#I cannot say WHY this area compels me so and yet

[redrobin-detective]

You ever write something and come look at it later and wonder which one of your many issues caused this?

#me @ me from 2 days ago: you good fam?? #what IS it about grief that I love writing #why do I love emotionally wringing people dry over the loss of a loved one???? #my two active wips rn are both about the batfam poorly dealing with death and struggling to move on #I cannot say WHY this area compels me so and yet #I watched a man die yesterday #kept another one on the brink the rest of the day #idk man at this point death feels like an old friend #one I can sit down and have tea with and talk in depth about the meaning of his work #Sorry Im still processing yesterday and now I'm just thrown reviewing the 5000 words I wrote in a crazed episode Monday

[valiantstarlights]

Lovely beings of the Dreamling tag, I need your help. 🙇‍♀️ I'm writing a Shadow & Bone Dreamling AU where Dream is the (sad wet cat) Darkling and Hob is the (soft dom) Sun Summoner.

It's inspired by this GIF set of Mr. Ferdinand Kingsley by the talented @issylra 🌼

The problem is: who do I put in the position of power? Both versions are very compelling and (to my lack of shame) I am a greedy hoe who wants both.

So! I have written samples for both versions, and I would like for you to read them and then vote which version you prefer. (Feel free to defend/explain/keysmash about your choice in the tags if you choose to reblog. 😊)

Both versions are under the cut! Please read them first before voting! (And thank you in advance for helping me. 🖤)

--

prompt: sharing a bed + assassins

--

(sad wet cat) Darkling Dream in the position of power

"The bed is large enough to fit both of us," Dream says, because it's true. He is just stating the facts. The inn is a day's ride away from the capital. Jessamy and Matthew will take turns guarding the door. Fjerdan assassins are on their tail and want them dead.

Facts are easy. Unlike his muddled feelings about the man in the room with him, facts are black an white. Safer to navigate. There are no grey areas about them.

"Yeah, I can see that," is Hob's reply. He has his hands on his hips as he regards Dream. "You sure you want to share a bed with me? I wouldn't want you to be scandalized when we wake up in the morning and you feel my--"

"Both of us need to rest," Dream interrupts before the image could fully form in his head. Hob on his side behind him, slow, sleepy hot breaths against his hair, arms around him, keeping him warm and safe... These thoughts have no place, no right to consume his waking mind. "And you, most of all, since you are the one they are after."

A lie. Fjerda has long wanted Dream dead as well, but Hob does not need to reminded of that knowledge and be burdened by it.

"I can take care of myself, you know," Hob tells him. A counter. A challenge. A fact. Dream remembers their first meeting, and Cain's broken nose. He cannot refute that. But he also cannot say that he worries still. Not because Hob is the Sun Summoner, but because Dream cannot bear to think of him being in peril in the first place.

"We ride at first light," Dream says, and sits on one side of the bed before lying down, still in his black kefta. His armor must always be donned. In place. No chinks in them.

Hob sighs and sits on the bed as well, before he extinguishes the balls of light he has conjured. His skills are getting better. No wonder Fjerda is getting nervous.

"Good night," Hob says in the dark as he lies down beside him. Dream can already feel his warmth, and their bodies aren't even touching yet.

Dream hums, and longs to close the distance between them.

He doesn't. He dares not.

But Hob does not care for things like propriety and personal space. Never had, with Dream. Hob closes the distance between their bodies as if it were as easy as breathing and not a daunting journey across the ocean that it is in Dream's eyes.

"Cold?" Hob asks next to his ear. "You're shivering."

Dream didn't even notice. He knows Hob can feel the quickened beating of his heart, but he doesn't notice himself shiver. The words get stuck in his throat for a moment before he says, "Sleep, Hob. We have another day of travel in front of us."

A non-answer. Hob always forgives him this, even when it frustrates him. And Dream knows he is frustrated, judging by how his arms tighten a little around him. Not so tight that it hurts. But just tight enough that Dream cannot wiggle away in the night.

"Yes, Your Majesty," Hob says in a sarcastic tone, his lips so close that it brushes against Dream's nape.

Sleep comes easy to Dream that night, and he cannot spare a thought on why that is, because first light comes, and with it, the imperative to escape.

But unlike what Hob assumed in the night, Dream is not scandalized by the shape of Hob's manhood that nestled innocently against the upper swell of his buttocks, just below his lower back that morning.

No. It only served to stoke the flame growing larger in the pit of Dream's stomach. One day, he is sure that the fire will raze all his carefully built walls and consume him utterly. He fears and anticipates that day in equal measure.

--

(soft dom) Sun Summoner Hob in the position of power

"Come, darling," General Gadling says, and pats the empty space on the bed beside him. "I won't bite."

Dream hesitates. He knows it is improper, for the General, for the Sun Summoner himself, to invite someone as dirty as Dream to share a bed with him.

Yet he wants. He longs to know what it's like to fall asleep surrounded by General Gadling's scent, and the man himself beside him. To wake up and trace his features while he sleeps. He had been looking so stressed lately.

Because of Dream? Because of all the trouble he caused?

The proper reply to General Gadling's order would be to firmly state that he would be fine sleeping on the floor.

"You're thinking too much again," General Gadling says, now rising from his comfortable perch to lead Dream towards the bed with his own hands.

Dream should refuse. He remains quiet and pliant, the nerve endings in his hands alight at the general's touch.

"I told you, didnt I? I won't bite." When General Gadling smiles, it's a smile fit for a rogue, but it's tempered by fondness. By gentleness. He has smile lines around his eyes. Dream wants to kiss them. "I mean, not unless you want me to."

An image of General Gadling biting his neck and sucking on the same spot, leaving a vivid mark on his skin, has Dream flushing.

"Do you, my star?" General Gadling asks. He has gotten closer somehow without Dream noticing. "Do you want me to bite you?"

"N-no," Dream lies.

"You don't sound so certain," Hob says. He tucks a strand of Dream's hair behind his ear, his touch lingering on Dream's jaw.

"We should sleep," Dream tells him, and forces himself to move away from the man and towards the bed, sitting on the neater side, back towards him. Dream hates that he wonders how many others shared General Gadling's bed before. He's so kind and handsome, a living saint, both in skill and in deed. Surely there have been others before Dream.

He is not so naive to think that he is the first, or the only one.

And yet, Dream is the one sharing his bed tonight.

No, not sharing his bed in a carnal way. Just sharing the bed. For sleep. Like how he and his siblings shared a bed. And meals. Sometimes even clothes.

And besides, it was only for tonight, while the otkazat'sya staff and the other Grisha find the ones resposible for the assassination attempt against Dream.

General Gadling sighs. "Very well. But please, go ahead. I have something I need to check on before I could join you."

'Something?' a traitorous part of Dream's mind asks. 'Or someone?'

"No," Dream says, when General Gadling moves towards the bedroom door. "Please. Stay." Dream bunches the thick blankets under his hands so he could force the stubborn, humiliating words out of his mouth. "I am... The attack has left me..." He looks up helplessly at the general. He could still feel the press of cold steel against the tender part of his neck, just under his chin.

If General Gadling had been a second too late...

"Oh, my sweet Dream." And now General Gadling has knelt in front of him and drawn him in for an embrace. Dream clings to him and, to his utter shame, starts to cry. "I should have made him suffer more."

Dream shakes his head. Dead was good. Dead means they can't hurt Dream anymore. But alive could mean that they could potentially hurt General Gadling. "I'm glad he's dead," Dream says quietly against the general's neck, in between hiccups. "I'm glad you're not hurt."

"I'm glad you are not hurt." Dream shifts as he feels a new sensation against his temple. Is...Is General Gadling kissing him there? Dream shivers as the small kisses makes their journey from his temple to his forehead, and then his cheeks. General Gadling seems to be unable to stop himself. His kisses are growing more heated, and Dream finds he does not mind. "I am glad you're still here with me."

With me. Not with us.

"Will you stay with me?" Dream asks him. General Gadling has stopped just before he reached Dream's lips, and now Dream can't look away from his mouth, slightly red from all the little kisses he bestowed Dream.

"As long as you want me to."

'Forever, then,' Dream thinks, as he moves to makes space for General Gadling, so they could both slide under the covers. When General Gadling wraps Dream up in his arms, he finds that he is finally able to breathe easier.

"Good night, General," Dream says quietly against the golden kefta, nuzzling it a little. He may not be allowed this indulgence, but for the moment, he does not care.

"Good night, my darling," General Gadling says, lips brushing Dream's forhead as he speaks.

His siblings warned him what would happen if he got caught by the Grisha. But they did not warn him about General Gadling, and the care he would show Dream. If the cage they mentioned is being caged inside General Gadling's arms, then Dream would choose it between freedom any day.

#shadow and bone au #like dream i am thirsty for hob and it shows sometimes #i will still claim that i am very normal about this pairing #a poll? a poll! #dreamling #the sandman #my writing

[bossferatu]

the characterization in this episode was off the charts.

we saw a lot of how each of the party views violence, what lines they have in regards to that.

to Rey it is a release. His beast is like a visceral itch under his skin, and so far we've only seen it scratched by violence. As much as he doesn't seem the typical Gangrel, his impulsive tendency to violence is about as aligned with his clan as he ever gets.

What's interesting about this is how he CANNOT handle the consequences of his violence. He can't deal with the aftermath of satisfying his basest urges. We saw this with Shaun (Sean?) and how he now mistrusts Fuego, despite how eagerly and without hesitation he satisfied his hunger.

Rey hasn't yet comes to terms with the violence he so craves, and he puts no forethought into what the consequences to his actions might be.

to Fuego it is power over a situation. We've seen before how she envies Rey's physical strength. She sees that as power. As ability to impose her will over others, much like her ability to Mesmerize.

She still sees herself as a superhero, as someone good, someone defending her home. She thinks she is right, that her choices and wants are more noble or better than others. But that's not why she does it, that's just her own excuse to herself. From what I've seen, she uses her 'morality' as an excuse to exert power without feeling bad. She hates being called a 'landlord' but doesn't hesitate to use Lingering Kiss on Shye, essentially getting them addicted to her kiss, just so she can keep feeding.

She doesn't think of consequences, only reacting according to her righteous impulse. She is classic Ventrue, seeking to push her power on others. She, unlike most Ventrue, seeks to protect what's important to her, but that doesn't make what she does good.

Fuego is one of the most complex vampires I've ever seen, and endlessly compelling, but she isn't a hero. She's ignorant to what danger she's constantly putting herself and all those closest to her in. And that makes her incredibly interesting and possibly my favorite character of this chronicle.

Serif is a little more difficult to gauge, from this episode, but it's clear to see that she has clear boundaries. She hasn't directly engaged in much violence this chronicle, standing by while the others take the more physical approach.

however, what we do get to see from her is her boundaries when it comes to ghouls. We already knew she was sensitive about the admittedly incredibly morally (dark) grey area in which ghouls operate. She doesn't seem to care much whether or not the coterie kills one of the security guards, but the second Rey wants to use his Vitae to save the other, she has a big reaction.

something that this implies, to me, is that she's not particularly concerned with the morality of it, or she wouldn't be, if not for her personal experience with ghouls. When Angela expresses contentment with her life, her choice, and with Isaac as her 'employer', Serif is upset. In fact, she's the same level of upset as she is when Rey gives the security guard NO CHOICE. This, to me shows that it's just the principle, the existence of ghouls which upsets her, not the actual morality of the situation surrounding creating one.

like Fuego, she uses morality to justify her own impulse and reactions, not the other way around. As much as she likes to believe it is a moral code that rules her actions, she is using it as an excuse.

this is not to say that these two are not some of the most (seemingly) moral kindred we will likely see. They both contain great capacity for kindness and humanity, but they are not as morally pure as they'd like to think.

to Isaac, I think it's clear that violence is a means to an end. He's pragmatic to a fault, and wouldn't needlessly endanger him and his in order to enact violence. He's the most reasonable of the group in that aspect thus far, and that's unsurprising, considering the situation he finds himself in.

he knows what dangers lurk for Kindred, and as a Tzimisce in Anarch territory very close to the Camarilla, he's in an even more precarious position than any of the other members of the Coterie. It occurs to me that while he's mentioned Shrecknet and how humans took it down, the others have no idea what danger the Second Inquisition poses. They haven't even really been informed about the Masquerade and WHY it exists.

he is now affiliated with this Coterie, partially in charge of the area they're in, and will be held EXTREMELY responsible for any breaks in the Masquerade. Already distrusted by the Anarchs, Isaac has no room for messy violence, even if it happened to be in his nature.

unlike the others, it doesn't seem like he's ruled by impulse, nor by morality. He is logical and pragmatic, or so he seems so far. It makes perfect sense that he should be furious or annoyed at the rest of the Coterie. He's the only one who understands the gravity of the situation in its fullness (or so it seems). And now, he has to clean up a big mess.

we'll see in future episodes, but here are my two cents about what the violence in this episode tells us about our new lil baby coterie. I for one was surprised that the shoe dropped so early, though I shouldn't have been, the tension has been piling up so quickly.

#a ventrue and a tzimisce walk into an underground parking lot #one of them mesmerizes and kills a security guard on the fly #the other cleans up the mess #it's not who you think #ny by night #new york by night #vtm #tzimisce #ventrue #gangrel #ravnos #vampire the masquerade #thank you Jason Carl and Co for the meal #ny by night spoilers

[woaddragoon-nadya]

Calling it for the...night

It is 5am so really calling it for the morning. All a matter of perspective

I am in love with Stormblood thus far. Below will be personal ramblings about why so that I have something to reflect on when I finish it. Obviously spoilers below, for Heavensward and up to the Ruby Sea in Stormblood

I find Lyse to be a really compelling character, and she's been one of my favorite scions from the very beginning. Getting to follow her is really awesome.

I love the dynamic of the crew. It contrasts STARKLY with the Heavensward group.

In HW we had Estinien (emo), Ysayle (emo), and Alphinaud (at the time emo). It was such a shift from the dramatic, yet lighthearted, tone of ARR. I came to really love and care for those characters, but literally everyone in the group being cold or depressed meant it took a very long time to latch on to any of them.

In SB, we have a larger rotating group so there can be characters who aren't drowning emotionally. Lyse is deeply emotionally invested, but she's also a hot head blonde with a good sense of humor. Alphinaud is no longer pretending to be totally mature and is relearning his dynamic with his sister, leading to him being roasted constantly. Alisaie is the emo of the group, but she still pokes fun at her brother and remains the logical planner.

NPCs have been totally awesome. I won't spoil anything for SB but I just find even minor NPCs to be well written and fun. In HW, I cared about the main crew, but anybody else I just didn't get attached to. I'll say Artoirel was probably the exception to that. I didn't even really have particular feelings about Aymeric until almost the very end of HW.

In SB? Gosetsu had me laughing within the first 30 seconds of his introduction. Shell Fella (cannot remember his name) I immediately vibed with. Tansui's VA had me interested in his first couple lines. Every character in Rhalgar's reach tugged on my heartstrings, especially Meffrid and M'naggo.

Some of this I think is I was sort of going through a mental health dip when I started HW, so that definitely impacted how much I enjoyed it. I might go through New Game+ and see if maybe I'd like it more now.

The final comment is the scenery. After slogging through the dullness of Coerthas and Ishgard, the sudden brightness of Kugane was such a moodlift. Things are detailed and colorful, generally a joy to look at. i think Rhalgar's Reach also suffered a little bit from it's dullness, but I prefer Ul'dah yellow dull to Ishgard gray dull, y'know? Not to totally shit on HW, because there are certain areas that are totally beautiful. They just weren't the areas I spent hours in for MSQ. I think the best parts of MSQ took place in the worst scenery, and vice versa the best scenery had either really short or dull MSQ. (Why did we have to do the Floating Islands, one of the coolest areas of HW, with Emmalaine's stupid annoying ass? ;( )

Anyway, I did end up enjoying Heavensward in the end despite all that. Which only makes me enjoying Stormblood off the bat way more exciting.

The Girlboss crew + Alphinaud.

#ffxiv #nadya hollow #Stormblood spoilers #Heavensward spoilers

[understandableparadox]

bottom of the barrel isekai review #3

Todays review: Choose your heros carefully

two BLs in a row... i would make a gay joke at my own expense but i'll be real, gay trash is soooo much more palatable as a whole then straight trash and i'm confident enough in whatever nebulous concept i've adopted as my sexuality to say that with something resembling pride.

so what's on the chopping block? utterly psychotic middle aged men reincarnated in a world ripe for their exploitation? perhaps a swarm of hyper busty vixens parading about on the strings of someone who has no idea how to utilize them? a magic system based on some mmo where its way to clear the author was bullied in or vaguely believed a certain class should be the strongest?

SUPRISIE! WE ARENT EVEN LOOKING AT TRASH TODAY YOU UTTER HEATHENS, WE ARE LOOKING AT SOMETHING VAGUELY COOL, I FUCKING TRICKED YOU, WE AREN'T AT THE DUMPSTERS WE ARE AT THE FARMERS MARKET AND WERE HITTING THE ANTIQUE STORE, GENDER AMBIGUOUS PARENTAL FIGURE WANTS TO PICK UP SOME VINTAGE COOKWARE TO SPICE UP THE GODDAMN KITCHEN

Ramblings aside, my established format usually stats that we have a short opening related to the title then a not so brief summation of the story, but this time the summation of the story will in fact be nothing more than a summation, as I genuinely think you should go ahead and read through this title.

our titular hero shane has been bullied by his friend to play test his beta for a gacha game

a game in which you use magical stones to revive ancient heroes and command them to destroy a collection of horrors from some demonic realm.

shane awakens after a long day of Gameing and finds that he is now stuck within this world, a magical divine sheep provides him after some prodding some game functions, along with a single stone to summon his first hero. from there, the trio set off to solve the darkness of the world and find a way to return back to whence they came. solveing the other mysteries and oddities the world holds for them.

and that's it, you ain't gonna learn a single thing more about this story from me, get the fuck out of my house...

well i'm not done yet and a little bit of this will be spoilers.

ok so why do I like this? the action is bad, the art isn't anything to write home about, the armor and weapon design makes me want to curl up in a small hole, bury me gentle please...

Well as i think i've said prior, A lot of things can be hidden if you have enough meat on the bones of it, to the point where i can ignore the guts of it being playdough and the skin being saran wrap you splashed paint over.

the story itself is overwhelmingly interested in how a world that functions through mmo and gacha logic would work. what happens when you can summon someone who is truly the pinnacle of humanity through shear luck? what about the common rabble that are only lucky enough to be able to afford one pull and end up getting some D grade shitterton, Bob the Spackle artist, special skill Crack Spackle.

what about the fact that you can just tell them to attack things and you can take a nap in the middle of a low grade dungeon? the concept of auto play but introduced to the idea of the world at large.

now lets pull out form smaller game concepts, the heroes are the only ones that can defeat the shadows, and only the summoner can control the heros. meaning that the heroes can only be as heroic as the summoner. a brave man shackled by those who even the gods have abandoned.

what about the towns in games that dont have the right vendors? the ones that cannot give the player things they want, the areas without bazaars or weapon shops or summoning areas or shop functions, what happens to them if they have no draw to keep players in them?

these are the questions that the manhwa loves to explore and I love exploring them with it. now, on to our normal questions.

"Is the underlying story, barring any other concept, good?"

Yes, its both a compelling romance with both the main character and the main love interest being good fits for each other with interesting flaws and qualities. they are not perfect and that makes them fun to follow. even without the romance the story has enough aspects for you to follow if you want to ignore the twinks prancing around.

 "on a sliding scale of min to max, how much is the author using this to explore fetish" 

0, big goose egg. unless the author has a fetish for being held in their sleep then yeah i guess thats a thing.

"How many story crutches does the author use to explore the story" 

I cant exactly see any noteworthy crutches, even the normal "game aspects" thing is something they have to specifically work towards within the story.

 "Is the author attempting to use the story as a way to explain why he is not weird."

they are trying to say that gachas are bad and I for one believe they should say it fucking louder for the rest of the world to hear.

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

I am now going to be taking isekai requests to review on top of the ones I have set aside for myself to review. to submit an isekai, please send it to me as an ask with the site where I can read through it.

#shitty isekai #manga #manwha #manhwa recommendation #isekai review

[schraubd]

Why Does DEI Make Good Free Speech Advocates Go Bad?

Keith Whittington, Princeton professor and chief of the Academic Freedom Alliance, has been reviewing various state-level attacks on academic freedom. Today he visits Texas, which has a trio of bills under consideration that all put public universities under their sights in various ways. Whittington is generally skeptical of all these proposals, but he does have kind things to say about portions of one of the proposed laws, SB17.

That bill would shift greater authority to the university boards of trustees, would prohibit the use of diversity statements in faculty hiring, and would abolish the activities of diversity, equity and inclusion administrators. A similar prohibition was adopted as an appropriation rider in the House. Violating the DEI ban can be a cause for terminating even tenured members of the faculty. The bill would also require state universities to adopt as part of their mission statements a set of pledges regarding intellectual freedom, including a commitment to "viewpoint diversity" and "institutional neutrality."

[...]

From my perspective, the DEI ban and the institutional commitments are all to the good in enhancing the intellectual freedom on college campuses. The potential penalty for faculty who violate the DEI ban is worrisome, however, in both its chilling effect and its unjustified expansion of the bases upon which tenured professors can be terminated.

(Whittington also raises the alarm about shifting review power to the boards of trustees).

I want to flag Whittington's claim that the DEI ban is "all to the good" (even if, perhaps, too draconian in its enforcement mechanisms). It is not all to the good! It is very bad, and pointedly, it's very bad for reasons that Whittington identifies elsewhere in his post! This is yet another example of how the anti-DEI obsession amongst some "free speech" advocates has caused them to endorse policies and practices whose impingement on academic freedom would otherwise be nakedly obvious.

Among the things prohibited by this part of SB17, universities would be prohibited from soliciting or acting on any statement regarding an applicants "views on, experience with, or past or planned contributions to efforts involving diversity, equity, and inclusion, marginalized groups, antiracism, social justice, or views on or experience with race, color, ethnicity, national origin, or other immutable characteristics."

As a constitutional law professor whose work focuses significantly on questions of race, equity, inclusion, and so on, I shudder to think how an interview with me would go if the hiring committee were forbidden from asking about or considering my views on these topics. What, exactly, would we talk about -- the Dodgers? And while for someone in my shoes there is an obvious relationship between the banned topics and my disciplinary work, there are also areas where this is germane for professors of any academic affiliation -- most notably, in discussions of pedagogy. As I've written before, it cannot be the case that university actors are forbidden from caring about questions like "will the job candidate do a good job creating an equitable and inclusive environment for our diverse academic community?" But SB17 strongly suggests that such concerns would, in fact, be legally proscribed.*

This is why I've written before regarding how anti-DEI bans are inevitably academic freedom trainwrecks. They're justified as checks against "compelled speech", but in practice they serve (and intentionally so) as massive chills on important facets of academic conversation. And the thing is, Whittington is well aware of the mechanics here -- he explains them ably in his critique of the companion SB16 bill. SB16 purports to forbid professors from "compel[ling] or attempt[ing] to compel" an enrolled student "to adopt a belief that any race, sex, or ethnicity or social, political, or religious belief is inherently superior to any other race, sex, ethnicity, or belief." Here's what Whittington says to that proposal:

It would likely chill classroom speech as faculty try to avoid any appearance of compelling belief on various sensitive topics routinely discussed in college classrooms. To the extent that the law simply codifies the constitutional prohibition on compelled speech, then it accomplishes little other than attempting to chill speech. To the extent that it might be interpreted to prohibit professors from advocating certain views in the classroom or requiring students to correctly describe and analyze such views in their coursework, then it will invite controversy. Not hard to imagine students complaining that a professor attempted to compel them to believe that, for example capitalism is superior to socialism by assigning them to write an essay with that premise.

Emphasis added, because that's the rub. If it's just an attempt to forbid compelled speech -- someone being forced to swear allegiance to a particular ideological framework -- it's redundant except for its knock-on chilling effect. But of course, the law isn't just about the specific "compelled speech" case -- it is designed to and inevitably will curtail very normal academic conversations.

Yet this exact same problem besets the DEI ban. If it's just about forbidding a requirement that prospective professors genuflect before a graven image of Derrick Bell as part of the application process, then it's unnecessary and only serves to create an additional halo of chilling effect. But SB17's DEI ban doesn't "just" do that; it by its term stretches to cover any "statement" on matters of diversity, equity, inclusion, race, or other like topics -- topics that a hiring committee regularly and appropriately should be considering. For example, as someone who has served on a hiring committee, I very much want to be able to inquire into whether (to pick a recent example) a candidate openly believes Jews should never be hired again. It is important and good that a person like that not get hired; I absolutely can and should be giving preference to candidates who do not take that sort of view! And more broadly, we can and should be able to consider and debate over whether given candidates will do a good a job facilitating an effective academic and pedagogical environment for diverse communities. That's normal, and that's salutary, and that would likely be either forbidden or at least significantly chilled by application of Texas' proposed DEI ban.

Again, the logic for why the DEI ban is problematic is contained in Whittington's own post. He should be able to spot it, and yet it says that the provision (absent the penalty provisions) is "all to the good." FIRE went through the same thing a few weeks ago, drafting a trainwreck proposal against DEI statements that -- were it on any other topic -- FIRE would be screaming bloody murder about the obvious academic freedom impingements. Something about the DEI issue is corrupting free speech advocates, causing them endorse obvious violations and ignore flagrant threats. They're going to need to address this blindspot sooner rather than later, because this fever doesn't seem to be going away.

* SB17 has a provision that exempts requests for information regarding "pedagogical approaches or experience with students with learning disabilities." That narrow and highly specific carveout strongly suggests that inquiring generally how a prospective professor would seek to facilitate an effective and inclusive classroom environment for students of diverse backgrounds would now be verboten.

via The Debate Link https://ift.tt/bO1oDRU

#academia #academic freedom #diversity #texas

[geryuthespacesquid]

Okay okay I'm having too many thoughts on tears to contain them I'mma put something here Spoilersssss

If I'm being quite honest I keep seeing posts saying this game is better than BoTW entirely and I simply cannot agree I think they're genuinely about the same for a number of reasons.

BEAR IN MIND: I have completed the Rito and Zora areas, but unfortunately I have not been able to find any of the dragon tear memories or whatever they're called, I have been looking but i have no damn clue.

I will say that I think Tears of the Kingdom has better characters overall but I do think there is some flimsiness that comes with having so many npcs to focus on that was also present in BoTW and that's why the vast majority of BoTW character personalities are pretty severely headcanoned or flanderized in fan media, I feel like the same thing is gonna happen for tears. On that note, I also think that it's a good thing that the old sages are pretty hazy. The dialogue the old water and wind sages had was pretty fuckin similar, if not identical, and their personalities don't show much, and in some capacity I think that's smart. The greatest folly of BoTW imo was making the most compelling characters the dead or inactive ones, it's why I say AoC was a better story than BoTW, because it uses all the best characters to the fullest extent, and takes the ones that weren't as strong and lifts them up. Because of that, I think it was smart to not make the dead characters as lively again, because now people won't get hung up over them again.

But, on that note, I think that it genuinely makes them pretty unnecessary. I feel like there would've been better mileage just making Rauru narrate that and tell the new sages what their ancestors did so we have one super strong character compared to a few ones that feel a bit unnecessary. And while Rauru is only going to get stronger, probably, I think it could be cool to just have him mirror Link a bit and remember and lament his friends some.

So far, these stories feel very identical, it's just a With Friends sort of deal that I like mechanically and think is being played very well, I just also think that pretending these two stories are super different is a little far fetched. The new sages have more potency because you work with them for the whole dungeon and boss, which I love, it gives them more energy and supports their personalities a lot more, and does more to convey the idea that yes, Hyrule was attempting to move on from the champions by no longer having the mindset that only a champion can save them. The new guys are here to help, and they're not abandoning their fate to one guy anymore. BUT, in my mind that feels like a retooling of BoTW's story to better convey a point that didn't land right in BoTW.

Gameplay, I have nothing to say or complain about. It's the most flawless part of this game, they took botw and made it better in basically every way. If I had to say something, I do miss premade elemental arrows, because pressing up on the D-pad every time is such a time waster that I just forget half the time. Also these monsters are fuckin spooky and I hate it. /pos

Finally, the world. I won't say that I'm happy with, or understand why none of the shiekah tech is anywhere anymore. I get it, with the new shrines and towers, it'd be so much shit just all over, but it's still hard to believe that all vanished and just deactivated, especially because there's really no reason to have new towers, but of course, that's for a gameplay feature rather than a lore feature, so I suppose that's a moot point. What really gets me about this fuckin world is HOLY SHIT WHY IS THERE SO MUCH TO DO. I cannot focus at all and that's both a benefit and a detriment to me because botw let me laser focus on things which is good for my easily distractable mind and I've yet to hear one person say otherwise on the idea that there's too much to focus on. It's never a negative thing when mentioned by folks, and I don't think it is, but FUCK I need an alternate game mode that just hides like 70% of the quests until you complete some because having these all accessible means I will never finish this main story.

Also, fuck the depths. That's it, fuck the depths.

I like this game. It's just kinda weird, something is preventing me from loving it, and I hope that resolves by the end because I really would like to love it, and say it's better than botw, but as far as I'm concerned I don't think I have a severe preference for either one.

#totk spoilers #squidzard.txt #loz #loz totk

[fierceawakening]

@gougeandkill the sorites paradox type of question of when a fetus becomes a person is always going to be vehemently debated tbh 😔

but I totally agree that it’s p much irrelevant. you can see this referenced in other areas of medical ethics e.g you cannot compel someone to donate an organ to save someones life even if they are the only match in the entire world. you just cant ethically or legally compel anyone to use their own body to sustain another life!

===

Yep.

I see people who say “well my religious texts define when life begins as ‘quickening’ so before then it’s not even alive, checkmate anti choicers” and it STRAIGHT UP BAFFLES me

I’m all for making fun of people who confuse actions in extenuating circumstances with fucking MURDER but. Uhhhh.

If we’re using religious definitions of when life begins that are likely not informed by science as accurate as we have now… why shouldn’t we then go by whatever that same text says about any other scientific issue, like “should I get a vaccine?”

It doesn’t make any sense that you’d rely on science for anything BUT whether a fetus is “alive” yet.

But yet people talk about it like “quickening” is something other than “our best guess when we didn’t have the technology yet to, y’know, just… look in there.”

[princeofgod-2021]

LIGHT OF LIFE 366

John 1:4

TOO LATE 29 – WHEN HE HAS SAID NO! 3

Isa 14:26-27 This is what I plan to do for this land. I will use my power to punish all those nations." WHEN THE LORD ALL-POWERFUL MAKES A PLAN, NO ONE CAN CHANGE IT. WHEN HE RAISES HIS ARM TO PUNISH, NO ONE CAN STOP HIM. ERV

Was it Over-zealousness, plain foolishness or an act of outright rebellion that killed Josiah?

I don’t know beloved; read along and find out.

I saw God showing His Supreme counsel that no man can meddle with.

Ecc 6:10 You are only what you were created to be—a human, and it is useless to argue about it. PEOPLE CANNOT ARGUE WITH GOD ABOUT THIS BECAUSE HE IS MORE POWERFUL THAN THEY ARE, AND A LONG ARGUMENT WILL NOT CHANGE THAT FACT. ERV

Josiah’s Epic Passover Celebration was intended to stir God’s heart and compel divine mercies, and he started the process of appeal well.

He first gathered everyone to understand God’s position and hoped to stir loyalty in them too, but no one cried or responded to it like he did.

2Ch 34:29-30 KiNG JOSIAH SUMMONED ALL THE LEADERS OF JUDAH AND JERUSALEM, and together they went to the Temple, accompanied by the priests and the Levites and all the rest of the people, rich and poor alike. BEFORE THEM ALL THE KING READ ALOUD THE WHOLE BOOK OF THE COVENANT, WHICH HAD BEEN FOUND IN THE TEMPLE. GNB

Then he enjoined them to adhere to Faithfulness by a command and decree.

Sincerely, the best that commanded loyalty does is to induce awe only within the lifetime of the commander.

2Ch 34:31-32 After Josiah had finished reading, he stood in the place reserved for the king. He promised in the LORD's name to faithfully obey the LORD and to follow his laws and teachings that were written in the book. Then he asked the people of Jerusalem and Benjamin to make that same promise and to obey the God their ancestors had worshiped. CEV

Now, just when we thought he had already destroyed all idols in the land, you realize that a Man deeply intent on pleasing God will yet search wildly and find remnant odious debris to clear.

2Ch 34:33 JOSIAH REMOVED ALL THE DETESTABLE IDOLS FROM ALL THE AREAS BELONGING TO THE ISRAELITES and encouraged all who were in Israel to worship the LORD their God. THROUGHOUT THE REST OF HIS REIGN THEY DID NOT TURN ASIDE FROM FOLLOWING THE LORD GOD OF THEIR ANCESTORS. NET

Then the Passover followed in Chapter 35. Josiah must have felt that after all his acts of tremendous sacrifices, God had no choice but to relent and give up His Judgment.

Evidently, he is not aware of a golden rule…

1Sa 15:22 And Samuel said, Does Jehovah delight in burnt offerings and sacrifices as in obeying the voice of Jehovah? Behold, TO OBEY IS BETTER THAN SACRIFICE! TO LISTEN IS BETTER THAN THE FAT OF RAMS! MKJV

He didn’t know Jesus like we do; he would have understood better.

Sadly though, the church today still lives oblivious of golden divine Principles.

Heb 10:6-7 MULTIPLE BURNT OFFERINGS AND SIN-OFFERINGS CANNOT SATISFY YOUR JUSTICE. So I said to you, ‘God—I WILL BE THE ONE TO GO AND DO YOUR WILL, TO FULFILL ALL THAT IS WRITTEN OF ME IN YOUR WORD!’ ” GW

Beloved, if God has said No! And your plea bargain is not followed by favoured response from Him, you simply bow out and let him do what He wants, or else, you go down with the fallen.

Josiah now felt that because he had given so much sacrifices, God was bound to relent on His judgment’ he thought no more definite processes of Judgment will occur around him while alive.

2Ch 35:20-21 After Josiah had done all this for the temple, King Necho of Egypt marched up to do battle at Carchemish on the Euphrates River. Josiah marched out to oppose him. Necho sent messengers to him, saying, “Why are you opposing me, O king of Judah? I am not attacking you today, but the kingdom with which I am at war. GOD TOLD ME TO HURRY. STOP OPPOSING GOD, WHO IS WITH ME, OR ELSE HE WILL DESTROY YOU.” NET

God had begun attacks on neighbouring nations and he saw that they will soon get to Judah, so, he wanted to stop them.

The Egyptian King warned that God had sent him, but Josiah insisted.

2Ch 35:22 But Josiah was determined to fight. HE REFUSED TO LISTEN TO WHAT GOD WAS SAYING THROUGH KING NECO, SO HE DISGUISED HIMSELF and went into battle on the plain of Megiddo. GNB

Why did he disguise himself

Because he perceived that God indeed sent Neco and thus, his chances of winning was slim, so he hoped that if he disguised himself, he could become less vulnerable.

This is a clear indication of fighting/opposing the Lord’s will; this was foolhardy and deadly.

2Ch 35:23-24 During the battle an Egyptian soldier shot Josiah with an arrow. Josiah told his servants, "Get me out of here! I've been hit." They carried Josiah out of his chariot, then put him in the other chariot he had there and took him back to Jerusalem, where HE SOON DIED. He was buried beside his ancestors, and everyone in Judah and Jerusalem mourned his death. CEV

You will not die but live to Obey and comply with all His perfect will, IN JESUS NAME.

Join us on Friday for another thought-provoking Subtopic.

Keep Shinning!

Brother Prince

Wednesday, June 14, 2023

08055125517; 08023904307

[magicalgardenofhypnosis]

Thor: Battle From Hell On Eath

Part 1 - 2

Steve stood up from the ground exiting the building back to yet battle field where he hears the sound.

He picks up his shield from the remains of what was the ground and awaits my arrival.

I appear one of the war ridden field standing tall in my own uniform smiling at my new man,

He throws his shield in to the air launching in the air with a summersalt catching it in a Olympic level feat.

He lands on his feet in a sexy pose to show off for me with a bright and sexy smile on his face.

Shield is cracked in half holding on to it very tightly as he falls to the ground with a shock

During the battle star shard power shoots in a downward spiral trajectory on to earth.

He sparks as the sky glows not a fiery hot power blows up landing.

Thor is left is utter distraction that his palm pops open by force sending it flying.

The hammer is completely defying gravity out of the area breaking through miles of corruption in to Steve’s hands.

Part 3 - 5

Thor is astonished at what he sees stepping in to the light he faces him head on putting his hand out.

Captain America just smiles swinging the hammer in the air as the thunder crackles a bit.

Captain slams the ground with the mijnor as it splits it in two and Thor falls in.

The ground opens up letting it collapse over him and enclosing him falling into the void.

He is free falling in to the pit of darkness a void nothingness encroaches close to him.

“What fresh hell is thy doing to me?” Thor is telling fuming with anger.

“Why can’t I summon mijnor?” He swears in a fiery fist of fury.

Images of the world he has known for all of these centuries every mistake and victory he has been through.

“Why he thy deign to disrespect this God of Thunder?” He screams.

“Mwahahahahaha….Oh Thor you have no idea of who he is” Steve says.

Steve Rogers appears in all his glory his suit is no more of the glorious red, white and blue.

It’s now a shiny golden with the symbol of a tiger edge in a purple power boost over him.

“Captain Why? Do you dare attack me?” Thor countinuea.

“My Master Lawrence, The Purple Haze will be victorious.” He states.

“He cannot lose ever.” He shouts pump fist in the air.

Part 6 - 8

Thor wakes up in what he can only assume is Asgard his home for centuries of life.

He hits the ground in great crushing pain on to his back as he lay unconscious.

His mind rushes out of control the universe appear spinning into a void of emptiness.

“Wait! What the fuck?” He yells coughing as he wakes up.

“What did you do to Asgard?” He demands

“Follow my voice Thor, you will obey”

“You are compelled to submit”

“Nnnnnnnooooo”

“Move in to the hall ways of your home”

“How can you control me?”

He enters Odins main room lay the throne of his father, the man is dead but he stands tall

He sits on the throne picking up the scepter it is everything he could imagine it to be.

The staff is generating so much purely absolute and potent galactic energy through out his body.

The radiant blow sparks shoot from his eyes all over as the man in question ascends from the floor.

“I know who you are Master Lawrence, this is your home, your throne and I am at your mercy.

Part 9 - 10

“Who are you ?“

“Thor Slave of Master Lawrence”

“What is your purpose?”

“To serve you”

“I am everything you want”

“Yes Master Lawrence”

“Sir Yes Sir”

“Kneel at my feet”

“Put this helmet on”

“This is the Kingdom of Lawrence”

The end

[classic80sand90smovieloves2]

Meeting and Dating Produce Joe

(My gif)(Requested by @westanimagines )

- You and Joe meet when you get a job at the grocery store and are given a tour of the place by your new manager. 

- After being shown around the floor of the shop, he takes you into the backrooms and introduces you to Randy and the ever interesting Joe; who he has to tap on the shoulder in order to make him realize there’s people behind him since his music is playing so loud. 

- The bespectacled boy tries to play it cool but you can tell he’s a little embarrassed; particularly when his eyes fall on you and your manager explains that you’ll be starting work there the next Monday. 

- You give the man a polite hello before you’re ushered out of the room and whisked away to be shown around the rest of the building; leaving Joe flustered yet realistically unhopeful. 

- As I said before, you start work the next Monday and things go smoothly. You make friends with the other girls on shift and you do the mind numbing work that pertains to a job at a grocery store. 

- When you first start working there, you don’t really talk to Joe all that much. You don’t have a reason to be in his portion of the store most days and you’re new to the job so you’re doing whatever you can to look like a picture perfect employee as you figure out the rules of working there. 

- Once you’re a little more comfortable in your position, you do a bit more wandering and are trusted with more tedious jobs that have you going into the back of the store. That's when you actually start making conversation from time to time. 

- Your conversations are always a bit awkward but you come to realize that that’s …sort of just Joe. Which is why you begin to feel a bit bad for him.

- He’s always detached from everyone, always alone, and though you can’t say for sure that he isn’t the one who’s doing the detaching, you figure that it can’t be easy all the same and make it your mission to be friendly and talk with him. And his pleasant response to your interest in him convinces you that you've done the right thing. 

- Soon enough, he’s latched onto you. Not in a creepy way but in a friendly, ‘you’re the only one who I’m comfortable around and who talks to me’ sort of way. 

- It’s easy to see that you just being there makes his day a whole lot better; and that he looks forward to your little interactions, and though your coworkers certainly find him a bit strange, you begin to find him sort of cute. 

- Surprisingly enough, it doesn’t take Joe a ridiculously long time to shoot his shot. He just randomly asks if you’d want to see a movie with him on Saturday and against your better judgement of dating one of your coworkers, you can’t help but agree. 

- Hey, if there was anyone you’d be able to avoid at work and whose offer is dorkily endearing enough to persuade you into accepting, it’s Joe. 

- So you meet up with him that next Saturday and settle in for a date at the cinema, sharing a popcorn and pretending like you aren’t flattered by/don’t notice his glances towards you. 

- He almost kisses you after the movie as the two of you are saying goodbye but he very obviously loses his nerve and plays it off before the two of you call it a night. And as you’re driving yourself home, you’re surprised by how disappointed you are that he didn’t....

- Though you don’t wind up waiting too long for that kiss since you wind up taking it for yourself a few days later when you’re retrieving something from his area of the shop. 

- You figure that it’s best to get it out of the way to show him that you want him to kiss you so, after he hands you the box of things that you’d came there for, you lean up and peck him on the lips, giving him a cheerful thanks before you leave the room; leaving him an ecstatic mess. 

- And just like that, you’ve got yourself the freshest boy at the grocers. 

- Joe likes to pretend like he’s this cool tough guy but at the same time, he knows that he isn’t; which makes you being with him a big accomplishment in his eyes. He’s incredibly proud that you’ve chosen to be his girlfriend and being your boyfriend makes him feel cool so he loves pda and being able to show you off.  

- Him awkwardly throwing his arm around your shoulder while trying to look all macho. He’s a dork and that’s just something you’ll have to get used to. 

- Kiss his cheek! Kiss his cheek! Seriously, he loves it almost as much as he loves you. 

- Clumsy but sweet kisses. 

- Taking his glasses off so that you can kiss him better. I can’t imagine it would be easy to touch lips with those massive frames in the way. 

- The main pet name he uses is babe and it almost always sounds hilarious whenever it leaves his mouth.  

- Most of the time, when you cuddle, he’s the big spoon. He likes nuzzling into the back of your neck and having you pressed up against him; and he’s tall so it works out quite nicely. 

- Laying your head in each others laps. Oftentimes he’ll snuggle into your lap or stomach, wrapping his arms around the small of your back as your fingers card through his hair. 

- Brushing his hair out of his face. It never seems to bother him but every now and again it bothers the hell out of you. 

- Always having the freshest fruit and vegetables. If your boyfriend doesn’t put aside the best of the bunch when your favorite produce comes in, is he even your boyfriend?

- Spitting watermelon seeds and playing other stupid little games.

- Sliding down the grocery shoot every now and again when you know you aren’t gonna get caught; not that your boss really cares 90% of the time. 

- Making faces at each other.

- Goofing off and not taking yourselves too seriously. 

- Occasionally spooking him when you come to visit since he plays his music so loud. It’s become a highlight of your day to make him momentarily jump out of his skin; you consider it to be you avenging his eardrums. 

- Borrowing his Walkman and cassettes. It’ll definitely take some convincing though, that things practically his baby. 

- Dancing to music and lip syncing to songs.

- You can’t tell me that he doesn’t look like a “little” nerd, which is why I’m making him liking Star Wars and Star Trek and all of those geeky interests a thing. 

- Going to conventions and other nerdy events like that.

- Playing different tabletop games. 

- Movie dates. Something tells me he’d be one of those guys who are scared of horror movies but would try to play it off like he wasn’t…up until he’s clutching your hand all tight and refusing to walk down a dark street.

- Arcade dates.

- Carnival dates. 

- Mall dates. 

- He’s adorably willing to indulge in your more “girly” interests and probably secretly likes them himself.

- Taking naps together; though he strikes me as the type of person who barely gets any sleep so you might just be taking naps at his apartment while he does his own thing.

- Playful competitions.

- Him scaring the shit out of you with his chopping and dicing; to the point where you’re compelled to do his work yourself so that you know he isn’t gonna lose a finger. 

- Eating lunch together and sharing food. You spend pretty much all of your lunch breaks in the backrooms with him.

- Talking with Randy every now and again while you wait for Joe. He appreciates the occasional company and the fact that you can save him some trouble and relay messages to your boyfriend for him. 

- Long conversations about nothing in particular. You can rant to him about whatever you want but I can’t guarantee that he’ll be listening too intently; not that he’s purposefully ignoring you or anything.

- He’s kind of the typical oblivious boyfriend but he’s never malicious in his ignorance. He’s just a goofy dork who doesn’t take notice of subtleties and has trouble concentrating. 

- Letting him brag about his accomplishments; even though you probably know that he’s completely making them up. He’ll probably “come clean” later on in your relationship and you'll have to hold back a laugh while trying to sound sincere when you tell him it’s okay. 

- Him trying to act tough yet borderline hiding behind you when things get scary. 

- Most of the time, Joe doesn’t take notice of any flirtation or suggestive interactions between you and other men so he rarely gets jealous of people. You could openly flirt with a dude and he’d be none the wiser. 

- As much as Joe likes to pretend like he can kick peoples asses, he most certainly cannot so don’t expect him to start any fights in your honor. He’s a bit of a coward so he really isn’t all too protective of you. 

- Joe’s a laidback guy and you sort of knew what you were getting yourself into when you started dating him so the two of you really don’t get into too many fights. If you do have them, they’re a quick argument and an even quicker resolution. 

- Both of you sort of just choose to forget about arguments or you bicker until you come up with a quick “fine.” “fine!” sort of agreement and subsequently forget about the problem. Either way, fights never last long. 

- Joe tells you he loves you pretty much every day; usually when you’re saying goodbye or in other circumstances like that. 

- He might give you the occasional headache but you love him nonetheless. He’s a dork but he’s your dork and you’re gonna stay with him for as long as you can. 

#produce joe imagine #produce joe imagines #produce joe headcanons #produce joe headcanon #intruder 1989 #intruder imagine #intruder imagines #intruder headcanons #intruder headcanon #80s movie imagines #80s movie imagine #80s movie headcanons #80s movie headcanon

[elsewhereuniversity]

About Face

“Do you have any questions about your prescriptions today, uh…m-miss?” The pharmacist’s question is laced with assumptions about who you are. It’s not great, of course, but it’s also not worth your time to fight about today.

“No, I’m good,” your smile and voice are sugary-sweet, but your eyes are daggers as you take the bag and turn back towards the door. The heat and humidity are already staggering at 8 am and you are immediately made sticky by the brief walk to your car. As you start it up, there’s a brief chime of email-receiving from your phone, but you ignore it. Then there’s another ding, this time your lab-mate, Valerie, texting you.

Hey, u almost in?                                                                                     In like 30min. had to stop by pharmacy

K. Jill was looking for u. Also ugh that paper for tomorrow, I’m not even a  birdsong person lol

Lol get over it, I had to read one of your fancy neuro papers last time. Did jill say what she needed me for?

Whatever lol. She didn’t say.

                                                                        Ughhhhhhh

Jill, Dr. Dominguez, is your advisor, and you know you need to get her some figures and sections of your thesis soon, but these damn stats…well. There’s a reason you prefer spending your time traipsing off-trail through the wilderness over sitting in front of a computer all day. Not that this part isn’t interesting and important too, but come on.

Traffic is moving at a sluggish pace, of course, so you’re lost in contemplation and dread of the analyses you need to attempt running today, and the inevitable conversation with Dr. Dominguez that will have to happen at some point. As the traffic finally begins to move, you grit your teeth. Maybe it’s time to consider actually asking for help. I have no fucking clue how to do multivariate shit…You stare ahead as you inch forward, before a frustrating, jolting stop at a red light. Your eye is drawn to a kid crossing the road, wearing a grey hoodie. They look forlorn, for some reason you can’t entirely enumerate, and you glance back at them as the light finally turns.

The sun isn’t very high yet, so there are still some odd shadows stretching across the sidewalk, but you could’ve sworn that the kid had no face.

****

You manage to put the pharmacist and your grandma and the obviously-just-a-trick-of-the-light-I-mean-how-else-could-that-be faceless kid out of your mind for the rest of the morning and actually get some results you can work with from the analyses you’d been worried about. And when Dr. Dominguez pops into lab to talk to you, she is actually impressed at both the pace and quality of work you’ve delivered thus far. In fact, you’re feeling pretty damn good about everything, despite the earlier unpleasantness, so you decide to grab some lunch and hang out with some of the other grad students and lab techs.

Lunch-special sushi in hand, you plop yourself down at one of the rundown old tables in the work room. Valerie is there, along with Raul, one of the grad students from a micro lab down the hall, and Jackson, one of the general lab techs. Everyone says hi, but you’re only vaguely following the conversation as you dig into your spicy tuna roll. Something something TA stipends being cut. Which is such bullshit, of course, but nothing new. You’re just about to jump into the discussion when you get a Facebook notification. It’s your cousin, who tagged you in a post. You stare for a good five seconds at your phone.

Just remembering the good times with my cousin before he decided to be a transsexual.

And then a picture from when you were 14, a picture you’d thought you’d deleted from every conceivable online location. A picture that highlights pretty much every single aspect of your body that made staying in the closet completely untenable. Everything just always happens at once, huh.

“Fucking asshole,” you mutter, and are surprised to feel the hot prick of tears in your eyes.

“Becca, you alright?” Valerie asks, and you belatedly realize that everyone at the table heard you and is now staring. They think you were talking about one of them, or responding to something they said.

“Uh, yeah, sorry. Just something my cousin posted. She’s—she can be such a jerk. Don’t worry about it,” you say as you hastily wipe away the tears.

“What’d she do?” Jackson asks. Valerie glares at him so fiercely that he rolls his eyes and holds up his hands, “Just, like, if you wanna talk about it.”

You sigh. You’re not precisely going stealth, but you also don’t just talk to everyone about being trans. Have you actually come out to Jackson? Valerie knows, and Raul, but you don’t think you’ve ever directly talked to Jackson about it.

“It’s—it’s fine. Just, she posted a picture of me from before I came out, and I really hate thinking about any of it.” You speak with a bit more force than you intend.

“Why is that a big deal?” Jackson asks, taking a bite of his pasta. Valerie glares at him again and Raul just shakes his head.

“It’s just…it took me a long time to figure it out, and I don’t particularly like being reminded of that. And it’s not great for dysphoria, either.” You say this distractedly as you go to the post and untag yourself.

“That’s really rough,” Raul says, frowning.

“Sorry, what’s that word?” Jackson asks with a raised eyebrow, “I guess I just don’t get it? It’s just a kid picture of you, what’s it matter?”

And that does it. You stand abruptly, “I need to get back to the lab.” You hear Valerie and Raul berating Jackson as you walk away, but you’re just so very done. You toss the empty sushi container in the trash at the corner of the hallway, near one of the windows overlooking the main walkway through campus. And you nearly trip over your own feet as you swivel to double check something down below. A gray hoodie. A child with no face looking over their shoulder as they turn a corner.

****

You don’t mean to take the wrong street. It’s already been far too long a day between all of the inanity with your extended family and Jackson. And everything you tried to run after lunch was a bust, making you feel like Dr. Dominguez’s praise earlier was completely undeserved. Given all of that, you decided to get takeout again, even though you really should be cooking, so you’re walking to pick up your order. It is early evening, the shadows having elongated to embrace nearly everything, and while debating whether it’s even worth confronting your cousin about the jab, your feet simply take you the wrong way. You don’t even notice, until you’re standing in front of an empty park that’s three blocks over from where you should be. Or, wait.

Not empty. One lone figure, sitting quietly on one of the swings, wreathed in shadow.

You’ve been walking quite quickly, but over the course of a few steps have come almost to a stop. With a shiver, you glance around the area, but no parents or adults are in sight, and the figure looks young, even from a distance. 12, maybe? Maybe the kid lives in one of the nearby houses? Probably. Should you call someone? Who? Not the cops. They’d just as soon arrest or hurt the kid as help them. It isn’t that late, leaving the kid be is probably the most prudent course of action.

But. The kid feels…familiar. Even from a hundred meters, you can see that their shoulders are hunched, their hands are tight on the chains of the swing. The gentle creaking as those chains move with the slight shifts of the kid’s body is despondent in a way that is known to you, somehow. So, against your better judgement, you leave the sidewalk and walk across the damp grass to the edge of the playground. When you step onto the sand, the kid’s head jerks up and their shoulders tense further, raising almost to their ears. You stop walking and from the new angle a streetlight throws the kid’s grey hoodie into stark relief.

“Are-are you okay?” you have to clear your throat to get the words out and your voice sounds weak and tinny in the still, silent park.

The shoulders shrug. The kid is also wearing jean cutoffs, their scuffed sneakers unlaced.

“Do you need me to call someone?”

A sharp shake of the head, and then their hands release the chains and fall into their lap.

“Don’t need anything,” the kid’s voice is low, you can barely hear what they’re saying. Gingerly, you take the last few steps to the swing set and awkwardly settle into one of the worn rubber seats. Only after you have already done this do you think to question why you are so compelled to talk to this child who—maybe? how?—has been dogging you all day.

“I said I don’t need anything,” the kid says in an emotionless voice. Their face is still completely shadowed by their hood and shaggy hair.

 “I just—look, kid, I think I’ve been where you are, and—”

The kid cuts across you, “I tried to tell them today. But I…couldn’t, I didn’t know how to, so I just ended up saying I like girly shoes and wanted some or whatever.”

Oh. So you were right. You know exactly what’s going on. In fact, you’re pretty sure you had that precise conversation, once.

“That’s tough,” you acknowledge, slowly pushing back in the swing, which creaks beneath you, “It took me a long time too.”

There’s silence. Then:

“That’s what I was worried about.”

You start and quickly glance over at the kid, who has finally turned to face you.

She doesn’t have a face, which, you suppose, really shouldn’t be a surprise. You weren’t seeing things, earlier. There’s just a smooth expanse of dark olive skin. The featureless head tilts to one side and she speaks again.

“I thought you might recognize me.” The voice is plaintive. With every word, you feel a sense of vertigo, like there is a mouth, somewhere, that is making those sounds, that it’s right in front of you, but you cannot perceive it.

You are breathing very rapidly, “I thought—how do you know me? What’s, I mean—”

“This?” the kid gestures at her face, “I don’t know, I can see but I can’t see myself, I dunno what’s going on. All I know is I was walking to the park and then I was here, or I mean, on the road this morning and saw you and I followed you and I just want to go home or just sleep or just melt away but I can’t, okay? There’s just nothing.”

Without noticing, you have sprung to your feet and are backing away from the faceless girl, the faceless girl who can’t tell her parents who she is. Who you are.

“I didn’t want to think about it,” you whisper. Why are you even responding to this? This is a hallucination, or a dream. You’re just reacting to the whole bullshit situation with your cousin and Jackson and that fucking pharmacy tech. Did you fall asleep back in the lab, is that it? You pinch yourself, but no luck, “I came out and that was what I needed. Okay? Why dwell on, on, on all of that shi—stuff that happened before?”

The girl is still sitting placidly in the swing, though her hands are once again clenched around the chains.

“I knew you were me, I guess. So I followed. I don’t think anyone else notices me either, not that that’s anything new,” The note of bitterness in her voice cuts you to the bone, “I thought maybe you—me, future me, whatever—would be able to…fix me? But nothing’s changed, has it?”

You’re backed up to the slide now, “Why are you doing this? What even are you?”

You slump against the side of slide, your knees suddenly weak, “This cannot—this is bullshit, I don’t know how you’re doing this, but—”

The faceless girl is in front of you now, hands jammed into the front pocket of her hoodie. She stands there, contemplating her future self, “I just want to understand,”

The kid, proto-Becca, or whatever or whoever she is, sure sounds like a kid desperately trying to make sense of something, and not some ghoulish nightmare creature.

“Just stop,” you say in a hoarse voice, “I just don’t want to think about it, I shouldn’t have to think about it, I just want to move forward.”

“Yeah,” proto-Becca abruptly falls to her knees, and draws them up to her chest. It takes a few seconds for you to understand the sounds that the kid is making are sobs.

You hug your own knees and contemplate getting up and running away and just forgetting about all of it: this faceless phantom of your childhood self, your relatives’ inability to accept your reality, the absurd, useless, pointless stats and analyses. You’re crying too, desperately trying to refocus on the here and now, instead of being drawn down into the rabbit hole of loneliness and regret and fear that always consumes you when you think too hard about those years in which it felt like your whole body was turning against you and you couldn’t find any satisfactory explanations for what you were feeling.

But the sounds of proto-Becca, of proto-you, sobbing into her knobbly knees bring you back to the present. Ironic, that. No matter what else, however she got here, whatever happened to her face, she’s a kid. She’s a kid. She’s. A. Kid. You were a kid.

You furiously wipe your eyes and nose and sit up, scooting a bit closer to proto-Becca.

“Hey, I’m sorry,” you say in as steady a voice as you can manage, “I was scared, and, and, and I lashed out. It’s not your fault, kid.”

She doesn’t lift her head, but the sobs are quieter.

“I mean, kid, no offense, but you don’t have a face. And somehow you’re me, right?” Okay, that came out meaner than you meant it to, “The truth is that I’ve done my best to forget pretty much everything that happened back when I was…you, I guess. But I can’t.”

She sniffles, “I’m trying to tell them, I am. But the boys at school, every time I try to talk to Mom or Dad I see those boys laughing and yelling and coming at me and I can’t, I don’t—know how I ended up here, or what to do about this or anything. I just want things to be normal.”

And, finally, you get it. Not why she’s here, or how, or what any of this means, but, at least, what to do. You’ve tried to help kids who were like you before. You’d never have told them that they needed to keep their feelings concealed, that they needed to not do anything so as to avoid reminding you of your own past. So why, then, are you doing it to yourself?

“Is it okay if I come sit next to you, maybe give you a hug?” you ask, as gently as you can.

You get a glimpse of the faceless face from behind the curtain of hair, “I—I think so?”

You get to your feet, a task far more laborious than you feel it should be, and cross to her. When you plop down by her side, she twitches, but it’s toward you. Slowly and carefully, you wrap an arm around her narrow shoulders, and hold her close. She’s still crying, and the hood has slipped from her dark curls.

“It’s okay that it’s taking time,” you say, “It’s really, really hard. I meant that. There’s…nothing out there. No one to explain to you, to, uh, us, what these feelings mean, really. I remember. I remember how much it feels like you’re just stuck in the same looped computer program. Endlessly completing the same actions with no idea why, only feeling like something isn’t right. And so scared of what happens if you do anything that breaks that loop.”

“That’s pretty much it,” she says with a note of wait, that wasn’t completely in my head???, “I don’t see how I can explain to anyone, especially Mom and Dad.”

“I think all you can do is be honest. There are some resources out there, although maybe they aren’t published yet,” you glance sideways at her, “But if you just…elucidate those feelings you’ve been sitting on, it at least opens the door to them comprehending.”

“I guess so,” she sighs, and then giggles, “But also, like, no offense, that was, like, a really freakin’ pretentious way to say that.”

You snort and ruffle her hair, “Whatever. Something for you to look forward to, then.”

She’s quiet for a bit and then, quick like a bird, she wraps her arms around you too, “So I’m gonna tell them, then?”

You shrug, “When you’re ready. Whenever that is. And I promise, you are no lesser if it takes a while. Okay?”

“But you’re still going to hate thinking about me, right? I mean, about how long it took me, you, to finally do it?” her head tilts.

You sigh, “I don’t know. It’s hard, I won’t pretend it isn’t. But I think I can at least say that it’s okay. That it’s not my, or your, fault.”

When you look up, her face appears. Smile first. Broad and full of braces, her quick and nervous brown eyes darting to your face and then back to her knees.

“You’ll be fine,” you say, giving her one last squeeze, “I’m the living proof, right?”

Her laugh lingers in the air as she fades away.

x

#transroadwarrior #stories #long post #about face #body horror #of the faceless variety #trans #transphobia #briefly #becca #proto becca #submission

[chookity-dookity]

THE VENTREXIAN

I don’t hate Avocato. Hate is not a strong enough word for it. I loathe him. Every second he is on screen, I am filled with physical revulsion. I am disgusted by his every action--by his very existence. I abhor him.

I didn’t always feel this way about Avocato. I liked him well enough in S1; even in S2, I thought he had the potential to be an interesting character. But I am so very tired of media narratives that implore me to forgive violent men because somewhere, perhaps very deep down, they are secretly a good person. We are told, time and time again, that the real fault lies with someone else--that they were led astray, manipulated into doing terrible things, and now they cannot be held accountable for their crimes.

I know that’s not what the writers thought they were doing in this episode. I’m sure they felt very clever, writing that pithy little exchange with Ash. After she absolves him of guilt, pinning all blame on the Lord Commander instead, Avocato grimaces in the general direction of the camera. “But I pulled the trigger,” he says, voice all gravelly, clearly eaten up with guilt inside. Look at him, the writers seem to say, taking responsibility for his actions! How noble!

Except, that’s not what I see when I watch this scene. I see yet another story that’s telling me one man’s emotional anguish is more important than all the harm he caused. It wasn’t about holding Avocato accountable--it was about making the viewer feel sorry for him. Woe is Avocato, laid low by the emotional burden of committing all those atrocities. Look at all the sad faces he’s making! Meanwhile, the atrocities themselves are glossed over. The show does not invite us to sympathize with the dead king, or the war-weary soldiers, or the betrayed people of Ventrexia. Instead, it shoves Avocato’s “guilt” in our face. What’s really important, apparently, is how this all makes him feel.

Maybe that shouldn’t surprise me so much. Final Space has always been a little too fixated on manpain. As enjoyable as these past few seasons have been, that’s one area in which it’s consistently missed the mark.

That’s not to say this episode didn’t have its positive qualities. I’m not so petty that I can’t see the good in this episode, even if I personally found it revolting. The animation was lovely. The music was wonderful, as always. It managed to balance three separate plotlines more artfully than just about any episode of Final Space to date. And while the B and C plots were relatively weak, they gave us plenty of slow, thoughtful character moments--one of the great strengths of this show.

But this episode also put a magnifying glass on one of the show’s biggest weaknesses. It is utterly incapable of dealing with moral ambiguity. It wants to. It often tries to, in its own awkward, bumbling way. But like the show’s creator, it’s far too quick to forgive. It fails to grapple with the genuine evil in Avocato’s past, instead insisting that he really was good all along--that his biggest sin was just placing his trust in the wrong person.

It’s a naive approach to take in the real world. In fiction, it just makes for a bad story.

I don’t think you can write a compelling redemption arc without understanding, at least on some level, why someone would choose to hurt other people. And Olan Rogers, for all his flaws, is a man with no darkness in his heart. I don’t think he understands what makes people do bad things. And I don’t think he’s capable of writing the kind of redemption arc that a character like Avocato demands. He has not stared into Nietzsche’s abyss and seen it staring back at him. I doubt he even knows it exists.

#3.0 stars #a mixed bag #final space #fs spoilers #the ventrexian #episode thoughts and analysis

[duchesschameleon]

what if - chapter 7

summary: a long lost letter leads to an adventure in Italy for three people who find love and healing along the way. a letters to juliet au

pairing: Aaron Hotchner x GN!Reader words: 3142 a/n: okay, the last three chapters are big ones, so buckle up! the whole fic is written, I’m just working through editing and cleaning it up. there’s no warnings for this one (I think, please let me know if I need to add any!) so enjoy! please throw a comment or a reblog my way if you like it!! and as always, thank you to @qvid-pro-qvo​ for being the best beta

what if masterlist

You wake up the next morning feeling both refreshed and almost hungover. Your throat is dry and eyes are scratchy from the crying but you also feel well rested and definitely a bit lighter. You get ready slowly, taking your time to make sure any traces of your crying are gone.

It’s later than normal when you join Aaron and Dave for breakfast. They’re sitting at the normal table, but Aaron looks tense. He can’t stay still, fidgeting in his seat. When you’re close to the table, he stands and pulls out your chair for you. You blink at him as you sit down, surprised by the gesture.

“Aaron, don’t you have something you want to say?” Dave asks once Aaron’s sat back down in his chair.

He shoots a dark look at Dave before clearing his throat. “I wanted to apologize for yesterday -”

“In the eyes Aaron,” Dave interrupts. Aaron sighs and shifts in his chair so he’s facing you.

“I want to apologize for yesterday. I was out of line,” he says, brown eyes locked on yours. “I shouldn’t have said that, I don’t mean it, and I’m truly sorry.”

You nod and take a sip of coffee before responding. “Thank you, Aaron.”

It’s really all you can say, now that the truth is out there. Aaron knows about your partner, you know about Haley. You both know loss and you know that both of you don’t want to put Dave through it again.

Conversation is stilted for a few more minutes, even with Dave’s best efforts to get something rolling between you and Aaron. Things finally settle into something comfortable when you bring up your search for Carolyn. There aren’t many left on your list, so you and Aaron choose a few near each other for the day.

It winds up being a short day of searching and not a successful one. Lunch might be the most interesting part of the day, at a restaurant that you would never expect to find nor to like so much. It’s a family owned restaurant just off the main road connecting some of the small towns near Siena. You probably would have driven past it, Aaron too, but Dave has an eye for these things. For the small things that turn out to be magical, with delicious food and great wine.

“The gift of old age, of slowing down,” Dave jokes when you bring it up. You feel your cheeks heat up, embarrassed at inadvertently calling Dave old but he tuts at you. “None of that, it’s all about the experience of life. You’re young, focused on going places and doing big things. You’ll learn to appreciate these small things, spontaneous things, in time. I’m just here to help you find them now.” He winks at you, raising his wine glass in a toast that you reciprocate.

“To the finer things,” you say, clinking glasses with Dave.

“To appreciating life, la vita bella,” Dave adds, pulling back from Aaron’s glass.

“La vita bella,” Aaron whispers as he shifts to clink his glass with yours. You take a sip, holding Aaron’s gaze. He looks away after a few moments, when the air feels too thick between you two. It’s a stark difference from that morning, and a testament to how far your tenuous friendship with Aaron has come.

A week ago, you wouldn’t have imagined being so comfortable in his presence but now, you find that you don’t mind being around him. You actually like spending time with him, and you know that you’ve already forgiven him in your head for his words yesterday.

It’s a thought that sticks in the back of your head for the rest of the day, how you have forgiven him. Even if you aren’t fully certain why. You know that you hadn’t told him your full story, even when the perfect opportunity presented itself as you explored Siena two days earlier, so it wasn’t his fault for not knowing you had experienced the same loss he has. He was scared for his friend, his mentor, and you can understand that. But there’s something more to it, you just can’t put a finger on it. Instead, you shove it all to the back of your mind and focus on the remaining Carolyn’s for the day.

It doesn’t take long to rule them both out and you find yourselves back in Siena by mid-afternoon. You head to your room, eager to work more on the story and see what you have so far. Aaron and Dave spend some time poolside and try to convince you to join them, but you stick to your plan.

You sit back in the desk chair, looking over what you have. You know it’s solid, that you’re building a compelling narrative. But you’re missing an ending.

You know there are still Carolyn’s left on your list. You also know that there’s a chance Dave’s Carolyn did leave this area. There’s a chance you won’t find her on this trip, or ever. You hope that isn’t the case, you want Dave to find her and have his happily ever after, but you know that the chances of that happening are dwindling.

There’s a knock on your door, pulling you from your downward spiral. You shake the thoughts from your head as you unlock the door and pull it open.

“Uh, hi.” Aaron says, hands in his pockets and rocking slightly on his feet. “I-we just wanted to see if you were joining us for dinner.”

Your brow furrows in confusion as you glance at your watch. Well, shoot. You’d been up here for longer than planned and sure enough, it’s well into the evening and time for dinner.

“Give me five minutes to change, I can meet you downstairs,” you say, closing the door as you turn back into your room. You hear Aaron huff out a laugh and roll your eyes, knowing that means he’ll be right on the other side of the door waiting for you.

And sure enough, when you pull back the door Aaron is there looking at his watch. “Five minutes on the dot, I’m impressed.”

You roll your eyes in response as you lock the door and turn towards the elevators. The two of you walk in silence to the hotel’s restaurant where you find Dave waiting at a table. There’s already a bottle of wine on the table, from the local vineyard that supplies the hotel with all it’s wine, and three glasses poured.

“I would like to propose a toast,” Dave says, once you both sit down. He faces you, raising a glass in your direction. “Thank you, for everything you’ve done for a complete stranger. It has been the most incredible adventure to be here again in Italy and to have met you.”

You smile at Dave, heart warmed by his words. “Thank you for letting me tag along, it’s been the greatest week.”

Dave smirks at you over his glass. “I think you’ve done a little more than tag along,” he notes, eyes flicking over to Aaron before winking at you.

After that, the conversation flows easily between all three of you as you share stories about your loved ones, reliving adventures with them. It’s a night filled with laughter, with memories, and a few tears. But it’s enjoyable. Things feel more relaxed, you’re comfortable with Dave and Aaron. Which is shocking given that a week ago you barely knew them and argued with Aaron constantly. Crazy what a week in a car searching for a woman can do.

Later that night, you’re out stargazing aimlessly. On the outskirts of the city, you can see more stars than you’ve ever seen in your life. It’s gorgeous and given the fact you aren’t tired yet, you find there’s no harm walking around the hotel grounds.

On a grass covered hill, you find Aaron laying on the ground. As you get closer, you see that he’s looking up at the stars, silent and pensive. He looks almost peaceful, tranquil. It’s a different look from the relaxed smile you’re used to seeing as he drives around Tuscany.

“Mind if I join you?” you ask, standing over Aaron.

He starts and leans up on his elbows, nodding. “No, not at all.” You lay down beside him, staring straight at the sky. You can feel the warmth from Aaron’s body, see his eyes flicker over to you in your peripheral vision.

“I don’t know if I’ve ever seen so many stars in my life,” you whisper. Your eyes sweep over the constellations, taking in the sheer number of stars in the sky.

“It’s incredible,” Aaron replies and you turn your head to look at him. “I only see stars like this when I take Jack camping. It’s not often unfortunately, but we always spend at least one night stargazing way past bedtime.”

You smile and turn your head back to the stars. It’s incredible to see the night sky so full of light and dimension. You’re used to the flat black of New York, the buildings providing all the light and color. This is something completely different and makes you feel so small.

Aaron clears his throat, and you can tell he’s getting ready to say something so you turn your head back to him. He says your name, almost whispers it, and pauses. “I - I wanted to apologize, again, for yesterday. I really am sorry. I was out of line, and I want you to know how sorry I am,” he says, brown eyes full of remorse.

You suck in a breath, trying to find the right words. “Apology accepted, Aaron. Truly. You didn’t know. I could have, probably should have, told you before but,” you take another breath, forcing yourself to slow down, “I was scared. Telling you felt big, it felt scary. It felt like, almost like it was more real than it has been,” you admit. Aaron had been a person who didn’t know - who didn’t give you the look of pity and sadness whenever he saw you. And when he told you about Haley, you knew he probably would never be that person. Telling him then, became an even more daunting task. As if he would truly know you, truly understand just what you were feeling. The pain, the grief, the way it feels never-ending and like an ocean you cannot cross.

“I know what you mean,” Aaron whispers. “When you tell people, you have to face it all over again. It’s like picking at a scab.” You huff out a soft laugh at his choice of analogy but nod before turning back to look at the stars. You’re both silent, just looking at the night sky. It’s a comfortable silence, finally. You feel yourself relaxing into the grass and just enjoying the moment, enjoying Aaron’s company. 

“Do you think she’s out there? Carolyn?” Aaron’s question cuts through the silence, makes you think.

“Yeah,” you say softly. “She’s out there somewhere, I have to believe that.”

“Am I wrong to want Dave to stop, to call this off?”

“No,” you say slowly, “he can’t go on forever. No one can. You have to stop at some point.”

Aaron lets out a sigh. “Then why do I feel like Jack on Sunday?” he mumbles. “It’s nearly time for school and I don’t want to go.”

When you turn your head to respond, you meet Aaron’s eyes. They’re warm and open, filled with wonder. You hold his gaze for a moment before his eyes flicker down to your lips and then back up to your eyes.

And then you’re both slowly moving in, and your lips are touching. You’re kissing Aaron. His lips are soft and gentle as they move over yours. One of his hands holds your chin in place, keeping you still as he deepens the kiss. His tongue runs along the seam of your lips and you open them. You lose track of time, kissing Aaron, reaching out an arm to wrap around his back and pull him close to you. He shifts, the hand on your jaw moving to wrap around your shoulders, his other down your back and rolling you so you settle on top of him. Your lips move together, exploring each other, until you pull back for a much needed breath.

You’re still holding Aaron, still resting on top of him, when it hits you. You were kissing Aaron. You roll off of him, laying on your back again. The tension that had been so present your first few days with Aaron is back, the air tense between you. You stay still, mind racing as you process what just happened and what to do next. Aaron’s just as still and silent beside you, neither one of you daring to speak first.

After a minute of silence, you make your decision. You sit up, take a breath, and then stand to walk away, leaving Aaron on the hill without saying a word.

You don’t look back, focused on making it to your room. You miss the way Aaron sits up, watching you walk away. You miss the way his jaw drops as he processes what just happened, the kiss, the situation, the fact that he kissed you a day after finding out you’d lost your partner only months before. You miss the figure in a window overlooking the hill moving his hand to let the curtains fall back into place as he smiles and shakes his head.

Sleep comes to you in fits that night, the kiss replaying over and over again in your head as you toss and turn.

Logic had made you walk away without a word - you’d recently lost your partner, you live in New York, Aaron lives in DC. Someone would have to give something up for the two of you to be together. And what would everyone say about you finding someone so soon? It’s been four months, that has to be too soon.

But in your heart, you know it’s not. You know that you can’t put a timer on recovery, on grief. And you certainly can’t predict when you’ll meet someone you fall for.

Finally, sleep overtakes your brain and pushes all thoughts of Aaron, of kisses, of relationships out of your head. You’re leaving tomorrow, heading back to Verona and that’s that.

---                                                                                                  

“Good morning,” Aaron says, taking your suitcase from you. “How’d you sleep?”

“Alright,” you respond.

“Good.”

You stand at the trunk of the car, unsure what to say next when thankfully Dave comes outside. Aaron walks past you to help Dave with his suitcase, giving you a moment to take a breath and push down all the thoughts of last night.

You walk away from the trunk and give Dave a hug. “Good morning,” you say, giving him a kiss on the cheek.

He returns the favor and gives you a little squeeze, helping ground you. “You know, the stars looked amazing out of my window last night, did you get to see them?”

“Yeah, they looked incredible,” you say, pulling open the back door of the car. Dave says your name, stopping you from sliding into your seat.

“Do you mind sitting up front today? I want to stretch my legs a little.”

So you walk around to the passenger seat and settle in, quickly glancing at Aaron as he climbs in. Your heart clenches, knowing what you want but also knowing it’ll be impossible to take.

For someone who wants to stretch his legs, Dave spends a lot of time leaning forward between the front seats, snapping along to the radio and singing in Italian. You have your arm propped up on the door and keep looking at the window, at the scenery passing by. It’s bittersweet to be leaving Tuscany, going back to Verona and then New York in a few days, but as you told Aaron last night, you can’t keep searching forever.

Aaron’s driving on the winding road to the highway when Dave all of a sudden sits up and starts tapping on Aaron’s seat. “Look, it’s the vineyard that the hotel stocks! C’mon, let's go see it. It’s our favorite wine.” Aaron slows the car and turns into the vineyard, looking around to see if there’s any signs about tours or visitation.

The road in is lined with trees and bushes and you can see people in the field working. Aaron’s driving slow, still uncertain if you can even be here, when Dave starts again.

“Stop the car Aaron, stop the car,” he says, moving to unbuckle himself. He’s opening the door as Aaron’s coming to a full stop and looking at one of the women working in the vineyard. You and Aaron climb out the car, following Dave and wondering what is going on.

“It’s Carolyn,” Dave says. He’s looking at the young woman working the field, a woman who could not have been alive in the 60s.

You and Aaron share a skeptical look before turning back to Dave. “Alright, let’s get you in the shade,” Aaron says, trying to steer Dave towards the trees. It hits you then, what might actually be happening here and you approach the woman.

“Uhm, tu sai dove Carolyn Bartolini?” you ask, stumbling over the Italian for ‘do you know where Carolyn Bartolini is?”

“I am Carolyn Bartolini,” the woman responds.

Aaron rushes over to you, saying your name as it falls into place for him. “This is - it’s her granddaughter,” he says, as another woman approaches you.

“Can I help you?”

“Yes,” Aaron says, turning to the new woman, “do you know where Carolyn Bartolini is?”

The woman nods, “I am Carolyn Bartolini.”

“Do you also have a mother named Carolyn Bartolini?” you ask, a smile breaking out on your face.

“Si, she left to go riding a little while ago. Can we help you?”

Aaron introduces the two of you and explains that you’ve been looking for her mother, that Dave knew her long ago.

“Aaron, let’s go,” Dave says, calling the two of you back towards the car. “Let’s go, this was -”

“Dave, Carolyn’s here!” Aaron interrupts. “She’s out riding, but she’s here.”

“Then let's go before she gets back.” For the first time, Dave looks apprehensive, scared almost.

“Dave, we’ve come all this way and she’s here! Come on,” Aaron protests.

“I’ve been ridiculous Aaron, you’ve been saying it all along. I knew Carolyn when I was a boy, I was barely 16. I’m not the same person anymore, so let’s go before she gets back.”

“Dave,” Aaron starts.

But then you hear horseshoes. You see Dave turn his head a little, a wondrous look in his eyes. You turn to see what’s going on behind you and you see her.

Carolyn Bartolini.

taglist: @qvid-pro-qvo​ @averyhotchner​ @kelstark​ @hurricanejjareau​ @oreogutz​ @whentheautumnleavesfall​

#aaron hotchner #aaron hotchner x reader #aaron hotchner x gn!reader #criminal minds #criminal minds fanfiction #aaron hotchner fanfiction #letters to juliet #letters to juliet au #romcom au #my writing #what if tag #fic stuff #charlie rambles

[incorrectshantaequotes]

Shantae Headcanons - The Half-Genies

This is a bit of a weird one for me, not gonna lie. Mostly because, well...you've kinda seen some of my headcanons already! Aside from Harmony, the half-genies don't really get that much screentime (well, Shantae does, but she's in a different post), so I've had to figure out their characterization myself for their quotes. Don't worry, though, that's not all I'm covering here. In any case - onto the headcanons!

Harmony

Harmony is a lot of things. A mentor figure, a guide, a gentle hand - she does great in a crisis, and does wonders helping others through their own. It's no wonder the other half-genies looked up to her. She does have one glaring weakness, though...she cannot do casual social interactions. At all. The other half-genies figured this out rather quickly when they went into the Half-Genie Festival; she did spectacularly with her performance, but during the afterparty? Harmony was doing her best to either not be seen, and what conversation was sparked between her and the partygoers was rather stilted and awkward. The reason for this? Well, it actually ties back to how well she does as a calm and collected leader...

Harmony's mother was well aware of the dangers of Quake Magic. Used without thought or care, it can cause mass devastation, as Shantae herself can attest to. So, to help Harmony when she was gone, she slipped in some instructions into the scrapbook to tell Harmony how to train herself. The catch was, she had to completely isolate herself from civilization first, to avoid any potential harm to innocents while she was still learning to control her magic. Harmony followed said instructions to the letter, only coming out of her training when she felt she was ready to fulfill her role as Guardian Genie. As a result of this nomadic lifestyle, Harmony's calm, disciplined, and can use her magic incredibly well, but it doesn't really make for a good social life.

Thankfully, the other half-genies have been able to help with that, letting Harmony loosen up and enjoy herself. She's still more naturally introverted, but she is rather open around the other half-genies. She has a lot of time on her hands, as very few actually want to be on the other end of her Quake Magic, so Harmony rarely has to actually step up to defend her town. That's not to say it doesn't happen, of course...

Harmony's town is completely landlocked, so she hasn't had to deal with Risky Boots. Instead, the main threat she deals with is Ammo Baron and his army. See, Harmony's town is in a similar position to Scuttle Town in that it's a great tactical position to launch an assault on the palace of Sequin Land. Unlike Scuttle Town, however, Harmony's town has a mayor who's never even considered firing Harmony, meaning that it's never been in the vulnerable position that let Ammo Baron take over Scuttle Town. As a result, 85% of Harmony's job has mostly consisted of dealing with Ammo Baron's plan B: brute force. Thankfully, her Quake Magic helps tremendously in this effort, frustrating Ammo Baron to no end. It's why he switched targets to Scuttle Town in the first place, and why he was investing in a flying armada in Half-Genie Hero. Easier to deal with earthquakes if you're not touching the ground!

Zapple

Zapple is very impulsive. You'd think that her paranoid streak might make her a little more cautious, but no. If anything, a common reason for her to head off on some crazy quest is whatever conspiracy happens to be in her mind. Thankfully, Vera's always been there to help bail her out when she gets in over her head, with the other half-genies helping in this endeavor as they've gotten to know Zapple better.

As the Guardian Genie of Armor Town, Zapple is an expert blacksmith. Who do you think made that armor? She actually ended up forming an unexpected friendship with Bolo because of this, thanks to their similar backgrounds. She also managed to figure out that Bolo's mom is the Squidsmith (more on that in the post I linked earlier) thanks to her spending some time on Siren Island for the Half-Genie Festival, and thinks it's absolutely hilarious that Shantae hasn't connected the dots yet. She's definitely not telling anytime soon, that's for sure.

After the whole Empress Siren thing, Zapple's relationship with Shantae ended up becoming...something between inspiration and friendly rivalry. Like everyone else, Zapple saw the fight between Shantae and Empress Siren's giant form. Like everyone else, Zapple agreed that it was impressive. So much, in fact, that it made her think, "Well, damn, I better step up." And soon after the dust settled, Zapple started training herself and her magic, hoping to do just as well defending her hometown someday. This also lead to challenging Shantae whenever she visited, as a benchmark of how far she'd come since they first met. Shantae was fine with this, knowing it was all in good fun...even if it was a bit unnerving how intense Zapple could get about it. However, after the return of the remaining Sirens (read here), Zapple's need to prove herself significantly died down, so the "rivalry" part of their friendly rivalry has been kinda phased out.

Vera

As the other resident half-genie on Siren Island, she and Zapple have been friends since childhood. Though from completely different walks of life, they get along very well, with Vera helping to ground Zapple's more manic moments, and Zapple always being there to cheer Vera on with her electric pep. Though Vera's been relieved to have some relatively subdued people in her life with the other half-genies, she does still gets along best with Zapple - even if her spontaneous plans and adventures can be a bit much. Someone has to be there to pull her out of the way of angry Bonk Tortoise, after all.

Beyond Zapple, though, Vera gets along very well with Lobster Siren, helping her understand the surface world better and come out of her (metaphorical) shell. This may have something to do with her Refresh Magic and connection to life making her one of the best at understanding Siren, second to only Shantae herself. She serves as a great translator for Zapple and Harmony, as their Spark Magic and Quake Magic provide little or no help understanding Lobster Siren.

Vera is an excellent dancer, knowing all the traditional dances from Tree Town and beyond. She and Shantae actually had a dance-off during the Half-Genie Festival when Vera saw how good Shantae was at it. Though, at the end, both were so impressed with the other that they couldn't decide a winner, and ended up calling it a tie (although a certain zombie and a certain electric genie were a bit vocal on who they thought won).They agreed to send each other tips when they had the time.

Plink

With her psychic powers, the threats Plink protects her town from tend to be ones they can't see. Specters, wraiths, curses - her Seer Magic gives her a better view on all of them, and she combats it by either seeing if she can talk to the haunting entity or warding off the area to ensure no one goes in by accident and causes something they might regret. It's not really flashy or spectacular, but Plink does her job well, and is one of the best people to talk to regarding the supernatural.

Runs a fortune telling booth in her spare time. She doesn't use her magic or anything, she's just well-versed in the world of fortune telling and thinks it's fun, even if she can't exactly predict the future. Plink does try to make it explicitly clear that she's not an actual fortune teller to those who come by, though, as she doesn't want people to come based on false advertising. It's definitely made for a fun party trick to show the other half-genies, though.

Plink knows Poe and Abner, running into each other when the latter two briefly rejoined the zombie caravan. The zombie brothers were a bit surprised to see another half-genie, to say the least, but were able to laugh it off. They talked a bit, ended up exchanging notes regarding what they knew about the supernatural, and going their separate ways. Ironically, though, Plink didn't connect the dots between Rottytops and the little sister the two mentioned until the Half-Genie Festival was nearly over. She really felt compelled to indulge in a facepalm when she did.

#shantae #harmony #zapple #vera #plink #not a quote #headcanons

[dragonrajafanfiction]

Dragon Song

The 3E exam was Toyama’s most difficult day. Afterwards, he always had to do a difficult counseling and comfort session with all the students about their visions. And for some who didn’t make the cut, his sessions would include brainwashing and memory wiping to make them forget everything about Cassell so they could go home and continue their lives, ignorant of everything they experienced here.��

He made his way back to his office and sat behind the desk.

He sighed and cleaned his glasses while he waited. No one ever knew what was going on in there. Only those who were monitoring with the cameras namely EVA. Whatever happened, the medical team was ready to take care of it.

But he felt the muscles in his neck were tense and his heart was beating faster than normal. His analytical brain told him he was worried about Tigre. Even though he told himself it was pointless to worry about him, that his fate was with the College now, he couldn’t stop.

So he spoke to himself in casual calm language. “I think its time to admit, that your care for that boy has gone beyond what is professional.” He slid the glasses onto his nose. 

“You could barely leave him there properly without tears coming right? That’s why you left so abruptly. Right now the test is starting and his dragonblood is waking up. He might attack the students inside once he realizes what he is. And then he has no future. You tried. You did all you could. But it’s possible he was doomed from the start.”

“But the heart will do what it will do. Heh... you’re not immune, Toyoma-kun.” He chuckled to himself. “But you cannot drink. Your students will need you now more than ever. You can go drink later.”

The phone, a traditional rotary, rang loudly in the silence. He picked up. “Toyama speaking.”

The raspy inhale told him who was speaking. Schneider’s voice came over the earpiece, “I can patch you into the feed. I would like you to watch.”

“Watch the boy turn into a monster? I don’t think so...”

“That’s not what’s happening. I’ll send the link to your cell.”

Toyama’s cellphone let up and he cradled the landline against his ear while he clicked the link provided.

The video feed showed the classroom. 

Normally the 3 E was absolute mayhem as each of the students’ minds were lost in the sound, like listening to a favorite song, the mind wandered and the body followed and they were compelled to write down their visionary inscriptions on the paper or on whatever other surface they could find. But what Toyama saw made his jaw drop in shock.

Tigre was singing.

He wasn’t just singing, he was singing with a smile of rapturous joy, tears pouring down his face. He wasn’t writing down his answers, he was singing them, speaking each dragon word in turn. As the dragon verses shifted, he would listen briefly and his eyes closed and he would hold in hands to his chest, his face beaming with joy before belting out a full throated perfect rendition of that Yanling.

Toyama felt his eyes burn and quickly blinked away tears for a moment. Relief washed over him like a flood and his smile started to echo Tigre’s. He felt proud that Tigre was succeeding. He wasn’t just performing well on the test, but he wasn't being violent. Quite the opposite. He was joyous, happier than Toyama had ever seen him.

But then in the next moment Toyama’s blood ran cold.

Dragon language wasn’t just words. They were commands. They could impose a rule upon an area to control the elements. They could command a forest to burn. They could command a storm, a drought, a flood, an earthquake, or lightning. Some abilities were so strong, they would destroy the user. If it wasn’t for the restriction placed on the use of this sacred speech by the College’s alchemical array, Tigre would have joyfully sang out and destroyed the entire college and possibly all of Chicago.

“Dear... God...” Toyama whispered. “Is he a Dragon King?”

“No. If he was, we would have erased him and shoved his body in the Ice Cellar. But he is a hybrid of Dragon King level resonance. He’s different from the other hybrids in other ways too. We’ve run other tests. Nothing about this man is natural... and yet everything is.”

“Is this why you have brought him here? Why you were interested?”

“I’m afraid that’s all I can tell you. We’re still studying. In the meantime, you should probably go out to meet him. He doesn’t have anyone else to talk to.”

Schneider hung up the phone. Toyama was brought back to reality. Yes he did feel fond of Tigre... but he was still a doctor and Tigre was his patient. He would have to carefully maintain his mind so he didn’t go berserk and bring ruin to the college. He stood up and made his way back to the library. When he came back outside, the thunderstorm had intensified. Lightning cut across the sky and thunder roared, as thought the sky itself were cracking apart. The trees swayed heavy in the wind.

----

When Tigre came out of his trance, his throat hurt, his jaw hurt and his face was sticky with tears. He was shaking and exhausted. He wasn’t at his desk any more but standing in the middle of the room. He wanted to see Toyama and tell him that he wasn’t mad at him for leaving him alone. So when he found him waiting outside, he ran up to him and hugged him, babbling uncontrollably all sorts of silly things while Toyama told him to get some rest while stroking his hair. 

He suddenly realized after that that other students were filing out. All the other students looked exhausted and limp. He turned to them with a joyous face, but they all just flinched away from him, looking at him with tear streaked faces. Even Porsche, who seemed vibrant and sassy before, hugged her two sisters while crying uncontrollably. Celeste glared at him accusingly and Tigre flinched away. 

“Don’t mind them. Most people don’t experience joy like yours.” Toyama pulled him away from the other students. “I will have to go help them with their feelings.”

Tigre was confused. Why would anyone be sad about what he’d just heard? “Toyama-san, I saw something amazing. You knew right? You knew what I was!”

“I had no idea exactly what you were.” Toyama said patiently. “No one did. Your vision is one that’s personal to you, something deep in your heart.”

Tigre reached up and touched his chest. “But... I don’t have anything there.”

“Maybe that’s...” Toyama wanted to say ‘for the best’ but he didn’t finish his sentence. “I have to go. You’re a student now, so you’re free to roam about as you like. Stay out of trouble. Okay?”

“Okay...” Tigre said meekly and watched Toyama walk towards the three sisters. Only Celeste wasn’t crying, she only looked extremely angry.

No one was happy, except for him.

He walked out to stare at the pouring rain in the entrance. He looked up at the sky that also seemed to be sad. But why? Those voices in his head were still ringing. He could recite every single word. But he whispered them, staying quiet. He continued to whisper those sacred words into the grey. They were still beautiful in his ears.

“Do you not have an umbrella?” 

His dampened mood rose again! “Chu Zihang!”

Without thinking he hugged the flinching man who just tolerated it. 

Tigre released him quickly. “Oh... I’m sorry.”

“It’s normal to be emotional after this. I’m happy you made it. The results will take a few hours to process, but Schneider sent me to congratulate you. He’s my mentor.” Chu Zihang’s eyes were dark and not the yellow he remembered.

“You wear contacts too.” Tigre realized.

“Yes. Toyama explained?” Chu Zihang raised his umbrella. It was large enough for both of them as they walked. He was calm like a granite stone. Tigre was a raw nerve of emotion.

“Yes. I remembered looking into your eyes and feeling something through them like what I heard today. No wonder I recognized you! You  really are my brother! But for the other students, they were very sad. I don’t... understand why...” He looked back at the Library that was shrouded in the rain.

“You’d have to ask them personally. I can’t speak for them. When my dragonblood awoke, I saw a very disturbing image myself. And then something tragic happened. So that memory is sad for me too.”

“Is that why its raining?” Tigre mumbled.

Zihang tilted his head. “I don’t think emotions can effect the weather. Though many people associate rain with sadness. In truth a tropical wave has been pushed up from the gulf by the jet stream.”

“Oh.” Was all Tigre should say, understanding nothing.

“You’re still shaken up. Let me get you something to eat. You’ll be hungry.” 

"Ah! You’re right! My stomach is growling a lot!” Tigre said in shock.

“You must have resonated very strongly. You were just standing there in the entrance to the library staring into space and now you didn’t realize you were hungry...”

“It was wonderful.” He breathed. “I wish I could listen to it again. I’ll listen to it forever.”

Chu Zihang glanced down at him and didn’t comment.

“Have you been out of the hospital long? Why didn’t you visit me?” Tigre bounced along deliberately splashing in the puddles.

“I was recovering still and then after that, Schneider kept me updated on your progress. I couldn’t visit you because visits were not permitted while you adjusted to life outside of prison.”

“Oh... we’re going to your dorm?” He asked recognizing the residential building. 

“Yes. I want to introduce you to a few of my friends. One of them, Lu Mingfei is also looking forward to seeing you.”

“Oh Okay... neat.”

Chu Zihang opened the door to the dorm and there were many people there! It was like a party! When he saw all these people. He was moved to tears again! He covered his eyes with his arm. “Sorry!”

One of them, a dark haired Chinese boy chuckled. “Don’t worry. Everyone cried at my 3E. You’re fine.”

Chu Zihang introduced him. “This is Lu Mingfei. He’s the president of the Student Union...”

“Kinda sorta... really I just kinda hang out here while other people do things for me.” He said bashfully.

A tall muscular blond grinned. “I’m Finger Von Frings.”

“And I’m Susie. Congratulations. Sounds like you passed.” She was a petite Chinese girl, making her the third Chinese in the group.

“I’m Zero. Pleasure.” Said a soft spoken blond girl with a Russian accent, who looked bored to be there.

“This is for you.” Chu Zihang handed him a small box covered in paper and a ribbon, like one of those Christmas gifts he’d seen in pictures.

“Thank you... can I open it?”

“If you want.” Chu Zihang mumbled.

Tigre pulled the ribbon and then opened the box after carefully shredding the paper. Inside was a brand new tablet computer. “It will be useful for studying.”

“Wow... thank you!” He laughed. Then he paused. “What is it?”

#Dragon Raja