#honestly the only way i can think of them reconciling

[teecupangel]

Been playing AC3 again lately and, for some reason, listening to Bill. It's great to hate him for his father of the franchise thing, but he seemed pretty sincere about trying to find Desmond beofore Absetergo. I'm kinda curious what would have happend if the Assassins did get there beforehand.

I agree that Bill was being sincere in finding Desmond before Abstergo did. I always saw him as someone who wanted to do what was best for Desmond and tried to protect him the only way he knew how. But that didn’t mean he didn’t hurt Desmond and his actions can easily be misinterpreted (especially by someone as young as Desmond was during that time) so yeah… Bill wanted to protect Desmond and he loved him in his own way but that didn’t mean he wasn’t a bad father.

And that would show even if he was able to find Desmond before Abstergo managed to capture him.

You did write ‘get there beforehand’ and I’m going to assume this means that they’ll be able to save Desmond from being abducted by Abstergo or get there before Abstergo captures him.

If it was the latter, Desmond would try to run away from the Assassins as well and probably won’t believe that Abstergo was trying to capture him (it would be funny and annoying if Desmond get captured by Cross because he was busy running away from the Assassins sent to get him) so…

We’ll have Desmond get saved by the Assassins during the time he was being captured by Abstergo. Cross and his goons would be surprised and the Assassins would use that to get Desmond out using the van Abstergo was about to use.

From there, Desmond would be escorted to the nearest hideout but, here’s the thing…

Since Lucy is staying with Abstergo, this means that Desmond would be saved by other Assassins and it can’t be Shaun and Rebecca because they’re more on the support side (until around Unity) so…

This means that the Assassins who would save Desmond would be those who tried to save him and died in AC1.

The ones to have been ‘implied’ to have been from the Farm.

It would feel like he was back on the Farm, surrounded by people he knew.

Would they be happy to see him?

Would they see him as stupid and foolish?

Those would be the things Desmond would be worrying about and he would want to run away, far away.

He would now understand that Abstergo does want him because of who he was but he would refuse to be an Assassin and he doesn’t want to be one, not ever.

Which means when he meets with William Miles…

Both of their voices would start to raise.

Words would leave their mouths that they may or may not regret later on.

Bill will call him the life he had spent living away from the Assassins as meaningless and without direction.

Desmond would say that he had been happiest away from the Assassins and that he didn’t want to be part of this shit.

In the end, Bill will raise his hand and hit his son.

And that punch will break whatever ‘foolish’ dreams Desmond held onto about making up with his parents, of finding some kind of middle ground.

And Desmond would do it once more.

He had done it before.

And he never forgot the lessons.

… that night, Desmond Miles disappeared once more.

And this time…

He was making sure no one would find him ever again.

#i was wondering if you wanted them to reconcile #but a desmond who doesn’t know his lineage and how important his bloodline is #and a bill who sees desmond as someone who wasted his life #would have a fight that would be much more explosive than the one in ac3 #honestly the only way i can think of them reconciling #is thru a long slow process #where bill doesn’t just acknowledge his shortcomings #but also to actually say ‘i’m sorry’ to his son #while desmond needs to not get carried away #by his past memories both the bad ones and the good ones #and see what bill is doing now #bill doesn’t deserve to be forgiven immediately #he needs to work for it #and desmond deserves more than just one conversation #he needs to see that bill changed or he can changed #ask and answer #assassin's creed #desmond miles #william miles #teecup writes/has a plot #fic idea: assassin's creed

[swordmaid]

tav shri’iia is THE canon for me obvi but I also really like the idea of tav wren with yves still being part of the dead three as bhaal’s chosen. the thing with wren is that he was yves’ childhood friend who was pursuing his bard career and severely flopping. one night when he was supposed to escort yves home from the graveyard he chose to perform in some tavern instead, and that night is when the bhaalists came and killed her. for him, one of his closest friends just went missing the night he was supposed to look after her, and when she returns 2 weeks later all beaten up and bloody with no memory of herself ofc he felt guilty….! and he couldn’t even bear to look at her because it’s all his fault u know … if only he didn’t ditched her maybe this wouldn’t have happened so one night he just decides to leave bc he couldn’t take it anymore. it’s always been his dream to be a travelling bard anyway and maybe his career will pick up in some other city than baldur’s gate, so he leaves her and his home and sets out to salvage what he can of his career. and in the most part he was mildly successful. he also ends up making a pact with some fae and they help with his bard career too lol but the guilt of yves is still in his mind- he just got better at ignoring it.

SO. imagine his surprise when he gets tadpoled and goes to moonrise to find a cure and he sees his friend - the girl that’s been haunting his dreams and the source of his guilt and shame - a part of the evil cult that’s been enslaving people with parasites. and now he’s meant to kill her? but how could he when he’s the one who left her behind and maybe it’s his fault that she turned out like this … but anyway I love the idea of wren being like noooo that’s NOT yves she would never do that!! and they’re just like girl ur delusional ur friend is literally chopping people up forcing us to find the parts like some treasure hunt

#but durge era yves is so similar to glados to me where she is so mild about everything and instead of forcing you to test #she forces you to figure out the murder mysteries around the lower city and present ur case in the murder tribunal #like as she says. the only thing better than murder is getting away with it and what’s more fun than to watch someone figure out the puzzle #you set for them u kno 🤭🤭 #and her proposition to ally w her is that she wants u to figure out the whole absolute ploy and how it started and what role she plays #and the only way to get those answers is to break in gortash’s place which betrays his trust … so it’s like a fun whodunit for her..!! #also i think wren finds out what actually happens to her that night .. learning that his real friend died and got replaced with this other o #other one who’s essentially just wearing her skin … reconciling with the truth that if he was with her she would’ve lived … killing this #yves for his friend so she can have some peace finally .. etc etc. it’s really about ween #wren*s survivor’s guilt bc I like to imagine they had another friend who he left with to look after yves #and when he finally returned after how many years he learns that friend has been dead (bc yves killed him) and allegedly yves’ mental #health went downhill when their friend died so she had to be sent away #which in truth she just left for the bhaal temple lol #anyway just thinking abt this three.. def wanna do a wren playthrough one day ..!! #also their other friend’s name is pan (full name xaphan) and they’re a tiefling but idk abt their appearance yet #making them a tiefling so yves’ first kill post lobotomy links back to her og friends where - if #it’s alfira she’s a bard like wren and tiefling like pan … but honestly pan could be Dragonborn too if she ends up killing quill lol #shut up about bg3. #bg3

[inhonoredglory]

Aziraphale’s Choice, the Job Connection, and Michael Sheen’s Morality

Update: Michael Sheen liked this post on Twitter, so I'm fairly certain there is a lot of validity to it.

I’ve had time to process Aziraphale’s choice at the end of Season 2. And I think only blaming the religious trauma misses something important in Aziraphale’s character. I think what happened was also Aziraphale’s own conscious choice––as a growth from his trauma, in fact. Hear me out.

Since November 2022 I’ve been haunted by something Michael Sheen said at the MCM London Comic Con. At the Q&A, someone asked him about which fantasy creature he enjoyed playing most and Michael (bless him, truly) veered on a tangent about angels and goodness and how, specifically,

We as a society tend to sort of undervalue goodness. It’s sort of seen as sort of somehow weak and a bit nimby and “oh it’s nice.” And I think to be good takes enormous reserves of courage and stamina. I mean, you have to look the dark in the face to be truly good and to be truly of the light…. The idea that goodness is somehow lesser and less interesting and not as kind of muscular and as passionate and as fierce as evil somehow and darkness, I think is nonsense. The idea of being able to portray an angel, a being of love. I love seeing the things people have put online about angels being ferocious creatures, and I love that. I think that’s a really good representation of what goodness can be, what it should be, I suppose.

I was looking forward to BAMF!Aziraphale all season long, and I think that’s what we got in the end. Remember Neil said that the Job minisode was important for Aziraphale’s story. Remember how Aziraphale sat on that rock and reconciled to himself that he MUST go to Hell, because he lied and thwarted the will of God. He believed that––truly, honestly, with the faith of a child, but the bravery of a soldier.

Aziraphale, a being of love with more goodness than all of Heaven combined, believed he needed to walk through the Gates of Hell because it was the Right Thing to do. (Like Job, he didn’t understand his sin but believed he needed to sacrifice his happiness to do the Right Thing.)

That’s why we saw Aziraphale as a soldier this season: the bookshop battle, the halo. But yes, the ending as well.

Because Aziraphale never wanted to go to Heaven, and he never wanted to go there without Crowley.

But it was Crowley who taught him that he could, even SHOULD, act when his moral heart told him something was wrong. While Crowley was willing to run away and let the world burn, it was Aziraphale (in that bandstand at the end of the world) who stood his ground and said No. We can make a difference. We can save everyone.

And Aziraphale knew he could not give up the ace up his sleeve (his position as an angel) to talk to God and make them see the truth in his heart.

I was messed up by Ineffable Bureaucracy (Boxfly) getting their happy ending when our Ineffable Husbands didn’t, but I see now that them running away served to prove something to Aziraphale. (And I am fully convinced that Gabriel and Beelzebub saw the example of the Ineffables at the Not-pocalypse and took inspiration from them for choosing to ditch their respective sides)

But my point is that Aziraphale saw them, and in some ways, they looked like him and Crowley. And he saw how Gabriel, the biggest bully in Heaven, was also like him in a way (a being capable of love) and also just a child when he wasn’t influenced by the poison of Heaven. Muriel, too, wasn’t a bad person. The Metatron also seemed to have grown more flexible with his morality (from Aziraphale's perspective). Like Earth, Heaven was shades of (light?) gray.

Aziraphale is too good an angel not to believe in hope. Or forgiveness (something he’s very good at it).

Aziraphale has been scarred by Heaven all his life. But with the cracks in Heaven’s armor (cracks he and Crowley helped create), Aziraphale is seeing something else. A chance to change them. They did terrible things to him, but he is better than them, and because of Crowley, he feels ready to face them.

(Will it work? Can Heaven change, institutionally? Probably not, but I can't blame Aziraphale for trying.)

At the cafe, the Metatron said something big was coming in the Great Plan. Aziraphale knows how trapped he had felt when he didn’t have God’s ear the first time something huge happened in the Big Plan. He can’t take a chance again to risk the world by not having a foot in the door of Heaven. That’s why we saw individual human deaths (or the threat of death) so much more this season: Elspeth, Wee Morag, Job’s children, the 1940s magician. Aziraphale almost killed a child when he couldn’t get through to God, and he’s not going through that again.

“We could make a difference.” We could save everyone.

Remember what Michael Sheen said about courage and doing good––and having to “look the dark in the face to be truly good.” That’s what happened when Aziraphale was willing to go to Hell for his actions. That’s what happened when he decided he had to go to Heaven, where he had been abused and belittled and made to feel small. He decided to willingly go into the Lion’s Den, to face his abusers and his anxiety, to make them better so that they would not try to destroy the world again.

Him, just one angel. He needed Crowley to be there with him, to help him be brave, to ask the questions that Heaven needed to hear, to tell them God was wrong. Crowley is the inspiration that drives Aziraphale’s change, Crowley is the engine that fuels Aziraphale’s courage.

But then Crowley tells him that going to Heaven is stupid. That they don’t need Heaven. And he’s right. Aziraphale knows he’s right.

Aziraphale doesn’t need Heaven; Heaven needs him. They just don’t know how much they need him, or how much humanity needs him there, too. (If everyone who ran for office was corrupt, how can the system change?)

Terry Pratchett (in the Discworld book, Small Gods) is scathing of God, organized religion, and the corrupt people religion empowers, but he is sympathetic to the individual who has real, pure faith and a good heart. In fact, the everyman protagonist of Small Gods is a better person than the god he serves, and in the end, he ends up changing the church to be better, more open-minded, and more humanist than god could ever do alone.

Aziraphale is willing to go to the darkest places to do the Right Thing, and Heaven is no exception. When Crowley says that Heaven is toxic, that’s exactly why Aziraphale knows he needs to go there. “You’re exactly is different from my exactly.”

____

In the aftermath of Trump's election in the US, Brexit happened in 2018. Michael Sheen felt compelled to figure out what was going on in his country after this shock. But he was living in Los Angeles with Sarah Silverman at the time, and she also wanted to become more politically active in the US.

Sheen: “I felt a responsibility to do something, but it [meant] coming back [to Britain] – which was difficult for us, because we were very important to each other. But we both acknowledge that each of us had to do what we needed to do.” In the end, they split up and Michael moved back to the UK.

Sometimes doing the Right Thing means sacrificing your own happiness. Sometimes it means going to Hell. Sometimes it means going to Heaven. Sometimes it means losing a relationship.

And that’s why what happened in the end was so difficult for Aziraphale. Because he loves Crowley desperately. He wants to be together. He wanted that kiss for thousands of years. He knows that taking command of Heaven means they would never again have to bow to the demands of a God they couldn’t understand, or run from a Hell who still came after them. They could change the rules of the game.

And he’s still going to do that. But it hurts him that he has to do that alone.

#good omens #good omens 2 #ineffable husbands #it's kinda like capt america: civil war #with Azi as Tony Stark: traumatized and trying to do the right thing #and Crowley being Steve Rogers: fuck the establishment let's go rogue #gos2spoilers #good omens meta #good omens 2 meta #go s2 #michael sheen #go s2 meta #go meta #*mine #*mymeta #ineffables husbands #ineffable soulmates #*mybest

[jewishconvertthings]

I can't remember if I've posted about this before, but tonight I was reminded by a class of a thing that I think may be helpful for some folks.

Because converting is *so* permanent and irreversible, and one should take it at least as seriously as entering a marriage (with the understanding that there is no divorce, only alienation), I think it's honestly a good idea to wait until you've had a major fight with your Judaism before you complete your conversion.

It's the same principle as wanting to wait until you've been sick with the flu together or had a major life setback or are lost at 2 a.m. on a road trip with your fiance before you actually get married. In that case, you want to know (1) what does this scenario bring out in them? (2) what does this scenario bring out in you? (3) how do those things interact with each other? and, most importantly: (4) how do you resolve it together?

With Judaism, it's easy to fall in love with Torah. It's easy to fall in love with an idealized version of your community. With the rituals and the liturgy and the music and the ruach.

It's harder to learn a point of halacha that hurts deeply and to be forced to reconcile what you know in your bones is right with the reality of the words of Torah and its interpretation by the rabbis. It's harder to meet your congregation in love and tochecha when they have fallen short of their vision and failed you in important ways. It's harder to force yourself to engage in mitzvot that you don't see the point in or that are boring or repetitious or do not spark joy.

And until you know how you will react when (not if) that happens, until you know how you will resolve it - or if you will even want to - you aren't ready to commit to something you can't just take off.

Sometimes it sucks to be a Jew. Sometimes Torah is more yoke than honey. Sometimes you're just not feeling it. And that's okay! That doesn't make you an imposter or a bad Jew; it makes you human. But you still need to address it, because that day will come.

I love being Jewish with all my heart, but there are parts of Torah that are like a knife in my soul. For me, the way I resolve it, is that those things in particular are the shards my neshama was sent to liberate the sparks from. We live in a broken, unredeemed world, and sometimes you should feel that, acutely. That is part of being a Jew, that you are sensitized to the world and its suffering. But it should still, in the end, lift you up. It should not break you, and you should not have to cut off major pieces of yourself to fit the role. Hitting that wall and feeling that pain before you immerse in the mikvah can really open your eyes to what kind of Jew you want to be - or if you actually want to carry this burden as well as taste its sweetness.

#jewish convert things #jumblr #converting to judaism #convert feels #convert advice

[theelastword]

*SPOILERS AHEAD*

So I’ve been seeing a lot of people talk about how big of a mistake Aziraphale made in the finale and how badly they feel for Crowley (instead of feeling bad for BOTH of them). And honestly? I don’t understand the perspective that Crowley getting his heart broken in episode 6 has to mean that Aziraphale was totally naive and wrong and that it’ll take Crowley a lot of time to forgive him, or that Aziraphale’s ending in season 2 wasn’t just as heartbreaking as Crowley’s.

Think about everything we know about Aziraphale, who has never once been power-hungry and— following season 1— no longer cares what Heaven thinks (he even told the Metratron that he didn’t want to go back to Heaven when first approached). Aziraphale only left because he sees angels like Muriel, who definitively have good in them despite everything, or even Gabriel who somehow figured out how to fall in love and find something that mattered more to him than the supposed ‘morality’ of Heaven. Aziraphale sees that spark, that potential of Heaven to be turned into what it should have always been, and he thinks that he can do it because he’s seen proof of angels who can get away from Heaven’s influence, a list that includes himself.

Not to mention THAT look he gave Metatron after he brought up the Second Coming, a look that (at least from where I’m sitting) was a definite steeling of nerves and his own way of saying “Okay, time to take this thing down from the inside”. He was NOT saying that Crowley should reform himself for Heaven, or even that they should go back because he missed Heaven. He was asking Crowley to go with him because he loves him and wants him by his side— and because he knows that Crowley has experience in being there for angels who slowly deviate from Heaven.

Aziraphale wants what he’s always wanted— to keep helping everyone he possibly can, without stopping to do what he really wants and just stay in his beloved bookshop with the love of his life. Because he never prioritizes what it is he wants when he could be helping others instead. That’s just who he is, which is what makes him so selfless and wonderful but also so sad in that he never just…lets himself be happy. And the Crowley that we all know would never hate or have lingering fury toward him for that. What Aziraphale is doing, although heartbreaking to people like me who just want the Husbands to have their little cottage in the South Downs, is actually really brave, AND just as worthy of the sympathy and heartbreak that many fans are feeling for Crowley.

EDIT: Also, as sad/problematic it may be to abandon your life and partner, it’s just as problematic to turn a blind eye to the oppression and injustice of Heaven that, by all means, you have the ability and voice to try to do something about in pursuit of prioritizing what you want. So if we’re going to be mad at Aziraphale, we have to be mad at Crowley, too (and I’ll be disappointed if hypothetical-season-3 paints the narrative that Aziraphale is the only one in the wrong here). Personally, I’m all for not being mad at anybody. I completely understand both of their choices, and I just want them to reconcile and be compassionate to what the other is going through.

#aziraphale i am going to wrap you in a blanket #leave my angel ALONE #good omens 2 #good omens #ineffable husbands #aziraphale #crowley #gabriel #aziraphale x crowley #gabriel x beelzebub #ineffable beurocracy #maggie x nina #metatron #good omens season three #good omens season two #good omens s2 #good omens s2 ending #good omens spoilers #good omens ending #good omens finale #2.06 #kin #aziraphale get behind me

[isan0rt]

You know, when you consider Azure Moon as a self-contained narrative, the use of ‘unanswered questions’ and ambiguity as a reinforcement of the themes of the route are really effective. I honestly think having the route not address the Slithers was the best narrative choice IntSys could possibly have made given the themes of Azure Moon.

Like. The developers didn’t really expect people to actually play all the routes; they designed the game so ‘everyone would have a different experience.’ As a result, all the routes have very different themes and scopes. Azure Moon is the tightest, most character-driven narrative despite not being the shortest route.

And Azure Moon is about grief.

Grief hangs over the entire route; except for Mercedes, every single one of the Blue Lions is haunted by the Tragedy of Duscur and the unanswered questions surrounding it. Felix loses his brother directly, and his worldview and best friend to the aftermath. Ingrid loses her fiance, but also her sense of security; without Glenn, her people may starve, and her personal future is now uncertain. Sylvain and Glenn were the same age, so we can assume they were friends, though his loss is less direct; Sylvain is surrounded by people broken by loss, including his own father. Annette’s father leaves her family in disgrace over being unable to stop the tragedy. Ashe loses his foster brother to the aftermath; and later his foster father as well. 

Dimitri and Dedue lose everything.

All of them spend the whole route wanting to find answers and some kind of closure for this event. It drives the entire narrative for all of the Lions actually from Faerghus. Mercedes, meanwhile, stands as an outside observer to that tragedy - but she is also dealing with her own personal tragedy and unanswered questions about her brother, and that drives her during Azure Moon.

And the thing about grief is that sometimes you never get closure. But you still have to move on, anyway.

That’s the whole point of Azure Moon. Dimitri has to move on. All the Lions have to move on. 

Mercedes cannot regain her brother, whether you find out his identity or not in the route. She has to move on anyway. Dimitri cannot reconcile with his family, not with Rufus (Did Dimitri kill him? We the viewer can never really know for sure) and not with Edelgard. He never finds out whether Patricia wanted to kill his father, or whether she loved Dimitri at all (and we the viewer don’t, either). He has to move on anyway. The Lions never find out the cause of the tragedy.

They have to move on anyway.

Involving the Slithers at that point would not only add a bunch of last-minute narrative complications that aren’t necessary in Azure Moon, it would undermine the emotional impact of the route (in much the same way the last map of Verdant Wind does, honestly). The themes of Azure Moon not only don’t need to answer the question of the Slithers; not answering that question is the point. Bringing up the Slithers at that point would take all the air out of the personal drama the route takes its entire runtime addressing.

Dimitri hesitates at the end. He stops, and tries to look back, and Byleth stops him. He has to move on. He can’t keep looking back at Duscur. He’s got to walk forward. 

And that means leaving his questions unanswered. 

#Fire Emblem Three Houses #FE3H #Blue Lions #Like honestly if you look at the route as the ONLY route you play #The story is incredibly well self-contained #In a way that also makes you want to play other routes! #Azure Moon IMO is really effective from an emotional impact perspective #Like. assuming you like deconstructions of Hamlet because that's what Azure Moon is lbr #Incidentally I personally don't think Dimitri actually killed Rufus....but I don't know!! He could have!! I will never know for sure. #That's the point.

[cheesit-notes]

Simon Riley + Hand Kisses

tags: kissing obviously, ptsd for simon basically, gn!reader, overthinking simon, simon getting violent at one point, a/n: sorry i was gone for a week! i want to say i worked on stuff but ive been busy with things and this was the only thing i did. im not all that happy with the time to result ratio of this tbh but i love the idea of Simonand hand kisses so enjoy!

Ghost who cannot stand any and all kinds of intimate touches. he doesn’t like intimate touches. no, actually, he loathes those touches. it reminds him of a time he’d really rather forget. there’s no way to really kiss him without having to slowly practice. underneath the mask, he’s nothing more than the emotionally scarred, vulnerable Simon Riley who went through far too much for any human.

the first time both of you technically kissed, you had asked if you could kiss him, he said yes because you looked like you wanted it so badly. the two of you stood awkwardly in his barracks. he’s wondering if he should’ve changed clothes earlier, he just got back and was still in his uniform, probably smelled fowl, but you didn’t say a word. ah, he thought he could handle it. he really did. but to kiss was a lot easier said than done. and he’ll never fully forgive himself for shoving you away slamming you against the wall, and he was choking you. he didn’t actually hit you, you tell him that everyday, but the fact he fully intended to hit you for the moment scared him. plagued with the thought that he truly was no different from his father; he could barely look at you for the weeks following that, much less talk to you. no, he refused to do so much as to stand near you; petrified he wouldn’t snap out of it in time, terrified he’d hurt you.

months later, he asked if it’s alright to try again. the kissing thing, you know? it was months after the previous attempt, you and Simon had already reconciled, as much as possible anyways, so the question left you a little confused. you were happy to, but only if he was really ready. and he said he was, he swore it. although.. looking at you, thinking back about the previous attempt, made him anxious. but he already said he would. so he should? he should stick to his words, right? youd probably think hes a coward. god, a man shouldnt be a coward. and he cant be a coward. and all these thoughts ran through his mind. he doesnt realize he’s zoned out and that you’re staring at him with a concerned look on your face. its not until you decide to speak does he snap back.

“are you sure you want to do this?”

he’s not even sure what to respond. what did he want?  he’s only really thought about what you wanted. it’s not like his wants really mattered in his eyes.

“you know, we don’t have to do this. we can still have a perfectly fine relationship without–”

“no! absolutely, no, we.. we have to kiss.”

he insisted, almost yelling like he’s afraid he wouldn’t be heard. and that you’d leave him because you’d think he couldn’t kiss you, because he couldn't give you of a normal relationship. and you deserved it. you deserved a normal relationship with someone who could give you what you wanted. and god, he wishes he were normal.

anyone could tell he was agitated. honestly, it isn’t easy for you. you could tell he wouldn’t handle it well if you kissed him directly. but if you didn’t then he’d isolate himself, thoughts spiralling like a roller coaster in his mind, and you couldn’t be sure when or where the ride ended. so, grab his hands, hold them in yours, and plant a gentle kiss on each. you hold his hands, looking into his eyes, and for what felt like hours, the two of you stayed put like that. until Simon told you to leave.

it caught you off guard, you’re a little taken back. but respecting his wishes, you leave the room. not even a minute after you leave, Simon slumps against the wall, he can’t stop the hot, burning tears from falling. maybe it was how soft your lips felt against his caloused hands or how careful you were with him, how you knew that he likely wouldn’t react well to either choice and yet you made the perfect one.

Simon Riley who sometimes holds your hand, silently hoping you’d kiss his hand again. he likes it when you give each knuckle a peck. if you bent down on one knee, you’d look like a knight kissing the princess’ hand, and Johnny would say this whenever he saw the chance. Simon Riley who still isn’t ready to kiss you directly, but he’s slowly working on it. Simon Riley who will probably learn to like different types of kisses, but right now, he's smitten over you and your hand kisses that make him feel oh so loved.

next time he holds your hand, give him a kiss, will you?

#cod mw2 #cod mw2 x reader #simon ghost riley x reader #ghost x reader #simon riley #simon riley x reader #simon ghost riley #lieutenant ghost #cod mw ghost #hand kisses #mmmm yes #cheesy likes cod?!

[transmutationisms]

serious question but do you personally believe there is a way to approach psychiatry in a way that uplifts and upholds patient autonomy and wellness or is the entire trade essentially fucked haha. Btw this is an ask coming from a 3rd year med student—with a background of severe mental illness—who is considering a residency in psychiatry after receiving life-saving care in high school pertaining to said conditions. (I have peers who have been involuntarily hospitalized and treated horribly in psych wards, with approaches i patently disagree with, but was lucky not to experience. I don’t like modern american medicine’s approach to mental illness; “throw pills” at it to “make it go away” ie. a problem of overprescribing, inadequate and non-holistic approach to mental health, and i feel a lot of that can be attributed to the capitalistic framework. I also def agree with you that so much of what can be considered normal human responses to traumatic events/normal human suffering can be unnecessarily pathologized—a great example being the whole “chemical imbalances in the brain is the ONLY reason why im like this” argument that ive unfortunately fallen hard for when i was younger and am still currently dismantling within myself…and like dont even get me started on this field’s history of demonizing POC, women, LGBT, etc). Like i deeply love my psych rotations so far, and i utterly feel in my gut that this is the manner in which i would like to help people—a lot of whom are just like me—but im wondering if there is a way to reconcile these aspects in a way that one can feel morally okay participating within such an imperfect system, in ur opinion… ngghhhhhh i just want to be a good doctor to my patients…

(ps i love all ur writing and analysis on succession!! big fan mwah <333)

i don't mean to sound unduly pissy at you, specifically, but i do have to say: every single time i've talked about antipsych or broader criticism of medicine on this website, i immediately get a wave of responses like this, from doctors/nurses/psychs/students of the above, asking me to, like, reassure them that they're not doing something immoral or un-communist or whatever by having or pursuing these jobs. and it's honestly frustrating. why is it that these conversations get re-framed around this particular line of inquiry and medical ego-soothing? why is it that when i say "the medical encounter is not structured to protect patient autonomy or well-being," so many people hear something more along the lines of "doctors are mean and i wish they were nicer"? why is it that it's impossible to discuss the philosophical and structural violence of academic and clinical medicine without it becoming a referendum on the individual morality of doctors?

i'm choosing to read you in good faith because i think it's possible to re-re-frame this line of questioning to demonstrate to you the sorts of critiques and inquiries i find more interesting and more conducive to patient autonomy and liberation. so, let me pick apart a few lines of this ask.

"is the entire trade essentially fucked?"

if you're thinking of trying to 'reform' the project of medical psychology within existing infrastructures and institutions, then yeah, it's fucked. if you're still assuming that affective distress can only be 'treated' within this medical apparatus (despite, again, no psychiatric dx satisfying any pathologist's understanding of a 'disease' ie an aberration from 'normal' physiological functioning) then you're not challenging the things that actually make psychiatry violent. you're simply fantasising about making the violence nicer.

"I don’t like modern american medicine’s approach to mental illness; “throw pills” at it to “make it go away” ie. a problem of overprescribing, inadequate and non-holistic approach to mental health, and i feel a lot of that can be attributed to the capitalistic framework."

i hate when i talk about psychotropic drugs being marketed to patients using lies like the chemical imbalance myth, and then pushed on patients—including through outright force—by psychiatrists, and the discussion gets re-framed as one about 'overprescribing'. my problem is not with people taking drugs. i am, in fact, so pro-drugs that i think even the ones administered in a clinical setting sometimes have value. my issue is with, again, the provision of misleading or outright false information, the use of force and coercion to put patients on such drugs in order to force social conformity and employability, and the general model of medicine and medical psychology that assumes patients ought to be passive recipients of medical enlightenment rather than active participants in their own treatment who are given the agency to decide when and how to engage with any form of curative or meliorative intervention.

'holistic' medicine and psychiatry do not solve this problem! they are not a paradigm shift because they continue to locate expertise and epistemological authority with the credentialed physician, and to position patients as too sick, stupid, or helpless to do anything but receive and comply with the medical interventions. there are certainly psychotropic drugs that are demonstrably more harmful than others (antipsychotics, for example), and some that are demonstrably prescribed to patients who do not benefit from them and are even harmed by them. conversely, there are certainly forms of intervention besides pharmaceuticals that people may find helpful. but my general critique here is aimed less at haggling over specific methods of intervention, and more at the ideological and philosophical tenets of medicine that cause any interventions to be imposed by force or coercion on patients, then framed as being 'for their own good'. were suffering people given the information and autonomy to actually choose whether and how to engage in any kind of intervention, some might still choose drugs! my position here is not one of moralising drugs, but making the act of taking them one that is freely chosen and available as an option without relying on physician determination of a patient's interests over their own assessment of their needs and wants.

"so much of what can be considered normal human responses to traumatic events/normal human suffering can be unnecessarily pathologized"

true, but don't misunderstand me as saying that drugs or any other form of intervention should be forcibly withheld from those who do want them and are made fully aware of what risks and harms seeking them could entail. again, this would still be an authoritarian model; my critique is aimed at increasing patient autonomy, not at creating equally authoritarian and empowered doctors who just have slightly different treatment philosophies.

"dont even get me started on this field’s history of demonizing POC, women, LGBT, etc"

ok, framing this as "demonisation" tells me that you're not understanding that, again, this is a systemic and structural critique. it is certainly true that a great many doctors currently are, and have historically have been, outright racist, trans/misogynist, ableist, and so on. framing this as a problem of a well-intentioned discipline being corrupted by some assholes is getting it backwards. medicine attracts prejudiced people, not to mention strengthens and promotes these prejudices in its entire training and practice infrastructures, because of its underlying philosophical orientation toward enforcing 'normality' as defined by 18th-century statistics and 19th-century human sciences that explicitly place white, cis, able-bodied european men as the normal ideal that everyone else is inferior to or failing to live up to. doctors who really nicely tell you that you're too fat are still using bmi charts that come from the statistical anthropometry of adolphe quételet and the flawed actuarial calculations of metlife insurance. doctors who really nicely deny you access to transition surgery are still operating under a paradigm that gives the practitioner authority over expressions and embodiments of gender. the issue isn't 'demonisation', it's that medicine and psychiatry explicitly attempt to render judgments about who and what is 'normal' and therefore socially 'healthy', and enforce those standards on patients. this is not a promotion of patient well-being, but of social conformity.

"i deeply love my psych rotations so far, and i utterly feel in my gut that this is the manner in which i would like to help people"

let me ask you a few questions. you say that you like your psych rotations... but how do your patients feel about them? is their autonomy protected? are they in treatment by free choice, and free to leave any time they wish? are they treated as human beings with full self-determination? if you witnessed a situation in which a patient was coerced or forced into a certain treatment, or in which you were not sure whether they were consenting with full knowledge or freedom, would you feel empowered to intervene? or would doing so threaten your career by exposing you to anger and retaliation from your higher-ups? what higher-ups will you be exposed to as a resident, and then as a practicing physician? could you practice in a way that committed fully, 100%, to patient autonomy if you were working at someone else's practice, or in a hospital or clinic? could you, according to current medical guidelines, even if you had your own practice?

when you say "this is the manner in which i would like to help people", what do you mean by "this"? can you define your philosophy of treatment, and the relationship and power dynamic you want to have with any future patients? is it one in which you hold authority over them and see yourself as determining what's in their 'best interests', even over their own expressed wishes? have you connected with patient advocates, psych survivors (other than your friends), and radical psychiatrists and anti-psychiatrists who may espouse heterodox treatment philosophies that you could consider? do you think such philosophies are sufficient for protecting patient autonomy and well-being, or are they still models that position the physician's judgment and authority over that of the patient?

"im wondering if there is a way to reconcile these aspects in a way that one can feel morally okay participating within such an imperfect system"

and here is the crux of the problem with this entire ask. you are wondering how to sleep at night, if you are participating in a career you find morally distasteful. where, though, do your patients enter into that equation? do you worry about how they sleep at night, after having interacted with a system of social violence that may very well have traumatised them under the guise of providing help? why does your own guilty conscience worry you more than violations of your patients' bodies, minds, and basic self-determination?

i can't tell you whether your career path is morally acceptable to you. i don't think this type of guilt or self-flagellation is fruitful and i don't think it helps protect patients. i don't, frankly, have a handy roadmap sitting around for creating a new system of medicine and health care that rests on patient autonomy. affective distress is real, and is not something we should have to bear alone or with the risk of having violence inflicted upon us. what you need to ask yourself is: how does the medical model and establishment serve people experiencing such distress? how does it perpetuate violence against them? and how do you see yourself countering, or perpetuating, such violence as someone operating within this discipline? what would it mean to be a 'good' actor within a violent system, if you do indeed believe that such a thing is ontologically possible?

#sorry for LONG ASS POST #psychiatry

[kissesfrombangtanatnight]

Jey (Part 2)

Recap

"Shut the hell up with that Jey. You know damn well I'm in this 100%. I would never love another man the way I love you. We've been through too much to get to where we're at. Look, the owner of the club said if he or one of his workers finds it, they'll call. I gave them my number and yours. So please calm down." It's a long while before he begins talking again. He laughs sarcastically as he rubs his beard.

"Oh yeah he called me and I went to pick it up this morning." You felt relief in your chest.

"....Well that's good, where is it so I can put it on?"

"You're not getting it back." Your mouth fell.

"What do you mean I'm not getting it back? You gave it to me Jey."

"Exactly. I gave it to you and you took it off, so clearly you don't want to wear it. You wanna be Miss Single."

"Joshua you are being fucking childish."

"Okay y/l/n." He says calling you by your last name that you dropped to add his, Fatu, to yours. You feel tears prick at the corners of your eyes as you turn away from him.

"You're such an asshole." You mumble lowering your voice. Not wanting him to hear the tremble in your voice now.

"Yeah whatever y/l/n, when you're ready to be a wife, then you can get it back."

Shaking your head, you turn your body completely away from him and stare out the window. You lightly dab at the corner of your eye as a tear slipped. His grip on the steering wheel doesn't loosen as he continues on down the road. Both of your minds clouded and emotions through the roof.

~

That afternoon

The day was slowly ending as all the family sat around several tables placed in Mama Fatu's backyard. The family had gathered to have a big BBQ. When you and Jey had arrived earlier, he kept up that same distant behavior. It was honestly getting on your nerves now. You wish he'd forgive you, but that man was stubborn. If he felt your loyalty was in question, he'd let you know how he felt. But he should know better. You loved him to death and would never sabotage your relationship with him for some random guy.

Right now though, the ladies all moved into the living room while the fellas stayed outside playing cards. The kids were downstairs in the basement hanging out and having fun amongst themselves. You sat across from Trinity as you sipped from your wine glass slowly. You weren't really engaging in the conversation, too focused on your husband. You could see him through the window having a good time as per usual. That beautiful smile on his face made you mad. Why couldn't he be like that with you?

"Y/n? Y/n you heard me?" You snap out of it to see Trinity staring at you as the others engaged in separate small talk.

"Huh?"

"I said come with me to the kitchen to fix more drinks. " You knew that was code for something else. But you don't hesitate and walk with her into the kitchen just as laughter erupts amongst the men outside. You sigh as you begin fixing more drinks absentmindedly.

"Girl what's going on? You look upset. Talk to me." She says  popping some skittles into her mouth. You begin to explain to her what was going on. She said nothing, only her eyes stretching then going back to normal, shaking her head or pouting.

"And now he's been giving me the silent treatment. Girl I don't know what to do. I didn't think it'd upset him this much."

"I remember when that happened to me chile. He was talking bout pulling out divorce papers. Told him that mess was not funny. I know how you feel."

"How did y'all reconcile? Cause I don't think I could go another day with him being this pissed." You look out the window to see him concentrating on the card game in front of him. He looked so damn good. And even though the sun was beginning to set, his skin still glistened. Not to mention the shirt had came off, exposing his beautiful tattoos. He'd recently got a tattoo with your initials just below his rib cage. Just looking at him was getting you excited and it didn't help that he was manspreading. Long story short, your man was blessed.

"Honestly? I just had to suck up to him. He's honestly a big teddy bear, with the right words and moves, he was good. If not, make him realize what he's missing with all that unnecessary anger." She smirks. You look at him momentarily to see him flex his muscles and you could've  dropped down right then and there.

"You think that'll work?"

"Girl yes, men love that kind of attention." She shrugs with a laugh. Then a idea popped into your head, it was crazy yes, but you were sure it'd get him riled up. You take the drinks you fixed and placed them on the coffee table in the living room before excusing yourself. You walk down the hall into the guest bathroom. Looking at yourself in the mirror, you bit your lip unsure.

What if it doesn't work?  Is this really appropriate?

Fuck it.

You pull your dress up over your ass and slide your panties down and finally off. You spread your thighs and take a few pics. Almost slipping on your underwear, you pull your dress down and lean against the sink scrolling through the pics. Satisfied with about three, you walk out and stroll back downstairs. You were a bit nervous, but you couldn't wait to see his reaction. You sit back down on the couch and just listen to the conversations the ladies were having. You darken your phone screen not wanting anyone to catch a glimpse of what you're about to do. You hide your smirk behind your wine glass as you find his name in your phone, Zaddy Fatu with the heart eye emojis. You find the perfect picture and hit send.

You were a bit nervous as it's been a while since you and Jey did something like this, but fuck it. You were in the mood for games and games you would play. Through hooded eyes, you out to him on the patio. You watch as he reached for his phone in his pocket. You almost burst into laughter seeing his eyes stretch and the deck of cards in his hands almost dropping to the floor. You could see Jimmy beside him glaring and yelling something, they must be card partners. He looks up at you shaking his head momentarily and mumbling the words don't.

But he should know by now, you don't always listen. You send a second pic. He begins to shift in his chair uncomfortably. His legs begin to bounce as he rubbed his hands up and down his legs in an attempt to ease the growing boner in his joggers. He was glad they were black or else they probably would've exposed him. Rubbing a hand down his face in frustration, he licks his lips as he glares at you through the window. You just wave your hand before popping a grape into your mouth. You were enjoying this. You finally send the last pic, which was ten times worse than the first two, in the most torturous way. He mouthed the word fuck, as he finally got up, not being able to handle anymore teasing. He doesn't walk into the house though, you watch as he walks across the yard and disappears.

Seconds later, your phone dings signaling a text from him.

Come here.

~Zaddy Fatu

Read at 9:45PM

You were going to make him wait just a while longer. No way were you giving in that easily. You went back to eating some fruit when your phone vibrated a second time. You almost choked on your pineapple slice seeing a pic of him with his dick in his hand.

I said come here.

~Zaddy Fatu

Fuck it, your man needs you and sure as hell wasn't about to pass this up. Excusing yourself, you walk out of the front door and down the driveway. He was lucky it was darker now and that he parked alongside the street. You make your way to the car, where he was obviously waiting in the backseat.

Hopping in, he wastes no time attaching your lips to his. So much fire was behind that kiss, your skin feeling like it was heating up. You moan into his mouth feeling his erection press between your middle. Not breaking the kiss, he pulls your dress up, reaching under your and sliding two fingers into your already wetness.

"Shit Jey." You moan breaking the kiss, mouth forming an o as your close your eyes in bliss.

"Damn baby you're soaking and I've barely touched you."  He smirked curling his fingers inside of you moving them in a rapid pace. The sounds of your wetness filling the car. You tangle your fingers in his wet hair as you connect your lips with his again as he continued working on you. Your tongues wrestle against each others as you fight for dominance but in the end, he won. It was getting sloppy, saliva sliding down the side of your mouth, but you could care less.

"Jey baby please, I'm about to-" Not being able to finish a sentence, your walls tighten around his fingers and you squirt all over the front of his joggers.

"Fuck baby."

"I'm sorry." You giggle as you lift yourself momentarily to slide his joggers down. "I'd love to continue with the foreplay Jey, but we don't have that much time and they're gonna wonder where we're at. Just fuck me already." You tell him. You let the backseat back as far as it'll go. You switch positions as he puts you on your stomach getting behind you. You throw your braids over your looking at him biting your lip.

"Say less mama." He says aligning himself at your  entrance. He grips your hip with one hand and the other, pushing himself into slowly causing you both to let out a groan. "Shit girl." He grunts. Finding a rhythm, he sticks with it thrusting into you hard and fast.

"Oh my god Jey! I love it baby!" You moan out as he thrusts upwards into you mercilessly. You hang on to the seat for dear life as the sounds of your love making fill the car once again.

"Fuck! Yeah yeah yeah-" You deepened the arch in your back as his thrusts seemed to get harder.

"Shit, you gon learn not to disrespect me. Say sorry." He grunts reaching over and grabbing the back of your neck. You were completely at his mercy. But you didn't care, you'd submit to him any day.

"Ah ooo baby I'm sorry. I'm sorry!" You scream out feeling every inch of him as your walls tighten around him.

"Say it like you mean it." He demands smacking your ass hard.

"I'm sorry daddy! I'm so sorry ahhh!" It's been a while and lord knows you've missed the feel of your husband inside you. You tried reaching back to get him to ease up, but that only fueled the beast inside him. He was gonna fuck the shit outta you.

"Nuh uh, you gon take this dick baby." He said as you cry out again and again.

Reaching around, he grabs you by the neck drawing you to his chest but not ceasing his movements. You rest your head against his shoulders, eyes rolled back. You were in a daze.

"Baby, I got something for you." He moans into your shoulder. Through hooded eyes, you catch a glimpse of something shiny in his free hand.

Your ring.

"Mmmmm Jey give me my ring."  You moan feeling your climax building. He let your neck go as you fall forwards. You take your ring from his hand.

"Put that shit on Mrs. Fatu." He demanded reaching between your legs and rubbing your clit. You felt like you were seeing stars.

"Baby I-ooo, I'm gonna cum. Shitshitshit!"

"Come on this dick baby fuck." Your orgasm hits you like a thousand waves. You spill all over him and on his thighs. "Damn I'm cummin. Fuck!" He groaned reaching his own high, coating your soft walls.

You collapse onto your stomach trying to catch your breath. He falls beside you looking down at your fucked out state.

"Keep that shit on y/n. I gave it to you because I see myself spending the rest of my life with you. That ring symbolizes my love for you and only you."

"I know baby and I'm sorry. I love you." You say stretching up to kiss his lips.

"I love you too. Now hurry up cause my mama walking down the driveway prolly wondering what the hell we doing." He laughs.

"Oh shit!"

A.N. Hope you all enjoyed! ♥️

#wwe smut #jey uso fic #jey uso smut #jey uso x reader #jey uso imagine #jey uso fanfiction #jey uso #jey uso x black reader #jey uso x black oc #the usos #main event jey uso #wwe x reader #wwe imagine #wwe the usos #wwe fanfiction #wwe the bloodline #wwe bloodline

[transmascissues]

i think we need to talk more about the very specific language people use to talk about trans men&mascs’ bodies, because the language they use evokes a very particular image. they call us dirty, ugly, deformed, mutilated, poisoned, ruined, and just generally “gross” and what it boils down to is a very pervasive sense of body horror.

people are genuinely disgusted by the mere existence of our bodies. i’ve experienced this in my own life, most poignantly when my father (who has otherwise been relatively supportive of my transition) replied to my desire for top surgery with “it’s not natural! nature doesn’t make people like that!”

transmasculinity — particularly visible, tangible, bodily transmasculinity — activates something in their subconscious that they don’t know how to reconcile with. they see us and immediately fall back on disgust because they can’t make sense of us any other way.

and this kind of visceral, all-emcompassing disgust is very specific to how people treat trans men&mascs. you might see similar things directed at other trans people, but it’s never quite the same. there is a very specific disgust that cis people (and honestly, a lot of trans people) reserve solely for us.

this is something i think all trans men&mascs have grappled with at some point in our lives, especially if we pursue a medical transition. any steps we make toward a body we feel good about will require wading through the cognitive dissonance of knowing that the bodies we strive to exist in will only ever be seen as dirty and ugly and wrong.

i can attest to this personally: when t started making me grow facial hair, i had to convince myself not to immediately shave it off because even though i loved it, i couldn’t shake the feeling of how other people would look at my face differently.

more generally, when i look at pictures of myself pre-t, as strange and uncanny-valley-ish it is to see myself like that now that i look much closer to how i want to look, i can’t help but be struck by how *pretty* i was. i know that’s all anyone else would notice — not how much more comfortable i am, but how pretty i used to be and how i gave it up.

just a few days ago, i had a moment in the shower where i just closed my eyes and imagined shouting at my mother: “this body is not yours this body is not yours this body is not yours” over and over because she, more than anyone else, has made it abundantly clear that every step i’ve taken has ruined my body somehow and she, like so many other trans men&mascs’ mothers, has made it her mission to clean me up and pretty me up and make me presentable again.

because that’s how the world at large sees our bodies: unsightly and corrupted and in many ways the grotesque physical manifestations of of some social sickness that they believe will destroy everything they value.

the disgust expressed toward other trans people tends to be a more abstract one — often a moral disgust, expressing that the action of being trans is objectionable to them. even bodily disgust is surrounded by these more abstract themes (think of people talking about transfeminine expression as a perversion of femininity — it’s not inherently the expression that’s the problem but the actions someone took to get achieve that expression, because femininity is supposed to be something good and pure and putting it down outright would go against that).

but when it comes to trans men&mascs, there is nothing abstract about that disgust. it’s incredibly physical — a visceral, tangible horror at the existence of our flesh and bone. they hate us down to the blood in our veins. they hate us down to our cells.

#in my experience this is the hardest part of internalized transandrophobia to work through #because its one of the easiet messages to internalize in the first place #transandrophobia #transandromisia #transmisandry #virilmisia #virilphobia #anti transmasculinity #trans men #transmascs

[thefirstknife]

i unironically hope Eris stays in her Hive form at least physically bc im already loving how both her & Immaru are pointing out Ikora's (and humanity's) inherent dehumanization of the Hive.

Eris being all "If this form does not leave will you still view me as a friend?"

Immaru when asked where the Experiment Subjects come from and responding with "Don't act like you care."

Honestly, it's so good. I really love the Eris stuff and some of these questions being posed. A lot of people react negatively to Eris doing this, forgetting that Eris has already been part-Hive for a long time. She was just hiding it behind the eye cover.

Technically, nothing inherently changed about Eris; she just embraced that part of her. And that's super important for her arc I think because she's been on a journey of accepting her trauma and her losses for a very long time. We helped her face her fears and traumas in Shadowkeep and she came out of it victorious. And the story never treated it as her traumas being gone; she still has them, but she has the means to tackle them and handle them and live with them. Since we helped her, she became more open and more involved with what we do to save our home, even if it meant tackling dangerous things.

And the thing is, now that her traumas cannot be exploited by Darkness anymore, she's capable of involving herself in these things, knowing that she has friends to fall back to and a support system and better mental fortitude. We've seen it through her endurance beneath the Pyramid on Io, and her grasp of stasis, and her dealing with the Crown of Sorrow and egregore and the Lunar Pyramid nightmares. And now with her embracing her Hive self. It doesn't change anything about her, but people prefer when she hides it so they don't have to see it. And she knows it (Sororicide lore book, page 1):

It's a perfect example of how we inherently view the Hive as untrustworthy. Obviously, there are good reasons for it! The Hive have caused immense pain and trauma to pretty much everyone in the universe, Eris included. It must take an incredible strength of character to embrace the fact that you're physically half-Hive, creatures that traumatised you in the first place. No one else has dealt with anything similar so naturally they're afraid for Eris. But I believe in her strength. And so does Drifter and Drifter is never wrong:

He'd read the reports. He saw the theories on VanNet. He didn't trust them. He trusted her.

There's a cutscene that people skip and can cause people not to see it, I recommend replaying the thing on a different character or seeing it online, but it shows Eris taking off her bandage in front of us:

It's such a powerful image to me. A symbol of her taking off her mask. Not pretending to be the same as us anymore. Because she isn't! The Hive are a part of her and have been for centuries. And she's always been in control. Our mistrust has always hurt her, but before this, we could act with pity towards her. Now that she's fully in Hive form, people's perception of her changed, for really no good reason other than prejudice. She is still Eris.

I definitely think that eventually we will have to reconcile with the idea of the Hive not being inherently evil in totality as a whole group of people. Obviously this is going to be difficult, especially when their leaders act the way they do, but eventually I do believe we will have to accept some of them, even if it's only Eris for a start.

#destiny 2 #destiny 2 spoilers #season of the witch #season of the witch spoilers #eris #immaru #hive #ask #long post #there's just something about like. eris embracing her full self that's so incredibly powerful to me #and that the way we tolerated her before was steeped in the whole. 'as long as you're sufficiently similar to us you're fine' vibe #but she isn't. fundamentally she has been changed to her core and she kept it hidden #we could only see the light of her third eye and even that made people suspicious of her just based on her physical appearance #but beneath that bandage has always been Hive eyes #the hive killed her and the hive saved her. i can't even begin to imagine what kind of complex emotions that would bring her

[shawtythatluvsurgut]

gunna have a video of me feeding my feedee up on my onlyfans soon. i’m thinking about starting it back up while i take a break from college because it was kind of empowering to get to own my kink in such a way. I also enjoy sharing that side of myself with all of you. subscription price will be between $8-$10/mo since my feedee is going to be collaborating with me on certain pieces of content. i will maybe begin gaining again once i get my health back in check, we’ll see. i want my muscle mommy build back, and to get that back i’ll have to pack on some weight. so we’ll see what happens with that. ;)

in the meantime and between-time, stay safe. especially on the internet. all of my old rules still apply for messaging me, but i will gradually get back to making regular content and posts. now that i am taking a break from school, i’m working more, but I also have free time on my hands when i’m not working. it feels really nice to get back into the swing of things. I’ve missed you all and I’ve missed the positive aspects of this community.

going forward, i’m just going to block people who talk shit to me or delete their comments (unless it’s of actual importance to discuss). i’m just done engaging with that shit. idk, i’m on new medication that seem to be actually working and i feel stable, so i feel ready to re-embrace this community with open arms.

a special thank you to everyone who continued engaging with me and communicating with me during my break. i appreciate all of your kind words more than you know, and if i didn’t respond to you it was because i didn’t want the answer to “hey how are you?” to be “i’m miserable. how are you?”. but I saw all of you - each and every message, comment, text, etc. - and i just want to say thank you. the people who still proceeded to message me with positivity are the reason I have decided I want to come back.

With all that being said, I hope you will all accept me back. I understand that some of you were upset that I left and didn’t understand my reasonings, but I hope we can reconcile our differences and i can gain your trust again. I’m not the angry person that I became when responding to hate messages, and that also influenced my time away. I could see that my demeanor on this hellsite was changing and I was getting more upset, angry and, honestly, afraid of going on here (let alone posting myself on here). However, that has changed. I’ve been working on being more optimistic and caring less about the negative opinions of others. Frankly, if someone doesn’t like me or my content they should just be an adult about it and either reach out to discuss that or ignore me. If they can’t do that, I believe they are childish and need to get a grip. There are some key things I’ve learned in life that I want to share with people who are as I described above:

- your comfort is not someone else’s responsibility. if it makes you uncomfortable, then don’t engage. It’s as simple as that.

- no one has to cater to your interests. everyone lives on their own agenda. your wants and desires do not take priority over the wants and desires of others. sure, there are some people who will cater to your every wish, but i’m definitely not one of them.

- similarly to above, your desires do not take priority over someone’s health. that includes both mental health and physical health. (death feedism is a thing if you are interested in someone wanting to gain while not caring about their health. this is not a death feedism page and i suggest you go search in the tags for that if it is what you are looking for. I do not want to kill my feedee, nor do I want him or I to gain enough weight to become immobile or at risk in any way. As hot as the idea is to me at times, we are both too active and work in active careers for that to be a realistic possibility for us. maybe someday i’ll get a stay at home job and get really big, or maybe someday he will. only time can tell. sorry for the length, i’m high. i’ll stfu now.

- people don’t care. no stranger online owes it to you to care that you don’t like their body, or that you don’t like this or that. it doesn’t matter because that person does not know you. there’s no point in wasting time caring about your negative comment unless it’s actually useful and constructive commentary.

So anyways, i’m back in business again. gonna post some FA art soon + start uploading to my OF again. I thank any of you who read this far and again I hope you can accept me back into the community.

Thanks,

Nico

#female feeder #ffa #nico speaks #i’ve wanted to say this for a while now #and i’m high enough to not fking care anymore #i’m back babey!!1!1!1!!1!1!!!!!1!1!1!!!!

[nyaagolor]

What are your thoughts on Apollo Justice (the character)?

OH BOY. OHHHHHH BOY. I have a fever and some free time lfg.

So honestly, I think part of the reason I love Apollo so much is because he runs parallel to Phoenix but also counter to him at the same time. I always saw Simon and Athena as the successors-- in terms of ideology and job and all that other stuff-- to the Phoenix-Edgeworth dynamic and status rather than Apollo and Klavier. Athena and Simon, to me, feel like extensions of the arcs of Phoenix and Edgeworth + the vibes of the original trilogy. Apollo and Klavier ( who I will not talk about bc we will be here all day)? They're the antithesis.

Apollo Justice The Game directly foils the original trilogy in so many ways, but I think even on a more base thematic level it runs counter to a lot of the ideas that we take for granted about the original trilogy, and because Apollo sits at the center of this, the things I love about the game are encapsulated in why I like him. There are a ton of themes in the ace attorney trilogy-- support networks, faith, trust, the truth-- and Apollo is defined by their limits, their failures, and their absence. He is let down, kicked around, defined by abandonment and betrayal and distrust. Apollo is defined by everything that Phoenix is not, and bc of how the timeline goes we don't really get any retribution for that, just a steady march forward, and I think that gives me a lot to think about with his character

Phoenix's arc right from Turnabout Sisters is about the building of a support network, and the ways that developing this support is integral for when things go wrong. We contrast Phoenix with Godot, Maya with Dahlia, and see how people left to stew in their resentment can chase vengeance to dark places (wow I wonder who also does this after the death of a dear friend leading to a crusade of misplaced revenge that almost leads someone they care about being killed.). With Apollo we get to stand on the precipice of resolution, but the important part is we don't get it. Apollo's life falls off the rails, and he's the one left to pick up the pieces.

We see through him how our trust can be betrayed by people of good and bad intentions, and the lingering consequences that has on one's ability to not only trust the people around them but themselves. And yeah!! That's why I adore him so much-- he's tested not by the possibility of failure like Phoenix often is, but climbing up from the reality of it. It's less "how do we make our way out of this mess before it goes nuclear" and more "things are already destroyed-- where do we go from here?". It has more of an element of recovery than prevention to me, and I think that's a fascinating avenue to explore in stories like these. Apollo pushes the envelope of the themes of the narrative and the characters-- he is the epitome of what it looks like when things fall apart, and it gives him and the trilogy characters something to reconcile

A lot of people have complained that Apollo barely feels like the protagonist in his own game, but that's honestly a huge part of the reason why I love him so much. He's defined by the spaces between, the limits and failures of things we had up to this point taken to be true, and left with a pretty limited degree of autonomy through it all. He's pushed around and puppeteered by people who mean well and those who don't, and I feel like a major theme of AA4 that I love but don't often see talked about is "what does it mean to have autonomy-- and by extension, control? What does it mean to take it back? What does it mean to lose it, and what does it mean when you'd do anything to keep it." Most of what I said is only partially resolved bc AA4 is... a game. A technically finished game. but!! Because it eviscerates our expectations of the franchise so thoroughly AND leaves open so many avenues, it makes Apollo and the rest of his crew some of my favorite characters because there's so much you can think about and do with them!!

also he's like. An insect to me. <3

#apollo justice #ace attorney #meta #mod vex #ask #im sick rn and I'm Tired so I didn't edit this

[juneknight]

Audible || 1

Part One | Part Two

Request: "Steven Grant reads erotica and Reader asks him to read aloud to her".

Immersivity: Steven Grant/fem!reader. Reader is nameless and undescribed, though her figure is limited by wearing one of Steven's shirts, and she works and undescribed job which she hates. If there is any detail which hinders your immersive experience, please feel free to bring it to my attention.

Part 1

*

There is no part of a bad day that Steven couldn’t make better. 

When you finally return to the flat you share with him and his headmates, you have no small list of ailments and complaints. Your feet ache, and your head as well. The clothes you wear to work are the last sort that you find comfortable, and you have been daydreaming about stripping them off—and perhaps slipping into one of Steven’s shirts which are always so worn and soft—since the moment you stepped out of the apartment building and nearly collided with the broom and brush seller who always gives you the eye.

All day, you have been wilting beneath capitalism’s shadow, doing a job that you have no passion for and which only serves to make other people more money than you will likely ever see, but it all melts away at the sight of Steven curled up in the bed you share together, his nose in a book. 

He glances up at the sound of the front door opening and closes the book so hastily that its cover makes a little sound as it snaps shut. Beneath the covers, he is shirtless. If his golden skin seems more flushed than usual, the observation is lost under your own relief at the very sight of him. Straightaway, he knows that your day has been rough, sees it in the bow of your shoulders, the shadows beneath your eyes. He reaches back without looking and sets his book amongst a sea of others on the headboard. 

“Oh, love. A rough one?” 

“It’s better now,” you say, already stepping out of your shoes and stripping off your work clothes. The sight of him so cozy in bed has reminded you of your own exhaustion which now tugs heavily at your eyelids. Steven watches you for a moment, his gaze warm and fond but not lustful, before tossing back the covers to reveal he is down to only his boxers. You amend: “Better now that it’s over.” 

“Sometimes, that’s the only good thing about a day, isn’t it?” Steven says, standing and going to the dresser. “That it ends, and that we never have to live it again. Underwear, love?” 

“Yes please; any pair. A shirt of yours, too, if you’ve got any clean.” 

Steven glances towards the mirror—there are many of them around the flat these days, convenient for Marc and Jake (or Steven, when he is not fronting) to be present in. Steven clicks his tongue at whatever his reflection says, moving to another drawer. “It’s my night, mate,” he reminds his reflection. “My night, my shirt.” 

“Someone complaining?” you wonder with a yawn, catching Steven’s shirt as he tosses it to you. 

“You know how Marc gets, always wanting you to wear his clothes. Possessive bloke.” 

“An easy way to solve that would be to share a wardrobe,” you tease, slipping into the shirt. You lift the collar, inhaling its clean scent which is so distinctly Steven’s. You tug on some panties too, always afraid that the one night you sleep without them will be the one that the apartment building catches fire. If the brushes and brooms man thinks you’re about to stand out on the London street in front of him and who else without anything on, he’s in for a disappointment. 

“I don’t think we could reconcile our preferences, honestly. Dunno why he keeps trying to slick our hair back when we all know that you go mad for the curls,” Steven says, watching as you slip beneath the covers and into the warm spot his body left behind. The only thing better than seeing you nestle beneath the sheets is joining you—which Steven promptly does, opening his arm so that you can rest flush against his side, your head on his chest. He rests his hand on the curve of your hip, stroking the exposed skin between your panties and his shirt with a calloused thumb. “You rest, love. If you need anything, I’m your man.” 

“Would you read to me?” you murmur sleepily. “I love the sound of your voice.” 

“It’s the accent, isn’t it?” he teases. You hear him swallow. “Sure—let me grab a book. Any preference?” 

“Whatever you were reading when I came in; you don’t need to start something new on my account.” 

To his benefit, Steven is quick to quip: “But I’m a few chapters in, you’ll have no idea what’s going on!” 

“Don’t care,” you say through another yawn. “Just listening to your voice.” 

“I…alright. Yeah,” he says. The strange reluctance in his voice is lost on you. You feel him stretch, hand searching the headboard. “I’ll have to sit up, love. That alright?” 

You hum in the affirmative, and as soon as he has taken his position with his back braced against the headboard, you are laying your head in his lap, just far enough away for him to be able to comfortably hold the book. You hear the rustle of pages as he finds his spot, having put up the book with such haste at your entrance that he had forgotten to mark his place. 

He begins to read:

“In the morning, we were all roughly awakened by the servants opening the curtains, letting in a stream of sunlight which reminded me painfully of my home. I had barely slept a wink, too unused to the strange palace around me and the coarse, lumpy straw mattresses that we were made to sleep on. Terror kept away the exhaustion, though nothing could help the way my temples ached from the long night. The others seemed just as terrified as I was: here and there, a few girls my age or younger clinged to each other, tears wetting their cheeks. Even the men looked uncertain. Their fear comforted me; at least I was not so singular!”

The soothing lilt of Steven’s voice melts away your headache. Your eyes shut, one hand resting on his knee as you drift into a half-sleep, lulled by the timber of his voice, the cadence of his speech. Sometimes, sentences would break through the fog of your relaxation, registering dimly in your mind. 

“...still not used to the smell of the sea, salt so thick in the air that I could taste it on my tongue. There was some familiarity yet in this for me, as I had been quite used to servants washing and tending to me back home, though never so roughly. By the time Evelyn was finished, I felt that she must have scrubbed me pink…braids only made the aching in my head worse. I hated to have my hair drawn back, to not even be able to hide behind its curtain…the Prince himself. I was sure that I was trembling with fear, my knees unsteady. I hoped that the others had appeared as nervous as I, though none of them had half the reasons I did!...ah…yada yada yada…we shared a nice peaceful sleep together, though the Prince stole all the covers like the sod he likely was—” 

Your eyes open, blinking tiredly. “A—sod? Does it say that?

“Of course it does.” 

“It does not; you’re making it up!” 

“That is a slanderous accusation which wounds me greatly—”

“Then you are skipping parts. You said yada yada yada—” 

“That’s, well, it’s what the book says, love, I surely didn’t write it—” 

Now your interest has peaked, pushing the veil of exhaustion back from your eyes. Lifting your head, you reach for the book, tilting it towards you just an inch: “Show me, then—” 

“Alright, alright,” he says, pressing the book flush to his bare chest to make it impossible for you to see even a single word. Now you notice that his face seems distinctly more flushed than usual, a nervousness in his eyes. “I am skipping parts. Just the boring ones, though.” 

“Is that how you usually read books?” you ask, brow furrowing. “You skip the boring bits? Aren’t you the man who once chastised a complete stranger in a book store when you caught him reading the last page of a book before buying it?” 

“That is a crime,” he says firmly. “This is completely different. I’m skipping them in order, aren’t I? I just…oh alright. I just didn’t think that this was a novel you would…ah…enjoy?” 

“Oh my god,” you say. “It’s pornography, isn’t it?” 

“It’s called erotica, thank you very much!” 

It is a good thing that Steven does not share the uppermost floor of the apartment complex with anyone else, because your cackle might have been loud enough to garner complaints. His shoulders relax a little at your giggles. He shuts the book, a finger holding his place this time, and gently taps it against your forehead. 

“Alright, that’s enough out of you. I hear enough about it from those two in my head. Besides—,” Steven says, sniffing indignantly. “—I read them for the plots.” 

“And what’s the plot of this one?” 

“Do you really care to know, or do you only wish to continue having a laugh?”

You school your face into a one that is appropriately serious. You hadn’t truly meant to make him feel insecure—which he was, judging by the way he had turned his eyes back to the cover of the book, his brow wrinkled and lips downturned in an expression that was remarkably like Marc. Sitting up, you prop your tired body beside him, pressing a kiss to his temple. 

“I’m sorry. There’s nothing wrong with smut. I’ve read plenty in my time—stories that are likely far less tasteful than this one. Tell me what it’s about,” you say, your sentence pitching up at the end and turning your statement into a gentle question which he could refuse if he was truly sore. 

But Steven could not ever remain sore with you. 

“Well,” he says, opening the book hesitantly. “It is about a spoiled princess. Outlaws from another kingdom steal her away to bring her to their royalty, hoping for a pardon from their own crimes. But along the way, her identity is somehow switched round with another hostage. Now everyone thinks she’s a prisoner meant to be a pleasure servant and serve the lords and ladies of this other kingdom.” 

“No!” 

“Yes!” Steven says, eyes lighting up at your enthusiasm. “But it gets worse, see? Because when they all arrive at the foreign palace, the girl mistaken to be the Princess is offered up to the King, and they kill her.”

You frown. “Oh, that’s quite dark.” 

“Yes, well the king is a right bastard, isn’t he? But now the Princess is terrified to reveal who she truly is to anyone, convinced she will be killed as well. So she must throw herself whole-heartedly into serving the Prince’s every pleasure while she plots her escape. There is politics and intrigue and quite a bit of misogyny which I am hoping to see punished in the second half—”

“You should read it to me,” you murmur, feeling a trickle of warmth in the pit of your belly. Thinking about Steven reading filthy novels while you were at work had made your heart stutter unexpectedly. Had he been hard when you came in? Did he read things like this and touch himself? The thought of hearing Steven’s low, accented voice reading explicit sex made your breath catch. You clear your throat. “You know…for the plots.” 

“The plots,” Steven says, drawing the syllables out slowly. “Right…I—are you sure, love? It’s quite naughty, isn’t it? And some of it is downright morally questionable.” 

“I’m sure. Go on, no need to skip over the naughty bits on my behalf. It sounds like you were just getting to the good parts.” 

Steven snorts softly. His gaze when he looks up at you from the book is sly and knowing. He sometimes can be shy and awkward, unpracticed in the ways of relationships and love and sex, but Steven was downright clever. There was no way he wouldn’t pick up on your eagerness, nor the true reason for it. And it sure wasn’t the plots. Shifting to make himself comfortable, he glances to you once more for your assent before cracking open the book and searching for his place.

*

Next Part

#steven grant x reader

[soracities]

What are you supposed to do when you see a formative bunch on friendships crumble? When you realise that you have outgrown the people you couldn't consider living without, who you thought would be present for everything in your life worth celebrating? When there is no scope to reconcile except on an acquaintance level?

it depends on why they crumbled and what exactly it is that you are reconciling--is it an act, or cumulative acts, of carelessness and hurt that can't be moved past? or is it simply a matter of people changing and no longer being as compatible as they once were?

based on your question i'm going to assume the latter, and in that regard i think it's important to acknowledge the depth of what you felt in respect to who you were then and who they were then, and allow it its importance for that period in your life. you make space for and value the time and bond you had for what it brought you, for what it allowed you to give and become and how it helped you. you acknowledge all the little pieces of yourself you owe to these friendships without diminishing the pieces of yourself that are growing now, separate from them (as is inevitable, sad and crushing as it may be sometimes).

the worth and impact of something isn't tied to its longevity, and i think a lot of the grief and confusion we feel in these situations is because we've associated the value of a relationship with how long we can make it last--and if it doesn't last it seems all those years meant nothing, but that's not the case. i think part of accepting and honouring the people we knew (and the people we no longer are) lies in recognizing that outgrowing something or someone is not so much an act of careless abandonment, but one of expansion: you, as a person, at one point in your life occupied these borders--then the borders widened and new space opened up: what filled those borders before can sometimes grow along with them, but not always--and when they don't, all it means is that you now have new dimensions to play around with and explore and they demand to be explored, as widely, as honestly, as freely as is possible--and its a disservice to yourself not to do so. what was there before remains, in its corner, as a signpost you can look back on and measure your growth and experience against, or alongside with: but you can only honour it for what it was (and yourself) by not forcing it to become something it can't be anymore.

again, i'm assuming this is just a case of people drifting apart and so, if you can only be acquaintances now, then bring sincerity to that acquaintanceship, in whatever way that is possible (just because you are not as close doesn't mean there can no longer be care)--if those are the new terms, i.e., the result of your own growth and that of the other parties', then all you can do is acknowledge and accept them for the new shape they have taken. the space opening up for you now, in the absence of these relationships growing alongside you, is yours--and the main thing now is that you find what your new values are, your new priorities and visions for yourself and then make those the focus of this new part of your life, without feeling you have to justify them to who you were or who you knew before.

at the end of the day ask yourself: have you done the best you can? have you acted and communicated with clarity, care, honesty, and understanding? and if so, and nothing has changed, then all that's left for you is to move forward into the new spaces waiting for you, carrying and valuing all that you are now. the more dedication you bring to honouring and exploring this new and growing version of yourself, the more sincere and better fitting the new connections you will inevitably make can become. by nurturing the space you're growing into--for yourself--you also nurture and prepare it for the experiences and the people that will fit you best. and they will come, in time.

i don't know if this will help, anon, and i know it is not always easy, but whatever direction your life is now moving towards i wish you the bravery, faith and enthusiasm to entrust yourself to it, and to the decisions you make along the way 🤍

#ask #Anonymous #notes from elsewhere

[thought--bubble]

Taking a little breaky break

This is just a heads up for my small little group of people on here. I have come to call my friends. I just wanted to let you all know that I'm going to be taking a much needed respite from tumblr and probably discord, too. I am feeling lost, sad,overwhelmed, and confused.

I know it sounds silly or whatnot, but all of this stuff is overwhelming and depressing, and I feel sick when I open this app at this point.

The best word to use, I guess, would be winded, maybe?

I joined Tumblr in Sept 23, and at first, it was really fun, a much needed escape from my daily never-ending list of crap to do.

I unfortunately learned how crazy this fandom can get early on and the hard way. I had hoped that that was just a one-off due to my newbie ignorance and took it as a lesson learned for myself.

But it's starting to feel like the drama never fucking stops. It just keeps going, and nice people, kind people, just get dragged and ridiculed for seemingly no reason. I will pathetically admit that I am a sensitive soul, and the things I've read and seen have seriously negatively affected me.

When people are catty regarding people they don't like or that don't like them, I can usually reconcile that to a particular degree. People are, in fact, people. Not everyone is going to vibe with everyone, and people will make jokes at others' expense, and it isn't exactly mature, but it happens.

That is what I expected when I heard this was coming. Some catty shit slinging between people who don't like each other.

But that isn't all this was, and I'm having a really hard time with that. I even thought, "Oh maybe some moderately rude jokes here and there where you know cultural differences and stuff could account for that" like I'm from the northeast and we can be harsh out here. So something that may be offensive to someone from another area may be looked at here just as a joke made in poor taste.

I know I myself have made jokes or whatnot, but you would think certain things would be off limits.

I thought I could combat the negative with positives. Silly jokes, little messages filled with love, but even that isn't working at this point.

My heart hurts, and my brain hurts.

And all this stuff has made me question myself. I had a block list a mile long for the longest time. Filled predominantly with people I had never spoken to because I was scared, nervous, I didn't want to accidentally interact with a post of someone who would be upset that I did, I unfollowed blogs I liked based on this same principle. I just desperately did not want to make someone mad or uncomfortable and find myself back in some weird mean anon tornado.

I tried to sus out who would be bothered by my presence and who wouldn't. I can't even know if my thoughts on who may or may not be upset by me were based on my paranoia or a perception i developed or was potentially affected by outside sources.

Now, i just don't know what the hell is going on.

Sorry for the word vomit. Just wanted to be honest. There are some of us out here who are just standing around with question marks over our heads.

Maybe it's because I wasn't here for a lot of that other weirdness. Maybe it's because of early events that shaped my experience on this app, but I for sure 100% need a break.

I'm an odd duck and love this app mostly because it's the only site I've seen where others actively fan-girl over my favorite Ewan character.

But right now, not even my love for Will can keep me on this app, and for those who know me, that's truly saying something.

This post is not meant to badmouth anyone at all. Honestly at this point I couldn't bad mouth anyone because I'm fucking lost on who anyone really is or how they really feel about things, dude I'm just plain lost.

Thank you to those who have been kind. My apologies to those I may have judged or assumed things about based on who the hell knows.

I hope that when I come back, I can open this app without yet another person that I like having a post of them being torn apart. Or a post of a story that I had heard being told in a completely different way and throwing me for a complete loop.

For now I am going to watch Will edits on TikTok and maybe read via Ao3.

Love and healing vibes to all.

#To my lovelies #I'll be back #I'm just not sure when #hotd fandom