#jesus fucking christ that ending is bleak

[homophyte]

well i finished reading the de-loused story booklet

#the mars volta #jesus fucking christ that ending is bleak #idk if anyone else came away with that impression but #the whole of it is so out there that the final piece just...dragging your forcibly into #remembering that its abt a real persons real suicide is just really heartbreaking #i think it is a worthwhile question to ask like. does deloused (story and album) #work as a memorial to julio venegas #does it memorialize. does it do so in a way thats befitting #and honestly i went into reading it thinking 'no' but ive come away with a different impression #theres nuance in it but the gut punch of how barebones the last part is compared to the rest imo make a commentary on them #on the need to like. commodify death into something eclectic and enjoyable and intellectually stimulating and sufficiently weird #but then in the end its just a death. its a very painfully real death. #you dont get 'resolution' on what happens when he 'goes back' because theres no such thing. he dies #and then like....taking that in concert with ambuletz? as a piece separate from the album but functioning as its closer? whoof #its distressing and sad and real in ways i hadnt thought it attribute to the album itself before #and it kinda makes it all the more sad that the selling point of the album is 'morphine and rat poison' #that very knee jerk morbid fascination is exactly what it winds up critiquing #even as some of the earlier parts perpetuate it by being graphic in certain ways and like. trying to hook you on those points #idk its interesting im glad i read it. i may yet again #frances remains my main interest and im glad for it bc i think to a certain extent tearing into deloused with that kind of zealous rigor #is disrespectful to the very dead it seeks to show respect #uhm anyway back to being normal

[vilelittlecritter]

Reading dreamscape and this shit is good.

Like, too good.

Like I am enjoying this way too much kind of good.

#omori dreamscape au #omori #omori au #i new it was going to be depressing but jesus christ this is downright heartbreaking at points... #everything is so fucking bleak. i love it #also should i be concerned if i agree with someone of the points that the very clearly mentally unwell people are making? #(reality is just a bleak nightmare) bruh same. or it might just be because i live in Scotland and everything is FUCKING GRAY #anyway is very good 👍 #i might actually write my own au... #it would probably be the Off x Omori au ive been thinking about but i dont want to just write off but omori #of course its a fusion but i want to still have it be its own story set in a similar world and style as Off #like Omori is still the purifier but the reason why aswell as their thoughts about it and end goal are different #is confusing but I'll fix the idea and if it makes any sense I'll try write it if anyone's interested

[spottedside]

laying in bed thinking

#one gripe i still have with the little shop movie is the dentist. #just him in general but especially his death #its very quick compared to that intense musical number #the musical number conveys that slow descent into death via asphyxiation #and makes you think how seymour couldve shot him in the head and been done #but he didnt want the blame. so instead he let him have a really cruel death instead #just sat and watched. and that tension and death is so amazingly conveyed in the musical #and in the movie he just falls over and they exchange a couple sentences instead #and i get the tone of the movie was lighter but jesus fucking christ #the plot is still crazy and everything is still there #its just so downplayed its such a missed opportunity #especially since they were originally going for that bleak ending that doesnt follow the rest of the movies tone #so just make it a darker movie?? #im sorry guys its been on my mind

[peachesofteal]

you satisfy the urge to see Ghost with little babies and simultaneously make me want more of him with little babies

Light on - single mom/neighbor fic Simon Riley/female reader

He sleeps like the dead on and off for the almost three days.

Uninterrupted, undisturbed, face buried in a pillow, television cranked as loud as he can get away with, the noise one of the only things capable of lulling him to sleep and keeping him under when he’s not on an op or in an active engagement zone. He gets up to eat, use the bathroom or shower, climb the four floors to the roof to smoke, but otherwise, he sleeps. He eats, and sleeps, and repeats this very simple routine, as he always does when he’s here, until it’s interrupted one night, by the tap of a hesitant knock on his door.

The sound freezes his blood, every nerve ending in his body lighting up in alert, muscles priming for an offensive position. He finds the one of many guns stashed in the flat on his way to open the door, mask slipping over his face, holding the weapon tucked carefully behind his body as he looks through the peephole to find… you. The girl from the roof, the baby, Emmaline, in your arms, your eyes nervously darting down the hallway before looking back to his door expectantly. Shit.

“I’m sorry.” You rush out immediately when he opens it, peering up at him with exhausted eyes. Emma is against your chest, and one of your hands cradles her head, the other under her bum, while you bounce her up and down while also rocking back and forth. “I don’t mean to be a pain in the arse but, is there any way I can ask you to turn your TV volume down a bit?” You try to smile but it straightens into a grimace and then your eyes dart to the ground before looking back up at him. “We uh, share a wall.” You tilt your head to the left, to the unit next to his and his eyes widen. “I’m so sorry. I don’t mean to bother you, I’m not trying to be that neighbor but-“ Jesus Christ. You share a wall with him? His mind drifts to an image of you asleep in your bed, tucked up under your covers all sweet, lashes laying delicately on your cheeks.

“Of course. It’s not a bother.” The baby cries in response, a broken wail making her lower lip tremble and you pat her back soothingly until she quiets, little hiccups coming from her mouth while she rubs her face into your shirt.

“Thank you.” You’re still bouncing, still swaying, and he’s mystified, watching you stroke a gentle finger through her fine curls. She yawns sleepily against you, and the tension leaks from your body a bit, spine slumping slightly, shoulders relaxing a notch. You look down at her, checking for something he doesn’t understand, before raising your radiant, tired face back up to his. He really, really wishes he wasn’t holding a handgun behind his back right now. “They told me, when I rented… that you weren’t around much. I thought it’d be a good fit since…” you gesture with an eyebrow towards Emmaline, and he nods.

“I travel for work.” His voice sounds more raspy than normal, a byproduct of too much sleep, something you look like you’d probably kill to have. Fuck. He’s been blasting his television while you’ve been up with a screaming baby for two bleedin’ days.

“Right, well I hope we won’t be too noisy for you, when you are home.” A door slams on third floor above the two of you, the bang of it swinging shut too loud and you tense, something bleak flickering across your face before it’s chased away with a half-forced smile. “Anyway… thanks, again.”

“Of course.” He repeats it, like it’s obvious, and then just as you turn away, he remembers something: “I’m Simon.” You glance back at him, timid smile tugging at your lips, your own name falling from your mouth like you’re giving him a gift.

“Oh, and you know Emmaline already.” You lightly tease, and he nods, his own lips lifting in an almost smile behind the mask in response.

#peaches asks #peaches writes #simon riley #simon riley x reader #simon ghost riley #simon ghost riley x reader #light on

[batmanisagatewaydrug]

every single book I read in 2022. all 129 of them.

jesus christ

let's start with the best of the best; everything else will get listed beneath the read more because I'm not an animal. even just picking out my favorites is honestly probably going to get pretty lengthy, even though I'm trying to keep the synopses short.

batmanisagatewaydrug's noteworthy books of 2022

Complaint! (Sara Ahmed, 2021) - necessary for anyone doing diversity work in higher education, tbh

America is Not the Heart (Elaine Castillo, 2018) - achingly gorgeous novel of heartbreak and healing.

The School for Good Mothers (Jessamine Chan, 2022) - honestly? I feel very good calling this my favorite book of the entire year. sensitive, smart, chilling.

Black Feminist Thought (Patricia Hill Collins, 1990) - truly ashamed to say I didn't read this sooner. Collins' clear-eyed analysis remains crazily spot-on 30+ years later.

Hurts So Good: The Science and Pleasure of Pain on Purpose (Leigh Cowart, 2021) - I read this book so early in 2022 and literally have not stopped thinking about it since.

Batman: King Tut's Tomb (Nunzio DeFillippis, Christina Weir, José Luis García-López, and Kevin Nowlan, 2009) - dare I say the most fun I had with a comic all year.

You Made a Fool of Death with Your Beauty (Akwaeke Emezi, 2022) - a romance unlike any other. queer, fun, sexy, bold as hell, and joyfully life-affirming.

The Dangers of Smoking in Bed (Mariana Enríquez, trans. Megan McDowell, 2021) - DELICIOUSLY creepy short stories that will lurk in your brain forever.

Lesser Known Monsters of the 21st Century (Kim Fu, 2022) - if a more perfect short story collection exists I am yet to find it.

The World We Make (N.K. Jemisin, 2022) - I normally hesitate to include sequels on a list like this, but god DAMN Jemisin is the queen of modern spec fic for a reason.

We Do This 'Til We Free Us: Abolitionist Organizing and Transforming Justice (Mariame Kaba, edited by Tamara K. Nopper, 2021) - excellent collection of Kaba's abolitionist writings, drawing on years of organizing experience and wisdom.

Jade City (Fonda Lee, 2017) - look out! new favorite doorstopper fantasy series alert!

Priestdaddy (Patricia Lockwood, 2017) - about the best damn memoir I've ever read. heartbreaking and hysterical in turns, poetry the whole way through.

Batman: The Long Halloween and Batman: Dark Victory (Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale, 1996 and 1999) - it's always so exciting when something much-hyped lives up to the hype in every way. Batman at his grim and moody Batmaniest with a Gotham that’s deliciously bleak.

Station Eleven (Emily St. John Mandel, 2014) - I didn't think I'd like this book much at all, then ended up proposing on the second date. oops!

I'm Glad My Mom Died (Jennette McCurdy, 2022) - you will also be glad McCurdy's mom died, and also experience every other known human emotion along the way.

Kaikeyi (Vaishnavi Patel, 2022) - SPLENDID mythology retelling + political fantasy.

My Body (Emily Ratajkowski, 2022) - haunting haunting haunting personal essays about Ratajkowski's life as a model and subsequent alienation from her own body.

Batman: Bruce Wayne, Murderer? (Greg Rucka et al, 2002) - genuinely what can I say I'm a messy bitch and I love when the Bats are having a terrible time.

The Batman Adventures Vol. 2 #1-17 (created by Dan Slott, Ty Templeton, Rick Burchett, Terry Beatty, and Bruce Timm, 2003) - a continuation of the Batman: The Animated Series universe that frankly just fucking rules.

Little Rabbit (Alyssa Songsiridej, 2022) - a potent and erotic adult coming of age story.

The Right to Sex: Feminism in the Twenty-First Century (Amia Srinivasan, 2021) - thorny, difficult, vital essays.

Fearing the Black Body: The Racial Origins of Fat Phobia (Sabrina Strings, 2019) - jaw-droppingly thorough research into the role of fatpobia played and plays in the project of race-making.

On Earth We're Briefly Gorgeous (Ocean Vuong, 2019) - yeah so it turns out no one was REMOTELY exaggerating. Vuong really is That Good.

Hench (Natalie Zina Walschots, 2020) - wild fun with a ruthless protagonist and her sex villainous beetle man boss; what more could you ask for?

Love Your Asian Body: AIDS Activism in Los Angeles (Eric C. Wat, 2021) - learning about queer history makes me feel like I’m holding something so vibrant and fragile and precious right in my little queer hand. this book is an emotional journey in such a shining way.

Never Have I Ever (Isabel Yap, 2021) - EXCITING short story collection centered on girls having Just The Weirdest Time.

and everybody else:

fiction:

Light From Uncommon Stars (Ryka Aoki, 2021)

Our Wives Under the Sea (Julia Armfield, 2022)

A Tiny Upward Shove (Melissa Chadburn, 2022)

A Prayer for the Crown-Shy (Becky Chambers, 2022)

Disorientation (Elaine Hsieh Chou, 2022)

The Laws of the Skies (Grégoire Courtois, trans. Rhonda Mullins, 2019)

The Monster Baru Cormorant (Seth Dickinson, 2018)

The Tyrant Baru Cormorant (Seth Dickinson, 2020)

Greenland (David Santos Donaldson, 2022)

Dead Collections (Isaac Fellman, 2022)

The Halloween Moon (Joseph Fink, 2021)

A Dowry of Blood (S.T. Gibson)

Nightmare Alley (William Lindsay Gresham, 1946)

The Vegetarian (Han Kang, trans. Deborah Smith, 2015)

The Metamorphosis (Franz Kafka, trans. William Aaltonen, 1915)

Before the Coffee Gets Cold (Toshikazu Kawaguchi, trans. Geoffrey Trousselot, 2019)

Woman, Eating (Claire Kohda, 2022)

Long Division (Kiese Laymon, 2014)

Jade War (Fonda Lee, 2019)

No One is Talking About This (Patricia Lockwood, 2021)

Portrait of a Thief (Grace D. Li, 2022)

Elatsoe (Darcie Little Badger, 2020)

A Snake Falls to Earth (Darcie Little Badger, 2021)

Glitterati (Oliver K. Longmead)

Gideon the Ninth (Tamsyn Muir, 2019)

Harrow the Ninth (Tamsyn Muir, 2020)

Nona the Ninth (Tamsyn Muir, 2022)

The Memory Police (Yoko Ogawa, trans. Stephen Snyder, 2019)

Even Though I Knew the End (C.L. Polk, 2022)

100 Boyfriends (Brontez Purnell, 2021)

Flowers for the Sea (Zin E. Rocklyn, 2021)

Any Way the Wind Blows (Rainbow Rowell, 2021)

Interview with the Vampire (Anne Rice, 1976)

Aristotle and Dante Discover the Secrets of the Universe (Benjamin Alire Sáenz, 2012)

Aristotle and Dante Dive Into the Waters of the World (Benjamin Alire Sáenz, 2022)

Into the Riverlands (Nghi Vo, 2022)

Siren Queen (Nghi Vo, 2022)

Strange Beasts of China (Yan Ge, trans. Jeremy Tiang, 2020)

short story collections:

The Memory Librarian: And Other Stories of Dirty Computer (Janelle Monáe, Yohanco Delgado, Eva L. Ewing, Alaya Dawn Johnson, Danny Lore, and Sheree Renée Thomas, 2022)

Walking on Cowrie Shells (Nana Nkweti, 2021)

Terminal Boredom (Izumi Suzuki, trans. Polly Barton, Sam Bett, David Boyd, Daniel Joseph, Aiko Masubuchi, and Helen O’Horan, 2021)

nonfiction:

Gender Trouble: Feminism and the Subversion of Identity (Judith Butler, 1990)

How to Read Now (Elaine Castillo, 2022)

Playing the Whore: The Work of Sex Work (Melissa Gira Grant, 2014)

What We Don't Talk About When We Talk About Fat (Aubrey Gordon, 2020)

White Tears/Brown Scars: How White Feminism Betrays Women of Color (Ruby Hamad, 2020)

Belly of the Beast: The Politics of Anti-Fatness as Anti-Blackness (Da'Shaun L. Harrison, 2021)

Some of My Best Friends: Essays on Lip Service (Tajja Isen, 2022)

One Day We'll All Be Dead and None of This Will Matter (Scaachi Koul, 2017)

How to Slowly Kill Yourself and Others in America (Revised Edition) (Kiese Laymon, 2020)

Sister Outsider (Audre Lorde, 1984)

Conversations with People Who Hate Me: 12 Lessons I Learned from Talking to Internet Strangers (Dylan Marron, 2022)

Cultish: The Language of Fanaticism (Amanda Montell, 2021)

World of Wonders: In Praise of Fireflies, Whale Sharks, and Other Astonishments (Aimee Nezhukumatathil)

Histories of the Transgender Child (Jules Gill-Peterson, published as Julian Gill-Peterson, 2018)

Yoke: My Yoga of Self-Acceptance (Jessamyn Stanley, 2021)

A Queer History of Fashion: From the Closet to the Catwalk (edited by Valerie Steele, 2013)

Transgender History: The Roots of Today's Revolution (Revised Edition) (Susan Stryker, 2008)

The End of Policing (Alex S. Vitale, 2017)

The Trouble With Normal: Sex, Politics, and the Ethics of Queer Life (Michael Warner, 1999)

Read My Lips: Sexual Subversions and the End of Gender (Riki Wilchins, published as Riki Anne Wilchins, 1997)

poetry:

Short Talks (Anne Carson, 1992)

Content Warning: Everything (Akwaeke Emezi, 2022)

Prelude to Bruise (Saeed Jones, 2014)

Alive at the End of the World (Saeed Jones, 2022)

Bright Dead Things (Ada Limón, 2015)

Motherland Fatherland Homelandsexuals (Patricia Lockwood, 2014)

Nature Poem (Tommy Pico, 2017)

Night Sky with Exit Wounds (Ocean Vuong, 2016)

Time Is a Mother (Ocean Vuong, 2022)

comics:

Batman: One Bad Day - Mr. Freeze (Gerry Duggan, Matteo Scalera, and Dave Stewart, 2022)

Spandex - Fast and Hard (Martin Eden, 2012)

Harley Quinn: The Animated Series: The Eat. Bang! Kill. Tour (Tee Franklin, Max Sarin, and Marissa Louise, 2022)

Batman: Whatever Happened to the Caped Crusader? (Neil Gaiman and Andy Kubert, 2009)

The Sandman: Preludes & Nocturnes (Neil Gaiman, Sam Keith, Mike Dringenberg, and Malcom Jones III, 1988)

The Sandman: In the Doll's House (Neil Gaiman, Michael Zulli, Mike Dringenberg, Chris Bachalo, Malcolm Jones III, and Steve Parkhouse, 1989)

The Sandman: Dream Country (Neil Gaiman, Kelley Jones, Malcolm Jones III, Colleen Doran, and Charles Vess, 1991)

The Sandman: Season of Mists (Neil Gaiman, Kelley Jones, Malcom Jones III, Mike Dringenberg, Matt Wagner, P. Craig Russell, George Pratt, and Dick Giordano, 1992)

The Sandman: A Game of You (Neil Gaiman, Shawn McManus, Colleen Doran, Bryan Talbot, Stan Woch, and George Pratt, 1993)

Run, Riddler, Run (Gerard Jones and Mark Badger, 1992)

Catwoman: When in Rome (Jeph Loeb and Tim Sale, 2005)

Batman: Year One (Frank Miller and David Mazzicchello, 1986)

Batman: One Bad Day - Penguin (John Ridley, Giuseppe Camuncoli, Cam Smith, and Arif Prianto, 2022)

Batman: Bruce Wayne - Fugitive (Greg Rucka et al, 2002)

Batman: One Bad Day - Two-Face (Mariko Tamaki, Jaiver Fernandez, and Jordie Bellaire, 2022)

Batman & Robin Eternal Vol 1 & Vol 2 (James Tynion IV and Scott Snyder, 2015 and 2016)

Batman: Their Dark Designs (James Tynion IV, Guillem March, and Tomeu Morey, 2020)

The Joker War Saga (James Tynion IV and Jorge Jiménez, 2021)

Papergirls Vol. 1-6 (Brian K. Vaughan and Cliff Chiang, 2016-2019)

Real Hero Shit (Kendra Wells, 2022)

Poison Ivy #1-6 (G. Willow Wilson and Marcio Takara, 2022)

and some gaming guides!

Monster of the Week (Michael Sands, 2012) - great game. so cool. cannot wait to actually play it someday.

Thirsty Sword Lesbians (April Kit Walsh, 2021)

special shame zone because I want you to know how bad this sucked, do not read this:

Rethinking Sex: A Provocation (Christine Emba, 2022). patronizing, puritanical, reductive, painfully cisheteronormative. weirdly afraid of group sex. not actually that provocative, just aggressively Catholic.

and last but most certainly least, a comic that I want to remind you all fucking sucked just one more time before the year is done.

Batman: One Bad Day - The Riddler (Tom King and Mitch Gerads, 2022)

Tom King, go fuck yourself. Mitch is cool though, the art slapped.

#bookblr #if you find a typo in here no you didn't xoxo #feel free to tell me your thots or ask about any of these i love to talk about my unhinged reading habit

[itchyeye]

@apocalypticsinn replied to your post “ok. i'm giving the first episode a shot.”:

Oh noooOOOO welcome to hell :,) Alice remains like this the entire series btw and it just. It doesn’t get better. The newest episode I wanted to strangle her- I’m VERY interested in hearing your full thoughts on even just this first episode-!

​whgau first thing's first i am touched to hear you're interested in my thoughts

ok so overall it was very bad. @socvinc is correct that the sound mixing is fantastic, especially contrasted against s1 of tma which was shoestring budget dogshit. but then again this new show was funded by a seemingly boundless supply of patreon dollars so it fucking better sound expensive!!

alice is absolutely insufferable. you could stick a classroom full of twelve year old bronies (and i mean the og 2010s bronies not the gen z post ironic queer reclamation kind) in front of a hundred typewriters for all of time and they would eventually produce every single thing that has ever come out of alice's mouth. sure, it seems like gwen and most other people are annoyed with her, so at least she isn't being treated as funny and charming in-universe!! but absolutely fucking impossible to listen to. will not be putting myself through more of that.

also, the general animosity and malaise is unearned. sure, we have all been at jobs where everyone is burnt out and nobody cares anymore. but there's a sort of creeping realization that comes with that. even if things are bad right off the bat, they still get worse as you familiarize yourself with your new surroundings.

to have your exposition be alice telling sam that nothing matters and there is no point to his job and everything is stupid and he shouldn't even be here just makes me hate her. it doesn't matter that she's doing it to give gwen a moment to shine and prove her diligence and dedication. it immediately makes alice a deeply unlikeable character. she is relentlessly negative and cynical and lazy and we have been given ZERO justification for why she would be so abbrasive to someone just starting a new career!! plus she's fucking annoying so the cards are REALLY stacked against her.

and the relentless gloomy bleakness of the Archives was so. so. so. earned. all of s1 had this slow slow sloooooow build up of tension and horror and false leads and red herrings and SUDDENLY WORMS. SASHA'S DEAD. TIDAL WAVE OF WORLD-ENDING WORMS. THREE DREAD POWERS AT ONCE. AND EVERYONE HAS PTSD AFTERWARDS AND STILL HAS TO COME IN TO WORK. JON'S GONE OFF THE FUCKING DEEP END. THEN S2. NO ONE CAN LEAVE. WE'RE ALL TRAPPED HERE LIKE RATS IN A SINKING SHIP.

the gloom and malaise and desperation is real and tangible and you are there with the characters as it builds. it's rewarding and dynamic. opening episode 1 with "everyone hates it here bc it's very spooky and bureucratic" is just a pale and unsuccessful immitation of the slowburn that MADE the archives what they were.

also the very first little mini statement was so lame??? no build up. no atmosphere. no character development. not even a short story, just a tumblr uquiz option. "i saw my husband but he was Shaped Wrong and also dead" jesus christ...

i might listen to episode 2 just because i have time to kill but being dropped into the middle of an office party gave me traumatic tma s5e1 flashbacks and i can't live through that again. one of my tmp anons who mentioned it was very office-banter based was SOOOO right. the majority of the episode felt like those incorrect-quotes accounts that clog up tumblr search results. just people i don't know and voices i don't recognize having weird try-hard conversations.

oh that's another glaring difference: the dialogue and voice acting in tma feels incredibly natural. the way conversations are written and the way they are performed feels believable, like listening to recordings of people who do not know they're being recorded. the conversations in tmp feel like watching f.r.i.e.n.d.s in that every line feels really rigidly scripted. no one talks over one another. no sounds overlap. there are no natural sounding pauses or stutters. just bad sitcom dialogue. BUT as i said to anon.... that's what the people want.

overall feels like an ogfic "inspired by" tma that i would have no interest in reading. a pale immitation of lightning in a bottle.

can't say i blame them. we all have bills to pay. but i can say i resent them.

#apocalypticsinn #[💌] asks and replies #protocol

[pacifymebby]

t r o u b l e/ chapter twenty six

Tommy

I was circling the countryside, tracking down country lanes in a spiral back towards Arrow House. Back home, without my little sister. Feeling defeated. Frustrated. Feeling the nauseous chill which sets in after the panic has passed. When you've burnt through all that fight or flight, when all the adrenaline you wasted has amounted to nothing... all that buzzing static, that rushing blood, all those racing thoughts for nothing because in the end they hadn't mattered either way. She wasn't here. We'd lost her.

We'd be lucky if we ever got her back.

"Jesus Christ," I growled to no one but myself through gritted teeth, "Jesus fucking Christ!" I spat eyes squeezed shut as I let my head fall down against the steering wheel. Driving blind down the road until I heard a tractor and swerved into the closest pocket, a cattle crossing with a rusty old gate.

I had that lump in my throat like I was about to cry. Hadn't done that for a long time, knew it wouldn't do me any good now anyway. Wouldn't bring her back. A useless emotion, a useless habit to get into.

I sucked in my cheek instead, bit until I drew blood and kept my eyes wide open until I felt the dry sting. The tears receding, the hurt swallowed down. The only way I knew how to handle it. Locked it away, started the car and did a U-Turn. No more slow spiral home. Accepted the truth of the matter, the dreary, bleak reality. The facts.

Sylvie had snook away from us. Been too clever, too quick... too much like her brothers. Too much perhaps like me.

She wasn't coming back by herself and she was already beyond my reach. I'd lost her.

When the phone started ringing I moved listlessly. Didn't rush to answer, much to the caller's disgruntled amusement.

"You know Tommy if it was my family yeah... if it was my little..."

"Enough Alfie," I groaned, "spare me the concern eh, I'll run my family my way yeah, you can do whatever you like with whatever I've got..."

"Well," he said, a darkness in his voice that didn't sit right with. Me didn't worry me as it should have because I'd already decided Sylvie was lost to the world. Gone for good. "Well," he said, "that's just it right, that's just it mate... what have I got Tommy... What have I..."

"I don't know Alfie what have you got eh do us both a favour would you, keep it short an sweet... I'm driving I can hardly afford to fall asleep at the..."

"She's safe Tommy," he said, his words not quite registering with me as I trailed off, as I swallowed the sprout of hope, tried to ignore the little bud about to open because this was Alfie Solomons and he'd never delivered good news to me before.

"She's what?"

"She's here mate, she's here and she's safe and..."

"Jesus Christ Alfie why the fuck didn't you just say that..." I shook, my chuckle a little breathy, disbelieving though I should have believed it. "What about Isaiah?"

"And..." he cut my smile short, "she wants to stay here with me...if that's alright with you of course mate..." the sound of his smile got under my skin, pissed me off more than I should have let it.

"What?" I frowned turning the car down a sharp winding lane, headlights on to cut through the mist. I should have been paying attention to the roads, not to Alfie. Should have been watching for lights in the fog. Should have been thinking about every possible threat. But I wasn't.

"Oh who? The lout? He's fine too, fuckin annoyin cunt but... I ain't harmed the lad yet..."

"Alfie... what the fuck did you just say to me..."

"She came here Tommy, I didn't even have to go lookin for her yeah... she brought herself all the way here and you know what she did mate? You know what she did... seriously mate I don't know what the fuck you're doin up there, how you're raisin the kids but fuck me... you've gotta change your fuckin ways cause this one's fucked in the head," he said, this amusement mixed up with his warning. I could picture him grinning, could picture him leant back in his chair, one leg crossed over the other, smoking a cigarette and grinning down the line, waving one hand about his head, the other holding his phone to his ear.

"Look mate if she's broken somethin I'll pay you back whatever I don't care..." I started, trying to focus on driving, trying to control the hope in my chest, the warmth which had returned to me when he'd said she was safe. Just because she was safe didn't mean she was going to stay safe. Not when it was Alfie who had her.

"Broken somethin? Mate she's the fackin broken one..." he said, "seriously..." he said, I could picture his eyes popping, could hear the shock in his voice and it made me smirk, "she's a fuckin sociopath Tommy..." he said.

"So melodramatic Alfie..." I mused, "go on then enlighten us, what's she done?" I asked with a sigh knowing that this would be a long story either way I played it. That I just had to humour him because for as long as he had Fen with him I was in his pocket.

"She fuckin came in here right, fuckin barged in here yeah, poor Ollie couldn't hold her back mate, poor boys traumatised Tommy, he'll need fuckin therapy yeah!"

"She's a teenage girl Alfie..."

"She's a little piece of hell is what she is Tommy, she's got a little piece of hell in her eyes... I looked into em yeah, I looked right into em an you know who I fuckin saw?"

"Go on..." I sighed, I already knew the answer. I needed a cigarette so I pulled up at the side of the road. Shouldn't have done.

"I saw you Tommy..."

I had to laugh then, had to let out that short disbelieving breath, had to smile and shake my head because if I didn't he'd know I believed him. He'd know I saw it too. He'd know that that was what really scared me.

Not the thought of little fen out on her own, lost and helpless, but the thought of Sylvia just cunning enough to weasel herself into a place she couldn't escape. And perhaps she'd already done that.

"Then why do you wanna keep her Alfie?" I asked forcing myself to relax, concentrating on my shoulders, rolling them once, twice. Focussing on my temples, forcing myself to feel them relax too as I exhaled slowly.

"Because..." he said, "and you'd know this right if you'd let me finish my fuckin story yeah Tommy, patience remember is a virtue... you still believe in them yeah? Virtues?"

"Finish your story Alfie, I'm not stopping you..." I said watching the rain which thrummed against the windshield, flicked my wipers on. Watched the leaking grey sky, the thunder would roll in from the hills soon. I needed to be home before the roads flooded.

"She fuckin barged into my office yeah and she danced for me..." he sounded astounded. I didn't feel half as surprised as I should have done.

"She danced?"

"Yeah!" He cried, "she stood on my rug right and she did a little dance... swan lake I think mate... it was fuckin holy mate... bought a tear to this cold man's dead fuckin eyes..."

"Right," I nodded thinking of my little sister, trying to picture the scene. Her e'n pointe in the middle of Alfie's old persian rug. A rug I'd stood on many times, a rug I'd once thought I was going to die on. I tried to imagine her dancing, the graceful, fae like way I'd been watching her dance since she were only a little girl. "So she danced for you..." I said turning onto a wider road, one which wasn't just a dirt track, "and now you want to keep her?"

"Nah," he frowned, "nah.. you my old friend are deliberately misunderstanding me ain't you... trying to make me sound like a fuckin nonce yeah? She told me she wants to stay in London... under my protection..." I could tell he was grinning , revelling in his own amusement at my expense. I shouldn't have let it get to me but it was, getting to me that is. "And she wants you to let her twin sister come to stay too..."

"Not happening." I said it a little too quickly, probably shouldn't have said anything at all because Alfie was most certainly trying to press my buttons but the words had left my lips before I'd had the chance to think.

"No? Well that is a shame mate cause I've already got one haven't I... she's gonna be awful lonely on her own ain't she... be a shame to keep em apart, twins ain't 'sposed to be split up for too long... woulda thought your lot woulda known that mate... really..."

I cut the engine, lit up a cigarette. Cut the headlights too so that my car was swallowed up for a minute or two by the gloom. For a second I could pretend that I too had been swallowed whole. That none of it mattered anymore. That it was all already over. That I could float about in it, the darkness, the gloom, the vapour that makes up the rain cloud when it's still just a cloud.

"Forget it Alfie, Sonya's stayin right here... and I'm coming to get Sylvie, I'll drive down today, pick her up ton..."

"Hold your horses gypsy boy," chuckled Alfie infuriating me then. A spark of rage shooting through me as I sparked my lighter and watched the flame lick at the tip of my cigarette once more.

"My little sister ain't a piece in your chess set Alfie..." I warned him but he only smirked again, all melodramatic reassurances.

"I know I know mate," he said, "listen Tommy... when did you get so distrusting eh? When did you get so suspicious of everyone... even your oldest pals? Now you tell me yeah... you tell me what reason I'd have for wanting to hurt your little Sylvia? Now think about it good and proper for a minute yeah cause I want a good fuckin answer... cause hurtin little girls mate, there ain't no good reason for that as far as I'm concerned...it's fuckin disgustin right...now really I thought you and me were on the same page there Tommy..."

"Yeah alright Alfie.." I said raising my hand to silence him, waving away the smoke from my cigarette before gripping the steering wheel too tightly seconds later when I realised he was reeling me in again, that I was falling for his oldest trick. "I agree with you alright, that's why I'm gonna come pick my sister up tonight yeah, bring her home... don't want anyone gettin hurt eh?"

"Tommy, Tommy, you ain't listening to me mate, you ain't usin them ears are yours Tommy, listen to me right cause I've told you once and I don't wanna keep goin round in circles with you yeah.. I phoned you right... to let you know that your little sister yeah, little Sylvia is a fucking sociopath... I just thought I'd remind you of that yeah... cause you don't seem to realise just how fuckin insane she is right.."

"So she's insane," I shrugged, doing my best to deaden my tone, let him know I wasn't bothered. Let him know that I didn't believe a word he was saying to me. "People say that about you too don't they..."

"Yeah..." he said leaning on the word, still grinning down the line, "yeah they do and insane right, recognises insane... an here I thought you already knew that Tom my old mate... I always thought that was why we were such good pals..."

"Fine," I said with a small smirk, "I'll bring me straight jacket.."

"Tommy mate.." he said again, that apologetic tone he kept putting on driving me insane, "look am sorry mate but she don't wanna go home... she wants to stay here..." he sounded like he was going to carry on, sounded like he had something else to tell me, some bargain to make. But I wasn't in the mood for cutting deals. Now my mind was racing, the cogs turning, the plans falling into place. I would go back to the house, I'd tell Arthur and John what was going on. Then I'd drive to collect Sylvia myself, I'd being her home and I'd throttle Isaiah for being so fucking irresponsible and stupid.

"She just don't wanna go home..."

"Yeah well you tell her from me right, you tell her you can't always get what you want," I said finally, determined that that would be the last we spoke on the matter, "it isn't up for debate Alfie I want her home..."

It was only when I hung up the phone and looked out into the murky afternoon that I sensed it. Something wrong.

Something out there in the fog, a shadow... someone watching me and my cigarette. Someone I could only hope hadn't been able to see me clearly through the mist.

There was a car stopped a little way behind me, their lights off but their shadow still palpable from certain angles when the light hit through the vapour.

When I started the car I felt the low warm rumble of it coming back to life vibrate through my body. I sat listening carefully to the heater turning on, I watched the condensation on the windows clear slowly.

And when I pulled away I kept my eyes on the rearview mirror, watching for movement in the mist behind me. Swallowing a lump in my throat when I saw it, a car following me from a short distance down the road. Stalking me silently as I drove towards the house.

So I couldn't go home and I couldn't turn and head for London as I'd just informed Alfie I would. Instead I had to lead them somewhere else. Lure them out of the winding country lanes, to somewhere I knew better than them.

"Arthur..." I spoke into a burner, "tell John to secure the house then meet me at the Millers Rest, come strapped..." I said carefully, quietly, listening to my brother's breathing on the other end of the line, waiting to hear his grunt of agreement, waiting for the question I didn't want to answer.

"You found her?" He asked, the edge of hope in his voice difficult to swallow when I knew I was about to crush it.

"This ain't about that... Arthur I need you focussed yeah... forget her, focus on this..."

I knew my words would cut him, that they'd leave a nauseous taste on the back of his tongue, green and guilty. But in our family someone had to be heartless, someone had to have clarity, someone had to be able to see the bigger picture always and that was me. I had to be this way because neither John nor Arthur would ever be capable of it.

So even if the words sounded cold, even if they sounded like they came from that part of me I loathed, I had to say them. Had to get him to focus on the task in hand, that is to say living through the next hour.

The Millers Rest was an inn abandoned way out in the middle of the peaks. We'd taken over it many years ago because it was tucked away in the valley between two hills, on the edge of a woodland, far from the city but also miles from any of the little villages and hamlets nestled between the peaks. It was the perfect place to disappear, the perfect place to make other people disappear too. So I drove slowly, uncertain when exactly I'd collected my hanger on, refusing to change my behaviour. Pretending I was still searching the winding lanes for Sylvia.

Sylvia who was fucking miles away, doing fuck knows what because she was stubborn and childish, because she was scorned and pissed off with me. Endangering her life because I'd told her no.

As I drove I watched the shadow moving through the rain carefully, noted how it stopped and started every now and then, trying to keep a safe distance. Trying to remain shrouded completely.

They probably thought it would be easier to stay hidden because I wouldn't be looking for them. Because I wouldn't be paying attention to them. Now I had to hope they weren't paying too much attention to anything but me. Had to hope they wouldn't notice that I was no longer driving them to Arrow House.

If they followed me to the Millers they'd follow me to their death.

I sped up at the last minute, racing around the final corner and up the straight line of road which ran past the inn. Swerving the car to a sudden stop in the middle of the road I abandoned it and ran to join my brother where he would be waiting. In the line of trees at the edge of the woodlands. Strapped and waiting for me or for the enemy, whoever turned up first.

"The fucks all this about Tommy, am fuckin soaked waitin here for..." started Arthur as I snatched a loaded assault rifle from him. He didn't question that, just picked up the other which rested at his feet. Prepared himself.

"I've been followed," I panted a little out of breath from my sudden sprint to the trees, in truth i had hardly noticed the rain when I'd run across the grass, "fuckin don't know who it is but theyve followed me all the way fuckin here through the rain and they'll be here any fuckin second now so be ready..."

"How do we know they're Italians?" He frowned, setting his weapon up and standing back against the tree trunk. The rain had come down hard on him and his red hair was dark and hanging limp and dripping in his face.

"We fuckin don't but whoever they are... they ain't our fuckin friends..."

"Nah," he shook his head, his eyes narrowing. I offered him a tight smile, a nod of approval because it reassured me to see his cogs start turning, the gears shifting. In a few moments time he wouldn't be Arthur Shelby anymore, something else would take over and he would keep us safe, that feverish streak of rage inside him, foaming at the bit, only ever held back by the thinnest of threads.

"Fuckin ain't our friends," I said again my own eyes darkening as I saw a black rangerover roll to a halt. As I saw two men jump down from either side of the car. I raised my hands to hush my brother but I didn't need to. He was watching them, silent, his cheeks flushing with the first shades of anger.

"Fuckin... how dare they come here threatenin my fuckin family..." he growled, his voice low but not low enough. The men weren't looking at the trees however, weren't listening for men hiding in the trees.

"Hush Arthur... Wait a moment eh," I said with a small smirk, watching as the two men knocked on the Inn door. They waited and, just out of sight, we waited.

"Fuckin c'mon lets just kill em," grumbled Arthur growing all the more impatient.

"Nah," I whispered, "not yet eh, wanna see what they do..."

And what they did surprised me.

"What the..." I mouthed, refusing to blink as I observed with wide eyes the strangest thing I'd ever seen two men do. They waited for a moment and then, when no one answered, they returned to the car and took out two shovels.

"Arthur... give me you phone..." I held my hand out waiting to feel the weight of it in my grasp. I closed my fingers around it and then held it up, using the camera to zoom in and record them as they dug their shovels into the ground and began digging.

"The fuck are we waiting for Tommy?" Grumbled Arthur, hushed by the hand I waved absently in his direction. "You wanna let them dig their own graves?" He smirked shaking his head, "you sick fuck."

"Shhh!" I hissed growing impatient, watching them dig, "I said wait Arthur, so just... wait." I held my fingers to my lips, holding the camera steady, trying to get a view on their faces. But they were wearing hoods under their jackets and they had scarves wrapped around their faces so all I could see was a blur of skin and wool shadow.

"Don't think that's a grave.." I said when they dropped their shovels two hours later, they stood hands on their backs, panting. One of them lit up a cigarette as the other crouched at the side of the hole.

For another minute or so they just stood, one out of breath, complaining to the other in Italian, the other on the floor swearing back.

"Wop bastards," murmured Arthur, "c'mon Tommy what are we waitin for?"

"You hear me Arthur it ain't a fuckin grave..." I said raising my finger to quiet him, "so we're waiting..."

"Fuck sake Tommy I don't like this..."

"Don't be so impatient brother," I smirked watching the men through the camera on Arthur's phone. "Look.." I said doing my best to focus the camera on the edge of the hole, "dumped somet I reckon..."

"So fuckin what!" Snapped Arthur, "cunts were following you fuckin home... we should just fuckin..."

"Shh!" I hissed when one of the Italians turned their head sharply, their eyes scanning their surroundings. They'd heard him.

Behind me Arthur hushed and raised his gun.

I held my hand out to steady him, to calm him down.

"Hold fire..." I murmured. Waited...

For a second all was still. The Italians, Arthur and I, the car they'd left idling. The rest of the world carried on, the trees moved under the best of relentless rain. The mud shifted, gathered and collapsed washed down the side of the hill in dirty rivulets.

Not us though.

It was as if we were disconnected. A switch flicked.

I weighed up our options... considered their unusual behaviour, the mystery I wanted to unpick. Considered how badly I wanted those answers. And then I nodded.

"Alright," I said lowering my hand, raising my own gun in time with Arthur as we fired in unison.

The first shots flew and wounded the man who had been standing, the one who had heard us. We didn't give them a chance to understand, a chance to defend themselves. Just approached slowly, a malevolent shadow emerging from the undergrowth, spraying bullets across the field, shattering the windows of their idling rangerover. Shattering the windows of the inn.

Firing until we were certain that both men on the floor were no longer men but corpses. Lifeless sacks of blood and bone and muscle tissue.

I lowered my weapon, pointing my barrel down at the paling features of the dead man at my feet. Looking down at him I felt nothing but the usual hollow, a mild disgust at the speed the soul leaves a body. How fleeting the moment at which we become a shell.

I kicked at his shoulder and watched the blood which stained his shirt wash away in the rain, replaced moments later by a constant blossom of red. I emptied his pockets, found ID, keys, cash and a burner phone that was probably already useless.

The lad wasn't even a Sabini, wasn't a Changretta, just some poor lad from the bottom rungs, a Conti trying to make a name for himself.

"Alright," I said plainly, turning away from the dead Italian to face my brother who was still looking down at the other.

"Alright," nodded Arthur his rain soaked hair falling across his face despite his repeated efforts to push it back. The rain was cold, ran in thick streams off our coats.

"Get your shovel Arthur," I said with an ironic half smile, shrugging my long black coat from my shoulders, abandoning it on the front door step.

Arthur didn't say a word, didn't complain though digging graves in this weather was sickening work. Just grunted and accepted his task, taking it just as I was. As penance for the evil deed we had just committed.

For hours in the rain the only sound either of us made was to grunt with exhaustion, a growl of frustration every time we lunged into the earth, hitting the shovel against the sludge, heaping it like shit behind us. It was relentless, the rain coming down so heavy that any progress we made felt trivial when every wrong step too close to the ledge of the hole saw the wall shift and then slide in on itself, filling the grave with mud before we could dig deep enough.

"Fuck this Tommy we're gonna be here all fuckin night!"

"If we're here all fuckin night we're here all fuckin night!" I growled bringing my foot down on the shovel and pushing with all my weight to try and shift as much soil as I could. "Fuck your comfort brother, we've killed these men so we'll fuckin bury em..."

And we did, but it took all night.

The sunset and we hardly noticed, the moon rose and all we felt was the chill, the burn in our muscles enhanced by the stinging of our chapped skin.

By the time we returned to Arrow House the following morning we were both pale and sheer as ice, bodies sore and stiff from a night of digging, of hauling dead men through the mud.

Our clothes were heavy from the rain, not a hair between us spared. We were soaked through, shivering with bloodshot eyes. Two stray dogs who had dragged themselves to the only safe place they knew.

The door closed behind us with a thud. The house hadn't been quiet but when the echo ricocheted down the hall the house fell silent.

Then there were footsteps. So light I'd have missed them had I not been suffering such a manic rush of adrenaline.

"Tommy!" Cried Sonya, her voice frail as she threw herself at me, her arms wrapping around me so tight that for a moment - once I'd adjusted to the initial shock of proximity - I struggled to catch my breath.

I took a step back, trying to balance myself where she'd knocked my center of gravity, my arms closing around her petit frame slowly, hesitant at first but firmer when she nuzzled into my chest and I heard the first sob.

"Alright Fen, it's alright..." I sighed, voice as gentle as I could manage, trying to hide the grazed way my throat felt when I spoke.

"Oh..." smirked Ada from halfway down the stairs, she was wrapped in a silk dressing gown, a pair of thick woolen socks on her feet miring the glamour of caramel she'd draped herself in, "look what the cat dragged in..." she narrowed her eyes but she couldn't hide the relief she felt so I knew she was glad to see us home. Not that it mattered much because I couldn't stay.

Still, I held onto Sonya and let her cry into my soaked shirt, stroked my fingers slowly through her long hair which she'd let fall down for once, blond locks uncombed, falling down around her waist. When she pulled away her eyes were wild with love and she couldn't have known it but had it not have been for the dye in her hair she'd have looked just like our mother.

She watched me with those wild wide eyes, tears still gathered in her lashes. Concentrating, studying me and then Arthur for injuries, for blood.

But the rain had washed most of the blood from our hands and the stains on our shirts were pinkish and faint.

"You two took your time, where were you?" Asked Ada observing us from a distance. Like she knew not to get too close. Like she knew what we'd been doing and didn't want tainted by the curse we carried.

And when I thought of that I flinched, dropped my hands from Sonya's shoulders and took a step back.

"Fuckin weathers fuckin awful," grunted Arthur, guilt radiating from the two of us so that even innocent Sonya bristled.

She looked up at me with dark, sorry eyes, eyes which asked me to shake my head, asked me to tell her that it really was just the weather that had left us like this. Washed up and late home with nothing to show for it.

So I shook my head.

"Sylvies in London," I said, "she's safe for now, Alfie's given me his word that he will look after her until I am able to bring her home..."

Sonya gasped, held her hand over her mouth to mute the choked sob of relief. I couldn't help the tug of a tender smile on my lips then, a momentary warmth which touched my heart. At least there was one Shelby who still knew how to feel.

"Alfie Solomons is 'looking after' her?" Ada scoffed, "Are you kidding Tommy? Alfie fuckin Solomons! He tried to kill Arthur!" She was looking at me not just with disbelief but disgust too, her arms folded, her teeth catching the light when her jaw hung slack and stunned.

"He is..." I said nodding, "and he did once try to..."

"twice," coughed Arthur, "it was twice actually Tommy remember..."

"he has tried, on multiple occasions... in the past, to kill our brother Arthur but... Alfie's an old fashioned man and he has a policy doesn't he..."

"A policy?" Ada scoffed, "a fuckin policy Tommy..."

"He has a policy of not hurting women and children, so our Fen will be safe with him and Isaiah until I go to London... I'm leaving today, she won't be waiting long..."

"For god sake Tommy look at you," derided Polly, her slinking figure materialising in the kitchen doorframe, a lit cigarette between her fingers which she looked down to focus on me, "you're not going anywhere in that state and you know it..."

"Can't wait I'm afraid Pol..." I started only to be silenced by my sister.

"Pols right Tommy look at you both for fuck sake, you're soaked to the bone... you look like you haven't slept all night... you can't go to London in this state, it's not safe.."

"Ada's right Tommy, you'll need your wits about you down south... won't be a youngen in London won't be looking for a shot at a peaky blinder to earn a bit of clout with the Italians..." Said Esme, her feet padding down the stairs as she carried the baby in her arms. She too looked tired, she too wore her concern on her sleeve.

"Enough mithering eh," I said with a lighter smile, trying to shrug their concerns off, turning to Arthur with a grin so that he would play along. "We're fine aren't we Arth, ain't made of sugar, a bit of rain never did anyone any harm..."

"That's right," agreed Arthur gruffly, pushing his sodden hair from his eyes once more. The blood under his nails caught the light, reminded me of the graves we'd left at the foot of the valley beneath the Miller's rest. Reminded me why I felt that tight burn across my shoulders, why standing up straight ached right down to my thighs.

"Nothin a hot shower and coffee won't fix..." I said, "Ada if you're worried about your big brothers I'll let you cook us breakfast if you like... how about something hearty eh?" I asked her with a teasing smile, relief washing over me when she gasped, astounded and biting back a giggle when she hit me with the baggy sleeve of her dressing gown.

"Get fucked Tommy..."

But our jokes weren't enough to quell Aunt Pols concerns, not enough to pacify her and so when Arthur and I headed for the spa to soak ourselves in warmer water, thaw our batter bodies out for an hour, she followed me, rushing to keep up with me as I tried to lose her.

"Thomas! Thomas I don't like this... this is a bad idea Thomas.."

"Pol," I sighed, "Pol following us in here is a bad idea..." I said resting my hand on her shoulder in the doorway to the health suite. My grip was light but firm and it stopped her. Left her looking up at me stubborn and shadowy as ever.

"You won't get her back if you go tonight..." she said finally, holding my gaze, threatening me with her coal black eyes.

Taglist

@jomarch-wannabe @zablife @call-sign-shark @toddlerbodybag @marwwfairy @mollybegger-blog @itsghostgirlyo @elina-777 @everysage @liliac-dreamer @impossibleheartflower @inalovesrabbits-blog

#trouble #peaky blinders imagines #bonnie gold x oc #shelby sister #peaky blinders fanfiction #peaky blinders x oc

[multi-muse-transect]

V in Mortal Kombat interactions.

@aggravateddurian

Duplicate

V: If you’re me from the future, please tell me I get Johnny out of my head.

V: It’s gonna come at a price.

V: So is Jackie alive in your universe?

V: Who's Jackie?

V: So where are you from? Haywood, Badlands or Charter Hill?

V: Haywood.

Raiden

V: It’s gonna take more than just fancy fighting moves to survive NC.

Raiden: Don't judge a book by its cover V.

V: Fuck, it’s so hard to fight without combat implants!

Raiden: You must get used to a life without crutches, only then can you overcome the city itself.

V: You don’t happen to know who’s the Zen Master now do you?

Raiden: Why he’s a teacher in the Wushi Academy!

V: You’re gonna love the esoterica.

Raiden: You should show me sometime.

Raiden: Such a bleak future you live in…

V: It has its perks.

Raiden: It’s horrible that people would do things to themselves to survive such an insane city.

V: The city ends up getting them regardless.

Johnny Cage

V: Told you Alex was the best.

Johnny: The best? She is leading woman material!

V: Johnny and Solomon are actors in this universe?

Johnny: You’re talking about Keanu and Idris right?

V: No, you’re not making my life into a movie.

Johnny: Maybe a video game can work?

Johnny: So you mind telling me how brain dances work?

V: You need to chrome the fuck up first.

Johnny: Adam Smasher sounds like a lame ass name.

V: Why don't you say that to his face when you see him?

Scorpion

V: You remind me of this one guy-he was a bodyguard.

Scorpion: I wish to meet him one day then.

V: Fuck me, what kind of implants cause those?

Scorpion: Technology isn't required to learn magic.

Scorpion: You're getting more and more skilled without your combat implants.

V: It took sometime but I'm getting there.

Scorpion: Arasaka's evil must be stopped!

V: They'll learn to fear the reaper when we raid it.

Sub Zero

V: I've met plenty of gonks like you in NC. All dead in a ditch

Sub Zero: Then I will be the first to survive.

V: You just sold out your clan by working for Arasaka!

Sub Zero: A small price to pay for salvation.

Sub Zero: Adam Smasher has proven himself to be a valuable ally!

V: Don't come crying to me when he bites you in the ass!

Sub Zero: With Arasaka's tech, I will create an unstoppable army of cyber-Lin Kuei!

V: Not on my watch!

Kung Lao

V: Careful, that attitude won't get anywhere in NC.

Kung: Cybernetic thugs don't scare me.

V: A hat? Seriously!?

Kung: Don't underestimate it V.

Kung: Is Panam available for today?

V: As if she'd go out with you.

Kung: I heard about the story of David Martinez. I've had the same experience like that...

V: You should take it to heart.

Sindel

V: This isn't my first time meeting a ruler.

Sindel: Oh? Do tell...

V: Jesus Christ, what kind of chrome makes you do THAT?

Sindel: Please, I don't need machines in my body.

Sindel: Do you do this often? Asking rulers out for dinner?

V: I learned it from a gig in Dogtown.

Sindel: Our magic will help cure your condition.

V: Let's hope it doesn't turn the other guy into pixie dust first.

Shang Tsung

V: Tell me where So Mi is or you end up eating lead.

Shang: You still care about her despite everything?

V: I've known many backstabbing assholes in NC. You're not special.

Shang: But I am built different compared to them.

Shang: I assure you, my magic will make sure that Silverhand will be gone.

V: I'm not selling my principals out to a wizard!

Shang: I wonder if I will have Silverhand's soul when I take it from your body.

V: One-try it asshole and two-I don't think that's how it works.

Shao Kahn

V: I almost mistook you for an Animals member.

Shao: Do you mock me mercenary!?

V: Not my first I've fight someone big with a hammer.

Shao: Then they must've died in the most humiliating way possible!

Shao: I am not afraid of a dying mercenary!

V: You will be.

Shao: All legends fade.

V: Not mine, it will never fade away!

Reiko

V: You're seriously coming at me with a spear and shurikens?

Reiko: Unlike you-I don't need machines under my skin.

V: Many gonks like you die because of loyalty.

Reiko: Then they have died honorably!

Reiko: You aren't afraid of death. Good!

V: I pass by it all the time.

Reiko: You spared Khameleon. So weak and disgusting! Mercy is disgusting!

V: Your devotion to the roided maniac is way more disgusting.

Tanya

V (if female V): You know anything I can get for Judy?

Tanya: I recommend the flowers of the royal garden.

V: My world can use more people like you.

Tanya: Maybe there is. Perhaps you weren't looking enough.

Tanya: I don't trust Reed.

V: Good, don't!

Tanya: Takemura is so blinded by loyalty.

V: That's Goro for you.

Kitana

V: You sound...familiar.

Kitana: I don't even know who you are.

V: Fuck me, I need one of those!

Kitana: First you must learn to train with them.

Kitana: I can't believe the Mox's care about money instead of caring for others.

V: Tell me about it.

Kitana: Thank you for telling me about Hansen.

V: You're welcome princess.

Li Mei

V: I think I know a detective who would love to have you as a partner.

Li Mei: Do tell Earthrealmer...

V: If the cops acted like you then NC would have zero crime.

Li Mei: Perhaps I should teach them.

Li Mei: So much corruption in your city, I'm surprise it's still standing.

V: You can thank the mega-corps that semi-run it.

Li Mei: 6th Street are nothing but barbarians parading as protectors.

V: Lofty patriotic bullshit is all they spew out of their mouths.

Kenshi

V: Fought a guy just like you. Hunted Tigers.

Kenshi: Was he just as skilled as me?

V: You're gonna love Jotaro Shobo since you kill yakuza a lot.

Kenshi: Really? Tell me where he is...

Kenshi: Your blades are advanced but not advanced as sento.

V: No shit. None of them can summon a ghost!

Kenshi: I would love to duel Oda one day.

V: I don't think that's a smart idea...

Ashrah

V: No one is good or bad where I come from...except for Maelstrom.

Ashrah: They are beyond redemption.

V: I know a guy who needs someone like you, he's FIA.

Ashrah: I know he has a good heart but is clouded by devotion.

Ashrah: So Mi is safe with me.

V: Tell her I said hi.

Ashrah: Regina Jones heart is so pure yet full of darkness.

V: Really? She doesn't seem to have a bad bone in her.

Smoke

V: What the hell kinda name is Smoke?

Smoke: One that you will respect.

V: Thanks for taking care of 6th Street for me.

Smoke: They're nothing but savages.

Smoke: The Aldecaldos have such a beautiful culture.

V: Wanna join them one day?

Smoke: Wakako looks like she's taken a liking to me.

V: Odd, she doesn't like anyone.

Geras

V: So..how does my story end?

Geras: Your future is very...hard to tell.

V: You're a Samurai fan?

Geras: I was watching their concerts very recently.

Geras: I suggest you should side with So Mi.

V: Why is that?

Geras: I have met another who travels to other timelines.

V: Ciri? Yeah, she does that.

Liu Kang

V: I can tell you didn't create my timeline.

Liu Kang: I would never create such depravity.

V: Shit, I'm sure Viktor would love you on the boxing club.

Liu Kang: I’ll visit one day.

Liu Kang: In one timeline, you and So Mi are together.

V: That...that's kinda beautiful.

Liu Kang: I have something that will help your ailment.

V: Really? It won't fry my nerves right?

#cyberpunk 2077 #V #Mortal Kombat #Liu Kang #Kitana #Raiden #Johnny Cage #tomas vrbada #Kuai Liang #Bi Han #general shao #Sindel #Reiko #Ashrah #kenshi takahashi #geras #Song so Mi #shang tsung

[dominosbrackets]

[ID the album covers for placebos "without you im nothing" and abbas "the visitors" END ID]

submitter comments:

my sweet prince: This song is so special to me my god it literally puts me in a whole other world. Like literally I have a whole city in my brain and characters and they all just appeared last summer in 2022 and I can visualise this room and this character and everything that they're not so strongly I mean my godddd the things this song does to me. I'm obsessed with songs that double as a love song and a song about drugs I know it's niche but this is my prime example and jesus fucking christ is this the saddest song ever in my opinion. It's so bleak and the way the rhythm is a heartbeat which obviously stops at the end. For me I see a character lying in the floor of their apartment bedroom and they have overdosed and it's just them trying to pick up just to pick themselves up and it's the early afternoon and the room is drenched in a yellow light (very much influenced by the album cover) and they're just. There in the middle thinking "oh this has happened before it's no problem" but they slowly start to realise "oh this is the last time" and it's just about all the things they never were and could have been and how they have finally lost and the end the heartbeat rhythm just stops and they stop too and. Ummm sorry leon. This song is very Emotional for me.

slipping through my fingers:

the chorus just fucking HITS.

Slipping through my fingers all the time

I try to capture every minute

The feeling in it

Slipping through my fingers all the time

Do I really see what's in her mind?

Each time I think I'm close to knowing

She keeps on growing

Slipping through my fingers all the time

#im sorry anja but slipping through my fingers sweep. just so good #abba #placebo #crysongs

[xenosagaepisodeone]

if you want actual accounts of what is happening to the homeless in your area, just go fucking talk to them like they're human beings. we're not rabid dogs, we're not going to kill you. jesus christ, i can feel the class privledge leaking off your post in waves.. if you actually try to talk to some homeless people you're going to realize that they are some of the most selfless, compassionate, open minded and spiritually free individuals you could ever meet.. but no, stay in your safe zone with all the other classist fuckers..

I work at a homeless shelter and joke about the things that the people in my community who seek our services (and concurrently people who work with them) like to joke about with me 🤨 part of that entails experiences they've had while temporarily located in other areas (such as the acid attacks, which as I implied feel are exaggerated, but still kind of noteworthy nonetheless). There are no moral judgements in my anecdotes. While the unhoused are more likely to experience violence than enact it, the violent conditions that create homelessness also sometimes end up creating violent responses to it lol, it's a near universal component of the life of anyone who has endured long term homelessness. Refusing to acknowledge this complex reality just ends up enabling the carceral logic that pathologizes and imprisons people who have already been unpersoned by the machinations of capitalism.

I'm sorry about your situation, but one thing I've observed so far in the bleak realities that are the housing and opioid crises is that no matter what side of the matter you are impacted by, without a sense of humor you will literally lose your mind. Is it really classist to respond to someone's life experiences like a peer and not an emotionally clinical therapist.

also...when I mentioned the person who was essentially talking to us about participating in acid attacks in gang warfare....did you envision this individual as a white collar associate...? I'm sorry I have no idea how you interpreted that post as roundtable gossip 😭

[yellowocaballero]

Iirc, in the movie it’s implied that after the Tim incident Bruce and Tim did not talk to each other again for over 50 years until the end of the movie. Like Jesus Christ I know Jason and Bruce’s relationship is super strained but that’s a whole other level of bleak. I will admit though I love it because for that exact reason, I was so caught off guard by it because you think a kid’s show wouldn’t go that route.

BTAS could get fucking dark sometimes. I still remember Perchance to Dream very well. Anybody else remember that episode? It was seriously really fucking dark. Where Batman - wait, I referenced it.

Very creepy when I was 13.

I did love BTAS for its bleakness - for how it was genuinely pretty noir, for how it said very little but could hit on some pretty profound notes. It was light on plot and dialogue, and each episode was very straightforward and very light on character or emotional work. It's very much a 90s cartoon, which were extremely high on action and very low on everything else. But it's such an exercise in atmosphere and tone, and watching BTAS you always got so sucked up into its world. I used to get up early at 4 in the morning to curl up in blankets and watch it, because I always felt like the show needed absolute darkness and solitude, and you could just lose yourself in it. It didn't need more than what it had. It's what makes the show still the best Batman thing ever: it was just pure noir mystery action vibes. With some silliness, colorful characters, humor, and life - but it was Gotham, and for 20 minutes you were within Gotham. Sometimes a cartoon is just vibes. They really don't make 'em like they used to.

Which is why I guess I disliked the ROTJ stuff. Character drama with always very minimalistic characters, shocking stuff like what happened to Tim, dramatic comic book plotlines - none of that felt native to BTAS. It took me out of the world. But yes, it's very tonally consistent with BTAS, isn't it!!!!!!! Isn't it!!!!!!!!!!!!!

#hey like. is that thing about being able to read in dreams true. #is that true???? #because ever since I saw that episode - like Tim - i've never been able to read in dreams #did batman gaslight me???? #my asks

[yapzone]

why i am such a hater on millennials (as a gen z girlie)

(jk ily (i do not))

1. my brother in christ you let the brony fandom happen. i'd forgive you but looking mlp up on youtube when i was 6 was my 9/11

2. give your kids normal names. like harper is cute but dont name your kid like moses or matthaison (this is not a joke i know a fifth grader named that)

3. also color will not kill your children. neither will pbs kids, going outside, or being bored for a little bit

4. stop with the family vlogs before your kids end up with child actor syndrome

5. oh my god shut up we get it you like the 90s we know you like teen titans and we know you like pokemon red and green

6. on that note can you stop being like "oOoOh the old pokemon games are harder" like you werent 10 playing it??? like it doesnt take a rocket scientist to realize swords dance is a good move

7. jesus fucking christ STOP DRAWING PORN OF KIDS CONTENT you are NOT entitled to your own place in a childrens space!!! its like going to a playground and insisting that all kids stay away from the swingsets so you can say bad words, or putting a seperate section for hardcore drugs in a candy store. you're kind of a total creep. this extends to adult characters in kids shows btw, watch what you say on the internet ffs

8. hey shouldnt you guys still be in animation school?

9. look its not your fault but you made a generation of middle schoolers terrified of growing up because the world is apparently a bleak and horrible place and they wont teach you taxes or smth

10. guys. we're not gen alpha. we know what ds's and nyan cat are

11. dude you're gonna fry your kids brains. taking away the ipad wont kill them. also i feel like you're sheltering your kids way too much and i need you to stop

12. anyways you guys arent entitled or bratty for wanting better living conditions or whatever boomers think abt you BUT you're kinda weird

[thenightlymirror]

Ok. Final verdict: Meet Joe Black is a good movie. Because it lends itself to multiple interpretations and little sections serve as good metaphors for very niche experiences. Maybe that’s not actually a good criteria on which to judge a movie, but it’s how I do it anyway.

Like the scene in Jesus Christ Superstar where Mary sings “I don’t know how to love him”. Such a vibe. Maybe this movie is only borrowing from that, but it works, because the ultimate human moment is when we walk back from the brink of death into ordinary life. Especially in love. You can’t help that love temporarily makes you someone else. It should. You should let it. It should fuck up your life. But life comes back. For better or worse. That’s a hard thing to describe to someone without mythic/religious metaphors.

Keep thinking about the old patient I drove to an appointment once, who had difficulty describing to people the profundity of his near-death experience. The profundity itself made it exasperating to try to relate to other people, now that the miracle was being further carried-out in the back of my stinky med-van on a bleak wet winter day. I’m afraid “Produndity” is itself just a button that your brain can push, some kind of chemical dispersal of relief. I’m sure that it is. But I would take feeling for it’s own sake. You have to share it with people, so profundity doesn’t just make you lonely, out-of-touch, useless. Maybe it’s useful in some Darwinistic sense to have a few loners driven insane by liminal experiences, even the kindest ones. But mercy on our own ends should dictate we don’t allow that.

Profundity is a kind of Babel-maker. (It is multiple.) You inevitably force an articulation of what was such a big deal in that moment. So, like the daughter, you can’t just love Death, instead the guy from the coffee shop comes back as her medium between her and Love. Her metaxu.

Can you live life after death and simply suspend naming the profound? I think you get a lot of options, and over the course of a lifetime, you choose a few. Love. Communism. Art. Knowledge. All good.

Lubezki was the cinematographer on this one.

[delmege]

this is going to be the most obnoxious, privileged complaining you've ever heard so I'm putting it under a cut but I need to get it out of my system

the amount of money my siblings have is hilarious. my little sister has 150k saved and my brother is about to buy a 400k house. they don't earn much more than I do but they are 27 and 29 and have lived at home forever so have been able to save virtually all of their pay, if they wanted to.

i am struggling to save a couple of hundred pounds a month right now and I know that that is at least prtly because I keep ordering bubble tea and things like that but in the face of what my siblings save, i feel like laughing myself into a grave and ordering even more because how tf would I ever be able to save that much?!

at the end of the year, my savings are going to be pretty much empty because I'm re-doing my bathroom (and yes! hooray! that is a really expensive thing I CAN pay for because I have savings! this is good!) and I'm like...

I knew they had savings. I did not know they were THAT much. When I think of what I could do if I had even one fifth of that money saved. it makes me feel bleak. so fucking bleak. omg. and i have SO much. don't get me wrong. I am aware and I am grateful and the RELIEF of that is great.

but I just... jesus fucking christ, y'know? I thought I was privileged, I thought I had a lot, I thought I had no reason to talk about being concerned about not having enough money for stuff or things being expensive but DAMN.

#i should delete this i expect #but i rly just needed to get it out of me

[llycaons]

only 17 hours left on adwd...almost to season 6 of sopranos...end is in sight. dgmw im really invested in finishing them, and I have enjoyed them, but they are both the less fun option of whatever I'm watching rn.

like I just listened to a chapter where a character said something playfully and somber 16 yr old jon snow is like 'the time for playfulness is over...winter is coming' and you know what this book could use some fucking playfulness. a single keynote about the joy of being human or having fun would cut through the grimdark murder-rape-starvation-slavery plots and hit powerfully hard in that like. it fucking matters. what they're trying to do by protecting all these people fucking matters. I already hate that dany's storyline is her wrapped up in being a 'mother' saving helpless and miserable hordes of eastern peoples heavily steeped in orientalist fantasy tropes, but none of them even feel like people. they're just miserable/starving and/or inhumane plot devices, either evil or absolutely helpless, for her to act upon. grrm's handling of slavery is a fucking mess

but back to my original point that this tragedy and bleakness is never balanced out with anything and it's like, ENOUGH. I KNOW! it's not even that the systems are being criticized because they always go above and beyond just for the sake of graphic and gratuitous violence that appear to center some characters affected by the systems of violence, but they do that by fucking over and using other, arguably far more marginalized characters in almost every single mc'a plotline. this is far more obvious in adwd rather than feast, which is a shame because there's a lot of plots in dance that I genuinely like. theon's abuse and identity crisis is really effective, tyrion's relationship with the only other little person we've seen in the book is really compelling, jon's actions at the wall are innovative and interesting, and the reveals involved in the davos and manderly plot was enthralling, and I really do love asha

but like...idk. I guess it was different in the early books but would a single line about joy persisting in the midst of the end of the world fucking kill him. I guess it's not rly his style but jesus christ dude. there's a point at which unremitting horrors stop being subversive to the fantasy genre and just become pointless torture porn

ALL THAT BEING SAID I'm only like 3/4 of the way through so if this happens egg on my face ig

#cor.txt

[mclean-shine]

Urgh God, don't read unless you wanna feel super bleak I just need to vent.

Jesus Christ it's all so hopeless, my house I've signed up for is an absolute fucking rip off for what I'm paying, I'm still unemployed three months after my previous job ended because I can barely see the point in applying to jobs because I hate working, and even if I do bother and they contact me then I can't be bothered to pick up the phone, I'm running out of money fast, all that money I spent years saving to make something of my life with is just being frittered away, my parents are just so done with me that I can't face asking them for help or even just talking to them, I've literally been in bed for weeks just consuming media doing nothing, getting fatter, letting friendships and my youth slip away from me, my depression medication is just useless now, my epilepsy is still just waiting to raise its ugly head and stop me from being able to drive anymore or just straight up kill me and wouldn't that just be oh so delightful.

I'm just so apathetic, something has just simply broken in me and I don't feel like I'll ever feel well again - everything I've fucked up in the past is weighing so heavily on my shoulders that I can barely breathe and I can't help but feel spitefully jealous of anyone I see doing well at all and I just don't want to be this wretched, vile, pathetic excuse of a person - I barely even feel real a lot of the time, just a pair of eyes observing the whole, the man in the mirror is just a sack of meat - nothing there. I can't even end it all because I'm terrified of dying and it would just utterly ruin my mum, so I guess there's nothing to do but just carry on, dead behind the eyes, till I finally and mercifully keel over.

Well that's it I guess, imma get some sleep - Christ, I wish I could wake up ten years ago and do it all over again