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ckneal · 3 years

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There’s a midam AU idea that’s been living in the back of my mind for months now, but it’s been slow going. Mainly because I suspect that doing the idea justice is going to mean doing more research than I’m used to, and maybe even rewatching the series proper to help me fill in some of the weak spots, and I have so many other story ideas that are frankly just easier to work on, two of which are already slated to be multi-chapter works. . . But I’m in the mood to type up something longwinded, so here we go. Keep reading if you’d like to see a rough outline of the first few chapters of this story I really hope to write out properly sometime.

(Warning, this is a long one.)

So, this story is loosely based on the Hundred Years War that took place between England and France from 1337-1453. But it’s only very loosely inspired. Very, very loosely. As in, I was reading a book, I read about one thing that happened, it germinated in my head, and then suddenly I had a plot developing that featured my current favorite ship. Additional sources of inspiration include one of my favorite fantasy series, and a personally beloved trashy romance novel. Because it’s fanfiction, folks. There are no rules here.

Of course, in this AU, the entire world is going to be made up, with neither side of the war distinctly being assigned the role of England or France—or Flanders or Burgundy, for that matter. I barrowed an inciting incident, and few smaller details from history to help things along here and there, but with no regard for keeping all the French things assigned to one group and the English ones to another.

That said, the inciting incident took its inspiration from the Battle of Poiters, a conflict during which England not only won against the French, but also took their king hostage. King Jean II was later ransomed back to his people, but at a sum that was so high, France could not afford to pay it all at once. England still returned France’s king, but new hostages were provided to serve as collateral during the interim, including the King’s son.

So. . .crown Prince Michael Shurley completely decimates King John Winchester on the battlefield, and sends his demands to John’s queen, Mary Winchester. The two kingdoms have been locked in a territory dispute for several decades, and this is one of the more humiliating events to befall the smaller kingdom yet, especially since they are unable to meet all of Michael’s demands. When the Winchesters begrudgingly admit this to the Shurley representatives, they’re caught off guard when they’re offered a trade: John Winchester will be returned, so long Dean Winchester takes his place as collateral.

Things are less than stable in the Winchester kingdom however, with more than a few factions quietly scheming for power. John and Mary were an arranged marriage that was originally held up like a fairytale when the two seemingly fell madly in love during their mandated courtship, but the years afterward had changed them. Civil unrest sparked by the war had brought out a lot of disagreements between the Winchesters and the Campbells and their approaches to governing.

John’s supporters are the ones to step forward with a plan, and convince Mary that it’s vitally important the people are not alarmed by their king’s capture. Mary initially finds it distasteful, but it’s talked around and adjusted and reframed, as John’s people ferret out more and more information about the vital party involved, until she finally agrees.

Because John Winchester just happened to have a bastard son. The resemblance to Dean might not be particularly remarkable, but no one at the Shurley court has ever seen the Winchester heir before. Plus, Adam Milligan has spent the entirety of his teen years studying to become a physician, of all things. He’s perfect for their purposes.

Ten years prior, the Shurley court had had to deal with its own bout of civil unrest, when King Chuck Shurley’s second eldest son had attempted to overthrow him with the support of several nobles from one the kingdom’s richest providences. Lucifer had allegedly been driven into exile following his defeat, and Chuck had been said to have contracted some sort of mysterious illness. According to rumors, the king had shut himself up in his private chambers and refused to admit anyone apart from his remaining children. Even servants were barred from tending him directly.

They snatch Adam away from his studies and force him into compliance by dusting off an archaic law left over from before the start of the war, when the kingdom relied on a conscription military force rather than a standing army full of career military professionals—this law empowering the crown to call on any of its citizens for a minimum forty days of military service per year. They tell Adam that his mission seems more dangerous than it is—really, all he has to do is pretend to be Dean, and use his medical knowledge to figure out exactly what mysterious illness has bedridden the enemy monarch.

Sam and Dean—the proverbial heir and spare of the kingdom—are not at court to meet their younger brother, when he’s hastily fitted for a royal wardrobe and put through a crash course on court etiquette. Sam is very publicly put on display at a holiday festival in another part of the kingdom, while Dean is sent orders to quietly stay behind at a country estate while his valet, Kevin Tran, is sent on to court. Neither of the princes is told about the plan until after Adam has already been shipped out, with Kevin in toe to help Adam along with the impersonation.

No one involved is in anyway comfortable with the mission. But it was only supposed to be for forty days. Adam was assured that the necessary funds to pay off the ransom would either be raised by the end of the minimum mandated service, or they would make contact to extract him. The Campbells and the Winchesters both allegedly had spies in the Shurley court, and they would make themselves known when the time was right.

Adam is given the impression that the latter had been told to him with the intention of making him feel safer. It did not work.

He’s terrified when he arrives—almost would have preferred being promptly thrown into a dungeon upon arrival, instead of a room full of foreign nobility who one and all give off the impression that if cut they’d bleed straight silver, and look at “Dean,” the hostage prince and purported military genius from the tiny, vicious country across the channel, as a curiosity to be studied. He’s assigned two guards (who I decided will be Anael and Samandriel, based entirely on the tags I threw together at then end of this post, during which I decided that I love these three together), who follow him around relentlessly, but beyond that, he’s. . .pretty much treated like a guest. If a stiflingly monitored one. There are limitations on where he can go and what he can do, but for the most part he’s just sort of. . .there.

Most unnerving of all, however, is the small package that Adam finds in his room when he first settles in. Kevin swears he has no idea who left it. It has the Campbell’s insignia clearly worked into the pattern of the paper it’s wrapped in, and inside he finds a knife small enough to conceal on his person, and a number of different herbs and powders that he recognizes from his studies—though of course, he’s more familiar with remedies to counteract their effects.

In other words, he finds an assassin’s-first-kill-job kit, and instructions on how and when to use it, if opportunity arises. This had not been part of the deal when Adam reluctantly signed on.

Unbeknownst to Adam however—though suspected by some parties in the Winchester court—Adam cannot assassinate Chuck Shurley, because Chuck is not there. Shortly after Lucifer’s insurrection, Chuck had quietly disappeared. Michael had only been a teenager at the time. He invented the story about Chuck being ill on impulse, certain that Chuck would be back sooner than later, and Raphael had gone along with it because, being twelve years old, Raphael was not yet old enough to question Michael’s judgement. It is now an awkward point between them.

Adam soon becomes another.

Michael regularly checks in to see how Adam’s getting on, in a way that Kevin assures Adam is entirely appropriate, since Michael is under the impression that Adam is going to be a fellow monarch someday, and is likely trying to be courteous. Adam inherently feels somewhat flustered around Michael though, which is not helped by the fact that Michael is somehow always present whenever Adam puts his foot in his mouth socially. On more than one occasion, he’s thankful that almost no one has actually been to his homeland, allowing Adam to blame an astonishing number of fuck ups on cultural differences.

Michael and Adam’s early one on one interaction are intensely awkward. Adam will forget to wear gloves, and then Michael will comment that Adam’s hands are oddly devoid of callouses for someone who’d practically been raised with a sword in his hand, leaving Adam to scramble for some flimsy excuse about hand cream. Adam will inquisitively ask questions about what sort of illness would be severe enough to leave someone bedridden for a decade but not kill them in that time (Kevin frantically motioning over Michael’s shoulder to convey that that is NOT the right way to fish for details on such a sensitive subject), and Michael will struggle to find an excuse around the quietly bubbling panic, because he hasn’t had to try to explain anything about his father since that first year, and he is not a particularly gifted liar.

And then there’s Raphael.

Unlike Michael, Raphael is suspicious of “Dean” right from the start, pulling Michael aside to point out things that don’t seem quite right according to what their informants have told them about Dean Winchester.

“Doesn’t he look a bit young?”

“Some people look younger than they are, Raphael.”

“I was told Dean Winchester had dark hair.”

“Dark blond is dark.”

“Aren’t his eyes supposed to be green?”

“They’re obviously blue.”

“That’s exactly my point.”

The forty days come and go with Adam and Kevin nervously waiting for some sort of sign from home. Roughly two weeks later, a messenger arrives with unexpected news for Michael’s court: the Campbells have officially broken ties with the Winchesters in a violent bid for power that has left the kingdom at war with itself.

According to Kevin, the civil war has probably slowed things down a bit, if it’s as bad as the rumors say. . .

Adam and Kevin are stranded.

“Don’t worry though—I know Dean, and he knows our necks are on the line. He’ll keep out of sight until they manage to get us out of here.”

Adam finds it difficult to put faith in the virtues of a brother he’s never met, but doesn’t have it in him to question Kevin’s faith. He worries about his mother, who might have been safe in the countryside, but also might have made the trek to the capitol when it came out that Adam had been abducted for the sake of persevering the royal family's throne. He can’t be sure.

And to top it off, Michael takes to stopping by Adam’s room every couple of days to privately talk about the movements of the various factions—who has been sighted where and in what condition, where they’re rumored to be headed. Adam interprets it as an attempt to shake out inside information. One day, Adam finally tries to set him straight by saying it doesn’t matter how many ugly details Michael throws at him, Adam can’t help him because he doesn’t know anything—and is promptly put to shame when Michael looks at him in surprise and says, “You misunderstand. I assumed that you would want to know these things, because they are your family.”

Michael leaves, and Adam’s guards exchange a look. When asked, Samandriel awkwardly tells Adam that the royal family used to have a fourth child. Gabriel. He was lost during Lucifer’s insurrection. Pirates overtook his ship. They’d never received a ransom. Michael had purportedly offered a standing reward for any news of Gabriel, and put an unwise amount of resources into searching for him until it threatened the war effort.

Adam and Michael start talking more frequently from there, starting with an apology on Adam’s part. It’s tricky at first, because Michael starts out asking questions about Dean Winchester's military exploits—it is the most likely common ground between them, after all—and Adam has to hastily change the subject every time. By the two month mark, they’re talking affably, and rumors start to circulate through the courts as Michael's routine check ins on Adam start getting less formal and more frequent.

On the four month mark, rumors get even worse. Raphael finally sits Michael down and really gets into all of the things about “Dean” that don’t add up, item by item. If he’s trying to pretend he doesn’t know anything about his country’s military exploits, he’s far too convincing given his reported record, and Raphael has it on good authority that more than half of those “cultural differences” in etiquette that keep cropping up are completely unfounded—and look here, three different informants have sent lists of Dean Winchester’s physical characteristics, and the foreign prince DOES NOT MATCH.

“Michael, something is not right here.”

“Fine, I’ll talk to him about it now.”

And Michael storms off to address “Dean,” while Raphael calls after him that he should wait until morning. Because it is the middle of the night.

Adam just happens to be up reading. Michael’s familiar with the book. Michael gets distracted, and they talk all night. The sun’s coming up when Michael finally leaves, and a servant happens to see him slipping out of Adam’s room. Suggestive conjectures promptly follow, and Raphael exasperatedly admits they only have themself to blame.

And this only gets worse, because now Adam and Michael have transitioned into being friends. No more guarded conversations where one is convinced the other is about to catch them in some sort of lie. When Raphael mentions that some of the lesser nobles are starting to think Michael and Adam are courting, Michael’s fidgeting is not at all lost on them, as Michael assures them that of course that isn't the case. He and Dean are merely establishing friendly relations that will serve them well down the road politically—

“After the war is over?”

“Of course, after the war is over.”

Adam’s been stranded in the Shurley court for almost a year by the time that he finally slips into his room and sees a sealed message set out on his bed. Adam doesn’t recognize the insignia as belonging to either the Winchesters or the Campbells, but it’s signed with the initials “SW” at the bottom. It mostly contains a lot of vague phrases that make Adam wonder if he was supposed to be versed in some sort of code. As far as he’s concerned, the only important information comes at the end: Kate Milligan has been safely relocated for the duration of the civil war.

Relieved, Adam goes down to dinner, where some sort of seasonal holiday is being celebrated, and has a bit more wine than he normally would. The Shurley court is one of those stuffy courts where seating is stiffly dictated by tradition. As a foreign prince, Adam’s assigned seat is at the same table as Michael, although, according to Kevin, his placement's much further down due to his being a hostage. After a few drinks, and after most of the nobles have cleared off from the table to talk and celebrate elsewhere in the hall, Adam sees no reason not to get up and relocate down the line of chairs to sit closer to Michael. It was against the rules, but Adam was aware enough not to sit in Raphael’s empty seat, and he’d been seen with Michael so often that Anael and Samandriel barely even blinked, because Adam obviously wasn’t about to attack their prince or anything.

However, it is worth noting that while talking to Adam, Michael consumes a decent amount more wine than he would normally have as well.

Later that night, Michael’s walking Adam back to his room, and he starts to comment that Adam seems happier than usual. But even when sober, Michael would struggle to say something like that—if he’d even attempt it while sober—and Adam winds up biting his lip as he watches Michael’s mounting embarrassment, as a simple compliment inexplicably morphs—words seemingly forcing their way out as Michael tries and utterly fails to stop them—into a compliment about how Adam is beautiful—that is, he’s always beautiful—that is, Michael can’t help noticing Adam most days—that is. . .

. . .Michael is adorable. And in a moment of pure, thoughtless impulse, Adam leans in and kisses Michael right there in the corridor.

Michael is profoundly shocked, and his reaction delayed. Adam had only gone in intending to briefly press his lips against Michael’s, but as he’s pulling away Michael abruptly leans in and reseals the kiss, and Adam in turn takes that as an invitation to pull Michael closer. And a few minutes later, Raphael happens to walk down the hallway and find the two of them enthusiastically kissing against the wall.

And Raphael promptly turns around and goes back the way they came, only stopping at one point to flag down a servant and order them not to let anyone else walk down that particular corridor for at least an hour, hoping that Michael and Adam’s “friendly relations” wouldn’t result in anything too inappropriate.

As it happens, nothing particularly inappropriate happens. Nonetheless, Michael still wakes up the next morning, fully clothed in his own bed, in panic because the first thought to distinctly make its way through the ungodly pain in his head is that he’d taken liberties with a guest the night before. The heir to a foreign power at that, a peer, a hostage! Michael never thought he was capable of something so dishonorable--he’d had Dean pressed up against the wall as if they were a couple of ill-bred urchins, and how does one even go about apologizing for something like that?

(Of course, if Michael were thinking clearly, he might have remembered that Adam had actually been the one to back himself up against the wall, with Michael obligingly following along, quite malleable to whatever positioning Adam wanted so long as Adam kept kissing him.)

Michael’s behavior was beyond unacceptable. If his father hadn’t already abandoned them, he’d likely disown Michael out of pure shame. There was no telling what kind of damage he’d done to the relationship between their kingdoms. At best, Michael’s uncouth actions would be a dirty secret between them in the years to come, after Dean married, and Michael was left barely able to look Dean’s spouse in the eye. If Michael were a lesser noble, his parents might demand he married Dean outright.

And suddenly Michael sat up in bed, realizing he could marry Dean. His mind begins racing, because of course he could marry Dean! It made perfect sense. They enjoyed each other’s company, and with both of them being heir to their respective kingdoms, their union would effectively end the war. It might be complicated—especially given some of the odd customs Dean had introduced to Michael’s court—but marriages had been used to cemented alliances often enough, and the thought of marrying Dean elicited a curiously hot feeling in Michael’s stomach, remembering the way Adam had pulled him close the night before.

(Fun fact, England and France actually did try to do this with the Treaty of Troyes in 1420; it did not go as planned.)

Michael goes through the rest of his day in an uncharacteristically upbeat mindset, because now it all seems to just be a matter of organizing things, and he is good at organizing. He would have to write to either John or Mary Winchester as soon as the situation in their kingdom settled, and formally ask for Dean’s hand, and he and Dean should have a chaperone present at all times moving forward to avoid scandal--though there would be no way to sidestep scandal altogether, of course. Adam was still technically Michael’s prisoner.

More than likely, the Winchesters or Campbells would demand Michael relinquish his claim to at least half of the territories that they’d spent the last few decades fighting over, but that would be fine. It’s traditional in Michael’s country to give gifts to one’s in-laws, and Dean is a future monarch. Anything too little would be insulting, and all would be consolidated eventually when Dean and Michael assumed their respective thrones. . .

Michael is still walking around delightfully living in his own head when Raphael pulls him into an empty room to discuss what they witnessed the night before. While not the most shocking scenario they could have imagined, they were not expecting to hear their brother announce that he and Dean Winchester would be getting married.

“And how are we to explain away our father’s absence during the proceedings, Michael?”

Michael’s good mood promptly withers. Because of course Chuck would be expected to play some part in arranging his son’s wedding. Ill or not, at the very least, he would be expected to make an appearance at the wedding. To have no part in it at all would be suspicious, not to mention rude.

While Raphael intended to snap Michael back to his senses, they had not meant to shake Michael into an immediate depression. They try for a gentler tone.

“You know, Michael. Our father has been gone for over a decade. He left no formal plans, he's sent no word. By any standard, he's abdicated. Perhaps this isn’t the right time to introduce a political marriage. Perhaps we should consider your assuming the kingship, and then come back around to formalizing your relationship with Dean—”

Michael, of course, is against this. Because their father is alive, and he will come back, and it will not be to find that another one of his sons had greedily tried to usurp the throne.

Seeing Michael about to fall back onto a familiar tangent, Raphael chooses the lesser of two evils and takes the conversation back to “Dean.” They ask which out of the two of them proposed to the other.

Michael abruptly realizes that he's forgotten something.

Meanwhile, Adam starts his morning on a much happier note. His headache is less punishing than Michael’s, and while feeling the normal amount of embarrassment that comes with drinking a little too much, the feeling does not extend to kissing Michael. His mother’s safe, he’s nailing his Dean impression, and Michael apparently likes him. Things could not be better. Until Adam remembers how the latter two items on that list are linked.

Michael is not like a classmate back home, who he could chat up, get a drink with, and maybe start seeing regularly if all things went well. Michael is, in fact, the acting ruler of one of the most powerful countries in the world, which just so happens to be at war with Adam’s, and under the explicit impression that Adam is similarly situated in the world.

Adam promptly begins freaking out.

And then Michael finds him.

Adam’s in the library at the time. Michael walks in and quietly dismisses Adam’s guards, and Kevin, leaving the two of them completely alone. Adam doesn’t realize what Michael’s doing right away, though he’s spent enough time with Michael to recognize how nervous he is as he starts talking about a proposal to end the war—selling the idea, as if Michael wouldn’t be enough on his own—and then sheepishly tapering into the idea that both he and Adam seem to have feelings for one another. And if Adam were able to go back in time and strangle his tipsy past self, he would, because then he wouldn’t have to see the look on Michael’s face when he says no.

And no, Michael does not understand.

Adam can hear years of living in the public eye at work in Michael voice, as he just manages to keep his voice level in asking, “Even if it would mean peace?”

"I'm sorry, I just—I can't."

". . .I see."

Michael excuses himself, and Adam collapses onto a couch, assuring himself that no was the only right answer, and he shouldn’t feel terrible—which, of course, since Adam’s spent the last couple of months flirting with Michael while posing as someone else, is not an easy idea to buy into.

Michael and Adam avoid eye contact at dinner, even as Raphael—who has zero doubts as to who initiated what the night before—practically burns holes into Adam’s skin with the looks they shoot down the table.

And then a messenger comes in. One of the wealthiest duchies in the kingdom (the same one that had once supported Lucifer, and of course would be populated with demon characters in the narrative) has declared its independence, having formed an alliance with the Campbells, and has launched an attack not far from the castle. Several villages have already been attacked along the way. Michael accompanies the armed forces he sends out to quash the uprising.

Raphael is left behind to fortify the castle and take in the refugees, who the messenger assured them are not far behind. Unlike Michael, Raphael rarely saw combat. Officially, it was because Raphael had adamantly insisted on training as a healer rather than a warrior, which was true enough. Unofficially though, Michael and Raphael are both fully aware that if anything happened to Michael, Raphael is the only one left to inherent the crown.

Samandirel and Anael escort Adam back to his room. Samandriel assures Adam that no one thinks he had anything to do with the duchy double crossing them, but it would probably just be safer for Adam to stay out of sight until things calm down. Anael is more closed-lipped about the situation.

From his window, Adam watches the first of the villagers come trickling in, and even from his vantage point he can make out burn wounds, makeshift bandages and hastily thrown together tourniquets, and he’s in hell, because it seems the only two options in front of him are to worry about Michael, or feel absolutely sick with guilt because he’s a trained physician and he should be down there helping.

Finally he pokes his head out into the corridor and asks if someone can find Kevin for him. Anael raises an eyebrow that “Dean,” who’s usually inordinately self-suffice for a prince, is suddenly insisting that he needs to see his manservant, but Samandriel is already helpfully heading down the hall. A few minutes later, Kevin is in Adam’s room, confused, as Adam asks him to take off his clothes.

“You can have mine, just switch with me, okay?”

“Uuh. . . Don’t you think mine will be a little tight on you—”

“Less talk! Strip!”

Michael had probably errored in assigning the same two guards to watch over Adam. After a year, the three of them had gotten to be on fairly familiar terms. Adam waited until Samandriel started to get chatty, and slipped quietly out of his room when Anael was distracted—neither of them having had any reason to think Adam would try to escape, because he had been nothing but compliant since the day he arrived.

From there, he goes straight to the infirmary.

Raphael had set up tents in the courtyard to accommodate the high number of people in need of care. Adam was a year out of practice, but the atmosphere was still familiar to him, and he slipped into the chaos unnoticed. Raphael doesn’t notice him until they are well into the thick of things, and Adam’s as covered in grime and gore as anyone else present. Adam had just gone for more bandages and the two of them nearly ran into each other, and for a split second Adam thinks Raphael just might not recognize him until hand closes around his arm like a vice.

“What exactly are YOU doing here?”

Then Raphael notices the stitches Adam had just finished putting in for his latest patient—and Adam’s stitchwork is immaculate, not the clumsy, half-hazard work of a solider who picked up the mechanics of it over the course of their career.

"YOU did that?"

Adam starts to fumble out an answer, but they are interrupted because then Michael is being brought in. The fighting is over. Raphael and Adam promptly drop everything.

Michael has a concussion. He’s also been lightly stabbed. You know, just lightly. Needs stitches though. Raphael is adamant that Adam leave immediately, but Michael, who is delirious, sees Adam and absolutely refuses to let Raphael send him away. Raphael winds up patching Michael together while Adam—annoyingly, to Raphael—is sat next to him, holding Michael’s hand. Adam winds up sitting next to Michael all night, because it’s the only way to keep Michael from getting up and tearing his stitches like a feverish moron.

Initially, Raphael refuses to leave too, not trusting their brother’s suspiciously competent love interest, whose family was purportedly allied with the traitors who’d just attacked their people. There are still more wounded to tend to, however, and Raphael begrudgingly has to step away—making sure to leave orders that a guard be present in the room the entire time that Raphael is gone.

Little does Raphael know, Adam would have lowkey given a limb to have Raphael stay. Michael’s demeanor is a lot less closed off when he’s feverish and concussed. Shortly after Raphael leaves, Michael starts apologizing for proposing earlier, and Adam feels like he’s been stabbed in the gut. And as he’s lying there, looking at Adam’s hand in his, Michael starts saying things he would not normally blurt out—like that ending the war was not the main reason he wanted to marry Adam, because the last year has been the best he can remember, and it is entirely due to spending time with Adam—even if Adam was only there by obligation—and he would do anything to make Adam happy, even if they weren’t together—and Adam is just stuck there, highkey dying on the inside.

Then Michael sees his face.

"I apologize, you’ve already said you do not want to marry me, I should not have brought this up—”

Michael starts to get out of bed completely unconcerned about his stab wounds, and as Adam’s pushing him back down, the words “That’s not true!” just sort of. . .fly out.

Then Michael’s suddenly looking at Adam, and his face is suddenly very sober, and Adam can feel his own face turning red.

"That is, I. . ." Adam realizes, suddenly, that he’s fucked. Telling Michael the truth is somehow both the right and wrong thing to do at the same time, and Michael is definitely in no condition to hear it either way. “How about, if you still want to marry me when all this is over, then I’ll say yes?”

The next morning is a string of stressful events for Adam. Raphael shooed him out of Michael room at dawn, and Adam went straight back to his own. Kevin, Samandriel, and Anael had all been reprimanded for Adam’s escape, with the latter two being replaced as Adam’s guard under Raphael’s orders. His first interaction with Ishim and Maribel does not bode well for them becoming friends.

When Adam tells Kevin that he’s thinking about coming clean to Michael, Kevin panics. News from the Winchesters had dried up weeks ago, even for Michael and Raphael’s sources. Kevin argues that they’d be better off attempting to escape on their own if the charade was getting to be too much for Adam, especially after last night—but even then, they should wait awhile longer. Why take any chances right now? And Adam doesn’t know how to go about explaining the why. . .

And it gets taken out of his hands anyway, when they step out of the room and find that it’s somehow leaked that Adam and Michael—who had completely misunderstood what Adam meant by “when all this is over”—are engaged.

Kevin doesn’t get another moment alone with Adam to discuss how stupidly dangerous this whole situation is, and Adam, no matter how hard he tries—can’t seem to get a moment alone with his fiancé to try to explain that the situation is not what he thinks it is. Everyone had vastly underestimated how far the rumors about Michael and Adam secretly courting had gone, and Adam can barely take three steps without a noble or courtier or someone pulling him aside to offer their congratulations, and as Adam gets closer to Michael’s chambers, there’s Raphael, circling like a shark and Adam does not want to make his confession to Raphael before he sees Michael.

Come dinner time, Adam finds that his seat had been reassigned. He now sits directly to Michael’s left. He keeps trying to convince Michael to step out into the hall with him for a second, while Raphael, seated in their normal place to Michael’s right, continuously circumvents him, firmly believing that Adam has done more than enough in private.

Then there’s a scream. A servant comes running out into the dining hall, carrying a bloody knife. They run up to Michael—up until the guards step forward to stop her, but she’s not attacking. Instead she hands over the knife and says that she found in the corridor outside the king’s chambers. She had been worried, so she broke protocol and went in. The king’s bed was drenched in blood.

Adam looks over and feels a chill when he recognizes the same knife that had been included in the murder kit he found in his room on day one.

If Raphael had looked up, Adam had no doubt that Raphael would have read something in his face, but they didn’t get the chance to. Michael and Raphael are busy staring at each, the only ones in the room who know beyond any doubt that the implication could not be true, because there had not been anyone in that bed to assassinate in over ten years. Neither of them is given the chance to try to spin the knife’s implications in any direction, however. While the court is still reeling in shocked silence, a guard walks in—completely oblivious—and announces that a messenger has arrived with urgent news.

Adam looks up, and finds he has room to panic more, when he sees Anna Milton walk in, a serving maid in the Winchester court, and as she drops a curtsey to Michael, she identifies herself as one of Raphael’s spies. She had held her place in the Winchester court for as long as she could, but when her real identity had been uncovered she’d had no choice but to flee, and she’s come with monumental news. The civil war across the channel has ended, the Campbells having been forced to seek asylum with their allies outside the kingdom, John Winchester deposed, and Dean Winchester installed on the throne in his place. She had witnessed his coronation herself the very day they identified her.

And Adam feels very cold, as if his blood had actually managed to turn into ice, which would have explained why he couldn’t seem to move, as every eye in the room immediately turns to him.

And that would be the end of part one.

#midam #adam milligan #supernatural michael #samandriel #supernatural raphael #anael #kevin tran #my thougths #i'm very tempted to throw jack in a joan-of-arc-inspired role

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littleoddwriter · 3 years

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Issues with Reader Fics

Okay, I'm probably going to be a bit controversial here. Yet, I'm asking you to hear us out, please. Fanfic writers, specifically those who write "x Reader" fics, please read this. My dear friend Jack has already made a post, where I and others have contributed our experiences and feelings towards certain issues with these fics. Those issues still prevail and therefore I've decided to make my own post, which is more of a PSA, I think. Anyway. You can and should read Jack's (@mlmxreader) post here, please. It is long, yes, but it is extremely important and will say a lot of things we will not talk about here again. Now, what this is mostly about is the tagging of those fics. Every single time, we (men and non-binary people) come across Reader fics and they're tagged with just "Reader", so, naturally we assume they'll be gender neutral then. Well, they basically never fucking are. Every time, in the first few sentences or in later paragraphs something like "baby girl, girlfriend, wife, she/her" will come up and it is frustrating, can be triggering (for trans people, like myself, especially because it can cause dysphoria), and is honestly just very excluding and rude. By doing that, you show us that you do not consider anyone but women to read those fics. Even though that isn't the case. Men who like men exist and we read fics. And we want to be able to read some that don't make us feel bad or excluded. We're not asking you to suddenly write Male!Reader fics. We're asking you to tag properly. If your reader is female, tag it as "Female!Reader" or "Fem!Reader". It doesn't take more than two seconds to do that. So, please for the love of everything good, take those two seconds and type in that one word, even the abbreviation is enough. But tag it! Please! Also, please, stop tagging "male reader" or "gender neutral reader" when it's a female reader. You won't get more notes from it. All it does is clog the tags and push down fics that are actually targeted towards those groups. So, don't do that, please, thank you. One thing I personally wanted to ask actually. Why do women read "Male!Reader" fics? This is a genuine question. Why do you, if you're a woman, read those fics? They aren't targeted at you, and frankly, I don't understand it. If I were cis and not dysphoric, I still wouldn't read "Fem!Reader" fics. They aren't for me, and I wouldn't be interested in it, even if those were the only fics for a certain character. So, if anyone could answer me this, genuinely, then I'd actually appreciate that a lot, I'm truly just curious, as I have noticed women reading my "Male!Reader" fics, too. Which is cool, as we've said, you may interact, as long as you're not creepy or fetishistic, but I still don't understand why you would read that in the first place. Now, onto what my two wonderful friends have said, when I asked them if they had anything to add to this issue, or perhaps overall, still: @iscariot-rising said, "It's just disrespectful for writers and readers alike to assume that everyone reading their fanfics is inherently female, to the point where for some it has become the standard that any fic has female reader - leading to writers not tagging their fics as female readers or mentioning in their descriptions that reader is female, instead only titeling it as "character x reader", before then three sentences in referring to reader as some sort of female term. This isn't just rude, it can also be triggering for people or make them dysphoric, if not just plain uncomfortable. Fandom spaces are something that is shared across all genders and sexualities and it is only courteous to respect this and tag your fics accordingly, since it doesn't take a long time and saves a lot of trouble for readers." And you know what? He is absolutely right and he should say it. You need to listen to us, please. @mlmxreader said a lot, too. For example, he's mentioned that there is a reluctance to even write Gender Neutral Reader fics, which is true. Even though it would be much easier, to be perfectly honest. Yet, people seem not to do it. Do y'all not want people of different genders to enjoy your fics without feeling excluded? He also said, "oh! yeah! there's also the whole thing about lingerie, too, like putting men in women's lingerie and talkin about panties and stuff, which comes off as extremely fetishising (when it's not written by mlm) as well as just... really gross bc like that stuff can trigger dysphoria and half the time it's not even tagged? Like it wouldn't be so bad if y'all tagged it; on top of that, there's also the whole fact that they assume that all mlm relationships revolve around sex and that that's all that matters. But then also using (m/n) standing for "male name" instead of (y/n), like, what the FUCK is up with that?? /gen" Again, he is absolutely right. Tag your shit, please. I know it can be tiring to pick out everything relevant, but trust me; you'll do a lot of people a big fucking favour when you tag your stuff properly. And frankly, I agree with him. I don't understand the whole '(m/n)' thing because if we're men, our names are automatically male because, well, we're male. It doesn't really make sense. That might just be a thing that personally bugs us, though, I honestly don't know. TLDR; Tag your fics properly, be respectful, don't assume everyone is female and therefore exclude everyone who isn't, just say (y/n)???, and yeah, that's basically it. Just be more considerate, please! That was it. I don't mean to personally attack anybody, but if you do feel attacked, that probably means that you're guilty of doing something I've listed here, and perhaps should consider changing that. I also wanna note that if you consider sending me threats or hate of any kind, I will delete it and not engage with it. If your first response to this post is something rude and hateful, you should take a step back and reconsider why you're about to do something so senseless. Does it help you in any way? No, it doesn't. So, what's the point, other than acting like a complete dick? Anyway, have a lovely morning/day/night; cheers!

#x reader #reader fanfiction #reader fic #reader insert #female reader #x female reader #x fem!reader #fic writing #fanfic writing #fanfic writer #this is genuine and comes from frustration rather than a place of hate #tag properly #same goes for content and trigger warnings #be more considerate #be mindful

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im-not-buying-it-ether · 4 years

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Spoilers for She-ra season 5

It was...disappointing. To me and I’m weird but these are my thoughts so hear me out.

First, Catdora became a thing and it felt like they didn’t resolve it properly and all Adoras and Catras interactions with each other felt unneeded, overdone, underdone, for out of character in the wrong moments

We never saw Hordak in any physical pain nor was it mentioned even though he suffers from chronic pain due to his defect. I don’t believe prime would help him or fix him in any way so what happened?

The Whole religious aspect to primes empire was hammered in way to much for me and felt like they were shoving everything that could be done with it down my throat. The one who loses faith, the baptism thing, the freaking chanting, it all felt hammered in.

The commentary between Bow, Glimmer, and Adora felt just as off putting as the whole Catdora bit.

Did they have to do an undercover mission at a jazz club? I loved Scorpias song and her relationship with perfuma but it felt wrong.

They ended on a “Let’s restore magic to the UNIVERSE” end and with all the fans saying things like “Entrapta and Hordak will take primes ship and explore the galaxy FOR SCIENCE!!!” and they hinted at the “time skip” end with the heart with Catdora and Glimmer and Bow together but it felt wasted...

They put all characterization and writing into ‘wrong Hordak’ and not our actual hordak. He just went unused most the time and his delivery was a little subpar.

It was a little cheesy when Adora turned primes ship into an ecosystem and healed all the barren land, not that keeping the environment going is wrong but still. It felt forced...

I personally didn’t like Catras short hair because it put to much attention on her ears, I think a literal cat lady should keep long hair that can be as poofy or as sleek as a cats fur can be. It was good character design that was kinda thrown away.

The Star sisters were in very little despite having trailer time and are then never really talked about again. And now I’m seeing people going crazy about how one was a trans man when he was only there for one episode and referenced in another.

Despite what I was wishing for there was to much redemption. Shadow Weaver pulled a Darth Vader and chose ‘redemption equals death’, Hordak only had time to realize he had a previous life he enjoyed and then made unexplained peace with Adora, Catra kept fighting for herself and attempted a Darth Vader but kept failing at that, it just felt like a mess of trying to give everyone a happy ending.

We don’t get to catch up with characters properly like the other horde kids, Imp, Double Trouble, most were just used for fan service jokes like Scorpias line of “Kyle like Roghleo”, had one scene like Double Trouble, or were just used as a background character like Imp and the other horde kids.

My question is what happened? Why did the show I love for 4 seasons suddenly become to much or to little of what I wanted or expected? Did they pull a Star vs the Forces of evil? A Steven Universe? Or did I just become some opinionated jerk while waiting for the final season? I don’t know but do other feel this way? Do any of you feel like the show took a sharp turn that wasn’t needed for a satisfying finale? I’m happy it’s done and that the characters got their happy ending but it just doesn’t feel right.

Update: my emotions have gotten the better of me and now I’m sobbing over what could’ve been

#she ra spoilers

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tmitransitioning · 5 years

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Radfem-friend anon from earlier! My friend does (at least seem to) genuinely care about my transition and making sure I'm comfortable/getting gendered properly and cares about other trans people getting the same respect, and I find it really hard to believe she'd intentionally hurt anyone? I've also found myself agreeing with a lot of the radfem stuff she posts and it doesn't seem as bad as people make it out to be?? Idk if I'm being swayed, should I still be concerned about this?

Yes, I think you should.

It’s difficult to talk about stuff like this for a couple reasons. The first is that we run the risk of making radfem communities seem appealing through internet atrocity tourism—the urge that makes people, say, hateread blogs they don’t like or lurk in horrible subreddits to make fun of them. When a whole bunch of people tell you how awful something is, and you haven’t necessarily experienced that awfulness as a direct target, or haven’t seen someone you care about be a target, it’s tough to consider the harm that the thing has in the concrete rather than the abstract.

Then, when you have trouble seeing it as concrete and real and affecting people’s lives, it becomes a lot easier to say “well this doesn’t seem so bad”. The harm becomes hypothetical, and the thing in front of your eyes seems a lot more salient. This means that you don’t have a readily accessible “defense” in your mind that you can compare someone’s words to, and it makes it a lot harder to counteract what they’re saying to you.

Think about, for example, a homophobic relative that you see during holidays. Say it’s your uncle Steve. Every time Steve says something homophobic about Gay Marriage, you might think of your own relationship, if you’re part of the acronym community, or you might think about your gay friends Jean-Paul and Kyle and how they’re scared to hold hands in public. Your cousin Wanda is a lesbian, and just married, and she gets mad at Steve because she’d waited to be legally married for a very long time. These are personal connections. Steve knows that you have those connections, and he chose to say homophobic things anyways.

But your aunt Peggy is straight, and doesn’t know very many gay people, and she says you’re just being too hard on Steve. It’s not like he wants to personally deny gay people marriage licenses, and besides, she has a gay friend, Natasha, who thinks that you should just sit down and talk to Steve to convince him of your view. Maybe Steve doesn’t outright say “the gays are ruining marriage”, he just says that he thinks you should have to marry for the “right reasons”, and that you should have to “prove you’re really in a relationship”. These are statements that you might, on the surface, agree with—you think hey, marriage is a big commitment, maybe people should have to swear that they’re doing it for love. But Steve isn’t saying these things because he believes in the sanctity of love, he’s saying them because they don’t sound as outright homophobic.

Maybe Steve is a huge racist and is saying this about immigration. Maybe he’s saying it about disabled people on welfare. Maybe Steve is a TERF—instead of marriage, he’s talking about medical transition, and claiming that people should prove they’re transitioning for the right reasons, because it’s a big irreversible decision, and you should prove that you’re a real transsexual with real dysphoria in order to seek medical care. Some of these things, if you see them outside of context, you might kneejerk agree with—“hey, medical transition is a big and irreversible decision, maybe we should make sure that people are really sure before they do it”. It’s not a moral failure to kneejerk agree with these statements, because they’re worded very intentionally to get you to do that. They give you a little bit of truth (“many parts of medical transition are irreversible”) and then, once their foot’s in the metaphorical door, it’s a lot easier for them to get you to agree with the rest. This is literally called the foot-in-the-door technique.

TERFs apply this technique constantly. Online, it’s wrapped up in concern trolling—e.g. “don’t you think that we should protect children from being attacked in locker rooms?”. You want to agree with that statement, because who doesn’t want to protect children? Children being attacked is objectively a bad thing. The words that they say are explicit content—children, attack. These are what you read. The meaning of their words is implicit content—they are trying to get you to agree with the concept “trans women are dangerous”. In order to do that, they hide the target (trans women), often omitting the idea of the perpetrator entirely; it becomes a question of children, the “victims”, being “attacked” by a nebulous force on which your mind can project whatever it thinks is the scariest thing that children could be attacked by. Once they have you agreeing with that sentence, they introduce the next concept, maybe “did you know that men commit more violent crimes than women do?”. Again, explicit versus implicit content—the phrasing itself is not factually incorrect, and you want to agree with it. But they don’t mean men when they say the word, because they view AMAB trans people, particularly trans women, as men, and they’re trying to get you to make that association too.

This goes bit, by bit, by bit, until you’ve agreed to a whole bunch of premises that seem logical and then suddenly you’re tricked into agreeing to things that are very explicitly transphobic. All along the way, you’ll be praised for listening, for being logical, and for finding people who really care about you. Every time you agree with a statement, you will be reinforced somehow—your friend might say they’re happy you agree, or randos on tumblr might like your posts or send you hearts. If you agree with someone else, you will also feel a social link to them (which is why this article is so resonant; cw ableist language), which is inherently reinforcing—who doesn’t like to belong to a community?

And that is the second reason why it’s difficult to talk about things like this. TERFs call trans communities “cults” a lot, and will refer to people from said communities who interact with them as “desisters”, or frame them as escapees from some dangerous ideology. Ironically, TERF rhetoric is textbook cult tactics. But just me telling you that, even though it’s true, sets up this “us vs. them” concept—even though it is that, because they are inherently opposed to our existence. But because I’ve said those words, too, when you see something that doesn’t seem that bad, it doesn’t fit with the concept of TERFs in your head. So you think wait, maybe these people aren’t really so bad. And then they have an opening to try this kind of language on you, trickling it past you bit by bit until you’re in the middle of the river and being swept along.

That’s why I’ve written all of this out. I don’t want to tell you “cut your friend off and don’t read that”, because you’d likely go “wtf hell no”, and it doesn’t help explain why trans communities are largely so insistent about no-platforming TERFs. Instead, I want to urge you to evaluate everything you read with a critical eye, and to ask yourself “is there any hidden meaning to this language that I might not immediately see? what does this person really mean when they say this? what motivations could they have? what would people I trust say if they read this?”. That applies for everything you read, including from us—I generally try to lay things out in detail, personally, because I think that it helps people to be able to see someone’s intentions. You know, writing into this blog, that we’re a group of trans people who have an interest in not exposing ourselves or our followers to transphobia. You also know from Rabbit’s previous response that at least a few of us (some of our answers go through committee behind the scenes) feel strongly about no-platforming TERF ideology.

It is fully possible that your friend does legitimately care about you, just like it’s possible that your homophobic uncle Steve cares about you, his trans nibling, or like it’s possible that Peggy and Natasha are actually friends despite Peggy’s apologism. But you should be careful not to let that care and the social bond between you two overshadow the impact of someone’s words on the world. You might love Steve because he’s family, but he still lobbies his congressperson to challenge Obergefell v. Hodges and reverse the legalization of same-gender marriage in the States. You might have a friend who’s a TERF, or a radfem adopting TERF ideology over time, but you should examine the impact that the things she believes have on trans people’s access to legal recognition, medical care, and quality of life. Be wary, read with a critical eye, and understand people’s motivations so that you can protect yourself and others.

- Mod Wolf

#mod wolf #long post cw #transmisogyny cw #transphobia cw #homophobia cw #apologies to steve rogers along with the other avengers and also alpha flight

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secretgamergirl · 5 years

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I’d like to talk about Graham for a little bit.

About a month and a half ago, this thing just sort of spontaneously happened that was on the order of the old Jerry Lewis telethons, raising an absolutely jaw-dropping amount of money for an organization called Mermaids, which is great and absolutely deserves to have it. I should clarify before anything further too that I’m using “spontaneously happened” here only to mean absolutely nobody involved had any possible idea that it was going to become the huge thing it became, not that it didn’t do so because of a lot of really impressive work, mainly from Casey Explosion and Dan Olson who both ended up playing producer as guests started hopping in and did phenomenal jobs they can’t get enough credit for.

I am, of course, quite thrilled to see how well that went, particularly since just something like a week prior I’d independently tried to start a charity drive for Mermaids which was... decidedly unsuccessful. And I came oddly close to getting properly involved in this one, because around the time it was at the $1000 mark, “guests” were mainly just people I’m personally friends with and haven’t talked to in a while, I was talking about joining in, but the timing of me getting hold of a microphone and a quiet room and guest coordination shook out weird and I lost my place in line to like, Chelsea Manning and Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez, who I will freely admit were bigger donation draws than me talking to old friends and sharing info about trans charities and transphobic groups trying to undermine them would have been.

One thing I’d have liked to have brought up is the other thing that made the whole event a bit bittersweet, personally. The whole thing was explicitly advertised as existing purely to spite one Graham Linehan, who rather infamously had spearheaded an initiative to undermine funding for Mermaids because these days he is a cartoon villain and defunding a children’s charity was the sort of thing he’s all about now. And I’m saying “now” and “these days” because I have kind of a weird history with Graham. Once upon a time, he was my biggest fan.

No, really. If you don’t believe me, go do a quick twitter search for him mentioning me. It’s a bit surreal to look back on. It was weird to live through at the time too. He started following me at a point where I had something like 10 other twitter followers, and was just super super pumped about literally everything I was writing about, you know, the rise of this group of transphobic fascists weaponizing twitter mobs. I’d start writing something and he’d just pop up in my DMs. Which... OK now it’s weird because I’m the last person the arguable king of all transphobes should be following, but at the time it was also weird because he hadn’t gotten into that and was this famous TV writer.

So first of all, it just sends a chill down my spine any time I see him talking about having trans friends who like him just fine and wondering if he’s still trying to count me there. Because I mean, the last time I actually talked to him it was pretty damn civil. Mainly because I was trying to make a calm rational case explaining that he’d just linked horrifyingly bigoted propaganda out, but I could see him grasping for that straw.

Those prior interactions color the whole thing for me in a really tragic light though. Usually, when you see someone who did a thing you enjoy(ed) tear their face off and reveal a disgusting monster, you get to go “ugh, I can’t believe I never picked up on what a creep this person was the whole time!” but... I personally don’t have that luxury here. At the point I knew him, I can actually say he was a decent, caring guy, willing to stick his neck out in a big big way for worthy causes. He promoted the hell out of everything I wrote for a while, and elevated the voices of a ton of other trans women and other marginalized people under attack from nazis. He really went all in with a pretty big media platform against that crap at a time where it wasn’t especially popular or safe to do so, and he campaigned about as hard as was humanly possible to repeal Ireland’s abortion ban, sharing some really horrifying personal stories which I’d probably still dig out when trying to argue the subject if it wouldn’t be giving oxygen to such a huge bigot. And for whatever it’s worth, that infamous I.T. Crowd episode? Some 6 years after the fact he really was self-conscious about that still, and just sort of... approaching every trans woman he knew one by one to try to explain where he was coming from with it. Which of course is not at all the same thing as apologizing for it, but presumably had he stayed that course, he’d have maybe grabbed some sensitivity readers before the next such bit went to air.

So yeah. My honest assessment of where he was at in late 2014 through early 2015 there is... well-intentioned guy with some blind spots legitimately trying to be a better person and work towards some general trans allyship...

... and then he just suddenly pulled this complete 180, and it’s one of the most chilling things I’ve ever seen. From my perspective, it was like being in a zombie movie where someone gets bit. First they’re fine, then you see a big ol’ red flag (I don’t recall whether the first such was him going to bat for the serial abuser creep we just finally kicked out of tabletop or him linking a post on freaking 4th wave now), and you have this little window of maybe we can cut off the infection before it spreads, and that fails and suddenly you’ve just got this shambling monster wearing the face of a former ally in the fight against them. I suppose a more grounded metaphor would be like comparing it to someone you know joining a cult. every value they had is suddenly gone and they’re just removing themselves from all their old circles to hang out exclusively with these dangerous creeps.

I can’t stress enough that this isn’t me saying “there’s still good in him.” Dude’s out there getting the police showing up at his door because he won’t stop harassing random women and literally organizing letter-writing campaigns to cut the funding to a charity that keeps marginalized children from killing themselves. That is way too far over the cliff to entertain any notion of someone ever crawling back. No my point in all this that moral consistency isn’t anywhere near as solid as people like to tell themselves it is. People can go from vehement anti-fascism to full on fascist over a single conversation with the right recruiter on the right day and there’s really nothing you can do about it but hope you recognize it before your denial starts to amplify the damage.

At least I sure as hell hope there’s nothing else you can do about it because again, this guy was literally my biggest fan before he suddenly flipped, and I don’t want to have to second guess myself about what part of me saying “fascism is bad and trans people don’t deserve this sort of harassment” was sufficiently unclear that a guy hanging on my every word for like a year could get all backwards.

This really isn’t a story with a feel-good moral at the end. I mean, the best spin I can put on it is, moral compasses can break, so be sure to pull yours out regularly and double check that it’s still pointing north, don’t just follow the person ahead of you and assume theirs is working? Make sure you’re familiar with a definition of fascism that doesn’t rely on what costumes someone’s wearing? Bear in mind that the oppressed minority turning out to be the real bullies is just not a thing that happens? Just... don’t ever be like Graham here.

#trans awareness

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myprincecandy · 7 years

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[Eng]Yoho!Girl Magazine - Feb 2017 issue - “Monologue / Huang Zitao”

scans cr. to 西国浪 on weibo

translation cr. to me

Monologue / Huang Zitao

“The things that I write and sing about, are all real experiences and feelings. I don’t care about how many people will like it or understand it. If you like it, listen to it. If you don’t, then forget about it. I just want to write out what’s in my heart. There are too many fake things in this world.”

Huang Zitao’s cover shoot took almost half a year to arrange between us and his crew. Because in this year, he has simply been too busy, filming movies like “Railroad Tigers”, “Edge of Innocence”, “The Game Changer”, and two tv dramas, “A Chinese Odyssey”, “The Negotiator”, releasing an album “The Road”, for which he wrote and compose every song. He even held a concert. All sorts of TV programs, promotional activities filled into every bit of space there is in his schedule.

Earlier on, Huang Zitao fainted at the airport because of health reasons. When we met him, he hadn’t fully recovered. He specially coordinated one of his outfits for the shoot. A white pullover, blue baseball jacket, ripped jeans and a pair of red Nike shoes. “I want to be photographed wearing this, “he says. “Ok, but we won’t us it.” That angered expression of his was so adorable.

We originally thought this would be just a casual chat session full of jokes, just like what we do with most other artistes, wearing a mask and talking about things that don’t hurt at all. Unexpectedly, this 23-year-old boy has a level of seriousness and stability way beyond his age, and is so scarily honest & sincere. This honesty has caused him to be misunderstood several times, just as he had mentioned “This society is twisted enough already. But what can we do about it?”

Should we just settle and change ourselves? That is definitely something Huang Zitao does not want to do. “There’s actually very little that one person can leave behind in one’s life. Things like money etc, you can’t bring them away with you. To do something that you don’t like just for money, that just speaks of emptiness, it’s useless.”

We feel that there’s a need to share this real Huang Zitao, as he is, with everyone.

Huang Zitao’s words

The last time I wrote something for someone was about 10 years ago. For someone who’s as lazy to learn and write as me… Lately I have caused everyone to worry because of some health issues. I still need some time to fully recover, but the work doesn’t stop.

2016 to me, is a year in which I accumulate things. I made 3 movies, 2 dramas, and released an album. I went to Madagascar, and became a soldier.

It’s pretty good to be a tad busy. I am used to it already. Just like someone who’s used to eating rice, if one day that person stops eating it, he/she will feel hungry. Other than music, acting, I don’t have other hobbies. When I stop, I won’t know what to do. I’ll feel very lonely, but loneliness is normal.

I’m quite satisfied with my current situation. I don’t want to exchange or change this life. Because everyone’s like that, eyeing what others have while holding on to what they own. They should be happy with what they have.

“The Road” took a total of 3 months to prepare. The things that I write and sing about, are all real experiences and feelings. I don’t care about how many people will like it or understand it. If you like it, listen to it. If you don’t, then forget about it. I just want to write out what’s in my heart. There are too many fake things in this world.

Almost everyone is asking me recently, why do I not want to use a double when filming action sequences. But then again, why do you have to use one? Doubles shouldn’t be used in the first place. If you take on the project but not do it on your own, then what’s the meaning of it? The logic of this question in itself is weird. What’s so high and mighty about being an actor? I don’t think it’s that way.

When filming “A Chinese Odyssey”, there was a scene with the Bull King in the end. I was very tired that day. I rushed over to Bingou straight away after getting off the plane. Have you heard of the place Bingou? First I had 4 hours of make-up to do, and then we shot all the way till 6 in the morning. The fight scenes went on and on and it was very tiring. I told myself that it’s ok, things will be fine after a good night’s sleep. I feel that my persistence is worth it. Because the fight was great, and showed my level of martial arts ability.

That day, someone said to me on the set that “You are quite different from others.” I asked “In what sense?” I’m just being myself. They said to me that a lot of artistes, when they come, they will first drag the time, only filling in scenes after using doubles to shoot for close to a month. And maybe the audience won’t even notice it in the end. But what can you do? The world’s already too twisted.

All those so called social media has become too commercialized. Nowadays, I don’t look at it except for those posted by my studio. But I like to look through Instagram. Because I feel that it’s a fair platform, and I get to interact with my overseas fans. And those catchy songs (trans note: think PPAP) online, I don’t understand. There are so many good songs to listen to, why does everyone listen to those stuff. A lot of people feel that listening to foreign songs is very fashionable, but why can’t China’s own music be? There are also a lot of people who fall out with their family over money, or it can be even more serious. I won’t touch on that. These things happen every day. The human heart can become very evil, and can resort to everything in order to achieve one’s motives.

Humans really need to move forward and development. But somethings cannot be thrown away. A lot of people have thrown things away, including artistes. My thoughts and principles are very simple, and have not changed. And that is to be myself, do the things I like. Two days earlier, I was recording my new single in the studio, I was very happy. Making music is forever the happiest thing to me. Without music, I won’t exist. When filming “Railroad Tigers”, everyone was being near driven crazy by me. Because I would sing my rap the minute I’m free. I don’t care even when Jackie Chan told me not to. I just sang. I won’t, because that person is somebody, because that someone is very good, want to make use of that person or curry favor.

The people who have come into contact with me all rather like me. Sometimes, it’s true that I’m bad tempered. I have said many times. I just want to be myself. That will not change. I will not go against my conscience. If they want to anti/attack me, then go ahead. It has nothing to do with me. Some people basically go around attacking others because they are not living their own lives well.

The other day, I had a chat with my manager. He said that I had changed a lot, that the things I say is more mature, more stable. It’s the 5th year since my debut… these 5 years… have really just flown by so quickly… understand? Really, there’s no way to talk about it.

Everyone will grow up and mature. I remember it was so hard to say “I love you” to my parents when I was young. Now I say it every day. I wrote a song for my mom back when I was in the States, called M.O.M. I had not seen her for 4 years by then. I had lived alone all those years, with no one keeping me in check. I was very not used to it, seeing her all of a sudden. So I’ll argue with her. The other day I was writing stuff in the toilet, as I wrote I suddenly thought of my mum. I cried as I wrote. The familial love, which had been so distant, has finally come back to me. That’s when I discovered how important it is to me. Those who have watched over your growth since young, you must learn how to love them properly. That is the basic filial piety that a person must have.

I also want to thank my dad. He had always supported me so much, in all that I do. So long as it doesn’t go against principles, he believes that I know what I’m doing.

And my fans. Last time I received a book they made, which was a compilation of each of my airport and stage appearances. I was very touched. I don’t need expensive presents. The things made with heart are forever the best. I’m not the type who like to express my emotions, and rarely say “I love you all” to them. I don’t use long essays or some fake stuff to console them. I just want to use my works. My real works. To prove my love. Because I have said it. These days there are too many fake stuff.

You do have to enjoy the feeling of being loved by so many people sometimes. Because this will drive me harder to make myself perfect, and not to disappoint them. This year, my movies will be released one after the other. For “The Game Changer”, I had a great time filming as there were a lot of action sequences. The character’s pretty complex for “Edge of Innocence”, it’s a real test on the acting skills. “A Chinese Odyssey” is very funny. Hopefully it can become a classic for decades to come.

Actually when the producers of “A Chinese Odyssey” approached me, I wasn’t too keen on it. You want me to play a monkey? I felt not used to it. And my character wasn’t suited towards playing Zhizunbao. But as I filmed it, I discovered that I’m quite similar to him. Especially when it came to the emotional scenes between me and Zixia. I was really into the story…that sort of feeling.. is indescribable. You just felt really miserable, especially when he puts the golden band on in the end.

I believe what’s yours will be yours.. What’s not yours, even if you force it to stay, it will eventually leave. Work’s like that. Emotions/Relationships are also like that. You can’t force it. So, just go with the flow. A few days earlier after filming, I heard the radio station play this old song on the car, “Xin Qiang” (Wall in the heart), “There’s a wall in your heart / But I have found a window / That occasionally shows flickers of warm light”. The melody is great. If there’ someone who’s really worth my love and trust, I’ll be willing to give everything for her. But if there isn’t someone like that, then there’s none.

I hope that everyone will slowly start to understand me more, understand just what sort of person I am. Through my movies, my music. I don’t care what the others are saying, those rubbish, fake stuff. I’ll work hard at living my life, working, making every day count, and slowly move closer to my dreams, even if it can’t be realized in the end.

But I’ll definitely continue to be myself.

Editor’s notes

20 minutes into the interview, Huang Zitao receive a notification from the crew of “The Negotiator”, asking him last minute to go on set for a scene. We continued the rest of the interview on the car ride to the set. But obviously, his nerves have been hit by things more serious. And he was restless, unable to focus. “They are all waiting for me? Just me alone”

He kept asking his assistant and pushing the driver to go faster. Just as we were almost there, the car was blocked from the entrance by other cars. “Why don’t I get off now, I’ll run over.” He said hurriedly. Very quickly though, the car started moving again, stopping in front of a building, he pulled open the car door. “It’s been tough on you today!” Turning to wave his hand at me before running towards the door without ever looking back, those red shoes disappearing in the staircase.

#z.tao #huang zitao #ztao #tao

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timeofthecentury · 3 years

Text

Internet safety tips - important for everyone

I’m writing this after a friend of mine got bullied and harrassed in real life thanks to a Tumblr post one lunatic didn’t agree with. Don’t want that to be you? Read on...

We are in an age where it’s easier than ever to access information. There’s some simple ways you can help prevent your information from being easy to access too. Just because you haven’t personally encountered the darker sides of the internet, such as harassers, doxxers, fraudsters and groomers, doesn’t mean they don’t exist. Trust me that everyone, especially minors, should avoid publicly releasing personal information when possible.

1) Keep your name safe

Why? Because it makes it easy for anyone to find out more info on you. This includes future employers, groomers, someone who wants to steal identities and commit fraud, and horrible people on the internet that want to continue online harassing offline.

- Use a pseudonym instead of your real name. It can literally be anything (though maybe try to avoid using names from languages you don’t understand, or you’ll get in some very awkward situations)

- Don’t use the same email address for everything so your real name and online identity accounts can’t be linked

- Keep separate accounts for your personal life and for interacting with strangers.

2) Keep your age safe

Why? Because there are creepy people out there who want to target minors, and even if you’re not a minor, giving away that additional information can make it easier for fraudsters to use your data. Any additional information can help turn a suspicion about your identity into a known fact.

- Avoid giving your real exact age ESPECIALLY if you’re under 18

- Do not tell anyone your birthday, if you used your real birthday to sign up for a website, hide it from your profile

- If you’ve told someone your birth date, don’t tell them the year too, and vice versa

- If you must give an age, try to refer to it in terms of the range of your age rather than being specific (e.g. I am / am not a minor, I’m in my 30s, etc)

- Making up a fake age may be useful, but be wary:

- if you’re a minor and you pretend to be over 18, you could end up being exposed to adult content. Even if you think you’re very mature, some people are very sneaky in the way they talk and you could wind up in a situation you shouldn’t be in.

- In the opposite situation, if you’re an adult, don’t pretend to be a minor. That just looks like you’re trying to blend in with kids and is seen as very creepy, plus if any actual minors find out, they’re going to feel very uncomfortable. If you’re in a situation where you feel you can’t be in that community unless you’re a minor, then you shouldn’t be there.

- DO NOT fall for “birthday game” posts which get you to “pick a character” or the like based on your birth month, date and year. You’ll just give away your real birthday like that. You can play along in your head or with real life friends, and just not publicly post the result!

3) Keep your address safe

Why? You don’t want randoms turning up at your house, do you? Also, bullies and online trolls could send you in person hate mail, or make fake calls regarding your address to the police. There have been many cases of such doxxing cases leading to horribly adverse effects on not only the day to day lives of the targets, but also their mental health.

- Don’t be more specific than country (or state for US people) when telling internet strangers where you live

- Do those internet strangers REALLY need to know which school / university / dance class / sports team / art lessons / etc you went to? (spoilers: no)

- For the love of everything holy do not tell anyone your actual address

- If you buy from onilne shops under your real name, make sure there’s no way that the shop owner can connect that to your online identity (e.g. using a different email)

4) Keep your password safe

Why? To avoid people logging into your account, and stealing not only the account (and any others that use the same email and password...), but all the data that comes with it. Plus, someone could take over your account and use it to trick your friends and family, or use it in a way that implicates you in crimes.

- DO NOT DO NOT PLEASE DO NOT use the same password for everything

- Use 2 factor authentication when you can

- Don’t store your password in plain text on a file on your computer. If you’ve gotta write it down, do it in real life and NOT on something that can be easily taken by someone else, like a post it

- Have trustworthy antivirus software on your computer and keep it, and your browser, updated, to avoid hackers exploiting vulnerabilities in your system and getting access to your accounts

5) Be careful with your exact nationality / racial heritage

Why? Another piece of identifying information, which can possibly help lead people towards your real life address or identity. You might get creepy questions from those who fetishise race. Plus, there’s been quite a lot of incidents of race based crime, so you’re not going to want to put yourself out as a target. (of course, you can proudly be Black or Asian or European or the like, but you should be aware of the risks if you publicise this information)

- Regardless of what people may tell you, it doesn’t make you a bad person if you “refuse to admit” that you’re white, or Black, or Asian, or so on, so don’t feel pressured into revealing this information.

- What IS wrong, is pretending to be a race that you’re not. So don’t make up a fake racial identity to cover your real one.

6) Be careful with your sexuality and gender when in the LGBTQ+ community

Why? Not every space on the internet is as accepting towards the LGBTQ+ community as you may be used to. Plus, there have been “raids” organised by more extremist sites, where they specifically sign up and “attack” users of websites that have large populations of members that don’t share their views. Homophobic and transphobic attacks have occured as the result of this. So keep this in mind if you choose to share your sexuality, trans/cis status, neopronouns, exact gender and so on.

- As with the last point, though, DON’T make up a fake sexuality and gender to cover your real one, that’s disrespectful to people who actually have those identities and experiences.

7) Be careful with other specifics

- Posting triggers: trolls might intentionally try to trigger you. There’s easy ways to filter out content based on tags on many popular social media sites, so you can do so without actually revealing said tags.

- Posting photos and videos of yourself: trolls might try and bully you based on appearance, including saying things that just aren’t true just to get at you. Also, that’s the number one way to identify you for sure. What would your future boss think about that TikTok challenge? Doing some of the more life-endangering ones is stupid in itself, but also definitely will make employers think less highly of you in future.

- Posting a drawing of yourself: You can still be identified with that, though it’s a bit more difficult if it’s more stylised. Paired with other data such as location and age, however, this suddenly becomes a much more important piece of the puzzle and can be the difference between someone finding your real identity and not. The great thing about drawings, though, is that you can change up your clothing, hairstyles and the like so that it still represents who you are, but not exactly how you appear in real life.

- Saying anything controversial: unfortunately we live in an age where you can get in trouble for something you said in a time when you were more ignorant when you’ve since changed your opinion. So if you’re about to say anything that’s at risk of being controversial, think first and make sure to be properly educated on the topic you’re speaking on. Be sure to avoid falling into echo chambers where everyone agrees with each other - just because people agree doesn’t make them right! Follow the facts, or in cases where there are no set facts, consult all opinions and make your own judgement.

- Just don’t post anything that would give someone incentive / reason to want to hack your account / harass you / doxx you. Unfortunately, even something that seems innocent can set someone off, such as posting a theory about a TV show. However, being careful with what you post can still reduce the chances of being targetted.

In summary:

The internet is more dangerous than you think, so it’s vital that you stay safe. Be careful with any and all personal information. If in doubt, just don’t post it! We can’t undo the trauma my friend has gone through, but we can try to help prevent the same thing from happening to other people. Please spread this information far and wide!

#text #psa #important #technology #fandom #tiktok #please share #textpost #text post #internet #tumblr #please reblog #2021

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wedontbitewecut · 5 years

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Monster #2 ~ The Countess

Jumping forward about 90 years from Nosferatu, I present another vampire (and the last one that’ll be in this list, although I could make whole gallery just of vampires), The Countess from American Horror Story Season 5, Hotel. In this gallery I wanted to cover the quintessential classic vampire, Nosferatu, and a very modern evolved vampire who represents classic vampire tropes as well as new ones and more current directions that vampire stories often go in, and Lady Gaga’s The Countess certainly makes for a very interesting conversation. Right off the bat, it is clear that The Countess of The Hotel Cortez is an inspired homage to Delphine Seyrig’s The Countess Bathory from Daughters of Darkness, what with her extremely elegant couture (often deep reds, black, and silver colors), platinum “epitome-of-beauty” blonde hair, refined and posh manor and behavior, bisexuality and sexual promiscuity, her cunning control, cunning, and deceit, but also her surprisingly human qualities that make her worthy of sympathy and oftentimes even admiration, not to mention that she lives in a hotel which she almost acts like she owns. Furthermore, Bonnie Zimmerman’s analysis of the lesbian vampire in “Daughters of Darkness: Lesbian Vampires” is strongly echoed in Hotel with The Countess, although in more modern and often ambiguous ways.

Similar to The Countess Bathory, Lady Gaga’s Countess is somehow continually stunningly beautiful, always appearing in the finest couture with looks that are incredibly varied but share a common thread (as with Nosferatu, The Countess is of the highest class, as vampires most often are), she displays some sort of kind nature that evokes sympathy and admiration, all while she is simultaneously doing evil things with no consideration for anyone but herself and her own very specific motives, acts which she often revels in. Honestly, The Countess reminds me of Edgar Allan Poe’s words about a dead woman being the most beautiful image on earth: The Countess is in a way dead, as all vampires are, and she is so often seen in the show as being absolutely covered with blood (she is a messy eater), but she is undeniably beautiful, and arguably downright sexy, and she constantly marries beauty with death and blood throughout. Like The Countess Bathory, she too is very sexually active and shows a certain bisexuality, although I tend to think vampires consider sexuality in a way different from humans, so putting labels like bisexuality or lesbian on them seems insufficient. The Countess seems to lean more towards men but certainly plays all fields, and she has a very sexual relationship with feeding, as we frequently see her and either Tristan or Donovan seduce and eventually devour a couple. The Countess’ sexuality is one of her strongest powers, and it is so interesting how she uses it as a means to get the blood she needs, but also because she is very sexual and enjoys such acts, which then relates to Zimmerman’s theories on lesbian vampires. While The Countess is not technically lesbian, she is certainly not straight or hetero-normative, and her sexuality is something far outside the realm of how the male gaze has traditionally treated and portrayed female sexuality. The Countess has a long string of lovers, both male and female, who she has drawn in and made fall in love with her, and then literally completed rejected and cast out to the curb once she’s done with them. In Hotel, she is seemingly in control of everything, and even has a small group of abducted children that she has made her vampire children (The Countess Bathory’s young lesbian lover/vampire assistant in Daughters of Darkness is in ways embodied both in The Countess’ lovers and her children), until of course we find out later in the season that she is actually not truly in control of anything, and in fact living a life of grief, victim to the true monster of Hotel, the hotel founder and insane mass murderer who built the hotel for the purpose of using it as a means to carry out his murderous desires, James Patrick Marsh.

Part of what makes Hotel so captivating and unique is how it melds together so many different horror tropes, as The Hotel Cortez is somehow a place where people who die there live on only in the hotel. We actually get a mixture of real-world horrors with culturally classic monsters, where the vampires are only part of the hotel’s monstrous inhabitants, and on Devil’s Night (Halloween) we see actual serial killers such as Jeffrey Dahmer and John Wayne Gacy come to the hotel to visit March, something which The Countess has nothing to do with. When we finally do learn about The Countess’ background, how she was an actress who fell in love with an extremely famous actor and his wife, and was their “Little Mouse”, the third in a three-way relationship, how she was turned vampire by them and how they then disappeared without a trace, and how she then has to live a life of grief, cloaked in luxury and beautiful excess, forever longing for her true love, forever taking in lovers and spitting them out in failed attempts to recreate what she originally had. It is this backstory, possibly more than anything, that humanizes The Countess and makes her worthy of sympathy, and despite all her atrocious acts, I find it hard to believe if the majority of viewers weren’t in some way rooting for The Countess, if only perhaps some of the time.

Another thing I want to mention regarding The Countess, is the significance of her relationship with Liz Taylor, who is a trans woman portrayed by Daniel O’Hare who is a longtime employee of The Hotel Cortez. She is one of the very few beings there who is simply a human, but because of her trans-ness and femininity, she is seen is monstrous by normative society and thus is right at home among the monstrous things in the hotel. We find out eventually that Liz had first come to the hotel before she had come out as the woman she is, and was still living in her assigned-at-birth societal male role, visiting the hotel with male coworkers on business. Alone in her room, she dressed in women’s clothing which she had brought with her, and as she was enjoying expressing herself properly in solitude, The Countess suddenly appears in her room. Long story short, this scene is perhaps the most moving, most heartfelt scene in the season, and perhaps all of American Horror Story. The Countess sees Liz for the woman she is, and though makeup and feminine attention allows her to see herself as such more clearly, and eventually encourages Liz to live authentically and to stay and work for her at the hotel, but not before showing Liz her own power and truth by killing Liz’s 2 male coworkers after they saw Liz dressed up. As a trans woman myself and as someone with a rather undefined/queer sexuality, Liz Taylor and The Countess are monumental figures to appear in horror and interact the way they did. It is also the first time I haven’t been slightly upset that a cis-man is cast as a trans woman, because Daniel O’Hare and the writers did such a fantastic job at making her extremely authentic and relatable in very important ways, not to mention how her relationship with Tristan in the show brings up critical conversations about trans people, sexual labels, and the ambiguous grey areas of love and relationships. It is very common for LGBTQ+ people to relate to monsters and especially vampires because the way vampires typically are thought to exist in society (hiding in plain sight, restricted to the night, unable to safely be visible during the day, sexually different and non-normative, etc...), and the relationship between Liz and The Countess is a perfect example of how complicated and not limited to a single genre horror is becoming, and how monsters not only share an affinity with women, but also with all LGBTQ+ people and especially trans people.

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