“Barefoot girl sitting on the hood of a Dodge, drinking warm beer in the soft summer rain...”
Many fandoms over the years. Haven't regretted a single one (mostly).
Jesus goddamn fucking christ. The foursome out there is still talking—that probably just saved your ass—likely sharing their evil plan that would be nice to know if two of y’all’s party wasn’t trying to leap out and announce their presence.
“Back,” you hiss. “Everybody back.”
For a horrifying second, you’re sure Karlach and Wyll ain’t gonna listen. But it’s Wyll who nods—dimly, dazed—and squeezes Karlach’s shoulder. Tilts his horned head towards the stairs.
The others got their weapons out. You haven’t had a look around. Don’t see Aylin nowhere. Got no idea who Whitey and Greaseball are or what they can do.
Karlach, thank fuck, goes along. Just around a bend, just out of sight and hopefully not in some fucked up echo zone.
“Calm down, the both of you,” you say, quiet as you can.
“Fuck that,” Karlach says. “I was in the hells for ten years. Ten. Years. All of it because of that fuck. I’m going back there, and I’m gonna rip that fucker’s head off and shove it up his ass.”
“You know, people say that, but in reality, it’s much harder to accomplish,” Astarion says.
Shadowheart throws her hands up.
“Not helping,” you say. Turn back to Karlach, your ass the only thing standing between her and making good on her threat.
“She’s right,” Wyll says. “That was my father. He’s supposed to be at the Gate. How in the hells…” He shakes his head. “It doesn't matter. I’m getting him out of here.”
“Wyll, stop. Both of you. Just fucking hold on two seconds.”
“If we are to attack, we must do so now or risk discovery,” Lae’zel says. And she seems to lean hard in one of those directions.
A shout. Then another. The cluster of y’all peer out as Greaseball and Whitey lift some kinda glowing crystal. Wyll’s dad (on all fours on the floor at the feet of the palest goddamn person here and you’re including Astarion in that, whole lotta fucking yikes there) don’t react. Just sways slightly. Looks like he got kicked in the damn head by a horse.
Then Pawpaw lifts a crystal of his own. Shouts something that makes your group all flinch or gasp.
“The dead three?” Shadowheart says and it sounds like that should be in capital letters. “Why is it always the dead three?”
An alternative rock band. That’d be a good name for one of them. One of the edgier ones. But your mental gibbering gets cut off when the floor rumbles. When that big fucking pit pulses. You grab whoever’s beside you and start to pull them back—
Huge. Spiky iron points and something vast and fleshy. Wrinkled. Old flesh, slimy flesh, the fuck is that thing even?
It’s. It’s a giant brain. Wearing some kinda wrought-iron diadem or whatever. Gale makes an urgent sound beside you (it’s his robe you got a fistful of).
“By all the stars in the Weave,” he says.
Lae’zel hisses, pure crocodile. Eyes wide, teeth bared. You think it’s that blood-lust grin of hers, but her eyes…that ain’t excitement. Not determination. Lips too stiff; more of a rictus than a grin.
…she’s. She’s scared.
Lae’zel is scared.
“The fuck is that?” you say.
But before anybody can answer, Whitey grabs the back of Wyll’s dad and hefts him up by the back of his neck. Holds him there as a giant fucking tentacle lifts from the giant floating brain.
Wyll moves. You don’t think. Just throw yourself in front of him, bend your knees, and shove. He’s young. He’s fit. Sturdy and strong and determined as hell.
You weigh as much as a linebacker. And you got a lower center of gravity.
He stumbles back on his heels.
“Outta the way,” Karlach says and lifts her ax. She’s gonna charge. Gonna blow it. Two unknowns and a giant, floating brain and she’s gonna rush out there and get smacked down like Aylin and they’ll catch you and the shining line will fizzle out. You’ll be caught. You’ll lose.
You look to Astarion. No words. No brainworms. But understanding flashes in his eyes anyway.
He blurs. Fast as fuck, faster than thought. Lashes out with a booted foot and kicks the side outta Karlach’s knee. Pounces on her as she goes down, gloved hand shoving her snarl back into her mouth.
Shadowheart skids down beside her. Leans in as Astarion pulls back, shaking his smoking fingers.
“You know she’s right,” Shadowheart says, low and urgent. “We have to wait. We know nothing right now. You’ll get yourself and all of us killed. You’ll get Wyll’s father killed.”
“Let me pass,” Wyll says to you.
“They got him,” you say. “Whether he’s already brainwormed, or he’s about to be, but they already got him. You step out there now, maybe they’ll kill him just to fuck with you.”
Desperation pulls on every line of his body. God, he’s so young. Young and good, and he wants that goodness so bad.
“You hunt monsters, Wyll. You know better than this. You know.”
Karlach sizzles. Literally. Shadowheart’s got her bare hands pressed to her shoulders, holding her down while her vents and the flames dancing along her hair flares blue.
Shadowheart grimaces, but she don’t let go. Not until Karlach’s face twists up—sorrow or shame or frustration—and she slumps.
Y’all’s cleric watches her a moment more, then climbs off. And when Lae’zel moves in, she holds up one of her burnt hands and says, “I’m fine.”
Jesus hands fix her blistered palms. Then Karlach’s fucked up knee. Shadowheart even holds her hand out to help Karlach up. Who bounces on her healed knee a couple of times.
And says, “Fuck me, Fangs, did you have to kick so hard?”
“Probably not,” he says, because he’s the world’s biggest dickhead.
“Fucker,” Karlach says with no real heat.
Something thrums. Plucks at a cord deep in your brain, worm thrashing and biting behind your eye.
Come. Follow. Obey.
Your knees damn near buckle. The others, all of you, all of it trembling with dreaddevotionOBEY.
But just as quick, a blanket folds over y’all. And you’re in your own body, clutching at Wyll as sweat pours down his forehead.
Another thrum. Muffled, this time. An air horn buried under a pile of blankets. Your teeth rattle in your skull and you manage to stagger over and catch the brain rising, ugly metal spikes twisted into it, flesh swollen and throbbing, infected somehow around it.
It vanishes. Poofs off in a purple cloud, and takes Greaseball, Whitey, and Wyll’s dad.
“No,” Wyll says. “No.”
It hurts. Slips between your ribs to stab at something soft. The look on his face; the look on Grandpa’s face the last time you seen him. Like he knew it was the last. Like he knew he’d never…that’s he’d die before you ever got back.
But Pawpaw is still there. Standing alone. And with the circus done poofed off, a sickly green glow lights up the wall on the left. The same shade as that demon circle over in Shadowheart’s goth dimension. Can’t see up there—it looks like an old overlook, probably used to hold guards and like, pots of boiling tar or whatever. But if you was a betting man, that’s where you’d put a bitch-slapped angel.
The victory is still there. The plan.
It’s all still right here.
You look to your group. People you been ass-to-armpit with for over a month, now. A group of freaks and assholes who’ve saved your bacon, fed you, crammed your soul into the jar you carry around your neck. The ones who found you post-“it’s complicated” breakup and made you eat and do goth girl yoga.
It’s here.
“We break into two teams,” you say.
“Godsdamnit, Snuggles, the last time—” Karlach starts.
“I think Aylin’s over there, and we gotta bust her out before we can touch Pawpaw. But he’s gonna know the fucking second that happens. Two teams.”
Her lips press thin. But she don’t disagree. None of them do.
It’s a narrow approach to the open space out there. It’s wide open beyond. People move in the shadows behind Pawpaw and his secondary murder pit, more of them moving out now that the freak show done left. A skinny little ridge runs up the right, to the old overlook where you think Aylin is. It’s gloomy the whole way up, and skirts two old rockfalls. It’s possible for a sneaky group to make it up there unseen.
“First group gets up there and busts out Aylin,” you say. “Gale and Wyll, you’re both spell guys. Astarion, you can cover them—”
“Now hold just a moment—”
“Excuse me?”
“You’re not a fighter,” Shadowheart says, arms crossed.
“I’m hanging back,” you say. “Outta the way. I can snipe some bitches if I can, but Lae’zel and Karlach is our heaviest hitters. And Shadowheart, you ain’t no slouch. Plus you can put people back together.”
“Darling.” There ain’t no teasing to Astarion now. He looks graver than you ever seen him. Like he’s trying to say something, but not out loud.
He’s been sticking close to you this whole time. Ever since the pit you fell into. This could be a nasty fight.
However.
“Please,” you say. “Go with them. They need you.”
You reach out, small and quiet and careful, slipping through the brainworm connection like a tiny eel in a stream. Brush up against his thoughts bobbing in the current.
You need him to go with them two. For this to work. For y’all to make it out with everything y’all need, please, you need him to.
He swallows that down. Eyes flicker, then he sighs hard through his nose. It’s only a little sulky.
“Pretty sure Aylin’s gonna bust out like a bitch the second she can,” you say. “That’ll be our signal to jump Pawpaw. Until then, we hold back. I don’t suppose any of y’all got something to hide us?”
“I’ve a handful of invisibility potions,” Gale says. Reaches into his pack. “Enough for our group, and one extra.”
Invisibility potions. Goddamn, special forces could really fuck a bitch up with something like that.
The entire group looks at you.
A piece falls into place you wasn’t even anticipating. It’s perfect.
“Yeah yeah,” you say and accept it.
“I can cast a silence spell on you all, as well,” Gale says. “You won’t be able to hear anything or cast spells yourself, but it will minimize the risk of anything echoing back.”
Fucking perfect.
You nod.
And here it is. The final moment. All of it coming together. The end of this shitshow. Astarion watches you as Gale whispers his silence spell and Wyll uncorks his potion. This is gonna happen fast and dirty. You’ll be done. This’ll be over. Holy fucking shit.
You can be brave in this moment. Reach out and brush the back of Astarion’s gloved hand. Which immediately twists to snag his fingertips with yours. Lightly, carefully, not even an actual hand hold. But your chest fills with buzzing and you almost don’t shove down the shudder that tries to run down your spine.
He’ll be safe after this. Last thing to do, last unpleasantness, and he and everyone will be fine.
Wyll shimmers and goes invisible. All sound in the world cuts off. Only the thump-whoosh of your pulse in your veins, the rasp of air in your own throat. Astarion’s red eyes on you as he brings up his bottle. Tilts his head back.
He shimmers silver and vanishes.
Twists his hand at the last moment to pull yours in. Fully clasps your hand in his and gives it a squeeze.
Then he’s gone.
You’re breathing a little heavy. Face warm. Nerves churn in your gut, a confused mess of all of this and all you’re about to do. He’ll be okay. He’ll be safe. Completely safe after this.
Shadowheart arches a brow at you. Looks at your hand dangling at your side.
You lift your chin. She rolls her eyes and looks away.
Won’t take Astarion and the boys long to get up to where they need to be. Up on the raised lip of the big brain pit, Pawpaw looms over some cultist in a tall hat, lips moving silently. Dismisses him after a moment and stares out in the direction the two clowns and Wyll’s dad went off in.
Glances down to the pit. He looks so damned tired. Like all it’d take is a single step in that direction, foot hanging out over open air, and he’d be done. Whatever’s going on, whatever plot they need a big damn brain for…
He sighs.
Karlach and Lae’zel move out ahead. You tap Lae’zel’s shoulder and gesture her to wait a second. Let Karlach move out to the right. Let Shadowheart get all hunkered down just ahead.
You pull your crossbow. Find the bag of bolts on your belt. You’re getting more used to it, the fumbling cranker (ain’t it’s real name but you don’t care). It’s still a bitch, though. But you manage it, the silence pressing down, a physical thing worming into your ears and up your nose.
Set the cranker down. You’re only gonna get one good shot before this kicks off. Pawpaw lifts his head. Squares his shoulders.
One shot.
Your team in position. Sounds too presumptuous to call them friends. All of them a nightmare in a fight, these three in particular. Without Aylin acting as a battery, they’re going to tear Pawpaw to bloody little gibblets.
You pull the cork on your own potion bottle. It tastes of unsalted bread, an aggressive nothingness. Then your own hands blur and disappear. The crossbow, too, how does that even work?
Oh well.
You drop your own pack. Any excess weight. You gotta be fast. Gotta fucking move. The second it leaves you, it becomes visible again. Fucking magic bullshit.
One shot.
Pawpaw turns towards y’all. You wonder how far up that slope the boys is.
Lift the crossbow, palms slick. Breathing too hard and your thoughts whirl in your skull. Your heart races.
Take aim.
Karlach’s tail tip flicks back and forth. Shadowheart normally whispers what you’re pretty sure are prayers before a fight, but now she crouches motionless, lips still.
Lae’zel is bunched. Waiting. A trap ready to spring.
The entire plan comes together. You feel it snap in your head. All the pieces laying down right where they need to be. It’s beautiful. It’s horrifying. It’s how you win.
Your hands shake as you lift the crossbow.
One shot. Move fast.
You exhale. Hold.
Your hands still.
You aim.
Pull the trigger.
The crossbow thumps in your grip, the bolt spiraling out. It shimmers into view as it springs forward. Sails cleanly through the air.
Hits the target.
Lae’zel jerks as it punches through the back of her skull. She goes down silent and twitching.
Most people I know had that one movie as a kid; that one movie that they would watch over and over and over to the resigned acceptance of their parents. I’ve always thought that movie says something about a person. What was your movie?
It was Superman: The Movie with Christopher Reeve. I fell down some stairs when I was 4 and busted my teeth. My parents had rented this for some cousins that were over for a BBQ the day before and figured maybe it would calm/distract me.
He was so handsome and good and he was my first love and every man I’ve ever met is judged against him. Unfortunately for every man I’ve ever met…
“The Militarization of the Police Department – Deadly Farce,” an original painting by Richard Williams from “The 20 Dumbest People, Events, and Things of 2014″ in Mad magazine #531, published by DC Comics, February 2015.
“For most people, he was the painter of ‘America,’” he added. “But even he said his vision was what he wanted ‘America’ to be. It was a mythical ‘America,’ a place where all people were decent, honest and full of good will. His work was full of gentle humor that made you feel a little better; even if you knew it wasn’t really true… you just wished it was. My parody of Rockwell’s painting simply says, ‘That myth is dead.’”
I think it’s relevant to add that even Norman Rockwell chose to leave his cushy job at the Saturday Evening Post because he wanted to make artwork that was more radical. The Post had rules that wouldn’t allow him to do artwork depicting black people as anything other than servants. The job paid really well and that was a huge reason he continued on. But he wanted change that and so he moved to Look magazine.
A lot of people know about the very first piece he did when he left the post which was the The Problem We All Live With which depicts Ruby Bridges walking to school under federal protection.
But I don’t think enough people know about Murder in Mississippi which depicts three real civil rights activists who were murdered by the Ku Klux Klan and sherriffs. The magazine ran the sketch instead of the finished piece because they felt it had a more striking statement to accompany the article. Norman Rockwell would finish that version after publication which is here
Rockwell’s legacy is sanitized because he decided to maintain his job at the Post for so long despite his frustrations with not being able to express himself. The civil rights movement was just his final straw to change what he could with the little time he had left. Look magazine received a lot of hate for Rockwell painting these as well.
Another favorite piece of mine is The Right to Know which depicts an integrated populace questioning their government. In 1968, the year of Vietnam and the year the Fair Housing Act only just got signed in months prior:
But I think it’s important to include the caption Rockwell originally wrote for the piece as well. I think it represents how a 74 year old Rockwell felt about the America he believed in and the people in it:
We are the governed, but we govern too. Assume our love of country, for it is only the simplest of self-love. Worry little about our strength, for we have our history to show for it. And because we are strong, there are others who have hope.
But watch us more closely from now on, for those of us who stand here mean to watch those we put in the seats of power. And listen to us, you who lead, for we are listening harder for the truth that you have not always offered us.
Your voice must be ours, and ours speaks of cities that are not safe, and of wars we do not want, of poor in a land of plenty, and of a world that will not take the shape our arms would give it.
We are not fierce, and the truth will not frighten us. Trust us, for we have given you our trust. We are the governed, remember, but we govern too.
I’d just like to briefly say even Rockwell’s seemingly feel good Americana pieces are often more political than people today realize for example
likely the most famous picture of a Thanksgiving dinner ever painted and you see it all the time.
What you may not know is its actual title
“Freedom From Want” it’s a part of a series of 4, including this now famous meme
“Freedom of Speech” These paintings were illustrations of FDR’s “Four Freedoms” speech where The President laid out a vision that would become what the Allies were fighting for in WWII universal human rights that became a part of the UN charter.
So this homey American Thanksgiving scene was also a bold statement that no one in the world should go hungry
Rockwell’s work was very political, he used that Americana small town America vibe of his work to make what he was saying feel very close to the viewers he was trying to reach and also his optimism of the human spirt but for sure not blind to the need to build a better world.
I just said something in a message to someone about X-Files and this popped up on my dash STOP IT. The original 'ship', I think? This is going WAAAAY back but I remember there were NoRomos (actively didn't want the romance), Mytharcs (preferred eps about the overarching Samantha/Smoking Man/alien plotline) and then there were Shippers (wanted them to bang and LIVED for the intense eye contact and subtext). And that's where the term 'shipping' came from? Yes?
Feck, I'm dating myself. Oh well, I'm still significantly younger than Gillian Anderson (not that it matters, she's aging like fine wine).
my favorite scene in LotR as a kid was when Sam started miserably freestyling in the tower of Cirith Ungol and the only reason he ever found Frodo was because he deliriously tried to join in
…i did read some of the novels, but i couldn’t get through them entirely…
…and so i genuinely have no idea whether or not this is serious. coz i mean, obviously, it could be a joke. but it could also have legitimately happened. people who have only seen the films underestimate the amount of random things that happen in the books that could come off as utterly silly and ridiculous if removed from their context.
Haha, well, it is pretty much what happens. Sam is looking for Frodo in the tower of Cirith Ungol and is despairing that he will ever find him. He sits down and does what any self-respecting Tolkien character does during their moments of hopelessness and bursts into song.
It’s a really good song (ten year old Ship had it memorized) and as he begins the refrain a second time, he hears Frodo’s voice answering weakly from above. Frodo is poisoned and despairing and beaten but he is still a Hobbit and cannot resist a singalong even while on the brink of death.
I feel like one of the reasons why the US is Like That is the difference between countries and states. Because apparently when you're nominally still the same country, different states can pull absolute bullshit on each other that would not fly in relations between two countries.
Like if idk Belgium decided "hey we have this huge homelesness problem that we've been neglecting for decades while allowing it to get progressively worse, but we figured out how to fix it: we're loading all the homeless people onto buses and moving them across the border to France", the french response wouldn't just be "aw naw ugh I wish they couldn't do that :/"
It'd be "hey buddy that's really funny, do you want to see how fast we can get tanks on the streets of your capital?"
The States are basically 50 countries in a trenchcoat. Some are theocracies, some are democracies, some don't know what's going on, some are practically having their own civil wars. The thing that's supposed to unite us flips political alignment aggressively every 4-8 years, destroying any hope of continuity and consensus. And most of us could buy a gun more easily than we could afford therapy. Those are most of the facts you need to really understand why it's Like This here.
excuse me for stating the obvious but like. james gunn outright calling superman an immigrant and doubling down on it when he got backlash (because he IS an immigrant, that's the point of superman) + the in-movie dialogue of "aren't you going to read me my rights?" "you're an extraterrestrial, son. you haven't got any rights to read." + the violence of his arrest and how they torture and mistreat him unapologetically, all under the guise of "protecting america", in a film releasing during the onslaught of violent ICE kidnappings and abuse... yeah it's really no wonder right-wing knobheads are crying about this being woke. they're being forced to look directly at the reasons one of the most well-known and beloved heroes of all time would not be on their side. and that's only ONE of the reasons this movie covers
I just think if you dunked Astarion in water he'd be unrecognizable for like 10 seconds. There is no way in hell he has naturally black eyelashes. There is no way that coif can be achieves without pomade and a comb, and there is no way that it would be water proof.
MOSTLY THOUGH I just wanted to like a nautiloid crash vs. on-the-road Star. Suspicious stranger vs. my favorite little creep whose head is like a lovely dandelion.
An Archive of Our Own, a project of the Organization for Transformative Works
Chapters: 4/?
Fandom: Final Fantasy VI
Rating: Mature
Warnings: Creator Chose Not To Use Archive Warnings
Relationships: Celes Chere/Locke Cole
Additional Tags: Slow Burn, Enemies to Friends to Lovers, Mutual Pining, Past Locke/Rachel - Freeform, Emotional Hurt/Comfort, Emotional Baggage, Past Child Abuse, Minor Character Death, Trust Issues, War Crimes, Emotionally Repressed, Angst with a Happy Ending
Summary:
Sometimes the hearts bearing the most scars are still capable of love that so profound it can survive even the end of the world.
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