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nicoline1998enilocin · 9 months

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Living our 'perfect' life | Part 2

PAIRING | Husband!Loki Laufeyson x Wife!Female!Reader

WORD COUNT | 2.4K

SUMMARY | Loki created a fake reality to be back with you, and he is absolutely delighted to have you back by his side. SHIELD isn't all that happy with his shenanigans, and when you find out about his plans too, you try to convince him to let you go for good. He doesn't take this lightly and when he loses you again, he completely spirals out of control as he tracks down the Darkhold to destroy anything and everything he possibly can.

WARNING(S) | This is your official trigger warning. Do not proceed if any of these topics upset you. Pregnancy & birth (non-explicit), slight gaslighting, an emotional goodbye, pretty major angst, little bits of fluff, Dark!Loki near the end.

A/N | This is part 2 of the request from @glitteryeggalmondherring, and it is important that you have read that one before reading this, otherwise this part won't make as much sense. Thank you for your amazing request and I'm hoping I could do it the justice it deserves! 🖤

Likes, comments and reblogs will be very much appreciated 💜

Main Masterlist | Loki Laufeyson Masterlist | Part 1

Loki couldn't possibly be happier than he is at this very moment. He got married to the love of his life, and now you're pregnant with two of his babies. When you found out that you're expecting twin boys it was a bit of a shock at first, but now the two of you are happier than you ever thought possible. ''So, what are we going to name them?'' you ask them as the two of you are walking through a store filled with all the baby stuff you could even dream of and more. ''I was thinking of giving them human names, so they would have that in common with you. Their last names are automatically going to be 'Lokison', so that way we have the best of both worlds!'' he says and you nod.

''Makes sense, but that doesn't answer my question,'' you said with a soft giggle. Loki could never get enough of hearing that, and he softly squeezed the hand he was holding as a sign of his love. A smile tugs at the corners of his mouth as he pulls you in for a little kiss, but your belly is in the way so it isn't as easy anymore. You're almost 7 months pregnant at this point, and seeing how they're two big guys, you're stretched pretty far already and kisses become less easy, but that doesn't mean the two of you don't kiss anymore. Oh no, ever since you got pregnant, Loki has gone almost feral in the bedroom and has to touch you whenever he can, wherever he can.

''What about Steven and James?'' you say, and Loki thinks about it. ''Are you wanting to name our kids after Captain America and the Winter Soldier?'' Loki says, and your face immediately turns sour. ''Why wouldn't I name the boys after them? The two of them are heroes and not to mention, they were some of my best friends! Besides, Bucky wasn't the Winter Soldier anymore when I met him,'' you pout, and Loki gives in. ''Okay, fine. We can name them after Steve and Bucky,'' he sighs because he knows he won't win this war.

The two of you picked out everything you needed for the nursery and took it home, wanting to get started sooner rather than later. When you were sitting in the rocking chair Loki got you as soon as the two of you found out you were pregnant, someone knocked on the door. ''I'll get it, you can stay here and sit pretty, darling,'' he says and you smile happily, not having to get onto your feet is an absolute blessing right now. When Loki opened the door he pretty much tried to shut it right away when he saw who was in front of it. Nick Fury was standing there with 2 SHIELD Agents, and he had a slight feeling about where this was going. It wouldn't end well in whatever way he would spin it, so he would very much like all three of them to leave them alone.

''Oh I don't think so, Laufeyson,'' Fury said when he tried to shut the door in his face again, without luck. ''We're here to talk, and if you just cooperate everything will be fine, and there won't be any more people hurt than you have so far,'' he says in a stern tone. Loki decided to just make a run for it and quickly turned around and upstairs, to where you were sitting in the nursery. All he cares about is you, and your twins of course. The three men are behind him but Loki is quick enough, shutting the door with his magic and sealing it so they can't get in. He grabs you and holds you close, consoling you as you sob softly, not sure what's happening but scared nevertheless.

They keep banging on the door and trying to barge it down, but Loki's magic is strong enough to keep it upright, and he just holds you close, whispering sweet nothings into your ear the entire time to calm you down. After about an hour and a half the three men go away and leave the two of you alone, but they're coming back with a lot more force later. Right now the two of you are just together, and you're perfectly content with that. ''Loki, why were those men trying to beat down our door...?'' You ask him, but he doesn't want to tell you.

''No reason darling, I've got everything under control right now. It's nothing you have to worry your pretty head about,'' he says, giving you soft kisses on your forehead. The fact that you feel cold to the touch is something Loki doesn't mind, he hasn't ever since he got you back. All he cares about is you, and the fact that he finally gets to live the life you have fantasized about countless times. “I love you, darling, as long as we’re together everything is going to be okay,” he says, rubbing soothing circles on your back. “Love you too,” you sigh into his chest, and your eyes are slowly falling shut from exhaustion.

Fury made true to his promise and came back again a few times, each time with no luck, but it was starting to wear you out at this point, especially with the way your pregnancy was progressing. Carrying one baby was already difficult, but you’re carrying double the amount of babies, so you also suffer from double the exhaustion. At this point, you’re about 7 months pregnant and you’re on complete bedrest, with Loki doting on your every need. He doesn’t mind because he loves taking care of you in every single way, so this comes naturally to him. However, when you wake up in the middle of the night with the world's worst cramping, Loki jolts awake, worry etched into his features.

“L-Loki, please! I think I’m in labor!” You pant and in an instant he’s on your side of the bed, ready to go to the hospital. “It’s okay darling, you and the boys are doing so well for me,” he says as he jumps into some clothing and helps you into a flowy dress before grabbing your hospital bag, right now you’re glad you packed that a while ago so it was ready to go in case your boys came early. In no time you’re in the car and on the way to the hospital, where you are immediately checked into the labor & delivery ward. It is a smooth labor - it’s Loki’s perfect world after all, and he doesn’t want you to be in pain or uncomfortable.

A few hours later you’re both holding one of your beautiful sons in your arms, and they are almost replicas of Loki. They both have jet-black hair, pale skin, and those gorgeous blue eyes that melt your heart every single time you look into them. And now you’re heart will melt three times as fast when you’re looking into them. “They’re beautiful,” you sigh and Loki agrees. “They are, and they’re ours,” he says with a big smile on his face. You have to stay in the hospital for a few days but once you’re allowed to go home, you couldn’t be happier. You have the love of your life and two beautiful sons. Life is pretty fucking perfect at this point.

But that feeling won’t last, however. SHIELD found out that Loki has created children in his reality, and it throws the entire universe out of whack. Not only should the reality not exist, the boys should never have been born either. When they have been home for less than a month, SHIELD is breaking down the door, but much to their chagrin, no one is home. Loki took you and the boys on ‘vacation’, or that is what he told you, at least. You weren’t entirely sure why, but you weren’t complaining because the four of you were very happy in your slice of heaven for the time being.

~ A few months later ~

The boys are growing like crazy, and enjoying every little bit of attention they can get, but you're getting increasingly suspicious nowadays. You've noticed that something is off about Loki, but you can't quite place your finger on why exactly, so you finally decide to bring it up to him. ''Loki, I know this might sound crazy, but why are Steven and James the only kids in Westview? I haven't seen any in all the time I've got you back...'' you say with uncertainty laced in your voice. ''You must be mistaken, dollface, they're all just sleeping right now! I think you've been so busy with our angels that you just don't notice them,'' he says, trying to sweet talk you out of knowing the truth, finding out about what he has done.

Your suspicion doesn't waver, however, and you bring it up more often, each time hearing the same excuse, and you're feeling like something must be wrong with you. Something must be wrong in your brain or the way you see the world because you trust Loki... right? Finally, every single piece falls into place when Fury and his men come by again, but this time you happen to be in the kitchen, and you can overhear their conversation. ''...asking for the last time, Laufeyson. Stop this or we will make you stop it!'' is all you heard and your suspicions were confirmed. This isn't real, you aren't alive and your boys never really existed. It is all a twisted reality Loki made up when he lost you.

She can't take it any longer and steps into the hallway where Loki is talking to Fury. ''Loki, you should listen to them. What you did isn't healthy for any of us, but mostly not for you,'' you start as you take his face in your hands, cupping them softly as you look into his eyes. ''Please, I need you to listen to these men, they only want what's best for you,'' you plead, but Loki doesn't want to hear any of it. He shakes his head slightly as tears roll down his face. ''Please, don't make me do this, Y/N, I can't go through this again,'' he says as he pulls you into a hug, holding you tight against his chest.

''I know you can, Loki. Because I promise I will find you in the next life, and every life after that one. We will always be together, but we can't be together like this. I'm not real, your boys aren't real, and this isn't healthy for you. Loki, it hurts me to say this to you, but you have to let me go. You are stronger than you think, but you're causing everyone around you so much pain,'' you tell him, now softly crying too. At least now you get to say goodbye to him, unlike the last time, when you were ripped out of life so suddenly during the war against Thanos. ''These months we shared were nothing short of perfect, but it has to end. I'm sorry to tell you, but it does,'' you say, and Loki squeezes his eyes shut to keep himself from crying again.

''I can't, darling, I really can't lose you-'' he says again, but you interrupt him. ''YES, you can! You are way stronger than you give yourself credit for! But at least now you get to say goodbye to me. This time I won't be taken from you like last time,'' you tell him and in less than a second your lips found his, giving him a soft and tender kiss. Your goodbye kiss. The last one you'll ever share, and as much as it breaks your heart to see him like this, you know it's for the best that he lets you go. ''You can say goodbye to the boys too if you want. They love you so much,'' you say as you pick both of them up. When he hears the little giggles coming from them he completely breaks.

He falls onto his knees in defeat, feeling like he lost everything all over again. ''I'm so sorry for every bit of pain I've ever caused you, and I wish I could take it all back,'' Loki sobs, tears staining your cheeks now too. ''I love you so much, Y/N, and even though it will hurt me more than anything, I will do it for you,'' he says, and slowly his magic starts to weaken, and the reality he created around all of you fades away. ''We love you, Loki, and I promise we will go and find you in every single lifetime after this time,'' is the last thing you say as Loki watches you, Steven, and James fade into nothing too. Sobbing uncontrollably, he whispers ''I will always love you, darling. In every lifetime, I will find you,''. It's the last thing he says before he gets taken away by Fury and his men.

~ 10 years later ~

Living without you again was absolute hell for Loki, and he changed completely. Where he used to be a loveable goofball, he has turned into the complete opposite, wreaking complete havoc wherever he goes. He has been on the run for a few years and is on the hunt for the Darkhold, which proved to be harder than he thought. He never got over the fact that he lost you again, and his mental health also rapidly declined. Falling into a deep depression and trying to end it multiple times, all without success, has led them to where he is now. Outside an abandoned building in the middle of nowhere, supposedly the place where the Darkhold is being housed.

He walks in and much to his surprise, the leads weren't wrong. There it lies in front of him, the book he has been desperately searching for, ready to be taken and used. He picks it up and lets out a maniacal laugh at the feeling of it. Finally, he can create a new reality where he is the leader, where he will have you and his sons, and where no one will ever try and stop him. With this book, he knows he's stronger than anyone in the universe, and he can't wait to get started. It doesn't take him long to create another reality, and there you are, right back by his side. The boys are on either of your sides, one next to you and one next to Loki. ''Welcome home, darling. I missed you,'' is all he says before taking your hand and walking into your new reality. Together.

#loki laufeyson #loki laufeyson fanfiction #loki laufeyson request #loki laufeyson x female reader #loki laufeyson x reader #loki laufeyson x y/n #loki laufeyson angst #loki laufeyson fluff #loki #loki fanfiction #loki request #loki x female reader #loki x reader #loki x y/n #loki angst #loki fluff

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foullegussy · 8 months

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I am making this post because Fontaine Archon Quest made me go down the theory rabbit hole and I need other people to agree with me that I'm not crazy.

Of course this post will have SPOLERS about the Archon Quest and some minor one about world quests, but I'll try to stay vague about them so everyone can still read this.

First thing off, fontaine is super related to Abyss stuff:

So far we have:

Childe actually finally dropping the things from his character story, giving us some weird Abyss fact that doesn't seem to be important yet (but i bet will become later on);

the whole Primordial Sea thing. I don't know if you saw that, but during the Archon Quest (in Marcel's underwater hideout) if you use elemental sight on the water it's black, just straight up black.

NOTHING has ever been black before, so that to me just screams ABYSS.

Also, it was flowing upwards, as in, in reverse, which reminds me of the reverse statue, the reverse city in the chasm, and all of that stuff. Then it would also make sense for it to "reverse" the life it created, dissolving people.

the world quests in Fontaine being very Abyss related, as well as the constant mention all over fontaine of the name Jakob Ingold, the one who allegedly first discovered the effects the water from Primordial Sea had on people (this is said during the Archon Quest).

So far, in every Archon Quest we've had the Fatui as main villains (except in Mondstadt, but then Signora kinda stole the spotlight, so we all forgot about the Abyss Mages), and the Abyss Order stuff has progressed independently with Dain, but I think they're trying to reintroduce the topic in the main quest this time.

One of my main theories is that the Tsaritsa is at least somewhat right in whatever her objective is (even if her Harbingers are deranged psychopaths), so when we'll eventually get to Snezhnaya it's gonna be some huge mess, but we're gonna get the key to piece together some facts that they've throwing at us since the beginning with no context, and find some common ground (Are she or Pierro still gonna be bosses we'll have to fight? Maybe. Will the common ground be fighting Celestia or maybe saving it from the Abyss that is, maybe, taking over? Also Maybe. I have some speculations, but no proof whatsoever. Just vibes)

The reason I think that the Tsaritsa is not our enemy and doesn't want the Gnosis to, I don't know, take over the world or some shit, is because then why are all the Archons so chill about giving their Gnosis away?

Many say that, well, Signora attacked Venti in Mondstadt, that means Venti didn't want to give his Gnosis to the Fatui, otherwise why would she have done that?

And maybe that's even true, but

why isn't Venti more worried about it, then?

after knowing Signora's backstory, she probably did it because of a personal grudge, ngl

Also, with every other archon it went very peacefully, especially with Zhongli. Zhongli who literally gave it away like it was nothing: if he truly cared about it he would have found another way to get his retirement, the Fatui weren't the only ones he could ask for help, but since he was already giving it away he probably thought he should get something out of it.

Ei too (and while she isn't technically one of the original Seven she has always been there as Makoto's twin, so she's still old enough to remember the Archon War), she literally didn't even have it on her and wasn't worried at all when Miko just straight up gave it away.

Even Nahida gave two of them away, the only thing that was holding her back was not the fact that she needed them, or what the Tsaritsa wanted with them, just the fact that one had just been used by Dottore to create a god to replace her, so she didn't exactly want to give him two of them.

So far all the gods we've met are: either old enough to know some stuff or the literal god of wisdom, who still knows some stuff thanks to Irminsul.

None of them seem too worried about the Tsaritsa's plan. (even mf Zhongli that literally signed and NDA is just chilling) (like, i know you know what the Tsaritsa is doing, and you're a really good guy who literally wants nothing more than his people to be safe, so if you're not stopping her i can't really think of her as a bad guy)

I made this long ass premise to say that when Lyney says that Arlecchino yes, wants the Gnosis, but also wants to save Fontaine, I-

like-

I think that could actually be true.

Or at least I don't think they're the ones behind all of the stuff that is going in in there (realistically speaking, we don't know if Arlecchino actually cares about Fontaine. I don't think she has plans about its downfall, but maybe she just doesn't give a fuck, whether they all drown or not), I think it either directly the Abyss Order, or just a consequences of abyssal energy on the land and water.

(also there's like, three Fatui tents in the entire map and from where they're placed it could actually be them just investigating what the fuck it's going on with the Abyss. I have 100% exploration, so i know i haven't missed any,,)

(from the official Interactive Map)

The Abyss being responsible might explain a bunch of stuff, like Childe being judged by the Oratrice guilty even when he's not.

Let's put some stuff together: Childe says that, while in the Abyss, he awakened "something", and that he still carries traces of that "something" inside of him.

The Oratrice is a divine mechanism, as such it is powered by divine energy.

In Fontaine we are introduced to Pneuma and Ousia.

Each of them is what could be called and "Archè", which (if memories of greek philosophy in high school don't betray me) means something like "original substance", something from which everything else originates (like Heraclitus thought it was fire, Thales thought it was water. I should go back to read it, i might find something there huh).

For Pneuma (the light one) this is easy to understand: after all we know that combined, the seven elements make the Light element, but that is just because the seven elements are actually the spectrum of the Light element broken down, and it is said that the Dragons lived in a realm made of Light. So Pneuma (which means something about life and stuff) is Light, and it is the original substance from which the seven elements derive.

One thing we know about Pneuma and Ousia is that they are opposites, they are both energy sources, and when interacting they annihilate each other, but also become more stable than when on their own.

Allegedly, this is probably also what Khaenri'ahn machines were powered on (because when the Ruin Serpent charges up he does that AoE attack where he shoot these yellow and purple blocks, which reminds me of Pneuma and Ousia; added to the fact that we know the Research Institute of Fontaine has been studying Dhari machines, this is probably some kind of confirmation).

Ousia literally means something about substance and matter (so on one hand you've got the "divine mind generating life" on the other you've got the matter, which remind me of the whole Descartes's res cogitans and res extensa, but whatever, another thing to look up again i guess).

If we're working on the whole "opposite to Pneuma" thing (so opposite to Light and elemental energy), then all that comes to mind is the Abyss (also referred to as the Void Realm).

This would tie back to Khaenri'ah and the fact that everything that everything that the Abyss touches gets the Mussolini treatment (this is a joke that literally only italians understand, sorry. Basically: it gets hanged upside down. down with the fascism boys)(i need to stop, sorry, i'm just in a silly goofy mood).

So divine things come from the Pneuma archè, that of Light: the Dragons, after them is the Primordial One, Celestia (Paimon??? The Travelers??? you know, the whole battle pass cutscene is hella sus).

The Abyss is a completely different archè: it exists outside of Teyvat and therefore has different laws (time is different there, we know from Childe's backstory), has taken on many different forms (oozing filth in the chasm, forbidden knowledge, etc) because its purest one is incompatible with the other realms.

(Do the Celestial Nails, placed in areas of high abyssal energy, contain enough divine power to generate an annihilation reaction, leading to funky but stable ley line disorders? Ice from Dragonspine doesn't melt, but doesn't spread either. Same for Tsurumi Island, the Eternal Oasis, and the Chasm)

Logically, there can only be one "original substance from which everything is generated", and the Abyss's presence on Teyvat is unnatural (the Abyss is, after all, a completely different world, it was Nibelung who sought out its power and opened the connection), so conflict is inevitable and again with the greek philosophy (still Heraclitus i believe, but i could be wrong): it is the conflict between opposites that generates things (such as energy).

(The first human civilization in Teyvat, the one that saw the conflict between the Primordial One and the Second Who Came, is based on ancient Greece. DO WE THINK IT'S A COINCIDENCE???)

Abyssal and elemental energy being opposites also explains why elemental creatures are so vulnerable against abyssal energy, why gods defeated in the Archon War escaped to die in the "dark sea" outside of Teyvat, and the annihilation that leads to stabilization probably explains why some abyssal creatures can wield elemental energy (Abyssal creatures that we know where humans at first).

If the waters in Fontaine got contaminated when the Cataclysm happened (and previous Hydro Archon died), then oceanids, elemental creatures, would suffer quite a lot and escape from Fontaine and MAYBE even get a little bit corrupted as well.

After all, the oceanid lady in the bottle event was extremely chill and lovely, while Rhodeia is as pleasant as hugging a cactus: is it just different personality or something similar to what happened with Apep (when she became a lot more angry after absorbing Forbidden Knowledge)? Doesn't Rhodeia also mention something about the waters in Qingce once being polluted as well (you know, right where the Chi was sealed? The Chi we know has something to do with abyssal energy from Baizhu's story quest)?

Just throwing these out there, it's very cool to realize how connected the Genshin world really is.

Going back to the Oratrice, a divine mechanism, who, maybe, sensed the Abyss in Childe and either

had a funky reaction

somehow knew the influence of the Abyss on Primordial Sea water (which after the world quests I can imagine how it could have happened), saw Childe's abyss-iness (abyssussy??? abussy??? amogus???) and went "Ah! Gotcha bitch"

the Jakob Ingold thing (because Childe is basically a herald at this point, mf can switch forms like my boy Enjou did back in Enkanomiya, god I miss him).

What would the abyss order have to gain by flooding Fontaine? Yeah, play the world quests. My boy Elynas is taking a nap bro (he chill tho so it's fine)

AND THAT'S MY PREDICTIONS. I guess. I might make more?? eventually??

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angelbitezzz · 9 days

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SO 👏

I been thinking really hard about how I'll be writing magic for whatever undertale related stuff I write.

If viewed as straightforward, we get an example of magic that could be reasonably tied to every human soul "trait" (more on that later) in undertale proper. Listed as follows:

Cyan magic: Tied to patience, requires targets to stop in order to avoid damage. Many monsters in Snowdin use it, though notably Papyrus, Sans and Asgore have used it

Orange magic: Tied to bravery, requires targets to move in order to avoid damage. Many monsters in Hotland use it, but a notable example would be Asgore as well

Green magic: Tied to kindness, could be reasonably tied to healing magic since healing is often associated with the color green, not to mention the game requires you to touch a green attack on some occasions (such as vegetoid's healing veggies). Plus Undyne and her turning you green, forcing you to stop moving but giving you the opportunity to protect yourself in the process

Blue magic: Tied to Integrity, likely something to do with gravity. Notable example is Papyrus and Sans, though Papyrus only uses it to weigh you down, versus Sans using it to throw you around (or maybe forcibly changing your direction of gravity?)

Yellow Magic: Tied to Justice, seems to be used strictly offensively? Notably, monsters don't use it against you, but Frisk is given the opportunity to use it during the Mettaton fights. However, I believe that the Karma poison damage from Sans's fight is because he's actively using Yellow magic at the time

Purple magic: Tied to perseverance. An oddball magic type, because the only Real example we get of it is during the Muffet fight. And since she's not technically part of the main cast despite having such a unique and notable boss fight, we don't get Much information on her personally to make any real guesses or judgements. And THIS is my sticking point, the thing I think about a lot

Muffet turns your soul purple, and you find yourself only able to move along the webbing that she strings up along the battle screen. You can't stray from the lines, you can only pass from line to line and move along them, until the magic wears off and you can move freely.

I have been thinking of how these magic types can be tied to elements as well, since we see a lot of certain kinds of monsters use certain types. I'll list my thoughts below

Cyan: Ice

Orange: Fire

Blue: Water/Or just straight up. Gravity. I know it's not traditional in a sense but we don't really get much on this one either bear with me

Green: Plant-life

Yellow: Electricity

Purple: And AGAIN I come up blank. Best I could figure? Earth. Rock. Or, conversely, the wind. Air. Something adaptable.

Purple stands out. It's a different sort of "trait" compared to the others, because all the others are straightforward. Anyone can define themselves by their Bravery, or their Kindness, or their sense of Justice, but who is defining themselves by how much they Persevere? Or Persist?

Soul Traits as I write them in TSoT or even Crossbones and Starstruck arent the end all be all of a person. It's simply tied to what chiefly motivates them. If they happen to be a mage, then the magic they use corresponds to that motivation, to that Color of magic. There's no right or wrong trait here, only intent.

Intent is important, intent is what causes you to be able to clear the genocide route so easily! Because the game knows you're going out of your way to grind—in short, you do more damage because you want to do more damage. If you don't want to hurt someone, then it's reflected in your attack. That is why monsters were so vulnerable during the war, because human vitriol made it all the easier for monster populations to be decimated.

Swinging back around to Perseverance: I think this trait—this magic, is completely personal. I think it reflects the user more so than the others because the point is to persevere—to survive. To Get Through This Shit. It's adaptability at its core.

Muffet is in a position where her family is split by the cold of Snowdin, and it seems like her family is extremely important to her, all posturing and threat displays and money hungry persona is masking the fact that she is concerned with and takes care of her own. And they care for her in turn—they do everything she asks, assist in the fight with you and help run her bake sakes, and upon her death you are greeted with a solemn scene of one of them rushing up to drop a flower where she stood and then rushing off again.

Adaptability and survival is important, but the best way to adapt and survive is to lean on others. Find your people, build your village and so on. She's never doing this alone. She knows this and it strengthens her. Her fight wouldn't be nearly as tough if she didn't have her spiders helping with it.

And ideally, a user of purple magic gets that strength from their loved ones. How that magic manifests depends on the person, as I've said before.

Muffet is a spider. She traps you in a web. Subtextually, one could argue that your connections to others are like a web expanding outwards to those that you know.

Angel, my self insert, has the perseverance soul trait. In Crossbones and Starstruck, you've seen her use purple magic once—to force her health to stop depleting. In a physical sense, she stopped the bleeding entirely, if only briefly. Ensuring her continued survival until help arrived. What else she can do with her magic, if anything, remains yet to be seen. But I'll tell you what—

Connections are important. Acknowledging your love for others only strengthens you. Electing to pretend that someone isn't important to you out of misguided fear of being rejected or misunderstood only hurts you, and thus, your magic.

:-)

#undertale #headcanons #the state of things fic #tsot fic #crossbones and starstruck #angel talks #hi ive been thinking about this a lot but im tooo tired to be concise so this is what you get #enjoy

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kylo-skywalkerr · 9 months

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It has come to my attention that some people apparently didn't know about the Duel of the Fates script??

Okay so here's some of the official concept art for the original (and better) direction that the sequels were meant to go down.

1. Many cool fights were cut from the script. Kylo was supposed to fight a form of Vader to outline how he's always been in the shadow of expectations that Vader left. The Knights of Ren actually got used for more than just a brief battle. The Knights hunted the Resistance actively, and as seen in the art, it wasn't just Ren or Rey fighting them. In fact, Rey kills them, and it makes her fear that she's slipping to the darkside. Rey runs off as Luke had and goes into hiding so that she doesn't use her teachings to be anything like Kylo. In her fight with Kylo Ren, she's blinded.

2. The story also went a far darker route. Years had passed between the movies. Characters were older, and changes were made.

For example, Rose and Finn get sent away to a First Order labor camp for their crimes against the FO.

While I can't find an image for it, the Resistance also takes fewer prisoners with them. Rigging FO ships to explode if they attempted to escape, disguising bb8 as a FO droid to rob their ships, all that fun stuff that wasn't featured as much in the sequels we got.

My favorite part was that Hux was the chancellor. All of the power he wanted was his, and Kylo was alright relinquishing it. It was proof that they were stronger together, with Hux admiring the force and even having a lightsaber collection of his own. Chancellor Hux wishes he had the force and is frustrated that he doesn't, so he keeps Kylo as a tool to use instead of banishing him from the FO or simply killing him.

The darker aspect comes from what Hux does after the Resistance defeats the First Order. In shame for all that Hux lost, he commits suicide with a lightsaber. Another thing to note is that if you read about it, it's mentioned that the lightsaber was supposed to be purple. The concept art, however, shows a red one, like Kylo's. (I'll have to note this particular fact down for later.)

3. Kylo gets stronger. A Sith holocron guides him to a new master, from whom he learns to drain life from and use force lightning.

Eventually, these teachings are used to kill Kylo's new teacher, bringing him closer to the dark side than he was before, despite the internal conflict still being present.

Kylo was also intended to get a new mask! It may or may not have been intended to be a show of his journey, but imo the concept art seemed interesting enough to note.

4. How Kylo's redemption was handled. While hunting a sith artifact, the artifact senses the light in him and pretty much explodes, leaving him disfigured and severely injured. The locals of the planet, despite knowing who he is, help him recover. Kylo begins to reconsider his actions due to the kindness he was shown and works his way towards redemption.

He still dies, but only when Leia stops him from killing Rey. He sacrifices his life to save her as in the original, making his death the endgame in both scripts.

5. Relationships. Reylo isn't a thing, I think she actually kisses Poe or something at a point. Rose and Finn are canon and at the end of their story have force sensitive children. That could have been in the original if not for Disney's "issue" with them being together. (That's not a story for today)

6. Rey's true name was revealed to be Rey Solana. Not Skywalker.

To conclude, the script was fascinating to me. There was redemption, suicide, new characters, different relationships to explore, and so much potential for a darker yet more interesting story than what we got. Thank you for reading!

Here's some sources if you'd like to read more about it yourself, those were just key things to note about the script!

(And of course, a source for where I got the concept art from)

#I loved the potential so much for this script #btw are you proud of me for not mentioning kylux in this one because you know i wanted to #they were so kylux coded in this script...#star wars #star wars sequel trilogy #star wars sequels #kylo ren #general hux #ben solo #duel of the fates script #leia organa #rey skywalker #finn #rose tico #poe dameron #knights of ren

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1863-project · 1 year

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I've been seeing screenshots of this tweet making the rounds lately:

I did a thread on Twitter adding some historical context, but it's easier to write long-form stuff on websites like Tumblr, so I'll do it here, too.

This is a screenshot from a 1944 election propaganda film called Hell-Bent For Election. The locomotives do indeed represent FDR (left) and his rival, Thomas E. Dewey (right). Dewey would famously try to run again in 1948 and was considered the favorite against Harry Truman, leading to the famous Dewey Defeats Truman newspaper headline. The film was directed by Chuck Jones (yes, that Chuck Jones) and distributed by United Auto Workers. It was made amidst WWII, and it isn't subtle about making sure the viewer knows a vote against FDR is a vote for Hitler. (Weirdly enough, there's a character that can easily be read as an antisemitic caricature trying to get the protagonist to vote for Dewey despite what we know was happening in retrospect; this is actually quite jarring and uncomfortable from a historical perspective.)

OP probably doesn't know this, but FDR isn't being depicted as a bullet train. The Shinkansen doesn't show up until the 1960s, and at any rate, the US was very much at war with Japan at the time this film was made, so there's no way FDR would be depicted using Japanese railroad technology even if it did exist at the time. What he is being shown as, however, is a streamliner.

Notice this gap here? Streamlined steam locomotives usually still had their drive wheels exposed to a degree to make maintenance easier. In particular, FDR resembles a New York Central Mercury (4-6-4 Hudson) with his chin as an added cowcatcher.

The streamlined cladding for the Mercury was designed by Henry Dreyfuss, who would go on a few years later to design arguably the most famous streamlined NYC Hudson locomotives: the Dreyfuss Hudsons.

You can see a bit of influence from these in the FDR locomotive, as well, as it has a ridge along the top. These pulled prestigious passenger trains known for high speed, including the flagship 20th Century Limited. FDR was, of course, from old money and could afford that sort of thing, but that's likely not the reason they depicted him as a streamliner here.

Streamlined locomotives emerged in the 1930s despite the economic hardships in the United States at the time. They were designed to evoke a sense of speed and modernity, and they represented a society moving forward. By depicting FDR as one, it projects a sense of strength, especially in comparison to the tired old Dewey locomotive, which looks nearly half a century old. This was a crucial portrayal considering that FDR had polio (or possibly Guillain-Barré Syndrome, another explanation) and due to ableism he had to hide that affliction to avoid being seen by opponents (both political and wartime) as "weak." Additionally, Dewey's consist (the train cars he's pulling) is made up of outdated policies, including a caboose labeled with "Jim Crow."

I find the use of a streamliner rather ironic because at the time this film was made, many streamlined locomotives were being un-streamlined so the extra metal could be used for the war effort. It's a bit of an odd choice from that angle, but it's clear that the imagery of streamliners and what they represented in the minds of the public was still going strong.

Also worth noting: yes, FDR won the November 1944 election and began a fourth term in office. He died only a few months later, in April 1945, and was succeeded by his Vice President, Truman, who finished his term and then, as mentioned above, beat Dewey again in an upset to win a full term in 1948.

(Truman gleefully holding up the incorrect Chicago Tribune at St. Louis Union Station, 1948)

So that's that, I suppose! You can watch the film here, as it's in the public domain:

youtube

(If you enjoy my historical writing, consider donating to my Ko-Fi so I can keep AGI running as smoothly as the 20th Century Limited! Thanks for reading!)

#history #I like trains #WWII #FDR #Thomas Dewey #Youtube

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lord-squiggletits · 7 months

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On my Pharma apologism bullshit again

So like, I've made posts in the past about how Pharma's trauma at the hands of Tarn/the DJD and his refusal to call for help makes sense given what we later learned about Tarn/the DJD's capabilities for isolating and brutally murdering targets. Basically, I said that it makes sense that Pharma is largely treated as a villain by the narrative because the present-day of the story takes place entirely during Pharma's madness/villain arc and that's the only function he has in the story: as a super tertiary villain that's not meant to be Super Deep. Since a lot of Pharma's character is stuff that you can only infer via retroactive lore scattered throughout future series, and the narrative never brings it up so you have to put the lore together yourself, it makes sense that Pharma's first/present-day characterization as a "mad doctor" is how he's primarily remembered.

But honestly, I still have to call bullshit on Ratchet immediately assuming Pharma was evil and working for the DJD. You don't have to sympathize/apologize for Pharma based on later lore that only we as the reader are subject to; you can find signs of it literally throughout MTMTE 5-6, the same issues that introduce Pharma and treat him as if he's simply a mad doctor/evil Autobot.

We establish that the facility of Delphi is on "the edges of DJD territory"

As characters introduce more details about the DJD, we find out a lot of "fun" facts about them:

They specialize in "extreme punishment" aka torture, as wee see a mech who looks like they've been completely stripped of armor and literally has their guts hanging out

They punish Decepticons who defect or turn traitor

Just witnessing the aftermath of what they do is enough to traumatize people (the Swerve line is played as a joke of how he was upset he couldn't talk, but the root cause of him not being able to talk was being traumatized by seeing the DJD's work)

Multiple Decepticons, including Drift who just earlier in MTMTE 5, tried to play off his fear of the DJD, say that they would rather be killed or euthanized than face the DJD

And, most importantly in regards to Pharma... the DJD were literally going to kill everyone at Delphi and destroy the whole facility if Pharma didn't comply with Tarn's demands.

And also: Delphi is harboring an ex-Decepticon who defected to the Autobots, aka one of the very people who the DJD are employed to track down and kill in the most gruesome of ways.

So in other words, not only would the DJD have wanted to kill everyone at Delphi simply for being Autobots, it also stands to reason that they would have inevitably come to Delphi at some point in time because they would've come for Ambulon and, presumably, Pharma's deal with Tarn was the only thing keeping Ambulon safe (as we can extrapolate since his t-cog deal was keeping everyone at Delphi safe).

Though of course, the characters in the story (I'll focus on Ratchet for now) aren't privy to all of this. But I still find it rather callous of Ratchet to react the way he does

Considering that before this conversation, he already knew the points mentioned above (including having the personal experience of Decepticons/Drift telling him they'd rather die than meet the DJD)

And what rubs salt in the wound is that later on Ratchet acknowledges that

For most of his life, Pharma was a fantastic doctor.

Later on in certain flashbacks we also find out that Pharma and Ratchet worked together at the DMF before the war even started and continued to work with each other throughout the war (such as when they saw all the dead Wreckers cadets), dating their friendship as having lasted at least 4 million years long. So basically, Ratchet has an intimate knowledge of Pharma from them being friends virtually their entire lives.

Then Ratchet sees Pharma go from "a fantastic doctor" to a raving lunatic killing his patients and just....... doesn't notice anything amiss with this? The ONE PERSON IN THE UNIVERSE who was closer to Pharma than anyone else just didn't question this sudden, radical change in Pharma's demeanor? Even after knowing about the DJD being on Messatine? Even after being personally told that people would rather die than face the DJD? And Ratchet's first reaction to the whole situation is to say angrily to Pharma "You harvested organs on behalf of the DJD?!" as if it was some sort of choice Pharma did willingly.

It's not so much Ratchet being mad about Pharma killing people that gets to me, it's the aspect of how Ratchet was Pharma's best friend for 4+ million years, used to be inseparable from him at one point, and should therefore have known Pharma well enough to understand when he was acting out of character, both in regards to betraying his medical ethics and in regards to behaving erratically and acting stark raving mad.

Like really, this is just a personal thing, but as someone who HAS a best friend that I've been friends with for almost half my life at this point (and soon we'll have been friends for longer time than we didn't know each other), I can't fathom treating her the way Ratchet treated Pharma here. Anger and a feeling of betrayal, sure, but assuming the absolute worst of Pharma and not giving a single lick of care towards the circumstances all pointing flaming arrows to a sign that says "PHARMA WENT INSANE FROM BEING BLACKMAILED BY THE DJD"? That's just low, man.

TLDR: I thought that the sympathetic Pharma lore wrt his fear of/paranoia about the DJD was only established retrospectively, but it turns out the signs of Pharma being forced/driven mad by the DJD were there literally from the start of the Delphi arc and Ratchet just didn't give a shit about it I guess.

#squiggposting #pharma apologism #honestly the funniest part of all this is that in the midst of a story wehre like #every other character has committed war crimes and gets forgiven/people move on #all the characters took one look at pharma and were just like 'nah he's evil'#it's funny to imagine that they just didn't like him and that's why they abandoned him bc it's like #the sheer hilarity of this 4 mil war where people hold blood grudges over the atrocities committed #and these actual crimes can also coincide with. 'yeah i didn't give that guy a chance bc i just don't like him'#anyways. sorry for being cringe. it will happen again

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bella-rose29 · 6 months

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Not Your Lover - Chapter 6

This is the slightly safer version (it's still kinda spicy tho) <3

I have also written a more explicit version of this chapter for anybody who is over the age of 18 which can be found here, so please don't read that one if you're younger or even just uncomfortable with that. hopefully this one is more accessible to everyone! (please let me know if it's still too much and I'll edit it)

(help I realised I don't actually know how to write sfw make out scenes)

Word count: 3.8k

Warnings: heavy making out, like heavy heavy, implied sex, swearing, mentions of the civil war from Nik's side, Davor is still a stalker

Tag list: @a-candle-maker, @bubybubsters, @el-de-phi, @hauntedethusiasttragedy, @iambored24601, @itsyoboo-jassy, @karensirkobabes, @kentucky-criedfricken, @little8sun, @mrsklockwood, @mvidaaaa, @nalie-98, @naushtheaspiringauthor, @notoakay, @pietromaximoffsbabe, @simbaaas-stuff

As always, let me know here if you would like to be added or removed from my Nikolai tag list! <3

Y/n and Nikolai had settled into a routine within the first two days of staying in the same room, and he was starting to blur the lines in his head of what was real and what was fake.

It was dangerous, walking this line, especially since one wrong move could ruin everything that the two of them had built, but Nikolai knew that he was extremely close to throwing himself fully past reality. They had kept the pillow wall the first night, but when they had woken in roughly the same position as they had the first time that they shared a bed it made sense to forgo the divider completely. Neither of them appeared to be acknowledging it while asleep, and it saved some effort in the evening when they were getting ready for bed.

Work on the building had continued in much the same way as before, although Nikolai noticed that there was a little more tension in the air than usual. None of this was helped by the fact that he couldn't let his demon out at night anymore, and had resorted to staying late at the mansion after Y/n had headed back to the hotel room so that it stopped giving him a headache. Davor was still watching the two of them, following Nikolai around when he tried to go on a late night walk to take his demon fishing, and it was starting to get annoying. He had half a mind to confront the man, but somehow whenever Nikolai actually wanted to see Davor, he wasn't anywhere to be found. Y/n had mentioned that he was doing the same to her, but she didn't seem nearly as bothered about it.

Currently they were working on the floorboards of the first room, having pulled up the old ones and throwing them out, and Nikolai couldn't help but stare at Y/n every now and then as she worked. His demon snickered at him in his head, and Nikolai muttered a quiet "shut up" under his breath.

"Sorry? Did you say something?"

"Huh? No, nothing."

"Oh. Never mind."

They worked in silence again after that, the only sounds being the new floorboards being put down.

By the time sunset came around a few hours later, they'd managed to lay the whole floor, and Nikolai had replaced the windows, letting in the evening sun. He wiped his brow, wishing more than anything that he could take off some layers (but that would mean showing his scars for longer than a few seconds, and he didn't feel like having that conversation with Y/n yet. She'd probably also stab him or something).

"You alright? You look pretty sweaty."

"Yeah, I'm alright. Hopefully this heatwave brings in tourists," he replied, turning to look at her. That was a mistake, apparently, since he couldn't do anything but think about how gorgeous she looked in the golden light streaming in and lighting up her skin, making her look ethereal.

He was so screwed, and he knew that there wasn't any coming back now. He'd very nearly kissed her the other night, when she'd come in crying about her mother and he'd wiped away her tears, but the demon just had to pick that moment to make a noise. Nikolai had scolded it the whole way back to the hotel, and it had the good grace to at least seem sorry for getting in the way.

It had been a little awkward since, neither of them saying anything about the fact that they had very nearly kissed purely because they felt like it, and the tension was starting to kill Nikolai. They kept waking up tangled in each other too, and although he knew he shouldn't, he held on to her a little longer in the mornings, and his touch lingered a moment more when he passed her things. Whether she'd noticed, he had no idea, but at least she hadn't told him to stop being weird yet.

~~~

Nik was being weird.

He kept staring at Y/n, for one, and every now and then he would hold on to her for longer than fake boyfriends probably should. He was staring now, in fact, although why she had no idea. She was covered in dirt and sweat from working all day, both in the bakery and in the mansion, and she definitely needed a bath. Maybe he was staring at her because of that? Yeah, that made more sense. Although when she looked at him (not that she was sneaking glances or anything), she couldn't deny how gorgeous he looked in the light, the sunset making his golden hair glow.

He kept talking to himself too, and Y/n was starting to worry that he was going mad. She'd talked to Gregor about it that morning, and apparently Nik was doing it while he worked in the workshop. Gregor also looked like he knew something else, but despite Y/n's best efforts she couldn't get it out of him. The man was notoriously good at keeping secrets, but if it was about Nik then she wanted to know.

"I'm sure he'll tell you in his own time, Y/n/n," was all he had said, and Y/n had huffed and left not long after.

She snapped herself out of her thoughts, blush rising when she realised that she'd zoned out looking at him, and turned back to the wall that she was painting. They'd done good work today; Nik had managed to get the new windows in with the help of her father, and the three of them had finished off the floor. Y/n had picked out the paint a while ago, and had made a start on covering the walls.

"You know," she started, and out of the corner of her eye she saw Nik turn to face her. "I think we can do this. How long have we got left now, eight days?"

"Yeah, I think so. There's still the two other rooms to do though. I know they're both clear but it's going to be a stretch to get them done on top of this one. It's taken us this long to get this room nearly ready."

"What happened to mister 'we can do it!', huh? I've got a plan, don't worry."

"Is your plan hiring the entirety of Taya? Because I might be an optimist but this is bordering on impossible."

"I thought that nothing was impossible, only improbable," she quipped, mocking his voice.

"Was that... was that meant to be me?"

"I thought it was an excellent impression. Did you have a problem with it? I mean, personally I thought there were two of you for a moment."

Nik laughed, shaking his head. "You're ridiculous," he said, looking at her fondly. Y/n smiled lightly back at him, and they got lost in each others' gazes. Nik suddenly snapped out of it, whipping his head back to the curtain pole he was adjusting. Y/n moved her own attention back to the wall, feeling her face heat up.

Shit.

~~~

An hour or so later, the sun had fully set, and Nikolai had had to turn the chandelier on in the room so that he and Y/n could continue to work. The demon had, for once, helped Nikolai out, since its laughing at Nikolai and Y/n gazing at each other made him realise what he was doing. He'd quickly gone back to what he was doing, and a moment later he heard the brush of the paint on the wall.

Now they were in separate rooms, and Nikolai had looked to check that the demon wouldn't be seen before letting it out.

"No noise, alright? The second you make a noise you're back in, understood?" The demon had nodded and padded off into a corner of the room, starting to use its tail as a brush, collecting the remaining rubbish on the floor. Nikolai felt proud of it once more, seeing it trying to help, and hoped that it had learned something valuable from working hard. Saints, he sounded like the demon's teacher. Nikolai frowned, shuffling furniture around the room. He supposed he was in a way, teaching it how to be nicer. Maybe he'd be able to let it out more if he knew it would behave. He was glad for the distraction of the demon, since it stopped him from thinking too hard about Y/n, and having to keep half an eye on the little bastard was rather entertaining at times. It was a little like having a child, except the child was quite literally a demonic entity of darkness and destruction that enjoyed ripping people's faces off and generally making their lives complete and utter misery. Nikolai suddenly wondered if that was how Baghra had felt about the Darkling, and shuddered at the thought of baby Aleksander. The demon noticed, growling lowly at its creator, and Nikolai called it over softly, careful not to alert Y/n.

"Come here, that's it, there we go," he whispered, settling on the floor as his demon came and rested its head on his lap. It was strange, doing this, but he could sense that his demon was disturbed by Nikolai's thoughts of the Darkling. While the man had been responsible for the separation between Nikolai and his demon, the latter now shared the resentment that Nikolai harboured. No doubt it was remembering the battle with Fjerda too, and the multiple brushes with death. Since then they had only become closer, reaching an agreement that they would die for each other if needed.

"Nik? You alright in there?" Both Nikolai and his demon turned to look at the doorway where Y/n's voice had come from, and they glanced at each other before the demon crept off into the shadows.

"Yep, I'm alright." He pushed himself off of the floor just as Y/n walked in, paint on her trousers.

"I think I'm gonna head out now, I've done what I can on the walls. You coming?"

"Yeah, sure. Let me just grab my things," he smiled, and she returned it, heading back into the front room. He took the demon back in, telling it to stop fussing and hurry up, and followed her out, collecting his jacket from where he'd slung it over one of the armchairs.

~~~

They made it back to the hotel no problem, although Y/n could have sworn that she saw Davor following them when they went round a corner, and when they were up in Nik's room he pulled out a bottle of kvas and two glasses.

"Drink?"

"Sure."

Davor following them wasn't too disturbing for Y/n, given he was a deeply untrusting person and was probably trying to expose Nik and Y/n's relationship for what it was, but Nik seem more concerned. He brought it up as he poured, passing one glass to Y/n and taking his own over to the sofa in front of the fireplace. Despite the heatwave, the hotel room was somehow freezing (Y/n had no idea how the owners managed it), so they'd lit a fire.

"You really aren't worried about him stalking us?"

"No, not really. Why are you so worked up about it?"

"Um... because it's stalking? It's quite literally illegal. Also, what happens if he finds out none of this is real?"

Her heart hurt at his words, but she quickly dismissed it as nothing. "Nobody will believe him if he says anything, because they like us a whole lot more. Everybody knows he likes stirring up trouble for no good reason, and I've got a reputation, hell, you have a reputation now. We'll be fine." She sipped her kvas, grateful for the burn as it went down. It stopped her thinking too hard about Nik.

"If you're sure," he frowned, and Y/n wanted to smooth the lines on his face with her fingertips. He settled into the sofa next to her having finished fiddling with the fire, and it was cramped enough that his thigh brushed against hers. She pulled her legs up, turning so that her back was resting against the arm and she was facing him. Nik angled his body slightly so that he was looking towards her, shifting in his seat in a way that had Y/n hiding behind her glass and trying desperately to not think too hard about his lap. "You alright?" he asked, amusement in his eyes and a smirk on his face, and Saints damn it she was blushing and he fucking knew it.

"Yeah, I'm alright." He hummed, and Y/n felt her cheeks grow even warmer. "What? I am!"

"Okay! You just look a little... flushed," he responded, and she could hear the laughter in his voice, making her glare at him. "There it is! I've missed that glare," he joked, only succeeding in deepening her frown.

"Fuck off," she muttered as she sipped her kvas, and he laughed, loud and bellowing. Saints, she wanted to make him laugh more often.

Sleeping next to Nik tonight would be difficult, she decided as she watched him.

~~~

A few hours and half a bottle of kvas later, Nik and Y/n had loosened up significantly, and were spilling secrets that she would never dare to tell him were she sober.

He'd confessed that he was absolutely terrified of spiders, having been nicknamed 'Nikolai the spider squealer' by his childhood best friend, and was considered a general menace to society as a small boy.

"Oh yeah, I find that so difficult to believe," Y/n giggled sarcastically, and Nik's responding pout only made her laugh harder.

"What is that supposed to mean? I am an absolute delight to have around!" He put on a look of offence, and Y/n nearly spilled her drink when she held her sides from laughing. "Seriously!" He was laughing now, spluttering as he spoke and unable to get words out properly. A few minutes later when they'd calmed down enough (it took a while since whenever they looked at each other they burst out laughing again), he spoke up again. "Go on, your turn. I think it's been my turn the last three times," he frowned, trying to count in his head. Y/n thought for a moment, before coming up with something.

"Saints, I don't know why I'm even gonna tell you this," she laughed, pressing her hand to her forehead. "Okay. So, basically, I've never... I have never... you know." She waved her hand in the general direction of her lower half. Nik's eyes went wide.

"Wait. You've never had an orgasm?"

"No, I haven't!"

"No wonder you're so fucking grumpy all the time, Saints!"

"Oi! It's not exactly my fault! Davor never could and neither can I, I gave up trying to get myself off like six months ago."

"Bet I could," Nik said, sipping his drink.

"...What?"

"I said I bet I could."

They looked at each other, Nik studying her over his glass and Y/n feeling increasingly flustered at the direction their conversation had taken.

"Prove it."

He said nothing, still just looking her, and she was starting to regret her words. "Sorry. Stupid idea. Forget it." She turned her face away, staring into the fire. He was yet to say anything, and the atmosphere turned awkward.

"Are you?" he said, and Saints, why was his voice so low? "Are you sorry?"

"No," she whispered, and she was hyper-aware of the sound of his glass clinking against the side table as he set it down. She turned to look at him, breath leaving her body at the sight of him closer than before, eyes filled with something dangerous. She put her own glass down, nearly spilling it since she hadn't taken her eyes off of Nik. "Why?"

"Because I want to prove it."

Something snapped then, and Y/n surged forward to grab at his shirt with her hands and pull him in for a kiss. He didn't seem to know what to do with himself for a moment, but after barely a second he was responding, wrapping his arms around her waist as he pulled her into his lap, moaning softly, and Saints she wanted him to do it all over again. Her hands moved up to play with his hair the way that she'd wanted to since their first kiss in the square all those days ago, tangling in the locks and tugging every now and then as his hands grasped her hips. She wasn't sure how long they were there for, exploring each other with their hands and tongues, but every second of it was just as good as she'd imagined. He'd moved her hair out of the way to kiss down her neck, alternating between soft kisses and gently biting the skin, drawing sounds out of her that Davor never could. "Nik," she whispered into his hair, not missing the way his grip tightened on her hips at the sound of his name. He slowly dragged his head back up, kissing as he went, before he pressed another to her mouth.

"Yeah?" His pupils were blown, the blue of his eyes nearly non-existent, and his lips were slightly swollen from kissing her.

"You gonna prove it or not?" she breathed, and he could only stare at her for a moment before nodding, and then she felt his hands at the top of her trousers, pulling up the fabric of her shirt. He hadn't taken his eyes off of her, silently asking if this was still alright, and they only broke eye contact when her shirt slipped over her head, landing on the floor a second later. He pulled her back in, kisses a little more gentle than before, and Y/n went to take Nik's shirt off. He hesitated slightly, and she paused, not wanting to make him uncomfortable. "This okay? You don't have to, if it's... I just... wanted to feel you, I guess." She blushed at the admission, and he smiled softly at her.

"It's okay, darling," and Saints she'd forgotten how her stomach dipped at the pet name. "I've just... got a lot of scars," he whispered, and Y/n immediately went to reassure him.

"That's okay. You're helping me out, not talking about your scars. but equally if you wanna do that then I'll listen," she said, pressing a kiss to his forehead, and she practically felt him melt under her. He moved back a little, giving himself room to take his clothes off. Nik paused for a moment, looking at his gloves, then made a decision and yanked them off, chucking them on to the side table next to his discarded drink. He glanced back up at her, waiting for her reaction as he settled his hands lightly on top of her thighs. Y/n could only stare at them, reaching out to hold one with her own hand but not quite touching. Most of the veins were black, and his fingers were the same, and as Y/n finally took hold of his hand, lacing their fingers together and turning his arm in her grip she noticed that the black veins continued partway up his forearms. "What..." She didn't finish, not sure where to go from there. Nik was transfixed by their interlocked hands, and his thumb was stroking hers.

"The Darkling," was his only response, and Y/n didn't know what to do other than press a gentle kiss to his mouth, cupping his face with her free hand. She pulled away, resting her forehead against his, and her hand moved down to rest over his heart.

"Does it hurt?"

"No. Not anymore."

She kissed him again, slow and careful, still holding his hand in hers.

"Do you wanna carry on?"

"Yes," he said into her mouth, hands sliding up higher on her thighs, pulling her closer to him, and Saints, he wasn't lying. She moved her hands to his shirt, tugging at the hem and lifting the fabric all the way off. Her fingers traced the lines of his chest, spending extra time on the scars and marks she found, and Nik's hands came up to rest on her back, pulling her flush against him. They kissed again, this time with more hunger, and in a sudden movement Nik had flipped them so that Y/n was lying on the sofa, legs half dangling off the edge as he situated himself between them, never taking his lips off of hers. Eventually he moved further down, and she lost all sense of time as Nik touched her, drawing out new sounds with every movement right up until he took her into paradise.

~~~

He moved back up her body a while after, having left soft kisses behind as she came down from the high, and when she brought his face down to kiss her it was soft and more loving than it should have been given they weren't actually together.

"You alright?" he asked, nose nudging against her cheek. She could only nod, wiped out. She could feel him smiling, the cheeky fucker, and she half-heartedly slapped his arm, trying to not think too hard about how toned it was. "What?" he smiled, pulling back to look at her.

"Nothing, just, you're a lot more... I don't know," she trailed off, blushing at his stare. "You have very nice arms," she decided on, and Nik's immediate laughter made her flush even more. "Shut up," she mumbled, turning her face to hide in the back of the sofa. She felt Nik's hand cup her chin, bringing her face back towards his as he planted a kiss on her lips, lingering for a while.

"Thank you," he whispered, amused smile still present. "You have very nice tits, if that helps."

"Nik!"

~~~

Nikolai had no idea where the two of them went from here, but he wouldn't take back a single second of it.

He'd helped clean Y/n up, and then had helped her move to the bed, passing her one of his clean shirts to sleep in. He went without the gloves as he got into bed next to her, leaving them sat on the table in front of the fire. He was just pulling his boots off when he felt Y/n's fingers on his back, tracing over the scars from the demon's wings. Her hands flattened on his back, then moved around his torso and under his arms as she pushed herself against him, pulling his head to hers to kiss him. The angle was awkward, so Nikolai shook his boots off and turned around, cupping her cheek to deepen the kiss. He clambered in next to her, breaking away, and pulled the sheets up over them. At Y/n's pout he simply chuckled, and brought her down to lie next to him, and she slung her arm over his chest and her leg over his, falling asleep not long after.

Nikolai stayed awake a while longer, thinking over everything that had happened. He really didn't know where they went from here, but no matter what, he needed to tell her the truth before they got too far in.

Chapter 7

#grishaverse #netflix shadow and bone #nikolai lantsov #nikolai lanstov x reader #nikolai lanstov x y/n #nikolai x reader #nikolai x y/n

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raayllum · 2 years

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I feel like the owl house fandom takes things way too srsly esp with ships and preferences on characters. idk I love hunter and amity's backstory and I love luz but I'm more interested in hunter and amity's backstory that doesn't make me racist their storylines are more interesting

So this probably won't be what you expected or asked for but I'm grabbing the opportunity anyway to address some of the ways I think TOH falters from a Storytelling perspective and why I think those issues (as well as how young a lot of the fans are, although when I was 11-13 in fandom I was much more chill and "live and let live" so just shows what a decade can do in terms of fan community) unintentionally perpetuate some of what you mention.

Also don't think you're racist for preferring Amity and Hunter (Hunter, Gus, and Luz are my faves) but I do think TOH has some issues with how it handles its characters of colour, so I am going to touch on that. While I'm white. this is reflected on / verbatim from conversations I've had with Black and Asian friends / fans of the show and how racial stuff can tend to play out in fandom (circa 2013 onwards from personal experience of how people have treated fave characters, like Finn from Star Wars, in the past).

That said, I do still like the show. I love the strong found family, everything surrounding Eda and her allegories for mental health are super solid and important, I'm thrilled by the queer rep (I’m queer & watched Korrasami happen live), and I don't think a show has to be perfect or to check off my personal preference to be good. But I do think the show is... an interesting mixed bag for a few key reasons I haven't seen anyone talk about, so here they are.

Under a read more bc this gets long, like, real long, even though there’s only four things on this freaking list, LMAO. For whoever reads it, have fun!

1. The Owl House writes like first impressions don't matter.

This is one of the biggest things in the show that breaks elements of setup + payoff. After all, if your setup is misleading or unaddressed by payoff later, characters and plot lines may come across as stilted. This also ties into other areas (such as screentime) that I'll touch on later.

By far the character who has broken setup the most, though, is Amity. For example, Amity is introduced as someone who has bullied Willow for years, even when no one else is around (i.e. it's not a pure performance), and even though they used to be friends when they were young. Their friendship fall out / Amity distancing herself from Willow is explained by Amity being forced to by her parents, and understandably struggling with how to deal with and explain it as a child.

I haven't seen the last few episodes of S2 (aka I got up to "Hollow Mind") and I was disappointed in S2A when it seemed like this plot element would never be addressed again. So I was very pleased to learn that there is an episode in S2B that talks about their friendship. Except... it doesn't address the bullying. Because yes, Amity tried to protect Willow by distancing herself... but Amity also didn’t need to Bully Willow, like, at all. Not within the confines of the story and not within the landscape of the character; her parents didn’t tell her to be cruel to Willow. She chose to do that. Repeatedly. And that facet of their bond... has never been adequately addressed. It could be, in the future (but I personally doubt it).

It’s particularly strange, because Luz was 1) canonically bullied in the human realm and 2) perpetually struggled at making friends. It makes sense that she’d be extra against bullies and protective over the friends she does have, and wanting to see real change before bonding with a practical stranger (even if Amity did show a slightly nicer side at the end of “Covention,” it wasn’t an even ratio whatsoever, either of her niceness or Luz’s meanness). But we’ll circle back to this.

We see this issue of initially bad behaviour being overruled, sometimes retconned, or ignored to the point of being rewritten a few more times in the series.

The one that ties into Amity’s character are her siblings. In their debut episode, they have plans to share private pages of their little sister’s diary. This is mentioned in another episode as something they’re trying to make up for, but they weren’t there when shit hit the fan at the library, anyway. So we never see 1) why they were going to be so cruel to Amity in the first place (and I have siblings myself, so no, it’s not a sibling thing, or just a sibling thing), 2) what exactly made them change their mind, and 3) this type of behaviour never reappears or is addressed in the show, either. While Luz gets called a bully for it, the twins get off basically scot free. Yes, they’re obviously affected by their mother, too, but there’s never even a whiff or a hint about why they felt the need to humiliate Amity on a public scale besides thinking she was uptight.

We see this one more time with Darius, which was the most baffling and completely jarred me the first time I watched it. Darius was being cruel and dismissive to Hunter, but warms up when he realizes the kid does have a spine and will stand up for what he believes this. This is not the heart warming moment or message the show seems to think it is. All I heard and saw was an adult going “Oh, this kid is too indoctrinated and abused to be worthwhile until he proves otherwise, I’ll treat him like trash and ignore that I’m exacerbating his symptoms of abuse until then.” And no matter what comes latter, this is a downright weird set up, emotionally.

I’m not saying that none of these characters can be set up this way, but the introduction and how different they are in all other preceding episodes — or even when information is given to re-contextualize certain things — feels like whiplash. So the setup is a little weird, making pay off either non existent or unnecessary. This stumbling block makes the emotional continuity feel disjointed too, in some aspects. The way this affects emotional continuity can best be seen in Gus, Willow, and Luz’s friendship — but again, more that later.

As for set up and pay off, it can lead to missed opportunities, namely: why the hell was Amity Lilith’s protege in Convention? Again, not saying the show is bad or this is a bad writing choice, but it’s a weird one. I remember watching that episode, seeing Amity be introduced as Lilith’s pseudo apprentice, and being excited. It meant Lilith-Eda, Luz-Amity, and possibly the two menor-mentee relationships could all be developed simultaneously! It’d be interesting to see the parallels and differences.

At the very least, it would give a personal stake to Amity and Luz’s possible developing bond, with Lilith at the very least going to disapprove, and give Amity and Luz a chance to compete against each other and to see that progression.

Then it was never addressed again. And it wasn’t set up as a “one day thing” either. It seems that Lilith possibly tutored Amity for months, maybe even years, for Amity to be considered her “strongest protege” (exact line). So we miss out on that possible, episodic but still connected plot line (especially because after Convention, we never see Amity caring a whole lot about actual school, even though that as her whole thing in her intro and second episode). Then, even when Amity and Lilith are back on the same side (imagine how interesting exploring that fracturing could’ve been!) they... never interact, never mention, and never act like they know each other.

They’re two characters with the same theme and similar arcs split down the middle, have an interesting setup, and it goes.... Nowhere.

Because first impressions don’t matter in the show, which is particularly weird, as typically 1) what you set up in the very beginning of the show is what you want the audience to be invested in, and 2) the audience is going to / has to pay more attention in the beginning of a show because they’re actively trying to learn the rules of the world and character dynamics / personalities.

And it’s not the only time TOH does this, so let’s talk about

2. Screentime, Race, and Chosen Diaspora

Specifically that Gus and Willow barely get any, and how this ties into race. So I’ve touched on this before in an article I wrote on Vocal where I share meta-adjacent stuff that doesn’t fit my tumblr vibe, so if for some reason this is your thing, they may be other stuff you enjoy on there, whatever. I’m not gonna repeat myself too much here, but basically:

The majority of the Owl House cast is white, particularly when it comes to who matters in the plot. Eda, Lilith, and their family are all white. Hooty and King exist in what we’re going to call an aracial space, as they don’t have race and aren’t coded as any particular thing, either; just tried and true demons. Hunter is white; Belos is white. Gus and Willow are regulated to background characters and most of the time when Willow is being developed as a character (“Understanding Willow,” “Any Sport in a Storm”) it’s typically also used to further a white character’s growth of... learning to treat her better? Gus fares a bit better, but gets less screentime.

So not only is Luz the only primary character of colour, she’s largely cut off in forming meaningful relationships with other characters of colour, and having those bonds highlighted and given strong screen time (as thus far in S2, every time Gus and Willow have gotten significant screentime, it’s been largely removed from Luz, with her often doing something else with Amity). Remember when “Star Wars: Rogue One” came out, and there were discussions being had of “a lone woman only having meaningful relationships with men and no other women”?

[ Side note: as for the first point, I’m not going to say things I love, like TDP, don’t fall into the “woman surrounded by men” trope for its two main female leads, as Rayla is friends with the boys and was raised by her dads, and Claudia’s primary relationships are also with other men. However, I believe this is mitigated with plot lines like Ellis and Lujanne in S1, as well as Janai-Amaya-Khessa in S2 and particularly in S3, and I think this will only continue to grow moving forward into S4 and beyond ]

At the same time as Rogue One, there were conversations regarding the films status of “people of colour purely as the supporting cast but never as the primary lead”? TOH meets in as a weird hybrid in the middle, with a person of colour as the main lead, but largely surrounded by white people — and this is the case for most characters in the show.

Raine’s main relationship is with Eda. Darius is in the rebellion with them, but his only meaningful relationship on screen in any way is really with Hunter and the past golden guards. Gus and Willow are mostly side characters. We basically never see their families/parents (and know far more about the Blights / Edric and Emira in every way. Gus and Willow ultimately don’t get the time with Luz for me to call their relationship meaningful. This is especially strange, given that often times kids who are bullied (like all three of them are) cling harder to the friends they do have, and that while S1 was better about making Gus and Willow be extremely important to Luz as her First Friends Ever, S2 has dropped the ball even more so.

Luz is like an island, ironically on the Isles and cut off from her cultural community and from other characters of colour even when they do exist in her new community. So that’s talk about that in full.

Now, there is Luz, who is the primary protagonist (honestly, you could argue Eda is her co-protagonist) and she’s lovely and I love her. However, more than once, Luz’s plot line for an episode is a B plot or less plot relevant compared to other characters (particularly Eda). I touched on this in my Vocal article, but Luz is living in diaspora in the Boiling Isles. Yes, the demon realm suits her much better than Earth largely did, but I would still love to see elements of her culture in ways other than her / her family’s name and her occasionally speaking Spanish. What about holidays, what about missing her mother’s cooking and the cultural connotations it holds?

The show does engage with aspects of the Isekkai genre that are sometimes overlooked, namely Luz being torn between two worlds (and given that she’s mixed, it’s not like the allegory isn’t already there), but it only goes halfway. It only shows Luz wanting to be in the Boiling Isles with none of the possibilities about cultural shock, assimilation, and other aspects that can play into immigrating countries — or realms. I’m not saying the the show not engaging with Luz’s diaspora is a bad thing, but it does feel like a missed opportunity (as most of this is) particularly since they do try to engage with her on a cultural level with her speaking Spanish and writing her as purposefully Afro-Latina and from the Dominican Republic.

But honestly, basically everything I’ve talked about already — occasionally misleading set up w/ a lack of follow through, screentime (both considering and not considering its racial elements) — are all compounded into my biggest issue with the show, however, which are its

3. Disengaged stakes

So while I love Luz, I mostly love her for her personality and sweet hearted nature. I don’t actually love her that much for how she drives the plot forward — even though she does, and even though she’s the protagonist. And this is largely because Luz — and many of the characters — exist in a limbo of what I’m going to call Disengaged Stakes. Basically, they have stakes, but due to a lack of set up, or pay off in regards to emotional continuity (never mind a lack of consistency, i.e. sometimes Eda needs to hide, sometimes she can be flashy in public with zero consequences, sometimes getting caught by guards matters when the story decides it needs a conflict, and sometimes it doesn’t etc) it’s hard to actually be invested in those stakes. At least for me.

For most of S2, this meant I wasn’t really invested in Luz’s efforts to get a portal to see her mom (although this improved when we actually got a singular episode with Camila). It’s clear Luz isn’t going to live full time, if at all, in going back to the human realm. I also wasn’t worried for Camila, as she hasn’t been fearing for Luz this whole time, instead believing things are perfectly fine if not better than they were before.

Let me give you an example, and this was actually pointed out in a youtube review of the S2 finale that helped me put my finger on why it... felt weird as a finale (again, even though I haven’t fully watched it yet, but I have watched the bulk of it).

The four kids are stranded in the human realm, but what does that actually mean, for most of them? For Luz, this carries a lot of weight. She’s spent all season trying to find a way home to see her mother, but is now there under awful circumstances with no way back to the place she actually wants to be. It will also offer Camilla the perfect opportunity to see why the Boiling Isles and her family there is so important to Luz.

But what does this mean for the other three kids? Shockingly little. Like I’ve touched on before, we know nothing about Gus and Willow’s families. Yes, I’m sad they’re separated from them, but I’m sad because generally, kids being separated from their parents is sad. I’m not invested in their specific relationship (same issue I had with Rogue One and Jyn’s relationship with her father, as well). All Luz actually wants, in her core, is to stay in the Boiling Isles. Amity’s relationship with her father is on the mend and her siblings are there for her, but Luz is still clearly the most important person in the world to her, and they’re not separated. Hunter has absolutely nothing back for him in the Boiling Isles, largely, and he’s actually as safe as he can be from Belos’ machinations in the human realm.

So you have four kids tossed into the human realm, and it only really matters for one of them.

This is amplified in their relationships. Willow and Gus rarely have anything beyond interpersonal stakes; Amity had her mother, but now her father has turned over a new leaf, there are no interpersonal stakes any longer for her family (and she radically stood up to her mother very early on in S2 as well). She and Luz have had no problems in their relationship besides very brief miscommunication and Amity’s mother. Amity has hardly any stakes outside of Luz. The characters who are dealing with very high stakes, such as Raine, are largely shuttered away outside of the story — or Hunter.

Dear lord, Hunter. Which, now that we’ve gotten here, let’s talk about what I think could have aided in remedying a lot of these issues

4. Merging

Now I know TOH had to jump through a lot of executive hoops (including the existence and plot relevance of Hexside particularly in S1) so I don’t know what sort of orders came down, or mandates they have to follow but:

TOH has too many characters, and plenty of them could have been condensed as pairs into half as many characters.

I know this, because I went through a similar process of originally having a central group of thirteen characters, and cleaved that shit down to seven. So what are my proposed mergings?

The twins become one character. They more or less are now, fulfil the same purposes and character points as one another (flesh out Amity’s family, tease her and be a listening ear, show their mother’s control, operate as illusionists, etc). Whether it’s brother or sister doesn’t really matter.

Gus and Willow become one character. I would say keep more of Willow’s backstory (w/ Amity), dads, and plant magic alight, as the merged-twin character could substitute as the group illusionist whenever need be. It means that instead of only having splintered individual episodes with Luz or for their development, the small collection would be bolstered and improved marginally. It still wouldn’t fix where screentime or set up fails them, but it would be a significant start. I adore Gus, he’s one of my favourites in the whole show — but he’s less plot relevant than Willow, who is already largely not plot relevant (at least, not outside Hunter’s arc in S2) and we gotta be economical somewhere.

Economical storytelling is when a character, scene, or plot beat is doing at least three things at once, largely — and right now Gus is doing the least, as much as I love my boy, with Willow right next to him. Thus, there we go.

Now for the big, perhaps flat out unpopular one:

Hunter and Amity should’ve been one character. Like the twins, and even Amity and Lilith, they’re largely one theme split down the middle. The show draws intentional parallels between their world views, callousness, and need to be the best due to their abusive families, their strong relationships / connections to Luz, who works to friendship and who are changed by her kindness. There are also less thematic but still overt parallels, like their artificial wands, opposing palismans (bird vs cat), travelling into mindscapes where they uncover secrets. Hell, they both even have a reformed father figure who works with the Abominable coven with a shittier parent who believes in their own superiority at any cost.

Say Golden Guard Amity is enrolled in Hexside — she has to be trained somewhere — and throughout the season we hear her refer to her uncle, who raised her. He just wants the best for her, and for her to be a worthy member of the Emperor’s coven! It’s only at the end of S1 we learn that Amity’s uncle is Belos, and that her growing bond with Luz may be tested in the future. Then, in S2, she has to make a choice between her familial loyalty, ideological defection, and Luz and her friends (who will have more time to be friends, because there are less characters running around). You can even keep the condensed twin as a surrogate sibling mentor — perhaps one of Belos’ more successful grimwalkers, or flat out not a clone at all.

This merger gives Luz and Amity real stakes in their relationship, a higher sense of drama amid the sweet fluffiness, gives more characters more screentime... And amplifies everything that already exists in Amity’s arc. Yes, seeing a quieter form of child abuse from Odalia is worthwhile, particularly for abused children — but as of S2 she’s basically gone full bad guy and has already done so before in early S2, as her abomaton nearly kills Luz in “Escaping Expulsion” so... moot point? Sorta? Is what I’m saying.

It would also, for the love of god, give Amity a solidified reason to dye her hair after she finds out she’s a grimwalker. She wants to reassert her own identity, she wants to be different than her successors while also honouring their good nature, etc etc. Imagine “Hollow Mind” but with Amity in Hunter’s place, and all the weight that would hold for each of them, and for Hunter’s character, now condensed into Amity’s. Also stronger parallels of Belos’ clones becoming less like his brother (because Amity is a girl) over time and with parallels of the implied plot line, of Belos killing his brother because Caleb fell in love with a witch, and it’s happening again, this time just with Luz and Amity, directly.

Basically the only things that would have to change would be a little of S1′s pacing, some of S2′s Blight parent related episodes (so largely two until the finale, which again, Darius or the condensed twin could easily substitute)oOr, to come full circle, you could have Lilith also play a factor, the way she did in Amity’s arc in the beginning. This would provide a greater sense that characters actually had lives and connections and little ship passing in the night moments before Luz showed up, and they would all feel more like!! REAL PEOPLE!!

The only thing that would possibly, likely have to go is Willow’s history with Amity.But given that the show has never really addressed the bullying, perhaps that backstory element would be better left dropped, in general. Amity can be a jerky bully without specifically bullying Luz’s friend for like, 4-6 years beforehand, y’know.

Anyway I will never not believe in the validity of what I call TOH Merger and how it would strengthen basically almost every single aspect of the show, take it or leave it.

Conclusion / Nitpicks

Other notes before we wrap up.

I got bored with just how many episodes relied on the “Character A doesn’t want to fess up to something bc they’re insecure, scared, or trying to look Cool, but inevitably lie and make things ten times worse, and then learn it’s important to be honest” in S1 (hi King, Luz, Willow, and Gus eps respectively).

Amity’s laser character focus on Luz stifles her relationships with both Willow and Gus (as it is more or less non existent outside of a few lines or group scenes); all of Amity’s character growth is largely because of her relationship with Luz, but the same cannot be said for Luz, leaving their relationship lopsided. This is particularly true for me (and is a total personal Aro-spec induced nitpick) and is all the more glaringly obvious considering they barely had one episode where the two were on friendly / friend-ish terms before crush feelings on Amity’s side came in. This makes me feel less invested in their relationship as a whole, as while it’s exceedingly cute, it feels like it’s based on nothing but Crush™ Feelings and that will also be less compelling to me than a strong Foundational Friendship that develops into a crush. I don’t mind that development happening fast, but this was a little too fast in my book.

Final disclaimer: Still like the show, still think it’s good, these are just some of the reasons I don’t think it’s Great. The lack of a Merger will haunt me. Thank you goodnight

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redladypaige · 6 months

Text

@shonpota asks what I learned in Israeli school

What I learned in Israeli school is..

WHAT I LEARNED IN ISRAELI SCHOOL IS

honestly you're going to be disappointed

tl;dr it's not explicitly hateful, it's much more about emphasizing certain facts and ignoring others to create a narrative and lie by omission.

I don't think it's very different than other western education, but you'll be the judge of that.

I'll try to explain if it makes sense.

First of all, I studied in public school almost a decade ago (jesus), so things might have changed.

So this is the least religious education you can get. More religious schools have been caught with more explicitly hateful material, but that I can't tell you first hand.

Arabic class

From seventh to ninth grade you have mandatory Arabic in school.

Since it's such a short time you really only learn the basics.

The class doesn't really count towards your diploma grade, so you just have to pass it, so most people don't really take it seriously.

There are optional advanced classes to take later on, which in my case were took by Arab Israelis, people with interest in languages and people who wanted to be translators in the IDF.

Civics class

Mostly dry stuff about the system of government, how democracy works, elections, rigjts, stuff like that.

There is big talk about equal rights, mostly mentioning that women had equal rights by law since the founding and that Arab Israelis are regular citizens with equal rights.

Gaza and the west bank weren't mentioned at all, at least when I learned. This is stuff you learn from the news or from your parents.

And of course nothing about systemic racism or anything like that.

You can say that the class shows the ideal clean version of the vision of democracy without actually diving down to what's happening.

Putting "politics in school" is a very controversial subject over here, which I found similar to what's going on with the critical race theory thing in the USA.

Right wingers are in power for a while (and it's getting worse), and for them anything that puts Israel in not a great like is political and should be removed, though it is sometimes used against them too.

It constantly changes and stuff gets added and removed.

Tanach class

It might surprise you that even in secular schools you learn the Tanach (the old testament for you Christians) from first to twelfth grade.

It might surprise you more that we learn it not as a religious text, but much more of an historical one.

It was one of my favorite classes because it actually felt like it encourages skepticism and analysis.

There is talk about how the Torah was probably written by different authors because of contradictions which is literally sacreligous

We talked about which stories are or aren't corroborated by history, how to know about the author by the perspective of the text, events written on from different points of view, etc.

History class

You learn history from first to twelfth grade.

It's very very western.

Starting from Greek to Rome to the middle ages, enlightenment, the French and american revolutions and world wars.

Colonialism is displayed as neutral I guess - just an event that happened. Remember that they don't want opinionated teachers.

We gloss over stuff like slavery and native American genocide when learning about the us, its mostly the revolution and stuff.

Sometimes history from a specific place rotates in, but the rest of the world is mostly reserved for the optional advanced classes.

Of course, there is a big emphasis to ties to Judaism throughout.

Within those periods you learn about what the Jews were up to, usually under the lens of how the current ruler abused them.

World war 2 and the Holocaust obviously is a huge chunk of the material.

You don't get to modern history until like the 10th grade.

And then it's mostly the narrative of the creation of Israel, again viewed neutrally.

It starts from the Dreyfus trial, which had a Jewish officer been accused for a crime he didn't commit.

That caused a reporter named Herzel to think Jews will always be persecuted and to start the Zionist movement with the idea to find a homeland for the Jewish people.

We learn about different proposals for where it could be, raising money, the first Alyot (people who came to Israel to live there).

The Alyot are presented as good things generally, saying that the lands were legally bought and that the people wanted to live side by side with the Palestinians.

Of course the reality is more complicated than that.

We get the Balfour statement, explaining how it's the first time Jews got international recognition for a country but also how it's really non committal.

We learn the efforts to get a country against the British, both the diplomatic and the terrorist actions the early Israeli organizations did.

We learn about the UN division plan, with saying that the Jewish people were happy to share but Palestinians won't come to the negotiations table.

We talk about the declaration of independence when the British left, and how we were immediately attacked by the casus belli of killing all jews by all surrounding countries and still won at the end.

The atrocities of the war aren't mentioned at all.

The Nacba is mentioned, with the word it self constantly getting in and out from the books every year, but it's mentioned subjectively.

As in, "the Palestinians see the events of this war, when Israel took territory in a defensive war and people had to leave their houses as a day of tragedy with the intention to one day return" or something like this.

We learn about immigration after the Holocaust and Mizrahis from Arab countries (like me),surprisingly not shying away from the racism.

The narrative is "there might have been racism then, but now we are all a melting pot of a single culture" or something.

It gets as far as the Six Day War and Yom Kippur war at 1973, anything beyond that is not covered in school.

The main narrative we see about Palestinians is that most of them do want peace and are happy to live side by side with the Israelis, but every time their radical leadership hated their own people, and won't take any compromise.

They want to kill all Israelis and take everything, and Israel is only defending itself.

You can say that's the most radical narrative we learn.

There is little exploration of why, the assumption is anti semetism.

Every war is presented as justified and as part for Israels quest for peace, while being the constant victim.

Inner Palestinian politics aren't discussed, we don't learn their history, their views etc.

That's it I guess?

Feel free to ask anything and I'll try to remember

#israel #palestine #history #school

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walkawaytall · 6 months

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For the fic writer ask game - any of these?

🍲 When did you start writing and why?

Oh, gosh...I started writing for fun when I was maybe eleven? I don't remember why -- that was just the year I fell in love with Madeleine L'Engle and Marguerite Henry books and I decided I wanted to be an author and started writing my very own novel, that was sort of a rip-off of A Wrinkle in Time I think. And then, later, I started my second novel, which was absolutely a rip-off of Joanna Campbell's Thoroughbred series. Around that time, I did start writing a Star Wars fic as well (it had no plot and was abandoned incredibly early on, but Han and Leia did get engaged like the night of The Battle of Endor or maybe the next day, so what else could you possibly ask for?), though I had no idea that the word "fanfiction" existed until years later.

As far as why...I'm not sure. I hated reading and writing in early elementary school, but that changed once I found things that interested me. And, honestly, I got praise for my writing, which probably encouraged it a bit. But I also liked to do it, so...I guess that's why?

🍱 Do you read your own fics?

All the time. I primarily write stuff I want to read. I wouldn't say I write only for me, because I think a lot of art is a sort of communal experience and having readers is an important part of that, but I don't write stories I'm not going to like. And a lot of times, if I go back to something I wrote awhile ago, while I might spot some weaknesses, I'll also see some strengths that can be kind of encouraging.

🍛 Have any comments, tags or reactions to one of your fics every made you laugh or cry or both?

This made my laugh out loud:

And this made me tear up a little because there were a couple of things they mentioned that made me feel like people were understanding what I was going for with certain things if that makes sense?

🍜 Do you ever feel pressured to write?

Yes, but not by anyone other than my own general desire to get a project done or whatever. Like, I haven't felt pressure from others and the couple of times I've received slightly aggressive hints as to what someone else wants me to write, I've ignored them. But I do feel pressure from myself occasionally.

Thank you for asking!

Fic Writer Asks

#ask away #writer asks #fic writer asks #fanfic writer asks #wat answers

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bringerofdeathandtheapocolypse · 10 months

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I genuinely haven't decided if I'm going to have Makarov be dead or not in the Alvarez arc.

Because I hate that they brought him back so long after his death because it makes his sacrifice feel so cheap.

And I honestly want someone else to be guild master at this point. Like I would say the three potential best options at the point the series is at would be Erza, Mira or Laxus and I'm going to explain why.

To start with, I do not think pre tenrou Laxus should be guild master. He was an asshole that refused to help his guild in the phantom war unless Lucy slept with him, he attacked one of his own teammates when Freed told him they had lost and while it didn't hit, it was close, beat Gajeel up way worse than Jet and Droy did and likely would have done so until he'd killed Gajeel if Jet and Droy hadn't told him to stop and did try to attack them and he willingly put the entire town in danger so that he wouldn't have to admit he'd lost after Evergreen was beat and have his ego bruises. He was not a good person and needed to be taught a lesson.

However, post Tenrou Laxus is a different story. He's a lot less full of himself and doesn't look down on his guildmates. I honestly would say his fight against Ivan is the completion of that character arc because he fights his own father to defend his guild, putting them above his own blood, something he likely would not have done for anyone aside for the thunder legion pre tenrou. He also in tartarous, takes in far more of the bane particals in hopes of saving the towns people and risks his own life to get Tempestar's blood(in the anime) so that Yajima and the thunder legion could survive.

Laxus, as of 100 years quest, can be considered a good successor for the next guild master because he is more likely to continue the legacy Mavis wanted for the guild.

Mira is also a good option in that she likely knows a lot about the job, being the second in command from how she's always the one people talk to about guild based things if Makarov isn't around. She's also no push over and would probably not let someone like pre tenrou Laxus get away with the things that he did. She's definetly not as strong as she used to, after all she hasn't been consistently fighting for years but I don't think strength is what matters in being guild master. At least not for Fairy tail.

And Erza is an obvious member of the list since she was listed as the 7th guild master so she would make sense to be an option.

But the reason I'm torn with having Makarov die or not is because (without getting into spoilers) I already have a lot of canon divergence planned for the Alvarez arc(something which seems to occur more and more as the arcs go on).

Like I already have the most basic plot beats laid out for the later arcs, its just certain aspects surrounding them that are shifting around as I decide which idea is the best one to pick for those arcs. I've already been putting foreshadowing in the rewrite for a while, some that might be more obvious than others and some I really doubt anyone would think "Oh that's important" when first seeing it (I am not going to mention what aspects are the foreshadowing or when it started because again, spoilers and I am so excited to put the new stuff out once the rewrite is done and I don't want to give too much away for the plans I have)

And while I have no problem going extremely off canon in the au at all, there are just certain things where I'm like "Ok but would this benefit from having Makarov be dead or alive"

I'll probably have the answer once I get to the Alvarez arc in like 5 years (Jokes aside, I don't think it will take me 5 years to get there but this book is going to be long. Its already at 108 chapters with the rewrite putting it over 300 pages in the pdf I keep and I'd say its like halfway done. Because despite there being more arcs pre tenrou than post, I still consider Tenrou the midway point and I have the KOTSH, GMG, Tartarous and Alvaraz arcs to cover once the midway is done and post tenrou, even the canon version of the arcs start getting long.

I also swear I'll have the current arc finished soon. I always just take breaks between arcs just because it takes so long to write them and then the editing is a long process.

#fairy tail #the bringer of death and the apocolypse #gajeel redfox #rant #laxus dreyar #Mirajane strauss #Erza Scarlet #Makarov Dreyar

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persefoneshalott · 1 year

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les mis spanish censorship adventures 5: the bishop deradicalization

LM 1. 1. 10 - The Bishop in the Presence of an Unknown Light

This is so far the chapter I've found the most censoring and edits to and it changes the message a lot. This bishop does not go through any kind of development or reflection (though sometimes the text will say he is 'shaken' and other lines like those are leftover, which make little to no sense with all the cuts). This is just another 'the bishop is kind' episode and it feels really pointless and strange.

I did not translate all of this because it's a lot of text and it's pretty similar to the english translation anyway. I merely translated the stuff that was changed and left the rest as in the hapwood text. You can see on the screenshots HOW MUCH it was cut (all the boxed sentences) and the edits in red.

Below the cut I'll elaborate on the changes, I recommend you look at the pics first and then go back here if you want to be surprised about them.

. Pro revolution sentiments are cut, the conventionalist mentioning having voted for it is cut, which seems kind of unnecessary considering they mention 93...

The 'to what name to you object line' is SO good, he has just compared a king's grandson and a "criminal"'s brother (Cartouche was a thief from the little I read about him so eh) as people who paid for their families crimes undeservingly and when the bishop is like I don't like these names together G is like which of the two, which implies the king is a lot worse which he is and I just really enjoy that line! But in the censored version after the bishop objects he's just like alright and says nothing because they CUT IT because they KNOW it's a great answer :/

Another really good significant part is destroyed when instead of the 'equally?' part we get "I cry with you" from the bishop and no answer from G again. The suffering of the monarchy and poor people is the same. :///

The way it's cut makes it seem like the bishop is on the right, bc he'll say something and then G will go quiet and then seemingly change the subject when there's actually reactions and more conversation happening . It makes it seem like G is in a bit of a rant too.

A bunch of text about how much money the bishops have and how they have a lot of food is cut, I guess because G is talking about the church in a negative way. The Jesus Christ line is obviously cut.

Lines like the bishop feeling shaken and 'now it was time for the bishop to be humble and G to be arrogant' are kept, which is confusing. There's another one about the bishop being moved later on, and it's like why?? There's nothing on this text that warrants this reaction from you?

I looked up the names G mentioned and I really like how he repeatedly compares revolutionaries with crimes that are done in the name of Catholicism as the 'if this is bad how can this other guy be good'. There's the Dragonnades (which was a government policy of repression ordered by the King in which protestant families were intimidated by the military, by abuses and destroying their property etc, into converting to Catholicism) which Baville and Francois and Letellier son (aka Marquis de Louvois, who was a war minister )have part on. There's Saulx-Tavannes being a catholic military leader during the French Wars of Religion... it's very good to go with that specific route when talking to a bishop I think. And there's Letellier senior (father), to which what I said doesn't apply, but he repressed uprisings from the people (la fronde) so it's another good one.

Anyway, they cut from all those except Marquis de Louvois. I really did not do any more research than going on wikipedia so I don't know why they decided that was a good one to stay. And with those cuts also disappears the paragraph where it's explicitly said the bishop is offended but not on the side of logic.

The final cut of their conversation is that they change it so that the bishop is the one who blesses the conventionalist, as it should be. The bishop redoubles his tenderness, we don't really know why, nothing has really changed in him. (I know he doesn't change per se because of G in the original, but I do think he is changed by the event)

Then they cut the part where the bishop says G is in heaven and because this bishop has not been #radicalized, the whole section of the red cap is cut.

AND because they cut this, they leave this: ""Was the bedside of such a dying man as that the proper place for a bishop? There was evidently no conversion to be expected. All those revolutionists are backsliders. Then why go there? What was there to be seen there? He must have been very curious indeed to see a soul carried off by the devil." AS THE CONCLUSION of the chapter??? which is so wild. G is in hell, reader, and the narrator is confused about why Myriel even went to visit him. What a nice way to end it on.

#les mis censorship #les mis letters #les mis #Ignore my typos thx #nooo don't say the french revolution was good you're so sexy aha (cut cut cut)#nooo don't say anything bad about catholicism #etc etc

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gullinbusti · 3 months

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Hihihihihii I first just wanna say, I love ur artstyle it’s actually so pretty, and so adorable, and super super yummy and delicious, and SECOND, I did a tiny bit of snooping on ur blog (just ur recent stuff), and I’m super curious:

1. What IS ur little world building thing that’s going on, I’m a bit confused 😭

And

2. Would u mind giving an introduction of ur main oc fellow? I love the design btw :333

ANYWAY, I hope u have a good day :D

Thank you very much for the kind words and gestures mate💐 (wish most people were interested like you but I have hope someday it will get attention) so to answer your questions I will spill them out in detail

(heads up: the world building is still in works so I don't blame you if you still get confused at the end of reading it but just to clarify it still in the works but his is what I got so far)

//Warning: Lots of reading (So bring a night light out)

For question 1:

In the world building, it contains things you might be curious with, the world building is considered to be fantasy, sci-fi, (horror but only for the important parts so not as much) coming of age, superhero, and yeah (that's all I can think of) Now. The world of mine is considered to contain, Marvel (supers from the mcu), God Of War, and the famous game itself Minecraft

Now originally, this was only all based off Minecraft itself because our original characters were from Minecraft named Renny and Tank (who you may have heard of on this blog) and in all cases, after the smithing templates were added to the game, I actually started watching marvel again and oh my I forgot how much I loved marvel, so a crazy idea of mine popped up and I decided to add Minecraft and mcu idea together to fit my world building, therefore leaving me to make new characters which are these ones you see today, the reason is because Minecraft's lore itself fit so well with the mcu in my opinion cause of how similar their fantasy and sci fi sides fit together, and also because the trims that were added looked cool and I wanted to think they give their host powers once it was added to the armour, so there (I'll explain that next time when you or someone else asks)

Then a few months later which was during the coming of the new years of 2024, I watched god of war, and I never actually liked it at first but then when I did I loved it so much like the mcu (I watch the 2018 and 2022(?) Ones not the 2000s I'm not an og) and so I decided to add all both mcu, Minecraft, and gow to fit together in the world building cause it actually fits because of the characters we have.

In the story these characters you see today are in our year the present day, and because you think they are in the mcu you think they are on the main universe earth-616 but they are actually on a world of my own called earth-937, the reason gow is in here is because the characters that I will mention are gods as well 1 god who is good and 2 others who are bad (basically villains) and so I thought it would be a good combination because I also have a god realm in the story before this so I guess it makes sense, and mcu is part of this cause I think I already just explained if not just remind me and I'll explain it if I didn't

And finally to question 2:

The main character throughout all of this is a character named Francis (last name being Besong) who is the main person you will see a lot (and again main character) he is known to be: funny (and when I mean funny I mean not by jokes but by the way how he acts when he wants to make someone laugh) fun, responsible, respectful, trust worthy, loyal, (dumbass that can't solve math), and all the good guys traits yk, he's an ambi or omni vert. Francis in the group is known to be the main leader cause he was the first one in the group to become a super, only after a good 5 days his friends found out and became supers themselves with him cause for the past 5 days he was bad at doing his super deeds

Francis is also depressed like any other good superhero cause really who hasn't made their characters depressed its character development lol but francis overtime eventually becomes the strongest super in the group (only to find out something deep about him he didn't know himself, if your still curious just ask and I'll explain what it is)

So...those are your answers, again the world building is basically a wip and still being worked on but I don't plan changing it anytime soon, if you want to know the deeper lore of Francis then I can explain more about him and if you want you can ask about the other characters themselves feel free to don't be shy in fact I've been waiting and hoping people ask about my ocs and world building and such more and know more deeper about it. So looking forward to the asks please send some (please I'm begging) and thank you feel free to ask more idc if you ask as the same person again or anonymous because I am pleased and happy to answer them all and get you guys interested in them. Again thank you very much💐💫💫🤗

#ponchos.txt #user1286 asked #world building #ask more please #ask

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nicosraf · 1 year

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I have to ask how you came up on the idea to write ABM? I just wanna know your thought process because I'm wildly intrigued. I'd love to know how you'd feel about a lesbian story between Lilith (Adam's first wife) and Eve which is what my story is about.

Hello! So usually I'm pretty secretive about all the stuff behind Angels Before Man and why it's like That, but I recently saw a tweet that wrongly assumed the motivations behind the book, and it upset me a bit, so I should probably finally go into detail about ABM's deal. Sorry if this answer is way too long.

1. Personal reasons: in 2016, I came out to my parents during a very rough period for my mental illness. It went very bad, and I ended up going to a therapist for a few month for, well, conversion therapy. This involved using a lot of Christian manipulation tactics ("God would not make you this way") and EMDR techniques that have done quite a bit of psychological damage to me. In 2021, while working with a new therapist, I had a "died and met God" nightmare, then developed an unhealthy obsession with the Bible as I processed what happened during conversion therapy. Another thing I need to mention is that my family are immigrants from an epicenter of the Mexican drug war, which exposed me to a lot of violence very young, and traumatized me in its own right; how I think about the violence we perpetuate on the people we love is something I just really wanted to write about, also. All this to say that ABM is just a convoluted allegory for trauma.

2. Theological reasons: during my obsession, I read the Bible in its entirety a couple times, and I developed a lot of questions about it, especially regarding angels and this Lucifer guy:

Why did Lucifer/Satan become evil? Ezekiel 28 is usually the passage people refer to that explains it (others argue this section isn't about Lucifer/Satan but let's assume for the sake of argument that it is). What's interesting about this section is the emphasis on the cherub's "blamelessness" (innocence! Lucifer's young innocence isn't talked about enough!!) and his beauty. I'm fact, his corruption is entirely linked to his beauty.

But what does beauty mean? To God? What is beauty before humanity? What is the purpose of it? How can you become corrupted by beauty? (For this, I looked at Ezekiel 16, where Jerusalem is corrupted by her beauty; this inspired quite a bit of the story of ABM as a whole, particularly regarding God's wrath)

What are angels for? What do they do? I asked a couple friends this and usually they answered that it was fighting demons and protecting humans, but there was a time before demons and before humans. (There was an "angels before man" if you will haha). This seemed to stump everyone I asked. Did they just worship? All the time???

Why does the Bible compare angels' submission to God to a wife's submission to her husband? (Well, that's a least an interpretation of 1 Corinthians 11:10). This is related to Jesus explicitly stating later that angels can't marry. Why not? It's especially weird, at this point, given the matrimonial relationship between Jesus and the Church, and God's own somewhat matrimonial relationship with Mary. So everyone can have a romantic/sexual/spousal union except the angels? Why can't angels love?

This isn't a question but it really strikes me that Michael's only line of dialogue in the entire Bible is in the book of Jude and just as a reference to a time when he allegedly argued with Satan and said "Lord rebuke you." Ah. Michael. That brings me to the last major question I'll mention.

What was Michael and Lucifer's relationship? Something really cute is that everyone I harassed with my questions seemed to have this idea that they were best friends, that they really loved each other once. There's no scriptural evidence for it, and we only ever see them fighting, but it just seems like it makes sense, doesn't it? Strong, golden-hearted Michael and the beautiful, doomed Lucifer...

And of course the duality of God as both jealous and loving fascinates me. Even more so I'm fascinated by the concept of a lonely God. Jealousy, to me, only makes sense when you're insecure about love. How could an all-knowing God be insecure about love then? Maybe because he loves different than you, and he'll never have anyone who can love him the way he understands love (no matter how much he wishes, because he's a lone god)

Somehow all these questions came together and formed a story while I was outlining.

3. Technical reasons: I've been wanting to write a full novel that didn't follow the 5-act structure for a while. I wanted to write a novel that had no source of tension for a majority of the narrative (the source of tension early in ABM is just from the reader; you know what's gonna happen, but the book doesn't allude to it until about Chapter 11, and even then it's vague). I wanted to write a book that's radically differently paced in the second half. And I wanted to be a bit experimental stylistically (inspired by the Latin American Boom authors). Angels Before Man gave me all the opportunities to do this, I'm afraid.

Ultimately, Angels Before Man is really weird!! I'm both very happy and very shocked that people have enjoyed and understood it. I'm incredibly grateful when someone lets me know that my little self-published gay Satan book has been healing or cathartic to them. That's all I can really ask for tbh! Again, sorry for such a long answer, but I'm riled up about my intentions being misrepresented.

And finally, Lilith x Eve sounds really interesting!!! I have a lot of thoughts on the double creation of the sexes in Genesis (so, so, so many). I'd be ecstatic to see your take on it <3333 :)

#again im sorry this is SO LONG ASHDKNDD #yall dont want to know what that tweet said about me #lord #anyway #thank you so much for the ask!! i really appreciate it #angels before man #forgot to mention the lines in Paradise Lost where John Milton says angels love to have gay sex #the queer aspect to angel/demon media is another rabbit hole that Morgan Dante left a fantastic anaylsis about on the ABM goodreads page #check that out for sure #on the trauma thing: sometimes i get some pretty rude comments on how people dont like the direction the book went #its very okay not to like my book but please dont be rude to me fr #ask!#mine #realizing now that i forgot to mention the story of Sodom as well #ill save that for another post skkskaks

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