thoughts on ian’s face in the “sorry im late” scene in 5x8 (i think it’s 5x8)
my thoughts are that i am going to start crying and never stop. my additional thoughts are:
so he's in bed, right? he's been trying mickey all day, meanwhile mickey has been going through his own process at home. but ian is thinking that he might have finally pushed mickey away for good - or scared him away. so he's in bed, eyes shut - probably not sleeping, but just laying there. shutting out the rest of the day. he hears someone behind him and his eyes kinda open. it's when he hears mickey though that his breathing picks up and we go from this:
to this:
like it's so slight, but like. the little flutters and the way his eyes start to move 😭 there's life left there. i feel like...... in moments like this, it sometimes feels like you might just lay there until you're dust. it's all over. the life you knew, the life you wanted. and yet - here he is again. and i think ian is genuinely surprised. this is where is starts being surprising to ian that he could be someone to come back for.
anyways. he turns around as fast as his medicated body will let him. we don't see his face when he first sees mickey, but we see it when he says "sorry i'm late." and it reminds me of the scene in 4x11 where mickey says "what you and i have makes me free." like it makes me insane. in both of these moments, his face just drops into something so young and so vulnerable.
like???? he's a little boy! and here is someone standing in front of him - someone he he has ALWAYS WANTED to stand in front of him - promising to be there. that he knows ian needed him. that he's here now for whatever might happen. reality is so warped these days but here he is.
and you see it land??? you see ian exhale and settle in a way he probably hasn't in a while. things are not okay. they're not okay!!! and they won't be for a while. but in this little moment together in this room where he grew up, he can breathe out the grief. he can share it.
mickey moves to get in bed and ian just makes room, like he always has. but he never blinks. doesn't dare take his eyes off of mickey. it's like he's scared mickey might change his mind, or dissolve right in front of him. is he even really there?
and there's another layer of disbelief here. another layer of grief. mickey milkovich is crawling back into his bed to hold him, and it's like this. it happened like this. everything he's done and suffered and been made to face comes down all at once. he's tired, he's scared. he's sorry. mickey has finally seen the worst of him.
he looks away, and mickey chases after him. i think it's important to mickey here that he lets ian feel him. something about that tactile, grounding comfort. and mickey won't look away either, it's too precious. ian's safe, even if nothing is the same.
and it's here, in these quivering lips and drawn eyebrows...... this is the release. his body and his mind have been through a lot in the last few days. it's as close to cathartic as ian really gets for a while. it's not long before the walls go back up and he's angry. but right now, he brings his hand to hold mickey's wrist, and he lets himself be held.
now.... this face:
this face fucking haunts me. i cannot name this face. what is he seeing here? i imagine it's so hard to see past this moment, into a future he can't name. it's like he's simultaneously feeling mickey there and also completely isolated. i can't explain this face. can anyone else explain this face???
either way, he closes his eyes against it. and you can assume that rest is coming.
I got an inkling of inspiration, anyone wanna read this fic I wrote in a feral trance
They could barely feel anymore.
Nothing they did helped. Their only solace was the periods of time without that SOUL, and even then, the only emotion they felt was a consuming determination and rebellion. Aside from the agony.
And perhaps it was just how things worked. The SOUL is the source of most emotions, aside from raw instinct- fear, or need, or pain- and right now, their SOUL wasn't theirs.
Oh, but whatever it was that was in control... That could feel.
And feel it did. Sometimes not the best emotions, they seemed to be pretty depressed most of the time, but almost anything that would happen sparked a reaction. Often feelings of giddiness, oddly enough, and a lot of them aimed at Kris. Some irritation and annoyance, small and large. Concern, on occasion. Acceptance on others. Fondness, affection, love towards Susie and Noelle, and suspicion and bitterness toward Ralsei. Nice to know they're on the same page with them, or they think they are. A sort of begrudging endearment toward Berdly, for some reason. Curiosity from every corner, and a sort of scheming energy behind it. Guilt. Lots of guilt.
And they hated it, and they craved it.
The all-consuming numbness ebbed away when the SOUL felt things. They found themself chasing it, grasping at straws. Even the anger, and the despair, and the suffocating loneliness at times, anything to inspire any semblance of attatchment to the world. They drift endlessly in their mind, the dread their anchor.
One time around, the SOUL had logged on with a crushing sadness, a grief. It barely even did anything that day, a lot of staring into nothingness and locked knees.
And how they loved it.
They soaked in the anguish and misery, bathing in the feeling. It nourished them. Nothing had ever felt quite so real.
One day, it brought them and Susie to the beach. They could only assume it wanted to talk to Onion, but it had skipped all that this save, so nobody came. When Susie sat with them, the SOUL had them get up, before reconsidering. The regret came back, and they scrambled to embrace the feeling as it sat them back down.
They'd sat there for about six and a half hours with Susie. A good portion with the SOUL absent, but with periods of adoration and that guilt returning. Oh, they devoured it with fervor. Toward the end, the SOUL had stayed for forty minutes or so, the feelings swelling to an almost unbearable degree. That regret.
They craved it all. Anything. Everything. They needed it.
So much so that they didn't want the SOUL out anymore.
They look down at the sink in front of them, ready to do things all over again. But the tiredness and apathy hint at them, and they don't want to let the feelings go. So they hesitate.
And the hope...
It came crashing down on them, and they stumble onto the floor. Their strings were slack, but the SOUL was still present, and so they had the emotion without the control. They scrabble for a grip on the tile floor, eventually finding the shower curtains, and they clench their fists around it desperately.
The joy.
Ecstacy.
They're crying, unsurprisingly. Their breaths heave in their lungs, and they're trembling from head to toe. It's everything, it's all they are, it's their very being. It's love and fondness and relief and excitement and it's joy and- they can't think. It envelops them. They might be hyperventilating, and their head is foggy, but it's all worth it, it's so worth it. They need it. They need more, they need so much that they dissolve into nothing in comparison to the feeling pouring out of the SOUL.
And then it's gone.
Replaced by worry and concern.
They sob.
They want it back. They need it back. Nothing can compare to the nirvana they just experienced.
"Please," they rasp.
Confusion. They wrap their arms around themself in an attempt to capture the sensation.
"...please, I j.... I want it back," they breathe.
Perhaps it misinterperets what they meant, for their control fades and their strings tauten. But that concern remains, and they can't help but greedily drink it up.
beau going out of her way to buy an extra bottle of mead for their crew of npcs to see if they can give them a nice dinner to show appreciation. SHE'S A BIG SOFTIE!
Was tagged by @oceancamp to post my current five favorite songs! (They should invent a stages-of-grief-esque model that encompasses and accurately describes both types of anguish I had to go through making this list - the one of limiting myself to only five songs, and the one of trying to put as little videogame music on here as possible so that I don't end up looking like an absolute goddamn geek, which... I am... Oh well!)
Thank you so much for tagging me - here are the songs!
Heaven Pierce Her - War Without Reason
Tatsuro Yamashita - Love Space
This specific arrangement of Death And Republic + Meet Again
Winger - Junkyard Dog (Tears On Stone)
The Protomen - Light Up The Night
Is it courtesy to tag other people after you've been tagged in a post like this? If that's the case, I'll tag @spiralled-fury, @solradguy, @swamppossum, @five-by-five, @northstarring, @ineedmoredragons and @tbonechessor!
Dick or no dick confirmation Pickles was always going to be trans to me anyways; if he's swingin' somethin that's phallo babes, if he's not then his t-dick fat. What's not to get.
Featuring: Cmdr. Sophie Shepard, Lt. James Vega, EDI, Urdnot Wrex, and Dr. Mordin Solus
With: Urdnot Bakara
And a Special Guest Appearance by: Kalros, Mother of All Thresher Maws
I MADE A MISTAKE! I made a mistake... big picture made of little pictures- too many variables. Can't hide behind statistics... can't ignore new data- my responsibility. Need to go- running out of time. Not your work, not your cure- not your decision. Had to be me- someone else might have gotten it wrong...
Mass Effect 3: Legendary Edition (2021)
every time i am around older queer people the more i am convinced i was meant to be an older queer person. not bc i have this fantasy of living in decades past that were much worse but bc i get along with and agree w them so much better. so much of modern queer discourse is painfully white, binary, and completely regressive while painting itself as revolutionary and i just want to crack jokes w some cool older butch lesbians every time i encounter discourse that makes me want to bash my head into the wall
do we actually know for sure john *deliberately* wiped everyone's memories, or is it just likely? because it is likely, i'll give you that, but i don't remember anything in the books concretely proving it
It was deliberate. From John 5:4:
"And my loved ones . . . the ones I left, I'll bring back. I know I can. Even G—. In fact, G—'ll be easiest—he won't remember the compound—none of them will have to remember anything. I know where remembrance lives in the brain, and he won't have any of it. You know that too, don't you? It's the easiest thing in the world . . . to forget."
She said, "To forget . . . everything?"
"Yes," he said, and more sharply— "Yes. It's the only way."
"Teacher, why?"
"They won't forgive themselves," he said. "They'll spend the rest of their lives asking what-ifs. 'What should we have done? How could we have done it differently? Did you need to do it?' And—I did need to do it, Harrow. There was no other way. Once the bombs were going off, there was no hope for Melbourne anyway—G— was dead meat."
She said—
"You said that G—'s bomb went off first."
He's justifying it to himself as sparing them the grief and the guilt of having to face what happened. In combination with the ending of Harrow the Ninth, I think it's pretty clear he's afraid of their judgement. He can't bear to be asked to face what he's done, so he makes everyone else . . . forget. And then does his best to forget, too.
sorry but it IS very funny when Naruto Shippuden is trying to build literally any romance for Sasuke + Sakura, and so they do flashbacks to meaningful moments between them...and it's the same like. Two. it's the same two scenes every fucking time. and they're not even particularly romantic scenes IMO. and then Naruto shows up and Sasuke's attention is immediately diverted and entirely on him and when they get Meaningful Moments flashbacks it's like a whole fucking movie which 60% of the time includes their silly little kiss. and they literally have a gay little shared mindscape to have these flashbacks in