#and i tried to make this the least like. tragedy posting thing i could cause we have enough of that

[postseasons]

dragon in the new warm mountain didn’t you believe in me? 🫂🫀

(happy (not?) retirement queen 🫡)

#ahemmm no comment #actually many comments in the tags #disclaimer i made this over a week ago pre np retirement so this is not about that #and i tried to make this the least like. tragedy posting thing i could cause we have enough of that #hence no injury clips #and i was hesitant to share this cause!! i don’t want to be stupid and dramatic about np #again we have enough of that #anyways nolpat is alive and thriving and getting her money!!! happy retirement gorgeous!! #nolan patrick #travis konecny #tknp #faron.vid #4:29 pm edit: or not??

[pttucker]

Among all those comments, a particular one caught her attention. – Dear author-nim. It was a great read. May I ask about your release schedule? Such an unparalleled naivete that made him use his real name as the username. Han Sooyoung stared at that name for a long, long time. She looked closer, and discovered another comment attached to it. – Are you… going to release another chapter tomorrow? She repeatedly clenched and unfurled her fists many times. Sweat was soaking her small hands. Is it really okay for me to write this? Even then, isn't it fine this way? Han Sooyoung hesitated for a long time, before typing her reply. While thinking about a certain someone, still alive beyond this screen. While thinking about a certain boy who'd breathe, eat, shout some nonsense about 'I'm Yoo Joonghyuk', and do whatever it takes to endure his own apocalypse. And so, the story of a regressor that reached 3149 chapters started in this manner. – Yes. A new chapter will be published tomorrow.

I WAS RIGHT!!!!!!!!

Well, I was right after I spent like half the novel convinced the author was actually Dokja. At least I wasn't alone in thinking that, considering Sooyoung thought so too. 😂

Though I do love that it's not at all how I thought it was. I figured she was the author and just forgot because she lost half her memories to her avatar and just assumed that Dokja wrote it because that was the most logical option that her Predictive Plagiarism could come up with.

Was not expecting all this wibbly wobbly, timey wimey stuff, though I guess I should have by the time I reached the end of the novel and all sorts of things in the beginning were being affected by the ending. Time travel. Dimension travel. Just full of paradoxes.

I loooooove though that the novel is "trash" because she has to speed write it as fast as possible based on vague memories while using Predictive Plagiarism (...plagiarizing herself...) because she only has a limited time with her own body and also because she needs to keep Dokja engaged, needs to pump out chapters as fast as humanly possible to give him his reason to live until the next day.

And I love that the reason it only has one view is because she doesn't bother to read it, not even to typo check. She already knows it has a reader. A paradox it may be, I love that the novel truly was written for Dokja and not just after the first hundred or so chapters when all the other readers fell off. Nope, it was written for him and him alone from the very beginning. Sooyoung already knows that she doesn't have to make it good, she just has to make it, and that in turn will save him, even if it dooms millions of others.

Oh man, Sooyoung seeing him in the hospital after he tried to jump out of a window and wondering where the heck tls123 is, why haven't they started posting yet, they need to hurry up and save this unbelievably precious idiot. 😭💖

Sooyoung of all people having to wrestle with the knowledge that if she saves one person, she will kill billions (perhaps trillions) of other people across multiple worldlines.

Well, actually, perhaps it's fitting that it is Sooyoung of all people because I don't know how many others in Dokja's party who would doom this entire universe of parallel worlds to save a single person, even if that single person is Dokja himself.

Like, it parallels pretty well with what's going on with Sooyoung's other half...she's the weird one in the group who wants to go save the Dokja they left on the train while even Dokja's incarnation is worried that they're going to cause a lot of harm in the process and open up another worldline of tragedy, which they all know Dokja would not want.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that Han Sooyoung is perhaps one of the few people selfish enough to save Kim Dokja at the cost of the entire universe and it's so interesting to think back on the fact that she literally tried to get Joonghyuk to kill him way back in the earliest chapters and now she's using Joonghyuk to save him.

(Oh man...when Joonghyuk finds out who his creator is...)

#granted it's almost difficult to think of hsy as yjh's creator because of all the weird circular time travel stuff #like...yjh lived as a real person because dokja read about him...dokja read about him because hsy wrote it... #hsy wrote it based on things dokja told her and things the living breathing yjh said and did or MIGHT have based on his real personality #...the personality that she gave him...which dokja read and brought to life...which made hsy write it later...around and around we go #like she's his creator but also it's almost like yjh created himself along with the help of dokja??? #lol orv you hurt my brain sometimes but I love you #(also hankim shippers rise up! get you a woman who will destroy the universe for you!) #orv spoilers #orv epilogue spoilers #orv #orv novel chapter 532 #omniscient reader's viewpoint #orv liveblog #hsy #kdj

[whatsyourcolor]

Here’s the thing I don’t think Akane got replaced as the good boss Kougami could work for.The timing was right when Kougami got scouted by Frederica(which I don’t think Frederica did alone because she’s also a special investigator.Same rank as Kougami..She probably was interested since Saiga’s lessons sure but she needed approval from way higher ups in foreign ministry).Nobody in MWPSB had the power to bring back someone in sibyl’s kill list.Moreover they only need obedient enforcers.Not someone like Kougami.MoFA needed his unique skill set and gave him a good deal(I suspect he wanted to come back too).He took it.That’s pretty much all there is to it.Also Frederica is very loyal to Shogo Yabuki(I assume she got promoted to occupy this post after ppp?)MoFA means a lot to her(like unit 1 of MWPSB does to Akane).She is also very competent.Kougami,Gino and Sugo seem to have good workplace dynamic with her.(also I can tell they like her as both a boss and a person from their interactions in the pp3)Here’s the thing I think Gino saying “Our chief is so cool.Just like a female kougami”is more like Gino fanboying over her because he thinks she’s very cool?That doesn’t mean their romantic compatibility.More like they are both cool people(they are obviously) and have similar interests..They also have mutual respect going by ppp and pp3.(I do think Frederica understands Kougami’s predicament at least to a degree).Now I am not saying they can’t be a good ship,they definitely can but so far there’s nothing to suggest it’s romantic?As far as canon goes she’s competent(like Akane and Mika),loyal to MoFA and a good boss.And we should leave it at that.(Personal opinion she’s just so beautiful she doesn’t even look human😛It’s so hard to get past her beauty because why does she have to be so pretty for? She’s already competent🥲)

Yeah, I hope you didn't think I was bashing on Frederica. I'm just not that curious about her. She's good at her job and she's not a jerk. She's competent and beautiful, but that doesn't pull me emotionally to her or makes her as good a character as the holy trio.

Kogami is cool and hot and handsome, but he has an irreparable flaw that he sees and is unable to fix himself. Ginoza has remorse, regret, nostalgia for his father and he's lonely. Akane fights with the system and has paid with blood for opposing it when she could just sell out. All these people have things moving them from inside in all directions. There's doubt, introspection, internal struggle, bad decisions, trust put in the wrong people, pain. They tried their best with what they had and they fail. Kogami failed to feel like he avenged Sasayama and is hounded by the ghost of the man he killed. Akane failed to protect Kogami. Gino failed to tell those he cares about that he loves them until is too late.

Heck, even Mika is more interesting to me. Imagine knowing your friends got killed by a psycho and the killer got away. You'd be pissed at hell too at the incompetence of the police and you'd think you will change things from inside only to end up messing up and causing a terrible tragedy. You become the thing you hate. It's beautiful.

As for the Hanagami ship...(yeah, I just named it like that lol)... I don't know. I don't really see it. Maybe a fic would get me into it? I don't know.

#psycho-pass #akane tsunemori #psycho pass #kogami shinya #sinners of the system #shinkane #psycho-pass 3 #psycho pass providence #tsunemori akane #first inspector

[peninkwrites]

I didn't want to have my own lil party in the notes of this incredibly based post so I'm gonna make my own to waffle on.

Because, yes, @lacystar is sadly so correct, Wilbur would not volunteer for Tommy in the Hunger Games. My thought being, who WOULD volunteer?? and not just because they'd be all but guaranteed to win ala Technoblade.

Who would volunteer as a sacrifice?

Many thoughts many thoughts. Like, the tragedy of Tommy volunteering on behalf of his older brother perhaps? Tommy was always protecting Wilbur, right?

Like, Tubbo is the sort to do some self sacrifice, but could he, that spur of the moment, think of it? He's our chess player, he strategizes, like when he exiled Tommy, that was a product of prolonged, careful thought (like relatively spur of the moment, but at that meeting he started thinking the moment Tommy started talking and making threats). So the question is not if he would be willing, I think, but if he would have the time to get that far in his thinking.

And this is largely my own cabinetduo biases coming into play, but would Quackity volunteer for Tubbo?? Red festival, he tried to defend him, but he very much didn't get in the way (not that I blame him! but he didn't)(alternatively... would Tubbo volunteer for Quackity? Clingyduo Will Cling, but would Tubbo make the same sacrifice for someone who protected him but also didn't?)

This is also complicated by timelines and such, are these their dsmp selves? where in the timeline? or did just vaguely equivalent events happen which make the dynamics at least translate? idk! Because I do think Manberg Tubbo, President Tubbo, and Snowchester Tubbo would all act differently, both on volunteering in general, (like even if all 3 would volunteer for Tommy, the reasons might vary. although... far enough along, maybe Tubbo wouldn't volunteer because he had Michael to look out for...) and how different times would I think cause variation in who he might volunteer for. I think Snowchester Tubbo would be more likely to volunteer for Quackity than Manberg Tubbo, which may seem ironic/counterintuitive considering going from foxhole buddies to arguably adversaries but it's both Snowchester Tubbo feeling More capable, and maybe viewing Big Q as a little Less capable by the time they get to the cookie outpost.

Tubbo is so so complicated, like would he volunteer for Ranboo during the especially married years?? I'm genuinely not sure. I think Ranboo would Want to volunteer for Tubbo but might fail to out of sheer social anxiety and panic.

Niki and Jack couldn't volunteer for each other, but I'd imagine if one of them got chosen, the other might volunteer for the other guy/girl to make sure they go in together, to keep the other safe. There's something horrible about thinking about Niki (Early Niki, L'Manberg Niki, even in early Manberg.) volunteering to go into the arena with Wilbur, especially because Wilbur would be shocked and horrified by her presence rather than grateful.)

OH would JACK volunteer for Tubbo??? Like, Jack was very ride or die for Tubbo toward the end. But would that mean Jack views Tubbo as less capable? As more valuable? Or does that complicate things too much, when really, Jack would just think he doesn't want his friend to be hurt any more?

Idk much to consider much to consider.

#hope you don't mind the tag lacy i didn't wanna clown in ur notes/distract from the crimeboys <3 #there are so many more dynamics i could have talked about #but some of them feel obvious (i.e. bad for skeppy) #and others feel like. hm. idk awesamponk is a puzzle. #but that's not the question at play here is it? #some of them feel like they should already be mentors and such. (phil puffy maybe bad maybe sam) #it's WOULD they volunteer. #idk. #dsmp #spilled penink

[no-where-new-hero]

Time for another Lantern Hill Book club catchup post! I wish I didn't have time to read and gather my thoughts only once a week at this point, but oh well ;(

CH. 9: (I'm pretty sure this is where I left off?)

LMM gets so much mileage out of personifying 60 Gay Street in this chapter, fully appraising us of its unfriendliness and hostility. Absolutely the most vicious house of her canon, I think--a pure extension of Grandmother's personality.

Jane felt that it might help the ache a little if she could only have a talk with mother, but when she tried mother's door it was locked. Jane felt that mother didn't want to talk to her about this and that hurt worse than anything else.

I've already bitched about this paragraph, but I'm going to bitch again. Robin's inability to put herself in her daughter's shoes for 10 seconds and at least TRY not to make this sudden summons seem so scary or overwhelming is so frustrating. If Jane has told her mother how much she likes their frivolous little chats and things and it causes Robin enough pain for Jane to stop confessing this kind of thing to her, Robin SHOULD have the awareness to realize what Jane needs most is an emotional connection with her. Earlier on, Jane is prevented from talking to Robin by Grandmother, but this paragraph kind of explicitly lays out how it isn't just Grandmother's heavy-handedness preventing Robin from being a good mother but Robin's own short-sightedness. Even comforting lies would have been better for Jane at this point.

CH. 10:

Love how LMM has so many jokes about PEI being too small to live on so that people must live in perpetual danger of falling into the sea.

CH. 11:

I don't think we'll actually lose Jody to the orphanage before the end of the book but goodness LMM knows how to pile on the tragedies.

...they drove along over the elfish underground city that comes into view under the black street on a rainy night.

A rare case of LMM being an urban writer. Of course she makes it as magical as she makes her natural landscapes.

She thought Jane quite the dumbest child she had ever encountered.

This constant harping on Jane's purported idiocy feels like such an implicit Maud judgment to me. Like. I feel like the average adult wouldn't be so immediately blunt about an 11-year-old's intellect or lack thereof? Unless it's just different mores since I feel like nowadays an adult would take silence as shyness. But Maud's own ferocious intelligence gives me the impression that she would be very capable of cataloguing people as dumb. (Okay I also just realized that during this time, "dumb" might have been used for people without speech but both Phyllis and Grandmother freely mock Jane for not being very bright which still reinforces my point a bit).

CH. 12:

Getting a lot of echoes of other LMM books in here:

She drew herself away and took in the lady with one of her straight, deliberate glances. (such an Emily Starr gesture) …but that dreadful old car of his broke down half-way." (Andrew appears to have bought his car from the same place as Barney Snaith) Perhaps the "Janie" was the last straw. Jane was not going to be "Janied." (Aunt Irene is giving a weird combination of Aunt Laura and Aunt Ruth.)

Aunt Irene is intensely creepy in a way I can't quite put a finger on. Well, I can--she's as possessive and judgmental as Grandmother, just more sugary. But their appraising and judging qualities are the same. Also the obsession with love meaning jealousy is really coming through as a motif here: Grandmother's jealous posessiveness of Robin, Robin thinking Andrew was jealous of Jane, Irene thinking Robin was jealous of her and Andrew's closeness, Irene's unnecessary attachment to Andrew. She seems to be twisting everyone's emotions around and then blaming them for things that don't seem to be there.

And I was always so fond of your mother…but…well, I don't quite think she ever really liked me.

This is the first sign of sense in Robin that I've seen so far.

CH. 13:

...in which Jane continues to have traumatic mealtimes with gaslighting adults.

More parallels to other LMM media! First we have Andrew "Kenneth Howard" Stuart to rival Barney "John Foster" Snaith, because beloved writers being your very close kin abound in the LMMverse as much as forgotten heirs to wealthy corporations being your neighbors abound in kdramas, apparently. Second, we have familial phrenology to catalogue the features inherited a la Emily Starr, as well as a lot of bald-faced commentary on appearances, and the Douglas Starr energy in Andrew is intensifying. I have to say Jane's acceptance and love of him feels a bit sudden--and I'm not entirely sure how much I approve of this bit:

Would he be disappointed because she was not pretty? Would he think her mouth too big?

immediately after her resolution not to be "bright and fresh for anybody." Will need to keep mulling over this.

CH. 14:

Aunt Irene made a fuss over dad. She purred over him...actually purred. And dad liked her purring and her honey-sweet phrases just as well as he had liked her cake. Jane saw that clearly.

For all that LMM adores and elevates cats, she manages to infuse untold amounts of disgust into describing people as purring in a way I find fascinating. I will never move on from how she describes Teddy "purring and scintillating" for Ilse, and here she's using it to illustrate Irene's corrosive sucking-up to Andrew. Jane again knows her onions about human psychology.

"She's got a secretive strain in her, Andrew, that I confess I don't like." "Knows how to keep her own counsel, eh?" said dad. "It's more than that, Andrew. She's deep...take my word for it, she's deep. Old Lady Kennedy will never be dead while she is alive.

More Aunt Ruth and Aunt Elizabeth type lines: "sly and deep" and "your grandfather Archibald won't be dead as long as you're live" make a comeback here.

And the rest of the chapter feels so much like Barney and Valancy heading to Mistawis: the way Andrew talks about his life (their tones are very similar), Jane's feeling of peace and freedom at Brookview. A small spotted dog in place of Good Luck and Banjo.

I also now have a strong craving to try wild-strawberry jam.

CH. 15:

This happens to be one of the days when I like myself reasonably well.

What a mood? This line suddenly made me like Andrew way more.

Once I took you down and dipped you in it, to the horror of…of several people. You were properly baptized before that in the Anglican church in Charlottetown…but that was your real baptism. You are the sea's child and you have come home."

Okay, I REALLY like Andrew in this chapter. I think in a paragraph like this I can kind of catch the glimpse of why he seems similar to Dean Priest. This is such a Dean thing to do and a Dean thing to talk about. Ditto with finding a magic house. Andrew lacks the cynicism of the Barney/Dean type, but he has their whimsy--possibly closer to Dean with it than Barney.

It's also very peculiar because Barney/Valancy, Emily/Dean, and Jane/Andrew all feel like they work around similar conversations and emotional connections despite being different relationships. One is romantic, one is romantic/platonic but also slightly familial, one is entirely familial, and yet they all cling to similar themes. Emily and Jane talk about who they resemble to Dean and Andrew. Setting up a domestic space becomes a plot point. Valancy and Jane are entirely happy with their author beloveds, yet feel a little insecure about how much that happiness and love is reciprocated. They travel by car to escape the peering judgments of society.

I will do my best to keep up with the book club from here, since things have gotten very interesting very quickly.

#jane of lantern hill #lantern hill book club #lm montgomery #lmm lockdown

[ninjagirlstar5]

Dude did you know/read -2+2 before i started interacting with your posts here or did you heard of it from seing me ramble about it? Also PLEASE get your work done first! This chapter is enormous and i wouldn't want it to ruin someone's schedule.

Also I'd love to hear your thoughts on it, not necessarily just the trial it could be of the story in general, if you feel like rambling that is ^^'

Don't worry, I spent my entire morning finishing my textbook chapter and completing a video question that I could finish in like, five minutes tops. I even shut off Discord to focus. It took four hours of my day to complete cause that's college for ya, haha. :']

Yeah, I read -2+2 before we ever interacted on Tumblr! Ngl, I didn't realize the author was you until I scrolled through your Kizuna tag on your blog and went, "hey, wait a minute, I read this fic-!" As for my thoughts on it so far, I loooove it! I love how Kizuna is forced to face the consequences of her actions while Ayame is grappling with the fact that she was this close to choosing to kill someone to save another and that her motivations weren't as pure and good that everyone makes it out to be for saving Kizuna. I love seeing how different the group dynamics have become thanks to how everyone is split up: the majority of the students sticking together, Yuki being forced out of that group due to his secret note but ultimately forming a little trio with Akane and Ayame (and I think Kizuna and Kanata, too, but they're more focused on each other atm when it comes to her recovery), and the lone wolves of Rei, Tsurugi, and Kinji. It really shows how fractured the group has become and that everyone's opinions are pretty complex and different from each other's, even when they stick to one side. I have yet to read the trial as of writing this, but Kanata's death hurts to witness, especially with how...simple it was. I believe she didn't even struggle, she was just sleeping and now, she can never wake up because someone (Kinji) took advantage of that vulnerability and killed her. I'm thinking that Kakeru, at some point, seemed to have walked in and saw what happened, whether it's his attack on Kizuna or Kanata, and tried to attack Kinji or stop him or something but I'm not sure. But her death definitely hits harder due to how simple it is and we can focus on the tragedy that Kizuna will never be able to fulfill the promises she gave to Kanata, her first friend. And how her grief quickly transforms into anger...ooooough, that's so good and in character for her, especially with how hard she's trying to improve herself now. Also, can I just say, I love how socially smart Kizuna is with her words and how she was able to bypass the third motive just by being clever with how she says things. There are many different ways for being intelligence, so seeing that play out with a character that is trying to redeem themselves is great. Ayame is also just...doing her best while grappling with herself and the thought of almost actually murdering someone, but is trying to be supportive of the others. At least being able to confide in Akane allows her to keep going, and she gets to befriend Yuki! It's so sweet...until you remember the twists with these two, haha, gotta love that dramatic irony. Oh, if (or when) we actually get there, that angst is going to huuurt. </3

Anyways, I do love rambling. And I love this fic! (Totally off-topic, but I hope my boy Teruya is gonna be okay from the whole near death experience of guns and stuff. He's gonna be okay, right? Right? I hope he's okay. I don't want anything bad to happen to him even though I know that's gonna be impossible in a killing game genre although I know his survival is pretty much guaranteed since you mentioned that you don't plan to change the death order. Doesn't mean I don't worry for his mental health though.)

#Asks #Star Talks #DRA #Danganronpa Another #DRA -2+2 #DRA -2+2 spoilers #tbh I had no idea how to tag this #edit: fixed the fic tags #funny thing is I kept double checking to make sure it was right #and I still got it wrong oops

[orionsangel86]

So, if you don't mind, I was thinking about that asshole who was rude on your Thessaly post by insisting that Morpheus is meant to be a bad person. I'm curious if you could expand on why you think he's not. I keep going back and forth on my own rereads, especially since the Thessaly relationship and The Kindly Ones writing seem to try and push in a "he IS a bad person" direction. I can't tell if my arguments that "he's just flawed and mentally ill" are fangirl goggles or legit interpretation.

Hey! I don't mind. So when I first got that comment, initially I thought the response was genuine, because it's been a while since anyone has responded to one of my posts in a bad faith way. I frantically tried to wrap my brain around the idea that I had missed something somewhere and that I was supposed to view Morpheus as a "bad person" because even after The Kindly Ones that has never been my interpretation. I then realised the response was just a bad faith troll from an asshole and felt relief that I wasn't wrong.

But I suppose it's all up to interpretation.

The issue is really with what you consider makes a person inherently good or inherently bad. It reminds me of that line in Good Omens:

“It may help to understand human affairs to be clear that most of the great triumphs and tragedies of history are caused, not by people being fundamentally good or fundamentally bad, but by people being fundamentally people.”

Because I genuinely think this line has inspired a LOT of Neil Gaiman's characters, whether human or not.

I also get a bit wary nowadays when certain sections of fandoms start labelling characters, especially protagonists as "bad" because that causes a slipperly slope into accusations of "if you like this character YOU PERSONALLY are a BAD PERSON" (Example: OFMD fandom and the forever bizarre reaction to the character of Izzy Hands).

Dream is not bad. He is not good either. He is entirely neutral. He may occassionally do things that may be considered bad, depending on your perspective, but he also does a lot of good things as well. How do we weigh him on a scale of judgement? Are we to act as his judge and jury for every decision he makes in the comics? I suppose we could do, if we wished to, such is the fun of analysis, but I think the end result would again depend on the perspective and morals of the individual reader.

But I will at least give my own interpretation. I'm putting on my Anubis hat and weighing Dream's heart against my trusty feather. Let's see how he does. Under a cut as its long.

I personally think that for a character to be labelled as "bad" their actions and motivations must cause harm, whether to individuals or larger groups, without them showing any care or concern for those they hurt, in their pursuit to achieve their goals.

For example, Lucifer in The Sandman is still a "bad" character even though there is a LOT of "Sympathy for the Devil" type of perspective in The Sandman. Ultimately Lucifer is still selfishly motivated. He doesn't care about the souls or creatures that reside in Hell, and he certainly doesn't care about humanity. When he kicks everyone out of Hell in Season of Mists it causes havoc on Earth, and leads to the death of at least one child that we know of. It is implied that he does far more damage than is explicitly shown.

Thessaly, as previously mentioned, is definitely a bad character. She is entirely motivated by her own selfishness. She doesn't give a shit who she hurts, or the damage she causes in her persuit for revenge in Game of You. She is cruel and malicious and yes, also a TERF. She does not show any empathy or consideration for any character at any point, and honestly, even her little speech in The Wake comes across as crocodile tears.

Desire is a more complex character but still falls on the "bad" side of the scale because Desire also shows very little regard for others when playing their games or implementing their schemes. Desire is going to do whatever they want regardless of who might get hurt because like Thessaly, Desire doesn't give a fuck about your feelings. Desire is cruel. This is stated textually. Desire's motivations are also usually selfish. The only time I found Desire remotely redeemable was in Overture. Desire saved the universe. Though it is made clear that the only reason they saved the universe was because they wanted to keep living in it. It's worth noting that even though Desire is very much "bad" I absolutely adore them and consider them one of my favourite Sandman characters.

Now to Dream. Unlike the above mentioned characters, Dream's motivations are rarely selfish. Even in The Kindly Ones, I believe even if you interpret the whole thing as Dream's own elaborate suicide plan (which is only one limited interpretation) I don't believe he ever meant for as many people to get hurt as they did, it's just that he found himself in an impossible situation where things escalated to a point of no return. Also, since most casualties were Dream's creations, arguably he probably assumed that either he, or his successor, would simply recreate them once the situation was back under control.

Dream is a lawful neutral character. He has his rules and he must abide by them because "I contain the entire collective unconscious, without my rules it would consume me. Humanity would be consumed." (I know this is Netflix!Dream talking but I'm still gonna use it cos its such a good line).

The big difference between Dream and the above characters, is simple. Dream cares. He cares about everyone. He cares about literally everyone - the entire collective unconscious of the universe and he is so bursting to the brim with care and love for them that he is buckling under the weight of all that care. It is what is destroying him and it is WHY he is so depressed and so susceptable to making bad decisions on a small scale.

Every motivation of Dream's is for the greater good. When he sees what John Dee did with his ruby, he is almost crippled by the guilt of it. He blames himself for giving the ruby so much power that it could corrupt a mortal that much. He is easily swayed by Constantine to give Rachel a peaceful death, even though at first he doesn't think about it, it's not like he laughs it off and walks away - like any of the above mentioned characters would do. He listens to Constantine and agrees to show that compassion.

When he realises he once again has to kill a Vortex - something that is part of his duty as Dream of the Endless, something that is very much carved in stone as one of his rules, he still hesitates, even though he knew what happened last time and all the pain he suffered because of it. A fundamentally bad character who does not care would not have hesitated in killing Rose Walker.

In Brief Lives, whilst his initial motivations were selfish, he realised that his trip with Delirium to find Destruction was causing harm to others. When he realised that people were dying because of their quest, he put an end to it. He hurt Delirium in doing so, unintentionally, but his reasons for stopping weren't because he was bored, or because he had given up on finding Thessaly, it was because people were getting hurt and he didn't want to be responsible for that anymore.

When you look at Dream's actions on a wider scale, he is a good character. It is only on a more personal level that his flaws start to show through.

Where Dream's behaviour gets bad, it is usually because he has been hurt, and when he is hurt, he acts like a petty child throwing a tantrum. It is when his cruel side comes out, and its when he is most like Desire.

Nada is the most obvious casualty of this side of Dream. She rejected him, he threw a tantrum, and condemned her to Hell for hurting him.

Calliope tells Dream that she believed the "old you would have left me here to rot." We don't know how true this is, even in the comics, but the idea that there once was a version of Dream who might have discovered his ex wife was being frequently raped and abused whilst imprisoned and bound to evil mortal men and refused to help her simply because she left him is horrifying, but as I said, we don't know if it is or ever was true.

Ultimately, on the small scale, all it takes is for someone to tell Dream that he is in the wrong for him to relent and accept his misgivings. Constantine called him out on Rachel, so he did what he was asked to do. Calliope didn't even HAVE to ask for him to free her in the comics, he just showed up and saved her without question. When Death told him what he did to Nada was "shitty", he immediately put plans in place to make it right, even though doing so was risky and put him and the Dreaming in danger.

Even the situation with Orpheus, whilst seemingly harsh on Dream's side, his son told him to his face "you are no longer my father" and so Dream, hurt and with wounded pride, walked away from his son and refused to look back - but he still arranged for the priests to take care of him.

His choice of Thessaly as a lover is messed up, but he was messed up at the time. My view as mentioned in my previous post is that she was a rebound. They make it clear in the comic that he never approved of her murderous ways (and I have no doubt that he would also dissaprove of her transphobia, even if not mentioned explicitly).

In The Kindly Ones I don't view the situation as Dream being a bad person. I view it as everyone else being bad. Dream is caught in a huge cloud of depression and shitty circumstance and he is unable to free himself from that situation, and even when others can sense his desperation and pain, no one actually helps him. Dream's biggest flaw in The Kindly Ones, in my opinion, is not asking for help.

Because he is prideful, because even after all he has been through, he could not shake off that pride. It went full circle, he was back in his glass cage refusing to ask for help. Only this time, the glass cage was his realm, his subjects, his role as Dream of the Endless, and he could not change himself enough to free himself without making the drastic worst case decision.

My hatred of The Kindly Ones as a story, is not because I think it does a disservice to Dream, but because it does a disservice to every other character involved. By the end of that particular story, I hated every character who WASN'T Dream. Because I desperately wanted one of them, ANY of them, to actually help him. To see past his stubborn pride and hold him in their arms and shake him until he saw sense. Because the message in that story seemed to me to be that people are inherently selfish and so wrapped up in their own lives that they won't help you when you need it most. That there isn't even a point in asking for help. So what's the point?

But then I am fully aware that my feelings are complicated and partly projecting onto the characters and the story and well, that's all not really relevant to the point of this post except to ask you all to take my opinion with a grain of salt.

So back to your original question. I don't think Dream is a bad person. He is flawed, he is a character who when pushed to the limit will do drastic stupid things, but then wouldn't we all if pushed to our absolute limit? He is extremely depressed and buckling under the weight of the collective unconscious. All that unchecked emotion carried within him, and it is literally killing him.

So when weighing his heart against the feather of judgement, I think I can forgive him some bad behaviour towards some ex lovers in the grand scheme of all he has done. As flawed characters go, he's hardly the worst, and the feather is still heavier than his heart.

#The Sandman #Dream of the endless #sandman meta #sandman comic spoilers #morpheus #The Kindly Ones #sandman analysis #asks

[horizon-verizon]

Do you think Rhaenyra should have ruled after she had fled from the capital? I mean, it is one thing to root for her when she didn't make that mistakes but after she showed herself a tyrant, I doubt any allies could have kept her on the throne. Everyone would have preferred Aegon III anyway. She dug her own grave, in short. No matter how we look at the reasons.

Probably a reaction to this POST.

Read this post, as well.

*EDIT*: This post by la-pheacienne really directs you to understand how Rhaenyra's story is also like a Greek ancient tragedy in that she turns worse from a past of being a morally-typical-neutral person. How, like I already pointed out from Othello, she becomes a tyrant and makes the decisions at the end, becoming a protagonist who ends first by others' acts and then her own.

If there were a better option, no, not really after Nettles, even with her grief (I explain why HERE and HERE). But if I absolutely had to pick on the pain of death since our only other option was Aegon II and the greens, most definitely.

You: "Everyone would have preferred Aegon III anyway."

This is not a democracy or a republic, anon, where the common folk or the nobles get to freely decide who gets to be their ruler or leader without going to war or using violence. This is a feudal monarchy. The Great councils that occur in this state only occur because the monarch allowed them to. There is a pattern of succession and specific transfers of power specific to the society here.

Rhaenyra was heir, and the war was fought on her behalf (not Aegon III or his siblings), so if she had won, she gets to rule in her own right as Viserys wanted.

You: "I mean, it is one thing to root for her when she didn't make that mistakes but after she showed herself a tyrant, I doubt any allies could have kept her on the throne."

Even after her death, her followers fought for her. Why? They took oaths to AND Aegon the Elder, of his own volition, was set against them anyway. The green allies were also outnumbered, with a weak and vengeful, stupid king. Finally, Jeyne Arryn was willing to house her, even if Rhaenyra left instead for Dragonstone for a new dragon (Before you go, "see! she even betrayed Syrax or something against her decision to go the DS, scroll down this post/quote for Sunfyre and Aegon's want of a "fiercer" dragon). So, yes, her allies would have been enough.

You: "She dug her own grave, in short. No matter how we look at the reasons."

Again, before Rhaenyra was born there were circumstances set against her. Jaehaerys made sure women had less power and were less considered for the throne through his refusal to name Daenerys, how he handled Rhaena, his treatment of his daughters (esp Saera), and the existence of the GC of 101 A.C. itself. Viserys never politically trained her. Since she was 10, her stepmother and her followers tried to diminish her standing in court and used misogynist principles against her for Alicent's own gain. Her first two sons were killed; first in cold blood murder by her own brother and the second fighting against those bought in by her usurpers. And 2 the very people who that son took in betrayed her. She watched as her dragon and last son died as the Dragonpit was attacked. The Dance account in F&B is an account where she's called fat negatively, slut shamed, and talked about as if she was evil or sexually undesirable due to a lack of female chastity even BEFORE she landed on KL.

Rhaenyra definitely made things worse for herself and made "dumb" (but actually pretty ordinary) decisions in her need to hold what power she had gained, but it also was not entirely because she was unstrategic that she lost. It's a combo, with one superseding and causing the other.

GRRM definitely made her too disadvantaged/unstrategic by not at least giving her more from Viserys or some more self-making moments with clear descriptions, but the point is clear: it is not simply or completely her fault overall that she lost--an indication of misogyny not only against her but the decline of Targ women in general, of which she (what happened to her) is the breaking point of the dynasty's height of power. She was really doomed from the moment she lost focus, yet placed in a situation because others have sought and fought to disempower her from the moment it was clear she was to remain heir even after Aegon's birth.

(8/21/23):

THIS is a great post by mononijikayu about medieval queens, female rulers, the history of how women in leadership positions were made and seen as threats to the very structure of social “order”, and contextualizing Rhaenyra thru Empress Matilda. I didn’t even know about Matilda’s husband being comparable to Rhaneyra’s Daemon! PLZ READ!!!!

Excerpt:

just as much, along with these fictitious portrayals, more lies are depicted. these women are considered vixens that cause havoc to men by shifting them into desires and danger. through the written word, we see how women are cast in roles of villains in men’s lives. it is because by their conclusive thoughts, women are the only creatures that are able to turn ‘good honorable men’ into despicable creatures who do shameful, deplorable acts for the sake of women’s pleasures.    [...] itis within this narrative that ancient chroniclers declare that women were in fact the doom of men. if they were not able to control the dangers posed by the wiles of women, then the foundations of the mighty society they had built would be up in flames.  [...] as i mentioned, these factors of community are written down and preserved. and with that, the example of the ancients were the foundations by which medieval society built itself. the same concepts continued to cause the same issue within society and that was the exclusion of women from participating in the bigger picture of community and state, much so with governing states in their own right—without judgment or disapproval. 

#asoiaf asks to me #rhaenyra targaryen #fire and blood characters #westeros succession #rhaenyra's characterization #a song of ice and fire #fire and blood comment #rhaenyra and feminism #asoiaf #fire and blood

[fivekrystalpetals]

I am almost at the end of the Head Hunter Arc and there are a hundred story threads all running parallel so I would def have to re-read once again to fit in the sequence of events. Anyway, I will make a longer post about all my thoughts later,, but now I really really wanna get this off my chest.

warning: rant underneath, please check the tags for the subject of rant, proceed with caution—don’t come @ me if this is your favorite character

Reim died—and I did not feel a single thing. In fact, I am more frustrated he died just like that than his oh-dear-poor-guy plight being shown to me. Am I supposed to feel sorry for him? I just can’t.

He is the worst kind of character—the ones who always want to maintain the status quo, the ones who think they can get away with anything because they are on the side of self-proclaimed ‘Good’, and whatever they do is ‘needed for the greater good’.

This guy single handedly, with one bullet, ruined whatever positive interactions might have occurred between the Baskervilles and the heroes (Break at least? Because Vincent, who is already working with the Baskervilles, is on... idk what side?)

I still maintain the Baskervilles were pulled into some major political conspiracy and they were forced to kill all those people in Sablier in order to ‘save’ them from getting turned into chains.

[The more the author shows me their flashbacks and how happy they were as a family—

look at them, they are the literal essence of found family ;-;—

shedding happy tears rn ;-; Fang, Doug and Lottie were best Dads/Big bro/Mom/Big Sis to Lily. 

—the more I feel like they were never sadistic cold-blooded mass murderers in the first place.]

See, Break and Lottie were making baby steps towards coming to work together for a common cause. On their next meeting, when Break put his sword to Lottie’s throat, she, whether fearing his power and deciding to buy time or what, did make an attempt to understand him rather than trying to jump in for a fight at once.

And then, when the ‘false’ Baskervilles came onto the scene, they were forced to make an unwilling alliance to defeat them albeit for a moment.

I had hoped—one more meeting and then maybe, hopefully, at least, these two would put aside their differences and misunderstandings and start working together to exchange information and unravel all the mystery of the Tragedy; in the process, the heroes start to slowly realize the true nature of the Baskervilles.

But no. Reim just had to ruin everything. He heard Lily’s story, came to the realization that Baskervilles weren’t monsters but ‘laughed just like us’, and decided... ok this child is innocent but she will definitely kill many more people in the future so let me shoot her right through her head now and finish her off.

I had been reading with a smile on my face because their interactions were so cute, the way she tried to console him and relate to him, the way she squealed on seeing the March Hare (March Hare really is cute btw)—and then, bam! I was more shocked when he ‘killed’ her than when Fang announced Reim was dead.

I can’t put this in a better way either so here we go—Reim is an idiot. 

Here is a child that spills out everything unprompted if you simply humor her for a bit. She is a literal goldmine of information about the elusive Baskervilles. All you have to do is pretend-play with her that you are her ‘friend’ and she will tell you all tidbits from her life. All ‘truths’ because she has no reason to lie to a friend. “Family is good of course, but friends are good too.” She trusts her family, she trusts her friends. 

Instead, what Reim does is go for the kill.

Without even understanding the basic nature of Baskervilles. 

He didn’t know or even bother to find out Baskervilles could heal before playing his trump card. 

Is he not Rufus Barma’s apprentice? Did he not learn a thing from the tenacious information broker, who deals with even life-and-death matters using information?

Has he never heard of the saying—half knowledge is a dangerous thing? Does he not know of buying time? Never heard of humoring someone? If she wants to see your chain, show her that, play with her till you manage to pass information to your friends and then when Break or someone strong enough to handle her hellhound arrives on scene, capture her alive, gdi! (I remember that scene from Dark Era when Dazai got frustrated that Akutagawa killed off half a dozen hopeful sources of information. Now, I understand his frustration.) 

In fact, he did not even wait to hear her full story, asked a question or two, came to the conclusion that they are gonna reenact the Tragedy of Sablier—(after listening to a gullible child, btw. She is ofc gonna listen to her elders. If they say yes, then yes; if they say no, then no. How in the world do you make such a major decision after listening to the words of a child? And once again, I am not so sure if the Baskervilles indeed enacted the First Tragedy of Sablier in the first place. He is jumping to conclusions there too.)

—and shoots her through her head. Whether she died or not doesn’t matter here. She survived because of her super healing power. What matters here is that yes, Reim did have full killing intention when he shot her. Had she been a normal human, she’d have died. It was her brains that he intended to blow out. No way she was gonna survive that if she were a human. 

He is the one that betrayed her budding trust. Sorry but I have no sympathy for him. If she used her chain to rip his throat, that’s on him. He shot the first bullet. Whatever she does afterwards counts as self-defense for me.

Well, here comes another idiot, Break, who doesn’t know any of this. Without even finding out what transpired there, he directly jumped in to fight against two self-healing Baskervilles all by himself, spitting blood, lost eyesight, can’t-last-too-long-in-a-battle and all as he is, in order to ‘avenge’ his friend.

Lottie, please come and talk all of this out—is what I wanted to say, because she seems the only one with brain cells among this bunch of idiots. 

see, I can even draw up the parallels between the Break-Lottie 'friendship' and Reim-Lily 'friendship'. 

When Break offered her to be his ‘friend’ (Break being a way more powerful opponent compared to Lottie, she was completely overpowered and at his mercy), she got through alright. Even on their second meeting when Break wanted to ‘shred her to pieces’ for killing Reim (which she probs has no idea of. It’s Lily who found him.), she managed to buy time if only with the appearance of the ‘fake’ Baskervilles and later escape.

Whereas when Lily, a child with a bit stronger chain than Reim’s (or so he says, for idk what his chain does) asked Reim to be her ‘friend’, he goes for the kill. oh no, poor guy doesn’t know how to buy time with a talkative, gullible child who has long given up on wanting to kill him and wanted to simply chat with him *sigh*

Same situation, different brains, different outcomes.

But because of that one stupid brain, all is gone to waste. No way an alliance between Break and the Baskervilles is gonna take place after this. I mean, I don't know if he meant it when he said this--

what are the many things he wanted to tell her please i wanna know i am dying for more interactions between them please

But it is too late now. It has turned into a kill-or-be-killed situation. 

As of the present, it is Break vs Fang and Lily; and istg if something happens to any one of them, I will personally kill Reim. all over, once again. painfully.

I love all the three and I can’t see even one of them die over an idiot who caused his own death because he is an idiot. 

#may-reads-ph #retrace li #reim-lunettes-critical #i don't think i will change my mind about this situation so it will be pointless to justify reim's actions to me #head hunter arc #this arc is giving me 50 shades of frustrations #this arc should be renamed head loser arc #bc everyone seems to have lost their head #running about like headless chickens and jumping to conclusions right and left #vanessa thinks it is leo break thinks it is elliot #evidence: buT hE Was THe OnLY oNE oN tHe SCeNe

[electricbluebutterflies]

new fears

Marc/Layla, possibly post-finale / possibly missing-scene / idk where this actually fits but it’s in that area somewhere and maybe a little canon-divergent / maybe not. PG13-ish (there are Implications) and also on ao3.

Prompt - “I almost lost you” kiss (thank you @apple-grass-and-smiles)

They need to talk.

Objectively, Layla thinks, they need to do a lot of things. They need to put at least two countries between them and what just happened – she refuses to think about the situation in any more detailed terms than that right now, she very temporarily had wings and she may less-temporarily have a goddess in her head and that’s something she’ll logistically handle in like a week and it’s kind of a lot for a woman whose policy on supernatural events has previously veered toward hell-no-and-fuck-you – and they need to have their usual post-adventure panic in a questionable motel room and she needs to get this energy out of her system and then, she thinks, then they need to talk.

To her great surprise, given the chaos of it all, they actually manage to do all of those things. She takes lead more than she usually would, and her mind and body are separate enough that she’s not sure how she manages to talk her way through it all, but… somehow it works, somehow they achieve appropriate distance before processing, and everything else falls into place.

It feels strange to have been so powerful, to still have residual energy in her veins after… that. Shock, she thinks, still too early to know how she even feels about the experience that goes against everything she thought she knew. What happened to her – what happened, such detached words even now and likely for weeks yet – does not line up with the horror stories her husband has told her on the rare times he’s even tried to explain. Does this become another gap between them? She felt divine warmth, like everything she’d ever done had led up to that ascension, not-

It all hits her at once and she doesn’t want this yet, and her mind can’t distract her enough but her body will do. Collision of bodies, desperation made flesh, she hates that she’s capable of this but at the same time there is something about almost dying – about the newfound fear that something bad could happen, the relief the past few years have given her of knowing it couldn’t but that is over now and she will find new fears when it all sinks in but right now she has not, right now-

Layla has done everything she can to stay soft, to not cause pain nor feel any more than she already has, and it is that fear that pulls her closer to her lover, fear that makes her take bitey kisses. What if this ends in tragedy? What if-

“I’m not losing you,” she breathes. “I can’t. I won’t.”

“Layla-“

“I thought you were dead. Maybe something worse.” She keeps taking kisses, keeps trying to push back sadness, keeps trying to refocus her emotions and fails. “I don’t… I don’t know how to do this if you’re not-“

“Layla-“

“I am not getting widowed in my thirties.” That’s still a possibility, she’s pretty sure – papers haven’t been filed, probably never will be, she’s not sure what their relationship even looks like going forward but she’d liked the legal tethering and-

“I didn’t mean to worry you.”

She laughs and it’s one of the darkest things she’s ever felt, and if she were able to focus for five goddamn seconds she’d turn this into the fight it deserves to be. Isn’t that always the problem? Years ago there had been a certain appeal there, how Marc saw her as… maybe not fragile, even in anger she won’t insult him that much, but at least worthy of protection she didn’t always actually need. It’s gotten annoying since, and considering what he almost tried to do to her, considering-

She deserves to be loved, she deserves more than she’s gotten recently, she is well aware of that, but she won’t be blamed for anyone else’s sacrifice. That’s where she draws the line, she decides. That’s where she will make herself very, very clear when she’s ready.

“I don’t know how,” she breathes, and this is the point where her emotions break, where she can limit the crying but not stop it from happening. “I don’t know how to think about it. At least… paperwork I could understand, I know I’d still hear about whatever shit you got into, we know too many of the same people, I know-“

“What did I do that I don’t remember?”

“You think I’m mad at you?” she laughs, and the fucking nerve of him right now, this is why she loves him, these moments she can’t imagine ever having with anyone else. “You are not the problem. Neither is… anything else in your head.” She takes a deep breath, tries to steady herself, fails. “I am not losing you. I love you more than that.”

He gives her a look like that doesn’t clarify a damn thing and fine, but even when things were going directions she didn’t want she was sure of this, maybe she’s the only person alive who’d ever put up with him and he knows, and this is why they’re unbreakable, this is-

“It’s over. Is that what you want?”

Layla answers with an eye-roll, doubt already creeping in. Over. Like hell it is. She knows there’s no way anything will ever be that simple for them. At best, this is temporary calm.

But that’s a problem for later, for days weeks months ahead, not right now. Not here, somewhere safe-enough, neither of them wounded – that’s an option now, that’ll be how she finally develops anxiety, the fact that maybe bad things can happen to him now – and everything is alright, everything will be alright, everything-

“What I want is for you to stay,” she says, shifting her position to get her hand over his heart. “What I want is for you to remember what we are, how much better we are together, and… stay,” she repeats. “All I’m asking. All of you. Stay.”

She doesn’t expect a promise in return, and she doesn’t get one, and it’s fine. The kisses are enough, the continued maneuvering is enough, the affirmations without words that she is still everything are enough. And maybe she’ll get used to this – we-almost-died sex could be hotter if both of them almost die, maybe – and maybe it’ll be fine.

“Stay,” she says as bodies collide. All she’ll ever ask for.

#moonscarab #marc x layla #layla x marc #ebf writes fic

[megapwnus]

I’m on a cross-country road trip atm with my sister @horrorcon and my dog and today I had very long conversations (kind of. me ranting mostly, I think, lol) about chromedome and his relationship with prowl and with rewind and with everyone on the lost light that he trusted (excepting rewind) poised to take advantage of him the moment he was weak (when rewind was nearly killed in the bomb explosion): rodimus, drift, BRAINSTORM*, prowl behind it all... and at the same time only BEING on the LL on paper for RW to help with decoding the matrix map etc but REALLY to look for his conjunx’s ex-conjunx with the expectation that if they did find Dominus that CD would be left in the dust. because those idiots never properly talked about the “after” of finding Dom. 

so actually RW is simultaneously holding CD to such high expectations of bettering himself/overcoming his addiction to injecting (when its the one thing he does that makes him feel useful and that the others See and Know him for and how he can contribute uniquely to their cause/needs... just look how confident and poised he was when talking to Overlord before it all went to shit) while simultaneously selfishly making him be surrounded by the temptation to do so/ people who expect him to inject**. oh my god i’m emo.

and yes I know that despite RW being selfish here, CD could stand up for himself, he could face that conversation about their relationship after finding Dominus head-on without assuming things, but he literally does not have the self-worth to even consider that there could even BE an “after” for him with RW once RW finds Dominus. He said as much when Tailgate was questioning him about it.  

So CD is on the LL, estranged, manipulated by those he is meant to be able to trust and who are meant to support him (his captain, the nominal-third-in-command, his purported best friend), struggling to make friends on his own without RW†  (Tailgate tries to be his friend but ends up poking at one of his deepest miseries in the most ham-fisted way, cyclonus raided kimia so CD’s not ready to be chummy w him it seems, etc etc... idk it just seems that CD is NEVER socializing without RW, and even stays behind when RW is out socializing a lot of the time (e.g., some(?) movie nights, Hedonia)), is devastated he cannot jump-start RW’s spark himself because he’s not medically/physiologically sound enough to do so (with the implication that it is from injecting, right? I dont think Ratchet says it outright but it seems to be what CD takes away from the conversation, anyway, fueling his self-loathing), (and AGAIN CD is only there on the LL in the first place to find the person he thinks he is a stand-in for in RW’s life....), takes the life-line he thinks Drift is offering him to feel useful and capable and worthy– when in actuality Drift is orchestrating a multi-player, carefully-articulated and long-in-play PLOT to manipulate CD into doing mnemosurgery on Overlord for Prowl’s dumb project, and then RW DIES and it is definitely partially CD’s very own fault, especially for interfacing with Overlord without supervision. And CD watches RW die knowing that RW “will never be able to forgive [him] for this.” 

I’m not even coherent in this post but I am just thinking thinking thinking about how this all plays out like a horrible Shakespearean tragedy and it’s not even the surface-level plot, really. CD’s life is probably one of the most compellingly tragic stories in the entirety of MTME/LL. And thank fuck it doesn’t end there.

*Ofc, Brainstorm (in my eyes at least) does redeem himself and take more care in/of their friendship in Elegant Chaos arc, focusing on CD, his depression, and his achievement of not erasing his memories of RW and breaking that awful cycle. Brainstorm devotes a lot to CD in this section of the story. HOWEVER, that does not change the fact that he played a direct hand in manipulating his best friend, which led to his best friend’s conjunx endura getting killed (among others on the ship!)!!! Idk, I LOVE BS but I do think that a lot of the fanon I’ve seen glosses over the fact that BS was complicit in the Overlord plot. And I find his involvement extra-inexcusable considering his more-informed stance on all of CD’s issues, his history with mnemosurgery, etc.  

**And Rodimus literally PREYS on this, whether that is conscious on his part or not. He knows CD wants to be useful, wants to be helpful, and above all wants to do GOOD because he feels he has not done enough good in this world/feels so guilty about his past re: shadowplay. It’s like the perfect storm. Canonically it is noted several times that although Rodimus plays the fool, he is incredibly astute and perspicacious when it comes to reading those around him, particularly in regard to how he can subtly manipulate them into playing into his schemes (see: using incorrect grammatical constructions in order to distract Minimus/Ultra Magnus during key decision-making moments in which he thinks Magnus will protest his decisions). Actually this also evokes how Roddy uses Drift and his insecurities and eagerness to please to absolve himself of his Decepticon past in the eyes of his now-fellow Autobots.... hmmmm Rodimus. Girl. 

† We see him hanging out one-on-one with Skids, and they get along very well and seem to care for each other, but their relationship becomes about Chromedome’s ability to help Skids recover from his amnesia, and, unfortunately, from that moment onward, Mnemosurgery becomes the focal point of their relationship. And, in the end, it ultimately leads to... well. the end of it. :(

#cdrw #really emo #im processing........................ #insert anime crazy eyes emoji #insert gif of girl talking to herself pacing circles in her room #rodimus #chromedome #rewind #skids #brainstorm #drift #ultra magnus #minimus ambus #james roberts youve bewitched me body and soul and mind and emotions and creative juices #tf #tf idw #tf mtmte #mtmte #megapwnus musings

[sunshine-arcanine]

okey… starting a diff post for this but

im gonna tell about them but first um.. be mindful of uh

pokemon abuse and death

read at your own risk, ermm yeah

ive mentioned them before, vaguely, but the year i became champion a … lot was going on in my region . professor sine’s new pc box program had been implemented most everywhere to allow anyone to access their boxes remotely instead of going to Pokémon centers to take your pokeballs out you know , because everything had been turned into digital data

well soon after me n my friends sascha and jony set out for our gym challenge this group came up called team Eden. and they were just about everywhere and they seemed pretty harmless at first cause all they talked about was , like, training their Pokémon in humane ways and how that made them better than everyone else . we kind of just ignored it , but eventually something happened with the new pc box system … it had been taken over by team eden and they had made the pcs unusable. you couldn’t retrieve your Pokémon, and even worse, the pcs were tied to the Pokémon centers themself to allow Pokémon to heal inside their digital pokeballs — so you couldn’t heal your injured Pokémon without restores or potions . a lot of Pokémon couldn’t get help and ended up dying , as well as a lot of mons stored in pcs ended up disappearing.

what happened was that team eden had used the flaws in the pc to edit their own pokemon’s stats, hurting them , AND to genetically modify two legendary mon using data from other mons- killing them in the process- to create a Pokémon stronger than arceus . I don’t know why they did it . but Sascha left me and jony to join team eden at that point and he ended up becoming the trainer for one of these pokemon . it was called polybius I think . but it didn’t turn out the way eden wanted it to, i think, cause it was always in pain and Sascha told me it dissolved any pokeball he tried to keep it in except for a master ball . so the only way you could keep it was against its will .

the other pokemon, Hieroconas, turned out ok.. but it was confused and didn’t know how to exist and was freed from team eden headquarters by a grunt who took pity on it, iirc… and i don’t really like talking about this part but i think it’s important to educate people about the tragedy of genetically modified pokemon . we already know about type:null and mewtwo but nobody knows about the polyhiero incident.

well. i was with Hieroconas for a while before I could finish my gym challenge; i never caught it, i just kind of hung around with it before I knew what it was because my Pokédex said nothing about it . i was too scared to go to Pokémon centers and the team eden grunts had gotten vicious in cities looking for it (which.. i DIDNT even know I HAD). and I learned that it didn’t know how to fight without a trainer instructing it ; but there was this move it had , Breaker, it was described in data to always hit but only work on one Pokémon as an instant ko

AGH THIS IS GETTING TOO LONG i just wanna make sure the full story is there . And people in my region like to pretend it never happened . This wasn’t that long ago ! Two years is not a long time! The team eden tower still stands in ka’dako!

Well anyways I’ll hurry this up and say that I had to instruct Hieroconas in a battle against Sascha who had polybius . And the way that thing sounded when it moved and it’s cry i really don’t think I’ll ever forget it was just so WRONG everything about it . Well. Breaker works only on Polybius and it killed it. I’m kind of glad about it, not to be dark, but at least it was put out of the misery it never asked for

Hieroconas is somewhere on a preserve now i think . I hope it’s okay.

Here’s a picture of their pc icons I took from a team eden computer

#cw pokémon abuse #cw Pokémon death #pokemon irl #sonsa info

[iuuua]

just watched takt op after putting it of for like, 2 years at least. its so good?? if ur a fan of improbable post apocalyptic situations u will like this. if ur a fan of music too and have Thoughts abt how it affects ppl's lives u will like this. i just have some things to say abt this anime as soon as i finished; ill try not to spoil major plot points.

first of all, it was enjoyable. the character dynamics are very fun and almost found family, tho i think they messed up here by adding some unnecessary romance. that being said, the way they develop as people implicitly strengthens their bond to each other which i think is what makes them likable. tbh, i thought takt was only really good for eye candy for the first two or so episodes, but the aforementioned developments rlly helped me like him. hes like a tsundere, kind of.

second, imo the whole anime has an underlying sense of tragedy. the premise is that aliens get on earth and wreak havoc bc they hate music, so humanity turns music into a weapon to fight these things. its a tragedy i think, the way music is supposed to be for pleasure and relaxation (this is directly mentioned in the anime) yet its been turned into war and destruction. apart from that, the way the characters are made to go on their journey is also a tragedy, a sense of doom at the end of their paths which the anime makes you forget as they develop, right up until it's important. i think they handled this well.

my biggest complaint is the relationship turn in the last two episodes where [SPOILERS: both women who traveled with him and established that fun dynamic, which i like, kiss the main character which i didnt like]. honestly, it was unnecessary to me because their relationship was, in my eyes, developing like a found family. so that threw me off because... yeah. i guess if youre into that thing, it makes it more tragic, but for me i didnt like it.

as much as i speak about the underlying sense of tragedy and doom in the anime, it is overall an anime of hope and a love for music. i think the message is to keep loving the things that make you human, break free from the tragedy of the past and grasp the future with your hands even if that thing you grasp is the very thing that caused you pain before. in this case, it's music, which logically is something we could live without, but we're human. we arent exactly logical. we yearn for music and we yearn to listen and share it.

ok i just dumped a lot of thoughts here but really, i enjoyed it. to add, the characters are very pretty. if i were to give it a rating... 9/10? im no critic, so this judgment is pretty high compared to others but i believe it deserves this rating. i do think it tried to compile a lot in 12 episodes, because the villain of the whole thing is pretty underexplained, but the focus on the protagonists' development drive the story.

RAAAAH take this as a viewers observations, im no professional!! i do hope u enjoy iy if u do watch it!

#takt op.destiny #impressions after the show #i really enjoyed it #rambles

[badwasabi]

Gotrek And Felix: Zombieslayer review

I tried to read a Warhammer Fantasy Book. Specifically, Gotrek and Felix. Specifically, Zombieslayer. This series is very popular.

This book was kinda mid. At least to me.

The series is about a human poet named Felix Jaeger who's battle bros with a one-eyed Dwarven Slayer named Gotrek. Slayers go around killing things, trying to find their doom. Since Gotrek saved Felix's life, Felix vowed to follow Gotrek around and make a cool poem about Gotrek's epic death.

That was twenty years ago.

(They also appeared in Total War: Warhammer 2.)

Each book is called "[blank]slayer", where our heroes fight whatever the blank is. In this book, it's a standard "zombie siege" scenario, except it's in a Renaissance-ish castle, and the zombies are run by a necromancer.

Minor spoilers follow.

The prose is extremely dry. It's not really telling a story, it's usually just...describing events.

The writer keeps using "Felix thought X", which is a fantastic way to make your reader not feel absorbed in the story. And we don't get much about his actual feelings about a lot of situations, no matter how dramatic they are.

Again, Felix is a poet, theoretically. If there was any POV character who should be prone to purple prose, it's him. Especially when supplies start getting real low, and he's dizzy with hunger. Or he's getting private time with his GF.

I write, and I draw, and I'm constantly looking for inspiration. It's not even voluntary. Some part of me is always looking for the next art piece, or story, or post.

Maybe Felix is out of poetic practice? Okay, then make that a subplot.

Maybe he feels like he doesn't do as much actual poetry as he should. This causes minor friction with Gotrek, or it's a long-running joke with them. Maybe Felix looks at the poetry books in the castle library or something, has a chat with someone about them, and those books get burned for firewood, or in an attack.

Something, something, tragedy of knowledge loss.

In fact, I'm pretty sure Felix's poetry isn't explicitly mentioned in the entire book. Gotrek does remind Felix of Felix's oath, but that's about it.

When Felix thinks about how it's been 20 years since he met Gotrek, maybe he could contrast the situation with the college he was in before he met Gotrek. Or his early life as a rich, ennobled merchant's son. Or the political riots he was a part of when Gotrek saved his life from the Reiksguard. The book is set in their headquarters.

Felix turns out to be better at commanding the men than some of the officers. You'd think he'd notice the irony.

It's just leaving money on the table.

Heck, what if Felix looks out, at the sea of zombies, and wonders if this is what Karl Franz felt while Felix and friends were protesting and rioting? What if he has friction with the 'Guard because he remembers how they killed his friends, and somehow they learn he participated in those riots, so some of them look sideways at him?

That's a very organic source of conflict.

This feels like "Extruded Book Product". Like the old paint-by-numbers Hardy Boys or Nancy Drew books, written by ghostwriters, to a strict formula.

Nathan Long isn't even the original main author. He took over after William King stepped away from the series. I don't know if the original books were like this. Unfortunately, my library district doesn't have any of the King books.

#warhammer fantasy #gotrek and felix #writing #books #nanowrimo #book review #wfb

[ah-ga-seven]

No More Pain | Jung Jaehyun

Pairing: Jung Jaehyun x Fem!reader 

Synopsis: The lingering wounds of your miscarriage have reopened. Now that you are broken up, an unforseen change in Jaehyun’s life has brought him back to your doorstep. Will he be able to fix you this time? Or will he fail just the same as before?

Genre: Angst, One Shot. 

Warnings: mentions of the reader having a miscarriage, depression, alcohol addiction and heartbreak.

Word Count: 2.8k

A/N: Probably one of the heaviest angsts I’ve written. I know the subject is rough but the idea came from a dream so I just had to write it down.

This was a different kind of pang to your heart.

You’ve had your fair share of tragedies, heartbreaks and disappointments, but this…

This feeling was nothing like anything you’ve ever felt before and quite frankly, you wouldn’t wish this upon your greatest enemy.  

It was a Thursday night, one like many where you decided to stay in and recharge from a busy day at your demanding job.

You were seated on your couch with a hot cup of tea as you mindlessly scrolled through your Instagram feed. Completely wrapped in the warmth of your favorite fleece blanket. But even the thick fluffy material couldn’t protect you from the cold shivers that ran down your spine.

You blankly stare at the post your best friend forwarded to you via dm and stiffened.  

Memories of the night you miscarried 4 months into your pregnancy flood back to you as you stare at his comment.

You remembered how broken he looked when the doctor couldn’t find the baby's heartbeat anymore.  

You remembered how he held you as you cried in his arms, promising that he’d love you just the same as he tried to console you to his best ability while suffering himself.

You remembered the pain and the relief of having Jaehyun by your side through it all. Glad that even though your life was about to change forever, he’d be the one constant thing you could rely on.

You remembered all of these moments like they happened yesterday, wishing future you could mentally prepare past you for what was going to be the hardest time in your life.  

The man who swore never to leave you did just that, and not even 6 months into his new relationship, your biggest insecurity was made into a reality.  

He had moved on for good, and even though you have no ill feelings towards him, you can’t help but feel anger over sadness right now.  

It was that easy to replace you. And that easy for him to find someone that could give him what you couldn’t.

Even though your miscarriage wasn’t the direct cause of why he left, the effects of the incidence on your mental health dragged him down with you. So both of you felt it’d be better to part ways for the sake of not wanting to hate or resent each other in the end.  

But God…you hated and resented him now more than ever.  

It didn’t matter to you that both of you started to date new people, because a part of you always held on to the fact that you’d somehow find your way back to each other, though the probability of that ever happening again turned to ash.

Your miscarriage broke you.  

No appetite for weeks, no motivation to get yourself out of bed and no cure for the monsters in your head who told you that Jaehyun was only sticking around out of pity for your broken state.

That same insecurity is what drove him into the arms of the women he told you not to worry about, and now they’re having a fucking child together.  

Knowing that that should’ve been you was a thought that was just too much to bear right now. You suddenly feel sick to your stomach, tears prickling your eyes as you rub the spot on your belly where the mini bump used to be 8 months ago.

You were finally doing better, thriving in your job and social life. Meeting new people and dating a few loose ends here and there, but you can already feel yourself spiraling back into old depressional habits as you stare at the picture once more.  

You pettily decide to like it, hoping it would spark interest from none other than your ex, and much to your surprise, it did.

Not even 20 minutes later your phone started to buzz on the counter as you poured yourself a glass of wine. You mindlessly retrieve it, expecting it to be your best friend but when you see his name as you take a sip you almost choke.

Is he serious?

You try to come up with what to say for the next 3 to 5 minutes but nothing in your head seems to translate your exact feelings to your fingertips.

You sigh in agony while leaning over on your kitchen counter with your phone still in your hands, reading his messages over and over again. You subconsciously start to bite your lip in deep thought, getting startled by your ringtone as your phone starts to ring in your grasp.

“Fuck,” you mumble to yourself, taking a big chug of the alcoholic beverage in front of you, putting on the bravest face and straightest posture to make yourself feel better before accepting the call.  

You knew you didn’t have to answer, but you were dying to hear what he had to say under these circumstances.  

“Y/N? Is that you?” His voice was unchanged. You didn’t know why, but you expected him to sound different, be different. Yet the same worry he’s always had for you was evident in his tone this time as well.

You clear your throat to avoid a voice crack and sigh. “Congratulations,” you tried to sound as genuine as you could, but you knew you sounded like shit.  

You start to play with the ends of your hair out of anxious anticipation, waiting for him to respond on the other end of the line.  

“I meant to tell you,” he starts. “I just…I didn’t know how and Chaeyoung suddenly uploaded the picture and-”

“Jae…please spare me the details,” you interrupt him. Saying his name like you used to felt like speaking a foreign language. He stayed quiet upon hearing your voice again and let out a frustrated sigh.

“Do you still live in the same apartment in Itaewon?” he suddenly asks, immediately alerting you to stand up straight because he could only be asking for one reason and one reason only.

“Y-yes.”

“Good, I’m on my way.”

Just like that, he hung up and just like that your heart rate starts to race uncontrollably.  

You down the remnants of your wine glass and hope he’s isn’t too close because your place looked far from neat. For the next 15 minutes, you run around, shoving things into random cabinets. Whether those items belonged there or not was the least of your concern and just as you fluff the last pillow on your couch, your doorbell rings.

You take a deep breath, calming your nerves as you walk up to your front door, taking it off the lock before you open it with a dramatic swing.

There he was. Jung Jaehyun.

As beautiful and put together as he always looked, no matter the circumstance. You forget how to breathe when you lay eyes on him and gulp. It’s actually him.

His big dark orbs widened as he laid eyes on you after months of not seeing you. His facial expression softened, slowly parting his lips to speak but you beat him to it when you broke out of your trance.  

“What are you doing here?” your shoulders fall as you look into his eyes for answers. The same eyes that once looked at you with so much love and adoration, but right now his pupils were stressfully darting back and forth, trying to read you like he used to be able to but he had no idea what you were feeling right now.

“Because I feel like shit y/n. Please let me in and let me explain,” he pleaded with a defeated tone.

You scoff, rolling your eyes. “What is there to explain? You knocked up your girlfriend and finally got what you wanted. Why bother coming here? To rub it into my face?”  

Your plan of staying calm and collected went completely out the window just now and you could tell by the shock on his face that he did not expect you to be angry with him.

He took a step forward, backing you into your own hallway. His height towered over you when you stepped back and without looking back he closed the door behind him.

“Y/n. I would never purposely do that to you. Ever.” You ignore his statement, narrowing your eyes at him.

“I don’t remember inviting you in Jaehyun. Does she even know you’re here?”

You hold your ground, crossing your arms over your chest as you wait for him to counter your attack, but he simply shook his head. Knowing damn well that you’re acting tough just so you won’t get emotional.  

As he’s scanning the premises, his eyes linger on the red wine bottle on your kitchen counter and with a look of utter disbelief, he averts his attention back on you.

“You’re drinking again?” he asks with an almost condescending tone.  

“Did you come here to practice your parenting skills because no thanks Jae, please leave,” you bite back as coldly as you could, but he wasn’t having it.

“That shit almost killed you and you’re just casually drinking again?” He runs his hand through his locks out of pure frustration, not knowing what to do with the misplaced feeling of still caring for you just the same, while also knowing he has no business to tell you how to live your life.

The truth is, Jaehyun had no idea what he was doing here. Everything about the situation felt wrong and he couldn’t lie to himself any longer. Ever since Chaeyoung told him she was pregnant; he couldn’t be fully happy about it. He couldn’t commit to fatherhood knowing how much it broke your relationship. How much it broke the women he loved most to this day.

“A little red wine didn’t hurt anyone,” you mumble under your breath and that comment alone send Jaehyun’s emotions into overdrive, unable to hide his disappointment and worry for you any longer.

“IT HURT YOU Y/N. DAMN IT!” He raised his voice at you as he roughly grabbed your arm to make you look at him, which is the last thing you expected. He wasn’t mad at you. He was mad at himself. Mad at the fact that he wasn’t there when you needed him most and mad at the fact that this is what your lives had come to.

You might have previously dealt with your pain by drinking, and you might have mindlessly mixed your anti-depressants with your drink once, which…just might have earned you a trip to the hospital, but that was your lowest low and you made sure it’d never happen again.

You beat your demons by yourself when he had already moved on, so he had no place to waltz back into your life when he felt like it, just to judge you.

You’re absolutely fuming by now because of that same reason and much to your dismay you feel new tears well up in your eyes.  

“NO, YOU HURT ME!” you yell back at him as you smack his chest, the salty droplets streaming down your face as you kept hitting his chest to make him feel your pain. “YOU LEFT ME.”

Your knees got weak and you knew you looked absolutely pathetic as you crouched down in front of him. Shock took over his features as he got down on his own knees just as quickly, pulling you into the comfort of his arms. The warmth that you used to call home and the warmth that always seemed to calm you down engulfed you completely, a feeling your favorite fleece blanket from before could hardly imitate.  

He patted your head with assuring strokes, whispering sweet nothings to you as he held you on the floor of your apartment. Letting you sob the pain away in his black shirt. “Shhh, it’s okay…” he kissed the top of your head, caressing your cheek as he wiped away your tears.

You calmed down slowly, ignoring the suffocating ache in your head and heart while he made you feel safe and sound like he always did. You sat there like that for God knows how long, letting your minds go into overdrive as silence comforted the both of you.  

Ironically enough, this scenery was the exact same as the one in the hospital 8 months ago. You cried in his arms just like this when you had lost your child, but now you were crying because you had lost him. For good now.  

“I would never purposely plan to have a baby this quickly y/n, you have to believe me. Chae was on birth control but it just…happened,” he whispers, finally breaking the agonizing silence.

You stay quiet, closing your eyes to the sound of his low voice, letting his words register. “I was going to tell you. I was planning to ask you out for a coffee but as soon as she passed her first trimester, she was just so excited and made the announcement…it was just bad timing.”

“All of this is bad timing,” you mumble, which made him nod in agreement. He sighed into your hair as he continued to explain. “Y/n, I’d be lying if I said I didn’t care for you anymore. I wish things were different, but they simply aren’t and I’m sorry.”

You sniff, dabbing your tears and your nose with the sleeves of your blouse before looking up at him through your lashes.

“You don’t have to apologize for moving on and being happy Jaehyun. It’s all I ever wanted for you.” You wipe the single tear that remained on the corner of his eye, not having realized that he shed a few tears himself too.

He leaned into your touch as he looked into your eyes before closing them, leaning his forehead onto yours while taking a deep breath.  

“I just want you to be ok.” He says suppressing a sob. “I can’t live this picture-perfect life knowing that you’re in pain y/n. It makes no sense; you deserve so much more it’s not fair.”  

Your lip starts to quiver as his words hit you, and you build up the courage to look at him again.  

He stared at you longingly and lovingly for the first time since forever and you knew a mistake was about to be made when he inched his face closer to you, but it was too late.

His lips made contact with yours and you completely gave in. Letting him lead you into a slow yet passionate kiss that took both of your breaths away.  Before things could get more heated, you realize what was happening and froze.

You take a hold of his wrists as you pull away, your eyes staring into his equally electrified ones as you recompose yourselves.

“I-I’m sorry,” he started. “I should’ve never confused you like that. Fuck. What the fuck am I doing.” He covers his mouth as he got up. Frustrated with his own behavior, he digs his fingernails into the palms of his hands to suppress the urge to swing at your door or any other object in sight for that matter.

You get up just as quickly as well. Straightening out your clothes before shaking off the nerves of what just happened.  

You take a deep breath followed by a shaky exhale as you opened your front door, turning around on your heels to look at an equally distressed Jaehyun.

He was about to speak; about to confess that he still loved you, but you stopped him by raising your hand, motioning for him to keep whatever he was about to say to himself.

Your eyes find his own and you take one last glance at the man that was supposed to be the pillar to your family. The man you used to call yours, and the man that you had hoped to still have a future with, despite everything.  

But you knew better.

You knew what was right and you knew what you had to do before things would start to spiral out of control again.

You stepped aside so he could pass by you, trying to avoid eye contact all while you could still feel his burning stare lingering on your fragile state.

You swallow harshly, licking your lips before you spoke as clearly and steadily as you could.

“For the sake of your family, please leave Jae…and never come back.”  

#jaehyun angst #jaehyun scenarios #jaehyun imagines #jaehyun imagine #jung jaehyun imagine #jung jaehyun imagines #jung jaehyun scenarios #jung jaehyun angst #jaehyun x reader #nct imagines #nct smut #nct angst #nct scenarios #nct 127 scenarios #jung jaehyun #jaehyun #jaehyun au #kpop imagines #kpop scenarios #kpop angst #jaehyun fanfic #kpop fanfic

[lordoftherazzles]

ALSO! You should do the dinner scene of the new Bookbinder chapter from Nori and/or Dwalin’s POV. 👀👀

Hey look I'm finally posting this!!

This was in response to a Wednesday Word Play where you write a scene from a different POV. AND, doing this for a Wednesday Word Play to write a new character/ship/etc that you've always wanted to try.

Two word plays, one stone!

It gave me an excuse to get off my ass and finally answer this ask, so without further ado, have some Nwalin (primarily Dwalin POV) from Chapter 7 of Bookbinder//Songwriter!

Dwalin had tried to warn Thorin that weaseling in on he and Nori’s dinner date for Valentine’s was a recipe for disaster, or at least it was likely to be one knowing Nori’s cheeky behavior. However, being the absolute best friend that he was to Thorin, Dwalin was doing his part in ensuring some of that tragedy never came to light. He didn’t mind Bilbo, and he certainly liked seeing his best buddy in high spirits, so it was an effort he was willing to make.

Which meant a chat with Nori before the two lovebirds ever showed their faces.

“I’m begging you, please act like…I dunno, a normal human being tonight?” Dwalin huffed a bit, swirling his glass of water around as he eyed those coming and going within the restaurant.

“You’re begging me, hm?”

Dwalin’s gaze shifted to the side to catch a glimpse at Nori’s shit-eating grin, and nothing about Dwalin’s expression seemed to shift from that neutral look it had. “It’s their first Valentine’s together and I get the holiday is a bunch of shit, but it’s kind of a big deal, I think. We like this one, remember.”

“Yes, I know. Not that was a high bar to reach to surpass the last man of Thorin’s life. Thrandumb Oropher was a fellow with poor taste, even for me. Really bendy though, if you want my opinion.”

“I don’t want your opinion on him whatsoever.”

“I will be on my best behavior, but if there’s low-hanging fruit, you know it’s only natural for me to grab at it,” Nori chimed in a sing-song voice as he leaned against his boyfriend’s arm. “It will be a fun night, I promise and don’t worry so much. Thorin does enough of that for all of us.”

With a small sigh of acknowledgment to Nori’s words, Dwalin finally spurred a small grin, leaning into Nori’s touch against his arm before the two special guests to join their dinner table just stepped inside the restaurant.

==========

Low-hanging fruit was always something Dwalin had to watch out for it seemed. While the evening had gone primarily well, there was always the hiccup or road bump that seemed to cause a little pause within the conversation. Small comments from Nori, a bit of blushing from the two across the table, and Dwalin felt more like a third wheel than anything, even if he was one quarter of this double date thing happening.

He was watching from the sidelines, just waiting to have to grab Nori by the scruff and haul his ass out, but no such moment came. Perhaps it was foolish on his part to assume that this meant they could relax. All of them were chatting a bit over wine and poking a little fun at how Thorin and Bilbo had met. The exact details of the story were still rather hidden. No one knew why, but Nori was currently needling in on that to try and fish out as many details as possible.

It was harmless, mostly.

“Yeah, and I hope he learned a lesson on showing up late to practice,” Dwalin huffed, amused in tone as he eyed Thorin and Bilbo from across the table as a grin was sneaking across his own lips at the memory. “Though it wouldn’t be the first time I’d tossed his ass into a dumpster.” Sometimes those punishments were deserved, and sometimes they weren’t even remembered, it all depended on the bullshit of the hour. In this case, Thorin didn’t show up late to practice and didn’t have to end up picking garbage out of his hair. A lesson learned.

“Just taking out the trash, I see!”

And that’s when Dwalin’s sense of comfort and ease at the dinner table began to melt. It was like placing a challenge down on the table, just ready for Thorin to pick at and he knew it. Side eyeing his boyfriend for a moment and noticing that very impish look, Dwalin wasn’t sure what to say to get them back on track–Thorin had spoken up far too quickly in unknowing retaliation.

Every good relationship starts with an interesting story, and yadda yadda, Dwalin wasn’t listening as he rolled his eyes and tried to focus on the expression of both Nori and Thorin, wondering just when that particular volcano of agitation was going to erupt. Sometimes it was a curse to be far too knowledgeable about their tell-tale signs in expressions. Nori always got a particular sparkle in his eyes when he was ready to make a verbal leap, and Thorin’s eyes always seemed to darken to something deep and thunderous like rain clouds whenever he was ready to go for the kill.

There it was, that mischievous little sparkle that had Dwalin straightening up in his seat some with his hands resting behind his head.

“Nori I wouldn’t–”

But the other man just kept going. Nori even went so far as to bring up a piercing that had….an embarrassing tale to it, which made even Dwalin pause!

Watching Thorin fly out of his seat and ready to leap over the table–if not for Bilbo’s interference–Dwalin reached over and latched a hand onto Nori’s thigh with a death grip to keep the auburn-haired menace seated.

“I want my bill.” And there went Thorin, stomping off and looking like a mess of embarrassment if Dwalin didn’t know any better.

Fixing Nori with a glare and removing his hand, while Dwalin could admit that this could have been a lot worse, Nori clearly didn’t know what ‘best behavior’ truly meant. “Great job,” Dwalin hissed.

“What? He never talks about these things and it’s nice to know he’s being taken care of, yes?”

“You have zero tact.”

Though as attention shifted to Bilbo, noticing the blushy look the newcomer was wearing, it didn’t seem as if he was completely put out by everything that had been said. Dwalin knew more than he was letting on about Thorin and had an inkling as to why it had bothered his best friend so much. It wasn’t so much the content as it was…well, the actual doing. It had been a fleeting conversation, what with Thorin asking for advice on how to properly approach the subject of intimacy and what not with Bilbo, but it seemed that both Thorin and Bilbo were of the same mind, but having issues getting to that point. Well, at least they were on the right track, and then Nori had to open his fat mouth.

“Well, to be honest…that was something I wanted to approach with him tonight, you know? Not just because of the holiday but…you know, I just wasn’t sure when the right time would be after the utterances I’ve heard about his relationship with Thranduil.”

“Oh, Bilbo, I don’t think you need to worry about anything. Thorin knows I love to jerk his chain, but if you want to jerk something else, I’d say he wouldn’t complain–ouch!”

Dwalin wasted no time in jamming his elbow into Nori’s ribs with a scowl.

“If it helps, he’s been considering the same thing. He even asked for advice. I don’t think he liked my ‘take him in the bathroom before dessert’ suggestion though,” He chuckled lightly. “It was a joke, but in all honesty, don’t compare yourself to Thranduil. All I ask is that you treat him right.” And now the ‘best friend’ voice came out. “I should have snapped that platinum blond twig long ago, so don’t fuck it up.” It was one of many threats that entered Dwalin’s tone whenever he spoke to Bilbo, or around Bilbo, or that had anything to do with the nerdy little book lover. Like Nori had said before, it wasn’t a high bar to reach when it came to Thorin’s choices in men in comparison to Thranduil, but by god, Dwalin would not see his best mate destroyed by yet another heartless piece of shit. Thankfully, Bilbo truly did seem above that.

Thorin had returned with a box, and a paid bill and was leaving without so much as a proper goodbye, not that anyone could blame him, but as the table was abandoned, Dwalin flagged down their server to take care of his portion of the bill.

“You really couldn’t keep your mouth shut tonight, huh?” He grumbled a bit before feeling a pinch at his leg. “Don’t try and weasel out of the doghouse, man, did you see Thorin’s face?”

“I did, but did you hear what Bilbo said? They’re both pining for it, and so now that he knows, perhaps that really good fuck will become a reality.”

Dwalin sighed. There was some truth to Nori’s words, but it would be foolish to admit as such. Nori would never let him hear the end of it otherwise.

“I want Thorin to be happy too, you know. Sometimes it takes a none-too-gentle push to get someone there. He can deck me at band practice on Thursday if he still has any of that pent-up agitation left by then. I did them both a favor.”

“You’re gonna apologize.”

“What?” Nori practically screeched, eyes wide and latching onto Dwalin’s arm. “Like, genuinely? Or in a ‘sorry for bringing up the piercing’ way?”

“Genuinely, or you’re on the sofa tonight. Might be nice having the big bed to myself and not being latched onto by a little gremlin all night,” Dwalin teased, but there was some sternness to his voice as he finished signing off on the bill and removing himself from his seat. “Just say sorry, and you’re out of the doghouse.”

“And into your bed?”

“I’ll allow it.” Leaning down and pressing a raspberry of a kiss to the top of Nori’s head, and earning a hissy fit in retaliation, Dwalin was sure that the night wasn’t totally ruined due to a vulgar mouth. So long as Thorin got some form of apology before Thursday’s practice, that’s all he cared about. Besides, would he have actually kicked Nori out of bed for tonight? Probably not, it was one of the few places where Dwalin didn’t mind Nori’s vulgarity.

And it was Valentine’s Day, after all.

==========

“How does this sound? ‘Hey, sorry for bringing your dick into the conversation. Happy Valentine’s Day.’”

“Try again.”

“Too late, already sent it.” Nori was in high spirits regardless of being halfway in the doghouse, but it was an attempt at a truce at the very least between the bass player and bandleader. No doubt the topic of conversation later in the week would be interesting. “If he doesn’t reply within the next ten minutes, I can only assume my theory was correct.”

“Which was?”

“My prodding and finally making Bilbo open up about his intentions was just the push they both needed to finally do the deed. I bet they’re having a really great time.”

“You better hope that’s what it is, or Thorin’s still gonna wring your neck.”

“Trust the process, Dwalin dear, I know exactly what I’m doing here. I’m sure we’ll hear something about it on Thursday, or at least you will, and then you can share with me the juicy details.” Nori pinched at Dwalin’s arm as they pulled into the drive of their shared, and very small, home. “Now, there’s a card waiting inside for you–”

“It’s not another ‘my dick springs forward for you’ card is it?”

“Even better! Now run along, I’ll be right behind you.” Likely in more ways than one if Nori had it his way.

“You’re a fucking menace,” Dwalin grinned after putting the car in park, leaning over to press his forehead to Nori’s in a small loving gesture that the two both delighted in, soft as it was. “But I love you anyway.”

“I know you do, just as I love you, Dwalin dear.”

#the hobbit #nwalin #nori #dwalin #thorin oakenshield #bilbo baggins #bagginshield #thilbo #hobbit fic #hobbit fanfic #razzywrites #fic: bookbinder//songwriter