Crowley Meratyn - Blog Posts

Animated Halt O'Carrick Concept

look, I know it's late, but I just finished watching this movie (again), and you CANNOT convince me that I'm the only one who's thought this. Tell me I'm wrong, if Halt were to ever be animated (with a better haircut) he would look EXACTLY like this:

Ballister, my beloved, this man is just Halt in another timeline. I mean come on. Any scene where he's hugging younger Will? Bam:

Halt and Crowley being gay? Boom, feast your eyes:

AND

And of course:

And obviously, you can't forget the ever allusive Halt Smile:

I swear, I'm so emo for this thought that now refuses to leave my head. I thought about this the first time I watched the movie, and I'm still thinking it. I refuse to picture Halt any other way now, and no one can stop me. If you're on the train, you better be fucking COMMITTED because we're going to the end of the tracks with this, baby

Pspsps RA fans, come get your content!!!

I found is two part one-shot collection in my WIPs and decided to stop holding them hostage as they've been there for months. I'll post the second one in the next few minutes, and I'll probably add to this in the future, but I have to wait for inspiration to attack, so it might be a while. Figured I'd just put these out while I was thinking about it.

Hope you guys enjoy!

ALSO, TW for discussion of child abuse (I mean, it's angst/hurt/comfort about Halt, so it's kind of a given at this point)

Will, looking at Halt, Pauline, and Crowley: Someone forgot to tell the third wheel that they're a tricycle

Halt, frustrated: Oh fuck me!

Crowley: I thought you'd never ask

You made it even better, and I love that.

Adding to it a bit, I feel like Halt would be the type of person who - unless he is woken in the field under threat - doesn't quite understand what anyone is saying when he first wakes up. You know that feeling where someone is telling you something, but it doesn't make any sense because your brain isn't fully loading yet? Yeah, that.

HOWEVER, Halt doesn't like looking stupid, so he'd just reply to whatever his brain is telling him the other person said - hence the random things being said. This leaves the other person bewildered, amused, and - in Crowley's case - completely ecstatic.

Just Imagine:

Tired and sleepy Halt saying random things because his brain isn't functioning properly.

Crowley, in a hospital: Halt, what's my blood type?

Halt: A Positive

Crowley: Well, I guessed wrong - call a doctor

I love this??? This also only furthers the 'Halt is actually a cat' mentality which is always a good thing in my eyes. Also gay

Ranger Gathering 2023 Prompt 1: Camp

Set during The Early Years: Yes there is Cralt in it. What did you expect.

The rangers were all sitting around the fire, holding mus of coffee in there hands, just enjoying each others company in silence. There wasn't really anything to talk about, no one could come up with anything interesting to say, so they didn't say anything.

This was really some of the only times the renegade rangers could relax, as they were busy at the momen trying to find and recruit other rangers to join them and team up against that bastard Morgarath.

Crowley looked around the circle of rangers around the camp, just being grateful that they were here. He turned his head and looked at Halt who was sitting next to him. He was staring into the fire, looking tired and drowsy.

Crowley shuffled a little closer to him and wrapped his arm around his friends shoulders. Halt looked up, slightly startled by the sudden touch, but relaxed when he realised it was just Crowley. But Crowley didn't stop there. He pulled Halt closer to him in turn, practically forcing the Hibernian to lean against him and rest his head on the red heads shoulder. Surprisingly, Halt didn't complain or protest, he just seemed to accept his fate.

Leander noticed this exhange between the two friends and hid a smile. It had been a long day, with a lot of riding and he knew the young Hibernian was exhausted. Leander turned his attention back to his coffee for a few minutes, but when he glanced back up he saw one of the sweetest and adorable sights he had ever seen.

Halt had fallen asleep aginast Crowley's shoulder and the older ranger was gently stroking his hair. As Leander watched he saw Crowley pull Halt's cloak further around his shoulders before pulling him closer and hugging him tighter.

Crowley glanced up, saw Leander watching them.

'I'm never moving again,' Crowley said completely straight faced. Then he continued. 'I will force him to stay with me like this forever and we will die like this.' He said it with such seriousness that Leander had to laugh softly at that.

'I'm sure you will.' He replied.

either autistic characters need to stop being so relatable, or I need to see a doctor

Alrighty the recent poll of who draws on who in the RA world brought me to a whole new idea

Autistic! Halt + drawing on skin/doodling

- Halt's hands are always littered with texsts and things to remember, as he isn't actually that good at remember *certain* things. (Some things stick, some don't, to do's and people are especially non-sticky)

- He gets distracted fairly easily in long briefings, but doodling on his skin helps, it keeps him from retreating into his own mind too much. Crowley knows this by now, and always has two pens with him for Briefings.

- Halt has trouble with showing love and affection in a, what he deems to be, 'socially normal and acceptable way' (kissing and touching, public hugs, saying I love you...) so he has a habit of doodling on the arms of the people he loves. Small imprints of his presence there, as if to say 'I want you to think of me, as I do of you' Crowley often has a bunch of his freckles connected to form constellations, or birds species (one of Crowleys absolute favourite things, it's why he loves to whistle)

- When Halt goes bad, getting to draw can sometimes help. Either as a form of mindfulness, or as a plain communication tool when he goes mute. He'll draw or write out what he needs at this time of distress. (And as Ranger's they dont tend to take a lot of paper, because it'll get wet anyways, so skin it is)

- Sometimes he thinks the drawing will help, but then he'll just get stuck in it, drawing the most horrid, deformed faces on his, or Crowley's hand, way too fast, and actually quite hurtfull, because of the tip of the pen. But even though it hurts, he can't stop. Crowley knows he hates this, and will be careful to wash his hands after a breakdown like this, so Halt doesn't have to see what he drew.

- When Halt gets really bored and doesn't know what to draw, he'll just ink his entired hand, but because ink doesn't go off easily, it can stay on there for a few days when it's as layered like this, terrefying possible opponents.

More Ranger's Apprentice Headcanons Because I Have No Self-Control (featuring bullet points!!)

I'm back on my bullshit, so buckle up buckaroos, it's gonna be a bumpy ride

ALSO, before I forget, I received an anon ask about if it was okay to write about my headcanons and such, and that is absolutely 100% okay!! I would love to see other people's interpretations of my thoughts, that's why I put them out there, so please feel free to interpret them as write about them, just give me credit, and let me know so I can see it!

Halt snorts when he laughs, but only if you really get him going. When he does, he'll turn bright red and try to cover his face, which works all well and good if the reason he's laughing so hard is because someone caught him super off-guard with a joke. However, nine times out of ten, he's only laughing that hard because someone decided to test his ticklishness (usually Crowley, but the others do it too once they find out), which means he can't cover his face without almost immediately moving his hands to grab the wrists of whoever's attacking him out of reflex

Speaking of Halt being ticklish, he would never admit it even under threat of death, but he actually doesn't mind being tickled. It shows him that people care enough about him to get close and try to make him laugh. He also finds it kind of nice to just be able to let loose and laugh when he usually can't out of fear of either vulnerability or tarnishing his reputation. Needless to say, if he lets you get away with tickling him, it's the ultimate sign of trust (kind of like a cat laying so its stomach is exposed and trusting you not to attack it)

When Halt is focusing on something, he has a habit of sticking his tongue out of the corner of his mouth (which I believe is something Horace actually noticed in KoC)

Halt has a bad habit of biting the sides of his fingers when he's nervous. If Pauline or Crowley happen to notice, they'll gently bat Halt's hands away from his mouth

If there is ever a mission that requires disguised infiltration in a high-class setting, Pauline and Crowley will almost always be the ones to handle it - and not just because of how well they coordinate off each other and work together. The main reason is because they both noticed how tense and jumpy being in that sort of environment made Halt after their first such mission. He never brought it up to them, and until KoC, they didn't understand the reason why (though they both had their theories)

Due to his royal upbringing, Halt is actually a very good singer and can play the piano as well (I don't know if the piano existed at this point in time. It's fiction. leT ME HAVE THIS)

Halt said that he can't face a plate of shellfish without throwing up, but he was underselling just how much even seeing a serving of shellfish deeply disturbs him. He'll usually start having a panic attack within the first few minutes, his mind telling him that the food is laced in poison, and that he is 16 years old and back in Clonmel.

Halt and Will both have severe PTSD, but only Halt is ashamed by it. At first, Will was ashamed of the way he was affected by his trauma, but Halt and his other friends shut that down really quick. Halt however, never had anyone who knew about what he went through, so he never had anyone to tell him that his struggling was okay. He was afraid that Will would end up the same way as he did, which is why he fought so vehemently against Will thinking he was doing a "bad job" of handling his trauma

Halt is very much a "do as I say, not as I do" kind of teacher. I mean look at him. This man's never even heard of self-preservation, but god forbid anyone he cares about pulls some self-sacrificing bullshit (that he pulls maybe 30 seconds later)

Random Ranger's Apprentice Headcanons (mostly Halt tbh)

I might elaborate further on some of these later, and I definitely have more than I'm posting this time around. Let me know what you guys think. I love having conversations about this shit

~ Will has found that the best way to ground himself during panic attacks or hard days since returning from Skandia is to hold a warm hand and a mug of coffee. He wasn't allowed to have coffee as a slave, and while Cassandra (then Evanlyn) held his hand, hers was always cold

~ Halt has a hard time sleeping because he is constantly plagued by nightmares. When Will was taken, he started having them about his death, and how the apprentice would blame Halt for being too slow

~ Halt is actually ambidextrous. He was born left-handed, but his parents forced him to learn to use his right hand due to left-handedness being seen as a sign of the devil. He still prefers to do a lot of things with his left hand though

~ Crowley is an only child. His parents tried for years, and it was only after they had given up that his mom became pregnant with Crowley. He is close with his parents, but he was unable to talk to them at all after Pritchard was banished up until Morgorath was defeated out of fear of putting them in harm's way

~ It was never diagnosed, (because, yk, the middle ages), but Halt actually has POTS syndrome. It wasn't too bad when he was younger, he would get out of bed and black out sometimes, or he would stand up and have to freeze for a moment until his head and vision cleared, and doing extreme exercises was fine, but walking up the castle steps could only be done with controlled deep breathing. However, in the last year of Will's apprenticeship, it seemed to get worse. The first time he full-on passed out in front of someone, he and Will had made camp, Halt had stood up only to collapse back to the ground. Will was frantic, and practically cradled Halt in his lap until he became responsive again about 12 minutes later

>> Will had never been that terrified in his life, because it was the only time that Halt was ever completely unresponsive when it was just him and Will throughout his whole apprenticeship. The guilt of that terror was what convinced Halt to see a healer (though it didn't do any good)

~ Pauline is 100% open to the idea of bringing Crowley into her and Halt's relationship, but they are both too scared to bring it up to her, so she has to do everything herself

~ He would only say this under threat of imminent death, but Arald sees Halt as a younger brother, mind you, a younger brother who constantly causes chaos and deserves to be cuffed around the ear sometimes, but still

~ Alyss once punched someone in the face and threatened their life for insulting Will behind his back

~ Before KoC, Will played a Hibernian ballad at a ranger gathering, but never noticed Halt slipping away with tears in his eyes, as he had picked one of Caitlyn's favorite songs

~ Believe it or not, Halt is actually incredibly ticklish. Will and Gilan learned this after Crowley pinched his sides at a gathering and Halt shrieked and leapt into the air. They will never let him live it down, and Crowley is obsessed with the weakness, finding it absolutely hilarious and adorable

~ Horace cried the first time he held Maddie. Then Will came to meet her, and he cried even more

~ Halt's regular handwriting is a strange mix between cursive and print, but he can copy anyone else's handwriting with little more than a glance. It's a skill that exasperates anyone who has to read his reports, because if they annoy him beforehand, he'll use their own handwriting

~ Before coming to Araluen, Halt had never seen a snake before, and his unfortunate first meeting was with the renegade rangers when a (fortunately non-venomous) snake got tangled in his blankets and he woke everyone else up screaming absolute bloody murder. Since then, he always freezes at the sight of a snake, and Crowley tells the story any time he's reminded of it

Crowley: Are you bleeding?

Halt: ...No?

Crowley, practically vibrating at this point: That is not a question you should answer with another question

Currently looking through all of the RA books I can find to verify the direction Crowley faces while at his desk in Castle Araluen it’s so I can be correct as to whether he looks round or up at someone entering his office

reading The Hibernian:

surely no one will be able to tell who my favourite character is…

bless this man 😭

just the absolute worst luck (mostly due to Morgarath’s blazing target on his back, but I digress)

could’ve sworn his eyes were green?? *scuttles off to edit fanfic*

it also just hit me that it’s never mentioned in the first 10 books that Halt and Crowley trained under the same man. could’ve used more of Crowley in the original books in general, imo (definitely no personal bias here)

ah… so we meet at last

crowley: your majesty, there’s only so much i can do about redmont.

duncan: you said you knew what their plans were.

crowley: i know what their plans are just fine. halt’s are chaos, but with structure, and gilan’s are chaos, but with… more chaos.

duncan:

crowley: you really ought to listen to how i phrase things.

a series of incorrect quotes based on personal interactions:

tennyson: don’t listen to anything this man says. half of what comes out of his mouth is lies!

halt: no

halt: more than half, i’d say

duncan: when halt began teaching crowley hibernian, i was convinced the two of them would use it to talk about me behind my back

*muffled hibernian bickering in the background*

duncan: as it turns out, they mostly use it to antagonize each other without my interference

halt: do we have to go to this funeral? i don’t even know this man!

pauline: he’s dead, if that helps, so you aren’t likely to meet him!

halt: it doesn’t help

will’s fortune cookie: your persistance will soon pay off

will:

will: I WANT A DOG I WANT A DOG I WANT A DOG I WANT A DOG I

crowley: i don’t see how anyone can drink their coffee with honey. it’s disgraceful

halt, behind him, pouring a copious amount of honey into his coffee: oh, yes — truly unthinkable

crowley: *writes “project” on a chalkboard* alright you motley lot, what should we name this project?

berrigan: operation oakleaf

farell: project coffee-beans

halt: mission ‘see-that-morgarath-never-shows-his—sorry-backside-outside-of-gorlan-again’

crowley:

crowley: *underlines “project”* we’ll think on it

will: *carefully places the final card on top of his card tower and sits back proudly*

pre-character development horace: *turns on fan*