Tumgik
#Schools are responsible for educating students WITHOUT TRAUMATIZING THEM
hiiragi7 · 4 months
Text
(Warning for discussion of abuse)
There is a certain ableist and classist feel to the way that a lot of people talk about highschool education and graduation that I've noticed. "I bet they never graduated highschool" is often used as an insult and to imply stupidity, for example. I've noticed this trend for a long time, but struggled to put it into words.
While education is important, I often feel very put down by the amount of emphasis placed on being a highschool graduate (and, on the opposite end, the disdain for non-graduates). I never graduated, due to a variety of factors; I suffered very extreme abuse starting in first grade from the school environment (As a diagnosed autistic kid growing up in SPED in the 2000s, ABA was the standard), I was being abused at home, I moved schools a lot, I struggle with several disabilities which impacted my ability to learn and developmentally I was never really at the same level as my peers besides in English and art, I developed chronic physical issues while I was still in school due to a genetic condition, and finally, I was kicked out of the house when I was 17 by my parents and I just never ended up going back to school (not that I could have graduated anyway due to a variety of issues).
I was never able to learn quite right and that lead to me falling further and further behind. By the time I was in middle school, I was already so far behind my peers that even if my teachers had wanted to help me learn the content, there was so much they would have had to teach me that it would have been impossible for them to fit it into the time I had with them, especially when they had a lot of other students to attend to besides me. On top of that, I had already given up on my own education sometime during elementary school, so any attempts that were made by my teachers were not well-received by me. I had already developed a complex web of trauma responses to anything to do with school by that point.
It seemed that I was caught in an impossible situation where between the trauma I suffered with and my autism, I could not tolerate even being in a classroom setting, much less learn in it, but there were no other options, which lead to chronic activation of trauma responses which overwhelmed both me and my teachers as well as everyone else in my life. There was also no understanding for me in these settings either, and nobody informed enough to realize what was going on with me and why I was constantly either shutting down and unresponsive or having severe panic attacks. Rather, I was called lazy, manipulative, not trying hard enough, making excuses, acting out for attention, and a slew of other insults as well as near-constant punishments which only served to traumatize me further.
To this day, I only have a second grade education in math. I do not know multiplication, division, algebra, physics, chemistry, and a variety of other subjects. Attempting to study school subjects gives me flashbacks no matter which method I use, whether it's online or with another person or on my own. I am gifted in English, but otherwise I do not know many of the things that people are generally taught in school as kids.
When I tell people I never graduated, often the response is "it's okay, you can still get your GED!" as if me not having graduated is a character flaw that I must eventually work to fix. It makes me feel as though my worth and value as a person is tied to whether or not I have at least a highschool education, and that without it I am less worthy of people's time.
Going back to my initial point, if not graduating highschool makes you "stupid", you must also consider who in practice is unable to graduate highschool - I find it is often disabled kids, traumatized kids, and impoverished kids. Not all of them, I'm sure, but definitely a lot of them.
Tying intellect and a person's worth to whether or not they graduated highschool fucks over those who couldn't through no real fault of their own and frames them as lesser for it. How can you say you believe in disability rights when you shit on those who are too disabled to complete school? How can you say you are against classism when you view people who could not graduate due to having to work full-time as lesser than you?
I feel that regardless of how much people insist they are an advocate (or how much they say "No no, when I said people who don't graduate are stupid I didn't mean those people, I only meant what I see as the acceptable group of non-graduates to call stupid"), there are biases at play regarding perceived intellect and formal education. I am viewed as inherently less-than when people learn I did not graduate. My lack of a highschool graduation certificate or "at least" a GED is viewed with pity by just about everyone I talk to.
I don't have a neat way to wrap up this post, but I do think it is important for people to examine their own biases when it comes to discussing formal education, as well as the overlap of non-graduates and marginalized groups, especially as it pertains to disability politics and capitalism.
73 notes · View notes
ourschooltrust-19 · 7 months
Text
Kindness in Action: The Power of Educating Students About Bullying 
In the corridors of learning, where young minds should flourish and dreams must soar, an insidious threat lurks in the shadows: bullying. With its devastating impact on students' well-being and academic performance, it is time to unite against this scourge. The time has come to build a culture of kindness within our schools, where empathy, respect, and support reign supreme. This article delves into the many facets of bullying and presents effective strategies to combat it. Together, we can pave the way for a brighter future where every child feels safe, accepted, and inspired to reach their full potential.  
Understanding Bullying & The Role of Bystanders:
Bullying is not just confined to physical intimidation; it encompasses repeated aggressive behaviour intended to cause harm and distress to another individual, often involving an imbalance of power. The imbalance can manifest in various ways, such as social status, physical strength, or emotional control.   
Bystanders play a critical role in either perpetuating or mitigating the harmful effects of bullying. Often, bystanders may feel uncertain about how to respond or fear becoming targets themselves. However, they possess immense power to impact the situation positively.   
Promoting Proactive Bystander Intervention:
The following strategies can be employed to foster a culture of proactive bystander intervention.   
Education & Awareness: Schools should conduct regular workshops and awareness campaigns on bullying, its consequences, and the importance of bystander intervention. Providing students with a clear understanding of what constitutes bullying and the impact of their actions can empower them to take positive steps. 
Anonymous Reporting Systems: Implementing anonymous reporting systems allows students to report incidents without fear of retaliation. This can lead to a more comprehensive understanding of bullying within the school community. 
Supportive School Climate: Creating a safe and supportive environment for all students is crucial. Educators should be approachable and responsive, ensuring victims and bystanders feel comfortable seeking help.   
Identifying Bullying in Schools:
Recognizing bullying behaviour is crucial for taking appropriate action. Some common signs of bullying may include physical aggression, verbal abuse, spreading rumours, exclusion from social groups, and cyberbullying through digital platforms.   
Several factors contribute to bullying in schools, such as a school culture that tolerates aggressive behaviour and a lack of awareness about bullying prevention among students and staff. Additionally, societal influences, family dynamics, societal influencers, family dynamics, and peer pressure can also promote bullying behaviour.   
Impact of Bullying on Students:
Emotional & Psychological Consequences for Victims: Victims may develop anxiety, depression, and feelings of helplessness. They may experience a decline in self-worth and have difficulty forming trusting relationships with others.  
Academic Effects & the Link Between Bullying & Academic Performance: Victims of bullying may struggle to concentrate, leading to a decline in grades and academic achievement. Frequent absences due to fear of facing bullies can disrupt the learning process and hinder a student’s educational progress. 
Long-term Effects of Bullying on Mental Health: Studies have shown that bullied individuals during their school years are more susceptible to experiencing mental health disorders such as depression, anxiety disorders, and post-traumatic stress disorder (PTSD) in adulthood. 
Combating Bullying in Schools: A Collaborative Approach for a Safe Environment ::
Role of Schools & Educators: Schools should prioritize creating an atmosphere fostering acceptance, empathy and mutual respect among students and enforcing robust anti-bullying policies that clearly define bullying and outline disciplinary actions. In addition, educators must undergo regular training on identifying and addressing bullying.  
Involving Parents & Guardians: Schools must conduct workshops to educate parents about bullying, its signs, and its impact on victims. Engaging parents in the process helps create a united front against bullying, where open communication between educators, parents, and students is necessary.  
Educating Students About Bullying: Schools can initiate peer support groups that provide a safe space for victims and witnesses to share their experiences and receive encouragement. Educational institutions should also promote diversity and inclusion to foster a sense of belonging.  
Utilizing Technology to Combat Bullying: Schools must implement anonymous reporting tools, encourage parents to be vigilant while monitoring social media platforms to detect cyberbullying, and incorporate digital citizenship lessons into their curriculum to educate students about responsible online behaviour. 
Combating bullying in schools is a collective responsibility that involves educators, parents, and students. Focusing on multiple aspects of this issue can create a safer and more supportive learning environment for all.   
In conclusion, by combining education, prevention, intervention, and empathy, we can work together to create schools that are free from bullying. By fostering a culture of respect, kindness, and support, Our School in Bangalore empowers students to be responsible, caring individuals who contribute to a safer and more harmonious learning environment for all. 
0 notes
pooma-education · 7 months
Text
Discussion mode:
Questions to discuss
i) What modern trends in education are baffling you? Why?
ii) How do you think students will remember you and your class after they complete their schooling?
Namagiri
▪️❤️▪️
(Nahid Raza, Leena Rai, Dr. Sekar Srinivasan,
Swetha Srivastava, Dr. Jemi Sudhakar)
▪️Nahid Raza: Education system is established and has started delivering. We need to understand how we could catch literacy first and creativity side by side. We need to make our students happy. We need to create a curriculum that is interesting. The trends that baffle today include monotony in the class, even in this era of digitalization. We need to create a community of students who take responsibility for their own learning. We have to make them autonomous learners. They could become inquisitive.
Listening to children, making them autonomous, and making them problem solvers will help the educators be remembered and respected. Importance needs to be given to children. They must feel wiser and better in the presence of the educator.
Language development in early education could be crucial. But before we move towards the cognitive development of a child, we must ensure that they are cared for, loved, and responded to. Please understand child psychology. Education should not be traumatic. It should be easy, incremental, and advancing. We must not forget the child while transforming them into human capital. The child must be facilitated socially too.
Sweet experiences with educators shall never be forgotten.
If we think we are teaching legends, they will become one. Arithmetic is ruthlessly easy, isn't it ?
Before teaching, we ought to align the values of the taught. Before we teach, we should establish communication. Before we communicate, we should connect. Classroom outcomes will be limitless.
▪️Dr Sekar Srinivasan: Usage of more technology-oriented gadgets is mainly baffling. Students are more conversant and skillful. If I can make them think without just spoonfeeding them with knowledge, they will remember us lifelong. Our influx of positive and confidence-building measures are liked by the students most. They actually need an intellectual companion who could be relied upon personally for overcoming conflicts.
▪️Swetha Srivastava: Modern teachers' selection is also not right; only marks of the teachers should not be the criteria for good teaching. A university topper will not necessarily be the best teacher; no one can give a guarantee.
▪️Dr. Jemi: Focusing on Enduring Understanding will keep our learners remembering us forever. "Enduring understanding" sounds appealing, along with traditional terminology such as "mastery" of the material. Teaching with objectives short-circuits unforeseen benefits. Backward design clarifies the content and connections for both teachers and students.
It's the nature of backward design to "make the connections explicit for the students," but it also benefits the teacher by providing a tool for coherent thinking. Backward design encourages explicit connections, unlike implicit textbook organization. Backward design is a technique for teachers and students to learn from.
▪️Azeez: Students will remember two types of adults in their lives: charismatic and caring. Having a strong person in their life who supports them, whether charismatic or caring, plays a big role in students' lives.
It's true that students remember teachers who support them and guide them with a caring attitude. However, teaching them something for life that makes them capable human beings and citizens is equally important. Dependency might hinder their preparation for life, so we need to support, guide, and care for them appropriately.
▪️Leader. Leena: Not exactly baffling but a thing to ponder over: Why people forget their roots and culture in the realm of digitization? Dependency on apps and technology is limiting physical connections. Even though virtual labs are creative, they abolish hands-on experience and critical thinking. People opt for easy solutions like CHAT GPT, but what about developing cognitive abilities?
Impressions on students are everlasting. To make them remember you, be there for their problems, provide solutions, teach them life skills, encourage cooperative behavior, instill culture, expose them to the world, listen to them, and appreciate their efforts.
What is baffling the most is the corruption permeating deep into the educational arena, uneducated people in higher positions, corporatization, and the greed for unacceptable favors within the education system.
What is baffling me❓
The recruitment process of Principal at some places:
√ The interview is conducted and the previous Principal sits in the panel and that too the lesser experienced
√ The questionnaire is googled up and enquiring like if a fresher is sitting in front instead of credentials mentioned in CV speak for themselves
√ The eye catching phrases for no of rounds are uselessly created to show that you are appearing for UPSC like HR Round Technical Round Virtual Round and last PI
√ The worst part is when a brand conducts virtual rounds through their Montessori head to a subject teacher to an admin for the post of Principal where the management is nowhere in the picture
▪️Roma Narang: Modern trends in education these days are self assessment, self made curriculum by students and ban on teachers as well as principal for any sort of punishment to students is really baffling the educators. It should be considered that students age in school time is not an accurate age to decide or fix everything. They need the support, guidance and benefits of all experienced ones like teachers, principal as well as parents.
Another bothersome point is digitalization which is good for extensive knowledge but there is no way out to limit the use of these smart gadgets. After COVID, smart mobiles are accessible even to small children but there is no constraint on its use which is eliminating moral values and right kind of relationships with each other but no such discipline is found to get back.
Today we need to adopt a teaching with art integration, more practical than theoretical and learning should be experiential and activity based. It should consist of life skills. So that students would atleast remember and love the teachers even after schooling.
Tumblr media
0 notes
ventblogtobedeleted · 2 years
Text
i wrote a suicide notes when i was 13. in them, i insisted that my local school not turn my death into an anti-bullying campaign, like they had so many times with every other kid my age that couldn’t make it. i didnt want them deflecting the fault onto kids like me- because i wasn’t bullied. i wasn’t someone who was mistreated by my own. kids my age were nice to me. instead, it terrified me that the true cause of my suffering- the administrations, the everyday pressure of being a student, the staff of teachers ignoring my mental health needs, would be erased for a stock narrative that might let them off the hook. i felt traumatized by being alive. i felt traumatized by being asked to participate in school.
im older now, and i understand it’s faulty to try and turn a death into a message. but im still sad for the 13 year old who struggled to be alive under normal circumstances. that 13 year old dying wouldn’t have made public schools less ableist. it wouldn’t have made the adults understand what i was going through. it sounds silly, right? that the everyday education system could be responsible for a pain like that?
im 25 now, and im very different from that 13 year old, but i think i still feel it. i do not know how to participate in being alive without it hurting, without it being too much to bare. you’re 13, and your parents are explaining slowly that it’s illegal for you not to go to school. you’re an adult, and you have to make money to be alive. it’s like this forever. there is a cost to the act of passively being around, there is effort in continuing to exist in the world. it is not an effort everyone has it in them to make. being alive costs something. and this is normal. it is normal to pay the cost of existing. 
and why wouldn’t it be? 
Tumblr media
we only ever hear from the survivors. we don’t know how bad it can get.
societal expectations are a self-cleaning thing. if you can’t survive in the current structure, then you wont. and then you’ll stop being around to complain about it. you are a bullet hole that isn’t counted because your pain was too big to be noticed.
im very tired and this essay doesn’t have a point
0 notes
Text
I grew up very influenced by U.S. culture, though I've never lived there. I've heard about school shootings, and been on alert because of them. But the closest experiences I have are when a kid brought a weapon to school and we got locked down, yearly bomb threats that had us evacuated, and the year a police man was shot and killed that had the entire city and all the schools in it on lockdown until they could find the shooters.
Thinking about the responses I hear to school shootings in the U.S., that last one really gets me.
The city was shut down for hours until they found the shooters.
The schools in the neighborhood stayed locked down past school hours to keep everyone safe because gunmen were on the loose, and a cop had been shot.
I can imagine what it's like to go to school and think there might be a bomb threat. We had so many of those, we weren't even concerned when they happened anymore.
I can tell you tornado drills, and fire safety, and even emergency prep.
I can tell you how terrifying it was when we were locked down because one student brought a weapon to school and threatened to use it.
I cannot, however, imagine what it's like to live like that every day. To walk through metal detectors, and wonder who might show up and open fire on a school for any reason at all. To go to work and think you might die in service to your students, or because you, as a student, are required to get an education.
At what cost is this education?
How many lives will be lost to gun violence? How many will be lost to suicide from poor mental health as a direct result of the stress these situations put on their lives? How many people will come away with I'll health -- physically, mentally, and emotionally? How many people will have lasting disorders like anxiety and post-traumatic stress?
What is the cost of this education, and of living in "the land of the free and the home of the brave?" Is it free, when you can't be in school without losing your life? Is it brave to commit mass murder, and to continuously choose political gain over doing what's right?
I've always wanted to live in America. I've always admired it, and dreamed of being there. I've picked the states I love the most, without ever having even visited them. Texas has been at the top for a very long time.
I was one of the few people I knew who knew the American Anthem without having lived there or close relatives there. I knew America the Beautiful, and watched American television, and used their measuring system. I've wished for most of my life that I was an American.
And yet, I find myself grateful that I'm not. I still wish I was, because I have a weird fascination with The States that I just can't shake. But the land of the free and the home of the brave? I thought that meant something. It doesn't, though. Freedom there is an illusion, and bravery doesn't seem to mean much. Being brave isn't stripping people of their rights and hiding behind guns. It's standing alongside people in strength and power and standing up with them. In government, and policy, and change. In leadership, and care of people.
Over and over and over again you hear about school shootings. So often, it's not even shocking anymore. What's shocking are the details. How severe was it this time? How many were injured? How many died? It was an elementary school? With what kind of gun?
I can't imagine living like that.
Correction.
I can only imagine living like that.
0 notes
Text
the fact that so many students are traumatized by school means that our education systems are failing in the most basic possible sense
4K notes · View notes
inexplicifics · 2 years
Note
Hello! Another idea for the AW AU Hoarde, if you like, but no pressure intended - if you only like some of it, or don't care to utilize any of it, I hope you at least find some amusement in reading the (rather specific and long-winded) prompt.
I was wondering what kind of apprentice Triss may acquire, likely accidentally (completely on-brand for this AU, really). Perhaps Vesemir travels to one of the orphanages founded in the Wolf's name, and meets a young pair of siblings/cousins/friends that have the same closeness as Geralt and Eskel did as children - like a soul in two bodies, like soulmates. But maybe one drinks the testing potion without ill effect, while the other is violently ill. And maybe Vesemir sighs and takes them both back to Kaer Morhen, with the thought that perhaps the two will grow apart, or the one will find a place in Kaer Morhen and wait for the other to finish Witcher training and be attached at the hip whenever the Witcher candidate has free time - at least that it would be better to bring them both back instead of separating them, and with the way the one took the testing potion, that kid should have no trouble passing the Trial of the Grasses, at least. And it's only after they arrive in Kaer Morhen that the one that failed the testing potion reveals a strong magical inclination. Now the mages realize that this child needs proper training, unless they want uncontrolled and potentially disastrous magical accidents to happen. And perhaps this sparks a whole discussion of whether Yen and Triss and Istredd and the rest feel equipped to even take on a student - not willing to consider starting a school, certainly not yet, since their own experiences were awful, but not sure what else to do. I'm curious what their feelings will be as magic users with past manipulative and frankly traumatic educational experiences, and what the Witchers' feelings will be (considering the response to mages goes from reasonably-wary to don't-want-ANYTHING-to-do-with-them-ever- except-MAYBE-Triss-if-the-injury-is-bad-enough). Particularly after the Witchers have changed their training methods and demonstrated a possibility for something less horrid and cruel, forcing the mages to look at themselves and ask if they can do any less. And the child? Who has probably been suppressing their magic, and is terrified they will be separated from their beloved sibling/cousin/friend. How will they feel, in their new home, when their soulmate has a place but they don't, not yet, maybe not at all? Except, maybe they end up having a knack for alchemy, or healing, and significant motivation to further improve the Witcher potions. Maybe, just maybe... this kid will be the one to figure out a pain relief potion, or magic spell, that will make the Grasses just that little bit less awful, and finally silence the screams that still occasionally echo from the walls of Kaer Morhen.
Perhaps this kid is the first student (after Ciri, of course) of a new generation of mages hailing from Kaer Morhen, instead of from the teachings of Aratuza or Ban Ard.
Anyway, just wanted to add that your current ongoing fic MBtT has been an absolute delight to read! Thank you for continuing to share your stories with us!
Ooh, this is very interesting! I shall add it to the Horde. I've been wanting to do something with a pair of trainees, one of whom takes the Grasses and the other of whom can't - this would tie in very nicely. Thank you!
63 notes · View notes
daydreamodyssey · 2 years
Text
Regarding controversial books in school...
I spent a long time in an education program that ranged from grades 4 to 9. A short age gap that entails a lot of change in the student mentally and emotionally. One of the projects I used to do was an annotated bibliography of books that would be appropriate, too low, or too high for an age group. All of them were books I went in without expectation.
Some books were harmless fun but not too memorable. Others had a lot of serious conflict done in neat ways. Others were trickier with social issues or, in one case, sexual activity.
Whatever feelings I had on the books, it was not my job to censor them, or tell the library or school they would traumatize or radicalize students. My job was to assess them in literary value and if students would use critical thinking while reading and inferring.
Inside the bibliography’s reviews, I listed all the potential subjects of concern a teacher should be aware of, so that the book could be talked about with precautions to the subject manner before reading.
 Kids cannot grow unless they are challenged to a reasonable degree according to their ability. Teachers are usually sensible enough to tell kids beforehand about uncomfortable subjects to prepare them for deeper understanding. Pedagogy always works in steps, not hurdles. Whatever anxiety, mental issue, or anything else is troubling the student will usually be attended to by the teacher or someone specialized. And if the content seriously bothers them, there should be a safe space to describe why and how to assess the proper way of making sure the student understands the content and meaning.
Kids know fiction is fiction, and they’ll usually try to read it anyway if it feels taboo enough. Honest conversation beats hiding it under the rug. And better they have a flexible response to it now than with a volatile reaction to it as adults.
38 notes · View notes
shaanks · 4 years
Text
Quick note about today’s Unus Annus video: 
Hi, my name is Av, and seeing Ethan’s genuine fear and shame and stress in this video has re-engaged my anger with the American public school system. (Specifying because it produced both Ethan and I, and I haven’t been to school anywhere else to see how things line up in other places.)
Those shakes that he got, the blanking out and the test anxiety even though he wasn’t under any pressure? Yeah, that’s an EXTREMELY common learned response this education system creates in people around math, even those that don’t have any sort of reading or educational impediment. There is so much pressure put on children in this country to perform well, immediately and with no assistance when it comes to math, and so much weight placed on being immediately good at it as an indicator of both intelligence and personal worth, that genuinely bright, engaged kids come out of our schools beaten down, anxious, and absolutely convinced that they’re stupid for not living up.
Prior to my current major, I was actually in STEM! I was majoring in theoretical physics, and almost across the board, the response from people involved some version of a fearful shudder combined with “There’s so much math in that though, don’t you hate it?? That’s too smart for me, I could never understand that.” Except then when I would explain theories, they understood things perfectly. When I used to tutor friends and help out with math assignments, they would seem so sheepish and rueful, and admit feeling incredibly stupid, until I just sat down with them and explained how the calculations worked, the tricks I had learned, etc. And there was always this sense of awed confusion, both at how quickly they actually could learn math, and at the mere concept of someone being patient with them and not judging their entire character based on how little I had to put into their understanding of the math. 
Kids in this country have been done so dirty and so wrong by the public education system in a thousand little ways, but this is one of the worst, because not only does it rob people of their curiosity, and their ability to give themselves credit for the ways they ARE smart because they’ve been taught that their intelligence isn’t the “correct” sort, but it also creates a cliff from which the fall is inevitable for students who do catch on without the assistance that they deserve. The crash that nearly all “gifted” students face when they eventually, at some point, collide with something they don’t immediately understand is harsh and debilitating, because children rewarded for not needing to ask for help and not needing to study never learn how to do those things, so when they DO need help or DO need to study, they can’t do it! So people burn out of fields for which they are genuinely passionate (as I did, in some ways) because our education system is designed at every turn to crush that passion out of people. (in a lot of ways it is designed to send poor people of color to prison and poor white folks to work retail, but that’s a separate essay.)
The tl;dr here is if you feel the way Ethan does about math, you are not alone. Not simply because we’re seeing Ethan go through it, but because it is a nearly universal experience in American public schools to be traumatized by math that we’re almost never actually taught how to do, unless we manage to scrape through into upper level graduate work, and even then its simply assumed that you already know how to do the work. I just want everyone reading this that feels that way to know it isn’t your fault, you’re not stupid, and that your ability to do math without a calculator (as if life is one long no-notes algebra test or smth) does not determine your worth, one way or the other.
509 notes · View notes
itsclydebitches · 3 years
Text
Tumblr media
Hello, everyone! Can you believe this is the third time I've started the recap for this chapter? Between a dying computer and a mass edit during my monthly state of, "Oh my god get rid of everything we can't let people know that we wRITE!" this project is cursed. This is the version though, I can feel it. Be positive!
Now, where were we? It's been some months (RIP) since I last posted, so I wouldn't be surprised if everyone's forgotten what's going on in this insane novel. A quick recap before the recap then: new teams have formed, no one is happy about it, Sun and Velvet went off to a shady club run by The Crown and — shock shock, surprise surprise — got themselves into a heap of trouble. That's the long and the short of it. We have to wait a while to find out what happens to them though because this chapter is focused on Coco.
We learn that Professor Rumpole has sent Coco and her new team — Team ROSC — out into the desert to take care of the grimm around the city's borders. To say that Coco is disappointed in this assignment is an understatement. We learn that they've been at this for a week straight and have gone without showering or a change of clothes that entire time (no one packed a bag?), so for a second I was hugely sympathetic. You know this vine? 
youtube
I feel this vine in my soul. Give me hot water and hot coco or give me death. Besides, work is work and dangerous, physical work without a break or basic comforts is incredibly taxing. Toss in the extreme heat of a desert and I'd be pissed at everything too, no matter how important my work was. That's human.
Yet instead of humanizing Coco like this, it turns out she doesn't care at all about the hardship involved. It's fighting grimm that she's annoyed by. She thinks that "Searching for the person or persons kidnapping innocent people for some unknown but dark purpose was way more useful than fighting Grimm far from the city" and I'm just like, Coco, honey...
Do you know what your career path is?
IT'S TO KILL GRIMM.
Tumblr media
Okay, there's admittedly a justification here, but it's a stupid one. Coco goes on to say that "This area was called the Wastelands for a reason." She's snarky about it, saying that it wastes “her time, her talent, and her patience," but the real takeaway is that it's, you know, a wasteland. Deserted of grimm and of people. What's the point of defending an area that doesn't need defending? A huntress' job might normally be to fight grimm, but when those grimm aren't around and kidnappers are, that's a whole new set of priorities.
The problem with all this is that the Wastelands is definitely not deserted and it's definitely not as far from the city as Coco would like to imply. In just a few paragraphs an alarm is going to trip and Coco will find six grimm roaming in a pack. Then she finds a person. Then that person says she needs to get back to see someone in the city within half an hour. So there are grimm, there are people about, and this area is apparently close enough to the border that you can get back to the city proper, on foot, and then get wherever it is you’re going in a bustling metropolis... all within half an hour. By that logic these grimm aren't out in the boonies, they're right outside everyone's door.
Yet Coco isn't convinced, saying that "Post Beacon [killing grimm] had been for a noble cause, but this just felt like … busywork." I cannot possibly emphasize enough that this is the job she signed up for. Not to be a detective specializing in missing people, not a war hero always on the front lines of a battle, but one of many huntsmen who perform the daily, routine, very necessary task of protecting the people from grimm. With "protecting" covering both immediate threats and preparatory work that ensures more threats don't come about — like taking care of grimm outside before they become a larger threat. You know what would have happened if Beacon had a daily chore of students killing grimm within a few miles radius of the school? There would have been far less grimm charging a mass of unprotected students when negativity unexpectedly skyrocketed.
And, as always, I am aware that Rumpole is the likely villain here. From a writing perspective, this is very much presented as her getting Coco out of the way so that she can go about her nefarious deeds in peace... but that doesn't erase the fact that the task itself is a sound one. Rumpole's motivations don't matter here, only Coco's annoyance that she... has to do her job?
Tumblr media
I mean yeah, everyone complains about their job to one extent or another, but can you imagine if you stumbled across a firefighter complaining about all the kitchen fires they've had to put out lately? "It's so boring! There are much better things I could be spending my time and talent on. I mean, that inferno that took out a city block last year? Putting that out was noble. But routine fires? House fires? Giving lectures on how to prevent fires in the future? Ugh, I can't believe the department expects me to do this grunt work." Meanwhile, you're sneaking off, hoping that this firefighter is never called to your house, nursing mild worries about how much they're romanticizing the recent tragedy that took so many lives...
Complaints about the job turn into complaints about the teams, which makes far more sense for Coco's character. Anyone's, really. Despite my insistence that it's a good thing they're learning to fight with people other than their three besties, that was absolutely a sudden and rather traumatizing change, just given how attached the teams already are. I'm not at all surprised that Coco is struggling to cope.
She says she misses her friends, obviously, but also "surprisingly, Coco missed being in charge."
...That's supposed to be surprising? Coco, you love being in charge! How is this in any way a revelation?
Apparently it is though, stemming from how bad Reese is as their leader. As with so many things in RWBY, I find myself disagreeing with a perspective that's presented as a fact: "She liked to lead by group vote, which wasn’t leading at all." Yes... it is? We could go down a rabbit hole of literal definitions — to lead is to direct, to direct is to regulate, to regulate is to direct again — but ultimately our understanding of a word does not adhere to the dictionary alone. It's a knowledge built on experience and I would hope that everyone's experience with the term "leader" includes that person considering multiple perspectives before making a decision. A leader doesn't impose their view on a group without due consideration of their preferences and needs — that's a dictator — a leader guides the group based on feedback and their personal knowledge. If that feedback and knowledge results in a standstill, or if their knowledge outweighs preferences, they are the deciding vote because the people have previously said, "We trust your decisions" through the act of making them leader in the first place. 
Asking for a group vote isn't avoiding leadership, it's an act of leadership. Reese decided that these situations warranted a majority rule. She further decided that whatever they settled on was indeed an appropriate course of action. Leadership skills are required to assess a situation and determine whether it's appropriate to vote on in the first place. If I announce to a group that we're voting on whether we go to the movies or the museum, I've done the work to determine that both of these choices are of roughly equal value and roughly equal availability. I haven't hit on any snags like, "The only movies playing are mindless blockbusters and I want this to be an educational outing" or "The museum is too far away. We'll never make it to dinner on time." Figuring out that a group can vote is its own kind of work. This avenue is particularly useful when the group is of roughly equal standing. With a few exceptions (like Ruby and Jaune) huntsmen classmates are all the same age, underwent the same training, and have had the same combat experiences. This isn't a case of one elite huntsmen lending their knowledge to an otherwise green party, it's a school randomly pointing at a somewhat outgoing individual during orientation and saying, "You. You're leader material, I guess, even though you've done little differently than the person standing beside you." Someone has to lead and Vacuo's switcheroo proves that anyone can be the leader if they're just put in that position. Coco claims a group vote is just "passing the responsibility off to your team" and yes! You want to share the responsibility because you are a team. They are a group of four equals working together with one person to guide them, they are not a boss with three subordinates. Why wouldn't Reese utilize the skills and ideas of those teammates? When making a decision, why wouldn't she see if everyone believes it's a good idea to do Thing A as opposed to Thing B? Unless Reese is outright ignoring her own ideas, beliefs, or gut feelings to cater to the others — which there's no reference of — this is good leadership. She's assisting her team in making decisions as a whole, rather than arbitrarily imposing her view on three others of similar skill and experience.
Yet Coco acts like because Reese doesn't go, "We're doing Thing A! End of discussion!" it's not leadership. Which, frankly, says a lot about how the RWBY-verse sees leadership as a whole.
Tumblr media
I realize I'm rambling a great deal, so let me quickly provide a different media example. I'm currently immersed in Star Trek: Voyager and in season two, episode 14 "Alliances," Captain Janeway is faced with a difficult choice: align herself with a violent and so far untrustworthy species, or risk traveling through this quadrant of space without any allies. At first she's entirely against the idea of an alliance, going so far as to say that this isn't a democracy. She's the captain, dammit, she makes the decisions! But her first officer begs her to reconsider. Then the crew express disappointment — even disgust — that she won't consider this alternative. Then her chief of security, being a Vulcan, provides a persuasively logical argument for why an alliance is worth the risk... Long story short, Janeway finds herself in the minority and changes her decision accordingly. She attempts to garner an alliance and the fact that she was right — the species wasn't trustworthy and the alliance fails — is entirely beside the point. She realized that the majority voice matters. As far as we know, Reese is already practicing what Janeway learned.
Tumblr media
ANYWAY the point is none of it matters because these characterizations are a mess. Coco also throws out that Reese "dressed like she was a twelve-year-old hanging out at the mall" and supposedly acts like one too. We're not given any examples of what that behavior looks like and, sorry, but I'm not personally inclined to judge someone based on their fashion sense. It would be great if this story actually engaged with some of the flaws the characters demonstrated, rather than just throwing them out to exist in this unacknowledged void.
Not that Coco's fashion-focused personality is really that important. Truly, the best thing about all this is how contradictory Coco's own thoughts are. She also listens to her teammates... except when she doesn't. She know when to go with their ideas and when to dismiss them for her own... except when she gets it totally wrong. As with so much in RWBY, this doesn't feel like the author giving Coco deliberate flaws that the story will grapple with down the line, it just comes across as a nonsense philosophy about leadership we're not meant to examine too closely. Coco gets to make references to the fact that her own, supposedly superior leadership is filled with holes, but heaven forbid she engage with that. 
She ends all this with the thought that no matter what she might decide, she trusted her team to "do what she demanded of them” and is now extending that courtesy to Reese. This I'm inclined to praise Coco for. No matter what she might be thinking, it doesn't appear as if she's tried to undermine Reese (well, not yet. More on that at the chapter’s end), and she doesn’t appear to be refusing to listen to that leadership, even if she doesn't like how it comes about. As we're about to see, Coco has her team's best interests at heart, no matter the challenges they're facing.
Her thoughts turn back to her old team and we get... this.
Velvet was with a team that didn’t recognize her awesome capabilities. Fox was withdrawing, having lost his family for the second time. Yatsuhashi was going mad with worry about Velvet and his teammates, knowing that he couldn’t be there to protect them, and worrying he would accidentally hurt someone on his new team.
Tumblr media
This is so unnecessarily dramatic. First, how does Coco even know any of this? Because it's been heavily implied that the old teams are barely in contact with one another. See: Velvet refusing to loop anyone in about the club and Coco stuck in the desert for a week. Second, why aren't they in contact, at least those who aren't on away missions? The entire group is acting as if changing teams means they're no longer allowed to be friends — family, as Coco puts it — when the relationship between Team RWBY and Team JNPR creates the opposite expectation right at the start of the series. Clearly, people from different teams can be close. Yatsu's worry that he might stumble using his semblance with new people is the only conflict that holds up here. Everything else has fairly straightforward solutions. Velvet needs to prove herself to new people. Yatsu needs to text Velvet if he's that worried about her. And Fox "having lost his family for a second time" is a pretty ridiculous exaggeration. You're attending the same school! Your family is still living down the hall if Vacuo has dorms like Beacon! In what world are these students unable to interact largely as they did before? They're acting as if the school has outright barred them from hanging out, rather than doing what will no doubt occur the moment they graduate: force them to work with different people. Just catch up with Fox over dinner! 
Honestly, this chapter is pretty short, I'm just continually bewildered by this story.
To get back to the actual plot, something trips a sensor the group has set up and Coco responds to the situation in what I think is both a smart and empathetic manner. Previous experience has taught her that it's likely just a lizard, so she doesn't want to wake up her team for no reason. Disagreements aside, she cares enough to let them rest — "They’d probably appreciate the extra sleep." However, if it's a "rare case of something she couldn’t handle alone" she'd immediately call for help. Great plan! It's not often in this novel that I feel like I enjoy the characters, but this little moment actually had me liking Coco. Which, yes, I realize is a complicated claim. Characters should test the reader to a certain degree, mirroring all the personalities we see in real life, including biased, mean, or contradictory people. It's often a good thing to write a character that your reader is frustrated with. That can be the point! The problem with Myers' writing is that it isn't the point. Coco, as the former leader of our heroes in this tale, should be someone we enjoy spending time with and her flaws should be the basis for growth, or an acknowledgement that she is an imperfect, but well-rounded person. As it stands, flaws in this novel just sort of... exist? They bop around in the RWBY universe with almost no acknowledgement from the narrative or other characters, leaving the reader with little to nothing to take away from the text. Is Coco correct in her judgement? Is this a bias she needs to work on? Is she putting on a facade and her natural instinct to care for her team is the real Coco hidden underneath? Who knows! She’s just frustrating to read about most of the time and nothing comes of that. 
Regardless, she heads out into the desert, using the night vision glasses Velvet made her. 
Tumblr media
Now see, this would have been the perfect thing to introduce before Velvet was fixing relay towers after the expert was injured. Remember how I said the novel didn't do enough to establish Velvet's own expertise? Not that a pair of goggles is really comparable to fixing a communications issue, but it still would have gone some way towards convincing me that Velvet is this super impressive tech gal, capable of handling any and all situations that might come her way.
But no, we get this impressive display of skill after Velvet's knowledge was needed in a pinch. 
The glasses help Coco navigate the terrain, allowing her to both see in the dark and zoom in on things in the distance. This allows her to spot the six jackalopes that tripped the sensor, as well as the woman currently fighting them: Carmine, a villain from After the Fall that I know nothing about. Ah well. Note though what I said at the start, that Coco's dismissal of this assignment is based entirely in its supposed uselessness. Yet now here we have a pack of dangerous grimm and an enemy to content with.
Also, this is where Coco moves from kindly teammate to overconfident fool. She said she'd call for backup if she needed it... and she clearly needs it! From what I can gather, all of Team CFVY lost to Carmine last time they met up. But now she wants to risk fighting Carmine alone? Go get the others!
She doesn't, of course. Carmine doesn't notice Coco at first. She's talking about how she has to get back into the city. "He’s going to kill me if I’m not back to the Mirage in thirty."
As said, this also implies that Coco isn't nearly as far out as she initially suggested. If Carmine can feasibly finish this fight, cross the desert, navigate who knows how much of the city, and meet up with the mysterious "he" all in under half an hour, then Coco is patrolling pretty much right at the walls. AKA, the area that absolutely needs to be grimm free.
Luckily for those of us who are reading the books out of order, Myers gives a quick recap of Carmine's significance. Last book she had kidnapped Gus and "held off the combined might of Team CFVY in the desert” (oh hey, I was right), presumably escaping afterwards. Now here she is again, likely up to some new, nefarious deed. 
Our of curiosity, I googled to see what she looks like and... 
Tumblr media
WHAT IS THAT OUTFIT? 
Coco watches as she works to keep on top of the six grimm, debating whether she should help or walk away, but when Carmine is taken unawares, Coco acts without thinking, throwing herself into the fray.
Sometimes decisions were like that—your body already knew what to do while your brain was still processing the situation. Only in this case, Coco’s body wasn’t necessarily the clearest judge of character. Her brain would have said that Carmine didn’t deserve her help.
Now see, this is a scene I can get behind. The entire RWBY-verse is based around a type of superheroism: people with unnatural abilities, fantasy weapons, and extensive training devote themselves to protecting the people from various threats. Yet too often RWBY fails to convince me that these people are actually heroic, taking the standard flaws of a character and unknowingly exacerbating them to the point where I think, "Is this meant to be a commentary on the anti-hero? Or a critical look at these fantasy formulas? Because we've got the elements of that here, but no indication that the authors realize they're writing something other than that standard story." But this? This works for me. Coco, as a huntress, is so conditioned to help others that her body responds instinctively to someone being in danger, regardless of who that someone is. She outright admits that if she'd had the chance to think about it she would have decided against helping Carmine. The fact that she recognizes this and move anyway says a lot of good about her. Well done, Coco!
Tumblr media
We see later that Carmine probably didn't need the help, but between the two of them the grimm really don't stand a chance. What's interesting though is how chummy the two are while defending themselves. Coco comments on Carmine's tendency to talk to grimm (like she does) and Carmine freely offers information about her movements, the fact that she lost her other sword, and that her partner, Bertilak, needs to "recharge a little" before getting back in the game. Carmine asks Coco if she'd like to team up with her instead (she does not) and the two have a number of flirty exchanges to top things off:
“I’ve been dreaming of a rematch with you,” Coco said.
“You’ve been dreaming about me? I’m flattered.” Carmine winked.
***
“Hot date with the Crown?” Coco asked.
“Don’t be jealous, darling.”
I bring all this up not as a criticism of the buddy-enemy dynamic (it's a favorite of mine), but simply because of something that happens next. Before we get to that though, I admit that I am on the fence about the flirting. Given that I haven't read After the Fall (assuming this characterization exists there), I know that Coco is a lesbian mostly via RWBY cultural osmosis, rather than through the text. This is one of the few (the only?) times that I've gotten a hint at her sexuality, yet it's associated with predatory behavior. Carmine, her enemy, is the one who turns an angry dream into a flattering one, the hot date with the bad guy into something to be jealous of. I'm honestly struggling to remember what, if anything, Coco has had to say about women in this book — this is what comes of such slow recapping and I acknowledge that this is entirely my fault — but I'm nevertheless discomforted by knowing Coco's canonical status, knowing RWBY's struggles with queer rep, and then reading a scene where the most overt representation thus far is the bad guy twisting Coco's words into something sexual.
I'm no purist. Give me a good enemies-to-lovers fic any day of the week, but that doesn't mean that kind of dynamic is the best to pull from in a franchise already facing heavy criticism for its queer rep.
Especially since the moment the grimm are gone Carmine turns her sai on Coco.
This is the "something that happens next" that I referenced above. It's weird to have them attacking one another after a whole scene of pretty genuine companionship. Coco doesn't help Carmine as a consequence of defending herself, she willingly gets involved. They tease one another. Carmine appears to answer her questions honestly. There's both implied and overt references to how well they work as a team. Then, suddenly, Carmine is outright trying to kill Coco, not just with her sai but by burying her alive. It's not the sort of banter that Ruby and Roman used to engage in, trading fake compliments and, in Roman's case before his death, legitimate feelings while attacking one another. Nor is Coco prepared for an attack the moment the grimm are gone, and she's not surprised by it. It’s just this sudden change that feels rather jarring. 
Though it's far from the first time BTD has failed to convey the emotion of a scene. Here's another example rnow. As said, Carmine is attempting to bury Coco alive by moving the sand with her semblance. That's horrifying enough on its own, but remember that Coco is claustrophobic. Yet none of that panic shines through here. She comes across as indifferent throughout the attack, thinking back to summers when her brother tried to bury her while she sunbathed, amazed that she could ever consider this fun. You know who Coco sounds like in this scene?
Tumblr media
At no point during this attack did I get the sense that Coco believes she’s in serious danger, let alone that she's struggling against a long-term phobia. The only time I even remembered that claustrophobia is meant to be a challenge for her is when she throws out the oh-so casual line, "One of her worst nightmares was being buried alive." Oh really? Because it doesn't seem like it! Coco is calm enough to remember that she used to be able to hold her breath for exactly three minutes and forty-two seconds. That doesn't feel like a character fighting against her worst nightmare.
So this scene isn't exactly compelling. Which is too bad because, as said, Coco as some other nice moments in this chapter.
However, during all this we do learn a little more about Carmine. Prior to getting trapped in the sand, Coco comments on how shockingly strong she is. "Carmine should have been at least a little bit worn down from fighting Grimm," but she's not, "She seemed nearly unstoppable now." Coco hits her full in the face, but she doesn't seem fazed. Earlier in the chapter there was that comment about how she previously took on Team CFVY alone and at the end of the battle Coco observes that Carmine "still seemed as fresh as she had at the beginning of the fight. How was she even doing that?" My basic reading comprehension skills tell me that this is setup for something, likely some change enacted by the Crown. Surely the text wouldn't put so much emphasis on Carmine's strength — have Coco questioning it to this extent, framing it as unnatural — unless we were going to get an answer, right?
But this is RWBY, so I'm not inclined to count my chickens before they hatch.
The rest of Coco's team arrives and it's then that she decides to pull the super dangerous stunt to free herself. Yeah, yeah, I get that she's suffocating and needs to do something now, can't wait to be dug out I suppose, but the timing is pretty ridiculous. The cavalry has arrived, yay! Time to blow myself up.
Tumblr media
Seriously. She blows herself up. Using her own semblance, Coco focuses on one of her gravity dust bullets and detonates it, causing all the others in her arsenal to detonate too. It gets her out of the hole and "knocked her Aura down to a dangerously low level."
So... let’s see. Coco can literally detonate a bunch of explosives on her person, after suffocating under stand, after fighting Carmine, after fighting grimm, after a week long mission, and her aura doesn't break... but Yang's does from a single Neo slash?
Okay, RWBY.
Reese and Olive try to attack Carmine together, but end up eliminating one another's attacks. I like that a team actually has some realistic difficulties for once. Coco, however, is internally an asshole, calling them "idiots" and saying that they need to learn to coordinate their attacks. Thing is, she apparently hasn't done anything over the last week to help with that. She's been too busy complaining about Reese's clothes.
Carmine runs off as more grimm show up, drawn by Coco's non-existent panic. To her credit she does thank the others for saving her... but then immediately tries to downplay that. “It wasn’t a fair fight,” Coco spat when Reese (correctly) points out that she's the one who was ambushed. She also starts giving orders and when Reese (again, correctly!) goes to point out that she's the leader, Coco talks over her, saying they can't waste any more time out here because she has reason to believe that Shade has been compromised. She needs them only because she's out of bullets and low on aura, but they definitely need her because "let’s face it, I’m the best strategist around for miles."
Coco's a strategist?
And why does she sound like a villain trying to convince the heroes to work with her? She’s already part of the team!
Putting all that aside for the moment, we're back to this prideful characterization. I liked the well-rounded Coco from a few pages ago who balanced caring for her team with the likelihood of needing backup. Now she's flinching from the idea that she'd ever need help (hello, Sun characterization too) and snatching Reese's role the moment she's given the chance. So much for respecting her position. If the book wants me to believe that Reese is unfit to be leader and this is a golden opportunity for Coco to right a wrong... how about we actually show Reese being a bad leader?
Regardless, yay working together? The chapter ends with them presumably taking out the grimm before heading back to Shade, along with an important revelation. Prior to leaving, Carmine asked Coco why Yatsuhashi and Fox weren't rushing to her aid. It's only now that Coco realizes she didn't mention Velvet. Why? Perhaps because Carmine already knows where Velvet is, which obviously doesn't imply anything good.
And that's the end of Chapter Ten! Can you tell I never know how to finish these recaps? Describing cliffhangers doesn't have quite the same punch as, you know, actual cliffhangers. You all just have to suffer through my mediocre endings with me.
But would you look at that! Turns out the third attempt at writing this was the charm! :D
See you for Chapter Eleven! 💜
30 notes · View notes
Who do you think is the most incompetent character in Canon HP? I think it's Fudge or Lockhart, but then again they're only incompetent in SOME areas. So, what do you think?
Oh my god, there are so many contenders.
I feel like this is almost every single character. We’re talking Harry who only seems to accomplish his goals by divine luck. We’re talking Umbridge whose methods are so ridiculous I can’t even imagine what she imagines the outcome of her actions will be. We’re talking Lockhart (though I’m not actually sure incompetence is the right word, it’s more that he’s so drowning in narcissism he can’t even recognize his abilities, Lockhart is a wonder). Fudge, for obvious reasons...
I’m not even sure where to begin with this, really.
I guess I have to go with Fudge just because his incompetency is not only a near constant but it’s also often nearly lethal on a catastrophic level. 
Just, god, Fudge, you are a wonder.
Let’s start with Sirius’ breakout from Azkaban.
Fudge panics and thus causes the population to panic. Advertisements are being run by the hour, Sirius Black’s face is on every newspaper page. This is in a society where dropping the very name Voldemort sends the population into fits of terror. Fudge could very easily have inspired riots and then gone and joined the riots himself because Sirius broke out of Azkaban. I am mildly surprised that Diagon Alley wasn’t completely in flames by the time Harry got there. And this is on the competent end for Fudge.
We have Fudge running advertisements on the Muggle television. Now, I’m sure somebody told Fudge this was a brilliant idea. It even sounds like a good idea if you don’t think about it much: this way he can’t even hide in the muggle world. The trouble is what if somebody looks into this? Sirius Black is being mentioned every hour in the muggle media? What high security prison did he come from? What crime did he commit? Did Fudge even bother to make up a fake muggle history for this fake muggle murderer he just made up? Remember, the coverup for the muggles Sirius supposedly murdered was a gas leak, so Sirius can’t be blamed for that. I expect some muggles started asking questions and either the obliviators had to work overtime, Fudge got lucky, or a more insidious but likely answer is that the wizarding world didn’t even notice that they had dropped the ball. They’re so secure in their belief that they have the statute under control, that muggles are inherently gullible and stupid, that one day the statute of secrecy will break without them even knowing.
Fudge then loses Harry Potter. How does he manage this? Harry walks out the door of his muggle home and steps onto a bus. I imagine this nearly gave Fudge a heart attack but the fact was that no one had told Harry to stay there, Harry wasn’t aware that there was even any danger, and there was nothing at all preventing him from doing it. The kid calls the goddamn Night Bus and steps right up on board. Fudge’s solution of what to do with Harry later? He tells Harry to stay in the Leaky Cauldron, doesn’t even assign him a minder, just has him stay there. Good lad, please don’t die.
Fudge then sends soul eating demons who nobody understands to Hogwarts in case Sirius Black might show up to ‘protect the children’. Within only a few hours on the train one student, Harry Potter at that, passes out from dementor exposure. Fudge is convinced he can control these things. The dementors show up to a quidditch match. Fudge is so unbelievably lucky that half the Hogwarts population wasn’t eaten. Fudge, however, is so incompetent and short sighted he doesn’t even realize he’s lucky. Of course the dementors listen to the ministry! He’s the minister of magic! To top this, the dementors aren’t even effective, they fail to catch Sirius Black. 
Also, a smaller thing of Fudge but very in character, Harry learns about Sirius Black through the world’s most contrived means. He happens to be hanging out in Hogsmeade where he’s not supposed to be, hiding under Ron and Hermione’s table, and Fudge drops by. Fudge then loudly says, “Ah, Rosmerta, random barmaid! Have I told you all about the time Sirius Black was responsible for the murder of Harry Potter’s parents? No? WELL SIT RIGHT DOWN” This isn’t quite as bad as murdering all the children, but it’s pretty ridiculous.
But hey, Fudge was there to almost murder a hippogriff who attacked Malfoy’s son? I mean, it escaped, but... FUDGE DOES THINGS!
Later, fifth year, he runs the smear campaign against Harry Potter. Now, running a smear campaign against a fifteen-year-old is a shitty thing to do but that’s not why it’s incompetent. It’s incompetent because he goes all out. Actively calling Harry Potter, beloved savior of the nation, a narcissistic liar just gives him credence. It’s too strong and it only works (not even for the full population at that) because people are so terrified of Voldemort they’d accept this Rita Skeeter tabloid madness rather than face that again. As it is, Harry has his interview in the Quibbler, which is basically the National Inquirer, AND PEOPLE READ IT. THAT’S INSANE. YOU FAILED FUDGE. YOU FAILED SO HARD. 
A better plan would have been to acknowledge Harry had been through a traumatic event. Cedric somehow died in the tournament, Harry has lived all his life with this crushing expectation he’s defeated the dark lord, Harry probably watched this happened and is in such traumatized shock he believes Voldemort did it. Worse, Dumbledore probably convinced Harry somehow that Voldemort had done it, and Harry not knowing what happened and trusting his headmaster agreed. This would have been far more effective. 
But Fudge is panicking. So he goes even more ridiculous than a smear campaign led by Rita Skeeter (which, of all the people to pick, you choose her?) 
He sets loose Delores Umbridge. Umbridge’s first brilliant plan is to send dementors to a muggle neighborhood. What was the outcome of this? Was Harry Potter supposed to be terrified into silence? Was the entire muggle neighborhood supposed to be eaten? Was Harry Potter, savior of the wizarding world who had just claimed Voldemort had returned, supposed to be assassinated without people thinking Voldemort did it? Seriously, I’ve turned this over in my head, and I have no idea what the ideal outcome here was supposed to be. Just that Umbridge is nuts.
As it is, the best thing for them happens, Harry Potter stops it and is put on trial. Except then they get accused of somehow losing track of dementors. They try to brush this away with there being no witnesses and Harry being insane but then Mrs. Figg shows up. So, either the ministry is so incompetent that soul eating demons are roaming the country or the ministry just tried to assassinate Harry James Potter, the boy who lived. Fudge saves himself by going, “Oh gee, look at the time, case dismissed.”
Despite Umbridge having gone completely mad and unhinged, Fudge sends her to Hogwarts. There she tortures students, presumably to silence them, but again it just gives Harry Potter credence. Why is Umbridge trying so hard to silence these people? She directly fuels Harry Potter building a seeming guerilla army of school children planning a coup of Fudge in Dumbledore’s name. It’s Fudge’s worst nightmare. More, she actively sabotages the education of an entire generation, students actually drop out of school. And then she fails to do the one thing she went to Hogwarts to do: silence Harry Potter.
Then, of course, Fudge finds out the ministry is lousy with spies, Voldemort really is back, and he just has to stand there and go, “Welp, guess I’m fired.” Yes, Fudge, you’re fired.
In short, I can’t think of a single action he takes that is in any way competent. More, nearly every action he takes could have very easily resulted in dozens of deaths.
106 notes · View notes
narwalbby · 4 years
Note
assassination classroom babies dealing with quarantine headcanons ✨
Lizzie You’re literally my favorite person on this Platform, Thank you so much for all your support, I don’t deserve this 🤧💕
——————————
AssClass Quarantine Headcanons:
Class E:
This is the worst that could possibly happen to Nagisa. Poor boy has to stay with his damn Psycho Mom and she won’t let him go out ever. Korosensei secretly Checks on him every two days tho, just to make sure she doesn’t do anything too bad
Kirara secretly misses her Classmates (mostly the Terasaka Squad), but she uses her free time to learn new spells and to explore her hobbies a little deeper
since Itona only owns that Garage of his dad Terasaka has offered him to stay at his house
The Terasaka Squad does Videochats per Zoom every now and then, but it‘s so chaotic Kirara sometimes just leaves shhshs
Karma uses his time to either study, play Videogames or think of new ways to kill Korosensei
He never sleeps. Karma doesn’t know sleep
Now that his parents also have to stay home, he finally talks about them and how he feels neglected by them. It was a heartwarming Conversation and everything‘s a little better now
The Girls have an own Groupchat and have weekly Zoom Meetings, where they talk about how they’ve been doing and stuff
Sumire opened up a YouTube channel, where she shows people how she cooks all kinds of food! She‘s semi popular! (All thanks to Mimura and his Filming Skills)
Sugaya tries out new stuff with art. He made a sculpture, he drew with oil paint, tried out many cartoon styles and also pointed with Acrylic paint
His mom thinks about selling some of his pictures but he refuses (Never steal my mans art 😤)
Kayano feels very lonely without her Classmates and her Sister. She eats tons of Ice Cream and eventually gets over Nagisa!
She also watches a lot of Netflix in that Time, she stays up till 4AM Binge watching her favorite Series all over again
Takebayashi and Fuwa accidentally called each other but ended up talking for over two hours about Anime and Manga
They eventually bonded over this and now recommend each other the newest Manga and Animes (I love these two sm shshsh✨)
Okuda gets much more confident
She stopped braiding her hair and eventually even dyed it in a different color
When Karma and her had a Videochat with Nagisa both of them almost choked to death
Yoshida is so bored that he just rides on their private ground with his motorcycle, but after some time he just looses the fun in it
Muramatsu is tired of cooking Ramen and tries out some of Sumire‘s recipes! He‘s not a perfect cook, but he improves day to day! (Underrated Characters are superior, change my mind🍜💞)
Megu and Isogai Check on the others daily, like the responsible Class Preps they are! They make sure no one is sick and everyone is comfortable at home
Well, you see, Okajima would just watch Porn. I wish I could go deeper, but everytime I think about him it’s just... Porn.
Oh, but he misses his Classmates a lot. He looks at some photographs he made, and probably cries about it later
Maehara is bored to death since he can’t date any girls, but he and Isogai chat almost every day and he plays some video games with the others
Sugino practices a little Baseball in his Garden and accidentally breaks his Neighbours Window
Yup. They ain’t happy about it!
Hinano excercises a lot, just like Kimura does
Kimura has some days where he takes a walk or just runs a little while listening to music, it really relaxes him a lot and helps him to deal with the whole situation
Chiba and Hayami also Videochat very often, just like everyone else
Chiba once pinned his hair back, because he was doing some of Korosensei‘s Tasks, and Hayami just stared at him and almost started to cry
(I mean can you blame her, his eyes are beautiful 🥺)
Hinano reads a lot about bugs and Animals, and she also watches a lot of documentaries!
She also saved a little squirrel that almost starved to death in her garden, and she named him Squirrel-sensei, in honor of Korosensei
Rio doesn’t known what to do, so she just Chops her hair off
But it’s fine, short hair really suits her, and she loves it either way, she was just bored
For Kanzaki... she would probably sit in her room and play videogames with the boys
She once rage quitted and yelled
Maehara was so traumatized that he didn’t play games for 3 solid days
Big 5:
Gakushu hates being Quarantined with his father, but well, what can he do?
He does a lot of unnecessary extra work, but other than that he just thinks
About Class E, about his father, about his friends and about himself
He secretly loves watching Theories and Myths, so that’s probably what he does on weekends
Ren has no idea what to do, so he just calls his friends and they talk about basically everything
He also tried out nail polish, but it just wasn’t for him, so he immediately rubbed it off
Okay this one is canon and you can’t change my mind: Natsuhiko remembers every. Single. Word. From the Shrek Series.
He was done with all of his school work and he ended up watching it all over again until he memorized everything
Teppei doesn’t do much except homework, but he mumbled to himself a lot
It was a habit before the pandemic, but it has gotten worse
He also watches Documentaries and ends up watching some about the dumbest topics, for example Otters or something
Seo is depressed, because he and his family can’t travel to LA anymore (rich kid problems 🙄)
Teachers:
Like I already said, Korosensei checks up on each one of his student, and he gives them a lot of extra work to do
Only because he cares about them and their education of course
He‘ll try to find a way to still somehow teach them, but he hasn’t found one yet
Korosensei also could travel the world, but he doesn’t do it because he says it’s a bad example for his students
None of them really care tho
Irina basically begs Karasuma to let her be quarantined with him, but he just refuses like the stern type of guy he is
Karasuma does a lot of paperwork and avoids texts or calls from Irina
Irina gets mad at Karasuma a lot and shoves chocolate up her mouth and cries over him
Other than that, she orders many new clothes and tries out different styles and aesthetics
Her favorite so far is Cottagecore
Gakuho isn’t to fond of him and his son being quarantined together
They only eat breakfast, lunch and dinner together, and that’s it. Nothing else happening here
He tries his best to care for his school of course, but he somehow also wishes to make things right with Gakushu
He knows that it’s probably too late, so he just doesn’t say anything and remains going school work and correcting exams
——————————
Ahhhh I Hope this is Fine, it’s very Long but I‘m sure you don’t mind 👀
@kaidasen
140 notes · View notes
Text
How far I’ll go
It has been over a week since Sora had disappeared and Kairi had done absolutely nothing. Now that not only her enemies but also her friends started to sideline her and keep her out of anything remotely dangerous, Kairi has had enough.
Haunted by massive guilt along with her hurt and sorrow, she finally steps up to take her fate into her own hands - with the help of a small friend.
Rating: General
Genre: Hurt/Comfort, Friendship
Disclaimer: All characters belong to Disney/Square Enix.
Also available on: ao3
A big thank you goes to @kairizine​. The fic wouldn’t exist without the zine and it definitely wouldn’t exist in this polished form. Thank you so much for your support and all the changes you made to the product so it would turn out just the way I wanted it to!
Another round of pre-sales open on July 5th, so please consider getting a copy for yourself! All money that doesn’t go into production and shipping of the zine will be donated to Futures without Violence. Check out their site here: https://www.futureswithoutviolence.org/
Let’s all work together for a wonderful future without violence ♥
Another thank you goes to @phoenix-downer​ who as always supports me and my writing despite me being very difficult to work with. Thank you so much ♥
Please enjoy!
___________________________
The sun had barely started to rise when Kairi opened her eyes and stared up at the ceiling, reluctant to get up.
An old toy boat that her father had crafted for her hung from the ceiling, complete with three little dolls that leant over the railing, staring back down at her. The cool morning breeze rocked the boat back and forth, causing one of the dolls to shift and hang even more precariously over the railing than the other two, yet somehow it didn’t fall.
The little grin that was etched on the doll’s face made a sad smile spread over Kairi’s lips before she sighed and got up, making her way over to the school uniform she had laid out the night before.
School. What a waste of time when she could be actively searching for Sora.
It has been over a week since he had disappeared and she had done absolutely nothing. Emphasis on 'she'. Riku had used the time to travel to Radiant Garden and the Land of Departure for intel, postponing the start of his first year of high school while Kairi was stuck finishing her last year of middle school after her friends had unanimously decided she should finish as much of her education as possible. While she understood their sentiment obviously, she couldn't help but feel frustrated that once again she was put on the sidelines against her will with no means to leave Destiny Islands on her own terms.
And that didn't even touch upon the massive guilt that was hounding her every day.
Kairi threw a glance at her vanity mirror. Her reflection looked back at her, with eyes red and irritated from so little sleep. Her face was starting to thin, too, but that was no surprise either. She hadn't felt like eating in over a week, not since—
A tear rolled down her cheek and she rubbed at it, furious with herself when instead more started pouring out. It was this weakness that got them into their current situation in the first place, probably the very reason everyone wanted her to stay on the Islands, to be out of their way.
"Kairi?"
With a small sniffle, she rubbed away the last tears and smiled down at the table. Her view was still blurred, but she offered her open palm to the small creature standing there. It immediately heeded her call and jumped onto her hand so Kairi could bring him up in front of her face and put on the best impression of a smile she could muster.
"Good morning, Jiminy. I hope you slept well."
It was Sora who had asked Jiminy to stay with Kairi. Knowing that his time was limited, he had urged the cricket to leave his hood and take refuge in Kairi's instead, to keep Jiminy safe from whatever was about to happen to him. She felt another tear roll down her cheek and a little frown spread on Jiminy's face in response.
"I slept wonderfully, you made me the softest makeshift bed possible. But the question should be: How do you feel?"
She shrugged her shoulders.
"No change," she answered softly, then shifted the sad cricket onto one hand. With the other, she held her skirt pocket open, allowing him to nestle into it. It wasn't as spacious and comfortable as her hoodie, but it had to do during school hours. She didn't need her enchanted dress—not yet. Not until the others told her it was time to go. Until then, she had stashed it away in a small traveling bag, filled with leftover potions and everything else that could be of use and loaded it into Riku's gummi ship. 
After an awkward and quiet breakfast, Kairi grabbed her satchel and quickly fled the pitying glances her parents were throwing her, only to be surprised by Riku who was leaning against the wooden fence of her front garden. Her heart ached at that. It was the place where Sora formerly—no, normally , Kairi corrected herself, because his disappearance was temporary, not permanent—waited for her each morning. 
"Good morning."
His smile didn't reach his eyes and her shoulders slumped a little.
Things with Riku were awkward ever since the fight in the Keyblade Graveyard. He rarely smiled and was tired constantly, something Kairi could more than understand as she was experiencing the same. However, she was very aware of how he avoided looking into her eyes—and she couldn't help but feel that he was upset with her—as if he blamed her for his best friend’s disappearance.
And how could he not? Had she been stronger, had she fought harder, maybe–
"C’mon, Kairi. You’re going to be late." 
Her heart skipped a beat.
"Are we going off-world?"
Riku shook his head and his smile wavered.
"I meant school." 
Oh. Kairi didn't reply to that, just walked ahead with her head hung low, avoiding Riku's eyes as much as he kept avoiding hers. After a few minutes of awkwardly walking next to each other in silence, Riku spoke up again.
"How are you feeling?"
Kairi shrugged."How are you feeling? Probably not too differently from me."
Aside from all the rightful anger and disappointment towards me , she added in her mind. But she had her own self-loathing to deal with, so maybe it evened out.
Riku didn't answer her, he just nodded, and before long, they reached the front of the school gate. Some of Kairi's classmates waved at Riku, having been friends with him for most of their lives and some of the younger girls giggled and fluttered their eyelashes at him as they passed by, but neither Kairi nor Riku paid them any mind.
"Why don't you take me with you on your world trips?"
Riku sighed and started rubbing his face tiredly, and for some reason it only made Kairi more upset.
"We've been over this before. We all think—"
"He is my friend, too."
"You're a Princess of Heart, Kairi," Riku tried again, a little quieter this time, fully aware of the students that threw curious glances at them. "You know we have to keep you safe."
"So that's what it's all about," Kairi huffed and crossed her arms in front of her chest, "this was never about my education, this was always about this stupid 'light' business."
"It's not 'stupid light business' and you know that."
"He saved my life, Riku!"
"Exactly, that's why I won't let you throw it away!"
Kairi halted and let her gaze fall. She was right. She had been right all along.
"Kairi?" 
Riku sounded hesitant as he called her name and Kairi fought hard to hold back her tears.
"I'm– I'm sorry it's me."
"What do you mean?"
"I'm sorry I'm here while he's somewhere else."
Riku startled her by grabbing her shoulders and making her look up into his pained eyes.
“Kairi, you can't believe that?!" 
“I will set this right,” she replied instead and internally cursed her voice for sounding weak and shaky. “I will fight harder and work harder and I won’t be a liability anymore. I know it’s all my fault, but I will help bring him back.”
And then Riku did something unexpected: he hugged her. Tears filled Kairi's eyes.
“I know I wasn’t good enough, but I–”
"No. You were good enough. It was all Xehanort. He chose to do these despicable things." Riku pulled her tighter. "Kairi, listen to me: I'm not blaming you. I never blamed you. You're my best friend as well, I could never choose between the two of you."
At that, Kairi couldn't hold back anymore. She grabbed a fistful of Riku's shirt and cried. Cried over the traumatic experiences she had had to go through, cried over the guilt she was harboring inside of her, cried over Sora being forcefully ripped away from her when she had just gotten him back.
They held each other for a couple of minutes, finally mourning the loss of Sora together, until the school bell interrupted their moment.
A little reluctantly, Kairi untangled herself from Riku, but he held onto her shoulders, searching her face with a worried gaze. She sniffled a little, brushing away a few stray tears that hadn't soaked into his jacket.
"I think I needed that. Thank you, Riku."
"Will you be okay?" he asked her and she shrugged.
"I feel better."
And she really did. Crying always made her head ache and she could feel the pain slowly creep into her forehead, but talking to Riku had lifted a heavy weight off of her chest. She adjusted the strap of her satchel and was ready to go when Riku called out to her again.
"Hm?"
His eyes seemed strangely sad once more as he mustered her intensely.
"...Take care, Kairi."
___________________________
Despite feeling better about herself and Riku, Kairi’s headache prevailed. Not that it mattered—she couldn't focus on her lessons lately anyway and when she could, she was unable to remember half of what had happened during class.
After the last bell of the day rang, Kairi quickly fled the classroom to escape her friends. She couldn't stand Selfie fussing over her constantly or the looks of pity Tidus and Wakka were throwing at her. But what upset her even more was the complete lack of compassion some of her classmates confronted her with, uncaring of Sora's whereabouts.
Two streets away from school, Kairi felt like she could breathe again. She immediately slowed down—she didn't look forward to arriving at home for the same reasons she fled school—and reached into her skirt pocket to free the little cricket. Jiminy gratefully jumped up and nestled into her hair and the two of them started enjoying the sun and warm rays on Kairi's walk home.
That was until Kairi arrived to see a familiar purple bag in her front garden. Her heart stopped.
”No…"
Kairi quickly opened the gate and ran onto the grass, hands flying to the zipper and revealing pink material and green bottles along with a handwritten note.
I'm sorry
"No. He wouldn't!"
Everything was a blur when she dropped her book bag in favor of the purple one, grabbed Jiminy from the top of her head to let him slide into her bag gently, and began running to the beach. She quickly untied her old boat and rowed over to the play island, ignoring the growing pain in her shoulder as she pushed faster and faster, all the while repeating the mantras of "No" and "He wouldn't do this to me" over and over again.
Having secured her boat as fast as possible, Kairi took off again, this time into the bushes, fighting her way through the thicket to reach Riku's gummi ship.
Except it was gone.
The clearing Riku had used to hide his gummi ship in was empty.
Kairi felt herself sink to her knees and hot tears pool in her eyes. Jiminy carefully wiggled his head out of the insides of her bag and looked at her with pity. 
"Oh Kairi…"
"He left me behind again."
"He wants to keep you safe." Jiminy jumped back onto her shoulder and brushed away a big tear that was slowly running down her cheek. “He cares a lot about you. We all do.”
“Then why does he ignore what I want?” 
“You know Riku,” Jiminy brushed yet another tear away with both of his little hands, “he’s not the best when it comes to emotions and other people’s feelings, but what he does he does out of genuine concern for you.”
“Maybe that’s the problem. Not only Riku, everyone keeps disregarding my feelings and just assumes what’s best for me.” She rubbed her eyes with the back of her hand before moving to massage her throbbing shoulder in an attempt to soothe the pain a little. It was another reminder of what had happened a week ago.
“Sora refused to let me help him because he thought it was too dangerous. Both he and Riku left me behind when King Mickey asked us to help him out. Axel held back during our training because he kept seeing Xion in me and refused to attack me with all of his power. If they had taken me more seriously, if they had just talked to me instead of protecting me...maybe things would have gone differently.”
“Don’t be too harsh on Riku. He helped you summon your Keyblade, remember? To be honest,” Jiminy let his shoulders droop a little, “I don’t think it was his first choice to leave you behind. I think he wanted to honor Sora’s last wish.”
Kairi's throat constricted. "Sora's– Sora's what?"
Jiminy nodded and climbed into Kairi's limp hand which she raised to better look at the little cricket.
"Before he spent his last moment with you, he asked Riku for a favor. He wanted him to take care of you—the same kind of request Riku had back when the Door to Darkness was about to close and trap him and His Majesty in the Realm of Darkness." Jiminy's expression softened. "They genuinely want what’s best for you, Kairi."
"I’ve always wanted what was best for them, too, and yet I never told them to stay put.” With her free hand, she grabbed the edge of her skirt tightly until her knuckles turned white. “I’ve always encouraged them to follow their hearts. Why does nobody allow me to follow my heart for once? ‘May your heart be your guiding key’—isn’t that what Master Yen Sid told us?"
Jiminy lowered his head with a sad frown and Kairi let her eyes wander, too tired to keep the argument going. The beach was bathed in an orange color by the setting sun and the water was glistening prettily. From here, everything seemed so peaceful, so unlike what Kairi felt right then. She lifted her eyes a little more and looked at the red sky when something caught her eye. It was small and very faint, barely visible against the strong rays of the sun, but that didn’t deter her. She gently placed Jiminy back on her good shoulder and got up.
"Kairi?” She felt Jiminy’s tiny hand press against her cheek. “Is everything okay?”
"See the line where the sky meets the sea?” was her only reply to which Jiminy cocked his head.
"Huh? You mean the horizon?" 
Kairi nodded. "It calls me."
She began walking forward, across the clearing and down until she reached a small cave.
"I don’t know why, but when I looked at the horizon I saw something in the distance. Like a small glimmer of hope. It sounds crazy, but my heart tells me to go. The horizon is where sky and sea meet. Sora returned to the world of sky and sea. It can’t be a coincidence. This is the best lead we have."
Her face lit up as she saw what she'd been searching for in the corner of the cave. Small and modest, but sturdy enough to survive strong waves, it still waited for its maiden journey.
"And our raft will take me there."
"No, no, no!” Jiminy pressed his hands into her cheek to catch her attention. “Kairi, that's dangerous! We might end up in the Lanes Between, a place filled with darkness!"
"I’m a Princess of Heart, the darkness won’t get to me. And this dress made by the Three Good Fairies additionally protects me from it. You’ll be safe in my hood or pocket, too. That is, if you want to come with me.”
She started to check on the ropes and sail, happily nodding to herself when she deemed them to be in good condition. 
"You've made up your mind, didn't you?" Jiminy asked her again and she smiled at him.
"I have to do this, Jiminy. I’ve waited for too long. Waiting isn’t good enough anymore."
"Then I don't have any other choice,” Jiminy mock-sighed and then puffed out his chest. “I will join you on your quest!"
"Oh thank you!" Kairi squealed and happily cupped Jiminy to her cheek.
This time, she would save Sora. And that's a promise.
26 notes · View notes
erikthedead · 3 years
Text
entry #1
I have finally acquired Microsoft Word! I really didn’t want to pay a monthly subscription for it, but it is the best writing software out there. Every time I mention myself spending money, a small prayer goes out to all the tax-paying members of the nation, since all my money comes from Universal Credit, which is the United Kingdom’s cute name for a type of welfare money. I much prefer just calling it ‘welfare,’ or even better ‘NEETbux,’ which I discovered used in online forums as a word for the money people receive when they are not in education, employment, or training (N.E.E.T), which has been my status for about two years now. Then ‘bux’ is just ‘bucks,’ obviously. Bucks is just money, obviously. Many people receiving Universal Credit also work as well; they just receive less - enough to supplement their wages if they aren’t getting enough money from their jobs.  
My last job was working in a busy restaurant for just about a year. Before that I was in university, but I dropped out after only completing the first year out of three. Before that, I worked as a carer for elderly people for just under a year. Before that, I was in college for two years, and I actually passed the course. I only passed it because the subject was forensic science, which included lots of writing about psychology, criminology and lab reports. I was never that good in the lab practically. I got flustered and bewildered in such a bright, sanitary environment that required precision and organisation to achieve the desired results. When it came to scrambling together a report to submit the next day though, I was pretty golden. I only dropped out of university because I had a mental break down as a result of poor mental health and just the fact that going outside and interacting with people was and still is incredibly exhausting for me. After a year of doing that consistently it seems, I get fatigued. In the end I got an average grade for the college course because some of the work was difficult, or boring, and that fatigue was hitting me by the second year. However, the grades I was getting on my university assignments for psychology and sociology were anywhere between top marks and good marks (Between 1st – 2:2 in UK student language). I never once read the feedback from the tutors who marked my work. All I needed to know was the mark was okay and moved on to the next assignment, firstly because I was arrogant and secondly, I couldn’t handle criticism. The mental break down itself involved me walking through the campus one day only to find myself slipping into a dissociative state. Nothing had happened immediately prior to trigger this, it just happened. It felt strange, like I wasn’t really real, and neither was anyone else. Everything felt distant and off, both externally and internally. It was frightening and strangely peaceful, as if at any moment someone could come in and blow the building up and I wouldn’t even react to it. That wasn’t normal. The only way to snap out of it was to lock myself in a toilet cubicle and lightly slice my arm with a tiny knife I had on my keys. It worked, but now I was in floods of tears and a state of distress, so I went to the student welfare services to see if they could help me or at least let me sit somewhere nicer than a toilet while I calmed down. It was an open office waiting area at the side of the bottom floor of a building that matched the layout of a prison ward with the stairs and the upper floors creating a square boarder of classrooms, that would have been cells for a prison. More for practical purposes than for aesthetic reasons, I’m sure. Still sobbing, and hiding my self-inflicted cuts, I asked the person behind the desk if I could ‘see someone,’ which is one polite British way of asking for help. After waiting a little while, a plump middle-aged lady appeared and brought me into her own little private office to ask me what had happened. She gave me her sympathy and asked me about my life and my history, and gave me some more sympathy, while relating her own experiences to mine. She was a good counsellor, basically. But having a good counsellor on site wasn’t enough to keep me on the course after that incident. Getting a degree just wasn’t worth it at the time. Being such a depressed and pessimistic person, I was only actually doing the course for ‘fun’ anyway, not for the hope that it will bring me a better future. Until recently, I never saw a future for myself. It wasn’t even a bleak future I imagined; it was just blank. I couldn’t even conceptualise it.
It’s not a mystery where all my misery came from. My childhood was a bit inconsistent to start, and from what I’ve observed, children need consistency more than anything to develop promisingly. I remember reading a study once that found children raised by parents who were consistently abusive to them were in fact more mentally stable than those raised by parents who could be lovely one day and nasty the next. It was not knowing what treatment they were going to get that did them in. It makes sense because if you’re always expecting to face a thrashing or a shouting at every day, you can at least prepare for it and train yourself to deal with it. We’re very adaptable creatures, but we need to be able to recognise patterns around us to do that. If there is no pattern, then how can we possibly make predictions? Without predictions, how can we possibly feel secure about our future? Having said all that, I was never abused in any way growing up, but I was sometimes neglected by my young mother, who was only 16 when she gave birth to me. Of course, it’s understandable now, but from a child’s perspective all you think is ‘why doesn’t my mum want me?’ When she sends you to your room for no reason and tells you not to come down for hours at a time. I asked ‘why’ a lot. Never got a good reason. I’m sure plenty of people who were raised by a drug-addicted parent can relate to this. She herself was a good mother, not amazing, but good. She told me she loved plenty of times, she gave me what she could, including a little sister when I was three years old. I think it was shortly after her birth that mum started taking heroin. It was only during drug education in year five of school (I would have been about 11) that I put the pieces together. She hid her addiction pretty well from us, but I sometimes found pieces of tin foil lying around the living room with lines of black residue on them, and once or twice witnessed her junkie friends ‘nodding off.’ There’s also a clear memory in my mind of being taken along by her and my nan to score some brown out of town and I can picture in my head the massive set of old-fashioned scales this drug dealer had sat on his coffee table right in front of me. I was too young to understand any of their lingo, though. Yes, I mentioned my nan, my mum’s mum. They got smacked up together, and they eventually got clean together. I’ll never know the details of how that came about because neither of them are alive anymore to ask. Mum died when I was 14 by taking an overdose of her methadone, then nan died when was 21 of a heart attack, likely due to the COPD she had developed from years of smoking.
My nan was so full of love for my mum, my sister and me. Some of my favourite childhood memories are being snuggled up in bed listening to her read me stories, which she did with flare and enthusiasm. She would affectionately call us her ‘wobblies,’ and give us more hugs kisses than we ever wanted. My mum definitely inherited her loving nature from her. But love on its own isn’t enough to keep kids clothed and fed and able to go out and do things. This is where the legend that is my grandad comes in. He is still going strong at 66 years old as of writing. God knows where I’d be without him. He’s been my father figure all my life since I never knew who or where my real dad was. He’s hard-working, reliable, responsible and strong. He supported us immensely despite not relating to him biologically. My biological grandfather was a free-spirited busker who liked to smoke and drink a lot, who I only met a hand full of times before he hanged himself when I was 19. His death did not affect me, but my mum’s and nan’s certainly did. I’ll probably have to see my grandad die as well eventually, and I don’t dread anything more.
Although I started off describing my family background by saying it’s obvious where my source of misery comes from, I must emphasise that my family is not the source of my misery. My childhood overall was pretty forgettable. I only have a few memories and they’re fond memories, despite the unfortunate situation I just described. Even getting my face ripped open by the neighbour’s dog when I was six didn’t faze me. It was only when puberty hit me that life started to feel horrible, and it just got worse.
I was an early bloomer, if blooming is what you call it. I call it mutating. I started getting hairy and growing tits when I was 10, and got my period about a year later. Now THAT is a traumatic memory. Waking up and going for a morning wee as usual, sitting down on the toilet and being overcome with horror at the sight of blood covering my pyjamas, realising there’s only one place that could have come from, then investigating the source only to confirm ‘Oh shit, I’m bleeding from between my legs!’ I was living with my nan and grandad at the time and I stayed there (or here, since I’m still living in the same house as of writing) under their guardianship while mum sorted herself out. After the shocking discovery of blood, I immediately ran into nan’s bedroom to wake her up. I vividly remember what and how she responded to me. With a sigh of what seemed like unsettling disappointment she said “Oh, darling, I’m sorry, I’m afraid you’ve got your period.’  I wonder now if she said it like that because she felt guilty for not warning me about this, as she should have. Someone should have. In all fairness I was young, but the other kids in my year at school were soon popping into adolescence alongside me, so I thought that soon enough everyone else would be going through what I was going through, but that wasn’t the case. I was bullied for having chronic acne. I was also a bit of a chubby boffin, but it was mostly the acne that people targeted me for. The girls shaved their legs once they started to get hairy, and I remember thinking ‘Damn, I suppose I’ve got to do that too,’ despite never wearing a skirt. They also seemed to relish in showing off and comparing their bras in the changing rooms, while I hid away as very best as I could. Make-up was a constant battle between students and teachers because they all wanted to look pretty, but it wasn’t allowed in middle school (Year 5-8), so luckily, I had an excuse for not wearing it. I’d regularly complain to my family about hating going to school, and how depressed I was, but it was all put down to teenage blues. ‘You’ll be alright once your hormones settle down,’ I was told more than once.  I remember my nan telling me I would miss going to school when I was older and so far she’s been proven wrong.  
2 notes · View notes
aalt-ctrl-del · 3 years
Text
sean hannity and rush limbaugh used to be these funny nuicances. Ultra conservative blokes, Prez Obama hating cultist, evangelical ranters about the evils of a black man president. Trash talk radio, so right wing
Kind of my first introduction to them was this whole debacle about a chicken tender that some kid brought to lunch, which was confiscated, and the drama went on for months. It was the whole FL Michelle’s promotion thing for health meals rather than trash meals, and I guess this school tanked the ideal of it super hard.
𝒜𝒩𝒴𝒲𝒜𝒴
catching snippets of them in our current climate, talking about trump and his tantrums refusing to concede. It’s bizarre. I call a lot of these people insane, since I’m not sure what else to call people who have an utter detachment from reality; an utter lack of comprehension or critical thinking. The blatant denial of what is going on in our world at this time, in major cities across the nation. In a city right next to my home.
For context, utilizing an unrelated topic. We have a guy that goes into a school and shoots up the place. Shoots a lot of teens, teachers, kills people or maims them. Kind of like the virus, only we don’t have shootings right now because most schools are shut down due to the pandemic.
But we’ll have students that survive, who come forward - with outrage fueling their motives, with hurt and trauma marking their words - they talk about the experience and what they want done. But you’ll have these guys like rush or hannity, calling them fake survivors and paid actors.
And this is true. trump said it too, the right-wing - NRA erections anonymous, and rush and hannity repeat it to their cult.
What is wrong with these people? What is going on in the head of someone that says, “These youths survived a traumatic experience, which very well might’ve killed them if they were in the wrong place at the wrong time. I can make a profit by - without an ounce of evidence - point the finger of doubt, and rally my followers against them. Because 2nd Amendment rights are the blood of the nation.” And that is how they make a living.
Not by educating their cult, but by fueling the gullible, delusional, fanatics. Validating the cultists conspiracy narrative, and giving them a platform, the right, to question whether the victim really did deserve to get shot for going to school that day.
And it’s happening once more, with the corona virus. hannity and rush behave like everything is completely normal, that we’re not 40 Million unemployed, thousands facing eviction, and a virus shredded through communities - killing hundreds of thousands and maiming thousands of others.
They play this lil game on trumps behalf, pretending that trump is completely within his right to recount absentee ballots from each and every state he lost - but only the states that went blue. It’s as if they have this ideal, wherein they’ll say, “How is it possible trump couldn’t win? He’s so charismatic, and brave, and he speaks with such eloquence. It can’t possibly be that 243,000 people are dead, and that butterfly effect influenced the decision of millions.”
And it might have been a different matter if trump was out there, trying to get control of the corona virus. Putting experienced people in charge of the pandemic response, listening to the doctors, congratulating Dr. Fauci for his efforts and hard work toward exploring the vaccines in production. Or, even addressing people, and informing them on measures for reducing spread. Y’know, the things that would make people endeared toward a sympathetic human person, and empower us in a time of tragedy.
But trump doesn’t do any of those things. He’s a decaying lobster in a fish tank, that the restaurant hasn’t removed because they have poor hygienic practices. trumps moronic and delusional fanatics chew on his carcass, since that’s all they got in that stagnant tank. They pretend trump is correct and has every right to be a dredge, and it makes them look like lunatics to normal functioning people. I don’t think they remember anymore what it’s like, to be normal people. If you took away their platform - they don’t have credibility but to their cult members - these people are no different from the evangelical cult members, speaking in tongues, insisting that “foreign angels will strike them down” - them being the absentee ballots, or people counting them?  
hannity and rush have never actually pursued truth or facts, their narrative is always “as bizarre as that sounds, it’s the only lead we got.” It doesn’t matter if they themselves insists that no one takes it seriously, the point of it is that they make their bread from deluding thousands. They sell a product which studies have shown has a detrimental affect on the health of safety of the vast majority that take it. They discredit and mock people, even young people, who have survived traumatic experiences, and they dismiss the casualties of thousands.
They are the most sublevel of human beings.
2 notes · View notes
mxrcayong · 4 years
Text
the avatar series: 01.15
Tumblr media
masterlist.
previous | next 
chapter fifteen
Tari has never felt this anxiety before.
Okay, wrong.
She may have felt this anxiety before, but in a past life. She was certain this was how Aang felt before storming Fire Lord Ozai’s temple; the rumbling in the pits of their stomachs, the paranoia that something is right around the corner, the inability to sit still.
However, unlike Aang, she has no clue who her enemy is. She felt like she barely scratched the surface of the plot against benders. Is there even a singular enemy? Tari can’t keep her thoughts on track, each of them constantly venturing to every possibility that could even occur – and the more potential outcomes she’s thinks of, less end in favorable ways. Consequently, Tari is having reservations about letting her friends accompany her. Maybe I should go alone, she told herself.
The seven of them sat together in their ‘temporary strategy room’, waiting for Sukiara to enter to give them their final briefing for the following evening. It was the afternoon of the day before the mouse trap for benders. She told them to be here as soon as the bell signifying when the canteen workers will bring lunch inside, which happened around ten minutes ago, rings.
The only conversation in the room came from Sonan, Doyoung, Jisung, and Yuta – who were still just getting to know each other without any sense of awkwardness. “Yo, how did I never see you before?” Sonan exclaimed, lightly slapping Jisung’s shoulder as he mentioned his mom loves her shop. “What’s your mom’s name?”
Jisung smiled sheepishly, “I don’t often go with her though. I’m always at school or with Yuta.”
School. Tari’s heart hurts. She never went to school – she never had the ability to, but from her knowledge of her friends’ adolescence and of any media regarding education; she knew it was imperative. She knew that it’s considered the gateway to life. Jisung hasn’t crossed that yet…he’s only going to be graduating in a few months. His life only just started.
Doyoung motioned to Yuta, pointing at Tari who was now lost in space for the millionth time today. In particular, she was facing Jisung – spaced out. They didn’t know she was thinking about Jisung’s future, how he might’ve turned out if he never got involved with her. In fact, she wondered where everyone would be if they didn’t get involved with her.
Safer, she thought, for sure.
At Doyoung’s hand motion from across the table, Yuta’s hand rested on Tari’s knee. The sudden contact was cold – potentially due to a few of his rings, but it sent tingles down her spine. She looked up, eyes wide, to see Yuta bowing his head to be in her eyeline. He sent her a soft smile, which Tari can imagine will calm her down in any other circumstance – but not right now. She stopped staring at the teenager and stared down at her lap, refusing to look up.
Because – right in front of her, sat Johnny and Kilari sharing mumbled words.
She hasn’t had a proper conversation – more than four words – with them since the day he and Kilari stormed out. Looking at them has made her heart heavy as she can’t tell if the look in their eyes were concern or despise. She has lost two people who mean the world to her and looking at them just reminded her of all of the possibilities she has lost.
Suddenly, the clinking of heels hitting the floor and the slide of the door echoed throughout the room – interrupting the limited conversation within the room. Tari couldn’t help but pray to any significant being out there – thanking them for distracting her with news.
Sukiara clapped her hands, standing in front of the corkboard like a professor whose waiting for their students’ presentation. A small smile playing at her lips as she scanned everyone’s faces, she asked a simple question made way too complex in this situation; ‘how are you feeling?’.
Lost. Scared. Conflicted. Confused. It felt like Toph has metal-bended her feet to the ground, making her unable to stand without the weight of the world holding her back. Unfortunately, this wasn’t reflected in the hum shared by everyone else around the room.
“Well,” Sukiara chuckled, “that responses was expected. Let’s go over the plan again, shall we?”
Tumblr media
The plan, sure, sounded solid but Tari was left feeling more clueless than ever. As everyone around her nodded and agreed, they were borderline excited to experience this action firsthand. Tari couldn’t stop thinking about what her job will be.
Yes, her job is to restore balance in the world. Her job is to reduce the threat.
But what does reducing the threat even mean?
Tari doesn’t know what to do. What if she can’t restrain them or arrest them? What if she has to murder them? The thought of taking a life sent shivers down her spine and made her want to repulse.
Everyone was standing up, ready to resume their last day and evening of training. It was potentially their last night of their stay here and they intend to take advantage of the evening meal. Yet, Tari was stuck in her seat – her concerns weighing her down.
Amongst the chaos of everyone sorting out where they’ll be going, Sukiara asked a question that Tari never thought she’d have to hear. “Tari,” Her voice trembled slightly, which was unlike her. “Do you remember how to blood bend?” Sukiara’s voice betrayed her cold exterior, conveying a thousand of worries and preoccupations occupying her mind.  
Of course, Tari did. It was a traumatic year.
She has yet to experience being heavily blood-bended, as Sukiara only did minor ones to demonstrate the power blood bending has. But she has blood bended before, and the sensation of rats trapped inside of her skin; scratching her from the inside, trying to break through her skin and escape. Oddly enough, it wasn’t painful. Sukiara had to blood bend Tari to remind her that even what felt simple may be the most harmful actions of them all. Blood bending was only something a master – no, even better than a master – water bender can do easily. It tends to be stronger under the midnight moon, but the strongest water benders can do it at any time. Tari was lucky. Her teacher – Sukiara - was the daughter of Hana’s block mate, who quickly learned the essence of what Hana did.
Hana was the originator of the blood bending technique and created it with cruel intentions. She was captured by the Fire Nation and prevented any access to water. But she found another source of water; blood.  It is the most malicious bending out there, hence why it’s the only one that’s been banned and deemed illegal – even before the anti-bending regime. Tari, of course, has never met Hana. But Aang did. When she learned how to blood bend, every night she felt transported to that moment. She’d be the first Avatar to learn blood bending, as Sukiara thought it was important – despite being illegal. But she remembers the fear in Aang as he saw the prisoners Hana took, as he saw Katara become unhinged, how she changed.
It was a reminder back then. The Fire Benders were seen as the cruelest and inherently evil – capable of burning and destroying. All the other bending seemed inherently harmless, only capable of harm when armed to. But this reminded them water even can be poisonous, harmful. This reminder only hit harder when Aang went to the dragon temple with Zuko to meet the original fire benders. Due to Aang’s deep and thoughtful learnt wisdoms, Tari has always had an open approach to benders and each of the nation’s cultures.
Sukiara snapped in front of Tari’s face, taking her out of her daze. Tari nodded slowly, choking on her spit at the implications of the question.
But no one else seemed to catch how Tari’s breathing slowed, her eyes widened, and her body stilled with the mention of the forbidden action. Doyoung, even, couldn’t see it. They were all in shock.  
“You know how to blood bend?” Kilari asked, although Tari couldn’t tell if she was even more upset by not knowing this.
“I thought it was illegal.” Sonan inquired, her eyebrows furrowing.
“Wow.” Jisung practically cooed, staring wide-eyed and impressed at Tari.
Yuta just smirked, while Johnny avoided eye contact. Doyoung? He was just trying to gauge how Tari was feeling about everything.
Tari felt all eyes on her, as if a spotlight was pointing at her. She hated this; all the attention. I’m not Aang, I’ll never be as good as him, she would think when special attention was diverted to her when she was younger. She has never learnt to like it. “Uhm, I’m going to meditate.”
“I’ll join you.” Doyoung offered, fully knowing that they wouldn’t meditate but just talk about how Tari is feeling. He already had one foot out the door when Tari turned around quickly and refused his company.
Her eyes were stern and Doyoung has never seen this emotion on her face before. She was the palest she’s ever been, her lips slightly blue and parted, her body trembling. It was as if someone locked her in an iceberg. “I want to be alone.”
Tumblr media
feel free to skip this part, I just wanted to add some fluff
After being practically abandoned by Tari and due to not needing to train with Yuta, Doyoung found himself with Johnny and Sonan in the weaponry room. Doyoung sometimes forgets how buff Johnny actually is; defined muscles and biceps. He went to work out with Johnny once before but ended up sprawled on the floor complaining about soreness. That was when Doyoung decided to stick to bending gyms.
Essentially, Johnny often would joke about being the ‘weakest’ in the group due to not being able to bend. Yet he’s anything but.
“You gotta turn it into a dance.” Johnny teased Doyoung and Sonan, as he started moving his fists to a silent rhythm they couldn’t hear. “It’s how you make it fun.”
Doyoung chuckled, “Do you think we can connect our phones to the speakers before we fight?”
“Yeah, totally.” Sonan said sarcastically as she was browsing the options of weapons. “ ‘Hey excuse me sir? I get you’re trying to kill us, but can we just put on Sorry Sorry?’”
“And ignore the classic ‘I Want It That Way’?” Johnny dropped his jaw in fake offense, temporarily halting his actions to fix the tape on his hands. “How dare you?”
“You are…” Doyoung started.
“My fire,” Johnny continued, singing dramatically to Sonan as she rolled her eyes.
“My one,” Doyoung turned to Sonan as well.
“Desire” Johnny held the note as long as he thought he should.
“Believe,” Doyoung’s arm went dramatically in the air.
“When I say…” Johnny trailed off, both of them not motioning to Sonan to finish the chorus.
“I want it that way.” Sonan groaned, trying to cover up her laughter with annoyance. “Shut up!” She busted out in chuckles as she saw how they started to pout. “We need to train.”
Tumblr media
Stone cold and alone; what Tari is used to.
And where she finally felt like completely and utterly herself for the first time in months, maybe even years.
The moment her knees fell onto the stone gazebo, she felt all her emotions wash over her. It was the triggering moment, the push off the cliff, the final button. Soon, her forehead was resting against her arm as she bowed forwards – her arm resting against the gazebo.
She felt like she hasn’t cried in so long. She hasn’t really had a reason to. She had Johnny, and Doyoung, and Sonan, and Kilari. She had ‘Iroh and Me’ and Hendery. She had so much than she would’ve thought. Yes, she now has Jisung and Yuta. But she could lose them easily within the next day, and she expects them to slip through her fingers  
But I can’t fail them. More than I already did.
She climbed up from her bow and kneeled. Placing her forearms on her legs, she closed her eyes and faced the sky.
“You know, you don’t always have to be in the gazebo to call me.” Aang teased, his spirit appearing behind her. He approached her before joining her by kneeling next to her. “You’re not okay.”
Tari sighed, “I’m worried about tomorrow.”
“The attack on benders, right?” Tari nodded Aang’s clarifying question. “What are you worried about?” Although they share the same life, they do not share the same brain. Yes, Aang’s knowledge and memories are stored in Tari’s brain – but it only grows continuously. He can’t have access to her thoughts unless she voices it to him.
“What do I do when I see…well, whoever?”
Aang sighed, “You know I’ll be honest with you.” He let out a sad chuckle, as if reliving his past. “When I had to fight Fire Lord Ozai, I asked Yangchen, Kuruk, Kysohi, and Roku what they thought. And they all told me to kill him.” He shrugged, “I’ve never taken a life before that.”
Tari smiled to herself, recalling his memories with him. “Yeah, I think that’s the reason I didn’t want to talk to Kyoshi.” Kyoshi was definitely the most cutthroat out of all of them. Not to say she was cruel because she was anything but that, but she’d be ready to kill someone when she deemed necessary.
Aang laughed with her, already sensing Kyoshi’s spirit ready to fight both of them for refusing to kill. Aang entering the Spirit World when he passed had Kyoshi argue with him about sparing Fire Lord Ozai’s life on and off for five years. “Yeah, honestly, after I spoke with her, I regretted it too.” Tari rolled her eyes. “But, I think no matter where we are on this – we all have our biases. Obviously, I’d tell you to not take his life, but it really depends on the situation.”
“So, let me offer you the wisdom given to me and my own.” He paused dramatically. Always the one for dramatics, Tari thought to herself in a playful manner – momentarily forgetting that he can’t read her mind.
“Yangchen told me this isn’t about us, it’s about the world and selfless duty calls you to sacrifice your own spiritual need.” He started, the gentle breeze growing stronger at the mention of the airbender. Tari thought of her encounters with Yangchen, an Air Nomad who was devoted and fierce. She never backed down from a fight or a challenge. As a result, she is still prayed to for protection today. “I agree with this, but sometimes, you know more about the world than you think.”
“Kuruk,” Kuruk was the water bender Tari was raised to be like, after all, he was the last Water Nation Avatar. Funnily enough, the mention of his name seemed to evoke a mighty wave crashing against the rock below them. However, thinking of Kuruk, her heart hurts. He lived in a peaceful time, often attributed to Yangchen’s contributions. But he was arrogant, brash, and careless. Consequently, he lost his fiancé and the love of his life. He never found love other than that. “He said you must actively shape your own destiny and the destiny of the world. So yes, take action. And remember what you do has a consequence.”
A faint smile and subtle eye roll came from Aang and Tari knew Kyoshi was next. “Kyoshi told me only justice will bring peace.” He let out a dry chuckle, “which of course, to her – justice means ending anything that threatens peace.” The two chuckled softly, Tari desperately trying to avoid sniffling as her nose was still blocked from crying. “But justice means different things and sometimes, that means giving people the opportunity to be better…when you think they won’t or can’t cause any more harm.”  
“Lastly, Roku said you must be decisive. Although this implies you cannot falter,” Aang paused, turning to look at Tari directly rather than around the two of them – his brown eyes staring straight into her as if they were reading her soul. “You can. There’s no wrong in taking time and sometimes decisions will be poorly received, but if you don’t act fast enough – you may lose the opportunity forever.” For some reason, she thought of Johnny with his warning of not acting fast enough. But she couldn’t dwell on that thought.
“My advice is when we hit our lowest points, we are opened to the greatest change.”
Tari furrowed her eyebrows, “And what does that mean in this context?”
Aang let out an exaggerated wink, “It’s for you to find out.”
“I called you to help me, not give me-“ Tari groaned, her head falling back as she resembled a child whining about not getting a toy they wanted in the store.
“But something else is on your mind?”
Tari’s words escaped her before she could even process them. She told him of Doyoung, of Johnny, of Yuta and Jisung, of Sonan and Kilari – of everyone she may be hurting or endangering. Aang was quick to remind her of her relationships with Toph and her daughters, of Aang’s own children and Katara, of Suki and Sokka’s daughter, of Zuko and his grandchildren (who she may or may not have had her first kiss with). Aang was quick to remind her that some friendships can transcend lifetimes, and if they leave her? The friendship isn’t worth it.
Tumblr media
Nightmare after nightmare, the night didn’t seem to get any better. She can’t imagine the sunrise tomorrow feeling any lighter than the darkest of nights, which she knows will be tomorrow night.
Tari was restless; waking up with a fright from her minimal hours of sleep. The bungalow echoed her friend’s breathing around her as her body jolted upwards. Her chest was heaving and she felt like she couldn’t catch her breath.
It was just a nightmare, she told herself. It’s tomorrow. They aren’t dead. But maybe her unconscious mind was right; maybe all her friends and loved ones will die tomorrow. Maybe she’ll continue to hurt and disappoint them.The only ideal outcome out of the dream that left her sweating in bed is the fact that once she’s gone, the burden of being the Avatar will be placed upon someone more worthy.
She scanned the room, just as a reminder that they are alive and are untouched. But she noticed one makeshift bed empty. She tried to see for any sign of life and immediately caught sight of the door leading to the cliff open.
After debating between floating using air bending or merely tip-toing, Tari decided to shuffle her feet to the door. Closing it softly after her, she already saw a figure sitting at the cliffside on the bench.
“I’m surprised to see you up.” Tari’s voice was small and groggy, as if a mouse had just woken up from a thousand-year slumber. It was so quiet Johnny could hardly recognize it. He looked up to give her a soft smile, scooting over on the bench to let her sit next to him.
The invitation felt strange. They haven’t exchanged a conversation that consisted of more than six words since he and Kilari stormed out. But Tari accepted it. It gave her hope – maybe, just maybe, they’ll be okay again.
He shrugged, his voice distant as his eyes focused on the line where the night sky meets the sea. “Couldn’t sleep. Why are you up?”
“Nightmare.” Johnny knew Tari was prone to nightmares, often dismissing them and helping her cope with them by saying she has him and she doesn’t have to interact with the subject of her nightmare in reality. Unfortunately, Johnny had a feeling he couldn’t say that right now. “You should sleep.” Tari commented, avoiding eye contact as she sat with her legs crossed on the bench. The last month has been definitely affecting their relationship. “I’m pretty sure you’re the one always preaching health.”
Johnny chuckled sadly, shaking his head playfully. Eventually, he looked up and stared into her eyes. She missed his brown eyes; the sparkle in them, the way they furrowed when he was concentrated on his next article, or the way they lit up when he saw his next potential photograph “Tari,” Johnny’s voice cracked. “I’m sorry.”
“For what?” She asked, her eyebrows furrowing. If anything, she felt the need to apologize. But she never knew when the best time would be.
The non-bender bit his lip. “For treating you like I have. You never deserved that.”
“No, Johnny, I’m sorry for never telling you the truth.”
“But Tari, you didn’t need to. Being the Avatar doesn’t change who you are.”
Tari sighs, “But it does.” She emphasized, almost yelling at him as she’s frustrated with how kind he is being. He deserves to hate her. “I’ve disappointed you.”
Johnny sucked in his cheeks as he turned away, his hands lazily interlaced together as his elbows rested on his knees. When Johnny looked up again, Tari made sure to memorize his eyes at this moment; full of kindness, warmth, love, and care. Not full of the rage or disappointment Tari has grown accustomed to over the last few days.
“Tari, you could never disappoint me.” He sighed. “I was mad at first because yeah, I thought you were lying to us. But it was something you got to choose to share or not. Once the anger subsided, I was mostly disappointed you couldn’t trust me.”
Tari’s heart broke. She scanned his face for any sign of malice, before eventually deciding on scooting closer to him and resting her head on his shoulder. Almost instinctively, he wrapped his arm around her back – rubbing up and down to do whatever he can to soothe her. “You, Doyoung, and Sonan are the three people I trust most in this world.” She emphasized. “Kilari is a little bit too tempered and impulsive for me to trust her with it, but I trust her almost the same amount.” Tari chuckled. “But especially you, Johnny.”
“Tari…” Johnny trailed off, finding himself lost in Tari’s eyes. “If things don’t go well tomorrow, I don’t think I can live with myself if I don’t tell you this.” The last few days of seeing Yuta constantly crave her physical affection while Johnny struggled to even catch her gaze for longer than 30 seconds made Johnny face the facts. And he’d hit himself to the Spirit World and back if he didn’t act on his feelings. His gaze soon found itself on his fingers as they fidgeted with each other. He decided to tear them apart and move one hand to Tari’s hand that was resting on her knee.
Panic filled her as Johnny’s sudden seriousness. Was he okay? Or was he terminally ill? Is he going to leave me? Not only that, but does he think he won’t survive tomorrow? If he thinks that, maybe I should go alo-
Before she knew it, his soft and plump lips landed on hers. They felt like home. The kiss was delicate, like the flutter of butterfly wings on her lips. It all felt so calming and normal, as if they’ve done it millions of times before. She wrapped her arms loosely around his neck, bringing him closer. Johnny pulled away, smiling – incredibly proud of himself that Tari was as red as a tomato. Ultimately, he wasn’t quite aware of his own similar complexion.
“You were my best friend for the first year I knew you.” He smiled, again capturing his lips with his teeth. “But in the second year, I think I fell for you harder than I knew.” Tari turned away from him, trying to avoid his gaze. Her mind wandered to Yuta – a boy who kissed her quite literally the day prior.
Stop thinking about boys, Tari chastised herself, you have a bigger mission to accomplish. “Johnny, I don’t think I’m in the right mental state to answer you right now.” Johnny nodded understandably. “I –“ She was about to explain herself before johnny interjected.
“There’s a lot going on Tari. You never need to explain yourself to me.” He smiled softly. “I know you, Avatar or not. I’ll always be here. If you love me or not.” Tari’s heart exploded that she barely had control over herself as she found herself placing a short peck on his lips one more time. “You know, you have very beautiful eyes.” He mumbled under his breath, but Tari acted like she couldn’t hear it – too shy to respond.
Once she felt the awkwardness bubble within her and the dire urge to run away and avoid talking about the kiss, she jumped up to her feet and brushed her pants of the non-existent dirt that gathered. “I’m going to try and sleep again. I’m still so sorry about what happened. I really adore you, Johnny.” He sent a small smile and wave to her as his focus went back to the stone courtyard. “And Johnny?” Tari called, as she started to close the door. “Try to sleep too, please. We have a big day tomorrow.”
Tari rushed back into the bungalow while Johnny sat on the bench, smiling at the moon like a fool.
request anything for future parts / penny for your thoughts here
6 notes · View notes