Crossover Queen

no touch me i social disty

& then years later Yennefer comments on how improbably youthful Jaskier is and Geralt’s like ‘yeah he’s part elf’ (cause like, we’re all ambiguously-human friends here, nbd)

Jaskier: no, what are you talking about? what made you think that??

Geralt: I thought you knew.

Jaskier: what do you mean, you thought I knew??

Jaskier: listen, I know the names of all my family going back to my great-great-great-great grandparents, and none of them were elves? 

Geralt: ….well. one of them’s lying.

Jaskier: I don’t like what you’re implying

Geralt: I’m not implying anything

Jaskier: yes, you are? you’re implying that one of my ancestors committed adultery with an elf? which is patently absurd?

Geralt: are you on speaking terms with your parents at the moment

Jaskier: what does that have to do with anything

Geralt: it’s just I don’t know if you should hear this from me

Jaskier: well, I AM hearing it from you, aren’t I????

Geralt: I shouldn’t have brought it up. I thought you knew.

Jaskier: where are you even getting this from? oh, what can you just, sense that somebody’s part elf with your magic witcher powers?

Geralt: …………….

Yennefer: oh?

Jaskier: it turns out my grandmother fucked so many people that the paternity of all of her children is up for debate

Jaskier: so they just sort of had to guess which of them were the half elves and in my mother’s case, they were wrong.

Yennefer: that’s hilarious

Geralt: I’m starting to see where you get it from

Jaskier: quite

Jaskier: anyway my mother says please will you come and smell everyone else on her side of the family just in case

Truck Carrying Gaming Dice Spills Onto Highway, Rolls A Perfect 756,000

Did anybody ask for an L.A. By Night pirate AU? No? Well, I made one anyway!

Victor is captain of the Maharani. His crew used to be aboard the Maharajah, until a few members of the local Camarilla—part of one of the most powerful pirate empires in the world—burned the ship down and forced them to commandeer a new vessel. Before becoming a pirate, Victor was a naval officer, but a leg injury took him out of service for a while. When the navy wouldn’t take him back after he was he healed, he turned to piracy—he’s never been able to stay away from the sea—and realized the pay was so much better. Now his ship flies under a black flag, with a skull above a crossed sword and scepter—a reminder of where he came from and a warning to those who would try to force him back into that old life.

Nelli is his first mate. In her youth, she was Petronella, heiress to the Griffith fortune, until she was kidnapped by Charles Price, captain of the Bloody Rose. For a time, she lived as his consort, his plaything, and convinced herself that was love. Until the next plaything came along. Nelli slit Dawn’s throat and left her body in the captain’s bed before sneaking ashore. There she stumbled into Captain Temple—Victor, a navy boy she remembered meeting years ago—and joined his newly formed crew. And once she started her new life—as a true pirate in her own right, not just someone else’s toy—she began getting the roses tattooed on her arm. Countless intricate petals and thorns creeping up her right arm and across her shoulder, each one drawn by a different artist in a different port. It started as a way to cover up the heart and chain that Charles had branded on her wrist—the same design each of his conquests was forced to wear—but has since evolved into something so much bigger. Captain Price claimed her years ago, but with each new drop of ink she adds to her skin, she declares that he will never own her again.

Jasper is the ship’s navigator, but no one knows what drove him to piracy in the first place. It wasn’t money like Victor or freedom like Nelli or rebellion like Annabelle. He simply washed up one day, with scars he won’t talk about and a past he never mentions, and became a part of the crew. Apparently he’s got no where else to go anymore, so he stays. And no matter where he came from, he’s appreciated here. He can speak multiple languages and decipher any map you hand him and hoards books more jealously than any gold they find. He’s more scar tissue than person at this point and everyone says he must have the devil’s luck to still be alive after all the danger he’s run head first into. He’s handy in a fight and intimidating as hell, but the tattoo on his arm of a beautiful white-haired mermaid hints at a softer side.

Annabelle was a stowaway that Victor all but forced into being a new deckhand. Despite her initially indignation, the rest of the crew have grown to love her as one of their own. She is made of righteous anger, all directed at those in power as the common people starve and suffer in the streets. Being a pirate wasn’t the life she’d imagined—she’d snuck aboard the wrong boat, she realized too late—but if it’s a choice between piracy and death, she might as well do some good while she’s here. If those in power won’t do anything to help the starving masses, perhaps it’s time for a band of outlaws to provide for them. Annabelle did a lot before joining Victor’s crew—not all of it legal—but the only part of her old life she’s willing to talk about is the two loves she left back on land. She has both of their names tattooed on her arms, as a reminder and a promise to come home.

Eva. Is. A. Mermaid. She’s a ghostly streak of white beneath the waves, and despite the cautionary stories that label mermaids as traitorous vicious things, she was the one who dragged Jasper’s body back to the surface when he was sure he’d drown. She trails after the ship, helping when she can—slipping a protection charm around Jasper’s neck when he visits her or keeping him company on late nights in calm water, answering Annabelle’s excited questions about all the legends she’s heard. She sometimes disappears for days at a time only to be spotted sunbathing on a rock near their next port. Eventually, Jasper gets the image of a pale mermaid—with bright blue eyes and a crown of pink plumeria flowers in her long white hair—tattooed on his forearm. The first time Jasper shows it to her, she can’t find the words to express how touched she is and chooses to just kiss him instead.

All of the Barons have their own ships, each with their own crew: Abrams captains the Gilded Age, Therese captains the Asylum, and Nines captains the Last Round. There is an agreed upon peace among all of them—so long as everyone sticks to their own territory—and in desperate times, they will even come to each other’s aid against a greater threat.

Currently, that greater threat is the Elysium, captained by Vannevar Thomas. After being forced out of his previous territory, Vannevar and his first mate Suzanne have started encroaching on the Pirate Council’s domain in an attempt to claim it for the Camarilla. The Elysium may just be another one of the many ships in the Camarilla’s expansive fleet, but it’s been raising hell lately. They’re stealing what they can, destroying what they can’t, trying to recruit allies from among the local captains, and targeting the Maharani in particular seemingly out of sheer spite. 

But Victor and his crew aren’t going down without a fight.

Barbarian

Bard

Cleric

Druid

Fighter

Monk

Paladin

Ranger

Rogue

Sorcerer

Warlock

Wizard

romans: institute a policy that says that conquered peoples are allowed to gain citizenship by military service, but also can’t serve in their home areas (because armed native soldiers + angry locals = revolt), thus requiring everyone who wants to be a citizen to work abroad for years of their lives, creating diversity.

A new player joined the group, their character being introduced as a captive in a slaver’s warehouse that the party discovered. They defeat the slaver’s mercenaries and free all captives, then want to interrogate the mercenary leader about the whereabouts of his master. The new PC, a young warrior, is obviously angry and tries his best to intimidate the mercenary into spilling information.

Young Warrior: "You did a pretty shitty job guarding this warehouse!“

Snarky elven Rogue: “Well, I mean… they captured you…”

Anathema: uh? 

it is of course possible that Draco would have gotten the Death Eaters into the school some other way if the Vanishing Cabinet hadn’t created the perfect opportunity, but it wasn’t looking likely.

so like, it’s reasonable enough to assume that Dumbledore’s death (at the hands of Snape specifically, obviously I know he was going to die soon enough from the curse, but the timing does make a difference so I’m still focused on this) occurred because of the Death Eaters getting into the school. the reason the Death Eaters were able to get into the school was because of the Vanishing Cabinet in the Room of Requirement, which Draco repaired.

the Vanishing Cabinet ended up in the Room of Requirement over the summer of 1996, presumably (reasoning for this is in the next paragraph), and Draco discovered it there sometime in his 6th year. but the only reason he had even known what it was, and what it could do, was because he had spoken with….

Graham Montague, a Slytherin who was in 7th year in 1995-1996 (when Harry & co were in 5th year). Montague was shoved into the Vanishing Cabinet in that year by Fred and George Weasley, because he was a part of the Inquisitorial Squad and was presumably about to take points from the Weasley twins for doing something disruptive. and we know that Montague got stuck in a limbo between the two connected cabinets, due to one of them being broken - he could hear things being discussed in Borgin & Burkes, which is how he was able to let Malfoy know that the other “end of the tunnel”, or basically the other cabinet, was in Borgin & Burkes (which, Draco would already have seen as a 12-year-old, in the summer before his 2nd year, when he visited the shop with his father - fun fact, Harry hid in that exact cabinet while Lucius Malfoy was transacting with Borgin).

Montague would never have had this experience at all if the cabinet hadn’t been broken in the first place. but in fact, we know exactly how, when, why, and by whom the cabinet was broken.

it was in the fall of 1992, when Nearly Headless Nick observed that Harry had gotten in trouble with Filch, and prompted Peeves to drop that very same cabinet from a large height in order to cause a distraction for Filch, allowing Harry to get out of trouble.

why was Harry in trouble in the first place? because he was “tracking mud” in the corridors.

why was he tracking mud in the corridors? because Oliver Wood had had him out on the Quidditch pitch all day even though it had been literally storming outside. so Harry came into the castle drenched and splattered with mud.

Dumbledore literally died because of how obsessed Oliver Wood was with winning the Quidditch Cup.

to clarify:

the bits about the Vanishing Cabinet being the only real way he had to get the Death Eaters in, having heard about it from Montague and how that made him realize he could use them as a passage, etc - that was all clearly laid out in HBP, chapter 27 (The Lightning-Struck Tower).

Montague being shoved into the cabinet takes place in OOTP, chapter 28 (Snape’s Worst Memory).

Draco seeing the cabinet and Harry being in the cabinet is all in CoS, chapter 4 (At Flourish and Blotts).

and the entire situation with the Quidditch practice and the mud and Harry getting in trouble and Nick getting Peeves to drop the cabinet is in CoS, chapter 8 (The Deathday Party).

Voldemort died because Harry was the master of the Elder Wand that Voldemort was trying to use.

Why was Harry the master? Because he overpowered its previous master, Draco, and won its allegiance.

Why was Draco master of the Elder Wand? Because he disarmed Dumbledore in the precise sequence being discussed, which relied on the vanishing cabinet.

“I’ve been held captive in a fairy mound for the past seven years, so not only is there a gap in my resume but my coding knowledge is way out of date now.”

“I’m under a curse from the bog witch and I can only work during daylight hours because at sunset I turn into an alligator.”