#operationtacklehug

[bipolyjack]

Commission for @operationtacklehug of her Masks character Jess “Lilith” Newark! Thank you so much Erika for letting me draw your smarmy gay hell princess, I love her so much!

Check out my website for commission pricing and details! I’m working on the last one in this batch right now so it’s a great time to grab one.

[lwamemes]

Sorry to bother you, but if you don’t mind, I’d love to know about the Akko showerhead joke too!

You’re not a bother at all! Sure, I’ll tell you in chat!

[stonewashedearthtones-blog]

Video Games - 3,4,16,18

3: Best game you’ve ever played?

Don’t make me pick! I’ll just give the first one that come to mind.

Borderlands 2. An amazing, hilarious and compelling story, coupled with a beautiful world really drove this one into my top 3 games ever. Every character was detailed and versimilar, even the villains and throw-aways. The combat was super fun, and the enemies were varied and ranged from hilarious to gross and ignorable to earth-shatteringly difficult. and the loot system! It was motivating without being overwhelming. It was used as a reward for everything— exploring, teaming up, fighting enemies, doing side quests, etc — without getting tired or dizzyingly complex. Truly an amazing game. (@operationtacklehug, get on that) Probably my pick for favorite of all time, but I don’t want to commit to that.

I also want to mention Bastion as the first game I played that made me understand video games as an art form. I have played it about 8 times now and I can and will quote it on demand. Drown me in that SuperGiant sauce. 

4: Worst game you’ve ever played?

It is genuinely a toss up between Mass Effect 1 and Dragon Age: Origins. The gameplay in both is among the worst I have ever experienced in my life. Navigating the cover in Mass Effect was utterly miserable and the missions were 3 hour long chores. Selecting and using any powers was jarring and wrenched me out of the game, but they were all impossible to target or hit anything with anyway. 

I have no idea what happened with DA:O, but that was even worse. Almost all of the problems I have with ME1 still stand but I also had to micromanage a team of like 5 people every second.

16: Character you’ve hated most? From what game?

My go to for best (and most hated) villain is Handsome Jack from Borderlands. Such a shit bag while also having a seriously interesting rise to power (and fall from sanity). If we are talking about genuinely hated characters, though, I think I despise characters whose purpose seems to be obstructing game progression for the purpose of “story”. I really, really didn’t like Lillie from Pokemon Sun/Moon. (Sorry, Erika)

18: A game you wish your friends knew about?

I wish my friends experienced one of the classic 2D metroids. Super Metroid and Fusion are both A+ in my opinion. But if I had to pick a game for all of my friends to play it would definitely be Mario and Luigi: Superstar Saga. I am so excited for the 3DS port.

[jupiter-suggestion]

the sky is empty, and cold envelopes the world. eyes roll back into heads, and fair hair as soft as feathers touches your neck. there is sadness here- but also, opportunity.

[bipolyjack]

Jin and Carney?

just did jin so here’s carney!

Full Name: Alastrina Fianna GravenorGender and Sexuality: female, attracted only to ppl who can absolutely destroy her in bedPronouns: she/herEthnicity/Species: orcBirthplace and Birthdate: born in the mountain fortress of Talabriga 13 years before the start of the campaignGuilty Pleasures: sweetsPhobias: being buried alive, being underground whatsoeverWhat They Would Be Famous For: fucking a death god probablyWhat They Would Get Arrested For: something that daph put her up to, like scamming a city guardOC You Ship Them With: currently no one, but down the line i Do want her to fuck the death godOC Most Likely To Murder Them: the death godFavorite Movie/Book Genre:Least Favorite Movie/Book Cliche:Talents and/or Powers: she’s light on her feet and she can stab good, also she has a knack for climbing large monsters in order to kill themWhy Someone Might Love Them: she’s persistent, gotta give her thatWhy Someone Might Hate Them: she’s also kinda dumbHow They Change: maybe she’ll get less dumb. we’ll seeWhy You Love Them: she is my beeg bootiful daughter and im really sorry all her sisters are dead but i’m hoping she gets to fuck a death god because of it

[bipolyjack]

Asking (almost) that same question back if you're interested: What's the most attractive quality a person can have?

oh boy probably having a sense of humor that jives with mine. if we cant laugh abt the same stupid shit then it doesnt matter how good the sex is u feel

[bipolyjack]

Fenalin/Vassar: 20. “I’ll protect you no matter what… even if it kills me”

ok so @stonewashedearthtones and i tag teamed this and it got super long so imma post the first half and hes gonna post the second half

why kobolds fucking suck: an essay by the bandlewax siblings (pt. 1)

Vassar awoke in phases, each step denoted by new agonies. He first became aware of a splitting headache, accompanied by an image of the Dunetrail campsite overrun by kobolds. He instinctively tried to raise his arm to cradle his head, but it didn’t move. Another step toward cogency and Vassar felt the three metal spikes piercing each arm, pinning them to the wood behind him. He inhaled, filling his lungs to scream and the exertion pulled him to consciousness. Vassar felt all eight skewers that passed between his ribs, angled so as to avoid vital organs, fastening him to the wooden table top. A deeply primal scream of pain and terror resonated within the room and echoed through the cave system that he was imprisoned in. And it continued to echo.

She hadn’t expected it to be so easy. The two kobold guards outside the den shrieked as the fire consumed them, pouring from the crystal tip of her staff. Their scaly skins buckled and blistered and melted away in moments, and it wasn’t until she strode past their burning bones that the first wave of fatigue struck her. Arazel had warned her of this. The pit fiend had been very clear that she would be able to use the power it gave her only a few times before exhaustion set in. The magic Arazel had given her wasn’t like the simple mending spells she’d practiced for most of her life. It drained her. Even one spell - as if the flames, leaving her staff, were dragging her vital essence out through her hands, into the wood, up through the heavy chunk of crystal, and out into the chilly desert night.

Fenalin stumbled only a step before catching herself with her staff, setting her jaw, and entering the dark mouth of the kobold den.

There were more of the filthy creatures in the downward-sloping tunnel, drawn by the screams of their brethren. Fenalin blasted them back with a pulse of invisible force. This didn’t sap her strength as the fire spell had, and she fired off another pulse, slamming reptilian bodies against the tunnel walls, hearing the crunch of bone and somewhere, distantly, a familiar scream.

Panic tightened around her chest, and she forced her way through the broken corpses now clogging the passage, shouting ahead into the dark, “Vassar!”

Vassar’s only way of measuring time was the occasional appearance of a pair of kobolds who would splash water in his mouth and shove a piece of moldy bread crust in his mouth before adding another awl to his collection. He drifted seamlessly between wakefulness and a dreamless sleep, too tired and hoarse to scream. Vassar’s thoughts teetered from Davien to Fenalin and back. With what little effort he could muster, Vassar centered them in his mind and prayed for them to save him.  Hours, days, or weeks later, a faint murmur made its way to his chamber. “Vassar!” The unmistakable sound of his sister’s call provided clarity and, shaking from the imminent pain, he inhaled. Vassar returned his sister’s call with similar spirit, if not vocabulary. Tears streamed down his face, from both the pain and the rescue.

She hurried toward the faint, distant shout, a fresh burst of energy in her short legs. The beasts hadn’t killed him yet. There was still time. The tunnel opened out into a wide, low-ceilinged central burrow. Startled kobolds looked up from their dinners, watching her for a moment in frozen surprise before springing at her all at once, snarling. Fenalin leveled her staff, gathered the power of the demon inside herself, and loosed another wide cone of green flame. She could almost feel Arazel’s long-fingered hand, dripping with liquid shadow, wrapped around her own fist as she clutched the staff. Harsh, high screams and the stench of burning flesh filled the chamber, and the spectral hand withdrew, leaving her weak and hollow. Coughing, Fenalin hurried through the spread of smoking skeletons, unsteady on her feet, until she found a badly burned but still living kobold at the edge of the radius of the blast. She planted a foot on its flank as it tried weakly to rise. “Where are your prisoners? Show me!”

It only hissed in response, and Fenalin struck its head with the end of her staff. It yelped and lifted a smouldering arm, pointing a clawed and trembling finger at one of the several tunnel mouths that branched away from the central chamber. As Fenalin lifted her gaze to the indicated tunnel, the kobold surged upward in a sudden burst of raw terror and clamped itself around her leg, dragging her to the ground. She shouted and tried to bring her staff to bear, but lying on her back, it was too long, too unwieldy, and the kobold’s claws raked across her torso, flaying open both clothing and skin, once from shoulder to hip and once across her arm and over her stomach. Fenalin cried out, more in fury than fear - this vile creature was keeping her from her brother - and kicked out with enough desperate force to fling the kobold off of her. She scrambled to her feet and swung her staff, and the pink crystal connected with the kobold’s skull, and the bone caved in, and a bit of gray sludge clung to the crystal as she drew it back.

She stumbled out of the chamber and down the corridor, still sloping deeper into the earth. The long gashes across her torso stung and bled, but she found that it didn’t matter. Vassar mattered, and she’d heard his voice, and she would find him and get him out of here. Any price was worth that. A bit dizzily, she recalled Arazel saying in his thick, wet-sounding whisper, Of course I would be delighted to help you, little one… but there will be a price. Each and every time. And then his black hand had stretched out and his forefinger had touched her brow, but beyond that she couldn’t remember what price he had exacted from her.

Two more guards at the end of this tunnel. She didn’t have another fire spell in her, she could feel herself already dangerously close to collapse, but Vassar was so close, she just knew, and she swung her staff with all the strength in her fat little arms until both kobolds lay sprawled on the tunnel floor, bloodied and unmoving. Breathing hard, supporting herself on her staff, she stepped over them and entered another, smaller chamber.

Oh god, what had they done to him.

“Vassar -” Tears welled up in her eyes at once, and she let her staff fall from her hand as she rushed to the wooden table where her brother lay. Thick iron nails pierced his bare torso, the nail-heads jutting out between his ribs, and pinned his arms just far enough from his sides that she could clearly see the rivulets of blood, both fresh and dried, making tracks over his brown skin and down onto the table. “Vassar, I’m so sorry -”

“F-fen…” Vassar’s voice was almost too hoarse to be recognizable. “Hhhelp me out of…”

“I - I don’t know how! If I just pull them out, you’ll -” She lifted a sweat-damp strand of hair off his forehead with shaking fingers. “Just - god, Vassar - just stay still there for a moment.”

This chamber held nothing but the table and a smaller bench of crude torture implements. She shoved the bench out of the way and cleared a space on the packed dirt floor, then dipped her fingers into one of the gashes across her chest and drew a clumsy, lopsided circle on the hard earth in her own blood. She hoped, fervently, that her friend wouldn’t be too picky about the quality of the summoning circle this time as she closed her eyes and spoke the name aloud. A sulfurous rush of wind blasted up from the circle almost at once, and Arazel loomed over her, filling the small chamber with its amorphous presence.

You summon me again, so soon, little one…?

“Arazel, I need -” Fenalin’s voice was hitching with her sobs, but she swallowed hard and went on in a rush, “I need those spikes removed and the bleeding stopped, and I don’t know how to -”

The pit fiend turned to observe the other halfling staked to the table, shifting its liquid-shadow form to hover over him, but unable to fully leave the circle of blood she’d drawn. This can be done. The price will be… the memory of a dear childhood friend.

“Done,” she said at once, and the dripping finger reached out, and as quickly as the image of her friend Aletha had sprung to her mind, her first friend other than Vassar, still in her memory a chubby young girl with pale hair braided up on either side of her head, tossing fistfuls of sand off the back of a moving caravan wagon and laughing as it blew back against Fenalin’s face… Arazel’s finger touched her forehead, icy hot, and she shuddered, and she had no idea what the demon had taken from her but as it inhaled with a wet sucking sound and sank back into the floor, she moved with a sudden confidence to Vassar’s side. The nail-heads were slick with blood, but she wrapped her sleeve around the first one and drew it out as quickly as she could, with the slurp of metal leaving flesh, before pressing her thumb to the wound and whispering a word of power, the pad of her thumb glowing red-hot and burning the skin closed.

[stonewashedearthtones-blog]

Vassar/Fenalin: 26. “I’m not gonna let you get yourself killed!”

A collaborative OC writing prompt with @bipolyjack​.  In retrospect, I didn’t address the prompt really at all. Read the first half first maybe please?

why kobolds fucking suck: an essay by the bandlewax siblings (pt. 2)

Vassar calmly studied Fenalin from four feet above the table as she pull the spikes out of the bruised form. Beneath the swelling and blood, he could recognize his own face, chest and limbs but despite knowing that this should be excruciating, Vassar didn’t feel a thing. Fenalin worked quickly and, when she freed the last piece of iron, she threw it on the ground and clasped his face in her arms. Floating over the scene, Vassar blinked, and abruptly returned to the table. He felt everything, the deep, hollows in his body, and the burning thumbprints on his sides and arms. Through it all, though, he felt Fenalin’s hands on his cheeks. Vassar threw his arms around his sister’s neck and the two of them sobbed.

Once they had collected themselves, Fenalin spent ten minutes helping Vassar to a sitting position. Vassar gasped the entire time. “Can you walk?” Fenalin asked, gesturing to his legs. Vassar’s legs were mostly unscathed aside from the burns from the straps used to bind him. He nodded silently, his throat too raw to speak. With Vassar leaning heavily on Fenalin, the two left the chamber and made their way down the tunnel.

Fenalin half-carried, half-dragged him along, supporting almost all his weight. She felt exhausted down to her bones; holding Vassar up, moving her own feet, and keeping a hold on her staff took all the focus she possessed in that moment. If more kobolds attacked them now, she knew she wouldn’t be able to fend them off.

It only occurred to her to ask when they reentered the main chamber and she remembered the other tunnels. “Vassar? Do you know where the others are?”

“M-more…” Vassar squeaked gesturing impotently to a branching path. The two of them plodded down the tunnel, and the voices of their captured kin gradually loudened. Several minutes later, Fenalin and Vassar crossed the threshold into a room much that was much larger than Vassar’s chamber, but was similarly decorated. The room was divided in half by metal bars which had been woven into a grid. A single kobold guard sat against a wall, but leapt up when the pair entered the jail. It rushed forward but Fenalin grabbed her staff by the base and whipped it around her head. The crystal slammed into the side of the guard’s head with a sickening crunch and the kobold crumpled instantly.

One of the halflings in the chamber, a man named Renault, raised his head and a look halfway between confusion and recognition dawned on his face. “Fenalin? What are you doing here? Is that Vassar?”

Another dead kobold. Good riddance. “Renault, rouse the others,” she said, propping Vassar up against the wall. “And stand back from the grate.” She was too tired to do this, she already knew, but she pointed her bloodied staff at the metal bars anyway and gathered the power Arazel had given her as the rest of the halflings shuffled back against the far wall.

Vassar’s world was starting to become clearer and clearer. He gave a cursory glance around the chamber. His sister’s shoulders heaving as she steadied herself and lowered her staff at the grate. In the farthest corner of the cage, Vassar spied a sad and discarded lute. “Fen, w-wait…” he said meekly. Vassar sank down and sat against the wall. “Renault. T-The lute…” A long pause. “Which? Which strings are l-left?”

There was a confused pause before Renault replied “The first, second and fourth. Why?”

Vassar sat up straight, and said, urgently, “First and second string, first fret. F-fourth string, third fret. Push down hard.” He closed his eyes and softly muttered “P-play the chord, please.” Vassar drew in a deep breath, wincing at the pain and sang one word, through his raspy, brutalized throat.

Fenalin

A brief rush of vitality surged through Fenalin’s body, and despite the whole situation, she smiled. Once more, green flames jetted from her staff, melting the bars into a glowing puddle and leaving a molten-edged hole in the grate. And this time, as the flames subsided, her vision blurred and she went down on one knee, clinging desperately to her staff to stay conscious.

A murmur went up from the halflings. When she managed to refocus her gaze on them, she saw that not a single one had stepped through the hole she’d melted in the grate.

Renault stared at her, taking in her tattered, bloodied clothing, the congealed brain matter coating the head of her staff. “Fenalin? Wh… what was that?”

She was already struggling to her feet. “I - Renault, listen - I have to get Vassar back to the caravan, he’s badly injured -”

“How did you -”

“Please, make sure everyone gets out of here safely.”

Breathing heavily and leaning on her staff, she turned away from her kinsmen and got Vassar’s arm around her shoulders again.

“Fenalin, what did you do?” Renault sounded angry, or perhaps scared. Or a bit of both.

“What I had to.”