"Mr. Bubbles, Mr. Bubbles-"
A little boy's voice--the first little boy that Tim had discovered in the labyrinth city below Gotham--echoed through the cavernous halls. Tim crept over the rubble of a broken stalagmite that had fallen through the ceiling, destroying the white and gold decor and dripping water inside. The room up ahead was lit only from glowing green tubes of liquid that lined every wall of Amity, the ectoplasm that powered the entire city.
"Are you there? Are you there?"
He peeked out from behind a crumbled wall. On his own, the little boy was crouched over corpse, fresh enough that it's blood was still wet on the floor. The boy's giant needle, the go-to weapon of all the Little Sisters that Tim had seen so far, was jabbed into the corpse's stomach and, slowly, ectoplasm and blood filled the glass jar on the end.
"Bring me a lolli-"
There was no sign of a Big Daddy, but Tim knew there was one nearby. These children were never without their protectors after all.
"Bring me a toffee-"
And at this point, Tim had killed enough of them to know for certain that one was around.
His left arm, marked all over with the needle marks of constant Plasm and ecto-dejecto injections, tingled, like there were ants under his skin. Or more accurate, he mused grimly, electricity-
Don't Think About It.
"Teddy bear, teddy bear."
He kicked his bare feet excitedly as he finished harvesting ectoplasm. Screwing off the jar, the child lifted it up to his lips like a cup and drank the viscus liquid down in huge, chest-heaving gulps like his life depended on it. Unlike Little Sisters who wore gore-covered dresses, the Little Brother was dressed in a white medical gown, relatively clean considering his filthy surroundings. His arms and face were free from dirt or blood, and even his hair looked suspiciously washed and combed.
Tim tightened his grip on his gun.
The Little Brother sighed, wiping his mouth on his sleeve. Brushing off his skirt, he yanked the needle out of the corpse. Then, like he could sense him, the boy looked straight at Tim. He froze.
Blank eyes covered in a green flim stared at him... and the Little Brother smiled at him, his teeth stained brown from the muck. "Mr. Helper! There you are, I've been waiting soooo long! Big Sister thought you'd never catch up!"
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ooo fantasy au Poppy oooo there's so much empty space on this, it's killing me
rambles:
why is there lace? why does she have a neck corset? because she's Gorgeous and I'm the Artist Here. i will always inflict my personal tastes on everyone I draw. pretty bird <3
it's really difficult to put clothes on a bird... stream helped out a bunch with the colors & the leg gear! I imagine that the leather is durable, which is probably the only thing that gets her to traverse less Forgiving terrain. Thornbushes and itchy tallgrass can't hurt her! she's got "boots"! How Does She Secure Them, i hear no one ask. that's what neighbors are for, isn't it? and a skilled beak once she gets the swing of it.
her shawl remains largely the same due to my lack of imagination! i put a lil feather clasp instead of the shawl being tied together to give it a more fantasy-oriented look. i think i succeeded? i like to think so! i imagine that the clasp gives Poppy some stress, though. It's sharp! Ish. it's sharp by her standards!
Poppy's enchanted glasses allow her to "see" injuries and illness, both caused by magical & normal means. this is very helpful in her role as healer, but also extremely stressful - just because she can see issues doesn't mean she automatically knows what they are! to her, a papercut may be misinterpreted by the beginnings of a fatal infection! i like to think that she got tired of needing to hold the glasses in place over her beak and asked if there was a charm to keep them steady. and they confidently had their resident wizard spell them on - oops! the spell was a little too strong! they're now magically superglued on! yeah, those are never coming off.
she also has a magic bag that i imagine was a gift from her family when she left the nest! she'd never directly use it herself - what if she falls in? what if something nasty managed to crawl inside? - but the Neighborhood uses it as collective storage. it can hold a lot! supplies, books, tents, gold, even Julie when she's determined enough!
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“what does geralt get from that friendship…”
another post examining the weight of geralt and dandelion’s friendship… because i don’t think people recognize how painful and debilitating loneliness can become.
the witcher as a deconstruction of the genre takes fantasy tropes to their most logical ends—it asks us to consider what The Lone Swordsman feels, looks into the humanity in a Cold-Blooded Killer. and it turns out he’s not cold-blooded at all.
that despite some superhuman abilities, he laments and worries and curses himself, just like any other worker of any other profession. just as the farmer is scorched by the sun, the washerwoman’s back aches, and the scholar goes half-blind studying, a witcher deals with all of the pains and annoyances and dangers of his job in a mundanely human way.
but the farmer, the washerwoman, and the scholar have something the witcher does not have—they’ll always be seen as human and part of their society. at the end of the day after enduring all of their labor, they have their wife to caress, festivities to attend, and taverns to frequent. but for a witcher? after the killing is over, what does he have? no one and nothing. not even a thank you. he is met with fear and hatred everywhere he goes, baseless bigotry and dislike.
I did my job. I quickly learned how. I’d ride up to village enclosures or town pickets and wait. If they spat, cursed and threw stones, I rode away. If someone came out to give me a commission, I’d carry it out.
so he faces not just loneliness, but being deliberately ostracized and cast out from society. geralt can’t even find a polite word in most settlements, much less a friend.
‘(…) Tell me, where should I go? And for what? At least here some people have gathered with whom I have something to talk about. People who don’t break off their conversations when I approach. People who, though they may not like me, say it to my face, and don’t throw stones from behind a fence. (…)’
this kind of loneliness is not a mere inconvenience. it’s completely altering to your self-perception and ability to see the positive in the world.
each day is not lived, but endured.
day in, and day out—forced to the most difficult and lowest labor in order to survive, and knowing that were you to die, no one would search for your body, few would miss you, hell, they might even spit “good riddance”.
in this situation, to find a friend, is not only friendship, but a rescue.
without dandelion, geralt may have drowned—drowned in solitude, amidst a sea of strangeness.
‘(…) And I’m alone, completely alone, endlessly alone among the strange and hostile elements. Solitude amid a sea of strangeness. Don’t you dream of that?’
No, I don’t, he thought. I have it every day.
because dandelion is not only a bright soul, characteristic rippling laughter and the strum of a lute, but someone who will intently listen to geralt, someone who mutually enjoys his company.
‘(…) you almost jumped out of your pants with joy to have a companion. Until then, you only had your horse for company.’
someone who doesn’t see him as strange and at the fringes of society at all, but as an utterly normal man.
and doesn’t impose demeaning, sappy sympathy onto him, but sobering and realistic “quit your bullshit” which ridicules the very thought that he should internalize societal hatred.
Do you know what your problem is, Geralt? You think you’re different. (…) [You don’t understand that] for people who think clear-headedly you’re the most normal man under the sun, and they all wish that everybody was so normal. What of it that you have quicker reflexes than most and vertical pupils in sunlight? That you can see in the dark like a cat? That you know a few spells? Big deal.
dandelion isn’t “willing” to accept geralt for himself—he already has accepted him. and to him, it’s no difficulty, it’s nothing worth discussing, because he sees no abnormality and no strangeness in him.
while others “prefer the company of lepers to witchers,” dandelion has already offered geralt to share his room and board. not out of sympathetic pity, not out of fetishizing curiosity. because… they’re friends.
and what else does this friendship save him from?
not only from others, but from himself.
worse than enduring others’ apathy and hatred is one’s own thoughts—the darkness and negativity which builds from witnessing and experiencing such behavior.
dandelion’s ability to counter and dispel geralt’s pessimism and self-flagellating tendencies—again, not out of pity, but out of friendship—is undeniably invaluable. someone to rescue you from your darkest thoughts, when you begin to spiral.
and in this darkness, all you can do is cry. you cry, beg for someone to help you, please—
Help! Why doesn't anyone help me? Alone, weak, helpless – I can't move, can't force a sound from my constricted throat. Why does no one come to help me? I'm terrified!
to be alone, the saga reminds us, is worse than a death sentence. to be alone is to “perish; stabbed, beaten or kicked to death, defiled, like a toy passed from hand to hand.” to be alone is to suffer, and to be with someone is to save them from that suffering.
'(…) I wouldn't like anything bad to happen to you. I like you too much, owe you too much-'
'You've said that already. What do you owe me, Yennefer?'
The sorceress turned her head away, did not say anything for a while.
'You travelled with him,' she said finally. 'Thanks to you he was not alone. You were a friend to him. You were with him.'
it is true that geralt has saved dandelion countless times, helped him, gotten him out of some scrape… but to ask what did geralt get in return? are you kidding me?
did you ever consider that it is dandelion who saved geralt?
by being with him. by being by his side. by being his friend.
indeed, dandelion has rescued geralt, countless times, from the yawning jaws of endless loneliness. he’s helped him, chased away the danger of geralt’s own rumination. and he’s gotten him out of scrapes, his own insecurities and bitter helplessness.
so what does dandelion give geralt? what does geralt get from their friendship?
an amusing question. what one gets from friendship is the friendship itself. and that is more than enough.
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