#Gil really does have a lot to deal with

[softquietsteadylove]

For the bodyguard AU:

A crazy Fan attacks Thena with a knife on stage. Luckily Gil is there to protect her👀

The crowd was roaring with enthusiasm for her performance. She was coming off the high of a few straight shows that had gone well. The audience was feeling excited, and it had even spread to Thena, penetrating her pessimistic shell.

Thena waved to them as they applauded her efforts. She swallowed, feeling the fatigue in her vocal cords after the full set she had performed. Nothing like a full concert, but evident none the less. She backed up from the microphone.

"Athena! Athena, you're my goddess!"

Gil looked out from backstage, trying to find where the voice had come from.

Thena also scanned the crowd, but couldn't find anyone who might have been able to be heard so above and beyond everyone else. She tried not to let it show on her face.

"Athena, I love you!"

She looked closer to the front, wondering who possessed that voice. It was male, deep, rough. Everyone close to the barricades seemed to be younger fans jumping and waving.

"Athena, be mine!"

Her chest rose and fell more quickly. This was becoming more of a situation by the second, but she couldn't pinpoint the source. She took a few more steps back, her hand subconsciously reaching behind her for a comforting presence.

Gil emerged from backstage to meet her halfway. Usually his code of conduct - per the label's insistence - was to be present but not seen. But this was an exception, "come on."

"I said you're mine, you bitch!"

Gil pulled Thena behind him, holding out his arms and making his surface area replace Thena's tiny frame behind him. He searched the crowd for himself, with eyes trained to detect problems like this.

Security dove for the man, but he must have had training in something. Because all they did was provide him with a staircase of bodies he could use to launch himself onto the stage.

"Athena!"

Gil's eyes focused in on the knife in his hand. There were worse weapons to face, but the best one to disarm was none. He held out his hand, "put it down!"

The assailant charged at them, fuelled by either delusion or a more powerful, more tangible substance. He came in swinging, "she's mine!"

Thena curled up behind Gil, not able to do much else in the given situation.

Gil moved only as close as needed to grab the assailant's hands by the wrists. So long as he could overpower him, he could keep the threat minimal. "Don't even think about it!"

Gil was stronger than the freak jumping impossible distances up onto the stage. He raised their hands above their heads, not leaving much room to get stabbed in the crosshairs. "Let it go!"

Bodies in yellow and black polo shirts came rushing out; better late than never, at least. The venue security rushed the assailant, enough of them piling on the threat that it didn't matter what was in his system, he went down hard.

The knife clattered away across the stage. The crowd screamed.

Gil didn't wait to see what would become of the animal, or deliver any last words. He turned around, pulling Thena into his arms and rushing her off stage, "come on."

Thena clung to him.

"Move, move, out of the way!" Gil barked at anyone who so much as came near them. This was his job, this was his protectee, his client: this was Thena. "Make some room!"

He led them straight through the backstage and out of the building. He wasn't making any stops in any dressing rooms, Kingo would bring them anything they had left behind. His priority now was getting Thena alone and safe with him.

She followed him silently, clinging to him.

Gil held his jacket up and in front of her face as they made their way to the car waiting for them. As always, no matter how they tried, there were still fans clambering to get a glimpse of the Goddess of War in her human form. "Back up!"

Thena climbed into the SUV, immediately sliding over in the backseat so Gil could slide in after her, no need to go around to the other door. He jumped in, nearly cracking his head on the frame in his haste. He slammed it closed and leaned forward, "drive!"

The ride service didn't ask questions.

Gil put the divider up immediately, looking over at Thena, "hey."

"I'm okay," she exhaled, with only some trembling in it. She pushed her hair out of her face.

"Thena," he repeated, moving until their legs were squished together on the hard and uncomfortable leather seats. "Look at me."

"I'm okay, she repeated before he held her cheeks, guiding her gently to meet his eyes. Her face crumbled.

"I'm sorry," he whispered, pulling her into his shoulder as he rubbed her back. No matter how expected or calculated a risk it was, it was still someone threatening her safety and life. He never blamed her for feeling rattled by the actions of those obsessed with her persona.

Thena shook her head against him, still pressing her eyes into his suit jacket. She was dismissing herself.

"Hey, no one would blame you," he said gently, holding the trembling songstress. "He came at you with a knife, Thena. It never should have happened."

She let out a breath, even more shuddery than the last. "You shouldn't have to keep doing this."

Protecting her? "Thena, it's my job to do this. I'm certainly not gonna let you fight these creeps by yourself."

"I mean it!" she lifted her head, pursing her lips in that stubborn way she had.

He brushed away some of her tears, careful of the eye makeup she had on that was admirably still in place. "I do too, Thena. I'm not going to let anyone get away with shit like that."

Thena pulled back, brushing more of her tears off his lapel and clearing her throat, which any vocalist usually did their best to avoid doing. She sniffled, "this seems to keep happening."

Gil let her fuss over him, if it made her feel better about it, "a couple times in a year is a pretty bad streak."

Thena looked at him in the dim light of the back of the limo. "I know you're saying it's not a big deal, but I've watched you had to fight a few too many psychos for my liking. And I still haven't forgotten when that mob of Eros' little fan-children mobbed you."

Gil chuckled, "that was a pretty bizarre fight to have."

"I wouldn't call it a fight," Thena grumbled but sat back again with a sigh. She flicked some hair over her shoulder, "at least the show was good. Although I'm sure Kingo is already bursting a blood vessel over the coverage of that attack."

"It was pretty open to see that the guy was nuts," Gil shrugged, already reaching into his suit jacket for both their phones. "Limo's taking us straight home. Do you want delivery?"

She looked up from her phone as he handed it to her, giving him the saddest, greenest eyes, like a kitten in the rain. She nodded.

How could he ever say no to that? He opened the app, "mood?"

"Surprise me," she sighed, looking down at her phone to check what Kingo was saying.

"Okay," Gil chuckled, already knowing to order her a comforting bowl of ramen with some dumplings on the side. He claimed one of her hands with his, even though it hindered her texting greatly.

She did visibly have trouble texting Kingo back with only her left thumb and a phone wider than her slim hand's width. But she gave him a squeeze back, grateful for the comfort.

#Thenamesh Bodyguard AU #it always feels nice to revisit these #because I never feel out of practice with these two #hopefully they always feel in character in this universe for you guys #Gil really does have a lot to deal with #but he's made for this #this is the job #and he takes it very seriously #Kingo does text them like wtf was that? #Gil tells him to look it up he's sure all the fans caught footage of it #also please bring Thena's stuff to her place for them #he's not leaving her side because obviously #They're both exhausted from the adrenaline #she walked into the building in costume and everything #door guy is like hey Thena hey Gil normal thursday night huh? #Gil does get delivery and basically feeds her all night #runs her a back #rubs her feet for her #the ultimate malewife #but he's your security guard #what is this booktok? #just kidding I don't read books I write this instead

[the-writing-goblin]

I am once again thinking about how good the story of the second age is, and all the fun things you could do with an actually decent adaptation. Consider:

Galadriel should be exactly the same as she is in Lord of the Rings. She is older, weirder and more powerful than any elf other elf in Middle Earth. Other elves are just as unnerved by her as mortals, and dealing with her is stressful at the best of times.

Elrond should be an absolute infant. Just, complete baby face. But everyone treats him super respectfully and he has a lot of power and influence. The energy should be the same as when the super ancient and powerful vampire or faerie or whatever looks like a ten year old girl.

ALSO there should be a tall, menacing elf with visible tattoo and facial scars who just. Stands behind Elrond looking intimidating all the time. The least elf-looking elf ever. All the other elves are uncomfortable around them. Elrond should treat them like their an Aunt or Uncle. The elf is one of the few surviving hard-line Feanorians, all of whom follow Elrond. The longer you can go without explaining this, the better.

Gil-Galad is very tired, and spends a lot of time balancing one of the most famously unstable political systems in all of Arda. Galadriel and Elrond both have factions they support to strongly to be relied on to be impartial. The reason he doesn't worry much about what Celebrimbor's up to is that he's the one member of the family who is highly unlikely to attempt something batshit nuts, and his followers are mostly moderate.

Celebrimbor and Annatar/Sauron should spend the whole series playing complicated mindgames with each other.

Annatar is playing four-dimensional chess from the beginning. For him, this is an all or nothing gamble. If he can't make the rings he won't have the power to seize control on his own. He should spend a lot of time having Light Yagami-level monologues where he tries to figure out what game Celebrimbor is playing while outwardly pretending to be harmless and normal and only succeeding at this about 75% of the time.

Celebrimbor should start of thinking the stakes are considerably lower. Like... is Annatar hiding something? Yea, but he figures Annatar doesn't actually have permission from the Valar to be here or something. Not, ya know, Annatar is secretly Satan in disguise. In the first act there should be an almost comical disconnect between the amount of energy Sauron is putting in to these mind games versus Celebrimbor.

Bonus points if as Celebrimbor figures out the truth, you intersperse more and more of his family backstory. The guilt he is still carrying for a lot the things that happened in the first age. Early on bring in the fact that Finrod went into Sauron's jaws alone and it was Curufin's fault, use this as angst material. And then as he figures out who Sauron really is, drop Maedhros and Thangorodrim in like a nuclear bomb.

Because Celebrimbor has seen this play before, and he knows what Sauron does to people. It wasn't even personal then, what Sauron is going to do to him will be so much worse.

And Celebrimbor chooses to forge the three rings anyway. He doesn't give up their locations, even with everything Sauron does to him at the end. And that should be devestating.

#silmarillion #rings of power #kinda #sort of the opposite of rings of power #celebrimbor #annatar #elrond #gil galad #wild tonal shifts in this post #oh well #I think this story should have wild tonal shifts tbh #I am unwell about these elves #lotr

[runawaymun]

Ask me about my not-yet-written-fics from this list

thanks, @eowyn7023 also tagging: @polutrope because you sent me an ask about this a while ago and I just haven't had the spoons to respond until now, sorry! <3

Elrond in Valinor + Second Flight of the Noldor

so this stems from three possibly spicy Opinions I have about LOTR: 1) The Valar kind of suck, actually, and it was wrong of them to bring Elves to Valinor in the first place and it went directly against Eru's plan. 2) Valinor is kind of liminal and bad for you if you were born in Middle Earth 3) Elrond sailing (and staying) in Valinor is makes very little sense for him as a character, and is more about Jirt's wish fulfillment than it is good writing.

Obviously, unfortunately, due to the narrative, Elrond must sail at the end of LOTR. He needs to recuperate from the absolute havoc Vilya wreaked on his system, and he also needs to reunite with Cel and get some closure about a few things, like Celebrimbor's death, Gil-Galad's death, and his relationship with Elwing.

So Elrond sails, as he does. He reunites with Celebrian. He spends some time meeting his various family members and spends quite a lot of time with Gil-Galad and Celebrimbor. He has exactly one (1) talk with Elwing to ask her some questions and explain what became of Elros, but in my head he is not really interested in pursuing much of a relationship with her. Elwing respects that.

He and Celebrian work on healing their relationship and re-establishing intimacy.

Elrond slowly recovers from the damage Vilya did to him.

He might need to spend some time in Lorien actually. He is very good friends with Este and Nienna.

After a while though, things just don't feel right. Valinor feels very static and strange to him, and he doesn't really feel like he Fits. And that hurts because everyone is so glad to have him there and they expect that he's just as glad to be here as they are.

Also he really misses his kids, and wonders about his grandkids, and the Dunedain.

Eventually he starts connecting with more and more people who feel like they don't Fit. Mostly Noldor and the few Sindar that sailed. Many of them are still dealing with PTSD from Middle Earth and Beleriand, or with scars that refuse to heal. Many of them are just Restless. Most Vanyar do not understand this, and it's hard to talk about.

He and Cel begin work on a second Rivendell, and this keeps them both busy for a short time. He still doesn't feel Right though.

Eventually he starts experiencing like a reverse sea-longing and it gets more, and more, and more painful.

Finally, he talks it over with Celebrian. And they petition the Valar, who are not very happy to be petitioned. And then Elrond starts preparing to sail East.

Listen listen listen. Everything that Elrond has ever built, worked for, or loved is back in Middle Earth. It makes zero sense for him to be happy in Valinor. He aligns overwhelmingly with the Sindar and with the Dunedain in the books, and the Dunedain also consider him as one of them. Rivendell is there (he left it in the care of the Dunedain). Arwen and Aragorn are there. Gondor, and what is left of Elros are there. His grandchildren are there. Elladan and Elrohir are still there. The people left for him in Valinor are all people he has already mourned and found closure with.

He's not really made for Valinor anyway. He's made to watch over Middle Earth, to keep its lore and secrets, and to caretake Elros' line. He made a vow, once, and sure Aragorn and his descendants are doing just fine but he still feels half-whole without them.

And he's not the only person who doesn't feel Right in Valinor, who miss the mold and the rot and the fungi and the sheer diversity of life, and the Men!!! The humans!!! The normalcy of pain and suffering and scars and disabilities!

And so Elrond sails with Celebrian, and many of the Noldor say 'fuck it' and they go with him. They're tired and restless and have misgivings about the Valar anyway. A remnant returns to Middle Earth, and this time they go for love.

Elrond retakes his seat in Rivendell and the Dunedain rejoice that the eldest of their race, their most beloved uncle has come home. Celebrian reunites with Arwen, and meets a long line of adopted children that she never got to see, and meets Aragorn and her grandchildren.

They live through the ages, quietly doing what they have always done: living as watchers and caretakers, carefully preserving memories and lore and history.

Rivendell becomes a place that is both mythologized and startlingly real, where it is rumored that anyone who needs it will find help and sanctuary.

Many of the Noldor live in Rivendell, but some set up their own small kingdoms or simply live alongside the men and dwarves. They're finally there to guide and watch over the Secondborn, just as was intended in the Theme.

Eventually, of course, Elrond must grieve Arwen and Aragorn, but he's there for his grandchildren, and his great grandchildren, and his great grandchildren, and all of his family thereafter -- and in Arwen and Aragorn and their line, it almost feels like he is reunited with Elros again.

Elrond is there to help.

#<3 #listen i know part of Tolkien's Themes are magic leaving the world etc etc. but I don't like it #and especially for Elrond as a character it makes very little sense #elrond #celebrian #lotr #i do like other people's interpretations of Elrond in Valinor and I enjoy Elrond in Valinor fics! #but this is the one in my head that works best for me and how I see him

[thelordofgifs]

In Defence of the Sons of Fëanor

Wait, again? Yes, always. But not anything really bad! Kinslaying, I hope we can agree, is pretty indefensible. But an accusation I often see levelled against the younger sons - that they failed to rescue Maedhros from Angband out of cowardice/stupidity - is bugging me. So! Before I get a fandom reputation as "the Gil-galad poster", I thought I might write something about a character I actually care about - Maglor! Also his younger brothers, but Maglor is the one I’m particularly invested in defending.

In fic (particularly a lot of Russingon fic) the views I tend to see expressed by characters, and backed up by the narrative, go something like "The Fëanorions heartlessly refused Morgoth's offer to release Maedhros and left their brother to torture for thirty years! Dangling from a cliff in full view of their camp! But then heroic Fingon showed up and immediately rescued him with nothing more than a bow and a harp - he barely even stopped to eat first!"

Firstly, I obviously understand that views expressed by the characters are not that of the author. It is absolutely valid for Fingon to accuse the Fëanorions of cowardice, and completely in-character for Maglor to feel incredibly guilty about not rescuing Maedhros (and in fact a pretty essential part of their dynamic, in my opinion). My issue is with fics that very much imply that this view is the Only Correct One. There are a lot of things Maglor does wrong over the course of the Silm. This is not one of them.

Beginning with the refusal to surrender to Morgoth in exchange for Maedhros’ release - I hope nobody seriously considers this a bad decision? A crushing one, certainly. You can write really sad fic about this (I plan to). But the Noldor had just received an excellent lesson in why trusting Morgoth to parley was a bad idea. They had no reason to believe that Morgoth would actually release Maedhros if they surrendered - which is correct. He wouldn’t have. The published Silm adds, “and they were constrained also by their oath” - incidentally, a fairly compelling point of evidence in favour of the oath being binding in nature to some extent, but not the point here. The point here is that they couldn’t have surrendered to Morgoth, and shouldn’t have anyway.

So, with that out of the way, we can accept that what Maglor et al are being accused of is not refusing to parley with Morgoth, but failing to mount an independent rescue mission.

(Incidentally, it’s generally assumed that Maglor, the second-eldest brother, was the one in charge during Maedhros’ captivity. I usually subscribe to this myself, but I would also like to note that Maglor is not once named during the description of these events. It’s always “the sons of Fëanor”, as a unit. You could make a pretty strong case that they were deciding things together, or even that one of his younger brothers had usurped him somewhat - C&C have form in that area…)

Actually before I move on from Morgoth’s proposed deal, an important question: did Maedhros’ brothers know that he was alive? According to (I think) the Grey Annals, Maedhros was captured in YT 1497, and suspended from Thangorodrim in YT 1498 - presumably after his brothers had refused Morgoth’s offer. That’s potentially around 10 years in which they heard nothing, before Morgoth makes them the offer! Perhaps they reasoned that Morgoth wouldn’t have put such a valuable prisoner to death; perhaps not. It’s doubtful they were offered actual proof that Maedhros was alive, at any rate.

“Sure,” you might say, “but they definitely knew he was alive once they could see him suspended from Thangorodrim!” I can’t actually express how strongly I disagree with this common headcanon. The Fëanorions couldn’t see Maedhros on the cliff! Where did people get this idea from? I presume it’s because of Legolas’ various physics-defying feats of eyesight in LoTR. I would like to make the argument here that there’s no reason to assume Noldor accustomed to the light of the Trees could see as well in the starlight as a Silvan Elf of shadowed Mirkwood, but that’s not really necessary. There’s much stronger evidence pointing clearly to the fact that Maedhros wasn’t visible: Fingolfin’s host marches right up to the gates of Angband and nobody notices him. He even yells for help, and they don’t hear him! There is no way that anyone knew he was there (and the Sun had risen by this stage, too. If he was visible, they’d have seen him.) I’m allergic to geography, so don’t take my word on this, but my understanding is that Thangorodrim is a whole little mountain range or something, not like a single cliff. As additional support for this, Fingon gets lost on his eventual rescue mission (in which he’s trying to break into Angband itself, because that’s where he thinks Maedhros is) and only finds Maedhros when he hears him singing. The Fëanorions were absolutely not spending thirty years going “ooh look clear day today! Give Nelyo a wave!”

The next thing to tackle is the odd implication that rescuing Maedhros was really easy, actually, and his brothers were cowards for not even attempting it. Not only do I think this untrue, I don’t see why you’d want it to be true? Fingon’s rescue of Maedhros is one of the best parts of the silm. It’s moving because Fingon is so so brave, and he’s brave because what he attempted was impossible. There is seriously NO reason why that should have worked, and that’s what’s wonderful about it. Suggesting that Maedhros’ brothers held back from attempting a rescue because of cowardice or not caring about him, and not because it couldn’t be done, imo really devalues the magnitude of Fingon’s act of grace.

On a more practical level, nothing about the description of the rescue mission suggests it was easy and anyone could have done it? I genuinely hate to make this joke but… one does not simply walk into Angband. Fingon is specifically described as “aided by the very darkness that Morgoth had made” - a darkness which, you recall, he had made in response to the light of the new Sun. If you’d tried to walk up to Thangorodrim before Morgoth had made his smog, you’d have been caught! There were orcs there! And probably all manner of other fell beasties! Maedhros absolutely couldn’t have been rescued before the rising of the Sun, and specifically Morgoth’s response to it.

A final point - the somewhat common claim that Fingon immediately, the instant he learned what had befallen Maedhros, set out to rescue him, and didn’t even stop to like, brush his teeth first. This is a nice image! The Russingon feels are unparalleled! Unfortunately, I don’t think the text backs it up. The published silm states that Fingon went to Angband “resolved to heal the feud that divided the Noldor”. This rather strongly implies that Fingon only left on his mission some time after he arrived at Mithrim, since there was clearly time for tensions to arise between the two hosts. One of the Annals (Grey or of Beleriand? I get them mixed up - at any rate, the timeline on Tolkien Gateway) puts this in even starker terms, stating that Fingolfin’s host arrived at Mithrim in Year 2 of the Sun, and Fingon rescued Maedhros in Year 5. That’s three years of waiting around before he set out! Now, you could headcanon that maybe Maglor et al told Fingon that Maedhros was dead, and he only later learned that they meant “captured and we never found a body” - but it’s also possible that he knew Maedhros was a captive the entire time, and still didn’t do anything. Three years is obviously not the same as thirty, but I find this detail interesting even so. It rather muddies the dichotomy of “Maedhros’ brothers didn’t care enough to rescue him, Fingon immediately saved him” that I often see.

tl;dr the Fëanorions weren’t cowards who didn’t love their brother, they were sensible and it’s tragic.

Right I hope that was a fairly measured and reasonable post (it was supposed to be at any rate) so now I can very quickly say how DARE you imply that Maglor didn’t love Maedhros consider how close he settles to Himring consider how he’s the only one Maedhros brings with him to the Mereth Aderthad consider their last debate ie the most heartbreaking dialogue in the entire book consider how he’s right and yet he still follows Maedhros in stealing the Silmarils consider how he only finally breaks after Maedhros’ death you can pry that tender loving codependent relationship from my COLD DEAD HANDS ok I’m normal now :)

#silmarillion #meta #my meta #maglor #maedhros #fingon #the line of miriel #accuse my poor little meow meow of crimes! #but accuse him of the right crimes at least #this is mostly directed at an imaginary person who claimed all these things #since they’re most commonly arguments I see separately #but I decided to rebut them all together

[olympeline]

FrUK FACE family Parent Trap AU, part 8! Part 1

Last time we left off, Tony had just returned and Matthew met “his” future stepdad. It was a shock to come face to face with Tony the way he did, but Mattie didn’t give himself away. He’s had plenty of practice dealing with curveballs by this point. So, they all sit down for breakfast and, afterwards, Matthew gets to witness Arthur and Antonio interact. Just ordinary domestic stuff. Mattie observes, and soon he can see what Alfred meant when he said that - although he likes Tony - he doesn’t think Tony and his dad are a good match. They get along, but there’s no passion. It’s almost like a business friendship, albeit an affectionate one. Tony is a nice guy and Mattie enjoys laughing at his jokes and chatting about ordinary, day-to-day things. So, no potential evil stepfather subplot here. But he still feels his stomach sink at the thought of what could happen in the future after he and Alfred swap back.

Can Matthew picture Arthur married to Tony? He can, but it’s not a picture that sits well with him.

What picture would sit well? Ah, isn’t that just the question. But one we’re not ready to answer. Yet

Meanwhile, Alfred is enjoying his time with Francis but Mattie’s jibe last time they talked is still niggling him. Alfred knows that he isn’t really a bad kid, but he does frustrate and exasperate Arthur. Lot’s of calls from teachers about talking in class and angry neighbours clutching baseballs and complaining about broken windows. Stuff like that. The thought of Arthur being happier with his more well behaved son? A son he won’t have to constantly excuse and apologise for? Yeah. Alfred no-likee. He’s well on his way to loving Matthew as a brother, but still. A little seed or resentment being planted? Maybe. Both twins have some complex feelings to deal with. I mean, on top of everything else going on with their situation, lol

Things go on as normal, until a few days later when Alfred comes home from school to find Uncle Gil waiting for him. Francis was called away last minute for work and so Gil is here to babysit. Alfred doesn’t mind. Gil is awesome! The two of them are ignoring Francis’s meticulously laid out instructions and making their own idea of food instead (“Hey, Uncle Gil, can we have a can of frosting for dinner?” “Sure, kid!”) when Gilbert casually brings up that his brother is getting married soon. In New York. Seems his fiance, an Italian expat, runs a restaurant there. Afterwards, Gil’s brother plans to move to New York permanently to live with his new spouse. Without thinking, Alfred starts enthusiastically talking about how great NYC is and how much Gilbert’s brother (Uncle Ludwig to Mattie) will love it there.

Alfred goes on and on about his home city for so long (homesickness nipping at the lad? Yep) that he doesn’t realise Gilbert has fallen silent and is just standing there, watching and listening. With an unreadable look on his face. Alfred trails off when Gilbert suddenly reaches out and tilts Alfred’s head, brushing his fingers behind his ear. Alfred is confused.

“Uncle Gil? What-?”

“You fell off the wall at the end of the garden when you were a kid,” Gilbert says. “Fell and cut yourself on a stone. Bled like a stuck pig and needed stitches. First time in hospital. Fran was having kittens. Think he cried more than you. Remember?”

Alfred feels his heart start to bang in his chest. Mattie never thought to tell him about that. It happened too long ago and they didn’t have time to go over everything. Alfred tries to sound confident when he replies:

“Yeah, yeah. I remember.”

“You do, huh? Like you remember New York?”

Alfred’s mouth is dry. The confidence is rapidly ebbing.

“I - y-yeah…”

“Weird, since you’ve never been.”

Alfred’s heart stops.

“I…I…”

Those red eyes bore into him.

“Or,” Gilbert says. “Should I say, Mattie’s never been. Or is that wrong now, too?”

Gilbert feels behind Alfred’s ear again, then takes his hand back. And stares Alfred down.

“No scar.”

Alfred can’t speak. He feels like he’s going to faint.

“Let me guess,” Gilbert says. “Alfred?”

(Dun dun dun! In the end, it was Gilbert who worked it out first. Whodathunkit? Anyway, that’s all I have for now. So, please enjoy and stay tuned for part 9! (´ε｀ )♡)

#hetalia #fruk #face family #hws france #hws england #hws america #hws canada #hws spain #hws prussia #my posts #aph france #aph england #aph america #aph canada #aph spain #aph prussia #parent trap au

[anghraine]

I decided to watch Rings of Power and I still like it! General thoughts on the first episode:

This episode does a lot of heavy lifting to introduce everything in a somewhat rough and often disconnected, but engaging enough way.

The voice-over exposition at the beginning is obviously echoing the PJ FOTR one, but it's more awkward and sort of generically high fantasy. I still like it better because a) no Númenóreans were harmed in the making of this voice-over, b) retaining the Finrod-Galadriel age gap while simultaneously leaning into their sibling bond is really cute, c) Finrod using a heavy-handed metaphor in which the greatness of SHIPS figures largely seems entirely in character and also very Telerin (Eärwen's son!!!), and d) the overall story of how Valinorean Elves ended up in Middle-earth is so highly editorialized that it feels like the self-serving Noldor version of the story, which amuses me.

I enjoyed the introduction of present-day Galadriel. She's clearly the most impressive and competent person in the company she's leading while also being kind of unhinged, which I appreciate in a female protagonist. Good for her.

And I like that she's clearly this ancient being and her fixation on FIGHTING EVIL FOREVER is, in part, a product of being old and immortal and stuck in a singular mode of being. However, she's also right and the comparatively young people around her are being condescending assholes (like Gil-galad, but especially that one guy who semi-mutinied against her and is prodding her on the ship).

(Oh, and she has great hair. I actually don't care if the entire wig budget went to her specifically.)

The only one who seems to really feel bad about their dismissive treatment of her is Elrond, which tracks. The hints that he isn't seen as quite an equal ("Elf-lords only") feels silly, but it's not a huge deal for me. And I like that he and Galadriel are bros alongside the tension in her relationships with basically everyone. S2 Celebrían plssss

I still think the complaints about costuming/hair, and incessant comparisons to costuming in PJ!LOTR/WOT/whatever are largely pretty absurd. I particularly liked Arondir's armor and how dissimilar it is from the aesthetic of the Lindon Elves, everything Galadriel wears, and the weirdness of the ritualistic armor removal as they approach Valinor. The Elves spontaneously bursting into unsettling song was odd but extremely on-brand for Tolkien, so it was fun to see it actually done onscreen.

I also think the show is quite beautiful in general and a pleasure to simply look at (no, not only because of the budget).

I don't like how heavily and visibly made-up the main female characters are, however, especially Bronwyn (who also has my least favorite costuming of any of the mains tbh). It reminds me a bit of how Padmé Amidala's heavy and perfect make-up in her death scene in Revenge of the Sith always distracts me from the pathos of the scene. God forbid she wasn't hot as she died, you know? I don't care about middle-aged and older men being cast as Elves, but I'd like to see more older actresses, too!

The Harfoot stuff has an interesting mixture of cuteness and underlying menace. It doesn't interest me as much as what's going on with Galadriel, Elrond, and Arondir/Bronwyn, but I like Nori quite a bit and the whole aesthetic they have going, so I don't mind spending time with them, even though it's kind of detached from what's going on everywhere else.

Speaking of Arondir, the Southlands stuff is interesting because there's so little to work with in terms of canon (even if they had rights to everything) and the canon that does exist wrt them is super racist. So having the textual racism towards Southrons actually be brought up in-story, and rejected by an Elf protagonist who is being played by a Black man, is like ... there's a lot going on there and other people are probably better equipped to talk about it.

Personally, I would have liked to see Arondir fall in love with Bronwyn rather than being presented with it as an established thing, especially with the conversation about how this almost never happens etc. His actor does a great job with what he's given, though, and I laughed at the other Elf who is like "do you know how rarely romances between Men and Elves ever happen? do you know they always END TRAGICALLY?!"

Arondir: mmhmm

Other Elf: THEY DIED, ARONDIR

Arondir gives off big "distracted by drawing hearts around Bronwyn's name in his Trapper Keeper" vibes in that conversation and, idk, it was just really entertaining to me.

Bronwyn herself is all right thus far. I did really like the moment when she's talking about how she's from the allegedly creepy village and the people there are her relatives and friends. By and large she seems the most normal person in the cast, honestly.

I also enjoyed how deeply ominous the "approaching Valinor" music was, lmao. A bit overkill by the end, but I rather like the idea of Valinor being scary if you're not supposed to be there.

ETA: cutting between the different plots via the Middle-earth map is a bit silly as well, but functional enough. Interesting to see Calenardhon on the map before Gondor even exists!

#anghraine babbles #long post #tv: lotr #rings of power #legendarium blogging #legendarium fanwank #finrod #galadriel #elrond #sw fanwank #elanor brandyfoot #arondir #bronwyn #pt critical #pj critical

[timptoe]

Finally started playing ME Andromeda, I’m about thirty hours in (so no spoilers!), and…it’s kind of lovely? I get the sense from the fanbase that it’s pretty hated but I’m kind of liking it. First impressions:

It’s very much like if Mass Effect and Dragon Age: Inquisition had an adorable baby. Is that why people don’t like it? Because it’s so much less hoo-rah military?

I also heard no one likes the Frostbite graphics but they don’t bother me? The asari are a little cutesy, but everything else is gorgeous.

I do miss Shepard and the crew, tbh. Love the Liara cameos. Will always want more of Kaidan and Joker and Tali and Vega and everyone.

Do like the new crew, especially their interactions with each other. Hardcore shipping Drack/Lexi. And the Drack-Vetra friendship is really sweet.

I just met Reyes and hooooooo boy. Scott’s been flirting with Gil but he’s suddenly falling hard for Reyes—sorry Gil, don’t hate me forever.

Also Gil just go kiss Kallo already, ugh.

Also also (because Reyes’ voice actor is also male Hawke’s voice actor) my new Dragon Age II headcanon is: after Hawke meets Zevran and does his quest, he will only speak to Isabela in Zevran’s accent for the next six months. She hates it but finds it weirdly sexy. (Much how I am reacting to Reyes’ voice.)

Jaal++

Did the Nexus really not carry a QEC to talk to the Citadel? They traveled to a different galaxy and didn’t think, hey, we have tech that’ll let us say “yo descendants we just woke up!”?

Exaltation is a sufficiently creepy plot point, right up there with indoctrination and Reaper liquidation.

I miss quarians.

I do not miss missions. The open world style is my jam, I love the viability/colonization aspect, love the way this game does side quests.

I find the concept of the exiles to be weird. You sign up for the Initiative, are deemed worthy of being sent ahead on the Nexus instead of an ark (so you’re presumably all in), and you flake out in less than a year because…it didn’t all go to plan? That part of the narrative’s kinda weak.

Though I just got the first part of the Jien Garson whodunit and I’m super invested already.

Really intrigued by the Remnant.

Andromeda does feel less high-stakes than the original trilogy, which is too bad. Sure you’re not dealing with galaxy-wide apocalypse, but survival in Heleus should feel a lot less Laura Ingalls Wilder and a lot more Oregon Trail.

Overall, I’m liking it. Less than halfway through so still plenty of time for it to go sour, but I’m intrigued.

#mass effect #mass effect andromeda

[kicktwine]

again. AGAIN!!! This time everyone worries quite a lot

••

Nothing of note had happened. 

Or at least, Alisaie didn’t think anything of note had or was currently happening, she mostly thought things like “I’m glad I don’t have to deal with whatever this Hancock fellow is talking about now” and “How much Gil would it take to ship this back to Sharlyan?” and “By the Twelve, there is no way dignitaries can talk for this long” and things of the sort.

Until, of course, she notices that her brother is not among the long-chattering crowd currently taking up most of the East Aldenaard Trading Company office, like she thought. In fact, he hasn’t spoken in minutes, which is firstly unusual. He instead grasps her hand to arrest her attention and tugs, eyes straight forward. 

“Alisaie,” Alphinaud says tightly, “We need to go outside.”

“What? Why?”

“Please.”

Alisaie frowns. Her brother does not say “please” to her that way. “Alright. Should I leave the bags here or take them?”

“Leave. Or — i-it doesn’t matter. Either.” 

He keeps a tight hand on his, so copying the notion Alisaie brings the goods she’s procured from the Ruby Bazaar as a useful excuse for why they leave so quickly. She throws a quick “Be right back!” at Tataru, and allows her brother to escape the office and take, instead of leaving the area entirely — which probably rules out an attack or something, seeing as he also didn’t try to get Tataru to come with? Or anyone else — take a sharp right at the stairs and nearly collapse directly on the damp grass underneath the porch and out of sight. 

Alisaie’s ears flatten against her head as a sudden spike of fear hits her right in the chest and sinks there. She drops her bags and darts under the porch to press her hand against his forehead. “Are you alright?! What’s wrong? Alphinaud?”

“Fine! Fine,” he says, righting himself — then leaning against the foundation, trying to find something even slightly comfortable. He pulls his knees in. “Just need— I,” he sucks in a tight breath. 

“Should— should I send for someone?”

Alphinaud shakes his head violently. He’s given up on speaking, wholly focused on taking heavy, short breaths curled up against the rock. Something is wrong, though, not fine, he’s acting like he’s sick or injured or, something, or,

Alisaie wants to call for someone anyways. Ch’ari is not here, off doing errands on completely different continents. Maybe Tataru would know what to do — she’s always been resourceful, and she’d peel away from the conversation in an instant if she told her. Stubbornness is a family trait, he could be hurt. But should she leave him? What if — she almost hits her head on the underside of the porch — what if something happens? She should have kept her linkpearl, Garlean intercession be damned—

Alphinaud grasps at her, vaguely, arm still tight to his side. She abandons her train of thought and darts in next to him, as if they were children under a blanket after lights had gone out, huddling under a porch. 

“Five minutes,” Alphinaud whispers, with no less than all the voice he can muster. 

Alisaie doesn’t like this. “Okay. If you do not recover in five minutes, I’m getting Tataru.”

A tiny nod, and he puts his hands atop his head and becomes a tight ball. Alisaie really doesn’t like this. 

Waiting, that is. Waiting around for something to stop. Or get better. Waiting is for people with no plan, with no solution, and she needs a plan. It is not a good five minutes, listening to her brother wheeze through his teeth as if strangled and trying not to skip seconds on her watch and feeling as if maybe there are ants on this grass (there are none).

But true to his word, as he always is, Alphinaud’s breathing slows, and calms, slowly, and he pulls his head off of his knees and leans backwards to take in the cool night air of Kugane. 

“…Are you alright?” Alisaie asks, once she has studied him for a reaction. 

“Mm-hm.”

“What was that?”

Her brother chances a thin look in her direction, his expression doing a funny jolt between relieved and worried at her own, and then seemingly getting too worked up and looking away again to breathe correctly. She must look like a timid mouse. And it’s only in the shelter of the porch that she admits she feels like one. 

“I’m sorry,” Alphinaud starts. “I didn’t… mean to scare you.”

“You would have scared me less had I known you weren’t dying. …Right? You’re not, right?”

“No, no, I promise. No dying. Just…” He takes breaks to make sure he’s still breathing. “Sick. For a moment.”

“How?”

Alphinaud takes his head off the rocky foundation and begins to fiddle with his gloves. At least this is a sign of normalcy, something that makes Alisaie adjust her own position — she hadn’t realized how tense she was — to listen. 

“I’m… sure there’s another word for it. But Ari calls it memory sickness.”

Alisaie’s eyebrows furrow, but she lets him continue. “He explained… how did he say it. That if something bad happens, sometimes the memory that contains that event — or, an object from the event, or something of that nature, can become tainted. And it can fester, if it isn’t paid attention to, so when the memory resurfaces, it can… You can get sick.”

“From a memory? How?” Then, “…Has something happened?”

Alphinaud shifts uncomfortably. He hasn’t — Alisaie realizes, he has only told her an abridged version of whatever he was up to in Ishgard, whatever explained his drastic shift in personality. It hadn’t bothered her before, quite the opposite actually she was very pleased and a bit smug and a bit proud and a bit worried, because her own shift from flat anger to full purpose was… riddled with events she would rather not recall, but now she’s more than a bit worried. 

“Nothing I am able to discern fully,” he lies. She frowns, and almost chases it, but she can still feel his breathing against the side of her chest, so… she will let it go until she’s certain he’s no longer ill. And if it comes from a memory, further prodding may hurt more than help. She will remember it, though. “What is it like, then?”

His head tilts into his hand. “Ari says for him it is more like he thinks he’s inside it, and he can’t get it to stop. The memory is so strong he feels sensations that are not real. But, um— he’s figured out how to feel the memory hit him. So he knows to leave before it makes him sick and he can recover in private. That is why he disappears with no explanation, at times. For me… I don’t know. I cannot tell what is causing it, nor can I think of any specific memory that has fouled. Mayhap I need to pay more attention. But I just become ill like this, as if I were in battle. And then it passes. Eventually.”

Alisaie buries her own chin in hand, sorting through this. “Does it happen immediately?”

“I don’t think so? It builds. That is probably why I can’t pin down what causes it. It has only occurred twice,” Alphinaud admits, quietly. 

“Well. What happened today? Mayhap you can narrow it down. We’ve been gathering souvenirs and repairs for the past hours,” Alisaie begins, stronger now that there’s something solid to puzzle out. 

“Dinner was par for the course, Ch’ari took the entire teapot for himself yet again and the food was wonderful. Those dignitaries inside were quite dismissive, and rather crowded in there. The Bazaar was busy as well — there was that man who tried to sell you a necklace thinking you were me. He was altogether too handsy and I should have kicked him for it. Should I have kicked him for it?”

“No,” Alphinaud says, a weak laugh behind the words. “No, violence is disallowed, remember? I value my sister over petty revenge.”

“We have evaded capture once, we could do it again,” Alisaie sniffs. “But that is not what bothered you?”

Alphinaud drops his chin onto his knees again. “Any number of things could have caused it. Maybe all.”

“Oh.” Her ears lower. “I’m sorry. I’m not sure how to help.”

“You are helping. Very much. And I greatly appreciate you being here with me, even if I pulled us out of the office without explaining.”

Alisaie leans herself against him, short and forceful. “If you think I’d abandon my dying brother, you’ve lost it entirely.”

“I am not dying,” Alphinaud snorts. “I am, however… a bit damp, now. And not bereft of embarrassment.”

Alisaie notices, finally, that the wet grass has soaked through her coattails and into her skirt somewhat. “Ah.” Alphinaud, too, must have a damp patch down his back and legs from his position against the ground. “Well, there is no shame in staying out a bit longer. Tataru won’t come for us for at least twenty minutes.” 

She stands, brushing dew and grass off of herself. “Come on, then.”

Alphinaud takes her hand and heaves himself up, nearly hitting his head on the porch. “We can walk a moment.”

••

“Ch’ari.”

The Miqo’te tilts his head in her direction, indicating that he’s listening. Alisaie tries not to let her breath in shudder. 

“When you spoke to Alphinaud about his memory sickness, what did you tell him?”

Ch’ari, ever perceptive, gets to the point she was trying not to dodge around with a concerned tail twitch. “Do you feel sick?”

“No.” 

He tilts his head the other way and studies her. She folds her arms and looks up at him, normally as possible, the Doman morning just cold enough to seep through the bones. 

Ch’ari knows, he knows she’s overly worried, and he’s not good at hiding how much he wants to do something about it. But how could you not be? And how is Hien so calm? If your brother went wholly missing not only in Garlean territory but in the middle of a wasteland of nothingness, with no one but himself and maybe — she doesn’t fully trust Maxima, they don’t know him — maybe one ally, maybe none, hunted down by the crown prince who doesn’t stop even without an Ascian in his skin Zenos doesn’t stop hunting until his quarry is dead or — she needs to stop thinking in front of Ch’ari. 

Said cat folds his arms and hums. “Your brother has about as much courage as he does fear of simple things. When I explained it to him, he mentioned that it was not entirely fear that caused him to fall apart, it was mostly a sense of wrongness.” He gestures with one claw. “It happens without your consent. It isn’t a sign of weakness to be beset upon by illness such as this.”

“I never said it was,” Alisaie says, becoming very interested in her sleeve. “I just… Want to know how he got rid of it so quickly. My brother is on my mind, if you were unaware.”

At least the attempt at humor causes Ch’ari‘s shoulders to relax, a half-smile causing a fang to poke out from under his lip. “I couldn’t tell.”  

He considers his words for but a moment. “Nali taught me a sequence. Firstly, you must recognize what your soul wants to do. Run and hide? Fight? Then, you must let it, but not let it at your objective. Give it a false target to exhaust itself on. For example — I often think I must either fight or hide. And so I have a terribly battered training dummy in my apartment that I allow myself to hurt.” He stops, and waits. For her. 

Alisaie plays along, at least for now. The walkthrough is more important than her posturing, and so she considers it. And after considering, she concludes that it is decidedly not that specific. She feels antsy, like moving, like yelling for someone to fix it. Like stealing a falcon and searching herself. As if her soul is beginning to shiver. “I… I don’t know. I just want to go after him before something happens.”

“It wouldn’t hurt to try running.”

“Right. Doma is big enough.”

“I’ll accompany you, then.” Ch’ari straightens, casting his lance into the impossibly deep fist-sized pocket bag he carries around his waist. Where he got the thing, Alisaie never figured out. “But, before— before we go, another word of advice. Sometimes, despite preventing it, you will get sick anyways.” He gently pokes her in the shoulder. “Like anything else. No matter the medicine, if you have the stomach flu, you might still vomit.”

“Gross.”

“Very. If you do get sick, all you need do is sit and wait. Breathe slowly. Do not focus on anything else. And it will pass soon enough.”

“Hmm.” More waiting. Taking laps sounds like a better option by the second. Alisaie remembers sitting with Alphinaud, however - the way his chest heaved in place and his shivers that passed him in waves. There is likely wisdom in staying still, at that point. She hopes she never experiences it. She hopes he’s not sick. Anything could have happened. Maxima could not possibly know all of this, could he? 

Like reading her mind, Ch’ari pulls out a pair of daggers and closes his bag. “I am proud of you for holding it together,” he mentions, affixing them to his belt. “With Alphinaud’s temperament and your rather knightly tendencies, I half feared you’d be gone already.”

She exhales, focusing instead on lacing her boots. “Yes, well. I have always been less prone to illness than he is.”

“Full glass am I for that. Not that I dislike caring for — well. I’m just glad you’re alright. If we keep our heads on, we will find him soon enough. Shall we race?”

“Where?”

“Mmm. How about that tree?” He points — they have not explored much of the Doman enclave’s surroundings as of yet, and the tree in question rests on a high hill far in the distance. Plenty far to wear herself out. 

“Deal.” She takes off. 

(“Are you feeling any better?”

“No. But… less antsy, I suppose.”

“Good! Good.”)

•• authors note i suppose?? — Ari is conflating a number of mental illnesses, including PTSD and anxiety, all of which share the vague symptom “freak out and shut down due to a trigger of some kind”. I can’t imagine a nomadic tribe or a band of pirates has devoted the resources to mental health, and while I’m sure Sharlyan has picked the topic apart in full, I’m less sure they have a robust and considerate education program about it. Nanali, at least, comes from a large family with chronicled history, and taught Ari the term “memory sickness”. 

I also don’t headcanon Alphy as having anxiety — you can have a panic attack or something similar without having a panic disorder, hence the nomenclature, and when you do, it’s probably a good idea to take the advice of the ones who have them often. He had a bad one early-hw, which scared him half to death and prompted Ari to open up about it. This time it was, like, almost random, but a few too many things happened too fast, and he should have sat down twenty minutes ago but didn’t recognize the warning bells. Alisaie either! She just needs to recognize when she’s starting to get overwhelmed, and already has the “go fast” coping method, but can apply in the short term too in maybe a slightly healthier way. They’re such worried little raccoons and I can’t blame them, not when they’re 16 and they hang out with Me, but auough. Help the

#my writing #ffxiv #yes… YES! the writers block is being defeated #And I only have fluffy comfort nonsense coming out. ah well it’s cute to me #alphinaud leveilleur #alisaie leveilleur #wol oc #ch’ari #it’s not like I get excessively protective of younger siblings or anything. In media. Its not like this happens to me #oH #stormblood spoilers #or patch 4.3-4 spoilers #This one is about the vague notion of panic

[thevalleyisjolly]

A lot of fan depictions of Elrond often depict him as primarily culturally Noldorin, which is understandable.  He was an important figure in Gil-Galad’s court, to the extent that he was appointed his vice regent if you go by Unfinished Tales, and he was one of the bearers of three Elven rings.  Periodically there will be some meta or fic which dives into his connection to the Mortal side of his heritage, but most depictions frame him as culturally one of the Noldor.

What I’ve never really seen (although I’ve admittedly been on hiatus for a few years) is much talk about the implications of Elrond being regularly depicted as culturally Noldorin, which is often attributed to the influence of Maglor and Maedhros.  I think that’s a pretty logical assumption to make, but it’s also quite a horrifying and sad one if you deconstruct it.

Because Elrond and Elros are sons of Elwing, and a significant portion of their heritage is from Doriath.  Not only that, but they and their mother were the last survivors of their entire family by the end of the First Age, something that was almost entirely the fault of the Fëanorians.  And then the Fëanorians came and slaughtered their people again, kidnapped them, and Maglor at least raised them for a while.

So the implications of saying that Elrond culturally identifies with the Noldor because of Maglor’s upbringing becomes that much more horrific because it also (unintentionally) says, “his family and entire people (the Sindar of Doriath) were attacked and murdered en masse twice, and the murderers kidnapped him and his brother as young children and raised them in their (the murderers’) own culture such that as adults, at least one of them continued to identify with that culture before any of the other lineages and history that should also have been his by family, by upbringing, and by right.”

And it’s not that you can’t enjoy Noldor!Elrond, but it’s just odd that you seldom see any approaches to Noldor!Elrond which acknowledge the inherent fucked-up-ness of why he would be culturally Noldorin.  There are so many avenues you could take it down too.  Maybe Elrond reclaiming Noldorin culture for himself in a positive way, discovering the non-Fëanorian experiences and histories and choosing them for himself, or even coming to terms with Fëanorian expressions of Noldor culture.  Maybe Elrond having a difficult time processing his relationship with his heritage, caught between the culture he was raised in and the other cultures that he never got a chance to grow up with.  Maybe Elrond working through various conflicting feelings at different stages in his life, because there are no such things as easy answers or “right” ways to feel when you grow up forcibly disconnected from your family and culture.

I personally like and headcanon an Elrond who identifies a great deal with his Sindarin heritage and who makes an effort to reconnect to that part of his family history.  I think there’s some textual support for it, such as in FOTR in “The Council of Elrond” when he briefly summarizes his genealogy and he puts a great deal more emphasis on his descent from Lúthien through his mother Elwing than he does on his patrilineal descent through Eärendil.  But that’s also a personal preference - as always in fandom, you do you. 

To be clear, there’s nothing wrong with seeing Elrond as culturally Noldorin.  It’s a very common perception of the character and even if it didn’t have textual basis, everyone’s still entitled to enjoy their own readings of the character.  I just think there’s often a missing dimension when we talk about Elrond’s relationship to culture (whichever one you believe he identifies with most), which has its foundations in and cannot be extricated from the trauma of the Third Kinslaying, no matter what love grew afterwards. 

#lotr #silmarillion #elrond #is this a hot take? not sure. #just having all kinds of diaspora feelings about elrond as usual #i'm not saying he HAS to identify as sindar or mortal or maiar over noldor #but whichever culture(s) you headcanon him as identifying with; there's always going to be that impact of the third kinslaying #and being kidnapped away from your family and your people and raised in a different culture (whether you later identify with it or not)

[hazelestelle]

Rarepairs! - A SpecRecs Rec List

@spectre-requisitions-exchange authors were revealed (last week XD), and I finally have time for some recs!

First, my wonderful amazing gift!

Stars With One by @wickedwitchofthewilds. I am so happy that you chose Harry Carlyle/Scott Ryder for me, and I love it so much! It's so sweet and a little spicy too.

There's so many great stories and you should definitely check out the collection, but here's some assorted recs:

On The Shore (From A Distance) by kaijuburgers. Kaidan Alenko/Citadel Doctor. It's so lovely and bittersweet, and I love Miles! Byte Me by Kalliesa. Legion/Female Shepard. It is so hot, omg! Trust Me, I'm a Doctor by @cat-shepard. Harry Carlyle/Sara Ryder. The doctor is in! It's so sexy, and the puns are amazing! Stitched Together by @ferindencadash . James Vega/Male Shepard. The slow burn, the pining, the flirting! It has it all. oil & water by forceinsensitive. Gil Brodie/Kallo Jath. The enemies to lovers ships! It's so well done, the world building is incredible and the relationship development is fantastic. Taking on the Broker by @alyssalenko. Shadow Broker/Female Shepard. It's hot. Like, hello?? Be Gentle by FinchMarie. Thane Krios/NB Shepard. It's art. Just look at it. So beautiful. A Deal is a Deal by @vorchagirl. More Shadow Broker/Female Shepard, because yes! a still, small voice by calypsid. Urdnot Wrex/Female Shepard. An amazing exploration of Shepard's character, and very hot sex too.

Of course, I also wrote some things myself :)

comm chats and more, Diana Allers/Samantha Traynor. Diana and Samantha talk a lot over the comms. And then in person. when push comes to shove, Akksul/Scott Ryder. Akksul and Scott's arguments turn physical in the best way. pour me a whiskey melody, Harry Carlyle/Reyes Vidal. According to Sara, Harry really needs to go out and have some fun. So he does just that. afterparty, Urdnot Wrex/Female Shepard. Shepard and Wrex have sex in a hot tub. That's it, that's the story. salt and pepper, Alec Ryder/Cora Harper. Cora is fascinated with Alec. She knows it won't go anywhere. Or maybe it will?

Happy reading! <3

#mass effect #specrecs 2024 #fanfiction #rec list

[themoonlily]

Galadriel's storyline in ROP rubs me wrongly in so many ways. Honestly, if an Elf really needs to be gallivanting around Middle-earth with a bunch of Númenoreans at their heels, it's Elrond. He's the young one here, whose angst would be a little more understandable in the scale and nature written in the show than Galadriel’s (not that she doesn’t have stuff to be angry about, I just expect better of her), with canonical connections to Númenor and thematic potential with his being Elros' brother and thus the living embodiment of what Númenoreans crave. Meanwhile, if anyone should be dealing with the Dwarves of Khazad-dûm, it's Celebrimbor and Galadriel - and especially the latter should be the political agent Elrond is made out to be.  For the record, I do not actually condone this idea, but if we are talking in the terms of the story as it is being told in the show, it would make a lot more sense if Celebrían had the role of the warrior princess that's been given to Galadriel. Canonically little is known about what she was actually like, and as a character she does not have the baggage of established lore and how fandom widely regards her role in the legendarium. Galadriel, meanwhile, has these in loads and we know she was being politically active and a wife and mother at this point of the Second Age. Weren't the show's creators harping on filling in the blanks or writing the book Tolkien never did write? Instead they've gone and erased an actual canonical character whose story was never very detailed, and completely derailed a character that does have plenty written about her. As the show's version stands, it pretty much declares the story of Galadriel as a woman with a husband and daughter is not worth telling. Galadriel is not trying to reach her goals through her personal power, charisma or influence but through violence and bitterness. 

And what did the first season accomplish? It made Galadriel's goal vengeance, pure and simple. Even before the death of Finrod, it was something along the line of avenging the death of Two Trees. Not a word about her personal ambition of becoming a queen in her own right, establishing a realm or being a leader. Her story is of aimless wandering for an age, looking for some guy so that she can kill him to avenge a brother who is living happily in Valinor. Now, especially after that scene with her and Halbrand/Sauron, Galadriel's story is twisted even further. Now it looks like it was Sauron who planted the idea of ruling as a queen in her head. And not even as a queen in her own capacity, but as subservient to him (Sauron does not share power, essentially he's offering her nothing better than he offers to any common orc). This casts a completely different light on her rejection of the Ring in FOTR and undermines the importance of what this moment means for her as a character: the temptation is no longer her ruling as the supreme queen, but acting as Sauron's bootlicker, which also makes the temptation look pathetic and thus her refusal no big deal. Essentially, Galadriel's story is not about Galadriel anymore. It's a story about men who leave her (Finrod and Celeborn), or who condescend on her (Elrond), or who use and manipulate her (Gil-galad and Sauron). I don't even know what purpose this serves. Not only is this ship-baiting just tired, but also what it implies about her is pretty awful and humiliating. It's contradictory to everything said about her in canon, or Elves and marriage. Galadriel even in her youth keenly reads and understands people and their motives and she is consistently the one person who recognises evil when it has not yet revealed itself and rejects it before anyone else. And yet here she is, dicking around with the enemy she has been hunting for millenia. It makes her look clueless, naive and stupid, her "quest" essentially a fool's errand, and it paints her later struggles against Sauron not as the actions of a leader trying to do the right thing even though it costs her everything, but as a scorned ex trying to get payback for personal slight. It's as if Amazon was not capable of understanding the concept of people choosing to do good for its own sake, and deciding to fight an almost hopeless battle because to do nothing would be worse. For them, every good deed has to have a personal stake or agenda. This undermines Galadriel's "goodness" (and her greatness) even more, as if this show's version of her hadn't done enough to make her look as bad as possible. And it shows Amazon’s profound misunderstanding of Tolkien.   Sidenote, now that I think more of this, I can't help this feeling: Galadriel had to be the one to go to Númenor instead of Elrond, because show creators were too much of cowards to genderbend Sauron or ship-bait a male/male relationship (for the record, I think ship-baiting or queerbaiting are both stupid things to do). Appearing as a woman is completely within the reach of Sauron's abilities, and he actually has the history of using shapeshifting either to fight or to entice. Hell, why is ship-baiting even necessary, unless to recycle once again some truly overused tropes? (Employing overused tropes in fanfiction is one thing, but I expect better from a big adaptation that makes a huge number of being faithful to the source material.) Tolkien in particular is known for his iconic friendships and love between comrades; in fact, it's the friendships of his characters, not their romances, that save Middle-earth and a betrayal of faith and fellowship is no less devastating. Instead of a potentially interesting and new take, what we got is an entire season of Galadriel and Halbrand getting off on being mutually terrible people, her apparently being the reason he returns to his evil ways, and her agency stripped away from her so that she can pursue an essentially pointless vengeance. Even the person she supposedly loves is mentioned only once in a throwaway scene that does not in any way convince me that she actually cares about Celeborn. Also the erasure of Celebrían (who is canonically around the same age as Elrond) now leads to the logical conclusion that she will be born some time during this show, which makes her extremely young in Elven terms at the time of her marriage to Elrond. Yikes. Furthermore, this is a further violence done to Galadriel and her narrative, because canonically she and Celebrían were together at least for most of the Second Age, but now her daughter will be married off almost as soon as she has reached some sort of physical maturity. (Honestly, does anyone believe that Morfydd Clark looks and appears as if she could be the mother of an adult daughter? I have no trouble believing this of Cate Blanchett's Galadriel. Both of these actresses are/were in their early thirties when they first appeared in the role of Galadriel. Maybe it's not Clark's fault -- although her physical smallness in the role of a very tall and strong woman is jarring -- and instead it's because the character is written as such a petulant child that it's horrifying to even think of her parenting anyone.) 

#anti rings of power #Galadriel #Celebrían #Elrond

[autumnslance]

[Language barriers and the Echo Anon] You ever keep yourself awake at night thinking how they hand waved currency differences in FFXIV. Sure I’m fully aware that tomestones, tribal currency and other such things exist but the majority of things are paid with Gil. It makes sense in Eorzea but less so elsewhere. Kugane can be justified with being the only open trading port of Hingashi, Thavnair receiving trade from Eorzea and the First’s currencies being so tossed about post Flood they accept Gil now but would it really make sense in places like Yanxia or Rak’tika(rural)? I don’t want to think about how places that you aren’t supposed to visit again lore wise(Elpis, UT and the illusory Amaurot in Tempest) can accept gil as payment and or even trade goods.

I really don't worry about it, especially if we go with the idea of Gil being a typical gold-based currency just with a funny name.

It was also an Allagan thing, recycled by Eorzeans. And with trade with Eorzea being common, it does mostly work in the Source. Yanxia is Doma, more open to trade and outsiders than even Hingashi, and has been part of Garlemald besides--and the Empire has no issue taking Eorzean coin and probably has a similar Allagan-inspired currency that's equivalent, given how much else they base upon the old empire.

Mostly it IS a gameplay convenience even more than the languages so players don't also have to worry about the Gil to Koban exchange rate, but there's also nothing saying the WoL and Scions aren't dealing in Koban when in the East and the game just doesn't deal with that.

As for the First, that's just a mess of handwaving a world actively in the midst of apocalypse and maybe we'll get more details in the 3rd lorebook, but they seem to be having a "collapse the languages and currency down since the remaining population is so small" situation there, and everyone has to trade with one another for survival purposes; even the Viis, who start working with the Qitari and the Night's Blessed.

And while a barter system for the Viis on introduction (or even the Xaela of the Steppe) might seem to make sense, it also unnecessarily complicates and bogs down story and gameplay, so like a LOT of other things in the game, shorthands it to "they just take your coin."

Which I find more and more, people kind of forget, especially when criticizing how "fast and easy" something resolves, that in the scope of the game, pretty much everything is shorthanded to keep gameplay and story moving along, from conversations to rest periods to equipment acquisition to scenes we don't see play out between NPCs and to the vast majority of gameplay mechanics where they intersect with character actions and interactions.

FFXIV tries real hard to make some gameplay part of the world and story, like teleportation. Or they make bland excuses on why we can wander around the 3 city-states post-Banquet, or why the WoL isn't given a shock collar too in Tertium, or can keep visiting unique locations for specific storypoints like Ultima Thule and Elpis. And if we were playing a traditional standalone, single-player FF game, those situations would be written and played out differently.

But sometimes a lore lampshade is just a lampshade, and not all game mechanics are actually lore, but ways for players to fill in the gaps when it comes to Roleplay and Fanfiction.

EDIT: And here's a post from some other folks, with some sources, that barter wasn't as widespread as people think, most places--even remote and sparsely populated--had regular commerce, and currency of some form was far more common and far-reaching than might be assumed.

Remember, folks: Hollywood and other media rarely have accurate portrayals of history, and our own modern assumptions of things being different "back then" are often wrong. Street vendors and athletic sponsorships were common in Rome and "Tiffany" is a medieval (nick)name.

#final fantasy xiv #Gil #Gameplay #Lore #Story #MSQ #Encyclopaedia Eorzea #Allag #Eorzea #Garlemald #Doma #Kugane #Viis #Azim Steppe

[terraco-07]

I'm gonna start this off by being self aware. Vriscourse in 2024 is so funny and kind of silly in a way so take as little or as much of this as you want. I think I should lead in with Vriska is divisive on purpose. Her entire story is rife with places where you can either hate her, love her, or find shades of grey. I love Vriska as a character, but I want to be perfectly clear. Vriska Serket is NOT a good person, but imo very few people are. Narratively speaking Vriska grows up on a hostile planet where she's forced to kill for her Lusus. She also has the influence of Mindfang's journal to contend with. Vriska never knows who she is, she's always living in someone else's shadow and constantly hating it. Yet at the same time she's trying to live her life by some grand formula. Let's take Tavros for example. By virtue of Karkat and the descriptions we get of Alternia we see the word pity used several times when describing Flushed feelings. Can we take it with a grain of salt and assume that Karkat a known romance over enjoyer is being an unreliable narrator? Sure, we can. That said I think that wording is relevant here. In Vriska's head she feels bad for this guy and thinks that she's the only one who can fix him. On top of that you add in that her hero was flush with a powerful bronzeblood and you've put massive blinders on yourself. She becomes so self absorbed with this idea that she ends up going way too far in her efforts to bring him around and pushes heavily past his consent and boundaries. (Looking at that kiss scene). Even after his death she says maybe 2-3 things about ahh man maybe I shouldn't say bad things about that guy anymore or am I bad for killing (another) friend. She's young but I think the lack of remorse is something that matters here when looking at her in adulthood which is what we're really trying to get to here. As for the previous murder it's barely even touched. There's an air of well Aradia killed me back so we're all good. Even though she ascended to God tier and initially Aradia was just a ghost who had to deal with it while Sollux had to cope with the fact that physically it was his body that killed his matesprit. General other beats are the arrogance, easy to anger, and lack of empathy. Which we actually get to see some development on those from pre retcon Vriska! More on that here in a second.

Holy shit Gil, you're rambling so God Damn much why do we care? I don't know, don't ask me, but here's why all that foundation matters. If we're thinking about the theoretical for any Homestuck character as a whole I feel like we have to consider who they are in adulthood. Tons of discussion and debate all circles around "well they were kids!" Okay, well lets talk about what they could be as adults. So with everything we've already brought up about Vriska, how does she act in her 20s? Personally I think she struggles post game. She has no mental purpose for a while and she's in a place where she doesn't have to fight just to live so that means tons of time to sit around and think. We've seen from pre retcon Vriska that when the stress is off she does actually consider what she's done to a degree. Do I think she thinks about Tavros or Alternian sins all that much? No. I think she doesn't like her younger self (like most people) and does what she can to avoid being like that anymore. That comes with painfully slow growth and still a lot of bridges in need of mending. Those same traits of being self centered and needing attention are there but they're a little more tempered. She can at least listen now and has the emotional intelligence to realize when she's hurt someone and actually care about that. In summary: Vriska is a complicated and flawed character and saying that she did nothing wrong but also saying she did everything wrong are both incorrect. There is nothing defensible about her acts (She fucked up bad) but we can understand why she may have done them without condoning them. As an adult she is still kind of an asshole but she's not to that same level and she gets to grow into a somewhat reasonable adult that is still a dick at times. Also if you got this far then enjoy my shameless Vrisrose propaganda. They get in fights all the time and want to beat the shit out of each other nonstop. Both of them suck and it's so funny.

#homestuck #vriska serket #Text post #Terra rambles #Look I just rambled on because both sides of this suck and there's an easy enough middle ground #And one that feels way more plausible to me

[nevadas-night-time-novelist]

Main 4 - S/O gets knocked up

CW: Pregnancy

Reader is AFAB but this is gender neutral.

Hank -It came as a surprise to him, he wasn’t even aware he was able to produce a child given his history of being torn apart and stitched back together, but sure as hell his partner gave him a positive test.

-He demands 2BD takes you off active roster immediately, he doesn’t give two shits what the others think, he is going to keep his mate and baby as safe as possible.

-Hank goes through hell and high water to get anything you so much as hint at needing, he’ll make runs to Gil’s, steal candy and snacks from vendors, hunt down the best and softest blankets and pillows to cover you with.

-This man begins hoarding baby things too, its mostly grey clothing and blankets, its rare to see any form of colour. It’s not like you had a way to find the gender anyway, so grey worked. He’s even got a steadily growing pile of soft toys and teddies.

-“Hank, the baby is kicking.” He drops whatever he is doing and runs over, hands eager to feel the signs of life from his growing bundle, his hands break away to shake violently with excitement before softly placing them back on his lover’s stomach.

-He gets far more clingy after that, he always wants you in his sight, encased protectively in his arms, or fingers entangled if he can’t embrace you. Spooning you tightly while you sleep in his arms.

-He fights far harder than before, eager to make the world safer for his love and his baby, a sense of pride different to the usual rush fills him with each successful kill.

-When the time comes for this baby to be born he completely shuts down, he is at an utter loss and can’t fathom a way to help. Doc has never delivered a baby, but then again Doc hadn’t done a lot of things that he’d done for his team before. Hearing his partner’s strained screams of pain hurts his heart, but all he can do is stand at the bedside with their hand in his.

-Though hours of pain, she arrives, a tiny and screaming bundle and Hank nearly passes out from the rush of emotions. Doc hands off the newborn to Hank, bundled in a towel, telling him to clear off the baby while he makes sure Hank’s partner is stable.

-He gently bushes the blood and mucous and stares down at this stranger in his arms. He has to take his goggles off since they’re filling with tears. Half of him, half of his partner… All perfect.

Sanmos (These two are a package deal, you get one, you get both)

-It was pretty obvious who was the father, given that Deimos is trans, not that it matters, both are equally this little one’s dad. Both men exploded with excitement when they saw the test in your hands.

-Both go into dad mode instantly, Deimos practically begs Doc to help him cut down on his cigarette dependency, and when he does need one, he’ll steer clear of you. Sanford is pretty handy, the ideal husband type, he begins building a crib for his little one, and the others help.

-Dei snuggles you as much as he can, and Sanford takes both of you into his arms, eager to protect this tiny slice of heaven lady luck blessed him with. Two amazingly, wonderful, beautiful partners and a bun in the oven. Neither man knows what kind of karma they cashed in to get this.

-Doc manages to get an ultrasound, and both men keep a small picture on them, who’d have believed a tiny ball of cells would make two grown ass mercenaries turn into soft piles of goo.

-Ford is fantastic at fixing up food cravings, even if he finds whatever you desire to be disgusting, even if its the dead of night and you really want this hard to make dish, he’ll get up and fight through it, just for you.

-Dei takes up an interest in sewing, baby clothes are definitely a hard find, so he opts for making them instead. He also gives making stuffed toys a go, but he can’t get it right, and as sweet as they are, he is absolutely not giving those abominations to his youngling.

-Once this little one is ready to come into the world, Deimos takes post next to his partner, allowing them to grab his hand, squeezing it during contractions and biting his lip to mask the pain of each strong grip. Sanford has the second most medical knowledge and opts to help Doc at the other end of the table.

-Eventually a healthy boy comes screaming into the world, and Sanford melts as he takes his newborn into his arms, taking him aside to clean him while Doc aids his partner.

-Deimos sings their praise, wiping their sweaty forehead and brushing their hair out of their eyes. “A boy, eh, he’s gonna be big and strong, like his parents,”

-You’re handed your tiny baby and Sanford bursts into tears when the little man sticks his lip out like he does.

2BDamned

-This was pre-planned of course, both he and his partner agreed on purposely going unprotected in hopes of this happening.

-“You should take another one, just to be sure.” His partner stared at the five tests now on the table and laughed softly. “Isn’t this overkill? Three brands, five test.” “I.. I just can’t believe its happening.”

-His excitement is only matched by his apprehension, he’d long since written off the idea of having a child, he’d never been close enough to anyone, never found himself in pure and unwavering love. And then you came into his life.

-He sends his boys out on missions to find anything possibly baby related, slowly but surely your shared room becomes more and more baby themed, the base becomes baby proofed with gates. Doc get snippy if his team leave weapons around, c'mon lads, the unborn can totally hurt themselves on them.

-Doc gets very fussy over you, it feels like every other day he’s wanting you in his office for a check up, its sweet but gets somewhat annoying. But he just wants constant reassurance both his beloved are in perfect health.

-He takes more breaks from his work to just relax with you, letting out raspy and broken purrs as he cups your stomach. Sometimes you fall asleep first, sometimes he does, sometimes you just lay together and talk.

-When you’re ready to pop, he needs Sanford’s help, his nerves becoming shot at he realises ‘Oh god this is happening, this is happening right now, I am not ready for this,’ But that’s how it is, you’ll never truly be ready for anything new life brings.

-Doc shakes as he aids his child into the world, tiny lungs screeching out their arrival, he swallows the lump in his throat, only managing a soft, “G-girl,” as he stares at her, clearing her face off with a towel before handing her to Sanford so he can check his partner is okay.

-But things are not okay, and he panics instantly. “There’s a second one-” He gasps, going back into midwife mode, helping bring his second little child into the world. “Also a girl, my god,” He can’t believe it, despite witnessing it all. For so many years he’d come to terms with never having one child, and now here he stood with two.

-After making sure you’re stable, he embraces his tiny family and cries, relief flooding his system.

#madness combat #madcom #madness combat x reader #madcom x reader #madness combat reader insert #madcom reader insert #x gon deliver to ya #hank #hank j wimbleton #hank x reader #sanford #sanford x reader #deimos #deimos x reader #2BDamned #2BDamned x reader

[nasuversekinkmeme]

Weekly Roundup: Prompts!

Kara no Kyoukai

Kara No Kyoukai ghost hunting.

Tsukihime

Smut, nrvnqsr/roa. nrvnqsr's pussy IS toothy

tsukihime yaoi. + arihiko

Gore tw, Arcueid/Ciel disemboweling each other and cuddling above the warm blood and guts? Romance preferred, but platonic works too.

kohaku/arcueid?? i think theyd be an interesting couple. lots of potential for toxic yuri

tsukihime CW adaptation

Smut, arihiko/shiki freaknasty t4t sex with the knife. also tboy frotting.

The Tsukihime Arihiko route.

Kohaku getting sick and Hisui taking care of her

Satsuki as a harem protagonist! (preferably sfw)

Fate/Stay Night

Fsn post heavens feel where Sakura has her own harem with all the girls and housewife shirou. Can be as wholesome or degenerate as you want, i just want to see sakura being loved

Shirou force fem by Caster

SFW Artoria/Cu

Fate stay night CW adaptation

Fate/Extra

Smut, hakuno pegging gil so hard that he pisses himself

Extra Shinji being happy. Maybe he gets summoned to Chaldea as a pseudoservant and bonds with the rest of the child servants.

Hakunon calming Nero down while she has a panic attack

Kaleid Liner Prisma Illya

Prisma illya sickfic

one of the prillya girls commits a madoka style self sacrifice

Prillya trio hugging for warmth in the winter

Fate/Apocrypha

Astolfo helping a trans girl transition?

Lord El-Melloi's Case Files

Smut, age gap, incest, Waver has to marry Reines due to political reasons, on their wedding night waver tries go to sleep hoping this is all a nightmare. It isn't a nightmare, Reines is now his wife and she won't let him sleep for the entire night. Femdom.

Smut, waver + prostate massage

Fate/Grand Order

Merlin forcedfem

Amakusa / Angra, fluff or ship

Would love to see a cutesy thing where Scheherazade and Mandricardo are having sex, and Mandri is trying and failing to be confident as it happens (optional Schez trying and succeeding at being confident)

Sita finally comes to chaldea and reunites with Rama, although not everyone is happy, since Kama really doesn't know how to deal with her paremts

Mebd being too horny to function in the slightest

Georgios/Vritra + bondage, him attempting to help her “atone” for her previous actions.

Smut, Cock worship + one of the Knights of the Round

Edmond Dantes as a vampire; anything with a vampire AU with him turning on the charm with Gudako or Gudao would be amazing :3c hell, even regular Edmond getting a mana transfer via blood drinking would be amazing!

Noncon tw, Kama psychologically tortures Gudako by using her clones and changing their appearances into people Ritsuka loves saying terrible things to her. She also sexually abuses her while at it

Smut, Shuten rooting around Guda guts 3, Massive oni dong boogaloo

Smut, Kagetora/Gudako

Morgan being a good mother fluff?

Raikou finds out Kintoki is dating Shuten and they have a talk

Jalter reacting to the utter lack of porn of her

Smut, noncon, solomon/goetia, teaching that beast a lesson

Caren drugs her father, ties him up and transfroms him in chaldea punching bag, for only 100K QP you get to punch and torture kirei for half an hour

Smut, fgo selfcest orgy

Smut, abercest gangbang

Smut, Archer getting sucked dry by Medb

Sita and Gudao tag-teaming/sandwiching Rama

Smut, FGO Asclepius but its him diagnosing the mc with needing to get dicked down so he does it himself since the mc needs it ASAP

Yu Meiren + Bedivere, where they crossed path when they were both immortals

castoria trying Really hard to convince oberon and guda that yes, the world is in fact ending and yes, that is a bad thing

Skadi/Iri dating after they met from their joint custody of Sitonai

an ill-fitting servant of the writer's choice is put in charge of the Chaldea daycare for a day

Shuten rooting around in Guda guts 2!

Smut, girlcock worship, either Kiara/GUdako or Kama/Gudako with trans girl Gudako

Mori Nagayoshi praised until he's a blushing mess!

Mozart being happy to see his friend Salieri again as servants

continuing on the "BB gets subjected to karmic transformations " train , let give her passionlip sized boobs , but BB doesn't get the giant metal hands to help her keep balance

BB gets tf'd into a inflatable punching bag toy , the kind that when ya give it a strong punch , it gets right back up. BB's fully conscious in that state , & once the transformation is completed, the newly made Bopper Bag is placed in the section of chaldea's gym that is often frequented by the ruler class servants.

Smut, Xu Fu/Yu Meiren

in fgo, kirei doesn't have magic resistance , so gudako could use her command seals to force him to wear a playboy bunny leotard , or model for a sexy fireman calendar. there's endless possibilities when it comes to doing lewd things to yorokobe man with the help of command seals~!

Unethical knifeplay from a Mister Hyde + Blood drinking. Thank you! Dubcon or Noncon is fine!

Shuten and Raiko have been fighting each other more fiercely as of late, so obviously the best way to relieve that tension is for them to have a nice long and relaxing hate-fuck session...that somehow causes more collateral damage than any one of their fights.

Just an AU where everything is the same But Gudao's design concept is a Genderbent Sakura instead of Rin

Morgan has a talk with her family, all of her family, adopted children included, i'm looking at you Lancelot, don't think you can outrun your mother

I would like to see Hephaestion get more attention, she is so cool

Smut, Oberon ovipos… there is so much potential and yet such a lack of it. Make master a seedbed!! 👏

KIREI MPREG!!

Nobunaga is bored with Chaldea, no challenge, nothing to conquer, until she sees something that catches her eye. A strong warrior, with a monstrous physique, whose only joy was in battle, after getting her eyes in that beast of a man that was Cu Alter, Nobunaga finally was able to set a new goal for herself: She wanted to get into this man's pants!

We get to take a look at medbs life in Chaldea, from her romantic dates, to her one night stands, to her weekly orgy and how she rode her way into literally every servant's heart in Chaldea to the point she has become the de-facto queen of the place, no servant, master or employee is safe from her charms!

Shimousa Kiyohime gets mixed into Proper Human History Kiyohime's spirit origin and she suddenly finds herself Very Attracted To Musashi

hi you know that bit in oberons valentines scene where he implies hes going to ask his caesar for money cause hes his dad in the play hes from yeah its ruining my life can i have some oberon/caesar to alleviate my hysteria about it how far you lean into the incest side of things is your prerogative but i need this its killing me

Smut, hello hello can i get my boy mandricardo some dick please? hes the 30 year old emo boy of all time and mayhaps some dick would relieve his anxiety. not picky about who is providing it can be hektor it can be astolfo it can be roland even now that hes playable just get him some good dick please

Goredolf/Koyanskaya? Can be smut, can be pre canon, post canon, pining, angst, anything you want! I'm just FASCINATED by the fact that this guy almost got murdered by her like three times yet have enough leftover love to hang onto the lipstick she gave him

Smut, Gudao gets tentacle fucked by Hokusai

Smut, Koyan of Light has a dialogue line where she states she wants to assert her dominance over Robin. I think Robin Hood legally has to be pegged by Koyan of Light now

Smut, Enough with the sad Olga Asks! i wanna see my girl getting fucked stupid for once!

anything bartholomew/guda please,, can be either smut or fluff, i just want more content of this pirate man

The reason Morgan hates Artoria is because she was in love with Guinevere and couldn't stand seeing her laying with another woman, much less her own sister. Now they're both in Chaldea and Morgan has 1500 years of suppressed feelings ready to be unleashed

okay , phantom thief amakusa & Mistress C (aka rider carmilla) are both after the same ultra rare artifact at the museuem , But Mistress C double crossed him. while she's taking an audio tour of the museum , Semiramis found the cupboard that amakusa got shoved into.

BB gets tf'd into a Doll Maid enemy & she's getting edged the entire time. if the author so wishes , this can be a fic where BB gets NTRD.

Smut, ishtar , astrea & BB glory wall .

Gray "resents Saber for being the ideal she was molded into" vs Castoria "won't somebody please give Saber a break" FIGHT!

No one in Chaldea seens to be able to cath Skadi's eyes, Medb catches one look at the ice queen and takes the challenge

Begging for anything happy Kirschtaria/Ophelia. Smut absolutely welcome, but will settle for just something with a happy ending.

I need more Dom!Guda. Doesn’t matter who subs.

Crossovers

can i ask for someone to make a john wick pseudoservant? or maybe hes a servant on his own. he's just hanging out with other chaldean servants, i think he'll fit right in

fgo asclepius stars in an episode of house md

Chaldea manages to summon Suguru Geto (up to anyone for whichever part of the timeline he's from), but it's only due to one unlikely catalyst: Fujino

Fate/Stay Night and Tsukihime crossover

Kim Dokja gets summoned to Chaldea

Any fandom

Smut, noncon, Hey is reader insert okay, and if yes can I ask for a reader insert about being stuck in a wall and various characters taking advantage of that? I just want multiple servants (or mages! ain't picky) playing with my holes without asking for my consent is that too much to ask

Smut, My prompt is: tfw you lose in a friendly competition and your opponent whip out their dick to shove it in your mouth as a prize.

This anon asks for omegaverse! Specifically, omegaverse with a focus on the worldbuilding. Do omegaverse presentations affect magecraft in any way? Do servants get summoned with the presentation they had in life? What about demi-servants? Or composite servants? or nonhuman servants? How does society (regular & mage one) evolve considering omegaverse is here? I don't need you to answer ALL of these questions (or even specifically THESE questions) but that's what I mean by "focus on the worldbuilding."

Smut, There is an astonishing lack of tentacles or pervy vine stuff anywhere. Caster Cu and Gudako vine sex. Or just write any servant using their tentacles or vine manipulation or anything other creative binding tools on Gudako to fuck her, really!

a cheese burger

#weekly roundup

[runawaymun]

🗡️&⚓, if you please!

🗡️ Defend your favorite war criminal (or make them worse - I'm not your mom)

I'm a Maedhros apologist for so many reasons. Chief of which is because I love him. But in all seriousness, while he is a war criminal and he is a mass-murderer, I think out of all the The Sons of Fëanor, he displayed the most restraint and regret.

Like sure the narrative tells us that Maglor deeply regretted his actions explicitly -- but he comes late to that realization after the end of the third kinslaying. Out of all the sons, Maedhros props up my idea that the Oath is something Eldritch and Outside of Them -- a compelling Force (which doesn't absolve them of their actions, but does explain things a lot) the most. He seeks the peaceful, least-violent solutions first, nearly every time.

Maedhros didn't participate in the burning of the ships.

Maedhros repeatedly tries to protect others at risk to himself - taking up the most dangerous/at-conflict lands in Himring, and trying end the conflict with Morgoth with the least bloodshed possible - at risk of his own life by going to treat with Morgoth. Is this his smartest move? No. Is it perhaps his most selfless? IMO yeah. I'm sure he knew he was walking into a trap, but he was offered an opportunity to end things with the least amount of bloodshed and risk to others, so he took it.

Maedhros does a lot of political (and familial) work in healing all the division his father caused over the Silmarils via the Union of Maedhros, but is happy not to be in charge and doesn't seem to need/want recognition. He doesn't have a huge ego. He relinquishes kingship to Fingolfin even though his brothers don't want him to.

The second he felt that his brothers might cause conflicts with others, he moved them out of Hithlum.

Celegorm had to convince Maedhros to attack Doriath. This was after Maedhros attempted to simply ask Dior to hand over the Silmaril - Dior may have inherited the Silmaril from Beren & Luthien, but IMO stolen property, even inherited, is still stolen property. Does this justify the sack of Doriath? No. But I personally do not believe that Dior had any moral right to the Silmaril either. Maedhros was well within his rights to ask for it, and while I understand completely why nobody handed it over, and the Oath may have compelled kinslaying anyway due to the "he who hideth/hoardeth/in hand taketh etc etc" clause -- Maedhros still asked first. and IMO that's a sign of, again -- the fact that he seeks out peaceful solutions first. And it was only after the Oath had awoken and after a great deal of "stirring" from Celegorm that Maedhros agreed to launch an assault.

Maedhros canonically hated what happened to Elured & Elurin. It was done without his knowledge and he also canonically tried to save them.

In a repeat of what happened at Doriath: Maedhros sent messages to Sirion first, and while again -- I don't blame Elwing for withholding the Silmaril because nobody at Sirion had any reason to believe that M&M wouldn't take the Silmaril and kill them anyway (especially after Doriath) -- he still tried. And it was only after they refused to hand it over and the Oath was awoken & in some versions of the tale the Ambarussa urged him that they launched an assault on Sirion.

Maedhros doesn't send anyone else on the fool's errand to try and retrieve the last two Silmarils. He goes alone with Maglor. There is no assault. No battle. He does it in secrecy and kills the least amount of people he possibly can. It really feels to me like the goal was to sate the Oath/save his family from eternal darkness with the least amount of bloodshed possible.

⚓ Pick a Silm ship to go down with. What is compelling about their dynamic?

I'm gonna have to go with Brimbrond, obviously. I love me some Russingon and some Gilrond but I just am clenching Brimbrond in my fists. They're so good. And the tragic end makes it better for me because Elrond's the one Gil-Galad sends to liberate Eregion and he fails. And when you add in the ship background it makes it even worse. Just...the THEMES. THE THEMES.

Elrond and Celebrimbor are both friendship-focused and people-oriented.

If you're a kidnap fam stan then they have a lot of bonding to do over stories of M&M. In my head, Elrond has to deal with a lot of weird/rocky political fallout due to being a "Feanorian fosterling" -- people are mistrustful at first. And he has to deal with his complicated feelings about M&M and like, no actually, he doesn't hate them -- which no one else seems to understand. But Celebrimbor would.

Both have to deal with the crushing weight of family legacy & trying to forge their own path & in a way choose their mother-names over their fathers' legacies. Celebrimbor chooses to go by Telperinquar rather than Curufinwe III. Elrond chooses "Peredhel" over "Earendillion"

Something something echoes of Elrond's attachment to "silver" lovers who meet untimely and horrible ends thanks to Sauron.

there's more here because I could ramble about them for ages but I just really love them together.

silm ask meme

#Maedhros #the simarillion #Elrond #Celebrimbor #brimbrond