#inward meltdown

[opens-up-4-nobody]

...

#sometimes u have a day thats just so. i cant even. its seems 2023 is my year of rage #directionless rage. i guess im mad at me but instead of being directed inward it just goes out into empty space #im just fucking. im at my saturation point #its a good thing i stopped taking measurements yesterday and went to the store tomorrow bc im so fucking #mostly bc i noticed a problem with the code for a paper that is fucking less than a day away from being locked in on acceptance #and now its like fucking i have to go through and change a lot and im also less than 48hrs away from another massive project starting #that will occupy my whole fucking waking nightmare of a life. so its a good thing im level headed. its a good thing i can accept my fuck #ups with honestly. bc im so fucking. ive had it. im up to fucking here with everything and i just want it to be done #im fucking full of bitterness and black bile and i want to break things. and whose fault is it? fucking mine #bc im too fucking exhausted constantly all the time to fucking pay attention to what im doing and notic that a fucking function isnt #working properly. fuck u fuck u fuck u. so what r we gonna do abt it? #idk well see what my boss says. i already texted her that news and its good bc at least i caught it but god its so fucking irritating #god. will i b told off for this? maybe. i probably deserve it. haha if so that will send me for an absolute tailspin. i cannot stand to #feel ive done something wrong. even when i kno i have. last time i had a total freakout meltdown and made v bad choices and that wasnt even #this bad. so its a good thing im currently fairly stable bc the desire to make bad choices is very strong #im just so sick and tired of everything and i want to let things implode bc im vindictive against myself. but we must not do that we must #be reasonable. so idk we may have to withdraw the paper. whatever i dont give a fuck. itll get accepted elsewhere. i dont fucking care #leave me alone to dissolve into the dirt and set my data ablaze to be helpful to no one. erase my Prospective impack. i don't fucking care #anyway today sucked. i might have to stay up all night trying to fix this. ensuring that i fuck up the start of the looming project yayyyyy #i hate it here. i stopped having fun over a year ago #itll b fine. im just fucking. im full im impotent rage #unrelated

[childrensward]

Hi, shout out to the regressors who are angry.

The ones who deal with emotional regulation problems, the ones who are easily agitated and annoyed by others, the ones who shout and scream when they're mad, the ones who have violent meltdowns, and the ones whose anger is directed inwards towards themselves. Sometimes regression isn't all about being happy and carefree, and sometimes our stressors from our adult life can seep into our regression life. Sometimes regression can make these big, complicated emotions even bigger, and sometimes those emotions can become so hard to deal with that we explode.

I want to let you know that, no matter how many episodes you have, you are still worthy and deserving of love, care and affection. Sometimes we do things during these times that we end up regretting, and sometimes it can hurt to have to relive these feelings when you reconcile with others about them, but I promise that your episodes don't make you a bad person, and it's always worth it to talk to someone you trust about it.

You're not a bad kid, you're just dealing with a lot of strong emotions that are hard for even adults to cope with, and while it's very important to find ways to cope with it so that you don't end up hurting yourself or others, it's also completely okay to make mistakes and you should give yourself some slack for when these mistakes do happen.

#age regression #sfw agere #agere #agereg #age dreaming #agedre

[doodleloverz]

I made this thinking of my own autistic meltdowns I still have to this day, but interpret it how you like!

Headcannon ramble below:

I myself went through many harsh events in my early childhood (and still to this day with poverty and more :/) that led to me having horrible meltdowns around the age of 8, slowly getting better but I still have them today embarrassingly enough. When I first saw Raph and started relating to him as an autistic person i immediately came to the conclusion of this self projecting headcanon. I imagine he, like myself, went through poverty his early childhood and being the eldest saw many things with his dad that he shouldn't have so young. Of course his brothers also faced such but they hadn't quite developed enough to know any of it for what it was yet, unlike him.

I imagine he had meltdowns around 8 years old like I did, where he'd scream and cry like he were a toddler having a fit in a slightly bigger body, leading to his brothers crying from confusion and his dad trying everything to get him to stop with no avail. Eventually out of shame and self loathing because of this behavior he forces himself to get better, or at least focus this energy inwards rather than outwards onto his family. I think more current time they all started to notice his internal struggles he's been hiding out of shame, like the scratching, and encourage him to do them more openly with them so they can help him learn healthier alternatives when he feels they are necessary. He still feels ashamed and doesn't feel like he deserves this from his family but it feels nice to hear from the people he loves that his fears and worries he's had his whole life are valid, and that he is not a bad person for reacting to them.

That's kind of it at the moment, I have ideas on what bad habits he has that hes working on now (more self projecting) but that's something I won't share unless it's how I did with the scratching (a less triggering format)

#rottmnt #art #doodle #artist #sketch #tmnt #rise of the tmnt fanart #rise tmnt #rise of the teenage mutant ninja turtles #rise of the tmnt #raph #rise raph #raphael #rottmnt raph #raph tmnt #donnie tmnt #rise donnie #rottmnt donnie #brains and brawn #Autism duo

[adirectorprepares]

okay if no one’s Posting i will have to. the thing that got me the most about polite society is how successfully it gaslit me! i fully believed from 20% in to the midpoint that this was going to be a movie about how ria’s fantasies were hurting her sister, how she had to let lena grow up and move on and stop trying to control her life, how she would be able to revel in her stuntwoman fantasies for fun but would learn that salim wasn’t all that bad and that they could all be friends in the end. it fucking got me!!!

and the reason it fucking got me is because that’s a dominant cultural imaginary - the idea that intense relationships between women (mother and daughter, sisters, “romantic” friendships) are temporary stepping stones on the path to heterosexual stability, a childhood fantasy you move on from. (i disagree with adrienne rich about many things, but she’s right about the inescapability and political significance of this hegemonic idea that female relationships cannot be stable or lifelong, that they evolve into stable heterosexual families. lillian faderman was also right about this.)

and the thing that is driving me towards a category four autism moment is the way that resistance to this idea about female relationships is built into the formal and structural work of polite society. ria criticises lena for acting like she’s in a jane austen novel - because the early novel form as represented by jane austen is deeply intertwined with this hegemonic approach to womanhood! at the start of emma, emma is mourning the loss of her childhood friend miss taylor to heterosexual marriage. she vows herself never to marry, but by the novel’s end she has gained emotional maturity and worked towards her own stable relationship with mr knightley. it’s a bildungsroman-type plot of mature emotional reflection, careful sentimentality, growth and character development. and this intertwining of individualist character development or maturation with the idea of moving from female relationships to stable heterosexuality is precisely what ria must resist to win in the movie. she has to resist the conspiracy theory plot** by resisting the western craft expectations of a specific kind of character growth and sentimentality!! ria cannot have a jane austen response to lena telling her she’s going to marry salim - she cannot reflect inwards and work towards a more ‘mature’ relationship with her sister, one where she is able to ‘let lena go’ and move on. instead, she has to hold onto her ‘childish’ anger, her ‘unrealistic’ stuntwoman mischief, her desire to do brunch brunch brunch dances with lena!!!!

brecht is having a field day about the use of movie fight scenes as gestus to disrupt the illusion that the realist bildungsroman plot is inescapable. elaine scarry is having a field day about all the times ria gets beat up. kyla schuller is having a field day about sentimentality and biopolitics. ALL THIS in a ninety-minute movie that is also the most fun and cathartic and balls-to-the-wall cinematic experience one could ask for. LITERALLY the movie of all time 10/10 no notes.

**which is fascinating and too much for me to coherently analyse at 1.30am, but i’m having an internal meltdown about raheela calling lena’s genes mediocre and framing her clone implantation scheme as a way to have a second chance at a life where she sacrificed herself to motherhood and the connection between nineteenth/twentieth century eugenic feminism and the novel form and artistic experimentation.

#polite society

[moodymisty]

Hey guys, feel free to keep sending in things like normal i would really appreciate it, but I'm going to take a few days off. Thanks for being here <3

TW vent

Very long story short, I still live with family for multiple reasons. It's complicated, and the current landscape doesn't help. But my mother is mentally ill and has no desire to get help for herself, and a lot of things fall onto me. But she has put a lot of time and effort into making me the one with every issue, rather than looking inward. My childhood was a lot of being called retarded and many other things, having passive aggressive jabs thrown at me, and getting berated at for getting caught wearing makeup and dresses because she wished I'd been born a boy. It's stressful when the person demanding so much attention and work from you has never really wanted you to begin with. this is only the tip of the iceberg but

Anyways.

I've had to deal with another meltdown, and my human interaction meter is largely at it's limit, so I'm going to go play some Elden ring or something else and try to relax. Thanks for being so patient with me.

#tw vent #to delete later #I apologize for being cringe on main but i figured i would give a slight explanation before dipping #I'll respond to comments and reblog the stuff i've been tagged in (sorry Kit) when I'm back

[kingusukaras]

some (mildly disjointed) thoughts i had about the translation of most recent leona overblot scene from the second twst novel. unsaid disclaimer is obvi these are just my thoughts and youre free to disagree. i cant stop you

read more because i might ramble a bit 💆🏾‍♀️

i'll start by saying that i'm very grateful for the novel & yuureis translations, bc its given me so much to chew on wrt leonas psyche and mental state, much more than book 2 in the game did. i havent bothered to go looking for reactions tho, bc i can already kind of predict the takes i'll find (knowing how parts of the fandom talks abt leona generally) - and i do "get" it, in the sense that i do also feel the way he tortures ruggie before he overblots is upsetting - but theres so much to dig into here, i feel like its such a waste to get hung up on obsessively moralizing

(i'll mention here that to formulate these thoughts i'm also pulling from the translation of leona's post-overblot scene, plus some moments from the game that i'll mention specifically as i go)

for example, the things leona says pre-overblot, his meltdown about dreams being stupid and useless, how the savanaclaw students (ruggie included) aren't meant to question him; they're meant to obey quietly, sound less like actual things he's trying to tell them and more like him lashing out at himself. as in, he's more talking at them, not to them. skipping forward to book 6: there we see leona give jamil advice, but the implication underneath is that everything he's telling jamil are things leona wishes he had internalized himself - again here, he's talking to someone, but really it's also directed inwards. almost like it's easier for him to look at (and speak about) himself critically when he can externalize it as critique of other people

the other thing im curious about is the distant, detached persona he adopts when he's truly angry. this'll be quick because i don't feel i have enough information to unpack it properly, but if i allow myself to spin thoughts out from limited information: it could almost be a habit he picked up as a child - something he might've forced himself to learn as part of an effort to be seen as more of a 'model' prince. if people were afraid of his moodiness because they feared what his UM (he) could do, then if he swallows those emotions maybe he can mitigate that. this, ofc, being shot through with the expectation that, as royalty, any order he gives people will obey

the final thing, for this post at least, is unpacking the way leona lashes out at ruggie when ruggie defies him. i'm willing to make the very safe bet that most of the reading of this moment is focused on leona being angry over being defied at all, or general disgust at how small and weak ruggie is (appears) to be. and while i think both of those points have some element of truth to them, i think the larger aspect of leonas reaction is jealousy. ruggie somehow, despite everything, despite all of the disadvantages life has thrown at him, still has the courage to have determination. and i want to be very clear here: this is not me saying being poor or struggling is admirable because it makes you strong - i'm not naive and i'm not here to romanticize poverty. what i am trying to say here ruggie's tenacity - a tenacity his life circumstances developed in him - is something that leona lacks, and that's what he's jealous of. he's jealous of his inability to keep having that hope, to maintain that courage in the face of his own repeated failures

(an aside: isn't it ironic that part of the reason ruggie has that tenacity is leona? leonas tutoring, leonas effective leadership of the spelldrive club, and as housewarden?)

(an aside 2x: in many ways, 'giving up' can be seen as a luxury. ruggie does not have the luxury to give up, because it could very well mean that he doesn't eat that day. for leona, regardless of what he does he's going to have a roof over his head and three square meals a day anyway, so what does it matter if he gives up? sure, he won't be happy, but he'll be comfortable in a material sense, and isn't that enough? except, of course, it isn't - not for him. as much as he tries to deny it, he's as fiercely ambitious as the rest of his dorm)

#king's meta #twisted wonderland #twst leona #leona kingscholar #disney twisted wonderland #every new translation post gives me so much more to mull over i love it #thank you yuurei

[lovelywongie]

Adore your latest post about Erasermic with an autistic reader! I think in addition to having teaching experience, Aizawa at the least has to be autistic as well. He’s learned to live around his symptoms but he can still empathise and knows a few tricks to help with your sensory issues someone with fewer years may not have discovered.

Aizawa would also be very good at spotting shutdowns (like meltdowns but instead of external panic there is a withdrawal inwards and loss of response to outside stimuli) and probably had more of these as a kid than true meltdowns. This is something Mic the extrovert misses, but he’s understanding once Aizawa explains the signs to him. When shutdowns happen they just roll you into a comfy duvet and carry you to a dark room with ambient white noise until you come back to your senses.

Hello! I really appreciate your request I didn't have much time to write something better but I didnt want you to think i forgot so here you are, as soon I'm going to come up with something better, I will post it!

Okay, so Hizashi isn't deep into helping autistic people when they are having shut downs but don't get me wrong he would love to he is very scared if he is doing something wrong so this is the thing that is kinda stopping him but Aizawa is educating this man like as the person that requested this, Aizawa is autistic he just like lives around the symptoms of autism. So Aizawa can pretty easily calm you down when needed, time that you were with Hizashi and you had a meltdown this dude didn't know what to do at the moment so you can just image you have a melt down with Mic watching a tutorial from Aizawa what to do but that time he learned a lot how to help you. But if being honest Hizashi will have fidget toys to help you and nothing else but let appreciate this man for it, he keeps it in his classroom.

#yanderebnha #mha #bnha #yanderemha #yandere eraserhead #yandere present mic #yanderemic #yandereaizawa #yandere erasermic #yandere erasermic x reader #yandere boy #yandere boku no hero academia #yandere aizawa #yandere bnha #yandere mha #yandere my hero academia

[nerves-nebula]

Does Donnie ever get angry? cause we'll be seeing Raph (obviously) and Leo and even Mikey lash out but Donnie never looks mad

ohhhohoh donnie gets angry, but he mostly gets angry at himself. even when he's angry at others he tries to bottle it up cause he doesnt wanna end up like Splinter or Leo and accidentally lash out at people and hurt them.

So he mostly directs it inwards (self blame, keeping anger bottled up, telling himself he doesnt have it half as bad as Raph so he shouldn't be upset, telling himself if he was less stupid and less anxious he wouldn't hurt so bad) even when what happens is obviously someone else's fault. like even when he's super mad at Splinter for being unfair or cruel, he'll only appear to be a bit pouty and wont say anything for fear of making things worse. even if he feels like he's DYING on the inside.

this doesn't cover meltdowns and over stimulation tho. but that's cause those are sensory issues where he'll feel almost out of control of his body and do anything to make the problem stop (example: that comic where he bit mikey. he didnt WANNA hurt him but thats just the first way his brain thought of to get Mikey to stop invading his personal space)

FINALLY THO he gets old enough to realize that not everything was his fault and he's killing himself with all this self blame. then he gets more angry/sarcastic and starts putting up more boundaries, but he still tends to err on the side of caution cause he would hate to hurt anyone the way that people hurt him. he's sensitive and i may more may not be projecting my baby self onto him.

#nnstuff #ask #teenage mutant neglected turtles #tmnt donnie

[221bluescarf]

I watched a movie this week and I believed it was created to serve as a message to me personally

I don't know if any of you have seen Broken Diamonds but it's about a guy whose sister is woman with schizophrenia. My online support group recommended it as one of the better portrayals of schizophrenia in movies, so we watched it together. I agree, it was very good. It wasn't sensationalized and you never saw a hallucination or heard a voice. It was pretty much all from the perspective of the brother —or the care-taker if you will

But the movie made me sad because I saw myself. I've done some of the things she did and acted in some of the ways she did in the movie. Especially off meds. I'd say her schizophrenia is worse than mine but some would argue it's just that her symptoms are "louder" than mine. And for good reason. It wouldn't be any good for a movie if she did everything quietly. My meltdowns are loud but other than that I retreat into myself. I don't yell at people or anything. It is often very inward and hidden out of fear and suspicion and not letting them see my distress because I believe they're trying to psychologically torture me (or whatever other explanation I have that justifies the persecution) Of course you also can't compare yourself to something fictional. That being said, I still saw a lot of things in the movie that remind me of myself.

The problem is that it didn't take me long to accuse my support group of showing me this movie because it was a message for me. This movie was filmed specifically for me. It was made to tell me what I will become once I'm alone. It was made to tell me my parents will leave me/die and I'll be left to decline far beyond where I am now. My brother will resent me if he doesn't already. I'll be completely lost in myself and go off meds more frequently. I'll live in long-term care. I was so distraught at the message that my parents will soon be gone. I couldn't stop crying.

In the movie, I believe she's been triggered by grief. I will be too.

This movie, its actors, its director and producers...all of them did this to send a message to me. Sure the movie made money too, and a lot of people liked the movie. But the motive was me. It was all for me.

It took a few days for me to "snap out of it".

In the end, I do really like the movie and I recommend it. I realize that it wasn't made for me but it was probably made with people like me or their care-takers in mind.

#schizospec #221bluescarf.txt #schizophrenia

[sepublic]

Do NOT like how similar Luz’s expressions look here. That borderline resentment... Is this meant to indicate a feeling of betrayal on Luz’s part? It was Eda and King who first inspired and introduced her to the mantra that us weirdoes have to stick together, that gave Luz a new hope and life; And now they’ve thrown it aside when Luz herself tries to bring it up in gratitude, in desperation, to remind them! So the utter betrayal to hear the ones it came from ultimately dismiss it, in a way dismiss LUZ... Like it really was all a lie and for nothing.

Not to mention, what if Luz realizes Eda encouraged her to save Amity, as a means to keep her away from the danger; And Luz figures out that despite what they struggled with in the previous episode, Eda still sent her away. Didn’t want Luz to help, didn’t trust in her ability to, which made Luz have to ask Raine to keep Eda safe in her stead... And Luz doesn’t know if Eda’s okay, so for all she knows, Eda has once again pushed her away to her own detriment; Just as how Eda would’ve died in the previous season finale had Luz not kept trying! Can’t Eda just recognize and appreciate what Luz has done and wants, dammit?!

And most of all, I can see Luz being angry at herself. She helped Philip unwittingly and has yet to admit it to her friends, Luz still thinks she messed up. She’s still hating herself for not being strong enough, for not being able to stop Belos soon enough; For not being able to save King, and letting herself get separated from him. If she couldn’t even save King, then on second thought... Maybe Eda WAS right; And being cut off with no way to check on the demon realm, the utter lack of closure and inability to do anything, losing agency. It’d just frustrate Luz so deeply as someone who’d had a breakdown over that in O Titan, Where Art Thou and she’s likely going to direct that resentment inward.

PLEASE, Camila... Let Luz know she’s accepted. That her choices are. That Luz has nothing to apologize for; If anyone can get this kid out of her headspace, out of the only people she has access to... It’s you. Let Luz know that she’s FORGIVEN for her mistakes because she’s just a kid and she’s willing to learn and has, so Luz can forgive herself... I really am scared. At this point not so much because of what others like Philip or the Collector can do to her, but perhaps mostly, what Luz can and has already done to herself. With her being an ADHD kid, I can see Luz having a total meltdown where she gets hurt and it’d break my heart, speaking from ND experience myself.

#the owl house #luz noceda #angst

[scribbling-punk]

Safe Port In A Storm

Cat has never been a fan of Mondays, but they always suck just a little more after she has spent the full weekend with Kara and Lena. Long lies, lazy breakfasts in front of the television, perhaps an afternoon spent in the park if the weather is nice, followed by board games or an early night tucked into bed together in order to ensure Kara doesn’t feel left out when her Mommy’s new friend is around.

It’s a relationship that Cat never really saw herself being a part of, sharing a loved one with another and diving into helping with the girlfriend who so often regresses when she is stressed.

She had surprised herself by how easily she slipped into the role; how much she misses being around them when they are forced to separate for work.

Cat has only been with Kara and Lena for a few months, but she’s quickly learning to spot the signs of Kara’s impending spiral into little space. The thumb that makes its way to pink lips before being stubbornly yanked back downwards, the shifting feet beneath her desk, the inability to concentrate; big blue eyes peering across at her every few moments.

She sighs softly as she watches Kara struggle, her heart aching for the little one stuck at work when she most likely just wants to rush home to Mommy, but little girls are not allowed to travel across the city by themselves and Cat can’t leave to take her.

Besides, Lena isn’t even at L-Corp. She’s at a meeting across town, stuck with Morgan Edge and his ego as they debate the intricacies of a deal that has not yet been made public.

It would take at least an hour for her to get through the late afternoon traffic and Cat isn’t convinced that Kara can wait that long. She’s fighting hard, but the little one is losing the battle and when those big eyes meet Cat’s across the bullpen once more, Cat doesn’t hesitate to beckon her across. She hasn’t been alone with a little Kara before, but she’s witnessed Lena soothe her enough times to stand in as an emergency caretaker—to calm the inevitable meltdown.

Kara rushes across the bullpen without even closing her laptop, her bottom lip sucked inwards to hide a trembling pout as she slips into Cat’s office.

“Hi there, darling girl,” Cat smiles warmly, “you wanna sit in here with me for a little while?”

Read Safe Port In A Storm early on Patreon.

#safe port in a storm #cat x kara x lena #prompt fill #early access

[cyborg-franky]

Hi franky! I was wondering if you had any headcanons or anything about the WBP or any of the other one piece characters doing karaoke? <3

-slams hand down on desk- this is good for my mental health and I want to hold you. Lots under the cut! If anyone wants other chars please hit me up <3

Ace

He acts all shy at first but get a drink in him and he won’t shut up.

He will drag you on stage and do a duet.

Has no concept of holding a note, just belts it out.

The drunker he gets the worse he gets.

Unironically loves Backstreet Boys.

Went as one of them for Halloween, don’t you know.

Also tries to do the screaming parts of alt music.

Video him taking off his shirt and swinging it around to highway to hell and humble him every time he gets sassy at you.

Marco

Likes the atmosphere of going to karaoke but doesn’t partake so much.

Is happy to sit with your things and watch you, makes eye contact the entire time with a smile on his face, being your biggest fan and supporter.

You can coax him up, depending on what sound you dangle under his nose.

Cheesy 80s songs or alt music tends to be his jam.

Would be 100% that bitch who’d lose it to Pretty fly for a white guy and make everyone stare at him, wondering where that energy came from. 

Thatch

Loves it, lives for it, and will make everyone join in.

Was probably the one with the idea to go.

Loves to sing all sorts and will belt out Elvis one second, Bonnie Tyler the next, and Lady Gaga the next. Just loves to sing, and will do all the parts himself, male and female roles. He’s a one-man show.

But he likes to get his friends on stage to do any song. 

He drinks gets excited and gets everyone pumped.

He’s just everyone's hype man including himself.

Just living his best life.

Watch him sing total eclipse of the heart and love it.

Izou

You dare bring him to your silly sing-song hall?

He’ll not be happy.

Will sulk.

However, is not above recording people making fools of themselves for future blackmail or amusement.

Though Izou is not immune to the charms of booze.

Get Izou drunk and he will be screeching the classics.

Will even do a headbang and whirl around his hair.

A drunk Izou is a great Izou.

Deuce

Every time he is dragged up on stage you can tell he is longing for the person who did that to him to get eaten by the floor [Ace]

Will mumble into the microphone.

Hates it, even drunk he will more than likely have an inward meltdown at the entire thing.

Ace can sometimes get a duet out of him.

Will throw a mic at the first heckler, however.

Will be the first person to tell you what you did wrong.

Sassy.

Vista

Sings the mic like it’s a lover.

If you are on stage with him he will accidentally smack you in the face with his dramatic arm movements.

Could sing opera.

And does.

Ever heard every song ever turned into an opera version? No? Then, boy, you are in for a treat.

Loves to be solo as well as a group.

The only one who is able to not mangle other language songs.

Is loud, hell, doesn’t even need a mic.

Jozu

He’s very shy and will prob just sit at the table and have a good time eating, snacking, and watching everyone else get on stage.

Kinda hides behind Marco [despite being so much bigger than him] when he’s asked to join anyone.

The only reason you can even hear him is the fact he has a deep voice.

Just kinda shyly stands there and sings and taps his foot.

There, he did it once, please just let him hide.

Haruta

Loud, over-the-top, drama kid.

He loves it, he has to be the loudest.

Picks all the really annoying songs that get in your head for the rest of the night.

Nags people who don’t really want to get on stage.

He hits the high notes well at least.

Will sing the really, really, fast songs.

“Come on guys! Just one more!” until he dragged off the stage.

Whitey Bay

Voice of an angel.

Looks like a superstar as she stands there with her flowing hair and flawless poses.

The proceeds to roar to death metal and scares everyone in the area, maybe not Ace or Marco but they are still surprised a woman that petite is capable of making the table shake.

Solo only - you will only cramp her style.

You might manage to get her to sing something that you can hear the lyrics of through loud screaming vocals.

Does have a nice voice.

#thatch #thatch one piece #one piece #whitebeard headcannons #whitebeard pirates #marco the phoenix #sfwpo #marco op #ace op #izou op #thatch op #marco the pineapple #fushichou marco #portgas d. ace #portgas d ace #fire fist ace #izo #izou #vista #vista op #jozu #diamond jozu #whitey bay #haruta one piece #masked deuce #deuce one piece

[blue-chimera]

I argued here that Dean was wrong for how he handled the events of "The Girl Next Door," but that his primary sin wasn't killing Amy, it was doing so behind Sam's back. There, my focus was on how Amy's death fits the general pattern of monsters that the Winchesters kill. They're generally not swayed by a monster's intentions, only the ultimate impact on human lives. So it wasn't a huge stretch for Dean to look at Amy & see her as someone who had to die for the good of all, much like he looked at Jack the rugaru, or Madison the werewolf.

However, I also think that Dean might've made a different call under different circumstances: that the decision to kill Amy was the result of (or at least influenced by) intense emotional turmoil.

To recap, Dean is falling apart: He's lost Lisa & Ben (and, with them, the dream of having a family of his own). He's lost Cas. He's terrified that he's losing Sam to madness. And he's also pissed. He's angry at Cas for the betrayal that caused these dominos to fall, and he's angry at himself for failing to see it coming.

Dean clings to the illusion of control that John instilled in him from an early age (an illusion that let him believe that a 9-year-old with a shotgun had a genuine chance of protecting his brother if a monster came calling). This illusion helps Dean maintain his sanity & keep from being paralyzed while confronting threat after massive threat. It empowers him. At the same time, it causes him to turn blame relentlessly inwards, then get overwhelmed by guilt & externalize the pain of it, lashing out at the people around him.

See, Dean's worldview requires someone to be at fault. The idea of no one being at fault (that sometimes no one in a particular situation is in control of the outcome) is terrifying & destabilizing. If he acknowledges the limits of his control, he'll have to reject ideas that are foundational to his identity. He'll have to reexamine who he even is — and who John was. And he doesn't want to do that. So, he clings to the illusion of control.

But in order for the world to be controllable, it first has to be knowable. Things need to follow predictable patterns. If the world is random chaos (or just too complex to meaningfully predict), you can't anticipate & prepare for things. This is part of why Dean finds it so hard to shake his prejudices, even when he recognizes logically that they're not always supported by the available evidence. Prejudices make for a more predictable world. Demons are always going to betray you. Monsters can't help but kill people. Nothing supernatural can be trusted. These things make for easy, straightforward rules.

When Dean feels like his world is going to pieces, he unconsciously doubles-down on these ideas to help him shore things back up, reflexively wrapping himself in cynicism to keep from bleeding out.

At the same time as he's doing this, Amy walks into his life. She's a monster. She's killing people. She says she's going to stop. She says she's done. But Dean doesn't trust her. He can't trust her. It's all part of the same fabric for him. And if he starts unraveling those threads now, everything is going to fall apart.

He has to believe that killing [humans] is in her nature, just as he's come to believe that killing [monsters] is in his.

We've seen that Dean can be more flexible in his thinking — more forgiving — when he's not in the middle of a meltdown. When he feels like he can turn to Sam to talk these things through (and does turn to Sam), Sam has succeeded in changing his mind. These are rarely easy conversations (see, again: the stabilizing role of prejudices in Dean's worldview & the inherently de-stabilizing effect of pushing back against them). But Dean has been persuaded to trust monsters, to be merciful to them, before.

It's just that, in early S7, he has no trace of that trust left.

#spn meta #dean winchester #amy pond #understanding dean winchester #dean studies #supernatural season 7 #spn #character analysis #character development: dean winchester

[novantinuum]

Glow or dark for ask game? 👀 not usually an and/or situation here....

Ty friend!! :33

So, this one is (or was, I guess) a one-shot I started writing for a recent Connverse prompt week. “Glow or Dark” were the two choices for day one, so I decided I wanted to try and find a way to mash them up together into one. This is adult Connverse, they’re like… engaged by now.

Basically, the idea I had was “Connie is kinda Big Bummer Steven doesn’t use his powers much anymore” and like… they’re all huddled in bed together, having a sleepy convo about this. My thinking is like… for a while Steven over-compensates? And he’s like… putting all his eggs in the “being human” basket and now somewhat neglecting his Gem side, and that makes Connie sad, because she loves both sides of him, and wishes he felt more comfortable expressing himself in all ways with her.

Also her fiancé can glow like a goddamn glow stick and she thinks it’s pretty, so sue her— it’s pretty and she wishes she could see it more but under positive circumstances *wheeze*

Snippit:

_

“Y’know, it’s kinda a shame you only glow when you’re really, really stressed out,” Connie murmurs out of nowhere that night, nuzzling herself even further into his side. “I bet you’d make for a nice nightlight.”

“Wait, what?” Steven responds, his words punctuated by a sudden peel of bemused laughter. He props himself up in their bed, scooting apart from her wanting embrace (she gives a pitiful but very cute little whine at this, still half-asleep) so he can actually turn to meet her eyes. “Where’s this coming from?”

If he fully understands the underlying question in his fiancé’s drowsy doozy of a comment— a comment he doubts she’d ever make while awake and alert— then she’s probably inquiring about why he never consciously utilizes even half the full potential of his power, not even recreationally.

And if he’s honest, it’s a fair question. He’s been somewhat ignoring this part of himself ever since he moved in with her late last year.

After all, it’s not like there’s much practical use for many of his abilities anymore. There’s no battles left to fight. No empires left to dismantle. No need to host those monthly healing sessions he used to organize, ever since he and the Gems bottled a large stock of his saliva for long term use. It’s nice, in a way. It’s like an extended vacation from all the stressors of this facet of his existence. Instead, he’s been able to focus all his time and energy on other stuff— like finally pursuing his GED, and doing some experimentation with some new instruments he’s never played. 

Little things.

Human things.

That glowing she speaks of, though…

The remnants of laughter fade from his lips as he refocuses his mind on this topic.

He hasn’t gone pink in weeks. It’s the longest period that’s passed without a flare up since that month his gem fell into an energy conserving stasis immediately following his meltdown in his teen years. So why is she bringing this up now? 

What’s really on her mind?

He asks as such.

This appeal for emotional honesty seems to jostle Connie out of the brunt of her drowsiness. She rubs the sleep out of her eyes with the furthest edge of her knuckles and then parts her lips again.

“It’s just… you never use them anymore,” she says, her brow creasing inwards. “Any of them. And of course I understand why, but…”

“But—?”

“But sometimes… I wish things weren’t so muddled for you. That you felt free to express yourself as both a human and a Gem in this space.”

His brows thread together as he considers all this, his confusion-addled mind looping right back to the throwaway, sleepy statement that hurtled this whole conversation into being in the first place. “So, wait— you’re saying you want me… to glow for you—?”

#jen rambles #wips

[wonder-in-wings]

TIMING: Early/Mid August LOCATION: The Beach PARTIES: Levi (@faustianbroker and Parker (@wonder-in-wings SUMMARY: During one of his enforced days off, Parker visits the beach where he encounters a shifted and very moody Leviathan. CONTENT WARNINGS: Teeth trauma Day 9. For someone who was as fond of swimming as Parker, he sure hated the beach. He and his family would go to the ones in Louisiana on occasion in his youth but every instance he spent out of the water, on the sand, clambering in and out of the car and feeling the salt from the water crusting over him like a shell of misery and needles on his skin was nightmarish. As a child he didn’t like dry sand on him, he didn’t like it getting into every crevice, how his hair felt afterwards.

His parents never told him that the swamp waters of the bayou were often similar, estuaries of fresh and saltwater creeping into the mainland though usually they were too far inward for it to really count. Parker loved swimming around their isolated chateau, finding little animals and especially bugs, which was a given by now. Occasionally he’d find a snake or even a gator. As per his mind, the young Warden was never afraid of these creatures with their sharp teeth, deadly venom and powerful musculature. These were all but memories in Parker’s mind as he sat there on the beach, having taken a small towel as though that would protect him from the awful sand even if he’d long since grown used to how it felt, deciding some odd years ago that it was unreasonable for him to find textures displeasurable. He was wearing a white linen shirt, rolled up at the sleeves and only buttoned a few times near his naval. The Warden was wearing jeans, though, as he had no intention of going into the water this time - part of him wanted to, for sure, but though the injury on his face had lent itself nicely to a pronounced scar that permanently colored his features, he didn’t want to get salt water on it. Not yet. And, of course, the strange, busy utility belt rested comfortably on his waist; he likely wasn’t ever going to leave it behind again, not after the past week and a half he’d had. It was a comfort object, something for him to know was always there, something that helped focus him. An object of security for an unstable mind. He didn’t want to risk having another unintended “meltdown” in public. Parker hated calling them that, they weren’t true but at this point, he had no idea what else to call them other than “bitch fits”, which was below him. That was a term for the disparaging illiterates online. The thought riled something up in his stomach, but he had since tried to come to terms with these inflammations of emotion and had started experimenting with temporary coping mechanisms to deal with them. Today he was clenching and unclenching a fist in a rhythmic fashion, repeating it until his insides simmered down. 

It was going fine. 

That is, until he heard someone scream. The pitch managed to puncture through his thoughts and Parker turned his head sharply in the direction of it. As it turned out, it was a woman talking to another woman and pointing worriedly to a distant part of the beach, a rocky place where no one was populating it either in the water or on the sand next to it. Instantly he felt intrigued - if she screamed and pointed, surely that meant that there could’ve been something over there, right? Perhaps a shark or even… His mind filled with curiosity at the thought that he could see a nereid, unlikely as that was. Parker got to his feet, abandoning the towel as he started to make his way over to the part that was gestured towards, finding potential in the rocky shoals and rough waves. 

—

A hulking figure had beached itself in the hard-to-reach cove, and that figure would have been thankful for the cover of high rocky walls on either side of it, if not for the anger that had driven it there in the first place. Well, anger and pain. Its muscles ached with fatigue that was not its own—it was an all-over sensation that seeped deep into the tissue, pain receptors alight as if they’d been set ablaze by some intangible, invisible instigator… which was true. It was the tether that tormented the demon, sapping it of its strength and its ability to tamp down those large, deadly emotions that it felt. The tether was the cause of its ire in every way that it could be, at this moment—it was what both inspired and allowed the wrath to run rampant. Being human in any capacity was like a lightning rod for complex and big feelings, and the demon didn’t like it. Not one bit.

Seeing what had happened to Teddy forced Leviathan to recognize what had been happening to it, and it was not on board. It’d been playing at this for too long. This ‘game’, this experiment… it was detrimental. It made Leviathan care too much. And caring, well, that was dangerous. That was foolish. 

But just because it had realized this didn’t mean it could immediately stop. So instead, the demon returned to the sea and took out its frustration on any and every human vessel it encountered, sinking them to the depths with a voracious appetite as if trying to remind itself of what it was meant to be. How it was meant to act. Unfortunately, all that destruction came with a cost—one cracked tooth that now throbbed painfully and had sent the beast into a pitiable fit. Which was when it had beached itself, and now it lay there, sides heaving, feeling too upset and sorry for itself to do anything other than bake in the sun. Its long neck and massive, dragon-like head were pushed up into the dry sand, half buried as it had thrashed about during the fit, jaws agape to keep pressure off of the aching tooth, tongue lolled onto the sand. Flippers dug deep into the wet sand beneath its chest and belly, the huge sail fin on its back quivering in the wind, and feeding tentacles flopped uselessly in the shallow water. The tail, nearly as long as the rest of the creature combined, whipped dangerously this way and that, almost like a cat displaying its anger. It moaned, the sound coming out like the thunderous, rumbling bellow of a crocodile, followed by a hiss as it pushed all the air from its lungs.

—

There were warnings in his head, warnings that told Parker that he should’ve turned around. He’d already gotten into a handful of scrapes, some of which were successful but none of them had given him the satisfaction of collecting, a validation that he craved from an unknown source. He hadn’t slept the night that he took the nymph’s tail to his workshop - he hadn’t slept the night before, either. Every attempt plunged him into an abyss of shadowed nightmares that didn’t exist, so he decided to forgo it in favor of his body crashing when it was ready. He ascended a treacherous rock wall slowly and carefully as he heard an uncomfortably loud and almost alien sound he knew was coming from the other side of the rough face he hugged. The warnings in his head were almost louder at this point but Parker kept his sleep-deprived blue eyes facing up and forwards; his biggest concern at the moment was that he didn’t grow up with this type of terrain and he was unaccustomed to it. One would’ve thought that the sound alone was enough to send shivers of terror into a reasonable mind, calling vague images of sea monsters to the forefront of the imagination. Parker had no such desire for self-preservation that outweighed his curiosity. As he climbed, eventually pulling himself over the edge, those same sleep-deprived eyes first caught sight of a gigantic, piscine sail. His breath caught in his throat at that sight but as his eyes drifted back down to see what the sail belonged to, he found himself seemingly gazing into an abyss. Surely the… creature? Anomaly? Old One? Parker wasn’t even sure how to refer to what he was looking at but he was immediately stricken with a primal fear.

The Warden had found himself on the edge, staring down at a massive abomination, a monstrosity that had been written about by Lovecraft in the throes of paranoia, the pirates who would mark such serpents on their maps. A dragon that was described in multiple religious texts. It moaned, a crocodilian hiss that was all too familiar in Parker’s mind though he couldn’t be sure what it meant. This was a powerful beast his curiosity had willed him to find, and it seemed beached. Surely it wasn’t dying…? Eyeing the long, almost recognizable whip-like tail as it flickered not unlike that of… well, an irritated jaguar, he pulled his legs over the edge and, incredibly foolishly, started to slide down the rock face, effectively placing him into the den of the leviathan creature. Whatever warnings that Parker had rattling around in his brain were falling on half-deaf ears. He was there now, at the mercy of the beached serpent.

—

It picked up on the human’s presence before it saw them, but that mattered little. What was a mouse to an apex predator, even in this state? What danger could any of them really present? It left the creature with room to be dramatic, room to play for pity. It would be amusing, if not for the very real sense of desperation that ran through the cold, dark marble of the Leviathan’s heart like thick veins of gold, all sparkling and enticing and ready to turn brother against brother, father against son. 

So it simply continued to lay there, sucking in another deep breath and letting its eyes roll in their sockets as they followed the human down the cliffside until his feet met the warm sand. 

Then, the sea demon lifted its head, pulling that sand-caked tongue back into its long jaws as it shut them gently, craning its neck to look at the human. Fuck, it was tired. Even the burden of holding its head up was too much to weather, and the demon let it drop to the beach again, blasting air and seawater out of its nostrils as it blinked its many small eyes in the human’s direction. The weight of its own skull pulled by gravity down onto the broken tooth sent waves of pain through its whole head and neck and it bellowed again, electing to just keep the jaws parted as it rolled onto its side. 

Whatever that person was doing here, they could get their fill of spectacle and then fuck right off, it figured. No one would believe him, anyway. No one sane. And those that did believe, well, they’d know better than to fuck around, else they find out. 

Another low whine escaped the creature’s chest as it continued to feel very sorry for itself, angry at the stupid metal for cracking its tooth rather than feeling foolish for throwing such a tantrum in the first place. It was well within reason to be upset, wasn’t it? Teddy had nearly died and now it needed to find a way to end their shared power before Teddy managed to do something even worse and cause irreparable damage. Not unlike this tooth. Fuck’s sake. 

—

Parker wasn’t on the sandy shore for long when the great beast lifted its giant head just long enough to regard him before letting it fall again, another roar tearing the air. Its head on the ground sent a tremor through both it and the Warden and he instinctively lifted his hand to cover his good ear, protecting what hearing he had left from the terrifying sound. He should’ve been afraid. And maybe he was. But contrary to every other instance he’d experienced up until this point, the ones with shifters, fae, humans, himself, Parker felt he must’ve gone so far in one direction that it looped back around to him keeping himself calm and controlled. He breathed deeply, shielding his face from the sea sprayed air that the leviathan exhaled but otherwise very slowly making his way towards the massive beast. He wasn’t sure why he kept advancing. Maybe this would be where the Collector, the broken son of the Wright Warden Legacy would meet his end. Even beached, half-buried in the sand and flopping about like a dying animal, the man knew that absolutely nothing he could have attempted to do would’ve been enough to keep the serpent from effortlessly killing him. As he approached, holding one hand to his ear and the other hand protecting the lower half of his face, Parker felt something tugging in his chest, something that he was sure wasn’t the case. He was reminded of an alligator with its reptilian maw, the way it hissed, the teeth that were the size of Parker’s torso as they clacked pitifully against each other. The Warden seemed smaller than the dragon’s tongue, and yet he didn’t feel fear pulling at him as he now stood close enough to feel the temperature of the scaled skin that stretched across the titanic skull, but still very visible to the beast’s many-eyed gaze. “You’re in pain.” It didn’t sound right, not really, not compared to something of that magnitude and magnificence, but the sentence still tumbled out of Parker’s mouth. He was reminded of an alligator… one that he found with the splinters of a harpoon lodged in its jaw, similar in behavior and evoking a very small, but intimate part of the Warden’s recently reawakened emotions.

—

Black blood ran along its gray tongue, oozing slowly from the injured tooth. That same blood coated the inside of Leviathan’s gargantuan mouth, turning the purplish, blueish, grayish landscape into that of a pitch black night sky on the verge of splitting open to release a powerful storm. 

Those seafoam green eyes fixed themselves on the human, and the beast chuffed miserably, kicking sand into the air with the force of the blast from its maw. 

Very astute, it chided, the voice coming from nowhere and everywhere all at once, ringing in the human’s head rather than actually carrying itself upon soundwaves. It sounded like the promise of pain; guttural and animalistic and old, if such a thing could be conveyed by voice alone. 

Have you come to gawk, then? Or perhaps you intend to run off and tell everyone what you’ve seen? What could they do in the face of such power? Nothing, it knew. Nothing, yet it still felt that nagging irritation at the idea of having to slither back into the sea because its alone-time had been interrupted by a gaggle of rubberneckers. 

—

It was then that Parker heard a chorus of voices hammering in his head, all saying the same thing but clear, not marred by his deficient hearing. It was deep, it was resonant, it sent an involuntary pulse of primal panic through the Warden’s frame as it felt as though he were injected with the words instead of given them for him to listen to or not of his own volition. He could only assume that whatever this creature was, it had the power of telepathy, something completely and utterly alien to the man, who until very recently kept his thoughts and emotions under lock and key. A blast door rusted shut with age and neglect. 

Suffice to say, since that blast door rusted shut with age and neglect had since been ripped open without his consent, the shiver of fear as the beast projected its words into his head, shook him violently and Parker had to breathe through his mouth to keep from either turning and climbing back up the rocky wall as fast as he possibly could or passing out on the spot from the pressure. He took a deep breath and felt his brow twitch as he regarded the leviathan, looking into its numerous eyes with his simple two. “Neither.” He said, unable to hide the tremor that carried itself in his tone despite giving the monster a look that showed no fear at all. The dragon could implant its voice into Parker’s head, surely it knew the adrenaline that coursed through his body but he was determined to push through it, not give in the fear, the emotions. He took a step forward as his mother’s voice soothed his mind, a calming presence after the thunderous voice of what he could only assume was a god or a demon. ‘My son, be gentle for me’. It was the same voice he heard when he got into the altercation with Felix. Parker… wasn’t a murderer, he was a collector. He wasn’t a gawker, he was observant. He wasn’t a gossip, he was incredibly private. He didn’t like the insinuation that he was here to gawk or run and tell other people; they were cowards. They didn’t have the courage to do what Parker did, scale the wall to find Dagon on the other side. They didn’t get to relish in the splendor of the sea beast, wither under its scrutinizing gaze, be made acutely aware of their own scope in relation to what existed out there. It was… humbling. He hated it but he couldn’t reject it as it sent waves of humility, fear, and anger through his body. “I…” He sighed softly, more of a breath than an expulsion of air. “Don’t suppose there’s anything I can do to…” Parker swallowed, the smell of blood in his nose. “Help.”

—

Curious. The stranger wanted to help. 

The division between the beast and the human visage it wore had always been pronounced—when it played house, it took on human behaviors. The more time it spent living that life, the easier assimilation became, and the beast was almost forgotten, at times. Until the sea called to it, until tentacles reached up to grasp the demon by the ankles and drag it back below the waves where it belonged. 

As it was now, it lost sight of the human aspects it had adopted over the years. It forgot, in a way, what it was to be human, until it assumed that form once more. And the longer it remained inhuman, the colder and more distant it became. After so much time resigning itself to the sea, Leviathan was more like its true self than anyone in this town had ever known it to be. Even Teddy, who called the being father, had always managed to conjure up its tender side. One that simply would not have existed if not for their connection. As it had looked upon the babe those many years ago, it had been pure curiosity that had driven its actions.

Over time, curiosity turned to affection.

Now it turned to something else. 

That unwavering, piercing gaze held the man’s form in its sights for many long seconds after he had finished speaking, as if weighing the offer to see how much of it was truth. There was no reason for the man to speak falsehoods, he could simply run if he felt so inclined, yet he did not. And so, it decided to humor him. What would help? Remove the offending body part. 

Cut it out, it hissed inside his head, the voice rolling over itself like an echo of the ocean’s waves that lapped at its hindquarters. The tooth. It opened its mouth wider, righting its head and rolling back onto its belly to make gaining access easier. Deep in the creature’s maw was a fang that had a fracture running from base to tip, slicked in black blood and, if the human would crawl into the jaws of death to inspect it, would wiggle in its spot with a gentle push. 

—

The rumbling of the serpent’s voices in Parker’s head was expected this time and while it still unsettled his mind, he now had a response to his inquiry and surprisingly enough, it wasn’t a bellow to get out of the sight of the dragon, to turn and flee as he was told for having long worn out his welcome by virtue of existing in the same space as it. Instead, it spoke to him again, telling him to cut it out. Fortunately, the creature specified what he wanted for the Warden to ‘cut out’ as before, it was a nebulous instruction. He was reminded of those times he’d bothered his brother. ‘Cut it out’, he said, referring to the younger Warden’s questions.  The monster’s jaw opened further and Parker took a few small steps back as the beast adjusted its head, appearing like the mouth of a cave as the words were sent to the man’s mind. A tooth. His eyes weren’t gifted in the ways that other hunters were but even in the darkened maw of the leviathan, he managed to easily find the supposed afflicted tooth - in the back, coated in black blood that gave it a glisten and it appeared abyssal. Split with herculean effort and the sight alone sent an all-too-human pang through the man.

Daring to venture closer, Parker cast a quick glance up into the seafoam eyes once more and he placed his hands on the lower jaw of the beast. “Okay.” He exhaled, finding the blood mixed with the monster’s breath unpleasant to his senses and he was nauseated by it but he pressed forward. It was a daunting sight and an even more impossible task - he was effectively told that he could help by climbing into the mouth of an ancient sea beast and removing one of its teeth. He’d read books, listened to fairy tales, this was a bad idea waiting to happen, a burning building he knew someone was inside of.

‘Parker, I understand the way you are. Which is why these moments of grace are so important to me.’ 

It wasn’t the screaming of alarms in his body telling him to run that he listened to. It was the gentle call of his mother, the siren in her own right who possessed the incredible ability to be both beautiful and deadly. She could hunt fae with the best of them, once having a higher kill count than his father even. And then, her blood-soaked hands could cup Parker’s face in them immediately after to soothe him, tell him that he was going to be okay when she found him with tears on his face for no reason he could comprehend. It was the gentle call of his mother and her elegance that pushed Parker to lift himself into the gaping, toothy opening of the leviathan, pushing through the nausea and overwhelming fear and futility in trying to figure out how the hell he was supposed to remove a tooth from a giant. He had tools, but was he willing to risk using them if one wrong move, one cut with his blade against a nerve could mean a quick and painful death? He wondered how loose the thing was; he wondered how deep the root ran. “I have sedatives.” He said aloud once he was in the mouth, treading slowly and carefully across the giant, sand-covered tongue. “Do you think those would help?” He asked, very much doubting that they’d be of any use at all; they were powerful but the serpent was decidedly hundreds of times bigger than anything else he’d used them on before.

—

They could… possibly numb. They both knew that nothing the human had would come close to putting it to sleep, but there was a small chance that whatever sedatives he carried might double as a local anesthetic. Or maybe not, but it wasn’t like it would hurt to try. Use them. We will see. 

It paused in its breathing, allowing the man a moment of quiet as he walked carefully across its tongue. … I will not eat you, it added, knowing that its word probably meant very little to someone in such a compromised position. I just want the ache to cease. 

Truly, it was bizarre that the man hadn’t run for his life like those that had seen Leviathan swimming here had. That probably earned some curiosity. 

… why do you help?

—

Inside the mouth, presumably in a place where the gargantuan entity couldn’t see him (unless it either had omniscience or eyes on the inside), Parker wordlessly nodded in affirmation. He wasn’t sure why, but he somehow trusted the rumbling voices in his head. He reached the tooth carefully, the seal-like tongue strange under his steel-toed boots, his hand clenching with a reflexive desire not to get the texture of the inky black blood on his palm; on a good day, on a normal day, it was something to be disregarded, closed down after the briefest of spikes of irrational anger on his skin. Today, Parker took an unintentionally shaky breath and he placed the same hand that had clenched moments before on the surface of the tooth, rubbing his fingers against the surface and wiping away the pitch blood to get a feel for the texture of the bone beneath. Surprisingly to him, the tooth seemed to move fractionally; that was good, that meant it might be easier for him to pull. Quickly coming to the realization that his entire outfit was going to be effectively destroyed because of the thick black liquid that oozed from the gums of the leviathan, his clean hand reached for the needle-like daggers that were looped on his belt. He pulled all four of them out and bundled them up together. “I don’t know.” Parker replied bluntly at first and that was his honest answer; the reason behind his spontaneous, uncharacteristic act of kindness wasn’t immediately evident to the Warden. “...I’m emotionally unstable.” He admitted afterwards, opting out of any veiled comments or insinuations. Turning the cluster of daggers over briefly, he glanced up at the gum of the tooth, which was above his head but swollen enough that he would be able to get all of the daggers in. “I’m going to attempt the sedatives.” He announced then, without waiting for further thought to interrupt it, he reached up and plunged the four daggers into the inflamed flesh at the base of the tooth.

—

Emotionally unstable? Leviathan would have laughed, if not for the everything of this situation. What had spurred the upset, the ache in its jaw, the anger it felt over having to leave when it didn’t want to—these things did not lend themselves to a good sense of humor. Still, it appreciated the candid response.

I see. There was a pause and the sail on its back twitched at the feeling of the tooth being jostled, but the jaws did not move. I suppose I am feeling similarly. The human announced his intent to administer the sedatives, and Leviathan braced itself… but the blades were too small to really be felt. It was more like a pinch than anything. 

Settling in, the demon wished it had found a boulder to set between its teeth so it did not have to hold its mouth open for so long.

Oh. If you require light… Spots along the roof of its mouth and down its throat suddenly illuminated on command, casting a blueish green glow that mirrored the color of its eyes. There was more on its outside that glowed as well, but that mattered not for the task at hand. If you have sedatives… do you have other tools on hand that will assist in the extraction? And for what purpose, it wondered, though it figured that question could come after the human was no longer standing upon its tongue. 

—

It was easy for the mind to fill in the spaces where there was nothing for means of processing information. Likewise, Parker supposed the mind also did that when it came to relativity; he was anticipating a much larger reaction to four needles in the beast’s heated flesh but then again, his daggers were small even by “dagger” standards, not to mention he was literally standing in the mouth of Jormungandr. Standing. As a man over six feet tall. When the beast agreed, in a sense, Parker felt himself wondering what arcane horrors could serve as a rough equivalent to drive an ancient sea beast into emotional instability. …Of course, this was assuming that it was something that could even be comprehended by him. He realized how stupid he must’ve sounded and he had to pause in his observation for several moments that seemed impossibly long, breathing heavily through his mouth and squeezing his eyes shut to push the embarrassment out of his mind. “Seems like we’re both having bad days.” He said, knowing full well that their situations could hardly be compared but as he was between the jaws of a great serpent, feeling very human even with his emotions swinging out of control, he attempted to form some semblance of a connection. It was unusual for him. And he wasn’t good at it. But he could hear his mother’s gentle coaxing in his mind all the same and that seemed to push him more towards trying to help, get through the day ideally in one piece. The leviathan mentioned lights and no sooner had it than the cavern that served as its mouth was illuminated in a seafoam glow. Parker’s pupils shrunk to black pinpricks in the icy blue as he grimaced slightly from the change in brightness but he recovered quickly enough, giving himself just a moment to glance around at where he was standing - the rows of jagged teeth, the blood that oozed from the root, the massive, seal-like tongue that Parker lightly tread upon, and further in he could see an alien esophagus. ‘Do you have other tools that will assist in extraction?’ The serpent’s voice rumbled in Parker’s head as the latter got a better look at the cracked bone; it was loose and not entirely wedged up in the gum but still, he wasn’t sure if the demon’s physiology was closer to a gator’s or a human. How far up was the root? He sighed quietly, his shoulders visibly slumping. “I have a knife.” He replied. “I don’t think it’s going to help, though. I’m just going to pull.” As he spoke, the fear that lined his voice was still there but it took a back seat to conviction. If he was going to die in the mouth of the sea monster, at least he was going to die trying to make something less miserable, for whatever good that did him. And that was unusual coming from him. “Let me know when you’re ready.” He said as his eyes danced over the tooth, seeing where he could wedge his hands to get some leverage.

—

Bad week. Bad month? It’s a blur. Its tone had shifted somewhat, taking on the silhouette of something more conversational and less direct and demanding, but that shadow still very much belonged to a creature of unfathomable age, experience, and cruelty. 

And in spite of this, it lay docile on the beach. In spite of this, it dug those flippers deeper into the sand, many eyes rolling up to look at the sky overhead as the man in its mouth informed it that he was going to pull until it came loose. Fantastic. 

Ready. As it would ever be, it supposed. It could feel small nudges here and there, points of mild pressure as fingers pressed against gums, searching for a spot to grip. They found it near the back of the tooth, where it had been pushed out of alignment and popped slightly free of its home—painful as anything. The sedatives had helped a bit, but there was still a sharp stab of pain as the man found purchase and tugged as hard as he could. Leviathan growled, deep and instinctual and ferocious, but its jaws remained open and it let Parker continue with his work, eyes squinting shut again. 

Blood seeped from the wound and the blackened tongue beneath Parker’s feet flexed in pain with each wretched tug. It was being vocal, that much was certain, but it was determined not to bite down, no matter how badly it wished to. 

Parker pulled, Leviathan bellowed, and finally, finally the damn thing ripped free. The beast lifted its head and angled its dragon-like snout down toward the sand, depositing Parker and the broken tooth on the beach before it closed those jaws again, hissing out a long breath that sent blood splattering in every direction. It shook its head like a dog trying to rid itself of a bee sting, shifting its weight in the sand before craning that long neck around to splash its head down into the shallow water. This seemed to soothe it, and the beast stilled save for the heaving of its massive chest. The bioluminescent parts of it seemed to dim and brighten in tune with its breathing, mouth opening again to let the seawater in to rinse away the mess. 

Thank you. It heaved a weary, trembling sigh, tail whipping through the air before splashing back in deeper water. Whoever you are.

—

It said it was ready and Parker didn’t hold himself back as his hands found as good of a grip as they were going to get given the circumstances, which he wasn’t sure he was either able or willing to explain to anyone; how would he? With them in position, he gulped starting pulling with every fiber of his being. Immediately, he felt it shift though it was obviously deep enough that it wasn’t going to be deterred in one fell motion. The serpent rumbled in a guttural growl that sent involuntary shivers through the Warden but he used that to his advantage; fear was a motivator and he told himself that if he stopped for any reason, he was going to die. So he coiled himself up and pulled again, virtually throwing himself down so intensely that he thought he was going to dislocate one or both of his arms. The growling turned into roaring, the sound pulsing and pounding in Parker’s deficient head and he felt a swirl of emotions that somehow, he managed to stave off. The ‘ground’ beneath him grew unsteady, his arms were becoming coated and slicked with thick black blood. The beast’s deep-throated bellows rang and the culmination of everything threatened to send the man into a shutdown but he didn’t. He couldn’t. ‘Just pull, boy. Wrights don’t freeze up.’ 

By the end of it, Parker had almost gotten into the position of someone doing pull-ups, using his weight, dangling from the tooth as the dragon’s tongue was moving too much under him for him to feel as though he were able to use an anchor. With a final heave, feeling the muscles rippling beneath his blood-smeared arms, the tooth was wrenched free with a root-snapping ‘clchk’ and he landed roughly on his back in the wet mouth of the demon, holding a cracked, bloodied tooth that was roughly the size of his torso. It was all he could do to curl around it as immediately the serpent moved with him in it and it dumped him onto the sand. For a few agonizingly long moments, he lay there on the beach among the blood, saliva and sand that clung to every part of him, his blackened arms tightly wrapped around the fang (though he knew better) and gasping for air. The leviathan hissed and Parker felt himself being sprayed with yet more pitch, taking each unpleasant fleck as confirmation that he wasn’t actually dead. The deafening expulsions of air from a monster in pain were drowned out by the droning of the aftermath of an explosion that now buzzed in his head. The creature moved, he remained still and soon enough it settled, leaving the two of them quiet, save their respective breathing.

It took the great serpent speaking in his head again for Parker to be yanked out of whatever coping dissociation he’d unintentionally fallen into to avoid the overwhelming conflict of textures and sensations he was experiencing. His eyes opened as he was pulled back to the present and he felt tears trailing down his temples, mixing with the inky blood as they got into his messy brown hair. And only adding to his whirlwind of emotions, the pendulum swinging wildly was the ancient beast, the creature he knew wasn’t from a perceptible reality that he could remotely recognize, thanked him. His expression softened. He went from looking bewilderingly up at the bright blue sky as though it were twisting and shifting before his very eyes in an apocalyptic endeavor to accepting what it was. It was just the sky. It was just the sky and he was just Parker and the leviathan just thanked him out of some human obligation. And that was fine. The Warden didn’t like thank-yous but he was so– ‘Overstimulated. That’s what it’s called sometimes, bro. We’ve talked about this.’ Parker loathed such terminology, especially when applied to him but perhaps… it held some truth to it sometimes. He gulped and his mouth lolled open for a second or two. “...You’re welcome.” The sentence had so rarely been uttered that it came out as a cracked mutter, unpracticed and uncertain. His eyes fluttered closed, his breathing falling more under control; deeper, more even, actually giving him oxygen. He still held the tooth in a deathgrip - he’d have to be killed before he’d relinquish such a treasure, even if Parker didn’t know what it belonged to. The Warden wasn’t sure what was keeping him conscious, feeling a lull wanting to pull him in a false sense of security, the safety of falling asleep after so many nights of not being granted such a luxury. Would he dream, at long last? Would he recognize the nightmare as the world-spanning serpent? He couldn’t know. “Whoever you are.” 

—

It watched the man for a moment before sliding itself backward into deeper and deeper water, head held flush with the waves, mouth still agape to allow the rinsing to continue. The sail on its back rose high into the air as it flexed to its full height, shivering in the strong winds that gusted over the ocean water.  It saw the way he clung to the tooth, and chuffed to itself. Enjoy your prize, Leviathan pressed into his mind, sinking itself beneath the water. And pray we do not meet again. And with that, it was gone. Off like a shot to its private little island to lurk in the cover of fog until it felt ready to come ashore once more.

#wickedswriting #writing // Aesop's Fables #writing with // Leviathan #teeth trauma tw