Halt O'carrick - Blog Posts

I've never done something like this, but I want to give it a shot this time so we'll see where that takes me

Welcome to the Ranger Gathering, coming August 2025!

Despite how quiet this account has been this year, the Gathering is still being held! We invite you to take a look at the prompts below.

How it works:

The Ranger Gathering will run for the entire the month of August, 2025. Each day has a prompt that participants can use to inspire works about Ranger's Apprentice, The Early Years, The Royal Ranger, or Brotherband.

Check out last year’s stuff here!

If you want to participate, tag your post with #ranger gathering 2025 so we can all find it!

A few notes on the Gathering:

You do NOT have to do all the prompts, or even most of the prompts to participate in the Gathering! The most important thing is to have fun and avoid burnout. Pick whichever prompts inspire your creativity, and ignore the rest.

The Gathering is meant to show off all forms of creativity! This means art, music, writing, memes, textpost, moodboards, playlists, or whatever else you can come up with. Don't feel like you can't participate if you're not an artist or author.

This blog is going to showcase a few posts from the tag every day of the Gathering, so make sure you support the creators with reblogs and comments.

Good luck, and see you all at the Gathering!

Text Prompts:

1. Adoption

2. Whisper

3. Trickster

4. Runes

5. Cavern

6. Masked

7. Throne

8. River

9. Forge

10. Famous

11. Dance

12. Hunter

13. Fading

14. Bloom

15. Trade

16. Anguish

17. Satisfied

18. Armor

19. Feast

20. Duel

21. Melody

22. Unlock

23. Dream

24. Tool

25. Chain

26. Portrait

27. Gift

28. Release

29. Oath

30. Generations

31. Roots

a few things with this

Not quite to the prompt, but imagine Horace is trying to alley-oop Halt over a wall or something and just....severely overestimates how much strength he needs to move this 5'3" wiry man and fucking LAUNCHES him into the air. Literally the most undignified scream anyone's ever heard from Halt as he suddenly know what it's like to be a bird. He's so lucky he managed to catch himself on the top of the wall bc he would have faceplanted directly into the ground on the other side. He still hasn't forgiven Horace and has banned him from ever speaking of it again

While he may not be the most delicate with injuries, if he's around, Halt is the first person Horace will go to if he's hurt, especially for stitches. Despite Halt's unintentionally rough treatment of bruises, he's actually surprisingly gentle when giving people stitches

When they were travelling together after Halt's banishment, Horace had to make sure Halt would eat. Halt was practically drowning in guilt and self-loathing at the time, though he tried to hide it bc he didn't want to make himself a burden on Horace. Unfortunately it manifested as Halt having little to no appetite for a good while after they first left Araluen, and once he noticed it Horace would subtly make him eat by refusing to start his meal until Halt had had the first bite

Halt also helped Horace practice with his sword when they first started travelling (before the Gallican knights anyways). At the time, Horace just figured Halt knew his way around a sword bc he'd had Gilan as an apprentice, but once he and Will learned a bit about Halt's past he connected the dots

Halt will poke fun at how much Horace eats, but also makes a genuine effort to ensure that he doesn't go hungry. He'll joke about Horace asking for seconds, but also subtly make his plate if you know what I mean

He also taught Horace the benefits of being a sarcastic little shit, only to immediately regret it when Horace inevitably betrayed him with it

One time Halt sprained his ankle really badly and absolutely refused to acknowledge it (bc he's Halt "Everyone Can Have Problems Except For Me Because It Would Make Me a Burden" O'Carrick) and Will just sent Horace a Look and Horace Immediately nodded and scooped Halt up bridal style to take him to the nearest infirmary while casually ignoring the violent death threats he's receiving

After book 8 when Will went ahead of them, Horace was trying his best to subtly make sure that Halt was okay. I mean, realizing that you're the last surviving member of your family besides a nephew you've met once would hurt, even if your family sucked like Halt's did. Horace wasn't very subtle and Halt noticed pretty much immediately, but he secretly appreciated the sentiment

There's more but I just can't think of them rn. I love them so much and I genuinely don't think their relationship earns enough attention

I need to see shit of Halt and Horace taking care of each other.

Or really just any content with those two. I love their relationship and their dynamic so much my two boys.

as soon as I can get back the Ranger's Apprentice Brain Rot, you know I'll be writing something for this lol. There's a lot of things I want to write for RA, but Hazbin Hotel started holding me hostage at gunpoint shortly after I started writing fics lol

You know what I'm kinda surprised about

That so far I haven't seen a single fanfic about what happened when Halt was going through it in the burning bridge and just started defenestrating people and beating up children

Flanny should have included it in the book that would have been funny.

Will wonders at first why Halt is so adamant on them both having a very diverse and inclusive diet. Then Crowley tells him about Halt's vastly changed lifestyle after learning he had a vitamin deficiency. Will stops questioning why Halt is so insistent on a diverse pallet.

Also, I like to imagine that he was really low on iron too, so not only was he exhausted all the time from the B12 deficiency, but he'd pass tf out every time he stood up too fast. This ofc didn't help his parent's view of him and made him doubt himself whenever Pritchard started training him. After all, why would this cool woodsman from Araluen who apparently served the king in a secret society of archers or whatever want to train a skinny boy who couldn't even stand without his vision going black and the world shifting beneath his feet? Clearly there were better people for this

Then Pritchard started feeding him foods high in iron after recognizing the signs and his symptoms started going away and oh my gods is this what normal people live like????

I like to think his vitamin/iron deficiencies are partially due to genetics and metabolism, and partially due to Bad Textures with a lot of the food served at the castle. He feels shitty for complaining, but something about how they prepare a lot of the food (particularly the meat) is just Awful and Terrible and makes him feel physically ill. But again, Pritchard to the rescue to save Halt's "fae touched" *cough cough* AUTISTIC *cough cough* ass from Gross And Bad Textures That Make Him Want To Swallow A Lit Torch

Random little Halt headcanon I had for you guys.

So we all know how in Ruins of Gorlan Will's first impression of Halt is that is is 'old, scary and might kill me' right?

Another well known fact is that if you do the math for this series (which I 100% recommend you don't and instead spend all of your time ignoring both the timeline and character's ages) that Halt can't be older than 35.

Well this got me thinking how on earth does he have salt and pepper hair while being 35? And while yes I do know of people who start greying in their early 20's because of genes and stuff but like that is to boring for my hyperactive brain.

What you may or may not know is that vitamin B12 affects hair greying and pigmentation (at least I think this is in no way a total fact) so what if Halt was just really deficient in vitamin B12?

I don't know how they would've figured this out in medieval times and with their limited knowledge of medicine and stuff but just roll with me here.

Being deficient in B12 also can lead to mood swings and chronic tiredness so i like to think that during his childhood in Dun Kilty Halt was just always grumpy and tired but then he met Pritchard and Crowley and they were like 'you do realise this is because of a vitamin deficiency right?'

Obviously they helped him get sorted out or whatever and I for the first time in his live he felt what it was like to not be extremely tired ALL THE TIME and it was the most comical thing ever! Like his whole face probably lit up and he was like "I feel alive!?"

I love the idea that this was a really popular campfire story for several years and also the story the renegade rangers told Gilan and Will when they first became apprentices mainly to explain that no, halt is not old just vitamin deficient.

It was a whole thing when Will became an apprentice because Gilan kept telling him that all of Halt's grey hairs were because Gilan stressed him out so much during his apprenticeship (Something he would've been VERY proud of were it true) but Crowley stepped in and told him the truth.

Thanks for the tag!! And they're not in a particular order bc they're my CHILDREN and I simply cannot rank them

Alastor (Hazbin Hotel)

Optimus Prime (Transformers)

Bumblebee (Transformers)

Soundwave (Transformers)

Halt O'Carrick (Ranger's Apprentice)

Steve Harrington (Stranger Things)

Bruce Wayne (DC)

Tony Stark (Marvel)

Raphael (TMNT)

Din Djarin (The Mandalorian)

There are others ofc, these are just the first ones I thought of lol

No pressure tags! @guesswhocouldntsleep @oberveroftheinfinite @lonely-lost-insanity @theanonemu

TAG GAME— List 10 of your favorite characters from different fandoms

Thank you for tagging me @coderiderr

Hortensia (Fire Emblem Engage)

Juvia Lockser (Fairy Tail)

Kaze (Fire Emblem Fates)

Lisia (Pokémon)

Maka Albarn (Soul Eater)

Owain (Fire Emblem Awakening)

Shirayuki (Snow White with the Red Hair)

Van Hohenheim (Fullmetal Alchemist)

Yuuri Katsuki (Yuri!!! on ICE)

Zeref Dragneel (Fairy Tail)

Tagging: @fayesdiary @dragonballwish @elegyofthemoon @sevarix-blogs @ghostlydragonpainter

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

Here's chapter 2 my little squidlings, feast, for I have attempted to provide a bountiful harvest

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: Dumbest scar stories, go! 
Cassandra: I burned my tongue once drinking tea. 
Alyss: I dropped a hair dryer on my leg once and burned it. 
Gilan: I have a piece of graphite in my leg for accidentally stabbing myself with a pencil in the first grade. 
Horace: I was taking a cup of noodles out of the microwave and spilled it on my hand and I got a really bad burn. 
Halt: 
Halt: I have emotional scars.

Bonus:

Will:

Will, concerned: You good dad?

Halt, sobbing on the floor: I don’t know what I’m crying more about, the fact that I’m not ok, the fact that someone finally asked me, or that you just called me dad.

Halt:

Halt: I love you too son.

Sometimes, I think we all just forget that Halt is in fact a huge fucking Nerd™. Think about it.

All the stuff he knows about history and culture and languages and geography, and just about anything he can get his hands on. It is especially mentioned in the first four books, like when Horace is trying to avoid a history lecture from Halt - and he is so familiar with them that he can tell just from the tone Halt is using that he's about to start one.

Halt just genuinely enjoys learning about the world around him, and I think that is awesome. It's nice to be reminded every now and then that Halt is just super smart. Tactics, cultures, food, plants, law in other countries - you name it and he probably knows a good bit about it. Even art! He's always the one to do artistic stuff (Shield emblems, writing out and making seals for documents (forged, obviously), making weapons and disguises and acting - whatever is needed, he's got it covered. And you know that if he doesn't know about something, he is sure as all hell going to learn.

Just wanted to bring that up, remember to incorporate things like that into writing, it's a pretty neat character trait that never actually gets touched on.

"Of course I have a lot of pent up rage. I've been the same height since I was 12."

-Halt O'Carrick

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

Will: I just saw Halt drop his cup of coffee

Will: It's been 45 minutes but he's just staring at the puddle on the ground, tears silently streaming down his face

Will: Honestly, at this point I'm too afraid to help

Halt: Will?

Will: Yeah Halt?

Halt: When it's only 7:30 in the morning and I've already heard a question that I know will be one of the top three dumbest questions of the day, it depresses me

Will: Sorry Halt

Halt, frustrated: Oh fuck me!

Crowley: I thought you'd never ask

Halt, waking up after being knocked out for the 2274879th time: Oh, I survived. Great. Love it when I do that

YOU.

You are ABSOLUTELY CORRECT and I don't know how I missed that. It just makes it even sadder every time someone makes fun of him for it.

BUT...

I think I can make this even worse

Now imagine, Halt's seasickness is caused - not just by brain trauma - but by a combination of that and a mentally scarring and fundamentally traumatic experience like... oh, I don't know

Your twin brother trying to drown you while on a fishing trip

BUT WAIT, THERE'S MORE

because this wouldn't be the first time trauma has made Halt sick at the sight of reminders of it. In particular, a certain line from book 8, when Halt is telling Will and Horace about his childhood, and he mentions that Ferris tried to poison him with a plate of shellfish, but it only made him violently ill to the point where he almost died

What does he say? Oh, that's right. He says, "I still can't face the sight of a plate of shrimp." HMMMMMMMMMMM Even worse??? When he says this he's joking about it

Nice trauma response you're making jokes about there, Halt. It's funny because we all know for a fact that if anyone else were to make jokes about their responses to trauma, he would be all over their asses

To sum it up, Halt gets physically ill when presented with trauma related triggers (specifically childhood trauma), and the brain damage only exacerbated that fact

Thank you for coming to my TedTalk and goodnight

Halt's Brain Damage

I mentioned Halt's head trauma in an earlier post, and said that I would elaborate on it. Well, this is my elaboration. Keep in mind, I am not a health care professional, I am only certified to perform first aid. I am only speaking from what I have witnessed in someone who has had a similar condition from a motorcycle accident, and from what I find and cross-reference in my internet search on the matter.

Halt, as we know, has suffered MANY blows to the head - a lot of which could have been fatal if not for the intervening hand of Lady Luck and some very conveniently placed Plot Armor™. Now something that both the characters in the books, and probably a good portion of the readers either don't know about or haven't considered is the resulting brain damage - or more specifically, the damage done to Halt's gray matter.

For those of you who don't know (no shame), gray matter is tissue in the brain that is largely responsible for motor functions, emotions, and memory. Gray matter cells are known to be the longest lasting cells in the body, but they do tend to degenerate and die as people get old. There are other things that can speed up the process of gray matter cell death, most notably Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, multiple sclerosis, and traumatic brain injury.

I have a friend who was once in a bad motorcycle accident that resulted in a metal rod and screws being put into his wrist, and a sudden increase in gray matter cell death brought on by the head trauma. He was a teacher of mine and currently has a wife, daughters, and grand daughters, and he is just over fifty years old. I had the same class with him all year for 4 years (JROTC), and during that time, I was able to see how the condition affected him as time passed. He does make jokes about it, and is very open with it. I also asked him if it would be okay to post this beforehand, don't worry. The symptoms that Halt experience in my headcanon align with this because it is my closest experience with it.

Obviously, these characters don't know what gray matter is, but that doesn't mean it won't affect Halt, and some of these symptoms are things that Halt experiences in the books. I'll give examples of that too.

One of the symptoms of gray matter damage is difficulty controlling emotions. Now you may be saying, "But Void, Halt practically patented the ability to control emotions," and you're right. However, we all know that Halt has a pretty quick temper that can lead to some rash decisions - and this seems to get slightly worse as the books go on. One of the biggest emotions that people with damaged brain matter have issues dealing with is anger - closely followed by sadness and feelings of emptiness (AKA signs of depression).

Another symptom of gray matter damage is memory loss. The only example of this I can think of off the top of my head (that doesn't include when he was poisoned which is a whole other type of trauma) is when he had extreme trouble finding the correlation between the red hills and Redmont in book 7. Then again, it was a stressful situation and no one can be expected to notice everything. Not to mention that he was the only one to make the connection at all. This one and the next one are more for angst potential then as current existing evidence. Imagine really quick as Halt gets older that the memory loss starts slow - forgetting that he already told someone something, forgetting where he put something, etc. Small stuff. But later, it gets worse. He starts to forget meeting new people, important past events, how to cook certain things, or even just trailing off in the middle of a sentence - unable to remember his original purpose for speaking, almost as if a sort of fog has started blocking things out. A lot of times, he'll know that he knew it at some point, but sometimes, he doesn't remember that he knew that thing in the first place. Sometimes gentle reminders will work, and other times, entire stories, recipes, and tasks will have to be completely re-hashed with him.

The final symptom I'm going to cover in this already too-long post is how gray matter damage affects fine motor skills and language. I'm fairly certain that there is an example of this somewhere in the books, But I would have no clue where to look. We're going full angst potential on this one boys. Again, it starts small - some slight tremors in his hands here, a troublesome button there. Then, it gets worse as the years pass. Having difficulty tying knots, writing getting more and more difficult, cutting his hand while trying to prepare food, dropping his mug of coffee for no apparent reason, sometimes slurring his speech, forgetting certain words from other languages, not realizing that he had reverted back to Hibernian in the middle of a sentence because his brain temporarily stopped being able to comprehend Araluen speech.

Halt doesn't want to tell anyone that the changes in his behavior that he can't seem to control frighten him. He's never been genuinely afraid of his own mind before up until he could no longer control what happened. It was a type of fear he was unfamiliar with, but couldn't stop from growing every time he failed to tie a knot, or someone told him about an event he couldn't remember. Everyone else was afraid too, but they toned down their own fear whenever they saw that desperate look in Halt's eyes that he couldn't quite hide, the one that begged for any confirmation that he wasn't crazy.

What the hell. I just wrote an entire essay. You know those posts that say, "In this essay I will discuss..." but they never get to the essay? Yeah, that but completed. This was born from the fact that Hal't has had a bunch of head injuries and I immediately thought 'haha brain damage go brr' and proceeded to write that in essay form. If you've made it to the end of this monstrosity, more power to you.

I'm going to try to go into a coma now.

Halt's Brain Damage

I mentioned Halt's head trauma in an earlier post, and said that I would elaborate on it. Well, this is my elaboration. Keep in mind, I am not a health care professional, I am only certified to perform first aid. I am only speaking from what I have witnessed in someone who has had a similar condition from a motorcycle accident, and from what I find and cross-reference in my internet search on the matter.

Halt, as we know, has suffered MANY blows to the head - a lot of which could have been fatal if not for the intervening hand of Lady Luck and some very conveniently placed Plot Armor™. Now something that both the characters in the books, and probably a good portion of the readers either don't know about or haven't considered is the resulting brain damage - or more specifically, the damage done to Halt's gray matter.

For those of you who don't know (no shame), gray matter is tissue in the brain that is largely responsible for motor functions, emotions, and memory. Gray matter cells are known to be the longest lasting cells in the body, but they do tend to degenerate and die as people get old. There are other things that can speed up the process of gray matter cell death, most notably Alzheimer's disease, Parkinson's disease, multiple sclerosis, and traumatic brain injury.

I have a friend who was once in a bad motorcycle accident that resulted in a metal rod and screws being put into his wrist, and a sudden increase in gray matter cell death brought on by the head trauma. He was a teacher of mine and currently has a wife, daughters, and grand daughters, and he is just over fifty years old. I had the same class with him all year for 4 years (JROTC), and during that time, I was able to see how the condition affected him as time passed. He does make jokes about it, and is very open with it. I also asked him if it would be okay to post this beforehand, don't worry. The symptoms that Halt experience in my headcanon align with this because it is my closest experience with it.

Obviously, these characters don't know what gray matter is, but that doesn't mean it won't affect Halt, and some of these symptoms are things that Halt experiences in the books. I'll give examples of that too.

One of the symptoms of gray matter damage is difficulty controlling emotions. Now you may be saying, "But Void, Halt practically patented the ability to control emotions," and you're right. However, we all know that Halt has a pretty quick temper that can lead to some rash decisions - and this seems to get slightly worse as the books go on. One of the biggest emotions that people with damaged brain matter have issues dealing with is anger - closely followed by sadness and feelings of emptiness (AKA signs of depression).

Another symptom of gray matter damage is memory loss. The only example of this I can think of off the top of my head (that doesn't include when he was poisoned which is a whole other type of trauma) is when he had extreme trouble finding the correlation between the red hills and Redmont in book 7. Then again, it was a stressful situation and no one can be expected to notice everything. Not to mention that he was the only one to make the connection at all. This one and the next one are more for angst potential then as current existing evidence. Imagine really quick as Halt gets older that the memory loss starts slow - forgetting that he already told someone something, forgetting where he put something, etc. Small stuff. But later, it gets worse. He starts to forget meeting new people, important past events, how to cook certain things, or even just trailing off in the middle of a sentence - unable to remember his original purpose for speaking, almost as if a sort of fog has started blocking things out. A lot of times, he'll know that he knew it at some point, but sometimes, he doesn't remember that he knew that thing in the first place. Sometimes gentle reminders will work, and other times, entire stories, recipes, and tasks will have to be completely re-hashed with him.

The final symptom I'm going to cover in this already too-long post is how gray matter damage affects fine motor skills and language. I'm fairly certain that there is an example of this somewhere in the books, But I would have no clue where to look. We're going full angst potential on this one boys. Again, it starts small - some slight tremors in his hands here, a troublesome button there. Then, it gets worse as the years pass. Having difficulty tying knots, writing getting more and more difficult, cutting his hand while trying to prepare food, dropping his mug of coffee for no apparent reason, sometimes slurring his speech, forgetting certain words from other languages, not realizing that he had reverted back to Hibernian in the middle of a sentence because his brain temporarily stopped being able to comprehend Araluen speech.

Halt doesn't want to tell anyone that the changes in his behavior that he can't seem to control frighten him. He's never been genuinely afraid of his own mind before up until he could no longer control what happened. It was a type of fear he was unfamiliar with, but couldn't stop from growing every time he failed to tie a knot, or someone told him about an event he couldn't remember. Everyone else was afraid too, but they toned down their own fear whenever they saw that desperate look in Halt's eyes that he couldn't quite hide, the one that begged for any confirmation that he wasn't crazy.

What the hell. I just wrote an entire essay. You know those posts that say, "In this essay I will discuss..." but they never get to the essay? Yeah, that but completed. This was born from the fact that Hal't has had a bunch of head injuries and I immediately thought 'haha brain damage go brr' and proceeded to write that in essay form. If you've made it to the end of this monstrosity, more power to you.

I'm going to try to go into a coma now.

Heads up, there's going to be quite a few on here, because I have a lot to say on the matter. Mind the tags, there is some potentially triggering stuff here

Halt's back is covered with scars from beatings his father gave him as a child. He also has a nick on his left ear from where a bandit threw a knife that narrowly missed his head. The place where the poisoned arrow hit him in book 9 left a permanent discolored scar that always reminds Will how close he was to losing his teacher. There is a split in his right eyebrow and an accompanying scar that goes all the way up to his hairline from a close call with a bandit that actually knew how to use his sword. Halt has multiple scars on his scalp hidden by his hair from the number of times he's been hit on the head (there are other side effects as well, but I'll make a separate post on that later). The wounds from the Kalkara are still on his leg, and will cause chronic pain when the weather changes, or after a particularly long day riding. There are self-inflicted injuries on his inner thighs, the oldest being from his childhood, and the newest being from after Will was taken. He's not proud of them, but he is proud that he hasn't relapsed since - though he has come close plenty of times.

Will has a couple lash marks from his time as a slave, and the nerves in his fingers and toes are damaged from the exposure he suffered through in the yard. He has exactly one scar on his wrist from an attempt on his own life, but thankfully Halt recognized the signs from his own experiences and put a stop to it before he got worse. The incident was actually what lead to Will learning of Halt's own struggles, though Halt didn't tell him that the issue was right behind him rather than a long time ago.

Alyss has a scar along her palm from a deep cut from when she was first learning to use her dagger. She wasn't being irresponsible or anything, but she had dropped it and reacted on pure instinct by catching it. Unfortunately, while she did catch it, her hand had wrapped around the blade. She's still a bit embarrassed by it, and she learned the number one rule of a falling blade the hard way: let it fall and get clear, DO NOT try to catch it.

Jenny has countless burn scars on her hands and arms from accidents in the kitchen - both as a student to Chubb, and in her own restaurant. There are so many that the nerves in her hands have been damaged to the point where she is completely unable to feel texture.

George is completely content with the only major scar he has being from the arrow he was hit by in Nihon-Ja.

There's more swimming around in my brain, but I'm tired and this post is long enough as is.

This is your invitation to talk about what scars you think the RA characters have and how they got them

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.

This is the first fic I've ever written and posted, and I literally woke up at 1 AM to write it, only to immediately fall back asleep once I was done. I hope to write more in the future, especially when I get back from my 5ish month hiatus around the end of November, so let me know how I did!

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)

The O'Carrick Curse

I just talked about a headcanon in the comment section of a fic that I just read, and realized that maybe I should post it here too.

In the fic ("who you are" by mipmaps on A03) Will ends up offering the surname 'Treaty' to Halt, who accepts, which I am absolutely in love with because of the headcanon that I am about to share with you guys.

I feel like Halt sees the surname "O'Carrick" as a curse, especially when he considers how miserably and/or tragically every O'Carrick (that we know of) has lived and died.

~ Halt mentioned that his parents argued all the time and were pretty much straight-up neglectful to everyone but Ferris. (I also headcanon that they were abusive, but I'll go more in-depth about that another time).

~ Ferris was so blinded by greed that he tried to kill his twin brother multiple times over a throne, and did so terribly at being king that he was most beloved by the people when that same twin was pretending to be him - not to mention that when he finally started to do better, he was instantly murdered for it.

~ Caitlyn spent her childhood being neglected and forced to grieve as the one person who truly cared for her apparently died, and she was the only one who really knew who was behind it. She also spent her whole life being sickly, and it was eventually what killed her, leaving her son (who I'm sure Halt was grateful didn't carry the same name) alone with her snake of a brother.

~ And Halt. He was also neglected his whole childhood to the point of being so afraid of hurting his parents' relationship that he would rather run away and leave everything he had ever known and loved behind then tell his parents that his brother was trying to kill him. Speaking of, his twin brother - with whom he spent his entire childhood, and loved in a way that only twins can - tried to murder him on three separate occasions for a throne he didn't even want in the first place. Shortly after this, Halt lost the man who he had come to see as a father, and had to deal with the survivor's guilt brought on by being saved by Will's parents, and leaving Will himself orphaned. He also didn't tell a soul about who he really was until literal decades later. He had to give up a second home in order to save his son apprentice that he felt responsible for losing in the first place (whom he has almost lost multiple times - the majority of which he felt responsible for). Then, he lost the man that he considered a brother (or perhaps a lover????). Not to mention the fact that by book 8 - aside from Sean - his whole family was dead.

I feel like Halt was bittersweet about his standing as the last of the O'Carricks. One reason, is he's glad no one else has to carry the burden of the (in his mind) cursed name. A part of him however, wonders if perhaps Halt was the curse all along. That was another reason that Halt didn't offer Will the O'Carrick name at his graduation, he was afraid that sharing a surname with Will would leave his former apprentice vulnerable to his curse.

When Will first offered his surname to Halt, the older ranger teared up, and Will was startled when Halt seemed to be on the verge of breaking down.

Before Will could start apologizing, Halt found himself pouring out all of his thoughts about the curse that he had feared his whole life, and his fear of inflicting it on Will and causing him the same misery. Will was completely stunned, because the only other times Halt had been this vulnerable were when he was telling Will about his mother, and when he spoke about his own childhood, and even then, those times were nothing like this. He had never heard this self-loathing from his teacher before but as he processed the words, he realized that it must have been hidden deep within Halt all this time.

Will took Halt's hands in his own, cutting off the older ranger's uncharacteristic rambling, and looked deep into his stricken eyes. "Halt," his quiet voice cut through Halt's mind like an arrow, "You are many things, but a curse is not one of them." Halt's eyes misted over, and it was all he could do to maintain eye contact. Will had never seen this level of vulnerability and hurt in his teacher's gaze, and he would do anything to take his pain away.

"You are not a curse, or a burden, or a monster, and it is not your fault that things with your family turned out the way that they did. You were as much of a victim as they were, if not more so." Here, Will took a deep breath, and bent slightly to maintain eye contact with the Hibernian whose dark gaze had drifted downwards to hide his shame. "Do you know what you are?" The soft question was rhetorical, for Will needed no one to give him answers besides his own heart and memories, "You are a protector, a kind soul, and the greatest man I have ever known. And I am proud beyond belief to call you my friend, mentor, and father."

At this, Halt's gaze snapped back up in shock. How could Will still say that after seeing him like this? After all the broken promises, and the hurt and heartache cause by simply being associated with the former prince? However, before he could speak his thoughts, Will plowed on. "I offer you my surname, not out of a sense of debt or obligation, but because I love you, and I wish for the world to know that we are family, and nothing - no self-believed curse, no painful pasts, and certainly no self doubt - will ever stop me from seeing you as my father. I offer my name because I see how much pain your own brings you, and if I can do even one thing to show you the same care you have always showed for me, then I will gladly do so."

By this time, tears had begun to flow freely down Halt's face, and Will's own eyes burned as well. Slowly, Halt nodded and whispered his acceptance which Will had to strain to hear. The younger ranger pulled his father into a strong yet warm embrace that he could only hope expressed the love he had for the slight man before him.

As Halt melted into the embrace, he felt as though a weight had been lifted from his shoulders, and though it would never truly leave him, the pain of his curse finally melted away as accepted the family he had feared for so long.

I literally love this whole thread with my entire being, and I'm not entirely sure why.

Halt gets to Skandia and Erak sees him and decides, "Hey, Halt is an old friend, might as well see what he's up to," and now he also gets to see the absolute chaos unfold as this unintended throuple meets up and has to explain themselves to each other. Erak doesn't think he's ever seen any of them so embarrassed before. While he may be able to put it aside for Karina and maybe Thorn if he does some begging and is extremely lucky, Halt has no such chance because of how much of a sarcastic pain in the ass (mostly affectionate) Erak finds him to be. Erak will not only never let Halt live this down, he will gleefully spill the beans to every mutual friend he and Halt have

According to the wiki, Karina Mikkelswife is two years older than Halt and that feels cursed somehow

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

Halt to Ferris, all the time: You know, when I was your age *proceeds to describe what he did 7 minutes ago*

"I'm not short. I'm just uncommonly untall."

-Halt, Will, and literally every ranger besides Gilan