#bc you thought it would make sense as a whole but it felt more disconnected?

[breakfastteatime]

hope you don't mind the rant but argh i finally realised why i feel so disconnected to survivor in comparison to how close jfo is to me

spoilers for those who haven't played survivor

but i really dislike major decisions made and i'm gonna babble on a little (i've had like eight panadol and two sleeping meds as of the last hour n a half so if this doesn't make sense that's why)

one that's been swirling around my head ever since i played us that it really felt like they brought cordova back JUST to kill him off. this also ties into my next point that i find bode's betrayal hard to believe as well. every role he had in the story could easily be replaced by someone such as cere, and i felt like the only reason he was there was to have someone for bode to kill to show how really evil he was but respawn didn't want to kill any of the main cast off. he's such a useless character in the plot that killing him off didnt effect anything LMAO

my next major dislike is, understandably, about bode :,) yes i know this can come off as making excuses for a character i was attached to since the trailers dropped but the more i think about it the more i really cannot understand both the timeline and the motive that was behind bode's betrayal. i kind of get the idea he was lax about betraying them UNTIL cal mentioned using tanalorr for the hidden path but according to the echoes you get after the game bodenis plotting and scheming the whole time... plus, you think that his whole motive relies on creating a safe place for kata on tanalorr where no one can find them but also like. you have two (technically three) jedi, a nightsister, and a whole clan of anchorites that kick the empire's ass every day. "will you be able to protect her when the empire comes?" fuckass have you SEEN cal use a lightsaber?? kata is safer with cal then she is bode

dagan was hella underwhelming too which disappointed me tbh i was excited for this high republic jedi to show us all this cool stuff only for him to die in like three seconds 😔

ANYWAY i hope this ain't too long but i'd love to hear your thoughts/criticisms on js bc i love the game and all the little bits are amazing but some of the decisions made have me a bit hrghh

Okay, friend, you asked for it ;)

The decision to bring back Cordova was an unexpected one, but the sight of him makes me cry happy tears every damn time, so it doesn't bother me at all. I take your point re: Cere being able to do everything he does, but part of Bode’s betrayal also hinges on him betraying Cere to Vader, who clearly wants vengeance after Nur (which is SO IN CHARACTER for Vader I can only lol. Petty bitch.), so Bode killing her wouldn't have had quite the same impact.

Because I was so convinced he was dead that him *actually* being dead didn’t strike me as ‘brought back only to die’. I would argue that killing him off did put them at risk of not being able to reach Tanalorr and defintely drove Cal to Nova Garon, but yes… Cordova's character probably lacks development and definitive purpose compared to the others… Although even as I say that, I find myself thinking of the logs he left behind in the various ruins on Jedha and the words of advice and I just can’t get mad. Plus there's that teeny hint that he's been unwell when Merrin asks how he's feeling. I see your points, yes, but I'm not too fussed by any of it.

Moving onto Bode...

So, here’s my interpretation of Bode, based on the post-game echoes and the little nuances that take on a totally new light on a replay. Bode is playing Cal from the very beginning. They are never friends from Bode’s perspective, and he is a master manipulator. He’s a textbook abuser – he lovebombs Cal with compliments and praise to cement their relationship, and does the same with everyone in his family. Plus, he used his knowledge of Cere’s location to further his cause with the Empire.

There’s also a power dynamic at play here because Bode was a Jedi Knight during the war while Cal was still a Padawan. Bode is older and more experienced with the world than Cal. He knows Cal longs for friendship, and he wields that against him more effectively than any weapon. Every action, every word, every choice Bode makes is solely to dig in deeper with Cal so he can and Kata can escape the Empire. Had Cal agreed that Tanalorr would just be for them, *maybe* Bode wouldn’t have betrayed him the way he did, but Bode is well on his way to the dark side because of his attachment to Kata. And Cal very nearly follows him because of his attachments to his family.

To me, this is what the Jedi Order meant by 'no attachments'. Jedi are allowed to love, but when that love becomes all consuming, when it becomes an obsession, that’s when the attachment becomes dangerous. Bode’s story is very similar to Anakin’s, he’s just not as powerful. Hasn’t got those Skywalker genes 😉  

Bode’s motive to me is clear – he *thinks* everything is about Kata, but actually it’s all about him. It’s about his grief and rage and fear because of his wife's death the terrible choices he made. Denvik promises that if Bode gives him what he wants (Cal and Cere), he will reveal which Inquistor murdered his wife. Bode is already in it for revenge, not his daughter's wellbeing. His choices are very pre-meditated. He is a parent, yes, and I can understand that overriding love of a child, but he is also a grieving husband who is so broken by his loss that his love for Kata has become too possessive. He is terrified of losing his daughter, and it eclipses his love for her. Kata is aware of this, and her love is also turning to fear. Bode is neglectful (he's always leaving Kata behind) and bordering on abusive at the end. He trusts no one but himself, and he even asks Cal at the very end if he can protect Kata. Cal says nothing because he knows he can’t – he’s tried protecting so many people, and he’s lost nearly all of them. He won’t make a promise he can’t keep, and that’s what completely breaks Bode. Bode doesn’t believe anyone *but him* can protect Kata because he has become completely consumed with fear and anger. Cal gave him a chance to make a better choice when he disarmed him. In fact, Bode had *so many chances* to make a better choice, and he didn’t. So, when Bode responded by choosing to try and kill Cal, Merrin *and* very nearly his own daughter, Cal had no choice but to put him down – hard. That second shot took my breath away both times I played the game because Cal knows he cannot save Bode and protect the people who matter, and by showing Bode mercy, more people will die. It's also about control - Bode tries to control everyone. Cal knows he can't, so he takes the only option left - killing Bode. Honestly, the more I think about that finale, the more intense it becomes. It's an astonishing moment.

I do wonder if the reason people struggle with Bode is because he is so nice, and he fits in so well, but it’s all fake and it’s all an act. Whether you saw it coming or not, that hurts. Cal – and the player – want so badly for Bode to be better than he is, and that’s the tragedy. Bode’s not capable of that. He has suffered losses just like Cal, but he couldn’t overcome them. It’s a lot to deal with emotionally!

And as for Dagan, I quite like him! Mostly because that final battle with him incorporates my favourite Star Wars thing – WEIRD FORCE SHIT. He’s also a mirror held up to Cal – this is what you could become if your obsession takes over you. I also think his relationship with Santari Khri is meant to show Cal the potential pitfalls of his relationship with Merrin if his attachment overcomes him… but we’ll have to see what happens next…

Gosh this got long. It's always fun to see other people's perspectives and share my own! Hope you've got some rest and feel better soon :)

#jedi survivor spoilers #star wars jedi: survivor #jedi survivor meta #answered asks #bode akuna #cal kestis #dagan gera #eno cordova #long post #breakfast tea has THOUGHTS and FEELINGS #times like this I wish i had a youtube channel el oh el

[detransraichu]

why did i think i was trans? how did i delude myself? it's complicated.

hiya. i'm a butch lesbian woman who was confused since i was 12 year old ish and thought i was transgender -- mostly nonbinary though with some periods where i thought i was a trans guy -- up until 2022. many factors played in that whole mess that went on in my brain and my life. i'm going to be putting it ic because it's ridiculously long :') but feel free to reply etc. i hope stories like mine can make people feel less alone in these experiences and maybe help pain like mine be prevented. i want trans people to be respected while also doing what is best for society and women's rights too.

anyway. here's my story.

to preface, my feelings about transness in general -- i do love many trans people, i saw all the good parts their community has. i still think i do believe in gender dysphoria and sometimes surgeries/hrt being required to help people be safe and happy, but i think alternate routes need to be explored and we need to push for people to unpack their internalized misogyny and homophobia BEFORE they label themselves. the mix of LGB and TQ has created a lot of infighting. with homosexuality it's behavior-driven, attraction-driven, but with being trans it's an identity thing and a disconnect in the brain, it pushes you to change your body or presentation in some way, or ask others to alter how they naturally would treat you with different terms or pronouns. i think there will be more and more detransition stories like mine, the numbers will grow bigger and bigger unless something urgently happens. bc the trans community does NOT or at least VERY RARELY tells someone to slow down the questioning of their gender identity, they do NOT ever question anything, they don't look for internalized sexism in how people describe their gender, they don't do the work to unpack that stuff in their community. and that's just straight up dangerous.

so yeah. how did i get here? honestly i think part of why i thought i was trans was bc i wanted to fit in and i saw the gender euphoria in other ppl and was like wow i want a feeling like that. and honestly in my personal case it was just me having fun doing drag and lowkey cosplaying as male characters i was obsessed with in media. and my DID added to it too bc i would sometimes dissociate and feel that part of me was male or genderless and that's not bc those parts of me were trans that's bc they are a manifestation of my traumas!!! on top of my eating disorder, dysmorphia and psychosis. i really wish ppl i talked to as a teen on tumblr hadn't jumped to "omg you hate your body? you wish you were a boy under patriarchy? you have suuuch trans vibes bestie you'll make the perfect lil softboy uwu" bc then i was extremely lonely at school and at home and just felt soooo excited at the attention i felt happy to fit in, and honestly even my "dysphoria" after that was that i looked like other trans ppl and i thought they were the coolest, i just felt deep admiration. and then i'd show pics online and ppl would hype me up just bc i identified as trans. so then it snowballed into me feeling terrified to go out bc i was scared i'd get misgendered since i was visibly afab and all my friends were trans and very toxic sjw stereotype so i saw cis people as toxic and untrustworthy and i got to write angsty posts about it that got somewhat popular which i loved bc i'm a writer and i loved to fantasize and imagine a sense of justice alongside other warriors... not unlike how i felt joining into the trans community. when deep down i knew i was being the annoying little sister trying to gain older kids's approval and trailing behind lol. the first trans person i met online was this awesome trans guy who did photography and he was a good bit older and i just wanted to look like him so bad so that he would like me. he ended up ghosting me. but i was still obsessed w him so i looked up trans stuff and fell in head first without even a questioning phase :/ which is 100% on me of course! i was just a very impulsive kid and the trans ppl around me lived in this big colorful world full of identities and drama and unconditional support... but i do wish someone had slowed me down and showed me alternate paths, the path of just being gnc.

i was also like. okay i know i'm queer but idk how, but i want to be in this community bc i'm so lonely (as a baby dyke). so i looked at the most opposite identity ever and gay trans man was the furthest away i could go from myself & my gay attraction & my body & my female masculinity. i was constantly dissociated, constantly. i was living in my yaoi fantasies lol like the "perfect" romance bc it wasn't hetero stuff which had scary power dynamics, and it also wasn't lesbian bc that hit too close to home and i'd start to have panic attacks. so i avoided those, tho sometimes i'd read fanfics w a side lesbian relationship.... but pretended to hate them and not care at all. that was actually part of me accepting my attraction to women, like moving slowly over to lesbian ships in fanfics and finally seeing what it would be like. it felt too good. so then i repressed it again or only showed my lesbian attraction when flirting with men online lol. bc of course there needed to be a voyeur, otherwise it's too real and gross and bad. tfw trauma and internalized lesbophobia.

but yeah anyway me obsessing over yaoi really made me think of boys very fondly -- always boys, never men -- and feel this deep warm happy feeling in my stomach. thinking of two boys together was total equality bc there was no woman involved, so no misogyny or weird "too real" feelings. if it had a woman i'd eventually have a total freakout bc i would keep pretending i was the guy in that scenario, which was BAD bc it made me sound like a DYKE. and boys had an actual personality (bc there very few genuine complex female characters at the time so they were all dumb or mean or bland) and they could do sooo much more than girls could so they were Better somehow. but of course if u say boys are better you're a misogynist, so i wanted to BE a boy so i could talk about how much i loved boys. and i loved boys bc i admired them. i wished i could be a "more male" version of a girl. i wanted to embody maleness so that i could create myself a better girlhood. and not even call it girlhood, so it was even cooler. i didn't want to be like the other girls, who were all loser straight boy crazy bullies. or even if there were cool girls with me, they would just annoy me (bc i was always depressed and exhausted from mental illness and untreated disabilities and it made me irritable). so yeah. boys were it. specifically boys bc men sounded almost triggering from my misogyny trauma. like men are the kind that hurt you. but boys are soft and sweet and special and harmless. they're the right kind of male person. the good ones. and they have such vivid relationships with one another and are such complex beings, unlike girls. and now that i'm a boy i'm gonna be the boy with the best morals and no toxic masculinity whatsoever, just a soft little uwu bean with a soft beautiful very typically girly flat chest, like an afab person before puberty, and no facial hair of course except for maybe a slightly lower voice and less fat (i thought it was good riddance at the time bc i was anorexic lol so that just reinforced it). i had this perfect image of myself. but it was always wavering, so i would never feel fully secure in my gender identity but i also couldn't lose my grip and question that i'm not nonbinary/trans bc then i'll have to accept that i'm an afab lesbian with a boring ass female gender. and i would have to disappoint everybody, and worst of all make them look bad for detransitioning. 

but yeah.... i actually am feeling less bad abt just being a bland woman. like i don't need to be special, i can blend in and people won't hurt me bc i'm a loser like in highschool. normality and domesticity are blissful actually, like i'm Just A Girl and i'm basic af or whatever. but there's other boring, gnc girls, and they're cool but they're also in the highschool situation of being "not the kind of girl that gets asked out and family is kinda broke and not noticeably pretty and has failing grades and untreated disorders so therefore an even bigger loser." so yeah i wanted to be different. to be noticed and thought about, and go against the grain. ie, cishet normative things. usually secretly, but then at some point i came out to my family and they got transphobic but also just said gross things to me that made it so that even if i had been wobbly on my identity i now didn't trust them to talk about it so i just repressed feelings and held onto a trans identity even harder. but then i started thinking of girls a LOT and envying lesbian women. who didn't have to worry about gender stuff, and also got to be gay in a way that... suddenly i noticed could be cool too. i had never allowed myself to notice it. but then i did. and i freaked out bc i was dating someone who wasn't a woman kgdkjgk and it felt transphobic af so i just resolved myself that i MUST be trans.

i was deep in the closet lesbian-wise and my brain tricked itself bc i just wasn't ready to accept being a lesbian. i just wasn't. i've only become ready this year!! and that's around the time that my ex broke up w me (or well we both came to the conclusion that i'm a lesbian so being w them would be wrong, and that it turns out they're only into men/enbies). and then i tried to be nonbinary again bc i wanted to get back w them so bad but then i realized it just wasn't me, and i started getting comfy w gay womanhood. and i came to terms with being a single butch lesbian!!! i'm so much better now that i'm radically accepting myself. it was a LOOONG stressful upsetting journey bc i wasn't being myself. but now i am being myself. and i'm clumsy af and kinda dumb and SUUUUPER inexperienced as both a girl loving girls and also just an adult woman in general. like being an adult woman is HARD and idk what i'm doing and i'm barely scraping by and i'm so behind everyone else. but now i gotta deal with it, actually deal with my issues :/ no more internalized lesbophobia & misogyny!! society often defeminizes girls like me and takes womanhood away from marginalized women but no!!! i'm still a woman. i'm weird but i'm just a weird woman and that's fine. some girls are freaks and weirdos and something different but not the differences that were considered "cool" on leftist tumblr as whichever community is most oppressed and has the most funky flags and ultra-microlabels. and i'm sorry to say, it's embarrassing as hell. but i did fetishize transness. i did think of trans people as unironically cooler than regular non-bigoted close-minded cis people, more interesting, better morality, cooler, smarter, etc. and i wanted to make friends and trans/enby online communities were super vibrant in fandom spaces that i was in. so yup. there it is. i'm a trans faker actually, though i was super out of it during it all, i wasn't doing it consciously. i just was ignoring my true identity, being a butch lesbian woman. it's so sad that i felt the need to repress myself like this, it breaks my own heart to think about it. but i did repress myself. i was soooo cruel to myself and was bigoted towards myself. but never again. never again!!! nope sir!!!

another thing -- i think i also used having a trans/nonbinary identity as a way to have an excuse to go no-contact with my abusive family. i was told they were bigots for being vaguely supportive but confused about trans stuff and struggling with the vocabulary and sudden identity discourse, asking embarrassing questions (that i had no answers for bc i wasn’t actually trans but ofc real trans people would) when i told them i was a boy so i get to use that as a reason not to talk to them. bc otherwise they just would never leave me alone. at least that’s how i rationalized it lol. so yeah. here i am. a complete doofus, with very little bit of stubble coming out of my chin that i have to shave daily. and a slightly transmasc-typical voice. i completely blew it, i repressed being a lesbian soooo deeply even though my family wasn't even that homophobic, all things considered, so i definitely could've lived as my true self. i was just ashamed and stubborn and believed all the things in the media and from homophobes. and thought ppl would be scared of me bc the only other lesbian in school was a creep. idk. it's all so embarrassing. but there ya go.

#lay text #my journey #detrans #detransition #radfem #gender critical #ok to rb

[frecklystars]

I’m so sad I won’t be able to watch the Oscars until I’m home from my trip in the third week of March ☠️ the whole world would have seen I’m Just Ken by then and I’ll be left behind 😭😭

And it’s not just “wah im gonna miss a show” bc I don’t rly care about the show itself necessarily. This is my main F/O and I won’t be able to see him but other ppl will. I have felt so disconnected from Ken. I’ve gotten a handful of inbox messages where ppl say “oh i have him call ME his sweet girl now because of your comic” or ppl will tag my ship art with Ken as “oh that’s ME and Ken” and it hurts. I’ve said multiple times I’m not comfortable sharing F/Os but ppl just? Don’t care?? My self insert isn’t somebody for you to project onto, holy shit why is that so hard for some ppl to comprehend

Now when he calls me sweet girl in my fics/drawings I don’t feel anything anymore, I’ve tried making comics and I feel absolutely nothing from him, it doesn’t feel special anymore bc so many people keep self projecting onto my self insert as if she were an “x reader” experience. I’ve felt disconnected from Ken for a couple of weeks now and I’ve been trying so hard to feel good with him again but I can’t. I’m so numb. I don’t want to lose him and the fact that the self shippers who openly project onto my stuff will see him singing live, but I won’t, feels like another major step backwards away from him, if that makes sense. My ship with him doesn’t feel special anymore. I need these characters so badly, I don’t have anybody else if I don’t have my Ryan F/Os and I don’t want to go back to months ago when I had absolutely nothing to hold onto and I was fighting every day just to stay alive. I’ve had special interests completely ripped from me due to abuse and I can’t go back to feeling as bad as I did last year, I had never felt worse and I’m so scared of feeling that way again. I need my F/Os I need Ken and I’m so far away from him now I don’t feel his love for me anymore and it’s terrifying bc last year was the worst year of my entire life and I don’t want to go through my flashbacks and nightmares all by myself, I don’t want to go back to constantly planning my own demise when my trauma was so fresh and I had nothing to comfort me. I jolted awake from more ptsd nightmares today, which has been nearly an everyday ordeal for a year, and I wanted to think of Ken comforting me like I usually do but I didn’t have the heart to do so. I feel so unloved and replaceable the way ppl easily replace my S/I in all of my posts, I don’t believe he’d care for me anymore.

I keep having meltdowns bc the thought of losing F/Os all over again during a time when I’m STILL in such an unsafe situation shakes me up so bad and I don’t know how to solve this problem. I need him with me I need comfort from these characters but I don’t feel connected with them anymore bc I’ve associated them with a dozen other people. At this point I’m not really upset about missing Im Just Ken, im upset about the fact i just feel nothing whatsoever and watching that live could have helped a little but I won’t be able to access it until other people have already seen it, and it won’t feel special anymore. And my ship with him just in general doesn’t feel special anymore, none of them do, and I’m scared and devastated and I don’t know how to fix it

#vent #whatever I’ll just cry about it and delete this later #I don’t want to fucking hard block every self shipper who dumps their tags onto my posts but god. you just don’t do that!!! #it’s common courtesy!!! i can’t share f/os I’m fucking sorry I can’t bc then I’m gonna lose them!!!! and I lost *everything* last year #I can’t lose Ken too but I’m scared I already did #and I want to go offline but I can’t I have to do commissions 😭 because I’m broke asf I can’t afford groceries #I wanna rip my hair out #ppl who didnt follow me last year + didn’t see how bad I was doing May-July have no idea #‘I wanted to die I felt so bad I was unsafe and stalked’ is a fucking understatement and I lost F/Os who were so important to me #and the idea of losing Barbie/Ken scares me to death #I don’t want to go back to feeling as horrible as I was 7 months ago I can’t do it. i can’t do it but I feel him slipping from me #and I wouldn’t if ppl just!!! would stop!!!! tagging my OWN ART as their self ship!!! tagging my stuff as theirs!!! #putting ship tags all over my own posts that are personal to me my god please I’m so tired

[lunatic-fandom-space]

I just finished season 4 and unlike with the others I didnt have a whole lot to say as a was watching, mainly because I was actually enjoying myself and thought the season was mostly really good ? absolutely wild. Nevertheless I have some thoughts

I LOVE Alya and Marinette working together, its a delight. When I talk about "man can you imagine if MLB did like a magical girl show and focused on female friendships instead of catfighting" THIS is what Im talking about!! And Idgaf about how this affects the Love Square at this point, this is all Ive wanted! Also, I feel like Alya and Nino knowing each others identities cheapens the Love Square conflict more than anything but I cant fully articulate why so I'll just leave it at that

The Love Square is in a very strange place where, when the identity reveal finally does happen, its simultaneously going to feel like its too little too late (a la the destiel confession bc this fucking show is just straight queerbaiting) and rushed because like. what kind of development is there between these two. They barely focused on romance this season (which is definitely part of why I think its better lol) but I dont mean that in the sense that we had less catfights and Marinette making a fool of herself for no reason, I mean that in the sense that it barely felt like they interacted at all, atleast to me so thats kinda odd

In the past Ive complained about how the civillian plotline usually feels very disconnected from the superhero/akuma plotline and I think theyve done a much better job, my favorite episode of the season is probably Qilin both for tying the akuma into the civillian plot and for having a somewhat unique conflict resolution. In general, I liked that we had people rejecting akumas as well as preventative measures in form of the charms, although I do think it sucks that a few episodes afterwards Shadowmoth just figures out a way to circumvent them and then its back to business as usual. I feel like a better workaround would be that the charms can only protect you from one akumatization each, so like, the charm Ladybug gave her grandfather in Simpleman can only protect him from becoming Simpleman again, but if he turns into Bakerix, she needs to give him a different charm. But I do find the charms cute

The new heroes all suck tbh, the only design I liked was Purple Tigress and Pigella came close to looking kinda good but then they made it this intensely unflattering shade of pink, which I find impressive because Rose is already wearing an completely different intensely unflattering shade of pink in her civillian form. One thing that I appreciated about whatever Mylenes superhero form is called, Pigella and Purple Tigress is that they had more justifiable reasons for Ladybug to pick them than most of the heroes in the last season, who were mostly just picked because They Were There ig. And then Penealteam rolled around and we were back to doing exactls that kind of bullshit. great.

Also, Ive already talked about this in a seperate post, but if they absolutely insisted on looking for a replacement for the Bee, it shouldve been Sabrina and they shouldntve invented a whole new character for it

Adrien got a little more focus this season and we actually got some insight into his character when hes not either The Object Of Marinettes Idolization or Ladybugs Punny Sidekick Thats Slowly Becoming Obsolete which I enjoyed because he has a lot of potential from a dramatic standpoint what with being Hawkmoths son and all, but hes usually so bland that I dont really care too much so this was pretty nice. And it only took us 4 seasons for him to get some focus, yknow, the other superhero in the title? Well better late than never I guess

Speaking of Adrien, Ive made quite a few posts where I said that this season would be ruined for me the second the Sentiadrien reveal happens but it never did, we're getting that in season 5 and I am not looking forward it especially considering the small taste Ive already gotten of it with Adrien being very obviously controlled by that ring. Like, I'll probably talk about it in more detail when it gets fleshed out in the show but for now I'll just say it doesnt make the stakes higher like the writers seem to think, it make the story wayyyy less interesting and it feels like its supposed to be an explanation for Adriens behaviour towards his father when we absolutely do not need one beyond "hes being abused"

I know I said that I thought this season was really good and now Im just just complaining mostly like I always do but idk, Im not as good at formulating my positive thoughts as my negative ones. The last thing I'll say is that I loved Scarabella and I loved her design and I loved the whole episode she was in, as well as the entirety of Sentibubbler, Alya really served this season

Thats it, thanks for reading :D

#miraculous ladybug #miraculous ladybug salt #miraculous ladybug crit

[unethicalexperiments]

SOOOOO this post has been in my drafts since i watched it, so i think dec 18-19-ish? and has been (mostly) unedited since so these are still my immediate reactions.

okkkkk actual archer post now. spoilers for the entire show and into the cold under the cut

i think the ending was like. i don’t wanna say “cop out” but, kind of out of left field? it felt very disconnected from the seasons leading up to it but i honestly can’t say i’m mad about it because i don’t think the post coma seasons were very good comparatively speaking to seasons 1-5. yes i know adam reed stopped writing for the show during/after season 10. i know he got tired of the setup after season 4 and that’s why we got that mess that was seasons 5-10 which was VERY up and down in terms of writing. i do, overall, like the ending and i don't think they really could have gone in another direction.

the agency was always going to have to be shut down. we’ve known since season 2 there were issues with keeping ISIS afloat, so i don’t think people really should have been surprised by that. i do appreciate that lana got the top job in the end, i don’t think archer himself would have enjoyed that job. her whole post-coma storyline with the other man i never really cared for, like yeah it does make sense for her to move on, especially with her young daughter, but robert was absolutely not the type of man lana would have been with and i thought that was bad writing. creating conflict and a solution (him being a billionaire) for the sake of creating conflict and a solution. i’m glad that ended when it did but it shouldn’t have been there in the first place imo lmao. i also want to say that while i’m not against the idea of lana and archer having a baby, i think they were destined to have some permanent tie in some way, but the way the show went about it was god awful. lana taking archer’s sperm from a bank gave fans another reason to hate the one black woman in the show, and then to give aj little to no screen time or story line after made it all feel like it was all just there to make people hate lana more. but also, what the fuck are you gonna do with a baby in a show about spies? it should have been saved for the end of the show and again i feel like this was adam reed just trying to get out of writing spy stuff (which he said regularly in interviews he grew tired of it, which, fair, but come on).

throughout the entire show pam’s character has changed so fucking much but she remained relatively consistent with regards to who she is as a person throughout. from very early on (at least season 2 if not 1) we’re shown how physically strong she is and how she actually makes a good agent. there were weird things thrown in about her personal life that i found very inconsistent with regards to her romantic/sexual relationships though. our first look into pam’s sex life is… very uncomfortable to say the least. she’s written as a sexual predator and commits assault on screen at least once in the early seasons for a “haha sexual assault is funny” moment that is never brought up again. on top of that, we’re also introduced to her being “undesirable” sexually which very quickly changes to “she fucks and she fucks WELL”. we’ve also known from the start she’s bisexual as she comes onto lana like episode 3, but then there’s a random moment in season 11 or 12 or whatever of her asking a random one off character to “be her polyamorous primary” and then this is never seen or talked about again and it feels like diversity for the sake of “oh look at us we have diversity” which i fucking hate. she’s a woman who fucks well and often and forced moments like that feel forced. sorry.

i do not actively participate in archer “fandom” bc let’s be real there isn’t really one lol HOWEVER the way other fans talk about cyril is fucking bizarre to me. ppl on here act like hes "uwu innocent cinnamon roll baby" when he's just as complicit as everyone else. we know he’s not a very good person from the start and that has been consistent throughout the show. i really don’t have much to say about him here he’s always been a pathetic character (and that voice actor whose name i can never remember is very good at those types, i really like him in what i've seen) and the kinda guy who is always going “but what about meeeee?!” and i think his personality brought a nice balance to the gigantic egos he shared the room with, as he still has a giant ego but he can’t really voice it, and he turns kind of incel-y because of it. i really enjoyed that about him, he was shitty in a different way, y'know? i will say the finale was kind of weird with him, i keep going back and forth on whether or not i like him not really getting a clear ending.

now to talk about cheryl. this has to be one of the most bizarre character story arcs of all time. she goes from a timid secretary who wants to fuck archer to a billionaire with (and i hate this word but i cannot think of a better one atm) psychopathic behavior causing destruction for the sake of causing destruction. she has this really interesting and crazy backstory that we first hear about in season 2 that develops over time, but starting like, season 5/6ish, it’s a slow flanderization of her character from a kind of hidden evil who is smarter than she lets on to a total idiot who likes to set things on fire. and oh! look at that she hears voices sometimes too! haha isn't psychosis funny! aren't people with psychosis terrible and evil? isn't that funny? anyway. this gets SIGNIFICANTLY worse post coma (same with krieger, i’ll get to that later) to basically someone who shouldn’t be outside of a hospital. it was really disappointing and even in the finale a few characters outright say “has she gotten worse?” pointing out in universe the flanderization (or possibly intentional writing?) which just feels shitty. also, her being a country music star for one season and then outright forgetting about it the next (explicitly said in the show she has no memory of it!) is just bad writing.

as for krieger, i feel very much the same way as i do about cheryl. he started off as a weird, kinda background character who turns out to be this mad scientist with ties to malory since childhood. some of his inventions are successful, some aren’t, but he did actually do stuff. as the show went on (post season 4) you also start to notice the degradation of his character like with cheryl, turning him into a bumbling idiot. he got a moment of his old self in the finale which was nice, and the little nod to him and cheryl possibly working together after was fun, but it’s no where near enough to make up for the way they both were treated for the past like 10 years in the show.

as for the man himself, i think he remained the most consistent throughout the show. we see character development, but not a lot, and i think that felt realistic. he’s still an asshole, he’s still a bad person, but he’s not as bad of a person anymore. i think he truly did remain the same character from the pilot to the finale. there were some moments in seasons 12-14 where i felt like he was getting more.. childish? almost? but the finale was him through and through. he always loved lana, he always loved katya, he always loved his daughter. i don’t think lana/archer could ever really be a viable endgame. we’ve seen them try, but they really shine as people, as parents, and as professionals when they have that cat-mouse dynamic and i think it was a good mirror to malory and nikolai from seasons 1/2. another thing, i know he said he didn’t care who his father was, but FUCK i wanted to know! i’m choosing to believe it was nikolai because adam reed had said that at one point that was the plan.

i also just realized i forgot to talk about zara completely. zara felt like, in ds9 when jadzia was killed because her actress had enough of rick berman, but they had one more season to do so they tossed ezri in there for the sake of having someone fill the spot. since malory was gone, lana took her spot, and zara was created to fit lana’s spot. i feel the same way about her as i do ezri dax, which is i really don’t care. sorry LMFAO. i understand why she was there but she didn’t add anything to the show to me.

now the finale itself. the whole “one last mission” thing was nice, it wasn’t mind blowing or anything but it was fine. i will say, i never felt like slater was archer’s real rival, i always felt like (pre coma seasons at least) it was barry. i think the ending of archer vs. barry would have been better but that’s just me. i think they fucked up a little going the route of making them friends in the end. and the whole both katya and barry being in the same cyborg body for some reason felt very weird and last minute, katya and barry didn’t end their relationship on good terms lol. AND THEN. archer having sex with the barry-katya hybrid caught me SO off guard. don’t get me wrong! i’m glad they put that in there but it was very 👁️👄👁️. unexpected to say the least lmfao was nice to confirm his bisexuality though? i guess?

while the finale covered a lot of recurring and repeat characters and storylines, i feel like there were some BIG ones that were left out. like, what the fuck ever happened with veronica dean?? the woman who shot archer, the reason he was in a coma for 3 years?? they mentioned her ONCE in season 11 in an off handed comment that “they were still looking for her”. ok so did they find her?? maybe it’s because i didn’t think the recent seasons were that great, but i thought the finale being centered around a fabian (was that his name? i genuinely don’t remember i’m not watching or reading wikipedia or anything while writing) storyline felt kinda lame too. whenever malory had something going on with a rival agency it felt fun but the whole IIA thing was incredibly boring to me. unfortunately no one could ever compare to malory's character in her terrible diva ways that i could never get enough of. and of course no one could do it besides jessica walter.

another thing is a nod to other early season stuff would have been nice. save for barry and katya, it was all post season 5. like woodhouse. or even a one off line about popeye. what about len trexler. rona thorne? was she ever mentioned again? they were relevant in the early seasons! idk. though i do wonder if we're better off without it, maybe the new writers would have fucked it up too much. the new writers probably don't even know who those characters were fghjfkdsgf. in short i feel like the ending forgot a lot about the beginning, and i think most fans would have enjoyed being reminded of the beginning.

anywayyyyyy this was long and ramble-y and probably incoherent but there we have it. after 14 years there goes my favorite stupid little show of all time. seasons 1-4 i can rewatch infinite times (and i'm not kidding when i say i've watched each episode no less than 30 times either actually fully paying attention or as background noise and somewhat paying attention) and will never get tired of. i enjoy season 5 and some of season 6. from there its a very mixed bag and i find it a little disappointing that a show that started off that strong went out kinda weak. i think i personally would have preferred the show ended after season 5 but i know that is not my choice to make. i don't even think they're (the later seasons) that bad, but they could have been so much better. in terms of adult animation this is still the one. and i don't even think i ever said anything about how much i always loved the art style. in the end, it will continue to hold a special place in my heart and be a shitty comfort show and i'm ok with that <3

#talking to myself #archer #archer fx #there. finally!

[goodfully]

oh goodness, okay i just finished reading steppenwolf and i just have so many thoughts flying through my head...!!!

okay first of all, it was written in this sort of... endless prose, stream of consciousness way? so it was a bit difficult to read through. but!!! i do love books that feel like a very long train of thought, if that makes sense. it was a whole lot of stuff without pause, and i dont think the actual message of the book clicked until the very end of it (ofc i could also be misinterpreting! but this was just what i got out of it).

hghfjg anyway. it made all the sense the moment i got to the part where mozart was telling harry that what was required of him was "to live and to learn to laugh". if he hadnt said this twice on the same page, i might have not gotten it (i wish i was big brained). ahhghhh thats it!!!!! thats all!!!!!! oh god. learn to let go, learn to not take everything so seriously, learn to take it easy... oh my goodness, literally learn to live laugh love. "how can you say that youve raken any trouble to live when you wont even dance?" maybe its bc i know i tend to live more in my head than i do in real life, but i really appreciated the book.

ngl im a bit confused at whether everything we've read about harry and his self torment and torture and existential crises in the book was really just an illusion or a dream, just like the magic theatre was. like everything we know of harry and what we learned of him could just be something all in harrys head. i think thats what pablo meant by harry misusing the magic theatre and confounding it with reality. the magic theatre, like our mind or subconscious, is... just there. and letting it overwhelm and overshadow our reality... i think that was what harry realized at the very end of the book. that the source of all his pain and suffering was in him all along, not bc of his disconnection from society (and the very upsetting need to participate in that society in order to survive), and he accepts trying over and over to understand himself. most of the book was of how harry felt alienated from mainstream society. but the world could be rearranged in so many ways and so many times, and youll still be you. learn the limitations you put on yourself and... dont be afraid ig.

thats the other big thing from the book, like not to be afraid of yourself and the countless number of selves you have. ive yet to read more of hesse's works, but i think this theme of the multiplicity of the self or how we all have multiple souls is present in a lot of his books. harry was so focused on the two "souls" of his, that were violently against each other. the constant resisting and suppressing of the self isnt ever healthy, and at least i think this book was trying to get at saying to allow yourself to do what you want to do and not be afraid of intensity or of the extremes.

agrhr okay, actually as i read through the book, i was reminded so much of 18-20 year old me. they would have related a lot to harry i think.. haha... its a little frustrating, and honestly emotionally tiring, but i suppose its at least nice knowing ive somewhat grown in the more recent years. it might have just been bc of the circumstances at the time, but agh i lived and thought so much like harry and thought i really knew everything, that life was meaningless and loveless, that id always be doomed to be imprisoned in my flesh, forever empty and unbelonging anywhere as long as i was alive. its embarrassing thinking about it now, how angry i was at the world for how corrupt and unlivable it was and at myself for being too scared to die, despite how badly i wanted to kms. i thought i could never feel at home in reality, and hhh harry saying something about having "an intense longing sometimes to turn to and do something real for once, to be srsly and responsibly active instead of occupying myself forever with nothing but esthetics and intellectual and artistic pursuits." ahghhfh screams i am not harry haller!!!!! but my god, i was, and i was so insufferable.

oh this was very early on in the book but that one paragraph in the treatise about suicides??? "those souls that found the aim of life not in the perfecting and molding of the self, but in liberating themselves by going back to the mother, back to god, back to the all... for they see death and not life as the releaser. they are ready to cast themselves away in surrender and to be extinguished and to go back to the beginning." ahhhghh!!!!!! bashing my head into a wall, why would you say that!!!!!! hesse why are you in my brain hhh

this is pretty insignificant but with how much harry idolized mozart throughout the book, my love for classical music has been rekindled and im honestly having such a good time relistening to my favorite chopin ballades and ahhhhhh!!!!!!!!

alright i think ill end here... ive really enjoyed all the books by hesse that ive read so far (besides steppenwolf, just demian and siddhartha so far) and i really hope ill find a copy of narcissus and goldmund someday!!! honestly i think that anytime now i think "uhm well lol! maybe ill just go kms!" after a minor inconvenience, i will probably suddenly remember steppenwolf hahaha

#finished reading #steppenwolf

[arispensieve]

Behold the grand examining-of-own-feelings-about-everything, in which it is in fact all about me! 

that was a weird experience and I am not sure I have had so many feelings at once about anything ever. 

Honored to be there. Kind of delighted with the newness, and the sort of raw intensity that I absolutely had not been expecting. Had no reason to have expectations but thought it would be more chill, ironically. Am not at all unhappy about it not being as such. 

Ashamed of leaving. Immense dislike of John. 

Immense respect for Paul. Lots of respect for Piper too, honestly. 

I think it snapped me directly into caretaking mode and that was... not optimal, considering that I was supposed to be in sitting and observing and helping mode, and that sort of jarring disconnect was harder to deal with. 

I’m like a weird monkey, I have to know who’s in charge at all moments and what the hierarchy is otherwise i start wanting to bite things. 

Piper was really sweet. And I think my presence made her happy, she just sort of took my hand and put it back in her hair and went “thank you ari. You are the listener you are so good at listening” and I was like well somebody better fucking do it around here JOHN but it still made me happy to think I could, you know. In some way make things better with my presence. 

So why did I leave then? Because I was fucking panicking and I knew if I pushed any harder I just... would probably break my head a bit more than I needed. It already took like 4 and a half hours to get home and I felt like dying the whole time. 

On the one hand, it was selfish. On the other, we had talked about it before and she had fully explained that Paul or I could leave at any time, so it feels disrespectful to her wishes to even feel bad about it. On the other other hand, that sort of you can leave whenever is, whenever I do it, based in exclusively moral values? As in, it matters most to me that this is a situation in which people can do whatever they need and leave whenever, but that is separate from my own feelings about the matter, which may in fact be don’t abandon me -_- 

And yes, morally speaking, those feelings would be mine to manage. Also, they probably don’t actually exist in Piper, or if they do I have no way of knowing and am making shit up. I still don’t want to inflict them on Piper. At all. So when I left I asked if there was anything she needed or anything else I could do before I left and then I felt awful about it. 

I didn’t want to. I said later that I didn’t leave bc I wanted to but am afraid that came off weird to her, I’ve heard her complain sort of about similar things with Rachel. I didn’t, though, and much of my drive home was sheer fucking rage that more of life is being taken from me by this stupid fucking panic. That yeah, if I had stayed and pushed through I would have felt even worse, but who cares when pretty much all I wanted was to stay?? 

but yeah. Caretaking Mode combined with John Shut Up Oh My GOD had me sort of like no one is fucking even listening to piper besides me and she’s the one trying to do this on 250 mg mdma and a bunch of fancy time capsule lsd >:( and I was like Let’s Do As Much As We Can Until We Just Remove Ourselves From This Situation (and I was straight up having an unrelated panic attack and, on the selfless end I didn’t want piper to notice and ruin it for her, and on the selfish end, didn’t want john or paul to notice and form any opinion about it at all, as well as everything I explained above) 

I also worry though bc I babbled out a “take good care of her what am I saying of course you will” to paul and I don’t want paul thinking i’m like. too attached to his partner. Which 1) she is her own person and 2) I am, but not in the romantic/sexual sense (that I know of, at least. I stopped and thought about this for a while just to be sure. I think I am honestly too young/not mature enough for her in many ways, lacking life experience, and also she is not quite at the emotional attentiveness level I would need, and the way she treats Rachel scares me. And also, no jealousy.) 

(Jealousy is a good indicator of that kind of thing for me. Like I was furiously jealous of rene and em getting together when they did, which was well before I consciously knew I had romantic feelings for em. Or I knew I was getting too many feelings for grace and needed to step back when they were like man i need to find other fun sadists to hook up with around boston and I was internally like But Why Not Me? What About Only Me? (even though the very logical reason for that is I live 2 hours away and they can’t drive, and also why would it be only me, I have nothing especially unusual to offer.) (That was before november of 2021 and all of that, I’m not sure I could have romantic feelings for grace anymore, but that’s completely digressing again.) Anyway, Jealousy is easily controlled and I don’t act out of it I hope, but it’s definitely and uniformly present when I have romantic feelings towards people. And I feel no jealousy towards any of piper’s partners. I like Paul a lot, especially after this experience. Ts is cool. Daniel I barely know but like from what I do know of him, Waket (despite being disliked by Piper/objectively knowing he’s a flake) I find to be a chill guy and a fun conversationalist and we drove around in my car which was nice. I wish Piper would be nicer to Rachel and wish Rachel would be nicer to Piper. Who am I missing? Does Sian count? Not jealous of her either. Oh, right, Steve. Sorry, Steve, not jealous of you either and didn’t mean to forget about you.) 

Anyway, all of this to say that to the best of my considerable self-knowledge, I do not have more-than-neutral romantic/sexual feelings towards Piper. She just tripped the caretaker mode really really hard which is not a side I’m comfortable showing to people like fucking John, and am back and forth about showing to Paul not because of a lack of trust but because (especially after dealing with Bee and that sort of subtle retaliation/othering if I seemed too close to Jo) I don’t want him to get the wrong idea. 

I accidentally showed him that I love and care about Piper. Which should not be that big of a deal. I do love and care about Piper. That much is kind of common knowledge to me. 

I hope it was shown to her too, but worry that I failed at doing that by leaving. Fucking hell. 

[bananagreste]

cheetahgirl-studios replied to your post:

Ah. You mean the Season 3 finale don’t you?

Oh, if only it’s just the season finale. 🙄

#i wrote a longer response but i'm like 'why bother?' #i still find it hard to believe S2 and S3 are written together #bc you thought it would make sense as a whole but it felt more disconnected? #so knowing S4 and S5 are written together does not give me a lot of confidence

[ry0chann]

my heart is full (yours is running out)

pairing // Doppo Kunikida x gn!reader

genre // angst

wc. // 1147

warnings // idk it’s kinda sad pfft, minor gaslighting (?)

summary // Kunikida is beginning to lose himself to the one thing you both never thought would betray him; his Ideals. Unfortunately for you, it's hindering your relationship.

notes // am i continuing to procrastinate writing smut by writing angst?? yes i am. also giving in to the whole "corrupted Kunikida" thing bc i felt that it was fitting for this, so it's probably ooc. and i feel like i might've changed my original concept half way through, but hopefully this still flows nicely

(fic loosely inspired by i loved you first by joan)

He had grown distant, and while it'd make sense for you to assume that was because of you, it wasn't. Even his demeanor was different; it was seemingly cold, where normally it was anything but. It was almost as if his priorities had changed. His world- which once revolved around you- no longer had you in the picture at all. You didn't even think this was possible; him, essentially leaving you behind to focus on himself.

The day you hoped would never come had made its appearance much sooner than you would've liked. Perhaps it was inevitable, yet you didn't want to accept that fact. To end things completely would hurt too much, you knew that much, but wasn't that your only option at this point?

Things were so good, perfect even; like something out of a movie. And yet, here you were, standing before the one person you thought you'd be with forever, explaining why your initial intention was no longer the plan.

Kunikida stood there wearing a blank expression, not giving away any of his internal thoughts or feelings. Your eyes were already glassy and you hadn't even said anything yet. You knew that as soon as you opened your mouth, the tears would fall. Trying to spit out what you wanted to say couldn't have been more difficult.

You sigh shakily, keeping your voice at a volume only he could hear.

"Kida, I-I feel like I'm losing you..." you take another deep breath, trying to avoid crying. "Please tell me I'm not. I have to hear you say it."

Pushing his glasses up with a finger, he sighs, "You're not."

That was a lie. Maybe he thought it wasn't though. Could he really be that blind to his own behavior?

"Kunikida... I am." you say in a trembling voice. "I'm standing right in front of you yet it's like you don't even see me. You're telling me you haven't noticed how disconnected you've been?"

He rolls his eyes with a scoff, "You've lost your head y/n. I've just been busy, is all."

That was always his excuse; He was always "busy" nowadays. Kunikida was always caught up with work, and if it wasn't that, then he'd be perfecting his Ideals. He had said a while back that he planned to "change the world for the better," and that he was the only one capable of completing such a task. It sounded too spontaneous, too unachievable, but Kunikida was anything but undetermined. He'd work towards reaching this goal no matter what, even if that meant leaving you behind.

You wanted to support him but he barely gave you the light of day anymore. Sure, "busy" would be an acceptable term to describe his recent behavior, but it didn't justify him paying you no mind. Kunikida's always put you first, yet recently even the thought of you was on the back burner. For him to not realize that was heartbreaking.

The tears that swelled in your eyes were threatening to fall the second you blinked. Your throat felt scratchy and your heart physically hurt. You take a step towards him, grabbing his hands and holding them tightly.

"Kida, I need you, more than words can describe. I don't think I have it in me to leave you."

His voice maintains that flat tone as he speaks, "So stay. No one's telling you to go anywhere y/n."

Pain-induced water droplets begin to roll down your slightly flushed cheeks, and your voice breaks as you respond to his statement.

"I can't..."

Kunikida stares at you a moment, trying to get a grasp on why you were so upset. He was genuinely at a loss. He lets go of your hands and cups your cheeks, wiping your tears with his thumbs.

"Don't cry my love. It'll be alright. Nothing's changed, and everything that will, will be for the better."

His words were anything but reassuring. It wouldn't be alright, and what was changing wouldn't be for the greater good. Your relationship was falling apart before your eyes and he was completely oblivious to it. It'd only hurt you to stick around and watch him slip further into madness. Of course, you'd feel bad for not trying to help him, but at this point, that was impossible. If he couldn't even realize something was wrong, you'd get nowhere trying to fix it.

"Kunikida I can't do this anymore." you whisper, your words getting caught in your throat. "I'm sorry, I really really am, but you're so different now, a-and there's nothing I can do about it."

You take hold of his hands, bringing them back down to his sides. For the first time all day, he appeared upset. Behind his stoic expression, there was pain- you didn't even think he was capable of feeling that anymore. That subtle look was enough to make you second-guess yourself.

Kunikida simply nods in agreement, which didn't help the tears streaming down your face.

"I understand."

That was all he said, he didn't even bother trying to fight for you. Maybe he finally realized how far gone he was.

"So that's it then? You're not even gonna try to get me to stay?" you ask in a quivering voice.

He shakes his head, "I'm not going to coerce you y/n. It's your decision, not mine."

You weren't ready to say goodbye to him yet, it felt too soon. You didn't think it'd be this easy for him, but maybe he just didn't wanna be upset in front of you. Suddenly you felt confused about what to do. Desperately, you wanted to stick around, to at least try and snap him out of this corrupted trance he was in. However, you knew that it'd only hurt you to stay and watch his downfall. You stand there at a loss for words, stomach hurting and heart breaking.

Kunikida caressed your cheek, softly placing a kiss on your forehead.

"I love you y/n, I promise. But I respect your decision."

You couldn't keep yourself from sobbing, your head falling into his chest as your arms secure themselves around his body. Yes, it was your decision to end things, but that didn't mean you actually wanted to. He may have been blind to his own behaviors, but his feelings for you never changed, no matter how distant he had become. Deep down, he did love you, and that's why he was letting you go.

If only you hadn't come to that conclusion so late, then maybe things could've ended differently, or not at all. Instead, you'd leave feeling regretful and guilty for ending things. Maybe you had it all wrong; it was all a misconception. Perhaps he was the one losing you, rather than it being the other way around like you initially assumed. Unfortunate that you'd never know now.

[ @requiem626k ]

#[ one shots ] #bungo stray dogs #bsd #doppo kunikida #bungo stray dogs x reader #bsd x reader #kunikida x reader

[embraceyourdestiny]

Found more of my observations so part two. Again, it’s rambley so it might not make sense. Also the beginning (1-5ish) is mostly the same as the first post.

Part one

me noticing things and speculating while watching all of roxas’ cutscenes bc i love my boy

1). Sora and Roxas’ “Where am I? Who’s there? Who are you?” I literally never realized that was the two of them having a conversation inside Roxas’ heart and from what I can recall I think that’s the only time “heart talks” canonically happen? I know it’s a really big thing in the fandom but I can’t remember a single other time that two people in one heart/body actually talked to each other and not one of them inside calling out. Although, you can probably count all the times Kairi made comments in KH1, like in Merlin’s house and such

2). The parallels between Roxas, Roxas’ life in the Org, and Ven’s time at the Land of Departure via people telling them the things they are experiencing weren’t happening. It’s probably done so intentionally with Roxas and his Org life but it still makes you draw an immediate connection between Ventus. Both of them were experiencing strange things and yet those around them told them they weren’t, either intentionally or because they didn’t think it was true, and in the end it lead them down the path those manipulating them wanted to go down and resulted in their demise.

2.5). Side note since this was specially about when Roxas tripped, the fact that Riku jacked Roxas for on the surface no reason at all is still hilarious. Like yeah you could say it was to cause turmoil and doubt within Roxas or to stop him from leaving the data world via train (if that was even possible) or even because DiZ just couldn’t make a whole beach area with everything that was going on, especially if that beach was Destiny Islands because remembering what happened to Xion when she went, it definitely would’ve messed things up, but it’s a lot funnier to think that Riku wanted to talk to him and also was like “you know what, fuck this kid I’m taking his money” lmaoo

3). Why do the twilight gang eat sea salt ice cream?? Obviously it’s because of Roxas, but with his precious memories missing I don’t think he would’ve noticed if they didn’t without being prompted. Sure, deep down it would’ve probably felt wrong to him to not do “the things friends do” with his friends, but since he had no recollection of it, I don’t think it would’ve mattered. Did DiZ intentionally program this? He had to of, which at first seems uncharacteristically kind of him, but I came to the conclusion that it was probably just a way to mess with Roxas even more and get him to do his bidding. Like I said, without prompting Roxas probably never would’ve noticed, but with prompting, suddenly the things he supposedly did all the time feel wrong. And if that’s wrong, why would he not question the rest of what’s happening, leading him to the end result of finding out the truth and returning to Sora? I could totally be BSing right now but DiZ is insidious, so I think it makes sense lol.

4). Roxas had an airplane in his room while Sora had a pirate ship. Besides obvious parallels between Sora and Roxas and sky and sea, is it possibly because Ven had his glider and could fly around and since Roxas had a part of him in his heart, that passed on to him? It makes me wonder how much of his room was his genuine interests/subconscious thought and how much of it was DiZ’s programming because there’s no way he could’ve known about that right?

5). Roxas sitting a considerable distance between him and the gang, not only showing his disconnect from his “life” in twilight town but his disconnect from his actual life in general, and possibly even from Sora. Visual symbolism is so powerful!!

6). I have to wonder how much of this “data” twilight town is actually data and how much of it is real. “Data” is honestly quite vague in KH but there’s no way DiZ was able to make all of this from scratch right? Why would he even, considering how much work that is? He had to have some how been able to use part of the source and I feel like this is backed by the relationships between the characters. DiZ is... an unsociable personal, to say the least. I do not trust his ability to portray genuine, realistic relationships between people and be as convincing as it is to Roxas and the player and a good example is the shopping scene with Pence and Olette. When Pence says “he’s stalling...” it sounds as if Roxas has done this before. And when Olette responds with a teasing voice that she’ll see him later, it sounds genuine and knowing, like this is just same old Roxas. It could just be good voice acting lol, and we know that “same old Roxas” isn’t possible since it isn’t real, but what if it was? What if there was a piece of their hearts in the data and their hearts had been able to bond in that miniscule amount of time and play out as it would if they were actually friends? There’s no way DiZ could’ve gotten the dynamics down so well like that, not with Seipher’s gang and the twilight gang, and not with Hayner, Roxas, Pence, and Olette themselves. And it’s even more obvious when you remember that the Org was meddling, sending in Dusks to find Roxas. There’s no way DiZ was able to make up the whole stolen pictures thing because he didn’t want the Org to mess with it. Sure, he knew they’d come and he planted data to get them off the trail, but between all that chaos I really can’t see him bothering making tensions between Seipher and the gang and making the town suspect them, it seems too natural to be made up data. He had to have some how take either their hearts or the entire town and everything in it’s essence and put it into data. How, I have no clue, but it doesn’t make sense otherwise. So, if their hearts of essence was sampled, even a little bit, of course they felt a connection to Roxas (and Sora) even though none of it was real. The heart is a powerful and mysterious thing and I don’t think that would’ve been possible if all of it was pixels and codes.

(On top of this, we know worlds are in some way sentient and can influence things on their own, so with even the smallest piece of the actual twilight town, the data twilight town could still function as normal. Everything would most likely be minute compared to the real thing, but it would still be there none the less. Time still seems to function, if it wasn’t real there wouldn’t be tournaments and the end of summer and such. DiZ was far too busy to be attentive to each and every person in Twilight Town, keep up with the in town events and flow of time, and repair Sora while stalling the Org. There’s proof of this because we can presume that KH3 twilight town is how twilight town usually is and from what I remember even when you go to the real TLTW in KH2 there are things like smoking chimneys and stuff showing it’s lived it, meaning he only sampled a small piece of it but it was still able to exist as a world even with that tiny piece. He effectively made an entire, functional world in data like the evil genius he is. This might not be that big of a revelation considering Tron, but Tron really is pixels and codes, that’s the difference. Tron is an AI who was able to grow a heart of his own, and also to some extent the CPU or whatever must’ve had one too to have that much awareness, but there’s no nature in Space Paranoids, no townspeople and school happening, so it isn’t the same. Twilight Town is a real world, even if it’s “data” and that’s just interesting because imagine what you could do with that information, in-universe or storytelling wise.

I guess this is technically touched on upon in UX because of all the data worlds but I don’t know if the fact that they were still real worlds is stressed anymore than it is in KH2, which is to say not. And data being real is definitely talked about in Recoded with Data Riku and Sora from what I remember. I haven’t seen much of UX though so I could be wrong but I feel like if it was talked about I would’ve heard about it lol.)

7). ROXAS DID VANITAS’ CARTWHEEL?? I literally never noticed this before omg so there really is a connection between them to some extent!! Of the male heart mates, Rox and Vani seem to have the least amount of attention put on them both in canon and canon which seems off to me since they’re both the “darkness” or anger particularly in Roxas’ case of their lighter halves, so I kinda doubted if there really was one but there is omg!! Now all the boys can (probably?) breakdance lol when will Xion!!!

8). It’s pretty funny that the Dusks just. Stand there and while while Roxas does his station of waking stuff. They’re like yeah we being controlled by someone else who wants to end him but we also respect him and wanna give him a fair chance lol, as evidence by them calling him their “liege” which I still don’t understand but now I’m imagining being Roxas’ pets and cuddling up to him and everyone is looking at him like O.O lol

9). Obviously I knew Roxas’ SoW heavily referenced Sora’s but I didn’t realize it also had a scene foreshadowing when they met later AND it parallels Sora’s even more by showing the “dark” side of Roxas aka his real self before he turns into the giant nobody, just like Sora’s shadow turning into Darkside, only Roxas’ happens in less than a second so it’s really fast and hard to tell

9.5). Omg I never noticed that they show us that Roxas is a nobody during this! It shows his hand, then it shows the twilight thorn. Same thing when it shows his foot than its foot that’s so cool!

10). More on “how true is this data” based on relationships!! There’s literally nothing that can convince me that DiZ would care about Roxas’ friends having drama, he’d even probably call it “drivel,” so I really can’t see him making Hayner upset that Roxas was with Seipher. They’re!! Real!!!

11). Olette saying they didn’t go to the beach because it wouldn’t be the same without Roxas hurts so bad, esp bc later when they’re talking about knowing him and stuff <//3

12). I am in so much pain over this one. I never made the connection between Roxas fighting his best friend twice, once Xion and once Hayner. No wonder he looked so uncomfortable, they made him relive one of the most horrible things that’s ever happened to him and that he’s ever had to do what the fuck 💔💔💔

13). I like the effort made to show that Roxas is friends with the whole twilight gang. It’s easy to assume he’s only really good friends with Hayner but him talking with Olette and checking out the seven wonders with Pence feels really nice and genuine

14). It makes me so sad they keep making Roxas look like a bad friend especially because he’s a GOOD friend and it’s not his fault. The pictures, losing the money, accidentally getting caught up with Seifer, losing the blue marble, none of it is his fault and thankfully the twilight gang are nice enough to not hold it over him but it still sucks like hasnt Roxas been through enough :(

15). It’s really sad we’ll never see Roxas as that somewhat happy go lucky, or at least carefree, kid he was in kh2 prologue because he never WAS that kid. He’s been through so much and his life has been so hard it’s really unfair. I hope post kh3 he can find at least some kind of peace, but he’ll probably never be that carefree again :(

16). Oh my god wait wait when Sora corrected himself form saying “the five of us— I mean, the six of us” WAS HE TALKING ABOUT ROXAS??? IM GONNA CRY 😭😭😭 I once saw someone say he meant Jiminy but as much as it sucks Jiminy isn’t that important to be included in the “gang that’s gonna save the world” and Sora seemed to say it on reflex, like he miscounted and corrected himself. He could’ve included Roxas but forgot himself, since he only just awoke when his heart was with Roxas not that long before. Omg I’m so sad and happy at the same time about this

17). Okay now I’m just watching someone play KH2 bc I wanted to see someone’s reaction to the prologue bc it’s so good but now they’re with the fairies and oh my god I never realized the mirrors in that room depict the different drive forms but specially that one explicitly mentions Sora being overcome by darkness aka Anti form?? That’s so chilling and a cool but subtle way to reveal all the drive form powers right off the back but you wouldn’t notice it til later

18). So. Roxas can double wield because he has both Sora and Ven’s hearts in him and Sora is able to double wield because when Roxas returned to him he either a). passed all his skills including double wielding to him, or b). Roxas legitimately was chosen to wield a keyblade and since we know he had a heart, when he returned to Sora Sora then also technically had two other hearts in him, granting him a second keyblade. Interesting.

19). Hmmm never realized that the samurai nobodies, which belong to Roxas, don’t appear until he goes back to Sora, almost as if they’re trying to follow their leader but then Sora keeps getting rid of them

20). Sora keeps bumping his chest with his fist just like Hayner does T^T I don’t know if that’s because Roxas actually did it or Roxas just picked up the habit from Hayner but I’m soft

#kingdom hearts #kh #og #sora kh #kh2 #kingdom hearts 2 #kingdom hearts theories #Roxas kh #twilight town gang

[holycatsandrabbits]

Tollense, an original serial romance by Dannye Chase, Chapter 1

A history professor falls in love with his best friend, a 3000-year-old vampire.

READ FROM THE BEGINNING: You are here!

NEXT

Chapter 1

1993

Professor Liam Beyer was born a decade after the deaths of the last soldiers to fight in the US Civil War. Thus, he was not expecting to meet a Union Army veteran in his 4 o’clock symposium on the Battle of Antietam.

Liam noticed the man as soon as he walked in, and not just because it was odd for a member of the public to show up for a faculty lecture at the university. No, the man caught Liam’s attention because he was distractingly handsome. Literally, Liam was distracted enough to drop his pen onto the overhead projector, causing a giant shadow to loom over the map of Maryland on the screen behind him, as if a third army had materialized there in a dense offensive line.

The man was of average height, with a slender build. He had dark hair in a short, modern cut and wore a pair of jeans and a white t-shirt with a faded label. He looked like he might be thirty, which was about the age Liam was, and so Liam did not immediately assume that the man had seen action in the Civil War. But there was something faintly strange about him, just in the way that he walked, light on his feet like a dancer, but stepping firmly, without a dancer’s well-practiced grace.

“General Lee,” Liam continued, in a slightly strangled voice, “of the Confederate Army, was, of course, outnumbered, but the battle was Union General McClellan’s to lose. Had he understood how superior his force was, had he taken more risks, he might have been able to deal a decisive blow to Lee’s army as it retreated. In fact, McClellan’s performance at Antietam was part of the reason that President Lincoln later removed him from duty.”

Liam put up a transparency of a white church with peeling paint, standing alone on a grassy rise. “On September 17, 1862, 7,650 soldiers died at Antietam, making it the bloodiest day for Americans in history. Two days later, a man named Alexander Gardner took some of the first widely-seen battlefield photographs of dead soldiers. Some were awaiting burial, and some were still lying where they fell. It was very difficult at the time to take photographs of battles themselves, as the technology involved careful treatment of glass negatives, and that was nearly impossible under battlefield conditions. But the dead do not move, and these photographs were so clear that when displayed in New York, family members recognized their fallen sons.”

Liam put up a transparency of one of Gardner’s photographs, young men lying on the ground in an oddly perfect line. The unknown man looked away.

oOo

Liam had grading to do after his symposium, but he walked to the campus union to grab a sandwich first. He was definitely not expecting Handsome Unknown Lecture Man to appear out of the crowd and drop into the seat opposite him. Liam was very proud that he did not choke on his bite of ham and swiss.

“I hope you don’t mind,” said the man. “I enjoyed your lecture. My name is Kurt.”

Liam put his hand out to shake. Kurt’s touch was faintly cold. “Liam,” he said.

Kurt cocked his head slightly to the side, as if assessing him. “I know. Liam Beyer, 27, assistant professor of history, specializing in battles. Is Antietam your favorite?”

“Um— one of them. I did my dissertation on it. On McClellan, specifically.” Liam felt slightly odd about the fact that this stranger knew who he was, but of course, it was all publicly accessible information. “Are you a Civil War buff?”

“Somewhat.” Kurt leaned back in his chair. “Antietam, god. I remember Bloody Lane— that’s what they called it after. The road was sunken in because so many wagons had gone by over the years. It was like trying to fight your way out of your own grave trench.” Kurt spoke with a faint accent that Liam could not place, something that seemed to shift from one place to another.

“You talk like you were there,” Liam said, smiling. “Are you a reenactor?”

Kurt gave a sharp laugh. “No. You?”

“I’ve been a technical advisor. It’s nice to meet other people who share my strange obsession.”

“Those pictures you showed,” Kurt said. “Photography is such a bewitching art. Those boys are long gone, but remain ever present in death.”

“You know, the war helped make Spiritualism popular,” Liam said. “It was so hard on the families back home to lose contact with their soldiers, not knowing what happened to them, or when, or where. They couldn’t bear it, and turned to mediums.”

Kurt smiled, and it made his bright green eyes sparkle with amusement. “Have you ever been to a seance?” he asked. Liam shook his head. “Most I’ve been to were quite boring,” Kurt said. “But every once in awhile—”

“That sounds like a good story.”

“I’ll tell you sometime.” Liam’s brain was already far too occupied with how attractive he found this poor man, and that was probably why the sentence sounded more like a salacious promise than it really was.

“So what do you do?” Liam asked faintly, crumpling his empty sandwich wrapper. “Are you a student?”

“Not at the moment. Just a fan of history. Of battles, actually.” Kurt leaned forward a little. “Liam, would you mind if I came to your office tomorrow to talk more? I have some questions and I think you might be the one to help me answer them.”

“I— of course.” Liam told himself that he agreed solely because he liked to talk about history with people, and that it didn’t matter whether or not said people were ridiculously attractive.

Kurt smiled at him again. “Until tomorrow then.”

On his way out of the dining hall, Liam was stopped by a student with a question about an assignment on Gettysburg. “I didn’t want to interrupt your dinner,” she said.

“Oh, it would have been fine,” Liam told her. “We were talking about the Civil War ourselves.”

The student gave him a confused look. “Dr. Beyer— weren’t you eating alone?”

oOo

In the end, Liam decided that as he’d never dreamed up a handsome man in quite so much detail before, that the student had been mistaken and simply had not noticed Kurt’s presence at Liam’s table.

And yet. There really was something very strange about the man. Liam couldn’t quite pin it down, just that there was a disconnect between what Liam was seeing and what he was feeling about him. For example, Kurt appeared to be thirty, but Liam would swear he was older. Kurt had looked perfectly natural at dinner, but it had also seemed like he didn’t quite fit in with his surroundings. Like if you’d taken a photograph of him at the table, he would have been slightly too bright, out of focus, or without a shadow.

Kurt’s knock on Liam’s office door finally came around eleven, and Liam was, he realized, far too happy to see him again. At first, nothing about the visit seemed terribly odd. They discussed Antietam again, then traveled forward to the Somme, and then much farther back, Megiddo and Kadesh. Kurt seemed to know less about those battles, Liam noted, but he was quite familiar with things taking place after Thermopylae in the 5th century BC.

It was easy to talk to Kurt, especially about interests they had in common, and as the conversation went on, Kurt seemed to relax a bit, which made Liam do the same. The day before, Liam had thought Kurt moved without grace, but that wasn’t exactly right. Kurt had a different kind of grace, a fluidity of small movements instead of large ones, an artistry shown in the fluttering of fingers while the rest of the man kept entirely still. The emphasis on such small motions seemed to draw Liam in, narrowing his focus away from his surroundings and onto his visitor. But at the same time, Kurt had such an air of other about him, that it was almost like Liam was looking at him through beveled glass, never quite getting the whole image at once.

However, Liam’s sense of ease around Kurt vanished entirely when another student knocked on Liam’s door with a question about an assignment. That in itself was perfectly normal, but during the whole time that the student was in Liam’s office, she didn’t speak to Kurt or apologize for interrupting their conversation. She didn’t give a single look to the chair that Kurt occupied beside Liam’s desk.

When the student had left, Liam leaned back in his chair, trying to fake the calmness that he no longer felt. “All right,” he said, watching his visitor carefully. “You want to tell me why I’m the only person who can see you?”

********

READ FROM THE BEGINNING: You are here!

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Updates Fridays on Ao3 and DannyeChase.com (rated E), and Tumblr (rated T)

Want to create fic, art, or other works based on this series? Please do! Just dm or tag me.

My previous serials are for Good Omens: Mr. Fell's Bookshop and Love's Endless Light

My Carrd

#Dannye writes #original fiction #serial fiction #tollense #vampires #romance

[whyjm]

Why I did not like the Spn finale

This is gonna be a long post..

I cannot get over my thoughts about how it ended and how bad I feel about it. I am so angry, sad and feel so utterly disappointed, I cannot wrap my mind around how this was supposed to be a satisfying tying up emotional archs ending??? Bc it was so far away from satisfying I would laugh if I was not presently crying over it..

There are several things that irked me a lot. Many people have voiced the problems of this show and its ending much more eloquently than I will ever be able to do.. But I gotta get these fucking thoughts and feelings out of my system.

I have been with Spn since the first episode aired. I am a straight woman, I don’t have to fight for representation, I don’t have to worry about coming out and being accepted for who I am, I don’t have the daily struggles of feeling anxious or depressed or suicidal or not being able to be who I am. I am lucky that way!

To me love is love and all love should be equal! And I stand with all who struggle and all who are not free to be who they are. I see you and I love you and I support you fully!!!

To see my friends having to fight, and then on top of that have a show that has meant so much to so many people be butchered and have a negative last message sent out, in its last 36 minutes of its life … It is a hard pill to swallow.

Cas and Dean  

In 15x18 we got to have a beautiful confession from Cas to Dean where Cas tells Dean he loves him and we know this is romantic love bc Cas begins by saying that the one thing I want I know I can’t have and then later I love you. Also Misha confirming it! This scene made me ugly cry so hard bc FINALLY.. (BUT what is missing from it.. the editing is strange.. bc Cas pushes Dean to the right but he falls to the left. Dean has no tears in his eyes while he looks straight at Cas when he talks, but he has tears in his eyes when he looks over his shoulder and see the empty. So what in this scene has been cut away and WHY?) Misha and Jensen did a great job with this and Cas got to find peace in just speaking his truth...  And it was beautiful to watch and after having seen Dean sitting sobbing on the floor the natural and logical continuation of this would have been to in the next episode address this, but in episode 19 no such thing happened. And I wondered where did Dean’s grief go where did his CARE for Cas go?? Dean who has been depressed and suicidal when Cas have died before is all of sudden cold and act like nothing have happened at least nothing that affected him very deeply.. It felt disconnected and strange. And it continued on like that and it felt very strange to NOT address such a HUGH plot point. It’s not enough to have Dean say to Chuck to bring Cas back or to see him wasted out of his mind, or hugging a dog like his emotional wellbeing depends on it.. This is not resolution or addressing it.

All of season 15 has felt like the relationship between Cas and Dean has been in focus and important to the overall arch of the season, and explored and then all of a sudden all traces of it are just ripped away, erased completely.. To have a confession like this go unacknowledged to me is poor writing bc you do not leave this big of a thing hanging in the air without resolution (fine you can argue Cas got resolution but I feel that no Cas did not get resolution either bc his feelings SHOULD have gotten a response no matter what that response was.. Dean did not, we never got to hear or see his version or his thoughts about it.)

I was thinking narratively they HAVE to address this, Deans thoughts and reactions to this gotta be shown. They HAVE to resolve this, acknowledge it. I have been sure a long time they would NEVER have Dean reciprocate Cas love  but keep it in subtext bc they are too fucking chickenshit to do that but at least have Dean talk about Cas….. that I expected him to do.. But it was not done in 19. I got the horrible feeling in my gut that they are not gonna resolve this they are gonna fuck this up, they are gonna go full brothers only and not give a fuck they are gonna push Cas out and show no care. Then we come to the final episode and boy howdy is there a lot to unpack with this episode.

(I had watched the long road home before the finale and when I watched that I KNEW that the end was going to be a letdown I felt it in all of me that I was gonna be disappointed. And I was proven right. And I have so many thoughts all jumbled up around each other that I don’t know in which end to start so sorry if what follows is incoherent and rambly.. )

15x20 - The end  

20 felt like a FILLER episode, right up until Dean’s death scene I was bored and was seriously considering turning my computer of and just not watch. (A finale should be as engaging and emotionally packed like episode 18 was. I refuse to acknowledge 20 as the end.. To me it ended on 19. That wrapped things up. Not completely satisfying but hell of a lot better than the disaster that 20 is.) But then Dean was impaled on that rusty spike thingy and I was watching with attention. I GET why they did Deans death the way they did, even if that is one shitty death for Dean and could have been fixed so he did not die.. I get what they wanted to get out of it: a brothers sad moment that they turned into a irksome thing. I actually cringed about the head thing and the hands and the farming of it all just urgh I got sick to my stomach watching that. What should have been a beautifully sad moment was put together in a romantic coded way and that to me ruined the heartfelt goodbye. Bc you do not touch and hold a dying family member like that. I KNOW I have said goodbye to my fair share of loved ones that I have loved soo deeply, but the thought of touching like that NO no way.. And also they have NEVER done that forehead touch in previous deaths, so to do this now just felt irksome.

They killed Dean a character that has struggled his whole life with being daddy’s blunt little instrument, who has self-worth issues and are suicidal, who has never lived for his own sake but have only ever lived to protect and raise another, he continues to put others before himself though (up until the last couple of seasons where we have seen them both break away from this toxic behavior). Finally he was allowed to LIVE and have a life that was not controlled, not running in a hamster wheel like a fucking puppet on a string. He was Free of all of that. He was free to go after what HE wanted for himself and what Dean wanted was LOVE, in my mind its perfectly clear that Dean loves Cas back bc that is what the story have been telling us.. its right there and the story do not make sense without it. Many others have done a great job at talking about this and describe this way better than me. So I leave further discussion about that topic to them.

Dean was looking for a job.  The angel Dean has loved since purgatory told him that he loved him and then died sacrificing himself to SAVE Dean yet again and then Dean dies a few days later.. How is this doing justice to Dean and what the hell kind of message does this send out to the ones watching?? They are saying it does not matter if you fight, your destiny is written for you and the only relief and comfort you will have will be death. They are saying Meh don’t fight it’s better to die bc it does not matter what you do. This is one of the fucked up messages this godawful ending sent to all those who have identified with Dean and Cas throughout the years.

They also say Cas who has been part of the story for 12 years is not important enough to have there, they IGNORED Cas, a mention in passing does not do justice to a character that has been crucial to the boys lives for 12 years. Dean Screamed in Sam’s face CAS IS FAMILY, Dean was destroyed when Cas died, he was hurt when Cas left bc everyone leaves Dean, Sam missed Cas etc… but still not important enough to show up in heaven in the last episode greeting first Dean and then Sam to heaven.. PFT…

To leave Cas and Misha out of the FINALE of a show that he has been part of for 12 years is so fucking disrespectful to Cas, to Misha and ALL the fans who love and adore both. It also makes no sense since  they all say how beloved Cas and Misha are. and don’t go fucking covid made it impossible bc the last scene with all those people without masks.. No that is just lying liars who lie…Covid my ass! This angers me a lot.

Family do end in ONLY blood apparently…..  

(And maybe lead to a lot of viewers for walker???  hence this very nice shirltess Sam scene............. ) shirtless Sam is always good though so no complaining here.

We see Sam and the dog give Dean a hunters funeral.. NO OTHERS are there?  How is it possible that none of the found family wouldn’t want to be there and show up?? Jack has restored everyone but still only Sam and the dog are there, no Eileen, no Jody and the girls, Donna, Garth, and the list goes on and on. Bc they wanna hammer in harder that supernatural has ever only ever been about two brothers and no one else matters ever.. It does not matter that this has not been true since the earlier seasons. The show of course is about Sam and Dean’s lives and journey through life, and I have loved to follow along on their journey.  BUT it was a long time ago this was the ONLY thing that mattered (bc if it had only been about the brothers the show would NOT have gone on for this long). Along the way they have picked up FOUND Family, and the message of the show has been Family don’t end in blood, Always Keep Fighting. But this last episode reverted back to season 1 and disregarded ALL character growth and storytelling of the past 12 years and went with fuck it ONLY Sam and Dean are important. So the next fucked up message they sent where: There is no Family don’t end in blood.. The only family that matters is blood. And then they have the balls to say Always Keep Fighting.. Are they fucking kidding????

Character development…….. who????  

Sam lives on after Dean dies and we get a montage of his life where he look miserable and is shown to not being able to get over that Dean died. We get a blurry wife and a kid named Dean. In his house there are photos of ONLY himself, Dean and their parents and maybe one of his son? Don’t remember all the details and refuse to watch that episode ever again. But no friends, no family, no happy moments are shown, it looked like a very lonely life. He dies with only his son there.. WHERE are Sam’s friends??? This montage of Sam’s supposed happy life is NOT happy bc he is not able to get over that Dean is dead, he can’t live a  happy life bc Dean is not there - again something that irked me and felt disrespectful to all the growth Sam and Dean have gone through. It was toxic codependency all the way through and that is not satisfying to watch. Especially since the brothers had actually broken that dependency. Sam had broken free, Sam have through the years wanted to get away from Dean and live his life as he wants and then he was happy…We have a moment way back in season 5 maybe? Where Sam runs away and this is shown as one of his happy moments in dark side of the moon.. No Dean in his happy places, Sam having thanksgiving with his girlfriend and her family, Sam alone with a dog. We have Sam and Amelia when Dean was in purgatory. So Sam IN text have been shown being able to be happy without Dean so why could he not do it this time?? Makes no sense! You can grieve but still have a good life.. But they CHOSE to show it like Sam was miserable bc Dean was dead and life was not worth living happily without Dean there..

The brothers have lately interacted like two individual adults, separated from each other, making their own decisions and trusting each other in making them, they wanted different things in life. And seriously WHERE DID EILEEN GO?? Why was Sam not reunited with Eileen that he some eps previous was shown to love, no instead they had blurry wife which feels like such a cop out. Sam did not get to live a happy fulfilling life and why did Sam not deserve to live a happy life with Eileen??? I know they are blaming corona for a lot of things missing in the finale that they intended.. BUT and this is a BIG BUT remember Jensen did not like the ending it did not sit well with him, he had a hard time digesting it, he objected to the ending! He spoke about that dying in battle would not be a satisfying ending - see the video of him talking about this at SDCC 2019. There is so much more to say about this but other people have voiced it so much better than I ever could so I move on to the next issue.

Dean in heaven  

Dean when he first arrives there happens upon Bobby who tells him John and Mary lives down the road and that Rufus and Arheta lives around there too. I hope Bobby’s wife was indoors, and that Jack with the help of Cas fixed heaven.  To this Dean only smirk/smiles.. and then Dean sees baby and goes for a drive ALONE with the words he will be here soon from Bobby again Sam is the only one that ever matter PFT. Dean who found a home in the bunker alongside Sam, Cas and Jack who told John: I have a family and that he was happy with himself and his life…. Spends his time endlessly driving around alone just waiting for Sam to appear.. ALL of Deans growth is thrown out the window.. he is reduced to salad dressing. Deans only purpose is to live for his brother and cannot possibly have what he WANTS for himself not even in death. He drives around for who knows how many years until Sam dies. HOW is this justice to DEAN? How is this a good and satisfying ending for Dean. Dean who wanted to LIVE, Dean who wanted to experience people in new ways, who had let go of Sam and saw Sam as his own person, now in heaven only drives around waiting for Sam to get there having no life or meaning of his own. It pisses me off to no end that they reverted back to toxic codependent Sam is all that is important to Dean shit.. They have broken away from this shit years ago and this is how they choose to end it right back at the beginning..

Now what is the point of telling  a story of growth and love and life if all that that journey amounts to is ending up at the exact point it started on?? You can watch season 1 and 2 and then this finale and it makes sense.. But having watched season 1-15 this ending does great injustice to the characters and the story. Again many others have written way better posts about this that expresses the great disappointment and hurt that is being screamed everywhere right now.

The Actors

I want to add the performance of all actors through the years, the love and care they have poured into their characters are amazing I have loved every bit of that journey. I love Jared, Jensen and Misha, and all the others for their amazing work and that is maybe why it hurts so much it ended in this way!

#spn 15x20 #Supernatural #Jensen Ackles #Misha Collins #Jared Padalecki #dean winchester #dean #sam winchester #sam #castiel #cas #spn 15x18 #spn 15x19 #rambly thoughts about the end #the end

[wtf-yoongi]

Flawless.

pairing | taehyung x reader

summary | you’ve lost count of how many notes you’ve left in between tae’s textbooks, from the silliest to the most profound, loving ones. and yet, even after all these months, taehyung doesn’t seem to have noticed any of them

genre/warnings | university fluff bc y’all whipped by university student!tae am i right

words | 3,070

note | this concept was inspired by a plot line in romance is a bonus book (which you can and should stream on netflix). also: for some reason i didn’t know but found out while writing this that i would do anything for kim taehyung and that’s just a fact

You don’t know how that even started.

It sounds like the kind of thing people who lose bets would be forced to do. If you lose, you’ll have to write a silly letter confessing your love to a friend. It would be funny, a story worthy of being shared with friends in between bottles of beer and other tales from college years.

But it really isn’t like that. Definitely not as funny or entertaining – just you being bored one day and then too into it to stop it.

You don’t know what had gotten into you the first time you did it. You arrived a little early at the apartment Taehyung shared with Jimin. Tae was still taking a shower. Jimin let you in and apologized for having to leave you alone because he was working on a paper due only a couple of days later. You sat down in the small living room area. Looked around for a while. Picked a thinning stack of sticky notes from your backpack. Wrote something silly on one of them. Added a little #1 to it. Entered Taehyung’s room. Picked a book out of his shelves. Opened it on a random page. Sticked the yellow note there. Closed the book. Left it alone. That was it.

After that, it was like an addiction. Maybe it was the thrill of getting caught someday – eventually, as you thought – and having a good laugh with your friends about it. You could actually picture it: Jimin and you cracking up in the kitchen after Taehyung shows up with a handful of notes you’ve written. You tell them you’ve been doing it for weeks and leaving them everywhere. Jimin jokes about Tae not even opening a textbook to pretend he’s studying. Tae eventually joins, giggling and shaking his head.

//

“Hey, what’s up?”

You blink quickly to focus your mind again, looking up to see Taehyung free his shoulder from the weight of his bag and place a bottle of water on the table you are now sharing. He looks relaxed despite the craziness of the end of the semester, smiling and waving at a known face two tables away before sitting down.

“You good?” He asks again and bumps his elbow against yours to coax an answer out of you. “You look too serious.”

“I was…” You start and look down at the scattered pieces of paper in front of you, trying to make any sense of them. You pile it all to at least appear a bit more put together – the papers and yourself. “I was in the library, but the tension was too much to handle, so I moved in here.”

“It’s noisy.”

Well, yes, it’s a common area filled with students doing anything but studying. You wish to feel at ease like these people. Are they done with the semester or what?

“Don’t you think it’s a little bit too noisy to study?”

“Yeah, but there’s a whole lot of people talking and I can’t tell them apart, so it doesn’t bother me,” you answer, maybe a little too quickly after a few beats of silence. You decide to add something else, something to not end it on a bad note. “It’s oddly calming.”

“Well, if you think so.” Taehyung raises his shoulders and flashes you a simple and toothless smile. 

You don’t know how that even started. Liking him like the way you do.

It sounds like the kind of thing you would hear from someone else. I think I’m in love with a friend, what should I do? It would be funny, giving them advice on this sort of thing, but it only happened in movies, right?

But it really isn’t like that. It’s real. And it’s not as funny or entertaining. It kind of hurts, actually, but you can’t stop feeling those feelings and it drives you crazy sometimes. 

More than often you had found yourself thinking about this before going to sleep at night – and sometimes losing sleep over it as well. It definitely wasn’t like a switch, but it sure felt like it. You gradually fell in love, but only realized it when Taehyung came running down the stairs at the Art Department to meet you. 

There was nothing special about him that day – it was just the same old Tae –, but it wasn’t the art that had changed. It was the artist’s eye. You knew the second he made eye contact that something was up, but didn’t immediately jump to any conclusions, no. Love was something that came to you much later. At first, you thought maybe he had his hair done differently or the sweater he was wearing just fitted him too perfectly, the color matching everything else flawlessly.

But you had never used the word flawless to describe Kim Taehyung up until then. That’s when you realized you were the one looking at him in a different way. And that’s also when you started to wonder if that would ever happen the other way around, too.

//

But, of course, that never happens. He never finds out. Maybe the books you were picking up were way too random or hiding the notes inside just made it too hard for him to find them, so you decided to stick a note to a cover for once. 

You could feel the adrenaline rush as you did it, almost as if you were committing a crime. What you wrote is far from incriminating, though. #19 this is a test to see if you’re truly that clueless about your own stuff. you tedious friend, you were supposed to find these. what’s the joke in me leaving them if you don’t?

After that audacious move, you were a little apprehensive for a few days. You couldn’t stop looking at your phone, waiting for it to light up with a new message. At any moment now, you thought to yourself – and it did come, the message, but it wasn’t what you were expecting. It was just a you up? I need help with an Impressionism piece and this is more your thing.

//

“This is your last one, right?” Taehyung asks after a few minutes. “Last test?”

You blow a strand of hair that has fallen in front of your eyes. “Yeah, this and a project due tomorrow, but I’m done with that already.”

“Oh, the one you were working on last week when I asked you to come over and you said you couldn’t?”

“Yup, exactly.”

When you disconnect your eyes from the words in front of you to look at him again, he’s calmly playing with the water bottle with a subtle smile on his lips.

“I wish you could’ve come that day.”

//

You had sticked a note on his only book on Impressionism just a few days before.

To be honest, you were disappointed. Over the months, you had found yourself wanting more and more for him to find the notes – and not just the ones that had jokes on them, but also the ones that ask about the weather, about how he’s feeling, apologizing for that day two years prior when you bought spicy snacks instead of the regular ones, praising his photography skills and everything else that was on your mind. 

Taehyung not noticing anything gave you a more whatever attitude to it, almost as if you knew for a fact that he would never ever find them. That’s when you started to write deeper ones that sounded a little bit too much like a confession. You were talking about your fear of the future, the pressure your parents put on you, the pain of being the second child after a perfect one, how you were scared of failing in life and all the stuff you were too much of a wimp to say out loud. So many you ended up losing count and they no longer had a tiny number written in the corner.

At this point, you were running out of books. Taehyung had a good collection on his desk and shelves, piled one on top of the other without any order – but not enough for the rate you were going at. You left a note every single time you were there and able to sneak into his bedroom and caught yourself finding reasons why you had to visit just to leave another one. It was the safest way to get something out of your chest. Tae wouldn’t see it and, honestly, if he ever did, it was also ok.

//

“Hey!”

“Hey, what’s up?”

“What do you mean what’s up? You’re the one who called.”

Taehyung laughs.

 “Actually, you never call. What is up?”

“How did the test go?”

“Did you really call just to ask how I did?”

“I wanted to know if your semester’s finally over… And if you’re free.”

“Right now?”

“Yeah, right now.”

“I guess I am… I have some books to return, but that’s it.”

“Can you come over after that?”

“Sure. Do you need anything I can pick up on my way? I think I’m stopping at the convenience store for some much needed and deserved alcohol.”

He laughs again.

“You’re right, you deserve it. In that case, can you get those potato sticks I like?”

//

Only it wasn’t ok anymore if he saw it. Not after you wrote that one. 

A whole month had passed after that day at the Art Department. You thought you had had enough time to understand what was going on – what you felt. And even after that, it was still hard to comprehend how you could let yourself fall like that.

It wasn’t like Taehyung was paying any special attention to you. He really wasn’t. He treated you just like any other friend – maybe a closer one, yes, but not that much closer. It was hard to distinguish, though. He was friendly towards everyone, always looking for ways to help. 

You racked your brain. Had he ever offered to help you with something you didn’t think he would do for anyone else? Had he ever shown interest in any way? What the hell was it that made you feel this?

Maybe it was just him. Effortlessly. Just like that.

That day, instead of going with something that popped into your head right there and then, you had a plan for once. You had imagined something a little bit longer, organized the structure of it all inside your head – sentence after sentence –, but couldn’t bring yourself to write the right words even after your third try.

That was when you decided to settle for I think I’m in love with you, you idiot. You’re driving me insane. Stop that now.

//

“Your beloved potato,” you say to Taehyung, handing him the children’s snack as soon as he opens the door. “Can I get a thank you, you’re the best or what?”

“Thank you, you’re the best,” he repeats your words with a small smile on his lips. Inside, the butterflies want to start fluttering everywhere, but you beg them to keep quiet and still.

You smile back at him, soon entering the small living room and leaving your much lighter backpack on the floor. “Is Jimin home? I bought him some as well.”

“No, but you can leave it in the kitchen and I’ll…”

“I don’t trust you, traitor,” you interrupt, hand immediately raising to point a finger at him, eyes squeezed in suspicion as you pick the round package and start walking again. “I’ll take this to his room and hide it somewhere. Don’t you dare look for it!”

There’s a moment of silence after you move into Jimin’s slightly messy room, looking for a spot to hide the chips and soon picking up your phone from your back pocket to let him know exactly where to find them later. When you walk towards the living room again, Taehyung is seated on the sofa with his back to you, slowly moving his hand through his growing hair.

Nothing sounds out of place or any less than completely peaceful until he opens his mouth again. He waits for you – for you to be seated and comfortable and fully focused, phone forgotten inside of your back pocket.

“Why did you stop numbering them?”

You freeze.

“What?”

Your first reaction is almost immediate. Your whole body tenses, going into panic mode with the force and speed of an electric shock. Somehow, you can’t seem to disconnect your eyes from his serene ones – a complete opposite from yours. 

Your brain, on the other hand, is running a million miles per hour. It wants to know and it has so many questions. When did he find out? Did he read every single note? Did he notice you had left one inside almost every book – sometimes even two or three? Where were they now?

But, most of all, had he read that one?

“Why did you stop numbering them? The notes, I mean,” Taehyung calmly asks again. He’s so composed and gentle you start to wonder what he is thinking about you now and what conclusions he has jumped to from reading all of that. “I know the exact order you left them up to a point and then I’m lost. It kind of bothers me, you were telling a good story.”

He smiles again and an invisible hand clenches your heart.

“I just…” You struggle to find the words and, when they do come, your throat feels dry and tight and like it doesn’t want to make a sound at all. You can’t face him anymore. “I lost count one day.”

“Too bad,” he admits with the same tender tone. “I was really enjoying it, you know? Your story. There are sixty-four notes in total, so I’m guessing you’ve been doing this for a long time.”

So he has read all of them.

Your palms start to sweat and your whole body grows cold all of a sudden. You let out a small cough, but your words still come out a bit too raspy. “Kind of, yeah.”

“I’m really sorry to be this blunt, but I just got to know,” Taehyung’s voice loses its cool a little and you can see his whole body reflect that, agitated, while he turns to you. His hands reach out a little, but end up halfway, resting on the sofa. 

Then, his words come out like he has finally opened his brain’s tap. 

“I just have to know since when you’re feeling like this. Are you still feeling like this? You wrote me a note saying you’re in love with me and I don’t know when that happened. How could you not tell me that? God, I’m so selfish. You wrote a bunch of things about feeling like you’re not enough and being scared of the future and all I can focus on is this one thing.”

You swallow, but your mouth and throat don’t become any less tight. “It’s usually a one-time thing, I don’t always feel like that. We’re all worried about the future, it’s fine.”

“Are you sure?” You nod. He lets out a long and staggered breath and shifts his hands impatiently. He wants to move them closer, but doesn’t know if the timing is right. “You didn’t answer my first question, though.”

You freeze again.

“It was a…” You take one deep breath, your voice as small as it has ever been, but still somewhat audible. “It was a few months ago.”

“A few months?” He repeats, voice escalating in tone, and you simply nod once again. “You should have said something. You know you should have said something, right? I wouldn’t… I wouldn’t reject you.”

“I know, I’m sorry. I got scared.”

Wait. He said what?

“What did you just say?” You repeat the words screaming inside your head.

Taehyung laughs, his easy-going demeanor back again. “You should look at yourself right now, your face is priceless.”

You really have no words. If the circumstances were any sort of normal, this would be the time you would raise your hand to pinch or straight up hit Taehyung, striking wherever part of him was closest to you. But this isn’t anywhere close to normal, so you just let your jaw hang open, your brain struggling to process the information.

“I’m going to tell you a secret, I truly never told this to anyone,” Taehyung starts, smile still plastered on his silly and flawless face. “I had a crush on you a long time ago, I think it was when we first started talking. I got over that quickly, actually, because you seemed so dead focused on being the best student and showed no interest at all. I thought it was ok, you know? At least I had you as a friend, you were a nice person to have around and I wanted to keep your company.”

And I was fine about it. Really, don’t get me wrong, I wasn’t your friend just because I wanted something more, I really love being your friend. And I was ok for a long time until I found a sticky note and then another and another and another. I couldn’t believe you left so many and I never noticed it, like, how stupid am I? I should get a prize for being this slow.”

And then there was that one note. The one you wrote about being in love with me. I swear, I… I didn’t know what to think and then it hit me like a thousand bricks and I couldn’t stop thinking about it. I was nervous around you again, I wanted to impress you so hard, I wanted to make you smile and happy. I honestly don’t even know how I’m still going at this without stopping, probably because I practiced. Yeah, I did.”

A few moments of silence pass before Taehyung is speaking again. “Aren’t you going to say something?”

Your dropped jaw turns into some sort of awkward smile. “Did you really practice?”

“Really?” Tae asks with an overdramatic expression. “I just said all of that and you’re asking me if I really practiced?”

You shrug. “I thought that was cute.”

“My God,” he overreacts, throwing his whole upper body towards you on the sofa. His voice comes out muffled now, but as playful as ever. “This thing only started and somehow I already know I’m doomed.”

Read more ›› masterlist

#kim taehyung #kim taehyung fluff #taehyung fluff #taehyung au #kim taehyung au #taehyung x reader #taehyung x you #taehyung x y/n #taehyung imagine #kim taehyung imagines #taehyung scenarios #bts one shot #bts imagines #bts fluff

[princeoftheroses]

Since you want asks, PLSSSE I want your Utena TH0ughts. WHAT is your favourite black rose episode? actually how do you feel about the black rose arc in GENERAL

black rose arc, black rose arc, oh black rose arc!!! by you adding how do i feel about the arc in general you are unleashed me to make a long post giving my very disorganized thoughts about this arc.

a couple of people call it a filler arc? i guess technically it is because it does not directly contribute to the main storyline and it wasn't in the manga and also the ending of the arc sort of makes it so the whole arc kind of didn't happen???

but also i think if a person labeled it as a filler arc they are kind of missing the point?? even if it doesn't contribute to the main plot (which it absolutely DOES but i'll get to that) it adds so much nuance to the characters of utena.

you get to see side characters and how they tick!! some of which like kozue and shiori become very important later as they become miki and ruka's rose brides in the akio arc! (side note : what was up with ruka he just kind of showed up and disappeared lmaooo)

also, it adds to akio! (tw warning for only the next paragraph, i'm talking about akio so you can except me talking about grooming and abuse)

not only is this where akio is introduced, but he is always so omnipresent. it was ... honestly really terrifying to see how chill he acts with utena here. of course the real grooming begins in the akio arc but you can see how he starts here. how he kind of builds himself as anthy's cool older brother that utena can trust and ask for advice for... but we the audience know that he CANNOT be trusted as even know we see him being shady af in the background. i really feel like if we skipped straight from the first arc to akio arc a lot of the creepiness of akio would not have been realized because of ... just how NORMAL he akio acts to utena. he's charming, he's smart, and he overall is somebody utena SHOULD be able to trust bc we should all be able to trust an immediate family member of a best friend , but of course the world doesn't really work that way. anyway akio tangent over because BOOOOOO akio (he honestly terrifies me so much because of how many predators like that exist and you can meet without realizing their intentions)

BACK TO BLACK ROSE ARC

one of the main reasons i feel like this isn't a filler arc, at least not in the traditional sense of the phrase, is because it builds a lot character relationships. something that i didn't like when i first watched revolutionary girl utena but now is one of my FAVORITE things is that for a while we don't really get a straight forward utena/anthy episode. because their relationship doesn't need to build in an episode, it just slowly builds over time. we just see these two causally existing and they just start to trust each other.

in the akio arc we get to see just how close utena/anthy have gotten over the series because of their late night conversations. like how if the black rose arc didn't exist akio wouldn't have been as impactful, if the black rose arc didn't exist it would feel more sudden how close utena/anthy have grown imo.

this arc adds a lot to the world as well. as long as the students stay inside of school they will not grow. dead people wander the halls thinking that they are still alive. these two facts contribute a lot to utena theorizing and analysis (mainly, the ideas that ohtori exists within a plain of frozen time literally because of anthy's magic and metaphorically because the cast is very cozy in their coffin) and i could not thank this arc for that enough. not only are these very cool ideas that may or may not have inspired elements in my own story (i can neither confirm or deny that one of my oc story is heavily inspired by utena) but they just add so many layers!

this arc also felt necessary because of the new duelists??? if we went straight from the first arc to the akio arc then it would've kinda gotten very tiring to see the student council constantly duel and lose to utena (with the exception of touga's sole victory to utena in the first arc before she duels him again and wins) but these new duelists possessed by the black rose are very interesting!

if i did have to make a compliant about this arc, though, i will say that at times the stories felt very disconnected to each other. while it was very funny for utena to not even know who keiko was when she dueled her, it would've been nice if sometimes the arc of the black rose duelist intertwined more with utena. as the arc goes on, the student council is on alert and is trying to figure out where the black rose is coming from, but they never really try to ask utena about it and utena never really tries to get involved? she just is chill until she gets the note to go to the duel arena to fight the black rose duelist. i don't really have a solution on how to fix this? maybe have the student council member that the black rose duelist takes the sword from be more involved? idk.

the villain of this arc mikage also really fascinates me??? i... really like him??? but not even as a villain ... i just really pity him. the realization he has in his duel with utena that everything he has been doing is for nothing because mamiya is already dead .. that always really hit me? the horror in his voice when he starts to recall the truth in his false memories.... for some reason, this is one of the most terrifying parts of the show for me. the realization that something you were doing, something you were doing that might've been awful but you were doing it because of somebody you care about deeply and love, it was all for nought. how much time he has wasted...

even before his duel with utena, there's this moment when after he got punched by utena he says something like "if she hadn't seen my duelist ring and challenged me to a duel, she could've killed me" or something like that, he's just so pathetic and i feel very bad for him but at the same time am too disconnected to him to truly feel empathy for him... that's some TOP TIER shit

overall, this part of the show is one of my favorites. the only part i like more is the last few episodes because it makes me very emotional.

NOW FOR THE SPECIFICS

favorite black rose duelist: honestly? wakaba. the girl deserves it this is stress relief for her. not only is this duel very emotional as i don't think we've ever seen utena refuse to duel somebody (at least not in the way that she does in this episode) but just the SHEER emotion.

i'm a real sucker for fighting the person you care about the most which is why the dark signer arc in yugioh 5ds is the best yugioh arc and this just really takes the cake in this arc. utena always shows concern for the black rose duelist because they are clearly people in pain who were not able to properly duel with their grief which let mikage manipulate them, but it's taken to a new level here.

the way that after the duel is completed, wakaba comes home to her empty dorm where saionji used to be but now isn't always gets me. she's just such a lonely girl and that's never really resolved for her. a lot of the other duelists have a optimist note to end on (kozue asking miki for a milkshake, shiori and juri saying hello to each other as they walk past, keiko being friends with nanami again, etc.) which is why the fact that wakaba is more alone now then she is ever... it is a feeling i can relate to an almost embarrassing amount.

favorite episode: COWBELL OF HAPPINESS, NANAMI TURNS INTO A COW-

ANTHY YOU GLORIOUS TROLL-

favorite episode that isn't cowbell of happiness: i'm very torn between the landscape scaped by kozue and thorns of death. shiori and kozue are both very interesting characters that i like a lot. but i'm going to go with thorns of death for now, as while i really like the landscape scaped by kozue, i think my preferred miki/kozue episode is their episode in the akio arc. meanwhile i like thorns of death way more than i liked whispers in the arc (mostly because i just do not really care that much for ruka, but azure paler than the sky was a banger and he was in that?) i just loved the feeling of seeing shiori the girl juri loves so much and juri's reaction to seeing her. the way my heart was wrenched when black rose shiori mocks juri... it really did hit different. but the hopeful ending did make me feel a lot better. i do like the way that juri out of all the student council members is the one closest to self actualization and this really sets that up even if there is still a bumpy road until then.

honorary mention: the boys of the black rose and kanae as a black rose duelist are both really great. i feel like if this wasn't the arc opener it would've had more room to stretch its legs and show how horrific it could've been. kanae is a girl i feel really bad about and similar to wakaba, i don't really think her episode was a very optimistic ending for her especially since akio probably killed her later in the show?

honestly the minute akip appeared on screen, engaged to a girl who HASN'T EVEN GRADUATED and is also emotionally manipulating her so much and having his little sister manipulate her too... throw the whole man away

tl;dr - the black rose arc is very good and i like it a lot, the ending of the arc really fucks me up, somebody give mikage & all the black rose duelists therapy, throw akio in the garbage, and this show probably exists in some sort of time loop / frozen time space as a metaphor for the whole coffin thing but you can probbaly find people smarter than me talking about that.

oh and go rewatch cowbell of happiness it's great

#this is what i do at 4 am #i started writing this at like 3 45 am and it is now 4 25 am :) #worth it #hope you like my shitty analysis and thoughts !!! i enjoyed writing it thoruugly #revolutionary girl utena #asks

[pendragaryen]

The things that stay with us...

This was supposed to be my last BFSN-post while the show is still airing - the last BFSN-entry right before the series finale. But now it’s just... a FSN-post? Call it a Big-Hug-post. A Hug-Gratitude-post. Or whatever you prefer. Though in my heart Bellarke will ALWAYS be canon (and nothing can ever change that): They didn’t give it to us in the actual show (a show, whose narrative clearly told us otherwise all this time, but well.. whatever...). It’s too much honour to grace such a disappointing last season with a BFSN, dearies. (Or... even more so now? ;P ) So, call it what you like i guess! ;). Honestly, i didn’t want it to end.. just like that... without any last words to you, the kindest, most tolerant and beautiful minded fandom i’ve ever been (proudly!) a part of since 2016. (The selfie lies. It’s not current. I’m sorry, i can’t show you my face these days.. This is from the day just before it all went inevitably down with this season: BB’s death. So... enjoy: That smile’s for you, fam! ;) 2nd pic: The tattoo i got almost two years ago now, on Sept. 22nd 2018, and that never fails to remind me of my emotional support person and the fact, that after every “down” in life there will come an “up” again <3<3<3 )

What makes the whole experience of this last ever season of The 1OO for me so incredibly sad is.... Well, please bear with me if you will... My english STILL isn’t the very best... But i’m trying to put my feelings into words:

Last year, when we got the news that S7 would be the final season, i DREADED this moment. I was AFRAID of this last day (and the hours) before the actual finale. And why so? Bc I am a person, who’s an incredible loser when it comes to let go of the things i love so dearly. Like The 1OO. I... in times i was OBSESSED with it, with the story, with the chacracters and the way they’ve been written, so credible, so tangible in their actions, nothing was just bad or good and even the villains actions had been understandable to some extend. It was amazing! I felt with almost every character! I LOVED it. (And to be very clear here: I’ll never STOP loving The 100′s 6 seasons, that are still existing for me!)

But what i wanted to say is: I dreaded the moment when l would have to let it go. THat inevitable moment, when this show with all its storylines and characters, that have been a part of my life for the last years and that i love so dearly, really ends. Forever. It would end and i wouldn’t be ready to let go, bc it means the world to me. Bc it changed me in more than just one way - no, even better, bc it made me want to change myself! “To do better...” *ugly crying...* THis show SAVED me in a way and in a time, where i was in a very dark place in life, in a very dark mind space (constant illnesses, termination of my job due to these illnesses, an ugly lawsuit etc. pp) , this show and its actors, especially one Robert Alfred Morley (yes), who helped me to look at myself and my mental insecurities and illness from a whole new point of view. I wasn’t ashamed of myself anymore. I felt... relieved. Understood. I even felt kind of loved for what i am, even with my anxieties. (There may or may not come a point or even a person in everyones life, that helps to develop this new kind of view on themselves. And for me this person was and always will be Bob Morley. And whatever happens, i’ll always love him for his open- and kindness and be thankful for his inspiration. I still call myself lucky to have talked with him a couple of times. I treasure these moments. Always.)

So, i was AFRAID of this day, when this all would come to an end. I KNEW it would wreck me, i would be devestated, i would be so incredibly sad, that i won’t be able to put it into words.

And here i am now. I AM sad. I AM devestated. But for so very different reasons that i could never imagine in my wildest nightmares... This last season... Season 7--- no i won’t start again. Not AGAIN. But... just that: What they’ve been creating for us here... it really overshadowed my joy of watching this show throughout this last season, yes even BEFORE that horrible murder of my all time fave and comfort character. I take back whatever i said about S6 or even S5. THIS... S7 was the season, that didn’t feel like the show i fell in love with anymore. Though changes CAN be refreshing and exciting... these changes haven’t been that for me.

Look. The thing is: Even WITH Bob’s request for time off and everything... There would’ve been PLENTY options for the writers to actually make it all make kind of sense! THEY COULD’VE DONE IT BETTER! If they’d really wanted to, that is... And here’s the point: I think they didn’t WANT it. For whatever reasons, whatever happened bts, they decided to do it like they did. And no-one’s able to understand their choices or the characters anymore - those characters we used to know so well, these characters i felt with over the course of so many seasons - who i could understand! EVEN THE VILLAINS! And now... look at the thanks we got. I can’t understand shit anymore when it comes to S7. Bc nothing makes sense. When i see even the GREATEST meta-writers among us surrender in their posts - than it’s really sad times for this fandom...

It’s not even just about Bellarke anymore. Sure, i AM disappointed that they’re not canon now. But then they shouldn’t have arranged the whole story around these two! “The backbone of the whole story”!!! I am laughing. In that case S7 was SPINELESS! Let me tell you. Everyone’s just... flailing around... great little side storylines, but somehow... disconnected from each other and all over the place. That’s how it felt for me to watch this season. And i’m feeling so exhausted by now... I never stopped hoping... I always thought, at some point it would make sense. I’ve read all your great metas AND I WANTED TO BELIEVE! It made perfect sense! (I seriously felt like Fox Mulder from time to time this season... and the lack of sense in the storyline as well as the complete absence of my personal faves (yes i include Clarke (Eliza) here, bc heck, she was so sidelined this season too, self inflicted or not) - all these things had been the “UFO’s or aliens i was hoping to see” one day... Guess i was wrong.)

I’m babbling... Sorry. But it will be for the last time in that kind of form. Promise.

At the end of the day (at the end of all things.. sigh, Frodo... i see you... *blinks back tears*) I am so glad that you’re all here with me, in the same boat. That I’m not alone feeling this kind of lost and baited and betrayed. Bc whatever you like to call it: The narrative promised us otherwise. Did JRott OWE us canon Bellarke? NO. Of course not. But HIS STORY did. The story he’d been telling us for SIX GD YEARS! THAT is what makes me so mad. But most of the time (and despite the selfie above) i’m just sad. Sad and disappointed. I know it will pass one day. And that i’ll find joy in watching S1-4, even S5 except for a couple of scenes, and certain episodes of S6 again. But now is not the day. Even IF they’ll give these characters a “happy ending” in some transcended form or whatever, in the afterlife maybe,... S7 is ruined for me. It wasn’t even a bliss for me before, but it was certainly ruined after they killed “The Heart” - pointlessly (THIS is what will haunt me even years from now..).

Today is the day for saying goodbye. It aches my heart, that we’ll have to do it the way we have to now. But at least we are together. So let’s raise a glass in honour of all the hours of joy and excitement this show brought us over the years, maybe even the tears and laughter, let’s raise a glass for the outstanding performances of the cast and the great storylines some writers developed for us. I am thankful beyond words. Let’s raise a glass to this awesome, talented fandom! I’ve met and talked to dozens of you guys througout the years, and it had always been a pleasure! I hope we’ll stay in touch! <3<3<3 And last but not least: Let’s raise a glass for Kass Morgan. This is HER baby in more than just one way. Without her vision... there wouldn’t have been a show. Or even Bellarke. CANON Bellarke, that is! ;) And i LOVE it!

These are the things that stay with us, these are the things we will remember.

So, have fun with the finale tonight guys! Or should i say: Good luck? ;) I won’t watch now. I haven’t watched since 7x13, and i won’t start again tonight. Not even for the finale. BUT... i’ll probably do it some day in the future. I’m still kind of curious after all. And there are still some characters i want to know how it ends for them. It‘s just... i don’t want to support any ratings. I don’t want to support JRott anymore. But i’ll probably get back to it - if what y’all will write about it afterwards looks promising or not... ;)

See you on the other side!

(Tags under the cut)

Hugs and love to you, dear fam! Tagging @together-is-my-favourite-place @natassakar @geekyogicheese @immortalpramheda @carrieeve @bellamyblake @angelbellamy @burninghoneyatdusk @iwearplaids @wankadi @katersann @nvermindiseeyou @ruggedmurphy @clarkgriffon @poppykru @broashwhat @malclmbright @kizo2703 @cominguproses13x @clarkeindra @tenmonologues  @shialablunt @sometimesrosy @zavens @wonderingwhyy @charmainediyoza @the-suns-also-rise @lee-em-dee @bellamynochillblake​ @junebugninja @songhyeri @underbellamy @talistheintrovert @jeanie205 @bellamys11thfreckle @doontpanic @clarkegriffinblake @goddess-clarke @eyessharpweaponshot @hostagetakerandhistraitor @infp-with-all-the-feelings @theatre-steph @historyofbellarke @as-inevitable-as-morning @bisexualbellamyblake @little-oxford-st @delicatebluebirdruins in no particular order (i am so sorry in advance, if i should’ve forgotten someone... >.<), and yes, i include you too @merlination my Danny, bc without you, i wouldn’t have started watching The 1OO in the first place... ;)

#the 100 #bfsn #bellarke fam selfie night #bellarke #bellamy blake #clarke griffin #bob morley #eliza taylor #the 100 cast #the 100 season 7 #series 7 #through the seasons #finale #series finale #final episode #episode #the last war #bellamy x clarke #clarke x bellamy #anti jroth #tattoo #selfie #my edit #my posts #my pics #my photos #mine #photos #the 100 fam #the 100 fandom

[lemonpeter]

STARKER, by Peter B. Parker

Chapter 9: Hurt/Comfort

A/N: we started joking that we should call this chapter ‘hurt/ no comfort’, bc it turns out that neither of us actually know how to write comfort :) the things that happen in this chapter will make more sense soon, we promise. but for now, we’d love to hear what you guys are thinking!

thanks so much for reading! (and thanks for being understanding about this chapter being late; we’ve both been really busy, and sometimes brains just don’t cooperate <3) - Bloo and Bri 💕

Warnings: subdrop, traits of borderline personality disorder (ie splitting), g*nshot wound, discussions of wounds and wound care, angst

Masterlist ao3

————

A choked off whine slipped from Peter’s lips as his eyes flew open. He screwed up his face, expression twisting into something pained. His chest somehow felt tight and hollow all at once, making him conscious of every single breath he took.

Sitting there, tucked up in the gym mats, he tried to clear his head, rid it of the unsettling fog, but found that he couldn’t. And his body...it felt like it wasn’t his. He felt trapped in his skin, like it was closing in on him.

The sudden low that he was experiencing was strong enough that it had pulled him out of the illusion entirely, his body trembling.

He tried to focus on what was around him, but it was hard when he felt so disconnected. He could feel cold globs of cum drying against his skin and causing his boxers to stick to him uncomfortably, his cock spent and sensitive as a few tears trickled down his cheeks. Wiping one away, he stared blankly at the wetness on the back of his hand.

What the fuck was going on? He hadn’t even realized that he was crying.

Everything felt wrong. His brain still felt floaty from his headspace, but it wasn’t in a good way anymore. He felt disconnected, floating without a tether to ground himself with. Gone was the happy and content feeling from before. This kind of floating... It was terrifying, and all he wanted was to feel real again.

But he couldn’t seem to quite get there.

His breaths became shorter as he started panicking, frantically trying to grab at the floor beneath him. But there wasn’t a surface to hold onto, just smooth, cold rubber. It didn’t help rid him of his distress in any way.

He knew that what he needed was Tony. But Tony wasn’t there.

Peter had heard of sub-drop, but he’d never felt it firsthand before. Obviously.

And even going into the scene, he hadn’t thought it was something he needed to worry about. It surely hadn’t crossed his mind while everything was taking place. Tony was gentle, perfect and sweet to him, even as he pushed his limits. Drops only happened to people with uncaring doms, right? And...it wasn’t like any of that had actually happened, so surely there was no reason for him to experience any after effects?

Wrong.

Peter was left alone to fall, just waiting until he finally felt connected to his own body again. Being grounded again took what felt like forever. But at least it happened eventually.

He felt sick. His skin was crawling and it all felt wrong. Like he had been taken apart and then put back together again, but the pieces had been jammed together, put back incorrectly. Puzzle pieces forced to fit.

All he wanted was to be held, to feel safe and protected. But there was no one there to hold him.

He was alone. He was always alone.

When he realized that, he truly started to cry in earnest. His eyes stung as more tears built up and spilled, falling in quick succession when he squeezed his eyes shut. A sob shook his frame and he pulled his knees up to his chest before wrapping his arms around them in an attempt to make himself as small as possible.

He was convinced that he’d never felt as empty as he did in that moment. Any pain from before was forgotten, incomparable to the sadness that was suddenly overwhelming him.

Tony left him alone.

Again.

Peter knew that it was too good to be true. He knew that he would never really have Tony, that Tony couldn’t protect him. Not in the way that he needed to be protected. He was stupid to think that he would be allowed to have something good, even in his own mind.

He never got to keep the good things.

But despite how much he was hurting, and the fact that he could feel the whole thing falling apart right beneath his fingers, he knew that his life with Tony was the only thing keeping him together. It was the only good thing he had left, the only chance he had at feeling even the most fleeting moments of happiness.

He had nothing without Tony, he knew that.

So, wiping the tears from his face, Peter sniffled, reaching for the glasses. He bit his bottom lip to stop it trembling and took a shaky breath.

He needed comfort from Tony, and if he had to get it himself, then that’s what he would do.

Because he was in control.

***

Pausing in the doorway of their bedroom, Peter took a moment to simply look at his husband.

Tony was stretched out on the bed, leaning back on what was an absolutely absurd amount of pillows and fiddling with some sort of schematic hologram that was being projected from the tablet in his lap. His hair was a mess, sticking up in all directions, and there was a wrinkle between his eyebrows. His eyes were narrowed slightly, one of his hands was cupping his chin.

Peter recognized it as his concentrating face. He’d always found the expression ridiculously endearing, and now was no exception. He could feel some of the resentment he’d been harboring begin to melt away.

The engineer didn’t seem to notice the younger man’s presence, continuing to manipulate the projection, fingers splaying out in various gestures as he tried to work out the problem.

Peter cleared his throat softly and shot a gentle smile in Tony’s direction when he finally looked up. “Um. Hi, Tony.” The fingers on his right hand fidgeted with his wedding band.

“Hey baby,” Tony sighed, giving Peter his own tired grin. His eyes flickered down to the younger’s hands, then back up to his face. “What’s up?” He began to close out of whatever he was working on, eyes shifting between the holograms he was moving and Peter’s face as he waited for him to respond.

Cocking his head to the side, the brunette slipped his hands into the pockets of his jeans. “I, uh, was thinking maybe we could go for a walk?” It came out like a question, even though he had intended for it to be more of a statement. “Wanna get out of the house for a bit, get some fresh air. Wha’d’you think?”

“I think that sounds great, Pete. I could use a break from this anyway,” Tony said, finishing up. He took a minute to roll his shoulders, groaning as he did. “God, I’m getting old,” he muttered under his breath as he pushed himself up off the mattress so that he could walk over to his partner. When he reached Peter, he leaned against him for a moment, pressing a kiss to his temple. “Let me grab some sunglasses and shoes and I’ll meet you by the elevator, okay?”

Once they were down on the street in front of the tower, Tony had suggested that they walk a few blocks to the park, maybe grab something to eat on the way back home. When Peter had agreed, they set off down the sidewalk, making small talk and just enjoying each other’s company.

It seemed that everyone had the same idea as them, families and joggers and couples populating the large open area when they arrived.

Tony reached over to grab Peter’s hand, lacing their fingers together as they continued walking through the crowded park.

Peter glanced down. He thought about pulling away from the touch, not really sure if he wanted Tony holding his hand. He was still pretty upset from the drop. He was feeling much better, hence them taking a walk together in the first place, but he hadn’t forgotten how he’d had to figure things out all on his own. Far from it.

Sure, it wasn’t exactly Tony’s fault that the sudden endorphin drop had caused the illusion to glitch, but he was still upset. He had been left alone and miserable.

He didn’t pull his hand away, though. But he kept thinking about it.

Tony did nothing to suggest that he noticed anything was wrong. He was unaware of Peter’s thoughts, of course, but he didn’t seem to notice the teen’s hesitation regarding the contact either. Which was probably a good thing, honestly. Peter didn’t like confrontation and he wouldn’t know what to do if the older man brought attention to his behavior.

But it also kind of bothered him that Tony wasn’t paying attention. Which was stupid and probably untrue, but his brain wouldn’t let go of it.

In a moment of fleeting irritation, Peter did pull his hand away sharply and tucked it into his pocket. Maybe now his husband would finally realize that he did something wrong.

Because he had. Right?

The older man looked at him, blinking slowly in his confusion. “Peter?”

“Yes?” His tone was a little snappy, which he hadn’t necessarily intended. He needed to try and relax again. But it felt like he was wound too tightly, a rubber band whose elasticity was about to be pushed past its limit.

He didn’t know what would happen when the tension finally snapped.

He could see Tony watching him out of the corner of his eye, but he didn’t look at him again. He kept his eyes forward as they walked.

“Talk to me,” Tony encouraged, trying to reach for his hand again. When Peter didn’t pull away or react negatively, he laced his fingers with the teen’s. “What’s wrong, baby?”

Peter bit the inside of his cheek. Hard. He knew that he couldn’t explain it. There wasn’t a way to tell Tony about the drop without explaining the illusion. And obviously that wasn’t going to happen.

But what else could he say?

“I just feel kind of off. I don’t really know how to explain it.” Not technically incorrect. But he knew that it wasn't really the answer that his husband was looking for.

Tony’s eyes were burning holes into the side of his face. “I’m sorry for that, honey. And that’s completely okay, everybody has off days, but I just… But did I do something? Because it kinda seems like I did….”

Peter finally glanced over at him, expression softening at the look on Tony’s face. He’d taken off his sunglasses and seemed sincerely apologetic, despite not having a clue what he had done. And he looked worried, too. Worried about him. “I...it’s okay, Tony. It’s- You didn’t do anything.” Lie. “I’ll be fine. Just feeling weird today, like I said.”

“Okay….” Tony sighed softly, nodding. His fingers squeezed Peter’s hand lightly. He let his eyes rove over his husband’s face for a moment, looking like he had something else to say, the words poised on the tip of his tongue. But all he did was quirk the side of his mouth up in the slightest hint of a smile, though Peter could tell it wasn’t quite a real one, staying silent as they kept walking.

Peter was quiet too, keeping his eyes trained on the sidewalk as they made their way through the park. He knew that it wasn’t Tony’s fault that he hadn’t been there to take care of him. That was just the reality of their situation; they couldn’t be together all the time. But the teen couldn’t get past the fact that he just hadn’t been there to help at all, no matter whose fault it was. It stirred something deep down inside of Peter, something hurt and upset and desperate. Something he hadn’t really known was there before.

It was a feeling that he wished he could just force down, back to wherever it came from. Ignore it until it dissipated.

But he kept coming back to the complete hopelessness that he’d felt as he sat on the floor of the compound.

Exhausted, dirty, and disconnected. With no one there to help him get better. Abandoned. It felt like he would never feel happiness again. Desolate.

And on purpose or not, it was all Tony’s fault.

“Are you ever going to tell me what’s going on?”

Peter felt irritation flash hot through his veins. “What are you talking about, Tony? I just told you that it’s nothing, just a bad day. Just drop it.”

“I- That’s not what I mean, Peter, I’m sorry. It’s just that…” Tony squeezed his hand gently, taking a deep breath as he tried to search for the right words. “Well...I don’t know. I guess I’ve just been feeling weird too, kind of off? I realized that I don’t...remember much.” And the last thing that he could remember from before he and Peter got together wasn’t exactly something he wanted to dwell on.

The older man paused for a moment before speaking again. “I tried to ignore it because everything else felt...good. Perfect, even.” He gave his husband a small smile. His eyes betrayed him though, revealing his confusion and anxiety. “But then the thing that happened with your aunt…,” he trailed off. “Something’s happening and I can’t just pretend it’s all okay. Not anymore. Peter, what’s going on?”

Peter just looked at him, heart pounding. There was no way this was happening. Tony shouldn’t have remembered anything about what happened with May. He’d made sure of it... Hadn’t he? “What? Nothing is going on, Tony. I don’t know what you’re talking about.”

He just needed to try and manipulate the situation slightly, to ensure that this time Tony forgot all about the disaster with May.

Tony frowned at the panicked look that was overtaking Peter’s face, wanting answers but worried about causing his husband any distress, knowing that he was already feeling vulnerable. “Peter, I need you to tell me. Who...what am I, baby?”

Peter heard the words, but they didn’t register immediately. He just watched Tony, the way his mouth moved and how his expression went slightly...sad? Yes, he definitely looked sad.

But then his brain processed what the other man had said and it hit him.

Tony knew. He really knew.

How did he know?

“What?” Peter froze, pulling his hand away again as he slowly took a few steps back from Tony. Was that his voice? It sounded far-away, like he was disconnected from his body again. No, no, he wasn’t going to let that happen. He never wanted to feel like that ever again. He just had to focus and fix the situation. That’s all it was, just a small fix.

He closed his eyes, trying to focus long enough to make the small adjustment to the illusion. But he kept getting distracted by the distant feeling, and the reminder of his anger from before. It wasn’t working. He huffed out of frustration, dread prickling under his skin. Why wasn’t it working? “Tony, I don’t-“

“Please, Peter,” Tony said gently. His eyes flickered down to Peter’s hand that was now hanging limply by his side. He softly shook his head, looking back up at the teen. “I just want to know the truth, whatever it is. It’ll be-”

The rubber band snapped.

“Don’t you dare tell me it will be okay or fine or whatever the hell it is you're about to say!” Peter was all but yelling, unable to keep the bitterness and pain out of his voice. He stopped walking completely, turning to face the older man. His eyes were wild as he glared up at Tony before looking away as he continued to speak. “You have no fucking right to say that Tony, you have no idea how I feel! You don’t know what it’s like to try so hard and always end up so fucking alo-”

There was a loud sound, almost a pop, that caused his eyes to open again from surprise, having closed them as he blinked back tears of frustration. His head whipped around to see if the older man knew what was happening, concern overpowering his anger, when the words died in his throat.

Red. All Peter could see was deep, dark red, spreading across the fabric of Tony’s white t- shirt. And the shocked look on his husband's face, his eyes wide with disbelief as he moved a hand to feel the spot, just underneath his heart. Right under where the arc reactor used to be.

Tony had gotten shot.

But what? No. No, no, that wasn’t right. Tony couldn’t get hurt. He wasn’t supposed to get hurt. Peter was only trying to correct the things he had somehow overlooked, get rid of the memories the older man wasn’t supposed to have, not-

“Peter?” Tony’s voice was a mumble as he touched his fingers to his chest, pulling away with red stained tips.

“Tony,” the teen choked out, tears stinging in his eyes again. How the fuck had that happened? He didn’t- He hadn’t meant to do anything like that, Tony wasn’t supposed to get hurt. He couldn’t-

He couldn’t leave Peter again.

“I’m so sorry,” he choked out, the first tears falling. Peter pressed his hands to the wound on his husband’s chest in a weak attempt to rectify the situation. He shifted his body, easily supporting most of Tony’s weight as the man’s legs started to give out. “I’m so sorry, I didn’t mean to do this. You’ve gotta believe me, Tony, I- I didn’t- I swear I didn’t mean to-”

Tony’s face was pale as he leaned his head on Peter’s shoulder, taking a shuddering breath. The sound terrified the younger man. “You didn’t...Peter, you didn’t do this.”

Peter shook his head quickly, choking back a pained cry. He didn’t want to believe that had done it. But there was no other explanation, how else would it happen? He was the only one with control in the illusion, despite the way he ‘let’ Tony be in charge during their scene the other day.

(Although that fact was seeming more and more questionable as time went on.)

He pushed Tony’s shirt up with a trembling hand after wiping his own eyes, looking blearily at the wound. It went clear through, back to front.

“Fuck, Tony,” he breathed, ignoring the blood that was dripping over his fingers. The sensation barely registered. He just needed Tony to be okay.

Maybe if he focused he could actually fix it. It had to work, there was no other option. He just... needed to focus without getting upset again. Because clearly that had only made things worse.

So much worse.

He tried to narrow his attention again, one hand pressed lightly over the injury and the other helping to support Tony as he closed his eyes. He was in control. He could make Tony better again.

Peter felt Tony’s hands cover his own and he opened his eyes, lashes still wet with tears that fought to spill over.

“I’ll be okay, baby,” the older man said quietly. He blinked slowly at Peter, trying to convey with his eyes that his trust in his husband was as strong as ever. “I know you’ll make sure I’m okay. You won’t let anything happen to me.” Maybe he didn’t know what exactly was going on, but Peter was obviously playing some sort of role in the things that were happening. He just wasn’t sure what. And trying to find out clearly hadn’t done him any good. “Let’s go home.” His voice trembled despite how he tried to sound calm.

Peter looked at him, breathing hard as he looked around. The park and the people around them carried on as if the past few minutes never happened, oblivious to the situation and his distress. Which he guessed was a good thing. Maybe. The contrast was jarring, regardless. “Home...yeah, let’s...go. We should go home.” He could keep trying to manipulate things on the way so that Tony would be okay and...maybe he’d actually get him to him to forget about everything that had happened on their walk.

He clung close to Tony, and he knew that he wouldn’t have been willing to let go of him even if he hadn’t needed to help him walk. He couldn’t. He had to make sure that his husband would be okay, and touching him allowed him some assurance that he was for the time being.

The teen regretted how angry and upset he’d been before. What happened hadn’t really been Tony’s fault and he knew that. It was all his. He’d known that the whole fucking time. It was just so easy to be hurt when he was alone and vulnerable like that.

But he wasn’t alone. At least not in Tony’s eyes.

Or… Or maybe he was since Tony was figuri-

No. He couldn’t think about that, thinking about that was only going to make things worse. He had to focus on Tony.

Despite his best efforts, spending the entire walk home watching Tony worriedly, Peter was unable to make any kind of progress in closing the wound in the older man’s chest. Tony’s body got heavier the closer they came to the tower, and by the time they reached the elevator, he was breathing shallowly as Peter supported all of his weight.

Grunting in pain as they stepped out into the foyer of the penthouse, Tony grit his teeth. “We gotta do something about this hole, Pete.” Sweat was rolling in beads down his forehead and back, soaking his already saturated shirt. “Don’t-,” he swallowed roughly, knuckles white as he clenched his fist. “Don’t wanna pass out.”

Peter nodded slowly, his reaction time slowed with his stress over the situation. Tony’s words made his heart go into overdrive again, because fuck. That was a fucking possibility, wasn’t it? Tony could lose consciousness- He could actually bleed out, even, despite the wound not being immediately fatal. Peter felt sick. “You need to stay awake,” he agreed quietly, voice shaking, unable to say the other words out loud.

If he remembered one thing from his own mishaps, it was that staying awake was vital with an injury. Especially such a serious one. Life-threatening. But he really didn’t want to think about it that way.

(Didn’t want to think about the way he’d felt cold as his eyes slipped shut on the dark train, body screaming with every breath, every pump of his heart, sure that he was dying. Sure that he’d get to be with Tony again-)

What was he supposed to do? Hell, what could he do? He clearly couldn’t get the wound closed by trying to mentally control the situation. (But why? Why was nothing working? The illusion was still up and running, so he obviously was still directing it.) So he needed to take another approach.

He wasn’t the best at doing stitches, only using them when he absolutely had to, on the wounds that he knew would take too long to heal, the ones that would catch May’s attention, but maybe that would have to do. He morbidly thought that at least he wouldn’t be the one feeling the pain this time. It probably wasn’t even the ideal response to the situation. Actual medical professionals would likely have other, more effective methods of intervention. Tony had a hole straight through his body. Peter didn’t care. It would have to do. He’d try just about anything to make Tony stop bleeding, at this point.

He silently guided Tony to their room, still supporting most of his weight as they walked. He was tempted to just hold the man in his arms, as it would certainly allow them to reach their destination faster, but he didn’t want to cause Tony any further discomfort by jostling him any more than what was necessary.

Once they were in the bedroom, he helped Tony sit down on the bed. Then once the older man seemed (relatively) comfortable, Peter reluctantly pulled away. Only to find a suture kit, but he still felt guilty.

The whole fucked up situation started because he felt alone, now he was leaving Tony alone when he needed Peter the most. Even if it was only for a couple of minutes.

Peter didn’t have to search for a kit long. Once he was able to focus, he made sure there would be one in the next drawer that he opened. Because of course there was, of course it worked. All he had to do was think of it, conjure it into existence.

Sure, he could make the equipment he needed appear on a mere whim, but he couldn’t save Tony from his own fuck up that he’d caused in the same way.

That was just fucking perfect.

He tried not to break the faucet as he turned the water on, frustration bleeding into anger.

As soon as he had the kit in his now clean hands, he rushed back to Tony’s side.

“How are you feeling now, baby?” Peter asked weakly, all of the fight that had built up in him in the bathroom disappearing at the sight of the older man. He didn’t know what he was hoping for. Maybe the wound had miraculously healed. A delayed reaction from what he’d tried earlier, or even just responding to his desperation. Anything.

Tony just gave him a pained expression, face somehow paler than it had been before. Not exactly promising. His eyes were glassy as he blinked up at Peter, mouth twitching when he grit his teeth.

“Okay...well, I found the first aid kit. So I can try to...try to fix this, okay?” Peter’s voice shook slightly despite his attempt to steady it. Even though he knew he was mostly talking to himself, he didn’t want Tony to know how afraid he was.

As if the panicked set of his eyes and the frantic way his once again blood-stained hands were jerking around trying to find something to do weren’t giving him away. He ripped Tony’s t-shirt in half, exposing his chest as he tried his best to wipe away the excess blood with some cloths he’d brought from the bathroom.

There was no real response from Tony, just a vague imitation of a nod and a grunt from the pain he was in.

Maybe… Maybe he could at least try and take away some of the pain first.

“Tony,” Peter said softly, lips trembling as he leaned down to press a kiss to his sweaty temple. “It’s gonna be okay.” He took a shaky breath, letting his eyes slip shut as he stayed in that position, curled around Tony’s body. He thought about the way he’d felt after those extra strength painkillers he’d received after his fight with Liz’s dad. The warm, thick, fuzzy feeling.

After a moment he opened his eyes again and sat up, gingerly pressing his fingers to the skin just to the side of the wound. “Can you,” he swallowed. “Can you f-feel that Tony?”

The older man groaned, squeezing his eyes shut. “Yes,” he bit out. “Of course I can feel that.” He took a labored breath. “Fuck, Pete, it hurts.” His voice was a whimper, or at least the closest thing to one the younger man had ever heard come from him.

Peter’s heart lurched in his chest and he immediately pulled his fingers away. Fuck, fuck, so he was going to have to do this without any kind of relief for Tony. “O-okay, okay,” he said unsteadily, mostly in an attempt to calm himself. He could do this.

He opened the kit that was beside them on the bed and pulled out a bottle of sterile water (there was alcohol too, but Peter knew that it would do more harm than good on such a deep wound) and a smaller kit with everything needed for suturing: suture thread, a needle driver, a couple different curved needles, and some scissors. There were forceps too, but he’d never had the patience for using them.

“This is, uh, this is probably gonna sting a bit, T, I’m sorry,” Peter whispered, looking up at Tony’s face as he uncapped the plastic bottle. “I’ll try to be quick, I p-promise.” All he got in response was another nod that was simultaneously jerky and sluggish. God, he was so out of it, and this was going to hurt so bad, Peter knew it. “Here, wait,” the teen rushed out after a moment, yanking his shirt off. “Open your mouth.”

Tony complied, making soft noises of discomfort as Peter placed some of the fabric in his mouth.

“Bite down on that, okay?” Taking a breath, Peter began to pour the clear liquid into the wound. He let out a pained cry of his own as Tony immediately began whimpering, the veins in his neck and head bulging as he pushed back against the pillows, teeth clenched around the bunched up t-shirt. “It’s okay,” Peter sobbed out, putting down the bottle and narrowly resisting the urge to run his hand through Tony’s sweat-soaked hair. He had to keep his hands as clean as possible. “It’s okay, Tony, I’m gonna fix it. I- I love you, I’m so sorry.”

Once he was satisfied that he wasn’t going to trap any bacteria inside Tony’s body, and Tony’s wails had quieted down to soft whines, Peter opened up the package of needles. He grabbed one that looked to be about the right size and threaded it with the suture line before securing it in the grip of the needle-driver. “Ok-kay Tony, here we go.”

His left hand manipulated the torn skin into the correct position while his right pushed the tip of the curved needle through. Peter gagged at the resistance he could feel, pausing and squeezing his eyes shut as he tried to breathe through the nausea. He had to do this, for Tony.

Peter placed a few interrupted sutures in the front of Tony’s chest, letting out a shaky sigh when the last was secured and the surface of the small wound was closed. He knew that the only reason Tony hadn’t yelled his throat raw was because his brain wasn’t processing the pain anymore. “You did so good, Tony,” he breathed as he blinked over at the man who was shuddering with his own labored breaths before looking down at his bloodied hands.

Sitting the tools down on the sterile pad he’d laid out, the young man’s hands moved to clutch at his husband. “Baby,” he said gently, voice calm now that he had fallen into the rhythm of his actions, satisfied now that he knew that he had a way to take care of Tony. A way to help him. He could take care of Tony the way he’d wanted Tony to take care of him. “I’m gonna roll you over now, okay? I need to stitch up the e-exit wound now, on your back. You’re doing so good, it’s all gonna be alright, T.”

After placing two stitches in the skin of Tony’s back, Peter took the kit back to the bathroom. He came back with a few warm, wet washcloths that he used to wipe the blood from his husband’s body.

Tony let out a soft whimper at the touch, his features crumpling in discomfort. “Pete,” he breathed, blinking wetly.

“I know,” Peter murmured softly. “But it’s all done now, you’re gonna be okay.” He went about settling the older man properly in the bed, stripping him of his jeans and pulling the sheet up over his legs and abdomen.

The blood-soaked comforter turned operating table had been pushed to the floor along with Tony’s shredded shirt, another blanket having been dragged out of the linen closet to be draped on top of the wounded man.

Peter sat down on the bed gently, right at Tony’s side. He wasn’t going anywhere else, this was where he needed to be. He had to take care of Tony. He wasn’t going to leave him alone.

One hand held onto his husband’s, the other finally moving to gently stroke through the older man’s hair. He knew that always tended to relax Tony when he was stressed.

Tony’s eyes slowly opened up to look at him, a slight smile tugging at his lips. Well, as much of one as he could manage. “Hey, baby...” He closed his eyes again. “Should’a been a doctor, Pete,” he sighed.

Peter tried to give him a smile back, but it was just as weak as the older man’s. The adrenaline that had allowed him to focus and successfully tend to Tony’s wounds was seeping out of him, leaving him feeling drained and overwhelmed once more. “Hey, Tony. How are you feeling?” There was a pit in his stomach as he waited for an answer. He was worried that Tony would hate him once his head was finally clear from the pain. He couldn’t lose Tony here too, he couldn’t-

Tony being alive but wanting nothing to do with him would be even worse than the man dying again.

As he started panicking, Peter completely missed Tony’s answer. He was lost in his own thoughts as he spiraled further and further into the chaos in his mind.

Tony’s hand lightly squeezing his brought him back to the present, grounding him. The older man always knew just what he needed. “Peter? You okay, honey?”

“What? I’m- yeah, I’m fine.” A huge lie. But he didn’t need Tony to worry about him. All his husband needed to worry about was healing and getting better. “How are you feeling?” He repeated his question.

“I already answered that.” Tony laughed weakly, making a face when his chest throbbed at the action. “You keep spacing out on me, baby. I’m feeling alright, not too bad. It takes a lot to get me down.”

That was definitely true on some level, at least. It seemed like Tony would keep fighting no matter what. The reactor, the palladium poisoning Rhodey had told him about, the...the stones. It was both endearing to Peter, the way the man persevered despite the damage done to his body, and completely terrifying. Although he’d thought he wouldn’t have to worry about the terrifying part here in the illusion.

But Tony got hurt anyway.

The older man shook Peter out of his thoughts once again when he started speaking. He was frowning softly, and Peter could tell that it was half playful and half genuine concern. “Why are you just sitting there? Come here. If you’re banishing me to be in bed, you can at least lay here with me.”

Peter slowly nodded, moving to lay down next to the other man. He remained on top of the covers to be sure he stayed clear of Tony’s injury, not wanting to hurt him, but still cuddling up to him as best he could. He couldn’t stay away. The mere thought of being away from Tony made the panic in his chest rear its head again.

And the regret. The guilt.

He’d fucked up. He knew he did. Everything that had happened was all his fault.

But he could fix it. And it would actually work this time. He was in control of his actions, he could handle some of the issues directly. He’d care for Tony while he healed, try to figure out what the disconnect was with his influence on the illusion, and make him forget all about this horrible situation. And he’d be sure to take away memories of the confrontation from May that set the entire thing into motion

Peter knew that he could fix everything. It had to be possible. He still had control over the situation, and Tony was going to be absolutely fine after some TLC.

He just needed to do some more patching on EDITH’s neural pathways within the STARKER program.

That would surely take care of things.

#starker #peter parker #tony stark #tony x peter #tony stark x peter parker #B&B write #SbPBP #Peter’s EDITH!verse #starker angst #angst #gun tw #hurt/comfort #or no comfort #but still lol #tw medical #tw stitches