchist, I think that actually Louis' optimism and idealism (and his unwavering commitment to allying himself with the working class and embracing those roots) are a perfect fit for the philosophy and always have been. I know that anarchism is mostly understood as being about throwing molotov cocktails and fighting the state (and the allure of its symbols are that they signify this, a terrific aesthetic for him to choose to sign on with in my book), but that's honestly largely cartoonish stereotyping that comes directly from anti-anarchist state propaganda. That resistance is necessary in this hellscape of oppression we live in and is super important, but in its heart anarchism is only about the state in that the state and capitalism currently stands in the way of its goals. The whole point of anarchism is that it's NOT about the state! It's about being able to imagine something better than a state, it's about how we live and about how we SHOULD live, it's about HOPE and picturing something utopian and something free of the ways capitalism pits us against one another! What could be more Louis than that?

"I need you and you need me and I love that" is as beautiful a way of talking about the cornerstone of anarchism that is mutual aid as any long winded essay I've read (even if what he meant was contextually different), and I think when he talks again and again about how special the space fans have made around him is he is expressing an intuitive understanding of the importance of autonomous zones, places and moments outside of the shitty life imposed on us by the system (also a huge part of anarchist thought). Maybe I'm just being an optimist but I think that Louis DOES understand that caring for people and wanting self-determination and freedom for all and allying himself with the working class involves a certain amount of resistance to and positioning yourself in opposition to the state. Thinking the symbols of smashing that state are cool isn't meaningless; it's a CHOICE. There are other cool symbols out there and I just happen to think that feeling a resonance with certain ones is something in and of itself, even if at this moment he does not choose to start a fight with the media about it all.

#long version of this part maybe later… (orrr maybe here and now oops lol): #I believe we are all born natural anarchists with a desire to live in mutually supportive ways and in freedom #it only gets beaten out of people by the trauma of the system and being forced to struggle to survive #Louis shares with many privileged people a certain immaturity of not understanding those struggles #but I think that 'immaturity' can include- in smart and good people- not having lost sight of that utopianism #because they are able to conceptualize it because they live the way we all should be able to #free of so many of the survival struggles #(I think that in some areas maturity is code for 'beaten down to a good capitalist') #anyway and that's why autonomous zones are important: #because you HAVE to have the experience of freedom sometimes to be able to move towards it #you have to experience wins to be able to keep fighting #it's the candy crush theory of organizing lol like: people will simply give up and lose hope if everything is struggle and despair #and nothing is hope and success #you don't have to win the whole fight to get glimpses but you have to have moments #anyway a song I love that is about that is Saturday Night by the Coup it's a BOP go check her out she feels like winning #boots is a commie but that's okay he Gets It :P #anyway #anarchism #blah blah blah #I love being a louis apologist I should add that to my header what can I say: I love him #also look how many WORDS I can churn out when there's no show😂gotta fil the time somehow #send me questions I beg you we've got a long couple months ahead #comrade louis

[badolmen]

hey you guys know that even if the people inside that submersible are rich billionaires, dying in that metal tube at the bottom of the ocean is a horrific way to die right. like. yeah stupid choices were made by the people in there signing off on a waiver that says the sub is not approved by anyone and they could die. but it’s the fault of OceanGate for knowingly putting people into a Home Depot DIY sub rigged up with an Xbox controller all to make a profit on people’s curiosity.

#ra speaks #personal #oceangate #missing sub #be normal on this post or I’m going to be disappointed in you and hope you grow as person #listen I’m not touching the ‘site of a horrific maritime disaster being used as a tourist locale’ with a ten foot pole #but like the people in that sub are currently going through something incredibly traumatic and will be lucky to survive #and I know we all love to laugh at dumb rich people suffering the consequences of their hubris #but jfc maybe I’m insane but like on a human level can you respect the horror of what is happening to real living ppl for a goddamn minute #there’s also a good chance these folk aren’t millionaires #they’re probably upper middle class folk splurging for the start of summer vacation #‘oh but I bet they’re still rich assholes-‘ THERES PEOPLE IN THERE. THEY MIGHT DIE. WHY IS THIS SO HARD TO GRASP AS A TERRIBLE THING??? #me. low empathy: wow this is horrible. I quite literally can’t imagine how the people down there feel but I’m sure it’s incredibly traumatic #dumbasses making memes: haha dumb rich kid and his dad are gonna suffocate in a metal tube lol

[ichthyorelationships]

an idea i invite anyone else to write about / run with lol....

the premise that The Change gets all messed up for alberto, say it's something that can happen from stress, &/or happens rarely and you just have to wait for it to resolve itself....used as some parallel to struggling through some emotional turbulence / upheaval / questioning / Realizing Things, etc etc

#luca 2021 #pixar luca #alberto scorfano #another idea i've failed to write for & so invite anyone else to run with: ciao alberto but what if he peaces out by swimming off lol #ends up in a coastal town maybe an hour's swim from genoa. but not Getting In Touch w/anyone for a while b/c plausibly he thinks that #giulia may not be a fan of him now by extension; just being too embarrassed asf to reach out to luca kinda lol....luca off doing his own #thing just fine & alberto not wanting to write him now like b/c i Ruined Everything again ahaha.... #and by ''not in touch w/anyone for a while'' who knows. months; a few years even....might stumble across news of him b/c like. #say more sea folk are coming to land / more humans know abt them & not many places are as [harpoon]ly from the start anyways #portorosso exceptional in that way....maybe where alberto settles down they're like legendary but also considered Good Luck anyways lol. #anyways like some people know of him who might; say; swim down to portorosso. have their own teen who knows a teen who mostly lives on land #most convenient re sparking [wow could they mean Our alberto] if he doesn't go so far as to take up an alias lol. but why would he.... #that difference in that massimo might figure that however alberto was surviving before; he could continue to do so now; but even though tha #is some comfort it's still Not Actually Enough....feeling way more Parentally towards alberto than his biological dad like that; obv #and anyways re: this [The Change gets messed up] idea it's more of an inconvenience lol but one that could still have some significance #like if he first finds out the issue exists via hopping right into the ocean; failing to change forms; never being human form'd in water b4 #thee worst....crash intro course to the experience of drowning. observation of How Humans Swim / being able to grab any part of the boat... #and besides That unpleasantness it's like; hey. where's my nonhuman form at #or; of course; being in sea form even while dry....especially if he's still dealing with Nonsense on land. which is presumed. #&/or if there's an upswing in nonsense b/c of Other ways you're Othered...ofc we can consider like; tfw you're a gay fish & maybe that's no #something that on its own would be like Aah until it's like well a) i kinda wanna do things that would make this Visible and b) i've learne #that humans also Have Issues about this kind of thing.... #appropriately my tablet was also all thrown off. no pressure sensitivity; input sensitivity overall was rough #but i would've had to restart my laptop about it lol like eh i'll just work around it

[giritina]

Is it a hot take to say hard line anti-psychiatry is definitely reactionary and anti-science and bad

#im tired of these people telling psychotic people they should go off antipsychotics and refusing to believe that the meds help us lol #like yes theres serious side effects to be considered but you are acting in bad faith if you believe wed be better off w out them l #and that wed be better off with out diagnosis or research of schizophrenia #tbh youre wrong if you believe anti anxiety and antidepressants dont work but at least youre maybe talking from experience #i do appreciate lots of antipsychiatry content if its nuanced but anyone who believes psychiatry should be discarded. wrong. bad idea sorry #and i KNOW with certain newly developed and niche therapies we can do well w out psychiatric meds but. theyre also new and niche. and #more often its that with therapy we can survive on lower doses

[swinging-stars-from-satellites]

we are going to survive this

#something about such a great cloud of witnesses #makes me think of. like. not just in the Christian sense of the heroes of faith. #how many people have survived their bad days. to prove to the rest of us that we can #sometimes I look at the people just a little older than me who relate to the things I go to and go oh. maybe it will be ok #Lu rambles #adulthood woes

[quietwingsinthesky]

the last unicorn post from earlier has me thinking about the master. that yana is still in there, you know? is still someone he was, if even for a brief flash across the life of a time lord. there’s no way to unlive that life. there are ways to twist it later, sure, to make utopia into hell on earth. but the life was lived. in much the same way that the doctor can remember, can feel, the love he held onto as john smith even as that life is ripped out of his hands. the doctor choose denial and then grief and then to shutter it all away. and so john smith died, and so professor yana died, and the doctor and the master live on. the doctor has done this before, and he lives in orbit around humanity, trying to keep the best parts of them and hold them deep enough to take root (which he can pretend he gets to choose, as a time lord. as a human, it all floods in and can’t be dug back out.) but what about the master, right?

to borrow a turn of phrase: i think there are two time lords left in the universe, and they both learned how to regret.

#regret here meaning less feeling the emotion of actual regret obviously because time lords do not actually funxtion on unicorn rules. they #already get sad just fine on their own. no humanity needed for that. #but i dont know. i just dont think he brushed it off so easily. i think he did a hell of a job convincing himself he did. #and what better way then to twist his own great works and destroy the species he was working so hard to save at the end of the universe. #but what about the knowledge that he *could* be that person. that somewhere in him exists a version that wanted to save people. #a version that is painfully too much like the doctor. even. now is that part worse or better than the human part? #but if past regenerations are ghosts i think yana deserves a haunt. #anyway maybe ignore this one im rambling about nothing here #theres just. i dont know. what if you were the last of your kind and in surviving you made yourself Not Like Them in a way you’ll never #escape. #i mean doctor who is just so concerned with all these plots about hybrids and children of the tardis and clones and What Makes A Time Lord. #but they’re so obsessed with it in just. a very Lore way. is what it feels like. we get brushes of more like with jenny and how she’s #physically a time lord and the doctor denies her that inheritance. a shared suffering… #but me myself im just fascinated with the doctor and the master as the time lords who survived. but they survived Wrong #its. its. children of gallifrey that don’t belong to her anymore. you know? #i dont care if river’s got time lord dna!!! or the metacrisis is physically human!!! i dont care!!! talk to me about what it means beyond #their blood and bones!!! what’s it like to have your sense of self stripped from you like that!!! #what’s it like when so much of you is the shed skin of time lords past. but one of you was human. one of you was painfully *humiliatingly* #human!!! #enough about how much dna you need to count as a time lord. i want to know how much they can mutate until they can’t be recognized as one. #does that make sense?

[stop-breaking-my-heart-dragonage]

I'm back on my bullshit thinking about the Hawke siblings again and how much I love a "both twins live" AU... but y'know what I love just a little bit more? An AU where all three Hawke siblings are alive, but one of the twins still get attacked by the ogre in Lothering and is presumed dead when they actually survived.

I like to think that since the narrative in DA2 is framed as a story Varric's telling Cassandra, we can play around with the fact that he's an unreliable narrator. Varric wasn't there in Lothering. He only knows what Hawke told him. It makes for a better story if Leandra, Hawke, and the surviving twin get to huddle around the dead twin and say their goodbyes... especially if they didn't actually get to do that. I mean, a lot of us already have that train of thought when it comes to Leandra's death and Hawke getting some closure through her final words telling them how proud she is. Whose to say Varric didn't do that for the lost twin, as well?

All that to ask what if the ogre attack happened, but the group was so overwhelmed by darkspawn they had to flee further and couldn't check the twin who "died?" Flemeth still showed up, but it was too late to go back and say goodbye.... so Hawke made a deal with the Witch of the Wilds and they all pushed forward to Kirkwall.

Imagine Bethany, left behind with broken bones and bleeding in the sand, fading in and out of consciousness as the remaining darkspawn surround her. She knows how to heal, how to fight back, but she's weakened. Her staff lays out of reach. Air shakes in her lungs. She tries to call for help, but only wheezes come out. Where's her mother? Her siblings? Did the ogre get them, too?

At this point, we all know what happens to the women darkspawn take, and Bethany could've met that fate; she doesn't have the strength to fight back as they drag her away. But before they can bring her underground, she's saved by another group of survivors. Perhaps they're more soldiers fleeing Ostagar, or townsfolk who recognize her from Lothering. They do what they can to treat her wounds but she needs a healer, so they bring her with them to seek refuge in Redcliffe... except they eventually realize she's an apostate. Well, she doesn't seem dangerous, but they still contact the templars.

Bethany wakes in a warm but unfamiliar bed with skilled healers tending to her. Templars hover by the doorway. First Enchanter Irving greets her, gentle in explaining she's safe inside of Kinloch Hold and that she's going to survive. When Bethany asks about her family, he gives her a sympathetic smile and says they only found her.

Bethany, who never took to embracing her magic the way her older sibling did and always felt like it burdened her family... has lost that very family. Could they survive the ogre and darkspawn? Or did the ogre tear them apart, too? How did she survive... but not them? Did the Maker really have such a sense of humor? How else would she end up in the Circle, a place her family went to great lengths to keep her safe from?

She doesn't want to think about it. She hopes they made it to Kirkwall, but the prickle of dread that crawls up her spine knows how unlikely it is. Bethany finds comfort in speaking with the mages who rotate in to heal and bring her food. Some feel trapped by their magic just as she does, but others remind her of her older sibling in the way they embrace their magic, a gift from the Maker. The younger apprentices who aid the mages ask her questions about what lies beyond the walls. The templars mostly keep their distance, but one is friendlier than others. A man with curly blonde hair and a sympathetic view of the mages bothers to speak to her more than his fellows do.

She's still in recovery when Uldred and his blood mages attack the tower, but she survives. Bethany heals, even as she's haunted by nightmares of the ogre wrapping its tainted hand around her body to crush her, flinging her aside to lay among the limp bodies of her family... haunted by the horrors the blood mages unleashed on the tower. She aids in restoring the tower the best she can, and accepts her new home, her new life. When she's well enough, she lights a candle for each of them; her father, mother, her eldest sibling, her twin... she even lights a candle for the family mabari, and prays to the Maker to give them her love as they stand at His side.

The Blight ends. Years pass. Bethany settles into her new life, becoming a fine example for the younger apprentices she mentors. She witnesses wrong doings against her fellow mages, loses friends to their harrowings or tranquility. She accepts what she is, even if bitterly. The Chantry's teachings about magic scar more than enlighten; she sees it in some of her fellow mages, feels it in herself. Secret meetings. Whispers of escape, of freedom. More escape attempts. Harsher restrictions.

Around this time, back in Kirkwall, Knight-Captain Cullen stands where he always does in the Gallows courtyard. He notices Hawke appear with some of their companions. It hurts to think back to Kinloch Hold, but something occurs to him: he knew of another Hawke who was brought to the Circle while he served there. They only spoke once before... well, before. He wonders if there's any relation. When Hawke wanders over to speak to him, as they always do, Cullen brings it up.

Hawke pales. A beat of silence. Cullen recognizes heartbreak; he sees it unfold in their eyes and swell in their throat as they realize that all this time, their baby sister was alive.

Then the day comes where new whispers float among the mages in the Circle. A visit by a Grey Warden. Most, including Bethany, assume he's here to recruit... until Irving comes to her. He says this warden's requested, though more like insisted, he see her now. But then Irving smiles; the warden in question said his name is Warden Carver. He received an urgent letter that his sister is here, alive, and he demands to know if that's true.

Bethany nearly collapses when she sees him.

While the reunion can't last; she can't leave the Circle and he has his calling; the twins embrace, sobbing out apologies and exclamations that they thought the other was gone. Carver tells her of Kirkwall, the expedition that led him to the Grey Wardens, and their older sibling's status as Champion. With a gentleness she never knew her brother to have, he tells her what happened to their mother, and more tears flow freely. Their sibling learned about her from a templar, though Carver grumbles that the bastard could've said something sooner.

There's the Maker's humor again.

...Now flip the script: imagine Carver being left behind instead.

For as strong and passionate as he is, that ogre still picks him up and slams him to the ground. Bones crack. Black splotches flood his vision, agony exploding across his skin. His sword flies from his hand. The soulless bastard tosses Carver aside like he's nothing, and he's left to lay there. His mother's cries muffle in his ear as though he's stuck underwater, sinking slowly into the dark.

It figured, honestly... that he'd survive Ostagar while his fellow soldiers were cut down all around him, that he and his eldest sibling would flee the field when all hope was lost... that he'd make it home to get his family out of Lothering... only to die protecting his mother. And why not? He is a protector. A warrior. It's a honor to die saving those he loved... so why didn't it give him peace?

Carver eventually wakes in the night among the bodies of fallen darkspawn. Everything aches painfully hot and his thoughts reject coherency. He knows his family is gone; they're dead, or they've fled... either way, he's alone; left behind. Something's broken inside of him, but he has just enough will to pull himself up at the sound of approaching footsteps. A group of survivors find him- funny enough, the same group who aided Bethany in an alternate timeline. Imagine that.

That's how Carver ended up in Redcliffe's Chantry with an overworked healer tending to him. He doesn't even flinch when the mage works their magic on him, knowing all too well the sensation of healing magic seeping into his skin, mending the flesh. He tries not to think of Bethany, or what might've happened to her.

The Chantry's overwhelmed with townspeople hiding from a danger outside that he can only assume is darkspawn... except it's not. He wonders how hard he hit his head when he hears the undead have come from the castle to slaughter what they can of the town every night. But then he sees it with his own eyes when one breaks in, taken down by a templar, and never before has he ever felt so useless.

Then the last two remaining Grey Wardens arrive. They're crucial in the final fight against the undead, swearing to enter the castle to stop the attacks at the source. While Carver couldn't participate in the final fight, something he complained loudly about, he did what he could in his condition to help like sharpening swords and handing out supplies. Mostly to keep his sanity and quite his thoughts throughout his recovery.

When the time came, he took up his sword again in the name of all those he lost.

An archdemon was said to be on the horizon, and the Grey Wardens needed everyone they could get to fight. Carver fights in the battle of Denerim where the Hero of Fereldan defeated the archdemon. He cuts his way through every darkspawn he sees. Ostagar flashes red behind his eyes. Lothering clutches at his heart. So much anger and sorrow built up inside him, flooding out in his tears and screams. Blood everywhere. Fire and smoke.

Then it's over.

In the aftermath of the Blight, like so many others, Carver has no home to return to. No family. He thinks to go back to Lothering to help rebuild, only to hear the lands were too tainted. These tainted creatures took everything from him... That's what eventually brings him to Vigil's Keep, standing before the Hero of Fereldan themself, asking to be made a Grey Warden. He already dedicated nearly two years of his life to killing darkspawn, and he had nothing else. Even when faced with the Joining, holding the chalice of darkspawn blood and being told to drink, he didn't flinch.

Life as a Grey Warden isn't as simple as he assumed it would be, but Carver finds purpose in his calling. Over the years, he grows to view his fellow wardens as family. He travels all over Thedas, venturing down into the Deep Roads to help clear out hoards of the darkspawn. But then comes the day he finds himself in Kirkwall, and it doesn't take long before he hears the name Hawke on the lips of the townspeople. His eldest sibling was not only alive, but they're quite popular among the people. But what about Mother? Bethany? He doesn't have to snoop too far to learn templars took Bethany away to the Gallows, and that Leandra Hawke was the final victim in a string of murders committed by a blood mage.

Carver finds himself standing outside the estate, glaring at the door. Furious. Heartbroken. Bitter. He wants to scream. This entire time, they lived. He's torn between wanting to reunite with his older sibling again, to get the truth from them, and wanting to barge into the estate, demanding answers to how they could let the Circle take Bethany... after what Carver sacrificed, how could they let Mother die like that? Was it all pointless in the end?

He leaves without knocking. He can't bring himself to see them. Not that it mattered. Before he could leave Kirkwall, the tensions with the qunari finally overflowed, and chaos fell upon the city. He's forced face to face with his older sibling again, but he wasn't prepared to watch the recognition slowly bloom on their face, or for all his anger to turn to mush. Carver's the first to speak.

"Somehow, I knew it would be you."

.............So, yeah. I really like this idea.

#da2 #dragon age 2 #bethany hawke #carver hawke #long post #there are so many routes you can take with this too like hawke finds out bethany's alive in fereldan's circle #and they gather all their companions like 'y'all we're doing a heist' 'great what are we stealing?' 'my sister' #'...isn't your sister dead?' 'APPARENTLY NOT' #or carver and anders could know each other from the wardens and one day anders tells hawke that they remind him of another warden he knew #and hawke is like '.............that little shit survived and he didn't tell me?? i'm telling mother' #OR both bethany and carver end up as wardens and happen to run into each other like '????? I thought you were dead?????' #and tbh bethany doesn't have to end up in the circle or carver with the wardens. that's just the paths i explored #maybe they're found by the warden and alistair who have wynne fix them up and they join the dao party #hell this could be backstory for an inquisitor carver or inquisitor bethany in dai #also yes this post is my way of saying that i love this idea but i'll probably never turn it into a fic so let me gush about it this way

[ioannemos]

the particular bad guy of this episode, a little apprehensively: the audience wants to see me die?

nate, with more sincerity than anything he's said to anyone in her presence before: like you wouldn't believe

#and he's not wrong #leverage #my favorite #tv shows #watching the stork job and the way that parker instantly goes 'we have to bail' after seeing the kids has me Feeling a Certain Way #bc i think it's partially like. i think she knows the feeling of 'the known sucks but at least it's the known' #how many times was she let down? was her hope that things would get better left to die? #i know she goes to save them all later but maybe at the time she was just thinking... 'don't give them false hope' #her insistent use of the phrase 'we can't save them' is just. augh. parker bb no #and eliot saying to sophie 'he's right' re nate's sticking to the plan of saving one vs trying to save all of them on the fly is smarter... #just ouch. reminds me of the fishing job where eliot's goal is 'GET HARDISON OUT' and the very clear reluctance with which he tells hardiso #'yeah. i have an idea what they're gonna do. it's gonna be bad. are people gonna die? probably' #bc he doesn't want that! he doesn't want to leave people in the lurch! but GET HARDISON OUT takes precedent for him #and he's doing the same thing here. GET LUKA OUT is taking precedent. he doesn't like it any more than sophie does #i just. ghenghnehganf. i have a lot of Thoughts and Feelings about eliot's priorities and how they intersect with his job as the hitter #he's the physical guy. he has to be not just realistic he has to be the pessimist bc if he doesn't plan well enough? he friggin dies man #eliot's always thinking of 'what can a human being survive' bc AS THE HITTER that's HIS weakest point #GHENFGHENFGGHGHEWLAFHGGLRHGI #i have normal feelings of normal intensity about eliot spencer #and parker for that matter! very normal #eliot spencer #parker #you pierce my soul #personal #abbie needs a twitter

[uncanny-tranny]

I think it's all about care, in the end. My cat is curled up on the bed I made for her, and the yarn used was made by people I never met, and the machines that they operated were invented by people who are perhaps long-dead. The electricity that courses through the veins of those machines were maintained in ways I never have witnessed, and it's about care, and pain, and care again. It's always going to be about care and community. Nothing that is built without that in the forefront of its mind will ever hope to live forever - only we will, and our care will. The only thing that will remain immortal - even with the pain even immense - is our care.

It's about care. It's about curling up on a warm blanket made by somebody who loved you enough to want you to be warm, and there won't be a shortage of that kind of care and love - it isn't a finite resource.

#positivity #we are not an island #we were not born alone - we won't have to die alone #the idea that you can survive alone is part of how you are alienated from not only the world but from yourself #will anybody who made this yarn know that it is warming the best friend love of my life #will they know how much she loves this blanket when she is cold and weary? will they know the love that went into the blanket? #will they know that their labour went to something soft even when they themselves didn't get that treatment all the time? #it does sometimes make me sad to know i will never be able to prove to the people who have done so much that they aren't unnoticed #maybe it's hubris or maybe it's being afraid that purposelessness is pervasive and seemingly unavoidable in a world that often devalues... #...who and what you are

[pushing500]

Our caravan was viciously ambushed by... two lil' munchkin cats. They were no match for Laursen, and our nomads continued on their way without any issues.

Until...

They were ambushed again! This time by a pair of terrifying... blind salamanders. These ones were dealt with by none other than our favourite lucky charm, Shamrock the donkey. A hero for sure!

Finally, we arrived at a lovely stretch of grassland where we decided to settle down for a few weeks to resupply. Don't they all look adorable camping out around their ominous obelisk? I wish I could draw scenery better. I'd love to be able to paint this up in a pretty oil-painting scene. Still, the screenshot itself is cute enough. <3

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#rimworld #gracie plays #The Children of Ecthuctu #art #my art #traditional art #rimworld art #unpolished art #I think Salvatore the cat is glad he's on our side #those munchkin cats didn't stand a chance #Neither did the blind salamanders #I'm so proud of Shamrock. #What a good donkey he is!! #The grassland is very nice #Much greener than the desert was #We'll grow and hunt to prepare some more survival meals #and maybe wait until Duchess has her baby? #Then we can set off once more #Hooray! Things are looking up #Have an awesome day <3