#either way they are twins even in the cosmic sense

[pinkeoni]

twelvegate is super fun and I love reading posts/theories about Will and El being bio twins but I also love the idea of there being a fantasy/sci-fi divide between Will and El’s powers. El’s powers while still supernatural is rooted in sci-fi tropes and lore while Will’s are steeped in fantasy tropes and lore. El has psionic abilites while Will has magic. El is the science experiment gone rogue while Will is the wizard. El’s powers were born out of men in science meddling where they shouldn’t have while Will was born completely out of chance because of ancient magic of the universe.

#idk #at least thats what i like to think #but also lowkey obsessed with some of the twelvegate posts like you guys keep fighting the good fight #either way they are twins even in the cosmic sense #also more willel narrative mirroring in this way #ive slept all day and then i woke up and had caffiene so now i cant stop postibg #will byers #el hopper #will byers has powers #willel #stranger things #byler #<- target audience

[trishacollins]

Afterimage

Please either feligami or felinette friendship. Would love to see sad smol Kagami hearing twins in her childhood au(hurt) then going to Feligami comfort of canon after s5 finale for the Feligami. For the Felinette just make them hug it out at some point after s5. You can also do Felix going to Mari for the cosmic macaroons and then going on flying date with Kagami. Whatever you like most :3

GiftFic for Anarchist Gang Server

*~*

To say that they were all feeling a little bit...under the weather was probably understating the facts by a considerable amount.

Felix had ended up in the center for the train ride back to Paris, Adrien on his left, Kagami on his right – though both of them were holding hands with each other as well.

Felix wanted a shower and to sleep for a thousand years. He could still feel his father’s hands around his neck, hear the way Kagami screamed as he fought his way through the nightmare to get to her.

But they were safe, they were together and safe – it was enough, wasn’t it? Except his uncle was dead, and Adrien had somehow managed to have a private chat with her and somehow ended up with completely the wrong impression as to the circumstances of his death.

Died defeating Monarch?

Felix supposed if it was true, in a logic-twisting sort of way.

He had to give Marinette credit for the mental gymnastics she must have been putting herself through. It was likely impressive.

But why? The why of it itched at the back of his brain, the logical parts of himself trying to make everything that had happened in the last seventy-two hours make even sort of sense in his head. Gabriel was dead, the Miraculous were back with their mistress – save for Duusu, who was sleeping in his pocket complaining of a ‘cosmic level migraine’ – Adrien had been delighted and charmed by the Kwami, fussing at him and babying him.

Felix hadn’t stopped him. Duusu was the only thing that had kept him even sort of sane through the nightmares.

He didn’t know if he could have made it through without the Kwami.

Marinette – Ladybug – was waiting for them at the train station, dark circles under her eyes and an exhausted expression on her face.

She nodded politely to his mother before she stepped forward and fell into Adrien’s arms. They clung, and there was a nauseating sort of backwash through the Peacock as their relief wrapped around each other.

Kagami elbowed him lightly in the side, and he made a face in response. She had done it, if in the weirdest way possible. She had done it. He had to give her that. He didn’t have to give her credit for lying to Adrien about the character of his father.

But defeating him? Ending the nightmares?

He probably owed her coffee or something.

“Kagami.” Marinette let go of Adrien long enough to hug Kagami, and then they both pulled Adrien into the hug.

Felix tried to tamp down a bit of jealousy, but she turned to look at him anyway, red eyes studying him. “Felix.”

“Don’t hug me.” He warned.

She snorted. “Why? You don’t want a chance to pick my pocket?”

Felix’s hand refleively came up to rest on his pocket. “Honestly, I know what you’re capable of. I’m more afraid of you picking mine.”

Marinette’s face softened slightly. “I’m not planning on anything of the sort.” She offered his hand, and he shook it cautiously. “Thanks for breaking them out of there.”

“Some backup might have been nice. But I understand there were other concerns.”

Marinette snorted, shaking her head. “Couldn’t be helped.”

“We’re glad you’re here now.” Kagami said softly. “It’s only been a week, and I feel we have so much to get caught up on.” Kagami took his hand, leaning into him.

Marinette glanced between them, slipping under Adrien’s arm. “I still have questions about this?”

“Getting kidnapped is very romantic.” Adrien deadpanned, resting his face on her shoulder. “Which is why I’m sorry to say, but I’m leaving you for my sensory deprivation chamber.”

Marinette rolled her eyes. “He really gave you nothing?”

“Well, I had a foosball table.” Adrien looked thoughtful. “I don’t think he realized it was a two person game.”

“He could have at least kidnapped Nino and left you with a friend.” Marinette muttered.

“Nino’s mom might have been upset.” Adrien pondered it for a moment, then shifted his head on her shoulder, arms wrapping around her waist.

Felix was familiar with the posture. It was Adrien’s ‘I’m about to make a terrible joke to change the subject’ stance, though he had never seen Adrien tuck himself behind anyone like this before.

They loved each other. His cousin was in love with Ladybug.

The girl that had saved them.

“We should go somewhere.” Kagami offered. “To catch everyone up.” She glanced at Marinette when she said that – but Felix had a feeling that it wasn’t going to be something they talked about until – well, later. Much later, probably. Maybe never.

Which saved Felix from the incoming terrible joke.

“I thought coffee and something to eat.” Marinette was aware of Adrien hiding behind her, but she was gentle, careful. Lacing their fingers together and letting him pull whatever it was he needed from her.

It was fascinating to watch. He hadn’t been sure what he would think of this Marinette – the one without any secrets, the one that he knew everything about. He hadn’t been sure when he shared the story that she would even listen.

But she had, and she had acted on it, and the fact had settled somewhere oddly inside him.

Marinette had done what no adult in his life, no person in his life had done – she had believed him, and then she had done something about what she had been told.

But at the same time, he barely knew her. He knew things about her – told to him by others, discovered on his own through accidental encounters. But they weren’t friends. They were at best reluctant allies on the matter of Adrien’s safety. Something she had killed for, unless his uncle had managed for once in his life to do something useful and just dropped dead.

(A part of him hated that he hadn’t been there, but the rest of him knew he couldn’t have been anywhere but where he had been, desperately trying to get to Kagami and Adrien.)

“They’re putting up a statue.” Adrien was saying to Marinette.

She pulled a face, but quickly turned her head so Adrien couldn’t see it. Which put her right in Felix’s line of sight.

He raised an eyebrow, and she rolled her eyes before turning back to Adrien with fake cheer.

Well, if she didn’t want him to say things like that, she shouldn’t have lied to him about the sort of person Gabriel Agreste had been.

*~*

She stops by his room on the way out, after hours spent ‘catching up’ while avoiding the elephant shaped problem in the room.

“Is he actually dead?” Felix asked over his shoulder, studying the windows critically. His mother had come into the house with a notebook and a remodeling crew, and gone room to room. There were bare spaces on the wall already from where pictures of the man himself had been. But he had a feeling that Adrien wanted to take a sledgehammer to these stupid windows.

“He’s dead.” Marinette confirmed, sliding down the wall.

“Did you kill him?” He wants to know the details, the truth of it. Not the pretty sanitized story she’s letting the media believe.

Marinette’s face is half in shadow, expression concealed, but she still shakes her head. “I didn’t.”

“Shame.”

She snorted, pulling her hands to her chest. “He’s your uncle.”

“Sure.” Felix turns and sits on the floor facing her. “And if you or someone hadn’t killed him, he would have set his sights on me once he had what he wanted.”

She winces, looking down at her hands. “I thought I had reached him.”

“So you let your guard down?” His uncle was a brilliant manipulator, if nothing else in his life was his the way he twisted and remade people – Sanculur was a good example of just how far he could drag people down. His aunt, too, probably. Adrien. How many people had his uncle left ruined in his wake?

“I did. He used Venom.” Her hands pressed against themselves. A ring, her earrings.

She was wearing them both. She was casually wearing two objects of utmost power on her person.

She had better be glad he had decided he liked this world, imperfect as it was.

“He made a wish.” Felix intoned, frowning.

“Except, I don’t know what he wished for. Plagg and Tikki won’t tell me- can’t tell me.”

Duusu popped out of his shirt, peering at her. “What about Nooroo?”

Marinette’s face fell, hands lifting to her hair. “I can’t find him.”

Felix felt his stomach sink. “You can’t-”

“He’s the only one. I recovered the rest.” But Nooroo, the one that had been suffering the longest.

There was pressure on his chest, the edge of a panic attack, the twisting, sinking feeling.

“It’s not over.” His mouth says.

“Until I find Nooroo. It can’t be over.” She whispered, hands in her hair, pulling the dark strands.

“And Duusu?” Felix asked carefully.

Marinette’s eyes darted up to him, blinking. “What about Duusu?”

His mouth was dry as he ran his thumb over the broach. “You’re the guardian.”

“Yes?” Marinette stared at him. “Oh. Well. As long as you don’t plan on any more world destroying Sentibeings, I think he can stay with you. He seems to like you. Right, Duusu?”

“Felix is great!” Duusu chirped, rubbing against his cheek.

Something in his chest unraveled all at once, a relief he hadn’t been expecting flooding his entire body. “Really?”

“Felix.” She hesitated, looking away. “The person with the Peacock holds my heart. Because they hold Adrien’s existence in the palm of their hands. They hold Kagami’s – and yours. Anyone with the Peacock could destroy either of them if they decided not to value them.”

He nodded. “That’s why I needed it.”

She smiled, sad. “I know that, now. I didn’t at the time. I think...if we’d worked together sooner, we would have found a better way. But what’s done is done. Monarch is...is dead.” Her voice quivered slightly. “The Kwami are back, safe.”

“Except Nooroo.”

“Except Nooroo.” She answered, voice bleak.

Impulsive, he reached out to take her hand. “We’ll find him.”

Her smile was tentative, eyes on his. “We’ll find him.”

@paracosmicat

@ultear-tigra

#felix graham de vanily #marinette dupain cheng #miraculous ladybug #gift fic

[argentumcor]

Uldwyn, Uldren, Crow, and Father Figures

One of the things that stands about the Sov siblings is that they don’t have a dad. They just have Osana, who is not a very good mother, being uninvolved and not affectionate (the fact Osana is not the mother kestrel in the story is another essay, but she isn’t). Considering the tech and how matriarchal the Yang Liwei seems to have been, given it adapted a monarchal matriarchy right quick in the Distributary, they might not have ever had a father outside the most bare biological sense. Osana might have opted for test tube twins. At any rate, no father is mentioned in any entry for the Sov twins. Not even a father figure.

I don’t think this was good for either of them, but I think it hit Uldwyn the worst. I spent a lot of time around young men in my time in the Army. The ones who didn’t have dads involved were obvious. They and a certain flavor of aimlessness and desire to prove themselves, a bad combo. Of course, men with involved fathers can have these problems, but it has a different feel to it.

We see this pretty plainly on display from Uldwyn when we’re introduced to him, all those years and a whole universe ago on the Yang Liwei:

Uldwyn grins messily at Mara over his opponent's shoulder. He's fighting a big, brutal woman from Gravity Ops, a woman who's had her myostatin genes knocked out so she can swell up into a giant plug of brawn. Uldwyn doesn't have a chance. He took the fight for the same reason he wanted to join the Amrita expedition—he measures himself by the bravery of his losses. By what he can survive losing. (Brephos II)

This is not a recipe for a stable young man. My uncle once told my mom “what a man wants most is for his father to tell him that he is proud of him.” You can argue that point if you want, but it is hard to deny the intensity of father-son relationships or the way in which they affect men as they grow from boyhood.

Uldwyn, and as such Uldren, had no such relationship. He didn’t even have a vague hint of it from what we can tell. Osana’s apathetic form of motherhood left him with Mara, who played a dual role of sister and mother- and filled in for some of the father relationship, badly. It’s too much pressure on Mara, I think, and it was really only a matter of time that their relationship became the ugly thing it did. Even if there had never been the cosmic powers and great wars, it would have gone wrong.

Whether this mess is just a function of their screwed up family or coming at least in part from the hyper-matriarchy of the Yang Liwei/Distributary isn’t clear to me. It was, at any rate, never going to be alleviated because of the Sov twins’ contrary independence and, later, the way Mara bound Uldwyn/Uldren to her when he struggled to become Awoken.

I imagine this made it all worse for Uldwyn by this...not really friendly to men environment in the Distributary:

...that the women should hold care and protection of the men and the others until more could be born. (Ecstasiate III)

It seems, based on this and the fact every single Distributary character we get a name for is female, that men were not allowed to hold any authority. How far this second-class citizen status extended is your guess. Interestingly, while men don’t seem to be inclined to hold authority in the Reef, it doesn’t seem they are blocked from it (Uldren is a prince, a title that isn’t mentioned in the Distributary, and holds authority as spymaster, while we have male cryptarchs, which are probably equivalent to Distributary eutechs, predecessors for the all-female techeuns) while they explicitly are in the Distributary. Could this have been a major appeal for them following Mara? Which would have posed a problem to those who didn’t want to leave, maybe not out necessity but at least culturally if men were...commodified to some degree.

So Uldren was living as a second-class citizen. He seems not to care overmuch when we do see him, being an independent sort who’d rather be in the wilderness (Hunter gonna Hunter), but we know he wants respect. He revels in praise. Mara’s in particular, but anyone’s will do. In the Distributary’s system, he wouldn’t get a lot, or if he did, it would be of the ‘dog walking on its hind legs’ sort. None of this helps his issues. No one has taken the time to teach Uldren the hard lessons, either, such as Saladin’s bitter lesson about mercy. He’s just sort of left to flail.

The rest is nearer history. Mara’s great destiny unfolded before her and he tried to tag along, win her attention and praise in increasingly insane ways, while she went her own way and grew colder. The Black Garden drives people insane and it exacerbated all of Uldren’s already existing issues. Things go wrong.

Then he becomes Crow. Crow, unlike Uldwyn/Uldren, is tossed a succession of potential father figures. First, we have the bad ones: Spider- he is getting off too easy for what he did- and then “Osiris”. “Osiris” behaves in a motherly fashion to him, and it’s what sold me on the rumor that this was actually Savathun.

It’s interesting to me that the mother figure Crow gets is a toxic one, but in a way opposite uninvolved Osana. Savathun finds herself caring about him, maybe a little out of the fact that she can’t actually love any of her real children (I wrote a one-shot about this whole dynamic). But she is a broken creature and a monster as well, and so her care for Crow is twisted, like every other mother figure in Uldwyn/Uldren’s life.

At any rate, enter Zavala and Saladin, positive father figures for Crow. Zavala, well, we all know how paternal he is. Saladin is harder and it’s a hardness Uldwyn/Uldren/Crow needed in his life. He tells Crow that it is not wise, or useful, to measure oneself by the bravery of one’s losses. He tells him mercy is a complicated beast. He demands self-discipline. He grants him authority and praises, soberly, his accomplishments for their practicality and contribution to the goal. After a long road of his own, he ends up sacrificing himself for Crow (yeah, maybe not much of a sacrifice it turns out, but it didn’t seem that way at the time).

No one, in Uldwyn/Uldren/Crow’s life, has put themselves between him and pain or danger before that point. It’s what a father should do, but no one has done it for him ever before.

So a lot of our boy’s life is influenced by the lack of father figures, and it is a major part of his current relationships and development. Would a lot of the trips we have seen with his story gone better if this theme had been kept in mind? Yes, but it is there, if unintentionally; it takes some doing to seize a story entirely for yourself, they are their own things, and better when you give them just the right amount of rein. The saga of Uldwyn/Uldren and the influence the lack of father figures had on him, and how that plays out for Crow, is an interesting story to tell and one that is well worth telling in this world of ours, frankly. 

#destiny 2 #crow #father figures

[wormholxtreme]

@soullesstrouble | plotted for a Happy!Eternity Sophie!Death Thing

In the beginning of time and space, there was one being of pure cosmic fire that rose from seemingly no where. Her fire burned brighter than anything the universe has seen sense, but it was a lonely existence for The Phoenix. Trap in a vastly void with nothing to do other than contemplate the solipsistic nature of her very life.

Life! A spark, a hope, a dream. The vision The Phoenix had was not necessarily one of unity, but one of cycles. The ebb and flow of time and space could grant life and would take it away, but what of those souls in the meantime. Who would cultivate these energies and who would care for them when that energy met it's end?

So in all her omniscient glory, The Phoenix did not begin her universe with rocks, or space, or planets, or even big bangs. She did not begin it with Adam and Eve either, but rather two entities. Eternity and Death.

Eternity could not remember what was before. He knew from Phoenix there was nothing and the thought alone made him sad for her. The idea of being so alone was heartbreaking. He was never alone, for his twin, his dear sister Lady Death would always complete his existence. The pair's bond was unmatched by anything in the universe as they created and destroyed in a beautiful cycle what would be the infrastructure of the universe.

And then she was created. Not a crafted piece of Eternity's mind. No, by this point in the universe life began to flourish on it's own. He had very little say in what would come next but he was always excited to find out, to guide it along it's way until the roads lead to his sister. But Letona...Letona was something different.

Something in her heart, in her very soul, rose above the rest. How she was able to mesmerize so many on Titan would have been alarming, except, she also mesmerized Eternity himself. He watched her with fascination, watched her kindness grow. Watched her sacrifice herself for her planet, for her children, even for the Titan who would destroy so much in her name.

That Titan who just as much as Letona became Eternity's obsession, Dione became Lady Death's. It would be ironic if it wasn't so poetic.

Eternity knew long before this war that his sister was slipping away from him. He chalked it up to jealousy, for who couldn't be jealous of his power to grant life? But it was so much more than that. She had a thirst, a quest to conqueror. Had The Phoenix still been around, had their Goddess not decided to visit the mortal planes for herself, Eternity was certain she would not have stood for Lady Death's meddling. But it was only him, and he would not abuse the rules their Phoenix laid out for them.

That is until Letona's soul came back, this time drawn to the power of the Goddess and landed on Earth. Only this time she wasn't Letona, she went by Virigina Potts.

So delicate a creature in this state. A human being, and not a mutant with grand powers. If she had her memories she may be able to spark those titan magics but in this state she was vulnerable, only with the exact same heart and devil may care attitude that she always had.

So when Eternity decided to keep her as his charge, knowing Lady Death would demolish her in the blink of an eye, he decided to follow in the Goddess's footsteps and become human. Harold Hogan, at your service.

He said the words to the younger redhead sitting in front of him, the small white coffee cup in her hands as Happy spoke very few words to relay this ancient history.

"I hope you're not to angry with me Sophie." he said simply, gesturing to the baby bump hidden behind the table. "It is meant to be a gift to you, not a curse."

#soullesstrouble #{character thread; harold hogan; eternity] #((I. love. this. fucking. verse. so. much))

[classpecting-the-hoyoverse]

i know kamisato ayato is a seer of space tho i disagree with classpects being like astrology i think astrology is so popular bc people unknowingly recognize the 12 base classes in them aka Deep Personality Stuff anyway what do u think lumine is i know she and aether dont have the same classpect

Isn't the core of classpecting deep personality stuff? A hero title is simply another way to label what you are like in my opinion.

Anyways, I will be under the assumption that your Lumine in question is the Abyss Twin.

With that out of the way, lets talk about...

The Abyss Sibling: The Witch of Hope

Witch: Active Manipulation class

One who changes their aspect

Alternatively: One who manipulates others with their Aspect

Hope:

Abstract: Conviction, Imagination, Fantasy, Delusion, Actual Hope

Literal: Light, Wings, Feathers, Religion

Despite how very little we have on the Traveler's kin, it's enough to glean off what kind of person she is and how she reacts to the environment she's surrounded by.

Let's start with her aspect of Hope.

People who identify themselves as Hope-bound are known to be motivated by their beliefs and sense of righteousness.

We know that the Traveler's Sibling is working with the Abyss in order to settle a score with Celestia, likely for what it has done to Khaenri'ah and its inhabitants.

Already does she show her belief that Khaenri'ah's punishment was unjustifiable and that going to war with the divine was the only way to avenge their people, seeking to destroy those under the Seven Archon's rule first.

After meeting the archons, her revenge plot sounds sinister. But since we don't what she's witnessed and experienced, there could be a side of that plan that could hold some validity. Even if the Traveler doesn't agree with it.

The Hope-bound are also said to posses a vast imagination, using it to conjure up solutions to injustice and unfairness:

The Abyss order has many creative plots that the Traveler's Sibling surely has helped scheme. One of them using the water dragon Osial and a corrupted statue in order to create a mechanized god to fight Celestia.

The imagery is nothing short of gruesome, more so for a concept as light-hearted as Hope. But to assume that Hope is the aspect for goody-two-shoes, you would be sorely mistaken.

Next there's her class, the Witch.

Witches, along with Heirs, are the magicians. They manipulate their aspect in ways that they think will befit them and their circumstances.

Witch of Life Feferi Peixies was able to bargain with cosmic horrors to create dreambubbles, a sort of afterlife for anyone in any timeline who have perished. Even after either one's waking, dreaming, or both selves are dead, the person can still keep on living as a ghost within those bubbles. Which, in essence, keeps said person alive essentially forever. It was also used to communicate with souls from far away in their sleep.

Then there is Witch of Time Damara Megido who. instead of using her powesr to win SBURB, used her abilities of time-traveling to sabotage her teammates and lead their session into its doom.

In addition to this, a Witch's arc starts with the Witch's surrounding engulfed by their aspect to the point where it influences them. This influence usually has an extension that takes form of what we'll call the Witch's Familiar.

Feferi is the troll heiress of the Alternian empire and is determined to inherit it and change the lifestyle of its inhabitants for the better.

Since birth, Feferi was tasked in keeping her lusus Gl’bolyb pacified and hushed, lest she lets out the Vast Glub and erradicates all life in not just her home planet Alternia, but in the whole universe.

Look at thatt mother-daughter bonding!

Witch of Space Jade Harley spent most of her life isolated from civilization and was raised by her Best Friend/Best Dog Bequerel.

Bequerel is the First Guardian of Earth and possesses an array of cool powers, his most prominent one being able to bend the fabric of space to his will. A power that will be passed onto Jade once she goes Dogtier.

What does this tell us about the Abyss Sibling?

The sibling is considered royalty by the Abyss Order as well as a leader. As one of the few people who not only side with Khaenri'ah, but is also unaffected by curse afflicted onto them by Celestia, she stands as one of the ancient civilization's last hopes.

She has the conviction of their salvation within the palm of her hand and that same conviction engulfs her. Their dreams turn into her's, and now she mans them like a ship, with the Abyss Sibling as its captain.

Her virtuous campaign against Celestia though, may only be a delusion that not only harms innocents, but the people she is trying to help as well.

A crack of her well-intentioned crusade could be seen in the Requiem of the Echoing Depths quest, where her attempt to ease the suffering of the hilichurls only lead to them suffering more pain.

Although the Abyss Sibling is the pinnacle of the Kharnri’aian's salvation, their hopes aren’t the only ones that’s she’s manipulating:

The main character of the game, The Traveler, has only started his journey in hopes of figuring out what happened to his sibling.

Time and time again does she elude the Traveler's eyes, keeping just out of sight. The one time they do meet face to face though, she tells him this:

For the Traveler, there is perpetual hope in him that they'll be together again, and the Abyss Sibling turns that hope into a tether; a motivator for him to complete his journey and to understand the meaning of Teyvat's existence.

Perhaps she is manipulating her own hope as well, stuck so far down in her delusion that Kharnri’ah could be saved that she hopes once the Traveler has finished his journey, he comes to the same conclusion as her and they could once again stand against the Heavenly Principles together.

#ask #homestuck #classpect #classpect analysis #godtiers #witch of hope #witch #hope #hope aspect #Genshin #genshin impact #genshin lumine #genshin abyss sibling #lumine #abyss sibling #genshin aether #genshin traveler #aether #just realized that mayb they were askin 4 a short aner and not a full on analysis #oops

[bells-of-black-sunday]

@axewhirl replied to your post “//literally do not mention t.arhos around me I...”:

tarhos.

​I'm pulling out my pepe silvia board, but it's fine: I honestly think the main reason Tarhos and Vittorio are so hated as characters is just because of click bait youtube videos that proclaimed he could stall out the game until the servers timed when realistically that never happened. I remember one morning playing 10 games against knights back to back and honestly he's not any worse than any other anti-loop killer in the game, I hated playing against Nemesis and Twins far more, he has very clear indications of what you're supposed to do in certain situations we can even see that in the showcase done by a beloved streamer between a top knight player and a top skull merchant player.

I also think the fact that really the only lore channel in the community called Tarhos and Vittorio's lore "boring" also played a role in it, but what is their lore really? Tarhos fundamentally is a deconstruction of the Edwardian romanticism of the renaissance that led to what we see of knights saving princesses and being generally forces of good when at most points in history knights were just glorified gangs to the point where tournaments had to be made and organized to stop them from killing people.

He is a child slave, he's not some noble man who went to go protect the holy land or save people, he's a man whose lived all his life being treated like nothing more than a dog on a leash. He is not rich. He is not pious. Even though he's been groomed into that lifestyle even he sees through the churches bullshit, to him there is no sin there is no right or wrong it's just some big mix of cosmic mud he'll never care to make sense of.

Either all of it is good or none of it is in his eyes. To him the only thing that separates him from other people is he doesn't lie to himself about what he's doing. He is hurting people not that he has or ever had a choice in the matter, he's just grown to cope in a way that he enjoys it. As we can see in his tome he talks about everything that's happened to him like it happened to someone else an example being:

""There was a village quite far from here. A small army advanced on this village on a mission, I suppose, to butcher the barbarians… to make this world a better place. Rather than be killed by a stranger or be taken as a slave these villagers had chosen to die by their own accord."

Tarhos scoops a few more maggots and tosses them into the mouth.

"I remember one mother had poisoned her family without hesitation or remorse. The love and strength of will it must have taken to do that is something I’ve yet to see in all my experiences on the battlefield and off. I have been around nobles and knights my whole life and all I’ve seen is cowardice steeped in the rotten stew of lies and hypocrisy.""

He is very clearly talking about when he was a child and his mother poisoning his family to try and avoid exactly what he's been through. On the other hand you have Vittorio, the survivor he came with, a 13th century Italian lord whose a pacifist who tried to find the fog, because he was told it was a paradise without violence or death. And debatably there could be a part of the entity like that, but that's not what either of them found.

Tarhos didn't even care about what Vittorio was doing until whatever happened over the course of the months they had been traveling together made one simple order, "Find another way", piss him off enough to kill and claim all of Vittorio's land for himself. Granted, could be entity influence after all Tarhos did carry the paradise stone out of those catacombs and it's what Vittorio's been unwittingly searching for the entire time, but Tarhos still makes a comment about how Vittorio only wants him to not be violent so he can sleep well at night.

That he doesn't deserve to hold such ideals Vittorio's entire fortune was secured with nothing but violence and stepping on others to secure such a petty need. He's a coward. The most cowardly lord he ever had served. Yet even in his tome, Tarhos doesn't hate him as much as he pretends to. Not only does he not kill Vittorio, he actively talks to him and thinks aloud telling him war stories and asking if he thinks he's mad, but especially so when other lords take notice of what Vittorio was studying.

That becomes the only reason why Tarhos is keeping him alive, because suddenly this idea of paradise is a much bigger deal than he thought. He's offered money, land, etc. to the people that want him dead, but the only thing they want is what Vittorio has on paradise. Which honestly could be the founding of the Black Veil for all we know. So of course when he gets pulled into the fog with the only 3 people he trusts he's going to see the entity as paradise.

And I can only imagine what he thinks when he sees Vittorio again.

#ooc #a path of destruction (knight) #-strangles him- i just think hes neat and makes me read student papers and studies id never normally read before #I'm so normal about him :) #this is so long though HERWHWEH

[oofouchstovehot]

(Very very sorry. I had to ramble a little about worldbuilding. It got out of hand.)

Nothing against the sans hyper fixation, i get it, i have it too.

but like... does anyone else wish there'd be a little more focus on other characters when it came to aus?

(BEAR WITH ME MY KNOWLEDGE COULD BE OUTDATED IF SOMETHING DOESN'T MAKE SENSE)

Like. For this huge clusterfuck of Sanses fighting other Sanses. A lot of them have home worlds right? Do they bring friends? Do they fight in the multiverse to protect them? Do they try to hide what they do? Is it just skeletons fighting in Dream and Nightmare's Groups or are there also Undynes popping up for backup? Is there a Toriel who Dream crashes with often? Someone other than Sans who is the only survivor of a destabilized world. Maybe there's a reason Sanses are most likely to survive? Is it chance? Is it the role he plays in most worlds? Is it a meta thing like Ink's relationship with Creators? Does Sans have some kind of cosmic plot armor due to our favor of him? Do the people who's world was destroyed, or destabilized, or kicked them out and have to live in the omega timeline, or crash with an alternate them, or live at Nightmare's Hideout-Castle-Thing jealous of characters with a home to return to when their job is done? Can we get Deltarune involved please?

Idk... The purely Sans groups are fun but surely there are more people helping the Stars and crashing with Nightmare's gang. I mean, mf has a castle. And Dream's cause seems to be pretty widespread.... Would Dust be chill enough with Kris to have them on the team? Would they pull the !#?@ Squad along or would Ralsei and/or Noel convince them to help Dream. Would they split in two? Are there people who's aus are perfectly fine but they decided to leave either because they were passionate enough for a cause, working off-world as a trade-off for protection or resources(like... food?) back home, or just- didn't like their universe at all? Susie and Noel fight on different sides but when SwapFell!Alphys helps booster Susie up into the castle so they can talk, nobody says a word. Underfell residents are even more cautious of eachother then before they were attacked since half of them now work for Nightmare and the others just want to get by? (Do Dream and Nightmare even look like Sans? Maybe they used to? Maybe they're a weird combination of Sans and Papyrus? It would make sense, they're twins afterall, but Sans and Papyrus come in Pair and don't look the same. Are they like Deltarune, perhaps? Technically the same person as Sans but with a role so twisted and different from the source that all resemblance is purely surface level? Doesn't that happen often? Nobody can really recognize faces anymore. Are you sure that's not normal? I think you're seeing things. Their auras do cause hallucinations on occasion. I'm sure they're normal. Just like Ink!)

Does Nightmare strategically pair up his soldiers so they're only fighting alongside different versions of themself in order to avoid bias from those who lost family? That's why the "Bad Sanses" are most infamous, perhaps? Because Nightmare looks most like them and therefore chooses Sanses as his closest thralls? But what about switched around Au's where someone who definitely looked like you is also definitely the guy would would've killed your family? What do you do about that? How do the Humans get on having all that DT in a space? Does the Most Determined Person change often? How do they interact with Killer?

What do Papyri think of short skeletons in scarves and hoodies, weighed down by an eternal grief and exhaustion carried in bags under their eye sockets? What do they think of the dust on that shady one's sleeves? And the way he's distracted by the nothing over his shoulder? What do Mutt and Red think of each other? What does Edge think of Mutt? Is it disturbing? Do they wonder what could've possibly changed to get where they are other than age? Is Paprika the Oldest? How old is Stretch? Edge made it into the Guard? Didn't Blue mention he was a teenager? How many kids have been mistaken for adults? How many lied? Is he okay? How does he possibly keep up with people like Ink and Dream? He kinda scares me. Do you think I could do that? What happened to Disbelief? Swapfell is surprisingly energetic. Edge, Paprika, do you need a Dentist? I know an Undyne-

#long post #dedaleradrabbles #Nightmare's Gang #undertale au #star sanses #underfell #horrortale #just tagging a few that are mention #undertale multiverse #i figured out how to cut a post! :] #much progress with alt text #AND cut posts #Just now figuring out tumblr #it seems #deltarune #swapfell #dreamtale #killer sans #dust sans #worldbuilding #fellswap #underswap #ink sans #utmv

[dailycharacteroption]

Deity Drop 3: Imbrex

Another entry, and another new type of demigod, this time being one of the mighty fey Eldest!

As their name suggests, the Eldest are very old and very powerful, and many of them may in fact be old enough to remember when the gods first created the First World as a rough draft of what would become reality, and when they abandoned it for the creation they painted over their home with.

Because of this, the Eldest are the ones that feel the general fey estrangement from the gods the most. Most are content to ignore the gods just as they themselves have been ignored, while others treat them with disdain or even hatred, particularly their worshippers. In any case, while they feel distant from the divine, the Eldest are somewhat akin to them, being of demigod status able to grant boons and divine magic to those that devote themselves to them. However, unlike other deities or even demideities, the Eldest treat their relationship with their followers as a more mundane sort of fealty than true divinities, perhaps because comparatively speaking there is less distance between the Eldest and their mortal following, but also because most Eldest have much more in common with mortal rulers and figures than cosmic beings with esoteric moral agendas in the multiverse.

In any case, that brings us to today’s subject, and one of the more alien Eldests, Imbrex, whose mysterious form, origins, and motives make them bizarre even by fey standards.

It is said that Imbrex favors endings, statuary, and twins. The latter two making sense given their immobility and apparent form, but the exact nature of their connection to endings is unclear, as theories range from simply their tendency to make strange telepathic proclamations and prophecies, to rumors that Imbrex will only move when it comes time to destroy the Material Plane and First World alike and start anew

To stop beating around the bush, Imbrex is called “The Twins” because of the form they take, being a pair of massive statues of androgynous, vaguely reptilian humanoids that stand side by side, holding hands. It is not known if Imbrex is one entity with two bodies, or two entities with a linked identity, or even if the statues are their actual true form at all. Either way, they never move, and only communicate with occasional telepathic broadcasts to those below them.

Around the feet of The Twins, a city by the name of Anophaeus has sprung up, the oldest buildings of which are literally built atop their feet or wrapped around their ankles, though drilling into the stone of Imbrex themselves is forbidden for obvious reasons. The architecture of Anophaeus is otherwise fairly mundane, resembling a Material Plane city in most respects. There in Anophaeus, the population enjoy the strange and addictive effects of Imbrex’s dreams, and follow their commands, no matter how strange or nonsensical they may be. Imbrex, for their part, seems as indifferent to their population as they are for all living beings, though sometimes attackers that try to invade the city are blasted by a constant stream of psychic assault.

Imbrex’s worshippers are few due to their indifference and the seeming randomness with which they respond to questions or the actions of their cultists, sometimes punishing them for poorly understood slights, or rewarding them or equally inscruitable reasons. For the most part, such worshippers instead focus on trying to interpret the strange Eldest’s will and what role they may truly have in the end times, if any.

Like all Eldest, Imbrex has no known relationship with the gods, though they do seem to be on good terms with fellow Eldest Magdh and Ragadahn, who also have an interest in prophecy and fate. If they can make more sense of Imbrex than others, however, the two do not deign to explain The Twins’ actions to others.

Imbrex does not seem to have any special servants of their own, but the various fey and mortals living at their feet, and when they do send out devotees to do their bidding, it is for tasks that even their servants do not fully understand.

Imbrex presides over the domains of Community, Earth, Law, and Strength, as well as the subdomains of Family, Home, Metal, and Resolve, reflecting the protection they offer their city domain and sheer earthen size and might, both of which worshippers may try to emulate.

Meanwhile, in 2nd edition, they preside over dreams, earth, family, and might, reflecting much the same as before, but now adding their connection to their strange dreams to the mix. Additionally, their clerics gain access to spells that link minds with telepathy, create duplicate images, and harden the flesh.

Those who show special devotion to Imbrex undergo a ritual in which they sculpt a humanoid figure, break it in half, and then repair it or otherwise bind the two halves. Doing so gives them a small measure of The Twin’s stony durability, their skin turning hard and pale like white stone.

However, as lesser divinities, the other blessings of Obedience are much simpler, being naught but an array of spells. Imbrex in particular grants access to magic that immobilizes foes or leaves them under a curse of misfortune, projects illusionary duplicates, lets the caster take on a statue-like form, and finally, unleash a destructive divine storm.

The Fey Eldest are barely mentioned in Starfinder so far, but they are not absent. Imbrex has not been mentioned so far, but I imagine they are still around. However, given the belief that Imbrex will one day wipe the Material Plane clean to start over, I imagine that some cults and fringe theorists might believe that such a prophecy might have referred to The Gap, and that the fugue that all experienced during that time was a result of them resetting reality, or perhaps attempting to and having been stopped.

 That will do for tonight, but there are still two entries left to do this week!

#pathfinder #deity #Imbrex #Eldest

[adobecult]

wow i immediately want to rewatch the return because holy fuck!  

i have a lot of thoughts, but think the main thing to note wrt the ending is that.. coop failed again. he fucked up on a cosmic scale this time. 

so the girl in the 1950s was sarah, which i didn’t catch at first, and as a result judy now inhabits her, but for all of dale/gordon/garland/phillip’s strategizing to find judy over the years, dale never realized that she was in twin peaks all along. just like he never realized that leland was bob until it was too late, or that he never realized the extent of windom’s plan until it was too late.

bob’s cooper form (mr. c) is killed through deus ex machina in the most literal way possible. after he is returned to the lodge, all main plot lines of the show seem to wrap up neatly, including the girl with no eyes magically becoming the real diane, except for the fact that dale’s fear/guilt-wracked face is superimposed over the entire scene. our false sense of security as watchers is slowly withered away.

the implication was that laura was somehow the one who could stop judy (because she’s “the One”, the angels were with her, or maybe simply because sarah was her mother?). dale attempts twice to finish the blue rose team’s 25-year-old plan, first by trying to snatch laura out of 1989 and second by taking carrie back to twin peaks. there are no concrete indications that laura would be able to accomplish the task at either of these points-- dale is running on intuition from 25 years ago, a “simpler” time when we saw him to be an exemplary agent with a fundamentally good nature. 

since then, mr. c has fundamentally altered the course of dale’s life and irreparably damaged so many others. dale expects things to be the same with diane, even after they go to texas and everything is “different”. she can’t look at him during lovemaking because she only sees her rapist. dale is compared by her with richard, who may or may not be his (or mr. c’s) son, and whom he has never personally met but whose name he reads with fearful recognition. 

his behavior delineates sharply from what we are used to seeing-- he’s sloppy, taciturn, reckless. he grabs a woman he believes to be laura and drives her halfway across the country because he believes that she can help him complete his mission, not realizing that he is also putting her in mortal danger on nothing more than a hunch. at the end, he can’t even remember what year it is. he’s still stuck in the lodge where the eternal question of “is it future or is it past?” is never answered. 

in the last shot, the lights go out. no more electricity. 

judy, being associated with the lodge spirits, feeds on pain and sorrow. she got what she wanted. if dale and mr. c are truly inextricable, as other characters and some of his behaviors indicate, then mr. c accomplished his mission to meet judy at the same time that cooper failed his mission to kill her. 

we don’t want to admit that cooper has darkness or failings in him. we want to see him as dougie, innocent and brave and caring. we don’t want to think about the pain and sorrow he caused or the pain and sorrow inside himself, just like the people of twin peaks didn’t want to see the pain and sorrow inside laura.

anyway i'm calling it quits there for now but wow what a show.

#txt #tp posting

[brotherskywalker]

SWRarePairs Letter below

Greetings Exalted One!

As you have probably gathered, I’m a huge Luke/Leia fan. I hope you are too, otherwise this might be a hard one for you to complete. I love them as a couple and view them as truly star-crossed lovers, so I hope you’re on board.

I did add a prompt along with each of my requests, so I won’t rehash those here. I mostly just wanted to write something to say thank you, and I guess to give a bit more perspective on what I love and want. I totally understand that this is all taken with a grain of salt. You can write your own interpretation of Luke and Leia and their relationship. But if you want to write the kind of Luke and Leia I love, then I’ll give you a little insight into my characterizations of them.

It’s my fanon that Luke and Leia were created by the Force in a similar way to Anakin. Not in the same way, but basically the Force was like “let’s take the Chosen One, give him twins, and have those twins give me even more powerful Force sensitive users.” So I’m all about Luke and Leia having kids together and it all being part of cosmic destiny. I love fics that explore this, from the struggle against the incest taboo, to the desires burning between them, to the utter submission to fate/destiny and the comfort of knowing it’s the right path they’re meant to be on.

Of course, adding other people to the pairing can complicate that and I requested several Luke/Leia + other people. I am happy with you combining things as you see fit. If you want to write romance between Luke/Leia/Han or Luke/Leia/Lando, for example, I am totally fine with it. I am happy for a situation like “Han and Leia love each other and get married as a way to help conceal the fact that Luke/Leia are also in love.” That scenario could work with any pairing for me. It is always my preference that any kids that Luke/Leia/+1 have are Luke’s and not the other partner’s, but you could also be non-specific if you want, or not include pregnancy or children.

A few more points: I don’t care for character bashing. In a story where Han isn’t involved romantically, I like him to merely have amicably broken up with Leia, or else it’s an AU where they were never involved. I don’t like him to be a huge source of angst for either of them. I don’t want him killed off and Leia grieving him. I don’t want him to be a huge abusive asshole, either. I just like him to be gone. If he is in the story, then I like him to be an equal partner to both Luke and Leia. I generally don’t care for Han/Leia, Luke/Leia where there is no Han/Luke, or where the two pairings are so separate neither knows about the other. I don’t want ANY solo Han/Leia whatsoever, please. (I am really really not into solo Han/Leia. I'm mostly fine with other combos like Luke/Din or Leia/Lando or something, but I'd rather it be Luke/Leia or an actual threesome with everyone participating.) I mean a little is fine, or if it starts one way and progresses with plot to something more, but I’d really prefer the focus be on Luke and Leia.

A few more points of my wants/DNWs: I don’t want any Legends/book stuff because I haven’t read them and don’t know them. I would prefer little to no references to the cartoons because I’m also unfamiliar with them, but I’m less picky about that so long as it can make sense if I haven’t seen them.  I do not like The Last Jedi. I love a lot of the characters from the sequels, but I do not like TLJ/the sequel trilogy. You are welcome to AU it if you’re doing anything involving prequel characters, or whatever you want. I do not like Rey/Kylo, and would beg you not to put in anything that alludes to that pairing.

I want Luke and Leia to love each other. A little unrequited stuff is okay, but ideally they are both equally in love with each other by the end of your story. I am not into anything abusive or coercive or cruel. (Exceptions can be made for LL/Vader etc. as a means to put LL closer together. Or they can be resistant at first, but come around as they give in to their true feelings.)

I am not into characters giving or receiving oral sex. (I know that's weird. If you really want to write a blow job or cunnilingus as part of sex, that's fine, but generally I'd just skip it 100%.) I am not into women receiving anal sex, however, double penetration is an exception with threesomes. A dick in each hole is love, lol. I always prefer Luke to be in her vagina and the other guy in the back, but I don't super care. (Two dicks up front is also nice, if Leia can take it.) I am totally fine with male/male anal sex. I like Luke to top one-on-one, but I am 100% down for Luke inside Leia, with Han (or whoever) inside Luke, for example.

I really don't like first person fic. Just throwing that out there.

I love graphic, loving sex. I love the incest kink. I love the pregnancy kink and lactation. I love Leia having a lot of kids with Luke. I love Luke loving Leia. I love the idea of The Force Ships It. I love the idea of Han and other people shipping Luke and Leia. I love porn with plot, and I love plot with porn. I love plotty porn especially. I love tropes and I love taking tropes and spinning them on their head. I love clever AUs. (Though no “switched at birth, Leia raised on Tatooine, Luke on Alderaan, please; it's just too over done.) I love domestic fic, and kidfic. I love angst and drama. I love romance. I love it all. I really want more fic of Luke and Leia out there that breaks the mold; that isn’t a rehash of a story someone else has already told. So, I'd rather no “sex in the Ewok village” or quickees between the scenes. I’d rather an AU.

You also welcome to ignore the sequel trilogy entirely. Please feel free to write any AU you want post-RotJ (or post-The Mandalorian if you're writing Luke/Leia/Din).

Okay, I am rambling on way too much. Here’s a link to my AO3 account in case you want to read any of my writings. Feel free as well to send me any anon asks here if you want to ask me questions about anything. You won't ruin the surprise, I promise.

In the end, thank you SO MUCH for offering to write for me. I am sure I will love anything new you write for Luke/Leia. We live in a dry desert so anything new will be wonderful. Please don’t stress about it. If you have some other idea you want to explore with them, please do it. I'm giving you my ideas to help you, not hinder you. If you hate them all and have some Luke/Leia story inside you that is aching to be released, please write it!

Thank you!!

#swrarepairings2022

[silly-dwea]

Writing WIP

(this might be one of the first things I wrote in years. I don't know if I'll ever get the energy and creative surge to continue this but have it either way. This was sparked because of my lovely DND characters, my first one ever being a cleric of Selûne named Kh'li (pronounced Kali, like the goddess). In that campaign Selûne puts Kh'li's morality and views towards the undead to the test and Kh'li loses both the test and then her powers (also unknowingly her fiance for the second time) for following what she knew to be Selûne's disapproval of the undead. They have a big falling out and while Kh'li does receive her moon based powers back, it is not from Selûne but from the Moon itself. In the future Kh'li ends up as a goddess in her own might with a known disdain for Selûne. And I guess that whole arc which my lovely DM crafted for me made me think about Selûne and Shar and their dynamic. I'm a sucker for black and white things ending up being actually varying shades of grey. So I went and did some research on what their OG lore was and started putting my own spin on it. I decided to make Shar my protagonist because it felt like the most natural choice. Also I loved the idea of seeing how they were kind of "doomed" from the start from a human aspect. This is their purpose as a godly being, this is what they were born to be and think but there is still that humanity in the way they think they have a choice. I'm rambling a lot so I apologise but I think I'm just finding out how passionate I am about these characters and it's exhilarating. Enjoy reading)

There's something almost comical about getting into a cosmically altering war with your twin soon after being birthed by the remnant primordial essences of the universe and creating The Earth Mother together.

Granted, it's not something that happens immediately. It does not even remotely flow in the recesses of our shared thoughts during the beginning of our becoming. In those few days, there's very little that distinguishes my wants and desires from Selûne's. I am Selûne and Selûne is me. We are One. The Hidden One does not interfere, eternal observer as they are, except when they need the deities within their purview to abide by the rules of the cosmos. Of which there are none yet. The Dawn Titans and Elder Gods know nothing of our existence and so do not offer a helping hand.

We move in a single minded focus, with an intrinsically shared purpose of creating more life. We travel the rivers of the Abyss, bearing witness to the expansion of Space. Everything we touch and everywhere we go, what once was a hazy swirling mist of shadows, becomes the ebb and flow of Light and Darkness. Once we are satisfied with the distance traversed, we stop and take our eternally locked hands and face eachother. For the first time since our birth I am struck with the realisation that I have a sibling and we are not One and the same. This would mark the first time I would feel a sense of Loss.

In the moments before our shared labour I take in the sight of what I now know to be Selûne - skin a lovely dark copper haloed by long strands of bright white and striking grey eyes - taking my hands in theirs. I know not what they feel. We close our eyes, taking a deep breath in as we do, and blow our breaths in the space between, intermingling and forming a furious tornado that spins with the help of our powers and the chaos of the Abyss. It spins for aeons and no time at all until it settles into the shape of a slightly flattened crystal sphere. Within it, tiny sparks begin lighting up.

#writing #my writing #selune #shar #selune and shar #dnd writing #dnd fanfiction

[walimatu-library]

The Nature of the Cosmos I

☰ Abstract & Table of contents

Planets and stars

The picturesque image of the Cosmos itself - the planets and the stars. Planets are colossal, spherical bodies that revolve around the even more colossal stars and they come in two known structures:

Small to medium sized rocky Terrans

Large to super sized aeriform Titans

I find that this apparent size dimorphism suggests one or a combination of two possible theories:

The Titans are older than the Terrans. This would mirror the organic life cycles as seen in our own telluric world.

The Titans and Terrans are two separate varieties of the same thing.

Aldun¹ is an example of a Terran with five of the six Cosmic elements: earth, air, fire, water, and aether (post-Coalescence). It's currently unknown if other Terrans have any elements other than earth, or if Titans have any elements apart from air. However, Aldun, like all other planets, does have a solidified heart at the center of its body, which is the source of its core essence.

The Sun, also known as Solana², is currently the closest star to us. Unlike planets, stars are bright and luminous, able to be seen all across the Cosmos. Contrary to popular misconception, stars are not balls of burning fire, but instead balls of raw aether. The aethereal radiance from Solana is needed in the production of the vitality we breath from the air around us. In addition, it was from the fiery death of Solus³ that filled our world with enough aether to create magic, monsters⁴, unprecedented weather phenomena, and new illnesses.

It has been sufficiently proven that the planets formed not long after the Sun, leading me to speculate that in fact the planets were birthed by Solana herself, or at least in part.⁵ This is further supported by the observable movements of the planets being centered around Solana. For this reason I believe it's safe to assume that Solana, and stars in general, are older and at least partially responsible for the creation of planets.

Now that we have the fundamental outline of the relationship between the planets and the stars, what can we conclude about their true nature? Well they're a bit reminiscent of various stories of the Divines and how they were created, especially if you don't interpret them in a literal sense. The single or twin all-creator(s) archetypes can be roughly equated with Solana and/or Solus. Both entities are responsible for the continued flow of the world. Both entities can be described as luminous sources of radiance, metaphorically and literally. Both entities are responsible for bringing shape to formless cosmic material, creating reality as we know it. Furthermore, various polytheistic deity archetypes can be roughly equated with the different planets. They were both formed by either one or two senior creator deities or the Sun(s). They are both reflections of their respective host(s). They both occupy their own heavenly worlds or realms.

In summary, I find it reasonable to conclude that the planets and the stars are in fact the Divines, at least in the way we perceive them. I also find it safe to theorize if we were to one day break free of our bond to Aldun and breach the Great Veil, we could travel straight to the divine realms themselves. It has been said that the elves were once capable of travel between the worlds at will and even drew from the power of the Sun. So it is certainly a possibility that the deities and their realms are one in the same celestial body. It's also possible man can accomplish this feat too, but only by properly understanding the Celestials and their metaphysical properties.

Notes

Pronounced "ahl-doon".

Also known as the Self-Created One.

Also known as the Second Sun.

Creatures that are the result of exposure to large quantities of aether through either magic, disease, or mutation.

There is a possibility that Solus was also created by Solana, but we do not have present sufficient evidence since Solus is now dead.

Chapter II. Minor planets →

#under twin stars #worldbuilding #wip #astronomy #theology #treatise #non fiction

[plainlo-inthemorning]

A little written-in-the-middle-of-the-night Loki fic snippet that just grew another leg. TVA Loki + Lokane. Rating T.

(First part is here)

Shine a Light, part II

The tempad feels hot and slippery in his palm as he stalks down the hallway, quickly putting distance between himself and the hunter he left unconscious amidst overturned chairs and tables in the canteen.

The mess had already been there, leftovers from workers rushing panicked to man their stations. He had simply added one more touch.

Tiny droplets of sweat bead his brow and blood has started seeping though the tear in his crumbled shirt.

The fabric is clinging wetly to his bicep, but in the mayhem unfolding around him, nobody gives him a second glance.

For the first time, he is thankful at least to be wearing the anonymous uniform dictated by the oppressors.

He reaches the kill me kind of room again and shuts the door behind him.

You were meant to cause suffering and death.

You’re a cosmic mistake.

You were meant to die at the hands of the mad titan.

Lies.

All lies.

Still projected on the wall is the paused image of a lost memory of his unfulfilled fate.

He sees himself, Thor and her on the barren planet with the black soil. The man he never became is lying on the ground, Thor cradling him.

She watches them both in shock.

It resonates in his bones. He has to go there.

He has to reach his brother at this precise, excruciatingly rare moment of heroism. His act of heroism.

Before the scheming and deceit poison their bond once more in an endless loop of disappointment.

In this moment, all is forgiven. Thor will listen and help. A different path will branch.

And he has to go to her.

It is ludicrous, this riddle, yet the truth of it presses hard on his chest.

On the grainy roll of film, he saved her life and her eyes bore into his with such intensity, his acute need still reverberates like an echo between the walls of the kill me kind of room.

The smell of lilacs lingers.

What will happen when he faces his own self on the timeline, he can’t imagine. Also, he gives it little thought at this late stage with universal logic already suspended as it is. Hopefully he can reason with the man he was meant to be.

He has had quite enough of being his own past, present and future selves’ worst enemy.

And so he pushes the buttons on the tempad.

//

Something is very wrong.

The sky is too blue, the distant sound of waves lapping calmly at a shore is misplaced.

He has emerged from the door onto a quiet gravel road lined with tall grass and low pines. A single, white wooden house stands to his left, surrounded by a lawn dotted with wildflowers. The sun is warm on his back.

This is Midgard, he is sure of it.

How could he shoot past his destination so spectacularly?

He is about to scroll down the list of numbers and names on the tiny screen of the tempad when he notices a man approaching. Old, walking leisurely with a round, short-legged dog much the same white color as the mortal’s own wispy hair.

The latter starts a little when he spots Loki.

And then he does the most unexpected thing and speaks his name.

Loki’s name.

He almost drops the tempad (no! Not again) and the old one grins good-naturedly. “Hold on to your fancy phone there. Far away, were we?”

Loki only just about stops himself from shaking the man by his shoulders. His fists clench uncontrollably.

“What year is this?! How do you know my name?”

His voice sounds shrill, feverish, and unsurprisingly the eyes in the lined face before him go wide with puzzlement and … something else.

“Loki, what on Earth? Are you quite alright?”

Shock washing over him, Loki staggers back. H-how?

But the man is closing the gap between them, oozing concern. “Have you - are you drunk?” he asks incredulously.

He reaches out.

What is happening?

Loki shies away from the touch, his mind spinning.

Forcibly gathering his composure, he straightens and wills his words to come out steady. “No, I’m okay. Apologies. A bad joke”.

He smiles reassuringly. It takes more effort than parting an ocean.

The dog is sniffing insistently at his ankles.

The man looks him over with suspicion but the worry is subsiding. “Okay, then… no harm, no foul. You know, sometimes these peculiar ‘jokes’ of yours can make a neighbor all kinds of slightly worried”.

Neighbor?

“Most understandably, won’t happen again. Sorry to have bothered you”. Loki cuts him off smoothly. “Have a nice day”. He nods and turns before hysteria can creep into his voice.

“In case you need it for your punchline, the year is 2016”, the man calls over his shoulder as he shuffles away, pulling the reluctant dog after him.

Loki’s blood runs cold. 2016. Oh, this is so wrong. Three years wrong.

Did he hit another button at the last minute? He had been clutching the tempad so hard the edges cut into his fingers.

He curses his own impatience. Tech savvy indeed.

Holding up the blasted piece of TVA wizardry, he tries to enter a new series of numbers when his name rings out again.

And again, he almost jumps. But this time, his heart stays in his throat.

//

“Loki? What are you doing out here? I’ve been looking all over for you”.

Her voice reaches him from the porch of the white house. She is skipping lightly down the steps, the screen doors left open behind her. Music drifts into the garden from somewhere inside.

She is crossing the lawn. He is no longer breathing.

Her long auburn hair is tied back in a ponytail, and she is wearing a light blue summer dress. Her feet are bare.

Absurdly, he notes that she looks more tanned than the last time he saw her through the visor of the destroyer in the desert. A year and a lifetime ago. To him.

His grip on whatever reality he’s been clinging to since New York is seriously faltering.

She is beaming. He cannot move a muscle.

She comes all the way up to him and without pause wraps her slender arms around his neck. He can feel the warmth of her body through his shirt, smell the perfume of her skin. She smells of … -

“Where did you go, handsome?” She smiles playfully.

“Pepper called earlier to say that she actually got Tony out of the door on time, if you can believe it, so they’ll be here any minute. And her and I agreed that you two hotheads are going to play nice tonight, okay?”

She is teasing him but he hardly understands the words she’s saying. It makes no sense.

And then, before he can begin to form a response, she stands on tiptoes and kisses him and the world falls away.

Reflexively, he puts his arms around her, drawing her close to him. She moans happily. He leans into the kiss, not knowing what he’s doing other than that he never wants to stop.

Her mouth is soft and warm and new and familiar all at the same time, and the way her fingers curl in his hair sends electricity shooting down his spine.

It should be all anguish and tragic confusion, like before in the castle beyond time, but it is not.

It feels more right that anything he can remember since before his fall from the Bifrost, more real and yet more magical than his recent journeys into mystery.

Then it’s over all too soon and she draws away.

His arms are suddenly much too empty and he almost reaches for her again, craving her touch.

For a fleeting heartbeat, his soul had no longer felt torn apart to the point of forgetting he’d ever been whole.

The chaos had crumbled in on itself like a bad dream.

He is surprised he still knows what peace of mind feels like after what has happened to him since arriving at the TVA.

But now she looks at him with alarm in those beautiful brown eyes and he is crudely reminded that he is an intruder in her reality.

What she thought she saw, she clearly no longer recognizes.

It takes him all of three stupidly long seconds to remember that she said his name. That he’s wearing his own face and not a disguise.

That she knew him immediately, just like the old man.

She kissed him.

Too many impossible possibilities and the thunderous sound of his own heartbeat (surely she can hear it too) blur his vision.

He’s only vaguely aware that he is stepping towards her, trying to say something without the faintest idea of what’s going to come out of his mouth.

If it’ll even be words.

Her eyes dart over his clothes, his face.

“Loki, what - Why are you dressed like that? Have you been gone? Is that … blood?”

She retreats further, fear building.

“Jane, I-“

Her name rolls of his tongue with a sweet-tasting intimacy like he has said it a thousand times before.

But he doesn’t get to dwell on this, nor gather his thoughts to say anything else before something abruptly lifts him off the ground and hurls his body across the road.

“How dare you touch her, beast?!”

Immediately as his back connects with the rough gravel, someone is there, a knee pushing him down, fingers closing around his throat. A sharp object presses against his chin.

There is a dangerous, unhinged growl as his attacker breathes hotly in his ear. “You will die for this!”

The man is strong and somehow blocking Loki’s own magic, but he still manages to twist his head -

And looks right up into his own eyes, nearly black with rage.

//

“Speak! What are you??”

The man with a face exactly like his presses the tip of his blade closer to Loki’s left eye. “You will show yourself right now or -“

Gathering his magic tightly around him (focus!), Loki pushes back, hard.

With a surge of energy, their bodies are separated, and the other version of him lands heavily in the middle of the road some meters away.

Both of them are on their feet with the fluid movements of two panthers ready to pounce, the other now in full armor.

He has to leave, right now, even if means leaving her which is a catastrophe that might either kill him or make him try to kill his other self if he stays here another minute.

This timeline is clearly not his own.

It cannot be.

Arm outstretched to ward off his furious twin with a shield of magic, he tries to work the tempad with one hand.

“Well, well, what do we have here?”

A booming voice above their heads.

“You know, when Jane pressed the panic button just now, I thought we had an actual emergency. Not that you were preparing a little dinner show for us, Reindeer Games. Gotta be honest though, this doppelgänger stunt was never my favorite -“

“Stark!”

The variant - for he must be a variant - angrily interrupts the man in the metal suit hovering in the air.

Of course, Loki remembers him all too clearly.

What has it been, less than a week since he threw him, or a version of him, out the window of the glass tower?

“This is not my creation”, the variant hisses with venom dripping from every word. “I caught him assaulting Jane. Kissing her”.

“What?!”

Stark focuses all his attention (and one of his iron fists) on Loki. A metallic humming rises steadily from inside the suit.

“A man on a suicide mission then. Boy, did you smooch the wrong wizard’s baby-mama. He may look all domesticated and cute now, but I assure you he’s still all kinds of crazy. In fact-”.

“Hey!”

“What?”

“I know it’s asking a lot, of you in particular, Stark, but could we possibly save the personal insults till we have dealt with this right here?”

Wait, just wait.

Damn it, he can’t tap in the destination on the tempad without looking at it.

Green smoke is swirling around the hands of his other self. He knows what’s coming.

“This is your last warning, devil! I will not have you hiding behind my face as I -“

“This is my face! I’m you, you fool! Bigger things are at large here and-“ Loki falters, his silver tongue failing once more with rising predictability within what seems a disconcertingly short period of time.

Although he honestly can’t tell anymore.

“Please, take a minute -“

He can’t help but shout, sounding hopelessly desperate.

In another life, he might have felt humiliated, but letting pride dictate his emotions is no longer a luxury he can afford to indulge.

Still, the silence that follows his outburst is not nearly as long as he needs it to be.

The variant stares blankly at him, mouth slightly ajar, but Stark recovers easily, his voice now icy.

“Yeah, dude, that one might have worked better if you’d put on a clean shirt. Time to fess up real quick or we’ll have to-“

Drawing what might become his last breath, Loki looks away and down at the tempad. He presses the button. No more time to double check.

“What the?!”

Both Stark and the variant visibly flinch as the door appears.

He quickly makes for it. “I - I’m sorry. Truly, I am”. He looks to their stunned faces before turning to his exit.

Out of the corner of his eye, he registers the variant move (he has to be a variant). His mouth twists in an ugly snarl and two familiar daggers are appearing by his sides.

Before the door snaps completely shut, Loki sees Jane run up to the man and grab his arm.

“Love, no, don’t!”

He sees the slight bump under her dress that he didn’t notice before.

And then the scene disappears and he’s gone.

Part III

#loki #loki series #tva loki #loki laufeyson #lokane ff #lokane fanfic #lokane #jane foster #loki x jane #loki fic

[s-creations]

Now We’re Six

Donald Duck was honestly not prepared to loose so much in such a short time. He's at the end of his rope when two familiar faces show up on his front door to offer their help.

Fandom: DuckTales 2017 / The Three Caballeros     Rating: General Audience     Relationships/Pairings: José  Carioca/Donald Duck/Panchito Pistoles Additional Tags: Dalla Duck mentioned, Scrooge McDuck mentioned, Gyro Gearloose mentioned, Gladstone mentioned, Fethry mentioned, angst, hurt and comfort, happy ending, start of a new family, the triplets are eggs still

Start of a Series Called: We’re the Three- Sorry, Six Caballeros!

How was it possible that he could lose everything in only three days? Scrooge didn’t want to take responsibility, even though he was the one who started this whole train of destruction. It wasn’t just enough to stay on the ground. Oh no, space was the next adventure, they just  had to go. Gyro actually had the audacity to look apologetic when faced with the angry duck. As if he truly felt sorry. Never mind the fact that it was his own creation that cost them so much. Did neither bird think it would be pertinent to heighten security? They were both so lax about the whole thing and now Della-

 Donald let out a shaky breath, tightening the grip on his arms. Trying to keep himself grounded. 

 Della was gone. There was no getting around it. She was lost to the stars because it was killing her to remain on the ground. Even though she’s just laid eggs, even after Donald gave every argument he could to make her see sense, she still went. Nothing was going to stop Della Duck. 

 Except a cosmic storm apparently. 

 So, here sat Donald. Losing his twin sister, his great uncle, his stable life. Self-barricaded away in his boathouse he’d only recently bought after scrounging up everything from his savings to get. Scrunched up in the padded booth of the dinner table with eggs covered in every blanket he owned and resting on the flat surface. A constant reminder of what had happened. What was happening. 

 Another shaky exhale as Donald attempted to relax. His body protested for being in a clenched position for so long, bones creaking and muscles sore. The clock over the stove read midnight in a blaring red color. Numbers that were burned into his eyes and seen from behind closed eyelids. A heavy sigh sounded as he reached out to fidget with the towel-created nest.

 He honestly had no idea what he was doing. Were they cold, to warm maybe? He supposed since the color wasn’t dulling, he was doing something right. Was he supposed to take them to a doctor before they hatched? They were only a few weeks away from hatching but that doesn’t mean something wasn’t wrong. Doesn't mean he’d be able to afford an office visit, no insurance. God, he needed to find a stable job quickly. He had four mouths to feed now and no income. Not a great way to start off the rest of his life. But since when has anything been remotely easy for him?

 Donald was broken from his thoughts when his phone chimed. The beaten up piece of technology was resting on the table as well. But had been pushed as far away as possible, teetering on the edge. He’d been receiving numerous phone calls and messages since the incident. Duckworth asking for Donald and the eggs to return to the mansion to talk this out properly, please. Fethry asking what was happening, was Donald okay, where was he? Gladstone actually sounded furious that Donald would just leave with the eggs in tow and no explanation.

 Donald was just tired of it all. So he left the phone alone, turning back to the eggs. 

 Only for the front door to be knocked on.

 Now he was starting to become angry. What idiot goes to a boathouse in the middle of the night? What idiot goes to any random place in the middle of the night?  Was it really so hard to just ask for a moment's peace? Just a few minutes where the environment and his mind would just shut up. The phone started to chime again just as another knock sounded. He was going to lose it.

 “Deal with the joker at the door first, then worry about the phone.” Donald grumbled, trying to keep his anger in check. An outburst could lead to one of the eggs being damaged. Which would not help the situation. 

 He opened the door, ready to tear whoever was on the other side apart. Only to swallow the words back down when he found a familiar parrot and rooster before him.

 It had been so long, years even. Yet José and Panchito looked as they did the day Donald left them. Minus the outfits, which were wildly different. 

 No three-piece for José. Merely a clean pressed, cream colored, short sleeved button up with the familiar straw hat perched atop his head. Black umbrella resting at the crook of his arm. Even in the dark of night, his feathers were a bright green that made Donald think of the jungles the parrot loved to explore. 

 Panchito was honestly the biggest change. No more overly large sombrero or bright, red outfit. The rooster looked like he’d be more at home on a farm wearing his faded jeans and short sleeved plaid shirt. He’d seem to have gotten taller as well, his comb grown out. Hand still in mid-air as he’d no doubt planned on knocking once again. His feathers were a warm red, seeming to have dulled a little since the years had passed, but still a comforting color. 

 All seemed to be frozen as they looked the other over. José still holding his phone up to his ear, Donald seeing his name on the screen display. Absolutely shocked, the duck’s bill opened and closed, mind still trying to confirm what he was seeing. He wasn’t even sure what he should say. 

 What are you doing here?

 How did you get here? 

 I’m sorry I left so suddenly and broke my promise that I would be back then never returning or even providing an explanation.

 He wanted to say it all. But Donald’s mind settled on uttering one world. “...Hi.”

 “Hola.” Panchito easily replied while José pocketed his phone.

 Donald merely stood aside and gestured for the two to enter, too tired to really question what was happening. As soon as he saw the eggs, Panchito let out a coo of excitement and rushed over. Carefully plucking at the fabric nest to cover said eggs better while speaking softly to them. José kept his attention to Donald, who closed the door with a sharp snap before facing the parrot.

 “You look like death, meu amor.” José spoke gently. A hand reaching out to preen a few feathers back into place.  Between the pet name, the gentle tone, the soft touches, Donald couldn’t help a shiver that traveled through him.

 “Really? Thought I was looking pretty good.” The parrot laughed softly, Donald forgetting how much he missed that sound. Was he close to crying or was he just extremely tired? “What are you two doing here?”

 “We heard about Della.”

 José had said it so simply. But it felt like a punch to his stomach, Donald wrapping his arms around himself. “How...who told you.”

 “Fethry and I are friends on Beakbook.” Panchito replied.

 “We came as soon as we could,” José continued, “Had to cash in all my mileage points and vacation time to get this to work. The company was a little upset that this was so sudden, but it was worth it.”

 “Cancelled a few birthdays on my end.” The rooster laughs softly.

 “We just wanted to be here. How are you feeling?”

 Donald let out a snort, rubbing his eyes as he walked back over to the table. He more or less collapsed back into the padded seats. “I’m not feeling anything. I used up all my shock, anger, and disgust on Scrooge the day Della disappeared. Now I’m caring for three eggs when I can barely keep my life together and I’ve ostracized myself from my family. Because they either did nothing to stop Della or just couldn’t understand why in the world I would be so angry.”

 A less than sane laugh escaped from the fragile duck. “And Della just left! Can you believe it? She had eggs. She just delivered her eggs and decided the next best thing was going on the big adventure! How...How absolutely messed up is that? How am I supposed to tell these kids their mother left because motherhood was less important to her than adventuring. The thing she’s done for years but could get enough of!”

 Donald pulled at his feathers, breathing becoming shallow and harsh. This was it, he was finally breaking. Just as he’d received a break in the clouds he feels himself falling apart. He was just so tired…

 Very little resistance was put up as his hands were gently pulled away from his sore head. Instead of self-inflicted pain, he was now clutching onto a shirt. His view became obscured by green feathers that felt like silk and were cool against his heated skin. A familiar tune of a lullaby started to be hummed that calmed his nerves further. Shoulders slumped as he felt himself slip away from consciousness. After three days of unrest, Donald fell into a relatively easy sleep with José holding him close.

 _____________________

 “I would just need to change addresses. It will not be that hard for me.”

 “Won’t you have anything to move?”

 “No, at least not a lot. I can just sell what I do not need. You?”

 “I have a lot of family heirlooms that I would like to bring. If possible.”

 “We will figure something out.”

 “Do you think Donald will be okay with moving?”

 “He is charmingly stubborn. But if we sell it properly, I am sure he will understand where we are coming from.”

 Donald squirmed as he slowly started to wake. Pressed against something warm and soft as he was rocked by the hammock. Fingers gently brushed through the feathers on the back of his head. It would have lulled him back to sleep if he wasn’t determined to figure out what was happening.

 It took a few blinks to clear his blurred vision to understand where he was. Laying against José, both resting in the duck’s hammock hanging in the supposed to be storage room. The only proper bedroom being set up for being the nursery. Panchito was resting on the floor nearby. The eggs and fabric nest had been moved from the table as well, laying next to the rooster who was running a hand over the shells carefully. From the soft light drifting from the window, Donald reasoned it was the following evening. 

 ...How long had he been asleep?

 “I’m sorry meu amor, did we wake you?” José’s voice was soft.

 “No...I was kind of waking up. How are the eggs?”

 “Pequeños Ángeles. So quiet and well-behaved.” Panchito teased.

 “The eggs are fine. We are more worried about you right now,” continued José, “Donald, you have not had a breakdown like that since college.”

 “Possibly even worse than that.”

 “Have more adult problems.” Donald responded weakly. He was still so exhausted.

 “This is not a normal situation,” Panchito argued, “You look so close to death when we arrived yesterday.”

 “Haven’t been able to clear my thoughts for the past few days. It’s all just been a...mess…”

 “We understand where you are coming from Donald. But this is such a sudden change, and to do it on your own…” José was not one to be at a loss for words. But this was a situation that seemed to be weighing heavily on all their shoulders with no clear answer.

 “I’m not going back to Scrooge.” The duck responded sharply.

 “That is not what we are suggesting.”

 “Then what are you suggesting? Because I’m too exhausted to figure it out.”

 “We’re going to help.” Panchito answered easily.

 It took Donald a few seconds to properly understand what was just said. “How? I mean, wait, no, that was rude. You guys already have enough in your own lives to deal with. I couldn’t just...ask you two to help.”

 “We are offering to help.” José corrected.

 “But-”

 “We want to help.”

 Donald sucked in his breath, eyes darting between the two other birds. José calm. Panchito eager. “...I’m not in a good place. Mentally, emotionally, financially.”

 “We were roommates in college, we know what you’re like. You’re going through something...heavy, so anyone facing this wouldn’t be doing okay. We understand. José and I have jobs to help with pay. Easy.” Panchito answered.

 “You can’t just...leave your jobs, your homes.”

 “I am a flight attendant. I just need to transfer to a hub positioned here. Panchito is a freelance performer, he can easily find work. And we do not have much tied to our current apartments. Moving will not be an issue.”

 “The boathouse will be cramped. It was already an issue with me and the eggs, once they hatched.” 

 “This may not be your most favorite of suggesting,” José started cautiously, “But, we would  need to sell the boathouse and find an apartment.”

 “I- We don’t have the financial support or a reliable credit! Mine’s terrible, you two aren’t proper citizens-”

 Panchito coughed weakly at that. “We actually received our citizenship a few months ago.”

 Donald’s mouth dropped at that, looking to José for confirmation. The parrot nodded. “We were going to tell you properly when we saw you again.”

 “Right..the original plan. Only going to be gone for a year,” the duck chuckled weakly, “My luck just had to ruin everything for everyone, didn’t it?”

 “No, no mi amor, esto no es tu culpa.” Panchito inched closer to grab Donald’s hand, José taking the other one. “You should know how unpredictable life truly is. We just have to greet each day the best we can.”

 Donald let out a small sigh, knowing he was slowly losing this battle. “...You didn’t ask… You shouldn’t… This is my family, my mess to deal with. This nothing you two should worry about. I’m not bringing you into this, you shouldn’t have to worry about it.”

 “Come now, are we not the Three Caballeros? We are together, to support each other, no matter what kind of storm we face. You need us now more than ever and how terrible would we be if we just abandoned you? Patinho bobo.” José gently teased.

 Donald was unprepared, but not unhappy, when a kiss was placed on both his cheeks. All but melting into the touch. A smile forming as he leaned back into José and gently squeezing each hand he still had a hold of. 

 “Are you really prepared to raise triplets?”

 “I’m used to a big family.” Panchito replied with a smile.

 “Never raised children, but I am a fast learner. We will be fine.”

 Donald gave a small nod, letting out a slow breath as his worries faded away. He didn’t argue when Panchito collected the eggs and all piled into the hammock. It creaked, but gave no further protest as they all settled down. Perhaps it was because he was so exhausted so he couldn’t truly argue anymore. Or because José and Panchito gave good reasoning. But at this moment, sandwiched between two people he loved and the eggs resting on his lap, Donald realized he was feeling content after so many days of unrest. 

 How could he ever doubt these two?

#Donald Duck #Jose Carioca #Panchito Pistoles #jose carioca/donald duck/panchio pistoles #The Three Caballeros #the three gay caballeros #s-creations

[thefolioarchives]

Reading of 2021, Part VII

36. The Vanishing Half by Brit Bennett

I loved this book. It tells the story of the twins Desiree and Stella, as they grow up in the village of Mallard, a village comprising only of light-skinned black people. Desiree is keen to go out and see the world, and one day they both elope. A few years later, Desiree returns to her mother's house with a child in tow, but Stella is nowhere to be seen. She's disappeared and Desiree has no idea where she went. And that pretty much sets up the rest of the story. I thought the characters were all well-fleshed out and I enjoyed reading about all their lives. Desiree's daughter June and her life as a student in L.A, Stella's new life away from Mallard and her family, Desiree as she struggles to leave behind her own past of domestic abuse and find a new love. This is a book about sisterhood, but it's even more a book about family and family history. How it makes us who we are, shapes us and when unknown, leaves a longing and a need to seek out the truth, to flesh out the lies and piece together something larger.

37. Dune by Frank Herbert

This is one of those books I've wanted to read since properly getting into science fiction, and I'm kind of annoyed I didn't read it alongside some of my fantasy companions back when I was younger. I was definitely under the assumption that a book written in the 60s would be illegible to me, an assumption I really shouldn't have given credence to. Either way, I felt this was an epic fantasy story in many ways and I'm not convinced it needed a sci-fi setting (I don't know why I'm so obsessed with fitting things into their "rightful" category and I think it makes me sound like an arsehole, so I should probably stop).

In the end, it's a story about power. About men grabbing for more power and I guess at some point, that kind of narrative has lost its appeal to me as a reader. There is also an insane amount of talking going on. I feel like there is hardly any action, and instead you just have characters talking about events. More show and less tell, Herbert. I'm fascinated by the themes of ecology and addiction, but I feel like these themes are just given passing attention. How the Fremen are trying to make a more hospitable planet out of Dune and how slow the process of terraforming is. The theme of addiction runs throughout the entire narrative, and I get the sense that drugs are crucial to this world and economy, but it's still not explored in any significant detail, which is a true shame. Maybe there will be more exploration in the rest of the series, but I'm not up for finding out to be quite honest.

38. The Imago Sequence by Laird Barron

I love stories that blend themes of secret U.S government work with cosmic horror (one of the reasons I love the Tinfoil Dossier and Twin Peaks). This led me to seek out more cosmic horror (that isn't Lovecraft, though he still has considerable sway within the genre and I'm a little bit stumped at the amount of people who, uncritically, recommend him) which led me to Barron. This is a collection of short stories, all seeming to take place within the same universe, albeit with some different time discrepancies. The majority of the stories I really enjoyed (the titular story was incredible!) and Barron's mastery of his language and genre is evident on the page. I did find that I sometimes had to look up a lot of the words, which honestly got a bit tedious after a while, but considering the strength of some of these short stories, it's a small price to pay for Barron's talent. There's a liminal sense everywhere, of horrors just beyond reach, behind corners and through cracks - of things bleeding through from somewhere cold and distant, of things lying in wait and slowly recruiting bodies and souls for its "project". That sense of unease is what I'm left with, at the end of reading The Imago Sequence, and it's a powerful tool to keep the suspense going. I'm keen to read more of his novels and other short stories, as I think he's created a horrific universe with a terrifying set of "villains".

#the vanishing half #reading of 2021 #books #reading #reading list #brit bennett #african american literature #dune #frank herbert #science fiction literature #scifi #horror literature #cosmic horror #laird barron #the imago sequence

[grim-on-the-darkside]

The Latest Information on Lucas’s Sequel Trilogy he wrote in 2011. Also some information from  Star Wars Archives: Episodes I-III: 1999–2005, author Paul Duncan interviewed George Lucas his ideas of a Sequel Trilogy.

Firstly, some of the things Pablo Hidalgo has stated about Lucas’s sequel trilogy that he has access to and spoke to Lucas directly about.

We know Lucas never considered the EU canon or a part of his Star Wars universe so it is not surprising his Sequel Trilogy was of his own creation.

........

"Fast forward to 2012, when we hear George is looking to make SW movies again, I though I thought 'I wonder what next Mon Calamari's gonna be. And it turns out, the Mon Calamari this time was huge swaths of the EU. There was no Jacen, no Jaina. No new Jedi Order. Chewie lived. Not surprising, but there it was."

~ Pablo Hidalgo, 2016               

https://ibb.co/nmjWcBM

..

[Regarding Lucas Sequel Trilogy Treatments he wrote in 2011 and sold to Disney]

Comment - "What are you talking about? J.J. threw out His story treatments and he [George Lucas] has no imput at all anymore."

Pablo Hidalgo Response - "Not entirely true. But the treatments as they were pretty much disregarded the EU, which was to be expected.”

~ 2018

https://ibb.co/Dz7qhTB

........

Commentor - 'Thank You for the clarification, might I ask if you ever recieved any direction that George Lucas with the number of children the Solos had as depicted in the EU?'

Pablo Hidalgo - "All I meant is his starting point for this Trilogy didn't have Jacen, Jaina, and/or Anakin."

Commentor - 'Was there Ben Skywalker?'

Pablo Hidalgo - "There was not."

https://ibb.co/JH2Y8tg

.................

Question -  "My question is, *what did George's treatments for 7 look like? I would love to see if they fit the EU."

Answer [Pablo Hidalgo]- "They did not. For instance, there was no Jaina, Jacen, or Anakin."  ~ 2017                                                                       

https://ibb.co/N7HKCsF

................

Pablo Hidalgo - "Jacen and Jaina never existed in George's storytelling, even in treatment form."

Comment Response - "And about Mara Jade?"

Pablo Hidalgo - "No. George never thought of Mara as being part of his universe either."

~ 2016 https://ibb.co/YLHk6Ft

.......

From Star Wars Insider

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"There was no Ben Skywalker in George's Universe. He came from the NJO team." ~ Pablo Hidalgo 2016

https://ibb.co/HDtXh6D

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"Question from Today, but I thought this was pretty well known. George Lucas never considered Jacen, Jaina, or Mara Jade as part of his universe."

~ Pablo Hidalgo May 2016 https://ibb.co/VDX2qvY

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"But anyway Luke in exile predates TLJ by a long time and came from someone who can very happily and rightly supersede anyone's feedback :)"

~ Pablo Hidalgo https://ibb.co/sKZnWKk

[Luke was in something of a self imposed exile on an Island in Lucas Sequel Trilogy which is something that Disney ripped off from Lucas’s Sequel Trilogy. Pablo is referring to Lucas in this quote.]

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"Luke was training a new generation of Jedi, it all went wrong because of 1 boy, and he's the 'Jedi killer' - that's the source.”

~ Pablo Hidalgo, 2016 https://ibb.co/JjYtGtf

[The source being George Lucas sequel trilogy treatments he made in 2011 and ended up selling to Disney later. Something else Disney ripped off from Lucas’s Sequel trilogy.] ..

Pablo Hidalgo -   "George's starting point for 7 had no Jaina, Jacen, Anakin and Chewie never died. So yeah."

[Reply] - "Could we please send this to every EU purist we know?"

[Other replyer] "They wont care."

[First Replyer] "They will after what Hidalgo just said after this."

[Pablo Hidalgo] - "No, they won't. You can't correct the internet.The info's out there. They've made up their minds."

https://ibb.co/mXGX0Qn

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Pablo Hidalgo - "But there was no sequel trilogy at that time."

Commenter 1 -

'Also, Lucas' Treatment of EP VII did not have the twins born in the Thrawn Trilogy'.

Pablo Hidalgo - "It didn't have twins."

Commenter 2 -

'You're referring to the treatment Lucas sold Disney in 2012. I guess plans changed.'

Pablo Hidalgo - "Or were defined. Jacen and Jaina were never part of George's story. They were Tim's [Zahn] invention."

~ Pablo Hidalgo Q&A

https://ibb.co/VQ5Zrr0

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Here’s what George said about them during an interview with James Cameron for his The Story of Science Fiction project.

“Back in the day, I used to say ultimately what this means is we’re just cars, vehicles, for the Whills to travel around in…. We’re vessels for them. And the conduit is the midi-chlorians. The midi-chlorians are the ones that communicate with the Whills. The Whills, in a general sense, they are the Force.

All the way back to — with the Jedi and the Force and everything — the whole concept of how things happen was laid out completely from [the beginning] to the end. But I never got to finish. I never got to tell people about it.

If I’d held onto the company I could have done it, and then it would have been done. Of course, a lot of the fans would have hated it, just like they did Phantom Menace and everything, but at least the whole story from beginning to end would be told.”

~ George Lucas

https://www.indiewire.com/2018/06/george-lucas-episode-vii-episode-ix-1201974276/

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As part of the book Star Wars Archives: Episodes I-III: 1999–2005, author Paul Duncan interviewed George Lucas. During this interview, George talked more about his plans for the sequel trilogy.

Paul Duncan: What about the stormtroopers? They look robotic, but they’re not.

George Lucas: How do you know what they are?

Paul Duncan: Did you have a different idea of what they were?

George Lucas: Yeah, they started out as clones. Once all the clones were killed, the Empire picked up recruits, like militia. They fought, but they weren’t very good at what they did.

Paul Duncan: That’s why they kept missing.

George Lucas: That’s why they kept missing. Then after the Rebels won, there were no more stormtroopers in my version of the third trilogy.

I had planned for the first trilogy to be about the father, the second trilogy to be about the son, and the third trilogy to be about the daughter and the grandchildren. [There was only one, Ben Solo, another Disney rip off.]

Episode VII, VIII, and IX would take ideas from what happened after the Iraq War. “Okay, you fought the war, you killed everybody, now what are you going to do?” Rebuilding afterwards is harder than starting a rebellion or fighting the war. When you win the war and you disband the opposing army, what do they do? The stormtroopers would be like Saddam Hussein’s Ba’athist fighters that joined ISIS and kept on fighting. The stormtroopers refuse to give up when the Republic win.

They want to be stormtroopers forever, so they go to a far corner of the galaxy, start their own country and their own rebellion.

There’s a power vacuum so gangsters, like the Hutts, are taking advantage of the situation, and there is chaos. The key person is Darth Maul, who had been resurrected in The Clone Wars cartoons — he brings all the gangs together.

Paul Duncan: Was Darth Maul the main villain?

George Lucas: Yeah, but he’s very old, and we have two versions of him. One is with a set of cybernetic legs like a spider, and then later on he has metal legs and he was a little bit bigger, more of a superhero. We did all this in the animated series, he was in a bunch of episodes.

Darth Maul trained a girl, Darth Talon [The only thing from the EU in Lucas’s Trilogy, but it wasn’t even really her, just had the same look and name, completely different background. She wasn’t even born yet at that time frame in the comics]., who was in the comic books as his apprentice. She was the new Darth Vader, and most of the action was with her. So these were the two main villains of the trilogy. Maul eventually becomes the godfather of crime in the universe because, as the Empire falls, he takes over.

The movies are about how Leia — I mean, who else is going to be the leader? — is trying to build the Republic. They still have the apparatus of the Republic but they have to get it under control from the gangsters. That was the main story.

It starts out a few years after Return of the Jedi and we establish pretty quickly that there’s this underworld, there are these offshoot stormtroopers who started their own planets, and that Luke is trying to restart the Jedi. He puts the word out, so out of 100,000 Jedi, maybe 50 or 100 are left. The Jedi have to grow again from scratch, so Luke has to find two- and three-year-olds, and train them. It’ll be 20 years before you have a new generation of Jedi.

By the end of the trilogy Luke would have rebuilt much of the Jedi, and we would have the renewal of the New Republic, with Leia, Senator Organa, becoming the Supreme Chancellor in charge of everything. So she ended up being the Chosen One.”

George also expanded on Midi-chlorians:

“This is the cosmology. The Force is the energy, the fuel, and without it everything would fall apart. The Force is a metaphor for God, and God is essentially unknowable. But behind it is another metaphor, which fits so well into the movie that I couldn’t resist it.

Midi-chlorians are the equivalent of mitochondria in living organisms and photosynthesis in plants — I simply combined them for easier consumption by the viewer. Mitochondria create the chemical energy that turns one cell into two cells.

I like to think that there is a unified reality to life and that it exists everywhere in the universe and that it controls things, but you can also control it. That’s why I split it into the Personal Force and the Cosmic Force. The Personal Force is the energy field created by our cells interacting and doing things while we are alive. When we die, we lose our persona and our energy is assimilated into the Cosmic Force.

If we have enough Midi-chlorians in our body, we can have a certain amount of control over our Personal Force and learn how to use it, like the Buddhist practive of being able to walk on hot coals.”

And the Whills:

“The Whills are a microscopic, single-celled lifeform like amoeba, fungi, and bacteria. There’s something like 100,000 times more Whills than there are Midi-chlorians, and there are about 10,000 times more Midi-chlorians than there are human cells.

The only microscopic entities that can go into the human cells are the Midi-chlorians. They are born in the cells. The Midi-chlorians provide the energy for human cells to split and create life. The Whills are single-celled animals that feed on the Force. The more of the Force there is, the better off they are. So they have a very intense symbiotic relationship with the Midi-chlorians and the Midi-chlorians effectively work for the Whills.

It is estimated that we have 100 trillion microbes in our body and we are made up of about 90% bacteria and 10% human cells. So who is in service to whom? I know this is the kind of thing that fans just go berserk over because they say, “We want it to be mysterious and magical”, and “You’re just doing science.” Well, this isn’t science.

This is just as mythological as anything else in Star Wars. It sounds more scientific, but it’s a fiction.

It’s saying there is a big symbiotic relationship to create life, and to create the Force, but if you look at all the life-forms in the universe, most of them are one-celled organisms. I think of one-celled organisms as an advanced form of life because they’ve been able to travel through the universe. They have their own spaceships — those meteorites that we get every once in a while. They’ve been living on those things for thousands of years, they’ve been frozen, unfrozen, and can survive almost anything.

The one-celled organisms have to have a balance. You have to have good ones and bad ones otherwise it would extinguish life. And if they go out of balance, the dark side takes over.”

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Obviously there is the older information that’s already been out there, I just wanted to share some of the newer information that has come to light. I’m sure in time we will learn more.

#LucasIsTheCanon