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littlemisssquiggles · 1 year

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So…about the FIFTH episode of RWBY Volume 9…

We're at the half way mark folks! Just five more episodes to go.

Apologies for skipping the fourth episode. Last week, this squiggle meister was a little under the weather. While I did watch the episode, I wasn’t up for sharing my usual first impressions on it. Granted, I will say now that I was a wee bit disappointed by the fourth episode when I first watched it.

[SPOILERS AHEAD! NUFF SAID]

Not implying that it wasn’t good since I definitely enjoyed the bits that introduced a bit more lore of the Ever After. I guess I was mostly disappointed by how quickly we got to this aspect of the story---the part where RWBY encounter the Smoking Caterpillar-inspired character who was introduced o as the Herbalist or simply “Herb” for short. For me, I was expecting this part to come later but I was deeply mistaken.

I had a hunch that the Herbalist would’ve forced Team RWBY to undergo some type of mystical test but I more pegged it to have come later after more adventures and encounters in the Ever After when Ruby was at her lowest and the test would’ve been her breaking point. But I guess this episode was more the start to Ruby’s breakdown than the final straw.

Overall, the more the story progresses, the more confused I become as to what the Ever After really is or rather what it’s meant to represent in the grand scheme of the world building in RWBY.

And coming out of today’s episode, it really is starting to sound as if the Ever After is some kind of limbo world. Like RWBY’s version of purgatory. It’s not the Land of the Living but it’s not the After Life either. It’s inbetween.

A place where people can come and possibly be born again---somewhat like reincarnation but not really? Certainly not the kind Ozma went through.

It’s the conversation between RWBY and the Curious Cat that truly got me thinking.

“...When we break or wear out or simply finish what we were made to do, we are called back. But Herb, his heart was too weak to listen so I gave him a little bit of mine.”

“...Is he dead?”

“...No, no, no. Well maybe a little bit. But not at all.”

“...Which is it?”

“Now that Herb’s properly returned, he’ll be fixed up nice and made into the Herb he wanted to be when he was still Herb then he’ll come back and find his purpose. Could be the same as before or maybe not.”

“When Herb comes back, will he remember anything?”

“What would be the point of that. Just like Alyx, you lot. I know where your from, things die. But we’re just not like you at all. We ascend. Herb will have a purpose again.”

“That’s impossible. Things have to die someday, right?”

“What happened to Herb, is that what happened to the King?”

“The Red King could not cope when he lost to Alyx. A crying mess. Thankfully he was called back and fixed up and how he’s the prince you met.”

“Fixed up? The prince was worse.”

“The prince isn’t supposed to be nice. He’s meant to play the game and win. No matter what.”

“So that’s why he cheats; when the Red King didn’t. But that still doesn’t explain why the Red Prince was so much meaner.”

“While the prince may not remember Alyx’s deception after ascending; the heart very rarely forgets.”

“But there was nothing about ascension in the story.”

“Of course not. Exposition is terrible boring. Even this conversion, on the whole, was rather tedious.”

“I wonder what else Alyx left out.”

Contrary to what the Curious Cat said, I on the other hand found the whole conversation between them and RWBY to be interesting because it does give some insight into the way the Ever After works while dropping more hints about Alyx.

I guess at the end of this episode, my whole question is...since the implication is that Alyx survived her adventures in the Ever After and ascended back to Remnant, who did Alyx become then?

The inference is that Alyx turned into an entirely different person when she returned home to Remnant; probably in more ways that one. So who did Alyx become and was the new Alyx a character we’ve already met before in the show? Y’know like a little twist we’ll get by the time V9 is over or something like that.

Like imagine if…by the end of V9, we find out that Alyx eventually became another reincarnation of Ozma or…Summer Rose or maybe she became Neo or something like that?

I’m just saying that all of this lore that we’re getting about the Ever After has to make sense in the end and tie back to the main narrative in some shape or form. So I’m just slowly picking up what little bit of information I can to try and piece it all together while I’m watching the season.

Overall, the way the Ever After works compared to Remnant is fascinating. I think for now it’s safe to say that it is indeed some kind of purgatory. Not life. Not death. But somewhere in the middle where one can go to either start over or never exist to begin with?

That what I’ll say for now. I’m especially looking forward to next week’s episode to hear the explanation for what the hell happened to Jaune!

"...Team RWBY. You finally made it..."

I can't believe RWBY pulled a "The Girl Who Waited" like in Doctor Who but with Jaune!

Jaune is the boy who waited. How long has Jaune been waiting for RWBY to show up? How much time has passed for him compared to his friends.

Holy balls! Jaune is old now---well older now? I mean it could've been worse. He could've been an old man by the time he reunited with RWBY.

At least he's finally rocking that wolf tail he’s always wanted from V4. I liked that nice little callback to that season as well as him naming his little jackalope friend Juniper after his team. That's sweet.

I can't believe RWBY pulled a "The Girl Who Waited" like in Doctor Who but with Jaune!

Yeah, nah, I ain't ready for this kind of pain and I'm not even a big Jaune stan.

Jaune is literally the boy who waited. But...how long has Jaune been waiting for RWBY to show up? How much time has passed for him compared to his friends.

In all seriousness, what happened to Jaune? Jaune was the last to fall into the Ever After so how is it he’s aged so drastically but RWBY hasn’t? I’m assuming it has to do with whatever acre of the Ever After Jaune fell into?

Perhaps time runs differently in that specific acre compared to other parts?

Don’t get me wrong, Jaune’s looking mighty good in his more mature age. A little rusty but otherwise fine.

I just wanna know if it’ll be permanent. Like when the group finally return to Remnant, will Jaune still be older or are the CRWBY showrunners gonna pull a Chronicles of Narnia or Marco Diaz from Star Vs the Forces of Evil where Jaune will revert back to his younger self as soon as he returns home but his heart will remember everything like the Curious Cat said?

I guess I’ll have to wait and see for next week.

Overall, Chapter 5 was another solid episode. As I'll reiterate, I dug the new lore drop that we got this episode.

Dug the interesting development that Ruby got too with her meeting the weird Metal Lady.

And I definitely loved the new theme that played during WBY's fight against the Jabber-Neos. I can’t wait for the full version to come out whenever.

Other than that, that’s all I have to say as my first impressions of this episode. Might share some more deeper thoughts later but that's all for now folks.

~LMS (2023)

#squiggles talks: rwby #rwby #rwby volume 9 #rwby spoilers #rwby volume 9 spoilers #jaune arc

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chemzee · 5 months

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also sorry i know you said you're currently on a morgan kick but i've been dying to know more about te and v. what's dulces sueños de las almas anhelantes? why are these kids wanted by the authorities? who is the host?

OH MY GOD DUDE WHOEVER YOU ARE THANK YOU THANK YOU THANK YOU FOR ASKING THIS I LOVE YOUUU 🧡🧡🧡🧡 YOU ARE THE BEST 😭😭😭

OOF I doubt I could be able to tell everything because there's SO MUCH TO TELL. But I'll try to be as brief as possible.

Dulces Sueños de las Almas Anhelantes (or Sweet Dreams of Yearning Souls) is a personal project of mine, which I had been developing and writing for almost 4 years now.

I wanna turn it into a series or comic some day (although it was at first thought of as a game but my ass has no idea how coding or game design works do yeah), high chances are, it might not happen because I'm lazy so blep. ✌

(‼️TW for some rather sensitive/uncomfortable topics‼️)

It follows the story of, primarily, 4 people, who are stuck in a weird Wonderland like place, as they go down a memory lain and recall events that led them there. Each of them has a unique narrative style which reflects the way they think/perceive the world/how they compiled their stories. These 4 people are Doc, Man in Red, V and Te (artworks of them shown in order (Doc and Man in red are old artworks and I wanna redesign them)), although V and T are THE main characters/protagonists.

Action takes place in a fictional country that is sorta like combination of Spain and England, that has suffered from an unusual sudden epidemy of unknown disease that sets everyone into panic, yet suspiciously, government does nothing. The four characters in question rebel against that, which leads to them being persecuted by the government (which is hard due to their anonymity). (NOTE THAT IT'S NOT BASED ON ANY REAL LIFE EPIDEMIC!!! It's a fictional disease that has no basis on any real diseases or real epidemics)

Te and V are couple of besties™ who are two teenagers who due to their own personal motives are taken in under the guidance of Becca (I have art of her but no reference yet) , a lady who owns an unusual private investigation centre, that uses unconventional means of solving cases. She insures that the identities of her workers and students are protected, which is why they go by codenames, in case of Te and V they are Number 4 (Quarte) and Number 5 (V) respectively.

V is a detective in training, who aspires to become a professional investigator when she becomes older. And she's a good one at that: not only is she smart but also determined, she's not gonna stop until she won't find out the truth (I like to joke that's she's a professional doxxer for a reason).

Te is also a detective of sorts, but it's not exactly what they focuse more on (and tbf they's not looking to pursue this career + V is a lot better detective). They are a medium, as they can hear the voices of the dead and they seek to help those souls fulfill their "unfinished business".

All the 4 characters stumble upon many enemies and foes, even considering each other their obstacles, but the most formidable one of them all is The Host. (Another old artwork and another character I wanna redesign)

The Host, as it seems at first, is their biggest ally: he, just like the 4 , protests against Government's passivity. Beginning as a humble news presenter, he then becomes progressively more relevant in news media, as he calls for action. He takes a particular interest in all 4 protagonists, as he thinks of them as most reliable sources for his campaign to succeed. Believing that he can get away with everything, he's determined to do anything in his power to make these 4 join his side, no matter the cost, no matter their economical situation, health issues, employment, personal life or age.

#ANON AGAIN I LOVE YOU SM 🧡🧡🧡#GOD BLESS YOU #dulces sueños de las almas anhelantes #btw this title makes sense in context of story but shhhh #v #te #man in red #doc #the host #my gay european criminals 🧡#answered asks #thanks for asking!

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thetoxicgamer · 1 year

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Get ready for Hades 2 with Steam sale on Supergiant’s unmissable past

Few video games can make me shiver with anticipation like Hades 2 does; I nearly still can't believe we're going to get a sequel to one of the best roguelike games ever. However, Supergiant Games' prior work served as the foundation for Hades, and a huge Steam discount currently allows you to catch up on that history in preparation for Hades 2 without having to spend a fortune. First up, of course, is the original Hades itself. With a wealth of awards and accolades under its belt, Supergiant’s latest should likely need no introduction. If you haven’t played the tale of Zagreus attempting to escape his dull life in the house of his father Hades by fighting his way through the hordes of the Underworld with the help of the Greek pantheon’s most famous faces, I can’t recommend it enough. Hades takes the repeatable progression of other excellent roguelikes such as the Binding of Isaac, Dead Cells, and Spelunky, and enhances it with both a more approachable ramp that lets you control your level of challenge, and a constant sprinkling of story that reassures you that you’re never wasting your time, even when a run goes badly. It broke out of its established genre boundaries for good reason, and at half price now’s a great time to find out exactly why so many people have fallen in love with its charms. Supergiant Games Steam sale - Bastion: The Kid fights a Windbag that's wielding a large axeIf the combat of Hades is what excites you most, then see where it all began with Bastion. I replayed Supergiant’s debut game just a few months ago and, while it’s certainly not quite as smooth and flowing as Hades is, the core feel of its fighting holds up well. The lush environments you traverse, meanwhile, absolutely do stand side-by-side with everything else Supergiant has made since, and its soundtrack is a perfect accompaniment. Playing Bastion, you’ll quickly realise that Supergiant’s penchant for a wealth of weird and wonderful weapons has been there right from the get-go, with all manner of different tools at your disposal, each with their own range of special abilities to choose from. It’s also a fantastic opportunity to hear the first outing of regular Supergiant narrator Logan Cunningham, who takes up similar roles in Transistor and Pyre, and voices the eponymous big man himself alongside several other characters in Hades. Supergiant Steam sale - Pyre: three characters, Hedwyn, Rukey, and Jodariel, look expectantly at the camera, inviting the Reader to sit with themPerhaps the thing you love most about Hades is its intricate web of characters, each clearly defined on their own yet constantly intermingling with one another in all manner of cleverly designed interactions. If that’s the case, let me present Pyre. Supergiant’s third game tells the tale of a ragtag bunch of outcasts attempting to win their freedom from the Downside by travelling the land and competing in matches of 3-on-3 fantasy basketball. That’s right: half narrative adventure, half sports game, Pyre effortlessly blends the two together to tell a branching story that can pan out in a multitude of ways. Losing a match doesn’t mean game over; it simply changes what happens next. The complex relationships you build in Pyre will make you care about every outcome, however, and they’ll also leave you genuinely agonising whether you should tell your dog pal Rukey to shave off that distinctive moustache. Supergiant Games Steam sale - Transistor: Red, a lady with vibrant red hair in a gold and black dress, pulls the glowing turquoise Transistor from a lifeless bodyFor those of you who crave interweaving systems that let you combine abilities in all manner of fun permutations much the way Hades boons do, there’s an easy choice. Transistor tells the beautiful, haunting tale of Red, a singer on the run through a high-rise sci-fi city who is accompanied by a talking sword, the titular Transistor. Its real hook, however, is its skill system. The Functions you get in Transistor are skills that offer three different… well, functions. You can use them as an active ability, you can use them to upgrade the effects of another Function, or you can apply them to Red for a passive effect. This turns the sixteen Functions you’ll gain over the course of the game into thousands of possible build combinations, and you’re encouraged to experiment as using a Function in different roles will unlock additional story snippets about the world and its inhabitants. As a simple example, Ping’s active ability fires rapid shots in one direction. Alternatively, you can apply Ping to another Function to lower its cost and speed up its execution, or you can fit Ping as a passive, where it’ll grant you vastly more movement in Transistor’s ‘Turn’ mode, which allows you to freeze time and plan out a rapid-fire sequence of actions that Red will execute in quick succession upon unpausing. While Hades is certainly the pinnacle of Supergiant’s catalogue to date, Transistor still holds a very special place in my heart. Supergiant Steam sale - Hades: Zagreus faces off against the Lernaean Bone HydraAlongside all the games, there are also discounts on each of the official soundtracks – led by composer Darren Korb, who also voices Zagreus, these are some of the most finely crafted accompaniments to their respective games, and absolutely worth picking up on their own merits. Supergiant Games Steam sale prices Here are all the deals in the Supergiant Games Steam sale: - Hades – $12.49 / £10.49 (50% off) - Hades + Soundtrack – $15.73 / £13.27 (55% off) - Pyre – $3.99 / £3.35 (80% off) - Pyre Soundtrack – $2.49 / £2.12 (75% off) - Transistor – $3.99 / £3.35 (80% off) - Transistor Soundtrack – $2.49 / £2.12 (75% off) - Bastion – $2.99 / £2.55 (80% off) - Bastion Soundtrack – $2.49 / £2.12 (75% off) - Supergiant Collection – $34.77 / £29.41 (73% off) The Supergiant Games Steam sale ends on April 27, so move fast if you don’t want to miss out on the bargains. If that’s not enough for you, then why not take a look at the best free PC games for even more excellent options to keep you busy while you wait for the biggest upcoming games in 2023? Alternatively, we’ve picked out the best indie games on PC if you’re looking for some amazing experiences from smaller developers. Read the full article

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bottoms-movie · 3 years

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SAMBUCKY FIC RECS

so a lot of people seemed interested this so here it is! if ya’ll like this, i can make more parts! this is split into three categories: based on tfatws, canon divergence, and au. all fics are on ao3. all of the fics are complete. some fics do include smut, but i included the ratings, so make sure to check for that based on preferences!

also, feel free to send me asks on your thoughts on any fics or if you’re interested in another sambucky fic rec post!

BASED ON TFATWS

Fill the Hole in my Heart | Not Rated | 4,848 words

Bucky dives into the world of online dating. The girls are nice, but there seems to be something missing. When he goes to Louisiana to meet Sam and his family, he realizes what that something was.

Skip, Reverse | Explicit | 7,945 words

Sam stood in the middle of their local Target with a throw pillow in each hand. The one in his left hand was butter-soft and matched the drapes in the living room, but Bucky had walked by five seconds ago and declared the one on the right “absolutely fucking hideous,” and so now Sam kind of wanted it more than he had ever wanted anything.

Sometimes romance is just bickering with your superhero partner/roommate at several different Target locations.

just won’t do right | General | 7,524 words

Sam's eyebrows go up, impressed, and he reaches over to squeeze Torres' shoulder, "This is amazing, kid. Thanks, really."

Bucky sits and watches in utter horror as the pink darkens on Torres' cheeks.

Oh, he realizes. Oh. Fuck.

body language will do the trick | Explicit | 12,598 words

“There’s no way you’re going to win this,” Bucky tells Sam. “I am going to love language the shit out of you.”

Sam gives him a considering look. “You do seem like you’d be really good at that.”

Bucky’s cheeks flush with heat. “Thanks, pal, I—”

Sam smirks, and Bucky’s eyes narrow. He shoves his elbow into Sam’s side and stalks off, leaving Sam cackling behind him.

“Your ass looks great today!” Sam yells.

Bucky reaches up to flip Sam the bird, and he definitely does not feel grateful that he wore his good jeans today. Bucky’s ass looks great every day.

checklist | General | 4,716 words

Bucky Barnes keeps a mental checklist of things he knows to be true at any given moment. Sometimes the checklist changes, because he's learned something else about himself. It changes, for example, when he starts realizing that maybe he would like to kiss Sam Wilson. Maybe.

best laid plans | 3 parts | 26,808 words

part 1: baby you’re the wave and I’m ready for the crash | Explicit | 6,616 words

Nah, my plan’s better,” Sam declares, before clapping Bucky on the shoulder.

“I’m sorry, what plan? Was that a plan? It didn’t sound like a plan to me, it sounded like a vague intention,” says Bucky, still scowling, and Sam grins.

“We’re winging it, the plan is a work in progress! Now c’mon, we gotta make some wardrobe adjustments if we’re gonna get into that club.”

Sam and Bucky have some unorthodox methods of going undercover in a club.

He Doesn’t Deserve You! | Teen | 5,154 words

Sam and Bucky have an argument that results in Bucky being left at the bar. A group of drunk strangers assumes Bucky just got dumped and quickly adopt him for the night to make him feel better.

Reconstitution | Not Rated | 10,228 words

“I didn’t back Steve on the Sokovia Accords,” Sam says unprompted one day. They’re so close to apprehending the Flagsmashers and wrapping up this ridiculous saga.

“I don’t follow,” Bucky says.

“I was the one who refused to sign it first. Not Steve.”

Sam says it so softly that Bucky has to strain to hear him. Sam is loud and chatty and half the time he keeps up a constant stream of chatter just to get on Bucky’s nerves, but Bucky’s coming to realize that when he really wants to make himself heard, he’s soft spoken and mild. Bucky doesn’t entirely follow his train of thought, though.

Or: a breaking down, remaking, and coming back stronger than ever before

Stuck On You (You Suez, You Luez) | Explicit | 10,136 words

Sam and Bucky’s mission was simple: stowaway on a ship suspected of weapons-smuggling in the Suez, gather enough intel to report back, and hop off again in Port Said. Something gets in the way, and a day-long recon session turns into a week of chess, bickering, semi-successful movie references, and trying not to go slowly insane.

His Touch | Mature | 1,006 words

When Baron Zemo touched Bucky’s face, Sam Wilson saw red.

Bucky just wants Sam to comfort him.

rusted | Teen | 2,358 words

Bucky doesn’t grace him with a sound of acknowledgement. He’s been quiet, ever since that night with Zemo. Well. Quieter. It’s almost like. Every time he opens his mouth, he’s half-expecting the Winter Soldier to come out.

He hasn’t, yet. Won’t, ever again. Not unbidden. Sam’s sure of that. Bucky, not so much.

‘You busy?’

‘’m scouring the—’

‘Good,’ Sam cuts the idiot off, ‘I need you to help me shave.’

advanced therapy methods for large adult men | 2 parts | 11,717 words

part 1: The Gottman Method for Dealing with Conflict | Mature | 4,187 words

Bucky and Dr. Raynor have a follow-up session and two entirely different conversations about his relationship status.

Or: Let's do more couples therapy, James.

it’s always Bucky’s Fault | 3 parts | 20,089 words

part 1: Did you see it? | Explicit | 3,905 words

In which there's supposedly a viral video of the Winter Soldier on his knees sucking off Captain America.

Everything is, like always, completely Bucky's fault.

CANON DIVERGENCE

Even in the Present (I Am Living in the Past) | Teen | 16,977 words

Sometimes Sam still questions everything about his ability to shoulder the 80-year legacy he now bears. His history, and the history of his loss, sticks with him and even in healing he doubts whether or not he is able to fulfil his purpose, and whether he may find lasting peace and happiness.

Told in fluid-fragments, the story moves between his therapy sessions after his return from active duty and the post-Endgame present.

You never forget your first | Teen | 3,650 words

The story of Bucky and Sam getting together in a series of firsts.

leftovers | Mature | 19,249 words

With the New Avengers up and running, Sam finally has time to start dating again. Unfortunately, it's not going as well as he'd hoped.

Partners | Explicit | 7,235 words

Sam's not sure if he can be Captain America. He's not a supersoldier. He can't throw the shield. He's just a dude.

And Bucky Barnes is just a nuisance, albeit a pretty good-looking one.

I’ll explain everything to the geese | Explicit | 50,949 words

Bucky is so competent that it hurts my feelings is not a rational complaint to have about a person, and yet, after a year of being Captain America and partnering up with Bucky for the new and improved, post-Blip Avengers, that’s kinda how Sam’s feeling.

It’s not great. It maybe leads to Sam making some rash, ill-advised decisions like claiming he has a previously undisclosed superpower, and then getting caught in a web of lies when he ends up actually developing that surprisingly inconvenient superpower. Talking to birds had seemed like a harmless superpower, but it turns out that birds have a lot of opinions, and they don’t hesitate to tell Sam about them, especially when it comes to his supposedly subpar courting skills. Which is ridiculous, because Sam isn’t courting Bucky. Right?

Night Swimming | Teen | 2,056 words

“Come on. The princess has a new arm for you and I gotta see if there’s a barber around here willing to tackle your…” Sam waved a hand at Bucky’s face.

“I don’t want a new arm,” Bucky immediately bit out.

And then -

“I can cut my own damn hair.”

Sam just raised both eyebrows. Crossed his arms over his chest again.

Dared Bucky to prove him wrong.

Cpvert Coffee & Flirtation Specialist | General | 5,542 words

The reporter says "—for Captain America to—"

And Bucky rolls his eyes. "Oh, here we go."

Sam looks at him then tips his head sideways, got a weird grin on his face. "Not a fan?"

"Not that. Just… the guy seems too good to be true, right? Wings and a shield?? Come on."

"Uh, is that why your eyes are like glued to the screen whenever he's on?" Kate says. "Is that why you call him Captain Tight Ass?"

"He's a goddamn show-off, and you know it. Tight ass or not."

Just then Sam snorts, real loud, grabs his coffee and suffers a horribly controlled laugh on his way out the door.

Stolen Moments | Teen | 98,767 words

“No,” Sam said, chuckling. “I don’t cheat,” he swept his gaze up and down James’ body, “even with guys who look like you. But, I’m bored and a little pissed, so if you wanna sit here and shoot the shit ‘til my man shows back up, I’m game.”

Never one to back to back down from a challenge - especially a challenge who looked like Sam Wilson - Bucky took another swig from his bottle and replied, “Sure, doll. I’ve got nothing but time.”

Steve has Sam. Bucky wants Sam. Sam wasn’t expecting any of this.

Such a Whirlwind Since I Saw You | Teen | 10,871 words

The Men of Letters turned Bucky Barnes into a weapon. Hunters Steve Rogers and Natasha Romanov are determined to save him, but they're going to need Sam Wilson's help.

“So you want me to ditch work, drive across America with you until you find your friend, who you thought was dead - all while avoiding some high-tech hunters who are out for blood?” Sam is asking.

Steve shrugs a shoulder, looking a little sheepish. Natasha almost laughs at the dry tone of Sam’s voice, but he's not wrong.

You Got What I Need? | Explicit | 37,588 words

Sam and Bucky are both in a bind, professionally. Nat points out a solution that neither men like. To save their careers they play along or rather, stop playing all together.

#marvel #sam wilson #bucky barnes #tfatws #sambucky #sambucky fanfiction #sambucky fic recs #fic recs #usermarcy #usersof #tusernini #tusersammy #usersmile #usersamanne #usercross #sambucky fanfic #my fic recs

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neon-vocalist · 2 years

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lipstick lolly

tags: @interesteddisaster @etchedstars (heya two birds with one stone :D)

i’m so sorry this is so late ahhhhh

yes i’m aware that the title is ass i had no other ideas :/

"Caddie?" Damian called, pushing open the door to Janis' bathroom. "Oh. There you are."

Cady smiled at him in the mirror, capping Janis' lipstick pushed to full height, making Damian cringe and reach for it involuntarily. "Hi, Damie. What's up?"

"Is that Jan's?" he asked, a hand steadying him against the doorframe as he recovered from the crime against makeup he just witnessed.

"Yep!" Cady replied, tossing the lipstick aside and turning around to hop up onto the counter. "Where is she?"

"I just saw her on her way out. Does she know you're here?"

"Doubtful," Cady shrugged happily, hopping off the counter and wrapping her arms around Damian's waist. "Actually... wait." She pulled her phone out of her back pocket and texted Janis.

Where are you?

She replied almost instantly. Coming over to your house ;)

Cady wordlessly showed Damian her screen. "So let me get this straight-" she began after he read it.

"You're not," he interrupted with a smirk.

"No. Well, yes, that too, but... she's coming to my house and thinks I'm home. And I'm at her house."

"Wearing her lipstick. Which you just brutally murdered."

"Yes."

"What are you gonna do, Cads?" Damian asked, already planning out how he was going to tell this story to the Plastics. Cady paused for a moment, thinking.

"Well, I guess I'll just have to beat her there!"

“Oh my God.” Damian shook his head and sighed dramatically as only a true theatre kid would. “How are you going to do that?”

Cady grinned devilishly as she described her spontaneous plan, Damian making a progressively worse attempt to not laugh as she explained. “And let me guess,” he said through giggles, cutting her off. “You need the car. Or the Jazzy.”

“Damian!” Cady pouted, her brilliant blue lips on full display. “I was just about to get to the math-y part!”

“You have got to be kidding,” he sighed, but let her keep going in her impromptu speech. It was clear to both of them that she was making it up pretty much on the spot, but Cady was positive it was going to work, and Damian just wanted to see how it played out.

“So,” Cady said, wrapping it up, “if it takes ten minutes for her to get from her house to my house on the actual roads, and it’s around two miles, and we’ve spent two minutes or so talking about this, that leaves us with probably five minutes to get there once we get everything together, if we want me in my house by the time she gets there.”

“Correct. And your plan of how to beat her in half the time is?”

“Simple. She has to stay on the roads. I don’t.”

“Sweet baby Jesus. And I assume you’re going to make me follow?”

“No,” Cady laughed, and Damian instantly relaxed.

“Thank the Lord.”

“That’s where you come in, though. If I don’t get there in time, which- let’s be real, I might not- I need you to call her and BS an explanation as to why I’ve suddenly Disapparated.”

“And how will you let me know you’re going to be late?”

Cady’s grin grew wider as she produced a pair of walkie talkies. Damian took one and clipped it to his jeans with an affectionate eye roll. “Okay, I need to go,” Cady said as she checked her watch and kissed Damian on the cheek.

“Wait!” Damian called. “How can I make sure you won’t get dead or kidnapped?”

“You have my phone’s location on yours, right?” Cady asked, not giving Damian enough time to check before she took off, leaving him standing on the driveway with his phone in hand.

“What am I gonna do with her?” he sighed, heading back inside and confirming that he did indeed have Cady’s phone synced to his.

Instead of watching the football game that was on or Dance Moms like he wanted to, Damian opted for watching Cady’s erratic red line on his phone dart back and forth and zigzag through side streets. After a few minutes of placing bets with himself on when Cady would tire out and slow down (and losing all of them), a text from Janis buzzed on his phone.

Damian. Why the fuck are you at my house.

He didn’t answer the message, only forged ahead with his newly realized plan. If Janis could see his location, he could see hers. He began to screen record the red and blue lines racing each other on his phone. He figured Cady would want to see them.

Oh, am I? he texted back, giggling as he imagined the way Janis would roll her eyes and sigh at him.

“Cads,” he said into the walkie talkie, “Janis is almost there. You either need to turn on the jets or accept that you’re not gonna make it in time.”

“Don’t worry,” a breathless Cady said from the other end of the line. “I just crossed the street in front of her car. I’ll get there in time.”

“You just what? How did she not see you?”

“No idea. Gotta go.”

Amused, Damian set the walkie talkie down and called Janis.

“What’s up, whore?” she answered.

“Always so polite. Hey, did you happen to pass Cady on the road?”

“Like in a car? No. Funny enough, though, I saw someone who I could’ve sworn was her crossing in front of me. But she’s at her house, right?”

Damian didn’t answer.

“Right?”

“Uh, sure.”

“Damian...”

“Yes?”

“What do you know?”

“I know nothing.”

“That’s for sure. Where’s my- where’s Caddie?”

“Were you about to call her your girlfriend?” Damian asked excitedly.

“Bitch. No, I wasn’t. She’s not my girlfriend.”

“You are going over to her house right now, she wears your makeup, you steal her clothing and stuffed animals, and I’ve seen you sit in each others’ laps so many times it’s crazy.”

“And?”

“You share spoons and straws. I’ve seen her take a lollipop out of her mouth and put it into yours.”

“And?!”

“Nothing. Just saying. That’s not very hetero of you.”

“Well, Damian, I’m not very hetero.”

“That’s for sure.”

“Okay, well, I almost got in a car crash because of you, so goodbye.” With no other warning, Janis hung up, leaving Damian to track the lines on his screen and silently cheer Cady on.

#paint by numbers #janis x cady #cady heron x janis sarkisian #cady heron #janis sarkisian #space safari #cadnis #mean girls #mean girls the musical #mean girls on broadway #ask games #this is so late i'm so sorry #system scribbles #tw swearing #wlw #fanfic #fanfiction

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your-eternal-muse · 4 years

Text

Kinda Wish She Were Dead

Heather Series Part 8

Part 1 Part 2 Part 3 Part 4 Part 5 Part 6 Part 7

Bonus! Readers Card Confession Series Playlist

Summery: During a night out on the town with the girls, Reader see’s something she wasn’t supposed to.

Words: 3.7k (my longest yet!)

Warnings: Swearing, a few sexual innuendos, Cheating, Mentions of Alcohol, and a fabulous right hook.

Pairing: Spencer Reid x Heather Carmichael, Spencer Reid x eventual Female!Reader

A/N: I’ve been waiting for this one....turn it up! Also, the song that inspired this chapter. For the meaning of the song, not that fucking boat scene.

~~~~

It’s hot.

Like “laying naked in the middle of your apartment with the air cranked and every fan blowing on you” hot.

I’m one of the lucky ones.

My old apartment was renovated to include central air a few years before I moved in.

Still, the humidity was smothering.

So why was I putting a full face of makeup on, knowing damn well I’m gonna sweat it off before the end of the night?

Because why the hell not?

It’s the first time I’ve made plans with the girls in months, and I deserve to feel pretty, even if only for an hour or two.

My therapist tells me I’m making progress.

And it finally feels like I am.

I don’t hate the day before it even starts when I wake up.

I hardly close my curtains anymore.

I’d like to say that with her help, everything went back to normal.

I go to work and come home. I hang out with my friends, water my potted plants. Talk to Spencer like I never confessed my love for him.

But it didn’t.

I haven’t really spoken to Spencer since the day I left.

I’ve wanted to.

I’ve wanted to tell him that I’m here. I’m still here. That I’m always going to be here.

That I care about him more than probably life itself.

Ever since I came back, we’ve had to work together, and we’ve had a few small conversations, but nothing like what we used to have.

I crave those conversations.

How we would bounce back and forth from idea to idea, topic to topic without so much as breaking a sweat.

The late night conversations about the probability of aliens, and life on the opposite side of the universe.

I crave him, and the intimacy he brought.

Lately though, he’s been coming to work with a sullen look on his face.

He shows up earlier, and stays later, drowning himself in his paperwork.

When her calls interrupt a caseload, he no longer eagerly picks up to hear what she has to say.

All I want to do is walk over and ask him how he’s doing. How the married life is treating him. If there’s anything I can do to help lift his spirits.

But I can’t.

I’d be overstepping a boundary I didn’t even know I created that night out on the balcony.

Knocking on my door snaps me out of my daze, and I quickly cap my lipstick, making my way towards my front door where my night stands, waiting.

JJ, Emily, and Penelope are waiting, big smiles and laughter bubbling from their lips.

I let the smile spread across my face.

“I just need to grab my shoes and then I’ll be ready.” I usher them into my hallway, running back to my bedroom to grab the pair of heels resting by my closet.

I sit on my bed, slipping them on with ease and grabbing my bag on my way out.

They all ooh and ahh when I step into the light of my kitchen, and JJ grabs my hand, twirling me in place so they can get a better look at my outfit.

“I almost forgot you had party attire, y/n.”

“God, I wish I had an ass like that. I’m older than you. That’s not fair.” Emily says, landing a playful slap against the fabric of my skirt.

“Oh stop it, you flatter me.” Once upon a time, the attention would have made me antsy. The voice in my head would whisper that they were lying to me, that they really thought I was the ugliest thing in existence.

That was then, and this is now. Now the confidence shines off of me like a spotlight.

“You deserve to be flattered, you beautiful goddess you.” Penelope says, her hands waving in the air.

I take a look in the new mirror that hangs in my hallway, and I can’t help but agree. The tight black skirt accentuates my curves, the low cut golden crop top that sticks to me like another skin puts the girls on display, and my heels give me legs for days.

I look damn good.

“Okay okay okay, pre-game selfie!” Penelope grabs her phone and holds up in front of her while we gather around.

She snaps the picture and within a few quick taps, a buzzing emits from my bag.

I dig my phone out, seeing the picture pop up in my notifications.

JJ has her arms wrapped around me, and I’m pressed to Penelope's side. Emily stands over us, one hand on JJ’s shoulder, the other on Penelopes.

I don’t think I could fake a smile like the one on my face even if I wanted to.

I save it to my phone.

~~~

If I thought being in my house, alone, with air conditioning was bad, then I shouldn't have even bothered coming out.

The bar, albeit small, was packed.

Even if there was a breeze, or any airflow at all, the combined body heat of the crowd would have swallowed it up.

I couldn’t really bring it in me to care all that much, though.

The dim lights and heat left my skin with a sexy shine, bringing attention to all the right places.

I could feel the eyes on me.

The ones belonging to men wanting to drown their sorrows in a woman like me, one who appears vulnerable, willing to go along for the ride.

It’s been a while, since I’ve had the attention of the opposite gender, especially this very specific kind of attention.

It feels good, in a way. To be wanted so openly. But it doesn’t mean jack to me, not if it’s not the pair of eyes I’ve been desperate to catch.

I should stop thinking about him.

It’s a girls night out. I don’t have to think, or worry about anything.

Besides, he’s probably busy doing other things. Thinking about me is the last thing on his mind.

I laugh and take a sip from the Shirley temple sitting in front of me, laughing as JJ recounts a story about will and a botched attempt at breakfast in bed.

I pick a cherry up from the fizzy drink, and bite the end off, relishing in the sweet flavor. I pop the stem in my mouth, twirling it around my tongue as I listen to the conversation, pulling it between my teeth and setting it down on the table in a knot.

“Oh my god. Did you just tie a cherry stem with your tongue?” Penelope is cheesing from the other side of the table, the bright pink straw of her margarita almost to her lips.

I laugh, holding it up for them to inspect.

“You know what that means.” Emily says, taking a sip from her own drink, before continuing her thought. “You, my friend, can give great head.”

A blush covers my cheek, but I cock an eyebrow. “Who told you?”

The three women burst into high pitched laughter, and I see Pen pull out her phone. She holds it up to me.

“Do it again. The internet needs to be blessed with this knowledge.”

I chuckle again, the spirit of the night enough to get me drunk off the energy. I grab another cherry from my drink, sucking the end into my mouth before popping it off, and swallowing it.

“Alright, we have one, untied cherry stem before us.” I hold out the stem for the camera to see. “Now watch as I tie it with no hands.” I stick out my tongue, placing it in the middle before closing my mouth.

I rest my elbows on the table, working my tongue around the stem, forcing it into submission to do exactly what I want.

Within 15 seconds, I pull it through my teeth, and hold up a tied cherry stem.

“Ta-da! Magic.” I place it on the table as they clap, smiles wide and goofy from their own alcoholic concoctions.

“She’s single people. And there’s a line forming so shoot your shot.” JJ is the one to speak to the camera, and I giggle, taking another sip.

Penelope brings her phone down, and within a minute my phone buzzes again, this time with the notification of the video being posted.

There are worse things to be posted on the internet about me.

“I never knew you could do that, y/n/n.” Pen says, taking a sip from her drink.

I run a hand through my hair, shrugging. “Didn’t think I needed to put it on my resume. It’s mostly a party trick I use when I like someone. I haven’t used it in years though.”

The unspoken question lingers on the air.

“No, I never showed Spencer. But I’m sure it’d blow his mind. The way that man applies math and logic to everything he does just solidifies the fact that I know he wouldn’t be able to do it.”

It’s been a while since I’ve joked about him openly, but it wasn’t forced. It didn’t hurt.

It was just a natural statement.

“Have you guys noticed that something’s up with him? He seems distant lately.” JJ says, leaning in closer so she doesn’t have to talk over the crowd.

“Okay, so it’s not just me.” I reply, playing with the straw in my drink.

“It’s gotta be something at home. I mean, he doesn’t even remotely act the way that he did when him and Heather first got together.” Emily's eyes look me up and down, reading my body language, but I’m done hiding.

I let the building anger ripple through me.

“He seems...sad. And not like, normal Reid sad where it has to do with his mom or something, no this is like..” she stops herself from continuing the sentence.

I finish it for her. “It’s like, me, sad.”

JJ sighs. “I hate to say it, but do you think it has anything to do with Heather?”

A glass shatters across the room, and like the red sea, the crowd parts.

Everything happens in no more than a couple seconds, but it feels like a lifetime.

Through the empty space, I see two people standing at the bar. The woman has her hands wound into the man's shirt, her body turned as she laughs at someone behind her, I’m assuming the one who dropped the glass.

The man has his hands gripped on her hips, smiling into her hair, before she turns back around, connecting their lips in the most disgusting kiss I have had the displeasure of witnessing.

The rage builds swiftly in my stomach and it pulses from my soul outward. The world’s tint changes and I see red.

“Even if it doesn’t right now, it will.”

When the hell did I stand up?

They stand with me, and I’m about to argue my point when Emily speaks. “You want something to record, Garcia?” She moves by me, fixing my hair, handing me her glass which holds a swig of her drink left. “Record this.”

I take it, downing it for a little liquid luck, and start for the bar, the three of them on my heels.

I profile him as best I can in the 20 seconds it takes to get through the now reforming crowd.

There’s a gold ring on his hand. His pants and shirt are dirty, and his boots are thick. He works in something having to do with construction, which means he’s probably done around 5 every night, and I know for a fact that it is way past that.

I walk up to them, grabbing her shoulder and pulling them apart, stepping in between them, getting face to face to him.

“Before you even think about laying a hand on me, my name is SSA Y/L/N of the Behavioral Analysis Unit of the F.B.I. From the look of your clothes and the ring on your finger, I’m gonna go ahead and assume that your wife is waiting for you at home.”

His hand instinctively falls to his back pocket.

“And since you just reached for what I’m assuming is your phone, she’s called you multiple times tonight. She knows. Now, fuck off and maybe you can salvage things with her, but believe me when I say this,” His breath smells sour. “You aren’t even half the man that she’s married to.”

He opens his mouth to say something, looking from me, to Heather, to the three women surrounding her, keeping her from leaving, and the camera pointed directly at his face.

He looks back down to me, and huffs, stepping back and walking in the other direction.

For a moment, I stare at where he stood.

And then a fire ignites in my stomach and it takes everything in me to not beat the girl standing behind me.

I turn, and lightning strikes behind her eyes.

“You’re not gonna tell him.”

“Like hell I’m not!” I take a step forward, and she takes one back, bumping into Emily who has her arms crossed, and her shoulders raised. “You know, I tried so hard to give you the benefit of the doubt, Heather. You made him happy and I honestly thought you loved him, but I realize now that he deserves someone so much better than you.”

“Oh what, someone like you?” She’s snide, her demeanor defensive and cocky at the same time. She thinks she’s gonna come out on top of this.

“You know what? Yes. Someone like me. Someone who wouldn’t even think about doing this to him, because the amount of pain that he is about to go through doesn’t even come close to the stupid fucking reward. Oh, so you slept with some douchebag because what? You’re not getting enough attention?” The words are cathartic, leaving my belly with the venom that has been brewing there for the past 2 and half years.

“I found your letter. I was right about you.”

That would have stopped me in my tracks 6 months ago. Now I don’t even flinch.

“Oh honey, it’s not a fucking secret anymore. You want to hear me say it? I love him. I am in love with Spencer fucking Reid, and the only reason that he is with you, is because I was a decent human being and could see that you made him happy, so I kept my mouth shut. But I don’t care anymore. I don’t give a flying fuck what happens now, because whatever it is, it has to be better than being with a lying, cheating bitch like you.”

“You think he’s gonna run to you? Is that what you’re hoping for? He’s not gonna believe you. And even if he did, I’d turn on the water works and make him believe it was just this one time.”

She doesn’t know she’s being filmed.

I turn to the bartender. “Excuse me, is she a regular here?”

The bartender smirks, wiping down the wood. “Yep. She comes in at least a couple times a week with that dude you kicked to the curb. They almost always leave together.”

Heather scoffs, crossing her arms. “Again, he’ll never believe you.”

“You sure about that hot stuff?” Penelope steps forward, shoving the camera in her face. “Smile for the camera.”

Heather's eyes go wide, before turning to me. “You wouldn’t dare.”

“I would do it for a fucking corn chip.”

I place my hands on my hips, getting so close to her our noses almost touch. My voice is dangerously low when I speak. “Either you tell him everything or I will. And trust me. I have my ways of finding out if you did.”

I step back, wishing the daggers in my eyes could inflict actual pain, as I turn to walk away.

I hear her shout in frustration before I feel her hands on my back, pushing me forward into the mass of people.

A couple people unaware of the confrontation help me back up with a smile, thinking I’ve just drunkenly tripped over myself.

Emily and JJ each hold one of my arms, making sure I’m stable, while Penelope keeps filming a look of shock on her face.

A wicked smile forms on my face.

I was hoping she’d do something like that.

I turn and my fist connects with her face, a nice cracking noise satisfying the lust building in my chest, as a thin coat of blood covers my knuckles.

Though, it’s not my blood.

She’s holding her nose in pain as she falls to the floor, taking down a bar stool with her, and I swear I see the bartender laugh.

I grab a napkin off the bar, wiping my knuckles before throwing it on the floor by her feet.

“C’mon girls. The night is still young.”

I see them cover their own smiles with their hands, and Penelope starts to giggle the shock away.

I know I should feel bad. It was unprofessional of me.

But she shoved me first.

It is, legally, self-defense.

Is it sick that I wish she would have punched me?

It doesn’t matter anyway. I know she won’t press charges. She’s smart enough to know she just dug her grave.

And now she has to lie in it.

~~~~

The atmosphere is different when I walk into the office the next morning.

It’s tense.

And one look from JJ and an inhale of air tells me why.

Spencer’s here.

I barely have time to set my bag down on my desk, before he grabs me suddenly by the arm, dragging me into a nearby conference room.

The anger is rolling off of him in waves, and I can see by the way he clenches and unclenches his fists, he is pissed.

He almost throws me into the room, slamming the door behind him.

“You want to tell me why the fuck you punched Heather in the face for no damn reason?”

Stupid, stupid girl.

Did she not think, that the way I would find out, would be from Spencer himself?

I can’t help but shake my head and laugh. “She didn’t tell you.”

“She told me that she was having a drink with a girlfriend of hers when you came up drunk, yelling at her, until you just punched her. Can you explain that to me?”

He’s finally yelling at me. After months of begging for him to yell at me, he finally is.

It doesn’t feel as good as I had hoped it would.

I don’t say anything, just pull out my phone to find the video that Garcia sent me.

“Are you serious right now, Y/N? Put your fucking phone down and explain to me why you broke my wife's nose!”

I sit in a chair, setting the phone on the table and sliding it towards him. I lean back and cross my hands over my stomach.

“Watch the video, Spencer.”

“Why? Why should I listen to anything you tell me?”

I lean forward, onto my elbow, annunciating every syllable. “Watch the damn video.”

He stands, and I watch as he fights with himself, before huffing in defeat, sitting in a chair and pulling my phone towards him.

He presses play.

I watch as his anger flows away with each passing second, despair taking its place.

This is what I wasn’t looking forward to. Seeing him see it for the first time.

Watching him break.

It wasn’t pretty.

I watch as tears form in his eyes and silently drop down his cheeks.

He clenches his jaw as he watches her shove me, and the punch that followed.

The room is dead quite when the video ends.

I’m the one who speaks first, my voice soft.

“I punched her, because she had the audacity to do this. She had the audacity to hurt you, and flaunt that fact publicly.”

I swallow, taking a breath before speaking.

“I meant everything I said in that video, Spence.”

He looks up at the nickname, his anger no longer directed at me.

“She hurt you, and I saw red. I didn’t think about what I was doing, and frankly, I’m glad I didn’t. I don’t regret standing up for you. I never have, and I never will.” I clasp my hands together, forcing myself to continue.

“I love you Spencer. I don’t think that’s ever going to change. I’m going to have to live with you finding other people and falling in love, and I promise you, I will support you in that. But not with her. Not after that. You deserve so much better than a girl who thinks she can get away with this just because she’s pretty and jealous.”

He taps a couple things on my phone, before turning the screen off and sliding it back over to me.

He stands.

I don’t. I continue talking as he walks over to me.

“You mean everything to me, Spence. If I know you’re happy, truly happy, then I’m satisfied. I will defend you until the end of the universe comes. You are my best friend, and I love you. And I’m sorry I was never upfront about it before, but I am now.”

I look up at him as he stands in front of me. “I’m done hiding from you.”

He’s still for a moment.

He reaches down and grabs my hands, pulling me up before he wraps his arms around my waist and buries himself into my neck.

I pause, but only for a moment, before wrapping my arms around him and holding him tight against me.

I can feel the wet spots on my neck as he cries, and his hands wind themselves into the fabric of my shirt.

When was the last time he was held like this?

I don’t count the time until he loosens his grip, stepping back from me and wiping his face.

I would hold him until the end of time if he let me.

“Thank you.” He whispers, before moving towards the door.

He opens it and walks out, and I grab my phone, running after him.

I stop in the doorway.

“Hey!”

He stops and turns, and the rest of the team is watching over their files.

My heart is pounding, and I feel out of breath.

“I don’t have a choice,” I let him remember. “But I still choose you.”

A small smile flutters across his face, before he turns and walks away.

I look down at my phone.

Spence xp

[Video]

Sent, 9:06 a.m.

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fresh-prince-of-denmark · 3 years

Text

Interpretation of V’s Mikoshi Poem Pt1: Life is Murder

Cyberpunk spoilers ahead:

Let’s talk about Cyberpunk’s literary references and what they mean for the story, coming from a former English professor/teacher.

Alt will read you one of two poems you cross the bridge to the Mikoshi depending on who is in control. Johnny is read an excerpt from Sailing to Byzantium by Yeats, while V is given an excerpt from The Love Song of J. Alfred Prufrock by T.S. Eliot. For now, let’s focus on V’s poem:

“Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,

The muttering retreats

Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels

And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:

Streets that follow like a tedious argument

Of insidious intent

To lead you to an overwhelming question. . . .

Oh, do not ask, "What is it?"

Let us go and make our visit.”

Cool. Some English majors (derogatory) work at project red. So why should I care?

Well I’ll tell you:

First, a summary: In this story, the narrator is on an evening stroll with a woman he most likely has a romantic relationship with although the vibes are far from a romantic love sonnet. Interestingly enough, the first few lines of this poem have been cut from Alt’s reading; including the epigraph from Dante’s inferno, which translates to the following:

“If I but thought that my response were made

to one perhaps returning to the world,

this tongue of flame would cease to flicker.

But since, up from these depths, no one has yet

returned alive, if what I hear is true,

I answer without fear of being shamed.”

This missing piece from Alt’s poem can be read several ways; most of them drawing a parallel between the Blackwell and hell. In fact, Dante’s inferno has a lot of similarities to the story. One can make a comparison between Virgil and Alt, leaving a debate on who plays the roll of Beatrice (the one being saved) and Dante (the one doing the saving) between Johnny and V. I have to wonder at the writers choice to leave this portion out, as there’s a lot to be said here about who truly comes out alive: who’s flame will cease to flicker? V, for obvious reasons, does not return to the world of the living the same. She will not live much longer, and is dying despite being temporarily “saved.” However, if Johnny returns to the body, he is no longer the Johnny we know; arrogant, self-assured, and more than a little narcissistic. The will to fight seems to have died within him; he leaves Night City, presumably looking to start over. While V clearly changes him before Mikoshi, he is a broken and somber man after returning to life, a flickering flame of who he once was. There’s also a connection to be made about Johnny/V dying and returning to life, literally rising from hell. The next part of the missing introduction is as follows:

“Let us go then, you and I,

When the evening is spread out against the sky

Like a patient etherized upon a table;”

I can’t think of a better way to describe what is happening in Mikoshi aside from the line “Like a patient etherized upon a table.” Johnny and V, in this moment, are suspended in an almost dream-like state. In Eliot’s poem, the “treatment” this patient is awaiting is presumably an examination/reflection of the self, which will lead to the narrator making a major decision. In this scenario, V is being forced to make a very tough choice, one that will take a lot of reflection as they decide what (a few months) of their remaining life is worth.

On to the actual portion of the poem that Alt reads:

“Let us go, through certain half-deserted streets,

The muttering retreats

Of restless nights in one-night cheap hotels

And sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells:

Streets that follow like a tedious argument

Of insidious intent.”

While Prufrock is taking his lover on a romantic stroll, they are hardly walking through rose gardens. They are traveling through the unpleasant parts of a city, and he is noticing all the unsavory parts of his world. Obvious references to night city include one-night hotels (such as the no-tell motel, the Pista Sofia, or the hotel that Johnny and V stay at after the parade, which Johnny gripes about and asks ‘what kind of losers stay in a place like this?), and ‘the sawdust restaurants with oyster-shells,’ which is possibly a reference to the fact that food in Night City is real sketchy (odd things like synth-milk, which Takemura complains about throughout the game). The streets like a tedious argument works on several levels here; both the crime of night city’s streets, which is relentless and quite literally never-ending (V can’t walk two blocks without an assault in progress task spawning), and the socio-economic ecosystem that threatens self-combust at any point. There will always be conflict between gangs, between corpos, between Arasaka and Militech, and between the nomads and the Raffins/Wraiths. In one mission with Padre, you find out that Arasaka and Militech are on the verge of waging another war. None of this conflict is positive, and always ends in bloodshed, often of the innocent. One can argue themselves in circles trying to find a solution to NC’s problems, there is no win-win situation. It’s a bit of a damnned if you do, damnned if you don’t situation. This comes up in conversation with Takemura on his career with Arasaka, as well as several other missions that involve those who choose to work for corporations to survive. This is also a point of conflict between V and Johnny a multiple times, one that never gets an answer. A literal tedious argument, tedious because there are no ‘happy endings for all involved’ in Night City. The final lines of Alt’s reading have more to do with V/Johnny’s final choice:

“To lead you to an overwhelming question ...

Oh, do not ask, “What is it?”

Let us go and make our visit.”

All the unsavory things V has to do to survive, all the people that have died to get to Mikoshi, lead up to one ‘overwhelming’ question: who will live on? There are so many other questions that should be answered: what is beyond the Blackwall? Are Johnny and Alt real, or is the soul truly dead, and are they just a copy of the people they once were? What happens to the idea of God and the afterlife when you introduce the idea of Soulkiller? But much like in the poem, we don’t get these answers. In fact, we are barely given time to contemplate the question as we fight for survival. A decision must be made, despite not knowing or even having time to dwell on these answers. Similarly Johnny, when presented with these questions in several side quests, refuses to even entertain the question, much like the poem’s narrator.

The rest of the poem, which is not included in Alt’s reading, is full of allusions to the story. The “yellow fog,” which persists across the poem is full of cat-like imagery, conjuring the bakaneko, the spirit of misfortune that can bring people back to life that Takemura mentions (coincidence that V/Johnny can adopt a cat? Keeping death as a close companion? I think not). Prufrock spends the rest of the poem contemplating his question, talking himself in circles, and the only thing that changes is his age as time slips by. Just as he seems to be making progress, he talks himself back to square one and begins again. Much in the same way, Johnny and V go in the same circles. Their journey begins with their deaths, and to death they will both return no matter what. Nothing they did really mattered, the world remains the same, broken and unfair. As Prufrock later contemplates: “Do I dare/ Disturb the universe?…Would it have been worth while/ To have bitten off the matter with a smile,? To have squeezed the universe into a ball?” Johnny loses his life trying to strike against an unjust world, yet he is scarcely a memory to most residents of Night City, who do not have time to contemplate what is right and what is wrong; their focus must be on survival.

Interestingly enough, both the poem and Cyberpunk reference similar secondary materials. Prufrock references Lazarus and Hamlet as he contemplates how he will never lead an exciting existence. Lazarus, much like V/Johnny, famously rose from the dead. Hamlet is a reoccurring theme in the storyline; Prufrock, V/Johnny, and Hamlet all are faced having to inevitably make a very difficult decision, the latter two involving tragedy for all no matter what. It’s also up for debate whether Hamlet is turning mad, similar to how we can’t be sure how much Johnny is driving V “mad” by taking over their mind. Despite this comparison, V/Johnny are no Hamlet/Lazarus. They are Prufrock; their lives, and their deaths, are meaningless in the grand scheme of things. Despite their efforts, they will simply fade away until they remain only in the memories of those they left behind. The play is further referenced as Jackie’s grave reads “Goodnight, sweet Prince,” and in a deleted audio file Johnny tells V “Sleep well prince/princess” before taking control if V chooses to attack Arasaka with Rogues help. What makes this more interesting is when you look at the line in which Hamlet is mentioned:

“No! I am not Prince Hamlet, nor was meant to be;

Am an attendant lord, one that will do

To swell a progress, start a scene or two,

Advise the prince; no doubt, an easy tool,

Deferential, glad to be of use,

Politic, cautious, and meticulous;

Full of high sentence, but a bit obtuse;

At times, indeed, almost ridiculous—

Almost, at times, the Fool.”

The Fool, which is mentioned several times by Misty, represents V and Johnny, in the journey that is told by the major arcane in tarot. The beginning of a journey — of a cycle — while the Death card symbolizes the ending of one phase and the beginning of another. An often painful transformation into something new. The main theme of Eliot’s poem is cycles; he talks himself in circles, never making a choice, always ending up where he begins. Circles are mentioned once again by Kerry during his personal mission, when he talks about beginning a new cycle in his life. V/Johnny’s journey together begins with death, and so it must end that way for them; whether it is a physical death, or a death of the self. No matter what, V’s fate is inevitable; they will face death again head-on, just as they did at the beginning of their story. The chosen passages of this poem asserts this cycle — the first three words of Alt’s first and last sentence are the same:

“Let us go.”

#cyberpunk 2077 #cyberpunk #johnny silverhand #cyberpunk v #v cyberpunk #arasaka #cp2077 #cp 2077 #cyberpunk2077 #cp project red #v #Alt Cunningham #cyberpunk spoilers #insufferable former English majors unite #please add your own thoughts to this #and thank you for coming to my dissertation defense #my posts #cyberpunk meta #cyberpunk 2077 meta

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winxrewritingsandfictions · 3 years

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Search by pairings :

SkyxBloom || RivenxMusa || HeliaxFlora || StellaxBrandon || TimmyxTecna || NabuxAisha || Others || Non-pairing ||

Newsletter

About me (available soon)

TABLE OF CONTENT

AN AUTUMN MORNING : COMPLETE

After years of wars and fighting, the Winx are all settled down with their husband. In this oneshot, we get to discover what a slow morning looks like on Heraklion. Sky is king. Bloom is Queen. And baby is one the way.

Pairings: SkyxBloom

Part 1

ACCEPTANCE: 2/7

Samara feels like Bloom deserves a chance. She sends her a letter to invte her to stay on Heklion over the summer. A multi parts mini fanfiction in which you will discover how Bloom and Sky blossomed from a regular relationship to a serious and devoted one.

pairings: BloomxSky

Part 1

Part 2

A NIGHTLY ROUTINE : 1/?

Series of night routines for each pairings.

FloraxHelia

COFFEE BREAK : 1/2

Stella visits earth before meeting Bloom. She needs a break from the magical dimension and planet earth seems like the perfect place. She then meets Bloom at a coffee shop and the two girls starts stalking. Later, Bloom saves Stella from Knut and from then on, her life changes.

Pairings : Bloom & Stella, specialists.

Part 1

COLONEL RIVEN : complete

One-shot

Sky realizes he needs help to win the war. And who else than Riven to win a war?

Pairings : Sky&Riven

Colonel Riven

DRAGON'S LAND: COMPLETE

The Trix had been defeated for a few months and a Party to celebrate the reconstruction of Red Foutain has been organized. For the occasion, Sky's parents have been invented and both royals decided to bring a gift to their son, a gift that will cause only problems and even more hatred.

Pairings: BloomxSky, DisproxSky

Dragon's land part 1/3

Dragon's land 2/3

Dragon's land part 3/3

FINALS : Complete

One-shot

It's the end of term and Bloom is struggling a lot.

Pairing : BloomxSky

Finals

GAME OF MINDS: 1/2

Samara and Erendor have a discussion on Bloom. What do they think about her?

Pairing : BloomxSky

Game of Minds Part 1

HEART TO EARTH : Work In progress

Mid-season 4. It has been over. The war was over. Valtor was dead and the magical dimension was finally at peace. However, there was a place where still weren't fine. A place that was never saved by the Winx. A place where Valtor had let him scare forever.

Pairing: DiasproxSky

Part 1

RAIN ON US : COMPLETE

One-shot

Stella has to go on Heraklion for political matters. A week before, the princess of Solaria and her best friend had been heartbroken by the prince of Herclion and his so-called squire. She does not want to see the sweet Brandon, but the latter does not want to waste more time. With his best friend's help, he will find a way to talk to Stella and apologize.

Paring: StellaxBrandon

Part 1

THE QUEEN'S GARDEN: Complete

Bloom and Sky have been married for a couple of years. Now both crowned queen and king, they rule over Heraklion. Both are adored by their subjects. However, Bloom is not truly happy. Something is on her mind and it is slowly bringing her down.

Pairing : BloomxSky

The Queen's Garden

THE MONSTER UNDER THE BED

one-shot

Riven isn't feeling good, and Flora knows that. She also knows that Riven doesn't like to talk about his problems. She doesn't know much about his private life, his past. No one does. But today, thee fairy knows her friend is feeling worse. But why? She decides to sit next to him and be present for him. Will he share his story with his friend ?

Pairings: Flora&Riven; MusaxRiven, Riven&Remi

The Monster under the bed

THE SWEATER: complete

one-shot

Bloom is wearing a sweater Sky has given her to keep her warm, however, that's not what people think happened that night.

Pairing : BloomxSky

The Sweater

TIME OF WARS : Work in progress

Year; Unknow. Place; Illiad. Statu; At War. What would have happened if the Winx and the Specialists had gone separate ways? The guys followed their friend to support him while his kingdom was facing a war. The girls; finished their fairy missions and decided to go abroad and fight among another dimension's population where no light shone and no magic was good.

Part 1

Part 2

Part 3

SKY'S REVELATIONS: COMPLETE

Sky had heard them. He had seen them fight. He knew they were here to help and yet, he had still tried to kill them. It was bad. The situation was horrible. He felt guilty. He hated himself. No. It was not worth it anymore.

Part 1

Part 2

WITCH LOVE : COMPLETE

One shot

Amaryl makes Mirta cry about her relationship with Lucile, and Musa doesn't like this at all.

Pairings : Musa & Mirta, Mirta x Lucile

Part 1

❤️🧚🏻‍♀️❤️🧚🏻‍♀️❤️🧚🏻‍♀️❤️🧚🏻‍♀️❤️🧚🏻‍♀️❤️🧚🏻‍♀️❤️🧚🏻‍♀️❤️🧚🏻‍♀️❤️🧚🏻‍♀️❤️🧚🏻‍♀️❤️🧚🏻‍♀️❤️🧚🏻‍♀️❤️🧚🏻‍♀️❤️🧚🏻‍♀️❤️🧚🏻‍♀️❤️🧚🏻‍♀️

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crusherthedoctor · 3 years

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Sonic Heroes: Sweet or Shite? - Part 1: SILVER

There are some heroes I like. And there are some heroes I don’t like. But why do I feel about them the way I do? That’s where this comes in.

This is a series in which I go into slightly more detail about my thoughts on the heroes in the Sonic the Hedgehog franchise, and why I think they either work well, or fall flat (or somewhere in-between). I’ll be giving my stance on their designs, their personalities, and what they had to show for themselves over the course of time. Two things to keep in mind:

1. These reviews will be focusing mainly on game portrayals. Though alternate media will occasionally be mentioned, it'll be for the sake of adding onto a point if a portrayal is similar enough, or to compare and contrast if a portrayal is different enough.

2. These are just my own personal thoughts. Whether you agree or disagree, feel free to share your own thoughts and opinions! I don’t bite. :>

Anyhow, for today’s installment, I decided to challenge myself by starting off with a complicated one. Born from the future, and never content to stay put in said future, it's the saviour whose debut came from the most unfortunate game... Silver the Hedgehog.

The Gist: Once upon a time, in the distant future, there was an idealistic young hedgehog named Silver, gifted with the power of telekinesis for reasons unknown. With his amazing potential, he was truly destined for a wonderful, prosperous li-just kidding, it was shit.

“All two of us.”

For as long as he knew, the world was forever plagued by Iblis, the terrible Flames of Disaster. Cities stood in ruin, flames stood high, the floor was lava... it was a bitter life to be certain, all thanks to Iblis. Not even defeating the titular creature did much good, since it would simply come back to be a shitty boss fight another day. What was he - and his friend, Blaze, a character we definitely never saw before and definitely didn't have a completely different backstory before - to do?

Trust the first person he sees, of course. Even if they look like they might be related to the same Flames of Disaster that he fights so constantly.

If he had eyelids, he'd be winking at the camera.

This mysterious fellow, Mephiles the Dark, informed Silver that if he were to wipe out Iblis for real, he would need to take a trip into the past, and eliminate the root of the problem... Sonic the Hedgehog? That was what Mephiles claimed, yes. What was his proof? There was no proof.

That was good enough for Silver.

Oh look, it's Fleetway Sonic.

After an elaborate series of events, which should sound exciting but really isn't because it was just Silver going “Iblis Trigger grrr” in varying tones of voice, he was finally able to corner the blue hedgehog... twice! And despite having less fighting know-how than the hero who saved the world plenty of times, he effortlessly came close to killing the blue hedgehog... twice!

This looks like a jobbing for...

Why twice? The first time was halted by Sonic's friend Amy Rose, who Silver had met beforehand after she mistook him for Sonic, an understandable mistake that even the keenest of eyes would be forgiven for making.

The second time was also interrupted, this time by Shadow the Hedgehog. There's only room for one controversial non-blue male hedgehog in this franchise, sonny boy. Actually, his reasons were more benevolent than that: he wanted to show Silver the truth about what was going on, by time travelling to the incident that gave birth to Iblis. Why was one able to to this, so long as more than one Chaos Emerald was present? No one knew.

That was good enough for Silver.

“I challenge you to a dumb-off.”

As it turned out, Iblis was one half of a sun god called Solaris, the other half being the aforementioned Mephiles. The Duke of Soleanna wanted to reunite with his late wife by harnessing Solaris' power, which succeeded from a certain point of view since he's dead now too. The resulting blunder split Solaris into two halves. One half was all brawn, with little capacity for intelligence. The other half was Iblis.

Understanding the error of his ways, and after making peace with Sonic, Silver went back to the future to try something different, which consisted of doing the same thing he always did. Luckily for him, the script decided it would work this time, albeit at the cost of Blaze sacrificing herself... Maybe? Sort of? It’s not entirely clear what happened to her, and it’s not like this was the last we ever saw of her.

~La laaaaaa, la laaaaaa, la laaaaaa, heading to a better game, la laaaaaa~

But ohhhhh nooooo, turns out THAT didn't solve anything either! In the present, Sonic was killed by Mephiles, after the latter realised he should probably do that already if he wanted to make any progress at all with his plan. This incident led to Iblis being brought into the present, and they fused to become the omnipotent Solaris once more. Such power... such divinity... such devastation...

Actually, he was really easy. The antlion from Underground Zone was harder.

Manchild robots - 1, god of time - 0.

With their super forms in tow, Silver, Shadow, and the revived Sonic joined forces to defeat Solaris, with Sonic in particular going the extra step in retconning Solaris out of existence entirely. Since time itself reset, meaning Iblis was no longer a memory, Silver's timeline was given a second chance. What was he to look forward to in this new, promising future?

Shit.

The Design: Let's take a closer look at Silver's appearance, shall we?

Or rather, a certain thing that's wrong with it.

He's holding up fifteen fingers.

Yes, you all know what I'm pointing to: the hairstyle. Let it be known that I'm very aware of the intention behind this design choice. It's supposed to be based on the Japanese Red Maple Leaf, which holds a lot of relevant symbolism for Silver's character. This is a fine idea in theory, and I can respect the intent and the creativity.

But here's the thing: If it looks like a ganja leaf, people are going to say it looks like a ganja leaf. I know some fans will gnash their teeth at me saying this, but the fact of the matter is that intentions and ideas, no matter how good they may be on paper, don't always translate well into the final product. Unleashed Secret Rings Black Knight Sonic '06 in general is certainly no stranger to showcasing examples of that, and Silver's hairstyle is no exception. There are ways to incorporate symbolism in a character’s design without making them look like meme bait in the process, and no amount of “umm ackshually” will change that, I'm afraid.

That said, there's another reason why I'm staying clean of Silver marijuana: it doesn't work for a hedgehog character. With the other hedgehogs, their hairstyles are simple and get the point across: Sonic's goes without saying, Shadow's is more angular to befit a slightly rougher hero, and Amy's is a cute bob cut of sorts. But Silver? Even without the ganja, you've still got the two tentacles making up the back of his head.

I'd rather not be reminded of hentai quills, thanks.

“I thought Crusher-san would like it :’(”

I do find it hilarious that they went through numerous designs for Silver, and this was what they chose to go with. Some of his prototype designs may have fared better had any of them been used instead... but we didn't end up with any of those ones. We ended up with this one, therefore I'm judging this one.

But don’t worry, it’s not all bad with Silver...

The Personality: As far as actual character goes, Silver's personality is as straightfoward as most characters in the series, yet it's no less interesting, because it took a while for it to fully evolve to what it currently is. The seeds of his character - a good-natured yet awkward and rather insecure kind of guy, who doesn't fully understand how the present time works - have always been there, but it was often downplayed in earlier titles due to him being hungry for Iblis Trigger blood... or being an arsehole for no reason.

Although to be fair, everyone in Rivals is an arsehole for no reason.

Eventually though, after the writers gave him a Snickers, these traits got more opportunity to shine. Mostly in side media admittedly, but it's been noted in the games as well. With no Iblis to angst over, he's proven to be a surprisingly bubbly chap, who just wants to know how you're all doing, fellow anthro kids. And whereas his naivety was previously used for intended tragedy to benefit the evil plan of a guy who thought taking the -istoph- out of Mephistopheles would make him inconspicuous, now it's been used for a bunch of low-key contexts that do a much better job at endearing him to the player.

Finally, something I can relate to.

Hell, he even seems to have learned from the Mephiles incident, as he was quick to make it clear to the next shadowy deep-voiced anthro with demonic eyes he met that he wasn't gonna fall for any of them fibs no more, ya hear?

“YouTube and Twitter don’t count.”

All in all, it works well enough, in my opinion. His personality does pave the way for some funny and wholesome moments, and since they’re no longer trying to build him up like he’s Shadow 2.0, he's nowhere near as much of a tool as he was before. So I guess you could say... I like it?

Does this mean I can say that I like the character as a whole then, design and '06-induced idiocy aside?

Well, not quite...

The Execution: This is where the complication part comes into play. We know now that I like his personality, not so much his design, but that's only the half of it. It would be more accurate to say that I like his personality... and dislike everything else.

Aside from that, obviously.

For starters, the creation process for his character and story was summed up with, in their own words, “Think Trunks from Dragon Ball Z”. So he comes off as rather lazy and uninspired. Now I'm not expecting my Sonic characters to be 100% unique, there's always going to be similarities to other franchises no matter what you do, even if subconsciously or by complete coincidence. Taking inspiration in itself is no big deal at all.

But... was that it? Copying a DBZ character to such a blatant extent? Was there no other thought put into it?

Naturally, this ties into an overarching problem: the franchise's mid-00's habit of trying way too hard to be the anthro Dragon Ball Z. Sonic has had DBZ influences since the early days, with the Chaos Emeralds and Super Sonic, but it didn't assimilate itself into every waking aspect of his universe. It was merely an additional flavor that added to the complete package, in the same way that a Death Star with a moustache didn't mean the franchise was suddenly Star Wars the Hedgehog.

But come the turn of the millenium, nearly every main title in the series ended with Super Sonic and/or Super Shadow saving the day, while everyone else either stood around being useless, or only helping in ways that no one actually cares about. Including the in-universe President apparently, since only Sonic and Shadow were featured in the photo on his desk.

Amy smiled. “I guess the rest of us can go fuck ourselves, huh?”

This reached its peak with - of course - Sonic '06, with Silver in particular being an obvious result of this then-ongoing trend. And yes, it would be unfair to use him as a scapegoat, considering it was already a problem long before he turned up. But moreso than even Shadow, it's an era that Silver is forever a relic of, for better or for worse.

But it doesn't stop there. Since Silver is considered a mainstay character, his gimmick of being from the future also creates problems of its own, because in order for him to make further appearances, he keeps turning up for little explained reason, and thus he suffers the Deadly Six problem of being shoved into places where he doesn't belong, for fanservice's own sake. Take Sonic Colours DS for example, where he went back in time JUST to check out Eggman's theme park... Okay...?

On one hand, I’d visit it too, since it's made by Eggman. On the other hand, I’d stay clear of it, since it's made by Eggman.

And when there IS a justification with more weight to it? It's just recycling the '06 routine of trying to avert his ruined future, which isn't much better. The cause may differ depending on the story, but if his future is a permanent shitehole for one reason or another, he might as well cut out the middle man and stay in the present altogether, since that's where his friends are anyway. But they seem intent on not doing that, despite the future schtick being a noose around his neck at this point.

In hindsight, maybe this was a hint to how the rest of the arc would turn out.

And then there's his dynamic with a certain purple cat... No, not Big. The other one.

“I’m here, by the way.”

Simply put: I don't like this dynamic. At all. Or rather, I don't like how they keep milking it. Blaze's backstory was radically changed to justify her presence in Silver's future, and it really shows, since she barely even shows up half the time, as if the developers themselves forgot she was in the game. But her backstory has since been restored to her original alternate dimension interpretation, so hanging around with the grey hedgehog is all good now, right?

To be brutally honest, I probably wouldn't care for this dynamic regardless. But I would be more willing to tolerate it, and I'd refrain from groaning every time they're seen together... if they weren't intent on playing it up so much in spite of '06 being wiped out, sometimes with a bit of commentary involving their thoughts and memories, which only succeeds at making things more confusing. If Blaze is around, Silver will be nearby, and if he's not at first, he will be soon enough. This franchise does have a problem in general with restricting who's allowed to interact with who (I personally believe Sonic Heroes may have led to this, or at least it accelerated it), but I'd argue it's at its most insufferable here, with Blaze's potential and her entire world taking a backseat to being the sidekick of Ganja Man.

And you might say “Well, it's part of the franchise now, so you'll just have to accept it”. To which I ask: Have you accepted Two Worlds? Have you accepted Solo Sonica? Have you accepted Sonic's friends not doing much as of late?

Yeah. That's what I thought. “It’s just how it is” doesn’t mean you can’t criticise it.

Meanwhile, Marine is lucky enough to get so much as a shout out.

So yeah, I have quite an extensive list of grievances involving poor Silver. But... very little of it has to do with him, right? They're all indirect problems that he just so happens to be linked to, as opposed to someone like Chris Thorndyke, who is genuinely a shit character through and through. This is more comparable to Tails being bitchy in Lost World, or Amy being manipulative in Chronicles, or Sonic being a smug dumbass in IDW, or Shadow not wearing a Hawaiian shirt in Boom. Frustrating, regrettable, but not really the character's own fault.

Yet even after all that, there's one last kick in the teeth... How do you fix all this? And how do you fix it when he's since gained a sizable fandom, many of whom like him for these very attributes? If you leave it as it is, you're stuck with this big, awkward mess that everyone pretends to ignore. If you try to do something about it, you'll get complaints about disrespecting the True Silver Spirit, and you’ll get questions about why you didn't create a new character instead... And if you did use a new character for the sake of a clean slate, THEN you'd get complaints about not using Silver.

It's a tough call to be sure, and it's such a shame because like I said, I do appreciate his personality, so I can't say he's bad outright. But with all this... clutter, I can only put him in the average category. So, in he goes.

Crusher Gives Silver a: Thumbs Sideways!

Well, I'm glad this one's out of the way. Putting my thoughts into words with Silver was harder than it should have been. I do slightly regret starting this series off on a rather downer note, but rest assured, it's a lot more positive from this point onwards, since while I have higher praise for some heroes more than others, the hero characters as a whole fare a lot better than the majority of villains not named Eggman.

I guess you could say that I hope to show why Sonic's friends aren't as shitty as the haters would suggest. ;)

#Sonic Heroes: Sweet or Shite?#Opinion #Sonic the Hedgehog #Silver the Hedgehog

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dragonheart-swtor · 4 years

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Imperial Agent Storyline: Drunk History Version

Since people really seemed to like the last one! Y’all’s collective wish is my command. Spoilers for the Imperial Agent storyline, obviously. Enjoy!

- so you start out with your agent on Hutta, a little polluted slimeball of a world that literally everyone but the Hutts canonically hates. there's lore but we're going to ignore it. the important thing is that you're here to con a Hutt, always a dangerous gambit, into working with/for the Empire.

- you sneak into a corner to space facetime your boss, a guy we only ever know as Keeper because Intelligence is weird about names. sneaking into corners to facetime people is a repeating theme throughout the story.

- you are informed that you've already got a cover story set up, and you'll be posing as an infamous pirate called the Red Blade who'll be able to get in close to the Hutt in question, whose name I've forgotten. Nethro or Nefro or something.

- "wait, what about the actual Red Blade," you ask your boss, probably

- "he's halfway across the galaxy, you don't need to worry about him," your boss replies, in a textbook example of what we in the writing business call “foreshadowing”

- (spoiler alert: you need to worry about him)

- but we won't worry about that for now. bada bing bada boom, you stroll on into the Hutt's place. you are immediately confronted by a guy who, shock and horror, actually knows the real Red Blade and knows you ain't him. (one would think that all-seeing Intelligence would have known about him, but nuance.) this is a problem for a number of obvious reasons.

- your options are as follows: bribe him, kill him, or sleep with him. (this is also something of a recurring theme throughout the story.) whatever option you take, he's dealt with. (yes, this is the man eris fucked five minutes into her storyline.)

- (I didn’t want to pay him money, leave me alone.)

- anyway, the mission progresses smoothly. meet the Hutt, do some jobs for the Hutt, betray the Hutt's right hand and stab him in the back right after convincing him you were friends, invade the Hutt's rival's palace, McMurder the Hutt's rival, you know. your average day at the office

- most of the way through, the Hutt's other right hand starts to be suspicious about you. this is Kaliyo Djannis, and she will be Plot Relevant™.

- by which I mean she shortly thereafter walks in on you facetiming your boss and gets hired by Intelligence to help out for gods know what reason. welcome to your first companion

- (or possibly you walk in on her facetiming your boss in your room, I.. don't remember, honestly. something like that.)

- anyway one Hutt is dead the other is working with us bada bing bada boom this is going great and hey remember when I said you needed to worry about that guy you're impersonating this whole time? yeah, about that,

- so the real actual Red Blade comes sailing in to Hutta and Intelligence immediately calls you up like "hey, hate to bother you, but your cover's about to get blown in a big way and we need you to murder the guy whose identity you've stolen before he can expose you.”

- "so, just like that training mission last week. gotcha, boss, no problem."

- murder time™

- congration you done it! go home to Dromund Kaas.

- "You're on Imperial soil now, agent. Welcome home." [nonhuman Agent immediately experiences 27492738957 microaggressions] (this joke isn’t mine, for the record)

- first off, Intelligence HQ has a bomb aesthetic, as does the entire Empire in general

- second off, you do walk in on your boss talking to - by which I mean "being given a speech by" - a Dark Lord, which is less than optimal for a number of reasons, first and foremost that speeches by Dark Lords of the Sith quite often immediately precede someone getting killed

- said Dark Lord is one Darth Jadus, who will proceed to be a thorn in your side for approximately the next three hours of gameplay

- (don't worry, after that three hours you'll get a worse thorn)

- Darth Jadus decides he likes you and declares you "his" agent, which you immediately get the gist is about the worst thing that can happen to an Intelligence agent from the way everyone around you treats you like you've just had a ticking bomb strapped to your back for the rest of this meeting

- you're sent on a handful of missions, including one to the Dark Temple which, you know, Force-deaf people aren't supposed to be in, but Jadus Does Not Care

- Jadus calls you into his office at one point and tells you he's going to do some ritual to bind you to his service or something, it's not really clear, but it's clearly Not Optional and also terrifying in concept

- now, quick sidebar. there are basically two paths to take here: one where you suck up to the Sith and treat them with the utmost care and respect and fear like you're kind of supposed to, and one where you mouth off at every opportunity. Eris is mortally terrified of Sith, so she just kind of.. submitted knowing she was going to die if she didn't.

- my second run, however, was just a "hey how bad can I fuck this up" character because I already knew the story.

- I decided to mouth off to Jadus at every opportunity, including adamantly refusing this ritual.

- "What can he do to me?" I asked the person I was playing with. "I'm the protagonist! It's not like he can kill me!"

- Jadus: *kills me*

- me:

- (mechanically, anyway; story-wise I'm sure he just. put her on the brink of death. but mechanically speaking he literally actually did kill my toon)

- (this should be a warning for exactly how much this storyline is willing to put its usually-heavily-plot-armored protagonist through.)

- anyway.

- do some missions, blah blah blah, Sith possession in the Dark Temple, blah blah blah, you know the drill

- well, turns out Jadus is going on tour with several hundred Imperial civilians, military, and Sith, allegedly all hand chosen, to share his ~vision for the Empire~. that's all well and good, whatever I gue-

- sorry what do you mean his ship exploded

- what do you mean a member of the Dark Council just blew up in orbit

- cue Kill Bill sirens

- Panic! At The Intelligence HQ

- this throws everything into chaos; not only was Jadus more directly involved in Intelligence, but he was a Dark Councilor so now there's a massive power vacuum

- the Sith who ends up filling this power vacuum? Jadus's daughter, Darth Zhorrid.

- remember when I said you'd have a bigger thorn in your side after Jadus?

- so yeah. so Zhorrid is, for lack of a better word, fucking terrifying

- she's sadistic and completely careless of others' lives or wellbeing and oh yeah she also instantly latches onto you even harder than her father did and demands you find his killer

- a lot of your meetings with her aren't really plot-relevant so I'll sum them all up here:

- Zhorrid was horribly abused by Jadus, completely broken. She tells you a story about how she used to sing, and her father hired a tutor, then had her sing at a Kaas City performance until her throat was so damaged she could never sing again. He tore every scrap of joy out of her life, completely failed to teach her what she needed to know to survive the rigors of the Dark Council, and instilled every ounce of hatred, sadism, and complete lack of pity he could in her.

- She kills people for no reason other than a whim, because she was listening to a Sith opera and the aria was "very moving" (an actual literal thing that happens).

- She acts like a complete spoiled brat child. At one point the other Dark Councilors literally beat and torture her, presumably for this reason because she's insufferable and arrogant and way out of her depth, and she cries to you about it

- If you’re like me, your response to all this is basically “cool motive, still murder”

- I have sidetracked very hard. where was I

- so you spend a while trying to hunt down the people who blew up Jadus's ship. There's a bunch of rebels, you hunt them down, they've got biotech weapons called Eradicators set up to destroy cities on multiple planets, skippity skip to the big reveal

- Jadus is alive, and he organized the whole thing so he'd be able to remake the Empire into the image he wanted. He tortured and enslaved the survivors of the Dominator's destruction

- Jadus gives you a whole speech about how fear is a gift to be shared and "Through victory my chains are broken" but there must be chains to break and blah blah blah holy shit this man is genocidal

- you have three choices: join him for real, pretend to join him so you can sabotage his ship and then kill him (at the cost of hundreds of thousands of Imperial lives), or refuse outright and save those hundreds of thousands of lives but Jadus escapes (and you know he's allegedly likely to return and do even worse damage later).

- (Quick sidebar again, for those who haven’t played it: Eris chose the second option and has nightmares about it for the rest of her life. It's actually extremely haunting in-game - as you're running through Jadus's ship to sabotage it as fast as possible, you can hear the distress calls from various colonies and planets being attacked, the screams of the dying that you doomed. It's horrifying.)

- so yeah there’s really no winning that situation but hey! at least Chapter One’s over. surely in Chapter Two things can’t get worse.

- Chapter Two: Things Get Worse

- there's this guy, Ardun Kothe, an SIS agent. he's a huge threat for some reason I don't remember. you're supposed to infiltrate the SIS to get close to and eventually kill him. not an easy job, but okay, we can do this.

- Intelligence sets up the meeting; months ago they sent the first word to Kothe that there was an Intelligence agent ready to turn and they've been building up from there, sending him a steady stream of information

- enter Hunter, aka the worst bastard in this entire storyline and that is an achievement. He's the one you meet first on Nar Shaddaa.

- you do some missions for the SIS, whatever, it's not important. You finally get to meet the rest of the team - and Ardun Kothe.

- Kothe wants to speak alone, which is p typical tbh. He expresses some doubts, which you assuage as best you can; he gives you your code name: Legate. It's from a form of sabbac, he explains, you'll have to play with him sometime.

- (It is difficult for me to make what happens next funny instead of horrifying, so forgive me if the tone changes a bit here.)

- Everything is going fine.

- "I'm sorry about this, Legate."

- What?

- "Keyword: onomatophobia. Engage Thesh protocols, phase one."

- Everything is not fine.

- You black out and have an extremely rude awakening.

- So it turns out whatever happened with Jadus, the Dark Council decided you were too dangerous (usually for doing your job too fuckin well) and that you needed to be leashed. So not you have mind control programming in your brain, and anyone who has your keyword can take complete and unequivocal control of your body. this is, in a word, not great.

- (This is, as I mentioned, actually extremely horrifying. You have dialogue options and they don’t change what you actually say. You have an opportunity to shoot Kothe and even if you try to select it nothing happens. But we’re not here for the horror take (not today, anyway) so let’s just This Is Fine that and move on)

- Tl;dr you can’t harm Kothe or any members of his team, you’re forced to obey anyone who has your keyword, and this wouldn’t be that much of a problem because we’ll just tell Watcher Two what’s happened and oh wait you can’t tell anyone about your programming either. well, shit.

- You go on to work double agent, like it was planned, with this new, uh. twist

- about a third of the way through the chapter, your mind kind of cracks and you start having hallucinations - seeing things you know can't be real during a holocall, passing out in the middle of your ship and waking up in medbay.

- After that, a new voice lives in your head! Watcher X, someone you either killed or let flee on Nar Shaddaa, has sort of joined the party. Is he an AI in the spinal implant the real Watcher X gave you? is he a figment of your broken mind trying to process its situation? Who knows! Not you! either way, this is not optimal but at least he seems to be being helpful this time

- so anyway we should probably try and figure out how to undo this programming bc Intelligence is being Wholly Unhelpful

- (ASAP, please, especially with how horrible Hunter acts toward you - let’s go with “uncomfortably leery,” which I promise is generous.)

- by the way, your companions still have no idea what’s going on during all this, although they try to be varying levels of supportive (thank you vector I love you bug husband)

- Good news! The Intelligence Archive almost definitely has information on what they did to you and how to fix it. Bad news! You’re definitely not authorized to look that up and crashing the power mainframe to make sure they don’t see you do it sends the security droids after you. whoops.

- Good news! There’s a way to fix you. Bad news! You have to make and inject yourself with a still-kinda-experimental cocktail of chemicals and it may or may not give you permanent brain damage. it’s fine. this is fine.

- also it takes a while to kick in which is Less Than Optimal and by the time it finally does you’ve just been left with a binding order to stay and guard the door on what is, for you, a suicide mission. there’s some incentive to “break your chains” for ya.

- You fight and kill Kothe. Who, shock and awe! is an ex-Jedi! this was in no way painfully obvious by how he kept talking about “sensing” things, I’m sure. definitely not.

- Hunter escapes, because of fuckin course he does. Hunter, who suddenly seems far more in control of everything than he had before. Hunter, who knows far more than he should. Hunter, who ends up leading you to a much, much larger conspiracy.

- End Chapter 2.

- Hate to disappoint, but Chapter 3 is honestly the least interesting to me personally, so this’ll be brief compared to the previous chapters

- You spend a lot of time hunting down this much larger conspiracy, including Hunter specifically. There's a lot of betrayal and secret reveals. (It's not tedious by any stretch of the imagination, but the story beats definitely don't stick in my head as well as the first two chapters, even after two playthroughs.)

- you go to Voss and, in order to get into a Voss-only archive, get married to a person you just met before almost immediately leaving the planet (and your new spouse) behind. this is never mentioned again.

- you get hold of a holorecording from the Star Cabal, the big conspiracy. problem: the holorecording contains a trap for the brain-enhanced Watchers, and now half of Intelligence is in a vegetative state. this is not optimal.

- partially as a result of this, Intelligence basically gets dissolved, which is Not Great because it puts you right under the thumb of yet another asshole Sith lord

- the Watchers are recovering, though, so that’s something. Watcher Two, now Keeper (the old Keeper got promoted), contacts you so you can keep working on this Star Cabal thing.

- you get intentionally captured so the Star Cabal can torture you and you can “break” and give them false information to lead them into a trap. you are immediately afterward expected to get back to work like nothing happened. this is never mentioned again.

- You track the Star Cabal to their base, way out in the Unknown Regions iirc, and infiltrate it during a meeting of the top agents.

- murder time 2: electric boogaloo (well, more like murder time 45, to be honest, but shh it’s fine)

- You fight the Star Cabal guys, chase Hunter through the whole place, and finally corner him.

- (Salt warning ahead on my part for the next story beat, if you can call it that.)

- Hunter, when beaten, reveals what I personally think is the most bullshit stupid reveal in the entire game: he is actually a she, and has been using a stealth field generator (or something similar) to change his/her appearance the entire time. There are multiple interpretations of this - "he's trans" is my least favorite, sorry-not-sorry, because a) it's pretty clear she still considers herself a woman and Hunter is just a convenient persona, and also b) a clearly predatory man is absolutely horrid representation as far as playing into harmful stereotypes about trans people, thanks. Personally, my rather cynical interpretation is that they wanted one more shock value reveal at the end of the storyline and I guess couldn't come up with anything better. It's my least favorite thing in the whole IA storyline.

- anyway, that's not really important. I just needed to be mad about it for a minute. ignore me. moving on

- The important part is this: what you gain from the Star Cabal's base is an item called the Black Codex, an ancient piece of technology with the power to erase all records of a person's existence.

- Unless you are very stubborn about it the Agent’s reaction to this is basically “oh thank fuck I’m freeeeeeeeee” and you fly off into the hyperspace sunset with your crew, giving middle fingers to the Sith whose grip you’re escaping all the way. which, really, who can blame you.

And that’s the Imperial Agent storyline, folks. Roll credits. I’ll probably do the Bounty Hunter storyline next while it’s still fresh in my mind, but I could also do the Sith Warrior storyline probably if y’all’re more interested, vote now on your phones.

#unfortunately I don’t remember jack shit from the Jedi Knight storyline #so until i finish replaying it y'all're just gonna have to hold your horses on that one #swtor #imperial agent #drunk history swtor #i have the original much more serious version of me summarizing that first scene with kothe in drafts btw #should anyone want to see it #it's the version where i actually tried to get across to someone who'd never played the game the absolute horror of that scene #and was; i think; fairly successful #the notes on the sith inquisitor post have finally slowed down so i think it's time to post this one

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princeanxious · 4 years

Note

I love your dragon au, may I have some headcanons?

Uh sure! You weren’t ship specific so i’ll try and be a lil broad and touch on a few for all of em! (Theyre all interconnected in a way but often spend much of their time together apart from the others bc thats how dragons be, even if these dragons are much more social than the average dragon)

Demus- Dragon Remus x Prince(ess) Janus

- Janus is ftm trans! His parents were never supportive and actively tried to hide that from that kingdom at every turn, so, he may have secretly gotten a certain mage’s help “cursing” him with snake/dragon scales & additional certain masculine attributes so that he’d be sent away and get time to live his life without royal duties breathing down his neck. Even if he’d have to live the rest of his life as a prince locked away in a tower.

-Remus is a Dragon that’s known to be very curious, driven to hoard things that intruige him. He lives in a castle he and his brother Roman overtook years ago, and they guard it and their hoards within it well. However, one day a nearby kingdom reached out to them with an offer: if they guard and protect Prince Janus while the kingdom scrambles to figure out what to do, the dragons will recieve offerings to add to their hoards along with provided meals and the means to provide for Janus. All the kingdom requests is to keep Janus safe and happy.

-and of course, they agree to. And Remus falls head over tail inlove in a matter of days. Janus follows soon after he finds that Remus is completely unbothered and supportive of Janus’s transition.

-Janus and Roman also get along super well, tho not in a romantic sense, especially after Roman learns of Janus’s love for plays and acting skills. Roman also gifts a few intricate outfits to Janus from his Hoard of beauty and passion bc they fit the short prince quite well, and because Janus wasn’t given anything to wear from his kingdom aside from tailored princess dresses(which he doesn’t usually mind the skirts portions now w/ his new body but somedays the disphoria would spike back out if he looked in the mirror while wearing one). Roman also helped cut Janus’s hair, and both dragons would growl threateningly at any kingdom official who dared look at Janus’s attire change questioningly. If anyone asked, it was because it made Janus happy and feel safe, and that was their job, was it not?

-Janus loves his new Dragon Boyfriend and his new Dragon brother-in-law(technically?) and this result just solidifies his confidence in the decision he made to get here. Roman and Remus know about the secret behind the curse and what Janus did to get here, they think he’s super fcking clever bc of it. And, Ro and Re swear on their hoards that they’ll never spill the secret if Dee doesn’t want them to, one because the Kingdom would then have a lead on trying to Reverse the Curse, and two, because it would put the life of the mage who was asked to do it in danger, and three, because their dragons and dragons are very very good at protecting what they love.

Logince- Dragon Roman x Knight Logan

-Logan is a prince to a neighboring kingdom, and he was betrothed to Janus in an arranged marraige sort of settup. Niether of them loved the other like that, but they were best friends and Logan respected(and defended) Janus being trans. So when he finds out something happened to Janus, he’s alarmed and upset that he wasn’t informed sooner. Then he finds out Janus is being guarded by dragons, of all things! And well, he needs to make sure Janus us safe, and find out whats wrong, what happened? And no one stops him from traveling out to the castle that houses the dragons to find out. The least he can do is make sure Janus is okay and respected by the dragons, but like hell is he going to wait for Janus’s scrabling kingdom to catch up.

The first thing he’s greeted by is a tall red scaled dragon, and he’s immediately on guard. The dragon grins and drops into a defense position. They don’t ask the other questions, which Janus will give both of them shit for later, but both parties are fueled by challenge and protective goals. And they launch into battle without a word.

-Roman is immediately intruiged and excited to find how Logan matches him in a fight, actually standing a pretty solid chance despite his weight and height. Logan is a skilled swords man, the best in his kingdom, its a shame his only downfall is that Roman has twice the height on him and more than twice the muscles, figuratively and literally. But even then Logan isn’t deterred and is capable of flipping the dragon onto his back which is p hot roman cant lie, so its a p even scuffle bc Romans highly entertained w/ this mysterious attacker.

-they kinda get caught up in the scuffle for a good while till Remus comes out to investigate and Logan disengages and dashes into the forest bc he’s smart enough to know he can’t really win the fight w/ one dragon, two is a death sentence.

-roman spends the whole night heated and excited as he rambles about the gorgeous short knight who nearly kicked his ass. Logan spends the whole night rethinking his strategy and trying not to get distracted by the memory of the infuriatingly hot smirk the dragon kept aiming at him.

-they scuffle twice more, filled with witty remarks and snarky quips that progressively get more flirty before they think to speak about /why/ Logan wants into the castle b4 the truth comes out.

-both are a little sheepish when Janus finds out just who Roman’s been waxing poetic about kicking his butt in an even match and spend a good 20 minutes scolding their gay af selves. Then Logan gets updated on the whole situation, including his not so subtle transition and his new dragon bf. Logan gets the dragon’s permission to visit so long as he keeps things a secret, and he scoffs that they’d think he’d even dare to try to ruin his best friends happiness.

-niether of them really knows when their little rivalry picked back up, but Roman and Logan spend their time together bickering and taunting eachother while playing a semi-unbalanced game of cat and mouse. Logan’s not allowed into the castle w/o playing their game first, and he honestly doesn’t mind. Their interactions get way more flirty and theyre just gay disasters that take way to long to admit their developing feelings till it all kinda rushes out the moment Roman pins Logan to a wall and Logan reaponds by locking his legs around the other, daring to keep him there.

-yeah they express their feelings to eachother in many ways that day. And Logan ends up secretly(to his kingdom at least) dating Roman, and Roman gets a prince bf of his own. They still taunt and play their game of cat and mouse tho, now its just accompanied by a ton more kissing.

Moxiety- Dragon Patton x Mage Virgil

-Virgil is the mage that helped Janus transition in secret, they’d been friends for a long while and meeting in secret to plan it. Virgil’s a pretty powerful mage and talented at what he does, and Janus’s trasition was a spell he cast himself, and its irreversable(on purpose, by Janus’s request/demand)

-Virgil travels alot now adays, never staying in one public place too long in fear of Janus’s knights suspecting him and capturing him. He knew the risk and was willing to pay the price to make Janus happy. He knows he must lay low for a while, and hes not very open about being a mage in fear of that being found out.

-well, one day he finds himself in a town not so open to the idea of magic in general. Its one slip up hes not sure he regrets to heal an injured child, but he finds him self tied to a wooden stake that same day, surrounded by a village chanting about how all magic is evil.

-and then a dragon swoops over and snags him from the fire as it ignites, just barely sinking his clothing before hes up in the sky. He promply blacks out from shock.

-and when he wakes up, he finds himself tucked carefully into a hammock with a soft blanket. The room he’s in is filled with an interesting assortment of things, haphazardly placed enough to register as a hoard than any other kind of room in this tower. That and the dragon that rescued him is resting nearby, his blue scaled wing outstretched and draped over Virgil protectively is kind of a dead giveaway too.

-Virgil would learn later that Patton had been following him, lead by how his hoarding instincts weirdly worked. He’d be thankful then, that they saved his life, despite the fact that he now technically counted to Patton’s instincts as part of his hoard. Patton was adamant that he’d been trying to rid himself of the attachment before, but once Virgil was in danger his insticts had been set aside to save the poor human. He couldn’t help that touching Virgil just solidified his instincts’s claim.

-Patton lets Virgil know he’s welcomed to leave any time he wants to, that they were safely away from the dangerous village now. Virgil finds he doesn’t want to leave just yet, and they settle on becoming friends.

-Patton is friends with Roman and Remus, and often visits them when he’s feeling too lonely. He’s plenty friendly with Janus and Logan at this point, being a much softer natured dragon than the twin dragons.

-the group finds it very, very coincidental and very ironic the first time Patton brings Virgil with him to hang out.

-their love story is a bit slower, but lets just say one day months down the line, Virgil pulls Patton into a really shy kiss and Patton all but startles Virgil with the happy purr that bursts from the back of his throat. Its not to much longer after that that theyre relationship is fully established.

#find more abt the other side of this au on my nsfs blog ;)#or send asks too. either way i rly do love this au #fantasy dragon au #sanders sides #virgil sanders #patton sanders #roman sanders #logan sanders #deceit sanders #remus sanders gif #janus sanders #luka writes #logince #demus #moxiety

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kryptsune · 3 years

Note

Tell us more about the mythology of Yokaitale, or perhaps even what specific versions of Wonderland inspired Wonderfell (like did you take anything from the 2 American McGee games at all?)

🌼 Wonderfell is a fun one. I take inspiration from way too many adaptations to list here but yes you are correct I am a huge fan of McGee’s interpretation so that does creep in. If you noticed Chesh has a hoop earring. That is definitely inspired by that version. I don’t take too much from the Disney version since... I know this is controversial but I don’t think it’s the best adaptation. It gets the usual Disney family-friendly treatment. Which is fine I still love it but if you know me I like things a little more... mature.

I was also inspired by games like Alicemare, IB, Yume Nikki. It doesn’t make sense now in the context of the fic but it will. Wonderland has always suspended the real and the surreal and I definitely play with that concept a lot. Things are not always as they seem.

I always felt like Undertale initially was an Alice in Wonderland variation from falling down a hole into a magic world, to a cast of colorful crazy characters, to having to sacrifice or grow in some way along the journey. It’s why I made Wonderfell because I have always seen Sans as a Cheshire archetype and not just because of the grin. It’s more like his abilities. The Cheshire cat can disappear and re-appear at will. It’s not a direct one to one but his teleportation abilities are very similar. Pap has always embodied the Mad Hatter for me especially with his fascination with puzzles instead of riddles.

I also really wanted a more fun and colorful take on UF stuff. I am really tired of Boss always being angry or Red always being abusive... or I don’t know that characterization that made me make my own version (Underworld AU) in the first place. Or god... them being just a shit post. I know it’s nice to have those every once in a while but I always felt the missed opportunity to actually make them something other than cardboard cutouts. In my opinion, I feel like a lot of my boys have taken on a life all their own. It’s why I am using them in my original work.

Yokaifell? Well, it kind of stems from some of my favorite anime of all time, Kamisama Hajitemashita being one of them. There is just something really cool about yokai lore because I always make the joke that if you go to Japan anything can and will kill you. There are so many yokai to work off of too so that's where the inspiration comes from.

{READ MORE FOR LENGTH PURPOSES}

Mythology wise my Yokaifell lore post goes into quite a bit but the things that I have not mentioned in that is how the world works outside of the main story.

As I continue to develop Souly Damned I have been wanted to add more and more of the things that have influenced my storytelling so they kind of cross over in ideas. The realm of yokai in this instance is a separate realm (I do know they are spirits but just bear with me). You can think of it as another dimension separate from our own but still accessible. It is possible for mortal souls to enter the spirit realm but souls are kind of the key here.

Normally humans just walk through the gates and never end up in the realm because they don’t believe in the realm or its inhabitants. Those that can see have the realm's magic buried within them and the more they worship/believe the more that influence grows. In the majority of my work, I ascribe to the idea that the eyes are the windows into the soul so the more magic you have the more vibrant your eye color.

Since Yokaifell is set in modern-day most humans have normal eye colors. Basically, magic = key in this lore. Now you may be wondering why my Frisk, little out of her element bean that she is, is able to run through the gate. She starts off as a normal unsuspecting human who is lost in the forest whom Ryou accidentally lures. Usually, he does that on purpose to mess with humans but in this case, he is just playing his koto and relaxing. Since the town that Frisk moves to is more in the mountains the people there are very in tune with the old ways. They even warn her not to go into the forest because of it. She just doesn’t listen since she doesn’t believe in magic or superstition.

The yokai in my lore can only be seen by those with magic in their soul unless they drop the veil. Obviously being a foreigner she has 0 idea what Ryou is trying to tell her when she first encounters him. That is until he imparts just a sliver of magic on her soul so that she can actually understand the language. But... uh... whoopsie. Humans with magic are rare and that makes them incredibly yummy to the yokai around the area. This creates a chain event where she ends up in the spirit realm and because of Ryou’s mistake she is able to pass through the gate like one of them would. The oni chasing them ends up smashing the gate they came through and there you are... she is stuck which you can already gather is dangerous.

Ryou and Kuro are two yokai you don’t really want to mess with because their past history is seeped in blood. They both despise mortals for some unknown reason. One that is revealed further down in the spoiler section. How they went from practically killing mortal and yokai to laxer is also kind of a question mark. Kuro is able to quell his rage by serving the kami (in this case Asgore) while Ryou... uh... ok he doesn’t really handle it all that great. He is just a very salty boy.

Like my lore for Souly Damned lower level of yokai can not just jump to the mortal realm whenever they want. There is a hierarchy established and fortunately, Ryou and Kuro are pretty high up there so they can interact to some degree. I have that outlined further in the lore post.

I will say that in order to explain this I have to toss up a spoiler warning for anyone that does not want to see it. {THERE BE SPOILERS AHEAD}

So... spoiler time but Ryou and his brother Kuro used to be humans at some point. This was centuries ago but they both died when a rival village tried to eradicate their own. Kuro being the proud warrior went off to fight, leaving his little brother to watch over the rest. Unfortunately Ryou never actually sees his brother again and yeah... it’s sad to say but he dies on the battlefield. Ever since he was a child he wanted to be a warrior. He dies fullfilling that dream.

Ryou though being younger tries to fend off the attackers but he is eventually mortally wounded and left for dead. He bleeds out as the snow starts to fall again which is why his design not only incorporates red but also the snowfall aspect, especially his human guise.

In that time there was more magic and yokai roamed freely. The souls were far stronger and because of both Ryou and Kuro’s deeply held emotion that affects their souls eventually calling out to the Kami... they are then reborn as yokai in the process. Ryou as the mischevious Kitsune and Kuro as a gashadokuro samurai. So it’s established that humans can become yokai but it's rare as the centuries progress. It takes an incredibly strong soul coupled with some kind of deep emotion which could be anything from rage to love.

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zachsgamejournal · 3 years

Text

PLAYING: Breath of Fire 4

This was supposed to read COMPLETED: Breath of Fire 4, but the designers decided in lieu of story and character development, they’d pack in a billion bosses in the longest dungeon this game has ever seen.

So we arrive a fishing village. It’s cute, but small. That’s the weird thing about this game, every town and dungeon is very compact. Even the village with a giant canon shooting nuclear-level hexes at places is smaller than a 7-11 parking lot. Anyway, village. In order to progress, we need directions...I guess. The only guy with directions won’t give’em until we bring him one of three things. I decided to go search some ruins for a special item. It took a while, but i found it and the path was revealed.

This brings us to the world map: unlike BoF3, instead of moving about freely, the player moves along paths to hot-spots: like Mario RPG. So you cannot discover places without being allowed. This is a good way to control the player’s progress. It also prevents confusion, like in Breath of Fire 3 when you move to the East Continent and everything is just available to the player, but you’re not quite sure where to go. But this also carries the issue of having to “lock” every new location until the player fulfills a prerequisite.

So...we went south. We found some nomads. They warned us the checkpoint to the capital was closed due to some business. We instructed to go through a tomb. This is the tomb where Fou-Lu came out. We run into his guardian, and defeat him. This was a fun fight. It was challenging but not overwhelming. I had to shuffle characters, manage healing, and pull off some good spell combos: fun.

But then at the end of the tomb is another boss. This boss is a pair of dice. Dice one is impervious to magic attacks. The other is impervious to physical attacks.They both have spells that murder and insanely injure in a single hit. This boss was not fun. But I survived.

So we get back to canon town. Ursula gets us on the inside. We move up to a headquarters on the hill. Inside, we find injured soldiers. Moving through some weird lab with a giant organ in the middle we find a room filled with...more giant organs. I remember this part, but I actually thought this happened sooner. Anyway, ELINA is here, we found her! She warns us that a tentacle or something that is blocking our way can only be cut with the Dragon Slayer, a sword that Yuna--a bad guy--has. Talking to the injured troops, we’re told Yuna is at the check point.

Giant eye roll here friend: GIANT EYE ROLL.

Get to the check point, Yuna says he doesn’t want to fight. Ryu isn’t playing though, he swipes at Yuna and the dragon slayer is dropped at our feet. Yuna flees and we take the sword back to the organ room. As we make our way through gunk and ribs, we find small house in an indoor garden. Inside is Elina.

Yuna is there to explain. To shoot the Hex Canon, they need a sacrifice. The more attachment the sacrifice has to the region targeted, the stronger the hex. Also, they need to fill the sacrifice with negative feelings. So they torture the sacrifice, horrifically. The problem, according to Yuna, is that the sacrifice often dies. So Yuna wanted to create a permanent sacrifice. Something that could survive the torture and be used again. So taking parts of monsters and using a variety of black magic, Yuna turn Elina into an “endless” (a god, like Ryu and Deis). But she doesn’t look human. Her lower torso down is grotesque mix of enlarged organs spilling out of her. Those ribs we climbed up were hers. Those tentacles we cut, were hers.

It’s gross.

And depressing.

It’s weird, BoF3 was like hit after hit of emotionally challenging scenarios. Nothing this dark, but consistently more than “hero defeats evil”. But this is some dark shit. Cruel. it’s not morally grey. It’s evil.

And Yuna escapes again.

Elina and Cray are in love. So she asks Cray to put her out of her misery. Cray is quite heart broken. Cray doesn’t tell the others what he did, but they know and they support him.

We’re now committed to find Fou-Lu. we get to the capital and it’s destroyed. refugees are sprinkled about, lost and confused about why this is happening. Imperial soldiers are injured and express absolute fear of what’s happening. We find a general. It’s interesting that bad guys in the city are thieves (looters, I guess?). Turns out it’s Ursula’s grandfather. They have a moment before we enter the castle. It’s interesting, despite the empire being evil, the soldiers don’t seem to share the innate cruelty of their commanders...but you know. You commit to serving monsters, you don’t come out smelling of roses.

SO--finally in the castle. I’m like, “This is it--I’m finally about to beat this game.” Nope. The largest, most confusing dungeon in the whole game. I mean, it makes sense, it’s the final dungeon. But so much of this game was short, compact dungeons. There’s no more story left. We know all the plot, we know all the character stories (for the most part), yet there’s hours of gameplay here.

The castle is confusing as hell. At the beginning is a door that says you need a blue charm. Damn. So I start wandering the basement. I got turned around and confused so many times. Every time I thought: “This is it”, I found a dead end with some shitty treasure. It’s not fun. I’m not high level, so none of the fights are a breeze. I can still win, but it takes work and concentration. So it sucks being lost and bumping into a fight every 30 seconds.

FINALLY I find another boss: Dragonne. It’s like a zombie dragon or something. After every round, he heals for 15,000 hp. No way I can do that much damage in a single round, so I’m freaking out. I check online, they suggest using a dragon form to knock out the healing. After that, the battle isn’t too bad. Afterwards, I get lost again and find a door now needing a red charm.

DOES THIS NEVER END!?!?

I checked a guide. Apparently Dragonne dropped a blue charm. I missed it. I had to call it a night. I really thought I was gonna wrap this up, but god...

#Zach's Game Journal #PLAYING #Breath of Fire 4 #PlayStation #PS1 #DuckStation #Emulation #Video Games #For Elina #Imperialism is bad

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