#for context it’s stated that she’s a young child instead when that happened in the book universe so…

[glitter50000]

Having the show state that Baghra’s sister was ten years younger would mean that show!Baghra would’ve been about sixteen when she killed her six year old sister and was banished

#for context it’s stated that she’s a young child instead when that happened in the book universe so… #Girl how precious was that swan figure??? #No wonder she was so overprotective of Aleksander he’s like her new clay swan lol #Nah I’m joking #unless… #Anyway I’m sending the darkling AND Baghra to therapy #shadow and bone netflix #shadow and bone #baghra morozova #Baghra

[tornrose24]

Ideas and story bits for the tgamm werewolf AU

-Everything is almost the same, except most ghosts are alive and now werewolves. Transformations usually happen during full moons.

-There are a few werewolves around the county where Brighton is, and Sally is the head werewolf since she is the most capable and has better leadership qualities.

-There was an agreement that there can’t be any more werewolves created, given how dangerous it is to be one, not to mention that not everyone can be trusted with such a power. And children are off-limits given that they have a harder time controlling themselves (not to mention its too mean to do to a kid).

-Todd was bitten at some point in his adult life, but he doesn’t know who did it since he couldn’t see who they were at the time. In addition to his usual issues, he doesn’t bother connecting with anyone since he doesn’t want anyone to find out about his secret. He can control himself fine as a werewolf, but he has a harder time when it comes to his appetite when it increases in that state (of course).

-Most folks in Brighton believe that SOMETHING is roaming the woods and on the outskirts of Brighton on full moons. This doesn’t happen often (especially because Todd knows his chances of getting spotted likely increase depending on who is in town).

-Todd was on another one of his epic food binges during one full moon, and chose a certain neighborhood to rummage for food. Molly was eating a snack outside her house that night.

–Todd saw the food in Molly’s hand and was planning on snatching it from her before she even knew it was gone. However, Molly saw something, got excited, and instinctively reached out for it, right as Todd was about to take her food, and bit down on her arm instead.

-She screamed like hell, and Todd was scared and ran off. Her family took her to the doctor and got her shots to be safe, but they assumed Molly was bitten by a random dog.

-Molly recalls it looked like a wolf in a shirt with a unibrow, but doesn’t say anything, because she isn’t sure if she saw things correctly. She doesn’t even suspect it was a werewolf until she hears about the local myths. Though it slips her mind for a bit.

-Meanwhile, Todd is in a panic because he bit someone, which was something he was trying to avoid for a long time, and which could get him in serious trouble. He tries to keep an eye out for the person he bit for most of the month.

-Eventually, Molly and Todd do cross paths again. Molly remembers seeing Todd once or twice, but this time he acts shocked as if he knows her and then runs off before they can say much to each other. He then tries to keep an even closer eye on Molly until the next full moon.

-The next full moon happens to be on a camping trip Molly takes with Libby, Kat, and Sheela (like in episode 2). She goes out into the woods to gather wood when the full moon comes out and she transforms, though the process causes her to get further away from the campsite.

–As you could imagine, Molly is torn between freaking out and getting excited. She still retains awareness and her intellect, but her impulse controls are REALLY bad as a new werewolf and she ends up chasing after whatever she finds and acts more like a dog at play. (Cue montage of chasing after squirrels, chasing her own tail, randomly digging stuff up for no reason, and howling her head off).

-However, she makes the mistake of angering an adult bear far stronger than a werewolf child/young teen. She gets chased down and cornered, but a certain werewolf who had been trying to keep track of Molly steps in and manages to get the upper hand before scaring the bear off. (This idea was loosely inspired by a drawing by  @artistcaptainbendy even though I’m sure the context behind it is much different). He gets some injuries for his troubles, but Molly is ok.

–Molly is scared and tries to get away, but the adult werewolf grabs ahold of her. She struggles until he starts talking to her, trying to calm her down. He sounds and looks oddly familiar, but Molly can’t place why. Then he gets frustrated with himself and apologizes to her for transforming her. That’s when Molly realizes what exactly happened to her the month before and is shocked that this is the same werewolf. She asks why he didn’t just eat her and he tells her that he does NOT eat people, and she’s going to have to fight back the urges to do the same for a few months.

–He is also just shocked (and a bit unimpressed) that Molly is more excited than freaking out about what happened to her.

–The werewolf intends to take Molly home, but both of them are too tired to go any further, so he just lets her crash at one of his hiding spots with him. He intends on leaving before the night is over and she wakes up, but he oversleeps and Molly wakes up first instead. Which is how Molly finds out that the werewolf is none other than Todd, and instantly everything makes sense to her. 

-Todd freaks out because now the girl knows who he is, and it changes to a different kind of panic when Molly decides that she wants him to help her get the werewolf side under control, especially since he was the one who cursed her in the first place.

-So now in addition to having transformed Molly on accident, Todd now has this girl coming after him during the day and trying to get him to tell her everything she needs to know. It’s overwhelming for the man who is not used to this much social interaction, but he can’t bring himself to completely ditch Molly once she finally expresses concerns as to how this could effect her life and her relationships with her family and friends.

–Meanwhile, people are wondering why the heck Molly seems so attached to Todd of all people. This curiosity does not escape Todd, who is worried about this affecting his own safety.

-Eventually, he just takes Molly to Sally since she’s the only trustworthy werewolf that won't say anything. Sally figuratively chews Todd out for what he did and tells him that Molly is pretty much his kid AND his responsibility now. However, there still might be a way to reverse the curse since she’s still young, but she will need to look into it a bit more.

–So in addition to trying to survive every new moon, Todd has to deal with a feral Molly and try to help her control herself before she ends up biting someone or worse.

–But even if he doesn’t admit it out loud, Todd does start to warm up to Molly and appreciates that maybe he has someone he can open up to. Of course that does take awhile.

Other random thoughts and ideas:

-The McGee family would have to find out sooner or later (and Sharon will try to beat up Todd with a bat for what he did, accident or not).

-Geoff and Jeff are alive and also werewolves. Which means we get a gay werewolf couple. They would find out about Molly, but aren’t as judgemental about what happened.

–Libby would also eventually find out, but would be kept from Molly’s full moons until she gets control over herself to avoid biting her as well.

–A lot of dogs and wolves HATE Scratch regardless of which form he is, since they can tell what his deal is. By contrast, they ADORE Molly since they can sense she’s a genuinely good person who loves animals.

–There is a part of me that wants to include vampires… and by that, it would be hilarious if Andrea and her family were vampires (as in the original Dracula novel kind that do go out in the sun) as part of the whole ‘werewolves vs. vampires’ cliche.

–The Chen family seek out other supernatural creatures besides ghosts. So this time around, Molly also has to be worried about her own safety despite her crush on Ollie.

#the ghost and molly mcgee #tgamm werewolf au #werewolf au #molly mcgee #scratch the ghost #todd mortenson #sally tugbottom

[chutkiandchotte]

Who Owns Sheesh Mahal; and Why?

This post is inspired by this post by @jalebi-weds-bluetooth in which she discusses with great clarity and insight the question of what exactly happened in Arnav's past, his trauma due to it, and how he finally overcomes it on his second marriage day. Do go and read it if you haven't already! It's an extremely well-detailed answer. It inspired some thoughts in me about the inheritance laws, the legal implications of Chachaji's actions, and Arnav/Anjali's motivations in that period.

One larger question I find interesting is why Chacha-ji could usurp all the property over Anjali, the eldest child and Arnav, the direct male heir. Why didn't anybody fight it? Anjali? Mamaji? Dadiji? Arnav himself? Here's some context:

1. What is the actual Indian inheritance law and how did it apply to Sheesh Mahal/Arvind's wealth? Indian law does not allow ANY child in a Hindu family to be disinherited completely in favor of another heir from ancestral property. Which is to say, if a person has accumulated wealth of his own during his lifetime (such as Arnav, for example), he may will it away as he wishes. However, any ancestral property - defined as any unified property or wealth passed down over 4 or more generations - MUST be distributed equally amongst all children. Once it's divided, that property no longer counts as "ancestral" for the next generation. So, for example if the owner of an ancestral palace dies, ownership must be legally shared between his every child or it must be sold off so that every child can get a share of the profits. But those inherited profits would not be considered "ancestral" property and the next generation could dispose of it how they wish. Arnav's dad and his grandfather might have accumulated personal wealth through various means in their own lives but at the very least, Sheesh Mahal was an ancestral property which, after 1956 (when this law was instituted), would have to be equally shared between all children upon the passing of the owner (ie Arnav's grandfather). Exceptions:

If any/all legal claimants voluntarily signed away their rights.

Daughters: they are entitled to claim an equal share of their father's property under this law, even IF it's not strictly 4 generation ancestral - they can argue 2/3 generation inherited property to be ancestral property - this is a bit of legal grey area.

2. So, what was Chachaji's actual claim to the ancestral property and why didn't he fight his brother for it sooner? Now this all depends on things we have no idea about - years in which various people died, legal agreements, and so on. If Arnav's grandfather passed away before 1956, the ancestral property would have smoothly passed on in its entirety to a very young Arvind, no problem, and Chachaji would get nothing and could claim nothing during his brother's lifetime (cue the Shakespearean jealousy and resentment motivation). But that's not likely considering ages and timelines - most probably, Arnav's grandfather passed away after 1956. Then legally, Chacha-ji could have fought for his share of Sheesh Mahal upon the death of his father. However, the family could have settled on Chacha-ji an equivalent monetary amount (from their personal coffers) in lieu of his share of Sheesh Mahal, to prevent the palace having to be sold or shared. I could guess that some amount of emotional blackmail, coercion, bribery might have been exerted by elders of the family on Chacha-ji to not claim those rights and agree to take the money instead of it - but unfortunately, I don't think they made him sign a legally enforceable declaration stating this. Another possibility is that in the 60s, 70s or whenever Arnav's grandfather passed away, the Sheesh Mahal property maybe wasn't worth all that much as an old building in need of much repair and the monetary value he received would have seemed like a much better deal to Chachaji that he happily grabbed. Properties like that in tier-B cities of India greatly increased in value between the 1950s and mid-1990s - as towns became cities and cities became prosperous and commercial, what once was a crumbling, high maintenance, old fashioned mansion on the outskirts of a small city becomes a high value piece of real estate in the middle of a prime commercial area with certified heritage value to boot.

No matter what, I simply cannot imagine a greedy character like Chachaji not finding ways to use the 1956 Hindu inheritance law to his benefit if and when he most profitably could. It's highly possible that in the wake of Arvind's death he defended his claim to the property by arguing that he was unlawfully cut off from his due share during the time of his father's death and he was legally owed at least half the property. And the remainder also got in his control as the self-proclaimed "financial guardian" of his underage nephew which he could easily prove himself as. This is a likely scenario especially if Arvind/his father didn't bother to make Chachaji sign any official documents waiving off his rights and merely trusted to their family ties and good faith that he wouldn't try to push Arnav out in the future. Here are another few lessons from his family history that Arnav took to heart - trust no one, money talks loudest, and always secure your deals, entries and exits with tight legal contracts.

3. Let's go back a bit. Why is Chachaji middle class and covetous? If Chachaji didn't get his property pay-off at all (ie if his father died before 1956) it makes sense. But if he did get his pay off, why would he still be middle class/poorer than wealthy Raizadas in the flashback? I assume because unlike his brother/father, he may have got a substantial fund to start with but lacked the talent or drive to increase or even maintain it. He also likely lived in an extremely lavish way. He probably whittled a lot away in gambling, women, stupid business ventures, bad investments. So there he was at the time of Anjali's wedding, having spent much of the money he got in lieu of his ancestral shares, also having got used to his lavish lifestyle that probably burned that money up, and loathe to let go of it. Sidenote: I can imagine that maybe a short time before Anjali's wedding he came begging to his brother/mother for more money, or made a scene about his "rightful" share as per law but could get nothing and with Anjali's wedding and dowry costs coming up, not to mention Arnav's expensive education and personal rights on the inheritance, they insisted they did not have any money to spare for him. This probably created a huge amount of resentment in him and fuelled his spiteful and excessively cruel actions in throwing out Anjali and Arnav at that critical moment in their lives.

4. So we see how he swiped the property from Arnav. Then the next question is what about Anjali's legal claim and why did she never exercise it? For all his sociopathic greediness, Chachaji can't change the laws. One thing we CAN be sure of is that the 1956 ancestral property law definitely applied to Anjali as well as Arnav, in fact, twofold: as per that law as a daughter she had a legal right to fight for not only ancestral property but also as an adult she had the right to fight for an immediate share in all of her father's property and wealth. However, and here's the kicker, she most likely could not do so because her father himself probably made her sign away all her rights to her inheritance at the time of her marriage. And THIS one, I am sure, would have been legally enforceable. This is a common practice in wealthy families. See, these laws are made to breakdown patriarchal norms but as long as the patriarchy exists, sexism finds a way. It's a widespread practice to ask your daughter to sign away all of her rights to the family property just before her marriage, to avoid her or her in-laws laying claims to it at a future date. Considering Anjali's youth at the time of her first marriage, she probably didn't even know what she was signing; or belonging as she did to a loving and conservative family, she trusted her elders to make the right decision and signed it happily knowing what it was, thinking she was merely ensuring her Chotte got his due. It's also very likely that Arvind did not leave a will naming Arnav as his heir. A legal will is extremely hard to contest or sideline, even if the beneficiary is a minor. But in the absence of a will, wealth inheritance becomes a legal nightmare that often is solved by he who gets there first and he who can afford the most expensive lawyers. Who could have imagined the nightmarish events of Anjali's first wedding that would have made a legal will extremely important? But once that happened, Chacha-ji probably didn't waste any time. He used Arvind's lack of a will, Arnav's young age, Anjali's legally enforceable disavowal of her legal rights, and his own status as the only adult heir with legal rights to first, get control of all of Arvind's wealth and properties, and subsequently use expensive lawyers to get them legally all in his name. Yet another one of his father's mistakes that Arnav vowed not to repeat: as situations changed, remember how quick he was to make a new and clever will that cuts out untrustworthy relatives like Shyam (and Khushi in that period I guess 😭😭😭) and protects his loved ones like Anjali? It's that lesson that most likely saved his life from Shyam's murderous intentions in the kidnapping period!

5. Why didn't Mami, Nani, fight this inheritance situation? Chachaji may have neatly usurped everything but I still think there is enough ambiguity in the situation here that if taken to court by efficient lawyers, Chacha-ji could have been defeated. However, it would have been an extremely stressful, years long affair (these things can last decades), and extremely time and money intensive. I think Nani/Manohar would have been willing to fight for Arnav's rights, but Dadi would NEED to be involved and make regular court appearances, sign several documents, give testimony as part of their efforts. But she disappeared off to her ashram. Maybe she didn't want to fight her own son in court; maybe she resented Nani/Mama as being Ratna's family and responsible for this whole affair; maybe she just didn't have the selflessness or courage to fight a weary legal battle for her grandchildren. I can imagine her regularly skipping court appearances or refusing to sign documents that painted her or her husband and son in a bad/negligent light. Her total lack of interest and cooperation on this matter probably scuppered their chances or petered out the case before it even started. I can also imagine a young Arnav himself asking his Nani/Mama to give this up - we know he has a HUGE ego (he would hate others fight his battle for him) and a relentless burden of responsibility for his loved ones and a strong sense of duty in terms of what he owes people (he'd feel guilty at how stressed they are getting and how much money they are spending, money they probably couldn't afford, all for him...he'd already be feeling like a burden and hating it and this would exacerbate his feelings of humiliation). And then of course that would birth in him the intense and burning desire to ONE DAY get his ancestral rights back on his own merits and efforts, and complete his revenge on his Chachaji. And he did, and pretty spectacularly at that, as we saw in the events of the first episode.

6. Why didn't Arnav just legally fight his Chachaji to get the property back instead of the expensive buyout we saw in episode 1? He definitely could have, and probably would have saved some money in the process. Young Arnav probably did aim for a legal battle as the means to get his properties back, working towards, among other things, being rich enough to afford the kind of lawyers who can win this case. But probably just as he got that level of rich, his investigations into the current state of affairs would have told him that his Chachaji was on a rapid financial decline anyway; a legal victory would have been long-winded, maddeningly bureaucratic and piece meal, ultimately unsatisfying - and the humiliating "buy-out" plan would have occurred to him as a much more fun not to mention a more direct and vicious way to snatch the properties and complete his revenge. As we saw in the show, it was a well-thought out, long-term plan: keeping tabs on Chachaji's declining financial status, doing what he could to make it worse, then waiting for the perfect moment to strike when Chachaji's helplessness, humiliation, and suffering would be devastating and complete. Arnav would always rather go for one direct and efficient hit via a business deal than pay his lawyers to fight a never ending legal battle in the background of his life. Arnav is not greedy and he does not covet money for its own sake. Neither does he care about "saving" Sheesh Mahal. It was never about the his birth "rights" or an emotional connect to an ancestral property or regaining lost wealth for him. It was always about revenge for the suffering his uncle inflicted on his sister and himself, payback for the humiliation they endured, and closure for that moment of traumatic abandonment.

P.S. -

This is basically like a fanfic, I know, and that's because we have a bit of gap in the details of what happened in the past on the show so I had to fill those out myself. A lot of it is hinted but not confirmed, maybe that was part of their intention in creating an aura of horrific trauma around that past event? I do think after a certain point on the show, they could have explored some of these past events a little more, and particularly we could have got some more development on the Chachaji front. Since we didn't get that, I guess we can enjoy writing speculative posts like this one!

Speaking of fanfics, this OS titled Sheesh Mahal (once again by the super talented @jalebi-weds-bluetooth!) beautifully captures what I too think would have been Arnav's attitude towards this much contested piece of ancestral property after he's actually got it. It's also an amazing slice of happily married Arshi life, extremely cute and awww-worthy.

#ipkknd #phew this is long and also took forever to write #if there's any people familiar with indian laws who see problems here please feel free to chime in

[overthinkingtaleblr]

This is the guy who runs Poltertoast, you had a tma taleblr au?! Pls pls tell more

I had a TMA Taleblr AU! I developed a lot of it with a close friend who had recently gotten into TMA at the time, and I still think about it a lot tbh. Basically the idea was ‘Taleblr, but the characters bend to the whim of TMA rules’ and was sometimes an exploration of how far things could go. We had a lot of antagonists as Avatars. And a lot of tragic ends…

Here’s some highlights so I don’t just throw the whole plot into your face all at once—

To begin: a part of TMA includes Jon dropping by the states, so if we want them to interact, it happens here. Maybe if he does his world tour earlier in the story, PIE can come back and get involved with the evolving situation right at the end of season 4.

Since the Avatars and other things done by the Fears are basically paranormal, PIE would start their exploration thinking it’s ghosts and stuff and come into a horrific realization as time goes on. By which I mean, similar to Jon, their search for answers has been turning them into the things they’ve been seeking to understand and maybe destroy.

CBF is a creature of the web, one who left a severe impact on Ghost after he survived it as a child. Probably based on the growing anxiety of how a child sees the world and how they may be tricked into allowing bad things to happen thinking it’s friendly.

Similar to Ghost, Spooker is also touched by the Fears before joining PIE. His dad ran a Desolation-based cult that’s boiled over and led to most of the members and some innocent people dying in a fire. One of the members ascended to being an avatar from it, but it still cut their member count down to two. While being touched by the Desolation, Spooker is eventually consumed by the Spiral, becoming an avatar similar to the Distortion.

The Toasts are a bit depressing. Johnny isn’t introduced to the fears until after joining PIE and even then he doesn’t fully understand what they’re chasing. At one point, he encounters a monster that seems to target twins and assumes that means it would be coming for him next, but the Stranger entity takes Gavin instead and the worst part to Johnny is that he didn’t notice the difference. Toast also starts leaning down a Hunt path that he either gets pulled out of or we get a free werewolf.

Entering this world with the least amount of context for anything, Chris’s reaction is to research as much as possible. Seeing as most of the people on the team are avatar-touched or aware that the avatars are willing to talk to them, Chris struggles not to see them as extensions of humans and can’t bring himself to the hunt-y mindset. He likely goes down the path of the Eye instead, learning and learning until that knowledge eats him. It would be funny if he and Jon met early on, agreed on the safety of their shared methods, and then reconnected after said method ate their humanity.

The Unicorns are inside of a Lightner— A ‘the last unicorn’ paperback that makes the reader consider themself.. One of the unicorns. I’m guessing it’s just Stardust in this situation (the book IS titled the LAST unicorn) but part of his goal would likely be making more. In a destructive manner— the book and the unicorn who possesses it are both aligned with the slaughter. in order for Stardust to stay around, the book has to stay open.

Spooker’s niece, Poppy, lives with her desolation-cult grandpa, friends with several young avatars, and a borderline caretaker of the Last Unicorn Lightner. Her alignment is to the fears themselves, and she thinks it’s funny to mess with PIE’s head. (She does not respect them, and kind of sees other humans as food for entities.) She may not be an active threat, but she is dangerous.

Light Zeron and James Maloney have similar stories, being so afraid of something that when they eventually managed to co-exist with their own fear, it made avatars out of them. Light is aligned with the Dark and Maloney to the Vast (bird-themed!), and they’ve both come to enjoy their new jobs, even as they still harbor the fear that fed their entity.

Maloney used to work with Princeton Quagmire, who (if I remember right) was centered around trying to find a way to destroy the entities. They haven’t consumed or taken to him just yet, but Maloney isn’t the first time he lost an employee. His other accomplices at the moment are Jenny Toast and ‘Officer Starbucks’.

Though it freaks her out a bit, Jenny and Maloney stay friends through his transformation. This likely does not bode well for her own fate…

Maxwell is an avatar of the Hunt, Aimee is aligned with the Lonely, and neither of them realize how deep down the rabbit hole they’ve dug themselves. Maxwell just constantly wants revenge, but his definition keeps changing, and Aimee doesn’t understand why she seems to be on a different path to the rest of the world. They’re friends with Poppy— even if they don’t understand what they’ve become, she supports the change.

I don’t remember considering the Acachallas, but Sally could easily embody the End and Spencer could be an incredibly powerful Buried avatar.

To anyone asking “Why were most of them avatars? Why not just kill them?” I like the trope of someone coming back Wrong, and that happens multiple times if the character is basically hollowed out and replaced by an entity of fear.

I might be missing or misremembering some things ^^; but YEAH— that’s the general vibe of the tma AU. I had a story in my head where Jon’s visit to the states was extended by encountering these mfers— including meeting Poppy Soup herself at one point, her being very coy about knowing something that Jon doesn’t, and him being confused about how someone who feels so human knows so much about what’s going on. His interaction with PIE probably devolves into an argument.

+ my old doodle from when i first announced this au

#taleblr #taleblr headcanons #taleblr Au #taleblr TMA Au #johnny ghost #johnny toast #taleblr pie #fred spooker soup #gavin toast #chris colon ghostie

[greatwyrmgold]

More Otherverse OCs

A bunch of people liked the last post I made about an Otherverse character I made up, so I figured I'd share a couple more with varying degrees of detail.

Frode Kvasir, the Emptied Vessel

I'll start with Frode, since he's possibly the most detailed out of all of these. But those details are all in this Reddit post I wrote on him, so I won't write too much here.

Frode is basically an Other in the form of a transient, which faeries created and use to gather and refine the experiences of people faerie don't want to directly interact with. He's stuck in a cycle where he gets rescued by local unhoused people; listens to, refines, and shares stories; and has all of that knowledge violently extracted from him before being abandoned again.

Eve Penders, Glamour Alchemist

The protagonist of Pith, a fanfic I posted one chapter of. Her backstory was supposed to be explained in chapter 2, but I never got that to a state I was happy with before getting distracted.

Born Evelynn Micaiah Isolda Pendra, firstborn of a couple of lesser faerie Practitioners. Her parents pawned her off to the faerie for reasons she was too young to understand. The terms were relatively lenient, with three important points.

First, there was an option to buy Evelynn back at a later date, if the original price plus interest was paid. The parents intended to use this option more or less immediately, once they used the amount borrowed to do...something...but if this worked, being sold probably wouldn't be a defining moment of Evelynn's childhood. After all...

The faerie swore not to seriously or permanently harm Evelynn for the duration of the contract. No long-term transformations, no maiming, no stripping away her identity, stuff like that.

Finally, the contract would end when Evelynn came of age. No more special protections, no precontracted buy-back, etc. Evelynn would have one chance to win her freedom at that point, with terms left up to her owner. If she won, she'd be given a new life to replace the one she lost. Otherwise...

Eve's feelings about this arrangement are complicated. She recognizes that her parents cared about her to some extent; if they didn't, they could have gotten a much better price out of her. But at the same time, they still sold their own child to the Fair Folk. If they truly loved her, wouldn't they have found another way? If nothing else, one parent could have agreed to be temporarily sold. Aren't parents supposed to do stuff like that, to sacrifice themselves instead of their children?

Stripping away details that only matter in the context of the unwritten fanfic: Evelynn's contract was passed around, and wound up in the hands of Guildmaster Morcant, a faerie businessman who ran a literal sweatshop. (His workers make stuff, but the sweatshop's primary money-maker is the sweat of exploited children.)

Morcant has a thing for stripping away names and identities from his workers, to make them fit into his machine better, but he was limited in what he could do to Evelynn by the terms of the contract. He could reduce her name to Eve Pendra, but couldn't eliminate her personal identity or ties to her family. Eve caused enough problems for this faerie that he wound up selling her off; he sees the whole thing as a big disgrace.

As her eighteenth birthday approached, Eve's contract wound up in the hands of one of Morcant's rivals. Eve convinced her that she could embarrass Morcant again by selling Eve to him, specifically so he could get vengeance on her through the contest...and also giving Eve enough of an edge that she won the contest he rigged.

That happened; Eve won. She kept the gifts she was given to win the contest (notably including the ability to produce a small amount of glamour herself), and also gained a new life to replace the one she was taken from.

Eve Penders was no longer connected to the Pendra family, but she had awakened at a normal age and was trained in the art of using glamour. Eve Penders was awakened, bound by the Seal of Solomon as a Practitioner, but Eve technically never took the relevant oaths herself; thus, her Practice tends to be fragile and ephemeral.

Eve has the skill of someone trained by a family of faerie Practitioners, but this quirk of her Awakening exaggerates the weaknesses of glamour-based Practice. Luckily, she chose to attend college in a town where a prominent alchemist lived. Alchemy is a much more stable Practice, to the point that even non-Practitioners can use it to some extent.

Eve still uses glamour sometimes, both on its own and in conjunction with alchemy. For instance: After she decides to turn against her tutor, for reasons irrelevant to this bit, she steals alchemical reagents she's working with, replacing the stolen portion with glamour. Since some of the active ingredient is still present, the potion has part of its normal effect; the glamour makes it appear to be fully effective. Eve hopes nobody will realize it isn't before she's rescued her tutor's homunculus-clones and turned fully against him.

The Melomanic Bug & the Calamity Bug

This story starts with a third bug, the Millennium Bug. This Bug was a Nex Machina, created when a technomancers tried to channel some of the global fears over Y2K into an entity they could use. They wound up snaring more of the Y2K panic than they anticipated, creating a centipede-shaped Other powerful enough that it took most of the powers in one of the world's largest cities to contain.

Luckily, the technomancers tried this in late 1999, so it wasn't long before Y2K went—and with it, most of the fear that kept it going. The Millennium Bug collapsed in on itself as people realized that Y2K was largely under control. But that much power can't just go nowhere.

First off, the Millennium Bug created a powerful echo. (A pale shadow of the original Bug's power, but that's still very potent, especially compared to other vestiges.) It was bound by a Practitioner with an interest in creating artificial Others, who sacrificed several visceral Others in an effort to stabilize the echo. The first of these was a musically-inclined bogeyman, which was disproportionately influential over the end result—a slithering bug-snake-thing surrounded by haunting music. The Melomanic Bug.

Now, part of the process of stabilizing the Melomanic Bug involved forging a sort of master-familiar bond with it. The Bug's creator(?) assumed two things: That the stabilization would be largely effective, and that a familiar bond with a powerful Other would be less hazardous if he designed the Other for the purpose of being his familiar. These assumptions were theoretically sound; in practice, what he was doing was too experimental and volatile to have that much hope in things going according to plan.

The Melomanic Bug's "master" now spends most of his time maintaining either the Bug or his connection to it. It's only a matter of time until something disrupts him enough that he gets utterly subsumed by the Bug. Whether this results in the whole thing messily collapsing/detonating or gaining enough Self to truly stabilize depends on the circumstances.

But the Millennium Bug didn't just leave a ghost, it left an impression, something like the Carmine Beast's. But instead of collecting violence, it collected fear; and instead of manifesting as violent behavior, it coalesced into a new bug. A scorpion-shaped mass of the dread people felt towards a seemingly inevitable doom.

Known as either the Millenarian Bug (a reference to millenarianism) or the Calamity Bug, its core was formed around fears that the city would decay under a crime wave, which has a strong influence on it. However, over the past couple decades, most of the power it accumulates comes from global climate change.

The Calamity Bug can take human form, appearing somewhere between a corporate executive and a yakuza boss. (Did I mention that these characters were written for a fic set in Tokyo?) If it isn't trying to look normal, it has a stovepipe hat like a caricatured 19th-century industrialist, aside from the fact that it's belching smoke like a literal stovepipe.

Aside from this shapeshifting, the Calamity Bug retains some of the Millennium Bug's Nex Machina nature. In particular, it infects areas with its presence, cutting them off from reality. People trapped in these areas emerge, apparently the victims of either violent crime or industrial accidents. And of course, it has an affinity for technology—especially internal combustion cars and industrial machinery.

The Calamity Bug and Melomanic Bug are nowhere near the godlike power of the Millennium Bug, but they're certainly among the city's local powers. (Well, the Melomanic Bug's "master" is—that Bug isn't fully sentient.) They're remnants of a calamity that almost befell the city.

The Virgin Killer

A bogeywoman, living in the same town as Eve Penders up there. They are, in fact, friends! It's probably worth noting that the city they live in has an associated realm, called the Undertow. It's a bit like Kennet's undercity, but shallower and less bloody. The details matter in theory, but aren't interesting enough to get into here.

The Virgin Killer usually goes by Virginia or VK, both because her true name is a double misnomer and because it's not a name most people would want to be called by. The big thing I like about VK is the way she hunts.

Imagine you're some stereotypical frat boy, bar-crawling to get lucky. You're drunkenly hitting on girls, ignoring them when they tell you to buzz off, maybe getting a little handsy. Finally, one girl responds positively, a girl wearing a white jacket over a red sweater. Virginia. She looks vaguely familiar, but you're pretty sure you've never seen her before.

Virginia invites you to her place, and you accept. But something's off about the apartment. it's eerily quiet, and you notice that she doesn't turn around after taking off her jacket, even when she's leaving the room. As Virginia goes to tidy up her room, you think you see something move by her shoulder. A trick of the light, surely.

When she's ready, you head into her room. Virginia faces you still, sitting on her bed, wearing her red sweater. On the wall behind her is a great big mirror; you can see that Virginia's sweater is backless.

So is Virginia.

Where there should be smooth human skin, there is instead a gaping cavity. Bloody things squirm in her hollow torso, like a cross between intestines and earthworms, coated in blood.

You flip the fuck out. Virginia stands up, asks if something's wrong. The things in her back unfurl, stretch out behind her. One reaches forward, you stumble backward before it can grab you. This shit is not worth the pussy.

You run out of the apartment, Virginia following. You scream for help, but nobody responds. One of her bloody tentacles almost grabs your arm, your ankle, your neck. You run out the back door, duck through an unfamiliar alley, keep running, running.

Suddenly, you realize she's gone. You're in the middle of downtown, in the middle of the night, high on adrenaline, with a bit of red smeared on your cheek. But you're alive.

Over the coming weeks, you keep thinking you see Virginia in the corner of your eye. It's not her, just some classmate or neighbor or random chick who looks kinda like her. But seeing those girls reminds you of that horrific night again.

So yeah, that's VK. She hunts douches, brings them to her apartment (which straddles the normal city and the Undertow), reveals her true form, chases the douche back through the Undertow version of her neighborhood into the normal city, and lingers in their mind.

That last effect is achieved through glamour she barters from Eve, which lets her look a bit like the women her targets run into. Not their friends or family, just random women they happen to pass by regularly. Each time someone thinks they see VK and is afraid it's actually her this time, she feeds on that fear. And there are a lot of douches in town.

VK is, physically speaking, one of the strongest Others in town. She works as an enforcer for the local council—keeping peace in the market, intimidating ornery goblins, driving out unwanted intruders, that sort of thing. She doesn't have a lot of special tricks; she looks human, looks familiar, and has basic bogeyman tricks plus extremely strong back tentacles.

Okiko, the Cinder-Urchin

A side character in an Otherverse/Jujutsu Kaisen crossover fic I never wrote. My notes identify her as "an 'it's complicated,'" specifically noting "Ghost:Wraith::Revenant:Okiko". Which doesn't feel quite right, looking back, but it's a snappy opener.

There once was a petty thief, shot to death by police officers while running from the scene of a crime—a common enough occurrence in any large city. Somewhat less commonly, she got up and began killing police officers in revenge.

Practitioners working in the Tokyo Metropolitan Police Department reacted quickly. One of them caught the revenant and threw together a quick-and-dirty positive binding to keep her in place long enough for her to be bound properly. As Pact/Pale nerds know, positive bindings bind like with like; they're not particularly forceful, but they feed power into the bound Other, so it generally chooses not to break the binding.

The Practitioner contacts Sakura*, a local incarnation of Spring. She wove living green plants into the revenant's binding while the group's more powerful members got ready to deal with it. In theory, this was replacing the positive binding with a negative one, binding (un)death with life, which would keep the revenant trapped against its will. Instead, the revenant kept drawing power from the life-infused binding.

This made the revenant verdant, stronger than expected, and unsuited for what the police Practitioners had prepared. She escaped to kill more police officers; they tried to bind her again, this time in fire, but again she drank from their binding and became a burning torch of a revenant.

I'm a bit torn on whether the group should try to bind her with a third thing, have her overcome it a third time to cement Okiko as a breaker of bindings, and then contact the local Lord; or if they should see that coming and contact the Lord first. Either way, the Lord gets contacted.

For most Lords, this should be the end of the story. The Lord sees that this new Other is a threat to the local community and puts it down. But this is a Jujutsu Kaisen crossover, and part of the fic's premise is that Satoru Gojo is the Lord of Tokyo.

For those who don't read/watch JJK, Gojo has an anarchist streak. In my fic, he took the position of Lord specifically to prevent anyone else from using it; when he realized powerful Practitioner families and such took this opportunity to abuse their power even more, he instead started abusing his Lordship to disrupt various power blocs in Tokyo's Practitioner community.

So instead of destroying the revenant, Gojo shapes her, guides her. This is where the revenant becomes Okiko. No longer is she blindly attacking anyone in a police uniform; she's a being of life and fire and freedom, delivering righteous violence on those who abuse their power over others. Police officers, of course, but also corrupt politicians and abusive businessmen and the like. Obviously the police Practitioners aren't happy about this outcome, but the optics of complaining about how she still murders the cops who brutalize people aren't great, and it's not like they could directly oppose Satoru Gojo even if he wasn't Lord.

That's Okiko. A revenant who gained a knack for absorbing anything used to bind her, consolidated into someone who punishes abuse of power.

*Sakura isn't notable in any way I feel like sharing, but I really like her name. See, sakura/cherry blossoms are symbolically important in Japanese culture, and specifically symbolize the start of spring, when the titular cherry blossoms—hey, where are you going? Come back!

Carl Thurow, Magus at Law

(He isn't an attorney but I don't have any other law magi to make that joke with)

"The universe is perfectly balanced. Action and reaction, good and evil, debit and credit. All things have a price equal to their value, and that is how it should be."

A Law Magus/accountant who buys into the status quo hard. He started with significant advantages that he turned into overwhelming strength, so he assumes anyone else could do the same if they worked at it. Never mind the fact that he actively made it harder for others to succeed as he ascended.

Another critical part of Carl's worldview is the belief that everything is a zero-sum game. He believes that for anyone to gain something, someone else needs to lose something. (Justified in part by seeing the world as innately competitive; if Alice gets stronger, Bob gets weaker. Mostly justified by being extremely loose with his logic.) The only way to make the world better or worse is for the "good" people to gain as much as possible at the expense of "bad" people.

He has two unique points of Practice.

First: With a proper ritual space, tools, and enough time, Carl can calculate a numerical representation of value for a person/object/etc. Their karma, their Self, their social clout, their personal strength, and so on, reduced to a single number. This process involves drawing a diagram around them—like long division, but magical (and circular).

Once he's done this, Carl can add additional elements to the diagram to either drain or add raw power to them. Draining power leaves them diminished but exaggerated; a goblin becomes pettier and nastier, a faerie becomes more ethereal, an Incarnation becomes less human and more axiomatic. Adding power dilutes them, making them less special (though more powerful).

Second: With a bit of raw power and the right ritual diagram, Carl can create two equal and opposite spirits. This has many uses; for instance, some elementalists would be interested in someone who could turn a store of raw power into fire and ice elementals.

Most often, though, Carl does this to create Omens of fortune and misfortune, binding the former to bolster his own luck and inflicting the latter on those he deems deserving. (Being a Law Magus, he's naturally skilled at finding karmically-deserving targets.) Frequently, these people are already desperate; an extra dose of misfortune drives them to do even worse things, which makes Carl feel justified in targeting them.

A literal shower-thought idea.

Blackforest Angler

A concept that I've worked into a couple of different characters for different fics.

Step 1: Have a powerful Blackforest Trapper who uses Others in the "trap". (This usually involves something brothel-adjacent, binding succubi and the like, but anything that requires trapping Others to serve as part of the trap could work. Or maybe mundane humans, if they're bound to it magically and not just by a salary.)

Step 1b: The Blackforester has the full Practitioner panoply. His place of Blackforestiness is his demense, and his familiar and Implement are in part used to control, tap, or otherwise interact with it.

Step 2: The Blackforest Trapper dies, but his connections remain. (Maybe justify this with an exotic form of death that doesn't sever his connections cleanly, or entangles them, or something.)

Step 3: The spiritual remains of the Blackforester—his legacy, his memory, the connections between his panopoly and other possessions—stick together, animating a new Other.

This Other, the Blackforest Angler, is formally a complex spirit. It's composed of the Others bound within the Blackforest Trapper's Practice, the demense and building it was based out of, the Implement that...was involved somehow.

The angler is a living symbol of the idea that the harm someone does can outlive them. The system our Blackforester created outlives him, continues to ensnare new Others to keep it working and claim new victims to empower it.

It's powerful; not as flexible as the Practitioner that originated it, but about as powerful, and not tied to a single fleshy body.

Unnamed car salesman

I never got around to naming this character. Let's call him Kobeni, because his cars rate more highly than he does. He's a chaos mage, which is like a Finder except that he calls himself a chaos mage (and doesn't think of what he does as "finding" things).

Kobeni buys and sells cars, but the most notable car on his lot is his own work. He dragged a sedan off the Paths and gave its internals enough of an overhaul that a mundane mechanic should be able to fix it if something goes wrong (taking Lost engine bits for use in other projects).

He also channeled the car's Lost nature into a very useful ability. If nobody outside is looking at the car, and everyone inside the car closes their eyes, it can teleport to another empty street with the same name. The big limitation is that the jump consumes as much gas as it would normally take to drive there, and the car has pretty crummy gas mileage for its weight class; if you don't plan things out carefully, you'll be stranded on the wrong Third Avenue with an empty tank of gas.

It also hasn't been extensively tested; in particular, Kobeni hasn't tested things which might let the car slip back to the Paths. Don't teleport to or from roads with "oak" in their name, don't drive on those roads too long if there aren't people around, and definitely don't drive off a cliff.

There's also a gremlin-built city car which has been on the lot for years. It was probably designed to be crashed, so obviously not many people want to drive it.

Batteries Spirit

I guess this isn't a "character" in the conventional sense, but I don't know what else to call it. A magic item with a soul?

It's a complex spirit—part electricity elemental, part automotive spirit, part infrastructure technomancy...thing. Its primary hallow is a portable car jump-starter. (You know, one of those batteries with the jumper cable clamps that you can stick in your car to jump it in case you don't have a friend around when your battery dies?)

That jump-starter is very good at jump-starting cars, in part because part of the batteries spirit enters the car's battery. While that segment of the spirit resides in the battery, the car is basically guaranteed not to have battery problems (no more jump-starts, no matter how cold it gets). In exchange, the spirit siphons some energy from the car's engine, which has somewhat worse performance and gas mileage. The effect is easily large enough to be noticed if you're already tracking those things, but probably not if you aren't.

The spirit segment in a battery can thrive or starve, depending on circumstances. If the car is driven every day, it will grow to fill the battery and infiltrate parts of the car's electrical system; it shapes the electrical system of that car to serve as a better hallow for itself. Such a segment can spread to cars which its host vehicle jumps.

On the other hand, if the car isn't driven much at all, the segment withers and dies, returning the battery to normal. If the segment inhabited the vehicle for any significant length of time, other immaterial Others might take up residence in its place, with all sorts of interesting effects on the vehicle.

I keep calling these spirit segments "segments," because they're all still parts of the same complex spirit. The spirit is distributed over dozens of cars, giving it significant power...while making it difficult to use that power for any specific thing. And since events which let it spread from one car to another are relatively rare (a car it inhabits being used to jump another car), it's not likely to spread across the entire continent any time soon.

Whoever holds its primary hallow can consult the spirit for its wisdom. It knows a lot about automotive electrical systems, of course, and also understands the flow of electricity in general. Mostly, it's a way to tap power from cars across the county. Of course, drawing too much from the spirit risks draining the weaker segments to death, removing both a source of power and a spot it could theoretically spread from. (And creating haunted car batteries, but that's somebody else's problem.)

The batteries spirit itself doesn't have much personality or agency. It has dreams of spreading to one of those new electric cars, with their massive batteries, and maybe figuring out a way to infect the broader electric grid from there. But it doesn't have any plans for that other than "Hope someone jumps a Tesla with one of my hallow-cars," and it's not clear whether it could spread to something charging a battery it's in the way it spreads to batteries it charges.

The Bogey-dragon

Just a random weird idea. Dragons are created when power feeds into itself, like a fire burning on itself, growing stronger faster than it consumes itself. Bogeymen get power from fear. What happens if a bogeyman sustains itself on fear of its own reflection?

#pact #pale #otherverse #wildbow #pact oc #original character

[uncloseted]

what do u say to a friend who seems to be falling to a transphobic path (via insta shorts). before she told me she supportss ppl's identities and pronouns but now shes repsoting bathroom trans women in bathroom content. where do i find resources and good evidence to help her im rlly sad abotu this

Ahh, that’s a hard situation to be in. Social media algorithms are so powerful in pulling people further and further towards prejudiced viewpoints. What to say kind of depends on the person- what their stated concerns are, what they’re actually worried about, and what kind of points usually get them to change their minds. That said, there are a few things I’ve had at least some success with:

The first one is to try and get the person to empathize with trans people. Usually this involves asking them how they would feel if people insisted on calling them [opposite gender version of their name] and using [opposite gender pronouns]. This is especially effective if the person has a nickname they exclusively go by, because then you can ask them how they feel when people insist on using their “birth name” instead of the name they go by. You can also ask them to reflect on their own relationship with gender. What makes them feel like they’re the gender that they are? How do they know their gender? Is their gender identity important to them? What does gender mean to them? Sometimes just getting them to reflect on what the trans experience is like makes a difference in terms of seeing trans people as people who just want to be respected instead of as a political football. Depending on how they feel about that line of questioning, another tact you can try is “born this way” - that trans people are born trans, and that it’s unfair to discriminate against them for something they can’t control. That was relatively effective when people were debating over gay marriage, and I think it works reasonably well here, too. This can also be a good place to point out that people who we might consider “trans” - that inhabit a cross-gender role in society, who cross dress, who occupy the social role of a third gender, etc. - have been documented for tens of thousands of years. It’s not a new phenomenon, despite the fact that people treat it as if it is.

Going off of that, it can be helpful to put the trans rights movement in a historical context. I like to remind people that they were losing their minds in this exact same way about gay people ten years ago, and then they all kind of got over it and the world hasn’t ended as a result. Is this really, substantially different than that, or do people just not like change? A lot of reactionary movements are just people who don’t like change trying to retroactively justify their discomfort, and I don’t think this case is any different. This works particularly well with the bathroom debate, because you can say, “we’ve always had moral panics about bathrooms. Until the 1960s, bathrooms were racially segregated in the US. Politicians argued that desegregating bathrooms would lead to a public health emergency because because “venereal diseases were commonplace among blacks, and an integrated ladies’ room would put white women at risk of catching VD from black women”. In the 70s, the Florida Legislative Investigative Committee issued a report warning of the dangers to the “health and well being of our population” due to gay men using public bathrooms, with particular concerns about gay men assaulting young boys in bathrooms. Obviously, neither of those things happened- there was no increase in VD after desegregating women’s bathrooms nor an uptick in child molestation because we allowed gay men to use public restrooms. Do we really have evidence to suggest that trans people pose a credible threat to public health or public safety? Or are the talking points about trans people in bathrooms the same as these previous pro-segregation talking points in that they’re not based in fact?

You can also ask them about the practicalities of their concerns. Assuming we did want to make sure that the only people allowed in women’s bathrooms are people who were assigned female at birth, how do we enforce that? Is there someone who will stand outside every public restroom and check people’s ID cards? Will women have a special key that allows them access to women’s restrooms? It’s not practical to go by “well, I’ll just know,” because lots of trans women “pass” and a lot of AFAB butch women don’t. In fact, AFAB butch lesbians have reported that they’re facing more harassment in public bathrooms than ever before. And ironically, this creates a situation in which trans men can’t use the bathroom that transphobes think they should be using- lest they be accused of being a man in a women’s space. Depending on the person, this may be the time at which you can point out that bathrooms bills aren’t really about protecting women in women’s bathrooms- they’re about creating a situation in which trans and gender nonconforming people are excluded from public life.

Along with the practicality concern, you can ask about practicality on the part of the trans person (or person they think is pretending to be trans in order to game the system). Sticking with the bathroom example, being a rapist who dresses up as a women and assaults people in bathrooms is a terribly impractical plan. They would have to, what, buy women’s clothes, dress up as a woman, wait outside a public restroom, wait for it to be totally empty, then wait for an unsuspecting woman to go in, follow her and sexually assault her while hoping nobody enters the bathroom during the assault or hears from the outside? Purely from a practical perspective, who would bother to do that? I’m sure it’s not zero people, but I don’t think the legality of trans people being in public restrooms is going to meaningfully change the number of sexual assailants that choose that method, right? If they’re going to do that they’re already doing it, legal or not. This type of argument also works for “men entering women’s sports to get an advantage” - practically speaking, would it be worth it to physically and socially transition and face the social repercussions of being trans all to try to get a slightly better chance at a college scholarship or to get a slightly better chance to win a professional sporting competition? Maybe those people are out there somewhere, but to me that seems like a huge, lifetime commitment for a very temporary career, and I just don’t think many people are going to do that. Plus, these kinds of arguments are red herrings- what they’re worried about isn’t actually trans people, but (mostly) cis men pretending to be trans for some sort of perceived advantage. It feels unfair that trans people should have their rights taken away because cis men might try to take advantage of those rights.

Again down the practicality route, you can try the, “what are you actually worried about?” tactic. People who are anti-trans will often claim that they’re not against trans people; they simply have concerns about a specific threat that trans people pose. They’re not against trans people; they’re worried about sexual assault in public bathrooms or they’re worried about fairness in sports or whatever. At this point, you extrapolate what they’re “actually” worried about- “oh, so you’re worried about sexual assault against women, that’s a really big concern for me, too.” Then you hit them with, “so surely you’re this concerned about [bigger problem], right?” This can look something like, “you must be really concerned about the 70% of sexual assaults that are perpetrated by someone the victim knows and the 67% of assaults that happen in the victim’s home or the home of a family member. What do you think we can do to protect women in those circumstances?” If you want to be a bit cheeky, you can say something like, “if you’re worried about sexual assault, you must be really concerned about the fact that 66% of trans people will be sexually assaulted in their lifetime.” Putting their concerns into a larger perspective forces them to either acknowledge that there’s a bigger issue they should be paying attention to or it forces them to admit their problem is just with trans people, regardless of where harm is actually being perpetrated.

In terms of resources, a lot of you will probably know that I really like Natalie Wynn’s YouTube channel, Contrapoints. It provides a lot of thoughtful and nuanced discussions of trans identity and transphobia, as well as discussing the mentality of people who are transphobic and how their minds might be changed.

I’m sure there are other trains of thought you can try and that these may or may not work for everyone, but they are tactics or arguments that I’ve found to be useful in my day to day life. Hopefully they’ll help a bit for your friend, too.

[divinemissem13]

30 Days of Prodigy, day 12: Favorite Character(s)

After smashing a vial in the science lab, Warrant Officer Rok-Tahk has run off in a fit of anger and embarrassment. The Admiral rubs a hand over her face and drains the last of her coffee (this mission requires coffee, no matter what Doctor Noam says) and goes to find the young Brikar.

She’s not sure of the context of Rok-Tahk’s childish tantrum, but she has to remind herself that despite her stature and impressive intelligence, Rok-Tahk is, after all, still a child. 

When she had taken the former Protostar crew under her wing, Janeway had been surprised to realize how quickly she would become a mother figure to them. She has certainly been in that position before, lost in the Delta Quadrant with such a young crew… but this time is different. These young heroes had no mother figure in their lives at all until they came across the Protostar, and it seems that they had quickly imprinted upon their Emergency Training Hologram which just happened to look and sound a whole lot like Admiral Janeway herself. 

So now, here she is, trying to figure out how to deal with Rok-Tahk’s outburst in a way that is both commanding and comforting. Chakotay was always so good at finding this balance. She thinks and then quickly corrects herself: Is … he is good at it.

Janeway finds Rok right where she knew she would - in the holo-enabled zoology lab, sitting scrunched up (well, as much as a Brikar can scrunch) in a corner and stroking a targ that is curled up in her lap.

Janeway is struck, suddenly, by the memory of another young woman, wise beyond her years with the gentlest of souls, who used to take refuge amongst nature as well. On a different Voyager. In a different lifetime. 

Returning to the present, the Admiral clears her throat gently, just enough for Rok to realize she has company. 

“Vice Admiral Janeway!” she exclaims, her voice impossibly high pitched and young sounding coming from her gigantic stone-like stature. Rok moves as if to stand, but Janeway stops her with a gesture and instead finds a stool which she perches on so that they can speak face to face. 

Before Janeway can say a word, Rok-Tahk is launching into an apology. “I’m so sorry! I didn’t mean to break anything! But no one was listening to me - they never listen to me because they think I’m just a kid - and I got frustrated.” 

Rok hangs her head in shame and Janeway is overcome with the urge to take her in her arms and rock her like a baby. Of course, that would be an impossible proposition even if Rok wasn’t under her command. Instead, she compromises by resting her small hand on the massive rough shoulder and giving her an encouraging pat.

“What were you trying to tell them?” Janeway asks diplomatically. 

“They were talking about tachyon particles and if they can really be controlled and… and I know they can. I’ve done it. But they wouldn’t let me talk.”

“Ah, so you broke the vial to get their attention,” Janeway says.

“Yeah, but then… I was so embarrassed that I just ran away,” Rok moans.

Janeway hops down from the stool and begins to pace thoughtfully.

“Did you know that I started out as a science officer too?” she asks.

“Really?” Rok asks, wide-eyed.

“Oh, yes. And I also had to struggle to be heard,” Janeway confirms.

“But you’re an Admiral! Everyone listens to you!” 

“They do… now,” Janeway smiles sympathetically at her young charge. 

“You may not have noticed, but even for a human, I’m fairly, well, short,” she chuckles. “When I was first starting out, other officers found it easier to simply talk over my head than to listen to what I had to say. Especially if I had something to say that might challenge their way of thinking.”

“So what did you do?” Rok asks, leaning forward with rapt attention.

“I did my fair share of yelling, of storming off, but then I realized something: If I was confident and assertive, people began to listen. I was trying to make them listen, but what I should have done is stated my case, firmly and confidently, they would want to listen.” 

“Firmly and confidently,” Rok echoes, sitting up a bit straighter. 

“That’s the ticket,” Janeway nods. She hesitates for a moment and then adds, “And try not to break things. At least not on purpose.”

“Ohhhh my gosh!” Rok-Tahk jumps up to her full height, now towering over the Admiral. “I didn’t clean it up! I’ve gotta go! Thank you, Admiral Janeway!” she calls as she runs from the room. 

Admiral Janeway pinches the bridge of her nose and looks down at the holographic targ that is now stubbornly head-butting her leg.

“That went well,” she quips to the targ and then she leaves the room too, making sure to deactivate the holograms before she goes.

#kathryn janeway #rok tahk #mentor #star trek prodigy #save star trek prodigy #savestartrekprodigy #i wrote this #30daysofprodigy #fanfic

[qu-film-history-to-1968]

                                                       The Magical Experience of Liaka Studios 

                                                                            Dante Calabrese

When discussing and going into depth on a film I remember watching fondly as a child growing up was called "Coraline". What makes this film stand out and memorable was the entire story, aesthetic, visualization etc. The film utilized stop motion animation to create this memorable and iconic film. I remember how special and unique the film felt for me when seeing it for the very first time in theaters and the creativity of it all. The film story revolves around a young girl named Coraline Jones who moved to a new town with her parents and left her old friends and life behind due to her parents book publishing work, once they move into their new shared old house her parents are immediately neglectful of her and never have time to spend with her and focus on their jobs rather than spending time with her. As Coraline struggles with adapting to her new house, surroundings and neighbors she stumbles upon in the very old house a small door locked up and covered over by the very old house wallpaper which she eventually opens up and finds out that it enters into another reality world exactly like hers but rather everyone is the same but better and exactly how Coraline pictures her parents to be especially. The only difference is these people are not the same, and they all have buttons for eyes shown into their eye sockets, and she meets her "Other Parents" which they are called. Eventually the more she visits the other parents and go through the door she becomes more tempted with the idea of staying there instead of returning to her actual life and real family, but she soon finds out it's not as it seems there and it shows the true colors and horror that awaits Coraline with the "other mother" being an actual monster and demon of sorts wanting to take Coraline for herself and sow in buttons to her eyes as well. Unfortunately stop film animation is very scarce in the film industry and not too many studios and films are created with this amazing style and passion, except for the studio who created this film and others called "Laika" and "Aardman".  

"I read the book of this movie in the 9th grade. Now I do not say this often, but I found the movie better than the book, I did not like the book when I read it. I want to try mango milkshakes. They looked great in the movie, and mangos are my favorite fruit. Dakota fanning is one of my favorite actresses. The cat was my favorite character. I also loved the fact that Coraline had blue hair." (Rotttentomatoes,December 27th, 2009). Two considerable events and importance that occurred during the year this film released back in 2009 were the death of Michael Jackson and Barack Obama becoming the 44th president of the United States of America. These two I remember happening but more the death of Michael Jackson, I didn't really know much about the music artist and only few of his music growing up and didn't know how he died or why, but for what I know now from back then is a lot more and different with the way I look at this historical day in history. As for the new president of the United States that year it has not really changed from what I knew then and now for the most part. After rewatching the film once more it is very much different yet the same just as I remembered it being 8 years old, it made me realize how much darker and serious the story tone is especially having more context and layers underneath it all without realizing it at the early age back then. The films style and art is more amazing and colorful than I remembered to be as well what especially changed and different was the realization of how much more horror aspects were implemented and shown at during certain film scenes, being much older and having more mental growth and comprehension I'm able to cherish and feel as if the film is a completely new version almost like an uncut release due to the matter of seeing more details and easter eggs I wouldn't have noticed before at a very young age. The film has shown to also have an adult audience in mind while making it true to the book and for being a children's movie even at times making myself question if this film is suitable for young viewers with how psychological and dark the tone is at certain parts of the narrative. 

What this says and shows regarding how history and individuals' memories can differ from a reconstruction or adaptation is the fact it will not always be true to the source material, or as accurate as once remembered. As well of other benefactor being the brain and mindset two different versions would have from one another even though being the same exact person, this same exact person isn't the same as the younger version once before, being older now and having so much life experiences and growth changes how you revisit a scenario, memory or even a movie once seen years and years ago being a whole completely different person than you are now.

                                                                                    References 

Ebert, R. (n.d.-a). Coraline Movie Review & Film Summary (2009): Roger Ebert. Coraline movie review & film summary (2009) | Roger Ebert. https://www.rogerebert.com/reviews/coraline-2009  

Selick, H. (2009, February 6). Coraline. Rotten Tomatoes. https://www.rottentomatoes.com/m/coraline 

#submission

[reasoningdaily]

How do you explain slavery to kids?

It’s important to tackle the topic in an age-appropriate way, experts say—and to make sure children understand how the legacy of slavery informs life today.

Chandra and Brandon Carr remember taking their children to visit the Charles Wright Museum of African American History in Detroit last year. Upon seeing a replica of a slave ship packed with shackled, life-size, real-looking Black people, their then-six-year-old daughter became upset and asked to leave.

“I remember hugging her and telling her ‘It’s OK to be sad. What happened wasn’t fair,’” says Chandra Carr, an administrator at Wayne State University. But a few days later, the Carrs, African American parents from suburban Detroit, talked with their children not only about the horrors of slavery, but the heroic efforts of Black people and others to resist slavery—and how efforts to make life fairer for all people continue today.

Slavery is a tough topic for any child. But approaching the subject in age-appropriate ways that help children understand the full context of the institution—then and now—can help build empathy and critical-thinking skills. Here are some ideas from the experts on how to get started.

Talk about slavery in age-appropriate ways

Educator Rebekah Gienapp, author of Raising Antiracist Kids: An Age-by-Age Guide for Parents of White Children, supports having conversations as soon as kindergarten—or younger, if it comes up. But the older a child is, the deeper and more explicit conversations you can have.

For instance, Beverly Daniel Tatum, president of Mount Holyoke College in Massachusetts and a psychologist who specializes in race and education, says with children five and younger, it’s important to emphasize that slavery happened “a long time ago.” They can’t always distinguish between what happened hundreds of years ago and today, and therefore might be afraid that something similar could happen now to their own family.

Other grade-by-grade resources can be found through groups like Learning for Justice and Teaching for Change.

For children of any age, Tatum advised acknowledging a painful past while pointing toward a brighter future.

“It’s appropriate to acknowledge that this is a sad thing that people were mistreated in this way,” says Tatum, author of Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? “The good news is, we now live in a time when we know better.”

Be mindful of language

Avoid language that dehumanizes people or reinforces the superiority of one race over another.

For example, instead of saying slaves, say “enslaved people,” which helps children understand that these people had lives and personalities beyond enslavement. Instead of saying “slave masters or mistresses,” call them enslavers, a word that does not imply superiority over enslaved people.

“Using accurate language helps children understand that enslavement was a system,” Gienapp says. Children, she notes, should know it was a deliberate system of oppression.

Talk about race—not just slavery

Children notice and comment on racial differences at a young age, and experts say it’s important that parents don’t shy away from those conversations. (This Nat Geo article has some tips on getting started.) That way, stories about slavery are not children’s introduction to stories about Black people.

“Make sure you've had lots of conversations already about race that are not about this traumatic, difficult history,” Gienapp says. Otherwise, children could think that all Black history is sad and traumatic.

Emphasize life before slavery

Understanding Black history beyond slavery is an important lesson for both children and adults, says Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones, coauthor of the children’s book The 1619 Project: Born on the Water, inspired by her New York Times series “The 1619 Project.”

Listen to Nikole Hannah-Jones discuss bringing "The 1619 Project" to Hulu as a six-part docuseries on the Overheard at National Geographic podcast.

“Sometimes when you begin the story with our enslavement, that’s a way to further dehumanize our ancestors,” says Hannah-Jones, who coauthored the book with Renee Watson. “To help children understand all that was lost, you have to show all that we had before slavery.”

For instance, Born on the Water tells the stories of Africans before they were enslaved. Parents can also look for stories about cultures like the Mali Empire of Central West Africa, whose leaders oversaw complex political systems and hundreds of thousands of people during the 13th through 16th centuries.

“It’s important for all children to understand that enslaved people had culture and history in Africa,” Tatum says.

Give children a fuller picture

Children often learn about the day-to-day lives of enslaved people. But Tatum says it’s also important for children to hear stories about their resistance to slavery. That way, they’re not seen as passive victims, she says.

Also, by learning a fuller story, children don’t end up feeling like all white people were bad. “Were people enslaving people, going to slave markets and looking at human beings as though they were merchandise? Yes, that was happening,” Tatum says. “But there were white people who thought that this was wrong. There were white people who were on the Underground Railroad helping people to escape.”

And as horrific as slavery was, children should also know it was a story of survival.

“Ultimately, the story is patriotic and triumphant,” Hannah-Jones says. “Because it talks about how these people who didn't want to come here, who were ripped from their homes, came here and fought for equality for all Americans.”

Connect the past to the present

The effects of U.S. slavery didn’t simply end with the Civil War, and Tatum says it’s important for children to understand how the lasting impact of slavery shows up today. Here’s a paraphrased example that can help explain economic differences that children likely notice or learn about as they grow up:

“Enslaved people weren't paid. And so they didn't have the opportunity to grow richer. And it was illegal to educate them.

“Meanwhile, the people who were benefiting from that unpaid labor did grow richer. So they could buy more property and attend good schools.

“After slavery, Black people had little money to support themselves, and they were still denied education. So those people had little wealth to pass down to their children and grandchildren. But enslavers did have money to pass down.

“Fast-forward to today: Black people are more likely than whites to be poor, undereducated, live in poorer housing, and have poorer health.’’ 

Tatum says that understanding the history of slavery as well as Jim Crow laws after slavery helps children contextualize the poorer conditions of many Black people today.

“If we don’t talk about the structural racism that led to these circumstances,” she says, “they might think that the disparities are the result of the failings of the people who are experiencing the disparity.”

#american history #Black History in America #Black LIves Matter #Real American History #How do you explain slavery to kids? #slavery of africans in america #white supremacy #white systemic economic empowerment schemes

[xtruss]

A father and son attend an exhibit on slavery at the National Museum of African American History and Culture in Washington, D.C. Ruddy Roye/National Geographic Image Collection

History & Culture Family: How Do You Explain Slavery To Kids?

It’s important to tackle the topic in an age-appropriate way, experts say—and to make sure children understand how the legacy of slavery informs life today.

— By Cassandra Spratling | January 26, 2023 | The National Geographic

Chandra and Brandon Carr remember taking their children to visit the Charles Wright Museum of African American History in Detroit last year. Upon seeing a replica of a slave ship packed with shackled, life-size, real-looking Black people, their then-six-year-old daughter became upset and asked to leave.

“I remember hugging her and telling her ‘It’s OK to be sad. What happened wasn’t fair,’” says Chandra Carr, an administrator at Wayne State University. But a few days later, the Carrs, African American parents from suburban Detroit, talked with their children not only about the horrors of slavery, but the heroic efforts of Black people and others to resist slavery—and how efforts to make life fairer for all people continue today.

Slavery is a tough topic for any child. But approaching the subject in age-appropriate ways that help children understand the full context of the institution—then and now—can help build empathy and critical-thinking skills. Here are some ideas from the experts on how to get started.

Talk About Slavery in Age-appropriate Ways

Educator Rebekah Gienapp, author of Raising Antiracist Kids: An Age-by-Age Guide for Parents of White Children, supports having conversations as soon as kindergarten—or younger, if it comes up. But the older a child is, the deeper and more explicit conversations you can have.

For instance, Beverly Daniel Tatum, president of Mount Holyoke College in Massachusetts and a psychologist who specializes in race and education, says with children five and younger, it’s important to emphasize that slavery happened “a long time ago.” They can’t always distinguish between what happened hundreds of years ago and today, and therefore might be afraid that something similar could happen now to their own family.

Other grade-by-grade resources can be found through groups like Learning for Justice and Teaching for Change.

For children of any age, Tatum advised acknowledging a painful past while pointing toward a brighter future.

“It’s appropriate to acknowledge that this is a sad thing that people were mistreated in this way,” says Tatum, author of Why Are All the Black Kids Sitting Together in the Cafeteria? “The good news is, we now live in a time when we know better.”

Be Mindful of Language

Avoid language that dehumanizes people or reinforces the superiority of one race over another.

For example, instead of saying slaves, say “enslaved people,” which helps children understand that these people had lives and personalities beyond enslavement. Instead of saying “slave masters or mistresses,” call them enslavers, a word that does not imply superiority over enslaved people.

“Using accurate language helps children understand that enslavement was a system,” Gienapp says. Children, she notes, should know it was a deliberate system of oppression.

Talk About Race—Not Just Slavery

Children notice and comment on racial differences at a young age, and experts say it’s important that parents don’t shy away from those conversations. That way, stories about slavery are not children’s introduction to stories about Black people.

“Make sure you've had lots of conversations already about race that are not about this traumatic, difficult history,” Gienapp says. Otherwise, children could think that all Black history is sad and traumatic.

Emphasize Life Before Slavery

Understanding Black history beyond slavery is an important lesson for both children and adults, says Pulitzer Prize-winning journalist Nikole Hannah-Jones, coauthor of the children’s book The 1619 Project: Born on the Water, inspired by her New York Times series “The 1619 Project.”

“Sometimes when you begin the story with our enslavement, that’s a way to further dehumanize our ancestors,” says Hannah-Jones, who coauthored the book with Renee Watson. “To help children understand all that was lost, you have to show all that we had before slavery.”

For instance, Born on the Water tells the stories of Africans before they were enslaved. Parents can also look for stories about cultures like the Mali Empire of Central West Africa, whose leaders oversaw complex political systems and hundreds of thousands of people during the 13th through 16th centuries.

“It’s important for all children to understand that enslaved people had culture and history in Africa,” Tatum says.

Give Children a Fuller Picture

Children often learn about the day-to-day lives of enslaved people. But Tatum says it’s also important for children to hear stories about their resistance to slavery. That way, they’re not seen as passive victims, she says.

Also, by learning a fuller story, children don’t end up feeling like all white people were bad. “Were people enslaving people, going to slave markets and looking at human beings as though they were merchandise? Yes, that was happening,” Tatum says. “But there were white people who thought that this was wrong. There were white people who were on the Underground Railroad helping people to escape.”

And as horrific as slavery was, children should also know it was a story of survival.

“Ultimately, the story is patriotic and triumphant,” Hannah-Jones says. “Because it talks about how these people who didn't want to come here, who were ripped from their homes, came here and fought for equality for all Americans.”

Connect the Past to the Present

The effects of U.S. slavery didn’t simply end with the Civil War, and Tatum says it’s important for children to understand how the lasting impact of slavery shows up today. Here’s a paraphrased example that can help explain economic differences that children likely notice or learn about as they grow up:

“Enslaved people weren't paid. And so they didn't have the opportunity to grow richer. And it was illegal to educate them.

“Meanwhile, the people who were benefiting from that unpaid labor did grow richer. So they could buy more property and attend good schools.

“After slavery, Black people had little money to support themselves, and they were still denied education. So those people had little wealth to pass down to their children and grandchildren. But enslavers did have money to pass down.

“Fast-forward to today: Black people are more likely than whites to be poor, undereducated, live in poorer housing, and have poorer health.’’

Tatum says that understanding the history of slavery as well as Jim Crow laws after slavery helps children contextualize the poorer conditions of many Black people today.

“If we don’t talk about the structural racism that led to these circumstances,” she says, “they might think that the disparities are the result of the failings of the people who are experiencing the disparity.”

[ask-remy-lebeau]

please remy you can start a conversation with what anon said.... mainly about the fact anon made a mistake in every word of that expression (I'm french). like "it's sacrebleu for one and why you talking like a granny?" or "you need an acute accent on the first e, not a grave one, and you forgot an e to make the word bleu (translates as blue)." or " did you know bleu is supposed to replace god? it's like how gosh is said instead of God around some young kids in english to avoid blasphemy"

To play devil's advocate, I have no clue if they were using a laptop or phone and most computers don't automatically let you type with accents, you have to turn that on in settings and then remember which accents are wear on the keyboard that's written exclusively in English here in the states. I also don't know where they actually learned french from, they could just be learning from Disney movies like Beauty and the Beast, because they definitely didn't learn that in my class. Also, if they are learning in a school setting I've heard that language classes in American schools are pretty shit, for instance I have a student who's stepmother insists on the student calling her ma grand-mére thinking it means my great mother, the student refuses to correct her because she hates her stepmother due to the controlling, emotionally manipulative, and spiteful behavior she's always aimed at the student. The student enjoys calling her an old lady in French every time she sees her. The student's younger brother mispronounces it as merde instead of mére, which makes the student even happier. The student has an actual French to English dictionary because they were so deeply interested in learning French and happened to have a middle school french teacher who had lived in France for a while and did her best to teach the students in the same way you learn to speak it as your first language when you're a child, making it easier for the students to learn. This student has issues making new connections with words, though, so they don't remember most of what they learned conversationally, but their vocabulary is the best I've seen for a student who can't speak anything but English. She's able to recognize lots of written french words and what they translate to, especially if you give her context like an image, but she can't use her vocabulary conversationally. She can't form sentences in French. The words she recognizes best are food and makeup related, because that's what was easiest for her to practice with at home, most makeup brands include French on their labels and you can buy French foods at certain stores where English labels aren't used

#most of the students ecperiences are just straight up ripped from my actual life #i struggle greatly in learning new languages and I don't know why #but I can recognize food words pretty well #we didn't even spend all that long on food in class that's just what stuck with me best #my french dictionary is mostly used for translating some things I see on tumblr now when i don't trust google translate

[sirikenobi12]

War & the Jedi

This will be a long meta rant, FYI.

The Jedi Order, specifically the Prequel era Jedi Order, gets a lot of hate these days particularly regarding their involvement in the Clone Wars. Accusations are tossed at their feet constantly ranging from corruption all the way up to warmongering. 

Let’s first look at the Oxford English Dictionary definition of these two accusations, shall we?

Corruption - having or showing a willingness to act dishonestly in return for money or personal gain.

Warmonger - a person who encourages or advocates aggression towards other countries or groups.

The definitions of these two words are so very misunderstood when it comes to relation to the Jedi. If the Jedi are truly “corrupt” then where are the examples of their dishonesty for wealth or personal gain? In fact, I’d argue that canon (and Legends) makes a point to show us that it is the Sith who are in it for personal gain, not the Jedi. The Jedi have absolutely NOTHING to gain from this war on a personal level, in fact they are losing members in terrifying numbers.

The Jedi are also not advocating aggression towards the Separatists, in fact what we see instead is the Jedi DEFENDING against the Separatists. I have yet to see in either canon or legends an instance where the Republic forces invade a Separatist planet who doesn’t have an army or some military involvement (i.e. weapon factories). However, time after time we see the Separatists forcing peaceful planets who want nothing to do with them to either bow to their cause or die (i.e. Ryloth, Lurmen planet, Kiros, Mandalore) the Jedi and Republic Troops will then follow the Separatists to these planets, but they try to do what they can to liberate the planet from the Separaist invasion and then they give the planet the OPTION to join the Republic for safety and economic reasons, but they never force them, as is super evident with Mandalore.

Yet people don’t seem to see this and continue to drag the Jedi through the mud. 

Here are the top 5 other “woke” takes I hear - 

Jedi are peacekeepers and should not have gotten involved:

 First things first, let’s look at the definition of Peacekeeper - a soldier, military force, etc., deployed to maintain or restore peace. 

I’d argue by that definition the Jedi were still peacekeepers, it’s true that they weren’t a 3rd party as they normally were before the war, but their position was trying to maintain or restore peace. Peacekeeper is not the same thing as a Pacifist, the Jedi were skilled warriors (training from childhood to wield a lightsaber), the difference is Jedi used their skills for defense not attack which is what we constantly saw throughout the Clone Wars. 

With regards to the idea that Jedi “should not have gotten involved” I ask you then what exactly were they supposed to do instead?

 We see at the beginning of Attack of the Clones that the Jedi are worried things will escalate to war, they have obviously gone to the Chancellor hoping that a diplomatic solution can be presented to avoid bloodshed. Or if that isn’t possible then that the Republic have some way to defend themselves other than relying solely on the Jedi (i.e. an army). The Separatists are the ones pushing them to a breaking point, were the Jedi just supposed to stand back and let innocent people be invaded/killed because they didn’t want to get involved? The Jedi were “Guardians of Peace and Justice” which means it was their duty to help bring about peace in the galaxy while also enacting justice. 

Then after Geonosis (where they lost approx. 187 members mind you) they learned that the Sith are leading the Separatist army - the Jedi are duty bound by their code to fight the Sith, they had no choice but to join the war. 

So, I ask again...what were they supposed to do instead?

2.  Jedi used a slave army for their own purposes:

 Okay, I can (and probably will) write a whole argument based on just this accusation alone. There are so many fallacies I don’t even know where to begin but I’ll try. 

I guess my first question is the same as #1, what were the Jedi supposed to do instead with regards to the Clones? 

Technically speaking the Clones didn’t “belong” to the Jedi, they were “property” of the Republic (as stated by Lama Su in Attack of the Clones). In fact, the Jedi Council not only didn’t know about the order, they had vehemently denied Syfo Dias’ earlier request to raise an army in the first place. The Sith KNEW the Jedi would be against it, this was all part of their plan to trap the Jedi (as was EVERYTHING about the war) - they clouded the Force, they literally deleted Kamino from the Archives so the Jedi wouldn’t discover it until the Sith WANTED them to (i.e. Jango just happened to use a Kamino dart?? Come on people). Yoda even states “blind we are if creation of this clone army we could not see” he fully admits they missed it because the Dark Side was clouding their vision. 

Regardless, the army was created, there was no changing that fact. Had the Jedi not taken command of the army do you think the Clones wouldn’t have had to go to war? Do  you actually believe that the Republic who couldn’t get their citizens to give 2 craps about the war would’ve taken up the mantle and fought instead? Do you think if the Jedi were like “thanks, but we didn’t order this” that the Kamioans would’ve just let the Clones go free? 

The answer you’re looking for is...no. 

So, like absolutely everything about the Clone Wars the Jedi did the best they could with the cards they had been dealt. They chose to lead the army on the front lines, putting themselves in just as much mortal danger as the men they were leading. They even sent a member of the Jedi Council to oversee the creation of future clones/training to ensure they were being treated humanely (something the Kamioans thought was ridiculous). They were the first to tell the clones that they were individuals, they constantly put themselves in front of their men to protect them (i.e. season 7 Obi-Wan deflecting the rocket from blowing up his men). The Jedi did what they could, just because we didn’t see on screen Jedi stopping to grieve every time a clone died did not mean that they didn’t care - real life Generals can’t stop in the middle of a battle to grieve over their fallen soldiers either, so why is it we consider it a moral crime if the Jedi don’t?

Another thing I’ll add is once the Jedi had evidence that the Clones were actually ordered by Dooku, did they immediately stop and say “oh hell no, these flesh droids can’t be trusted, we should just have them decommissioned”?? NO! They defended the Clones, stating that they were good men and should be trusted (and look where that trust got them in the end).

The Jedi were forced/coerced to fight this war as much as the Clones were!! Why are we willing to forgive the Clones, but not the Jedi???

3. Ki-Adi-Mundi killing Geonosians was the same as Anakin’s slaughter at the Tusken camp: 

This is another moment where context is everything because there is a HUGE difference between Ki-Adi-Mundi on Geonosis and Anakin in the Tusken camp. The fact that I have to even spell it out makes me wonder how people can even dress themselves in the morning. 

The Geonosians were an opposing military force, attacking Ki-Adi and his troops. Anakin slaughtered unarmed women and children out of vengeance. 

Now, had Ki-Adi turned to his men and screamed “to the catacombs!” brandishing his lightsaber with a murderous glint in his eyes and proceeded to cut down the unarmed bugs below the battle then you’d have an accurate comparison on your hands and I’d be appalled right there with you.

But, as it stands this is not the same thing...not even close.

4. The Jedi sent children to war: 

So, this is a tougher one and I can even understand the concerns behind it, and I even share some of those concerns. The thing I will say to this is, given what we see throughout Star Wars, what constitutes a “child” seems to be different than our own real world definition. 

Padme, for example, was 14 when she was elected Queen, and she wasn’t even the youngest ever elected. She (and her handmaids) were trained as children to defend themselves and their people both politically and in battle (much like Jedi), but you don’t hear people condemning the people/traditions of Naboo the way we see the Jedi being condemned for theirs.

Jedi children arguably mature faster than your standard person, and with regards to Star Wars there are also species’ age ranges to keep in mind. Grogu for example is still a baby at age 50, could it be possible that Ahsoka at age 14 is on the same maturity level as a human in their early twenties due to her Togruta DNA?? We don’t know, it’s never stated other than Anakin saying something about because of her advanced skills he forgets how young she is. 

Obviously Boba Fett is treated like an adult by other Bounty Hunters - no one even questions when he picks up a job and is placed in charge of a group at age 12 or 13 (and he is placed in an adult prison without anyone questioning it). It could be that by law according to Star Wars that 13 is actually considered an adult. Throughout history (and in many different cultures) 13 was when people were considered to be “coming of age”, So, once again we’re placing our cultural biases onto a fictional space fantasy world without realizing it might not even be an issue in that world.  

But even beyond all of that I ask you again - what else should the Jedi have done? 

Their young Padawans would eventually have to grow into Jedi Knights, even before the war by the time they are teenagers they usually followed their Masters on missions (often very dangerous missions) in order to get real world experience. At the time of the Clone Wars the real world they were living in was one at war. If they hadn’t brought their Padawans onto the battlefield how else would they have learned how to strategize, or how to cope with the emotions of battle? They would’ve been ill prepared if the war had continued on for years and years as it had looked like it was going to do...once again, the Jedi had no real choice in this. 

5. The Jedi lost their way because of the war: 

Did they though?? I’d argue they actually didn’t. We first have to ask ourselves what is a Jedi - well, according to the very first time we hear any type of a description about a Jedi they are introduced as the “Guardians of Peace and Justice for the Republic” I don’t see how the war took that away from them. 

The Oxford definition of Guardian is a defender, protector, or keeper. I fail to see how the Jedi stopped being any of these things because of the war.

Here’s the bottom line, the Jedi’s biggest mistake was that they fell for a plot 1,000 years in the making. The Sith spent over a millenia perfecting/hatching this plan, there was nothing the Jedi could’ve done to prevent the war by the time the trap was sprung. As always, I’m not saying the Jedi were perfect (I hate that I have to always specify that when I argue that the Jedi were good), all I’m saying is they tried to do the most good that they could with the situation they fell into - few groups/characters can claim the same thing.

Everyone seems to forget that the Sith controlled BOTH SIDES to that war, there was nothing - absolutely NOTHING the Jedi could’ve done that would’ve changed or won that war. So, instead they saved as many innocent lives as they could and to me, that’s very Jedi. 

#star wars #jedi #Clone Wars #jedi appreciation #jedi positivity #jedi positive #pro jedi #stop blaming the jedi #meta #rant post #war #The Clone Wars #attack of the clones #jedi culture #jedi council appreciation #jedi did not deserve genocide

[i-put-the-yan-in-polyandry]

Yo im back and this time im gonna tell you about a really weird and elaborate dream i had several times that will still sound like some pick me self insert but stay with me.

It wasnt SAGAU surprisingly, but a modern version of Teyvat. Visions and Gnosises (Gnosi?) dont exist. Venti, Zhongli and Ei werent gods/Archons either. I was in school/studying. I was the adopted daughter of Ningguang and Beidou was her girlfriend, then fiancee, then her wife and with that my stepmom. Ningguangs position of Tianquan was like one of a president and Beidou had the highest ranking position of the Army idk what it was called. Kazuha was a subordinate of Beidou's she picked up in Inazuma and Beidou ended up adopting(?) him so he was my stepbrother. (Tbh we still dont know if the adoption papers are legal but noone really cares)

Zhongli still worked as a consultant at Wansheng Funeral Parlor but had a lot of knowledge and could consult you in all kinds of things. Xiao was his adopted son and some sort of martial artist/athlete??? They were also our neighbors that lived right beside us and Xiao is my childhood best friend. Xinyan, Yunjin, Venti and Barbara were all idols/musicians of some sort. Xiangling was a worldrenowned cook. Xingqiu stayed pretty much the same. Chongyun also stayed the same just that his Yang spirit was a really really rare and unique medial condition. Childe was a diplomat from Snezhnaya with a strong liking of all kinds of sports that involve fighting. Shenhe was also still the same just that her homocidal urges were anger issues managed with medication and some anger management classes instead of the ropes. Ganyu worked as a secretary of State and Keqing kept her position as Yuheng which was also some sort of high-ranking Government posirion. Yanfei was still a lawyer and Hu Tao was also still the director of Wansheng Funeral Parlor.  Kaeya, Lisa, Jean , Eula and Amber all worked in the government body of Mondstadt. Albedo and Sucrose were both Scientists. Diluc had a monopoly on the wine industry. Idk what the fuck Bennett, Razor and Fischl do but they were outside a lot. All the kids went to school. Qiqi is alive, just has amnesia from an accident when she was really young. The Tri-Comissions were the government of Inazuma with Raiden as its head. Ei and Makoto were twins while Scaramouche was their younger brother. Ayaka and Sara were both also both highranking government officials. Yae was still responsible for a shrine and Yae Publishing House. Thoma stayed Thoma. Yoimiya also stayed the same. Instead of working as a ninja under the Kamisatos Sayu was a ward/distant relative or something? and went to school like a normal kid Watatsumi is its own state that seperated from Inazuma a long time ago with Kokomi and Gorou as its leaders. Itto didnt have a official and steady job but helps out where he can in exchange for money. Aether, Lumine and Paimon were either reporters or paparazzi.

Most of the dream was just short scenarios one after another. Most of the shit that happened was either really funny, awkward or i wanted to kill someone (either myself or somone else).

The first "scene" was of me seeing a smiling Ningguang taking me to the fucking giant mansion we lived in alone (for some fucking reason) after she adopted me. The mansion is HUGE. The thing had three floors plus a basement, our own pool, several balconies, a gigantic garden, a fucking Ballroom and also a big garage on the side directly under my windows. (This is context for a later point)

The next was of me being introduced to Xiao and Zhongli.

Then a huge timeskip and the awkward introduction-dinner where Ningguang reintroduced Beidou as her girlfriend and Kazuha as her son. Then timeskip again to their engagement-party which was a fucking nightmare (never ever let alcohol and food unattended when Xingqiu, Xiangling and Hu Tao are near) Then all of the wedding planning and then the wedding which was beautiful and nearly worth it after the planning nearly costed me my sanity (only worth it cuz i got to see all of the guys in suits and the happiness of Ningguang and Beidou).

I often had sleepovers with Xiao because of three reasons: 1. I walked in on Ningguang and Beidou doing the deed one too many times 2. Ningguang being away one business trips and im sure as hell not staying alone in a big ass mansion and 3. whenever Ningguang had some important guests i didnt want to interact with (basically everyone but the people i just listed). I most of the time just climbed out of my window on top of the garage, jumped down from the garage, climbed over the fence that seperated the properties, climbed up a tree to be able to slip through Xiaos window into his room.

Also apparently most of the guys besides Zhongli and Venti and a few of the girls had a crush on me at one point??? and noone ever told me??? (Explains a few incidents that i didnt write about tbh)

If you want me to elaborate on something just say so and i hope you liked it

Hummingbird

we love modern sagau here

jealous of your dreams as well

#slimegod.ask #hummingbird anon

[beneaththetangles]

Scars: From the Battousai to the Cross (to You)

When I was a child, I dreamed of having a scar on my face or maybe across my chest. It would be the mark of an adventurer, of someone cool and courageous. But the act of getting the scar? I wasn’t interested in that.

One day, though, it did happen. I took a tumble off my bike onto the asphalt, gashing my knee. That wound healed as a scar—one just a little smaller and less visible than those I’d imagined.

As I became older, though, I started thinking the opposite way, and acted to avoid getting scars. I was more careful when handling dangerous objects. I tended to wounds quickly. And I just generally avoided precarious activities. A vanity had taken over—I didn’t want to do damage to a face or body that, in my sight, was just barely okay to look at as it was!

Still, when I looked to the world of imagined warriors, fighters, and samurai, I would admire those blemished by battle. Most prominent among them for me was Kenshin Himura, whose courage and conviction were a goodness and heroism that I wish I could somehow emulate. His cross-shaped scar spoke to me of his character, of a man who would fight to save others but refused to kill them, involving himself in situations that required great sacrifice of himself.

Eventually, as I purchased the series, one month and DVD at a time, I made my way to Rurouni Kenshin: Tsuiokuhen (Trust and Betrayal), OVAs providing context to the first two arcs of the series, which showed the young Kenshin before he became kind and loving, when he was a violent weapon unleashed onto the enemy. It was practically perfect, I thought, except for the very end (spoilers ahead)—a conclusion that confused me because it didn’t seem to ring true, because it somehow made all that was to come feel less heroic and less authentic.

During the final battle in the arc, Kenshin is badly injured and psychologically in a terrible state, too, after coming to understand that Tomoe, the woman he has fallen in love with, is a spy and betrayed him (though perhaps with good cause, as Kenshin also learns that among his assassinations was her former betrothed). On the verge of death, Kenshin is able to drive the killing blow instead—though as he opens his eyes, he sees that he is only able to do so because Tomoe has become between the two fighters and sacrificed herself, with Kenshin pushing his blade through her and into his enemy.

In her final moments, dying in Kenshin’s arms, Tomoe reaches upward and carves a wound into his cheek, crossing over one made earlier by her fiance, and scarring him for life, now physically in addition to emotionally. She had come to love Kenshin, and given her life for him, despite all the pain he caused her. She had given him life.

Tomoe’s scar crosses Kenshin’s initial one

But with this gift, Kenshin does the unbelievable. While he does decide to become a wanderer and help others without killing, it won’t be until he has killed many, many others to complete his role in the revolution.

That’s right—he will change fully, but not immediately. There’s way more slaying yet to do.

At the time, and for many years afterwards, I thought it was a major flaw in the story. After what Tomoe did, how could Kenshin not abandon his life of brutality right then and there? How could he continue to do evil, by choice, even if it was meant for good?

I’ve now come around, and think that his decision is rather nuanced, understood better in the context of war, and most importantly, in being human. Just as no perfect person exists, no perfect fictional character does either. Kenshin does what he does because he thinks it’s right. He turns from being a blank slate of a Battousai to becoming one with more will and agency, who is now on the front lines battling because he feels it will eventually be better for the people of Japan and ultimately save lives.

And in all these decisions—leaving the Battousai role, continuing to fight, eventually becoming a wanderer—Kenshin carries with him the X-shaped scar.

To Kenshin, the scar don’t seem to represent a love that he didn’t deserve—at least not primarily. It is a reminder, instead, of what he must do to earn Tomoe’s love. And so, Kenshin’s life becomes about atonement from here on out, as he tries to make recompense for all the pain he’s inflicted, most of all on Tomoe, reminded of her by his daily reflection.

But can Kenshin ever do enough to atone? As a viewer, we might say “yes,” as he does plenty, saving so many innocents. But I contend that he ultimately cannot fully atone, for an “innocent” died in his place, and there’s nothing one can do to match such a sacrifice. As much good as Kenshin does, it never makes his life even; it never repays Tomoe for what she has done.

When I consider scars, I also think of another—this person not a fictional character, and not the one who must repay, but who was in Tomoe’s place, who was the sacrificial lamb and savior.

The story of Jesus’ crucifixion is full of physical punishment that left his body torn and tattered. His back, head, hands, and feet were wounded terribly. And we know, from the post-resurrection accounts, that at the very least, he carried a few of these wounds with him even after receiving his heavenly body:

“See my hands and my feet, that it is I myself. Touch me, and see. For a spirit does not have flesh and bones as you see that I have.” And when he had said this, he showed them his hands and his feet.

Luke 24:39-40

Christ was able to talk to his disciples and teach them after receiving his scars. As the divine and perfect son of God, he rose from the dead and continued to teach his disciples and help them understand what his death meant. Tomoe is human and could not do the same, could not communicate with Kenshin after receiving her own wound, that which would take her life.

Or could she? There’s perhaps a proper answer out there for why she carves a cut into Kenshin’s face as her last action, but I’ll offer this possibility. I think Tomoe was explaining to Kenshin that “You caused my death, but still I love you and will always be with you.”

An act of violence reflects the violence Kenshin inflicted in Tomoe’s life, first by slaying her fiance and then her, but the blood they both shed there recounts her love for him, and the scar that will form will be a reminder every day that she is with him, and he should be forever changed by that.

How very much like our own story that is. The Romans and Jesus’ own people (and one of his own disciples) were responsible for his death, but the Bible makes it clear there’s more to it than that—humankind’s need for a savior after causing our own deaths through sin are what led Christ to the cross. We all together, and each individually, are responsible for Christ’s death.

But after his death, he, too, imparts something to us. He changes our hearts, transforms us, and leaves an enduring reminder by remaking us, causing us to be reborn, and marking us with his seal, the Holy Spirit.

We are “scarred” forever by the loving God, changed from the moment we accept his grace.

It’s also worth noting that Christ was in his new body when he appeared to the disciples. And that new body included his piercings. His perfection included these “imperfections.” His own “cross-shaped scars” were scars caused by the cross, and they remained a part of him.

And so, as a reborn child of God, I can return to the thought pattern I had as a child, too. I can think of a scar once again not as a blemish that makes me unattractive, but as something good, something cool and courageous. Not as something ugly, but something beautiful.

The beauty of grace.

The beauty of scars.

#Anime #Christianity #Rurouni Kenshin: Tsuiokuhen #Rurouni Kenshin: Trust and Betrayal #Kenshin Himura #Tomoe Yukishiro #Grace #Scars #Articles #Author: TWWK

[heyitsyn]

Keeping Up With Seijoh Pt. 10

a/n: based on this post uwu

okayokayokayyeyyy

LOOOK I LOVE THIS SCENE LIKE I CAN GO ON A RANT OF HOW IMPORTANT THIS SCENE IS LIKE SKDJSLDKKSSM

okay so

yuhhhhhh

the way this is set up is basically seijoh simping for you

also they have their own separate gc just for them bc they dont want you to see them just simping for you

even tho oiks ltr does that everyday

but hes not ready for that conversation

there was a few times that you were kinda curious as to what was in the chat

but they would click off and they would blush before diverting you to a different conversation

this might sound hella weird and creepy

idk bout yall but i think its cute that they take random pictures of you doing the sinplest things

this all started bc of one picture

from baby aki-kun

so basically you stayed behind with kunimi during monday to just study and you sat in front of him while sharing his desk

babie took a pic of you just studying and he sent it to the gc with no context

its a known fact that seijoh doesnt practice during mondays so they were all doing something out of school

but they were all missing you so seeing you with kunimi fueled jealousy in everyone

even kyo

oikawa blew up in the chat and was keyboard smashing

the others were just teasing him like hes lucky youre with him

but behind the screen, they were blushing and red and envious and AAAAA

thus spurred on some sort of competition

like they would send the chat pictures of you like 'hA TAKE THAT SHES WITH ME'

unbeknowst to you, these boys have folders of just cute candid pics of you

oikawas insta is filled of you and his snap is full of you in his story and his tiktok is full of screaming simp rants about you

the tiktok comments are all like, 

‘IS SHE YOUR GIRLFRIEND?!’

‘OIKAWA-SAN SHES ADORABLE’

‘BACK🤺OFF🤺OIKAWA🤺I🤺CALLED🤺DIBS🤺ON🤺HER🤺FIRST🤺‘

random ones like him doing a day in my life type of vids and you appearing and everyone can just see the small blush on his face and the bashful yet happy smile on his lips

its really adorable

but the real ones know that shes been appearing in his insta since day 1

moilk.bread.1

thats practically your account now 

welll,,,

its more of a fan account for you and a lot of people from aoba johsai follow that account since you dont have an official one yet so they all simp for you there

the pictures were all from everyone like the boyz group chat was a haven for your candids

you did think it was strange that the boys would constantly ask to take pictures with you and everyone was just trying to get a pic to have aesthetic couple pics w you

and they would put it as their wallpaper or lockscreen

IMAGINE THE BLUSH THEY WOULD GET WHEN COMPLETE STRANGERS WOULD ASK THEM IF THATS THEIR GIRLFRIEND

oooo i mentioned this in the post too that iwa and you went to the gym and you guys took a mirror pic

after, you didnt really like the gym bc its just hard yanno?

iwa went back and while he was setting up his weights and equipments, his gym buddy noticed his phone light up causing your picture to show up

'oh? is that your girlfriend, iwaizumi?'

duh he doesnt have a girlfriend so he was like 🤨 until he saw his phone

the lockscreen was blaringly bright and your 'couple pic' was showing with the notifications

totally not oikawa blowing up their group chat bc he was with you

ofc babie hajime got all flustered and he blushed before shaking his head

'n-no'

he mumbled and his buddy laughed before clapping his back

'well, you obviously like her so do somethinf about it before someone does'

dont you think he doesnt know that?

also with mattsun!

this mans works in a cute cafe that this old granny owns and this thought has been living in my head rent free

and he was working during the weekend at the cafe

there were other people there but granny loves him bc hes been working there sibce he was like 15 and she took care of him a lot

he was like a grandson

so while he was serving, this granny was manning the cashier and checking people out

issei's phone was there on the table behind the counter and it started glowing at the indication of the messages being received

'have a nice day-oh!'

she noticed it right there and she saw the picture on his lockscreen

you were probably being carried by him due to your levelness with his height and you were kissing his cheek while issei smiled brightly

that was a picture you both took during an outing at the mall and the sunset behind you was just perfect to take a picture in

poor granny was like 'oop dont look at the messages' so she turned it over to not go to his privacy

there again you were

it was a polaroid of you two and he was backhugging you at school

hint? 👀

askldfjlsdkf

she knew issei was a very handsome young man so there shouldnt have been a surprise that he would be dating someone

can we name this granny?

granny inko lol

okay so granny inko saw issei coming over to rest the serving board thing and she beckoned him over

mattsun nodded and leaned over the counter to see what she wanted only to be greeted with a flick to the forehead

‘oW what was that for?’

he whined while holding the spot

granny inko tutted disapprovingly before crossing her arms

‘youve been working all week this week when you could’ve taken time off to spend it with your pretty lady. is this how men are nowadays? didn’t i teach you right to treat women properly?’

duh baby mattsun was confused like O_O

‘wha?’

his dumb question made her grab the phone and place it on the counter in front of him

‘your girlfriend, child. women need attention constantly and as much as you want that money, is it worth losing that smile full of happiness?’

okay stop it granny im getting emotional

more like disagreeing bc that wouldnt put food on the table BUT ANYWAYS

baby issei was surprisingly embarassed and scratched his neck

‘um,, baa-chan,,,,, she’s not my girlfriend’

he flustered and gave her an awkward smile

granny inko shot him a confused look and tapped the phone

‘well, she looks like she is. and if not, better hurry your move, boy. girls that make men happy like that only comes as rare as a good scratch ticket’

LMAO 

i do not encourage gambling so please save your money kids

you know what

these boys do that just to actually feel like it

okay thats confusing so imma explain it in greater detail

whenever someone mistakes you as their girlfriend, it makes them feel like you are for that split second and its just an addicting feeling

its like what if you were their girlfriend?

i mean, youre already the whole team’s girlfriend but theyre greedy brats and just want you for themselves

ohohohohoh

kyo!!

kyo def has a selfie of you both with the doggie filter but it was actually you who took it while he was just staring at you in the background

that was his lockscreen for like the rest of his high school career

lol

anyways!!

he was actually in a fight and during it, his phone fell off to the ground and conveniently oikawa messaged causing it to light up

one of the thugs had their hands gripping kyo’s collar and was pushing him against the wall while the others were surrounding them

they saw the phone flash and kyo cursed at the terrible timing and he made a mental note on killing oikawa later

a guy picked it up and he smirked, seeing the pretty smile of a pretty girl

‘heh? whats this?’

kyotani pushed the guy who was holding him but other two surged towards him and held him tighter

their leader snatched the device and chuckled

‘oh. its that bitch from his school. what is it’

he snaps his fingers as he tries to remember before stopping

‘aha! l/n y/n!’

kyo growled

‘shut up!’

the guy grinned at him and tapped the phone against kyo’s chin

‘oh yea. i heard shes a cutie. most people here know her, kid. now we know shes connected to you and guess what. you cross us again, she’ll take your place as you are right now. orrrr, we can,,, use her as our pet. thats how she is in your team, right? so let us have a turn. maybe we can send you a pic, hm?’

yea no that wasnt happening

kyotani easily beat those people up after because even just saying that unleashes power he didnt know he had

‘bastard. youre lucky this is just a warning. you touch her and i will kill you’

he landed one last kick on the guy’s face before taking the phone and leaving

now he has to figure out how to hide the bruises

you fussed later and he didnt tell you the reason instead just saying they said something that made him angry

nah

you were a person he didnt want to disappoint and he knows how much it hurts you to see him in that state

that was one of the things he hated but loved at the same time

you were such an empath that you would treat him and wince as if you were the one feeling the pain instead of him

and it made him feel special

you were one of the few things he holds close and he would be damned if anything happened to you because of him

the group chat was actually just blowing up with more screaming and the third years yelling at each other with the first years just casually reading the texts

they were used to the arguments within the team and you would remain so naive with the whole thing

kunimi is the type to keep silent and he didnt really care about anyone getting angry if you were spending time with him

but he does get annoyed if you were with kindaichi because you three were a package lol

like when kindaichi and you were at the arcade, this kid walked all the way there just because he didnt want kindaichi to hog you to himself

duh you thought this was adorable and endearing bc they wanted to hang out w you

no LUV theyre greedy brats who gets jealous over yOU

OH

so like i mentioned before that you and makki would walk over to the bakery and you guys would buy food there and such

and its also canon in here that makki only shares his food with you and no one else lol

why?

because when you eat the puffs, you put one in each cheek and it makes you look so adorable like a squirrel

sorry but squirrels are so cute like AAAAA

makki takes so many pictures of you and a lot are surprise shots where your eyes would be wide with cheeks full of food

aaaaa so cute

like you and makki sat down on a bench in the park across the bakery and you excitedly dug in to your own treat

makki chuckled at your excitement but he placed his hand on you arm to stop you

‘y/n-chan. say aaa’

you lit up and let him put the puff in your mouth and thought he was done but was surprised when there were two

you happily chewed it and went back to looking at your treats

but makki interrupted you again by calling you out

‘princess~’

the nickname made your eyes widen with red painting your cheeks and the shutter of the camera made you realize what he did

‘makki-senpai!’

you whined and he laughed

makki had a lovestruck smile on his face and he wiped the bit of creme on the corner of your lip

‘gotta take care of my princess~’

STOPPPPP MY HEART? GONE MY SOUL? GONE HOTEL? TRIVAGO

OH MY GOD IM IN SUCH A MAKKI AND MATTSUN AND IWA AND OIKAWA AND THIRD YEARS IN GENERAL BRAIN ROT PLEASE HELP

but we gotta give love to the second years :’)

ive mentioned that watari is the only person to ever go into your house right?

well, he comes over to cook and such so you guys spend time making food for the team 

watari takes this opportunity to take pictures of you cooking and the group chat cries bc its so domestic and they all start having the same thoughts

they really said seijoh braincells

it was like seeing a glimpse of a possible future for them

you, wearing an apron, cooking on the stove with your hair thrown in whatever with baggy clothes

gosh

thats like you someday being their wife and waking up one morning to see you there cooking in the kitchen

oikawa swears he had a dream that night because of that picture and he continuously thanks watari for YEARS because of that picture

okay are you curious about the dream?

yuhhh

oikawa woke up in an unfamiliar bed in a foreign room 

he felt his bones crack when he stretched and his hand extended out to a side that was still quite warm

hm

somebody must be sleeping next to him

then he stood up, catching his reflection in the mirror in front of the bed

;)

why would there be a mirror there hmmmm????

ANYWAYS

he noticed he had a bigger build and his hair was longer

then came the itch of the facial hair that he swore wasnt there a minute ago

this guy even checked out his butt and to his surprise, wow

obviously he was confused and a part of him thought this was the future

tooru walked to the door to go into the hallway and concluded, yep, this was not his house

then he heard music being played somewhere and a mixture of voices coming from a room

sounded like a woman and children

he stops at the top of the stairs, suddenly hit of the thought that this voice was so familiar

‘hm?’

tooru walked downstairs and stopped when down the hallway in front of the steps led to the kitchen where the voices seemed to lead to

‘mama! mama! mama! toast! i wan toast!’

‘in a bit, darling. just let me finish flipping the pancake’

the song was lo-fi with the volume being turned low enough to hear the voices fine

tooru wandered down the hallway and he stopped, finally seeing the owners of those voices

there was a handsome little boy sitting on the chair by the island and his brown hair was a mess of wild curls

there was a woman with h/c hair swaying to the tune and a beautiful little girl curled up in her arms while sitting on her hip

‘hey’

oikawa spoke out and caught everyone’s attention

‘papa’s awake!’

‘pa!’

‘hello tooru’

tooru froze

that was you

he knows it’s you

‘y/n-chan’

he whispered and you looked back at him from the pan

‘yes? if youre looking for coffee, we ran out apparently’

that was not what he was talking about

he hastily walked over to the boy and he blinked rapidly

‘you look like me’

he mumbled and the child grinned

‘eung! papa  and yozo look the same! mama and nana say so!’

yozo?

feeling like all the attention was on him, the little girl whined and her hands made grabby motions to him

‘pa pa’

she whined and tooru just felt something in him that screamed to hold the kid

you shushed the little girl

‘dont worry, looney loon. papa’s right there’

loon?

tooru stayed frozen at his spot and you raised an eyebrow at him

‘tooru? luna wants you’

oh

luna

that snapped him out of his trance and he held the little girl in his arms where she smiled at him and then he felt tears welling up in his eyes

then he woke up

okay sorry that was a long dream

so this dragged on for so long already okay

this was only meant to be small but aaaaa i couldnt help itt!!!!

but anyways!

the boys are just simps for you and theyre creeps that take pictures of you and they think about you all the time pls accept their love

also a mild continuation of the dream:

oikawa was holding luna and she was happily laying there when another figure emerged from the hallway

‘iwa-chan?’

he asked, surprised

what was he doing here?

iwa heard his name and grunted before going to a beeline for you

you smiled at him and he leaned in to give you a kiss to which oikawa froze in

iwa noticed his best friend holding his daughter and luna saw her father there

‘daddy!’

she shrieked and tooru blanched

‘uh, what?’

iwa extended his hands out to hold the girl but tooru held her tightly and leaned back

haji narrowed his eyes

‘um, give me my daughter, oikawa’

he grumbled and tooru shook his head

‘no! shes my daughter!’

you blinked

‘your god daughter, yes. but she’s half of your best friend, tooru’

half of his-

god? daughter?

‘so that means-’

‘piece it together, oikawa. did ya get brain damage or something? babe, call the doctor’

oikawa screamed

a/n: lol look WHO ROSE FROM THE GRAVEEEEEEE :) anyways. i really want to deeply apologize to everyone for taking an unexpected break and i shouldve told you guys and im really sorry :( everythings just chaotic lmao and im just like taking a breath for a second uwu and im so AMAZED at how many people still follow me even tho ive been gone for so long like bls yall are real ones :’) i love you all and the req box is still closed at this time as i need to finish the ones i have first soo thankyou for reading thiss and hopefully ill update soonerr!!! :)))

also not me completely messing up my kuws and missing 8 and 9 in my masterlist and having a mindblowing realization that i have 10 keeping up with seijoh fics

#haikyuu #haikyuu!! #haikyuu imagines #haikyuu!! imagines #haikyuu x reader #haikyuu!! x reader #haikyuu headcanons #haikyuu!! headcanons #aoba johsai #aoba johsai x reader #aoba josai #aoba josai x reader #seijoh #aoba johsai imagines #aoba josai imagines #seijoh imagines #seijoh manager #haikyuu manager #haikyuu!! manager #aoba johsai manager #aoba josai manager #seijoh x reader #aoba johsai headcanons #aoba josai headcanons #seijoh headcanons #haikyuu fluff #haikyuu!! fluff #aoba johsai fluff #aoba josai fluff #seijoh fluff

[somelittlewhitebird]

okay so i really hate the once upon a time interpretation of peter pan now that i look back on it and i must rant about it

okay, so, for context, i was a huge fan of the ouat pan back when i was about 12-15 years old. looking back, i probably was fascinated by him because he was the fictional crush of my two crushes at the time (i was a mess at that age and i don’t think i should elaborate on it), so i can’t remember exactly how sincere my liking for him was. however, i wrote many unpublished fanfiction of him and attempted to roleplay him often in roleplay groups, anyway i was really fixated but looking back i realize how stupid it is if it’s to be counted as a genuine adaptation (i know it isn’t because it’s once upon a time, but, that’s irrelevant because i’m counting it as one anyway)

okay, so, (spoilers), peter pan in ouat is a villain. (great! i like people who agree with me on peter’s evilness!!) however, he is very... collected? strategic? neutral evil? he behaves much like an adult - which is later explained because apparently he actually is an adult who just pretends to be a teenager.

tinkerbell barely knows him, hook and peter view each other mostly neutral for enemies and hold no deep seated hatred for one another, oh and peter’s shadow is actually the evil one except that it isn’t really because pan is rumplestiltskin’s father and he abandoned him and since he is kind of the worst parent ever you can’t really pretend he’s not evil.

there’s a lot i have to say on this, but firstly: making peter “actually an adult” just does not work in my opinion and feels like an extremely lazy way to try and make pan more evil to me.

the whole conflict/plot in the book stems from childhood vs. adulthood, and how both have good and bad parts regarding it, and how it are two completely different states of mind that have difficulty understanding one another. peter is scary because he is as whimsical and full of potential as children; he's essentially nothing yet and thus he is everything, making him hard to understand or predict. hook is scary because he is cruel in a different way - he is more predictable, but also much colder and cynical. by removing this duality and changing it into "well actually they're just exactly the same thing except that one of them pretends not to be", you don't add another layer, you remove one of the layers and make it less interesting. peter was always scary and unpredictable, because children aren’t inherently good and nice. kids can be mean and sadistic and unpredictable - not quite realizing what consequences your actions have brings a certain impulsivity. children have intense emotions that may seem erratic and are just as quickly forgotten after. young children may be greedy and not feel that attached to other people yet, they can suddenly turn mean and taunting just to see what happens because of the never ending curiosity that plagues a child’s mind. of course, not all children are like this, but peter was described as such. now, give someone like that an immense amount of power, such as, say, controlling everything in the dimension they live in, with no consequences of their actions that negatively affect them at all - and you have a chaotic force possibly hindering your every move.

ouat didn’t use that concept, though? instead, pan poses as a smug teenager, who despite some catch phrases that sound vaguely childish doesn’t behave like a child at all. he never runs after his introduction, he rarely actually laughs instead of chuckling, he doesn’t do impulsive and erratic things at any point, and he’s not actually that scary to make up for it, either? it all feels like lazy twists to me wherein the authors tried to do what was least expected, but they made no use of the already existing factors that could’ve made pan and neverland scarier.

also, all the children cry on neverland because they’re home sick?? but there’s also this vague implication that i hope i didn’t imagine that all the lost boys came from extremely shitty homes? and even if they didn’t, really? that’s how you tried to make neverland scary?

neverland in the book had many implications that made it horrifying!! it was described as if the entire island was actually alive, as if it was one creature that could seek out people to let on there. the longer the main characters stay there, the more they forget about their lives before neverland. it cannot be found and instead finds you. you need to scare it away with night lights because otherwise the wall between neverland and this world may crack at night and drag you in. the island appears to be constantly changing and time works extremely weirdly on there - people grow much slower, yet plants grow much quicker, the island comes alive only when peter is there, and just... it comes off as some sort of fae trap and although i don’t expect much from ouat, even less so for them to use my extremely specific headcanons for this story, i feel like there is so much unused potential in both peter and neverland. (and tink and hook for that matter - as well as wendy to some degree, though i actually think she’s done quite nicely in the show so i’ll give them credit for that)

#peter pan #peter pan book #once upon a time #neverland #pan ouat #ouat #ouat peter pan