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lunarblazes · 2 years

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whoops my hand slipped again (ao3)

Pearl has mostly settled in, all things considered. Chromia is beautiful, full of flowers and wild bees (Scott tells her he's not allowed to tame them on behalf of a foreign princess of the Dawn), and she's been fine there. Another person stumbles into the city bounds after her, someone who introduces himself as Joe Hills. Pearl can tell he's like her when she squints; the air shimmers oddly around him in the same way it warps around her fingertips. She wonders if he feels like she does, but they don't talk about it. Not in front of Scott. Scott shows them their rooms in the inn. He takes them to another empire, the city in the sky.

There are more people like her, in Stratos. She's not sure of their names until they introduce themselves to Joel, the ruler and maybe-god of the shining city (Cub, Scar, and Grian), but, like Joe, they each have some strange air about them, particularly the one called Grian. None of the emperors seem to notice. It makes her a little uneasy (she's almost relieved when Grian topples off the clouds) but that's quickly wiped away by the sheer splendor of Stratos' temples.

There is a temple to a grain goddess inside of Stratos. Pearl lingers in it for a while, examining the gardens planted inside. Despite all his blustering, Joel's kept them well, cultivated them exactly right. She doesn't know what metric she's using to compare, but she's right, she knows she is. Pearl asks Scott what the goddess' name was (this is a place of reminiscing, not of present honor; this goddess is at least dead to the man who made the temple, whether he's divine in his own right or not) and his face scrunches up in concentration.

"Peril," he finally answers hesitantly, his accent shaping the word.

Pearl stares around the temple again. The woman in the statue has no face, just a smooth slab of andesite stone, but the scythe she holds is sharp, huge enough to do real damage. Pearl knows that farming sickles are just dull enough to cut wheat. They shouldn't be used for fighting. What kind of a grain goddess is also a warrior?

"Peril," Pearl repeats softly and ignores the way the light that's replaced her heart jolts in her chest as the sunlight drifts into the temple. "Interesting."

She forgets about it quickly enough, even when Grian and Scar join them again with elytra and she has to squint against the deja-vu that presses at the walls of her mind. Pearl's still floating, after all. Glowing. She's paying attention well enough, but she's not really processing the things she's seeing. She's a little afraid, deep down, that they might hurt her more if she thinks about any of this too hard.

Things get a little weird when they enter the Nether.

There is a man, which is unassuming enough. Pearl has seen many men in her life, actually, and this one seems both unfamiliar and unlike her, but that is also par for the course at this point. He's wearing light armor, a teal tunic, and sturdy brown boots over dark pants. He appears to be talking to two people, one she semi-recognizes and one she sort of doesn't. As he turns, she sees that there's a scar over one of his eyes. It pulls tight as his eyes widen.

Pearl stares at him, mouth downturned slightly in a confused frown. Maybe she was wrong? He might be someone like her, she might have just not seen it.

She squints at him, trying to see the warping she's come to associate with the people who call themselves hermits. Sure enough, the air starts to stretch under her scrutiny, but it's not what she's looking for. The hermits have an aura like pulled taffy. It moves and stretches and explores lazily, heavy and cold without any mass; Pearl can see the weight on their shoulders and often wonders if it shows on her own. She doesn't feel any heavier, any more burdened, though she supposes she wouldn't have anything to compare it to. This man's wrongness--it's thin, flowing like water. It sets in fast, coming to a rolling boil then flickering out of existence all within a few seconds of him laying eyes on her. Whoever this man is, he's not like them.

Pearl takes a cautious step back as the man surges forward.

"Santa Pearla?" he asks reverently.

"Who?" Pearl says, bewildered.

"You--you! You're the Saint of Sanctuary, la Madre de Girasoles," he insists, though his voice wavers slightly at the clear lack of recognition in her own.

Pearl looks to Scott. She has no idea who that is or what those words mean. He shrugs.

"This is Sausage," Scott says, by way of explanation. "Protector of the empire of Sanctuary."

"No, no, she's the protector," Sausage insists, kneeling. "She's the source of our magic!"

"Mate, I'm a cleaning lady," Pearl says back. She blinks. This interdimensional memory stuff is getting weird--is she really a cleaning lady? The kneeling is also freaking her out. She knows that whoever she is, she's not supposed to be holy.

"But--there are statues of you," Sausage says, uncertain. "And murals?"

Pearl shakes her head and helps him to his feet. "I don't know. I'm just Pearl."

"She came here through the Rift, Sausage," Scott says in a stage whisper. "I think she's just a cosplayer."

"Oh, I did come here through the Rift, didn't I?" Pearl says thoughtfully. "Good to know."

Scott gives her an odd look. Sausage stares out into the distance for a moment before blinking, looking anywhere but at her.

"She looks so much like her, Scott," Sausage murmurs.

"I know," Scott says, "but she's not from here."

"Right," Sausage says, and claps his hands. "Yes, okay! You're a visitor, here, we--we can arrange a tour in Sanctuary, for our new guests!"

The tour is nice, and there are a lot of hermits. She's decided they're called hermits now. It just seemed like the right thing; none of them have a home, after all, and it's only right that they take the name of a creature that must share. It's an agreement they all innately have, maybe, because suddenly the term just becomes commonplace. Pearl's still not sure if the emperors can see the warping, but they definitely feel it. There's a gathering of about ten hermits crowded around Sausage's chests, including the man she was uneasy around earlier (Grian, she thinks it was), and the air is practically crackling with the way it's being tugged at. Different currents, different directions, all of it flying in separate spheres of chaos. She watches as one of the rulers, a goblin dressed in layered blue, red, and gold, staggers back from the fray, clearly disoriented as he leans against a tree.

Pearl retires to Chromia's inn after that, her head slightly spinning. If she thinks too much about any of this, she might dissolve or burst at the seams. Joe is there, absentmindedly tapping his fingers on the banister of the balcony to his room. They stare at each other for a while, the ever-present warped air still twisting behind them, and Pearl resolves to take a good long nap.

Before she gets to her room, it occurs to her to ask Joe about it. That wouldn't require her thinking too hard, really, and surely would prevent any further crisis or brain twisting caused by thinking too hard.

"Joe," Pearl asks, "are you okay?"

Joe doesn't turn around, but he sighs. "I mean, like, physically? Metaphysically? Dimensionally? Mentally? What flavor of okay are we talkin' here?"

"All of the above, probably."

"Metaphysically, I think I could be worse. My soul's probably fine. I don't think I have a way to tell, though, so that could be really wrong. Dimensionally--well, that's where the trouble starts, isn't it," Joe begins. "There're these mirage-type things--"

"Yeah," Pearl interrupts. "I think all the hermits have those."

"Is that what we are?" Joe says thoughtfully. "I like that name."

"Do I have it?"

Joe finally turns to look at her. He squints a little. "Yeah," he finally says, "I think it's--it's a little more obvious, actually. Kinda defined."

"Oh, lovely," Pearl says. "That means I'm the coolest and should be the leader."

Joe giggles. "Yeah, sure. Mentally, well, I got a little freaked out with so many people around, it was... not the best, but this inn is really quite nice, so I think I'm doin' a bit better. And physically my arm is broken."

"Joe!" Pearl yelps. "Why didn't you tell anyone? I'm sure they could have helped patch you up!"

"Well, it's--they were busy," Joe insists, "and I didn't want them to have to deal with it! They run kingdoms, Pearl, it's not like they have time to deal with--"

"It's a broken arm, Joe, how hard could it be to fix?" Pearl says. "C'mere, I can probably figure out how to set it."

"Ah. There seems to be a little bit of confusion here," Joe says. "Which is understandable. I didn't explain very well--that might be why nobody tried to help, actually, but--hm. Maybe this should have been in the metaphysical category, or the dimensional category."

Pearl stares at him, waiting for an elaboration. Joe stares back at her and does not offer any.

"What's wrong with your arm, then?" Pearl prods.

"Well," Joe says. He takes his left arm--not the one he was messing with on the banister, Pearl notes--and tries to prop himself against the wall. By all accounts, the attempt should have worked because he was literally just touching the wall with his arm. It does not. Pearl watches as the warping snakes its way down his left arm, causing him to simply phase halfway into the wall. He sighs.

"Oh," Pearl says. "That sure is a new and interesting way to break your arm."

"Yeah," Joe says miserably.

A beat.

"I don't know how to fix that," Pearl says awkwardly.

"Me neither," Joe says. They're back to staring at each other again. Joe pulls his arm out of the wall.

"Well, goodnight?" Pearl says.

"Yeah, g'night, Pearl," Joe says, remarkably amiably for the situation he's in, and goes back to staring out the window.

Pearl flops into her new Chromia bed, stares at the little toy sheriff that sits on her bedside table, and tries very hard not to think about anything until she falls asleep.

There are sunflowers growing from her pillow when she wakes. Their faces mirror her own in position as the sun rises to the east. Pearl ignores them.

Girasoles--sunflowers.

#pearlescentmoon #joe hills #smajor1995 #mythical sausage #the convergence #lunar prophecies #pearl in this au lives in my head rent fucking free shes about to get so much worse #also my apologies if joe's off base i tried my best but i have sworn to not watch him sadly #if i did i would grow too powerful to function in society and thus me and mr hills must always remain separate it is a tragedy

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aquelondungeonmaster · 2 years

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hey consider this au in which. most of the hermits to go through the portal are absent from hermitcraft, of course. really, all of them except pearl.

at least, that’s probably pearl, right? she’s got that same cleaning lady outfit. sure, there’s something different about her-- maybe it’s just that her elytra look different? but she looks like pearl, and sounds like pearl...

and she acts a lot like pearl, but not quite. she seems to recognize the still-present hermits, but it’s almost like she knows them secondhand, from the perspective of someone watching from somewhere else rather than interacting directly. she likes fighting, and plants, and those sunflowers that keep springing up from nowhere, and she’s very, very powerful, and she’s just pearl, right?

(in which. pearl, plunging into empires, simply traded outfits with another version of herself.)

#empires smp #hermitcraft #pearlescentmoon #bold of me to call this an au before pearl's perspective on the rift stuff comes out #but if i get prophecy dodgeballed on this i will simply be thrilled and flattered #NOTE TO SELF COME UP WITH TAG FOR THE CROSSOVER LATER #Canon Convergences #< yea that's a start #mcyt #a-post-lon

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enneamage · 3 days

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Reflecting on the number of roleplay plotpoints on DSMP that have real life parallels now. I will genuinely carry this baffling media experience with me to the grave.

#I'm sure there's even more I don't know about #reflecting on c!Q and real Q today. No big insights just the haunted look of a Seer who watches prophecy and reality converge over and over

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wheelercore · 1 year

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Lays in bed at night and thinks about "Mike is the key" "two keys" "two man job" the "todfather" car and I just [REDACTED]

#im going to be sooooooo delusional for a moment wait #running off my rusty s3 memory here but. in order to deactivate the keys you need two ppl #however joyce did it on her own. and i just think. hold on.#in order to do it she had to take one and try to reach out to the other #one key to reach out to the other. thats how you close the portal. a struggling connection that eventually reaches #mike can sense the void- which is used as a connection point somehow related to the UD hivemind and RSU minds #im going to pass out #idk is this a tedgate post or a prophecy #the physical distance between the two keys... one person cannot close the distance on their own... it needs to be a collaboration...#are you seeing it. are you seeing the metaphor #only when there is the connection will the protals close *flashes back to the focus on mike when they pass by the portal convergence at the #library*#oh were not surviving this one my brain chemistry will be altered forever

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encrucijada · 2 years

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hi haze dogs sounds immaculate, also two word titles are the most superior and haze dogs vibes so much as a title ok bye

thank you!!! as my new brain baby i am so happy people like haze dogs. and i wholeheartedly agree about two word titles, that's why i have like 5 of those 💀

#haze dogs.. coughing roses.. evergreen lung.. crocus lane...speak prophecy.. catholicism gothic.. barrio ángeles.. astral convergence #answered

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momma-of-many · 3 months

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THE FOUR WINDS! (Prophetic Word)

I heard The Lord say, “Wherever my Spirit is blowing, that’s where you need to be flowing and going”! The Lord is leading us a way we’ve never been before. What are the 4 winds of heaven and how do they apply to your life, family, circumstances and Church? It took the four winds together to bring life to Ezekiel’s valley of very dry bones! I sense The Lord saying, “Prophesy, it’s time for the…

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andy-15-07 · 3 months

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can you do a fic with Paul Atreides, where Y/n is a bene gesserit and they find he is the One

Our love is powerful

masterlist ! pairing: Paul Atreides x reader

Dune Masterlist

In the mystical world of Arrakis, where sand dunes whispered ancient secrets, Paul Atreides and you, a Bene Gesserit, found yourselves entwined in a destiny written in the sands of time. The air in the Sietch was charged with anticipation as the Bene Gesserit sisterhood, with their millennia-old knowledge, discerned a truth that transcended the ordinary.

As you and Paul stood in the sacred chambers of the Bene Gesserit, the reverence in the air hinted at the gravity of the moment. The sisterhood, with their eyes that held the wisdom of countless generations, regarded Paul with a mix of expectation and acknowledgment.

"Y/N," one of the elder Bene Gesserit addressed you, "the threads of fate have woven a tapestry that binds your path with that of Paul Atreides. He is the One—the Kwisatz Haderach."

The realization hung in the air, a moment that echoed through the corridors of time. Paul, with his piercing blue eyes and a destiny that weighed heavily on his shoulders, looked at you with a mix of curiosity and acceptance.

"What does this mean?" Paul inquired, the weight of the prophecy settling on his young shoulders.

The elder Bene Gesserit stepped forward, her voice a melodic resonance that carried the echoes of ancient wisdom. "The Kwisatz Haderach—the One who can bridge space and time, unlocking the secrets of the universe. He who possesses both male and female ancestral memories, breaking the limitations that have bound humanity."

You, a Bene Gesserit bound by duty and destiny, met Paul's gaze with a depth of understanding. "Paul, you are the culmination of a plan set in motion by the Bene Gesserit sisterhood. The threads of our bloodlines converge in you."

The gravity of the revelation seemed to settle in the room. Paul, born into a lineage of political intrigue and ancient prophecy, found himself at the crossroads of destiny.

As you and Paul retreated from the sacred chambers, the Sietch buzzed with a mix of anticipation and uncertainty. The sands of Arrakis seemed to echo the whispers of the prophecy that had been unveiled.

"Y/N," Paul began, his voice a quiet contemplation, "what does it mean for us? For our relationship?"

You turned to him, your eyes reflecting the weight of the truth. "Paul, our connection goes beyond the prophecy. The Bene Gesserit may have seen the threads of fate, but our love is a force that transcends destiny. Together, we navigate the path that unfolds before us."

The days that followed were filled with the intensity of preparation, as Paul embraced the training and revelations that came with being the Kwisatz Haderach. The Bene Gesserit sisterhood, with their watchful eyes, guided him through the intricacies of their ancient knowledge.

Amidst the trials and tribulations, your connection with Paul deepened. As he grappled with the weight of his destiny, your presence became a source of solace and understanding. Late nights were spent beneath the stars, the two of you seeking refuge in each other's arms.

One evening, as the desert winds whispered tales of destiny, Paul looked at you with a mix of vulnerability and determination. "Y/N, I may be the Kwisatz Haderach, but my heart belongs to you. Our love will be the anchor as I navigate the complexities of this path."

You smiled, a reassurance that transcended words. "Paul, no prophecy can diminish the love we share. The threads of fate may guide your journey, but our connection is a beacon that lights the way."

As Paul embraced his destiny, the sands of Arrakis witnessed a love story that defied the limitations of prophecy. Together, you and Paul Atreides forged a path that merged ancient wisdom with the unwavering power of love—a journey that echoed through the sands of time, leaving an indelible mark on the destiny of Arrakis.

#paul atreides imagines #paul atreides x reader #paul atreides x female reader #paul atreides x you #paul atreides #paul atreides imagine #dune x you #dune x reader #dune imagines #dune imagine #dune part 2 #dune fanfiction #timothee chalamet imagine #timothee chalamet imagines #timothee chalamet #timothee chalamet x you #timothee chalamet x reader

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guysgirl-boymom · 2 years

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I maaaaaay have bought these books from @arvidabookco entirely based on the covers! How BEAUTIFUL are they!?!?!? I've never even heard of this series. It's copyrighted from 1996 and Avon Books no less. Written by Sharon Green and covers designed by Thomas Canty. I think this series of covers look SOOOOO beautiful, I cannot wait to read them! #books #usedbooks #arvidabookco #sharongreen #thomascanty #theblending #convergence #competition #challenges #prophecy #betrayals https://www.instagram.com/p/CjayfsdrK9B/?igshid=NGJjMDIxMWI=

#books #usedbooks #arvidabookco #sharongreen #thomascanty #theblending #convergence #competition #challenges #prophecy #betrayals

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blueiskewl · 2 months

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The Marble Head of Apollo Unearthed in Greece

The excavation, carried out by a group of students of the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki in the archaeological site of Philippi Kavala, brought to light important findings. Among other things, they discovered a rare head of Apollo dating back to the 2nd or early 3rd century AD.

The statue dates back to the 2nd or early 3rd century AD and it probably adorned an ancient fountain.

Natalia Poulos, Professor of Byzantine Archaeology, led the excavation, which included fifteen students from the Aristotle University of Thessaloniki (11 undergraduates, 2 master’s, and 2 PhD candidates), Assistant Docent Anastasios Tantsis, and Professor Emeritus of Byzantine Archaeology Aristotle Mendzo.

Archaeologists say, this year the excavation continued east of the southern main road (decumanus) at the point where it meets the northern axis of the city (the so-called “Egnatia”). The continuation of the marble-paved road was revealed, on the surface of which a coin (bronze phyllis) of the emperor Leo VI (886-912) was found, which helps to determine the duration of the road’s use. At the point where the two streets converge, a widening (square) seems to have been formed, dominated by a richly decorated building.

Archaeologists say evidence from last year’s excavations leads them to assume it was a fountain. The findings of this year’s research confirm this view and help them better understand its shape and function.

The research of 2022 brought to light part of the rich decoration of the fountain with the most impressive statue depicting Hercules as a boy with a young body.

The recent excavation (2023) revealed the head of another statue: it belongs to a figure of an ageneous man with a rich crown topped by a laurel leaf wreath. This beautiful head seems to belong to a statue of the god Apollo. Like the statue of Hercules, it dates from the 2nd or early 3rd century AD and probably adorned the fountain, which took its final form in the 8th to 9th centuries.

In classical Greek and Roman religion and mythology, Apollo is one of the Olympian gods. He is revered as a god of poetry, the Sun and light, healing and illness, music and dance, truth and prophecy, and archery, among other things.

Philip II, King of Macedon, founded the ancient city of Philippi in 356 BC on the site of the Thasian colony of Crenides near the Aegean Sea. The archaeological site was designated a UNESCO World Heritage Site in 2016 for its outstanding Roman architecture, urban layout as a smaller reflection of Rome itself, and significance in early Christianity.

By Oguz Buyukyildirim.

#The Marble Head of Apollo Unearthed in Greece #Philippi Kavala #marble #marble statue #ancient artifacts #archeology #archeolgst #history #history news #ancient history #ancient culture #ancient civilizations #ancient greece #greek history #greek art

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queerfables · 9 months

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The Rules of the Twist

Given the themes of deception and sleight of hand in Good Omens season 2, I think most of us agree it's at least possible there's some kind of twist waiting to be revealed in season 3. We're bouncing around a lot of theories, but I wanted to take a step back and look at the general shape of what we might expect.

The big twist we've seen before in Good Omens is Crowley and Aziraphale's body swap. (Okay, technically it was an appearance swap. But that just doesn't sound as pithy.) Rather than anticipate an exact repeat of this trick, I'm considering the swap as a sort of model. What does it tell us about the rules Neil plays by when he pulls a twist in this story? What clues can we expect, and what can we not count on? Sure, there's no guarantee that a season 2 twist is going to map exactly onto what we've seen in the past, but I think it's a reasonable place to start. Take these as guidelines and take them with a grain of salt, but if you're sorting through all our fascinating Good Omens theories and trying to decide what you think, you might find them helpful.

So then, what are the rules?

Broadly speaking, Neil plays fair with twists. He foreshadows and includes enough hints for the audience to make a reasonable guess at what's going on, or at least to look back after the reveal and go, "oh, of course". But he still keeps some cards close to the chest.

During the body swap, there are two big gaps in the information we're given:

Key events happen off screen The swap happened between scenes, during a time that it was only suggested, not confirmed, that Crowley and Aziraphale would be together. The transition between these scenes also used film and tv conventions to make that passage of time "invisible" - we see Crowley and Aziraphale get on the bus, and then we see them in the morning going about their days separately, and we're conditioned to think nothing important could have happened in between.

Key tools (eg abilities, items, information) haven't been shown before The swap was not something we'd ever seen Crowley and Aziraphale do, and it wasn't something they'd ever talked about either. It fit comfortably into the established world building but it hadn't been specifically signposted as a possibility.

The other big twist that Good Omens pulled was the romance between Gabriel and Beelzebub as the explanation for Gabriel's disappearance from heaven. Both of these information gaps are involved here too. The offscreen event is obviously the meetings between Gabriel and Beelzebub that lead to them falling in love - up until Gabriel's flashback sequence, the only indication they'd ever met each other was a brief conversation at the airbase during Armageddon. The tool that we haven't seen before is Beelzebub's ability to create a fly vessel for Gabriel's memories (protecting him in much the same way that Crowley and Aziraphale protected each other with their body swap, in fact).

These are pretty big gaps, really. And given that Neil knew there'd be years between seasons 2 and 3, I expect he would have leaned pretty heavily into them if he wanted to hide something. So how do we predict a twist if we can't know where it is and haven't seen what it might involve?

Unanswered questions

This is the big one. Looking at where the furniture isn't, you might say.

What's interesting is that the questions that point to a twist aren't usually subtle or ambiguous. For the body swap, the two converging questions were: what did Agnes' last prophecy mean, and how could Crowley and Aziraphale survive their executions? In season two, some of the unanswered questions signposting Gabriel/Beelzebub were: how did Gabriel lose his memory, why was he carrying a box, what was the significance of the song he kept singing, who was he at the Resurrectionist with...

I think guesses about upcoming twists are most convincing when they seek to tie up loose threads from the show. For this reason, I'm a little skeptical of theories proposing the kiss between Crowley and Aziraphale involved some kind of twist. It isn't impossible, I just don't see any unanswered questions there. (Savvy readers may note that I too have speculated about a twist hidden in the kiss. I do find the possibility fun, but it's not a theory I'm seriously committed to). If I was going to really buy into one of these theories, I'd want it to explain one of my big unanswered questions other than "but how could they get into a fight that hurts me so deep in my soul?" That's definitely a question I have, but not technically a mystery.

It's worth noting that in the case of the body swap, we were initially given a false answer to the question "how did they survive their executions?" The angels and demons watching attribute it to Crowley and Aziraphale having "gone native", believing that their natures had fundamentally changed, making them immune to holy water and hellfire. It might be the case, then, that some of the apparently resolved questions this season warrant further investigation. Is there more to the story of Gabriel's disappearance than we know, for example?

2. Unexplained details

If examining an unanswered question is looking at where the furniture isn't, then this is where we take all the pieces of furniture piled up in storage and see if we've got anything that fits. Everything is fair game here: script, acting, music, props, sets, costumes, editing, camera angles, audio effects, visual effects, everything. If it's on the screen or coming through the speakers, it was put there on purpose by multiple teams of highly skilled and attentive creators all working together to create the final product.

I think you could probably do an entire meta on all the little details pointing towards the season 1 body swap, but here are some of the big ones:

"Crowley" sees the restored Bentley, but takes a taxi instead of driving it

"Aziraphale" circles "Crowley" when they order their ice creams, the way Crowley more typically moves around Aziraphale

"Crowley" says "tickety boo", an extraordinarily Aziraphalean phrase

The collar on "Crowley's" jacket is a beige tartan rather than its usual red

There are general differences in the ways David Tennant and Michael Sheen embody the characters throughout the swap

Similarly, Gabriel and Beelzebub's romance has lots of small details pointing to it. The big one that keeps showing up is the connection between Gabriel and flies. He mentions them and interacts with them repeatedly, and although it isn't obvious at first glance, there's a fly in the box that he carries to the bookshop. This all culminates in the reveal that it's the same fly, Beelzebub's gift to him.

Here's the problem, of course: if everything in the show is intentional and crafted with meticulous attention to detail, how do we know what actually matters? This is why I think it's so important to look at the unanswered questions first. There's a joy in seeking out Easter eggs and connecting all the dots, and sometimes you might strike gold this way, but there's also a lot of noise in the signal. It's helpful to know the general shape of what you're looking for, so you'll know when you've found it.

You can reverse engineer this. Start with details that jump out at you and then look for a puzzle they might explain. This works, but it's a little easier to get lost in the weeds, struggling to sort out what's significant and what's a fun reference to another piece of media or a hint to a question that's already been resolved. Going back to the twists we've already seen on this show, the unanswered questions around them were really big and obvious, so I think it's a good idea to ask: if I hadn't noticed this detail, would I have thought this was a mystery that needed solving?

Okay, but what do we do with this?

Well, maybe nothing. These criteria can't confirm or rule out any theories, after all. I'm laying it out like a rubric but it isn't really, I'm just describing a few storytelling patterns we've seen before and making some rough guesses about how they might show up again. If I were really serious about this I'd probably take a look at other examples of Neil's work and see how well my model holds up there, but the truth is I'm not really familiar with enough of his other works to do this. (Confession time: I was always more of a Pratchett fan).

The main reason that I've laid everything out like this is it informs my thinking when I stress test my own theories, and I figured other people might be interested in it. I'm also hoping it will help me to be able to refer back to this when I write meta in the future. For my own purposes, I find a breakdown like this helpful because it gives me a sense of how a writer approaches their story, where they'll tip their hand and where they'll hold things close. It's no guarantee and it wouldn't be any fun if it was, but in a lot of cases we're not aware of our own patterns, so it can be surprisingly illuminating.

#good omens #good omens meta #fable talks good omens

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lightman2120 · 10 months

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youtube

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lunarblazes · 2 years

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@oh-snapperss hey bitch

ao3 link

It's really quite simple, in the words of Mumbo. She sees the sunflowers. The sunflowers see her. She keeps walking.

Pearl isn't sure when they popped up. Between one night and the next, her lawn was suddenly covered in the things, a sea of monotonous shining yellow. They all faced towards the sun. She wished they would look somewhere else, but that just made her feel like they were following her instead, so she retracted the wish and resolved to ignore them.

Of course the compass is sat right at the root of one of the flowers. Right in the center of her door, too, where she can't miss it. If she were a slightly more superstitious person, she'd swear the sunflowers themselves put it there. But she's not, and it definitely points to Grian's base (as all roads seem to, eventually), so she sighs and resigns herself to an evening of getting no work done.

The sunflowers stare expectantly. Pearl ignores them, spreading her wings and elytra dually into the sky and taking off for Grian's latest crime against nature. The compass is steady, unfortunately, and she's right on time, for once. There's already a substantial number of hermits gathering in Grian's basement; she can count maybe four or five who arrive before her, and then there are seven or eight after. She's not keeping track, though somehow she feels like she should be.

As Grian prepares his little speech, she stares beyond him, head cocked to one side. The Rift sits, expectant as the sunflowers were. She doesn't like it, not at all, no matter how beautiful the stars are. It feels--above all, it feels hungry, a realization that sends dread coagulating in her throat, forming an insurmountable lump of terror as she looks on.

Despite her fear, all her reservations, she finds herself stepping forward with the others. It's a strange sort of detached panic that takes over her, then, and at once she knows she should have left the compass on the floor. Pearl should have turned that stupid thing into mulch. Let the sunflowers have their prize in the form of compost, a rotting magical thing seeping into the taunting, sickly yellow of the petals. Hopefully it would have killed them for good and she'd be working on her next cleaning job or checking stock in Twinkly Trash, finally reaping the rewards of the soup coup just days prior.

But she'd picked it up. And now she couldn't put it down--none of them could. Briefly, she wondered what that meant for Grian, the one who'd delivered them, and then her nose was a fraction of a centimeter away from the Rift and she didn't really have time to wonder anything before it decided she belonged to it.

It--it… what must be understood is that traveling between worlds is not something that is done frequently. The Rift isn't friendly. It's not evil, but it's not friendly, and it wasn't dedicated to making their trip comfortable.

As such, Pearl almost suffocates on the scent of spring winds before they even arrive. She chokes on the smell, the lack of air, the paradoxical straining of her lungs as her brain insists that they must be receiving something, something to keep them alive. She's not, or at least she doesn't feel like she is. Pearl feels like she's dying, like the complete emptiness around her is a giant stomach and this is how she's being digested. Every time she tries to think of her home for some kind of reprieve, it's snatched from her throat, leaving her dry and desiccated, a wounded animal in the desert searching for an oasis in vain.

The desperation is unbearable. She thinks if it doesn't end soon, she'll simply cease to exist; not dead, not alive, just conscious. A hollow shell, a frozen body in space. Pearl can't see any of her friends. She hopes that means they're okay. As she thinks of them, her breath fogs in front of her face, and in it she can see shapes bleeding--the faces of the people she entered with. They're escaping her now, both physically and mentally, her mind scrabbling for a hold on anything as it's systematically wiped clean. A blank slate.

What needed her to be blank? Why? What did it want?

Pearl keeps choking, clawing desperately at the air, at her throat, at anything to prove she's alive, until she catches the first glimpse of daylight and it's like a breath of fresh air to a drowning man six feet below the waves.

Her lungs heave as she furiously, ferally claws her way out, scraping and kicking and silently screaming to dislodge herself from the emptiness' gravity. Something murmurs around her, almost impressed, and she wants to tear its throat out with her teeth. Pearl pulls herself out of a vacuum with all of the grace of a starving wolf falling upon a deer carcass. With rotten, bloody meat between her jaws, Pearl finally reaches daylight.

The breath comes easy to her now as she gulps lungfuls of fresh air so clean and crisp her throat hurts from the sudden shift in abundance. Out of the corners of her eyes, she can see the other hermits arrive, some in worse shape than her, even, but she can't bring herself to care. She barely even remembers their names. Pearl feels stripped, hollow, barely alive. Barely even surviving.

And then she blinks, and it's all vanished. The pain, the Rift's hunger, her own fight for a feast, the thing it made of her. It's gone as quickly as it sets on, and with its absence comes a sense of abject calm, a stillness and serenity Pearl can work with. She's all too eager to let the memories flee her head as she realizes she's no longer where she was once standing.

The other… well, the others, whoever they are, had vanished, leaving Pearl shakily standing next to a settlement of tall birch buildings. Their roof tiles are painted in colorful patterns, laid with colorful Nether wood planks and beams. They're quite well-constructed, Pearl can't help but notice, and with something of an absent smile on her face, she starts to explore.

"Can I help you?" someone's voice asks, confused and a little rough.

"Oh, I'm just looking around," Pearl says airily, occupied with the realization that something's stuck itself in her chest--not in the sense a sword would stick, in the place where happiness and joy make their nests. It's a glow. Not really an emotion, good or bad, just pure energy, a light of some kind. She frowns faintly, vaguely sure it hadn't been there before. It was mildly upsetting her, really. It wasn't bad, just--confusing, an extra piece in a puzzle with no room for it.

Regardless, she turns around slowly, her mind still drifting from the strange teleportation. She feels floaty, almost as if she's asleep, a giggle bubbling up from the back of her throat. It takes her a second to remember her name and give it to the stranger. "I'm Pearl."

The stranger blinks at her. "Um, I'm Scott. Ruler of Chromia."

Pearl hums. "'S really pretty, Ruler-of-Chromia-Scott. Very colorful."

"Just Scott is fine, actually," he corrects her, turning to leave the house they're standing in. "This way--I can take you to the inn."

She follows him complacently, wondrously gaping at all of the beautiful things in Chromia. The houses are all as beautiful as the ones she'd seen before, and the entire… city? country? was built atop a gorgeous mountain.

A patch of sunflowers await her as she trots behind Scott. Pearl smiles and plucks one, tucking it behind her ear as a long green dress billows around her ankles. She grabs and lifts the light, airy skirt and rushes to catch up to her tour guide.

Pearl's always loved sunflowers. They tilt their heads to look at her when she walks past, brighter than the sun, with a reverence she's not seen yet knows intimately.

#pearlescentmoon #smajor1995 #the convergence #lunar prophecies #we've been being evil in dms alright #it's fine she's fine

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yona-chan · 4 months

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Wow, it's been a while since AnY gave me a nostalgic kick to the gut, but chapter 254 delivered. Yona and Hak camping out together, just the two of them... super reminiscent of the start of the series.

Also, just... Ik-Soo's prophecies coming back, specifically that one where he said Yona needed to seek the help of the dragons or Hak would die. Well... now it's just her and Hak again, which I really like: everything from the start coming back around in a new light. It's almost as if the two paths Ik-Soo saw have converged, or are threatening to, at the very least.

Really enjoyed this one :)

#speaking of being a while when did I last textpost?#it's been a while that's for sure #oof I need to order vol 40 for my shelf #forgot to preorder it #also need vol 10 of knh #akatsuki no yona #manga spoilers #akatsuki no yona spoilers #any 254 spoilers

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pen-and-umbra · 5 days

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Compilation spoilers below.

As the party delves deeper into the Temple of the Ancients, a vision of Sephiroth delivers a cryptic speech:

(“My fragmented mother, these errant worlds… All shall be one again.”)

“My fragmented mother” is a very deliberate choice of words. While the OG story touched on Jenova's fragmentation while dealing with the subject of Reunion, the plotbeats focused on Sephiroth and his failed copies rather than the creature itself. As the story unfolds, Cloud kills or severely injures Sephiroth during the Nibelheim mission, leading him to utilize clones and Jenova's remains after emerging at the Northern Crater in order to repair his maimed body. The same Ultimania Omega relayed that developers once thought about a scene where Sephiroth was revealed to have a Jenovaesque lower half. (The concept was eventually scrapped, but it would have added an even more grotesque element to Sephiroth's already terrifying being.)

(“It shall encompass worlds unbound by fate and histories unwritten. <...> My dominion shall reach into infinity”)

However, the Remake implies that the Reunion serves a different purpose. Or, more accurately, Sephiroth refers to a distinct event—the merging of worlds—as Reunion. According to Sephiroth's cryptic message, this is yet another foray into “godhood”. Not too unlike Ultimecia’s time compression, Sephiroth allegedly plans to join all the timelines into one to achieve “infinity/forever”. And yet, what does it have to do with “his fragmented mother”?

(“All made whole.”)

What if the true purpose of Remake's Reunion is not about “infinity” per se but about the “whole” part?

From the perspective of the OG, we are led to believe that the gathering of failed copies is the result of Sephiroth's will. However, Cetra's hologram delivers an interesting warning as the party traverses through the Temple of Ancients.

(“Heed well to our warning of that which is to come…<...> The reunion. When our adversary's scattered malignancy shall converge to plague the Planet once more.”)

The Cetra allegedly referred to Jenova's own inherent ability to reassemble its pieces (“Reunion”), whether conscious or unconscious. Unless the message was purely prophetic in nature, the statement presupposes that Jenova's body was already dispersed during the era of the Cetra, predating ShinRA's R&D department's experiments with alien cell injections. The Temple of Ancients narrates a gripping tale of Cetra's battle against the calamity-from-the-skies, with significant casualties suggesting a lasting conflict rather than a singular encounter.

Thus, it is possible that Jenova sustained injuries and lost some of its biologics before Cetra managed to seal it. Alternatively, fearing Jenova's reunification, the Cetran people may have “scattered” the creature in some way in order to hamper its resurrection. Whatever the case, at the end of the day, Jenova at the Nibelheim reactor appears incomplete or misshapen, missing a wing, and apparently suspended midway between morphing into a humanoid.

If the message is interpreted as a prophecy about the future, it demonstrates Cetran's extraordinary augury ability. However, assuming their knowledge of the future is precise, they never mention a different agent (Sephiroth), instead referring to their “celestial adversary” as the enemy who will plague the planet once more.

Anyway, spool forward, and in the age of ShinRA, the likes of Hollander and Hojo kept experimenting with Jenova's organic material, further disseminating alien cells. Several of its hosts have died. That includes both humans (Angeal or Gillian, for example) and monstrosities infused with J-cells that our party encounters (both organic and mechanical). While it is hard to estimate how many test subjects died during the course of the Jenova/SOLDIER Project, we can suppose that quite a number. It is currently unclear what happens to Jenova cells after the host dies; several instances appear to be convoluted (Angeal's mother allegedly dies alongside alien material, but Lucrecia claims that Jenova cells keep her alive). Let's assume that J-cells usually die with the host. As a result, an uncertain amount of organic material is missing from Jenova's body and will not make it to Reunion.

When combined with the Ancients' reference to “scattered” essence, Sephiroth's words about his fragmented mother make a lot more sense in the context of worlds merging. What if the primary aim of unchaining timelines was to acquire unattainable fragments of Jenova from hosts that are deceased within the primary timeline? Destiny's Crossroads, as a singularity of some kind, appears to be linked to all points in time and space. As a result of destroying Harbinger, our party is likely to have had an impact on PAST events (Zack's Last Stand). As a consequence, Zack lived. What if Jenovaroth's true goal is to alter branching timelines so that as many J-cell hosts as possible survive to converge at Northern Crater? Bringing scattered Jenova fragments across time and space to resurrect the entire entity and restore its power? The consequences of such a plan could indeed be disastrous.

Examining the issue from this perspective raises the question of who is truly in control and what kind of being will emerge after Reunion has run its course. It also raises the question of whether there are other ancient “deposits” of Jenova's organic material left from the Cetran War, if the warning in the Temple of Ancients was NOT a prophecy about ShinRA era.

👋 @pen-and-umbra

#sephiroth #jenova #ffvii rebirth #ffvii remake #ff7 rebirth #ff7 remake #ffvii #final fantasy vii #ffvii@luv fandoms

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slavonicrhapsody · 10 months

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Of all the demigods i find it odd that Rykard imitates GO the most because he should have been opposition to GO in every aspect but in truth is ideals are "strong will take everything and living eternally" Just like how Marika destroying other cultures and spreading her own religion with Godfrey and removing DD. The only difference is that one does not have a tree

literally SO TRUE this is like my blog’s entire thesis statement

The Taker’s Cameo description reads: “when Rykard turned to heresy, taking by force became the rule. The gods themselves were no different, after all.”

The entire basis of Rykard’s rebellion is that the rule of the gods (Marika and her empire; the Greater Will) is to take by force, so in order to oppose them, one must use their methods against them… fight fire with fire. However, to use the gods’ own methods is inevitably to liken yourself to them. Though “blasphemy” is defined as an “impious utterance or action concerning God or sacred things,” at the same time, it is also defined as “the crime of assuming oneself the rights or qualities of God.” Though Rykard is reviled for cursing the gods, he ends up becoming like a god himself, embodying the same aspects he hated about the gods in the first place.

Rykard’s sorceries are powered by both intelligence and faith, just like how the incantations of Golden Order Fundamentalism, developed by his father Radagon, are based on both intelligence and faith. Even the God-Devouring Serpent itself, taking countless souls into its body as part of its “family,” is eerily similar to the practice of Erdtree burial: in both instances, we see a great mass of bodies brought together into one Whole.

The prophecy of the serpent devouring the world, bringing every living thing together inside the Serpent God, is not so dissimilar from the sentiment of the Golden Order’s Law of Regression: “all things yearn eternally to converge.” Rykard’s tragedy is that he became exactly the thing that he hated. I think at heart Rykard’s intentions were never actually to improve the world, but to debase and humiliate the gods as he felt they did to him.

#elden ring #rykard #rykard lord of blasphemy #asks

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