#On the morality of animal slaughter. You could just fucking admit that and we could have an honest conversation but nooo

[aquietanarchy]

Trying to engage with antivegans is like

"I think the torture nexus is bad"

"you idiot, the people operating the torture nexus are really nice and polite the entire time."

"okay but that doesn't address my fundamental issue, which is with the very existence of the torture nexus itself. you're not addressing my argument."

"the torture nexus is fun and if you disagree with me YOU'RE responsible for all the evil in the world!"

#God I'm so sorry followers. I'm just. I haven't had a Dramatic Online Interaction in a long time I'm just trying to process #like. It's just. Oh okay so it wasn't about the insulin at all. #I think the unnecessary slaughter of animals is bad and you think it's fun. You could just say you think it's fun. You know #You don't have to put up all these smokescreens about disability rights and the environment like it really just comes down to a disagreemen #On the morality of animal slaughter. You could just fucking admit that and we could have an honest conversation but nooo #veganing on main #<- please feel free to block my vegan tag if you don't want to see any of this #Yarrow speaks into the void

[system-of-a-feather]

(TW: Blood mention, gore mention, slaughter / animal death mention, homicidal ideation)

Dude I pushed Riku out of the front so I could go off about my unique brand of homicidality-suicidality, but shit gets too gorey apparently for this blog so they had me backspace it out

But honestly trauma-induced bloodlust but also being cognoscente and aware enough while triggered to not Commit a Crime in the system's name can become a fucking mess.

And honestly, yeah bloodlust is a huge issue in this system's main trauma holders (we actually have a part that went to a slaughter house for a class in university and really really really wanted to become a butcher for life cause it gave them a high) and yeah we're kinda horrible representation cause of that but also putting it out there cause like, yall don't gotta be ashamed if you are in a similar boat. Thought crimes don't make a person it's the actions that do.

Honestly though, I still do love that like anon that was like "UWU YOU ARE DANGEROUS WHAT IF YOU KILL SOMEONE" cause like, yeah we really do have that potential already in this system. I promise you me, and like two other parts in this system, should we have been given our own bodies and not had other parts to counter act us, would have very likely at least tried to kill someone at some point. I *am* an "evil alter" and I *am* probably what would have been a "serial killer alter" - but I am NOT one because I am an *alter* in a system.

Like people that go "UWU YOU MIGHT BECOME A KILLER" like literally, DID is what kept me from being one. I'm not ashamed to say it because its true. 100% there was a time I did consider it, there was a time I did plan it, there was a time I was enthusiastically interested in it.

Those days are gone cause

I can't make decisions for just myself because Im tied to the like 40 other versions of me and my decisions will inherently affect them

My other versions of myself have gained my respect and have a view of the world and life that I genuinely believe is far healthier and better in the long run than my own

I'd probably get booted the fuck out by Mom and Dad in my brain if I even so much as genuinely considered it

I have too much to live for these days to be throwing my life away for senseless highs and thrill seeking cause these idiots actually have me sitting here experiencing parts of the world and life that is better than pure thrills

Like I'll straight up be upfront about it cause I am 1) not ashamed of what my trauma made me into, the same energy that caused me to be like that is what saved OUR life and I'm better than the me of the past so *shrugs* and 2) I'm not gonna fucking do it so it doesn't fucking matter if I admit it.

Homicidal ideation has no moral weight to it - especially not homicidal ideation that occurred in the past.

#alter: xiv #plus if the government reads me posting this and decides it qualifies me to be arrested #then thats their decision to change passive to maybe not so passive by removing the concern of #1 #2 and #4 #but i digress #reblogs off in case Riku gets squicked out by me being a buck hundred about this #but comments and shit are fine #just leaving them off cause riku does #in fact #tend to get squicked out by me being too loud about this shit

[iamanartichoke]

[please blacklist spoiler tags: #loki tv series spoilers, #loki series spoilers, #loki spoilers] 

I know I have missed a lot of people’s takes and reactions, there’s just - there’s so many. So I’m sorry if I’m inadvertantly repeating anyone or whatnot when I proceed to make my own posts. 

Cut for length and spoilers.

Which is a segue into - I feel legitimately concerned, based on how many people are reading the TVA as being the moral authority and/or being on Loki’s side, and Mobius Dick’s interrogation being therapeutic for Loki (and how gross that is), along with an emphasis on ooc-ness for Loki and just overall cracks and fractures in the (what I thought was a) more or less solid episode - 

I feel legitimately concerned that I may have wildly misinterpreted, like, everything, up to and including Loki’s characterization. And it’s actually kind of hilarious bc like - 

Me: All opinions and interpretations are valid! No worries! Also I’m open-minded! Also I have no issue admitting I’m wrong! 

Also me: *feels physically ill at the idea that my interpretation is so very wrong* 

I’m not even lying, guys, my stomach is in knots. And I guess it’s because, like - I thought that it was pretty straightforward that the TVA are the antagonists here?? That Mobius isn’t Loki’s friend - he’s Loki’s interrogator and handler bc he needs Loki for his own purposes. That the “single sacred timeline” is not only nonsensical but also kinda fucked up (as Loki rightfully points out). 

Like I’m watching these scenes and it doesn’t even occur to me to take the TVA’s word as the correct one here. Why would I? I’m taking Loki’s word as the correct one - Loki, the one who’s calling out everything that is stupid and ridiculous about the concept of the Timekeepers and the TVA, the one who is being scape-goated and is aware of it. 

To touch on the ooc-ness of Loki - I mean, the first half of the episode was cringey and ooc, yeah; Loki was too over-the-top and the “comedic” tone didn’t quite land (I’m honestly wondering if Tom’s just not good at comedy? I mean, Betrayal was a genuinely funny play (and heartwrenching) but besides that, I can’t think of anything really comedic that he’s done.) but I’m willing to overlook that because when we got into the second half of the episode, he began to feel much more like the Loki I love.  

Historically, Loki has consistently been the one to see the truth for what it really is and either saying or doing something about it. He actively tries to delay Thor’s coronation because he recognizes, when no one else does, that Thor is not ready to be king. He knows that Odin isn’t as righteous and wise as he pretends to be (and, in fact, he knows that Odin is guilty of more than Loki could ever be, and he calls that out too). He sees SHIELD as the farce it is (and possibly knows Hydra has infiltrated it; I headcanon that he knew but just didn’t care bc why would he?), and he sees Earth and the humans in a much more accurate light than Thor could hope to. You lie and kill in the service of liars and killers; the humans slaughter each other in droves while you idly fret. Etc. Here, it’s the clowns are playing their parts to perfection (that’s the only quote I can remember right now). 

And I mean, yeah, the narrative has never acknowledged that Loki is right about everything. It’s a huge source of frustration for me bc the narrative continues to be so black-and-white about heroes and villains and, being villain-coded, Loki doesn’t get to be validated no matter how right he is. 

But I don’t think that’s the case here. I think, as the protagonist, his word holds a bit more weight. It should, at least, and I personally didn’t see anything that made me think that we shouldn’t consider Loki the authoritative voice in all of this. Loki, not the TVA. 

Mobius’s interrogation? Was very clearly cruel and fucked up, to me. The sham of a fake ass trial that Loki had to endure, with the implication being that no one who stands trial is actually getting a fair trial bc the TVA has no intention of judging anyone not guilty? Fucked up, with horrifying implications. The process of deleting people from existence being literally as detached and soulless as a trip to the DMV (complete with tickets!)? Very disturbing. Like, none of these things are the traits that I would look at and say, hmm, yeah, these guys seem legit and totally correct about everything, too bad for Loki. 

And Loki’s reactions to Mobius - his frustration, his defiance, and his eventual emotional breakdown (which we only saw when Loki was completely alone) all felt accurate to me. Again, there were a lot of over the top aspects of Tom’s performance here but I think what makes me more willing to overlook them is that, in general, we’re getting a more animated Loki than we’ve gotten to see him before, in a way that feels true to him as opposed to whatever was going on with him in Ragnarok. 

He’s not in the middle of a mental breakdown/identity crisis. He’s not being mind-controlled anymore (or influenced). He’s not being villain-coded while Thor is propped up as the hero and the ideal which, to me, means that we are actually getting to see Loki’s personality when all of that is taken away and the only thing he’s got left is himself. It’s a really shitty situation and I hate that he’s in it, but after the initial exaggerated reactions, his response to it worked for me. 

So - yeah. And now I’m like, biting my nails and my stomach is in knots bc I thought I knew Loki and I had a comfortable idea of Loki, and I thought I was more or less decent at interpreting things - but, so, clearly there were things happening and being picked up on that just whooshed right over my head bc it never occurred to me to be on the lookout for them in the first place. Does that make sense? I don’t even know what I’m saying. 

Just - I am really, really doubting my own perception of what this series is attempting to do with Loki and it does not feel good at all. So I guess ultimately I am not capable of putting my money where my mouth is and treating all interpretations as valid, when it comes to myself. (I didn’t realize I was that far up my own ass so as to speak confidently about validity while telling myself that my idea is pretty correct.) Soo there we are. 

Idk if I even want to post this but it’s time for me to clock out now so, for better or for worse, *hits post button* 

#sorry this is rambly and i need to make it clear i am in no way #taking issue with anyone else's takes or opinions or feelings #i am more or less just saying that i'm doubting *my* takes and opinions and feelings #and i don't like how it feels #that's all #please don't @ me #loki tv series spoilers #loki series spoilers #loki spoilers #loki series meta

[laryna6]

Lina Inverse being An Actual Teenager explains a lot of the flanderized traits.

The mood swings: teenager. Eating a fuckton: growing teenager who also walks everywhere, fights with a sword and casts spells, all of which take a fuckton of calories. Like when they meet her, her new companions are all Judging You when Lina goes through tablefulls of food like a buzzsaw, but after being dragged into that level of exhausting bullshit OP demon fights they are also 100% down to murder for more calories.

The ‘good judgment’ part of her brain is not remotely hooked in yet. Yeah, normally she makes good tactical calls, because she’s a genius, but adolescence means your emotions suddenly get a heck of a lot more extreme and you need to relearn how to deal with them.

It actually made it into the anime that it’s not entirely terrible that Lina has no judgment of what she’s up against or idea of her limits, when Gourry and Zelgadis are ‘welp time to go die heroically failing to prevent the end of the world’ and she’s ‘look guys if you go into a fight thinking you’re going to lose you are 100% fucked, you need to have the right mindset.’

‘Why are Lina and Gourry not officially a thing/not a thing in-story despite her admitting her feelings for him’ - she’s an effing teenager and he’s 21 IIRC. That’s part of why Sylphiel is A Threat: she’s actually Gourry’s age and he could actually date her. Unfortunately for Sylphiel she did the whole Florence Nightengale thing right after Gourry had The Trauma specifically involving family murders over OP weapon, ending with him stealing said weapon in the hopes his loved ones would stop all killing each other, so he’s NOPE to a relationship with her because he doesn’t want to drag anyone into all that.

That’s also why Gourry is a bit condescending to Lina sometimes, since like yeah you’re a genius but you’re also a teenage moron. ‘I’m actually a little glad that the people who could tell her stories from when I was Like That for her to hold over my head are mostly dead...’

Lina’s relationship with having Feelings for Gourry isn’t tsundere: she’s an effing teenager who was obtaining a doctorate instead of socializing with any kind of normality. This is her first ‘I have Feels what do,’ the mazoku going ‘oh hey she has a loved one who isn’t actually The Chosen One let’s kidnap that’ and also she CAN’T pin him down to stop being jealous and having a conversation about her feelings would be Awkward bc again, teenager. 

Lina’s also one of the living seals of Shabranigdo as per Rezo, and there does seem to be bleedover. Of the three we see, she’s the only one with anything resembling like... ‘murdering children is wrong.’

Rezo is a Complete Monster, Luke suggests killing literally everyone except this one human who has decided ‘I like this one’ re and like OMG being a morality chain is exhausting Gourry has it so much easier than this lady with an Actual Teenager hitting on her... And when Phibrizzo wants to Fuck Up Lina enough that she’ll do the thing he wants even knowing what a horrible idea it is, he specifically kidnaps Gourry and has a child zombie he controls run themselves onto her sword. She knows the kid was already dead and it still fucks her up.

There’s one more vessel of Shabranigdo in backstory that’s, like, she’s specifically a Generation Xerox of. According to Milgazia he was an pretty good dude (until he got taken over, and that piece of Shabranigdo is still around, just in a Cold War stalemate that could end at any second), to the point he’s like, offering Lina a mercy kill partially in his memory if she needs one even though it’s discussed that if he did that his entire community of survivors would get slaughtered and the mazoku’s path to the human city beyond their mountain would be open. As in, he’s willing to pay that price to get her out if she thinks that what mfing Xelloss and Phibrizzo have planned for her is that bad and she thinks that’s the only way out.

But like... at this point Milgazia has gone way through trauma and terror in the face of eldritch abominations sent to kill everything getting slaughter after slaughter, win after win, to the point they’ve just killed so fucking many people, species and gods there’s very little the world can even do to delay the inevitable anymore to this zen of ‘every extra day anyone lives is a Fuck You’ so like, Lucas Magnus could have been the total Murder Hobo a lot of people think Lina is, and Milgazia would still have been ‘kudos’ for being alive in general, much less fighting the mazoku and thereby delaying a lot of other people’s deaths.

Milgazia: ‘yeah... me and this socially awkward teenager who ran away to fight even though her community said Hell No are literally all two species could send to fight the apocalypse, a third didn’t bother to respond to the message because their numbers/gene pool are so fucked from preventing the last apocalypse that if they take ANY casualties in this they’re dead anyway so the fate of the world is w/e’ Milgazia: *makes a Dad Joke* ‘Look if we don’t make dad jokes when we’re all about to die then none would ever have been made since the world’s been fucked since immediately after the creator realized part of their body just got torn out and wanted it back’

...yeeeah... I’m kind of wondering if there’s a reason a teenage girl is signing up for something that will get her away from a species desperate to repopulate... like, she does want to Save The World but yeeeah I’d want out of there too.

#ah slayers #should re-read #and probably get the new translations #bc Tokyopop

[aotopmha]

Attack on Titan in 2020

I've sort of dropped doing detailed chapter posts on the series because that type of writing wasn't very fun for me anymore and I have taken a liking to a bullet point kind of approach where I list the elements that stood out for me in the chapter or make a separate post for some specific topic I'd like to talk about in it.

I've started like 10 different posts to attempt to talk about AoT this year and I always end up with incoherent rambling because of all of the elements I'd love to to talk about.

This year's chapters were 125-135 and this year's episodes episodes 1-4 of season 4.

The anime episodes in particular have given me a lot of food for thought, so I'm just saying fuck it.

I think the biggest misstep of the story for me will forever be the fact that it decided to use fairly specific historical imagery.

The Eldians are clearly supposed to have allegorical equivalency with Jewish people, but the Jewish people were never the oppressors. There weren't any Jewish empires. That's conspiracy theory bullshit.

But on the other hand, the series clearly takes great effort to not stereotype any of the groups it's portraying and gives complex reasons for what both sides do. It's one of the few Japanese series that I've seen not stereotype Middle Eastern-coded people (Ramzi and Halil) or black people (Onyakapon). Everyone are people, it says. It even champions diversity:

(Chapter 118)

It is also very much true that a bunch of fascist states use long-term history as an excuse for their actions:

(Chapter 127)

Nation did X 2000 years ago therefore our conquest of them is justified.

This makes discussion about the series' themes like a minefield.

The people who are very critical about its imagery are right, but the people defending the series aren't wrong, either because it condemns all of those nasty ideas of conquest and hurting innocent people.

You can't have a more clear-cut condemnation of genocide:

(Chapter 127)

If you combine all of these details instead of zoning in on them one by one, to me what the story is saying is that *even if* all of that conspiracy bullshit is true, innocent people don't deserve to be slaughtered no matter the reason because they are still people who have their own feelings, thoughts and wishes.

The story clearly gets the baseline, but fumbles the details. I decided to look up some more discussion surrounding this these past few days and I just wish there was more good faith discussion about it. A lot of it feels like a moral superiority contest.

I think it's these kind of flawed stories that actually deserve detailed scruitiny over stories that are rotten to the core because they are *almost there*. Talking about them is a good topic starter in what to do and not to do in a story like this.

Speaking of rotten to the core, I think the absolute highlight of the chapters this year is Eren and some of the chapters this year finally gave me a pretty clear picture of what is going on with him.

Context from 123 certainly helps, though:

(Chapter 131)

This is about Eren's perspective. He can't accept the destruction of Paradis.

It's not that this solution was inevitable looking in from the outside (which is one of the interpretations I see around for Eren's actions), it's that *Eren* can't see any other way out of this except the most extreme because of all of the horrible things he has seen from the outside world. It is very similar to the way suicidal people can only focus on the negative.

You can tell them everything is going to be okay, but those words won't reach them because their mind won't let them and loops them back to those negative thoughts.

Eren can't see the ice cream or silly clowns. But he can see how the other Eldians in the league of Eldians are willing to push Paradis under the bus. He can see how Grisha's sister was killed. He can see how racist and cruel Marley is towards the Eldians in Liberio (and how the people have racist leanings towards other nations, too).

He can only see those bad things. But he also understands how everyone outside of the walls are human just as the people inside of the walls are.

So he is torn to pieces by guilt.

He doesn't want to do this, but he can't see any other solution.

This is why I also think he can't rob his friends of their agency. He is fighting for them to have a good future:

(Chapter 133)

(Chapter 131)

What really stood out to me on a revisit is that Eren considers himself much worse than Reiner.

I've seen criticism on how the story pushes the narrative of both sides being the same and this detail is really important to me because this is the story acknowledging that what Eren is doing is worse and gives all of the following exchanges about this the context of it being a similarity in principle.

Both sides have killed for what they think is right and have to deal with how they have killed people. This is such an important detail in the Uprising arc, too, where Erwin firmly acknowledged that overthrowing the government might not actually be the right choice by him. It was simply what he saw as right. On a narrative level this avoids absolute truths and preference of one character perspective over the other and once again makes it about individual perspectives.

The theme of individual perspectives is so ingrained in this story at this point in my eyes that it's another cornerstone in understanding what is going on with Eren to me.

I think it's great.

I also really appreciate Annie and what was done with her in this chunk of chapters.

(Chapter 127)

There has been this narrative going around that proposes that the story is in Eren's corner too much. But these chapters are nothing but questioning Eren and Annie is one of the main voices in this. It's the Marleyan girls, really and I think this is a very necessary part of making the narrative work. Once again, it separates the narrative and character perspective.

It says that the Paradis side caring is about character perspective, not what the narrative sides with and Annie is even sympathetic to Mikasa in that instance.

She gets it. Unexpectedly, I think Annie might play a bigger role in taking down Eren than expected. Her character arc about deciding to no longer go with the flow because she doesn't want any more tragedy to happen is basically calling for it.

(Chapter 128)

Another element I've seen brought up is the fact that nobody seems to address the Bert-sized elephant in the room, but some of our characters are certainly thinking about him.

This is such a thematically strong element and really interesting because Connie joined the military to make his mom proud and be a good soldier. This is the motivation behind his claim when he says they are going to save the world. But what does becoming a good soldier mean, exactly?

Well, apparently possibly gunning down people you care about.

This moment is so good because it's another moment where the idea of glory in war is taken down a peg.

The moment with Connie declaring they're going to save the world is so often criticised, but it is actually turned on its head in 128. There is no heroics in this. This is actually Connie's big "killing a person" moment because it strips away the final bit of comfort in killing in war, the excuse of killing for good moral reasons.

It is also a wonderful complex evolution of the series' themes. Trost was about fighting monsters. In the Female Titan and Clash of Titan arcs some of those monsters turned out to be human. In the Uprising, Return to Shiganshina and Marley arcs all of those monsters turned out to be human and here in the War of Paradis arc, everyone is human and the only separating system is what everyone views as right.

I really hope the anime will let this chapter breathe a little bit more.

Moving on, I guess it is time to address the rumbling.

I love it as a horror spectacle.

(Chapter 130)

And I really I think it needs to be non-CG when animated. CG is fine in spectacle battles, but not in horror settings because it is too clean.

The rumbling needs to be disgusting and dirty.

Chapter 132 gave me one of the few moments in which I truly cared about Levi. I think him telling Hange to dedicate her heart was a very good moment to cap off their relationship. He sent another SL commander to fulfill their duty.

The speech about hatred in chapter 134 also stood out to me. I think it definitely should be fitted in there somewhere in this, but I also see a bunch of criticism for it.

I want to point out that this is the side of present Marley talking here. It's the military dictatorship.

It's the Nazis. I think the Nazis should feel regret for exploiting innocent people and admit they're wrong.

I also like how the horrors here are undoing the brainwashing and showing the truth to the citizens.

I guess you could read it as heavy-handed, but it is also something that needs to be addressed and in principle, it's not wrong.

I'm also going to put a mention of Historia here. I've talked about how this is my biggest and most glaring problem with the series because of how thematically unfitting it feels, but I've also talked about it in many posts. I wanted to focus more on other stuff in this post.

So now, we make it back to chapter 135.

I think having stewed on it for a month now, I like the element of mindscrewing our cast with the Titans of the people they love is the strongest element of it. It's making them face their personal traumas and we also get some great character moments and payoffs from it.

Mikasa ended off the year in a very good note in my eyes.

Even this deep in the story, this chapter left me in a situation where I have no idea how things might turn out.

I might have rough ideas, but not anything specific and that's fun.

Well, this is it on my retrospective.

2021 is confirmed to be AoT's final year of publication as volume 34 is set to be the story's final volume.

Those who hate the story can finally be free of it and those who care for it, can look back on it with fondness and sadness and many other emotions and evaluate.

It's been 7 years for me. What a wild ride.

So, I'm asking everyone, what are some of your observations on AoT in 2020?

Is there anything you'd like to add or do you have any observations or counterarguments for anything I've said?

I'd be curious to see what everyone else thought of AoT in 2020!

#Attack on Titan #Shingeki no Kyojin #Eren #Eren Jaeger #Eren Yeager #Annie #Annie Leonhardt #Connie #Connie Springer #Hange #Hange Zoe #Historia #Historia Reiss #Mikasa #Mikasa Ackerman

[jewishzevran]

soft fires and wildflowers

three: “please don’t walk out of that door.” / requested by @statueofsirens​ (☙)

“my love for you will always be like a mountain stream: quiet. persistent. continuous.” – Sanober Khan.

"Are you out of your mind?”

“Oh and I suppose you are now the moral metric by which we should all judge ourselves?”

“You know I didn’t mean that, Viv! Don’t twist my words!”

“What would you have done? ‘Cause from where I’m standing, it was either “kill a group of templars” or “let them discover the cabin and either slaughter or arrest us”!”

“I don’t see “let yourself almost get killed in the process through sheer recklessness and stupidity” on that list!”

“I’m a grown woman, Anders! I can make my own choices, and I don’t need you to coddle me!”

Vivian's hands were curled into tight fists as she and Anders raged at each other, venom flying back and forth between them, barely covering for the panic she knew they were both feeling. 

It had been far too close. They almost walked straight into a trap, and had it not been for Fenris, all three of them would be dead or prisoners. 

In an attempt to buy them time, Vivian had used herself as bait to draw the Templars deeper into the woods, further away from the little cabin they had stumbled upon, clearly abandoned in haste and perfect for a trio of fugitives needing somewhere to sleep. She could have left it there, could have left them to wander aimlessly through the trees by themselves, but she chose to neutralise the threat single handedly, and by the time Fenris and Anders caught up with her, all the Templars were all dead, but she had been moments from joining them.

Apparently, grinning widely, slurring "take that, scum", and then collapsing wasn't exactly an end goal Anders had been aiming for. 

"You didn't even tell us what you were doing!"

"I didn't want to risk involving you!”

"You can't not involve us! 

Vivian threw her hands up in frustration. " What would have happened if they'd captured you?"

"Then I’d go to my fate knowing at least I’d done something worthwhile and managed to spare your life in the process!”

"Andraste's tits, Anders, you're such a fucking martyr. I didn't spare your life at the Gallows for a lark. Why do you think I'm in this tiny run-down shack with you? For my fucking health? I'm here to protect you!"

"Yeah, well. No one asked you to fucking do that, did they?" Anders spat. "At least if I was by myself I wouldn't have to spend half my time repairing the damage of your bad decisions!"

The words cut Vivian like a razor sharp knife. She took a step back. He might as well have punched her. 

"Maybe I'll just leave then." She said, voice quiet and deadly. 

"Maybe you should." Anders replied, before turning and walking into the only other room, slamming the door behind him.

For a moment, Vivian stood, completely taken aback, heart breaking. Then she steeled herself with fury and grabbed her knapsack, already packed in case they needed to make a quick getaway.

If he didn't want her, then she'd go. Where, she had no idea. But she'd work it out. Let him get captured by Templars if that's what he really wanted. 

She was crossing to the door when her thoughts were interrupted.

"Vivian–"

A hand caught her wrist, and she looked up to see Fenris, silent until now, looking at her with soft, pleading eyes. She had completely forgotten he was even here, so wrapped up in her temper.

Vivian remained frozen in place as he slowly closed the gap between them, not letting go. Still keeping eye contact, moving as though she were a spooked deer he did not wish to further startle, he leaned in and rested his forehead against hers.

"Please don't walk out that door. Stay. Please." 

The words were murmured against her skin, quietly, softly, a gentle entreaty for her ears only. 

Their eyes both closed, and Vivian let herself relax into the touch, feeling her anger drain out of her feet into the floor, leaving her with nothing but the feeling of being a scared child hopelessly out of her depth. 

"Fenris, I–" 

"I know," he murmurs, rubbing his thumb in soothing circles against her wrist, "I know."

Vivian felt tears burning in her eyes, and it was Fenris pulling her into an impossibly tender embrace, stroking her hair and rocking her gently, that forced them to roll down her cheeks. 

She let him hold her while she sobbed, clinging to him as though he were the only thing in the world that could stop her suffocating in her terror. 

Fenris tilted her face up, brushing tears away with his thumb, then leaned in for an impossibly soft kiss, and reached for the straps of her bag. He hesitated for a moment and Vivian held still, giving him wordless permission to continue, and without breaking the kiss, he gently slid the bag from her back.

"Go to him." Fenris murmured against her lips, smiling gently. "He needs you just as much as you need him."

"I can't lose him, Fenris. What if he does get caught? I can’t… I can’t–”

"I know, Vivian." He replied, kissing her again. "We're both here to make sure that doesn't happen.”

“But he doesn’t–”

“Of course he does, Vivian. You’re both scared of losing the other. You just lash out in the same way, and you’re both too stubborn to admit it, sometimes. Go to him."

She took a deep, shaking breath, wiping her eyes with the heels of her hands. "Okay."

"I love you." He said, brushing his lips against her hair. 

"I love you too, Fenris."

Vivian crept to the door into the tiny bedroom, and when she opened it, Anders looked up from where his head was in his hands, eyes red and puffy. 

He immediately leapt to his feet, wrapping his arms around her like a vice and sobbing into her shoulder.

"I'm sorry, Viv, I'm so sorry–"

"I'm sorry too, Anders, I'm sorry, I didn't–"

"–shouldn't have said–"

"–be more careful–"

"I can't lose you, not after all this, I love you, I need you, Viv, I don't know what I'd do without you.”

“Me neither, I’d die without you, Anders, I love you so much, I have to protect you, I can’t let them get you, I won’t–”

They moved to the bed, curling up on top of the sheets and holding each other tightly as the near-animal panic slowly dissipated, kissing desperately and hungrily. 

A while later, the door opened as Fenris slipped inside, curling up behind Vivian and linking his fingers with Anders' over her waist.

"Thank you," Anders murmured, rubbing his thumb over Fenris' skin. 

Fenris didn't say anything in response, just squeezed Anders' hand and smiled softly. 

They all knew they couldn't stay here forever, and eventually they'd have to move on to somewhere new, but for now, they had each other. Everyone was safe. And for a few minutes, that was enough.

#hawke x anders #hawke x fenris #fenris x anders #hawke x anders x fenris #viv/anders/fenris #my sweet babbies #BEHOLD how i take angst prompts and make them soft #ash writes

[lisinfleur]

Bróðir Minn

The request:

Author’s Notes | Oh, thank you for this chance! I love when I can fix the plot and give these brothers some tender background! Universe | Vikings Pairing | No pair Info | Viking Age AU, Fixing Plot AU, requested by @mzliterarydreamer​ for 5CW7 | “Bróðir Minn” means “My Brother” in Icelandic Words | 1094 ⁑ Warnings: Some graphic violence, mentions of death, wounds, and blood.

They weren't all the time together on the battlefield, but to separate from his brothers this time was a mistake. Sigurd realized that when he started to see the number of enemies around him was becoming bigger than the number of allies.

His men were falling and bit by bit he was becoming alone on the camp. And for a leader like him, to be alone would end in two well-known ways: being captured and tortured, then exposed in order to low the morale of his men; or being slaughtered like an animal for the enemy wave he wouldn't be able to hold by himself.

Both honorable fates. Both would grant him the Valhalla. Both were something he didn't want for that moment. The reason why he was fighting with all of himself to avoid being surrounded or separated from the rest of his army - something he couldn't avoid for too long.

A circle of foes formed around him and after a while, the few men that were trapped into that formation with him were down or dead. Yet, Sigurd's fierceness didn't fade.

If he would have to die, then he would give his brothers something to tell! If he would have to die, he would die fighting, so Ivar would have to admit he died like a Viking instead of mocking him for his death.

However, those men weren't interested in killing him. They seemed to know enough about his culture to play with his efforts, hitting him from side to side, pushing him instead of hurting, wounding him instead of killing.

Sigurd had multiple cuts in his face, arms, and sides when the sound of a horse became audible and he thought it was his end: surely it was their leader, coming to see their prisoner and decide his fate. He prepared himself, taking a deep breath, mentally calling the gods and asking them to stay with him at that moment.

But the answer of the gods wasn't the cold blade of death, neither the embrace of the Valkyries. Instead, the horse didn't stop and the sound of wooden wheels followed a voice Sigurd knew very... Very well.

The last voice he waited to see screaming against enemies that could be threatening his life.

"CHARGE!!"

Ivar's horse invaded the circle of foes like Sleipnir himself, smashing the enemy soldiers at his commander's orders, stepping over whoever who dared to stay in front of his powerful chariot.

Surprised, Sigurd saw a few bones cracked and heads smashed under Ivar's horse before his chariot stopped right beside him.

"Come in!" his little brother yelled, and shocked, Sigurd took a second to really understand what was happening.

Enough for Ivar to yell again, showing his older brother's shocked brain he wasn't daydreaming or anything stupid like that.

"Come the fuck in, Sigurd!! Come in! Quickly!!"

Still dizzy, Sigurd went upon his chariot as the men he brought with him were opening a way through where the brothers could pass.

And Ivar yelled at the horse, still walking over two other enemy soldiers before riding through the free path his men provided.

The whole way was made silently by the two brothers. Ivar focused on conducting the horse back to their camp, Sigurd watching the corpses and fights giving place to trees and snow until they were safe at their settlement.

The horse stopped and men came to conduce prince Sigurd to the healer's tent.

Not a word was exchanged by the brothers who just looked at each other for a moment.

Sigurd had his wounds cared, some of them burned, some of them stitched. Ubbe and Hvitserk came to see him, but for the day he had to recover, he didn't see Ivar a single time.

In the next morning, the young prince got up, walking by himself towards his little brother's tent, surprising Ivar who was settling his braces in his legs, preparing to go to their communal table.

"I see you're already better," Ivar said, not taking his eyes away from his braces.

But Sigurd remained silent for a while before finally letting it come out of his mouth.

"Why did you come back for me?"

Ivar sighed, letting go of the buckles and lifting his eyes toward his older brother.

"Why wouldn't I?"

"You hate me," Sigurd answered readily, thinking that was the obvious answer for such a question. "You keep saying you're ashamed of me, you wish I wasn't here... That I play the oud around and it annoys you... Then why?" His voice wasn't harsh this time, but truly curious. "Why did you come back for saving me?"

"Would you let me die that way, Sigurd?"

Ivar's voice crossed Sigurd's chest like a rusted knife. He also said many times he hated his little brother. He also spread out loud how much he wanted his mother had left Ivar to the wolves...

But at the bottom of his heart, he would never be able to leave his little brother to be killed like that and he knew that.

Ivar noticed his brother's brain had done the math by itself.

"I may dislike what you do and sometimes not understanding why the gods gave you perfect legs to be a singer when I could be a greater warrior with the gifts you have, Sigurd. I may even desire my mother had left you to starvation such as you many times wished I had been devoured by the wolves when father left me in that forest. But you're my brother. Such as I'm yours. My blood is your blood and we are the same. So, don't make me stupid questions, Sigurd. You know the answer. You know exactly why I went there and saved your ass from those bastards."

"Because you wouldn't lose the chance to smash some heads under your horse's hooves," Sigurd said, mockingly.

And the glow on Ivar's eyes became the same he was used to seeing when his little brother smiled cynically at him.

"No, brother. Because someone needs to sing about my victories, now get the hell off. You're distracting me and Hvitserk will eat the whole table before I can get a single piece of bread," Ivar answered, with the moody tone of the everyday.

But this time, Sigurd didn't answer with any kind of harsh word. Instead, he turned his back to Ivar, walking through his door, muttering something only the two brothers heard, almost as a secret in between them both that Ivar smiled small for a single second after hearing.

"Thank you, brother."

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#history vikings #imagine vikings #ivar #ivar the boneless #ivar imagine #ivar ragnarsson #ivar lothbrok #ivar's heathen army #sister wives #5CW #5CW Event #5CWIvar2 #shot

[renardtrickster]

ThePedanticRomantic Rebuttal: If You Like Goblin Slayer, You’re Probably A Hypocrite Edgelord

OH BOY I SURE DO LOVE ME SOME goblin slayer discourse cute people ALL OF THOSE THINGS. And you’re only going to get two of those.

First of all, ThePedanticRomantic, in a super-brave move that nobody could have possibly predicted, accuses Goblin Slayer of being an allegory for racism/muh borders/antisemitism/buzzword halfway through the video. Congratulations, nobody has even spewed up that hairball. In a previous draft, I went over how it’s very unlikely that a Japanese work would use largely european imagery when nine times out of ten, “vaguely european” is all that settings like this get. But let’s go over how that innately doesn’t make sense for propaganda.

Let’s say the Redhats make a propaganda piece against the Bluejackets. The piece would most likely, despite being for Redhats, focus entirely on Bluejackets. How depraved they are, how they’re evil, what they do, what they believe in, with the Redhats being relegated to “wow we killed them and are heroic”. Or at least that’s what I would do if I made propaganda that’s a phrase I shouldn’t say. Either way, Goblin Slayer does not operate like this. The depravity of goblins is either stated in passing dialogue, or shown for a few minutes, making up 10% of the anime. The other 30% focuses on killing them, and the other 60% focuses on Goblin Slayer as a character and his relationships. That seems rather odd for a propaganda piece, to focus on interpersonal matters.

Furthermore, why it’s focusing on Goblin Slayer. This isn’t just “Wow, Kill The Rapists: the Anime”. It’s focusing on Goblin Slayer and his dynamic with his party. What a lifestyle of encountering brutal sadists on a daily basis does to a person. What treating them with the same hatred they show to everyone does to a person. How he’s so socially stunted and probably mentally unwell from this career, how all his friends are vaguely scared of him, scared for him, and how this is shaping his whole life and how it will end probably poorly. A propaganda piece does not do something like that, they would focus on how noble and rewarding it is, not show how grim, dirty, and devoid of reward of even a promise of accomplishment it is. The Goblins are not a plot element to show how “imagine this is a race and we should kill them”, they’re a Necessary Weasel for a character like Goblin Slayer to come into being, and how it develops him.

Additionally, the thought-provocation was NEVER “is it okay to genocide the Goblins?”, it was “is it okay for one man to try undertaking that quest?”. Priestess wasn’t shell-shocked over “wow he killed babies that could have been good”, she was horrified by the fact that, after watching her friends be slaughtered, violated, or BOTH by the Goblins, Goblin Slayer waltzed in and did something equally horrific, even though it was necessary. Think of it this way, the concept of killing babies is horrific, but it was entirely justified in this situation. Doesn’t stop it from being horrifying. That’s like a kid learning that superheroes should capture bad guys and put them in jail, being put into a hostage situation, and being saved by shooting the criminal. That was morally justified because the criminal put a child in danger, but fucked up because the child witnessed death, and learned that nonlethality isn’t always the go-to option.

The bigger issue I have with this video is the point Pedantic is making largely. That Goblin Slayer is JUST AS BAD as Sword Art Online when it comes to handling rape. The problem isn’t just “oh they both use rape to show Bad Guy, they’re exactly the same”, it’s HOW they use it. Let’s construct an example using everyone’s favourite punching bag: Nazis.

Film A is about Nazis in Nazi Germany. It is grim, it shows the evils of the Nazis in full colour, even though you already hated Nazis, you get re-affirmed because the film uses itself to convince you that these are the bad guys instead of “audience, you know what to feel”, and the evil of Nazism is treated for all it’s worth.

Film B is entirely suburban. It’s mostly lighthearted, focusing on the protagonist’s journey and their clashes with Dickhead. Dickhead is a dickhead, and is mostly a jerk, petty, or has motivations kind of like the protagonist, but for some negative end or one that clashes with the protagonist’s. Halfway through, or near the end of the film, Dickhead is revealed to be a full-on Nazis, with armbands, regalia, and all that implies. This wasn either foreshadowed very poorly, or not at all. The reveal that Dickhead is a Nazi is treated as more of “wow, that’s another thing I dislike about you” than anything very serious. The protagonist beats them up and goes on to finish their journey. In case you weren’t fully intimidated by Dickhead, there’s one scene of him saying or doing very generic Nazi stuff that gets the point across without actually doing anything. Heavy metal plays over this scene.

DO YOU SEE THE PROBLEM?!?!?! Goblin Slayer treats goblins with fear and loathing. Anytime a Goblin enters someone’s life, they are fucked up irreparably. Shield Maiden still has PTSD, Fighter quit adventuring outright. People die gruesomely and slowly! In Sword Art Online, it’s almost a joke! Death Gun reveals that he has a rape penchant for no reason other than to raise the stakes. Sugou tied Asuna up and fondled her and she not only barely reacted to it, but didn’t show any signs of that as soon as he stopped touching her! It’s superflous, provides nothing to the characterization, and is incredibly lazy. The author of Sword Art even admitted that it was unnecessary and he did it because he read light novels that had those exact plot elements tacked on. They are not comparable in this respect. That’s edgy.

Semi-Finally, PedanticRomantic has OBVIOUSLY only seen the first episode, maybe watched some reviews who also only saw the first episode, and wrote this entire dissertation. The Goblins don’t need to be deep, they’re a necessary weasel for Goblin Slayer as a character to exist. There aren’t moral quandaries, just notations that even though Goblin Slayer is doing an okay thing, it’s self-destructive. And while the premise is “guy kills goblins”, it actually focuses more on the characters and interpersonal relationships more! Of course it sounds edgy and hollow when you say that, you’re cutting out an entire 60% of the show! Berserk sounds edgy as fuck when you just relay “man with big sword fights demons and his rapist demon-king ex-friend” and completely omit that focus on Guts’ character, strong development, entire party of friends, and themes of inevitability, fate, and perseverance.

Also thank you for smugly ending off with “i thought it was cool but but then i STOPPED BEING AN IDIOT, if you still think it’s good, then okay”. I covered this in a different post, but it’s a humongous reflection on yourself.

I said “semi-final” up above, because Pedantic made an “apology video”.

Don’t bother clicking on that video. She doesn’t actually listen to any criticism or comments on her video which she disabled lmao, but blames it on the fact that the video was poorly scheduled, rushed, fans didn’t get the point she intended to make, and something something youtube algorithm. Where I come from, we call this clickbait. Get fucked.

Another video like this I would recommend is the one made by NECRO XIII. It takes a more MST3K take on the video, but gets across a lot of the points I made/liked.

#thepedanticromantic #the pedantic romantic #goblin slayer #rebuttal #discourse #oh no renardie is posting #infoxicated #tw rape

[thejakeformerlyknownasprince]

If you are still doing book reviews, could you do one for the departure?

Short opinion: I admire the hell out of #19: The Departure, and I’d put it on every summer reading list in the country if I could.  I also find it unbelievably annoying.

Long opinion:

I agree with all the people who point out that K.A. Applegate does something incredibly daring and complex and real-world important with #19, through showing that the Evil Empire of Evil can still have a ton of residents who just kind of ended up in Evilstown through the bad luck of being born there and can’t really be held responsible for (initially) believing the poison they’ve been fed their entire lives.  Aftran 942 is arguably the most important character in the series because her greatest sin is simply not questioning the beliefs that she grew up with—and as a result, she horribly enslaves and violates at least three or four people (including children) and commits at least one murder.  We come to understand that what Cassie asks her to do—to reject everything she was raised with and believes and cares about—is not only incomprehensibly difficult, but nearly ends up being deadly.  Applegate deconstructs the idea that entire groups or belief systems can be “evil” and simultaneously shows that the actions of an entire group can be so evil that the only moral choice is opposition.  She makes it clear that many of the yeerks fighting the war against humans are doing so because of false or distorted beliefs, and also shows that rebellion against those beliefs is possible.

But in order to accomplish this effect, #19 awkwardly uses everything from an enraged black bear to a fucking random-ass leopard to herd the characters around the plot.  How about just a bear, but maybe one that is humanized or has rabies?  How about a more straightforward survival story with no random-ass leopards, maybe one in which Cassie’s major moment of saving Aftran’s life is instead giving up all of her found mushrooms so that Karen can eat?

Regardless of how it happens, Aftran and Cassie together make this incredible, radical choice to trust each other, and they do so specifically because of their forced empathy for one another.  Cassie thinks of yeerks slugs and slavers, but never as individuals, until she and Aftran end up forced to spend two nights sitting around in a cave whining about their respective difficulties with the ongoing war.  Aftran dismisses gedds, hork-bajir, and other non-yeerks as “lesser” species in need of domination for their own good until she ends up unavoidably forced to take Cassie’s perspective as she is literally seeing through Cassie’s eyes.  It’s not that Cassie is anything all that special; it’s just that Cassie is a unique individual with fears and dreams.  Cassie’s a scared kid thrust into a war too big for her to handle, just like Aftran.  Cassie’s an animal nut and an only child who thinks shopping with her best friend is silly and has a crush on her CO.  Cassie deserves to live her life free from controllerdom, even if that means Aftran isn’t allowed to use her eyes.

However, in order to have that moment of empathy, CASSIE FIRST HAS TO BECOME A FUCKING VOLUNTARY CONTROLLER.  Just to be clear, I am 100% with Marco: once that happens, the other Animorphs have a duty and an obligation, albeit an unpleasant one, to kill Cassie and Aftran.  Forget letting Tom have the morphing cube; that decision right there is the most unforgivable thing Cassie ever does to her team.  Letting the yeerks morph is a bad idea.  Letting the yeerks know the names, addresses, faces, and personalities of every one of the Animorphs is a far bigger betrayal.  Worse still, it’s one that Cassie commits out of sheer carelessness: she seems to be suffering from temporary amnesia because she genuinely does not realize she is dooming all of her friends and her entire family to the same fate when she lets herself become a controller.  It is canon (according to Tom, Eva, Chapman, Allison Kim, Alloran, and John Berryman, all on different occasions) that being an involuntary controller is LITERALLY a fate worse than death; if not for Aftran, Cassie would dodge that bullet while allowing everyone she loves to take it in her place.  The only alternative would be forcing someone she loves (Rachel or Marco) to kill her in order to save the other people they love.  I cannot think too hard about this moment without despising Cassie as a human being. Anyway, would it have been that hard just to have Aftran abandon Karen and infest Cassie one of those times Cassie was sleeping next to her?

However, Applegate does an absolutely amazing job of showing that the moral choice—to give up on having a host—is the unbelievably difficult choice for Aftran.  She explains the rhetoric of “look out for oneself” and “fight to get what you and your group need” very clearly—and then utterly takes it down, not just on a societal level, but also on an individual level.  Cassie and Aftran draw strength from one another, saving each other’s lives several times until there’s no doubt that each one would be dead without the other.  Cassie’s whole character arc is about the importance of drawing on others for strength and about the power that comes from vulnerability, and her willingness to rely on Aftran to save her is an even more important part of her development than her willingness to save Aftran.  The lesson that Aftran takes from Cassie’s dependency as a form of strength is also really important: that it doesn’t have to be either-or, a matter of the yeerks having the humans’ strength or the humans having the humans’ strength.  It is possible for the two species to work together, and the moral solution to the power imbalance is definitely not one in which the yeerks punish the humans for the andalites’ bad choices and their own bad luck through using children as livestock.

And yet this lesson gets somewhat lost in that Cassie’s whole oops-I’m-a-controller fuckup miraculously works out for her.  She does not allow Aftran to infest her in the hope of changing Aftran’s mind; she does it because she’s unwilling to get Karen’s blood on her hands.  And then she not only avoids consequences for her mistake but ends up being better off for having made it.  I’d be less annoyed with Cassie doing something stupid and then the universe rearranging itself to make that stupidity okay if she didn’t do it four or five other times in this same damn book (quitting the team, using a horse to attack an angry bear, allowing a controller to see her morphing, becoming a nothlit) and if the universe didn’t accommodate her every damn time (Jake being way too understanding that she’s leaving her friends to die, the horse fending off the bear, the controller being one of the few on the planet who is wavering about the idea of involuntary hosts, caterpillars resetting as butterflies).  I’d be even less annoyed if the series as a whole didn’t demonstrate this pattern again and again and again.  Cassie risks her life to save some baby skunks, only for the skunks to become the key to stopping Visser Three from destroying Ax’s forest (#9).  Cassie thinks that the gang should trust George Edelman (#17) and Mr. Tidwell (#29) only for them both to prove to be trustworthy; she doesn’t think that they should trust Taylor (#43) but still manages to come out of nowhere to save their butts after she proves to be right yet again.  Cassie stops Jake from killing Tom because she doesn’t want Jake hurt; that decision ends up working itself into the morph-capable yeerks rebelling and Cassie claiming she knew it all along (#50).  Cassie just “knows somehow” that stopping John Berryman from ever being born will bring Jake back (MM3), just like she “knows somehow” that the Animorphs can trust Ax but not Tom (MM4).  It’s sloppy characterization, it’s awkward plotting, and it’s just bad writing.

AND YET this book is also incredibly important as an SF* story in general, because (I will be the first to admit, as a huuuuuuugggee SF geek from about age six on forward) SF specifically has an ethics problem.  No other genre promotes ideas such as “they were urgals so it’s okay for us to slaughter several thousand of them and then go have a party,” “we often shoot/stab/torture humans to hurt the demons inside them because, dude, they’re demons,” or “my dad being mean to me is a valid excuse for destroying a planet.”  The yeerks get a raw deal right from birth—but being born without eyes isn’t a valid excuse to steal someone else’s body in order to use their eyes.  Cassie is only trying to defend her home and her family from invasion—but defending one’s own isn’t a valid excuse for cruelty or capricious murder.  Applegate doesn’t allow the reader the luxury of an easy story with a simple moral; she shows how the right choice is neither easy to find nor easy to make once one finds it.  She also shows that the “heroic” gestures SF worships are often as harmful as they are helpful, and that making the truly right choice to care for others and avoid harm is a years-long commitment to exhausting and unrewarding selflessness.  In the process she also heroicizes both Cassie and Aftran for making that choice.  There are not enough SF stories that humanize the alien villains, and there are definitely not enough SF stories about strength that doesn’t come from fighting ability.

Nonetheless, I’d like to count off the freaking plot holes in this freaking book.  The leopard’s presence is never properly explained, and its behavior doesn’t make much sense: sometimes it’s frightened enough of a wolf to run away, and sometimes it’s willing to fight a wolf and a gorilla in one go.  The yeerks just let Karen go at the end for no really good reason, when they go through heroic lengths to kill other ex-hosts who know too much in #8 and #31 especially.  Cassie picks up the Idiot Ball at a couple different moments in a way that is frankly uncharacteristic of her.  Aftran manages to hunt Cassie down and follow her home while in the body of a seven-year-old child without morphing and apparently without using any public or private transportation, when none of the other yeerks succeeded in doing this with any of the Animorphs after any other battle.  A panicked horse, an angry bear, a flooded river, and a badly-placed rock manage to conspire to get Cassie and Karftran stuck out in the woods in a string of bad luck worthy of a Charles Dickens novel.  While they’re out there, five super-competent teens who can (among other things) see for miles, track scents, and run at 30+ MPH remain unable to find them for days.  Ax doesn’t feel the need to mention the whole “metamorphosis resets the nothlit clock” thing during the several days that Jake et al spent worrying about Cassie.

NONETHELESS, this book shows the awe-inspiring degree of courage needed to face down one’s entire society and systematically reject every aspect of it and its damaging beliefs.  It also shows that the Karens of the world need the Aftrans of the world to make that radical decision, because although it is heroic to choose to act in the face of one’s society committing atrocities, it is equally reprehensible to choose not to act in the face of those kinds of atrocities.  #19 is a clear example of what makes K.A. Applegate a writer like no other, in that it rejects the easy choice of writing YA SF with all-bad villains or all-good heroes in favor of the right choice of writing an emotionally exhausting but deeply thought-provoking war epic with no simple answers.  The fact that Applegate does so in a book that also has gutwrenchingly accurate descriptions of depression (Cassie feeling unable to care about anything, even her loved ones), uncontrollable-giggle-inducing moments of humor (Marco announcing that he has to be excused from class to go buy a nicotine patch because he feels the urge to become an adolescent smoking statistic coming on), and stick-in-your-brain imagery (Aftran struggling to describe blindness as she and Cassie stand in a field of wildflowers) is just another credit to her freaking amazing ability as a writer.

So YOU’D THINK she could come up with a better way to get this plot moving than a fucking random-ass leopard.  Le sigh.  

*SF ≈ speculative fiction ≈ science fiction, fantasy, horror, modern myth, etc.

#animorphs #animorphs reviews #mama nature #aftran 942 #cassie #the departure #19 #yeerks #asks #answers #anonymous

[directorscutandsomeotherstuff]

A change of paths

(Welcome to Director’s Cut, where bad fanfics are terrible and I have way too much time on my hands. Today, we’re talking about a little gem called Fable.)

(Fable was an action RPG released in the mid-2000′s that was pretty okay. A bit hokey and childish, but then I played it as a child, sort of, so it was perfect. It had a moral choice mechanic, back in the day when that was just starting to be the “hot” thing, and about eleven billion years before video game designers realized it was stupid and we were all sick of it. In a sense, it kind of played out like a father telling a story to his kid, letting his kid choose what sort of action the Hero would take. Of course, then it turned out this kid was a petty little shit who made his character beat up guards and kick chickens all day long, and the father was too much of a weakhearted sap to step in and not nearly creative enough to find a way to make the character properly suffer for his actions in-story. What we’re left with is a simpering little tale about a guy who gets called a Hero, joins a guild of Heroes, and gets lauded with fame and fortune even if, by all accounts, he should have kingdoms beating down his door for indiscriminate slaughter and having a really stupid mustache.)

(Also its director was an over-promising charlatan who claimed that an Xbox era game would have real-time tree growing mechanics, but people don’t write Peter Molyneux fanfiction, so we’re not here to talk about him. Instead, let’s talk about that good/evil mechanic some more.)

(Lotrdude (I wonder if he’s a fan of fantasy stuff) seemed to be really taken in by the idea, and so he decided to not only write a story about being evil, but also about seeking redemption. And as I’ve already touched on with things like that one Lord of the Flies deal, I find fanfiction authors trying to be complex to be simply adorable. Let’s dig in.)

my first attempt at this site. It seems kinda long, (Less than 1500 words? You’re right. This thing is a freaking novella!) but read all of it. PLZ review.

A CHANGE OF PATHS

He sat on his bed reflecting on horrors of the past. His mind raced from bloodbath to death-ridden bloodbath. (As opposed to all those life-ridden bloodbaths he used to take at summer camp, when he was nine.) Death was all he ever knew. He saw the faces. Their screams had haunted him. Their lives were quickly taken from them, without thought or reason, and it was all by his hand. At one time, it was pleasing to go pillaging the towns. It took no effort, for his power was too great. (He took the greatest pleasure out of things that never challenged him. Boredom was like an aphrodisiac.) He would prance into the gates, almost laughing at the peasants as they wailed and ran into their homes. He took great joy in slaying hundreds, and taking their measly possessions. And the guardians of the town? What a jest, one swipe of his almighty sword would send them to the grave. (He’d maxed out his Strength experience, you see. Dude had a body like a tank made of beef.) Then, without looking back, he would leave humming a tune and perhaps playfully tossing a bag of money in his hand. He had lived this way for years. He had slaughtered, and burnt much of Albion. He had become the very essence of fear. At the mere sight of him the people would run, and mention of his name sent a shiver down peoples spines. Now he sat secluded in the forest, with no one daring to venture to his lair.

He reached up to his forehead and felt the bony horns that had sprouted on his brow, cultivated by pure evil. He looked into the mirror across from his bed. His eyes had begun to glow a blood red. They burnt with the fire of hell. These were the marks that proved his nature. These were the signs that showed his soul to the world. (And other than random villagers not crowding him and randomly falling in love, it was the only penalty for a maxed out Evil stat. Truly, he counted himself as being among the damned.) He was alone in a prison without walls, and his mind was tormented by darkness.

For now he sat calmly in his home. A dimming fire burned in the furnace, although an ungodly, ferocious storm raged outside. Lightning flashed, thunder roared, and rain pelted the house like arrows. This storm was different from others. Its rage was also forged by evil. (The storm also liked to kick chickens and wear black clothing.) The man looked into the fire then he turned to the forest, and for no apparent reason he walked outside into the storm. He looked down the path that cut through the forest like a knife. (Slowly, and as a result of the foot traffic of animals and people?) He did not know why he was leaving, perhaps to escape his past, his prison. His head low, the man began to trudge down the trail.

The forest was as dark as the so-called "Heroes" soul. The woods had a demonic aura that shrouded its branches like a thick fog. (The forest also liked to kick chickens an-I’m gonna stop, now.) The trees were all dead, their dark shapes casting menacing shadows when lightning crashed from the sky. The rain persisted; it drenched the man, though he did not care, for his mind still ached from memory. His thoughts raced back further to the things that had started it all, his childhood. His family: dead, the heroes guild, his training place, and home: destroyed, his mother: slaughtered before him, and finally the thing that most haunted him, his sister: killed by his own hand. (Of course, considering he’d been massacring villages for years, one more death shouldn’t matter, but then apparently he was being haunted by all of those deaths, too, so he could only assume he was suffering from omnicidal mood swings.) All had been wiped away. He knew now what he was going to do. He would take his own life, soon.

He trudged on weeping. (Poor Weeping only whimpered and rolled over, morbidly glad that he had only been trod on, today. It was the luckiest day he had had in a long, long, depressing string of misfortunes, living in these chicken kicking woods.) He had been trekking through the forest for the entire night. His clothes were torn, and his skin bled from the cuts of woodland underbrush. (Underbrush had apparently proved to be more dangerous than the town guards he had slaughtered. Perhaps Bowerstone should have invested in gardeners instead of guards.) His thoughts a raging fury that threatened to burst. For hours the storm raged as the man wailed, tormented by unseen demons. The earth beneath him gave way. He slipped on the muddy path beneath him. He lay face down in the murk. He didn't move. He finally turned and faced the sky, the water rinsing mud and tears from his face. He lay there for another hour trying to rid his mind of the stench of blood, but it was no use, suicide was near. (Suicide tipped her wide-brimmed hat at the sad sack of half-demon on the ground. “Hail,” she said, “have you seen that loser Weeping around here? I’ve come for my weekly taunting session.”) He rose to his knees. Voices whispered and at times shouted angrily in his head. He thought his torment would never end. He drew his sword, and gazed at the dark blade. Its hilt was blood red like the blood it had spilled throughout the ages, and the blade was black as his heart. Hellish curses were etched into the sword, (such as “Demons’ Sweaty Taints” and “Fuck Me with a Flaming, Barb’d Devil Cock”) speaking of untold, legendary evil. This sword had caused all of the destruction in his life, (including all the punted chickens.) yet he had wielded it like a plaything. He lifted the blade to the sky then turned it on himself, the swords tip aimed at his heart. He shut his eyes intent on ending his suffering. For a moment his mind was at peace.

He slowly opened his eyes. Before him was one of the most beautiful thing that his weary soul had ever seen. (Suicide in a bikini. I mean, she may be the embodiment of despair and a demon who delights in the senseless taking of life, but damn if she don’t got curves.) In spite of the storm a patch of sky was clear and sun shined as brightly on this one holy place as pure gold.  It was a building, a temple. It was completely white and glowed with mild warmth. Its pinnacle stretched towards heaven in a grandeur that dumfounded the man. (As in, it caused him to found the company that makes Dum-Dums. Grandeur tends to do that to people.) He dropped the sword, its blade ringing in the harsh rain. He crawled towards the light, and towards hope. It almost seemed unreal to him that there was still light in the darkness, and yet it stood before him in a welcoming glory. He crawled away from the storming chaos and passed into the light. The voices stopped and the pain subsided, as he crawled with a weariness previously unknown to him, (because, again, maxed out Strength stat. If you could imagine pecs literally bigger than one’s head...) and yet he made it up the white marble steps and up to the entrance.

He stood before it shakily, and with all the courage he had pushed the door open, longing for the comfort behind it.

(On the other side, he found a bar. A tall, shapely woman in a black bodysuit was pointing abstractedly in his direction, saying something about how he was the one responsible for destroying a bald, imposing bartender’s “babies.” And it was then that the warlord knew the truth. He had been Willem DaFoe this entire time.

The End)

Peace. That is what it was, peace. The glorious alter stood before him. It seemed to call to him, delusion it may be, but still it called to him. The beautiful singing of melodious voices flowed through the room. The followers of the god, Avo, where singing with utter devotion, their bowed heads covered by their holy robes. (The Hero thought it was a bit weird that they’d bundle their robes up over their head, leaving the rest of their body stark naked, but he had to admit some of these clergyfolk had some killer curves.) The man took a few arduous steps, and fell to his knees. Water and blood dripped onto the floor. This was a man torn. This was the closest to death one could go without passing into it. The man looked up at the alter yearning for acceptance into this tranquility. The man reached for the bag at his side. He took out all the money he had stolen from the villages, (which amounted to about a hundred gold. Peasants gave dick for money, as it turns out.) and set it on the alter with an utmost gentleness. He fell to the floor and bowed in supreme reverence, listening to the voices of the disciples, their music soothing his head.

(”Yeah, uh, sir?” said one of the naked priests. “I know who you are, and I’m pretty sure dropping a hundred gold’s not gonna be a worthy penance for the slaughter of hundreds of people.”

“Robin, you git!” the man next to him snapped, his hand slapping against the priest’s chest with an audible snap as he leaned in to whisper sharply. “Avo doesn’t turn down good money. Just give ‘em the holy whooshy treatment and leave his soul to rot, right?”

“Right, right.” Robin sighed, as he held his hands up and began to recite scripture. At least in the Chapel of Skorm, he thought to himself, they actually care about moral values.)

Suddenly he felt a rise in his spirit, which for a moment turned to pain. He flew into the air defying all reality and convulsed as a mixture of feelings and emotions shot through him. (A fear of heights was one of them.) He then felt an invisible hand touch his face. It comforted him in an odd way. And as soon as it had begun the sensation stopped. He fell back to the floor (with an impact that cracked the tiles as his massive beefcake body dropped like a stone). He felt excited almost to the point of being nauseous, as he spun about with an odd disorientation. (He was still on the floor at this point, just Sonic the Hedgehoging around the place.) He stumbled through the temple (like a rolling, beefy ball) and eventually tripped through the door landing again on the muddy ground. He felt…different. His mind was at peace and an odd heaviness that once pulled him down was gone. His head so used to torment felt light and dreamy. He raised his hand to rub his head and felt something that almost made him jump. His horns, the thing that struck fear into peoples hearts, were gone. Now two blackened scars remained. (He could feel that they were blackened with his hands. Max levels in Hands, you see.) He looked into a puddle nearby. The reflection showed that his once fiery eyes had become black, like charred wood after the flames had been extinguished.

He rose to his feet, astounded by what had happened. His nerves twitched in response to his enlightened feelings. (Amazingly, being enlightened felt a lot like getting electrocuted.) He let out a sigh and turned towards the path, which led into the forest. It seemed lighter now. (The path looked like it was made out of marshmallow fluff). For the first time in four years the hero saw a sunrise. The rain had subsided to a light spring shower, and birds chirped in the distance. The man looked back in the direction of the temple and simply nodded as in response to its gift. And with that he stepped off into the forest towards new things, not knowing where the path would lead next. (He was amazed to discover it led back to his lair. Enlightenment really did a number on your long-term memory, it seemed.)

#fanfic #fanfiction #fanfiction commentary #Fable #angst fic #Avo