#moonquake

[no-demons-in-wonderland]

Patience smut loving potatoes, my suggestions are all over the place today. Enjoy the stunning panels of very random selections.

Moonquake ~ Ballboy Tactics

Golden Bells and Dragons Scales ~ Bloodbound

Long Live Hatred ~ Blossoms of the White Night

Mixed bag of dicks here (pun intended)

[randomshitpostistan]

A different astronomy and space science related image is featured each day, along with a brief explanation.

[grazielira]

[magistralucis]

Moonquake [Snippet]

(Jesus Christ has it been over a year since I last posted any snippet of anything I’m working on??? 😩 Since I’m slowly getting back into my writing, have one from a pet project I began last year. I watched a lot of Tarkovsky last summer and it broke my brain, and what better cure for that than magical realism?

It’s not finished, I work on it tiny bits at a time. It’s a Tillchard. It reflects many real-life events and dynamics, but at the same time, it is so out-of-chronology I’m not sure this matters at all. Also Till might be a bird and Richard a moon wizard. It’s complicated. Have a peek.)

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"There's a barn burning tonight, down where old man Stefan lives." Till says one cloudy afternoon, and Richard looks up, his hair brushing shadows about his neck. Beneath it an earring glitters. Two mugs of coffee steam quietly on the counter. "You know the field opposite the cemetery gates, the house up that path. They asked if we'd come."

"A barn burning." Richard repeats. Till's gaze is as faraway as his voice. After a moment he stands up, then ties up his hair as he joins Till by the back door. "How's that, then?"

Till shrugs. "It's old. Mouldering. Besides, he's got a bigger one now." Their eyes fall upon the little shed further up the yard: Till's new workshop, humble but lovingly made, their most recent project together. Richard put up the walls, Till put on the roof, and the former had seemed more alive for their labours than he had in a long time. "He must've figured it wasn't worth paying to get it dismantled. And you know you want to keep an eye on anything that burns - maybe have a cookout, too, while everyone's around."

"I do." Then Richard is silent for a long time, thinking. He considers for so long he outlasts the heat of his coffee - as well as Nele's brief visit, bounding into the kitchen and demanding hugs, her hair ribbons coming all loose. It takes some teamwork (and pinky-promises for snacks) for the two men to retie them, after which she runs off again, and by then Richard has made up his mind. "Did you tell him we were coming?"

He hasn't gone out much recently. Till's gaze sparks a little, a revival of hope. "I wanted to leave it to your judgement."

Richard sniffs the air. Sweeter than the usual, and much heavier; it will rain in the night, but no later, when most of the barn will have smouldered down. In the deep snow it's hard to get a fire going at all, whereas in the bone-dry seasons, even a sole stray flame could be a disaster - yes, today's the right time, it'll be a good time. "Then let's all go together. Should we bring anything special, or are meat and drinks fine?"

"Funny you mention that." The spark has becoming a roaring fire, and Till smiles brightly, leaning in to take the other's hand. "Coming from the old man himself, our price of admission is one of your famous cakes... or a six-pack. Whichever's quickest, he said."

"A bag of quark is pretty quick; give me one, two hours."

And so they all go together - including Nele, since the days are still long and light and there will be other children there. Half the village has turned up. People are happy to see them, and especially delighted to see Richard; they all knew he had come back, but not exactly how or why, and the majority haven't even seen him in a long time. Richard takes it well. Till stays close to him all evening, and is glad for the shy happiness in his eyes, fragments of the old Sven he thought he'd lost for good.

Over dessert they finally light up the barn. It goes up in flames politely as only loved worn things do, since it was a damned good barn while it lasted. In the backdrop the village continues to feast: sweetmeats are laid out at table, old man Stefan herds his chickens away, and Nele sits happily over Richard's Käsekuchen and a large glass of milk. A griddle sizzles here, a cheer breaks out there. Above the smoke the night sky glowers vividly, casting a warm glow against friendly faces.

Many of them will not have cause to meet again that year. Gatherings such as these are uncommon these days, and with the recent reunification, they only threaten to grow rarer. With a quiet sigh Richard leans against the fence, contemplating the upturned order of things, when the promised rain comes at last. It falls in a slow mist initially - no different to the smoke above the barn - but then the thick drops come, and it's the tail end of the burning anyway, which wraps the festivities up somewhat. Some make their exit altogether, shouting goodbyes over waved bottles as they leave the gate, and some withdraw indoors with all the drinks and the cooking-things. Soon there is no one left but a select few, smokers mostly, and Till looking for Richard looking for a purpose.

"Scholle? Scholle, shall we go?"

Richard stands before the fence separating barn from field. Gazes. Past the lens of rain the flames lick in strange directions. Twenty-eight steps lie between himself and the fire, twenty-eight days since his revelation, a full moon since his life was inverted in the Schweriner See.

"... Scholle?"

He concentrates, and for the second time ever, he receives a response.

[magistralucis]

Moonquake [Snippet]

(Been scribbling this again while reviving my mojo for other projects. I’m at a stage where I can write down events and dialogue, but the distinctive voice for each is taking its time to return. Moonquake is just weird enough, narratively, to be free of these nuances.

Not related to earlier snippet (x). Still Tillchard, still Tarkovskian.)

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All books lose a stray leaf at some point or another. This is one of them. Richard wakes in the lakeside cabin. This moment may have happened, or may never happen, or perhaps happen so far in the future it is hardly worth thinking about: he certainly doesn't, even as rain pours from the roof and the burning sun sings to him outside. The pillow is dry, but a sheen of water tickles his feet when he sits up to get his bearings. Ripples part from him, cascade outwards, and are vanished in the storm.

He barely needs to look around to know he is dreaming. For one, those curtains are his (as in, left behind in New York) not Till's - not to mention he is old, so very old, swanning from the roots of his hair. Everything’s a dream when one has lived for as long as he has. He gets up and makes his way downstairs, wading through the flooded hallway, grabbing a jacket on his way out the back door. The grass has grown up to his thighs. Richard unlatches the gate and shuts it behind him, quietly, then begins to walk the familiar path towards the lake.

Only at the end of it does he realize he is barefoot. It doesn't bother him. The rain hasn't followed him out here anyway.

If he wanted it to, though, it would.

For now he files the thought away and enters the expanse. His silver hair sways in the breeze. Soon the path has fallen away under his feet, stone becoming dirt, then fading into loamy soil. The grass follows after, swiftly rising waist-high along the shore, and he weaves his fingers through them as he passes. Like his fellow guitarists he fidgets often, and would twist and spin and tear to quell all manner of feelings; age is no barrier to dream-he in this endeavour, and by the time he finds Till at last, his fingers (clever/dextrous/non-arthritic) must have braided their way through half the lake. Soft reeds slip through Richard's fingers as he leans down to look.

Till's upper body is bare, pale. He's half swallowed by water, half slumped facedown on the grass. From here it almost looks like he was trying to leave, but gave up, and settled for a nap instead.

"Hello." Richard says. He understands that feeling well.

At the sound of his friend's voice Till lifts his head. Water drips from his hair, as silvery white as Richard's. "Hello."

Richard smiles ardently. This too is familiar, the rasp of Till's stubble against his palm. "And where have you left your swan-skin, fair one?"

"It is where you first gave it to me, many years ago. It's back in Paris. It might be in Chicago, who knows." Till doesn't usually talk like this. He may be morbid but he is grounded, and when asked about concrete events he can generally offer a structure, if rarely to the exact date and time. "Sometimes it takes a different shade and gets left on a tour bus, or you are wearing it, or I am when you are not looking. It could even be onscreen. Presently, though, I have no idea - and I was hoping you could enlighten me, since I'd rather have it than not."

Dreams don't have structures. Just scattered images and stray leaves. No meaning other than what one wants to see in it.

"I get so lonely without it, you know."

Richard knows what he'd like to see. "Let's look for it together, then. I'm coming in with you."

[suprememysticalbeing]

[brujasbl]

[grazielira]

Kang Jinwoong 🔥