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scenikeight · 1 year

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What My Father Wanted was to Kill God: Reflecting on the cycle of Rebuild of Evangelion

It's been two years now, since Evangelion 3.0+1.0 hit Japanese cinemas for the first time.

I think many of us chose to say goodbye to Eva on that day, too, leaving satisfied. I can't fault anyone for this. But there's a part of me that stings knowing that 3.0+1.0 has been left relatively un-combed-through in comparison to the other films, and I don't feel right leaving it this way. Today, I want to dissect "loop theory" - what it was before 3.0+1.0 came out, in what ways we missed the mark back then, and finally, what the resolution of 3.0+1.0 meant for the story. I want to understand what it meant to kill God.

This article was heavily inspired by "What was loop theory? Investigating the truth after Evangelion 3.0+1.0", by Japanese fan-channel Eva Fan. If you want to understand the meta angle of Rebuild better (i.e. "why does Rebuild even exist in the first place?"), please watch the NHK Professional documentary on Anno and the production of 3.0+1.0 (not "The Final Challenge of Evangelion" version on Amazon, although you should watch this one too because they're both great.) The meta of Rebuild is outside the scope of this article.

SECTION 1: WHAT WAS LOOP THEORY?

If you're already familiar with the basis of loop theory, you can probably skip this section and head to section 2. This is gonna be a lot of recap. I, for one, have never been a huge fan of the idea of "loop theory". This isn't to say that I've ever disagreed with the conclusion that Rebuild's world is stuck in a loop, more that I felt like painting it as a "theory" is seeding more ground to bad faith actors in the fandom than necessary. However, I'm using the term here to refer generally to different theories about the loops, namely those regarding Kaworu and potential connections with End of Eva. Now that all of the disclaimers are out of the way... ESTABLISHING OUR BASES, PART 1: THE MESSENGER

From the moment he's introduced, Kaworu's entire purpose in the first two films seems to be establishing the loop to the audience. His familiarity with previous versions of Shinji is front and centre in the very first line he speaks.

Some relevant lines from Kaworu in 1.0, 2.0 and 3.0. Full sized image here.

While at this stage, we lack information on how much Kaworu knows, we are at least aware of his knowledge of previous iterations of the Eva world in that first line there: "The Third one again". This is compounded at the very end of 2.0, in which he declares that "this time" (as opposed to previous times, presumably failed attempts), he will make Shinji happy. In 3.0, there's a moment in which he seems to confirm to himself his musing in NGE of having been "born to meet" Shinji (notice the lack of のかもしれない "probably"), and following some more ambiguous lines we'll skip over, at the end of a long speech about parts of ourselves remaining in the world even after we're gone, he suggests he and Shinji will see each other again just before he dies.

These lines lead some fans to believe that the loops were in some way or another, under Kaworu's control. This iteration of loop theory suggested that the loops exist so that Kaworu, who remembers the events of NGE, can achieve his goal of "making Shinji happy".

ESTABLISHING OUR BASES, PART 2: THE RED SEA

Non-exhaustive chart of potential connections between Rebuild and NGE/EOE, compiled by users on /a/ board in 2011. Full sized image here.

There are several environmental aspects of Rebuild's world that seemed to suggest a connection to The End of Evangelion, most obvious amongst these being the red sea. As Kaji explains in 2.0, the seas were blue prior to Second Impact. Flashbacks to this event reveal that it bore slightly more in common with EOE's Third Impact than NGE's Second; note the presence of the Black Moon in the comparison above. Early on in 1.0, there's a shot that shows cross-shaped white outlines in the red sea, that appear to be remnants of EOE's crucified mass production units. The moon in Rebuild also has a large, red streak on its surface, that could be the bloodstain that was left there by Lilith in EOE. Additionally, Shinji's SDAT in NGE always looped the same two songs, shown under the track numbers 25 and 26. In Rebuild, Shinji's SDAT's track number begins at 27, and goes up from there (it seems to represent the relationships he forms with other people). Some iterations of loop theory suggested that Rebuild was set directly after End of Eva, and that the events of Second Impact as remembered by the cast were actually EOE's Third Impact. Additionally, though its relevance to any canonical NGE content is tenuous (tenuous, but not irrelevant when it comes to Rebuild; see the bonus chapter), Sadamoto's NGE manga also ends with a kind of timeloop.

From the epilogue chapter of Yoshiyuki Sadamoto's Neon Genesis Evangelion manga. Full sized image here. After Instrumentality, the epilogue flashes forward to a long time in the future, where the crucified Evas are seen as some kind of relic from an unknown time. We see Shinji, Asuka and Kensuke reincarnated, and Shinji and Asuka meet for the first time, with some sense that they've seen each other before.

Full sized image here. This ending could be seen as an explanation of sorts of what's going on in Rebuild; the characters have been reincarnated a long time after the fact, while elements of the old world remain as part of the environment.

ESTABLISHING OUR BASES, PART 3: DOUBT

It should go without saying that, even at the time, these particular conclusions had holes in them. (This is to say nothing of the hundreds of other iterations of loop theory; if we went through every whacky headcanon explanation people posted on Reddit under the guise of it being any kind of genuine theorization, we'd be here all day)

Sequel Theory, especially past 3.0, required you to ignore contradictory information being presented in the same scenes the evidence being drawn on was. The comparison image I included earlier (it pre-dates 3.0's release, but was certainly spread around long after the fact) suggests that the Four Adams as they appear in 2.0's flashback could have been the Mass Production Evas (of which there are 8, not 4!). Two of the lines from Kaworu it included also don't support this line of reasoning; both "This time..." and "You don't change" imply multiple previous loops, not a singular. And while we haven't mentioned them so far, the coffin he emerges from in 1.0 being one of several was also something people were aware of back then. Speaking of Kaworu - Shinji's Happiness Theory doesn't seem to line up with the way he goes out in NGE, either. He asks Shinji to kill him with the goal of achieving true freedom; it doesn't seem like he's looking for a next time, but rather an ending, away from his destiny as an angel. It doesn't really follow that Rebuild's loops would be a journey he'd set himself on willingly, rather a circumstance he's put into by some other force.

SECTION 2: PAYOFF

3.0+1.0 responds to the foreshadowing of previous entries in a way that's kind of inconclusive, on its face. I'm going to save the potential answers for the next section; for now, let's just go over the information we did get, including some things you may have missed. PAYOFF, PART 1: OUT IN THE OPEN

Kaworu describes Gendo as being the origin of the cycle. Full sized image here.

Our first piece of confirmation, and first in-universe mention of the loops (or "cycle"/"circle"), is this line. "Gendo was the center of Instrumentality this time", the "this time" implying there have been other Instrumentalities with other person/s at the center. "Origin of the cycle" may indicate that Gendo is in control of the loops as a whole, or it may instead indicate that different people start them, perhaps through Instrumentality.

Asuka wakes up on the beach. Full sized image here.

After coming to terms with her feelings, Asuka "wakes up" in the same spot she was lying at the end of EOE, wondering if she was asleep. This is still in the anti-universe, but as was established by Gendo earlier on in the film, the Evangelion Imaginary and the anti-universe as a whole manifest as parts of one's memory. Asuka is our POV character for this section with her, so she must recall having been here. Maybe you could interpret "was I asleep?" as Soryu, specifically, having woken up.

Selections from Kaworu's Instrumentality. Full sized image here.

Anything that focused on Kaworu here was always going to be the juiciest in relation to the loops, but it's surprisingly upfront even then: There have been multiple previous loops, and Kaworu is not in control of them, he just continues to exist without agency over them like all of the other key players do. (That's both of our aforementioned Theories disproven in one scene!)

Kaworu introduces the "Book of Life", Kaji clarifies the details. Full sized image here.

We're also introduced to a new concept here, the "Book of Life". There's very limited information on what this does, but at least Kaji is here to fill in some details Kaworu conveniently leaves out, as he likes to do (that, if nothing else, Shinji and him meeting over and over again is something Kaworu has power over.)

Rei and Shinji discuss the birth of a new world. Full sized image here. Most of Rei's instrumentality scene exists to wrap up the other aspect of Rebuild's narrative we're not talking about here, so I'll skip past all of that to this: with Unit-01 and the Spear of Gaius, Shinji is capable of creating a new world, through a power known as Neon Genesis. It may be worth noting that Shinji has to clarify that he isn't going to rewind time or revert the world, just create a new one on top of the existing. This may establish a precedent for characters in control of Instrumentality being able to do both of those things.

PAYOFF, PART 2: A CLOSER LOOK NGE has a LOT of references to the years its set in. Even beyond the on-screen text, there's plenty of instances of plaques and other signs with the 2015 date on them. Rebuild, however...

Yui's grave as it appears in 2.0. Full sized image here. The only time we ever see a date in the first three films is here, on Yui's gravestone in 2.0. It's partially obscured by flowers, and may appear at first to read the same as her NGE grave did. On closer inspection, though, you can clearly see there's a 0 in front of 2004.

This could be what the gravestone has written on it. Full sized image here. One time could mean anything, but it becomes a pattern when we see more dates in 3.0+1.0...

The manufacture information on the railway track turntable in Village-3. Full sized image here.

The plaque on the AAA Wunder. Full sized image here.

Looking at that date given on the railway turntable, the earliest date 3.0+1.0 could take place is the year 12001. This, combined with the physical evidence present in the first two films, seems to imply that Rebuild follows the same rules established in the Sadamoto manga, that the loop isn't necessarily a reset of the world, but rather a continuous stream of time in which the characters are reincarnated. It makes sense Sadamoto would use this as the basis for his ending, too - he worked on the first two films, and the Mari bonus chapter clearly demonstrates that certain aspects of Rebuild were solidified during their production. Furthermore, the scene in which Shinji asks Gendo what he wishes for has more visual references to EOE than you might think...

Gendo grasps his right arm, as if he remembers the time he lost it. Full sized image here. The arm thing is obvious, and the line he says there could be about EOE, but you might notice something else in that image on the left there. There's a picture of Shinji in the background. That image comes from one of the flashing sequences in EOE's Third Impact, in fact, the entire sequence is overlaid on top of that shot of Gendo.

This shot in 3.0+1.0 versus the same sequence in EOE. The encode of 3+1 I was using was dropping frames here, so I had to cut some of it out. Video mirror here.

By the way, adult Asuka's official name, as used in every piece of merchandising she's been in so far, is just "Asuka Langley", not "Asuka Langley Shikinami" or "Asuka Langley Soryu".

Good Smile Company's "1/7 Scale Figure: Asuka Langley". She has a fair few figures, all of them with this name. Other merchandise never calls regular Asuka this. Full sized image here.

Rei holds a doll of Tsubame. Full sized image here.

The same thing ends up happening with Rei in-universe. The version of her with long hair is clearly Rei from 2.0, who has been inside the entry plug this whole time, but when we see her on the stage, she's holding a baby doll. It has Tsubame (Hikari and Toji's daughter)'s name written on it. It seems to follow that different versions of the same character end up re-joining into one during instrumentality, be that cross-loop like Soryu and Shikinami, or in-loop, like Rei and Sokkuri (Lookalike). This would appear to go beyond just regaining memories of previous loops, as Rei and Sokkuri existed in the same loop independently of one another.

SECTION 3: A PROPOSAL

And now, to get into the real meat of the issue. ...Whose doing was this, exactly?

Here's the thing: Kaworu, we can already rule out. We know it wasn't him. The next most likely candidate you might think of is Gendo, but... is he, really? Because Gendo died in EOE (perhaps not physically, but regardless), killed by Yui, but ultimately of his own volition. He had come to terms with himself when he died. He doesn't seem like someone who would have still had unfinished business. Then, what of Shinji? Well, I think it's the same deal with him, too. Shinji might not have found his place in life at the end of EOE, but he also doesn't seem like he was clamoring to start over, after all of that. In their video, "What was loop theory? Investigating the truth after Evangelion 3.0+1.0", Japanese Eva fan, Eva Fan (lol), of Minna no Eva Fan fame, gives us a different answer:

It was Yui.

Yui entered the Eva experiment for Shinji's sake. Full sized image here.

Yui's motives in NGE may have been left mostly up to the audiences' interpretation, but I don't think there's any doubt she loved her son more than anything.

As Unit-01, she becomes God at the end of EOE, accepting the burden of being the eternal proof of mankind's existence. She leaves Shinji behind, knowing that he still hasn't found his place in life.

A PROPOSAL, PART 1: YOU WERE WAITING FOR THIS MOMENT

Yui leaves Shinji as he comes into his own. Full sized image here.

The end point of the loops and emergence into the new world: Shinji makes the decision to create a world that doesn't need the Eva. Shinji and Yui, previously one being, separate. Shinji breaks the curse of the Eva, becoming an adult, and now away from his mother, emerges into the real world.

As explained by Gendo, the anti-universe, the end point of Rebuild's story, is also the beginning, and somewhere Yui, at one point, resided.

The beginning and the end are one in the same. Full sized image here. The anti-universe is "the one and only place fate may be bent to one's will". Shinji, in his parting words to Yui in EOE, tells her he thinks he'll keep making the same mistakes over and over. To quote Hideaki Anno: Eva is a story that repeats. In the aforementioned Eva Fan video, they suggest that the anti-universe may in fact be the world of NGE (perhaps, the world inside of Unit-01). Yui creates a new world through Neon Genesis, one which resembles the old, to tell the story of Shinji anew. To give him another chance to grow. For as long as Eva is Shinji's story, it is Yui's; her goal was to bring Shinji a bright future, after all. The act of piloting the Eva sees the child return to the place they resided before birth; back into the comfort of their mother's womb. In Rebuild, the “mother” seems to become all but irrelevant - Yui Ayanami may reside inside Unit-01 but this is never touched on in the same way; Asuka’s mother doesn’t seem to even exist, and her original seems to reside inside Unit-13. The existence or non-existence of a mother’s soul inside of an Eva dictates nothing about who can synchronize with it (see: Unit-02, Unit-08, Unit-13, etc). However, taking a step back, it’s almost as if the reason why the presence of the “mother” is missing from the material world of Rebuild is because the entire series takes place within the world the mother created. If Shinji entering the cockpit of an Eva unit in NGE is returning to the womb, then what is Shinji doing by existing in the world of Rebuild?

In deciding to create a world that doesn't need the Eva, Shinji is accepting life without his mother. The parting of mother and son represents the break in the loop. He emerges into the new world, reborn as an adult.

INTERJECTION: WHAT’S IN A NAME?: YUI IKARI/YUI AYANAMI

Rebuild’s Yui’s name isn’t Yui Ikari (at least, her maiden name isn’t) - It’s Yui Ayanami. In NGE, Gendo took her surname when they married. In Rebuild, Gendo already had the surname Ikari, and Yui Ayanami took his.

I think fans have been generally puzzled by the purpose of this change, but this interpretation - that Yui Ikari from NGE is the heart of the loop, the God that created the world and the God that Gendo would kill at the end of 3.0+1.0 - would seem to explain why this is the case. She’s Yui Ayanami because she’s a copy - like Rei is - of the original Yui. A Yui created by Yui Ikari. This also may explain why the date on Yui's grave says "02004" - after all, it's the grave of Yui Ikari, not the grave of Yui Ayanami.

Rei of NGE is more than just a clone of Yui, she also holds a piece of Yui’s soul (in the form of emotional memory), while Yui herself resides in Unit-01. Therefore, it stands to reason that Yui Ayanami is not really an individual, but rather someone who holds a piece of Yui Ikari’s soul - I think even more so than Rei (who undeniably is an individual). Yui Ayanami may function as a kind of messenger for Yui Ikari, who holds the knowledge she has and steers the story in the direction it needs to go. There are many players in Rebuild who are more like symbols than characters, and I think this is a huge part of why Yui Ayanami is not a character like Yui Ikari was.

For the sake of brevity, I’m going to use “Yui Ikari” to refer to Original Yui, and “Yui Ayanami” to refer to Rebuild Yui, unless stated otherwise, for the remainder of this post.

A PROPOSAL, PART 2: ...WERE YOU THERE THE WHOLE TIME?

Kaworu himself wasn't brought into Instrumentality in EOE directly. Rather, the fetus of Adam was, through Rei intaking Gendo's hand. If souls like Rei and Sokkuri are capable of rejoining into one in Instrumentality, I wonder if the presence of Kaworu in Instrumentality can be explained by his soul rejoining with that of the Adam fetus. He definitely appears as Adam there, the same way Rei is Lilith. Which brings us to this:

Shinji and Gendo upon seeing familiar souls: "Were you there the whole time?". Full sized image here.

Gendo offers Shinji the apology he never got to hear in EOE, and then realizes: Yui's soul was residing in Shinji. Instrumentality likely reconciled the souls of Yui Ayanami (the individual who became Unit-01 in this timeline) and Yui Ikari (the soul who lived on as God, and in her son), the same way it may have reconciled Kaworu and Adam's.

For as long as Yui's soul resided in Unit-01, and in Shinji, her story was not over. For as long as Shinji was stuck in his loop of making the same mistakes over and over, Eva's story was not over. For as long as the Eva exists, Yui will, and End of Eva leaves Yui there, in space, as the eternal proof mankind existed at all.

If 3.0+1.0 says "goodbye to all of Evangelion", it must be the end of Yui Ikari's story, too.

INTERJECTION: WHAT’S IN A NAME?: “SHIN EVANGELION”

The Japanese title of Evangelion 3.0+1.0: Thrice Upon A Time is シン・エヴァンゲリオン劇場版𝄇, (Romaji: Shin Evangerion Gekijouban𝄇, English: Shin* Evangelion Theatrical Edition𝄇”).

There are three points of interest in this title:

Shin - The use of “Shin” here falls in line with the titles of Hideaki Anno’s other recent films: Shin Godzilla, Shin Ultraman, and the upcoming Shin Kamen Rider. While I’m not really the best person to explain this as I’m not really familiar with the source material, the other Shin films are based pretty heavily on earlier works in their respective franchises (I believe both Shin Godzilla and Shin Ultraman have sequences that are recreations of scenes from the original movie/series). Shin Eva also, obviously, does the same thing with NGE and EOE scenes. *According to an interview with producer Akihiro Yamauchi on Shin Godzilla, the title of “Shin” was chosen for the film due to the variety of meanings it conveys. In all four titles, it is written ambiguously, and could be read as “new”, “true”, or “God”, amongst other things.

Evangelion - NGE’s title and Rebuild’s title are actually spelled differently. エヴァンゲリオン is the spelling of Evangelion used in NGE, ヱヴァンゲリヲン is the spelling used in Rebuild’s title (not the in-universe machines, for the record). They’re pronounced the same way, but Rebuild’s spelling uses characters that are a little archaic (if you want to get technical, it could be romanized as “Wevangeriwon”; note the use of “wo” instead of “o” just like in Kaworu’s name, and you probably get it.) Shin Evangelion uses the NGE spelling, not the Rebuild spelling, which makes it sound like “Shin Neon Genesis Evangelion Movies”, not “Fourth Entry in the Rebuild Franchise” (in fact, “Evangelion Gekijouban” comes from Death and Rebirth/End of Eva’s Japanese names). Earlier posters for this film in English gave it the NGE font rather than a Rebuild style logo, which pretty accurately represents how this looks.

The symbol at the end - The symbol at the end of the title, is a symbol that’s used in sheet music. This could be read two ways - “Shin Evangelion Gekijouban: End”, or “Shin Evangelion Gekijouban Repeat”; If you assume 𝄇 is one symbol, then it’s a “repeat” sign (tells the player to repeat a section of the sheet music). If you assume it’s a colon and then a subtitle, then it’s an “end” sign (𝄂, signifies the end of the piece.)

A PROPOSAL, FINAL PART: TO KILL GOD

Full sized image here. Gendo's goal in NGE and Rebuild is the same: To be reunited with Yui. In Rebuild, he will become God through the use of the Key of Nebuchadnezzar and trigger the Additional Impact with himself at the center, so he can see her again in Instrumentality. But there's a second aspect to this plan... Killing God.

Gendo lays out his intentions. Full sized image here.

I think it would be naïve of me to suggest that Gendo had any intention of ending things when he said this. These lines obviously pertain to something else (I think all of this is covered in the process of beginning the Additional Impact anyway), and it's made clear that he goes into Instrumentality as stubbornly as he always is. He fully intended to destroy all of the spears, so nobody would have any way of manipulating or ending Instrumentality, so he could live peacefully with Yui for the rest of time.

Whatever it might have meant there... "Killing God" takes on a completely different meaning by the end of the film. Yui Ikari is an existence that will live on indefinitely; someone who will never die, even long after humanity is gone. In becoming Unit-01, she alone will wait in the universe forever. She once resided in the anti-universe; the Promised Land, the one and only place fate may be bent to one's will; she created the world of Rebuild of Evangelion, the beginning of everything. Yui did all of this to give her son a better life. To let him try over and over again until he broke the curse of the Eva, and emerged into a brighter future.

She, Unit-01, Evangelion as a whole, could not rest until Shinji grew into his own. Gendo comes to the conclusion during Instrumentality, after bleeding his heart out to his son, that he isn't any closer to reuniting with her.

Full sized image here.

But after acknowledging Shinji's adulthood, accepting his own fragility, and resolving their story...

Full sized image here.

...He realizes she was right in front of him this whole time.

Full sized image here.

With this, Gendo exits the train - the same train his story began, the train station he abandoned Shinji at all of those years ago - his story is over. He no longer seeks eternal life with Yui. As Shinji breaks his own curse of Eva and is reborn out of the comfort of his mother's world, and into a world of his own creation, he says goodbye to all Evangelion.

Full sized image here. Gendo, in peace at the end of his own long journey, is willing to let Yui sleep. And so, he kills God.

Full sized image here.

#evangelion #rebuild of evangelion #neon genesis evangelion #analysis #yui ikari #gendo ikari #shinji ikari #kaworu nagisa #yui ayanami #evangelion 3.0+1.0 #shin evangelion #shin eva #nge #eva #loop theory

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qqueenofhades · 1 month

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Hello! I have a question that may be a tad uncomfortable but I don't know who could answer honestly. How do you get over class with a professor who self identifies as your mentor/father? He spilled his guts to me after class and told me how happy he was he connected to a young girl like me(Im 19 he's 59). He will be my prof for the ENTIRE year. I don't know how to feel, it wasn't flirty at all, and I actually think he sees himself in me. He's odd and off putting and stand offish. I am too, kinda. He said if shouldn't feel lonely because Im different, because I have my family, and now him (also Implied i should find god).

He's a conservative catholic with a wife and kids, I can tell he doesn't mean it in a weird way. He probably means well. But it's odd that he's acting like a mentor when I've only known him for a month.

Now, I thought this chat wouldn't affect me but he psychoanalysed me and it felt like he saw right through me while treating me like his therapist. I also think he's a lonely man who is projecting, seeing my potential and "what could've been" for himself.

How do I cope? I don't want this to affect me, but it pushed me terribly off axis. I felt pigeonholed, more than anything, and also feel bad for him.

WELP. Okay, first of all, I want to reinforce that this is NOT your fault and that it clearly creeped you out to the point where you decided to ask someone for help, all of which means that the situation is not okay and he does NOT have the right to do any of this -- whether forcing emotional intimacy on you after a very short time, suggesting that you Find Jesus and/or convert, hinting that he wants to "mentor" you, or whatever. Just because he's a conservative Catholic is no guarantee that it won't get creepier (indeed, often the total opposite) and even if it wasn't sexual or didn't feel sexual at the moment, that is... wrong. He should not have done it. He does not have the right to decide He Is Now Your Mentor and to push that connection on you. Even if it was not conscious or intentional grooming behavior, it is... squicky to say the least, showed that he was willing to push boundaries with you right away, and is certainly something that should make you cautious of any more uncontrolled or one-on-one interaction with him. So yeah. Gross. "Now you have me so you won't be lonely"??? Sorry, there is no scenario in which I can imagine that being an okay thing for a professor to say to a student. No. It may be that he just doesn't have a good sense of social boundaries or appropriate behavior, but that also doesn't mean you need to excuse it.

Next, if you can switch to another section or class so you don't have to spend the year with him, that might be worth looking into. If you can't, then obviously minimize the time you spend one-on-one (if there are office hours or if you need help with the class, maybe ask your peers or the TA if there is one, rather than him) and remember that you can tell people at your university if it continues to creep you out, not just me. There are procedures in place at most institutions to document this kind of interaction if it continues to cross a line (I don't know where you are in the world, but in the university where I work in the US, there's an office of Title IX, which deals with these kinds of issues). Older male academics smarming up to young female students and telling them they're "special" happens a lot, unfortunately, and while it doesn't always end terribly, it is something that you deservedly flagged as weird and which you should keep an eye on going forward. I'm sorry that you've experienced this and once again offer my support in navigating this year in as un-icky a way as possible. Please remember that you do not have to apologize for or excuse yourself for making choices to get out of a weird situation that clearly threw you for a loop, and you do not have to put up with this behavior if it continues or gets worse. Good luck.

#anonymous #ask #school stuff

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sakurapika · 4 months

Text

Reviewing New Year Sale Outfits in Twisted Wonderland

In Japan, New Year's Day (お正月, or "Oshogatsu") is the biggest holiday of the year, and it is also my favorite. That being said, the TWST artists never disappoint when it comes to the art for this event, so let's review all of the cards!

Spoiler warning for upcoming ENG and JP sever event cards, including some Groovy art!

Round 1: 2021-2022

Kalim Al-Asim (SSR)

Look at him, he's so festive and cheerful

This Kalim, as well as Deuce's SR, have a special place in my heart. I started playing TWST the summer it came out, but I wasn't a "serious" player until around New Year. Kalim and Deuce were my first "duo magic" pair, and I love their interactions in the story as well.

I love his headband ribbon and how it matches his obi. The sparkly hakama also suits him. I'm excited to see Jamil's version of this outfit as well, but we all know it'll be a very long time until Jamil volunteers to work retail during the peak season.

12/10 he's so cute

Deuce Spade (SR)

I was surprised that this was just an SR, and that you could get him by finishing the event story. His outfit is so detailed!

I chose his Groovy art so you could see that he's wearing sneakers with his outfit, which I found funny. Cater is wearing similar shoes in his own SR, so it must be part of the Heartslabyul New Year attire. It still feels very in-character for Deuce.

The silhouette of his outfit is interesting. His jacket is short like a suit jacket, but has the sleeves of a haori. There are lots of elements of his dorm uniform, like the pins and sash around his waist.

Not only does he look awesome, but he chose to work during the New Year's Sale to buy a present for his mother.

12/10 very cool and wholesome

Round 2: 2022-2023

Ruggie Bucchi (SSR)

HIS HAIR!!!

Aside from Vargas Camp and his birthday cards, Ruggie doesn't have a lot of SSRs, so I'm happy for him. I look forward to getting him in the English server soon.

I love how Ruggie seems to have picked up a lot of merchandise from around the store. Aside from a fan, which all the boys are using as their "weapons" for battles, he has a little koi bag, which I love so much (I have a similar one). The little toy he's holding is called a den-den daiko (でんでん太鼓), which is popular for young children.

11/10 congrats on getting the job, Ruggie!

Cater Diamond (SR)

I chose to show his un-Groovy art, because it's easier to see his outfit.

His clothes are similar to Deuce's, except that his "vest" is red, and he is wearing a button-down shirt underneath. The mix of Japanese and Western influences reminds me of Taisho-era clothing. He looks like Kazushi Tatsuishi in the anime version of My Happy Marriage, which also happens to be set in the Taisho Era.

It's hard to see in this picture, but he has a hairpin in his hair!

10/10 he slays

Sebek Zigvolt (SSR)

He looks so dramatic with his gloves and fur collar, but are we surprised? He's a Diasomnia student, after all. I wish they had given him a different hat, though, because it looks almost identical to his dorm uniform.

This one makes me laugh, because he poses like my dad. Not seen in this image is Sebby's neon-green geta, which I think my dad would love (he likes having shoes in unusual colors).

10/10 who needs fireworks on New Year's Eve when you have Sebby?

Vil Schoenheit (SR)

He stole the show.

At first glance, his outfit may bear too heavy a resemblance to the regular Pomefiore uniforms, since they're already inspired by kimono.

With his fascinator hat, netted gloves, and black nail polish, though, Vil adds a sense of mystery and intrigue to his outfit. He looks like he is playing the role of a Taisho-era socialite who poisoned their lover and is now actively avoiding the police.

Either that, or he got divorced from Rook. After all, it looks like he is wearing a furisode (a type of kimono meant for single women) rather than a tomesode (worn by married women), like in his dorm uniform.

11/10. The storytelling potential is limitless.

Round 3: 2023-2024

Trey Clover (SSR)

I love his scarf and hat. His coat looks longer than Deuce's and Cater's, and more like a haori. Overall, it looks like a cozy combination.

Like Cater, he is also wearing a button-down shirt under his kimono, and his vest is green. Heartslabyul is the only dorm that gets a character in this event every year, so it's nice to see that the outfits are personalized for each character.

He looks like he could be someone's uncle, but you know for sure that he'd spoil his nieces and nephews.

10/10 very classy, if he was working at the store and I came to visit, I'd trust him.

Ortho Shroud (SR)

ADORABLE.

Something I've always found interesting about Ignihyde clothing is their use of sharp shapes and geometric patterns, especially in Ortho's case. I wonder how Idia's version of this outfit would look.

Ortho and Idia must've had so much fun creating this outfit together!

Infinity/10 if Ortho were trying to sell me anything, I'd buy it, regardless of whether I actually need it.

Rook Hunt (SSR)

He's wearing RED EYELINER!

His outfit is quite different from Vil's. While Vil is wearing a furisode, which is traditionally worn by women, Rook's outfit seems to have a more traditionally masculine silhouette (of course, this is just my interpretation). This probably means that Epel will get to wear an outfit similar to Rook's next time as well.

The peacock feathers on his red hat is also a nice touch.

His pose and expression remind me of Wen Kexing from the C-drama Word of Honor. They also have similar personalities.

10/10, he looks like he just stepped out of a period drama. I look forward to seeing the fanarts of him with Vil.

Jade Leech (SR)

Jade's card has to be my favorite from this year's lineup. I just love how they translated Octavinelle's suits into kimono, while keeping details such as the purple bow tie.

I'm obsessed with his haori--it looks fluffy. I'd like to buy five.

His pose is so...

Like Trey, he looks like someone's uncle (it must be the fedora). However, unlike Trey, he looks like someone's uncle who may or may not be part of the Yakuza. Instead of giving you money on New Year, you owe HIM.

He also looks like he goes door to door selling products, and is about to sell me what he guarantees is a genuine Toshiba toaster oven and absolutely not an overpriced knockoff that will short-circuit and cause my entire neighborhood to lose electricity.

11/10 I will buy that toaster oven anyway.

Which cards are you most excited for? Let me know!

#I'm an f2p player so I've been saving for them ever since GloMas ended #disney twisted wonderland #twisted wonderland #twst #kalim al asim #deuce spade #ruggie bucchi #cater diamond #vil schoenheit #sebek zigvolt #rook hunt #jade leech #trey clover #ortho shroud

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birdofprey1234 · 2 months

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Hello all. In case you've been unaware, recently tumblr has begun rolling out a partnership with Midjourney to scrape the entire website and its users' posts for their AI training. This includes peoples art, and probably also writing and photography. Anything you've posted the company may use for training, and you are opted IN by default.

Obviously this blog has been inactive for quite a while now, and no new art has been or will be posted here, but this puts me in a difficult position. I'm not sure exactly what I'm gonna do with this blog from here on. Some people have recommended editing posts to put a glaze filter over old art so that it's unusable, but I have many hundreds of posts, not all of which are tagged, and I'm unsure whether the AI training has already gotten a hold of them or not, making the potential filter useless. Not to mention the reblogs that already exist of the old un-glazed artwork.

I considered deleting everything, maybe even the blog itself, but that idea...sucks. I like the idea and the feeling that though I'm not active, my art is still out in the fandom tags somewhere, and that I have had an effect on the fandoms I was in and shared my art with. And again, the reblogs still exist, so I'm not sure what that would mean in terms of AI scraping. My worry is that deleting my blog would only relinquish any control I do have of what is done with my art.

As it is I'm kind of at a standstill. I was recently thinking over sharing my art again on other blogs, since I do miss being a part of that creative space. But now this change has kind of crushed that idea entirely. All this, plus the extreme transmisogyny apocalypse happening on here in the last month, and the seeming silencing of important movement tags like palestine, it really makes me want to ditch tumblr altogether. I've seen many people considering switching platforms. There's been a lot of markiplier mutuals specifically who have encouraged me to join cohost, I also have seen pillowfort as an option for others. But those platforms are new, kind of janky and will be hard to get used to for me. Plus, idk if I'm using them wrong but there's like...11 posts in each tag that I've seen so far, which kind of kills the feeling of being a part of a big open fan community I really love. Cohost seems like a nice platform, but if only 30-35 people move over, then it's really going to be a moot point. I wanna be where everyone else in the fandom is. I worry that this mass migration will only splinter communities, as we're all going to different places. I don't want to make 500 accounts on different platforms just to stay active and feel aware in the community.

My entire online social life up to this point has basically been on tumblr, I have a lot of blogs with a LOT of memories attached to them, and it would hurt to just drop them and move away.

Overall I'm at a loss. I enjoy sharing my work, my ideas and thoughts, I like being a part of these creative communities. But it seems like everyday the online space becomes more and more hostile toward creatives and fans, and much more advertiser friendly. One thing i never ever wanted to happen was for my art to be used for AI, and I naively thought that tumblr would be safe in that way. Guess not. I sometimes wonder if eventually all large social media will crash down and The People will dedicate to going back to personal websites and forums. I would enjoy a space where I could share my art on my own terms, and not have other peoples interaction with it overshadow everything else.

I'm not sure what I'm going to do yet. For now I will be staying on tumblr until I figure it out, but definitely no more posting creatively. I want to try to keep my work up if I can. I would recommend on all your blogs going to settings and toggling ON "prevent third-party sharing for this blog", as that will let tumblr know you wish your work, including reblogs of it to be excluded from the scraping. I'm unsure how actually useful this will be, or how much the company will respect these wishes but. It's there. I would also love for you to come talk with me @boobookiss and, hey, maybe make a cohost account. I'm on there as boobookiss as well. I hope to keep touch with you all and see this little community stay together.

#markiplier #markiplier egos #myposts #ok to rb

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maybege · 7 months

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Mug vs Choker

Summary: Paz and you get comfortable in your new arrangement.

Pairing: roommate!Paz Vizsla x fem!Reader

Wordcount: 3.0k | Rating: E (18+ only!)

Warnings: Modern AU, Free Use Arrangement AU, Roommate AU, explicit sexual content, unprotected sex, (un)requited pining, dom!Paz, sub!Reader, cream pie, size kink, lil bit of cockwarming, some dirty talk

Happy Tuesday everyone! I hope you are having an amazing start into the new week. I had a little inspo for Paz again and channelled it into a new part for the adventures with roommate!Paz, which I hope you will thoroughly enjoy. If you have any suggestions on what scenarios you would like to see with this pairing, please let me know – this AU really is like playing in a sandbox for me. Please let me know what you think in a reblog or a comment!

masterlist | crossposted on AO3

Sometimes you wondered where the hell you had gotten the audacity from. Like that time in primary school when you had asked the big kids if you could play ball with them. Or that time in college when you decided to switch majors at the last possible moment and finally ended up with something that really brought you joy. Or when you agreed to meet Din’s friend when you desperately needed a roommate and a place to live.

And not to forget that time when you asked said roommate for a free-use arrangement.

Paz Vizsla was … He was big. Now you knew it was true in every sense of the word but it still felt not enough to truly capture the physicality with which he was present. Broad shoulders, tall frame, muscled forearms that starred in your dreams more often than you wanted to admit. And paired with the cocky confidence he exuded, Paz Vizsla was like a dream come true. He was a burly man, almost too broad for the door frame and too tall anyway and he was intimidating with his forearms full of tattoos and his hands weary from work and the little scar on his eyebrow.

You never considered yourself brave and didn’t even consider yourself adventurous. When you thought about your unfulfilled desires it was always in the safety of your locked bedroom. But fantasizing about something and actually doing it were two completely different things and you knew that. And to be fair, you’d never met a man you felt like you could live those fantasies out with. It took a whole lot of trust that you just never found yourself placing in any of your dates and boyfriends.

Until Din introduced you to his colleague and friend and apartment-hunting potential roommate for you. Paz Vizsla.

You’d wanted to declare Din insane if he thought you’d move in with a man like that. He looked like he could snap an adult like a twig. But then he started speaking and his voice was a deep rumble and he was funny, making little quips and jokes and you noticed how his shoulder hunched, how he tried to appear smaller than he was in that little coffee shop on the corner where you had first met.

Since then, he had been a recurring figure in your wettest dreams.

Living with him for two years, you knew his presence alone made your brain feel like scrambled eggs. You got brave, around him, brave enough to tease him and flirt with him and ask him about relationships – all under the guise of friendship. It would be the closest you could ever get to him, you had argued, since he so clearly did not think of you in that way.

Which, as it turns out, was the wrong idea because not even a week ago had he fucked you into the couch so good, you got wet at just the thought of it. And now you were in a freaking free-use arrangement? With Paz fucking Vizsla?

“I could get used to that sight.”

You startled, turning around in the hallway, your hair still dripping wet from your shower, in nothing but your underwear. You had taken to wearing less and less clothing around the apartment. Both because it was kind of exciting to see Paz’s reactions and because it was even more exciting to have him touch you as a result of it.

Paz closed the door behind him and shrugged out of his jacket. He did not take his eyes off you and you felt goosebumps rise on your skin.

“Hi,” you breathed, your heart already racing in your chest, “How – How was your day?”

“Shit,” he replied, taking a few slow steps towards you. Your eyes ran over his form, his broad shoulders, his thick arms, his strong hands that you wanted to feel on you. “Doesn’t matter now, though,” he continued slowly, “Because I feel like it is about to get a whole lot better.”

“Yeah?” you smiled, taking a few steps back, towards your bedroom.

The grin that spread on his face brightened your entire day. “Yeah,” he rumbled, lengthening his steps until he was right in front of you, “Much better, actually.”

His body was warm as were his hands when they landed on your hips, guiding you back and back and through the open door until the back of your knees hit your mattress. You let yourself fall back and Paz followed, his lips landing on yours in the most electric kiss.

Kissing Paz was fun, it was passionate, and it made your entire body tingle. Dreks’ kisses had never been like that, and, for that matter, no one’s kisses had ever made you feel this way. Cherished. Wanted. Desired.

“Want you to ride me,” he whispered against your mouth, “See your tits bounce in that pretty lace.”

His hands ran over your sides, rough fingertips digging into the flesh of your thighs, angling your knees up around his hips. “You want that, love? You want to be filled by me?”

You nodded eagerly, turning with him so you could straddle him. The pressure against your core made your pussy throb and the lace sticky with your juices. You could feel him already hard underneath you, his jeans rubbing against you in the best way.

The urge to feel him inside you made your hands tremble and the excitement that you were so close to Paz Vizsla did not help you with your struggle to focus. But Paz did not mind, it seemed. Instead, he merely chuckled when you continued to struggle with his belt buckle and lifted his hips.

“Let me help,” he said, his big fingers deftly working and you swallowed heavily when he freed his cock, shimmying his jeans down his legs as far as they would go.

He did not lose any time before his hand landed on your hip, his thumb brushing the lace of your panties aside and seeking your clit. You shuddered on top of him, the stimulation making you even wetter.

“You got any lube?” he asked, his voice even lower than before, “You know how big I am, sweetheart, don’t want to hurt you.”

“Uh, yeah,” you nodded in confusion, pointedly looking at your nightstand, and watched as Paz reached with his other arm that wasn’t busy making your pussy throb to the nightstand and got that small bottle of lube that you kept in there.

Dreks had always scoffed at your desire to use lube and only after your ultimatum that no lube would result in no sex, had he agreed to use it. Though you did not mention it now, you just wanted to enjoy Paz. Paz who had thought of the lube himself and who seemed to have no trouble knowing how much would be needed to cover his cock and who was careful to look out for any discomfort on your face from the temperature difference.

“You look gorgeous,” he whispered, mouthing at your jaw as he worked a finger inside you, the lube made things much easier, though you were sure you had never been wetter either, “Love that colour on you.”

“I know,” you replied between heavy breaths, working your hips against him, “Blue is your favourite colour.”

“You wearing it only for me then?” he teased you, his teeth nipping at your bottom lip before his thumb brushed over the lace covering your nipple, teasing until it hardened under his ministrations, “My pretty roommate is making herself all dolled up only so I can fuck her properly?”

“Paz,” you gasped, a little flustered at his choice of words but there was no denying the way you clenched around him at his words.

“I know, love,” he murmured, his lips forming that cocky grin that let you know that he knew exactly what you were thinking, “You are not used to getting properly fucked, not used to someone who knows how to work his cock inside you. But I am here now, okay?” you nodded, “I am here and I am going to take care of you, sweetheart, just sit down on my cock, yeah?”

You watched in fascination as he pumped his cock a few times, coating it in lube. “You know I am big,” he stated and you could not take your eyes off the sheer size of him. You knew he would fit. He had fit before and he could fit again.

That did not make the prospect any less daunting though.

He held his shaft up for you, his other hand still on your hip when you rose up on your knees. For a moment you considered you getting your panties off first, making it less of a hassle, but then you felt his tip brush through your folds and over your clit and you decided it wasn’t that urgent anyway.

Everything in you screamed to have him again and when the tip of him caught on your entrance, you could another rush of wetness in your core.

“Go on,” he instructed you, “Sit on my cock like a good girl.”

“Shit,” you cursed, your thighs trembling as you slowly took him in, “Paz, I – I think I –“

“What is it?” he asked you, his voice strained too, “You can’t be cockdumb yet, sweetheart, you barely have the tip.”

“You are so big,” you gasped, sinking down a little more and trying to remember to breathe. He stretched your walls so deliciously it made you want to sit down on him completely but you also knew your body enough to know you needed to be patient and to wait and to – your walls fluttered again when you took another inch, “Shit, I feel so – it’s so –“

“So what?” he asked again, his hands squeezing you tightly, “Fuck – talk to me, love. Tell me what you feel.”

“I feel so full,” you breathed, throwing your head back in an effort to make it feel like he wasn’t filling you up to your throat.

Paz chuckled, the knowing undertone making you even wetter, “Imagine how much fuller you will feel when I come inside this little pussy,” he mused, his thumb landing on your clit again and you could not hold back the half-moan half-gasp when he started to circle it again, his hips shifting the tiniest bit. Still, it was enough to make your body feel like he had moved mountains.

You sat down on him completely, the weight finally off your legs though they still trembled from the pleasure that you felt.

“Good girl,” he praised you, looking up at you with dark eyes, “Now let me see those tits bounce.”

He landed a slap on your ass made you yelp and sit up straighter, your walls betraying your arousal by pulsing around him. The dark-haired man smiled, folding his free arm underneath his head, looking like relaxation personified.

Putting your hands on his chest, you leaned a little forward, trying to get the leverage and support you needed. Being on top was not your favourite position, you always felt a little off, a little uncomfortable, a little too pressured, before.

But Paz, even with him fully in his dom persona and the pointed non-effort he put in, made you feel safe. Even with his eyes on you, with his thumb lazily rubbing over your clit, spreading the wetness, you did not feel like you had to perform for him. You felt like you really go at your own pace.

And you did.

Your hips moved slowly as you took care to give yourself enough time to get used to his girth. The first few thrusts started out shallow before you gained the confidence. Before you knew it, you had gotten faster and Paz had adjusted his movements accordingly, expertly working your clit like he knew what you needed. The way you tilted your hips had him hitting a spot that made you see stars, that made it difficult to control your movements but you wanted – needed – him to get to that spot again and again and again until –

“Fuck,” you breathed, tightening your grip on his shoulders, “Paz, please!”

“Come for me,” he encouraged you and started to bounce you on his cock like you weighed nothing, ensuring that you hit that spot, “Come for me, pretty girl, let me see how beautiful your pussy looks clenching around me. I wanna start off my weekend by feeling you come around me, by filling you up. You can be good for me, can you not, hm?”

You whined, the words getting stuck in your throat at how good it all felt.

“Can you be good for me?” he asked again, his tone carefully balanced between absolute sweetness and condescending and you loved it.

As soon as your orgasm hit you, you could not hold yourself up anymore and instead sank down on him completely, leaning against his chest while your body felt like it was floating above the roofs of the city.

Paz, though, kept fucking up into you. His arms wrapped around your back, one hand on your ass while he chased his own high. His deep grunts and moans in your ears only helped to prolong the feelings of pure ecstasy in your veins.

He let out a loud groan, his cock buried as deep as it could go and you shivered when you felt him come inside you. “Fuck, you feel so good,” he grunted, his cock still pulsing inside you, “Stars, you are a dream come true, sweetheart.”

You ignored the flutter in your chest at his compliment and instead kissed his jaw. “That was perfect,” you nodded in agreement, your face still buried in his neck as you tried to come down from your high. If you calmed down your breathing enough, you could hear his heartbeat in his chest and there was something about this proximity that made your brain all foggy.

Weird, how strictly platonic feelings could do that to a person.

“I promised Din we would come over for potluck tonight,” you finally found your voice, “That was what I was getting ready for.”

“Oh shit, I am sorry,” Paz sat up, carefully taking you with him. He shifted inside you and you winced at the sudden movement. You could feel your combined juices trickling somewhere between your thighs and you were sure there was a total mess on your sheets. “And then I barged in and ruined you getting ready.”

“Didn’t say that it bothered me, though,” you reminded him with a gentle smile. Sitting so close to Paz you could see how the sunlight from the window made the speckles in his brown eyes shine brighter. He was so beautiful, you could not stop the way your finger ran over his eyebrows down to his cheek and jaw.

The look in his eyes was incredibly soft – you would have used the word tender – and when he tilted his face to press a kiss to your fingertip, you knew you were done for.

“Still, maybe we should agree on a sign or something,” he suggested, “To show that you are ready for … To show that you are open to advances. Otherwise, I get hard just at the thought of coming home to you.”

You could not help yourself.

“That doesn’t sound like a problem to me,” you admitted, shuffling closer so you could kiss him again.

“It’s not?” he sounded surprised, pulling away from your face until he could see you shake your head.

“It really isn’t,” you murmured, “Though I agree, it might be a bit more practical than just ravishing me as soon as you get home.”

His chest rumbled with laughter against yours until he kissed you again. You knew you would have to be careful with his stubble or else the beard burn on your chin would betray you to your friends. But when he ran his tongue over your bottom lip or grabbed your chin ever so slightly to keep control of the kiss, it was harder and harder to pull away from him.

After an eternity that still was not enough for you, Paz pulled away from your lips, trailing kisses down your neck. “How about a mug?”

It took you a second to understand what he meant.

“Have you watched too much New Girl lately?” you snorted but your grin fell when you saw the confusion in his eyes, “Remind me to make you watch that show,” you said instead, “It’s a classic.”

“Sure thing, sweetheart,” he smiled, his fingers drifting to the necklace that was hanging around your throat.

Which gave you the best ideas you ever had.

“What if it’s something I’m wearing?” your hand landed on his on the necklace, “Like if I have my necklace on, then I’m open to – to well, to you. And if I don’t then it’s just … like always.”

“But you can take off the necklace any time,” Paz insisted, “Or use your safe word – or –“

“It’s okay,” you assured him, your lips quirking up in a smile when you remembered the hour-long conversation you had with him about safe words and boundaries and things both of you wanted to try, “Paz, I trust you and I think you seriously underestimate how … how attracted I am to you.”

You shifted nervously, too shy to meet his eyes.

But his fingers under your chin made you look at him again and the sheer vulnerability you found there made your heart clench.

“You really are needy, huh?” he half-joked, his voice getting a little too rough but your eyes fluttered and you swore he could hear your breathing catch. He grinned, “Maybe this free-use thing isn’t as complicated as I thought,” his hand squeezed the soft flesh of your ass, “Maybe you really are just a needy little thing for me.”

You squirmed at his words. “Paz, don’t tease,” you pouted and he chuckled, pressing the lightest kiss on your lips, “I am not teasing,” he assured you, his thumbs rubbing circles into your skin, “And I could go for a shower before we leave for Din’s, what about you?”

You ended up being an hour late for Din’s potluck.

#paz vizsla x reader #smut #maybege writes #paz vizsla x fem!reader #roommate!paz vibes

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bigfan-fanfic · 8 months

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Convalesce (Batdad x Bruce Wayne x Bucky Barnes)

Requested by anonymous for I love the idea of Bruce/batdad/Bucky and Steve/superdad/Clark. Please write a headcanon about their relationship if you’re ok with it

There's something just delightful of the way Bucky has begun to show affection.

And in its own strange way, it's a parallel of how Bruce has begun to grow freer with his own love.

When the Winter Soldier fled Vienna, it was the Justice League that was tasked with finding him - after all, they're a much more trusted organization than the Avengers, and it was their way of working to prevent the Accords from going through - if they were able to do better than the Avengers, they could continue to operate and keep metahumans safe and their privacy intact.

So with Batman on the case, it was soon evident that James Buchanan Barnes was being framed.

So with the Justice League helping to deprogram him, it was a relatively painless process to free him from Hydra control.

You offered your own house as a place for Bucky to convalesce and to keep out of the public eye - Wayne Manor was pretty secluded, even during gala season.

Bruce wasn't as happy about it, but with the potential of the Accords hanging over his head, he allowed for it. It was insisted upon that Captain America assume a new title, as the Justice League was already a sanctioned UN organization, and they did not wish to play favorites.

So Steve Rogers, simply going by the Captain now, joined the Justice League and was allowed to come visit Bucky at Wayne Manor.

Bucky never intended upon engaging in courtship with the Waynes, it was simply something that happened. He helped the Bats train down in the cave, and in daily life, acted as a personal bodyguard to Batdad.

But slowly, he came to deeply respect both Waynes and their children.

You kissed Bruce when he returned from patrol, like usual, and Bruce nudged his chin in Bucky's direction.

Bucky was watching you two curiously. You gave Bruce a little nod, and he moved over towards Bucky.

You approached as well, and Bucky froze for a moment, until you put your hands along his waist.

Bucky gasped, but Bruce moved behind him and lightly rubbed his shoulders.

From that moment on, Bucky joined the two of you, kept close and involved.

Bucky helps Bruce come to terms with a lot of things - his time as a tool and weapon makes him firmly against putting the Robins to use in the field, and he now has the courage to say something about it.

While Bucky gets to heal from his trauma and start to cope in a healthy way, Bruce gets a new perspective to look at his life from and start considering life outside of Batman.

And you meanwhile, have a bit more support that you didn't before - Bucky's a lot more outspoken about his opinions on Batman than you are most of the time.

Bucky understands you, and he doesn't let him being a third in the relationship allow Bruce to push off any responsibility. He's willing to say the things you've had to let go by.

Bucky is also sympathetic, deeply, to your whole family. He's happy to help out all of them with whatever they need.

But most of all, he loves the two of you.

And just like how Bruce was brought out of his shell, so too has Bucky begun to take initiative. Giving kisses, holding hands. Coming with you both to bed without needing to be asked (and occasionally bodily taking Bruce when he gets caught up with Batman work)

Because, as he confesses to you one night, when Bruce lies asleep between you, holding you as his head rests on Bucky's chest, this is where he feels he really belongs.

And he will live it out to the fullest, and help you both any way he can.

And this, he knows, is what love is.

#bucky barnes x male reader #bruce wayne x male reader #batman x male reader #avengers x male reader #dc headcanons #marvel headcanons #crossover headcanons #bucky x bruce x reader #headcanons

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tavs-tressym · 14 days

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Delicious Denial - Chapter Five

(AO3 Link) | Master List

Rating: Explicit, 18+

Pairing: Astarion x Fem!Tav (You)

Word Count: 4900 (approx)

Tags: Fluff, eventual smut, domestic fluff, camp life, slow burn romance, sexual tension (A LOT), masturbation (a bit), voyeurism (a bit).

WARNING: SELF-HARMING BEHAVIOUR (to feed Astarion), knives.

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A reimagining of the game's events if Tav had zero magical or fighting ability. But she's still pretty fucked up. 👍

(Lots of comforting camp life content)

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A/N: PLEASE PROCEED WITH CAUTION, CONTAINS POTENTIALLY TRIGGERING CONTENT, LOVELIES!!! XXX

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Chapter Five - Syrup

This morning’s spread isn’t as luxurious as yesterday’s, but you’re putting in all the effort you can. There’s an art to porridge, simple to make, difficult to maste- Okay, it’s porridge… But it does taste surprisingly good considering the lack of resources. Various chopped fruit and berries that you harvested from nearby bushes adorn the top of each bowl. Each one identical and artistic, aside from Karlach’s portion which is arranged in a smiley face. You think she’d like that. You lay the bowls out for the group to pick up in their own time. Then you clean the knife you used for the fruit and hover your wrist over a cup. The knife rests against your skin and… You hesitate. It’s okay, you take a deep breath and try again… You hesitate. “Guh!” You exclaim, jumping, jogging and huffing on the spot.

Okay Tav. You got this. It’s just a little cut. It’ll only hurt for a moment. Come on. Don’t be a coward. Let’s go in three… Two… One!

… You hesitate…

But you push through! Slicing your skin, dripping the scarlet contents of your wrist into the cup until it is full.

Ow, ow, ow, ow, ow…

You grab a cloth and wrap it around your wrist, pressing hard to stop the bleeding. Holding it away from your new shirt, you promptly replace it with a bandage and sigh. You continue to clean the station as the others emerge from their tents and take their bowls with thanks. Lae’zel doesn’t thank you, but you expected that. Each companion spots the cup of blood, but doesn't say anything. Karlach takes her bowl, thanks you whilst giggling at the design before rushing over to Shadowheart to, no doubt, gossip about the blood-filled cup. Gale is the only one who comments.

“Ah, I see you’ve discovered Astarion’s little secret?” In truth, you’re thankful that someone actually said something so you could explain yourself. You nod, smiling. “I’m just happy he wasn’t skipping meals because he was turned off by my cooking.” You chuckle.

“I hope you found out in a more… Appropriate way than we did.” He searches your neck for any injuries.

You gasp. “He didn’t…?”

“He certainly tried. I woke up to his teeth grazing my neck… But once I sent a mild shock of lightning through him, we seemed to understand each other.” You both laugh.

“Well, he just told me. From a safe distance.” Gale watches you giggle, still smiling.

You look at each other for a little longer than is comfortable before he catches himself. “Oh-er- Thank you for breakfast.” He holds up his bowl and walks over to the rest of the group.

Last but not least, Astarion leaves his tent, he revels in the feeling of sunlight on his pale skin as he stretches. He spots you: cleaning and unaware of his presence. You don’t clean gracefully, but brutally. You wrestle with a particularly stubborn spot on the makeshift counter, eyes wild with determination. His eyebrow raises, grinning at the sight before making his way over to you. His movement stutters when he spots the cup, pleasantly surprised to see it there. The closer he gets, the stronger he can smell it, smell you. Resting one hand on the counter and his weight on one hip, he makes a strong and successful effort to pull his eyes away from his gift and onto you. “For me?” At the sound of his voice, you untuck your lips and un-crinkle your nose, leaving the spot alone to see him for the first time today.

Last night ended a little abruptly. Once you noticed he was staring at your lips, you had turned away. You weren’t willing to give him that much. He didn’t say anything about it, but you could tell he was a little frustrated, mostly confused. You had been flirting all night, so why not? You still don’t know and you aren’t ready to look at that yet. But that didn’t stop you from staying up, worrying about how awkward it would be the next morning.

Your grin matches his before you decide to test the waters. “Oh no, that’s Wyll’s, he’s going through a phase.”

A light giggle escapes Astarion’s lips. “That is a shame, now we’re going to have to fight for it.” You smile, shaking your head.

Good… Back to normal…

“Well, hurry up then. Because you took your sweet time, it’s going cold.” He smirks and takes it in his hand, delighted that he can still feel warmth through the metal. He begins to walk away. “Oh no, no, no. You’re not going anywhere until I know how I taste.” He stops and spins around quickly, his grin somehow even wider. You adjust your position, bending over, elbows resting on the counter, one arm lying flat, the other propping up your head under your chin. You raise an eyebrow. “Go ahead.”

“Who’s the freak now?” He taunts.

“Uhuh, enough talking, more drinking.” You say playfully, gently pushing the bottom of the cup up, towards his face.

His eyes: animalistic, as the scent grows stronger. He chuckles a little before breathing it in, deeply. As he exhales, a groan threatens to escape, but he catches it in his throat when he sees your eager eyes in the corner of his vision. He wouldn’t dare to give you the satisfaction. He presses the rim against his lips and hesitates before taking a sip… Which turns into a gulp… Which turns into a chug... The cup is empty, yet still upside down, his mouth still wide open, his eyes rolling back behind closed lids, desperately trying to yield more from it. He admits defeat as no more drops will fall and stares, downcast, into the emptiness. The memory of your taste still dances on his tongue: rich, nutty, buttery syrup. He wipes his teeth clean with his tongue, savouring every smear of red he can find. “Very eager…” Your voice breaks his hypnosis, he clears his throat and regains some control over his body, ensuring the counter hides his bottom half. You giggle, his efforts of concealment flying under your radar. “I’d say that’s a very good sign... So, full review?” Your cheeks begin to ache from your constant smirking, but there’s no stopping it, his reaction was truly delicious.

He sighs, happily. “That… That was amazing…” You sit up to meet him on his level, arms supporting your upper body. Meeting your eyes with his, he licks his lips.

“Good, I take it you’d like to continue with our arrangement then?” He nods. “In that case, you can expect another cup for dinner.”

“Dinner…” He thinks to himself. “Dinner is so far away…” His gaze passes your face and finds the blood-soaked cloth on the table behind you. Saliva begins to rapidly fill his mouth. Then the bandaged cut on your arm grabs his attention: a spot of red, peaking through the white. If he had it his way, he’d drain you entirely, right here, right now. But that wouldn’t be wise, you’re offering this to him, he needs to play by your rules if he wants to keep his new, continuous food source. And he knows it. Plus, he’d miss your company. You feel the danger under his stare.

“Don’t start getting greedy now. One cup per meal, remember?” He swallows before engaging with you again.

“Of course, not one drop more…” He grins, flirtatiously.

“And what do we say…?” You gesture with your hand, expectantly. You love this. He scoffs but when he realises you aren’t letting up, he sighs dramatically, blowing a curl of his hair into the air. “Ugh… Thank you…” He rolls his eyes, but you can tell his gratitude is genuine. You smile triumphantly and take a bite of your own breakfast before turning around, ready to multitask eating and cleaning. Astarion stands there for a minute, looking at anything but you in order to calm himself down. Once he succeeds, he turns around to find every companion staring at him with very, very wide grins. You just beat him at his own game, and everyone saw it.

“Not. A. Word.” He commands, causing scattered giggles to emerge from the group. He adjusts his shirt and storms off into his tent to get ready for the day.

------------------------------------------------------

Once everyone is finished, it’s once again time for everyone to armour up. You notice Karlach struggling with her straps and walk over, offering a helping hand. “Aw… Thanks soldier…” She seems sad when she sees you.

“Don’t mention it… Are you alright?” You ask as you dodge the hot metal of her armour.

“Me? I’m more worried about you! Last night, I-”

“I know. And it’s okay. Really… Astarion told me about your heart… It must be hard, not to be able to touch people…” Her knitted brows relax and she chuckles softly.

“It’s awful… Maybe I’ll tell you the full, long story sometime soon, but the short version? I was betrayed by someone I cared about… Someone I trusted… I was given to Zariel and I became her personal attack dog. She took my heart and stuck this damned engine in it’s place. I spent a decade trying to escape… But, thanks to this mindflayer bullshit, here I am!”

Zariel, you recognise the name, the Archdevil of Avernus.

You finish the last knot and step back to look her in the eyes. There’s no tears, but a deep sorrow, still.“I’m so, so sorry Karlach, I can’t even imagine…” Her mouth becomes a smile, but her eyes don’t match up. She tuts.

“Hey, come on, I’m here now! I’m free! I might be burning hotter than a furnace but I’m free!” When she speaks the word ‘free’, her eyes finally catch up and her whole face lights up. You sigh, then smile at her.

“How I wish I could hug you…” You look at each other for a moment, unsure of what to do. Then you have an idea as you spot a stuffed toy bear on the floor. You hold it up.

“Ah, Clive, meet Tav. Tav, Clive.” You laugh and squeeze the bear tightly, rocking with him in your arms. Once the ‘energy has been transferred’, you hold him up for Karlach, posing him so his arms are outstretched. Once she realises what you’re suggesting, you swear you see tears filling her eyes but she shuts them quickly as she takes Clive from you. She holds him close, rocking. She sighs and mouths a ‘thank you’ to you. She finds it difficult to pull away from your indirect embrace, but does so anyway, still smiling at the gesture.

She turns her attention to the rest of the group. “Right gang, let’s go smash some skulls!” Her and the rest of your companions gather and head off together. You wave them off, smiling.

------------------------------------------------------

Last night’s party left quite a list of chores for you today. Certainly not the worst mess you’ve ever had to clean, but it’s pushing it. You work through the camp, humming sweet sounding melodies to yourself as you do. The laundry basket quickly fills with wine soaked rags and clothing. You set it aside to gather the empty wine bottles in a neat formation, ready to be washed and reused for potions. Occasionally you stumble into lost trinkets and jewellery you don’t recognise before shrugging and adding them to the camp inventory. Once the camp begins to look somewhat presentable, you turn your attention to the food station, examining the current and limited ingredients.

Tonight’s meal: Butternut squash pie.

You fold the raw pastry, time and time again. Beautiful layers rest and expand with each waiting period. The squash is well seasoned, roasted over the fire. Onions left to caramelise for as long as possible whilst you assemble the well worked pastry in a greased tin. Once the filling is complete, you take the time to cover it with an intricate pattern, strategic holes poking through pastry petals. Braided crust containing the treasures within. A savoury, sweet concoction all wrapped up and adorned with some of your best work, ready to be baked.

Sinking the basket of laundry into your hip, you make your way to the lake. It’s there that you flick through clothing, separating them neatly and guiding them into the water. As you target smears of red on a ruffled, white shirt, you notice a tear. Along the hem, it sags, revealing a hole, surrounded by torn thread. After doing all you can to cleanse it, you hang the shirt to dry in the sun. It makes quick work of it and once you’ve finished the rest of your task, it is dry.

Sitting with your back against a tree, you drape the fabric over your lap, a small, sharp fish bone in hand. You reflect on your lie as you’re faced with the daunting task ahead of you.

Shit. Why did I say I could sew?!

Hesitantly, you pierce the soft material with a mess of knotted, red thread following the fish bone’s path. You weave and knot it further, leaving messy kinks and bulging mistakes. It doesn’t look great. But, you suppose, fashion is hardly the party’s biggest concern. You hold your pitiful attempt at the sunlight to inspect it. It really doesn’t look good. Alas, it will have to do.

Soon after you’ve folded and distributed the fresh laundry to each tent, the midday drop off arrives. This time, it’s Shadowheart, carrying a bulging backpack as though it weighs nothing. You give a welcoming smile that she doesn’t reciprocate. “Here, this is everything so far…” She plonks the pack on the floor, creating a small dust cloud and a loud thunk.

“Thank you, I’ll sort through it in a moment.” You continue, expecting the sound of distancing footsteps, but there are none. You look up again to find her still standing there. She seems awkward, anxious, her hands intertwining and parting. Puzzled, you ask “Is there anything else I can do for you?”

She glances at you. “I…” she begins “I just wanted you to know that I’m… Happy… For you.” The words sound pained, reluctant, a desperate grasp at grace.

“Oh?”

“I saw you earlier, with Karlach.” She pauses. “You’re… A good fit. I think.” You raise an eyebrow as her sour expression becomes clear to you.

She’s jealous.

“Shadowheart, I-” You’re interrupted by a defensive tone.

“Just remember, she has friends. Lots of friends. Understood?” Her inner conflict pushes spite in her threat, making it panicked but firm.

“Shadowheart-”

“I’ll spell it out for you. Hurt her and die by my hand.” She grabs the handle of the mace secured to her hip, just to emphasise the point.

“Shadowheart!” She finally shuts up and lets you speak. “We’re friends. That’s it. Don’t get me wrong, she’s wonderful, but that's just not the nature of our relationship.” There’s a long silence as red slowly creeps onto Shadowheart’s cheeks.

“Oh… I see…” Her embarrassment cannot hide the beginnings of a smile.

“You like her.” You smirk.

“I- What?! I- Don’t be ridiculous!” Her flushed face panics, wide eyed at the accusation.

“You like, like her.”

“I-...” She waits for your cackles to end, unamused. “Alright! Yes, I do…” A deep, sorrowful sigh falls from her mouth.

“What’s wrong?”

“Nothing. It’s just… I’m… A cleric of Shar.” She caresses her hand, comforting a small, dark wound. “I have a mission from my cloister and I intend to follow it through, as I have with so many others, but… My devotion leaves little room for… ‘Recreational activities’. Let alone a relationship.” You try to show her your most understanding smile. She seems to soften her edges a little and looks… Sad.

“Well, considering Karlach can’t touch you, I doubt many ‘recreational activities’ would be on the table, anyway.”

“Oh, I think we could work around it…” She smirks, it seems that she’s thought about the logistics before. You chuckle.

“Surely you have more time now than ever, since being on the road. You could die tomorrow, why not see where it goes for now? What’s the harm?”

She pauses. “Well… I imagine we’ll all split ways once we’re cured, so the distraction shouldn’t linger for much longer than that… Alright, I’ll consider it. I suppose there’s no harm in having a little fun in the midst of all the chaos.” She looks around as you try to hide your smile, so as not to embarrass her. They truly would make an adorable couple.

“And what about you?” She not so subtly segways, moving the attention away from herself.

“What about me?” You almost scoff at the suggestion.

“I’d rather not pretend you haven’t attracted some… Attention. If that’s alright with you?” She says firmly, hand on hip. This time, you do scoff. But not because you don’t believe her, but at the thought of actually committing to any of the potential suitors before you.

“Mmm, yes. I’ve noticed Lae’zel flirting with me too.” A successful attempt to dismiss this topic? Maybe?

“Very funny, but we both know what I mean.” You smirk and shrug. She rolls her eyes. “Fine, I won’t press you.” The smirk turns into a smile, you nod, gratefully. “I should head back, we’ll be back at sundown. See you then.” She disappears down the path, you breathe a sigh before continuing your list of chores.

------------------------------------------------------

It’s getting close to sundown, you cover the pie in the tin and leave it over the fire to bake so that when the group arrives, the smell will find them. Hovering your wrist over the cup feels less daunting this time. You’ve decided to reopen the wound from earlier, as painful as that may be, you don’t want any further scarring on your arm. And so you do just that. The cup is filled and placed on the counter as you hear familiar voices nearing the camp. You watch and wait for them to enter. Astarion arrives first with the rest following distantly behind. He must have rushed ahead. His armour is a deep leather, layered over a black, ruffled undershirt; paired with matching leather pants and extra padding on the knees. It’s lightweight and well fitted to his lean body. There’s blood splattered all over him, adding crimson streaks throughout his otherwise perfectly styled, silver hair. His confident posture suggests that the blood is, thankfully, not his.

Must have been an eventful day…

He looks around and finds you, he grins. You smile and nod your head in greeting. He takes this as an invitation to move closer, trying to ignore the tantalising smell emanating from the cup. “Hello, darling.” He moves behind the counter to get closer to you, resting his elbow on it. You turn to face him, hand on hip.

“Hello, Astarion. Busy day?” You gesture to the state of his apparel.

“Always.” He smirks. The voices grow louder, there are excitable squeals, thumping footsteps and… A bark?

Karlach bursts in with a white-furred, four legged friend following closely behind. She’s holding a bone over her head as the dog jumps at her, playfully. She trips and falls over, giggling as the dog chases the, now flying, bone across the camp and catches it in the air. “Good boy Scratch! Who’s a good boy? Who’s the bestest boy?!” She stands and the mouthwatering smell of dinner fills her nostrils. “Gods…” She turns to you. “Tav! We have a dog! Meet Scratch!” You turn to Astarion with a questioning look.

“Ugh, as you said: ‘Busy day’.” He responds.

“I can see that.” You laugh as the rest of the group enters at a more leisurely pace, the smell of dinner hits them too. Gale practically moans at the scent.

“Tav, you’re putting my humble stew to shame, time and time again.” He says, smiling warmly at you. “Thank you, but you haven’t actually tasted it yet so please try to reduce your expectations for me.” You laugh. You feel Astarion move a little closer whilst you aren’t looking.

“And that is something, I simply cannot wait for. Is it almost ready?” Gale moves towards the pot on the fire.

“Hmm, let me check.” You move past Astarion who watches you leave his side with a slight annoyance at the intrusion on your conversation. You open the pot, allowing the steam to escape before bending over and inspecting the crust with Gale looking over your… ‘Shoulder.’ Well… He’s looking at something…

Without looking, you reach your hand out behind you. “Could you pass me the-” A rag is placed in your hand before you can finish asking Gale for it. You look back to see Astarion, cup in one hand, towel in the other, standing over you. “Oh, thank you.” You say in slight surprise.

“No, thank you my dear.” He says, tapping his finger on the cup before walking past Gale to sit by the fire. You fold the rag and use it to lift the pot and place it on the counter. You shimmy the pie out and begin slicing it, revealing the glistening, rust coloured interior. You place a slice on each plate and hand them out, receiving the usual thank yous and none thank yous.

Scratch sniffs your legs and sits in your way, waiting patiently. “Uh… Hi, Scratch…” You look at him, awkwardly. His tongue just lolls out of his mouth as he tilts his head in response. “Um… What do you want? What does it want?” You turn to Wyll, hoping he can read this creature’s mind. He chuckles. “I think he’s hungry.”

“Oh…” You scan your brain for the little information you know about dogs. Meat, they eat meat.

“Never had a pet before, Tav?” He asks, amused at your awkwardness in front of a dog, of all things.

“Uh, no. Never seemed like my kind of thing.” You make your way to the food storage, now refilled with bits and bobs from their journey. You take a string of sausages, pull a few off and slowly put them in front of Scratch, yanking your arm away for fear of biting.

Wyll laughs at the sight. “It’s alright Tav, he seems well trained. Look, he’s not even touching it yet.” Scratch whines at the sausages on the floor, awaiting your command.

“Er-Go ahead, Scratch.” You say casually. He doesn’t seem to understand and stays still. You roll your eyes and make a gesture to him, urging him to eat. He pieces it together and pants excitedly before tucking in.

Taking your own plate, you walk back towards the fire and look around to find an empty spot. Each log is big enough for two and most are full. Wyll and Lae’zel are sharing grand battle stories with Lae’zel being not-so-subtle about her attraction to him, making him blush aggressively. Shadowheart and Karlach are deep in conversation, Karlach seems to be unable to take her eyes off of her as she speaks passionately about her love for night orchids. Astarion had tried to sit alone to enjoy his ‘dinner’ in peace, but that didn’t last long as Gale decided to shuffle over and talk his ear off about some theory he had about something or other. As much as you like Gale, even you’re starting to get bored. But, you can’t help but smile as you quietly decide to sit alone, on an empty log to enjoy your pie in the atmosphere of sweet conversations around you. Taking a deep breath, you feel grateful that you get to experience this. That you get to enjoy these peoples’ company. Friends aren't something you’re used to, any friend you had, you had to lose. But not now.

You feel… Safe... Mostly…

Basking in the moment, you look around and notice Astarion stand up and excuse himself, cup still in hand, he enters his tent. Presumably to get away from Gale’s ramblings. Everyone finishes their meal and you gather the plates. You need to wash Astarion’s cup. You set the plates aside and head towards his tent in search of the missing vessel. You begin to call out to him but then you hear something. You swear it was a grunt. Thinking nothing of it, you go to speak again. But stop. This time, you’re sure it was a groan. The whisper of a “Fuck…” followed by quick breaths.

Is he? No way…

There’s a gap in the fabric, candlelight inviting your gaze. You shouldn’t. You know that. But in your mind, you can see what you can’t see, and you have to know if you’re right. Just a passing glance, one moment to confirm your suspicions and that will be all… You lean in…

His back is facing you, one hand encouraging the flow of liquid from the tilted cup. Head tipping back, just far enough for your eyes to gather that his brows are knitted. His right arm seems to be wrapped around something in his lap, his hand peeking out from the left of his waist. You begin to pull away, your vision gaining one more vital piece of information as you do: The rocking of his hips.

You take a deep breath, grinning. You choose a nonchalant approach when you call his name: “Astarion?”

A rapid fumbling can be heard from inside. “Er- Just a minute!” You’re desperately trying to hold back laughter as he pokes his head out, your blood dripping from the corner of his mouth. “Yes?” You follow the stream as it drips from his chin.

“Cup?” You hold your hand out.

“Ah, y-yes, of course. Wait here.” He dips back into his tent and retrieves it.

“Thank you.” You take it and begin to turn away… But you can’t help yourself, this is too good of an opportunity to make him sweat. “Do you need help with anything?”

“Hm? What? N-no. Why?”

“Oh, you just sounded like you were struggling with something.” You look directly into his eyes with a mischievous grin. He coughs and clears his throat, his pale cheeks becoming tinged with the slightest blush. “But, if you’re sure…” You shrug nonchalantly and begin to walk away, stifling further giggles. You turn your attention to him once more, gesturing to your own chin. “Oh, and you have a little something. Right here.” He immediately wipes it away with his hand and squints at you, clearly irritated by your teasing. That doesn’t stop you from snorting with laughter as you make your way to the rest of the dishes.

You start washing the dishes and by the time you're finished, Astarion emerges from his tent, no longer wearing armour and adjusting his shirt. You make eye contact as you remove your apron, let down your hair, shake it out with your hand and sigh at the relief. He definitely isn’t over it, it’s clear in the way confidently saunters over to you, in a desperate attempt to maintain his pride.

Nice try…

“So, how was it?” You ask with the widest of grins.

He scoffs and folds his arms. “Look, I don’t know what you think you heard, but-”

“I don’t know what you mean, I’m just asking how your dinner was.” You wink.

“Of course you are.” He rolls his eyes, then smirks at you. You take two cups from behind you and fill them with wine. “I’m sorry for teasing. Peace offering?” You hold a cup out for him. He grazes your hand as he takes it from you, without hesitation.

“I accept. But, surely you can do better than this, darling.” He flashes his eyes at you, grinning, anticipating your next move.

“Hmm, how about this? Oh, my lord! I beg your forgiveness!” You twirl dramatically, feigning devotion. “Tell me, your majesty, is there anything a lowly subject such as myself can do to earn your mercy?” You take his hand and kneel before him.

He laughs at the display. “I could get used to this.” He takes a sip of his wine. “Fine, I forgive you. Get up.”

“Oh thank you, sweet, merciful lord!” You plant several tiny kisses on his cold knuckles. He doesn’t stop you, enjoying your warmth on his skin.

He chuckles and helps you up. You use your free hand to brace yourself on his chest, regaining your balance. Looking up at him, he smiles, warmly, at you. You smile back. As you remove your hand and pull away to sip your wine, you realise it’s wet. You look at your crimson coated palm, then his bloody shirt. “Um… Ew.” You wipe it on his sleeve. “Do I even want to know where all this came from?”

He raises an eyebrow at your squeamish display, grinning. “I’ll tell you if you come and sit with me.” He gestures towards the lake and as you turn to see it, he moves closer to your ear and whispers: “It’s quite the story.” His breath tickles and sends a shiver down your spine.

You clear your throat and find the wine bottle with your free hand. “Well, in that case…” You wink and begin to head to the lake. Astarion follows closely behind, shooting a smug smirk towards Gale, who was watching the entire interaction from the corner of his eye.

~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~~

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spanishskulduggery · 1 month

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Maybe I'm dumb, but I'm having issues using Spanish descriptors. When is the right time to add "de" and when is it not? I would have "restaurante mexicano", but then my head would spin at "maestro de español". I know this is a stupid question, but I don't like how confused I am... is there some rule that denotes when "de" is appropriate to indicate a descriptor, like how you explained "cual" and "que" to me?

With this particular example it's about the nationality and how it comes across

If you said restaurante de México it would be "a restaurant from Mexico" as if the restaurant had originally been in Mexico (which could happen for foreign chains)

And if you said maestro español it would sound like "a Spanish teacher" as in the teacher is from Spain

(el) español is "the Spanish language", but español / española is "Spanish" or "Spaniard", so it becomes a different thing

...This can be especially useful if you don't know the gentilicio "demonym" of what someone is called when they're from a place - like there's a city in Spain called Huelva - someone from there is called onubense ... so un hombre onubense = un hombre de Huelva ; that's an irregular one though, a lot of them are generally straight-forward but still

It also helps if you don't know the nationality like danés/danesa is "Dane/Danish" but then the country is Dinamarca "Denmark"

You may also run into some cities/states/etc where it could be like un restaurante chico "a small restaurant" vs. un restaurante de Chico "a restaurant from (or potentially "in") Chico"

...

But for your example, it's especially important for genders - say you have una maestra francesa "a French teacher" as in "a female teacher who is French" vs. una maestra de francés "a French teacher" as in a "female teacher who teaches French"

Same idea with de inglés "English-related" vs. inglés/inglesa "English" the nationality; or un profesor/una profesora de literatura inglesa "an English literature teacher" for example has nothing to do with their nationality at all

Subjects in school are generally considered nouns, but especially in something where you could confuse someone's nationality with the subject they teach

In general if you're talking about adjectives by themselves they don't usually need a de

The adjectival phrases with de are normally de + noun (person, place, or thing)

Sometimes with nationalities it's a bigger difference like above

Other times it can be sort of whichever one you feel like - as in una camisa roja "a red shirt" vs. una camisa de color rojo is "a red-colored shirt" [lit. "a shirt of red color"; where de color (algo) is an adjectival phrase]

You will sometimes see de + adjective + noun or de + noun + adjective; same general idea as the other it's just a longer phrase

As an example - de primera is understood as "first-rate", probably de primera categoría ...as de segunda is "second-rate" or sometimes understood as "second class (citizen)" probably again de segunda categoría

But that's different from something like de primera mano "first-hand" where it is specifically "first + hand", and again de segunda mano would be "second-hand" which would mean like a thrift store or "second-hand" clothes etc.

Again, not really a set rule aside from a few where it's very important to make a distinction

[Also, side note, de + algo is sometimes referred to as "genitive" in case systems but it's - "of" or "belonging to", where it can also be property/possession in some cases; like la casa de mi amigo "my friend's house" vs a simple su casa "his house" which is much simpler but vague, as it could be "her house" or "their house" too - de + pronoun can be used to indicate clear ownership when something could be vague....... still considered a kind of adjectival phrase, but not the kind of adjective you'd immediately think of]

If you have any other specific examples you want me to go over, just message me it can be sort of hard to generalize when some examples come up but I hope that sort of helps

#spanish #asks #langblr #learning spanish #spanish grammar #learn spanish

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crippleprophet · 1 year

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Hey Mac! Do you have any crip books or resource recs for crip sex/sexuality?

Feel free to delete if you're uncomfortable answering :]

do i ever! i actually did an essay for my master’s in disability studies on the topic of disabled people’s access to sex so a lot of these are sources from that (feel free to dm me for my paper!) & others are things i’ve collected for leisure (hah)

i’m bolding my favorites and italicizing ones i haven’t read but have been recommended / have on my list; as with everything, having read a piece + recommending it is not an uncritical endorsement, & i have various contentions with all of these pieces ranging from minor nitpicking to outright disagreement.

feel free to send an ask or dm if you want my thoughts on a particular work or need help obtaining a pdf!

books

Sex and Disability ed. Robert McRuer & Anna Mollow

The Sexual Politics of Disability: Untold Desires by Tom Shakespeare, Kath Gillespie-Sells and Dominic Davies

Unbreaking Our Hearts: Cultures of Un/Desirability and the Transformative Potential of Queercrip Porn by Loree Erickson. York University, dissertation submitted 2015.

McRuer, R. 2006. Crip theory: Cultural signs of queerness and disability. New York: New York University Press.

Kinked and Crippled: Disabled BDSM Practitioners’ Experiences and Embodiments of Pain. Emma Sheppard. Edge Hill University, dissertation submitted 2017.

Love, Sex, and Disability: The Pleasures of Care by Sarah Smith Rainey

intellectually disabled people / people with learning difficulties’ right to sex

Hamilton, C. A. 2009. ‘Now I’d like to sleep with Rachael’ – researching sexuality support in a service agency group home. Disability & Society. 24(3), pp.303-315.

Hollomotz, A. 2008. ‘May we please have sex tonight?’ – people with learning difficulties pursuing privacy in residential group settings. British Journal of Learning Disabilities. 37, pp.91–97.

Vehmas, S. 2019. Persons with profound intellectual disability and their right to sex. Disability & Society. 34(4), pp.519-539.

Significance of the attitudes of police and care staff toward sex and people who have a learning disability by A. Bailey & D. Sines. Journal of Learning Disabilities for Nursing Health and Social Care (1998), 2(3), pp.168-174.

sexual facilitation & making sex accessible

Bahner, J. 2016. Risky business? Organizing sexual facilitation in Swedish personal assistance services. Scandinavian Journal of Disability Research. 18(2), pp.164-175.

Linda R. Mona (2003) Sexual Options for People with Disabilities, Women & Therapy, 26:3-4, pp.211-221.

No Pity Fucks Please: A critique of Scarlet Road’s campaign to improve disabled people’s access to paid sex services by Tova Rozengarten and Heather Brook. Outskirts vol. 34, 2016, pp.1-21.

Julia Bahner (2013) The power of discretion and the discretion of power: personal assistants and sexual facilitation in disability services, Vulnerable Groups & Inclusion, 4:1, 20673.

BDSM, paraphilias, & alternative sex

Goldberg, C. E. 2018. Fucking with Notions of Disability (In)Justice: Exploring BDSM, Sexuality, Consent, and Canadian Law

Hollomotz, A. 2013. Exploiting the Fifty Shades of Grey craze for the disability and sexual rights agenda. Disability & Society. 28(3), pp.418-422.

Reynolds, D. 2007. Disability and BDSM: Bob Flanagan and the case for sexual rights. Sexuality Research & Social Policy. 4(1), pp.40-52.

Tellier, S. 2017. Advancing the discourse: Disability and BDSM. Sex & Disability. 35, pp.485-493.

Sheppard, E. 2018. Using pain, living with pain. Feminist Review. 120, pp.54-69.

Tyburczy, J. 2014. Leather anatomy: Cripping homonormativity at International Mr. Leather. Journal of Literary & Cultural Disability Studies. 8(3), pp.275-293.

Sheppard, E 2019, 'Chronic Pain as Fluid, BDSM as Control' Disability Studies Quarterly, vol. 39, no. 2.

other articles

Finger, A. 1992. Forbidden Fruit

Fritsch, K., Heynen, R., Ross, A. N., and van der Meulen, E. 2016. Disability and sex work: developing affinities through decriminalization. Disability & Society. 31(1), pp.84-99.

McKenzie, J. 2012. Disabled people in rural South Africa talk about sexuality. Culture Health & Sexuality. pp.1-15.

Shakespeare, T. 2000. Disabled sexuality: Toward rights and recognition. Sexuality and Disability. 18(3), pp.159-166.

Shildrick, M. 2007. Contested pleasures: The sociopolitical economy of disability and sexuality. Sexuality Research & Social Policy. 4(1), pp.53-66.

Wentzell, E. 2006. Bad bedfellows: Disability sex rights and Viagra. Bulletin of Science, Technology & Society. 26(5), pp.370-377.

“‘Like, pissing yourself is not a particularly attractive quality, let’s be honest’: Learning to contain through youth, adulthood, disability and sexuality” by Kirsty Liddiard and Jenny Slater. Sexualities 2018, Vol. 21(3), pp.319–333.

non-academic texts

Andrew Gurza’s blog - andrewgurza dot com / blog

Disability After Dark podcast

A Quick & Easy Guide to Sex & Disability by A. Andrews

Cripping Up Sex with Eva

my cripsex tag, which i’ll add to this post, has other relevant content, & i welcome any additions from folks! all the best to you 💓

#asks #reading lists #cripsex

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the-daily-slasher · 1 year

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The Butcher's Daughter [pt.1]

This is a multi-part slow burn with Thomas Hewitt cause I needed something to write on my off day. There will be spice at some point, and of course: general trigger warnings. Don’t like 18+ scenes/horror/blood/ etc.? That’s ok, just don’t read this one, friend. It will be rather upsetting to you.

Time-Line and Continuity: Sticks mainly to the reboot duology: Texas Chainsaw (2003) and Texas Chainsaw: The Beginning (2006). This story takes place pre-1969. The story will have elements of Texas Chainsaw: The Beginning (2006) and Texas Chainsaw (2003 Remake). The story takes place in the abandoned town seen in those movies, but is an hour drive outside of Harlow, Texas (as seen in Texas Chainsaw 3D) for purposes of plot.

Summary: After your mother's death, your father, driven down a bottle with grief, loses his butcher shop to creditors. Wanting to escape his debts, he chooses to move back to his hometown. Not wanting to lose your last family member and being hopeful of a new start, you go with him. It's a ghost town, but he appreciates the solitude and it allows for enough space to start a small cattle farm. He's happy his old drinking buddy Charlie Hewitt is still in town. His mother, Luda Mae is very happy to have 'neighbors' down the road and feels motherly towards the girl, hoping to take her under her wing. She also can't help but think of the potential for her boy to finally have the chance at a friend.

Note: Reader age is unspecified but reader is of age. I keep hair/skin/body descriptions vague [without sacrificing quality of writing] so everyone can see themselves in the story.

. . . . . . . . . . . . . .

"This place is really out there." You say. Your father is taking his turn driving the old pick-up out to his hometown.

"Use to be farmers out here. Lots of space, no one in your business that you don't want there. You'll like it." He says, hoping you weren't regretting joining him. Though you had lost your job when the family business went under, you didn't have to come with him. "Besides, after a couple weeks I should be able to get a farm hand or two. You could move to Harlow or go finish that degree you were working on."

You smile. "A farm hand out here?" You look out over the dry fields of what used to be sunflowers.

"Sure." You dad says, a playful grin on his face, "I'm sure there's an armadillo or two that could use a steady job." The two of you laugh a little to ignore the weighted reality -- your father needed your help to make this work and there was no way you would be able to avoid the creditors if you moved anywhere else. You told him many times this was your choice, that you wanted to help, but you knew you really had no other option. At least not at the moment.

Your father was not a good man and was not often plagued by guilt for his actions, but he cared for you. The two of you spend the rest of the ride talking about the old house your father had inherited from his parents when they passed away. It's a classic farmhouse layout, a full upstairs you'll get all to yourself. A wraparound porch would be the perfect place to sit outside and watch the sunset. You knew he was painting a picture that was too good to be true, but he seemed happy.

It's mid-afternoon by the time you're pulling into the dusty drive of the house. It's far from the road and the yard surrounding is green and overgrown. The fence around the house has fallen down in several places and remnants of a vegetable and herb garden have grown unchecked and un-weeded in the back of the house.

You help your dad take boxes into the house, taking your things upstairs and your father's things into the bedroom on the ground floor. The house was big but needed cleaning. Everything was covered in a thin layer of sand-like dust and it was obvious no one had been in the house for years.

In the process of getting everything out of the truck, you notice the garden in the back had several, late-season vegetables. Once the boxes are all inside, you go about picking what you can while your dad works on the house's generator. It'd be nice to have something other than bologna sandwiches for dinner.

You found some old baskets in the kitchen pantry, you've already been able to fill two baskets with mustard greens and sweet potatoes and small green pumpkins by the time the sun starts to go down. As you pick up the last basket you watch the lights of the house flicker on and an excited shout from your father as you hear a generator come to life. A smile plays on your features. Perhaps this would be alright.

You go inside the house, setting the basket on the counter next to three others. You start washing the dirt off your hands in the old sink when you hear a car pull into the driveway. A door opens and you hear a gruff voice call your dad's name. "Charlie! You old son of a bitch- you're still here?" You hear your father reply to the man and you peek outside the front room window. An older man with deep features gets out of a beat-up pickup and your dad walks towards him.

"Who the fuck you callin' old, you old cocksucker?" The old man laughs heartily and your father embraces "Charlie".

The two men talk for a few minutes. Your father comes back in, the old man "Charlie" getting back in his truck and leaving.

"Hey, you feel like going out for dinner?" He asks.

"Out?" You ask, confused. You're getting dirt off a basket of sweet potatoes when he comes in.

"That was an old friend of mine, Charlie Hewitt. He and his folks still live around here. Their house is a half mile down the road and his mama is doing a roast tonight." He goes to the sink to wash his hands, dark oil staining the fresh bar of soap by the sink.

You hesitate, but smile, "Sure, dad. Sounds great."

Your old man splashes water on his face and runs his hands through his hair before drying his hands. "Go clean up and we'll head over on that way. Gonna change m'self."

"Like Sunday dinner kind of clean up or just 'no dirt on my hands' clean up?" You set the basket aside and dust your hands off on your jeans.

"Nothin' fancy. His mama's just old fashion- likes dinner to be a little more proper. 'Specially if it's guests." He starts to walk away. "Let's leave in a few, alright?"

You wash your hands, fix your hair, and find an old, corn-yellow dress. It's modest, the hem going down to your shins and the collar buttoning up to the base of your neck. Linen and tailored at the waist, it ruffles in the light breeze as you stand on the porch of the Hewitt household in dusty, white canvas shoes. The air has cooled but you still feel heat coming off the wood of the porch when Luda Mae answers the door.

"Bill! It's good to see you, hun." Luda Mae smiles and opens the door wide and her eyes go to you. "My god she looks just like Beth." You're surprised to hear your mother's name out of the mouth of a stranger but smile politely. Luda Mae smiles, "Luda Mae Hewitt, sweetheart. You must be y/n. I knew both of your parents long before you were born. It's nice to meet you." She welcomes you into the house with a hug. "Come on in Bill. Charlie's having a beer on the back porch with Monty, why don't you join them? I need a little time to finish getting supper ready." She looks at you, "Would you mind? I need a little help getting the table set." She smiles kindly as she leads the two further into the house. It's modest, a little dirty, but everything around this town seemed to be a little grimy.

Your father nods and follows her, making sure you were trailing behind. "The house looks great, Luda. Your boy still helping you around the house?"

"Tommy mostly works at the slaughterhouse nowadays but he still does the heavy lifting around the house and the store when I need him to." She lets him out onto the back porch where he's greeted with friendly, though swear-filled jeers from Charlie and Monty.

"Um how-how can I help?" You ask.

"There're some blue and white plates up on the top shelf of that cabinet. Get them down and set the table for six, dear."

"Yes, ma'am." Luda Mae smiles at your manners. You do as she asks as she gets a roast out of the stove. You carry plates to the dining room and set them out. You hear the side door open and heavy footsteps in the kitchen when you walk back in.

"Excuse me, Miss Luda Mae? I set the plates out. Where do you keep the silverware?" You look up to see a very tall man in a leather, half-mask and slaughterhouse apron. He's splattered with blood and his hair is matted. You shrink back a little when he turns his head and see you. His eyes were intense.

"Y/n this is Thomas. Tommy, this is Y/n, Bill and Beth's daughter. Y/n and Bill moved in down the road. They're staying for dinner so go get cleaned up." She tells her son.

"Nice to meet you." You smile politely and he stiffens slightly before nodding to you and heading up the stairs quickly.

"Don't mind him, dear. Terribly shy." She laughs a little bit and hands Y/n silverware and napkins.

You get the table set and Luda Mae brings in the roast, mashed potatoes, rolls, and a few other things. You help with the last few preparations and Luda Mae calls the men into the dining room. Monty, Charlie, and your father were all different levels of drunk but Luda Mae scares them into acting pretty sober. Thomas comes down in clean clothes and his hair brushed and sits at the table. Luda Mae makes sure he sits next to you. He doesn't say anything the during dinner but Luda Mae is charming and talks to Y/n.

Your father, Charlie, and Monty ignore you for the most part, happy to jeer at each other, cuss, and make off-color jokes just tame enough not to get hit with Luda Mae’s wooden spoon. That’s not to say the two friends of your father don’t recognize your existence. Both men’s eyes wander every part of you, lingering for a little too long. But that’s as far as they go. Bill was a son of a bitch, that’s why they liked him, but he cared fiercely for you. Charlie and Monty knew a single stray comment towards you was a guaranteed ass beating.

“You work at the slaughterhouse?” You ask Thomas, not really expecting an answer. You were alright with a one-sided conversation, but you needed something to tune out the drunk laughter on the other end of the table. “That must be interesting. I’ve never been in a slaughterhouse. Dad and I used to do something similar, though it was just a small butcher’s shop we ran.” You smile charmingly, doing your best to be the kind guest. “Working in a slaughterhouse sounds more interesting, honestly. ‘Specially since you wouldn’t have to deal with some of the customers dad and I would have regularly.”

Thomas tilts his head towards you to listen better as you talk. He offers a confirming “huff” when asked if he works at the slaughterhouse. His eyes stay on you. You were small compared to him, and utterly adorable. You really were interested in his work? More than that, you’d worked in a butcher’s shop? You weren’t a weak build, you had some muscle on you from the work you did. But still, he couldn’t imagine the girl in front of him enjoying what he enjoyed.

Everyone finishes dinner and Luda Mae asks you to help clear the table so you do. All the windows in the bottom floor of the house were open to let the cool, evening breeze through. Your dress ruffles when a stronger breeze blows through and Thomas catches a whiff of your light perfume. He watches as you help his mother, not realizing he was staring until his Uncle Monty points it out, laughing drunkenly.

“Well shit, Bill. Better keep track of your daughter.” He laughs.

“ ‘Fuck you talking about?” Your dad laughs a bit, finishing another beer.

“Ol’ Tommy here can’t keep his damn eyes off her. Got a crush there big boy?” He slurs out and is met with raucous laughter from Charlie.

Bill takes a second and looks Thomas up and down. “Good luck.” He says, “She’d kick your ass.” He says through building laughter.

Luda Mae comes back in the dining room with a cake and you trail behind her with plates. You see the three men laughing and Thomas sitting silently. Charlie and Monty make a couple more cutting remarks towards Thomas and you realize they’re all laughing at his expense. You see your dad open his mouth to join in the jeering.

��Dad.” You say, voice low but firm. It catches his attention immediately and he looks at you. “Don’t.” Thomas looks at you again. Having anyone besides his mother be on his side… it was unusual, but it was nice.

“Sorry kiddo. We ‘ere just havin’ a bit of fun.” He slurs a bit, but he does looks genuinely sorry. Charlie and Monty start to jab at your father when Luda Mae puts them in their place.

Everyone enjoys dessert and you help Luda Mae and Thomas clean up the dishes.

“Dinner was great, Luda Mae.” You say, putting away the last of the dishes. “Thank you so much.”

“Anytime, dear. It was nice to have company over. I enjoyed myself.” She sets the dish towel down that was in her hand. “Do you need help getting Bill back home?”

“I can just drive him home, it’s not a big deal.” It’s then you realize that during the course of doing the dishes, the dining room had gone quiet. You peek back in and see all three men slumped at the table, passed out.

Luda Mae chuckles. “Maybe so but you might want some help loadin’ him up in the truck and dragging him into the house.” She looks at Thomas. “Tommy, get Charlie and Monty upstairs then help Y/n get Bill home.”

Thomas nods and goes and picks up Charlie and his uncle, one under each arm and hauls them upstairs. A few minutes later he’s putting your father in the back seat of the truck and sitting in the passenger side as you drive down the road towards your new home. You can feel his eyes on you, even in the dark of the cabin.

“…I’m sorry if my dad said anything awful.” You say finally to break the silence. “He’s not always like that.”

Thomas huffs quietly in acknowledgement.

“And thank you for helping me get him back to the house. It’d’ve been quite a sight if I’d tried to drag him into the truck myself.” You laugh a little bit at the thought, trying to make light of it all. Thomas feels the smallest twinge of a smile on his face when seeing you laugh.

Once at the house he carries your dad over his shoulder and into his bedroom setting him on the bed. He walks back out into the foyer where you stand, “Here, I’ll give you a ride back home.”

This surprises Thomas a bit but he nods. You really were one of the kindest people he’d met. He walks out to the truck with you but gets to the driver side first. He reaches and opens the door and waits, watching you. After a moment you realize what he’s doing.

“Ah. Thank you, Thomas.” You smile and get into the truck and he closes the door behind you before getting into the truck himself. Your smile causes his heart to tighten. Every smile he could get, he wanted.

You drive him back to his home, making a little more pleasant small talk, and Thomas listened contently. He liked your voice.

Once back, he waits for you to put the truck in park and gets out.

“Goodnight, Thomas.” You give a small wave and drive away. He watches you drive away, raising his hand in a small wave, a barely audible grumble coming from his throat.

“…y/…..n….”

#slashers #slasher x reader #thomas hewitt #slasher imagines #thomas hewitt x reader #slasher community #slow burn #texas chainsaw massacre

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queerly-autistic · 3 months

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My dad just messaged me going "seeing all this 'Save OFMD' stuff made me realise some things never change" and attached a load of pictures he'd dug up from fifteen years ago of me in my 'Save Ianto Jones' fan campaign era.

As much as it made me laugh, it also made me think about something that I've not talked about before: the fact that this is what introduced me to campaigning.

I was a very lost queer (undiagnosed autistic) kid, bullied and lonely and keenly aware that there were a lot of bad things happening in the world, but I had no idea how to begin to even try to change things, or even any awareness that there was anything I could do to change anything.

And then my favourite show killed off my favourite character, and I suddenly accidentally found myself swept up in the mobilisation (without even realising that that was what was happening) of the fan community around me. It's where I learned about the idea of campaigning as, y'know, a thing that I could do. It introduced me to the concept that I could actively try and do things to make a change I wanted to see in the world.

And now that's my actual literal real world adult job. This is what I do in my 9-to-5. Some of the skills I learned and developed at seventeen (and the lessons from the fuck-ups - oh boy there were many of those because I was seventeen) trying to get the BBC to un-dead my favourite bisexual welshman are skills that I now use every day to actually create change (such as writing persuasive emails to influence a specific target).

And I've also used them outside of the 9-5 in the smaller grassroots campaigns I've been involved with. For example, the skills I learned from a fan campaign when I was a teenager helped me play a small part in stopping the deportation of young autistic man, and potentially saved his life.

There's a HUGE amount of crossover/symbiosis between fan campaigns and 'real world' campaigning. A huge number of people involved in these fan campaigns are already involved in organising (or at the very least supporting/donating) for 'real world' issues. And, if they're not, then a fan campaign may well be their introduction to campaigning - a 'wow ok so I can actually do this' moment that inspires them to start pushing for change on other issues too.

It's fantastic if someone goes 'hey, I managed to call Netflix about picking up Our Flag Means Death, which has made me realise maybe I can also cope with picking up the phone to call my political representatives about [insert other issue here]' - and if the strategies they put in place to help them do the Netflix phone call also help them do the political phone calls as well, then that's absolutely brilliant.

The same with getting experience/confidence writing emails, or learning how to create and push a hashtag on social media, or realising the power of taking mass actions (like signing a petition). It even goes so far as inspiring people to follow up a fan campaign donation with an additional donation to a good cause, and helping direct them to some good charities/initiatives to donate to (because sometimes knowing which are the right ones to send your money too is very hard). These are all skills and experiences that can help build both confidence and understanding of how to get involved with campaigning for change, and these are absolutely transferrable to an infinite number of causes.

It's about people feeling empowered to take action: feeling like they can do it, that it's tangible to them as something they can do, and giving them the tools to do it. The endgame in real world advocacy and campaigning is getting stuff done: petitions signed, phone calls made, emails sent, donations collected, rallies attended.

And no one (outside of the internet moral purity police) cares if your journey getting there started with a fan campaign.

#erin waffles #save ofmd #save our flag means death #renew ofmd #renew our flag means death #adopt our crew #ianto jones #torchwood #save ianto jones #advocacy #campaigning #look at me in these pictures i'm a fetus

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golvio · 6 months

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So I've got...some complicated feelings about this. Some of them more analytical, some of them more personal. I get pretty long-winded when I think out loud about this guy, so I'm putting my thoughts behind a cut.

On the one hand, I definitely noticed that TotK's Ganondorf was more preoccupied with his appearance, not necessarily in a stereotypical "vain villain who never shuts up about how beautiful they are" or a "gym bro who spends more time checking himself out in the mirror than actually working out" sense, but in a "he's very conscious about the image he projects and wants to maintain careful control of how other people see him at all times" way. I'm glad I've got confirmation that I wasn't just seeing things. Also, that TotK discusses how he uses attractiveness to manipulate people, as implied with how he portrayed "Princess Zelda," had some really interesting implications about his life as the Gerudo king and his personality and skills in reading people that Nintendo never followed up on, because god forbid we give this character any recognizable traits that could inspire curiosity about who he is as a person or discussions about gender roles in ways that aren't "He pretends to be a cute little white girl because he's an Evil Degenerate."

On the other hand...it kind of contributes to the way I've been weirded out by how the game itself treated him and how certain fans treat him. The game itself made a lot of effort to dehumanize and un-person this man as a character even while making his human form visually appealing. The fans themselves are celebrating this a validation of their seeing him as a sex symbol, calling him "a bi icon" because both men and women are attracted to him, etc.

Like...there's all this discussion about Ganon's appearance and how sexy people find him, but not much consideration of what *he* might want, or how he feels, or what he's attracted to. I know that's kind of a goofy question to ask about a fictional character who can't really have opinions on things beyond what the writers give him, but...it's just kind of...objectifying?

For example, I don't take any issue with headcanons that Ganon might be bisexual, or at least enjoys the attention he gets from people of any gender, since I've got my own headcanons about him being queer, but I do get weirded out by the assumption that just because both men and women find him attractive that means he *must* reciprocate their desires and be bisexual. It's the same thing that weirds me out about fan art pre-release that portrayed him as this airheaded himbo jock because fans wanted to ogle his sexy body without having to deal with his intelligence, his anger, his negative qualities, or his potential dangerousness.

There's this tendency to objectify him in both the game, whether as a "monster" to slay to prove the player/Link's mettle as a hero, or as a trophy to symbolize Rauru's dominon over the frontier territories of his kingdom. And then there's a tendency to objectify him in fandom, presenting him as a pinup devoid of his original personality, or trying to shape him into a "good Ganondorf" that the fans would actually like to be friends with by sanding off all his sharp edges so they can access his body, which they find beautiful, without having to deal with the parts that might complicate that or that they'd dislike.

Fandom as a whole seems to have a blind spot when it comes to the objectification of masculine characters, particularly because it's like, "Oh, BOYS can't be objectified! Only pretty (white) ladies can get objectified!" Nevermind that objectification is a phenomenon that's super commonly done to nonwhite men in tandem with the more overt and violent dehumanization that comes with racism, especially men with darker skin. And there doesn't seem to be much of an interest in exploring what that might mean for Ganondorf as a character, whether just as discussing double-consciousnesses and exploiting expectations to manipulate people, or to explore how being treated like a piece of meat or a pretty ornament who exists only for other people's pleasure can really warp a person.

I guess...this is something I've been thinking about since playing Slay the Princess, which asks a lot of questions about objectification, how people's complexity can be dismissed and ignored when they're shoved into the Love Interest archetype, and how being limited in this way in the eyes of others can seriously hurt and warp someone even if it's being done in the "nicest," most paternalistic and "benevolent" way possible. It presents the core relationship as being a fundamentally unequal power balance; no matter how fearsome and terrifying the imprisoned party becomes, she is always at your mercy, she lives and dies based on the choices you make, and the "nicer" routes are potentially just her saying what she knows you want to hear and auditioning for your sympathy because like it or not you're her warden. It also forces you to ask yourself what makes you come to love somebody, and to consider the possibility of loving somebody while also acknowledging their thorny, messy, contradictory, and dangerous parts. I wish I could see more works considering this for Ganon, as opposed to regurgitating tired old "Destroy This Mad Brute" tropes or turning him into a "safe," palatable, easy-to-digest love interest.

#loz thoughts #ganondorf #racism mention tw

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prettyboysdontlookatexplosions · 1 month

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medialog february 2k24

is it almost april. yes. am i letting that stop me. no. the perfect is the enemy of the good!

watched

she must be seeing things - a 1987 indie about a woman who gets obsessively jealous about her girlfriend's past after discovering her collection of photographs of ex-boyfriends; this movie contained one of the most human-feeling love scenes taking place between two characters in an established relationship i have ever seen, and captured the feel of new york city apartments inhabited by the un-rich in a visceral way. it is also a funny movie about how annoying artists are. i am like sincerely curious as to whether jonathan larson, during the years before or while he was developing rent, caught a screening of this (it had its premiere at film forum, where i saw it), because a story of sexual jealousy between a very professional black lesbian lawyer and her irritating yet captivating white bisexual artist girlfriend... did feel a little familiar to me as a person who could still belt out every line of take me or leave me in my sleep, ngl!

poor things - we've discussed this but: Yes. Me. Absolutely. i wanted to live in the world of this movie forever, it could have been four hours long and i NEVER say that shit. one of those where sometimes i see critiques or queries i think are valid and i nod peacefully and think: ah, but it wasn't for that; it was for me, to have a treat. also one of those where people are saying some bonkers ass shit about it all over the place, as we have also discussed; i do genuinely believe that reading it as in any way interested in or convinced it is describing a story of female empowerment is deeply misguided, and that much of the pleasure of the movie comes from the fact that bella doesn't need to be empowered, because she has been lucky enough to be raised as an experiment rather than as a woman, which is a fun sexy provocation that is of course nonsensical if taken literally but incredibly fun for me (the person this movie was for) to sit with for two hours.

office space - i watched this in high school and HAAAATED it, was bored out of my mind, and then every time it came up in conversation, which it did a lot because this is how things were in high school in 2005, i would say i didn't get it and the person i was talking to would say, "you have to watch it twice." i don't think i've ever had an experience with a piece of media where the response to my response was so reliably uniform. anyway yeah this is funnier the second time. stephen root might be our greatest living actor idk

drive-away dolls - YEAHHHHHHHHHHHHH BIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIIITCHHHHHHHH

the heartbreak kid - elaine may's mikey and nicky is one of the most emotionally brutal films i've ever watched, but i think i found this harder to sit through. it's brilliant - i talked about it with a friend who'd seen it sometime earlier who said it was the first movie she could remember seeing that confronted men's fantasies so directly, which is apt - but absolutely excruciating. i never really understood what the film people were talking about when they talked about the use of cuts to build/release tension until the scene at a restaurant where a guy keeps winding himself up to break up with his wife on their honeymoon, and not doing it, and the camera just makes you stay with him until you are begging for relief.

sex, lies & videotape - rewatch with director's commentary. steven soderbergh is definitely on the list of famous people i delusionally believe i could be friends with if the circumstances of life had caused our paths to overlap.

zone of interest - another one that has really Brought Out The Takes, about which i'll just say: no one in this movie is turning a blind eye to what they're doing with the possible exception of the mother, who's happy to join in with some chattily murderous antisemitism but finds the material reality of it too distasteful to stay (in at least one potential reading of a plot point left interestingly ambiguous). personally i thought the film was (1) almost completely disinterested in the question of the banality of evil (2) quite good.

mission: impossible - i talked my friend into going through the series with me and we started off with a double-header; the colors in this movie are sooooooo good. tom cruise at this point has obviously had work done by xenu's finest specialists but revisiting this did remind me that he actually also genuinely always has looked quite young for his age - he's 34 in this but he looks like a baby.

mission: impossible - 2 - i literally can't believe there are people who don't like this movie. grow up

read

monster midway: an uninhibited look at the glittering world of the carny, william lindsay gresham - i guess i don't know what i expected from a nonfiction book about the carnival by the author of nightmare alley, the great american novel, but it definitely wasn't 300 pages about how the carnival is the most special and wonderful place on earth and the people who've given their lives to it are the noblest, boldest, most magical folks you can find. i particularly enjoyed the section on palmistry as cold-reading, which included a long quote from fake psychic about how really most people just need to be told some basic emotional truths and to believe in themselves, so if she can give them that, that's a dollar well spent, which is tbh hard to argue with.

listened

rosie tucker - tiny songs vol. 1 - rosie tucker came onto my radar through one of dave's mixes, which i'm still listening to - her song "all my exes live in vortexes," which opens "i hope no one had to piss in a bottle at work to get me the thing i ordered on the internet," caught my ear - and while i haven't delved further into her discography, i did love this 12-track, 10 minute album (not a typo!), which gives you the sense of someone spitballing an idea for a song just long enough to start it, then losing interest and moving on to the next one, but in a good way? idk it's fun and weird and only 10 minutes!

#media 2k24 #isabel 2k24

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midethefangirl · 9 months

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it’s been long since I made a pro Tony Stark post but seeing someone try to blame the events of Civil War going south on him had me heated. look, I will admit that some of Tony’s actions in the movie where not okay at all like wanting to kill Bucky for killing his mother while under HYDRA’s influence but maybe Steve stans and a lot of pro team cap folks should realize that Steve’s actions also played a huge role in the movie as well.

for one, maybe Steve should have realized that 119 countries banding together to make a document, you feel is threatening your rights, is a serious matter. 119 countries is almost two-thirds of the countries in the UN and the world, if a great part of the world thinks you are doing more harm than good, maybe as a superhero, you should try to reason with them.

two, Steve chose to do nothing when he thought his rights were threatened by the accords. I do think there were some human rights violations in the accords that should not have been avoided, however, Steve chose to do nothing. anyone who has done a bit of activism know how ineffective that strategy is.

three, Steve’s actions were proving to the UN even more reasons why they felt the accords were necessary. interfering with law enforcement when they were out for Bucky who was potentially dangerous was a bad idea. sure, Bucky was his best friend and I don’t blame Steve for wanting to save him. however, let us remember that Bucky had killed people while he was the Winter Soldier and the Romanian government didn’t have the perspective we have and they had every reason to see him as a huge threat.

four, infantilizing Wanda by calling her a kid because Tony decided to put her on house arrest. and yes, I agree that Tony not telling Wanda was a very bad idea but let us not forget that the Avengers were still under public scrutiny after a disaster of a mission in Lagos and the accords. Wanda could have been attacked by outsiders who could have gone the Zemo route because a family member was in Lagos and that would have caused her to try to defend herself which could get twisted by the media and turn more of the public against her and the avengers as a whole. mind you, the Avengers were facing enough mistrust from the public.

also, Steve, calling a huge comfortable compound with a swimming pool an internment is a bit tonedeaf to those whose ancestors have been to actual interments. as someone who had an Asian American on his team, I’d expect he know better.

five, accords or not, maybe the Russian government has the right to know about a man controlling dangerously brainwashed men within their country. sure, it latter turned out to be a false alarm but considering the fact that this was a security threat which many countries would take seriously, Steve for some reason never considered the fact that the Russian government should be alerted to something like that. if this didn’t scream arrogance, I don’t know what else did.

six, resisting arrest and trashing public property while on international borders in the bid of resisting arrest would piss off the very people who are already pissed at you and your American passport would not bail you out of that one. even international passports come with a warning about their holders committing a crime in other countries. the fact that Steve acknowledged that his team could get arrested for that made it even worse.

this one is actually addressed to the whole of team cap, not just Steve, but seven, you cannot commit a crime on international soil with full knowledge that it is a crime and then blame somebody else for why you ended up in jail. sure, the rift and Thaddeus Ross are sketchy in nature but Scott and Clint blaming Tony for why they ended up there was funny to me because they made the informed decision to commit a crime.

eight, which is a major part being that it was the climax of Civil War, hmmm, maybe keeping the secret of the death of the parents of your rich teammate whose money was funding the search of their killer from him is a very bad idea. idk, man, I would be angry too if it were me. sure, wanting to kill Bucky was wrong but if we didn’t fault the Mayonnaise twins, T’Challa, Peter Parker and later Shuri for going after their parents’ (perceived, in T’Challa’s case) killers, maybe we could give Tony too some grace because brainwashed or not, I would have gone after Bucky too.

nine, the apology letter was the shittiest letter ever and I don’t blame Tony for not wanting to speak to Steve during the events of Infinity War. like how can you even write that type of letter to someone you offended and expect the relationship to still be intact?

there was one part I almost forgot but that quote that emboldened Steve is also dumb the more I look at it. oh yeah, plant yourself in front of the 119 countries you didn’t even bother to address at all and tell them “no, you move” is the ultimate height of hubris. when you are already on thin ice with the public? and Steve thought this was a good idea? yikes 😬

#pro tony stark #tony stark defense squad #steve rogers critical #i’m still bitter about civil war #the more i look at it the more i hate it #and yeah i agree that the accords had their own problems too so i am not fully on board with them #but this post is less about the accords and more about steve’s response #the part that had me angry the most is the “plant yourself like a tree as say you move” quote #like my brother in christ #you didn’t even bother to address these countries in the first place #y’all didn’t even bother to have a word with the public and this is the route you want to take?!#now that im thinking about it #this is arrogance at its height #what was steve thinking when he decided to roll along with this quote?#if civil war was trying to get me to support team cap they failed woefully at that #one part was from having steve acting like this.#the fact that even chris evans was not on steve’s side should say something

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