#fuck this hellscape we give different names

[futilechildhooddream]

what’s one non-useless thing I can do. does any of this matter in the long run, will I be able to work in the long wrong

stupid hellscape of a world I just want to live

#feeling helpless #feeling worthless #fuck this hellscape we give different names

[hotchnisslvr]

how do we carry on?

pairing: hotch x bau!reader

rating: m

word count: 4.8k

genre: angst, hurt no comfort

summary: emily was your confidant, your best friend. when she dies at the hands of ian doyle, you find comfort in your boyfriend, aaron. when you find out that she’s alive and that hotch had known all along, your world falls out from under you. can you and hotch come back from the decision he made for the good of the team?

*if this gains enough traction i might follow up with a pt.2 to give it a happy ending*

The criss-crossed lines of the tile floor blur together as you stare blankly between your feet. The tops of your thighs have gone numb from digging your elbows into them, using your cradled hands as a pillow for your forehead. You couldn’t go home, not until you knew.

Rossi had offered to go on a walk and get a coffee, but shitty lukewarm hospital coffee was the last thing you needed. You hadn’t meant to write him off, you just couldn’t justify doing anything to distract from the fact that she was on that operating table, that Emily’s life was literally hanging in the balance.

The rest of the team was no better off than you are right now. Penelope’s knitting needles clack relentlessly, the scarf inside of her purse growing as her hands keep busy so her mind doesn’t focus on how hard she’s trying not to cry. The last time you’d poked your head up, Derek hadn’t moved from the waiting room windowsill where he’d been standing still as a statue staring out at the cityscape. If Spencer didn’t stop shaking his leg, you feared he would wear a hole straight through the tile. JJ exits the waiting room as often as she returns, her liaising days quickly coming back, making her their only link to the operating room. Hotch’s behavior is no different. His cell rings every ten to fifteen minutes, no doubt the Bureau wanting to know how the hell this could happen. It’s the only sign that time is actually passing and you’re forced to accept that you’re not stuck in some fucked up purgatory-esque hellscape where time stands still, torturing you as your dear friend’s life teeters between worlds.

What you wanted, what you needed was for him to hold you; to place a kiss against your temple and tell you that everything would be alright. It had to be alright.

He couldn’t show favor to you though, not now. The team didn’t know about your relationship with him, though you believe a few have their suspicions. You’re all too observant for your own good. Not much goes unnoticed by anyone. So when JJ walks back into the waiting room, everyone shifts toward her to try and get a glimpse into her facial expression and body language for any sign of an update regarding Emily’s condition.

Instantly, you know something is wrong. JJ’s eyes flit from one person to the next, not lingering very long on anyone. Spencer is the first to stand and you follow suit. You close in, forming a small half circle. Behind JJ, Hotch stands in the doorway, brow straight as he folds his arms across his chest.

“JJ?” Her name is an anxious plea on Penelope’s lips.

JJ’s eyes drop to the floor as she presses her lips together. She takes a deep breath and lifts her eyes, yours the ones they land on as she speaks. “She never made it off the table.”

A choked sob echoes from Garcia as she falls into Derek’s arms, his features fixed as he stares ahead though his knuckles flush white as he holds tightly onto Penelope. Rossi pinches the bridge of his nose, eyes closed as he mutters something to himself; a prayer, maybe. Spencer envelopes JJ in a desperate embrace, as if clinging to her will somehow make her words any less true. Afterall, how can they be? Emily can’t go down, not like this; not after all she’s survived.

Someone says your name. Your brow dips, but you don’t respond. You need to see Emily. Your feet move of their own accord, guiding you through the waiting room. Someone grabs your arm and you tug away from their grasp, set on pushing onward and finding the OR.

Someone repeats your name, and you can’t help but latch on to the deep tenor that belongs to Hotch. You halt in your tracks and close your eyes, tears leaking over your eyelids and down your cheeks.

“I need to talk to Emily,” you say, your voice small.

The way Hotch says your name is laced with pity and you hate the way it sounds on his tongue. He pulls gently on your arm in an attempt to reel you into him, but you resist. You bite your lip to still its trembling. Yanking your arm free, you press on into the hallway and stumble toward the double doors that read in bold letters: Authorized Personnel Only. Fuck that. You’ve got a badge, that’s authority enough. Before you can push through, firm hands twist around your arms.

You push back, but their grip tightens. “Stop,” Hotch urges authoritatively. You turn into him and pound your fist against his chest, a sob cracking free from your mouth. “She’s not gone,” you cry. “She’s not gone. She’s not—” Your legs tremble with the wave of grief that crashes over you and you can’t hold your weight as it does so. Falling to your knees, Hotch reacts. His arms fold around your waist, catching you as you collapse into the wide plane of his chest. Your ribs ache as your lungs inflate with each rapid, sobbing breath. Your vision turns fuzzy at the edges as you try and fail to slow your breathing. It feels like you’re dying as the waves of grief assail you over and over again, battering you, body and mind, in an unrelenting tumultuous current of sorrow and pain as the wicked reality sets in. Emily is dead. You barely feel Hotch’s hand in your hair cradling you against him. As he murmurs apologies and sympathies in your ear, you don’t see the weighted look he exchanges with JJ.

•

The funeral comes and goes. The day is too beautiful for Emily not to be there to see it. You sit on the porch at Hotch’s house, breathing in and out as you watch the daffodils dance in the afternoon breeze. You smooth the fabric of your dress down over your knees, the satin wrinkled from the way you clenched it during the service.

Your phone buzzes in your purse. The number of messages and phone calls you’d ignored continues to rise, but you can’t bring yourself to express any gratitude for their condolences. You can’t bring yourself to feel anything except the crushing weight of grief.

You picture Emily sitting beside you on the wooden porch swing. Last Summer, you’d sat here with her as the team gathered for a Fourth of July Barbecue. Jack had made invitations and delivered them to the team at the office. He’d been so excited and so were you. It was around then that you and Hotch had begun to toe the line between colleagues and something more; a morning coffee dropped off at your desk here, an extra visit to his office there. You’d sat here with Emily watching as Rossi backseat barbecued Hotch on the grill. She’d caught you smiling at him alongside the fondness in your gaze. She’d clocked you from a mile away.

“Oh, you’ve got it bad.” Her laugh had tinkled from lips, ringing like a morning bell.

“What are you talking about?” you’d asked, trying and failing to school your features into a mask of indifference.

“I’ll tell ya, it’s a big swing, but if you hit it, that’s a home run for sure.”

You’d nearly choked on your lemonade, coughing and gasping; drawing the attention of the others.

“Wrong pipe!” Emily had called while pointing at you and clapping a hand against your back. “She’s good!” In a low voice she’d added, “Though I’m sure with him, it’d be just the right pipe.”

You’d elbowed her in the ribs and bust out laughing together. For the longest time after that, she’d been the only person that you’d confided in about your burgeoning feelings and relationship with Aaron. Through that, she’d quickly become your closest friend on the team.

A couple of kids shout at one another, laughing, as they ride past the house on their bicycles; shattering the memory. You dip into your purse and withdraw your phone, pressing a button and powering it down. The screen door creaks on its hinges and Hotch steps down onto the porch, the planks shifting beneath his weight. He sits beside you and offers you a mug. The scent of coffee reaches your nose and you accept it, thanking him quietly. Aaron had taken his suit jacket off and loosened his tie. He stretches an arm around your shoulder and draws closer to you. He kisses the side of your face and stares out at the yard.

“It was a beautiful service,” he offers.

“Aaron, don’t.” You close your eyes and take a breath. You hold the coffee with both hands, rubbing your thumbs up and down the warm ceramic. “Please don’t make small talk with me about this like it’s all so fucking normal.”

He sighs and apologizes. “I just wish I could make all of your hurt go away.”

A shudder runs through you and you nestle in closer to him, taking a sip of your coffee as you do so. “I don’t think it’ll ever go away.”

•

Her brown eyes stare back at you, though the photo paper could never capture the light that flared within them when she was alive. Of all the faces you could have seen up on this wall, you’d never anticipated hers being one of them.

Every day you stop by her portrait on the wall of fallen heroes. People talk about her less and less around the office. The team doesn’t stop, though your conversations are stilted and often end in awkward silences; no one really knowing how to carry on once the conversation slows to a natural end. You speak often with Spencer about the ways in which you’ve been grieving, the sleepless nights and early mornings. Derek is reserved. He’s angry above anything else. He feels betrayed by Emily and a part of you understands that. She’d not told any of you after all. You’d be remiss if you’d not also spent some of your time grieving in anger. Of all the times you’d stayed late after work, gotten together to hang out on weekends, or gone out for drinks, she had never indicated anything was wrong. You had told her everything, confided every one of your fears and hopes into her and you’d thought that the street had been going both ways. God, you’d never been so wrong.

“Conference room in fifteen,” Aaron says as he walks past you, hand grazing your back as he does so.

You smile tightly and nod, glancing once more at Emily’s photo before making your way to your desk in the bullpen, ignoring the fact hers still sits empty and unoccupied beside yours. How has it been three months already?

•

“Emily!”

Your eyes dart around the room frantically searching as your heart thunders in your ears. You feel the organ pounding against your ribcage, threatening to break free of it. It only takes a second for you to realize it had been a dream.

Aaron rolls over and sits up, threading an arm around your back and rubbing your hip with his fingers. “Another nightmare?” he asks, words tinged with sleepiness.

You nod, yawning as you rub your eyes. The dreams are further apart, but at least every other week her face haunts your subconscious. You can’t help but wonder if it’s some sort of self-punishment as life goes on and the days get easier.

In reality, you don’t know if it’s easier or if you’ve just forced yourself to become numb to it all, compartmentalizing the pain of losing your best friend because if you didn’t you don’t think you’d be able to leave the house and do what you do day after day.

“Are the appointments with the therapist helping?” he asks.

Another question you don’t know the answer to. On some level, yes. Talking to someone who knows nothing about you or her or anyone else on the team is good. You don’t have to walk on eggshells, worried you're going to dig open a wound the others are equally fighting to heal by talking about her or how much you miss her or wish she was here. On another level, you don’t open up fully to the doctor. There are some layers of this injury you don’t want to see heal and scar over. If you do that, it’s like you’re telling Emily that you’re over her death, as if it’s something as easy as that, something you just get over. No, some things need to stay fresh, to serve as a reminder that Ian Doyle is still out there. The man who took your best friend away from you and your BAU family is breathing and she’s not. You clench your fists, the sheets balling up in your hands as your resentment burns deep inside you. Yes, that’s it, the idea of him walking around thinking he’s gotten away with this is enough to stoke the flames simmering deep inside you.

You take a deep breath, mentally imagining the flames subsiding, and they do. They dial down, but they don’t disappear. You glance down at Aaron, who snores softly beside you. His fingers still curl around your hip and a faint smile graces your lips. He tries, you know he does, but this is exhausting for everyone. He bears the brunt of it at the office. He fought to be the one to meet with the team and conduct the grief interviews, not wanting a stranger to come in and sift through your friends’ and colleagues’ pain over what happened. God knows how much bureaucratic red tape he had gotten tangled in right after the fact, the higher ups demanding how such a blunder could occur right under their noses. Aaron had put out the fires though, as he always did. Reaching around his back, you withdraw his hand from your hip and tuck it by his side, not before pressing a kiss to his knuckles.

You glance at the clock before lying back down. 4:15AM blinks back at you on the digital clock face. In forty five minutes the alarm will go off and it’ll be another day at the office. Settling down into the pillows, you press your back into Aaron’s body, yours molding against the planes of his as if it’s the most natural thing in the world.

His arms slinks around your waist and pulls you in as if you can get any closer than you already are. He tucks his chin over your shoulder and his lips brush against your jawline.

“I love you,” he whispers and you relax into the safety of his embrace.

“I love you, too, Aaron.”

•

Nights are hard when Aaron is gone. Pakistan is nine hours ahead and all Hotch has to communicate with anyone is a satellite phone, the number for which you don’t have access to. Whenever Hotch calls, the caller ID flashes the word ‘Unknown’ across your screen. There have been several times you’ve missed him due to being asleep or at work. Each call missed feels like being sucker punched. Every time you talk, a part of you worries it’ll be the last time. You didn’t use to have this fear, not until Emily. Despite staring death in the face on a week by week basis, most of the time playing Russian Roulette with the Grim Reaper himself in each unsub you cross paths with, somehow you never thought he’d actually take someone you love from you; that he’d take down one of the team. You never thought there’d be a last conversation with Emily, and now she’s dead.

Dead. The word is a heavy stone, sinking from the cusps of your mind to the pit of your stomach. It sits there, a persistent ache idling deep inside of you. It never relents and it never allows you to forget.

There are nights you dream that Aaron is dead too, that somewhere far away and beyond your control, he’s dying on the ground, bleeding out, and no one knows. You don’t even know what he’s working on and he can’t say; despite your relationship there are still levels in which Hotch’s clearance supersedes your own and the need-to-know red tape keeps you out. Afraid to close your eyes and dream of his unseeing, you stare at the blades of the ceiling fan whirling lazily overhead of the bed you usually share with him.

“I miss you,” you whisper to no one; and you don’t know who you’re talking to anymore.

•

“He’s back?” your heart flutters in your chest, equal parts excited and anxious at the prospect of Aaron’s sudden return. You push off your desk and swivel in your chair to stand, rushing down the hall and leaving Reid behind as you make your way hastily to the conference room.

The door is cracked and a gleeful sound eeks past your lips as his tall frame comes into view. You slip in before anyone else arrives and throw your arms around you. Inhaling deeply, his familiar teakwood scent envelopes you just as his arms do. You move to pull away, but his arms tighten around you.

“A second more,” he whispers, and there’s an edge to his voice.

You write it off to jet lag and sink into his embrace, though you notice how slight he feels against you. Finally, you pull back and cup his face in your hands. The scruff of his beard is prickly and you laugh as you take in his rugged appearance. “I don’t think I’ve ever seen you with this much facial hair.” You swipe your thumbs over the hair on his lip and he tilts his head, kissing the inside of your hand. He closes his eyes and breathes in deeply before lifting them to meet yours. It's then you realize how tired he looks. The bags under his eyes are puffy and purple, almost as if they’re bruised. His forehead is creased, brow furrowed; definitely not how you pictured him upon reuniting.

“Aaron is everything ok—”

“I need you to know I would never hurt you,” he says quickly, interrupting you.

You purse your lips, brow pinching at the sudden admission. As your lips part to speak he directs a pointed look at you, the depths of his brown eyes wavering. “I love you,” his voice cracks, “so much.” He swallows, his throat bobbing as he does so. “Please remember that.”

There’s a hollow feeling in your gut, a chasm opening wide where every anxious and painful thought that you’ve tried to keep buried since he’s been gone begins to claw their way out as a thousand different outcomes play out in front of you. “Aaron, what’s going on?”

He doesn’t answer your question as the rest of the team trickles into the room, sitting at the round table or standing as suspense fills the space. It’s tangible. Everyone’s posture is rigid and tense in anticipation of whatever it is he has to say.

“Seven months ago I made a decision that impacted everyone on this team,” he begins, eyes firm.

Spencer shifts uncomfortably beside you. Rossi leans forward, fingers steepled under his chin.

“As you all know, Emily had lost a lot of blood,” Hotch continues and your ears prick at the sound of her name. Why would he bring her up? No less, her condition the day you all lost her. You all know this.

“…the doctor’s were able to stabilize her.”

Your lips part but no sound comes out as you raise your eyes to meet his. They meet yours for the briefest of seconds before flitting on to the others.The next words to leave his mouth sound far away, interrupted by the blood now pounding in your eardrums. “She stayed there until she was well enough to travel…given identities…”

There’s a lump in your throat and you feel as though you may choke on it. Air doesn’t seem to be able to bypass it and you have to remind yourself that you can breathe even though it feels like all the oxygen has vacated your lungs.

Penelope is the first to speak. “She’s alive?”

Spencer’s brow quirks as he tries to rationalize what’s being said to him. “We buried her.”

You did. You helped carry the casket. You felt the weight of her dead body and watched it sink into the earth. If that wasn’t her, what the fuck or who the fuck did you actually put in the ground?”

“As I said I take full responsibility for this decision,” Hotch continues, eyes downcast. “If anyone has any issues they should be directed towards me.”

The blood pounding in your ears is deafening. When Hotch looks up, you search his eyes and can’t help wondering if you know him at all. All of the nights you literally made yourself sick from crying and he held your hair back as you dry heaved over the toilet and your body spasmed from the grief of losing your best friend, he’d known that she was alive. For a moment, you think you may be sick right there at the round table at the thought of it all. Derek is speaking, his voice tight with anger but you don’t hear him. Heads turn and the hairs on the back of your neck prickle as a haunting feeling creeps up the back of your spine.

Turning around in your chair, everyone else stands but not you. If you do, you know your knees will buckle and fall out from under you. Spencer and Penelope are on their feet, moving briskly to greet the ghost of Emily.

Except she’s not a ghost. Her skin is not the cold blue-gray pallor of death, but pink and bright, the blood beneath her flesh very much pumping through a heart that’s beating. Her dark brown hair is sleek and shining, her bangs grown out and styled; her part now to the right. You watch her arms fold around Spencer and the way he squeezes her in turn. Penelope follows suit, tears streaming down her cheeks as she smiles widely. Derek stares on, features fixed in a cross between anger and shock. Emily approaches him with apprehension. An apology leaves her lips as she draws him in for a hug and his arms tentatively wrap around her. When she turns to you, your muscles tense. Those deep brown irises flicker back and forth across your face, searching for a reaction. You don’t give her one. Instead, you push past her, avoiding any and all physical contact with her, and dip out of the conference room.

You hear Garcia call your name and Derek shouts about having a case. You don’t care. You bypass your desk, not even bothering to get your purse. Your keys are hanging on a carabiner on your belt loop. Ignoring the elevator, you shove your way through the entrance to the stairs and move down them so quickly you’re surprised you don’t lose your footing and tumble down them. Down and around you go, your footsteps echoing as your heart slams against your ribcage. You slap your badge against the keypad that lets you exit the building, ignoring the greeting from the security guard at the front. As you push through the front doors of the office building, you barely make it to the bushes before you fall to your knees and retch.

•

A car door slams followed by the double beep which locks them. You close your eyes and inhale deeply as you prepare to face him, hands clenching around the sweater you were packing. A tear slips free from your eye as you breathe out and look toward the ceiling, as if the answers to why all of this had to happen are written up there. This is not how your reunion is supposed to be. You’d pictured his homecoming for weeks; thought about the outfit you’d wear to dinner and the lingerie you’d bought to wear just for him when you both got home, opened a bottle of wine, and made up for all of the time lost while he was away. That is how tonight is supposed to go.

Now you’re leaving, and you don’t know if you’ll be coming back.

The lock on the front door jiggles before the gears click into place. It squeaks on its hinges as it swings open. Five beeps follow and you can picture his fingers pressing against each button on the alarm system. His keys clatter as he drops them on the table. As his footsteps edge closer to your bedroom, you count each one. The sound that usually means safety and security, now sends a shiver of anxiety throughout your body.

He appears in the doorway, eyes rife with exhaustion and the bags beneath them puffy and swollen. His cheeks are flushed and his nose is pink, as if he’d been crying. Maybe he had been, god knows you had. His eyes flit between you and the bag you’re packing. His lips part and a small sound of desperation slips past them.

“Baby, please—”

You hold up a hand, curling your fingers into a fist. Your lip curls as you speak. “Don’t,” you breathe. You swallow the lump that quickly forms in your throat as you drop your hand, zipping the bag shut.

The inner corners of his brow draw upward and you can hardly stand to look into his pleading gaze.

“You have to understand—”

“Understand, what? Aaron?” You ask sharply, struggling to hold back the thick hot tears pricking the backs of your eyes.

He places a hand on his hip, fingers tucking back the fold of his unbuttoned shirt as his thumb hooks into his belt; a gesture you’re all too familiar with as he does the same thing with all of his suits. His other hand rises to pinch the bridge of his nose. He pauses, inhaling as he tries to find the words. After a moment, he scrubs a hand over his face and turns his gaze to yours.

“I wanted to tell you so badly,” he says. When he looks at you there are tears in his eyes. “I hated myself, watching the agony this decision put you and the team through. I wanted to tell you and take away your hurt, but I couldn’t. It wouldn’t have been fair to the team. Just because you’re my girlfriend, I can’t—” He turns his hand and slams his hand against the doorframe causing you to flinch. “Dammit!”

Your voice is soft, but sure when you speak. “You can’t bend the rules.”

It’s what you’ve always worried about, both of you. You always knew the job could come first, especially with him being the Unit Chief. You always understood that that meant no preferential treatment and that is something you never would’ve asked him to do. You just never anticipated it happening like this, a complete and total life altering mind fuck.

Aaron drops his hand and it slaps against his thigh in defeat as it falls to his side. “What was I supposed to do?”

You cross your arms over your chest, fingers curling over your biceps to try and still your shaking hair. You hang your head and a curtain of hair falls across your face, “I don’t know, Aaron.”

He kicks off the doorway, moving towards you with his hands outstretched. It happens without thinking, the way you flinch away. Pain flashes in his eyes and you feel as though you’ve been punched in the stomach the way it’s suddenly hard to breathe.

His hip is close to yours, his body angled away from you. You can feel the weight of his gaze on your shoulder as he looks down. “Don’t do this,” he whispers.

Your lip quivers, chin wobbling in response to the tears you’re trying so desperately to hold back. “I have vacation I’d been saving.” You pick up your bag and throw it over your shoulder, not daring to look up at him because you know if you do you’ll shatter into a thousand shards of glass at his feet.

As you move toward the door, you pause. For a split second, you entertain the thought of dropping your bag, running across the room he’d chased you around so many times before, and throwing yourself around him. You consider all the things you want to say and scream and cry about; all of your anger, sadness, betrayal, grief, and love. You crave him so terribly in that moment because his have always been the arms you’ve run to when things become too much to bear.

Instead, your chin dips toward your shoulder as you speak, but you don’t raise your eyes to meet his. If you do, you don’t think you’ll be able to leave. “My gun and badge are in the safe.”

As you make your way down the hallway, you have to bite your knuckles to stifle a sob just as you hear one leave his lips from the bedroom.

You don’t turn back.

#aaron hotchner #criminal minds #criminal minds fanfiction #criminal minds fic #aaron hotch fanfiction #aaron hotchner criminal minds #aaron hotch fic #aaron hotchner headcanons #aaron hotch x reader #aaron hotchner x you #aaron hotchner drabble #aaron hotchner x fem!reader #aaron hotchner x y/n #aaron hotchner fanfiction #aaron hotchner angst #aaron hotchner hurt no comfort #angst #hurt no comfort #bau reader #bau!reader #fem!reader #hotch x reader #hotch x y/n #drabble #fic #hotch #sad!aaron hotchner

[zep-zep-blog]

Im back from the dead yall. I got this idea from @timeslugarts ^^ Go give them a follow for their amazing art! Hope yall enjoy!

Vox x gn!reader

Genre:Fluff | Cw: death, car crash, hospital mention

☆Devilish Love☆

Darkness. That's all you could remember until you wake up in this fiery hellscape. In reality, you were hit by a drunk driver and was in a coma back on Earth with family crying at your bedside, but your soul was trapped here. In the underworld of sinners that were repenting for their crimes.

You wandered the streets, looking around at the different sinners, demons, and other wayward souls. That is until you ran face first into someone, that being a tall man(?) if you could even call him that. He had a tv as a face for crying out loud. "Watch it." He said in a voice that was common in late 50's shows, his voice was sharp and boomed. Ofcourse you squeaked out an apology, but it wouldn't be the last. As you ran into him several times, even getting into arguements with him.

Over time, you did grow close. You stopped arguing with him less often and he offered to let you stay at his place. Soon his roommates, Valentino and Velvette grew to accept you and noticed how much romantic tension there was. You hung around him like a lost puppy, helping him with paperwork or his various shows he produces. This did lead to some issues though, as one day you had accidentally mixed up the scripts for one of the shows and you got into an argument. You and Vox had argued for almost 2 hours, but he finally cracked and impulsively kissed you on the lips.

That kiss had spiraled into you being his right hand, his assistant, his second half. You and him ran Voxtech with a iron fist, planning on taking over sinners and hell. He was also planning some ring options behind the scenes, asking Velvette for help on diamond size, band size, even the box color. Little did he know that the doctors in the mortal plane had other ideas.

You stood in the kitchen, messy hair from just waking up and only in one of Vox's more casual shirts and some underwear. He sat at the island, pouring you guys some cereal, you were about to take a spoonful when BAM your gone in a blink of an eye. Vox panicked, going absolutely nuts. Every tv, phone, camera, you name it was spent looking for you. He even went down to the Princess's hotel to demand an answer from Alastor.

"WHERE ARE THEY ALASTOR! I SWEAR TO GOD I'LL TURN YOU INTO VENISON BY THE TIME IM DONE-" He yelled, going berserk at the front door of the hotel. The door opened by Vaggie lunging at him with her spear, but was thankfully stopped by Charlie. "What's going on? What did Alastor do?" She asked with her signature smile. "He took them! I just know he did!" Vox screeched, pointing his finger at the clam and smiling radio demon. Every one turned their heads to look at Alastor, who looked a bit too calm for the situation. "Who?" His staticy voice came off as genuine confusion. "MY SPOUSE YOU STUPID FUCK!" Vox argued. "Who?-" Alastor was cut off by Angel, "Wait. Someone married you?" He asks, "Well, we were going to get married, but-but they just DISAPPEARED!" Vox says desperately, but not wanting to give Alastor any ammo he left. He returned to his office, giving annoyed huffs to Valentino and Velvette's questions.

Meanwhile, you had woken up to a heart moniter beeping and the warm embrace of your mom, hugging and weeping. The smell of hospital had made you more aware of the situation. Was..was that all a dream? You weren't exactly the perfect person, but having a dream about falling inlove in hell was a bit much for your human mind. Eventually, years had passed and you had lived a single life with a few pets for company, never getting over that dream until your death. Unfortunately, time in hell is different, while almost 30 years had passed since that car crash it had only been a few months for Vox. He had lashed out and never stopped searching. He spent all his time balancing finding you, fighting Alastor, and running Voxtech.

You had woken up in the same place 30 years ago, but it didn't look like that time had passed. You were shocked, it wasn't a dream all those years ago. You dashed through the streets looking for the familiar building of your long lost beloved. Soon you reached your destination, zooming through the lobby, but getting caught short by security. You caused a huge scene, cussing and yelling, begging for them to let you see Vox. Velvette alerted him to your outburst and he zapped through the wires to the lobby and froze. It was you, the person he still had the perfectbring for. The person he still made a plate for. The person he hugged a pillow at night to remember the touch of. He ran to you, shouting at the guards to let you go. He hugged you tightly, sharing a few tears as you hugged him back. You missed this, he missed this.

After being reunited he couldn't wait anymore, he eventually proposed with the ring he saved all that time. Sure he waited months, but you waited years and now you both could take over hell together.

#vox x reader #hazbin hotel #hazbin hotel vox #x reader

[birbwell]

Tell us about different monastery burning motifs! Would be interesting to hear how each of them work narratively

hi! this was mostly explored when @st-vesta and I were yelling incoherently about it. I also don't have a very good grasp on The Name of the Rose as I've only watched the show. tbh I'm really only confident of my interpretation of PotE SO WITH THAT IN MIND

[SPOILERS FOR THE NAME OF THE ROSE, THE PILLARS OF THE EARTH AND PENTIMENT]

Right from the get-go their burnings are very different in when they come into the narrative. It comes very early on in Pillars of the Earth, with Kingsbridge Cathedral burning down right near the start. It's the force that drives the plot. Pentiment's Kiersau Abbey goes up in flames in the end of the second act as a culmination of the long-standing tensions over the course of five (?) years. The Name of the Rose ends its story with the burning of its mountain monastery.

How do they happen? Till the last second, Kingsbridge's fate was kinda just strung on a line of bad luck and split-second decisions. A forest boy named Jack tags along with a mason's family, becomes refugees of a burgeoning civil war, and ends up in Kingsbridge. He gets the idea to burn down the cathedral to give the kindly mason a job, and isn't even fully sure of his decision as he lights the vault boards on fire. He’s just a child. 

And yet.

Fire is a catalyst. As much as it is a catastrophe, it also presents three groups of people all fucked by the hellscape of 12th century England with an opportunity to build something brighter. Aliena’s family and earldom taken by the Anarchy, Philip and his languishing priory, and Jack, coming from the fringes of society all working together to pull their futures out of the ashes of the cathedral… Kingsbridge and its town start thriving again. 

(Fire is very much a motif in PotE. Someone as powerless as Jack using this volatile force of nature to bring down something as grand and sacred and built-to-last as a stone church! The Church controlling fire to produce a ‘miracle’ and restore faith in the institution! Fire as Hell, the only thing that has ever scared William Hamleigh! Fire as hope, Philip treading the aftermath and watching the sun rise with Tom!! I;m very ill)

Kiersau and Tassing, on the other hand, have been fostering tensions that would eventually destroy the monastery. It is the powder keg’s inevitable explosion. Neither the village nor the abbey are willing to back down, so it culminates in a situation where one or the other caves in. Nobody has been having a Good Time for a Long Time. Especially not Claus. In his grief, he walks into the library and sets it on fire.

Fire is an answer. It is a terrible, terrible night. We are told that the Benedictines scattered to the wind. We don’t get to see the immediate aftermath, but does it matter? Magdalene explores the abbey and it is still the same derelict cathedral from years ago. She wasn’t there to witness it, but there its soot-stained carcass stands as a reminder of tragedy. Some saw it as a victory, certainly- the humble villagers triumphing over their Benedictine landowners. Things grew from it, though- Wojslav and Matilda find their new chapter of life here, Mathieu and Illuminata find new, loftier prospects outside of Tassing, and Andreas finds a way out of an unhappy life.

The mountain monastery in The Name of the Rose has a long-kept secret, and attempts to unearth it are met with death. It goes up in flames after a week of murders as a last-ditch effort by Jorge to destroy its library and bury its secret for good.

Fire is the end. No matter how grand and complex the library labyrinth was, it would have never held up against fire. William and Adso didn’t succeed. They couldn’t have saved the library and they couldn’t stop the deaths. Jorge did what he set out to do! The elusive Finis Africae is still shrouded in mystery and anyone who knew of the contents is dead! The monks disband and William comes out of it disillusioned. 

TBH, all three of them make use of monastery burnings to destroy some hidden truth or secret. The history of Tassing? Records largely in flames, and even given to distortion, since we, the player, are able to interpret that segment! The truth about the White Ship? Gone with Prior James’ bones! And Finis Africae. Fire, if anything, can hide and rewrite. 

TL;DR: fire do many thangs and pyromaniacs everywhere are right.

#pentiment #pillars of the earth #the pillars of the earth #the name of the rose #pentiment spoilers #pote spoilers #notr spoilers #birbwellspeaks #really my expertise is on PotE. ive only played through Pentiment once so i hope i can do this justice #though i also have lots of thoughts about how different Tassing and Kingsbridge are community-wise... #like. that response to the fire. and in general they are written v differently #ALSO SORRY FOR THAT SHITTY NOTR SCREENSHOT #i dont have the episode in good quality

[sardonic-the-writer]

Are you familiar with the '1 vs 1000' video Tom did with Tubbo, Ted and Schlatt?

Hear me out: during the separation bit of the video it's actually not a a few minutes of giggles and stress. It's full weeks without even knowing if the other group is alive still. Until eventually reuniting and managing to get the hell away from these 1000 people who're trying to kill the group.

Got any HCs or thoughts? 👀

- 🕷️

i actually wasn't aware of that video until this ask so i had to go and watch it gjengj

• You fucking hated the forest

• Well, not really. You just hated it becuase that's where you had been lost for the past week—battling with swarms of bugs and other hostile wildlife

• All by your lonesome I might add

• How the fuck you had ended up here was a mystery that you personally didn't give enough shits to solve at the moment

• You'd originally been dropped in this hellscape with a few others, barely able to introduce yourself before the ground had begun to tremble

• Any thoughts of an earthquake was thrown out the window as a hoard of bloodthirsty people quickly entered your feild of vision

• The four others you had been stuck with—a group of guys all around your age with varieties of different clothing choises—had promptly begun to yell and run in the opposite direction of the hundered of people running after you all

• Momma hadn't raised no idiot, so you were quick to follow

• Somewhere along the way, you had broken off from all of them, not even noticing until all of the screaming and clamoring from behind you had drifted farther and farther away until it was practically silent

• "Guys? Hey? Hello??"

• Fuck. If only you had been able to remember their names. What was that one dudes name? With the weird facial hair? Schlagg—or no, Schlatt?

• The longer you wandered around, the less their names mattered

• And that's what you did for the next five days. Wandered around, hoping to spot someone friendly. Really. That's all you did

• If you weren't so fucking thirsty, you might have just complained about how bored you were the entire time. Thank god you knew how to siphon rainwater into your mouth. Turns out that one survivalist teacher of yours in highschool was useful for something

• "Fucking god. If I ever find what asshole dumped me here, they'll wish I had killed them when I'm done with 'em—"

• "That's what I'm sayin toots."

• "Wh— Schlagg!?"

• A kick to the leg and deep scowl later, you were not only reminded that his name was, in fact, Schlatt, not Schlagg, but you had also been reunited with your previous acquaintances

• "Wow! Holy shit balls! Look Tobes, we found them! That weirdo from earlier!"

• "Gee. Thanks blondie."

• "Hi!! I'm Tubbo!! I didn't get a chance to talk to you a lot last time! Please don't call me bitchboy."

• "I—"

• "Don't ask."

• Yeah you had been right. They were all bat fucking shit crazy

• Ted, you had learned to be his name, sounded like the most mentally stable out of all of them, so you mostly stuck with him—and in turn Schlatt, who still occasionally glared at you when you mispronounced his name

• Well, you had assumed Ted to be pretty mentally sound. Until you had witnessed him trying to run away from the mob of people in a boat.

• On land.

• With Schlatt.

• Good god how were you going to survive with these people

• "Hey Tubbo, what do you think would happen if I ate this really weird looking plant?"

• "TOMMY NO—"

• Yeah you were fucked

#mcyt #mcyt x reader #mcyt x you #mcyt x y/n #schlatt #schlatt x y/n #schlatt x you #schlatt x reader #ted nivison #ted nivison x you #ted nivison x y/n #ted nivison x reader #tommyinnit #tommyinnit x you #tommyinnit x reader #tommyinnit x y/n #tubbo #tubbo x you #tubbo x reader #tubbo x y/n #x reader #request #au #fanfiction #headcanon

[userkoo]

this site is so sensitive when i mention tae and jk together. like i even saw a tiktok naming their fav pairings and for everyone it was fine but when it was taekook they had to disclaim it was (pLaToNiC) was that not implied by the rest of your list?? ppl are so scared to mention them at all but if he's with another member its fine. its annoying and ppl are so transparent

i actually don't think tumblr is a primary suspect among the list of platforms where people move weird about taekook,.. but i'm speaking as someone in a little bubble of mutuals who are normal people lol. i also have never ventured onto the hellscape that is the bts stan side of tiktok so i can't speak on that either (besides seeing screenshots of people on there calling normal behaviors from jungkook 'red flags'... oof.) most of the bullshit, in my experience, stems from twitter where, like you said, even a simple mention of them hanging out together can end up with people accusing you of being a 'shipper' or a 'diet solo.'

this is going to be rambly so i'm putting it under a read more for the sake of not clogging people's dashes, but here are some of my thoughts on fandom culture/shipping in general:

oh real quick for for transparency sake, i'll start this off by saying: 1. i don't care about the relationship status of any of the bts members. they're single to me unless they officially and publicly state otherwise without any privacy invading force involved. 2. i have no problem with fans thinking/implying bts members are queer. lgbt fans finding comfort and comradery in their favorite people isn't a bad thing. :)

now for the actual post~

the fan dynamics on twt are so different and if you even mention taehyung and jungkook in the same sentence or say that they're very obviously close friends, you might end up on some of those 'defend [insert member here]' accounts where they encourage people to block and report for the slightest of 'offenses.' and like you mentioned in your post, that's over people talking about them platonically!! or over people who simply read fic without ever insinuating they think they're actually dating.

the puritanical culture that exists in very large parts of the bts fandom (and was present in the 1d fandom as well) is so weird to witness. we can all have differing opinions on whether or not rpf is 'good' or not, but unless someone is sending fanfiction to bts personally... it is harmless. and it will always exist. you will never enter into a fan space where independent, 'non-canon' content isn't being created by fans... and why would you want to? so much of fandom culture and history is about creation (and is also super lgbt centric!!)

in my opinion, the only people who still get up in arms about shipping discourse in 2023 are those under 18 or those who have no previous fandom experience. after stanning harry styles since 2012, i have heard the 'gay rumors made them drift apart!!!' argument so many times that it is genuinely nausea inducing. (and my opinion on that is... if you are that turned off by people possibly thinking you're queer to the point where it makes you end an important friendship, you either weren't very close to begin with or you're homophobic. likely a combination of the two. gay rumors are not, and never will be, offensive. they are not something you need to protect your fave from. why is this the argument so often touted by fans? why would you WANT your favorite person's self image to be so fragile that they end friendships over rumors? and that's not even getting into the fact that skinship and performance is built into the literal DNA - lol - of kpop...)

like. maybe i'm just too old to care now but i genuinely could not give less of a fuck if people think jk and taehyung are in a relationship. i do not care. they're both beautiful people who are clearly fond of each other. do any of us know how deep that fondness runs? nope! and we never will! and that's more than okay because these are grown men with personal, private relationships that we will never be privy to... as it should be. as long as boundaries are respected, i don't care what people think to be true.

can shippers get overzealous? for sure. do the people who analyze their every move need a new hobby? most definitely. but i think it's more than obvious now that the people who go to insane lengths to invade their privacy are stalkers or people trying to dredge up dating rumors between them and women.

it gets especially transparent when you have videos and rumors online about bts members dating people they've never interacted with publicly (using 'liskook' as an example, there are youtube videos with 10million views about them. one posted ten hours ago has 52k views) but i never see them condemned with the level of vitriol i see people using when it comes to jk and taehyung. is that not weird?

idk man. there's no concise ending to this post. fandom culture just intrigues me which is why i have so much to say about all this. it's especially interesting to me how it intersects with queer culture - or directly opposes it.

[lynnaquinn]

So as I work on Rustbelt and Marked becomes the first book anyone will ever see of it, I grow more and more in love with the setting.

First off, recently because of other games, I've learned of a side of Post-Apocalypse media I never knew about, this honestly helped me develop the world into more of a unique setting. I never knew of the whole Roadside Picnic style settings.

But I digress, going back to what has happened.

So when I started arranging things, when the first book broke into three unique books, I rearranged what classes were in which Encampment Groups to have it make more sense to me. Marked went through huge changes in this in that I swapped out Dimensional and Lost to put in two of what I call "Blue" factions (reference to an in house categorizing of factions between Red, Green, and Blue, all lined up with the Terrain "Food Chain" and yes, these terms will change when final product is made.) I swapped the Rift-Scarred into a "Red" faction and then took the HUGE bite of putting the Ghostrunners as my "Blue" for book 1, making ECO the "Green."

The concept behind the world is that due to our fucking over nature, weather is so intense that we now live in what the corporations call Walled Cities. Through some "proprietary" tech that "wasn't given to them by something beyond us" the cities are shielded from the Apocalyptic storms happening outside them.

These cities are Capitalistic Hellscapes that sell different means of escapism almost like drugs; things like AR chips to remove the grime from your sight (or any other filter you choose,) splicing for cosmetics, and black bagging the homeless to "test new products on."

If the generator goes by its own failing or a storm getting in causing it, then for a brief moment a nuclear level event happens, ripping space and destroying the city.

The Rift causes the survivors to be forever changed. Some are scarred physically and mentally but gain psychic abilities, some become closer to the animal kingdom or even change themselves, and those unlucky to be connected to the AR slowly get their engrams dissolved into the digital aether.

You play the survivors of these Rift-Torn Cities within the first book.

Some rule concepts that used to be only some factions have also evolved to be an every faction thing honestly. These are things such as Leader/Unit Options and Archetypes.

Probably still need to figure more descriptive names for these hahaha.

Leader and Unit Options are a choice shared by Encampment Classes with similar themes that are a) Completely optional in your list, and b) meant to be thematic and fun. It is an option like having one of your Team be a Robot or an Intelligent Animal or what not or your Leader being a Cyborg or Hybrid or Splicer.

The Unit Option offers new equipment, the Leader Option offers new Equipment Sets for your leader, but you get to keep your leader type's ability. Both of these give stat changes to their stat line.

Originally I was only going to do one per the few that allow it, but now each faction gets 2 sets they can choose from and allows 2 Unit Options in their list instead of 1! This increased the original 2 sets to 5 now!!!

Archetypes were another "only some Classes had them" mechanic. They originally were replacing faction equipment on those Classes and offered a choice to the player that they HAD to choose one of.

Each non-leader originally had 2 equipment slots, the Archetype would take one of them presenting 3 that a player could choose from that were thematic to the class and each had 2 pieces of equipment that a unit only could have 1 of.

They work the same now, but with every faction having one, I've pressed the equipment limit from 2 to 3 to compensate so everyone can have some fun with the equipment outside of Archetype Choices.

Another thing was increasing D10 to D12 and upping the 4 basic stats on ALL models by 1. This was just to have better variance on odds.

Beyond that, swapping around Speed and Perception stats then changing Will to Grit really seems like a minor change, but honestly is one that feels important to me.

What other changes am I thinking of? As I've narrowed the books down to 4 planned, I thought of extending the 12 Classes in future books. But in the hours before typing this, I started to debate putting the upgrades just inside the books that have those classes. This would add alternative themes and options for each Class and related NPC Classes.

Just some thoughts hahaha.

#game dev #game design #game development #tabletop #miniature #wargame #lgbtqia #lynnaquinn #Rustbelt #post apocalyptic #cyberpunk #random thoughts #story

[certified-anakinfucker]

10 Characters, 10 Fandoms, 10 Tags

How to play: name 10 of your favourite characters from 10 different fandoms, then tag 10 people to do the same.

tagged by @kiwikipedia and @chiafett, i’m giving them both a gentle muah and an obligatory apology for mobile’s bullshittery

Cheerilee | My Little Pony: Friendship is Magic

Take a wild guess where I got this screen name from LMAO it has survived a loooooooooong time. I think I first took it when I was 11? 12? on a hellscape sns. Now I brought it back bc I like the vibes :) At the time I wanted to be a teacher like her (and my mom), and plus her coat color was probably my favorite color at the time. I just loved her a lot.

Christophe Giacometti | Yuri!!! on Ice

He got subjected to the “fuck you he’s mine” treatment, but really I just. Adore him. He showed up like a whore who was DEFINITELY seeing Viktor so long ago and now they’ve turned into the closest friends anyone could ask for with the most beautiful sense of “I love you but you’re going to pay for that” rivalry. He is so pretty. I kind of want to bring him back for SW but I dunno what he’ll be doing :(

[Redacted] | [Data Expunged]

I like my men pathetic and miserable and they can’t do jack nor the shit without causing a cascade failure on an unimaginably catastrophic scale and bringing about destruction to everything he’s ever loved BECAUSE he loved so hard and now everyone sees him with such a sour (bittersweet at best) taste in their mouth and he’s resigned himself to the background in so many things he used to be the proudest of his prowess in but he’s so pretty and dainty and and and and and-

Anakin Skywalker | Star Wars

Me and the scrungly blorbos ass-up in untreated trauma from abandonment issues and being thrust into high positions of power without proper support despite others insisting that we ARE being properly supported at all measures but there are people scared and jealous of us and we keep refusing to admit how deeply it effects our daily lives and relationships until it inevitably destroys what good we do see around us and we have to make the decision on whether to learn and grow from this or just shrug and keep it trucking in the trenches. Neither of us made the right choice here and that’s banger. We’re doing great wdym?

Jedediah | Night at the Museum

Can’t believe I had to split up Jedediah and Octavius for this but I just genuinely admire him. He is so cool. Maybe it’s the free-spirited gay cowboy gender.

Loki | M*rvel

Shut up he’s hot

Wheatley | Portal (2)

Don’t speak to me he’s so so so stupid

Jazz | Transformers

This is entirely Mikey’s fault and I will make sure she knows this daily. Jazz is so just like me fr

Honorable Fandom Mentions

Basically, fandoms I only dipped a toe into but not deep enough to pick just one favorite!

Hades (Game)

WHERE IS MY MOTHER NYX. WHERE IS SHE. I deeply admire anyone’s ability (namely @purgetrooperfox) in sitting through this game.

Red Dead Redemption / 2

What if I turned Micah and Dutch into mulch? What if Arthur lived an amazing life instead? This game makes me feel so many emotions what the fuck I should play it someday 🥲

Tags <3

i’m dumb and wasn’t paying much attention to who was already tagged so. @milf-maul @jekyllnahyena @spaceydragons @sithbian @friedennic @walk-ng-d-saster @kemendin @grandninjamasterren @perasperaadastrawriting @kkrazy256

#cheeri was tagged here #kiwi youre so lucky i love you /lhj #hi leoooo im borrowing u for a callout #terra i keep trying to @ your name and getting sent back to #‘omg wait kkrazy256 is TERRA??? the very terra im talking to rn?????’ #i refuse to elaborate on who the redacted is #and i refuse to elaborate on marvel loki #i absolutely will not elaborate on wheatley. i will not do it

[deflare]

I’m doing a Silly Little Thing.

Games Workshop, creators of Warhammer 40k, have an advent calendar full of chibi space marines--23 different chapters, plus a blank paint-your-own model. So every day in December, I’m going to be popping one of these spots open to pull out the marine, look at it, and give a little summary of the chapter and its lore. I’m tagging this “40k advent”, for whatever tagging purposes you need.

What’s a “space marine” and a “chapter”? Time to kick things off with a lore dump! The story of Warhammer 40k starts around 28,000 years in the future, in the 31st millennium. Humanity’s sprawling interstellar civilization fell the fuck apart, as the warp--the hellish ‘hyperspace’ used for faster-than-light travel--became impossible to navigate. Earth fell into an endless Mad Max hellscape of squabbling techno-barbarians, ravaged by nuclear fallout, environmental catastrophe, and the ravages of uncontrolled psychics.

Into this stepped the Emperor, a giant immortal super-psychic human. His armies fought hard to unite Earth in his name, and when that was done, he looked to the stars, launching a Great Crusade to unite all of humanity under one Imperium of Man, and murder every alien they see along the way.

As part of his goals, he created 20 Primarchs, his ‘sons’, superhumans almost as mighty as he was to serve as his generals. And from the genetics of his Primarchs, he created a way to uplift normal humans into legions of genetically-augmented supersoldiers--the Legiones Astartes, the Space Marines, who would be the speartip leading the vast hordes of unaugmented humans in the Crusade. ...Then a little ‘woopsie’ happened, the Primarchs all got yote across the galaxy so he couldn’t raise them himself, but he still had his Space Marines, so it was fine.

As the Emperor’s armies spread across the galaxy, he was reunited with his Primarchs one by one, and each one took leadership of their legions of sons. Two Primarchs and their legions disappeared from records; it’s a whole Thing, a big in-universe mystery, don’t worry about it. As the Crusade reached its end, the Emperor decided to fuck off back to Earth, leaving his first-found son Horus in charge as Warmaster.

Horus promptly decided to rally half his brothers to fight the other half, juice himself up with the power of dark gods, and rebel against the Imperium. It was the Horus Heresy; it was a whole thing. It ended with him mortally wounding the Emperor, just as Horus was brain-blasted from reality.

In the aftermath of the Heresy, the unconscious Emperor was sealed into a life-support device called the Golden Throne, where his main job was to act as a lighthouse for spacefarers. The new regent, Roboute Guilliman, one of the loyalist Primarchs, decided that the big problem with the Space Marines is that a legion of them was too powerful a force for any one person to lead. So he ordered them all to break up into hundreds of Chapters, self-contained armies of 1,000 supersoldiers. Then over the next few hundred years, the surviving loyalist Primarchs fucked off, went into stasis, or died.

We pick up the story again 10,000 years later, which is just an absurd length of time. The Imperium still lives, but it’s a rotting carcass of an empire that stumbles along through sheer inertia. It fights thousands of wars every day across the galaxy, losing ground to endless hordes of aliens, mutants, rebels, and followers of the dark gods (including the remnants of those traitor legions, who’re still running around stirring shit up). The government has become a fascist theocracy dedicated to the worship of the mostly-dead Emperor as a god, against his explicit wishes. Trillions of people live in squalor, their lives dedicated to building or using weapons in the Imperium’s endless wars, until they die and are turned into corpse-starch to feed the next generation of the oppressed. Recently, the galaxy cracked in half, and things got even more shit. Hundreds of new chapters of Space Marines have been raised to try to defend the Imperium; some have been destroyed, some other have turned traitor, but most still fight in the Emperor’s name.

The one ray of hope: Guilliman has returned to take leadership of the Imperium, despairing at the horrific state of it. He now leads a new crusade to reunite the Imperium, and to slowly drag it into a slightly less miserable position. He’s aided by a new kind of Space Marine, the Primaris, who’re just a little bit better than the classic model made by the Emperor. Can he and his armies pull the Imperium back from the brink and create the glorious empire his father dreamed of?

No he can’t, because everything sucks and the Imperium deserves to fall. But we can enjoy watching everything fall apart. And enjoy looking at/painting some Grimdark Little Guys in the meantime.

Links to the Days: 1 2 3 4 5 6 7 8 9 10 11 12 13 14 15 16 17 18 19 20 21 22 23 24 25

#warhammer 40k #space marines #advent calendar #text heavy #lore dump #40k advent

[kinsey3furry300]

My history of banned, and somehow unbanned, books.

In the spirit of Pride and Juneteenth, when it seem like American school’s are desperately trying to ban any and every book that even slightly examines America’s historical treatment of LGBTQ+ people and people of colour, can we take a moment to appreciate that my state run secondary school (11-16, I don’t know what the US equivalent of that would be, Junior High?) banned all Pokémon related media for “encouraging gambling and animal cruelty”, but kept It by Steven King on the shelves for years because it was the late 90’s/early 00′s, Goosebumps was popular, and the headmaster saw the cover and thought it was “Just another scary clown book for kids.” (UK cover below).

In addition to that one scene that makes everyone question how It ever got published, It incudes such gems as:

·       A horrifically detailed description of a homophobic murder that takes the time to criticize Maine’s (at the time legal) “Gay panic” defence, intentionally makes the homophobes look like idiots by being Judas Priest Fans and not knowing the lead singer is gay, and sets the scene for the whole book by showing that multiple people can see the attack happening and don’t intervene because they think it’s none of their business, and this is right at the start of the book.

·       Includes a deconstruction of the “Only the deep south was racist” myth by depicting the horrific organised racism of backwoods New-England and shows how inept and dangerous these yahoos are, and how law enforcement and the federal government and US armed forces turned a blind eye to it

·       Includes an evil logging baron torturing and murdering three people for daring to try and form a trade union and then has the fourth surviving union activist reap bloody revenge by murdering the Bosses enforcers with a lumberjack axe, in full public view, while no one lifts a finger to help.

·       Incudes multiple scenes of domestic violence, bullying and corruption, and criticises how people will be fully aware of it happening and just refuse to get involved.

·       Takes time in pretty much every chapter to show how the white-picket-fence, small-town post-war America conservatives seemingly want to return to was always a nightmarish hellscape of prejudice, unacknowledged and unpunished violence, poverty, and sexual repression, and that even Regan’s 80’s seemed like a liberal paradise by comparison to that hellish pressure-cooker of hidden panic bubbling away just beneath the surface.

So don’t ban books from schools: do what my headmaster did back in the day and unwittingly traumatise your students for life but give them a good early understanding of systematic prejudice by literally judging a book by it’s cover, and letting 11 year old me read a book entirely about 11 year olds stumbling across a horror they should not and getting fucked up for life by it. Hell, by this logic we just need to re-design the cover of Maus to look more Disneyesque, Beloved to look more like Gone with the Wind, Left Hand of Darkness to look like a typical YA dystopian novel, and to Kill a Mockingbird to have a bright, cheery cover, and try to sneak them back in to school libraries under slightly different names

#it #Steven King #steven king's it #Beloved #Maus #left hand of darkness #to kill a mockingbird #Banned books #Every kid should read at least one book that will fuck them up for life #Mine were It Watership Down and Beloved #And animorphs can't forget animporphs

[psalmsofpsychosis]

it's soooo fun when i constantly feel like i'm having fewer and fewer conversations and more and more inivisible arguments, like, an almost never-ceasing sense of difference between what i value and hold dear and find important vs what the people around me find valuable and important, so i feel like i'm eternally in a court case where i have to actively defend what is important to me and make cases for it just to have it exist, i can't move past the defense stage and actually grow into what i love and peacefully exist in it and see it grow; i'm forever stuck at the mind-numbingly boring stage of "actually, what i stand for is very important and necessary. Actually, yes, it's a fundamental human need; not that anything has to be fundamental in order to be respected and be accomodated. Actually, being hopeful and playful and having a sense of wonder and awe is something to value and celebrate, i dont need you to twist it into "naivety" just because you have no value for it. Actually, yes, curiosity and an open mind and receptiveness and responsiveness is a necessity, not a luxury you get to eliminate whenever the fuck you want. Actually, it's a very good and lovely and beautiful thing that i'm focused and private and give my undivided attention to one person at a time, and no, i dont need to "be fixed" and mingle with all you 7600 "friends" who you dont even know the first name of. Actually, creativity and variety and nuance and complexity are foundational necessities for us to thrive; this is non-negotiable and i will not stand for your lukewarm homogenised hellscapes. Yes, we need deep and intelligent and thorough understanding of our world beyond surface level aesthetics and 'what happened where', beyond engaging only with what we see and not what they mean."

You dont get to fucking grow when you're forever stuck at the very baseline of "actually, me and my needs are allowed to exist; stop devaluing and constantly trying to erase me out of existence." A seed in soil only grows when it's welcomed and fed by the environment it's trying to grow in; and yeah i know of the "grow where you're planted anyway" narrative, but it was never about "grow where you wake up everyday and have to fight back against 99 things actively trying to fuck you over, sleep, rinse and repeat."

#i'm so fucking tired like #i'd like to exist beside one (1) person who actually shares my values and is not an active cog in my fucking wheels #the way i have to scream at people to be kind and considerate and mindful and warm; show some fucking affection #and i'm constantly told that ''i need to cool it;'' no i dont and i wont #YOU need to do better. i'm tired of always being the one expected to loosen up on my values #i used to get so fucking angry when i did the most basic good deeds and people would turn to me and tell me with a weird forcee smile #that i'm ''so special'' #FUCK YOU i'm not special; i'm exceptional and i'm good and i'm competent and i'm worthy and my existence is meaningful #but you wouldn't know it because you dont hold a value for what i find important #so at best i get a lopsided performative ''you're so special'' that's barely hiding your attempt to single me out #truth is; i'm not special and i'm not alone. there are a considerable number of people who see worth in what i uphold and i'll find them #i'm so fucking tired of getting shallow compliments like ''you're so special'' #go fuck yourself i'm GOOD AT WHAT I DO

[cryptidfoxes]

pokemon ask game ! for glenn and maggie : wailord, chatot, ditto, luvdisc!!

@selfshipstorm I need you to understand how delighted I am both this ask and the last you sent were for my TWD loves >w<

-Me: 5'3 or 5'4 (I can never remember which exactly 😅)

•Wailord - Who’s taller, you or your F/O? What’s the height difference?

-Glenn: 5'9

-Maggie: 5'7

I'm the shortest of our trio and these two-mainly Glenn when he wants to be a little shit-like to hold it over my head...No pun intended. 😂

https://m.youtube.com/watch?v=N7p2UeB_QRM

•Chatot - Give me a song that sums up your self ship!

I'm a sap and that's all that needs to be said; next slide. 😂💜

So, we're gonna ignore the source media takes place in a Zombie Wasteland for a moment cause the first thing that comes to mind to distinguish us is texing/messaging styles.

•Ditto - If someone tried to impersonate you or your F/O, how would you distinguish the two?

-Me: Idk what it is, but I do not like to shorthand stuff unless I'm in a major hurry; I'd rather write "one" over "1" or "I don't know" over "idk." Stuff like that. Also, as you may be able to gather through my posts, I use a lot of emojis...Like. A lot. So any text these two may recieve from "me" that is full of shorthand and/or not dotted with a thousand emojis may tip them off.

-Glenn: OPPOSITE OF ME. High energy and he's usually pretty busy, especially with his job-delivery boy always going and going. So if he sends anything that can be shortened that isn't, me and Maggie are immediately asking "...Is that him?"

-Maggie: Her's is actually...Simple and sweet? She's not the biggest on PDA, but behind closed doors-and in private chats-she is super affectionate...And big on pet names. ("Love," "Darling," "Honey," ect.) SO. Seeing even one text from her that doesn't call at least one of us by some sweet nickname has me and Glenn basically turning into the Caveman Spongebob meme and "Who are you and what have you done with our girlfriend-"

(I put this one last cause I knew it was gonna be the longest answer 😅)

•Luvdisc - Who fell in love with whom first?

The short answer is I fell for Maggie first and then Glenn.

Glenn fell for her first and then both of them kinda realized "We like Fox." at the same time.

THE LONG ANSWER?

I arrived at the farm a few days before Glenn and the Atlanta crew and was imediately fucking smitten with the eldest Greene daughter. However, not gonna lie, I did some heavy assumptions and sterotyping and just kinda assumed "Yeah. Downhome southern girl. Probably not interested in another girl and family probably wouldn't care much for it either." So, I bite my tongue, content to have a tenative new friend. (Quick spoiler: At the end of all this, Beth is super supportive and Hershel is the defination of "Little confused but he's got the spirit.")

In enters the Atlanta survivors; me and Glenn befriend each other real damn fast. What are the chances of meeting a fellow nerd your age out in the wild in the current hellscape? And if I start to develop a crush...Well, that's my business. 😂 But, when I notice Glenn starting to take an intrest in Maggie, I kinda shy away a little from making a move. When they actually start messing around with each other and developing their relationship, I completely step back.

A little bit down the line, after the big reveal of what's in the barn and after they've started to stablize their relationship, unknown to my oblivious ass these two have a discussion about boundaries and all that important couple stuff, and the topic of "Hey...We both have feelings for our mutal friend." somehow comes up.

Meanwhile. I'm over here off to the side just. "👉🏻👈🏻 They're both really cute and cool, but they're my friends and I don't wanna fuck up our friendship and they seem to already be together and I don't wanna throw a wrench in that and *insert a long ass stream of anxious rambling here.*"

There's a fic-length explanation to what happens next that I should really write one day, but the tl;dr is they basically approach me when I look like like I'm feeling pretty calm and just "So...How do you feel about a polycule?"

#self ship #ask game #thank you for the ask!! #ship: zombie love song #REAL TALK #ONE OF MY FAVE SHIPS TO GUSH ABOUT >u<

[youreyeslookliketheocean]

youreyeslookliketheocean’s DSMP Fic Recs!!

Figured it was about time for one of these... :)

Mostly SBI-centric because they’re my favorite dynamic. I’ll probably add to this list as time goes on, and I also want to go back through my ao3 history and find some lesser-known fics I really enjoyed to rec them all. But for now...

* oneshot  ** unfinished work

** the lights go out (my heart goes still) by curseworm

With his old home unwelcoming and his new one gone, Tommy is alone. After hours of staggering through the freezing snow, he finds a cabin.

Technoblade’s cabin.

He hides himself away in the deepest corner he can find, taking only what he needs to survive, wasting away in the cold and the dark. He’s petrified at the thought of being found out, terrified of what he thinks Techno would do to him.

When Techno finds his injured teenage brother huddled in a filthy little cave beneath his basement, the rage he feels is immeasurable. The voices demand blood, and blood he will give them. Dream won’t be getting away with this one.

(On the other side of the world, in a country that floats on a man-made lake, Philza gets himself in a bit of a pickle.) 

** The hearth down under by Crystalquill

A tiny change gives Tommy the courage to flee to the Nether instead of the cold tundra, finding an unlikely ally in the midst of a fiery hellscape.

But tiny changes can alter the course of history. The SMP will never be the same.

(Lots of cool Nether worldbuilding in this one!!)

to be a wanderer, wandering by hydrangeasheart

Tommy's feet drag in the snow.

It's so, so cold. He's so cold. His toes are freezing. His exposed shins feel like they’ve been cut open-- even the one that’s bandaged. His wings have gone numb, which is almost, almost good, because now he can’t feel the shifting, broken bones inside of the left one, just under feathers and muscle.

He doesn’t know why he’s still walking.

-

Or, Tommy leaves the exploded ruins of Logstedshire behind, and walks until he finds somewhere safe.

And things keep going from there.

(A canon-divergent AU, splitting off somewhere around when Tommy started hiding out below Techno's house.)

that’s, like, a hundred miles by No_one_you_know (and then “as long as i’m here”, and “he’s my brother, i just raise him”)

Dream would kill him. Dream was going to kill him- he was going to- no, he wouldn’t. Dream was his friend- friends don’t hit each other- Dream was supposed to take care of him- Dream /was/ taking care of him.

It hurt to breathe. It hurt to think. He couldn’t clear his thoughts as he stumbled to the family computer, pulling up a tab on google and frantically typing the name into the search bar.

The words Technoblade Watson stared back at him, the little black bar at the end of the letters blinking slowly, mocking him.

Why, of all people, did it have to be Technoblade?

in short: the one where dream sucks as a parental figure, tommy runs away, and visits his least favorite family member technoblade.

passerine by thcscus(blujamas)

Do I really need to put the summary here? Pretty much everyone knows this fic. Also, though, if you enjoy this one you should totally read thcscus’ connected fic, “shrike”!! It’s only at 2 chapters right now but it’s already really good and has this dark, foresty aesthetic I love...

not with a bang but with a whimper by dip_dyed_ghost

He knows Tubbo doesn’t care about him anymore. He knows that. He’s been shown that. But it doesn’t stop Tommy from caring about him. He brushes the pads of his fingers over the compass’s glass and wonders how he’s doing, if he’s tired of it all yet, if he needs help. He watches the way it points strongly in the direction over the ocean. He hopes he’s alright.

Even after everything, he hopes he’s alright.

During his exile, Tommy finds a drugged and hurt Tubbo on his doorstep. He can’t not help him.  

(This one has a neat take on potions, in my opinion. Also it’s only 4 chapters so it’s a quick read!)

take this compass, follow it home by lightning_anon

Tommy's a fuck up, he can't pay attention, and never sits still. He taps his hands, pushes people away, and has never had a best friend. He's a screwed up, forgotten kid lost in the foster system. He's also just been placed with a new family. Tommy knows how this goes, he never ends up staying long. After all, no one wants a fuck up like him.

Why would this house be any different?

Or: the obligatory sleepy bois foster fic, but with a focus on the neurodivergent kids that inevitably get lost in the system.

(Genuinely want to see more books like this in original fiction. It’s part of what inspired my newest og wip, “To Build a Home.” So sweet and I feel like I had my eyes opened to some neurodivergent tendencies I never knew existed. I read this in a day and can’t rec it enough.)

bloodlines by youreyeslookliketheocean

Tommy’s an orphan on the run from his previous guardian. Philza’s a king who prides himself on keeping his kingdom in an era of peace. Wilbur’s the crown prince, and Techno’s right beside him as his adopted brother. When Phil’s kingdom of Pogtopia is threatened by the bloodvines—a strange, brainwashing plant infecting many of the surrounding kingdoms—the four must work together to keep the kingdom, and their family, safe. --- A royal au sbi fic... + the bloodvines, for spice.

(Yes I’m self-promoting. But, in my defense, I’m very proud of it. If you checked it out it would mean the world to me :’))

Heat Waves by tbhyourelame

Dream has always held a gentle admiration for George, but when their nuanced friendship trickles into his sleeping mind, he awakens to a new world of conflicting emotions and longing. Lost in the midst of a heat wave, he continuously listens to a song that works itself in to the very core of his heartache. Floridian nights, unsent messages, spiraling infatuation, and terrible, terrible weather.

Another fic I think pretty much everyone knows about. Listen, listen... I was once an idiot who said “Oh no, I’ll never read Heat Waves. It’s irl, not characters, and it’s probably cringe”... No. I was so wrong. This fic is wonderfully written, with a pretty quick moving plot and great characterizations. You do need an ao3 account to access it, though. Just to let you know. (Also read “Helium”, unfinished and hasn’t updated in awhile, but it’s the continuation). 

Guitar Strings and Keyrings are What it Takes to Build a Home by Anonymous

Techno was adopted by Phil when he was 12 years old.

He'd been enjoying his morning before Phil came to him asking if he would mind them taking in another kid. Against his better judgement, Techno agrees and ends up with two new foster brothers who he was determined to not get attached to, no matter what.

Tommyinnit’s unbeatable method of avoiding sudden death by eneliii

“I uh,” Tommy starts, not knowing how to break this to the hero lightly. He hates to be the bearer of bad news. “I think your powers are broken? It’s not a bad thing of course, but like, I swear you tried to mind control me and it like, totally failed. Which is fine, honestly, don’t feel insecure. Everyone’s power stop working sometimes… I think.”

Sheesh, this is very awkward. Why is no one else talking? Why is Philza looking at him like he grew three heads? Why is the Blade staring at him so intensely? Why is Willow still frozen?

“Did I, did I hit a nerve? Yikes,” Tommy hisses, “Well um,” He steps back, bracing his legs and bending his knees, “This was like super fun, but I’m - I’mma head out.”

or,

in which Tommy manages to annoy the hell out of Phil, Techno and Wilbur by being both impossible to catch and irritatingly endearing.

or or,

a crack fic where Tommy is a vigilante and Phil, Techno and Wilbur are the heroes hunting him down.

(Feel like I am obligated to say how incredibly funny this fic is. Seriously. I have a distinct memory of sitting on my neighborhood park’s swing, giggling hysterically, while reading this. Well...until the end... but we won’t get into that...)

** bones in the ocean by bunflower

“Your reputation precedes you, y’know.”

“Does it, now?” Philza watches him coyly from where he’s now leaning against the wall, arms folded around his chains and gaze half-lidded, his lips curled in an arrogant, cat-like smirk.

“The Angel of Death, the ferryman of the Styx, the terror of the western seas. One of the most feared captains ever to sail, and yet, I have to wonder… how did a man like you end up all on his own? We searched the area where you were found—not another soul in sight. So,” He fixes him with a long look, allowing the silence to hover like a dark cloud, the words rolling off of his tongue with all the venom and smugness he can muster, “—tell me, Philza. Where is your crew?”

OR: Technoblade is a naval captain, and Phil his unwilling prisoner. Somehow, they manage to come out of it as friends in the end.

(Is this fic considered popular like passerine/Heat Waves now? Cause I feel like it’s reputation precedes itself, at this point... Pirate au.)

****

Okay! That’s it for now. Like I said, though, I want to add to this over time and also dig back for some older things I’ve read. Also, if you have any recs feel free to send them in! I’m about to go back to school and therefore might not have time for reading fun stuff, but whenever I get the chance I’d love to check them out!!!

Happy Reading!!

#dream smp #dream smp fanfiction #dream smp fanfic #dsmp #dream smp fic rec #dsmp fic rec #fic recs #the lights go out my heart goes still #the hearth down under #to be a wanderer wandering #that's like a hundred miles #passerine #shrike #not with a bang but with a whimper #take this compass follow it home #bloodlines #heat waves #guitar strings and keyrings are what it takes to build a home #tommyinnit's unbeatable method of avoiding sudden death #tumoasd #bones in the ocean #sbi fic rec #sleepy boys inc #sleepy boys fanfic #dream team fanfic #dream team #ao3 #fanfiction

[redorich]

A favorite trope of mine has always been- getting to see another person’s past. Is it some kind of judgment thing by a higher power? Something like Freeze Day from SCTFOE? Person trapped in a nightmare and their nightmare is being projected? Who knows. All that’s important is after months of healing, some of the Hermits get to see exactly what Tommy went through. It shows short clips of him before being happy, the rise and fall of Manburg, Wilbur going insane, the festival, the withers, all of it. Just short clips of these things though. The last clip of the SMP is just Dream’s mask outlined by his green hood saying, “you’ll stay here alone with just me until you learn to be quite and respectful and not fight those who are in power over you. Even if you have to stay out here *forever*.”

This turned into a whole drabble smh xD

((btw @give-grian-rights helped me so thank you))

-------

The remaining hermits aren’t sure what happened. They have no way of knowing. There was a witch involved, Cub thinks, but what their fallen friends must have done to piss her off to the point of getting cursed is beyond their ken. Among those laid out are Cleo, Grian, Xisuma, Zedaph, and Tommy.

Scar and Cub work their Vex magic together to figure out that their friends are trapped in their worst memories. (Etho calls it a Demonic Hell Viewing Illusion, and False smacks him upside the head for the Naruto reference.) Holding hands with a victim pulls you in, but that’s what they’re counting on. Joe’s already wading through Cleo’s nightmare before anyone gets the chance to ask, and Impulse and Tango aren’t far behind doing the same for Zedaph. However, it doesn’t work for Grian, Xisuma, and Tommy; they were found already holding hands. They must have figured something out about the curse before they succumbed to it. All the hermits can do for them, for the time being, is hope.

Tommy, Grian, and Xisuma wake to the smell of sulphur and smoke. The ground is orange and littered with bullets. Grian grabs Tommy’s hand, and Xisuma grabs a discarded rifle. Tommy points his finger up at the top of a mound of scrap metal and dead bodies. There’s a nether portal, except the obsidian is whiter than quartz. That's where they have to go to get out of here.

All around them, demons lurch and shriek and hiss and all sorts of unholy behavior, bodily flinging themselves at the trio as though they know none of them can take the men on their own, and that just by dogpiling them all one of them will get lucky. Xisuma instantly snaps into a professional mode, the way he sometimes does when he's killing zombies but they keep social spawning. He takes up the lead with machine gun fire and grenades, carving a path through the crowd. Grian takes up the rear with a handgun. Neither Xisuma nor Tommy ask why Grian is so comfortable with a gun. They've got more pressing issues.

An imp gets lucky. It's just enough to crack the visor of Xisuma's helmet, and the imp instantly gets mowed down.

"I can't see," Xisuma rasps through gritted teeth.

"Then take the helmet off," Tommy says, cleaving through an enemy with a sharp piece of scrap metal. Grian breathes in sharply. As far as Grian's aware, Xisuma always wears his helmet.

Xisuma goes quiet for a second. "I suppose you've got a point."

The helmet gets dropped to the ground and demon limbs shuffle it away. They don't have time to look at Xisuma's wild brown hair, his purple eyes, the burn scars on his jaw.

They make it to the portal all in one piece. Xisuma takes one last wistful look at the Martian hellscape, then takes his friends' hands. They step through the portal together.

----

They step out of the portal into the foyer of a high school. Grian's eyes shutter.

"We'll be headed toward the roof, I believe," he says, staring dully through the spectre of a broken, bloody man holding a rope.

Tommy latches onto Grian's clammy hand to ground him as the three ascend stairs and traverse the dark, winding hallways. The ghost follows them. It isn't like Ghostbur-- it's, well, not vengeful, but it's not kind. The man named Gareth keens about Grian's sins, about a boy named Taurtis who Gareth hates, about mafia and yakuza, about his poor wife Jane.

On the last set of stairs, Gareth makes a wailing remark that causes Grian to bodily flinch. Tommy doesn't even know what the ghost said (he wasn't listening).

"Fuck off," Tommy says, "you're the shittest ghost I've ever met. Even my brother could..."

He trails off. This is not the way to fix things for Grian. On a hunch, he reaches into his pocket. Of course the object he's looking for is in there; it's his brother's coat.

He holds the object out to the ghost. "Have some blue."

Gareth warily takes it, dropping his rope. It floods periwinkle, then cyan, then dark royal blue. A weight seems lifted from the ghost's shoulders as he clutches the blue, mutters something about Jane, and leaves.

Tommy takes Grian's hand, then Xisuma's, and they go through the door to the school's rooftop together. They halt as one. The portal is there. Standing between them is a boy maybe Tommy's age, with a corpse at his feet.

"Sam," Grian whispers. "Taurtis."

The standing boy smiles, eyes obscured by a purple mask with a rectangular symbol on it, and flexes bloody wings. The corpse on the ground has blood all over its back, where wings once were, and broken headphones around his neck.

"Man, Grian, you really held out on me," Sam says. "This Watcher power really is something else--"

Sam topples over backward. His body hits the ground in front of the portal. Xisuma lowers his gun.

"He looked like bad news," Xisuma says.

Grian grimaces. "He was. Come on, let's go."

They once again step into the portal.

----

“Do you want to be a hero, Tommy?” Technoblade roars, “Then die like one!”

Their paltry little group of three gets no chance to take in their surroundings, to see what’s going on and where they need to go. All they can process is the legendary PvP champion, acolyte of the Blood God, Technoblade, unleashing Withers upon what once might have been a town.

Tommy yanks them into cover. “I don’t know where the portal is,” he hisses.

Grian squeezes his shoulder. “We’ll find it.”

Explosions rain hellfire down upon them from all angles-- not just the Withers, but TNT buried in the ground. They’re so close, they can see the man who set it off. And he must have, because he’s yelling about it, yelling about his L’Manberg and his unfinished symphony and begging his father to kill him. He’s wearing Tommy’s coat--

Bile rises in the back of Grian’s throat. Tommy wears his brother’s coat.

Tommy’s eyes are glued to the gleaming diamond sword that Wilbur gives to his father. He watches his brother die all over again, and he knows where he must go. He turns his back on his broken family and breathes.

“We need to go to the Nether,” he says. They nod.

The black portal is across the battlefield. They come across corpses more than once on their way, but ignore them. They can’t afford not to.

In the Nether, there is a rickety, dangerous pathway with no rails, made of cobblestone and obsidian and oak logs. Manic-depressive ravings on signs proclaim the path as the road to Logstedshire. Piglins try to knock them off to no avail, and ghasts blow up the bridge behind them as they run. On the other side of the Logstedshire portal is... actually not a hellscape, as Grian and Xisuma have come to expect, but a little village encampment. Nothing is blown up, nothing is amiss, except Tommy himself. And, of course, the figure they spot after they catch Tommy staring at it.

It’s Dream. The up-and-coming famous speedrunner who Grian faintly recalls killing once in MCC, which was apparently a big deal. The man approaches, and Grian realizes where he recognizes the mask from. It’s the same one that Tommy wears.

“Tommy,” Dream says conversationally, “items in the pit.”

Tommy’s hand wavers, reaches up to unclasp his chestplate, but Xisuma’s hand on his shoulder stops him.

“No,” Tommy says.

“No?” Dream parrots incredulously. “You know the rules. It’s for your own good. Armor in the pit. Tools in the pit. Friends in the pit.”

They all gasp, though for different reasons. Tommy’s eyes narrow. “Friends in the pit? You’ve never said that one before.”

Dream’s head twitches. “Friends in the pit. Friends. In the pit.”

The man’s voice is deeper than Tommy remembers. Something seems to resolve within Dream’s behavior, yet he keeps twitching. “You’re in exile, Tommy, you don’t need. Friends. I’m all you need. You were doing so good. I thought you learned to behave. I’m all you need. You don’t need friends.”

What happened to the eloquent poison that used to drip from Dream’s tongue like honey? He sounds like a broken record. All at once, Tommy staggers under the weight of the realization that this isn’t Dream. Somewhere underneath that horrible man that abused him is the real Dream, trapped in his own body and watching the dreamon that possessed him hurt his friends.

Xisuma’s gun makes an appearance again, but Tommy holds up a hand in a silent request for the admin to hold his fire. Tommy grabs Dream by the shoulders, removes Dream’s mask and then his own so that he can look the man in the eyes. “I know you’re in there, Dream. When I get out of this nightmare, I’ll save you. I swear it on my discs.”

Dream’s face twitches erratically. The movement spreads to his whole head, neck jerking. He raises straight up into the air, higher and higher, then explodes into a shower of items and no body. A white portal shimmers into existence.

“What the hell was that?!” Grian demands.

Tommy grins, taking the man’s hand and leading him to the portal. “I’ve got a friend to save.”

Grian snarls. “Tommy, he abused you. He’s not your friend.”

“That wasn’t Dream. It was a--”

“Dreamon,” Xisuma breathes.

Tommy nods. They walk through the portal together, and when they wake, holding each other close, they know they’ve got a mission. They can do it.

#mcyt #hc x dsmp #yandere high school #yhs #doom #cubfan135 #zombiecleo #grian #xisumavoid #zedaph #tommyinnit #hermit!tommy au #hermit!tommyinnit #goodtimeswithscar #ethoslab #joe hills #impulsesv #tango tek #technoblade #wilbur soot #philza #ph1lza #dreamwastaken #me.txt

[pyroclastic727]

Owl House said fuck capitalism

So this episode was interesting. Lilith pretty much killed her sister. Why the fuck would she do that?

Even more interesting: why is Belos like that? How did Hooty put his head through one of those guards? Who the fuck is the Titan, and why does everyone like him? And how are these all tied together?

This episode was a metaphor for capitalism

...and another delicious step towards radicalizing the youth into dismantling this fucked-up neo-feudal system.

We’ll start with Belos. 

Emperor Belos is a weird name, don’t you think? We all thought it was spelled “Bellows,” but it wasn’t. In fact, it’s five letters, starts with Be, ends with os, and describes a megalomaniac emperor that restricts people’s freedom in order to accumulate wealth for himself.

Sound familiar?

Emperor Bezos Belos created capitalism. He saw the beauty of magic and decided to make himself the most powerful.

Belos created a system that destroys the masses and boosts his power.

 I’m dipping into fan theory a little, because the fan theory fits. We know that people get branded with coven magic that makes it so they can only specialize in one area. We know that Belos is the most powerful witch in the Boiling Isles. We know that the excess magic, magic created by restrictions, has to go somewhere.

It’s the same system that many viewers see all the time. A job takes up all your day and tires you for the night, so you can only do one skill for the rest of your life. Jeff Bezos is the most powerful man in the United States. Excess money, money taken by restrictions, has to go somewhere.

The magic goes to Belos, like how the money goes to Bezos. Belos created capitalism, and he won it.

The guards aren’t real. 

Look, we’ve never seen their faces. They’re all the same. Why would you work so hard to get to the top, just to become a nameless, faceless killing machine?

Oh, also Hooty stuck his face through one. There is nothing under the armor.

Why? Well, it’s the same reason you see all those celebrities going around flaunting their wealth and bragging about how hard they worked. Like all those songs about how they grind every day and work harder than everyone else while you’re out clubbing, and that makes them dope. And then you take a closer look at them and see that they had a small loan of a million dollars fueling them, or an entire talent agency behind them, or their dad was a famous country star in the 80′s. 

They’re fake. They’re hollow. They��re a ploy created by the capitalist emperor to try to delude you into working harder. 

Let me put this into perspective. I guarantee that every single one of you has heard stuff like this: “Hard work makes you successful.” “I put in the work, and that’s why I’m successful.” “If you work hard enough, then you can be as successful as Mark Zuckerberg.” 

And unless you’re a robot or really lucky, I’m sure all of you have failed at this. Maybe they told you that hard work would make you good at math, so you spent 22 hours a week working on calculus, only to pass it by 3 percentage points and have it destroy your perfect 4.0 GPA. Maybe they told you that if you talked to people enough, then you would make friends, so you spent a lot of time talking to people, only to end up lonely and friendless. Maybe they told you that if you did well in school, you would get a good job, so you spent all your time working hard to be a good student, and then ended up in a soulless, dead-end job.

The guards are there to delude you. Look, who really gains from you being productive? The answer is the ruling class, the CEOs, the government, the bourgeoisie. It has always been that. All you get from working is a paycheck that lets you survive. They get a paycheck that lets them get rich. Just like Belos gets the magic and productivity of the specialized coven witches.

The guards are there to trick you. The truth is that nobody can join the Emperor’s Coven. It’s just there to make you think that hard work will make you successful. Then you spend your entire life working hard, trying to prove to the person in charge that you’re worthwhile. You give your whole life to the Coven, and they give you nothing. 

Magic is supposed to be something you pursue for fun. Being skilled at things, being good at something beautiful...that’s supposed to be something you do because you want to. But they took that and made it into a source of productivity. It doesn’t matter if you make good content. All people fucking care about is if you upload the day of premiere, if you make a lot of content quickly, if you maintain a million different conversations with strangers who expect you to be the most interesting person in the room. They don’t care how it hurts you. They don’t care how you crack from the stress. How you cry when you think no one can see you, and then you check your phone and someone can see you, someone did see you, and you have to put on your face and be the charming, magnetic person they want you to be. (oh by the way that’s why I wasn’t online much last week)

And it ruins it. Suddenly you can’t watch The Owl House without being stressed. You can’t make any content. You can’t make spells as powerfully as you want to. Your passion is replaced by perfectionism and insecurity, a voice telling you to keep being the best at what you do, or else they’ll forget you and let you die.

There’s also the Titan. 

So nobody has mentioned him before, because in addition to the Boiling Isles being a hellscape full of witchcraft and queerness, it’s also full of atheists. 

But suddenly we have people saying all this shit about him? Shit like, he gave witches the gift of magic, and then they learned to use it in a civilized manner, since being uncivilized was disrespectful?

I mean, first off, that’s fucking wrong. The island gives people magic. The island, which just so happened to be shaped like a titan-sized human. But the island/titan gives everyone all types of magic. Hell, even Luz gets to use magic, and she’s human. 

It sounds really fucking familiar. (tw for discussion of homophobia and colonialism and misogyny). It sounds like when the news is on and they show some Tr*mp supporter talking about how fetuses have more rights than people and it is their holy duty to take away a woman’s control over her body and force her through unbearable pain and into an 18-year commitment she didn’t want to make. It sounds like all the times people tried to say homosexuality should be illegal, citing a single line in a book written two thousand years ago and heavily edited by a European king. It sounds like all the times people said God wanted them to conquer, to own the entire earth, to force the other races into pain to support them.

This is that bullshit thing people do where they commit awful sins and justify it by citing the will of God. 

Or, it’s the Coven using religion as an excuse for evil.

Look, the Emperor’s Coven is clearly colonizer-coded. Saying that people’s original form of magic was wild (and showing a picture with the same joyous, rowdy energy of an 18th or 19th -century Black or indigenous party), and that it was God’s will for them to be “civilized?” Sounds like that thing that powerful white people did where they went and murdered people and forced them into their twisted capitalist system. God, gold, and glory, is what they said, because history books just love to omit the gore.

Lilith is passing the abuse cycle along. 

You know, like a good little colonizer. God I fucking hate her. She’s a MILF, in the sense that she’s a Mother I’d Like to Fling off a cliff. 

Ah, enough screaming about how much I want to drown Lilith in a tub of Hooty’s mucus. Let’s go into why I want to do that, and how she took the evils of capitalism and just...adopted those.

So, Lilith is sick and twisted for what she did to her sister. But, uhh, that’s the point. You see, there are so many other people out there like Lilith who would do the exact same thing, if given the chance. These are the people who do mean things when the teacher isn’t looking, and then act nice and try to frame you. These are the people who will hate you if you’re better than them. These are people who would do anything to bring you down, if you dare outperform them.

It’s greed, my friends. The mental illness that capitalism blesses us all with.

Lilith herself said it: she dedicated her entire life to the Coven. What she wanted was to be the best. And she almost was...except for her own sister. Someone who lived with her, annoyed her at home, bested her at school. Someone she could never beat, no matter how hard she worked. And her sister was younger than her, too! How insulting was that? Lilith wanted to be the best, and someone in her exact situation did better than her.

Lilith was insecure. And it consumed her.

But why? Why does insecurity consume her? I mean, no one can be motivated by insecurity forever. Well, not unless someone conditions it into you.

The lovely thing about the capitalist system is the morals it teaches you. Things like: “You’re only useful if you’re the best.” “Being school smart makes you smart, while being social smart or sports smart or creative smart or fandom smart is worthless.” “Your worth can be quantified by numbers and is based off arbitrary measures like your income or your grades.” Things that can and will drive us crazy if we let ourselves believe them.

And it did drive Lilith crazy. She got so twisted by a society that said being good at magic is her only worth. Look, Lilith used to be good at things, probably. She was good at sports. At times, she slips up and does an okay job of being Eda’s sister. She has a powerful presence when she’s in a room. And she’s wicked good at manipulating people. 

But that didn’t matter. Lilith bought into the lies. She let herself believe that magical skill was the only way to measure her worth. And since she needed to be the best, she hurt Eda for it.

The beautiful thing is, Eda didn’t buy that. "It’s my power, kid. And before you showed up, I spent my whole life wasting it.” Is what Eda said, as she used up the last of her power, the last of her life, to save Luz. In her final moments, she proved that she’s not like them. She’s stronger than them.

None of this matters. Not magical prowess. Not the hierarchy. Not the promise of joining the Coven and having more power than anyone else.

The only thing that matters to Eda is her family. Her real family. Her Luz, King, and Hooty. And by extension, Willow, Gus, and Amity. Those are Eda’s real reason for fighting, for dying: to protect them. Look, there’s no way she would’ve come out of that fight alive. She has a family, and her love for them is stronger than greed or jealousy or capitalism. 

Lilith never understood that. She thought the water of the womb was thicker than the blood of the covenant. Or, that the water of the womb and the blood of the covenant are stronger than the bonds of found family. She thought it didn’t matter if Eda loved, her, only if the Emperor loved her. Fucking bitch.

And now, a little something to worry about, before we go. Amity Blight. The girl who wanted to join the Emperor’s Coven more than anything, who dedicated her whole life to doing well in school, to being the best, to being perfect.

And then she met Luz. She fell for Luz. Now she’s in a tricky place, where habit and conditioning want her to join the Emperor’s Coven, but her heart wants her to do the impossible and destroy capitalism.

She wasn’t in this episode. Funny that being injured and unable to work ended up saving her from watching her future mother-in-law die. So she bought some time.

But Luz’s true mom is dead. This is the second mom she has lost, and she’s only fourteen. As powerful as King and Hooty are, Luz needs Amity. Luz needs Amity to support her and help her get back her mom.

So Amity has to make a choice. Fear and insecurity, or love and a high chance of death? 

She’ll probably choose death. Because that’s the message that this family-friendly show is giving us kids. Fuck capitalism. All you need in life is to do what makes you happy and be with the ones you love.

#the owl house #toh #owl house #toh spoilers #edalyn clawthorne #eda clawthorne #toh eda #eda the owl lady #luz noceda #amity blight #lilith clawthorne #cancel lilith #toh lilith #the owl house analysis #toh analysis #owl house analysis #toh meta #owl house meta #the owl house meta #agony of a witch #originalpost #toh king

[klbwriting]

Unexpected Allies - Chapter 1

Fandom: Six of Crows/Shadow and Bone

Pairing: eventually will be Kaz/female!Reader but for now nothing

Warnings: I mean, Kaz Brekker is involved, someone is getting maimed

Summary:  The Darkling won the Ravka civil war, defeating the Sun Summoner and taking command of Ravka. Then he went looking for ways to make his Grisha more powerful. Kaz Brekker knew this but took the job at the Ice Court anyway, getting himself and Jesper Fahey thrown into a Ravkan prison for his efforts. After getting broken out by the Darkling's second in command the trio has to find their way to the Permafrost and the resistance gathering there. And then Kaz has to figure out a way to get his crew out of this whole mess. But how can he get himself out of the mess of feelings he has for the Grisha with all the powers?

Note: Hello!  I am alive!  I have found motivation for something else!  As much as I loved the Shadow and Bone show I have found more love in the Six of Crows books so this fic is an AU based on both.  In this the Darkling won out over Alina and then Six of Crows happened like it does, except the Darkling showed up to ruin things as he does. Also going to address the Inej sized elephant in the room, in this Kaz’s feelings were less strong towards her because I ship the fuck out of Kaz and Inej but I also ship the shit out of Kaz and myself too and I needed some self-insert.  I hope you like it, I missed writing and I’m glad to find some inspiration again.  

Kaz Brekker was known even in prison as the guy who didn't need a reason. He wanted his infamy to spread even behind bars, the better to keep those looking for a pigeon to harass away. On his first day in this hellscape he had stolen a fork from the dining hall and used it when his cellmate attempted to take the makeshift cane that he had been provided from his hand. Now he no longer had a cellmate and his old cellmate no longer had his eyes, and word spread quick of the young man willing to kill to be left alone. That had given him the time and space to start to plan his escape.

First, get Jesper as his cellmate. That was accomplished with ease. Anyone else they put in with him would be blind or deaf or crippled within 24 hours so it came down the guards asking him straight out who he wouldn't maim. He said Jesper Fahey and they allowed it if only to have a night's peace. Jesper didn't look like he was faring well. In a cell at Hellgate Jesper would have been alright but here in a West Ravkan prison near Os Alta where his Zemeni features made him stand out he had become a target. When he entered Kaz's cell rage filled the young crime lord. Jesper was thinner than ever, dark circles under his eyes and hands fidgeting constantly, almost like he needed a drug but Kaz knew it was just because he couldn't focus his energy.

"Jesper," Kaz whispered after the guard had left and his sharpshooter sat on the cot. "What do you need?" Jesper looked at him slowly and gave half a smile.

"Just my friend, s'all ok now," he said. Kaz felt the side of his mouth twitch up just a little. "But I could also use a way out of this damned place." Kaz nodded, gripping the wooden walking stick a little tighter. He wanted to put a comforting hand on Jesper's shoulder but he could not, Jordie's body, cold and wet and dead flooded his mind, and he couldn't bring himself to reach out. He hated that this place seemed to be tearing his friend apart slowly. It was even taking a toll on him. Everyday was the same, waked up with the sun, eat a breakfast of stodgy porridge and soggy bread, washed down with possibly the grimiest coffee ever made. The prisoners were then sent outside to work on either the large farm for the prison and surrounding towns or they were forced to be target practice for the Grisha guards. Normally only the worst of the worst were reserved for practice, or those that pissed off the guards. Kaz had avoided this so far but he knew Jesper had run his mouth one day, getting snarky with the yard guard and he had almost been drowned by a Tidemaker the next morning. Lunches were non-existant most days. They were shuffled from work to 'free time' which meant sitting in the hot afternoon sun either playing cards, or, if they were lucky, sitting under one of the shady trees that scattered the yard. Evening was the only decent time at this hellhole, it was dinner, and then back to the cells. Kaz enjoyed this time, he was normally alone to plan, and now that Jesper was here they could plan together. He had the beginning, how to get out of the cell, but the rest he was still working on.

"I have been planning this since we got in here, you were the first part of my plan," Kaz said, watching as another set of guards walked by. He checked the small window above their heads. "She's coming any minute now." Jesper looked at him confused for a moment before the cell door opened and a guard told Kaz to get up. Kaz nodded and stood, Jesper rising as well.

"This one should come too, he was at the Ice Court with me on that night," Kaz said to the guard. The guard looked between them and shrugged, motioning for another guard, a Grisha Corpolaki judging from the kefta he wore. They led Kaz and Jesper out of the cells and into one of the small interrogation rooms. Kaz was familiar with the room at this point, having been there several times in the past few months speaking with the Grisha Infernei who was seated at one of the two chairs in the room. She looked up as they entered and he noticed that she seemed relieved, something she hadn't shown before.

"Are there anymore of your comrades from the Ice Court in this prison?" she asked, motioning for another chair to be brought in. Jesper sat down hard while Kaz stood still, leaning on the walking stick and once again studying the Infernei. She wore a red kefta with black stitching, something different from the others and he was still not sure why. He supposed it was because she was high in the ranks. After the Darkling defeated Alina Starkov and her followers he had gone back to using his true name, Aleksander Morosova, and became king of Ravka. He used the power that he had sucked from the Sun Summoner to control the Fold now, moving and reshaping it to whatever he needed and on the night of Kaz's jurda parem heist he apparently needed the jurda parem also. Kaz and Jesper had been taken but the others had escaped.

"No, no more of us, just we two were involved," he said. The Grisha looked between them, assessing them. Kaz took another moment to look over her while she studied Jesper. He always liked to measure who he was up against, and he didn't mind studying her. She was curvy, seeming to like waffles more than Nina did, with hair a deep auburn and eyes the color of dark chocolate. The first time he saw them they reminded him of Inej's eyes except her's were more hopeful than he had ever seen Inej. This Grisha fully believed that something good could still happen in the world. Kaz was almost jealous of this, but of course, this Grisha had seen her side win the Ravka civil war. His eyes now met hers and he saw that while he was studying her she had been doing the same to him. He could tell she knew he was lying but he didn't care. He had spent the last 4 months keeping his answers vague, giving just enough information so that she would feed him information back about the current situation at the Little Palace, now the true royal home since the Grand Palace lay in ruin. King Aleksander left it as a reminder to those who would attempt to assassinate him, bodies still left scattered around the rubble, Alina Starkov's kefta in tatters on the front steps. Kaz hadn't seen it but from the way this Grisha described it, he believed it was terrifying.

"Mr. Brekker, we both know the heist you were attempting could never be accomplished with just two people," she said, a knowing smile on her face. This seeming infatuation the Grisha had with him was a plus for Kaz. He often wondered if he could possibly seduce his way out of the situation but his mind couldn't fathom the interactions involved, so he would wait. Perhaps this woman had a inclination towards criminals, she might be seduced by anyone, Jesper could do it easily, Kaz just had to get the ball rolling so to speak.

"I don't know, I think Jesper and I can accomplish anything we put out mind to," he answered, bringing himself to nudge his partner in crime with his elbow. The Grisha nodded and opened her notebook as she did at every meeting and began to write.

Y/N had noticed the look on Kaz Brekker's face when he elbowed Jesper Fahey. She could see his hesitation, she noticed the look in his storm gray eyes. He was bracing himself for impact as if the touch would somehow hurt him. Jesper's face was surprised at the touch, and he physically turned towards Kaz with shock. She opened her notebook and pretended to jot down something important as she did every day, but she mentally notated this interaction. She had been listening to others in the prison and despite his limp Kaz never let anyone see him as weak, however, this aversion to touch was never mentioned. He hid it well out in the general population but she could see something about touch bothered him immensely, that information could be useful later. Kaz Brekker was a tough nut to crack she had to admit, but eventually she would get to where she needed to be with him, hopefully sooner rather than later. Aleksander was having a tough time buying her excuses and she had to become even more convincing for him, continuing to keep his trust after the betrayal of the Sun Summoner was an arduous task. She hoped soon she could drop her facade and begin her true purpose, breaking Kaz Brekker and his cohorts out of this prison and find the gathering resistance in the Permafrost.

"Alright Mr. Brekker, we left off yesterday with you explaining to me how you came to know about jurda parem and what the Fjerdans were doing with Bo Yul-Bayor and his son Kuwei?" she said. It had taken months for Kaz to even start explaining anything to her. She had hoped that agreeing to allow his friend to be his cellmate would open him up. Luckily the gamble had worked at their last interrogation. His answers had still been too vague to really make an impact but it was a start. She hated to make him desperate but she needed the information, something to feed to Aleksander and send him on a chase for more jurda parem. Kuwei Yol-Bo had escaped from the Ice Court and that knowledge was keeping Bo from cooperating with the Second Army. He had recreated exactly one vial of jurda parem and refused to create another until his son was returned safely to him. Kaz Brekker and Jesper Fahey had been the last people to see Kuwei alive and she needed something to tell Aleksander before he decided to come here and do the interrogations himself.

"Yes, I believe I told you that a rumor had gone around Ketterdam and that I just happened to hear it," he said, making sure he was as convincing as he could be. Once again Y/N pretended to write something down, pretending to believe his lie. He was a very good liar, she could see that in the way his eyes held truth, his body language said honest, even his pulse was calm, however, the blood in his veins moved just a milisecond faster during his falsehoods. It had taken nearly a month to figure out the tell in his body but she had done it and now she used this against him.

"Must have been quite a rumor to make you put your friends in the line of fire of Fjerdans and of King Aleksander," she said, keeping her voice light, leaning a little closer to him. She couldn't lie, she was enraptured by the young man from the Barrel of Ketterdam, but she wasn't foolish enough to believe that he would ever see her as anything other than another Ravkan Grisha blindly serving her king, but she could pretend that she hoped to lure him in, get him feeling confident about her.

"Jesper will tell you, he was eager to join me to find this new drug, imagine the kruge we could make from such a thing," Kaz said, standing suddenly and poking Jesper towards Y/N with his cane. He moved towards the wall, leaning against it. Y/N watched him for a few moments before turning her attention to Jesper. He wanted to push someone else at her? Why? She could tell he liked the attention she gave him, maybe not in a way most men did, but he liked it all the same. Jesper barked a laugh.

"Eager? You came back and acted like we were going to be rolling in kruge, become kings of Kerch," Jesper said. He was also a practiced liar, following the lead of his boss as it were. Y/N smiled at Jesper then, making sure her brown eyes looked intrigued and enraptured. She noticed the Zemeni man leaned back in his chair then, clearly not interested in the attentions of a Grisha like herself. "But ya, I mean, I wanted the kruge and I was having a good run that night at the tables, felt lady luck was on my side." She saw him fidgeting near his waist, where his guns should be. She had those stored in her private quarters, along with a certain crow headed cane, waiting for the right moment. She had been watching Kaz and Jesper since they arrived, having her spies give her information on them. They were the only link she had to Kuwei and Inej Ghafa and she needed to know all she could before she continued her plan.

She tried to pry more out of the two for several minutes before one of her people, a young Squallor entered.

"The hour is late Korovsa, the king is finished waiting," she whispered. Y/N’s jaw tightened. Her eyes flashed to Kaz and she saw him take notice of the slight change in her features. Her fears were starting to come to pass. She needed to end this charade now.

"Guard, please escort Mr. Fahey back to his new cell. Mr. Brekker and I have more to discuss," she ordered. The guard grabbed Jesper's arm, hauling him from the seat. Y/N wanted to say something, tell them to lay off the guy, but knew she couldn't appear as if she cared. Once he was gone she made a motion for Kaz to sit. He still stood. "Sit, now," she insisted, hoping he heard the urgency in her voice. He eyed for another moment before he moved to sit. She leaned closer, all of her coy attitude gone.

"What's happened?" Kaz asked casually, working the top of the walking stick with his hands, the only sign of his concern. Y/N let out a breath.

"My time is up, tomorrow night expect there to be a riot, stay in your cell with Jesper, don't leave until you hear 2 bells, then leave the cell and go to your left, the door will be ajar due to the last guard through it mistakenly knocking over mop. Once you are in the corridor go right and follow it to the deserted morgue. I will join you and lead you and Jesper out, do not leave without me," she said.

"Why should I believe any of this? That you're just going to help up walk out of there?" Kaz asked, trying to read her, seeing if she was lying. She groaned annoyed. Why was it that her only hope was as distrustful as her current king?

"Because I want to see the king's body burn before he destroys all of us," she whispered, voice dripping with venom. Kaz looked a little surprised at her viciousness and he nodded. She sat back, knowing that by now the guard had returned.

"Well Mr. Brekker, you've once again been no help, tomorrow the king will be coming to personally interrogate you, I hope you are looking forward to it," she said. "Guard take him back to his cell." The guard nodded and yanked him out of the chair. "Careful, the king won't like it if he can't inflict the pain himself," she warned, more to Kaz than the guard. She hoped Kaz believed her enough, that she had shown her hand to him enough that he would do as she asked. If he didn't they were all screwed.

#six of crows #kaz #kaz brekker #kazbrekker #kaz x reader #kaz brekker x reader #shadow and bone #crooked kingdom #jesper fahey #unexpected allies series