#really the last one this time... maybe...

[hellspawnmotel]

the happy end

[inkskinned]

everyone says "oh repair in a relationship might be difficult but it will feel good after it's done."

but you weren't raised in a safe house. like generational wealth, it just skipped you. neither of your parents really know how to apologize or to talk to you with peace in their hearts. at sixteen, just once, you'd written down a little speech and tried to give it to your mom: hey i don't like it when you comment about my body and she'd given you this strange look, almost alien, and you'd felt stupid and small, then. and your father? fuck no. many years later you'd describe it to your therapist: in my house we just pretended like nothing had happened. like, overnight: all the pain was gone.

and since you weren't raised right, you struggled in school, too, didn't you. you struggled making friends because the architecture of appropriate behavior blindsided you. you weren't cruel - but you obviously seemed off to the other kids, strange in a way that was somehow always abrasive. and in that state - unhappy at home, unhappy during the school day - you would have given anything to have been loved. any person and any context.

so it's fine when your friend is a little pushy or mean or controlling. sure, she keeps you up late with threats of suicide but tells you never to call an ambulance. sure, he constantly pressures you for sex. sure, they are overly clingy one day just to disappear the next. all of them are still your friend, which is new. you don't understand this idea on the internet that you could just "cut people out" if they don't "serve" you. if you cut out the people in your life who take from you; you would have nothing and no one. maybe the people who can exile others just have more to choose from. maybe they had good parents. maybe they just have had an easier life, and have never needed someone.

not that you need people (you do. it makes you sick how badly you need people to like you), you rarely ask for more, don't you. so when you finally get into a relationship - well; now you're really chosen. and what's more, they make you feel wanted. even if it's just for a fraction of a second, you get to say: this is my person. holy shit.

nobody is perfect. hell, you're not perfect either. and how many times do you hear the words relationships take work. it's work but it's worth it. your hands shaking on the steering wheel. you have tried podcasts and audiobooks and self-healing and (in utter desperation) even a chatbot (it was a bad night. inside of the yelling, you'd thought: this is just the normal shape of my life). and the thing is that you want to give people grace. you want them to feel like you don't take everything personally. maybe that's why you're terrified to set a boundary.

and everywhere the positivity like an earthquake at your feet. all of this should feel like healing! you should practice gratitude! repair will feel good, right? it will feel good, eventually. the problem is probably you, actually: maybe you are just bad at it. you need to control your emotions more, you're always lashing out at the wrong things. some part of you is still sixteen, writing a dramatic letter to your mother. some part of you is still hiding from your father.

it must be like how they name mascara better than sex, then. repair is something you can buy lessons for; it is likely that repair doesn't really feel good - you're just being marketed to. the people who are able to have hard conversations and actually feel good: those are also people who have that generational wealth where their parents are normal or even kind and their friends were supportive and gentle and their partners never raised their voice. it feels good to them, but you probably will never feel safe enough for it, how could you.

but then you meet her, and she hurts you by accident. shaking, you bring up your handwritten bulleted list of things you have condensed into the smallest, gentlest packet of information. you have codified it into the perfect therapy speak. you have practiced it for three days, trying to make sure it is the best and least offensive version of things.

and she just... accepts it. and holds your hand. and asks you gentle questions about everything. she apologizes immediately. there's no fight, no yelling. you walk away feeling - good. it feels good to be cared for, it feels good to be seen.

the problem is that it has now thrown everything else into a terrible kind of relief. because this entire time - this entire life - it could have actually been that fucking easy.

[muffinlance]

Consider: Post-canon Zuko wakes up in the body of his childhood self, the morning of That War Meeting. Would he still speak against the plans, knowing his fate? What do you think he would do differently the second time around?

"Turned away at the doors, Zuzu?"

"Shut up, Azula," her brother sulked. But sulked weirdly, after staring at her too long and too wide-eyed, not like she'd surprised him but--

But like he hadn't expected her to be there. At all.

He turned away. ...He turned back. "Hey, Lala? Do you think you could help me practice that one set?"

He didn't meet her eyes.

She narrowed hers. "Which set?"

"The one I'm bad at."

She scoffed. Pushed away from the wall she'd been leaning against. "That's all of them, Dum-Dum."

He didn't shout or stomp or yell about the nickname. His lips twitched.

"It's okay," he said. "If you're afraid you won't be a better teacher that my instructor..."

It was the most obvious manipulation ever.

Perhaps if he proved an adequate firebending student, she'd work on his courtly survival skills next. Honestly, it was good that not even Uncle Gets-Cousins-Killed had been fool enough to take Zuko into that war meeting. She could only imagine how terribly that could have gone.

"Keep up," she said, and turned her steps towards the training grounds.

He did. There, and during the katas she ran him through.

Azula kept her eyes narrowed.

"Hey," he asked, "do you know how to bend lightning yet?"

As if he could have missed it, if she'd been able to get more than sparks. "I will soon," she said.

"You will," he agreed, and flowed through his next set. The one she'd only just mastered.

Father didn't notice how weird Zuzu was being. Uncle never noticed anything. Zuko ate dinner and asked a servant for seconds and didn't stutter or flinch or lose his appetite when father asked, coolly, what he'd done with his day. Azula's shoulders tensed, because one mention of how she'd squandered her own training time teaching him--

"Azula hogged the training grounds. For hours," Zuzu scowled, exactly like a petulant thirteen year old.

Exactly like he hadn't been acting all day.

By the time Father was looking her way, Azula had her usual smirk in place. "I'm sure there would be room for both of us," she said, "you're not afraid of a little friendly fire, are you, brother?"

Zuko sulked. And ate his seconds, like he was enjoying each bite. There was something in his eyes, like a joke no one else was getting.

---

Father died that night. A heart attack. There were the faintest of burns to either side of the treacherous organ; the royal physician hypothesized that he'd grabbed at his chest, fingers burning hot in his final moments; so hot they'd only exacerbated the problem.

The royal physician would never have been brought any victims of lighting strikes. Those that occurred in the capital did not generally require a doctor in the aftermath.

Zuzu ate a hearty breakfast.

He didn't order seconds. Azula gave him points, at least, for not being tacky.

---

The sages named Iroh as regent.

They named Zuko as Fire Lord.

"No," the tiny Fire Lord in his perfectly miniaturized Fire Lord robes said, sitting at the head of his war council. "We're not doing that. And I'll be reviewing all recent battle plans, as well. What's this I hear about a division of new recruits being deployed to the front?"

He did not mention how he'd heard of the 41st Division. No one asked.

"Prince Iroh, surely--" one of the generals tried to appeal.

The young Fire Lord's regent was looking as startled as the rest of them, for a moment. Then he sipped his tea, and smiled.

"Your Fire Lord is correct, of course. A change in our leadership--a change the other nations may mistakenly view as weakness--will necessitate a change in our strategy."

"Now," said their lord, "what, exactly, is our overall objective in this war?"

War, the new Fire Lord decreed, was not an end unto itself.

---

The new Fire Lord continued to have time, to pretend to be trained by her. Azula watched him. Adjusted her footwork. Did not tolerate, and was not offered, any commentary on who was teaching who.

"What did you do with my brother?" she asked, as they flowed from one set to the next. As her hands, poised to throw fire, just so happened to be pointed his way.

He missed a step. It didn't look like an act.

"I'm, uh. Right here?"

She didn't bother to dignify that.

He didn't bother to look worried about her hands, one movement off from a true attack.

He looked around, then grabbed her sleeve, and tugged her further from any walls that may hide ears. The royal family's private training grounds were wonderfully large, and wonderfully open.

"It's me," he said. "It's still me. Just. More of me? Longer of me?"

She narrowed her eyes. A familiar expression, by this point. "Explain."

"...I found the Avatar," he said. "And this is definitely his fault, but--but I guess it started at a war meeting, when I was thirteen."

Azula listened. It was a very Dum-Dum story.

[floccinaucinihilipilificationa]

My dear friend, When I was 13 years old and in a dark place I wrote you a message that we'd now call trauma-dumping in which I told you I was feeling suicidal. Not only did you respond to me, but you were so kind and told me I was brave. More than a decade has passed since then. I left tumblr and came back, I got two degrees, I changed my name, and more. I recently remembered your tumblr and am so happy that you are still here, still making silly Sherlock drawings. I don't know what the last decade has been like for you. I hope it has shown you so much kindness like what you gave to me so many years ago. I hope that you show that level of kindness to yourself. Thank you for listening to a scared teenager. Thank you, from the bottom of my heart. I love you <3

Dear anon friend,

To be honest when I logged into tumblr this week again and read your message I cried a little because I had a really hard day at work and then your message was so nice, and then the next day I felt really good because I had your words with me, so thank you. Maybe fandom can seem silly to other people but isn't it great that we are still connected in some way after 10 years because of a BBC Sherlock adaptation and get each other through hard days? (´꒳`)♡

I am so happy to hear what your last decade has been like! Thank you genuinely so much for sharing!! I can't wait for the next one and all the great things you will do. You wrote that you were "trauma-dumping". I just want to say I'm really glad you reached out 10 years ago. You were a child and needed help, and you got that child help. I'm really proud you did and I hope you are as well. (´｡• ᵕ •｡`) ♡

And just like this it is may 31th again!! Where did the last year go? What happened to me wanting to post more comics?? Well, let's try again this year!! (°□°;)

I hope it was a good year for everyone. Sherlock will always be here. And John too! (*ˊᗜˋ*)

[chrysa3tos]

i drew this last summer and distinctly remember going uh oh, I think this might be my new hyperfixation- and now we're here! happy 1 year of kpdh you funky polyamorous hunters 🌈👹⚔️

[minidoodles97]

Hawke family fleeing the Blight

I have some thoughts on my Hawke having to deal with another Blight and keeping her family safe again. But that's too long for this post, so I'm just gonna add it to my list of Dragon Age fics that I still need to finish...

[demaparbat-hp]

Here I am, pushing the Jian Li (Akai Kotou! Zuko) = Jinshi (The Apothecary Diaries) agenda.

[theres-no-future-in-it]

Pokemon AU - Interrogations

I think Siffrin should have a fox in their pocket at all times. You know, as therapy! (At least as long as she fits in there..) Anyway, meet Siffrin’s Vulpix! They came from the island with him. Like Siffrin, she unfortunately doesn’t remember their homeland either, but she’s a sociable creature nonetheless! (much to Siffrin’s benefit..)

Also, science ISAT characters canonically can’t see colours, I imagine it would be harder to spot that Pixie is a lot diffrent from other vulpix- most people would probably just think it’s a strange shade, but not that diffrent.. but obviously, it becomes clear that they aren’t when they start using ice-type moves!

more in the tags <33