#the main ships pale in comparison | Explore Tumblr Posts and Blogs

grandline-fics · 22 days

Note

Hi! Can I request OP men (monster trio, Ace, Law, or anyone ur comfy with doing!) reaction to reader becoming self conscious and suddenly anxious when there are too many ppl around and they try to ground them? It could be a crowd or even members from the ship! Thank you ^^

DESCRIPTION: You’re anxious when there’s too many people around

WARNINGS: none

CHARACTERS: Luffy, Zoro

WORDS: 1,318

A/N: Thank you for this request. I wanted to do more scenarios with some of the other OP men but could only manage two this time. I loved this idea so there'll be a part two in the future. I hope you like what I came up with for this

*REQUESTS ARE OPEN*

MASTERLIST

———————

LUFFY

Wherever Luffy goes, a crowd is sure to follow. Whether its civilians drawn to his free and infectious nature or rivals getting into his face as a challenge that he doesn’t back down from the end result is always the same; very little breathing room because of the mass of people. For the most part you were used to this constant buzz of noise and cluster of presences but tonight it was getting to be too much for you. After a long battle of fighting groups of enemies to be immediately dragged into an all out celebration, you were reaching your limit of what you could take.

You didn’t want to be rude to the people who were grateful for you playing your part in securing their freedom and leave the conversations or festivities too early but when eyes weren’t on you, you were definitely searching for something that could allow you to disappear without drawing too much attention or cause any offence. You breathed a sigh of relief when the current civilian you were talking to left you to grab something to eat. Idly sipping at your own drink you inched further away from the main hub of people, trying to feel some sense of security in a quieter section.

Suddenly from above you heard the loud and all too familiar laughter of your Captain that was already causing an infectious smile to pull at your lips before you had even looked up. Perched high on the town’s clocktower was Luffy, using the stone lion fixture adorning the rooftop as his own personal seat to look over the entire town’s celebration. Because your weren’t amongst the crowd you were easier to spot and when he saw you smiling up at him he grinned wide.

Immediately he launched his arm out towards you and without waiting for your response he took your arm and pulled you through the air to land safely on the roof with him. Now out from the almost suffocating crowd you finally got a moment to breathe and look down at the view of the town now far enough away for you to appreciate the atmosphere and beauty of their joy. You smiled and settled down to sit next to your Captain, finally able to relax. “So why’re you all the up here in the first place? Would’ve thought you’d have more fun down there with the people.”

“Started to get annoyed when they kept calling me a hero, all I wanted was to eat.” Luffy explained with a grin, moving his enormous hoard of food back onto his lap to continue eating. “Besides when I saw the lion up here it made me think of the Sunny.” You smiled at the simplistic answer and looked at the fixture in question. As nice as it was, it paled in comparison to Sunny. You couldn’t help but let out a small sigh which didn’t go unnoticed by Luffy. He recalled how you hadn’t be with anyone before he brought you up here. “You not having fun?”

“Not exactly.” You shrugged, unable to lie to someone so open and honest with their feelings as Luffy was. You could always trust him to listen and not dismiss your feelings. “It’s just been a lot since we landed here. The people are friendly but it was beginning to feel like I couldn’t breathe around them. It was just getting to be a bit much.”

“How do you feel now?” Luffy asked curiously, not wanting to make you feel uncomfortable either.

“A lot better, definitely like I can breathe again.” You reassured with a bright grin that Luffy returned while also reminding himself to always check on you while in a crowd like this from now on.

ZORO

Why did you have to land on an island that was virtually a Marine base in its own right? As much as you and some of the others wanted to leave and journey to the next island, Luffy’s orders were final and he wanted to stay. Just because there were a ton of Marines stationed on this island and lived here with their families, why should he change what he wanted to do. As much as you wanted to protest your Captain you knew no amount of logic or begging would change his determination to explore freely.

The most everyone could compromise on was the promise to keep as low a profile as possible and only engage the Marines if-and only if-your cover was blown. To ensure that disaster of a situation didn’t happen, the more level-headed members of the crew paired up with the more instinctual and chaotic members. Today you were left to walk the town with Zoro, the added element of ensuring he didn’t wander off into areas that would certainly spell trouble meant your worries were doubling. Every step you made through the streets, you swept a nervous glance around trying to keep track of anyone in a Marine uniform while also trying to pinpoint escape routes if the worst did happen.

“You need to relax.” Zoro muttered from beside you and you flinched, your already tense body coiling even tighter. You looked up at him with widened eyes. “You’re going to draw their attention and blow our cover.” At that you bristled but then panic set in and you couldn’t help but look around you again. With a sharp sigh, Zoro turned his body so he was blocking you from view and more importantly you could only look at him. “If you’re getting nervous about keeping a low profile but keep looking around the way that you are, people are going to end up taking notice and cause suspicion.” You opened your mouth to argue but you couldn’t, not when he was making sense. Still you couldn’t just relax the way he was telling you to. Zoro watched you carefully and frowned. “What’s got you so wound up anyway? What’s your biggest worry here?”

“Look around you!” You whispered. “Everyone is either a Marine or related to one. If we get caught-”

“We’ll deal with it as a crew like we always do.” Sometimes Zoro’s clear cut view of a situation was a reassurance but other times it was annoying. Dealing with a situation that could have been avoided in the first place was not what you wanted and wouldn’t necessarily work out as perfect as it would in his head.

“I just don’t want to be the reason one of us gets hurt when fighting didn’t need to be an option.” You shrugged helplessly. You didn’t want to seem weak, especially not to someone like Zoro but you couldn’t change how you felt in that moment. “I can’t be so laidback like you, sorry.”

Zoro rolled his good eye but threw you a small smirk to show he wasn’t annoyed. Silently he took your arm and swapped your original walking position. While he managed to keep one arm lazily around your shoulder, he also managed to be just ahead of you enough that his three swords were in front of you, almost like a shield. “As long as you’re part of the crew we work together and do our part to protect each other, yeah? So until someone spots us just relax and try not to look so panicked otherwise it looks like I’m kidnapping you.”

At that you laughed for the first time since arriving on the island and nudged his side while making no move to step out from his arm. It was strange how just being like this managed to calm you immensely. “Let’s hope Sanji doesn’t see. He’ll attack you on the spot and that’ll definitely blow our cover.”

“Yeah…would be worth it though.” Zoro grinned only to wince when you nudged his ribs a little harder. “I was kidding!” Well for the most part he was.

271 notes · View notes

elegantsparklyllama · 4 months

Text

Why we love Asha x Starboy

I just watched Wish, and it is because of the lack of meaningful character interaction in the movie. Aside from Asha and Magnifico, there are only so many characters to bounce off with Asha. There are 7 friends, but they're surface-level at best, with one line per character. The same goes for Sabino (Asha's grandfather), Asha's mom, and even the goat! Star in the final movie is a one-note "follow your dreams" character. There is no added dimension to these interactions, making the film feel hollow.

Giving the Star a humanoid appearance and a potential romance with Asha suddenly makes Wish more interesting. By making Star a human, writers are less likely to treat them like a random animal sidekick and more like a human character.

Meaningful character interactions give viewers something to cling to and relate to emotionally. The Disney Renaissance emphasizes romantic subplots and family conflicts for this reason. You can also find this when the main hero interacts with an animal sidekick. They provide the heart of a movie.

As a writer, I'm attracted to romance subplots because, like any relationship, they provide exciting character interactions and emotional investment. I'm beating a dead horse, but just because a princess has a romance arc doesn't mean she isn't empowered. Belle and Mulan are Disney princesses with love interests, yet they are still fully fleshed-out characters. Romance can also thematically enhance a story. Beauty and the Beast would not be the same without a romance between Belle and the Beast.

In the context of Wish, I think Asha already has an animal sidekick with the goat. She only needs one (they already have too many characters with the 7 teens). It is not that animal sidekicks couldn't be compelling characters. Mushu from Mulan is an example of creating entertaining animal sidekicks. He even has a character arc that complements Mulan, the main heroine. However, with Disney standards right now, you can't help but feel they might butcher the animal sidekicks.

Even the OG movie Snow White checks the mark for meaningful character interactions. It is not between the nameless prince and Snow White, but it is with the seven dwarves. Ironically this is where Asha's 7 friends are based off. The most important relationship of Snow White is literally in the title of her movie: Snow White and the Seven Dwarves. Unlike Wish, the reason why they can get away with 7 dwarfs is because the film is centered around the relationship between them and Snow White to avoid bloat.

It doesn't help that Asha and Magnifico themselves feel like bland cutouts. If you compare them to Disney's rosters of heroes and villains, they'd pale in comparison. They have the most interesting interactions but it feels like the bare minimum.

Whenever I look back on a movie, I remember a thought-provoking thematic beat or even a funny character interaction. Wish doesn't leave room for much. The movie feels like an amateur school play they show to grade-schoolers which is a low for Disney.

You know what's sadder?

I wish I could've had that meaningful character interaction with Asha and her grandfather, Sabino. They had something with Asha wanting to grant Sabino's wish but Sabino refused to let it be granted. In the movie, the conflict lasts for about a scene, and then it shifts to granting the wishes of everyone in Rosas.

You can see why the writers toyed with the idea of the Star Boy being a younger version of Sabino. The relationship between Sabino and Asha is the heart of the story.

This imaginary ship buried in concept art gave what the movie lacked: a heart. It is not enough to spew out inspirational messages and call people stars. One should also incorporate humanity.

I have a lot more thoughts on the story, specifically in its thematic beats but that is for another time.

#meta #disney wish #wish 2023 #asha x star #star boy wish #asha wish #princess asha #disney

127 notes · View notes

moodymisty · 4 months

Note

little lorgar angst

lorgar mortal lover who manages to give him peace and love. who helps him to heal from the shit kor phareon did to him. Who acts as a positive influence on both him and the legion to the point she's beloved by even his own sons. Who manages to stir him down a path that will see monarchia and all the tradgidy born from that event never happen. And because all that will ruin the plans of Erebus and Kor, they have her killed. Thinking they will get away with this assassination. only Lorgar knows. somehow he knows it was them. So does the entire legion. And for the first time, he feels such ahtred and anger for his father... How dare they take away that which gave him such comfort? And gods help them once the rest of the legion learns their beloved mother was taken from them... Just this utter sense of quiet cold rage...

I personally always write that the main sticking point as to why someone doesn't just kill their beloved at any point is simply that, you're going to have a primarch on a rampage coming right for you. And including a legion that liked her too? The carnage that takes place would make other events pale in comparison.

I would imagine that they manage to do it while Lorgar is off planet. Either they manage to overpower the defenses he has protecting her, or they hire an assassin more than capable of sneaking by. Perhaps Erebus does it himself, he's the type.

Lorgar ends up finding out via vox, when he's light years away from Colchis. Whatever was being done is left in the hands of one of his commanders and a small fleet of marines, and he turns the Fidelitas Lex back towards Colchis. The ship is basically silent the entire time. the legion had actually begun warming up to her quite a bit, and to see their Primarch in shambles (held together for now but he's clearly cracking at the seams), it turns them all into angry, vengeful, mourning astartes; Ones eager to act upon their Primarch's orders for retribution.

When he gets back, Kor Phaeron or Erebus, perhaps both, would find it key to quickly redirect Lorgar to whoever the 'murderer' is. If they can't and Lorgar figures out it was them, I imagine it would take quite a bit for them to convince him to not wipe the floor with their heads. Though I doubt they'd be able to, given his extremely mercurial nature.

The Word Bearers end up in shames, and it's unknown if they'll ever truly recover. The other legions can only watch on and take heed.

#Misty's book club #tw main character death #technically?#primarch x reader #lorgar x reader #warhammer 40k x reader #The Lorgar Aurelian family drama plotline

59 notes · View notes

where-i-overanalyze · 1 year

Text

Soul Eater characters and their MLP Gen 4 equivalents

i will be disregarding all ships and familial relationships for this purely because it would make it WAY too complicated and this is my silly little haha. i already put too much thought into it, i cannot burden my mind with the restraint of familial and romantic relations.

first up, the main 7 characters. starting with the one who inspired this all:

Maka as Twilight Sparkle

she's got the wings, she's got the book smart, she's got the power of friendship on her side, it's perfect. this was all started b/c while rewatching the anime, we joked that Maka's dubbed voice sounded like Twilight. this one is the strongest comparison, it gets worse from here.

Soul as Spike

no offense to Soul, but he's usually secondary to Maka most of the time. snarky, sassy, and often asking questions. also, his name is Spike, Soul's got spiky hair, it makes sense.

Black☆Star as Rainbow Dash

cocky, proud, super strong, fast, and blue!! a lot of their development revolves around like valuing other people (Black☆Star is more about like,,,, becoming his own person but y'know) also they both have scratchy voices.

Tsubaki as Fluttershy

calm and mild mannered, but also on occasion has the ability to go apeshit. befriends someone who is quite strong and obnoxious that most characters find annoying.

Death the Kid as Rarity

obsessive about appearances and has a particularly fancy way of talking. pale?? distinctive hair. makes sense.

Patty as Pinkie Pie

no explanation necessary.

Liz as Apple Jack

older sister figure! blonde and realistic, kinda tough and used to having to work for stuff (though Liz doesn't have to do it too much anymore now that she and patty are chilling w/ Kid) also, AJ was the only one left of the mane 6 lol.

Crona as Princess Luna

obviously the moon connection, duh. dark aesthetic, doesn't understand other people, and gets kinda possessed by madness!! which leads into my next choice

Kishin Asura as Nightmare Moon

evil!! but also because they were a bit misunderstood. spreads their powers across the entire world. possesses someone who is also part of them. lives on the moon.

Lord Death as Princess Celestia

tall and a god figure, but also kind of royalty? super OP but also we barely get to see them fight or use their powers ever so that our lovely main characters can be the ones to defeat the big bad. questionable morals at times.

Stein as Discord

crazy ass bitch!! tall and a slightly concerning amount of people simp for them. looks stitched together, stuff sticking out of their heads.

Marie as Princess Cadance

Ox as Snips

weird hair,,,,,,,,,,

Harvar as Snails

tall?? Harvar's a spear so he's tall by default. he's also gold-ish when he's in weapon form so that counts, also pointy b/c unicorn and spear.

Jackie as Octavia

Jackie has to be Octavia b/c her name is based off of cellist Jacqueline du Pré and even though Jackie doesn't play cello, this is who she must be to fulfill her destiny. also, they both have dark hair.

Kim as DJ Pon 3 (Vinyl Scratch)

gay. unicorn, so she has magic like a witch

Kilik and the Pots as the Cutie Mark Crusaders

there's three of them and they are inseparable. do not separate them. Kilik can be Sweetie Belle b/c he's standing in the middle.

Sid as Big Mac

man of few words. super strong and ,,,,,,, angular?? idk they're both kinda blocky. sad eyes,,,,,,,, UNDERRATED.

Naigus as Zecora

doctor!!! also if i was a pony, i would have a crush on Zecora. i have a crush on Naigus. this is my reasoning.

Medusa as Chrysalis

evil. weird and confusing hair!! dark aesthetic with one accent color. insanely manipulative, undeniably slaying.

Arachne as The Storm King

this one comes as a suggestion from Tumblr mutual (and my literal current college suite mate) @xaltiide she says that this guy is "the big bad" but isn't doing Most of the bad stuff in comparison to the other villains.

and finally, my grand finale

Giriko and Justin as Flim and Flam

they suck!!!! they suck SO BAD!!!!!!!! and they're evil. HORRIBLE.

anyways, happy April fools everyone. i finished the last half of this post while an edible kicked in on a Friday night and i feel like that probably shows in what i have created, but i will stand by this.

152 notes · View notes

stefisdoingthings · 1 month

Text

I NEED to rant about the trigun stampede designs in comparison with trigun 1998 because like… they had so much potential and the show threw it out the window or something.

(Edit: i haven’t read the manga so the mole thing doesn’t stand much but, again, this is only compared to ‘98 so plss dont attack me guys i swear i liked stampede)

rant, spoilers (?) + photo evidence under the cut

Tbh Knives/Vash bother me most, esp during their childhood. In tri98, they look almost identical at first, with only difference their hair color (Vash’s is more of a saturated blonde while Knives’ is closer bleach-blonde), and the mole under Vash’s left eye. Later on Vash get his hair cut and styled in spikes by Rem, while Knives takes liberty and cuts his own hair military-style. That’s about when they start to have individuality. This individuality reflects on their actions, with Vash trying to free a butterfly from a spiderweb, and Knives just killing the spider, thinking it's the most rational solution.

In tristamp, they lack any kind of individuality, with the twins having mirrored haircuts and Knives a mole under his right eye, which really really doesn’t make sense to me; I thought the mole was supposed to represent the flawed, more human nature of Vash (just like his scars), and the absence of it on Knives’ face to be a reminder that he is, for that reason, better, almost perfect and, most definitely, not human. (Edit: guys I’ve been informed it exists in the manga but I’d still like it if it didn’t)

With that they lose every kind of individuality, and it doesn't make sense for them to look so different while they're adults however having similar hairstyles despite not seeing each other for years.

(not even going to mention the fact that they made him dead pale in stampede and instead of increasing his melanin and making his hair lighter they lightened both skin and hair color but it's not relevant to this kind of analysis and just a stylistic choice i guess)

As adults in tri98 they keep their hairstyles and Knives keeps a more military-looking outfit, which looks a whole lot like the SEEDS outfit they wore when abandoning the ship, while Vash has this super over-the-top outfit with the red coat and all. Tristamp keeps the idea of Knives wearing a similar outfit and Vash going crazy with his fit, but by doing so they made both of them look insanely different and inhuman, Vash looking too clean, with technical, expensive-looking, new clothing, and Knives just straight up looking strange. Nothing about his outfit even suggests human.

For Knives I don't think the point is to look human, so it doesn't matter, but Vash is too odd-looking to be considered one of the humans, while his goal is just this; to look super cool but still human enough. In tri98 this communicates well, but not in tristamp.

(i couldn't find a pic of knives as a kid w the uniform but its the same as vash's)

Also, they're built so differently... Vash looks like a 17 year old kid and Knives looks over 25, their bodies should look the same (they're Plants after all) but with Knives being stronger in terms of power and skill, not having abs.

Basically the main problem is that the designs rely a lot on the aesthetics but not the practicality/lore-accuracy of them. I know tristamp is not meant to follow the original plot line, it just makes me a little insane how little the relationships between the characters were incorporated into these designs.

#sorry for this i just had to get it out my system #my friends suffered this rant incoherently so i had the obligation to write an actual thing and post it on tumblr #rant #i need someone to talk abt this to #i dont know if it makes sense i sort of gave up during the end #trigun #trigun 1998 #trigun stampede #vash the stampede #knives millions #millions knives

29 notes · View notes

phedbeauty · 10 months

Text

I sometimes like adding to the discourse on my favorite shows to see if others felt or viewed it the way I did. It's usually fun, but for The Bear...hmmm.

I just want to leave my two pennies on the show and this SydCarmy ship (I've never been a shipper but I do recognize romantic chemistry between characters when I see it).

I didn't watch the 1st season right out the gate. I kept seeing it on my Hulu recs though. I noticed in the promos that it had JAW from Shameless in it, but I don't think I started watching it until November or December 2022 because I wasn't watching anything on Hulu like that. But, I eventually did. It was the DIVERSE cast that piqued my interest — a stressed-out looking white guy amongst a group of black and hispanic people (barring Richie). Interesting! So, I hit play. I binged the season, loved it. Then I started noticing that a lot of people loved it. Great! I did notice something between the two main characters Syd and Carmy but it was very subtle. You would honestly miss it. I did watch it a second time and noticed it more (because you don't always catch things the first time around) but still like a whisper of something. I honestly think their meet-cute is very telling and when Syd came back at the end. It's all in how Carmy looks at her (and he be looking).

Now, here we are with season two. Prior to, everyone is saying that there will be no romance and Syd and Carmy just have a platonic relationship. Okay! That's fine, whatever. Clearly viewers have noticed something and they're shipping the two. Not a big deal. But, season 2? I binged it, loved it. Now I see that there is definitely some romantic vibes there. Honestly, it sticks out like a sore thumb, and that's just on the first watch. They said they weren't going to have romance, but they gave Carmy a love interest and Marcus catching feelings for Syd. Okay, twist! They lied, that's fine. Carmy and Claire do have chemistry, as does Syd and Marcus, but it paled in comparison to, and I believe quite noticeably, the sparks between Sydney and Carmy. It's there. My issue is why are they making the SydCarmy shippers think they're delusional when the evidence is literally on the screen? Make it make sense.

They say this season is about their partnership. A partnership is a relationship, it's synonymous. It can be romantic and it cannot be. Being in a platonic relationship is not devoid of intimacy (it's just not sexual). That's fine, but their interactions were not giving 100% platonic. I think Carmy likes Syd, Syd might not notice (or is scared to), just like she didn't notice with Marcus. I think her mind just doesn't want to go there and she's focused on the restaurant and it's success. Either way, I'm not delusional. All this discourse is a great marketing ploy I will say (which is probably why this season has gotten way more views). Great job!!

I liked Claire (how can you not). I have no negative commentary on her. I just chock up their dialogue as getting to know one another, in Carmy's awkward way. I honestly don't know. LOL. I think she was needed for Carmy's character arc/growth. Her and Carmy had chemistry but it didn't feel romantic (maybe lustful). It looked romantic but didn't feel like it, you know. Maybe he liked the idea of being in a relationship and Claire was very persistent in pursuing him, so why not. He seemed to like her. But there is a stark difference between his interactions with her and Sydney. I know she's a girl he knew growing up, hung around but never talked to. Mikey and Richie teased him about loving her which he denied. It was very vague if this was actually someone he had a crush on, so I don't know. But like Carm said, he missed out on all that stuff, so why not give it a try.

I think Sydney's reaction to Claire wasn't initially jealousy just moreso annoyed. Carmy was supposed to come back and help her with choosing napkins and working on the menu. Instead, he comes back with Claire and kicks everyone out. I'd be pissed too. She'd been working on that menu alone and with Tina, and he comes switching up things after discussing it with Claire and not her. But it wasn't until the table scene that you can kind of see that she was shocked to hear him say that Claire was great. I think at that point you just have to accept it, so she admits that maybe she was just scared. Absolutely justifiable. But we all saw how that convo progressed, and there's more there. It's kind of like an open window.

The relationship between Sydney and Carmy is integral to the show. They have the weight of this restaurant on their shoulder and the crew's livelihoods. They need to get that Michelin star and repay back the loan to Cicero in a short amount of time. Every second counts.

I don't think we've heard the last of Claire, I think they should get some closure after that ending or whatever, because it would be shitty if he didn't. But I don't see them as "endgame." I see this as a story centered around Carmy, Sydney, and Richie; their relationship with each other and those around them.

In Sydney's episode where she went around to restaurants to get inspiration, they were giving her tips about being in a partnership. But the partnership that stood out to me was the one at Kasama where she was supposed to meet up with Carmy. Kasama means "together" in Tagalog. They are a Michelin star restaurant in Chicago, the partners/owners are a couple (for those who think Sydney and Carmy being together would ruin things). I just thought that was interesting. Could be nothing, but why not hope. LOL

I loved this season, it was great. Loved all the characters. Sydney, Natalie, and Tina were bosses! They were my faves overall. Richy made a huge 180. I'm here for it. I hope they win those Emmy's this season. And, I'm excited for a season 3 whenever that will be. Pay the writers!!

Sidenote: Let the haters hate. It changes nothing. Just because they say something, doesn't make it so (denial is real). We all watched the same show and you either liked it or you didn't. People shipping characters, as they always have, should not bother you.

Also, saying you don't want two characters together because you want to see platonic relationships but are okay with pairing said characters off with another is very contradicting and very not cool. It's not Shondaland, you're right. But, adding romance doesn't cheapen the show at all. I think the writers know what their doing. Again, pay the writers! :)

#sydcarmy #thebear #sydneyadamu #carmenberzatto #thebearfx #carmy x sydney #syd x carmen

142 notes · View notes

skitskatdacat63 · 8 months

Note

catie that AU art u posted… i’m running around in circles like a hamster on a wheel they are SO GOOD i need to know all the lore

Min!!!! Hi hello!!!!! I somehow keep ensnaring people in this AU brainrot so I'm quite proud of that 🤭🤭 I'M SO GLAD YOU LIKE THEM <33333 THEY ARE SO VERY IMPORTANT TO MEEEE

My main post about it is here !!(So I won't write too much here cause that covers a lot and also because I'm planning to make a Part 2 to that at some point!!) And then various art here, here, here and here. But the gist is that it's a historical au with arranged marriage(Vettonso), but also the potential for wherever secondary ships one desires(mostly Martian and Sebson lol.)

It's a lot more nuanced than this, but I like to think of them as Seb as my precious bratty boy king/emperor with his husband King Fernandom who is like a stray cat, who eventually warms up to him. Jense and Fernando are probably the most important side characters. Mark is Seb's long-suffering personal aide(also holds a very important role in Seb's court though) and Jense is a rogueish prince(probably???? Not sure yet) who is also an important member of Seb's court(basically in charge of all horse related matters and transportation.) And then I'm still thinking of how to add everyone else in. Historically there's four important roles at the top of the Emperor's Court, and Kimi and Nico will take those other two positions!! Otherwise, everyone else I'm not completely decided upon.

I'm half asleep writing this so uhhhhhh just read that first post I linked, everything I wrote here kinda pales in comparison to that haha. And let me know your thoughts ofc!! and any questions!! <3 mwah

25 notes · View notes

fatehbaz · 10 months

Text

[S]and has acquired a conspicuous profile in contemporary urbanization over the past two decades. [...] [S]and but also gravel and crushed rock, are the fastest-growing category of extracted material. Their extraction has increased six-fold in the Asia-Pacific region over the last two decades. Singapore, a city-state in Southeast Asia the size of New York City and half the size of London, is the largest per capita importer of sand in the world. The city-state’s urbanization and never-ending construction [...] is partly responsible for its considerable appetite for sand, but this use pales in comparison to the amount it requires for its land reclamation project, which has seen the city-state expand its territory from 585 square kilometers in 1959 to 724 in 2022. Singapore’s construction of territory, and the sand it has imported from all over Southeast Asia to resource its geophysical projection of sovereignty, invites us to consider the implications of urbanization’s enrollment of greater and greater volumes of sediment, and the geopolitics of the global sand crisis. [...]

As sediment flows and locks into place, it expresses characteristics of all three states of matter, depositing and eroding [...]. A geomorphological errantry, sediment is always on the move [...]. In its multiplicity, sand becomes a kind of narrator for those elements [...]. In its modulation [...], sediment sutures together landscapes that are neither solid nor fluid, but the porous interplay [...].

---

Between 2006 and 2016, Singapore, with a population of less than six million, was the top importer of sand in the world four times. Land reclamation there truly began with colonization by the British East India Company, with Boat Quay in 1822, when three hundred or so convict laborers who were paid pittances chopped down hills and cut up stones to embank a swamp, lest it remain fallow. When Singapore became an independent city-state in 1965, reclamation projects initially cut down hills for fill material, flattening the interior and exterior of the main island alike. [...] As these projects grew more expansive and the city-state’s demand for sand intensified, Malaysia and then Indonesia banned sand exports to Singapore [...]. This [resulting] price spike shook the city-state to its core, prompting the opening of a series of construction sand stockpiles [...]. The government began purchasing sand through its web of contractors and subcontractors from Vietnam, Cambodia, the Philippines, and Myanmar. [...]

The securitization of sand in multiple stockpiles in Singapore eerily mirrors what happened in the extractive sandscapes of its origin: similarly sized dunes bloomed along the banks of mangroves in Koh Kong, Cambodia, like a dream herniating into reality, an invasive species of landscape bursting at the seam where the land met the water, still haunting riverbeds years after the dredging stopped. [...]

---

[T]he fantasy of reclaimed land through dubiously sourced rudiments of city-statecraft. [...] This kind of work is normally kept out of sight behind physical partitions as well as the labyrinthine contractual involutions of procurement arrangements, until it is seamlessly assumed by the whole, consumed by land as a homogenous legal entity [...] [B]ehind the mask, another mask. [...] [T]he sand barges and ships enter the maritime waters of Singapore from [...] legally undisclosable sources of its origin.

The eponymous proclamation [...] is the legal mechanism by which a piece of reclaimed land is “proclaimed” as state land proper by the president. A reclamation can only become state land by the text of a proclamation, a eucharistic procedure which purifies the land of its ambiguous sedimentary origin. Prior to that it is foreshore or seabed, but once it has been proclaimed, “thereupon that land shall immediately vest in the State freed and discharged from all public and private rights [...] over the foreshore or the sea-bed before the same were so reclaimed.” [...]

---

The limit to seeing like a state is that the state has a way of doing things that it can’t see, and of refusing to register that which does not meet its threshold of intelligibility.

It blinds itself through the loophole, the nondisclosure agreement, the handshake and its subtle para-political fission. [...]

Singapore’s continued economic prosperity depends on the speculative projection of its territory through unequal economic exchange, disguising it through fabulations of sovereign ingenuity like the Gardens by the Bay. [...]

[There is an] asymmetry between its curated artifice and the remote terraqueous landscapes this curation predates upon, unsettling the ground on which the city-state projects its most delirious fictions of sovereignty [...].

But those very spaces of nondescript hinterland are the logistical and industrial engines which make the Gardens possible. [...]

---

[T]he sheer colonial and postcolonial history of geographic expansion and environmental transformation implies that there are still further worlds to extract for reproducing the global city. Urban form rewired by geo-economic fortune and political repression subversively enroll land and labor into its globe-spanning machinery: it needs to keep on expanding to stay ahead of whatever anticipated global economic movement will buoy it in the future. [...] The transmutation of Singapore’s development trajectory is not historical, but contemporary: Singapore is the global city as a centripetal conjugator of space-time, funneling either term through supply chains that pass through it to produce territory as a plasticity [...].

The calamity it visited on the population of Koh Sralao was first pioneered all over Singapore and its outlying islands in the name of necessity, modernization, and the nation, displacing Orang Laut and Orang Pulau communities, who faced a choice to either abandon their maritime ways or resettle further afield in Malaysia or Indonesia. Many of Singapore’s southern islands were grafted together and erased by land reclamation, with Jurong Island in particular becoming an agglomeration of eighteen different islands, their Malay names now lost, sunk together into the catacombs of a dedicated petrochemical refining and storage complex.

Instead of being haunted by the sediment it has reclaimed its land with, and the rhythms and ecologies this sediment subtended, the global city and its subcontracted tendrils haunt those vestiges of maritime and riverine life bound by sediment like a vengeful ghost, compelled to repeat its actions, and to forget them in the projection of another tabula rasa.

---

Text by: William Jamieson. “Extracting Sovereignty: Land Reclamation in Southeast Asia and the Emergence of the Global Sand Crisis.” e-flux Journal Issue #137. June 2023. [Bold emphasis and some paragraph breaks/contractions added by me.]

#abolition #ecology #imperial #colonial

39 notes · View notes

ben-the-hyena · 3 months

Text

Following posrs : characters created and designed by me for an original story between my dearest friend @papabirdurskeks and myself called Aguas Banderas, staging gods, magic, ships sailing on the sea and the ocean and mortals inspired from different Mediterranean peoples (mostly Iberian), countries invaded by them (pre-Columbian peoples etc), those who invaded them (Moors, Muslim Spain etc) etc. Mat made incredible designs notably for the main character, the gods and a few antagonists, so I kicked my own ass and finally made designs for the characters created by myself in the story. GO SEE HER ART FOR HER CHARACTERS IN HER BLOG THEY ARE GORGEOUS MINE PALE IN COMPARISON THESE GODS LOOK SO GOOD

Starting wirh the first one I came up with, Roccu, inspired from Corsicans which I am. He is one of the best childhood friends of the main character and is happily married to the other. He is a shepherd, a competent one and actually brave and good with his faithful fun not hesitating to defend his goats and sheep from thieves or predators and say what he thinks and knowing the mountain perfectly, but also stylish loving to take care of himself, very superstitious making him easily anxious, quite prudish to the point that whenever he sees his husband naked he acts like it's a first, and VERY scared of the gods and by extension the dangerous sea, he did NOT choose to come but had to because bestie and hubby went

Traditional clothes references

8 notes · View notes

yourchemicallyimbalancedromance · 5 months

Text

“I Keep You Safe From Me”

Chapter three: Push and Pull

Ship: slow burn romantic analogical

POV: Logan

CW/TW: this chapter lightly focuses on not being able to accept one’s sexuality, therefore causing minor mental health issues (in this fictional instance; In real life situations internalized homophobia can cause greater issues than the ones touched on in this part of the story.), If that in any way makes you uncomfortable or triggers you, please do not read; take care of yourself 💜 (also, let it be known that this is also a way of coping through my own issues, so I am not speaking on a topic that I am uneducated about.)

Also there is swearing in this fic as well

(No summary because I don’t want to give anything away.)

———————————————————————

3:24 PM

Logan closed the door and stood in the bare hallway aimlessly, mind running wild. He was dizzy from all the contradicting emotions. To anyone that passed by he probably looked like he was about to be sick. His face was pale and nausea rose up from his stomach to his throat.

Virgil was so beautiful, and sweet, and his music taste was immaculate from what he could tell by the band tees and posters and the little lyrics he heard over his pounding heart.

‘No.’ He told himself.

‘No. He’s only a friend. Barely that, even. An acquaintance. A stranger.’

He opened the door to his dorm and shut it with full force, not caring about the echoing sound that was bound to be heard from across the hall.

His room was a boring comparison to Virgil’s. NASA posters, paper mâché planets and stars hanging from the ceiling, messy bed, messy room, messy life.

He flopped onto his bed, face first into one of his many pillows, ignoring his previously abandoned desk which held a semi-realistic replica of the main planets; hand crafted from different things ranging from clay to styrofoam. The scent of paint filled the room and pale blue flakes buried themselves deep under his nails.

It was as if his brain was a broken record player, constantly taking his mind back to Virgil no matter how hard he tried to force the thought away.

‘His eyes, his voice— NO. Shut up!!’

He groaned into the pillow before turning over and pulling his hands up to his hair, gripping on to it harshly.

He’d fought these thoughts for so long, telling himself that liking guys was against everything he’d been brought up to stand for, to believe in. He’d never be accepted if he told his parents, or anyone for that matter.

…but Virgil seemed kind, and caring, what would be the harm in telling at least one person?

‘You’d get close and tell him, and then he would betray you and tell everyone.’ his thoughts responded.

He had only told one person before his first year at Georgia State, about his thoughts.

He removed his hands from his hair and dug around in the mess of blankets and sheets to find his phone.

He opened it and went to messages.

Logan: “I think I’m going insane”

Patton: “???”

Logan: “do you remember what I told you last year? about…you know.”

Patton: “I do. do you remember what I told you? It’s okay to say that you’re gay, Logan.”

Logan: “I like a guy. I think…maybe? Fuck, I don’t know. He’s a freshman here. No matter how hard I try to force him out of my head he keeps coming back.”

A chat bubble popped up before disappearing and then reappearing again.

Patton: “it’s okay to like him. It’s okay that you feel that way, but…are you trying to force him out because of him or because of you?”

Logan froze for a second, not wanting to answer.

Logan: “me”

Patton: “Right, okay. Thats alright. Listen, what about you try talking to him about it..? You might be pleasantly surprised.”

Logan: “No. Absolutely not. I’d rather throw myself down a flight of stairs.”

A ‘read’ message popped up under his text. Patton didn’t respond.

Logan rolled over onto his side, dropping his phone on the bed and staring at nothing in particular, letting his vision blur and unblur with every blink.

The silence was deafening but he tolerated it, forcing himself to deal with his thoughts due to having no energy to play music or rain sounds on his TV like he usually did.

He stayed like that for a while, staring into the void of nothing, letting his thoughts surround him, occasionally checking his phone for any messages from Patton, nothing came.

The time passing with nothing to distract him felt like torture. He hadn’t made any friends in the past two semesters and no one seemed like they really wanted to get to know him, and now…Virgil.

Virgil was here, and he was being nice to him, and he was probably fucking it all up.

The clock next to him reached 3:43 when he couldn’t take it anymore. He sat upright in bed and grabbed his phone with shaking hands, slowly getting out of the bed and walking into the hallway.

He stood outside of Virgil’s dorm for what felt like hours, but in reality was only a few seconds. He slowly raised his fist and knocked, holding his breath, quietly panicking.

What was he doing here, again? god, this was pathetic. Virgil probably hated him, he probably thought he was so—

“Oh, hey?” Virgil said a little confused, opening the door to see a fidgeting Logan.

“Hey. Um..” Logan raised his phone a little and tapped it lightly on the palm of his other hand a few times before looking Virgil straight in the eyes.

“I was wondering if I could get your number? Like, in case we have the same class and I need to get the notes if I miss a day…or something.” It was a blatant lie, he never missed a day, even when he was sick he showed up to classes; even if he was terrified that everyone in the lecture hall hated him over a few coughs and the occasional sniffle.

Virgil didn’t need to know that, though.

“Oh yeah, sure.” Virgil responded, afterwards reciting off ten digits to which Logan rushed to type into his phone.

“Is that it?” He asked after he was done. Logan stood there a second before breathing out, “yeah, yeah. Sorry, I hope I wasn’t bothering you.”

“I don’t think you ever could bother me. At least not now, anyway. You seem to like being around here though..do you wanna come inside? You can stay the night if you want.”

Logan’s eyes widened a bit at the observation and a pink flush melted into his cheeks. “You want me to— uh, yeah, I’d love that..I mean!— like, I’d like that.”

Virgil grinned, “cool” he moved away from the door and opened it wider, allowing Logan to come in so he could shut it.

He obliged, tentatively walking in, watching his step as to not make a fool of himself by tripping over the things all over the room.

“Sorry that it’s a mess, I forgot to say that earlier, but then again I wasn’t really expecting you.” Virgil said, kicking a trash bag away from him, making it land next to a pile of unfolded blankets.

“It’s alright, sorry for just..showing up.” He responded, folding his arms. A slight defense.

Virgil noticed this and tried to make himself seem gentler; shoulders relaxed, unclenched jaw, quieter voice. He didn’t know that realistically, the cause for Logan’s discomfort was no one’s fault but his own.

“I wish I could offer you something but there’s nothing in the fridge, and you’ll probably have to sleep in my bed…” Virgil said, “are you okay with that? I can sleep on the floor if you don’t want me to be—“

“It’s okay, really. I’ll sleep on the floor, it’s fine.” He said as calmly as possible, although the thought of being that close to Virgil made him feel like he was going to explode.

Virgil gave him a funny look, eyebrows raised slightly. “I’m not letting you sleep on the floor, man. That’d be pretty rude of me considering you’re the guest and all” he responded, almost laughing at the suggestion.

“Come on, you wanna watch Friends or something? I don’t know what time my roommate plans on coming back so..” he added, quickly changing the topic of discussion.

“Uh, yeah, that’s fine.” Logan said, trying to focus on anything else other than the rapid pacing of his heart. The clock on the wall. Focus on the ticking of the clock.

Everything faded away as his attention shifted and he could barely hear Virgil’s voice or notice how he was slowly walking in the direction of his room.

“—gan? Logan!”

He tore away from his staring contest with the clock and turned back to Virgil, who was standing in the doorway of his room.

“Are you coming?” He asked, hand on the doorframe, leaning against it.

“Yeah, sorry.” his body filled with tension as he answered, following Virgil into his room.

The first thing he noticed upon walking into the new friends strangers, room was the solid black pillows and comforter that took the place of the bare mattress. The blanket was wrinkled a bit, indicating Virgil had probably been sitting there before his unexpected visit…once again.

A Roku remote sat on the blanket next to Virgil’s computer. He grabbed it swiftly and unpaused the episode that was lighting up the tv. He recognized it as one of his favorites from the series: “The One After Ross Says Rachel”

Virgil sat on the bed where it was wrinkled, patting the spot next to him, beckoning.

He sat next to him, almost hanging off of the side of the bed with how far he kept the space between them.

Virgil didn’t notice, he was too busy laughing along with the laugh track.

* * *

5:20 PM

Five episodes later, Virgil had fallen asleep on Logan by accident, slowly leaning his head on his shoulder to being fully slumped against the taller man next to him. If he were awake, he would’ve never stopped apologizing and agonizing over the thought of making him uncomfortable because he was so close, but he wasn’t. He was snoring quietly, his chest rising up and down.

Logan didn’t move, tried his hardest not to breathe too deeply. He didn’t want to wake him up, he seemed so at peace, like he felt safe.

He moved his hand in slow motion and took the remote from Virgil’s hand, pausing the most recent episode they were on, stopping at the 10 minute and 45 seconds mark.

Quiet filled the room before Logan heard a door open and close, footsteps following closely behind.

Fuck, it was Virgil’s roommate.

#I’m projecting heavily on to the characters in this fic sorry not sorry /lh #sanders sides #thomas sanders #ts virgil #virgil sanders #ts anxiety #ts logan #logan sanders #ts logic #ts patton #patton sanders #ts morality #tw homophobia

10 notes · View notes

thetentaclecommander · 4 months

Text

St. Valentine (18+)

I will never not be amused by toying with religious/myth themes with these two. It's just too easy and fun! Here's some borderline sacarligious smut. ________________________________________________ St. Valentine (18+)

Rated E; erotic dreamy porn with a lot of Judeo-Christian/Greco-Roman imagery mixed in from both povs Fandom: Resident Evil Main Ship: Nemesis/Jill Valentine Chapters: 2/2 CW: some dubcon in places, implied mental and physical manipulation, straight up murderkink thoughts (full tag list on AO3) ________________________________________________ Excerpt: I hold you tightly, softly as you breathe and make those sounds that entice me, the sounds you make only for me. I sniff along your throat, your flesh quivering and arching against my teeth. You do this and every time I can't help but show my longing, my hapless need for you with hungry teeth against your skin, my dripping saliva coating you. My offerings are meager but you are to be worshiped, just like this. You are my everything, my saint, the sole thing in this world that makes me good. Your eyelids flutter, slitting open to show the faint glimpses of blue; faded almost silver in color, your pupils are blown wide but staring intently at me. Only me. They widen as I mark your throat; a trail of moon-shaped marks against pale skin each with halos of red and black pattern on what you freely gave. Let me worship you. Care for you. Bleed you like the hungry worm I am.

A few places are dotted with twin holes perfectly spaced in the moons; small wet tassels of red trail down from each. And you can only smile in that pained way as your lips curve just so; I can only pant as I feel a trail of thick excitement weep from the thick meat between my legs in response. You have so much power over me. I love to hate it. You hate to love it. It doesn't matter now, does it? It doesn't matter as I tilt those lips open, one thumb is all it takes for you to concede to me. One thumb that could carelessly press in and break such a perfectly made jaw, could crush in your lovely teeth to pulp - instead, I just look at them, peer at them before I with so much effort to not break them trail my tongue against your quivering lips. Your flesh sheen with the wetness of me and some of your red as my tongue drifts along your incisors, your molars, your flat and sharp teeth so soft in comparison to mine, but prized so much more. Somewhere, you push back - as much as I allow - and my tongue is trapped in your mouth. Your growls, higher than mine but darker, needy, demanding, tell me I stepped out of line, that I am to give to worship you for your sake, not mine. My arms surround your head, dwarfing you. Your hair, your very human hair spill out from the small clips and bands and other items you would use to pin it back. The white-blond carpet fans out along the sheets, a novel thing for one who has no ability to grow hair. I want to rip them out and see if your scalp bleeds from the loss, but I remove my maw from yours to sniff your long protrusions instead. I want so many things but I am not to take but to give. I am given the prize of how good you smell, your scent, your sweat, your fear, your blood, your lust, your all, so purely 'Jill'. Your hands, so soft, so calming stroke along my arms, then down against my face. So soft, you bless me with their touch. Your hands are more steady than mine, assured, aware, touching with no hesitation along my face. I lift up and purr in contentment from the attention; I even lightly nip against one, showing care to my most perfect one made so by my own works. I want to defile you, oh so much. (Continue reading St. Valentine on A03)

12 notes · View notes

starr-fall-knight-rise · 1 year

Text

Fool’s Gold

https://www.patreon.com/empyreaniris?fan_landing=true

https://starr-fall-knight-rise.tumblr.com/post/182501791735/master-post

https://docs.google.com/document/d/1jzEIdDAB4omdO2JcQVMObfrhLJ5kX4ONmSsLypM1ks0/edit?usp=sharing

“This is a bad idea.” Sunny said. Standing in the derelict shuttle bay, the two of them convened privately while the rest of the delegation slowly assembled itself. She restated her spear against the floor with a hard thud, visor retracted back from her inhuman face. Light glittered in waves over the electric blue carapace crowning her regal head, “She has the advantage here. This is their territory.”

That was true enough, Adam could sense it.

This ship, this palace was….. Well it was evil. Despite having been here on multiple occasions in the past, he hardly recognized the silent, dark hallways, branching off from the main shuttle bay and into inky black darkness. There was no life here, only silence, and a muffled sense of complete wrongness.

Were was the crew?

All around them remnants of station life lay in a tableau of captured time. Equipment sat scattered on the floor, crates overturned. Something dark stained the far wall, though Adam had no desire to figure out what.

He could guess.

Apollyon perfecting his manipulation…. He could only imagine that what lay behind these walls was far worse than the hand of god incident. Closing his eyes he couldn’t help but imagine the scene: a desiccated corpse sitting over an empty plate.

“She is at an advantage, but if Adham listened to me…. We have a secret weapon.”

Sunny tilted her head in a question, but it was cut off as Adham approached from the shuttle. The glowing white and gold of his armor cast off a small radius of light, a bubble which chased off any fleeing shadows. The delegation was small, Adham as the leader of the Makers, Adam as the leader of the constructs, Sunny as Kazna’s daughter and Conn as their resident mind reading manipulator plus or minus a few guards: That being Ramirez and another maker that Adam did not recognize.

The last member of their party might take some time, and the more dramatic their entrance, the better.

“I advise that we go no further into the station. I imagine Apollyon will be trying to throw us off and has set the stage to do so. Even if that isn’t the case, we don’t want to be trapped in tight corridors on an unfamiliar space station with architect knows what is wandering the halls.”

Adam agreed. The rest of the group gathered around in a tight formation, maker and construct leaders at the head.

Adham closed his eyes, “If you think we will be venturing further into this ship, you are sadly mistaken. We have come to meet you on your ground, and we'll go no further, if you wish to meet with us, you will come and meet with us here.”

For a long moment, there was only silence, a well of emptiness that seemed to spread outward from the welling darkness of the corridors and fill the room around them. The shifting of their bodies and the soft exhale of their breath was the only noise to chase away the abiding stillness.

And then she appeared, coalescing from the darkness like a wraith, shadows billowing at her heels, gold eyes flashing in the light given off by Adham the makers. She had never looked so sinister, her massive, horned black armor towering over them, shadow black cloak whipping around her heels. Her face was unusually gaunt, eyes sunken back into her head. Her once purple carapace seemed stained black.

“If you insist.” She said, and with every step the ground beneath them seemed to shake a little under the weight of her massive, armored body. Adam had always thought of Sunny as tall, relative to himself, but every time Kazna or Kanan showed their full height, he was reminded of just how short she was, a mere seven feet in comparison to her mother’s almost ten, with the added bonus of massive spikes on her helmet.

The rest of the delegation trailed in behind her, Everett, pale, twisted, and wearing robes of course red fabric. He had a look in his eye that was somewhere near manic, an unnerving grin plastered across his pale face, behind him came the thing that wore the chairwoman’s body, parading around inside it like a cheap suit, body rolling and twisting in ways it should not have been able. Adam was also not surprised to find Noctus joining them.

No matter how many times they stamped out the little bastard, he was always going to return.

And then.

The last member of their party.

A woman, with scruffy blond hair grown past the line of her jaw, her face made unfamiliar by the twisted look of contempt that marred her expression.

Adam could feel Ramirez stiffen beside him, and reached out a calming hand.

“So this is what the architect sends.” Kazna said, looking them up and down with a raised eye ridge.

Noctus chuckled darkly.

“Get on with it Kazna, we didn’t come here to exchange pleasantries. You want us to surrender, and we refuse to do so, what other arguments might you have for us.”

She lifted her hands to either side, “Your hostility is unfounded, you understand that this place, this….reality…. Is an intrusion. Apollyon claimed this long before the Architect came and stole it from him. He is only trying to regain what is rightfully his. Is that so bad?”

“Its hard to claim land that never existed.” Adham shot back, “Apollyon ruled over a realm that hed neither time, nor matter nor space. For this reason he holds claim to nothing but an impossible idea.”

She shook her head, “Your shallow mind refuses to understand. Apollyon was robbed of his true being, oneness with nothingness. How does that seem fair?’

Adam jabbed a finger at her “You’re arguing the point of a creature you cannot even comprehend. You make it sound like the architect just showed up out of the blue one day and stole Apollyon’s home. We have no idea if that is the case. It could be that the architect existed within the same space as another entity, and thus resulted in creation besides, I am sure there are other locations just chalk full of infinite nothingness.”

“Thats not how it works.” Everett spat.

“I don’t care how it works. People live here now, and I don’t care what your issue is, you cannot promote the genocide of an entire universe and be in the right.” he waved a hand, “And the fact that you all are okay with this is baffling o me. You understand that when this is all over Apollyon will have no use for you? Your very existence is abhorrent to him because you are a three dimensional creature that takes up time and space. The very nature of you being here is the one thing that he is fighting against. There is no new world order that will find the group of you on top. Once this is all done, you will vanish, like you never existed. All of us will permanently cease to be forever.’

“Not quite true.” Noctus said making his stately way to the front of the group, “Apollyon will absorb what we are into himself.”

Adam sighed in frustration, “He isn’t going to do that. He doesn’t want you. He is using you. The fact that you can’t see that is…. Well it is simply baffling to me.” he turned his head to look at Renegade who hovered at the back of the group. She didn’t seem nearly so pleased to be there as the rest of them. In fact, she kept her head turned away at all times intently examining the wall.

Did she? Seem unenthusiastic about all this.

He turned his mind to Ramirez, knowing that the marine would know her better than anyone else.

And indeed, he couldn’t take his mind or thoughts off of her, examining every line of her body, every shift in movement. Looking at her he seemed convinced that she did not want to be here, that all of this was making her just as uncomfortable as the rest of them.

She didn’t want to cease existing, and all of this had simply gotten out of hand.

She was just too stubborn to back out. These thoughts spurred on his hope, and he couldn’t help himself from leaning forward, eagerness holding him on the balls of his feet, “Come on Mav…. Renegade, you know this is bullshit,” She jumped a bit, surprised someone had talked to her directly, but refused to look at them.

Kazna glowered at the marine, and then at Adam, “Keep your dog silent.”

Adam narrowed his eyes, “Your negotiation skills are shit, you know that,: He raised his hands to the air in frustration. Why are you doing this Kazna, I just don’t understand. Why make yourself the bitch of an Eldritch abomination. You used to be a general, leader of nations, and now here you are doing a space squid’s dirty work, receiving nothing from it, losing everything and heading face first into never existing ever again. I don’t see how this benefits you.”

She growled, “I have lost,nothing. This fight is the greatest battle I could have fought, the greatest glory.”

Sunny shook her head, “So what, it's not like your deeds will live on. Once Apollyon takes over, it won’t matter how good a general you were or what you did.”

“I did not ask you to speak,.” Kazna said keeping her eyes intentionally trained on Adam in refusal to speak to her daughter.

“Yeah, no surprise there. You know I find it funny which battles you chose to fight and which ones you run away from. Destroy the universe sure, but you were too pathetic to fight for your own damn family.”

Golden eyes flared, “I have no family.” Sunny stepped forward and so did Kazna, and the tension in the air only grew until they were on the edge of a snapping point. Weapons were raised and all around the room bodies were gearing up for this to end bloody.

“Did I really mean so little to you?”

And then the tension snapped, like a rubber band, but instead of breaking it was as if a hand had slipped, and the band had sprung back into position, tension vanishing in an instant.

Kazna and Sunny turned at once, their movements similar enough to mark them as mother and daughter, eyes widening at the same instant as the rest of the room turned towards the owner of the voice, deep, smooth baritone warm and gold like the flow of honey.

And standing just inside the shuttle bay, shedding golden light like a cloak.

Was

Lanus, tall, strong and shimmering like the purest of gold. For a drev he would be considered incredibly handsome, as a Maker brought back to his youthful prime. But despite the regal bearing of his head, his expression was sad, a heartbreak etched in flesh.

Kazna stammered, faltered into silence, and for the first time since Adam had known her, she was speechless, the paul of darkness sliding from her for just a moment as her eyes fell on the one whose death had started this all.

Lanus stepped forward, his movements sure and lithe like the warrior he was. He showed no fear as he looked upon her, slowly pacing the distance that stepped between them before stopping before her.

Toe to toe they were able to lock eyes.

His expression grew with ever increasing sadness as he looked her over.

The room was still.

With a gentle, slow hand Lanus reached up brushing his thumb tenderly over the gaunt skin of her cheek, “What have you done to yourself, Zhak Dzhalzheen.”

56 notes · View notes

petalologist · 5 months

Note

YOU SHIP CHIYAKA tell me your thoughts sand i'll tell you mine there's like 3 other people on this site i've met who ship chiyaka

HELLO!! first off, sorry for such a late response; i've been out of town for a few weeks. i really appreciate you reaching out though, as i love discussing ship stuff!!

honestly it started just because i have a problem with constantly shipping ayaka with various fatui LMFAO (stares at my scarayaka and lyneyaka art nervously) but i do think they could have a very fun dynamic! tartaglia is a very Respects Strong Women kind of guy and ayaka would be no exception, albeit her combat experience pales in comparison to those whose main line of work is in fighting. i feel like the obvious idea would be them meeting for diplomatic purposes, but i also think it would be fun if they just kinda met each other out in the wild, whether they know about each other's respective roles and titles at first or not. i think they'd equally spoil each other. ayaka is big on gift giving and would definitely express her affection through those sort of hints at first. i also have had thoughts about their respective thoughts on family? ayaka and ayato being the remaining members of their clan obviously makes them very close and worrisome about one another, and childe's sort of sheltering of his siblings might remind her of how ayato had been with her for a while. crying and sobbing thinking of ayaka pulling out her long since stored away childhood temari to teach teucer how to play, introducing his little siblings to various inazuman games and events like festivals. also, i enjoy the contrast between ayaka's more cautious and closed-off approach to live vs childe's seemingly impulsive nature. he'd be a bad influence on her in a fun way lmao

there's also obviously the angst potential. c'mon. harbinger and a government official/practically princess from two countries with rocky relations? childe is totally ayaka's 'sneak away at night, steal kisses in chinju forest away from their respective duties' bf. they'd be the types to fall for each other but barely see each other, as ayaka remains pretty stationary in her work for the yashiro commission and childe is always traveller for one mission or another.

these are all TOTALLY VAGUE and as you can tell i haven't actually ever hashed this stuff out, but i'd love love love to hear your own thoughts on them!! it's always so nice to see anyone who shares any of my rarepairs :"")

EDIT: AFTER LOOKING AT UR BLOG I REALIZE IVE READ YOUR FICS BEFORE??? HELLO WHAT AN HONOR

#ask #thank u again for sending this!!!!

9 notes · View notes

girlfriendsofthegalaxy · 1 year

Text

tuesday again 4/11/2023

more concise than usual. don't get used to it.

listening

the trombone is an underutilized instrument in indie rock. this is a delightful music video, the vocals bother me a lot less now that i know they're deliberately going for a robotic effect.

youtube

if you liked the Killing Eve soundtrack (largely brought to you by Unloved and Junoire), that sort of very smooth lightly psych-rock flavored thinking woman's music to smoke clove cigarettes to while slouching around used bookstores, you may like this song! reading this back it sounds kind of snotty but sometimes you need a french woman main character song to make doing errands feel like being on a secret mission

i found one of their previous albums, Psycho Tropical Berlin, sort of a one-hit wonder with Hypsoline (the credits song for As Above So Below) but it really is a fucking banger

i want the album art as a shirt So Bad but not enough to pay $25 shipping from france about it.

i think this was off the spotify weekly discover playlist? can't imagine where else i would have run across it

reading

remember the vampire-adjacent private detective novels i was reading? not the ones from last week, the earlier ones. the author alexis hall chucks you a free short story Sand and Ruin and Gold if u sign up for his mailing list.

i think the orca comparisons are a touch heavy-handed at times, but the imagery in this thing...i really am a sucker for the rot of a coastal tourist trap. i bear no fondness, but i do give them a weary nod of acknowledgement. this town is a construct for other people to enjoy. i typed out a very long thing about how the economics of tourism shaped the town and everything about the civic calendar down to the school year, but--it was not really meant to have real residents or be a real place. there was absolutely nothing to do and nowhere to hang out without paying for anything in the off season.

It was just after closing on Reunification Day, the last of the stragglers gathered up and banished back to their world. A spiral of faded, plastic bunting from the celebrations had blown into one of the pools. I went to get a pole to hook it out but heard a splash and turned in time to see Nerites leap from the water in a gleam of skin and scales. The wind whisked the ribbon from between his fingers, and he reached after it, his body twisting sinuously in the air before he crashed into the pool again.

I’d never seen him—or any of them—move like that before. The jumps and slides we taught them were supposed to mimic their natural behaviours, but they rarely performed them spontaneously. And this was something else again: a wild leap and an ungainly splash, more beautiful to me than the most perfect bow or spin because it seemed so absolutely heedless.

He surfaced again, almost vertical, spinning in the pale-grey spray, one hand catching for the bunting’s tail. A tug, and it tumbled from the sky, nothing but a lifeless piece of string.

i am beginning to remember that all the shit that really sticks in my brain is in short stories and novellas you (general, including me) have never heard of.

watching

star wars resistance. i am finding this far more enjoyable than the bad batch or the mandalorian bc it has something of a storyline that it sticks to, even though most of the runtime is a teen... he's not really a teen, he was a new republic pilot so he's probably like twenty but in my heart he's like fifteen. part of the appeal of ds9 for me was a very consolidated set of recurring background characters and getting to see that there are other things/factions/people all working for their own ends. baby's first practice spy mission.

the ship design is really killer: it asks and answers the question "what if a pirate spaceship was also a galleon?"

i find myself excited to watch the next episode, which is not a familiar feeling when i watch star wars stuff. i really hope s2 holds my interest as much as s1 did.

why am i doing this? i have seen all the star wars except for: most of the LEGO stuff, most of the addendum and errata for tcw (including the crystal crisis arc), the holiday special, and most of the droids and ewoks animated shows. like i am Really scraping the bottom of the barrel here, even though i'm not really sure why this show fell into such obscurity.

playing

a bit cranky with weird west, bc i think to get past this stealth level i will have to dismiss my companion (can't seem to knock out guards unless i'm standing up, the companion AI has a very loose definition of "staying close" and is only "invisible" if you're also crouching, and you can't direct your companion to stay put in one place OR to stay close/stay crouched permanently. i may have exhausted most of the appeal of the world on my first fifteen-hour run through the first story. i am more than a little disappointed bc i did have a fuckton of fun in those fifteen hours and was expecting the good times to continue.

making

still halfheartedly poking away at the baby blanket, less than half a repeat this week and i don't feel like getting up, digging the blanket out of the catproof bag, and putting enough lights on for a real photo. this is repeat 7/10 tho so we are slowly approaching the end

#tuesday again #tuesday again no problem #Bandcamp

23 notes · View notes

softquietsteadylove · 11 months

Note

Currently I'm playing Assassin's Creed Odyssey and whilst playing I'm thinking about the Eternals back then, in Ancient Greece.

So basically i thought about Socrates annoying our Goddess of War. And Thena would never admit she actually likes talking to him.

Hugs and much love!! 🖤✨

"Is the Goddess of War cowering again?"

Thena bristled and glared at the old man, "I do not cower."

He chuckled, though, sitting himself on a rock amongst the olive trees behind the main constructions of Athens' outskirts. "And what to call it then?--you hiding here in the trees?"

She rolled her eyes. The old man was not so insufferable, but he had no problem saying things that made her want to pick him up and rattle him like a barrel. Although she was almost grateful for it in comparison to the obsessive reverence of the rest of Athens.

"Too many demands in the day already, young one?" he asked, raising a frayed, white eyebrow.

She sighed; if only he knew how young he was, to her. "They are discussing the launching of ships. Why this would need my input - let alone approval - is beyond me."

But the old man laughed, letting his walking stick rest against a different rock. Thena eyed the pale length of dead wood. "The senators, as they call themselves, are just as new to this as the idea itself. They have assembled this great counsel and yet they still seek the approval of a higher power. One wonders why they assembled this body to 'speak for the people' if they were going to surrender their decisions to a figurehead in the first place."

Thena let old Socrates ramble on. She typically wasn't one for the musings of man, much preferring her solitude. But the old man hadn't ratted her out yet, and as far as humans went, he was far from the worst. "Have you been postulating again?"

"Bah," he waved his hand through the air, squinting up at the Grecian sun through the olive leaves. "Just a crazy old man, to them."

"And you think you are not, to me?"

"Maybe," he grinned at her with what teeth he had remaining, "but I'm a crazy old man who lets you be, no?"

Thena allowed a faint smile on her lips. "Indeed, you are."

"So then, we seem to have reason for our alliance," he chuckled.

"And you?" Thena asked in an unusual invitation to continue their talking. She summoned a blade to her hand and whittled down his walking stick.

Socrates watched her the same way he watched fisherman haul in their catch; with admiration for the craft, but with no further interest in the act itself. "Hiding from that young tyke."

"Young Plato?" Thena smiled as she sliced the wood cleanly, angling it to form a head for a proper cane. The old man was walking around leaning on this tree length washed up on the shore. "He is fond of Phastos as well."

"Ah, yes, Hephaestus?" Socrates raised his other eyebrow, to which Thena shook her head. "What of your Champion?"

A length of wood went flying.

Thena tossed the properly carved cane back at the man, "what of him?"

Socrates shrugged an increasingly bony shoulder. "You're with him when at all possible, aren't you?"

Thena nearly pouted at the needling - but entirely correct - statement. She huffed, "there are many demands on Gilgamesh."

"Ah yes, Gilgamesh," Socrates laughed, resting his hands outstretched in front of him. "And what do you call him?"

She gave him a somewhat tired glare. She could deny him the rest of his needling and simply leave. But then she ran the risk of an advisor or senator or counsellor - or stars forbid one of the many sculptors searching for her - finding her. She sighed. "Gil."

"Oh."

She glared at him anew, her hackles rising despite her best efforts.

Socrates gave her a look that made her want to chuck him right off their cliff of solitude, "Gil."

She hardened her expression at him, if only to keep her annoyance from boiling over. He said it in a way that made her feel agitated. "Have you not other people to pester?"

"None as fun as you, dear," he laughed heartily, his head tossed back.

Thena huffed again; insufferable old coot.

"And what power does your Gil possess, again?"

She glared at him, but he feigned some effort into remembering, scratching the beard on his chin. "Strength."

"Ah, yes, the fella who can reach into the forges and grasp iron with his bare hands."

No trouble remembering him at all, it seemed. Thena pursed her lips, "indeed."

"They do demand a lot from him," Socrates agreed with her earlier statement at this much later junction. He snuck his eyes - still sharp under the wrinkling of his skin - back over to her with a grin. "Not very fair to you, is it?"

Thena refused to dignify that with a response.

Socrates let out another laugh, and she wondered how many rocks might fit in that wide mouth of his. "That's why you're out here moping?"

The shade of the trees was doing nothing to shield her from the heat of the sun.

"Dearie," he snorted, jabbing her knee with the cane (which she just so-kindly fashioned for him!). "You are the patron saint of Athens. I'm sure if you want to steal your boyfriend all you need do is ask."

Thena flushed further at yet more indignity. "I do not-!"

"Oh, save it!" he drawled at her, in a way no one else in Athens would ever dare. He scratched at something in his ear, "I don't care what you think I think or what you know I know."

She glowered at him.

"There you are!"

Thena looked up, a smile coming over her (whether she wanted it or not). "Here I am."

Gilgamesh pushed an olive branch out of his way to lean on the rock beside her. He nodded to old Socrates, "and good day to you."

"And you, Champion," Socrates gave him a smirk. "We were just speaking of you."

"Oh?" Gil looked at Thena beside him, who was glaring at the old man.

"Have you nowhere else to rest after your ceaseless chatter?"

Gil didn't argue with her. He had seen her and the old philosopher interact a few times before, and it was always funny. Jabs were only ever made in good humour. "Actually, I was hoping to steal the Goddess away with me."

"She's all yours, sonny boy," Socrates stood, stretching out his arms before taking up his newly carved cane. "Don't mind me."

Gil simply nodded to him as he began shuffling past them and into the city. He looked down at Thena, stealing one of her hands off her lap to hold for himself. "Hey."

"Hey," she beamed. The unique relief and comfort of his company truly had reached new heights during their time in Athens.

"Time for a break?" he propositioned, pulling her up from her resting rock, her hand still in his. He brought his head closer to hers, "I packed us a little picnic--you, me, in the orangery?"

Thena kept her eyes on her personal embodiment of solace standing before her. She yearned to curl up in his arms, "divine."

"I thought you weren't one for divination."

"Away with you!" she snapped at the old bastard one again chuckling at her expense. She thunked her forehead against Gil's chest.

"Hey," he chuckled, rubbing her back as he allowed her frustrations. "Come on, he's not bad. As far as humans go, I'd say you're fond of the old guy."

"I am done speaking of him," she sighed, still pressing her warmed skin to Gil's cooling robes. She purred as he pulled her hair over her shoulder, running his fingers through it gently. "I believe you offered sustenance?--and solitude."

#Thenamesh AU #I did look up both incarnations #I know in the games he's not designed as an old man #but honestly I wrote that his eyebrows were bedraggled #and I kind of went from there Love #I hope you don't mind #I thought it would be kind of cute for him to be this annoying grandfather type #he is a philosopher #he has no interest in the literal Goddess of War walking around in their daily life #if anything he doesn't believe she is a goddess #he knows the Eternals are...something #but he certainly knows that Athens impressed their beliefs upon her #not the other way around #so when he sees her haunting around the outskirts of the city #he just lets her #he too is tired of the pomp and circumstance of young Athens #and we may not know for sure #but he doesn't seem to have had a family #he thinks it's funny to get under the Goddess' skin #tease her about the things parents and grandparents tease about #he waves at them when they're out #others are like Socrates do not address the patron gods informally!#he's like ah we're old friends right kiddo?#Thena pretends not to like him #but he gets jostled and falls one day when some soldiers are passing through #and she picks them up and makes them apologise to him at knife point

13 notes · View notes