Hello ya’ll. I’m Twilight Angel. Welcome to my page. You can call me Angel, or Twilight, or Tangel (courtesy of a discord friend).
I’m christian and aroace and most likely not neurotypical (nothing diagnosed, but life, ya know?), plus I’m a blatant supporter of other members of the LGBTQA+ community and people who are neurodivergent or disabled in any way. If you do not like or support those things this probably isn’t the blog for you. Please politely move on.
I do have my own links meetup that I’m working on, but it will basically all be written and posted on A03, mostly because I am not very good at drawling. But, that being said, I am working on reference drawings for my Links and will be posting them on a secondary blog here, along with rambles about the darlings, as I get them done. So, be prepared for that I guess XD
I have various other fics posted on my A03 as well, including a couple WIP Avatar the last Airbender fics, but my brain is currently fixated on Zelda, so don’t expect updates on those for a bit XP
Anyways. Hi, I hope we’ll have fun bopping around on this site and talking about nerd stuff together.
P.S. The art in my bio and my profile pic are not mine.
Profile pic was done by MaskedMoogle on IG
Bio art was done by Lemog Leo on Artstation
Some useful links.
My Writing Whump Scale
My Link Meetup AU Blog
I think one of the greatest joys of fandom is being able to look back on a certain media or a ship or a trope or event or something of that nature, and being able to remember like "oh yeah! that was how I became friends with [x]!" "that was when that friend and I watched that show and stayed up until 2 am to do it!" and when those friendships bleed back over to real life too, like "oh I tried that food bc x says they like it!" and "that's x's favorite animal!" and all these sorts of things that happened because we happened to meet just like, in the great vastness of 1) human existence and 2) the ephemerality of fandom existence.
The way that certain things become suffused with that friendship and the like joy that really is. What an uncommon occurrence. What a lovely thing it is. What an honor. What a privilege.
Thinking of this one again. I love you - all the fandom friends I still talk to, and all the ones that've become lost to the vicissitudes of time -
I still have the baby blanket I made your son, it's embroidered with his name on the front, but it never made it to the mail, he must be nearly ten years old now, I remember when you mentored me about that one life skill, thanks for letting me talk to you when you were busy, do you remember when I was telling you about my family, what about the time you and I voice called over dinner, or when I told you to try rambutans and jujubes, I still have the pencil holder you sent me seven years ago, but of course I ate the chocolate, the last time we talked you didn't seem so good, you were worried about your health, I haven't been back there in years, I hope you're well -
And for all my memories of you: what an honor. what an uncommon privilege.
sorry i will never understand cis grief. your daughter is living her best life and going around with friends and feeling like a human being. your son doesn’t feel like he needs to crawl out of his skin anymore and can actually smile. your children are happy and no longer see their existence as the worst thing in the world. why are you grieving this lmao. grow up.
Over Thanksgiving, my wife's mom said to her that she grieved "the son she lost". It pained my beloved so much that she asked me if I ever mourned her like that (we had been dating for like 10+ years before she realized she was trans). I said no; and, when asked why, I thought about it for a second.
Being a very metaphorical thinker, the image of a butterfly came to mind. This beautiful thing that grew out of something else. No longer what it was before, but something new and wonderful. A continuation, a becoming, a realization of self.
I turned to my wife and said "you do not mourn the caterpillar".
She loved that so much that I got @vaspider of NerdyKeppie to put it on a pennant to hang in our home.
I'd imagine that, when we first see Grace on Earth, his spark is gone. The man that had once called someone a waste of carbon has been so thoroughly beaten down, humiliated, and rejected that his spitfire has vanished.
Around others, he's learned to shut up, keep his head down, and move on.
It tracks with rejection sensitive dysphoria from AuDHD and "some people don't rise to the occasion, some people are failures". But I digress...
As soon as he is alone in space with Rocky, though, Grace can be just as wild as he used to be. Running crazy experiments, doing what his heart desires, going wild with it and getting that spark back all over again.
Rocky will never beat him down or humiliate him or hurt him the way others had. Grace can be himself for the first time in a long time. And that's why he's so goddamn successful and brilliant at what he does.
I like to think that the ghosts of Yáo Li Jie and Olesya Ilyukhina stayed with Grace through his time in the Hail Mary.
They were invested in the mision and dying even before they could fulfill their roles for the Project Hail Mary must be reason enough for them to have uncomplete things to do.
I like to think that they were accompaning Grace through his mission, giving him strenght to not lose his mind. That those moments in which he learned something about himself out of nowhere, or those sparks that lead them to solutions related to how to navigate Hail Mary were motivated by the efforts of Yáo and Ilyukhina to guide and help him.
Imagine with me:
Yáo and Ilyukhina not understanding they are dead at the start and thinking that they just wake up earlier (Yáo die first so he realize first in thinking this, when Ilyukhina dies Yáo explains to her that she did not survive the induced coma).
Yáo and Ilyukhina knowing that is cruel to wish for Grace to wake up sound and safe, just for him to be complete alone, but he is the only hope they have left.
Yáo and Ilyukhina feeling more at ease after Grace gives their corpses to the stars.
Ilyukhina been the most excited one about Rocky apparition, because she was an engineer and is just fascinated by what Rocky can do.
Yáo and Ilyukhina been indignated to have lost their chance to be part of the first contact in life.
Yáo trying to pass his knowledge as a captain to Grace, to ease his way with the controls.
Ilyukina been that little voice in Grace head of giving a chance to the Blip- A, that maybe they are friendly.
Yáo been a quiet force that supports Grace. There is point, at least in the book in which Grace seems to think that maybe he was brave, but he doesn't remember it, maybe that thought came from Yáo who believed that anyone could be brave.
All those little moments of luck been Ilyukhina and Yáo trying to influence so Rocky and Grace can have a successful mission.
Both ghosts, but specially Yáo bringing bad energies the moment they realize that Grace was sent against his will.
Ilyukhina crossing to the other side in peace the moment that realize that Rocky is the new engineer and that Grace has made the taumeba been able to survive Venus and the eridiani-2 planet.
Yáo crossing to the other side in peace when Grace decides to go rescue Rocky, because he can finally see Grace been truly brave for someone he cares.
Extra + Rocky
If Grace has 2 ghosts taking care of him, Rocky has 22.
22 eridian ghosts noticing the Hail Mary first and making it more noticiable for Rocky (maybe they made subtle sounds or vibrations so Rocky would have a better picture of it).
The Blip-B and Blip-C having a perfect trajectory to the Hail Mary thanks to the 22 eridian ghosts.
22 eridian ghosts celebrating that their single survivor has been able to be part of the first contact.
The Hail Mary been the home of 22 eridian ghosts who come in all the sizes and shapes.
22 eridian ghosts been fascinated with the alien that Grace is and how leaky he is.
22 eridian ghosts concentrating their efforts so Rocky is able to recover after been burn by the oxygen.
22 eridian ghosts using their best clothes (they are ghosts they can wear whatever they want) as a celebration for having succed in doing the taumeba.
22 eridian ghosts not knowing what to do once Blip-A starts failing and Rocky is left without astrophage.
22 eridian ghosts crossing to the other side in peace once they hear the knock outside the Blip-A, because Grace is here.
Extra Extra:
Both ghosts, human and eridian, been able to "see", understand and "touch" each other and doing and alliance for sake of their two single survivors, who needed a team and a miracle, and all they got are ghosts and each other.
just read your deity grace fic and I Have to know: does stratt Suspect anything? even if she doesn't jump to the conclusion that grace was a god of some kind, watching him be chased down only for the earth itself to feel like it's screaming and protesting and not stopping until he passed out HAD to have shaken at least one person who witnessed it
so at first, she doesn't. grace is a bit weirder than most; but she just kinda doesn't pay it any mind, since he's the one who figured out astrophage was actually alive, how it breeds, and now is a huge part of the petrova taskforce/project hail mary. she can deal with him being a little left of normal. lots of scientists are weird. he's just a bit more weird than the rest.
(more below because i started writing and then i just. kept writing lmao. this is now my outline for the stratt/outsider pov of cosmic slumber apparently XD)
tl;dr she doesnt truly know. no one does. but they all have varying levels of "something is not right and we just did something so much worse than we thought". but EVERYONE is affected by what happened. some just more than others
but then she gives the order. there's no other option. she hates it, but she has to do it.
it starts off as expected. either he'd run, or he'd freeze up. he runs. not unexpected.
but then weird things start happening as she listens to the radio chatter, making her way towards the location where he'd been chased. Right as someone says that they have eyes on him, that they're going to make contact, stratt rounds the corner and way off in the distance, she can see that bright yellow coat, and guards running after him. it sucks, but necessary. it's grace or earth. she wishes she didnt have to make the call, but thats what she has to do.
grace is tackled.
at the very moment he hits the ground, the ground begins to shake. stratt staggers, startled and confused - there'd been no indications of a quake this large, or even this long. it keeps going.
things start happening as she slowly picks her way closer. when the first CME happens, she looks up in shock, squinting at the sun. her eyes go back to where the doctor is retracting a needle from grace's neck. then her eyes widen because grace keeps struggling, like there was saline in the needle rather than a powerful tranquilizer
the earthquake is still going. grace screams, and she can hear birds shrieking, distant mammals howling and crying out. another needle. another CME.
stratt watches in horror because things are happening that are not right, and they only started when grace was tackled. but that's not possible.
but she gets closer, and she sees grace crying, right as misty rain begins to fall. the doctor begins stuffing pills down his throat like a dog refusing to take its medications - a last resort, in case somehow the injections werent usable. but grace just howls and thrashes beneath half a dozen guards. the very ground beneath stratt's feet, still shaking, heats up enough to feel it through her shoes, then cools. a transformer explodes behind her as he tenses his muscles.
the doctor shouts for backup. more arrive with even more sedatives. needle after needle goes into grace's body, along with more pills than she's ever seen anyone take, willingly or not. it takes a long time but finally, finally, grace's blue eyes slide shut. the animals that have been crying out the whole time fall silent all at once. stratt's heart pounds in her ears as she stands a few feet away, watching grace's limp body be hauled off the suddenly still ground. there's no breeze to rustle his hair.
grace is taken away on the back of a truck.
and stratt stand there, staring at the grass patch where grace had lain. the rest of it is dead, yellowed and dry.
in the rough outline of his body is a patch of lush green grass.
stratt had expected a bit of guilt.
she didn't expect the growing horror and realization that maybe she should've paid more attention to how strange dr. ryland grace was. maybe she should've listened to the dread, the terror, the sorrow she was feeling; familiar in the sense that she knew the emotions, but unfamiliar in the sense that it wasn't hers.
i finished the audiobook in 4 days, saw the movie the day after, and have dragged everyone else i know into the Project Hail Mary pit by their ankles. so, y'know, i feel TOTALLY NORMAL ABOUT THEM!!!!
my drawings are a fusion of the book and movie aesthetically, but I decide to keep Rocky's little shirt + the horrible burn scarring of the "lets shove Rocky in the airlock to save him" scene.
i also designed this sticker, and if anyone wants to buy one, lmk:
Rocky not understanding the concept of nightmares.
Grace has nightmares every night, including the first time he sleeps in the tunnel under Rocky's watch. He tosses and turns in his sleep, he mumbles, he cries, he begs; his brain doesn't remember his last conscious moments on Earth, but his body does.
He doesn't remember having the nightmares. He knows he wakes up feeling like shit, but that's about it; not a big deal.
When in the morning Rocky asks him why he is so noisy, he assumes that he was snoring. "It's a human thing, we can be pretty loud when we sleep. It's not very polite to point it out."
Rocky accepts it; why wouldn't he? It's a human thing!
(Later, when Rocky gets aquainted with human noises enough to recognise Grace's sounds as distress, he concludes that sleeping must suck for humans. This explains why Grace always tries to stay up as long as possible and needs to be reminded to go to bed, actually. Such weird species; they really should watch each other better if this is the norm for them!)
...It's only when they start their journey to Erid, when Grace feels safe again sleeping under Rocky's watch after those couple of months of separation, when he is more or less at peace with the memories and the past, when he is filled with joy of saving Erid and Earth and his friend, when he starts to believe that he'll actually get to live — it's only then Rocky sees him sleeping peacefully through the whole night for the first time.
Rocky freaks out.
He waits for Grace to enter the loud stage of his sleep, and Grace just. doesn't. He doesn't move, his breathing is slow, his heartbeat is steady. Looks peaceful, but this is Wrong, right?? Is he dying? He is dying, isn't he???
He ends up waking Grace up, utterly terrified. After a lot of confusion Grace realizes the misunderstanding and feels Bad about it.
Rocky feels worse. He was supposed to watch over him! He was supposed to protect! And he missed this!! At least let Rocky know how to prevent this in the future. You slept peacefully just now, what changed. Rocky fix and make sure the nightmares don't happen again. Explain Right Now.
Grace, who fell asleep on the floor curled up around Rocky's ball and is not yet ready to admit out loud that the peacefulness was probably due to the close proximity to someone who cares about him: "uhhhh your ball is pretty warm? humans tend to have more nightmares when we are cold, so it's probably that".
He is never allowed to sleep on his own ever again.
Grace remembered the whole "being forced to go on a suicide mission" thing before Rocky moved out (I think even movie!Rocky still had to go back to the Hail Mary at least once to get his stuff, and in the book this memory happened much earlier), so may I offer: Grace breaking down and writing "COWARD" in big bold letters over everything else on his "Who am I?" whiteboard. This is how he sees himself in the moment, nothing else seems to matter. It's fine, Rocky can't see it — and even if he could, he can't read. It's just a little self-depricating reminder for himself. "Hey, that's who you really are". "Hey, you can't pretend anymore". "Hey, you are not a hero, even if your whole planet and your alien friend see you as one".
Except, before parting ways, he teaches Rocky the basics of the written English (in the book Rocky asks him to and I assume movie!Rocky would want that also), and Rocky runs around the ship pointing his camera thingy everywhere trying to find and read all the words, like an excited child who is learning how to read.
And he sees the board.
And it's funny, at first. He bullies Grace for the messy handwriting. He complains about the lines that are not 100% straight. And then—
That's a big boy right here.
Vent post I did a while ago, finally felt the courage to post it
I hope it'll reach the people who needed to read this.
Edit: Took my sweet time to do it, because I kept forgetting- But the original comic that inspired this one has been found! Thank you very much!
