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multicolour-ink · 11 months

Note

I read your post about both Mario and Luigi being reckless and dreamers and it got me thinking a little about that scene with their family, specifically their dad. And after having seen the fandom around this movie go nuts with fanfics and stuff, I have to ask, do people really believe Mario and Luigi's dad is a bad father just because he doesn't agree with Mario's reckless decision to start their business?

(I say only Mario here because the dad's words are clearly aimed at Mario, even if it was both their idea, but this is more about Mario and his dad rather than both brothers)

Like, when I see the scene at the dinner table, all I see is a dad who is concerned for his kids going into a business without a safety net or backup plan. Mom is trying to be supportive and loving, but dad is clearly the more 'realistic' of the two or at least more vocal about it.

Like, if you have a kid who had a stable job then suddenly quit said job to do freelance and also spent all their life savings on a commerical, you can't tell me you wouldn't be a little worried their future. As a parent you wanna be supportive but there also were you might go "um, are you sure you know what you're doing? have you thought this through? if something happens what will you do, will you have health insurance?" that sort of thing.

It's like quitting your day job for pursue a career in acting or photography or just starting your own company in general. It's probably smarter to do it on the side rather than up and quit your job and lose a stable income as you work to purse your actual goals.

And yeah, he definitely could have worded it better, (why call him nuts? why belittle their dream? why say that he was dragging Luigi down with him, that's mean!) but he does seem like a caring father who wants the best for his kids. And yet, so many stories depict as a horrible father and mistreats both Mario and Luigi and I don't think that's fair.

And given how Mario acts and reacts to certain situations (like jumping into the sewer without a second thought, running and climbing across construction sites, picking fights with people etc.) I get the distinct feeling that this is not the first time Mario has made some questionable decisions or at least acted rashly without really thinking things all the way through.

Tell you've never had kids without telling me...

Ooh this is a long ask! In order to answer this, I will need to divide it up into numbered points, as it is easier to organise my thoughts. I will also be drawing reference from this, this, this, and this (because I love OP's thoughts here).

1. Papa Mario

You are right in your thinking that Papa is trying to be a realistic in his opinion about the business venture! I've said it before myself, but Papa Mario does not strike me as a strict parent, but rather just voicing the opinions of his generation. It is far more common for someone of his time to be more fixated on the idea of getting a steady job and supporting family etc. It's not that they are being mean, it's just the society they were brought up in. I've heard this myself from older members of my family (including my own parents).

Nowadays there are much more opportunities and ways for people to venture into independent careers, but those always come at a risk. More often than not it requires more skill, heart, and sometimes luck to make it work. While Mario and Luigi are fortunate to be able to have a roof over their heads and be served food, sooner than later they will need to support themselves. That's primarily what I believe their father is getting at; while their Mama is happy they are being adventurous (wonder where Mario got that from? 😉) and is happy to support them, their father just fears that they will fail and be back to square one.

I personally haven't seen anyone explicitly say that they believe Papa Mario to be a bad father - and he is not! What he says comes from concern and love, not neglect.

2. Mario's Relationship With His Father

"You're bringing your brother down with ya."

I've seen some people come forward and admit that they see this line to be confirmation that Mario and his father don't get along, that Mario is seen as the "troublemaker".

I personally don't think that there's any bad blood between the two, but it is obvious that Mario gets most of the blame for the idea of the plumbing business in the first place - despite the fact that Luigi is just as much centre focus in it as he is!

We don't really get much of the family to get any idea of the history there...but I believe that the shaken relationship between Mario and his father could just all be down to Mario's assertiveness. Papa knows full well that his eldest son is very overconfident and brash, and will always stick up for Luigi (evidenced by scenes like with the baby Bros ❤️️) - but it's clear Papa wishes Mario would stop with that mindset, for fear of his son failing.

Notice how Papa never suggests that Luigi find his own path, his own job, and let his brother learn his lesson on his own? Because he doesn't need to. He knows that his sons are always in it together, no matter what. Luigi is just the more quieter of the two. So in order to make sure that he gets his concerns across to them, he instead directs it at Mario (which backfires spectacularly).

Which leads me on to...

3. The Brother's Bond

There are two ideas I have over what the relationship between Papa Mario and his brothers (Uncle Arthur and Uncle Tony) is like:

Papa and Arthur are twins, with Tony being the younger sibling (which makes sense for Tony's more carefree personality - with two older brothers taking the brunt of responsibility)

Papa and his brothers are different ages, with Papa being the oldest

Regardless which one is correct, it makes Papa's words to Mario at the dinner scene all the more impactful - because he knows what it's like to be an older role model to siblings and set a good example.

However, whilst that bond is strong, I don't think either of the family could have even predicted just how tightly bonded Mario and Luigi would become - even with knowing they are twins.

Not to say Papa doesn't love his brothers (or is not as close with Arthur if they are twins) but what Mario and Luigi have together as brothers goes far deeper.

Whatever you want to call it - fate, the stars, destiny - it's clear that Mario and Luigi have a bond that is unlike any other. They are intertwined together so tight that just being away and out of sight of each other causes them both great distress. It is like they are one soul split into two, and those two halves yearn to be together in order to feel complete.

They are each other's emotional and physical support. Without the other it's meaningless. They ride or die together - no matter what.

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missbrunettebarbie · 5 months

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CW’s Gotham Knights sorting

Attention: SPOILERS AHEAD!

Turner Hayes

The first thing that hit me about Turner before he was framed for Bruce’s murder is that he was genuinely happy with his life. I expected a lot of Main Character AngstTM from him, the way most protagonists are written especially on the CW, but there was none (or very little) of it. And it’s not like Turner doesn’t have sources of angst: his parents are dead and he went overnight from the son of cleaners to the adopted son of a billionaire -and all that implies- without any explanation. You can see it clearly in Gotham Academy (and in the city at large) that he isn’t very liked. Actually it looks like most people resent him for ‘getting uppity’ and rising above his station. Just look at how Brody treats him in the beginning or how the people of Gotham are ready to believe the worst of him overnight. But Turner doesn’t care. He has his best friend, Stephanie, he has Cressida and he has Bruce. He loves them and they love him; more than enough for a Snake primary. Sure, Bruce may be a bit too busy and it’s annoying, but Turner can always distract himself with a party. Classic hedonistic young Snake.

Turner’s arc is all about betrayal and how one deals with it. Turner is slowly, over the course of the series, betrayed by almost his entire inner circle: Bruce, Cressida and even his dead parents. Interestingly enough he is the person who doesn’t betray anyone even when they turned their back to him. At the end of episode two, Turner is the one who went to save Duela from the Talon despite the fact that she abandoned him to certain death. I don’t think Duela was entirely in his inner circle at this point (although I think she, Cullen and Harper were slowly getting there from the very first pilot when they handed him the lockpicking tool for his handcuffs, thus including him in their escape), but I think it was important to Turner that he will not be the kind of person to leave behind someone who might rely on his loyalty. Another moment that comes to mind is finding out that everyone at the Gotham Gala is gonna be gassed to death. His first reaction? “Stephanie is there!“

Like all healthy Snakes, Turner adopts Bruce’s morality as his own. And he’s so successful that I almost wondered if he was an Idealist for a while. But what sold him as a Snake for me was him saving Cressida versus not saving Joe Chill. Cressida had helped the Court to kill his father and frame Turner for the murder but Turner saves her because ‘this is what my dad would do’. So he blows up his cover to save the woman who helped raise him and betrayed him in the worst way possible, despite the odds being overwhelmingly against them. But when he finds out Joe Chill had been framed by Thomas and Martha Wayne’s murders and will face the death penalty….he does nothing. Despite the fact that Joe was arguably more of an innocent than Cressida, Turner doesn’t even have a throwaway line later on about wishing he could have helped him. (This plus the way he has zero remorse over killing the Talon also made me rule out Badger as a primary.) That’s because Turner is Bruce’s son in all the ways that matter, but he is not his heir in this show. He’s too much of a Snake to ever be.

His secondary is somehow even more obvious than his primary: this is the guy who had argued that they need to stick together from day one, who said that what makes them different from Joe Chill is the fact that they have each other, who was literally introduced to us extending a hand towards Brody when the latter lost the sword fight. He is such a Courtier Badger that for the first half of the show it almost overshadowed his primary. Not to mention, he is an amazing manipulator. Look at the beginning of episode two; after failing to convince Duela to trust Stephanie by vouching for her, he pivots: “[Put the knife down] or you might kill the one person who could prove we were set up.” He realizes Duela needs a self-serving reason to stop threatening Stephanie and he gives it to her. The same hyper awareness of emotional situations shows up again in episode thirteen when he wants to convince the group to have faith in Duela. The rest of the Knights are somewhat derisive that someone with Duela’s past and parentage could ever become a self-sacrificing hero…at which point Turner reveals his own parents’ secret: they were assassins sent to kill the Batman, and if they don’t trust Duela because of who raised her, they shouldn’t trust him either. And it works like a charm as the group gives into Turner’s wishes.

Duela Doe Dent

Duela is such a complex character, I wasn’t sure of her sorting till the very last minute. I think what’s important to look at in order to figure her out is her mom. Duela idolizes Jane Doe and wants nothing more than to be like her. And Jane is the ultimate hedonistic Double Snake. So of course Duela has a Snake secondary that is always ready for a con. But at the end of the day this is just the model she wears because of her mother. One of the themes of the show is trying to live up to your parents’ expectations and what that does to you. And modeling Jane’s Snake sec I think made Duela to feel a bit invisible. In episode eight when she talks about how her mom had so many identities even she herself forgot who she really was, it’s the first time when she doesn’t talk about her with admiration, but with fear. Duela is similarly terrified of losing herself while trying to live up to the legacy of being the Joker’s daughter. Deep down under that playful Snake, there is a Lion Secondary that is as blunt as they come. Her plan B when rescuing Turner in episode nine? A bomber vest to kill everyone if needed. Her reaction to evil!Harvey? To taunt him by throwing the truth in his face. Turner is dying from radiation? Duela tells him as soon as she finds out, against everyone else’s wishes. As Turner says she ‘has no grasp on social clues’, ‘she always tells the hard truths’ and ‘she’s always…Duela’. And I don’t think it’s a coincidence it’s this last line that makes her kiss him. This is the Lion secondary being overjoyed at someone liking Duela for who she is, not who she tries to be. Her fighting style (punches and knives to throats), her way of gathering information being kidnapping and torture and her tendency of giving Turner a reality check whenever he needs it are also evidence that support a Lion secondary. Her idea of a distraction is also hilariously straight-forward: she escapes from the police by pointing out how she’s trying to pick her handcuffs. (Sidenote: Turner and Duela’s ‘not offended’ game, aside from giving us THE most romantic line in the show, it’s also very Lion-coded IMO. There is very little you can say to a Lion secondary that will offend them as long as you are honest and it’s clear your intentions aren’t malicious.)

When trying to figure out Duela’s secondary I realized that she is incredibly healthy for a girl raised in Arkham by a conwoman. Sure, she’s extremely self-serving and would climb over anyone to get what she wants, but she has no regrets about it. It’s a tough world and everyone is in it for themselves. Except Duela is in it for her and her mom. (And she thinks the same must be true for her mom.) She’s a Snake primary who can’t be with Her Person. So she’s a little burnt. She doesn’t let herself get too close to anyone because what’s the point? Everyone leaves you eventually. Jane is the only person that had been there for Duela so she is the only one allowed to be in her inner circle. But than episode two happens and Duela abandons Harper, Cullen, Carrie and Turner to save her own skin. So when the invincible assassin comes after her, Duela is all alone. Except no, because suddenly the others are there and they are saving her life. She tries to clumsily thank Cullen for it, but he points out that if it wasn’t for Turner, they would have left her for dead. This is the switch that puts him on her map and slowly but surely, her Snake latches onto him. “I don’t care about Gotham, I care about Turner.” Duela and Turner’s first conflict in episode 11 is a deeply Loyalist one: she wants him to run away with her and her mom because she only cares about these two people, but Turner’s inner circle has expanded to include the others, so he can’t just leave. And the girl who’s already kinda burnt takes it as a betrayal and leaves without him. But she does come back when she realizes her mom is safe, but Turner is in mortal peril; or tries to. I find it interesting that her reaction to seeing the others imprisoned is to say ‘Even little bird’. And that’s because Carrie is the other person she bonded with.

Duela heals completely in the last episode when two things happen: Harvey promises to be her dad and commits a great sacrifice for her…and Turner comes to save her despite still being under the impression that she was never gonna come back. Her delighted expression when seeing him says it all. I always thought the Twelfth Doctor’s speech ‘Do You Think I Care for You So Little that Betraying Me Would Make a Difference?’ is every Snake’s dream, especially a burnt Snake’s, and Turner gave her this exact speech with his actions. Duela’s last scene mirrors Turner’s attitude during the whole show.

Harper: Duela, do you even care about the people?

Duela: No. But Turner did. And I cared about him.

She has adopted her loved ones’ morality and is willing to act on it. She’s a healthy Snake now despite all the tragedies that have happened to her.

(I am unsure about this, but I do wonder if Duela might have had a Bird primary model filled with nihilistic beliefs that she gets rid off by the end of the series. It would explain some of her more Idealist-like scenes, like when she is upset Joe Chill -the patron saint of small thieves- was actually set up. Or when she has to be comforted by Turner after saving the lives of kidnapping victims: “Just because you did a good thing doesn’t make you a good person.” The fact that this phrase makes her smile happily was hilarious.)

Harper Row

Harper is another Lion secondary that can’t be anything else but what she is. She’s blunt and forceful and makes her opinion known. She may be a genius but she is no Bird as she has none of the Bird sec traits. Sure she does research when needed, but she doesn’t show any particular inclination towards it outside life and death situations. As proven in the last episode, when she’s in a fight she goes for the biggest weapon. The way she stands up to Stephanie’s mom by throwing the truth in her face is also a very Lion move.

Harper is another Loyalist and for a while I believed she was a Snake with only Cullen as her person. After all, everything she does was and is for him. But she’s actually pretty miserable. Which is why I think she’s actually a Burnt Badger. @wisteria-lodge has this to say about Burnt Badgers: “[the Burnt Badger ]has decided that communities are unsafe, unpractical, and the only way to be safe is to be alone - or to try and be content with a much smaller community than the one they want. For this reason, Burnt badgers tend to look like miserable Snakes.” We sadly don’t get a lot of interiority for Harper (another reason to hate the cancellation), but I think her behavior towards Stephanie and especially Stephanie-Turner when contrasted to Duela’s is telling. Harper and Duela both have a crush on a person that has a very deep relationship with someone else, to the point that one can mistake the relationship as romantic. Which Harper does and starts resenting Stephanie and pushing her away in order to protect herself. She’s too scared to let herself get attached, typical Burnt Badger behavior. Meanwhile Snake Duela is just happy there is someone else prioritizing Turner like she does.

After their names are cleared, Harper says she might enroll in Gotham Academy with Stephanie, which to me shows that she’s looking to build a community.

Cullen Row

Cullen is the only one, alongside Stephanie, that is willing to deviate from their quest of proving their innocence in order to catch an art thief. While Harper refuses to risk her life in order to ‘recover trinkets for the rich’ and Turner says it’s not a priority, Lion primary Cullen has embraced his role as a hero of the city and thinks it would be unethical to not try and catch the thief and recover the stolen art. He’s also the one that wants to clear his name in the pilot because ‘I am the one who chose the damned thing’. If Turner wants to prove his innocence because he doesn’t want to be remembered as his own father’s killer and Duela and Harper don’t want to risk their lives in order to clear their names, Idealist Cullen is the only one who wants to do it because it’s the Right Thing to do.

I oscillated between Snake and Bird for his secondary, but I went with the former because deception is his go-to method. Need to trade the electrum for Turner but don’t want to give it to the Court? Just create a fake one. (And that scene is such a contrast with Lion sec Duela whose solution is to try and cut the powerful space rock with a run-of-the-mill knife LOL) Need evidence from the police station? Pretend to be a cop. In the pilot, when they knock out the cops chasing them, Cullen is the one that uses their station to keep the other cops from finding them.

Stephanie Brown

Stephanie is a Lion primary who is pretty much being gaslighted by her parents. She knows your mom being so drunk and drugged she can’t even stand at your school function is wrong, just as wrong as your dad using his money and status to supply her addiction just to keep up the picture of the perfect family. Stephanie does everything her parents tell her to, including ‘dating a guy with the right last name’. Except that’s not entirely true. Stephanie rebels in her own quiet way from the pilot when she helps Turner and keeps helping him and his friends after they become fugitives. You can see her Lion primary both loves the rebellion and the fact that she gets to be a hero, to truly do something good. As I pointed out before, aside from Cullen, Stephanie is the only one who believes it’s their duty as heroes to recover stolen art.

When she lets her father go to prison instead of giving Lincoln her friends’ location, Arthur Brown frames it as a Loyalist conflict: me versus them. But Idealist Stephanie doesn’t see it that way. What she sees is that her father is going to pay for his crimes, while her friends are innocent.

Her secondary was a bit harder, because I think it had been a bit burned by playing the perfect daughter, but I settled on Lion secondary. She and Harper communicate with each other in an easy and blunt way, like Lions do. She also has the Lion tendency of picking a strategy and just sticking with it, no matter how ill advised it might be. In her case it is using her hacker skills despite almost being arrested in the second episode. She’s also incredibly honest (when Brody asks about what she thinks about his dad, Stephanie just repeats that she thinks his mom is nice), uncomfortable with deception and goes after what she wants once her Lion primary has picked a path (see how she kissed Harper both in episode 11 and 13).

Carrie Kelly

Carrie is Bruce Wayne’s student when it comes to vigilantism and his true heir in the show. She is another Lion primary, and a Paragon one at that, just like her mom and her mentor. Like Turner’s and Duela’s, her story is about rising to your parents’ expectations, but in Carrie’s case, she surpasses them! Dr. Kelly is Gotham’s best surgeon who has double shifts at the hospital because this is the right thing to do and her drive has rubbed onto her daughter. So of course Carrie picks up on her mom’s, and later, Bruce’s, desire to save people and protect the city. As such when the opportunity arises she becomes Robin, Batman’s partner. Dr. Kelly is shocked her daughter would become a vigilante, but as Carrie points out she had been raised to do the right thing. This is also why she saves Turner and co in the pilot: she knows they are innocent and as such needs to rescue them. She’s still a young Lion who has quite the idealistic view and we see in the episode ‘More money, more problem’ -where she manages to put a mob boss behind bars only for him to be released by corrupt officials- that Gotham’s harsh reality could easily burn her. Thankfully I think the creation of the Gotham Knights would help prevent this.

As for her secondary, first things first: this girl is not a Lion. She steals the journal pages in episode two and keeps the secret about Batman killing Turner’s parents for the next eight episodes without much effort. She doesn’t have any Bird or Snake traits, which leaves Badger secondary, something that fits her quite well. I would say she is a Bookkeeper Badger, the other side of the coin to Turner’s Courtier Badger. Wisteria says about them: “A Bookkeeper Badger shows up and does the work. They are dependable, they are thorough, they don’t like cutting corners (Badgers consider cutting corners on something that they actually care about immoral.)” This perfectly describes Carrie.

Brody March

Brody doesn’t get that much interiority, so it’s hard to settle on a primary to him. I am oscillating between a heroic Badger or Lion as he turns on his parents when he realizes they are doing terrible things. I am gonna go with Badger primary, mostly for how much it seems like a community is important to him. When he joins the Knights in episode 12 he immediately considers himself one of them: “We would be fine.” There is also the way he seems to have quite the social life at Gotham Academy. This is mostly implied, but from the very first episode, while Turner is positioned as the outsider who will never get over the stigma of being ‘from the slums of Gotham’ and as such never truly belong in the upper class, Brody is the ‘guy with the perfect family name’ as Stephanie puts it. Everything he does is to live up to this family name, but unlike Stephanie, he genuinely wants to do so, it isn’t just pressure from his parents. You can see the first peak of the more heroic Badger when he does volunteer work at the hospital with Carrie and is bothered by the people left to suffer and wants to help them.

Brody and Turner’s pre-show relationship is fascinating and I’m sad it never gets fully explored. It’s clear they were somewhat close to each other, probably mostly because of Stephanie, but they are also clearly rivals in a lot of aspects: when it comes to swordfighting, to Stephanie’s affection and just to social status in general. Being the Bruce Wayne’s son, Turner is somewhat socially above Brody and pretty much all of the other students and you can see it irks them as they certainly feel he doesn’t deserve it. Brody believes Turner is capable of murdering his own father for money for…nine episodes, I think! And unlike most of Gotham, Brody clearly had enough of a rapport with him to have some doubts, but he doesn’t. I think these are the dark tendencies of a Badger to give into prejudice.

As Turner’s foil, Brody is another Badger secondary, but like Carrie -with whom he forms an organic friendship- I think he’s more of a Bookkeeper. While Turner may have been introduced to us in the pilot offering his hand to Brody, Brody is introduced when he accepts said hand, showing his fair play. His reaction when he is in uncomfortable situations (the gala, when he discovers the hidden camera with the recorded evidence) is to ask a friend (aka Stephanie) for help.

TL;DR

Turner Hayes - Snake who picked up Bruce’s morality/Courtier Badger

Duela Doe Dent - somewhat burnt Snake (with maybe a nihilistic Bird model)/Lion with a healthy Snake model

Harper Row - burned Badger/Lion

Cullen - Lion/Snake

Stephanie Brown - Lion/burned Lion

Carrie Kelly - Paragon Lion/Bookkeeper Badger

Brody March - Badger/Bookkeeper Badger

#sortinghatchats #gotham knights #gothaam knights cw #turner hayes #duela doe #duela dent #harper row #cullen row #stephanie brown #carrie kelly #brody march #this took me FOUR hours to make!#this show has given me brainrot #meta #my thoughts

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fuckyeahmarkgatiss · 1 year

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The recent Times article on Mark & Ian

https://www.thetimes.co.uk/article/mark-gatiss-and-ian-hallard-i-asked-him-to-marry-me-the-afternoon-we-met-339v55jw2

The article is behind a paywall but I still had some access so here you all are!

Mark Gatiss & Ian Hallard: ‘I proposed on the afternoon we met.’

The League of Gentleman star and his actor husband on dating at the dawn of the internet and coming out to their parents.

Mark

Ian and I met online back in 1999, long before Grindr, when online dating still had a certain stigma attached to it. “Poor you! You can’t find anyone in the real world, so you have to go scrabbling around on the internet.” I didn’t tell my family how we’d met for several years.

You also have to remember that gay men didn’t necessarily go on dates in search of eternal happiness. Dates were fun and exciting. So, when we met in the glamorous surroundings of Finsbury Park Tube station and went back to my flat, I didn’t think it was anything serious. But it was. Ian loves to tell people that I asked him to marry me that afternoon. With hindsight I think I was probably joking, but I certainly had high hopes: “Maybe he’s ‘the one’.”

Having said that, it did take a while to get used to the idea of being a couple. All my previous relationships had sort of … fizzled out. With Ian it was the opposite; we seemed to grow closer and closer. We’ve even collaborated on several projects and I’m directing his first play at the moment [the Abba-inspired The Way Old Friends Do, which Ian wrote and stars in], but there’s never been any sense of rivalry. We get asked if it’s difficult living and working together, but why would it be a problem to spend time with the person you love?

I grew up in a working-class town near Durham, my dad worked at the pit. Telling people you were gay in that situation wasn’t easy. I came out to my friends when I was 15 and there were a few comments at school, but I was never bullied. The real problem for me in the Seventies and early Eighties was that I had no idea what to do about being gay.

Apart from the occasional storyline in [the drama series] Play for Today, the only gay men on TV were John Inman and Larry Grayson. I play Larry in the new TV drama Nolly [about Noele Gordon, a star of the soap Crossroads] and understand why John and Larry were regarded as torchbearers. But some gay activists in the Seventies saw them as the enemy: screamingly gay, but at the same time a sort of neutered Saturday-night camp.

Somehow I managed to put off telling my parents to the point where my mam was the one who brought it up. I was home from university and she simply asked me. It was a huge relief. I said, “Hadn’t we better tell Dad?” Mam looked at me. “Oh no! It’ll kill him.” So we didn’t.

A couple of weeks later I was talking to Mam on the phone and she said, “I told your dad. Ooh, we had some snow overnight.” Initially I thought that had saved me from having to talk to him about it, but it had just been popped at the back of a drawer.

Dad struggled at first, but considering his background it could have been a lot worse. Although it was a bit awkward when he met Ian, we never had “issues”. Sadly we lost him in 2021. The weird thing is that as he got older he became much more tolerant. Even after he lost Mam — his loneliness seemed to soothe his prejudices. He understood that love is where it falls.

It sounds like a complete cliché to say, “We make each other laugh all the time,” but it’s absolutely true. Our shared sense of humour has become the glue that has bonded us. Ian’s definitely more together than me when it comes to admin, and I’m pretty sure he did most of the organising when we had our civil partnership in 2008. The main problem is that, left to our own devices, we can be as bad as each other. We make all these grand plans, then we decide to take Bob [the labrador] for a walk instead.

Ian and I did have a brief period of broodiness, then we quickly realised that neither of us was responsible enough, so we got a dog. The ideal scenario would be that a fully formed, well-educated, extremely polite grown-up knocks on our door and declares that they are the fruit of my overeager teenage loins. We get to be parents without the hard work!

The couple in 1999, the year they met

Ian

Remember when Stelios from easyJet started his internet cafés? Without Stelios I wouldn’t have met Mark. I didn’t have the internet at my flat in London, so I would go to a Stelios café every day to check emails and log on to gay.com. Back then online dating didn’t involve pictures; it was just messages and a phone call. When Mark and I finally clapped eyes on each other, there was that awful moment of tension, trying to decide if we fancied each other. If not, I guess we would have headed off on our separate ways.

Mark was only the second man I’d made contact with online and the first one I’d met. I did sort of recognise him because The League of Gentlemen had been on telly, but I hadn’t actually seen it. That was probably a good thing. Had I been a massive fan, I’m not sure things would have worked out.

Mark’s career has taken a different trajectory to mine. He has been involved in a lot of high-profile projects and around the time of Sherlock [Gatiss was co-creator, co-writer and appeared as Holmes’s brother, Mycroft] things did go a bit crazy. That one-sided success can cause havoc in a relationship, especially with actors — lots of arguments and jealousy. Some relationships seem to thrive on that constant drama. Not us! I’ve never seen Mark have an argument with anyone. He’s unfailingly polite to the point of diffidence.

I hit my teens when TV was full of adverts about Aids — huge icebergs, tombstones. My parents were your typical easy-going, middle-class Brummies. There was no hint of homophobia but, in that climate, you can see why they might be concerned about having a gay son. What kind of future did I have? I was either going to die of Aids or kill myself out of loneliness and depression.

When I eventually told them I’d met someone and talked about bringing him home to meet them, they were very happy. I told them he was in this fantastic programme called The League of Gentlemen and proudly told them it had won a Bafta. Unfortunately they decided to watch it. They saw this collection of psychopaths and monsters and thought, “What’s he got himself involved with? Is it a cult?” Mum rang me up and said, “Please tell me it’s not him who plays that weirdo Mickey.” I paused for a second and then said, “Yes, Mum, that’s the man I’m going to marry.”

The Way Old Friends Do, Lyceum, Sheffield, Tue-Sat; Park Theatre, London N4, Mar 15-Apr 15; and touring until Jun 10; thewayoldfriendsdo.com

Strange habits

Mark on Ian

He’s incapable of keeping his side of the bed tidy. I call his pile of dirty clothes “the Bedroom Monster”

Ian on Mark

He worries about us travelling in the same car in case something happens to us both and Bob becomes an orphan

#Mark Gatiss #Ian Hallard #adorable husbands #the way old friends do #recent article

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quietgalcoasterss · 4 months

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My Rides on Kingda Ka

As of right now, I've ridden Kingda Ka at Great Adventure 3 times. I love this thing to death, even if she breaks down a fair amount. But I like to think that she just gets nervous when big crowds come in and the ride ops have to give her a bit to calm down before working again. You go girl :p

Before I discuss my rides on Kingda, lemme tell you about the time I just missed it. It was the first trip I went on this past summer with my dad, in which I got over my coaster fear for good. I was intentionally saving Kingda Ka for last, as I saw her as the most thrilling ride in the park. I had just gotten off El Toro, and figured Kingda was next on the list. We walked over to the Golden Kingdom, and at the time we did not know about the pathway between the Golden Kingdom and Plaza del Carnival, making back-to-back rides on Toro and Kingda way easier. So we ended up walking all around the park, unsurprisingly exhausting us.

As we made the voyage over, seeing Kingda lurking in the distance unsurprisingly excited me and gave me butterflies in my stomach. She be a big coaster; Great Adventure locals will understand how it feels to not only see her rising far out of the tree line during the drive, but being able to get up close in the parking lot. And Kingda Ka is LOUD: you can't hear it throughout the park since there's a lotta coasters that make some noise (Nitro, Superman Ultimate Flight, Medusa, El Toro etc), but when you're up close to her she roars. Fortunately, I'd been seeing trains go over the top hat all day-especially in the loooong line of Superman-so I knew she wasn't closed for the day.

We finally arrived at the entrance. Kingda Ka stood reaching into the sky. It was a particularly cloudy day. I handed my stuff over to my dad, raced for the gate, and...

she was closed for maintenance.

At this point, my dad and I were both too exhausted to wait around for her to come back online, so we decided to just head back over to Medusa so I could get one last ride on her. And hey, Medusa's a solid floorless coaster: smooth as glass and really nice colors for brownie points. But lemme tell you how I felt as we got back into the car, and sure enough a train was going over Kingda Ka's top hat. I guess I would have been bitter, but I was tired, thirsty and I still had an awesome day in the end, even if I missed out on the tallest coaster in the world. But I would be back soon. Very soon.

Few weeks later, I was back in Great Adventure, just a few days before I would leave for college. But I wasn't just here to have a fun day. I was here to conquer Kingda Ka for good. But first I warmed up with a ride on Medusa. Weeeeeeeee :3 \o/

Once I got off, I immediately gunned for Kingda Ka. Sure enough, she was closed yet again for maintenance. But I wasn't leaving: I put my stuff in a locker and I got comfy outside the gated-off entrance. I don't know how long I waited, maybe around 15 minutes, but I kept myself busy by listening to the staff tell people coming by that she's not sure when the ride will reopen. I do wish there were at least some benches nearby the entrance; Kingda goes down a lot, so it'd be neat to have to seat on the ground or lean against the fence. Not an earth-shattering issue though, just something you notice while you're waiting for a roller coaster to reopen in 85 F and 80% humidity with no idea of how long you've been waiting. You think some crazy stuff man.

Finally, the staff member got the all-clear from the station, and the chain was lifted. I zoomed into the queue, and fortunately there was almost no line. As far as I'm aware, Kingda Ka's queue seems to work in two parts. The first spans from the entrance and throughout much of the zig-zaggy barriers, while the second goes from the end of the last zig-zags to the station. I'm guessing that ride ops only want a certain amount of people in the station at a time, just in case Kingda goes down and they don't want crowds of people waiting around. So once the station starts to empty, they tell the ops dividing the queue to let more folks in. The first half was pretty much completely empty, and I ran all the way to the station. And lemme tell you, the ride ops operating Kingda Ka that day were stellar. I know Six Flags ops have a reputation for being pretty lazy, but that is not the case for Great Adventure. So far through my two recent visits, I don't think I've ever seen an objectively bad or even lazy crew operating a ride. I guess if I had to pick one that was bad, I guess it would be Green Lantern, since they seemed a little more bored than usual. But even then, they weren't half-assing or anything, they were still very much on top of things. And Kingda Ka's crew on that day was perhaps the best example of all. Whenever a train pulled back into the station, they began encouraging people to quickly unbuckle and prepare to get out and going to not stall the line. But they weren't forceful or rude: they had this perfect blend of strong encouragement and energy that got the next batch of riders hyped. It was awesome. I really hope that Great Adventure keeps up what they're doing with their ops, it makes me so happy seeing my home park doing so well in regards that their company is known to lack in.

Finally, I got into my seat and lowered my restraints: row 3, left seat. And lemme tell you, I was getting nervous. My coaster fear might have been slain, but that did not stop the anxiety over riding a hydraulic launch coaster. The train left the station, and stopped over the catch car. Staring at Kingda Ka's top hat from the parking lot is one thing. Staring down the top hat while in a train is a whoooooole other thing. Even now, having gone over it 3 times, I still get antsy over just the anticipation. A number like 456 feet (139 meters) can feel not as large when comparing tall coasters. And I know, Kingda's currently the tallest in the world. But in a world full of Top Thrill 2's, Intimidator 305's, Red Force's and Fury 325's, that number can still become numb, even if it's still the tallest. But when you're actually facing it down? It aaaaaaall comes back as to just how big a strata coaster really is. And it is scary. Fun, but scary.

I wasn't staring Kingda down for long, as my train ended up quickly hooking onto the catch car, followed by the brakes lowering. I wanna say that it's about 3 seconds from the loud click of the catch car to the launch slingshotting you off. But it somehow feels like a thousand years and an instant at the same time. My point is: Kingda Ka is fast. And it feels fucking amazing. It feels AMAZING!!! I LOVE IT SO MUCH!!!!!! I MUST'VE BEEN GIGGLING FOR LIKE 2 MINUTES STRAIGHT AFTER GETTING OFF AND I TOLD MY FRIENDS OVER DISCORD JUST HOW AWESOME IT WAS AND IT SURPASSED MY EXPECTATIONS SO MUCH!!!!!! AAAAAAAAAAAAA I LOVE KINGDA KA SO MUCH!!!! AND IT'S SMOOTH!!!! IT ISN'T GLASS SMOOTH BUT IT IS SURE AS HELL NOT CLOSE TO BUMPY OR RATTLEY OR ANYTHING OF THE SORT!!! WHY DO THOOSIES SAY KINGDA KA IS ROUGH???? I DON'T GET IT!!!! DO THEY HATE FUN???

So yea Kingda Ka is awesome :3 But I wasn't done with her just yet for that day. After hopping off I got some rides on Superman, Nitro, Jersey Devil and of course several on El Toro. The bull demands my soul and I shall answer. I am the bull's servant. But then I was feeling some more Kingda Ka. And sure enough, I now knew about the pathway between Golden Kingdom and Plaza del Carnival, so it was a way shorter walk. And hey, turns out Great Adventure has a few animal exhibits along the path. That was neat seeing some turtles :>

Fortunately, Kingda had been operating pretty smoothly all day. Unfortunately, that meant a line had formed. I think while waiting in line she also briefly went down as well, but you can't win all of em lol. So I ended up sitting in queue for a while. But we all knew that she was awake yet again once we heard trains firing off through the bamboo, and sure enough the line started moving again. It was while I was approaching the station that after hearing another train firing off, and I saw this girl look at her friend next to her with an expression of "how did you convince me to get in this line what is wrong with you".

Also can I just say that I love how you can hear Kingda Ka's launches through the bamboo, but you can't see it all too well? It's so cooooooooool. I know it's not the same as what OG Top Thrill Dragster did with the bleachers, lights and audio, but it's still so neat. I love little details like that: it makes Kingda feel like she's part of the bamboo forest. Even if you can see it all from the parking lot but it is what it is lol.

I sat in the same seat and row as before; it's just a nice seat. Not front row but still up close to the front. Ride was just as amazing as before, but after I got off something timely happened. As I was exiting the station and returning to the entrance, it started to rain. When it rains, the ride ops close Kingda Ka until the storm passes, since it's apparently pretty painful going that high up in the rain. So imagine my face when only a minute or so after I went over the top hat, they had to close Kingda lmfao.

I waited out the rain by grabbing some fries, albeit I still got a little wet and I forgot my rain jacket. Once the storm passed, Nitro and Medusa both unfortunately closed for maintenance: Nitro for presumably something caused by the rain, and Medusa for issues with one of the trains. But hey it wasn't a big loss: I got another ride on El Toro :3

But I figured to end the day with one last ride on Kingda Ka. The line was a little better from last time, and I sat in the same row. But another single rider asked if he could have the left seat, which I was fine with. And y'know what this man did? He put his hands up on the launch. I'm more than fine with putting my arms up on most coasters. I'm looking at you Nitro :>. But Kingda Ka's launch? Hell nah. After going over the top hat then sure hell yea. But even the ride itself tells you "Arms down. Head back. Hold on!" right before the launch. Apparently the wind hurts with your arms up at a speed like that! So yea, god bless that man's soul, hope his arm's are ok too.

So as of right now, those are my 3 rides on Kingda Ka. I love this beast to death, and I hope Great Adventure keeps her hydraulic launch for as long as possible. What happened to that guest with Top Thrill Dragster was tragic, and hopefully something like that never happens again. And hell, I'm pumped af for Top Thrill 2, it looks amazing. But what Kingda Ka does is special. It might not be the only hydraulic launch coaster in the world, but it is now the only remaining hydraulic launch strata coaster. And Intamin doesn't manufacture the hydraulic launch anymore on account of its inefficiency and cost. So for now, stay strong Kingda, you deserve just as much love as OG TTD did in its heyday. And next time, I'll go front row :>

#six flags #six flags great adventure #kingda ka #roller coaster #roller coaster enthusiast #thoosie

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angelsdean · 10 months

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dean's kinda right for calling sam a selfish bastard in 1x11 because like, in this instance sam insisting they do what HE wants very much WILL result in two people getting killed. like it's a certainty. if they turn around and head to california two innocent people WILL die.

while they're driving and discussing the case they figure out the window for these disappearances is consistent across the board: second week of april. then sam say this is the second week of april.

sam sums up the gist of it, john's sending them there to save this next couple before they vanish. this job isn't just about hunting some monster or spirit in the area that may attack, the attack is certain. the pattern has been consistent for years. it's very likely another couple will disappear / die. and it's already the second week, there's no wiggle room, no space to pause and come back to this case later.

still, sam insists on dropping the case and heading to california. the demon and getting revenge is more important to him right now than saving lives.

dean says, this is important. saving lives is important. and sam says he understands, but his next statement shows he really really doesn't. because he says "I'm talking one week here...to get revenge." ONE WEEK is exactly the amount of time you don't have. Letting this case sit for one week will ensure that another couple dies. Revenge can wait. John can wait. It's been over six months at this point without word from John. Now that they know generally where he is, it can wait. One week won't change much on that front.

so, i mean, dean IS kinda right. sam IS being selfish in this moment (and stubborn. he is thee Most taurus)

yes, dean is also a bit defensive and deflecting because sam won't stop insisting dean's a mindless little soldier and dean also feels some resentment at sam for just leaving him to deal with john on his own (1x06 shifter monologue) and some of those feelings are a bit unfair (but dean's allowed to feel them! just like sam's allowed to feel his anger and resentment toward dean! they can feel things even if their perceptions of the situation are not 100% true). and this scene is playing off as an echo to sam leaving for stanford, he's going to california whether dean likes it or not! and that's gotta be dredging up some bad feelings for dean. but dean's still right about sam acting selfishly here. sam says he understands that hunting is important and this job is important, yet he's willing to let these people die and be collateral in his quest for revenge.

(side note: it's also very interesting to me that when sam asks "that's what you really think?" dean owns up to it right away. which is a nice contrast to the last episode where sam under ghost-possession says a whole lot of shit to dean, fulled by his anger which the ghost is exacerbating, and it's very obvious to dean and the audience that sam does feel those things, even if the words came out harsher than they might have normally. but sam insists at the end of the episode he didn't mean it !! but from dean's reaction we can tell dean doesn't buy it. but here, dean doesn't beat around the bush. he's angry with sam, he's annoyed that sam is putting his own feelings and need for revenge over what dean believes is the more important part of their job, saving people. and so he says it! and maybe it's harsh and sure he'll feel bad about it later, but it's healthier to say how he really feels abt the situation then pretend everything is fine)

in summary: AITA for wanting to drop a case that NEEDS to be completed this very week or else two people WILL disappear and likely die, just so i can track down our dad who's been MIA for *checks notes* over six months, because he's closing in on the demon that killed my mom and girlfriend and i just want to get revenge already !! even though california's a big state and it'll take me at least a day or more to get there and there's no guarantee i'll even find our dad but we can work this case now and save lives now but i just, don't wanna :/

#yes this is probs reads as heavy samcr*t but like. LIKE. dean literally is not wrong in this situation #and i'm not even saying sam's wrong for wanting to find john / avenge jess but like. buddy !! it CAN wait !!#there are SO many variables that do not guarantee they will find john IF they go to california #but it's very very likely they WILL be able to save these people in time if they go work this job #anyways. i do love sam. he's my stubborn taurus younger sibling. i have experience with these things ajdksfk #sometimes your younger sib is just. Wrong and so very stuck in their mindset and you gotta tell em off a little #vics spn rewatch

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kedreeva · 11 months

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My friend (>:|) started talking to me about someone writing a Steddie JP AU, but all that did was make me really want a Camp Cretaceous AU with the Party. So please come along with me for a moment.

Will Byers wins an art contest to get there. Dustin beats a video game. Mike enters a storytelling competition. Max's skateboarding sponsors send her. Lucas and Erica's mom is one of the lead scientists, so they usually live up the island with their dad, who lets them go to the camp to hang out (which incidentally means neither of them but especially not Erica is impressed with the camp). El... no one's quite sure how El got there. She's quiet.

The camp counselors, Steve and Eddie, introduce themselves at the dock and take the new arrivals to the camp to meet Lucas and Erica. Everyone hits it off well that first night, trading their stories about how they got here, talking about dinosaurs. Most of them actually do like dinosaurs, but there's a line drawn in the sand about whether these even ARE dinosaurs (Will and Dustin argue they are NOT, Lucas and Mike argue that they ARE, Max doesn't care she just thinks they're cool, Erica doesn't care she just thinks they're not cool, El doesn't really know what dinosaurs are, but it's her fault they got into the debate).

They actually get to spend a few days on the island before shit hits the fan. Getting into shenanigans, learning the layout, seeing things that will come back later. Getting little hints of the evil going on behind the scenes, but in ways that don't particularly set off alarm bells until you're looking back.

And then the indorex breaks containment and the island gets abandoned. The kids are out when it happens, maybe in the riding balls so they end up relatively safe, but not recovered. Steve and Eddie stay behind to try to find them, but they JUST miss each other several times, and finally they're forced to leave the kids there despite KNOWING in their BONES that the kids ARE alive.

The kids spend the next 6 months surviving the wilds of jurassic world. Dustin befriends a dinosaur he names Dart and gets lost in the woods for a while when they get separated. They build a fort from the remains of the camp. They go on adventures to acquire food and drink and try to communicate with the mainland. They face off against opportunistic poachers and nearly escape on the boat, eventually making it to the nearby island and finding out all the lurking evil from the first half of the story has come back to bite them, and they can't go home without saving the dinosaurs from the Russians running some kind of underground dinosaur fight club.

Meanwhile on the mainland, Jonathan is mourning his little brother while Joyce is trying to figure out how to get them to the island to go looking for Will. Nancy turns up because she caught a wisp of communication from Mike from one of their attempts to contact home, and she KNOWS they are alive. So the three of them start digging and end up in contact with Steve and Eddie who are like yeah we got you, we can get you there, we know the place, we'll come help. So THEIR group ends up heading to the islands to look.

Hopper, meanwhile, as head of security for the island, has been losing his mind because he cannot think how this happened except one of his team failed but he personally vetted the whole team, they were all exceptional. it HAD to be sabotage. Someone was not telling him something. He's furious. He ends up going to the island to investigate , and runs aground of Joyce's group, and ends up joining them.

They find evidence of the kids on the island, and then somehow end up in radio contact with the kids on the other island. They call in authorities (hello Sam Owens), and hop islands to go get the kids, who by this point have definitely befriended Murray the scientist who is 99% certain there's a conspiracy going on he hasn't figured out yet and Dmitri, one of the robots they've reprogrammed to be on their side instead. They're getting ready to go head to head with Dr. Brenner, El's "dad" in some way, when Joyce's group finally gets to them, and it's getting kind of grim until Sam's group also arrives, and everyone gets rescued and/or arrested and the place gets closed down and our people all get to go home.

#stranger things #the party #steddie #camp cretaceous au #stranger things fic #my writing #idkfandomwhatever #this is your fault maz

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xgoldenlatiasx · 1 month

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ohhh I am Brainstorming

ok ok so infodump ahead: Arcelia is the daughter of Archie (aaaand possibly Maxie? I haven’t figured out if I want hardenshipping to be divorced or if they get together after ORAS) and grew up a member of Team Aqua. For a while there she had full confidence in her father’s plan, but then Something happens (haven’t figured out what yet) and realizes oh wait this idea is shit actually what the fuck dad. unsure of what to really do to stop her dad yet, she runs away and ends up in Littleroot. there she stumbles into Professor Birch getting chased by a wild poochyena, saves him, etc. etc. etc.

not really sure what to do with this lost child who literally just came out of the bushes and saved him one day, Birch takes her in and lets her be an assistant like Brendan is. buuut she’s not super good at it. she gets kind of fed up and restless, especially when her dad is still out there planning to FLOOD THE FUCKIN WORLD, so as a way to try and help her Birch gives her Pebble the Mudkip and sends her out on a journey. thus begins her gym challenge and her mission to save her father from himself basically.

post-ORAS Archie has to serve time and stuff so Arcelia… doesn’t really know where to go from here. and she doesn’t wanna stay in Hoenn honestly cause she’s still kinda recovering from saving the world and fighting her own dad. SO Birch tries to help and sends her to Naranja Academy in Paldea, where hopefully she can find some semblance of a normal life and learn to just be a regular kid. it’s all well meaning but it doesn’t exactly work out bc Arcelia ends up being all by herself. again.

aaaand of course that’s where she meets a certain future-ground-type-elite-4-member! Arcelia is 16 at this point but she has to start off at freshman cause of yknow, never going to school before, and Rika is 17 and a junior. Arcelia struggles because 1. this is an extremely drastic change to literally anything she’s ever had in her life before 2. sure she’s only like a year older than the rest of the kids in her grade but she’s still significantly more mentally mature than a majority of them and thus has trouble connecting with them. honestly, even if she was allowed to start off as a sophomore, that prolly wouldn’t change cause kid has literally seen shit beyond any other high schooler’s comprehension.

Rika, not knowing anything about the whole saving the world thing but can easily see Arcelia’s struggling, approaches her and offers to help her with fitting in, keeping her grades up, and stuff like that. and the rest is history! the two become extremely close, but I don’t think Arcelia would fully open up about being the hero of the Hoenn crisis just yet- she’ll vaguely mention her strained relationship with her dad and make it come off as something much more simple than “my dad was an evil team leader who tried to drown the world”, but during their school years Rika never totally understands the full weight of it.

I think once Rika graduates they have a dramatic falling out of some kind. haven’t exactly figured out the details of it yet but during this falling out Arcelia has to go back to Hoenn- probably somethin to do with her dad or with Kyogre or whatever- whatever it is she can’t tell Rika about it, which only frustrates Rika even more and creates a further rift between them. eventually Arcelia just leaves with hardly a goodbye and neither of them really get any closure.

-of course until Arcelia comes back to Paldea several years later :]

#pokemon #pokemon oc #pokemon scarlet and violet #pkmn sv #pokemon omega ruby and alpha sapphire #pkmn oras #trainer arcelia #elite four rika #my art

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charonyx · 3 months

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Crowley braninrot mess (not coherent) (all over the place)

Just to get thoughts out of the way, I want to analyze the Crowley card because this is definitely BIG (and I hope the rest of the staff may get their cards too). Fair warning, this is all speculation, theories and just whatever my brain is spilling out

So, THIS

My first thoughts were "Oh my gosh, really????", then I started to consider what this meant for the story, as in, why release his card NOW? Yes, this is an event card, but this is the first staff card and well this makes me suspicious of him coming into the main story. I mean, of course, he'd have to intervene somehow considering the suspicious smile he gives in the opening (which reminds me of Malleus' smile, but not getting into that, more people have analyzed that probably)

Anyway, his role will be made apparent, but I can't think of a way he'd organically waltz into Chapter 7 and become important right now. Which is why the Crowley = Levan theory would make sense where it would be this emotional meet up of a biological father that Malleus has never known and Lilia would have to deal with the fact someone he long thought was dead is right now playing the role of a goofy headmage. The thing though, is that I have a feeling that isn't where the story is going. Do I think they have something that's connecting them together? Yes, but there's something I can't quite explain that's preventing me from fully accepting the theory. Imma just try to write out (more) thoughts and try to digest my stance on things.

So, Malleus' conflicting thoughts on knowing his biological dad is alive, yet considering Lilia his real father since HE'S the one who took care of him, HE'S the one who had suffered hatred and rebuke trying to raise him and honor Meleanor's wish, spicy stuff.

Lilia's thoughts and emotional rollercoaster of knowing that one of his best buddies/Meleanor's partner/whatever relationship they had, is alive and hasn't considered contacting him, to reach out after grieving for his loss. Also spicy.

But also

The fakeout of a parent death. Many pieces of media do it, but I don't know if it feels right that Malleus gets to have a parent be fine and alive unless they make it tragic like Crowley has amnesia and doesn't remember anything about his past yet he has some sense of determination to keep going and find stuff out even if he's not sure why. THAT would be something.

There could also be a turnaround where Levan, a kind soul, fell into grief after his wife's death and has been trying to get her back/get her soul? that he places all his energy on that and places on an incompetent and silly act. As for his feelings for Malleus, there are multiple options. He either doesn't care for him, only cares for Meleanor and doesn't pay attention to him. This doesn't seem likely to be in Levan's character from what little we hear of how he was, even if he was suffering from heartrending grief. It could also be that he somehow knew Lilia, Baul and Maleficia were caring for him and he was certain his son was in good hands so he focused on other things (idk I'm just pointing stuff out). Could also be he thought his son died with Meleanor since he was out who knows where as a diplomat and got lost/captured/something that impeded his return (paralleling how Maleficient's plan for prince Phillip was to lock him up for 100 years and later release him once he's old and frail to save princess Aurora?). So, he never knew about Malleus' existence, never went back to Briar Valley and one day found his way to NRC where he later became headmage. And, seeing Malleus in his first year look identical to his late wife, he feels heartstricken to know his son survived and he had lost many important years in his development, so he would feel no connection to his biological father. Knowing that, he decides not to interfere, what would Malleus think of a father who was never there? A stranger claiming to be his father, yet feels his son would never accept him into his heart. It's too late.

While this could be in line with Levan's personality, it does seem a bit fanficy, especially the part I added with him seeing Malleus enter NRC. But this is speculation! So YEEHAW!

Now, how would Lilia, someone who spent so many decades with Levan, not recognize him right now? The only explanation I can think of would be he either 1) has a totally distinct personality that Lilia wouldn't even consider him at all, even if the hair color seems to be similar to Malleus' or 2) he's using glamour (although TWST hasn't shown people using glamour, it's a possibility) that would make it so Lilia doesn't recognize him

Also, his cane saying "RAVEN" is real interesting since it could be for NRC or his name being similar. Wild theory, but I feel like someone gifted him his cane, I don't think he was the one that engraved Raven onto it, at least, that's considering the latter option of it being his name.

I don't know, every time I try to think of Crowley's deal, thoughts keep popping up due to the possibilities of what he COULD be.

Anyways, this wasn't a concrete post or some genius "I'VE CRACKED THE CODE!!!". Just brainworms and thoughts I had to write out and make myself accept what I consider to narrow down future events. But TWST could throw a curveball, completely blindside me and I'll be gobsmacked. Who knows!

#twisted wonderland jp card spoilers #twisted wonderland chapter 7 jp spoilers #dire crowley theory #mostly mish-mash of ideas #NOT concise #dire crowley is malleus' dad theory? I guess?#this has made me accept the theory a bit more considering the ways the story could take it #but not ride or die yet #idk bird man be mysterious #can't wait for his groovy #maybe more clues to what may be going on #ALSO HIS VIGNETTE #gosh I never thought I'd have Crowley brainrot #yet here we are #happy new year

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howlingday · 11 months

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okay silly idea on the way, imagine jaune's children from the future coming to prevent jaune and his "mother" from meeting, but they can't say that so they disguise their plans as advice to their father …that somehow way they work. That's the idea now if you'll excuse me I'm going for a coffee to stay awake.

Don't stay up too late!

To be honest, I had an idea like this, though the way that would go would be different from this.

---------------------------------------------------

"I'm confused. Who are you guys?"

"Uh, we're..." Oran gulped as he stared at his father. Though he looked about his age, there was no doubt that this young man was his father.

"We're Team OYDN, Oyakodon." Yui answered for her team leader. "We're recent graduates of Haven Academy."

"Haven?" Jaune asked. "I didn't know they were still running."

"Why wouldn't it be?" Dani giggled.

Jaune was quiet for a moment. "Because the headmaster was exposed to be in league with Salem?"

"Oh! Uh, wh-what I meant was-!"

"That was the old headmaster." Nott came in for the save. "Headmistress Malachite took over after the old headmaster removed."

"Oh, okay." Jaune nodded. These huntsmen and huntresses were so strange. First, they all sat down at his table at lunch, and then they started asking him about his personal life. He would have thought they were hitting on them if not for the tint of green on their faces when he asked. Apparently, he wasn't as handsome he thought. "Still, it's weird to meet a stranger and immediately dive into their personal life."

"Yeah, that was my bad." Dani scratched her head. She then moved her hand up to scratch behind her cat-like ears.

"We're recent graduates." Nott explained. "We saw a huntsman and we were excited to ask someone on the same side."

"Oh, uh, okay?" Jaune looked to his sandwich that had barely been touched. "But why are you asking about my love life?"

"I'm... interested in a friend who also graduated," Yui said, convincingly looking nervous, "but I'm not certain that we should be pursuing a relationship now that we've made it." She turned to her team. "Sadly, my team caught wind of this and decided to ask a complete stranger for assistance."

"Sounds like you guys are good friends." Jaune chuckled, before turning somber. "I know what you mean, though. One you graduate, it feels... almost empty in the grand scheme of things. Sure, you made it, but what do you do now?"

"Uh, what did you do?" Oren asked.

"A really good friend once told me... that I should keep moving forward. There's no point in dwelling on who you were and focus on who you are now and who you can become." He smiled. "So, I guess the best advice I can give you is just live."

"Thanks, Dad." Yui smiled.

"Huh?" Jaune quirked a brow.

"Dude!" Yui shot up. "Thanks, Dude!"

"Uh, okay?" His scroll buzzed. "Ah, crap. I gotta take this to go." He picked his plate. "I'll be seeing you guys, later."

"Sure thing! Later, D- er, dude!" Oren awkwardly waved.

"Later!" He waved back, before heading inside.

"Smooth move, Moony." Dani smirked at her friend.

"Shut up, Schnee." Yui muttered.

"Make me, Malachite~." Dani teased.

"What's the plan, now, Or?" Nott asked, looking to his dark-haired leader, putting his hands behind his head and lacing them into his blond hair.

"For now," Oren dipped his sunglasses low to get a look at his father, revealing a hint of his silver eyes, "I think we should stay close, and find how and why Dad would be responsible for the end the world."

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

Oren - Male (Vale) Awkward

Yui - Female (Mistral) Intelligent

Dani - Female (Atlas) Cheery

Nott - Male (Vacuo) Lax

Oyakodon - Parent-and-child donburi, denotes yellow, brown, and white coloring.

#rwby #rwby oc #rwby ocs #jaune arc #my ocs

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just2bubbly · 4 months

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I know this can be a bit distressing but I want a story where Kai is older where he remembers his love what he still feels for Cinder, this is just a story please thanks for the answer

Masterlist

Thank you for sending in this ask, nonnie, it was a bit distressing since I couldn't find a new reason to make these two fall apart but not to worry about that, I used my big brain and was creative enough to make something up. Hoping it serves you well! :)

Old Roses on a Summer Breeze

Ship: Kaider

Words: 1.7k

Genre: Angst

A/N: SOSN isn't canon in this fic, Future fic

Kai's Perspective:

"Yes, Torin. Do make time on my schedule for this coming Saturday evening. There's an event at Tara's school." He informs, shuffling through the pages of the manuscript Torin had brought.

"Are you the guest?"

"Ha, for once I'm not. They have some school performance, I'm going to see her," he says.

Torin smiles fondly, both the men thinking about the little kid that made Palace delightful.

"Boo!" someone cheered loudly.

"Fu- oh my stars," he cuts his swear word as he sees Tara," we did talk about this, no coming here alone."

"But Da, I wanted to surprise you," she reasoned.

"I mentioned it multiple times, Da's office has important documents."

"Well I came in to show you something," she said, trying to save herself from scoldings.

"And couldn't it wait till we sat down for dinner?"

"Maybe not," she goes, coming ahead to sit in the chair before him.

Kai nods at her antics, Torin eyeing him.

Sighing he closes the document he was reading, "Then off it with, love."

"Can Torin-da give us a moment?" she asks politely.

"Tara, are you sure it can't wait till dinner, I have some work to complete."

"I'd take only 5 minutes," she begged, making puppy eyes at him.

"Kai, it's ok. I'd come back again in a while. Does that work fine for you Tara?" Torin chuckled, coming to rescue the child.

"You are the best, Torin-da!" she announced, giving him a cheeky smile.

Exasperated, Kai gave in to their schemes, signalling to his advisor that he would ring him once he was done with Tara. His daughter brought her precious thing to his table as soon as Torin was out of the room.

"I drew us," she says with pride lacing her voice, "You, me and Mama."

"That's wonderful. Can I see it?" He requested.

"Obviously," Tara murmurs, her words carrying a trace of sarcasm, a trait she had inherited from him.

The picture she drew was wonderful and he wasn't biased towards his daughter. She had a certain level of artistic skills that was beyond her age. She drew pictures better than her parents, provided none of them were good artists themselves.

"You will be such a fantastic artist in the future. I have to admit you look very beautiful in this," he comments.

"You always say I look beautiful," she said accusingly.

"Because you always do," he chuckled.

"Would you like to hang it?" she questioned.

"Maybe. We can put it in the drawing room or the living room."

"I mean in the office," she clarifies.

"Oh," he says," You think so?"

"Yes, you have a portrait of you and Mum and me when I was a kid. You don't have a family picture at your desk," she explains.

"That's quite thoughtful of you."

"What does that mean?"

"It means you are clever to notice I don't have a family photo at the desk."

She nods and remembering her manners she thanks him.

"I think my desk has too many pictures already, how about we hang it on the wall? So every time you come here you can see it."

"But you said not to come in here."

"And let's change that to when 'you come here accompanied'."

He cleared as they walked towards the gallery in his cabin, where he had hung images of significant events in his life. His parents and him, later his dad and him, Torin and his family, his wedding day, Tara's birth and so many uncountable events.

"We would have to remove something for this to fit in?" he said aloud.

"We could remove that one," she said pointing out to a frame in the top left corner.

"Let me see," he said looking towards the picture she pointed. It was the Rampion Crew on Scarlet and Wolf's wedding day, young people with dreams of immense happiness.

"That has many of Da's friends. Maybe something else," he convinced, trying to not think much about the picture.

"I have never seen them. Why don't you invite them for New Year like we invite Mum's friends?"

"They live far away and are just too busy to come, Tara."

"Friends make time for each other, that's what Mum says," she countered.

Having nothing to say to that, he changes the topic," Let's find some other picture."

"This one? " she suggested to the set of the same individuals in different places.

"Maybe we could take that one down," he concedes unwillingly.

They do remove it, much against his wish. Once they do, he smoothens the corner of his daughter's drawing to put in the frame.

"Tada," she cheered when their work was done, both staring at the wall.

"It does look nice," he admires.

"I'm born talented," she bragged, drawing a chuckle out of Kai. Tara is lost in her moment of glory and pride, her father holding himself from going down a path of nostalgia and grief.

"Are you sad because we removed your friends from your gallery?"

"No darling, Da is so happy to see your drawing in his gallery."

"Then do you miss your friends?"

"Yes, Da is sad because he misses his friends," he says, trying to keep his sorrow from coming back to him.

"Then you can call them and tell them you miss them," she suggests like a wise lady. He wishes he could find enough courage to do so.

"This New Year, we will invite them over. What do you say?" he asks, taking his child in his arms and carrying her to the couch.

"Yes, I'm excited to meet all your friends," she cheered, her hands taking the old photo from the table and looking at it closely.

"I know this lady. Teacher Yamin taught us about her. She is the Queen of Luna before forming a demo-mo something," she fumbles "--democratic government," Kai provides.

"Yes, she is the Queen Selene Blackburn of Luna, the last of her lineage," Kai explained, but to him, she was just Cinder, the mechanic, the revolutionary, one of his past mistakes- nothing that Tara needed to know.

"I didn't know you were friends with the Queen, Da."

"I'm friends with the Queen, I'm friends with a lot of famous people. Even Queen Camilla."

"You don't have Queen Camilla's picture on the wall," she pointed.

His daughter was a wise lady he thought.

"Queen Selene was better friends than Queen Camilla," he explained.

"How is she?" she asked incredulously.

"Like all Queens are, Tara." He gave away nothing, Cinder had no place in his present especially not as a role model for his daughter. Daiyu was enough of a role model for her.

Before she could go on being a curious child, Kai decided to cut the conversation short. Glancing at the time and in relief said, "Your time's up, love. Torin must be waiting for me. I'd see you at dinner."

She said her goodbyes and walked out of the room, leaving Kai sitting behind on the couch.

Going against his better judgment, he picked that photograph. It was years ago- when Kai's only worry was being able to follow in his father's footsteps. Cress had clicked it while Thorne and Cinder had teased him to no end about his first time eating street food. Those were some happy days, he remembered.

He stood up, walked towards the wall and smiled proudly over his daughter's drawing. His eyes were drawn slowly to the other pictures on the wall, the ones he hadn't paid much attention to in the latter years.

Scarlet's wedding, Cinder's coronation, the first Lunar Ball, Kai's failed attempts at baking cakes- some scattered images of friendship and love all hung around on this very wall.

With how slowly things fell apart, Kai didn't have much scope to pinpoint where things went wrong. One moment there were talks of forever and the other moment he had just never found time to know her, for her to know him. When visits became infrequent and talks always began with 'talk to you later', Kai knew it was a slow change but it had crept on them like dust being ladden on old clothes. And just like that he didn't feel so giddy about proposing and when they had opportunities to meet his excitement had a lingering feeling of impending doom.

Kai was 18 when he fell in love with Cinder, 6 when he was fascinated with Selene and at 25 he had fallen out of love with both Cinder and Selene. Somewhere along the way she did too. No one to blame but themselves- not the distance or prejudice that separated them. Just not quite knowing each other after years of dating, "You were the best thing that happened to me, Kai." She had said the last time they had talked.

From what he had learned, Cinder had moved on quickly too. Just because you find new people doesn't mean you stop loving old ones, Kai even after his marriage and children was still harbouring a soft spot for Cinder. No remorse over his situation now, he won't change his wife and daughter for anything in the world. He just felt sad over a possibility that could have happened if he was a simple man with basic needs. He had found his love in Cinder and his forever in Daiyu, his feelings for Cinder were just a recollection of the past like old roses on a summer breeze. Something pain strikingly beautiful but not meant for you.

The phone rang and saved him from further getting carried down an old road he had memorised by heart. It was Torin.

"Yes, she went. You can come along. Also could you please arrange a box for me, I'd like to keep some things aside," he requested.

He collected all of the images of his friends and set them aside. If Tara continued her musings, he would need a bigger space to hang her paintings. Only one remained, Cinder's coronation with all of them smiling down at the camera thinking they had seen the worst of days.

A/N: This fic felt like writing about 'Sometimes Love Stays' from Kai's perspective and it's just better to accept things and move on than lament over it and I know it's easier said than done but it's the harsh truth, I hate it too.

Taglist: @gingerale2017 @salt-warrior @slmkaider @cinderswrench @cindersassasin @impossiblesuitcase @kaider-is-my-otp @cosmicnovaflare @fangirlforever0704 and lemme know if anyone wants to be tagged.

#kaider #tlc #fanfiction #tlc fandom #kai #cinder linh #konn torin #lunar chronicles #marissa meyer #just2bubbly fics #angst #original female characters #selene blackburn #asks #anon supremacy

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mumms-the-word · 16 days

Text

BG3 Tav Backstory Bash

This is a challenge to help people flesh out their Tav’s backstory by exploring their past. It is organized into four sections with seven prompts. You can treat this as a monthly challenge or a general project. You can write headcanons, fics, or share art based on the prompts! You can interpret the prompts however you want. If you want to share use the tag #bg3backstorybash

Got tagged by @elspethdekarios who already knows like way too much about Dani (I always pick Dani for these things, even though I should try to do them for Ardynn, Freyr, and Invi too). I'm insane and did all of the prompts from @kelandrin's original post. Anyone who steals this absolutely does not have to do that.

I'm tagging everyone. All of you. Everyone single person with a Tav.

Meridan "Dani" Zavrai (later Dekarios)

Age: 25

Mephistopheles Tiefling • College of Lore Bard • Entertainer • Chaotic Good

For your sanity, it's all under the cut c:

Baby:

Parents

Dani is the daughter of Maeva Zavrai and some unknown, unnamed (for me) deadbeat bard who never stuck around. Obviously Maeva knew his name, but she never spoke it after he left, because there was no point in dredging him back up.

They met in a tavern. Maeva was working as a barmaid to save up money to accomplish her dream of becoming a talented seamstress who designed elegant clothing. A certain handsome tiefling bard visited one day and the two hit it off really well. He ended up sticking around for a few months right up until the night Maeva told him that she thought she was pregnant. He conveniently disappeared the next day. No notes, no goodbyes. Maeva saw it coming a mile away, but it still stung.

Around the time Dani was a few months old, though, Brannon Rufford stopped by with his wife and brother, calling themselves the Merry Rovers. Brann's wife was heavily pregnant the night they stopped to perform at Maeva's tavern, and went into labor that same night. Maeva assisted with the birth despite not being much of a nursemaid, but Brann's wife died due to complications. Brann was...broken, and at a loss, and wasn't sure what to do next. Maeva offered to nurse his infant daughter for a few days while he figured something out. He and his brother disappeared for a week, but Brann then came back with a handful of gold and a strange request. If he worked to provide money for her, Dani, and his new daughter, Liara, could she care for his daughter for a year or two? Maeva reluctantly agreed, and from then on Brann became a kind of adopted dad to Dani, while Maeva became an adopted mom to Liara.

Birth

Dani was born in a room in the tavern where Maeva worked at the time. It was relatively uneventful as far as births go, but poor Maeva was expected to get back to work only days after giving birth, or else risk losing her room over the tavern. She moved in temporarily with her mother until she met Brann, and Brann's handful of gold and continued support allowed her to purchase a ramshackle house of her own.

First word

Probably "mumma" or something. Maeva was all Dani had for the first several months of her life. Maeva's mom was there, too, but she died before Dani could have any real memory of her.

When they first walked

She was probably a very average 10-11 months or so. I can just see her doing cute butt-scooches for the longest time, with her grandmother tutting that she's falling behind, right up until Maeva brings Liara home. When she first comes home, Dani pulls herself up to peek down into the makeshift cradle where Liara is laying, and it's obvious she's trying to make sense of this not-blue baby with no tail and round ears. Maeva tells her that Liara is going to be staying with them for a while and that it will mean some changes. After that, she's a little more inclined to walk (in part out of necessity).

Tantrum

Dani has had so many tantrums (though she's adapted her style since her baby days). Her first significant tantrum was probably after Liara had joined their household, but after Maeva's mother had died. Maeve had to bring both of them to work at the tavern and had placed them in a corner behind the bar with a couple of wooden toys to keep them occupied. While she was off cleaning tables, Liara snatched one of Dani's toys and Dani just had to scream about it. Just an absolute racket, which set Liara off, so now there are two crying babies in the corner. The tavern owner threatened to fire Maeva if she couldn't find someone to watch her brats, so Maeva quit and returned home to turn her place into a seamstress shop, something she'd been planning to do for ages anyway.

First sickness

Very early in Dani's infancy, she caught a mild cold thanks to the winter chill. Maeva was beside herself. This was her first kid, she didn't have much money for a healer, and she didn't know the first thing about soothing a baby who was hurting from upset tummies, stuffy noses, and other symptoms that must have been very, very new to a baby as young as Dani was. She ended up running to her mother's house in the wee hours of the morning half-convinced Dani was going to be dead by sunrise, until her mother took the baby, told Maeva to go to sleep, and had Dani snoozing peacefully within the hour.

Thunderstorm

Dani probably slept through most thunderstorms in Baldur's Gate. Stonyeyes, the district where Maeva lives and works, is sheltered partly by the Duskhawk Hill, so they didn't have much to fear from the Chionthar river flooding or anything like that. Honestly, the tavern noises she slept through as a baby were probably louder than most thunderstorms.

Childhood:

Friends/Siblings

I'm putting these together because to Dani, her friends Liara, Paraxxel, and Kellen are her siblings, especially Liara.

Liara was obviously the first. Though Liara lived with Dani and Maeva for the first 2-3 years of her life, Brann eventually decided to take Liara traveling with him. So for the next 10-12 years, Brann and Liara were a bit more like extended family who dropped by once a month or so. Liara still calls Maeva "Maemae" (a mix of Maeva and mama) and Dani still considers Brann the closest thing to a father she's ever had, but their relationship during this time was a bit more like really close friends. Liara is a bubbly, romantic girl who is obsessed with a good love story or love ballad and thinks her father hangs the moon.

Dani met Paraxxel (her dragonborn bestie) when he was just a street performer with an old drum and the clothes on his back. I have a whole fic about them meeting. But long story short, she convinces him to join Brann and Liara as part of the Merry Rovers, so now every monthly visit has him in tow, too. Paraxxel is a snarky, restless kind of guy who's always tapping out rhythms on his legs, on the table, etc. He and Dani are often going back and forth, ribbing and teasing each other. He's five years older than Dani, so he also takes on a kind of protective older brother role in her life, even though she insists she can fight in a scrap better than he can.

Kellen, the final member of the current Merry Rovers, joined around the time Dani was 13 or 14. He's a quiet, shy half-elf who mostly plays the flute for the Rovers and doesn't sing as much. He's about a year or two older than Dani and Liara, and Liara fell in love with him at first sight. She constantly talks about the fact that they're going to get married one day, but she never actually told Kellen she liked him until they were all well in their teens, because for a while it seemed like Kellen wasn't interested. He was, he just didn't know how to put it into words, and Brann is scary. Out of all the Merry Rovers, he's the most level-headed and sensible, second only to Brann.

Getting into trouble

When does Dani not get into trouble? She gets into scraps a lot in her childhood, including the scrap that let her meet Paraxxel. The kids that made up little street gangs in Stonyeyes were everywhere, and she wasn't about to let them cause trouble for her and her mom.

Birthday

I don't have an exact date for her birthday because I didn't think that far ahead, but during her childhood, her birthdays were always spent with Maeva (and Brann, Liara, and whoever else was part of the Merry Rovers that year, if they could make it). Maeva usually went out to buy a sweet treat and made as fine a dinner as she could for the evening. Gifts were few and far between, but Dani will never forget her twelfth birthday, when Brann gifted her her first fiddle and promised to teach her how to play it.

Games

Dani loves games. All games. Most of the games she played in childhood were the kinds you can play without actual equipment (no balls, no cards, etc). But being part of tavern culture in many ways, she learned how to play cards and play simple games in the streets with other kids too. (I have a fic where she teaches the BG3 companions one of her favorite games, actually).

Learning something new

Brann taught her every musical thing she knows, plus a couple of easy bard spells once he saw she had the talent for it. He started her off on the lute, since that's what Liara was learning at the same time, but at 12 he gifted her with a small fiddle and began teaching her that, too. She practiced for hours whenever he wasn't around so that when he next arrived, she could impress him and learn something new.

Trauma

This is a good segue into the next section. Despite growing up relatively poor, getting into scraps as a kid, and having several of the people she loved the most only visiting once in a while, Dani's childhood wasn't exactly traumatic. Hard, maybe, but she was happy most of the time. That is until she was 15 and her mother grew ill with some kind of illness that nearly killed her.

Since Dani and her mother couldn't afford healers for the most part, they tried to cure the illness the best they could, but her mother was bedridden for weeks. Dani was forced to pick up a few jobs, in the tavern, playing on the street, trying to do other people's laundry, to earn enough coin to buy her mother potions or herbs. Brann and the other Rovers were nowhere nearby and she didn't know how to get in touch with them. For the first time, she felt suddenly desperately alone and terrified that she might lose her mom.

Maeva eventually recovered, but the illness had forever weakened her legs, and she was unable to leave her bed for several more weeks.

Despite nearly losing her mother, Dani came to the conclusion that the only thing she could do to earn enough money to actually help her mother was to join the Merry Rovers. So once her mother was out of danger, she begged and begged and begged to join the Rovers the next time they passed through. Maeva agreed reluctantly, and the next time Brann arrived, he agreed to let her travel with them for while. Dani vowed to send money back as often as she could so that her mother could afford visits to a healer.

Teenager:

First love

Probably some scrappy Outer City kid who told her she was pretty enough times that she figured he wasn't just flirting. But even then, it was a fleeting relationship and it fizzled out immediately when Dani's mom got sick. After that, well...Dani is a flirty girl, and she's no stranger to one-off trysts and quick flings. It isn't until she meets Gale that she realizes what it actually means to love someone the way ballads sing about love.

Rebellion

Dani is a bit of a rebel at heart. While traveling with the Rovers, even though she loved and respected Brann, she didn't always listen to him when he told her to stay at the inn they were using that night or to not wander off. Liara swears Brann got more gray hair having to deal with Dani ignoring his orders than he ever had traveling with just her, Paraxxel, and Kellen. Sneaking out was just a common thing for Dani for a while. But she always came back.

Running away

Technically Dani didn't run away because she left her mother's home to travel with Brann with her mother's permission...but she did technically leave home at 15 to live the life of a wanderer without a home. I don't think she ever thought about running away from the Rovers. Never once. She loves them too much.

Reckless behavior

More than once while traveling with the Rovers, Dani has snuck out to meet someone for a tryst or gone gambling with the money she's supposed to be saving up to send to her mother. She's a good card player, but she sometimes doesn't know when to stop while she's ahead.

Peer pressure

Paraxxel and Dani have almost always been as thick as thieves, but for the most part it's never been romantic or flirty between them. Despite this, the ever-romantic Liara swore she saw sparks flying between them and that Dani and Paraxxel should totally start going out. Both of them were hesitant, but Liara is pretty persistent. So for Dani's 18th birthday, she and Paraxxel agreed to at least try it out. They both got pretty wasted and slept together that night. It was...fine? But the vibes were weird and both agreed, in the clarity of a slightly hungover morning, that they shouldn't do it again. They both preferred being friends and nothing more.

Growing pains

Dani probably went through a physical growth spurt after joining the Rovers, but it was nothing that she couldn't handle between knowing how to mend her own clothes and pestering Brann with a bunch of questions he always felt a little too awkward to answer. Emotionally, she dealt with the repercussions of several ill-advised trysts or unwise decisions to party or gamble. It took her a while to realize that she didn't have to constantly go out and "experience life" for her to have a good time with the Rovers.

Taking responsibility

Brann doesn't coddle his bards in his troupe. If you're going to be part of the Merry Rovers, you're also going to know how to manage your belongings, keep up with your instrument, mend your own clothes (or pay for someone to mend them), and behave yourself so you don't get tossed in jail (none of them are thieves for the most part, but Dani and Paraxxel did teach themselves how to pick locks and pockets). The most he's going to do for you is negotiate the rooms for the night and occasionally pay for dinner. So while Dani traveled with the Rovers, she had to learn to be a little more independent and deal with the consequences if she decided she was too lazy to keep up with her stuff correctly or gambled away all her money.

Adulthood:

Their “first time”

Her first time was after she left to join with the Rovers, but before she was 18. She can't even remember his name. She just remembers waking up the next morning to Brann throwing the guy out of her room and looking furious. She got smarter about flings after that. No more inviting people to the room that Brann was paying for.

Serious relationships

She never really had a serious romantic relationship. They were constantly on the move. She was fine with that, and put most of her romantic energy into teasing Liara and Kellen about their snails-pace romance while letting out steam with whatever handsome dude or pretty girl was fine with a few hours of fun. Believe it or not, Gale is her first committed romantic relationship ever. It’s very new for her and she often wonders if it’s too good to be true.

Work

Her job was to perform with the Merry Rovers. Brann could play many instruments, but he stuck to the lyre, while Liara played the lute, Paraxxel played the drums, Kellen played the flute, and Dani played the violin. She often sang and danced, too. The Rovers did more than play music, they tried to perform with decent theatricality under Brann's general direction. While not much of an actor himself, he knew how to construct a good performance, relying on the younger bards to perform and dance while he maintained the foundation of the performance with his music and voice. The Rovers were decently popular amid the Outer City districts.

Leaving home

She left home when she was 15. She's been traveling with the Rovers for ten years before she got snatched by the nautiloid.

Aging

Dani's a cool 25. "Old" to her feels like it'll be miles away. She often jokes that Brann, who is only barely 50, is old, but he's a spry guy and she hopes she's half as fit as he is when she's 50.

Finding your place

Dani doesn't feel like Dani unless she's got a fiddle in her hands or a song on her tongue. You couldn't convince her to become anything other than a bard. Separating her from music, song, and dance is like asking her to cut off a limb. She wouldn't be the same without it.

She's also obsessed with Baldur's Gate. She thinks it's the best city in the world. Not the safest, not the richest, but certainly the most colorful and the only place she would want to be. That is...until she's snatched up and dumped outside the city.

Now, she realizes her place is among the people who love her. Home, to her, is a person who holds your heart. It's her mother, it's Brann and the Rovers, it's her companions that she befriends after the nautiloid abduction, and in the end, it's Gale. Baldur's Gate is a wonderful city, and as long as she's within the city she feels happy. But she knows now that she can make a home wherever she is, as long as she's with someone she loves.

Starting a family/found family

Obviously the Rovers were her first found family, but she absolutely considers the companions she makes in BG3 her found family as well. To her, it just means her family is growing. It includes her mom, the Rovers, the companions, but also tieflings like Rolan, Cal and Lia, Bex and Danis, Alfira and Lakrissa.

She marries Gale, of course, and I think they wait to have kids for a few years. She's convinced she would be a bad mom at first (in that “I can barely take care of myself” kind of way) and Gale obviously has reservations. But I do think that down the line, they have a pair of twins who are just utter chaos, and they're only too happy to rely on their wide network of family members to help get through the more turbulent years of raising twins with Dani's personality and Gale's intelligence. It really does take a village...

———

Congrats you made it to the end! Please enjoy Dani’s expression for when she was like “Hey Gale this Waterdeep illusion is cool but I want to smash YOU, not an illusion of you” and his reply was “The old ways then. If that is what you wish, so be it.”

I could caption this so many ways lmao

#bg3 #tag game #my tav #dani #meridan zavrai #bg3backstorybash

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edutainer2022 · 1 year

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Frankly, I want to send you every single emoji from that ask game for Scott, but I'm trying to practice self-restraint. How about a couple of ൠ for him?

@amistrio Thank you! Yeah, I'm kinda contemplating the merit of answering the meme unprompted or sending myself an anonymous ask or five))

Random (TAG) Scott headcanons:

- this one I really enjoyed getting traction in vaster fanon - Scott is a mathlete and a decent engineer. Not Brains or the Mechanic level, but Dad Jeff level at the very least. He was elated to be in on Dad's plans and designs of TV-21 as a teen, was definitely in on the early designs of Thunderbirds and takes active part in upgrades and diagnostics (that's pretty much canon). He can reassemble his bird in his sleep;

- Scott reads. For leisure. Actual books. The "boring" classics of the "mandatory reading list" and beyond (that's probably something I glimpsed in TOS and hold really dear). And he's well versed in poetry. It's a Mom thing for him - they read a lot together, he later read all the stories to his brothers. His AP English essays were stellar, but "Liberal arts" was never an option, not for a Jeff Tracy's son, who worshiped Dad's life path and accomplishments. So it was math, physics and avionics.

- Scott has an MBA. That Tracy Industries money gotta make themselves somehow to fund increasingly expensive IR endeavors.

- after the TV-21 fiasco (financial too), Scott offered to enlist into GDF before he turned 18 - that way he thought he could pay for college and help repay the investors, so that his college fund would go to John and Virgil and their dreams wouldn't be derailed. Dad put a halt to that (and doubled down business efforts to make sure his kids were never financially insecure again).

- This one is a bit (a lot!) darker - in a typical "golden child trauma" fashion Scott ties his self-worth firmly to merits of performance and achievement. In a situation when his father sacrificed himself to save all of humanity, Scott considers himself obliged to give nothing less to compensate humanity (and his family) for that loss - that breeds martyrdom that comes across as recklessness or workaholism on a good day and a death wish on less good days (also, pretty much canon, in so many words). He genuinely doesn't get how his family or the world would need him for just him, if he's "obviously less" than his father was (being repeatedly mistaken for his younger father's image doesn't help).

- After really hard rescues, or sometimes when the burden gets too much, Scott would dash away in One across the world to Mom's grave. Alone. John and Virgil have figured it out and know not to try and coax him back before he's ready, but keep an eye on him.

- Learning about Dad's signal from Oort Cloud nearly drove Scott insane with guilt, whereas his brothers were elated. Which piled even more guilt, because he didn't want to trump their hope. He thinks he failed by "giving up" on the search all those years ago and "moving on".

- Scott has a track record of notoriously disastrous failed relationships, which actually troubles him a lot more than he lets on. It's usually a subject of brothers' ribbing (Gordon's, mostly), but it's actually a fair bit traumatic. Through a couple of break-ups Virgil and John had to stage interventions (up to and including flying in from their colleges). On at least one occasion it was Dad. Whoever falls for a dashing flyboy/hero/billionaire with killer dimples and witty one liners, usually, don't sign up for a deeply feeling, traumatized, crazed with anxiety family man, whose brothers and life's work are his whole world. At a certain point Scott got convinced he's damaged goods and happiness/family is not in the cards. He's, of course, wrong.

- Scott was to Dad what Virgil is to him and what their Mom was to Jeff - a grounding force, a confidante and someone with unwavering faith and inspiration.

- Dropping out of Airforce early on in the career to join IR cost him most or all of his GDF friendships and it stung deeply. It stung that many openly considered him a renegade, who chose "Daddy's private 911 gig and getting kittens off trees over the real service". Regardless of Bereznik POW headcanon (the hurt, PTSD and comfort potential there is, of course, unparalleled!), I think Scott had to face A LOT of cold shoulders, after Jeff's disappearance. Whereas Colonel Tracy was revered, Tracy "dropout" Jr. was openly stared down by multiple star generals and getting IR up and running again was an uphill struggle.

- Kyrano and Lee leaving IR after Jeff hit him hard. He's lowkey sure it's because he can't measure up to Dad (and father figures don't want him). In reality it was, of course, guilt and grief of the Old Guard.

-Some time, many-many years down the line Scott is gonna run for the World President office and win.

I can go on for a loooong while (Scott is among my deeply personally favorite characters not for nothing). Maybe I'll come up with a Part 2. I'm having lots of fun (making myself sad, mostly).

#thunderbirds are go #scott tracy #scott tracy needs a hug #scott tracy needs his dad #scott tracy needs therapy but noone ever brings it up #thunderbirds ask #methinks i have astronomy #headcanons #thunderbirds 2015

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kanos-blorbos-archive · 3 months

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Hi hi hi hi hi I NEED NEED to tell you something that came out of a conversation with my dear worldbuilder friend omg omg so it's about Exp in the reincarnation AU ok ok

As a prologue I need to tell y'all a few things because I haven't drawn in a while the older Exp but basically in a design I made a good while ago (mid/end 2020) Exp in his older age lacks both legs, plus a whole hand (promptly substituted with a fine prostethic) and three fingers on the other hand (those too promptly substituted with a fine prostethic) but the point now is that he lost the other leg and we specifically talked about how!!

So so basically in that AU Exp is back from a planet full of dragons and both directly and stringing from his son's DNA he got a few samples of dragon genes that he wanted to put to the use to create a whole dragon, WELL, he did create something akin to a dragon, a 4 meters tall winged reptiloid, and well hm, Exp has an habit, especially with newer creatures, to directly go into their enclosures to feed them, confident in his fake immortality and electric stick (think of like a really long taser thingy I'll give details on another post ig)

ALRIGHT SO his own confidence wasn't enough to save him this time because once DG9 inevitably bit him, it didn't just bite rip and run, which would have gotten exp a time window to crawl out of the enclosure, it bit and held there, trying to figure out basically how to eat the man whole, and the second that he was on the ground and couldn't get away Exp, for the very first time in 60 years, felt a gut wrenching, nerve-wracking fear and instinctively just screamed for help

Fortunately for him (but not humanity) as soon as Jacob Jr heard (very soon btw the boy has some veery good reflexes) he came to the rescue, and that was the first and probably only time that Jacob Jr willing hurt an animal or animal-like thing and especially the only time Jacob Jr somewhat struggled in a strength feat, because even though his species is designed to be dragon killers first of all, though she comes close, not even the prime example of hybrid can take down an entire dragon by herself, secondly, he had to use only one hand to keep DG9 down, even though it isn't quite a dragon, he was pulling Exp's leg away with one hand and pushing the mutant away with the other, which eventually worked because he managed to just rip his father off, ripping the entire leg off in the process, all before he lost too much blood as well

Thing is that Exp found himself for the first time being completely and utterly scared, terrified even, and neither William or Jacob have ever heard him scream in absolute fear, and especially Exp never ever did question his own mortality like in this moment, he came back to his own normal little later while they were closing up his leg and making sure he wouldn't die of bloodloss, but for sure Mr Jacob im-basically-a-god Lawson got a taste of mortality and he for sure isn't going to forget about it, and of course brag about it for showing off his creation

Oh btw in the Lawson household opinions on whether Jacob Jr should have let DG9 eat Exp, Jacob Jr of course thinks he did the right thing because it's ofc his dad and even though he knows he's a war criminal, he's also a pretty darn good dad, William has very mixed opinions on the fact, because he knows for a certain humanity could use one Dr Exp less but also he would've kinda felt bad, 11D straight up told Jacob Jr he should've let DG9 eat Exp because the world doesn't really need him

Aaaand that's it folks! I thought it was pretty good to show this to y'all because I love it, BYEEEE

#exp #jacob jr #reincarnation au #kano does art

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bardock1991 · 1 year

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“Penny has to stay dead, and I think she will. Anyone who thinks she’s still coming back is setting themselves up for disappointment.”

“The point of RWBY has always been that you can’t save every life, but you should try anyway But that also means accepting it when you can’t save someone Also, Ruby won’t learn anything if she can bring Penny back”

This what my friend, @asm5129 said about us talking about the possibility of Penny coming back to life after V8 & i completely agree. By bringing Penny back, it'd only undermine what Ruby's arc is in this show. Instead of coming to terms with the cruelty of the world, but still finding a reason & the drive to protect the good that's left in it, she'd only use her own suffering to justify hating the world & betray said world. That'd be no different than acting like Salem or Cinder. In the words of Suzaku from Code Geass' first season finale: "You betrayed the world the same way it betrayed you". & Here’s what i think will be the ultimate reason why Ruby won’t do what Salem tried to do... When Ozma died, she was all alone... She didn’t HAVE anyone else to turn to for comfort. Her birth mother died due to childbirth, her dad was killed by Ozma & even if she wasn’t, she was an overprotective & negletful asshole who kept her daughter in her room for 16 years. Ruby however is NOT alone, she still has Weiss, Blake & Yang. Sure, they can’t help her right now because they can’t fully understand how & why Ruby’s acting the way she does or how to help her, due to all 3 of them putting her in such a high pedestal. But sooner or later, one of them are gonna confront Ruby about this cause i highly doubt they’re gonna just LET HER keep acting that way forever. Yang did that with Ren in V8, so there’s no real reason why the same can’t happen here. But yeah, TLDR, bringing Penny back would not only go against the show’s themes, but also go against the main character’s character arc, which is NOT a good thing. Death in RWBY is permanent & should be treated as such. Now before anyone brings up: But Penny was brought back to life after V3. That scenario doesn’t count because Penny was a ROBOT! Meaning that her coming back was somewhat INEVITABLE. But she died as a human this time, there’s no Set of Dragon Balls, Revives or Phoenix Downs to undo that.

Plus, how did this entire story start in the first place?... Oh yeah, because Salem tried to get Ozma back despite the GoL clearly telling her that doing that would go against the cicle of life & death... How did that end up again? Oh yeah, Salem becoming immortal, her manipulating tons of people to try & rebel the gods, only for them to be wiped out, essentially making Salem responsible for the deaths of millions because SHE was the one who dragged out these people to their certain deaths, NOT the gods. The Gods are the ones that killed them, but they wouldn’t have DONE that if Salem didn’t form a fruitless rebellion. Then she became a demon, a new human race popped up & the rest is history... Do i need to explain why Ruby trying to do the same with Penny is a bad idea?... I really hope i don’t.

#rwby spoilers #ruby rose #penny polendina

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honeystwiggypeach · 2 years

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Rainy season!

Single dad!Eddie x reader

I’ll make a series masterlist for this later!!

Tw~ Eddie has financial issues and it’s referenced frequently, Eddie has wet socks, abandoned puppy, let me know if I missed anything!!! I don’t have a part two yet but I can start working on one if you guys are interested!!(I plan to turn it into a series if anyone would like to see it!!)

Guys this was what I was so excited for…it’s not so impressive now that I’ve read it but listen maybe it’ll be better later! But I’m gonna start the Chrissy fic too!!

Eddie hated the rain, fortunately he had his umbrella with him. Gwen on the other hand loved the rain, ironic wasn’t it, the way the father and daughter duo were complete opposites, Eddie watches as she splashed in all the puddles she can, her little Froggy boots and clear poncho keep her nice and dry as Eddie smiles softly, as long as he tries not to think about the way he can feel his soggy socks clinging to his feet he’ll be able to just savor the memory of his daughter having the time of her life and he finds that her happiness is worth a million soggy socks and more.

He watches as she ventures out from under the safety of the umbrella a little suprised look on her face when she can vaguely feel the weight of rain drops plop down on her raincoat.

She looks to Eddie with a surprised face as he lets out a little laugh. Eventually Gwen’s moved on to holding Eddie’s hand as she skips beside him.

“Daddy look!” She practically shouts pulling away from Eddie to fast for him to stop her as she runs directly for a cardboard box.

“Gwen” he’s practically gasping for air once he catches up with her, he peers down into the box as Gwen crouches down smiling up at her dad, “it’s a puppy daddy!”

He knows how this will end, she’s always lived puppies and he hates to break her heart.

“It is sweet heart.” He places his hand gently on her back.

“Can we feed him?” Her eyes are so full of love and innocence for everything around her, he’s certain that you could shove a sewer rat in front of her and she’d ask if she could bring it home.

Eddie lets out a little sigh before nodding, he’s certain he could afford the dog food with the pocket change he has right now, and if he saved up a little more over the week he’s sure he’ll be able buy Gwen that adorable stuffed animal she’s been eyeing every time they pass by the store front.

So that’s what Eddie does, but when he and Gwen turn to buy the food she notices the rain just manages to drip onto the little puppy.

“Daddy lets give him out umbrella he’s cold!” So Eddie does.

He settles the umbrella beside the puppy providing him a little shelter while the two are gone. Eddie hates the rain, hates the way it makes his clothes cling to his body how it leaves a sticky, grimy feeling on his skin, but for Gwen he’d walk through the rain every time.

You’d just left the book store taking a right to turn down an alley to get back home when you see the little box, it’s almost hidden by the umbrella when you see the poor puppy.

“Hi little guy” you whisper and he crawls over to lick at your hand.

“Are you all by yourself?”

“Do you like the puppy?” Gwen asks coming up beside you and you almost jump out of your skin.

You press your hand to your chest as you catch your breath, “I do! I think he’s very cute”

“Me and daddy got him food!” Gwen points up at Eddie who gives an awkward smile.

“Oh is this your dog?” You’re confused.

Gwen nods not quite understanding the question, “he’s not. Gwen just seems to like him”

You nod a bit scratching behind the puppy’s ear, “I see… so you wouldn’t mind if I brought him home with me?” Eddie shrugs and Gwen gasps, “can we see him again?”

You let out a soft giggle reaching into your purse before scrawling down your number on an old receipt.

“I think he’d like that…maybe we can take him to the dog park” you give Eddie a little smile as you hand him the paper and he gives you a small smile as you tuck the puppy under your arm before going on with your business.

Eddie can’t help but feel excited at the idea of getting his money back when he returns the bag of puppy food, perhaps he could afford the toy today after all.

Do you guys want me to turn this into a series? I plan to but I’m just curious if I should do a series or just like a part two!

Tags~ @ruinedbythehobbit

#reader insert #x reader #single dad!eddie munson x reader #single dad!eddie munson #dad!eddie munson x reader #dad!eddie munson #eddie muson #eddie munson st4 #eddie munson x y/n #eddie munson x reader #eddie x reader

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