This is brills!

Eridian Duet

Ilya gets pulled for a live post-game media scrum, and instead of being asked about the two goals he scored or how cohesively their team played that day, he gets asked the umpteenth question by some smarmy sports reporter about his and Shane’s relationship, with thinly-veiled jabs about how having two married queer players on their team must be bad for their locker room.

And Ilya loves being able to openly talk about Shane and their relationship, but he’s so sick of this offensive line of questioning. So instead he just makes his innocent-confused-puppydog face and replies in rapid-fire Russian. The reporter is thrown off and repeats his question, but Ilya just replies in Russian again, going on and on until the reporter gets flustered and gives up.

Later when the internet translates what he said, it’s something along the lines of, “I don’t understand such idiotic English questions, but if the sports reporter wants to ask questions about the sport he’s paid to report, I can answer those,” and then it’s just him praising his teammates on how well they’ve been playing.

RATED: G | WC: 4.8K | STATUS: COMPLETE

They’d had it planned out for at least two months. Well, Shane had, at least. His plan made the most sense: His parents were in Ottawa. They could drive, they had room in the house, and they loved Ilya.

Ilya had pushed back. He could drive. He had a big, empty house near the surgery. And he loved David and Yuna, but he could take care of himself.

They had argued back and forth for two full weeks, neither willing to admit defeat. But the dentist had been pretty fucking clear that the anaesthetic would be strong, so Ilya wouldn’t be able to drive himself anywhere, or even look after himself, for at least a day. Two days, in some cases, and he’d have pain and swelling for up to two weeks.

Imagine, after decades of your world becoming colder and colder, you are saved. A single Eridian, the only one of twenty three to survive, arrives in an alien ship, accompanied by a creature you can barely conceive.

Everything about the alien is so loud, hinges formed from tissue thumping and stretching in constant movement, even while unconscious. Completely organic, reliant of oxygen and hydrogen. Instead of a protective carapace, it regrows its damaged tissues. It has senses you do not, and technology so unlike your own, both able to utilise a force you have never heard of. The same force that killed almost your entire mission team. Highly adaptable, able to teach itself how to fly its ship in under a week, able to become fluent in the engineer's dialect in less than four years.

And if Erid's best engineer is correct (and there's no reason it wouldn't be), this creature not only managed to breed a predator of the warmth-taker to survive in various atmospheres, including Threeworld's, but also turned around to provide aid when it discovered that the predator could escape xenonite.

And you think: Surely, this creature which protects itself without a carapace, which sleeps so lightly and knows so much and learns so quickly, which saved two planets at the cost of ever returning to its thrum, surely, a creature so extraordinary must have a name to match

And you think: Perhaps it is strength, Mountain-Base or Lonsdaleite-Carapace. Perhaps it is intellect, Diamond-Claw or Lockpick-Mind. Perhaps it is courage, Song-Through-Silence or Path-Carver

And you think: None of these names hold the true weight of what this creature is to them. How do you describe something like that, which aids without expectation of anything in return, which risks its own life for the sake of a species it cannot touch, which performs miracles simply because it was asked.

Please enjoy this story inspired by the absolutely fabulous art from @ouchmyghostskin -- a tale of ghosts at the opera, sweet dreams, and figuring out some feelings! ✨

Day 2 of Painland week Myths/Legends

I dont think i’ve ever got around to sharing the drawing i did for the @dbdazine almost an entire year back! 😭

-ancient roman posca: water, red or white wine vinegar, honey, salt, herbs (coriander, mint, thyme)

-switchel: water, ginger, vinegar, sweetener, lemon, salt

-ayran: yogurt, water, salt, mint

-sees the reports of the heatwave in Europe-