Oh Grey Warden, what have you done?

Merrill could preform blood magic on me any day of the week * Come join me for random dragon age and Bg3 thoughts * any pronouns * 25 * queer * All my writing is here on Ao3: @notebooksandlaptops

[notebooks-and-laptops]

As I got into digital drawing, I knew I'd have to make a piece of art based on my OG lesbian crush, Tara from Buffy the Vampire Slayer. Her once more with feeling outfit is so iconic, I hope I did it some justice here <3

Pose reference by Elizabeth Sonrel

[cccrystalclear]

Been drawing more on paper these days with oil pastels and colored pencils. Wanted to try to replicate the looseness and freedom you get with textures and lack of layers

[notebooks-and-laptops]

Watching the untamed and I really liked that bit where they were discussing how they were doing collective punishment on the Wen clan and they turn round and wei wuxan is just standing there like this

[specialagentartemis]

Grace and Rocky, giving a tour of the Hail Mary to fascinated Eridian scientists and diplomats.

Pointing at things and explaining what they are and how the ship works, lots of awed and appreciative noises are made.

Until one of the visiting Eridians points out a specific item. “And that?”

It’s a strange, circular thing, a xenonite disk mounted upright on some sort of pivot so it can spin freely, but around the edges it has… spokes? Pegs? Sticking out of it, that hit against a stiff flap that would slow down the spinning.

It is also separated into sections decorated with crude etchings of a human and an Eridian.

“Ah,” Grace says.

“That,” Rocky says.

“That’s. Um.” Grace seems somewhat embarrassed. “That’s the sacrifice wheel.”

The Eridian visitors clearly do not know what to make of that. “We think we misunderstood Savior Grace’s word,” they say, apparently hoping this is a vocabulary mix-up. “Explain (question, polite)?”

“Didn’t misunderstand,” says Rocky, sounding very sheepish. “That is sacrifice wheel.”

“So. While we were on our way to Erid, we might have gotten… anxious about each other’s well-being,” Grace says, which everyone is already very aware is a wild understatement. “And, well, you heard what happened at Tau Ceti, and after. There were a lot of unexpected dangers for the whole trip that required a lot of, at least, attempted self-sacrifice to solve. We ended up almost dying for each other several times. And we had an argument about what we’d do if another crisis like that came up. And we couldn't agree.”

“Grace argued that Grace already was unlikely to survive long-term on Erid, so he should be the one to do any potential deadly but necessary maneuvers to make sure I was able to bring taumoeba back,” Rocky says.

“Which made sense.”

“Did not make sense! Grace already sacrificed so much for me and for Erid, wouldn’t be fair to make you do it again—“ Rocky cuts himself off with a huff. They have obviously had this conversation before. “So sacrifice wheel was compromise.”

“Yeah,” Grace says. He spins it to demonstrate; it whirls around in a blur and a rattle of the flap hitting the pegs, then eventually slows down, and stops—pointing at the segment depicting a very bad but very clear image of an Eridian. “Rocky made the wheel, I spin the wheel, and whoever it lands on, that’s who gets to sacrifice themself to save the other and the other person does not get to argue. This way, we wouldn’t waste time debating who does the self-sacrifice and who survives, it’s just a plain fifty-fifty chance. Or, eighteen-eighteen chance in base six. But the point is it could be either of us and we would have to accept the outcome.”

Rocky started fidgeting while Grace was explaining. When Grace finishes, proud of the equitable solution they came up with to allow them to die for each other fairly, Rocky says, “Now that we are back and we don’t need sacrifice wheel anymore… I have confession to make. About the wheel.”

“What about the wheel?”

Rocky doesn’t answer. Grace frowns, first confused, then suspicious, and spins the wheel again.

It lands on Rocky again.

He spins the wheel again, and again, and again, and it lands on Rocky every single time.

“Rocky!”

“I weighted the wheel,” Rocky admits.

“Rocky the whole point was that it was equal, that was why we even made it—“

“Never was necessary so doesn’t matter anymore!”

“But you WOULD have!”

“And you never noticed because you were hungry and cranky and distracted and so would have done bad job on heroic self-sacrifice anyway!”

“I would not! I would have done fine!”

(The Eridian scientists and diplomats are still here watching this btw. Slowly dawning on them that 1) these two are extremely not normal about each other 2) if Erid ever does another space mission they NEED to send a therapist aboard because this is what happens when they don’t)

[basilistic]

more strawpage requests...

[kendypun]

trying out a new, more "gritty" brush, and ofc feeding the Jaheira-enjoyers 😏

clothes-begone version can be found right here for a buck

or in a week or two on bsky 🤭

[kendypun]

My sweet Bae'zel, always gonna love you💚💚

Airing out the bitties on bsky

[dmitryanya]

have some moon lesbians for pride month <3

[hailed-marys]

i got maybe the most darling comic commission request from @castielrisingabove, who wanted to see grace failing to do pushups under the combined weight of some very enthusiastic pebbles! he's okay guys, don't worry, he's just... taking a break

[notebooks-and-laptops]

You know, they may not have handled everything perfectly, but willow and Taras silly little gay puns ('im a breast girl myself...but you already knew that', 'im cured! I'm with the boys!' etc.) is so authentic and earnest to me. Truly that's what it be like. Making your silly little I'm gay jokes all the time

[stivkagall]

Anders | Dragon Age

[thepagemistress]

You know, one of my favourite things about Ryland Grace is how sociable he is. How easy it is for people to fall into his orbit. They show it time and time again. How much his students obviously love him, how he manages to hype up the dour suits whilst he's testing the astrophage, Carl playing with him in the Home Depot, the other government people eating his Skittles, Eva Stratt dragging him around everywhere and allowing herself to be just that little bit more vulnerable around him, Rocky and the Eridians embracing him as not just as a savior but family.

I know it's not explicit that Grace is aroace but so often, aroace people are portrayed as distant and independent and happily isolated. Sometimes even to the point of misanthropy. It's so nice to see a character like this who loves connecting with people. He's a rambler, he's excitable. So what if he doesn't have a family or a dog. He doesn't need them because he has everyone he meets and that's enough.

[bulkhummus]

eridians live for a very long time and im curious if they experience the passage of it differently. was the amount of time rocky was gone for considered to be long? it is in human standards. rocky seemed distraught by the separation - but there is also the layer of trauma from the loss of the crew, and all of that time spent alone.

im thinking about Rocky parting from Adrian - and gone longer than expected (due to eridians not knowing about relativity, loss of the crew). at what point did they start to wonder if rocky was making it back? did they start wondering at all? maybe it felt like months to them because of the nature of eridian life cycles.

i keep thinking about Adrian talking to Grace, and Grace explaining, in equivalents, how long his mission was, why the crew was so small, about the coma (and the idea of being paralyzed and unconscious for extended periods of time is distressing and unnatural to humans) being not only logistically efficient but psychologically necessary, how he was never supposed to go home, how much time feels different when you're alone and confused and scared.

Through all of it, Adrian is thinking of Rocky.

Through talking to Grace, in expressing his humanity, Adrian begins to understand the full extent of time Rocky spent in space.

Adrian feeling heart break. They make the dome as big as they can. They give this creature every one of its comforts it mentions in its stories, in passing, in confidence to Rocky. Fine tuning to its preferences. Doing everything they can to make it feel like the home they were taken from because its species was terrified and out of options. They do it for Grace, and they do it for Rocky.

Grace telling Adrian before Rocky that he was taken from his home without his consent. It comes up naturally in conversations about the fun and exciting challenges that arise in designing a habitat for the human. He brushes it off but Rocky was right about human biology so noisy and so telling.

[hailed-marys]

ive been thinking about grace and eridian formalwear.... idk how to design clothes/outfits at all so this is me throwing random stuff at the wall

[mid-tier-mfrz]

oh you know Damm well I’m gonna cosplay this

[wardencommandershepard]

It's so funny how at the end of ME1 they do that little fakeout like "oh no! Shepard didn't make it! They got crushed under all this debris! Haha, just kidding they're fine 🙂"

Then you start ME2 and immediately Shepard dies

[free-my-girl-tourney]

Fandom Misogyny Victim Tournament

Round One, Bracket 3

Ashley Williams (Mass Effect) vs. Kennedy (Buffy the Vampire Slayer)

Ashley Williams

Kennedy

Remaining time: 3 days 5 hours

Propaganda below the cut:

Kennedy:

hated for Not Being Tara and being ~soooo aggressive~ pursuing willow when at the end of the day she's simply a different woman! and the horrible killing off of tara wasn't kennedy's fault

she's confident as hell

Ashley Williams:

Double standard: Mass Effect is a series about many alien species working together, and therefore the topic of xenophobia and space racism are getting brought up a lot. Such beloved male character as Garrus and Wrex get a pass for their instances of bigotry (towards salarians, for example), and Shepard calling one species "stupid jellyfishes" is a favorite fandom meme. Meanwhile Ashley makes a few distasteful remarks of the same genre and not only does that get her branded as the "space racist" of the cast, but also causes a lot of people to gleefully proclaimed that they killed her off in their playthrough like that's a good and deserved thing. Of course, the real reason is because Ash is a woman who is also a soldier who does not take your (main character's) crap, which automatically makes everything she has to say and every flaw she displays a million times more condemning and death-worthy than whatever the favorite fandom blorbos do.

Ashley is a soldier whose loyalty is to her people and her duty first. Military glorification aside ('cause that is the entirety of Mass Effect), that is the most noble type of a soldier to be. She does not sell out her principles, even for Shepard, and she's risking her life for her convictions multiple times throughout the series. She also goes off on a radical pro-human rally at the Citadel and is genuinely horrified by the sentiment of them all, and it takes her less than one game to become genuinely worried for Liara after the latter's mother dies. Her flawed perception of aliens is a point for character growth - which a lot of aforementioned characters do not do, by the way. She's a strong, responsible older sister and as older sisters often do she carries the weight of their family "curse", ready to heroically give her own life to cleanse it. Questionable, yes, but does give her certain honor, if not a ticket to therapy. Her readiness to point a gun to anyone in the name of protection, including Shepard or another member of the crew, like Wrex, is a point of admiration (again, as long as we operate within the series' premise of "Alliance soldiers good"), not contempt.

[lorain90]

Practices. Some doodles were done months apart, and my style has changed.