Ngl choking on water is lowkey so embarrassing like what do you mean I messed up both drinking water and breathing I was LITERALLY doing both before birth💀
Ngl being a waterbender and choking on water would be so much more embarrassing
the image of an exhausted commander fox, sitting in his office, throttling a datapad and yelling WHY IS MY JOB SPREADSHEETS?? before yowling like a space banshee and frisbeeing the thing through the open window with all the force of kamino-guaranteed strength bolstered by buereaucratic rage, where the datapad sails merrily and speedily for a longer distance than many would credit before impacting with concussive force against the surprisingly soft skull of emperor palpatine, gladhanding for the press in the courtyard of the senate below
Relationship goals right there. As you sit there, coughing up the air you accidentally started choking on instead of some of the burger in your hand like a normal disaster of a human instead of a mega tier disaster of a human, your current/future significant other is contemplating wedding stuff while watching you.
they’re equally disastrous in my mind but I’m still thinking about burgers right now
absolutely fighting for my life not to cough on this packed transit car because I don't want people to think I'm spreading disease when in reality I had a nature valley bar and that little bitch broke into a thousand pieces and is stuck in my goddamn throat trying to slowly bring me to ruin
Then, on his arrival in Constantinople, after much counsel with himself, considering that he was already unequal to the amount of pressing business and believing that there was no room for delay, on the twenty-eighth of March he brought the aforesaid Valens into one of the suburbs and with the consent of all (for no one ventured to oppose) proclaimed him Augustus. Then he adorned him with the imperial insignia and put a diadem on his head, and brought him back in his own carriage, thus having indeed a lawful partner in his power, but, as the further course of our narrative will show, one who was as compliant as a subordinate.
No sooner were these arrangements perfected without disturbance than both emperors were seized with violent and lingering fevers--
AM 26.4.3-4
this was one of those illustrations that was originally supposed to be a 5 page comic until I realized I don't know anything about later roman empire architecture or visuals or art or anything, so we'll revisit that later. maybe
for right now though, these two are fascinating. we have two brothers acting as one body, even becoming ill in tandem with each other, it's giving This Throne Is Cursed. like, the last time I read about emperors coming down with life threatening illnesses, it was Caligula, and that moment in his biography marked a very specific tone shift. I spent the rest of the (first) time reading about Valens and Valentinian waiting for something comparable to Caligula's reign to happen lmao (Dio 59. 8. 1-2)
and since Caligula was already on the mind, I started thinking about Tiberius: I think he would've loved these two since he had a whole thing about twin-ification and brothers and etc etc etc. ofc, Rome is both a Mouth and a Tomb, so it's going to go badly for someone/everyone eventually, but honestly I think that Valentinian and Valens were the best we could've hoped for. like it could've been so much worse
Tiberius and the Heavenly Twins, Edward Champlin
Failure of Empire: Valens and the Roman State in the Fourth Century A.D, Noel Lenski
⭐ I have a tip jar (ko-fi)!
⭐ and other places I’m at! bsky / pixiv / pillowfort /cohost / cara.app
jaiden started to tell foolish the truth about her “kidnapping” but etoiles had just the perfect fucking timing and scared the absolute shit out of both of them