YoinkTober 2021

[JoB]

(Although I must admit the first guy looks like a red shirt Captain Kirk to me...)

(Umh ... next generation, actually, isn't it?)

[tehta]

You're right, I had some sort of brain blip caused by lack of coffee. Fixing now.

[wavewright62]

I messed up the hairline, but it is indeed supposed to be Cmdr Riker. 
Trombones do get the Valkyrie theme, but it's supposed to be the Wagner tuba - a specialised instrument pretty much designed for the purpose.  Idiosyncratic, just like Mikkel.

Spoiler: trombone in battle • show

"Right we're going in.  Are you ready?  Mikkel, sound us in!" 
Mikkel unstraps the case from his pack, puts it down carefully on the ground, opens the case and pulls out the slide, sighting it down his arm to check for any bends or dents. He spritzes the slide with lubricant, fits it into place and runs it up and down a few times.  Does a few breathing warmups.  Digs out the mouthpiece, buzzes through it, puts it back and fishes out another one.  He blows a mezzo forte G to get the air moving, then takes a deep breath and launches into the theme.
By this time the troll has come out and is standing with the rest of the troop gawping at Mikkel, all of its arms crossed.  "wHAt'S WiTh hIM?" 
Without taking her eyes off Mikkel, Sigrun winces and shrugs. 
"i'D fIRe hIM." 
Sigrun nods.

[Jitter]

Opaque, great Tuuri poem! That scene was an alternative for me as well for the same prompt, but I couldn’t have taken it nearly as elegantly! And I just had an Adventure 1 bit on the previous one.

Trombone it is, whether it’s Riker or Madsen playing it I am drawing a blank so far on Theme Song, we’ll see whether I’ll have to skip this one.

Wave, I don’t really think the tweak was very big. The hero and the co-star will in any case just sing about (and maybe to, if they are lucky) each other, perhaps hold hands. What difference does it really make which gender any of them are? We are a modern company you know!

[tehta]

I chose trombone not because it was right for the piece, but because it seemed like the sort of thing Mikkel might play already (if only to make sarcastic wah-wah sounds at people).

Anyway, out of deep shame over my star trek gaffe, I have decided to destroy Mikkel's trombone, in this very silly continuation of my earlier 'theme music' piece. (Jitter, I borrowed your pink shirts. Hope that's okay. Also hope it's okay to spam like this with low-effort silliness.)

Spoiler: show

"Lalli, a word."

"Yes, Captain Eide?"

"I've realized that it is selfish for me to be the only one with theme music, and so I'm going to extend that perk to all my officers. It's quite hard finding good themes for everyone, though."

"Why are you-- Are you telling me this because you want me to find more sheet music?"

"No. I mean, yes, that's a great idea, you do that. But actually I'm telling you this because you are lucky! I've already found an awesome theme for you."

"?!?"

"Anyway, your fylgja is a wild cat of some sort, right?"

"My luonto is a lynx."

"That's a wild cat! So, another word for a wild cat is 'panther'. And, apparently, they are pink sometimes, which... Well, you do have all those pink shirts! This piece is most perfect for you! Mikkel, get your lungs over here and demonstrate Lalli's new theme. And you, Lalli, imagine this playing whenever you enter a room."


***

"A freak accident, you say? During a routine Cleanser training exercise?" Mikkel regarded the twisted remains of his instrument with resignation. He really should have foreseen this. "Oh well, this job was getting boring, anyway. Time for another!"

[LooNEY_DAC]

...You guys know this is all your fault, right?

[Jitter]

Hahaa, we are happy to have caused this

Sorry, I still got nothing myself.

[Opaque]

Haha, Yes! Riker looks great! My brother used to play trombone too. He was interested in playing specifically because of Commander Riker. We were also big fans of Picard's flute from The Inner Light.

Here's a poem for adorable little Lalli.
(Theme Music)
Quiet Song

Way back then, when he was quite young
Back to the place his coat was hung
A melody sat on his tongue
And in his solitude he sung

It was a ballad of darkness
About hearts brimming with weakness
Dreams filled with silence and meekness
Wallowing in their minds sickness

It came. Quietly and deadly it spread
Consuming all of his loved ones in dread
"Flee now! Run far away!" The eldest said
"Hurry and leave or you will join the dead"

With his kin, he fled his old home
Consumed in a fiery dome
Escaped to new place to roam
Far away from the catacomb

Year by year passes as they grew
He and them were the only few
Alone he sings for what he knew
Slowly he feels his strength renew

The song he loved from a long time ago
Laying gently in his memories glow
Bringing him order in his life of woe
Almost a peace like a new fallen snow

He works nights, keeping the woods safe
To bring some comfort to this place
At sunrise sleep shows in his face
And he retreats to his dream space

Deep in his mind he likes to spend
The daytime letting his mind mend
Alone he lets his voice ascend
Sings "Hello darkness, my old friend"

[Róisín]

Oh wow! These are all just amazing!

[wavewright62]

Opaque, you do a very good line in laments.  *sniff*

And tehta, there is Absolutely Nothing Wrong with low-effort silliness.  I like a good giggle, and that's a prime example.  Now to find a sax... oh, no, maybe they'll rediscover 'Careless Whispers', and every pantheon on the planet would withdraw their favour if that came to pass!

Edit: Okay, I got to amend another post, cool, cool.

Day 11 - Both is Good - the debate still goes on whether Emil and Lalli are linked romantically or platonically, maybe we should let bygones be bygones?


Oh, and LooNEY? Owned, delightfully.  (Although I had to go back and look, I thought Mikkel was already on trombone.  My mistake, and now (only now) realise that the fanart illustration I made of those story some time ago was wrong on that score.  My sincerest apologies.)

[tehta]

11.10.2021 Both is Good

I cheated and wrote this yesterday, because I had time on a train. It's a bit longer than usual, pretty fluffy, and hey, it goes along with wave's proposed theme for the day! (Is there a debate, though? I though we were all co-existing peacefully, in this fandom: shippers, non-shippers, ship agnostics...)

Opaque: Very nice theme choice, definitely more fitting for Lalli than the Pink Panther theme. And a very evocative poem!

and now onto my contribution...

Spoiler: show

They'd arrived in Brúardalur only a day ago, and this was Lalli's fifth visit to the bakery. It made Emil feel a bit awkward. (Although, to be fair, he himself had already investigated the town’s only clothing store twice. There just wasn’t much to do here.) At least this time they were only window-shopping: it was late afternoon, so the morning’s pastries were all gone. All that remained was fancy breads, and...

“Hmm, cake,” said Emil. “You know what might make sense? Buying a cake for after dinner. To celebrate my birthday!”

Lalli frowned. “Your birthday?”

“Yes, the day of, er…”

“No, I understand. But your birthday is today?”

“Actually, no, it was last week, while we were in quarantine. But there was no cake on that ship. And even if there had been...” Emil shuddered, remembering the sub-Mikkel-level cooking of the ship’s chef. “But these cakes look great.”

“Mm-hmm.”

“Will you help me choose one? Look at this one, it’s berries and cream: you can't go wrong with a cake like that! But it’s a bit plain and boring. That other one, with all those sugar decorations, looks very beautiful and sophisticated.”

Lalli’s awed expression as he stared at the decorated cake was a delight to see. He looked so carefree, almost child-like.

“Wait!” Emil was struck by a thought. “I guess this means that I am older than you, now! So you’ll have to respect me more.”

Lalli tore himself away from all that sugar. “Older? You are… two-one?

“No, I am two-zero. Twenty. Wait, are you twenty already? When was your birthday?”

It took Lalli a while to find the words. “Month four, day two-- day twenty.”

“April twentieth? But why didn’t you say-- Oh.” Emil mentally reviewed their recent past. “I guess that was when you were out of your body, and I was pulling you around. So, bad timing for a birthday.”

“Yes, bad time for everything. But you give me cake. In your dream place.”

“You are right, I did! But that’s not really… You know what?” Emil turned back towards the cake display. “Let’s get both cakes, for both our missed birthdays. We deserve it.”

Lalli nodded. “Both… is good.”


Note: we know they arrived in Iceland in early June, because the newspaper came out on the 5th. So, they spent May in quarantine, and April 20th would have fallen right in the thick of things (maybe a bit earlier in the story than I put it, but I could not resist the idea of a dream birthday cake).

[lwise]

Ah, tehta, love it!

[Opaque]

That Riker sketch inspired me to make a "OS or TNG" drawing. I like both.
(Both is Good)

[Mirasol]

Aaah, so many sweet and funny and sad and scary contributions since I last visited!
I hope I´m around more this week to comment on the new pieces!

Anyways, last week´s stress is now over, and here comes the promised art-dump (hopefully followed by smaller updates from now on):

Spoiler: 7: Sigrun´s Birthday • show

I offer you another different Sigrun: CoH-Sigrun! (And CoH-Mikkel) This one´s accompanied by a little drabble that I actually managed to get down to 100 words somehow.



“Ok, I´ll phrase it differently. I´m absolutely sure this is not how to make Lavacake!”
“I´m not taking criticism by someone who once killed a Snow-Spider with his food.”
“You asked me to help prepare for your birthday party, I´m afraid you´re stuck with my opinion now.”
“Fair enough. But come on, of course it´s made like this. It´s called Lavacake, pretty straight-forward, isn´t it?”
“Did you consult a recipe-book?”
“Who needs recipes? A true baker goes with their gut! Besides, this here absolutely should be the right way to make Lavacake. Today´s the most fun I ever had cooking!”

(The guests never forgot the sweet smell of ashes and molten metal coming from the resulting cake...)

Spoiler: 8:Fire • show

I was feeling quite sick on that day, so this one isn´t super-creative... Also the lava on the last picture pretty much killed my orange marker, so I just ditched the colorscheme entirely.

Spoiler: 9: Just a Tweak • show

The Squirrelcookie-chef has accompanied her mother to the store last Saturday. Upon reaching the checkout, she suddenly reverted back to her five-yearold self to beg for an Überraschungsei (a chocklate-egg with a small toy in it), which to her surprise, she got. Out of it came a sign!



With that she knew what she had to draw today! So here´s Mirasol from @thegreyarea ´s Squirrelworld adding the finishing touches to a fresh batch of squirrelcookies.
Featuring the last hurrah of my orange marker and my own endless tweaks to the squirrel´s color. I´m still not fully happy with it. But at least it fits the prompt in every way possible.

Spoiler: 10: Theme Music • show

I had no clue what to draw for this one. :'D In the end I settled for that right here: "Tatort" (= "Scene of the crime", airing since 1970) and "Polizeiruf 110" (= "Police Call 110", airing since 1971) are probably the most well-known German crime-shows. New episodes are still being made and one of either airs every Sunday night unless there´s a national holiday or something. (Or football apparently, like this week...) They both follow several groups of police inspectors stationed in different cities solving crime. And they both have really well-known theme songs, the Tatort´s actually having never changed since the show started.

Tatort
Polizeiruf 110 (I don´t think this is the current one, actually, but I couldn´t find it. The music is essentially the same though.)

[Jitter]

Both is good

Spoilered for sex talk (no action)

Spoiler: show

So, now that we are decided, how do we proceed? Do we contact the Dagrenning program, or…?”
”Or what?”
”Or do it naturally, of course.”
”It’s not natural.”
“Lalli, what could possibly be more natural?”
“I know it’s how it happens, but… I am a man. Emil is a man. I know what to do with Emil, he knows what to do with me. But you are… girls. You are different.”
“Well, not so different. The dangly bits are located a little differently, but mostly it is the same.”
“And you don’t even have to look! We can help make sure the payload lands in the intended port!”
“Rakel! You are terrible!” Emil was blushing fiercely.
“Ok, I understand you need to think it over.”
“And also, remember if we try, we can stop any time, if you are uncomfortable.” Inka always seemed to understand Lalli’s feelings, almost as well as Emil did.

***

“So, are you boys certain you are, um, up to this? Pun intended.”
“Rakel, stop it!” Inka was exasperated with her wife.
“It’s fine. We are ok.” Lalli was his serious self, but his earlier visible awkwardness was remarkably lessened. “We can try. We all want this. We are family.”
“Yes, we are family. We support each other through any difficulties. Even sex.” Rakel was trying to appear solemn, but both her and Emil started giggling at this.

But it was all right. They all loved and trusted each other, and Lalli was comfortable with touching the girls, even though he was still a bit weirded out thinking about how you have sex with a person who doesn’t have all the parts he thought important. There wasn’t anyone else he could even contemplate this, but his family was safe to be with.

“We have decided I will go first, although my lovely wife has promised to assist in any way” Inka explained to a blustery Emil and surprisingly cool Lalli. “Which one of you will it be?”
“Well, we… we were thinking about how to increase the odds so…” Emil started.
“Both”. Lalli cut in. “If it’s ok with you, we will both try.”
“Oh, ok, both is good! You are right, it does increase the odds.”

@thegreyarea this is for you. Tehta is also guilty.