every sky is full of stars

marlowe or ice | they/them | 27 | machineries of empire + the locked tomb + imperial radch + the masquerade oriented | sideblog

[mispatchedgreens]

wang baoxiang x klimt's judith ii salome (1909)

his hurt was the size of the world: inconceivable except from the inside.

[invariant-ice]

is this a he*archate game or what

[deaddove]

this series is actually hilarious bc one of the first things established about baoxiang during his first proper appearance is: he has spies in esen’s army. ouyang is right there when he admits to this. still ouyang remains oblivious to the fact that baoxiang is watching his mutiny plot unfold and pulling strings from the shadows, right up until the end of the first book when baoxiang spells it out for him. but even then he’s just like “damn thats crazy… anyway gfto. i’m trying to have a moment with esen here.” and then immediately forgets about it.

and then in the second book, zhu spends so much time and energy trying to figure out who’s spying on them. constantly going around like “i have a bad feeling… like there’s someone else we’re not considering… pulling strings from the shadows….” and ouyang is just “yea who knows” shrug… and when he finally is confronted by baoxiang again in khanbaliq he has the nerve to say “lord wang. i should’ve known.” brother you really should have.

[julesdap]

"It has all been for Taranoke."

— the traitor baru cormorant

[sallyisdrawing]

Ninth Saint

[imakemywings]

Also reminded of how badass Cheris' opening scene is, running experimental math equations while actually under fire and also trying to corral her squad into her quasi-heretical plan which ultimately ends up being successful despite all odds...no wonder Mikodez went "yes, this is the one"

[imakemywings]

This is an order to all moths from General Shuos Jedao: banner the deuce of gears.

i. Atom Bomb Fluke ii. Anther One Bites the Dust Queen iii. You're Gonna Go Far Kid The Offspring iv. Manipulated Living Michael Andrews v. Handlebars Flobots vi. Cog in the Machine Tonal y Nagual vii. 99 Luftballons Nena viii. Mama My Chemical Romance ix. Gun CHVRCHES x. Dear Dictator Saint Motel xi. Fire and Water Ryan Amon xii. We Lost Lorien Testard xiii. Requiem, K 626 Lacrymosa Wolfgang Amadeus Mozart xiv. Dark Matter Les Friction xv. Fish in a Gun Barrel NOFX xvi. Dimensional Rachem Macwhirter xvii. Bad Man Blues Saraceno xviii. Bring 'em Back Alive Audioslave xix. Nightmare Set It Off xx. When the Dying Calls Danzig xxi. I am Shell I am Bone Gazelle Twin xxii. Shatter Me Lindsey Sterling xxiii. Fly Like an Eagle In This Moment xxiv. Knights and Lords Audiomachine xxv. An End Once and for All Clint Mansel & Sam Hulick xxvi. Long Time Traveler The Wailin' Jennies

Photo credits beneath the cut

Background image: NASA image of the day April 8th, 2026

Man clasping hands: Emiliano Vittoriosi on Unsplash

Hands with guns: Dodohawe Show on Unsplash

Soldiers saluting: TV Beats on Unsplash

Gloved hands: Hugo Delauney on Unsplash

[deaddove]

obsessed with how esen and ouyang both have this conception of “his peasants” “your peasants” like the common people of henan are just baoxiang’s sims or something

[spiderthread-deactivated2025050]

(i'm sorry, you had a thoughtful character observation and yet i was entirely mentally broken by the image of gamer girl baoxiang)

[muppetebbtide]

csevet gets away with being crazy bc he's so sweetie but his story arc within tge is pure bedlam, he just does it so elegantly and politely it glosses over. courier agreed to be imperial secretary after one vague and polite insinuation from the emperor in that direction, despite possibly not having learned to read until he was a teenager (and the circumstances within which he was sent into maia's service are HIGHLY questionable, it's possible csevet wilfully interpreted chavar's wording to get the outcome he wanted). he got offended when maia insinuated, not that he would covertly read a letter of imperial business entrusted to him, but that he wouldn't immaculately reseal it if he had done such a thing. about fifty pages later he is hustled into admitting he did that exact thing with the first letter he ever gave to maia. and he immaculately resealed it. he is the only person to land a punch on anyone on-page, and he did it in front of like half the government. he insinuated the emperor was insane, to his face, then promptly prostrated himself on the floor outside. in like, the gravel. he loudly guilt tripped priests in a holy building and wasn't sorry about it even a bit. he personally influenced and drove several state matters that rightly should not have really been up to him, including the emperor's marriage and the investigation of the assassination of the previous one. he then proceeded to pick an empress and present the proposal to the corazhas as if that was the emperor's opinion, even though maia had no opinion in the slightest. one can make a textual argument suggesting he might have sliiiightly lied to the emperor about a few things, including his age, or at least obfuscated. his only apparent objection to becoming lord chancellor was said nebulous age. he still somehow has time to read ethuverazhin jane austen. he compared his commitment to his role to celehar's Actual For Real Religious Calling. katherine addison please let me look in his brain just once it HAS to be absolute scenes in there

[invariant-ice]

if any of the factions are responsible for tourism, it's gotta be the andan

[leidensygdom]

me of late

[imakemywings]

okay but also the fact that Brezhan at 53 is still considered young enough that other Kel don't take him seriously and that Jedao had already risen to general and done Hellspin and been executed and dropped in the black cradle by 44

[havendance]

I do love how The Raven Stratagem opens with Jedao just showing up and going ‘I outrank all of you due to being a general for 400 years and that means that thanks to the fact that all of you have been programmed to adhere to strict hierarchy, I am now in charge of this fleet’

[imakemywings]

One of the top lowkey Jedao moments is definitely when Khiruev catches him running the barrel of his gun along his jawline with his finger on the trigger while thinking and when she chokes in horror about this he says "whoops force of habit haha" and then we never talk about that again

[theradioghost]

fucking love when the character's body doesn't belong to them. you stole this body. or you were put in it without a choice. either way you can't give it back. maybe they're gone now. maybe you've got something left to do. maybe you don't know how. maybe you don't want to. maybe you're just afraid to die. and sometimes your physicality sickens you. and sometimes this body feels so entirely your own. and sometimes your loved ones look at you and you know they've just remembered that this is someone else's face. that you are a parasite. and you wonder whether you'd really give it back. whether these people would want you to. whether you'd have the strength to face your body's loved ones and justify yourself.

[theradioghost]

also good when the character in question just doesn't give a fuck, to be clear. or when they do, but their loved ones don't. or any other combination

[tanuki-kimono]

[Cyber Effect] astonishing modern raden (mother of pearl inlay) by Terumasa Ikeda. A nice pun on the classic Ghost in the shell ;)

Raden is a very old decorative craft (see video below), usually used on lacquer bases with floral or traditional motifs. It’s so great to see it used this way!

[invariant-ice]

i'm having fun with these wwii era type posters that will only make sense to the devoted machineries of empire fan