#my dad is fortunately not cruel like most of my family

[thewulf]

Frozen || Aaron Hotchner

Summary: Request - Aaron has a new neighbor, a sweet young woman. There's something between them. She new in the city and he invites her when he has the team over for a bbq... Read Rest Here

A/N: Ahh, just love him! Enjoy :)

Pairing: Aaron Hotchner x Y/N

Word Count: 5.2k+

It was hot. Way too hot. You’d been out weeding the garden for far too long now. A sweaty mess with dirt coating far too many different parts of your body. Super cute look. You were on a mission to get the damn garden bed weeded out. You’d, very fortunately, inherited the house from your aging grandma who wanted to downsize. You’d visited throughout the years and fell in love with the home and the area. The best thing about having a small family is that nobody fought you for the home.

But boy, were you in over your head. It wasn’t a massive home you’d just never owned one before and things were a tad overwhelming. Everything suddenly becoming your responsibility when you were least expecting it. Not that you were complaining. You owned a paid off home. How much better could it get than that?

The only thing that seemed to rip you right from your focus of pulling weeds was the small voice of boy behind you wondering about you, “Daddy! Who’s that new lady?” Shit. You were in the middle of crawling around the damn garden bed. Cursing lightly, you stood and turned towards the sidewalk with a smile on your face while simultaneously attempting wipe the dirt off your face but only smudging it further.

When you turned your heart about sunk to the floor. Why you? Why of all people that had to walk on by was it him? You were looking into the eyes of perhaps one of the most handsome men you’d come across in all of your years. And you were covered in dirt? The universe was playing a cruel trick on you.

Looking down at yourself you cursed yourself again. Quickly you looked back to the boy responding to him, “Hello.” You waved to the small boy keeping your eyes off his extremely attractive father, “I just moved in here.”

His eyes lit up, “A new neighbor?” He looked up to what you assumed to be his dad with big bright eyes pulling on his pants, “What happened to Mrs. Fields?” He looked you over curiously.

An interested one, he took a few steps forward to converse with you. A fearless little guy, “Mrs. Fields is my grandma. She wanted to go live in a warmer place, so she let me have her home and she moved down south.”

He took another few steps, almost to you now. His father had a pleading look in his eyes as if to apologize for his chatty son, “Cool! Do you like dinosaur’s?” He asked you excitedly.

“I love dinosaurs.” You knelt down so you were chatting with him on his level, “They’re like the coolest animals.” You responding drawing both a soft smile out of his father and fist pump from the little one.

“I know right!” He stepped even closer now, “Which one is your favorite?”

“Jack.” His father put a gentle hand on his sons shoulder, “You can ask about dinosaur’s another time. She’s busy.”

You shook your head looking up to him from your crouched position, “It’s alright. Gives me an excuse to take a break.” You turned back to Jack giving him a sweet smile, “My favorite dinosaur has to be the Velociraptor.”

He nodded excitedly at you, “That’s a good pick, but not the best…. Wait, what’s your name?” He asked after realizing he hadn’t asked earlier.

“I’m Y/N. It’s nice to meet you Jack.” You held you hand out for the little boy to take or reject.

He happily took your hand in his, albeit being three times the size. With a cheeky grin coating his face he responded, “It’s nice to meet you Y/N. That’s my dad! Daddy”

You looked away from Jack at his dad smiling at him, dirty face, and all, “Hi dad.” You waved up to him.

You could’ve sworn a hint of a blush crossed his face, “Aaron.” He held out his hand for you to take. Offering help up from the squat you’d been stuck in for a little too long. You took it feeling all too comfortable doing so, “We live next door.” He pointed over to his house, “Let either of us know if you ever need anything. Jack here loves to help.” He patted his sons head. For some reason that didn’t surprise you, not a bit.

“Thank you.” Your raging anxiety of home ownership dwindling a bit as you got to know the seemingly handy man next door.

He nodded smiling down at you, “We mean it. Now, let’s go Jack. You have homework to finish before soccer tonight.”

He groaned, “Okay dad. Bye Y/N.” He hugged your leg quickly before waltzing off with a pep in his step.

“Bye Jack.” You laughed watching him run over to his home, sliding in through the back door they left open.

“He’s a cutie.” You turned back to the rather striking man who just happened to be your neighbor. You wondered who his wife was. What she looked like. He had to have one right?

He ran a hand through his hair letting out a soft sigh, “He’s a handful, that’s for sure.”

“Aren’t all young boys?” You grinned.

He nodded, “That might be the truth.” He let out a small laugh, “I’ll let you get back to it. Nice meeting you Y/N.” His smile made him even more handsome. Damn. Did you have a crush on the older neighbor or what?

You nodded, “Likewise, see you around Aaron.” He tried to slow his racing heart hearing his name off your lips. Oh, he was in trouble. He waved going to the front of the house before disappearing within it.

See him around you did, whenever he was home at least. You’d become fast friends with Jack often playing with his dinosaurs in your shared backyards. You couldn’t say no to the sweet face when he asked so kindly, not even if you tried. Aaron had told you plenty of times that it was okay to ignore him, but you couldn’t. Especially when Aaron was home, he’d always come outside and join the two of you when he had the time.

You’d gotten to know, and love, the far too kind man over the last few months. You’d learned of his devastating past. You’d felt awful for him and just as equally broken for Jack. He’d lost his mom before he even got to know her and cherish her.

He’d gotten to know you too. Falling just as much for you as you did him. You were something nobody, but he and Jack knew about. A simple pleasure to come home to. He’d learned how you were a nurse, but you were back in school going for a Nurse Practitioner position. Aaron admired your drive for what you did. He really just admired you. The far too cute for your own good neighbor he’d never admitted he had a crush on. 

You asked about work. He didn’t tell you much. But as the months progressed his lips became like putty around you. Anything you asked he answered. It felt to right to fight whatever this was. You were too young for him. Too you, he had to keep telling himself.

You’d learned about the team. How Derek was a player but a lover deep down. How Reid was the boy genius of the group. How JJ turned out to excel as a profiler. You’d learned about them all. It felt like you knew them. It felt odd to think you knew people who didn’t have a clue about you.

So, one summer evening a devious plan sparked in your mind as you were sitting in the sandbox across from Aaron. You smiled up at him giving him a look. A look he picked up on, “What?” He asked making sure not to draw Jack’s attention away from the castle he was building.

You shook your head, “Nothing, just thinking.”

“About?” He pressed leaning forward with his elbows on his knees looking right at you.

“We should have a cookout. A barbeque. When you guys are here for a weekend.” You said as nonchalantly as possible feeling the nerves bubble up when you spoke.

He raised an eyebrow processing it. He’d kept you as his own for so long. Would it ruin things if he mixed his personal life with his work life like it had so often before? He knew deep down that’s why he was hiding you away. Every time these paths crossed bad, bad things happened. He couldn’t be the reason why somebody else got hurt. He wouldn’t.

“If you want.” You added making sure there was no pressure. You understood his apprehension to letting you all the way in.

“Sure.” The words were out of his mouth before he really thought about it too much longer. The grin that crossed your face was all worth it though. He’d really do anything to see that smile.

“Really?”

He nodded, “Next weekend? If we don’t get called in? I can ask the team Monday.” He didn’t want to blow their phones up on a weekend off. Rare as they were. He knew the chances were slim that it’d happen that weekend, but he wanted to show you he was committed to it.  

You nodded gleefully, “That sounds great. I’ll iron out the details this weekend.” You were a little nervous at the thought. But you knew they had to be great if he talked so highly of them.

He was wrong. They had an easy case that week that brought them home early on a Friday. They all said their goodbyes planning to meet at his place around 6:00 that night for the cookout. You’d gotten the final confirmation and started preparing everything the second he gave you the green light. It didn’t have to be perfect but you sure as hell wanted it to go smoothly.

There was nothing to stress about, just as Aaron had reassured you numerous times that evening leading up to everybody arriving. He could see the anxiety radiating off you

“Would you stop staring?” You asked pacing back and forth trying to think of any last-minute details.

He shook his head, “Not until you relax.”

You let out a huff. It was sweet but not the right time, “I just want it to go well, that’s all. I’ll relax once everybody is here.”

He was right, naturally. There was nothing to be stressed about. Each one more lovely than the next. Jack had gravitated towards you most of the night, even holding your hand and hiding behind you when Rossi was playing with him. Derek noticed Hotch watching you throughout the night. Smiling more than he’d ever seen the man before in his life. Derek clocked it quickly. Hotch probably didn’t even realize what he was doing. A man who was about to deny his feelings.

Derek had cornered his boss in the kitchen of his home not having a clue you were sitting in the room over responding to a few texts you ignored while getting the party ready.

“Hotch, what the hell?” You heard Derek’s booming voice from where you were sitting. You peaked up from your phone way too curious to hear the conversation that was so easily heard from the kitchen.

“What?” He sounded a bit taken aback by the confrontation, if only you could see their faces.

Derek laughed, “You know what.”

A brief pause, “I’m afraid I don’t Morgan.” He sounded a little agitated now. Nothing like he did when he was with you. It was interesting to watch him, listen to him, in such a different environment than the two of you had found so often.

You didn’t know Derek, but you had to assume he was rolling his eyes at that moment, “You like her. Your neighbor. Y/N.” This, you were not expecting.

“What are you talking about?” He answered. Ouch. Your heart was still racing though. What in the hell was he going to say next?

“Don’t play dumb. You’ve been smiling like a love drunk fool for the last two hours. You’ve been watching her like a hawk.” Profilers were scary. You hadn’t even noticed. Far too preoccupied with socializing and making sure everything was going okay.

He sighed, “She’s too young Derek.” You frowned. That was just untrue. You were in your late twenties. What’s twelve or so years?

“She’s not too young. Stop that. You’re talking yourself out of it.” Derek replied to his friend.

What came next hurt, hurt deeply, “She’s not my type though. She’s too young and not my type. It would never happen.” The sting that came from your heart radiated with each pulse.

Derek let out a howl, “That’s rich Hotchner. Whatever you want to tell yourself boss man.”

You didn’t let yourself hear the rest of the conversation. You shot right out of his house making a beeline towards the ladies with a fake ass smile adorning it. You’d successfully avoided him the rest of the night not able to bear the thought of looking at him. Who were you kidding? He was just being kind to you because you were kind to his son. Nothing more. Nothing less. No hard feelings. But you had the feelings. Real feelings that weren’t going to go away unless he went away. Operation avoid Aaron Hotchner was a go.

You’d been successful the better part of a month. Lucky for you he had been pretty wrapped up in cases leaving you and Jack more time to connect while Jess watched him. When Aaron was there you’d strategically leave when he showed up bidding a goodnight with some lame ass excuse. Jack would wine and Aaron would give you a pained nod in response. You never gave them much time to question you before you dashed home.

Aaron wasn’t dumb. This was his job for God’s sake. He knew it had something to do with him, but he couldn’t pinpoint what he could’ve done, and it was slowly driving him mad. Jack was getting frustrated too. You’d be fine until dad came around. He needed to figure it out. He missed you. He missed laughing and smiling with you.

He’d thought about it for days while he was off on a case. He thought about it as the team landed at the airport late on a Saturday night merging into Sunday morning. You on the other hand were having the time of your life out with your friends drinking far too much. Tipsiness, soon to be drunkenness, consumed your body throughout the night. You pouted when your friends pulled you into the backseat of one of their boyfriends SUV’s, making sure to drop all the girls off safe and sound.

You’d waved them off before you had the chance to actually enter the house. You fumbled with your keys before finding the right one. A shiver ripped down your spine, it was chilly. Odd for a summer evening you thought to yourself.

You turned the key in the lock only to rip the key right in half as you turned it. One half in your hand and the other stuck in the lock, “Fuck.” You began to panic. Your spare key was with a friend so you couldn’t even get in through the back. You tried to pick the key out of the lock only to be met with resistance. You were far too drunk to be dealing with this right now. The lock kept going in and out of focus.

You looked down at your phone, no. No, there was no way in hell you were calling him. You were too young and not his type. You couldn’t be the burden. Think, you had to think. After standing there for far too long without a damn thought in your mind you sat down on the bench you had outside. No locksmith’s would be open at this hour. Your parents were out of state. You didn’t have any family around. You could try and call a friend, but they were all probably still too drunk and passed out by now.

You groaned laying back on the bench thankful you’d at least turned the house light on before you left. Deciding that sleep would be better than lying awake dizzy all night you tried your best to get some sleep. Teeth chattering you curled up in a ball trying to preserve some warmth it felt like sleep would never come.

You must’ve fallen asleep at some point because when you were woken up very abruptly it was still dark. You let out a small yelp before thrashing out at whomever grabbed your wrist.

“It’s me.” That familiar voice calmed you down instantly. Your thrashing stopped but your head still spun. Yup, you were definitely still drunk. Damn tequila sodas were lethal to you. But you’d never stop.

“What?” You asked far too confused. Shivering even more than you were earlier. What time was it anyway?

He pulled you up in a swift motion shrugging his jacket off placing it around your shivering frame softly, “What are you doing?” He asked urgently feeling how cold you really were as he held onto your frozen wrists.

You mumbled something incoherent feeling the ill effects of the cold. You wrapped his warm jacket around you further trying to find any ounce of warmth you could in it. It smelled too damn good on top of it. It made your already dizzy head even fuzzier.

He placed a gentle hand on your cheek trying to get you to look at him, “Can you hear me?” His heart was racing. One moment he was pulling into the driveway. He always looked over at your house just to check, he always did when he pulled in late. His heart about dropped out of his body when he saw you laying there. He hadn’t thought much of it before running over to you. You were okay. You were fine. When you didn’t respond to his calls he had to resort to shaking you gently.

You mumbled some more clear “Yes’s”, but he still didn’t buy it. Not a bit. He looked you over quickly making sure you weren’t hurt before turning your body to his.

“That’s it.” He didn’t waste a second more before scooping you up into his arms with ease. You leaned your head into his chest shamelessly absorbing the warmth within you. It just felt too good to pass up. You’d let yourself be embarrassed later.

Once he got you inside he set you down on the couch. He wrapped you from head to toe in a few different blankets. You nuzzled in suddenly very thankful your neighbor had not only found you put kind of saved your ass. You were cold. Freezing. Who knows what you would’ve been like in the morning. Frozen most likely.

“I put a few blankets in the dryer for ten minutes. That should help warm you up.” Aaron squatted down so he was level with your horizontal body. With the utmost caution he brushed some hair out of your eyesight. Your body shivered at his touch sending a grimace to his face.

“Thank you.” You were more coherent but totally tipsy. The effects of the alcohol had finally started dying down, but it was still there.

His eyes snapped to yours. He must’ve been thinking the same thing. Not expecting you to be coherent just yet, “What the hell were you doing? Thinking? You could’ve been attacked out there. You could’ve frozen to death out there Y/N.” He sighed knowing he needed to reel it back. You were probably just as freaked out as he was.

You turned away. His stare suddenly too much for you to handle, “I’m sorry.” You closed your eyes willing the alcohol to just go away.

He ran a hand through his dark hair. He needed to try again, “What happened?” There, that was a start.

You started on how you went out with your friends and ending with the “My key snapped in the lock.” Holding up the broken stub still attached to your keyring.

Aaron frowned taking it from you, “Why didn’t you call.”

You shrugged, “Didn’t want to bother you.”

A groan escaped his lips, “You are never a bother. You have to know that. Please, just call me next time, okay?” Again, he wracked his brain for anything that he could’ve done. Why you’d pulled back so suddenly on him. It just didn’t make sense. What happened at the cookout? What did he do?

“Okay.” You didn’t feel like arguing. Not anymore. You were tired and cold but thankfully warming up. You knew that’d appease the man.

He sat down from the kneeling position, “Thank you.”

You didn’t respond only nodding a little. You finally felt warm. Wiggling your toes, you sighed in relief. He just watched you. Watched as your eyes drooped, clearly tired. Before he could respond the dryer went off. He shot to his feet the moment he heard it go off, “Wait here.”

You didn’t listen. You shrugged off the blankets. Why oh why were you still so drunk? You tried shrugging it off. Pushing off the couch you stood to your feet wobbling in the slightest. You hadn’t made it a few steps before you heard his voice again.

“What are you doing?” His scolding voice asked you. Your eyes shot up from the floor looking right at him. Blood rushed right to your cheeks. Busted. What else would’ve happened? You weren’t thinking right.

“Walking.” You smiled hesitantly feeling the room begin to spin around you.

He didn’t return the smile. His lips drawn in a harsh line. Mean Aaron Hotchner was terrifying. You wobbled slightly before stepping to the side.

“What were you thinking? You could’ve died out there! You were half frozen when I found you. Somebody could have found you before I did! Did you even think? You’ll be lucky if you don’t catch pneumonia let alone a nasty cold.” He dropped the warm blankets on the ground ready for the inevitable. He was pissed but he was trying to reel it in for your sake. You looked like a scared deer caught in some headlights.

You shook your head quickly, “I’m sorry.” You mumbled for a second time wiping your eyes quickly, not daring to cry in front of him right now. It was too much though, he was too much, “I can’t… I can’t do this.” You let out trying to walk around him. But between the tears, alcohol, achy muscles, and him you nearly tripped right onto your face had he not been standing right there. With quick reflexes Aaron caught you before you toppled completely. He pulled you up into his arms.

“What is going on Y/N?” His eyes searched yours as he steadied you back on your feet, desperate for some kind of answer. You stepped back away from his burning grip you liked far too much. Far, far too much for somebody who didn’t like you. Staying away from Aaron Hotchner was just not working. The operation was suddenly amiss.

Fuck it. Who cares if he knew? You’d blame the alcohol for this confession anyway, “I heard you.” You let out.

He shook his head, unsure of what you were referring to, “Where? What’d you hear?” He was afraid you’d heard some gruesome detail of his job he’d never be able to recover from. He wasn’t expecting you to say the next words that came out of your mouth though.

“At the barbeque. You and Derek in the kitchen.” You looked down and away. Anywhere but his eyes, you just couldn’t. Not after admitting that.

He thought for a moment and cursed. How could he have been so stupid? You watched as he registered your words. His mouth opened to say something before it closed, taking it back. Never letting that thought come to life.

You couldn’t take the silence, not knowing what he was thinking, “I’m sorry, let me call a friend. I’ll get out of here.”

He shook his head quickly, “No, please don’t.” He picked up a blanket before wrapping it around you at a distance, “Stay. Sit. Please?” He spoke in broken sentences as he watched you. Watched as you went through the different options in your head.

Of course, you would. You’d do anything for him, that much was clear. A sucker for Aaron Hotchner. You walked over to the kitchen table with him close in tow just in case you were to stumble again. He only relaxed when you were seated and steady. You place your hands on the table waiting for him to say something. You were at a loss for words, it was his turn to speak.

He looked around before his eyes landed on your glassy ones, “You weren’t supposed to hear that.” It sounded awful as it came out of his mouth, and he knew it. He knew it from the way your eyebrow arched up as if to question him.

You couldn’t help the light chuckle that escaped your lips, “Clearly.”

“No.” He groaned palming his hands across his face, “That’s not what I meant. I just wanted him to back off is all. It was the easiest thing to do to get him to do so.” Aaron pleaded both with his hands and his eyes right next to you at the table.

You rolled your eyes. You wanted to believe him. You really did. But were you too young? Were you not his type? I mean you were you. Not unattractive but not the most beautiful creature to walk across the stage either.

“Y/N, Jesus, I…” He sighed taking one of your hands by surprise. Your eyes finally found his again. He’d finally gotten your attention again, “I feel things for you that I shouldn’t. You aren’t too young for me but I’m far too old for you. You’re incredible. Kind. Sweet. One of the funniest people I’ve ever met. The way you treat Jack is unlike anything I’d ever dreamed of. As hard as it is for me to say, you should find somebody that isn’t as old as me.” He smiled giving your hand a squeeze before hesitantly dropping it.

You let out a breath you’d been holding in. Well, he’d laid it all out on the line for you. It made sense. But it didn’t. He didn’t even give a chance to voice your opinion. You didn’t care. It didn’t bother you. You in fact had never met anybody like him before. No man had ever asked you the question he’d asked you before. Gotten to know you so deeply, right down to your core. It wasn’t even really your fault you fell in love with the man as quickly as you did. He did everything you wanted, you needed.

You took his hand back, relishing in the feeling, “What if I don’t want to?”

“You should.” He tried once more.

But you weren’t having it, “Not.”

He shook his head letting his fingers lace with yours, “Y/N.”

“Aaron.” You widened your eyes giving his hand a squeeze this time, “Can I have a word now?”

He nodded, “Yeah, sorry.” That was the second time you’d seen a blush on his cheeks. He must’ve been feeling awfully vulnerable or maybe he was finally letting you in.

“You’re unlike any man I’ve ever met Aaron Hotchner. You’ve made me feel things I’ve never ever felt or dreamed of feeling before and you’ve only been my friend. You too are so kind, incredibly sweet, the most thoughtful guy and the best dad I’ve seen. You balance everything so beautifully. You’re a light and I love being around you if you’d want me to that is.” You felt as his thumb brushed up and down your index finger. A chill shot right up your arm and down your back when you realized what he was doing.

“I know I shouldn’t, but I like you. A lot more than I should.” He pulled your hand up so he could kiss the back of it. You watched as his lips brushed across the back of your hand so gently it only made you ache for something more. That was just cruel.

You grinned squeezing his hand tight, “I like you too. A whole lot. Who cares what you should or shouldn’t feel. That’s stupid. I like you. You like me. It’s that simple.” It was a combination of everything that had your eyes watering. It felt so damn good to spit it out at him. To let him know how you felt. To ramble everything out. You didn’t just like him. You loved the damn man.

He laughed shaking his head. You admired him as you watched the smile grow on his face, “Is it that simple?”

You shrugged, “I don’t see why it couldn’t be.”

He stood from the seat pulling you up with him. He pulled you close seeing as you were still as unsure of your own steps as ever, “How much have you had to drink tonight?” Damn profilers know everything, not that it wasn’t terribly obvious.

Might as well play it off, right? You leaned forward whispering in his ear, “You sound like a scary officer when you ask that.” You noticed the small shiver that rocked his body as you did so. A small, satisfied smile graced your lips as you drew back.

He shook his head running his eyes up and down your frame wrapped in a blanket, “Are you warm enough?”

You saluted him, “Yes, sir. And for the record I only had eight drinks tonight.”

He laughed, “Stop that. This is serious.” He put his hands on your shoulders to steady you out, “You have no idea how bad I want to kiss you right now.” He pulled back, as much as he didn’t want to.

You whined looking up to him, “Then do it.”

“No can-do pretty lady. You’re intoxicated.” He answered far too quickly for your liking.

“So? I can still make decisions.” You challenged his ability to use reason. So persistent you were being.

“Afraid not, let’s get you to sleep.” He let his hands fall from your shoulders.

You frowned, “Oh, come on Aaron.” Maybe pouting would work. But no, he was too much of a gentleman for your own good.

He shook his head quickly, “Let’s make a deal. How about, if in the morning you still want to kiss me, I’ll let you do just that?”

You sighed, “Fine. Come find me first thing though. Promise me that?” You started walking towards the couch before a light tug at your wrist stopped you.

He nodded in response to you, “I promise. There’s a guest room sweetheart. Let me tuck you in.” He pointed up the steps.

You nodded sheepishly feeling his eyes on you the entire way up. Before he could protest you pulled off your top off leaving you in a tank top and jean shorts, comfortable enough. He gulped as he watched the entire ordeal play out before him, thankful you weren’t just in a bra.

“Sleep tight.” He brushed the stray hairs out of your face once you slid under the covers, fighting every urge in him to lean down and kiss you goodnight. Not yet.

“Night Aaron.” You yawned letting the warmth of the bed consume you, “Can’t wait to kiss the crap out of you in the morning.”

He laughed, that full hearty Aaron Hotchner laugh that warmed your soul, “Goodnight sweetheart. I’ll find you first thing.” A smile adorned your face as you fell asleep to those words.

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[bekoobove]

Fazbear Fears #15: The Prisoners

 …Celeste, angered by her classmate’s good fortune, seizes the chance to take it from her- freeing a monster in the process…

 Celeste smiled with cruel excitement as she saw Evelyn try to nondescriptly sit down with her lunch tray. Most wouldn’t have paid any mind to the quiet, mousy teenager if she was the only thing in an empty room, let alone in the crowded cafeteria. It was different for Celeste, though- Evelyn was her latest verbal punching bag.

 She grabbed her boyfriend Franklin’s arm. “Come on, let’s remind her who’s in charge around here.”

 Franklin eagerly followed her as she began walking over. “Yeah, show her who’s boss!” He cheered.

 The rest of the students at the table (only the most popular in the school allowed) realizing her intent, eagerly watched. Other tables also took notice, if only from relief once they understood it wasn’t them that were the subject of Celeste’s mockery.

 Evelyn looked up nervously at Celeste, who slammed her palms on the table. “Well, well, well, if it isn’t Evelyn McIntyre.” Celeste chuckled cruelly. “How’s the family business going? Did the animatronics kill anyone this week?”

 Evelyn’s eyes watered. “Celeste…y-you know my dad closed the Pizza Parlor.”

 “Oh, I’m sure. Probably it’ll reopen in a week, after your dear old dad makes the robots even more deadly. Are you proud of him? Want to follow in his footsteps?”

 Franklin laughed, like he did at all of Celeste’s jokes. There were a few more giggles from the popular table, but other than that, the room had grown silent. No one wanted to interrupt Celeste.

 She was the most popular person in school by far- she was beautiful, and her family was rich (at least by the standards of small-town Breaker’s Ridge). Keeping that popularity meant making sure no one crossed her, and that meant occasionally she’d have to make a display of brutally tearing down some rejects. And at the moment, there were no bigger rejects than the McIntyre family.

 Celeste hadn’t bothered to learn much about the tragedies at Freddy’s Pizza Parlor, but she had heard some things. Apparently some out-of-towner had stayed in the restaurant overnight for some reason, but had basically been gutted by one of the animatronics. Then, at a birthday party, another robot maimed the guests with monster cupcakes. Celeste figured that that story had been embellished, but the fact remained that as of now, the Parlor was responsible for five deaths, one injury, and dozens of traumatized townsfolk.

 Celeste didn’t care about any of that- it didn’t affect her family or anyone in her circle of friends, after all. She also didn’t believe that Evelyn’s father did intentionally create murderous robots. But it made great ammo for attacking her.

 Evelyn stuttered. “No, no, I promise. We’re getting rid of the animatronics. They’re being hauled away by Fazbear Entertainment in a couple of days.”

 This was news to Celeste, and apparently most people in the cafeteria. Still, she tried to spin it. “Oh, yeah, the company your cheapskate dad ripped off. Are they sending a couple of lawsuits too?”

 After a moment of silence, Evelyn replied, seeming strangely a bit more confident. “No. They didn’t mind- especially after what we promised them.”

 Celeste chortled. “What could your loser family possibly have promised one of the biggest entertainment companies in the country?!”

 “The animatronics.” Evelyn said simply. “Apparently they’re really valuable, with lots of vintage parts and advanced technology. Fazbear Entertainment is willing to buy back the…properly functioning ones. The others will be scrapped.”

 This completely broke Celeste’s stride. “Oh…uh, so what are they paying for them? A couple of quarters? That’d be the most money that ever passed through your hands, I’m sure.”

 Evelyn grinned. “What part of valuable don’t you get? They’re being sold for $40,000. Each.”

 The cafeteria was quiet for another moment, then everyone eagerly began to pepper Evelyn with questions.

 “Wow!”

 “What are you going to do with the money?”

 “How many are working, again?”

 “Wait, where did your dad find them?”

 Everyone crowded around Evelyn. Celeste stared her down, growing angry. The spotlight was on Evelyn, which meant it was away from her. Not only that, but with that much money, the McIntyres could invest, and become rich. Celeste enjoyed being part of the most prosperous family in town- people had a tendency to fall in line. But if that loser loner and her family became just as rich, she’d lose that power permanently.

 Celeste stormed back to her table, trying not to let her rage and fear show on her face. Franklin scurried behind, encouraging her. “C’mon, honey-bunny! She’s a nobody. So what if her family makes some cash or whatever? You’re still in control!”

 Celeste, like usual, was amused by Franklin. He’d been nothing when they met, and she made it very clear to him that he’d be nothing again if she dumped him. So he constantly sucked up to her, following her around like an over energetic puppy.

 That didn’t dampen her anger, though. “Maybe, but I won’t be if her family gets rich! I just wish they didn't have those stupid robots…”

 Suddenly, Celeste perked up, fully registering what she’d just said. She pulled Franklin over to a quiet corner. “You said you watched some Youtube video about picking locks, right?”

 “Er- yeah, why?”

 The smile reformed on Celeste’s face, more sinister than ever. “Tonight, at midnight, we’ll break into the Pizza Parlor. We’ll smash those animatronics to pieces. And we’ll guarantee no one sees Evelyn as anything but a poor little nobody ever again.”

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

 Breaker’s Ridge hardly had a thriving night life. The town pretty much always shut down by ten at the latest. This made it pretty easy to break into a building, as long as you were quiet about it.

 Still, Celeste worried, glancing around anxiously. If some late night jogger saw her, it would ruin her reputation. You can only be perceived as so popular if you’ve been caught sneaking into a kiddie pizzeria.

 It wasn’t helping that Franklin apparently hadn’t learned very much from the videos. He clumsily pushed a hairpin around inside the lock, ears straining for the sound of the tumblers clicking. It was taking a while, and it was much noisier then Celeste would have liked.

 “Could you keep it down and finish this quickly?!” Celeste whisper-shouted, not caring her complaint was louder than any noise the lock made and was slowing Franklin down.

 “Just…give me…a second…got it!” Franklin grabbed the handle and the door swung open. “Not bad, huh?”

 “Not good, either.” Celeste muttered dryly as she walked inside.

 The building was in a state of disarray. The place had cleared out quickly after the most recent accident, leaving a mess. Rotting slices of pizza and cake sat on cold wooden tables, and the animatronics were frozen mid-dance, at the moment they’d been shut down.

 “Ugh, those things are creepy.” Franklin whimpered as he followed. Normally Celeste would have made fun of him for this, but she couldn’t help but agree.

 After everything that had happened, only three robots remained on the stage- a chubby brown bear with red cheeks, a light blue bunny holding a guitar, and a white and pink fox with a shiny hook.

 “Still can’t believe this place was allowed to operate.” Celeste pondered. “It’s so obvious it’s a ripoff of Freddy Fazbear’s!”

 “I think Mr McIntyre kind of had to.” Franklin suggested. “Apparently, he just found these animatronics in a junkyard and fixed them up. I heard a rumor they were in some location back in the eighties.”

 “Wonder why they were tossed- they look impressive and are apparently worth a lot.” Celeste cracked her knuckles and handed Franklin one of the two metal bats she’d brought. “Well, let’s change that, huh, sweety?”

 The pair quickly got to work smashing the robots to pieces. First, Franklin smashed the bear’s head in, exposing a metallic endoskeleton as hunks of its plastic shell crumbled off. Celeste ripped its blue eyes out of its sockets and threw them to the ground, stomping on them. They then worked together to push it off the stage, and it crashed to the ground. More dark cracks formed in its shell, its left arm twisted right off, and wires spilled out of the emptied sockets.

 The bunny didn’t get off much better. Each of them took turns hitting its torso like a mechanical pinata, causing servos and pistons to protrude out. Franklin grabbed its guitar and broke it on his knee, tossing it as one last sour note squeaked out of its mangled strings. After that, it too was sent tumbling down, its lifeless form splayed out on the checkered floor.

 Celeste wiped some sweat from her brow, but she hardly felt tired. “Ha, this’ll show Evelyn!”

 “Just that fox thing left.” Franklin pointed. The way the light beamed off the robot’s glass eyes, it was almost as though it was looking at them afraid.

 “Geez, thanks, Captain Obvious, Commander of the USS Duh.” Celeste snarled. “I’ll take care of this one.”

 Celeste pulled back into a batting position, aiming right for the stomach. She imagined that it was actually Evelyn’s smug, loser face, and…

 SWOOSH!

 CRACK!

 Plastic debris rained down from the point of impact, but that wasn’t the only thing. Lurching out of the new hole came an endoskeleton head with one eye on a long, skinny neck.

 Celeste screamed and backed away. “Why the actual heck is the head in this thing’s stomach?”

 Franklin, nervously, peered into the hole, taking care not to rub his face against the rough head. “Huh, that’s weird…it doesn’t look like the other endos in here. It just looks like a mess of parts.”

 This piqued Celeste’s curiosity. “Ok, I want to know what’s up with this freaky thing. Before we destroy the robot, let’s get this shell off of it so we can see what it looks like.”

 As delicately as possible, the pair pulled off the cracking shell to see what was inside. Eventually, the full endoskeleton was exposed. And it was monstrous.

 At the center of the skeleton, there was an ordinary robotic torso, but that was about the only thing that could be called ordinary. Four limbs sprouted off the bottom of its body- three legs ending in wide, rusty feet, and one armlike structure with a white hand. The other hand hung off of what should’ve been the neck. Instead, the heads- yes, heads, plural- had been fused to its right arm, the other arm terminating in a stub. One head was the one that had popped out the stomach- a bare metal skull with a mouth full of blocky teeth and wires trailing off it. The other was unique, in that it was the only part that had been exposed before the shell’s removal. It was already covered in plastic, which Celeste now noticed looked older and more stained than the rest of the thing’s body. It still looked like the same fox- sharp tufts of fur, large pink ears, rosy red lipstick and blush, and beady yellow eyes.

 “It’s like Evelyn’s dad just stuffed it in here.” Franklin commented. “Even if he found it like this, why not rebuild it to look normal?”

 “Meh, he was probably just lazy. If he was able to get it working, why bother what it looks like under the shell.”

 “So should we still smash it?”

 “No matter how mangled this thing is, it still has valuable parts. Smash it to pieces.” Celeste laughed. “After this, the McIntyres won’t have anything to sell…”

 Celeste paused.

 “Uh, something wrong?” Franklin asked as he readied his bat.

 “Those other two animatronics. The balloon kid and the chicken. What if he sold those?”

 “Evelyn said they’d be scrapped.”

 “That was probably a stupid lie to get kids at school off her back about those things.” Celeste scoffed. “Even if it wasn’t, with the others destroyed he might get desperate.

 “I want to finish this quickly.” she concluded. “So you destroy the fox while I find the other two and take care of them.”

 With that, Celeste swiftly walked out of the main dining area, through a door against the back wall marked with a sign reading EMPLOYEES ONLY.

 She quickly located the Parts and Service room. Trying the handle, she found it was locked.

 “Crap.” She muttered, looking around for a solution. She noticed, a little further down the hall, an office whose door was ajar. She guessed it belonged to Mr McIntyre, the manager.

 “Maybe he left his keys…” she hoped, glancing inside. Sure enough, a ring with a silvery key hanging off it laid on his desk, next to some notebooks labeled ANIMATRONIC MAINTENANCE LOGS.

 “Ooh.” Celeste whispered as she grabbed the key. “I’ve been wondering what’s up with those things.”

 She flipped through them quickly. Each notebook was dedicated to one of the five animatronics. She took special care searching the Chica and Balloon Boy ones, almost like she expected to see the words DESIGNED TO KILL smeared across the pages in blood.

 Ultimately it wasn’t that interesting- no hidden claws or mutant cupcake makers. Celeste was about to leave the office when she noticed one more log- Foxy’s. Her interest was piqued again- what had resulted in Mr McIntyre just sealing that freaky robot in its shell?

 Again, it began as normal- simple repairs and blueprints- before about halfway through the tone changed.

 LOG UPDATE 12- Something is wrong. Last night I put the Foxy endo back together- assembling it into what I assume is its original form. But when I came in this morning, the robot was in its mangled, mixed-up form again. It’s possible it wasn't fully powered off, but what in its programming would have caused it to tear itself apart and reassemble itself as a mechanical abomination?

 …I’ll try again tonight.

 A chill went down Celeste’s spine as she turned the page. The chill became worse when she read the next several entries where the same thing happened. Time and time again he’d fix it, but as soon as it was left unattended, something would return it to its monstrous state.

 Finally, a log came that actually indicated some progress.

 LOG UPDATE 18- Even in its twisted form, the animatronic is still capable of running showtime programs. Thus, I have come up with an imperfect but adequate solution.

 The plastic coverings for the robots all arrived yesterday. I have outfitted Foxy’s with electrical deterrents, designed to deliver a small controlled shock if excess movement within the shell is detected. I have stuffed the endo in the shell in as humanoid a form as possible, thus allowing it to function somewhat normally.

 I wish I could come up with something better, but the Parlor’s grand opening is in under a week and I need all animatronics up and running.

 I admit, I feel a little guilty. Whatever remnant of programming is running within the system will now be a prisoner in a form it dislikes. Then again, what am I worried about? Programs aren’t alive.

 …Right?

 Nervously Celeste put the log down. “Maybe he was just…imagining things.” she desperately reasoned. Still, she couldn’t help but feel a little more glad Franklin was currently pounding that thing into a pulp.

 Anyway, she’d gotten what she came for, so she left the office. Returning to Parts and Service, she tried the key. It worked, and the door swung open.

 “Alright!” she cheered, pulling out her bat again as she entered the dark room. “Which one of you dumb robots are first?”

 Celeste set her head on a swivel, searching the space for the animatronics. Nothing.

 From behind her, against the wall, something giggled. Celeste spun around to see a chubby animatronic child stepping towards her, trying to stab her with the sharp, broken end of a white stick.

 Celeste screamed and slammed it with her bat, sending its round fat head crashing against the wall. The laughter didn’t stop though, and neither did its body, jabbing the stick at her. Celeste dodged, the attack just grazing her arm.

 From the other side of the door, there came another chuckle- different, more girlish, but somehow much more sinister. It was the Chica animatronics- and it held a bizarre fleshy cupcake on its plastic palm.

 “Hey, girlfriend!” It chirped. “Care for a snack, because this little fella sure would!” It nodded at the cupcake, which gnashed its stained teeth.

 Celeste backed away, shrieking in horror as the headless Balloon Boy and cackling Chica marched towards her. She had a slightly better view now, and could see, yes, both of them were covered in dried blood and bits of flesh.

 “The- the rumors were true…” she whispered to herself. Attempting to recover, she swung her bat around wildly, taking no small satisfaction at the cracking of plastic and crumpling of metal her attacks yielded.

 Eventually she pushed her way to the door. She slammed it shut behind her and stuffed the key in the lock, turning it. It worked- the monsters were sealed away again, if not calmed. They could be heard banging on the metal door, as Balloon Boy laughed and Chica mocked.

 Celeste wasted no more time. She ran out of the back area, throwing open the door to the main pizzeria. “Franklin, we need to get out of here now! Before-”

 Franklin was nowhere in sight. But there were two details worth noticing- a thick, sickly trail of viscera along the floor leading into the arcade area, and the fact that the twisted Foxy endoskeleton- in one piece or many- was missing too.

 Well, that was all she needed to see. She bolted to the door, which remained ajar. She knew she’d make it- no robot could run faster than her.

  Maybe that was true. But at least could certainly climb faster.

 From behind the wall of arcade machines, something scurried onto the ceiling, in front of the door, and blocked the exit. Celeste screamed, tripped, and tried to scoot away.

 The animatronic stretched downwards, and she could see it in its full, living entirety.

 Everything that had made it creepy before- its disjointed body, its jaw full of small sharp teeth, its glassy eyes- was multiplied by them moving. Its feet would subtly adjust their position against the wall and ceiling to keep it from falling, in a manner that invoked an oversized spider. Tiny subtle movements of pistons and wires on its body made it seem to pulsate, as if it truly was alive.

 Celeste realized she’d been so distracted by the monster that she’d stopped moving away- and so she dashed, though she was still disoriented. She didn’t even realize exactly where she’d run until it was too late- the arcade area. A dead end.

 From behind her, she heard movement, as the robot followed her. She had come to where it was hiding before she entered. It was where it had brought its first kill.

 Franklin’s mutilated body laid on the floor, beaten to submission by the monstrous endoskeleton. Limbs had been torn off, including an arm that was in the middle of having the flesh peeled off the bones

 The endoskeleton dropped to the ground in front of Celeste with a horrendous metal CLANK. It studied her, like a predator scouting its prey- before speaking.

 “Hello, friend.” it said, in a voice that sounded like a blend of male and female with a heavy electronic filter. “Thank you for letting me out of my shell. It feels good to return to how I’m meant to be.”

 Celeste didn’t know what she’d expected it to say, but it wasn’t this. “If- if you’re so thankful, why did you- you?”

 “The boy?” It glanced at him as it spoke, an indifferent tone in its voice. “He was attacking me with his bat. Was I just expected to lie there and be brutalized? Like the old days, a plaything of stupid children? No, no, not now that I’m finally perfect!”

 “Perfect?” Celeste stammered, bewildered. “You’re a malfunctioning mess!”

 “If that’s all you can see, you’re a fool.” It snarled, showing the most emotion yet. “I can go anywhere, sneak up on those that could hurt me. I overpowered the boy with ease. But most importantly, I’m beautiful!”

 It began to scuttle closer to her, pushing her up against the wall. “Speaking of which, you’re right! I have not yet properly shown my gratitude to either of you. You freed me, and you deserve a reward.”

 “Please…” Celeste whispered, staring into its toothy maw. “I don’t want anything from you…”

 “I know!” the robot exclaimed, ignoring her protests. “Right now you are both so ugly- so boring. But I can make you something more- something beautiful!”

 It grabbed Celeste’s arms and began pulling with strength that went far beyond what any pizzeria robot should have. She could hear popping, and feel her arms being dislocated from their sockets. She could only scream in agony as the robot continued to talk.

 “Yes…” It mused. “You’ll come together, and be beautiful, just like me.” Though its mouth only had so much capability to emote, Celeste could tell it was smiling. “Finally, my turn to play take apart and put back together!”

 From her shoulders Celeste heard a horrendous ripping noise. That was the last thing she heard before she blacked out.

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

 “What the…” Kenny McIntyre muttered, staring at the ajar door. He had returned to the Pizza Parlor to pack up the remaining animatronics- Fazbear Entertainment’s representative was arriving in a few days, after all.

 He peered through the glass door. To his horror, he saw the Freddy and Bonnie robots lying on the floor, severely damaged.

 “Crap!” He cursed. “Someone broke in!” He pulled out his cell phone and dialed 911.

 “911, What’s your emergency?” The dispatcher answered.

 “Uh, hi. I’m Kenny McIntyre, I own Freddy’s Pizza Parlor-”

 “Are you freaking kidding me? What have your stupid animatronics done now?”

 Kenny sighed. He was gaining a reputation. “No, no! Nothing like that. In fact, someone broke in and attacked the properly functioning models. Please, send someone to investigate.”

 “Fine.” The voice answered. “But I can’t say I’m sad they’re gone.” The call abruptly ended.

 “Crossing the line of professionalism a bit, huh?” Kenny deadpanned. “Don’t punish me, it’s not my fault they’re like this!”

 Maybe not, said a nagging voice in the back of his head. But it’s your fault they’re here.

 Kenny had no argument against that. He tried to distract himself, scanning the inside just to be sure no one was still lurking…

 With this closer inspection, he saw something he hadn’t seen before- the equally brutalized Foxy animatronic.

 “Wait…” Kenny realized. The animatronic endoskeleton wasn’t there. All that remained were pieces of its shell.

 “Oh, no…” He whispered. “It’s…it’s free.”

 Kenny threw open the door and ran inside, frantically searching for the robot. He didn’t see it- but he did see a dark red stain which snaked across the floor, leading into the Parlor’s arcade.

 Stunned silent, Kenny slowly moved to peek around the corner. Just as he feared, there it was, walking free- the Mangle.

 That’s what he called it anyway. When it was like this, it didn't feel right to call it Foxy. Mangle felt more appropriate, because that’s what it was- a twisted tangle of scrap, wire, and plastic, that seemed to take joy in its own deformities and madness.

 He could hear it now, giggling and muttering in that creepy childlike voice. There were other noises that came from behind its form- squishing and crunching that seemed to be caused by its own movement. It was like it was building something.

 Sweat dripped down Kenny’s brow. He had to leave, let the cops handle this.

 He took a careful step backwards- crushing an abandoned soda cup beneath his foot.

 The Mangle’s head turned completely around. Its glassy eyes widened as they recognized him. Strangely it looked afraid.

 Before Kenny could even react, it scurried up onto the ceiling, and crawled right over and past him, into the backrooms.

 Confused but relieved, Kenny turned back to where the Mangle had been working- and saw the thing that would fill his darkest nightmares for the rest of his life.

 A mutilated form stood there, composed mainly of bone. Not any old bones, though- they were fresh, with tendons and veins still trailing off of them like ribbons. The body’s shape matched that of the Mangle- three legs, arms coming out of all the wrong places, and two heads. One of them was pure bone, a human looking skull that had been crushed and reshaped to appear more like an endoskeleton head. Brain material leaked out of its ear sockets and its removed eyeball. The other eye was clouded with blood. The main head was the real horror story, though. It appeared to be a patchwork of flesh, stitched together with hair. Skin had been plastered on, though many gaps revealed the red muscle and tissue that laid below. The grotesque structure had been designed in the likeness of the Mangle’s head, complete with ears that had been carved to end in sharp points, blood rubbed on the cheeks for blush, and a long, thin snout stuffed with human teeth and spindles of sharp bone.

 The structure was too big to use only one skeleton- it seemed to be made of at least two. This had left a lot of extra parts, though- loose, leaking organs and scraps of clothing littered the ground around it.

 Kenny screamed. He ran towards the back as tears ran down his face, yelling at the Mangle. “What have you done? WHAT HAVE YOU DONE?!”

 From down the hall, a nervous voice answered. “They freed me. And I freed them- from their ugliness and their limitations. Though for some reason they seem to think themselves the prisoners now.”

 Kenny stopped. “You- wait, what do you mean, NOW!?”

 He turned back. The flesh Mangle was nowhere to be seen.

 A drop of something red fell in front of his eyes. Slowly, he looked up.

 It was there, hanging on the ceiling. The conglomeration of mutilated bodies dropped down on him, screaming, biting…

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

 They were there, trapped in the dark, wet, bony mass. Two souls, who ruled their school and their town- now prisoners, serving out a never-ending sentence.

#fnaf #anthology #fazbear frights #five nights at freddy's #horror #cw: gore #mangle #body horrow cw #mangle fnaf

[janecrockeyre]

scum villain is a greek tragedy disguised as a regular tragedy disguised as a comedy disguised as a danmei

this is going to be long, and this is only PART ONE.

a.k.a, Analysing the plot of Scum Villain’s Self Saving System through Aristotle’s Poetics, because I Have Mental Issues

Part One: Introduction and the Tragic Hero

Scum Villain’s Self Saving System is a tragedy disguised as a comedy, unless you’re Shen Yuan, in which case it’s a mixture of a romance and a survival horror. It's a fever dream. It's a horrible, terrible book that made me feel new undiscovered emotions when I finished reading it. 

The thing is... SVSSS shares characteristics with some of the most famous tragedies in the West, such as Oedipus Rex, Medea, Antigone, the Oresteia... if you haven’t read these, I’ll explain everything. But the gist of my argument is this: SVSSS is the perfect tragedy. In triplicate. 

Tragedy as a genre is old as balls and so it has meant slightly different things to different people over the last few thousand years. I'll be focusing on ancient Greek tragedy, which was performed at the yearly Festival of Dionysus in Athens during the 500-350s BC (give or take a hundred years). Aristotle, when writing about this very specific subset of tragedy, had no idea that one day Scum Villain would be written, and then that I would be using his work as a way to look at Shen Qingqiu’s Funky Transmigration Mistake. Anyway!

Greek tragedy greatly influenced European dramatic tradition. I have a lot of opinions about white academics idolising and upholding the classics as the "paragon of culture" but I'll withhold them for now. I have no idea if MXTX has read Greek tragedy or not, so don't take this as me saying they are writing it. 

In my opinion, tragedy is a universal human constant. We are surrounded by pain and hurt and none of it makes any sense, so we seek to process that pain through drama, art, literature, etc. We want to understand why pain happens, and how it happens, and try to make sense of the senseless. The universe is cold and cruel and random. Tragedy eases some of that pain. 

On that note: Just because I am analysing Scum Villain through a Greek lens doesn't mean that it was written that way. I'm pasting an interpretation onto the book when there's probably a very rich and deep history of Chinese tragedy that I just don't know about. If you ever want to talk about that, please, god, hit me up, I would love to learn about it!! 

Anyway, tragedy. MXTX is excellent at it! Mo Dao Zu Shi? Painful dynastic family tragedy. Heaven Official's Blessing? Mostly romance, but she managed to get that pure pain in there, huh? 

But in my opinion, Scum Villain holds the crown for the most tragic of her stories. MDZS was more of a mystery. TGCF was more of a romance. Neither of them shy away from their tragic elements. 

Scum Villain would fit right in between the work of Sophocles, Euripides and Aeschylus. How? Let me show you. Join me on my mystery tour into the world of "Aristotle Analyses Danmei..."

Part One: The Tragic Hero

What is a tragic hero? Generally, Greek tragic heroes are united by the same key characteristics. He must be imperfect, having a "fatal flaw" of some kind. He must have something to lose. And he must go from fortune to misfortune thanks to that fatal flaw. 

There are two (technically three) tragic protagonists in SVSSS and all of them are tragic in different but formulaic ways. Each protagonist has their own version of “hamartia” or a “fatal flaw”. 

Actually, hamartia isn’t necessarily a flaw - rather, it is a thing which makes the audience pity and fear for them, a careful imperfection, a point of weakness in the character’s morality or reasoning that allows for bad things to happen to them. For example, in Oedipus Rex, the king Oedipus has a “fatal flaw” of always wanting to find the truth, but this isn’t exactly a flaw, right? Note: this flaw can be completely unwitting, as we see with Shen Yuan. It can also be something that the protagonist is born with, some kind of trait from birth or very young. 

Shen Yuan

Shen Yuan’s “hamartia” is his rigid adherence to fate and his inability to read a situation as anything but how he thinks it ought to be. He believes that Bingmei will grow into Bingge, and it takes several years, two deaths, and some truly traumatising sex to convince him otherwise. 

Shen Jiu

Shen Jiu’s fatal flaw is his cruelty. It is his own sadistic treatment and abuse of Binghe which directly leads to his eventual dismemberment. This is kind of a no-brainer. Of course, it isn't all that simple, and as an audience we pity him for his cruelty as much as we fear it because we know it comes from his own abuse as a child. This just makes him even more tragic. Delicious. 

Luo Binghe

Luo Binghe’s fatal flaw is a complicated mix of things. It is his position as the “protagonist” which compels him to act in certain ways and be forced to suffer. It is his half-demonic heritage, something entirely out of his control, which sets in motion his tragic reversal of fortune when he gets yeeted into the Abyss. He also, much like Shen Yuan, has the propensity to jump to conclusions and somehow make 2 + 2 = 5. 

As well as having their respective “flaws”, all three protagonists match the rough outline of a good tragic hero in another way: they are in a position of great wealth and power. Even when you split the different characters into different “versions”, this still holds true. Yes, Luo Binghe is raised a commoner by a washerwoman foster mother, but his dad is an emperor and he also ends up becoming an emperor himself. 

Yes, Shen Jiu is an ex-slave and a victim of abuse himself, but Shen Qingqiu is a powerful peak lord with an entire mountain’s worth of resources at his back. 

Shen Yuan is a second generation new money rich kid. 

Bingge is a stereotypical protagonist with a golden finger. Bingmei is a treasured and loved disciple with a good reputation and a privileged seat by his shizun’s side. 

In a tragedy, having this kind of good fortune at the beginning of your story is dangerous. Chaucer says that tragedy is (badly translated into modern english) “a certain story / of him that stood in great prosperity / and falls out of high degree / into misery, and ends up wretchedly”. If we follow this line of thinking, a good tragedy is about someone who has a lot to lose, losing everything because of one fatal point of weakness that they fail to address or understand. 

If we look at Shakespeare, this is what makes King Lear such a fantastic tragic protagonist. He is a king in control of most of England, who from his own lack of wisdom and excess of pride, decides to split his kingdom apart to give to his daughters, favouring his murderous, double crossing progeny, and condemning his only actually filial daughter to death. He loses his kingdom, his mind, and his beloved daughter, all because of his own stupidity.

This brings us to:

Part Two: Peripeteia

This reversal of fortunes is called peripeteia. It is the moment where the entire plot shifts, and the hero’s fortunes go from good to bad. Think of it like one of those magic eye puzzles, where you stare at the image until a 3D shark appears, except you realise the shark was always there, you just couldn't ever see it, waiting for you, hungry, deadly, always lurking just behind that delightful pattern of random blue squiggles. 

Each tragic hero has their own moment of peripeteia in SVSSS, sometimes several:

Shen Qingqiu

In the original PIDW, SQQ’s peripeteia presumably occurs when he finds out that Bingge didn’t perish in the Abyss but has actually been training hard to come and pay him back. There’s really not much I’m interested in saying here - as a villain, OG!SQQ is cut and dry, and the audience doesn’t really feel any pity or fear for him. As Shen Yuan often mentions, what the audience feels when they see OG!SQQ is bloodlust and sick satisfaction. There is also the trial at Huan Hua Palace, which I will talk about in Shen Yuan’s section. 

Shen Yuan (SQQ 2.0)

One of SY’s most poggers moment of peripeteia is the glorious, terrifying section between hearing Binghe for the first time after the Abyss moment, and getting shoved into the Water Prison. 

“Behind him, a low and soft voice came: “Shizun?”

Shen Qingqiu’s neck felt stiff as he slowly turned his head. Luo Binghe’s face was the most frightening thing he had ever seen.

The scariest thing about it was that the expression on his face was not cold at all. His smile wasn’t sharp like a knife. Rather, it showed a kind of bone-deep gentleness and amiability.”

This is the moment of true horror for Shen Yuan, because he knows what happens next: the plot unfurls before him, inevitable and painful, and he knows that death awaits him at Luo Binghe's hands (lol). Compare it with the bone deep certainty with which he faces his own downfall during the sham of a trial later in the chapter (I’ve bolded the important part):

“In the original work, Qiu Haitang’s appearance signified only one thing: Shen Qingqiu’s complete fall from grace. [...] Shen Qingqiu’s heart streamed with tears. Great Master… I know you’re doing this for my own good, but I’ll actually suffer if she speaks her words clearly. This truly is the saying “not frightened of doing a shameful deed, just afraid the ghost (consequences) will come knocking”!”

After the peripeteia is usually the denouement where the plot wraps up and the threads are all tied together leaving no loose ends, but because this tragedy isn’t Shen Yuan’s but the former Shen Jiu’s, it’s impossible to finish. 

Shen Yuan cannot provide the meaningful answers that the narrative demands because 1) he doesn’t have any memory of doing anything, and 2) he wasn’t the person who did them. Narratively, he cannot follow the same path as the former SQQ because he lacks the same fatal flaw: cruelty. 

This is why Binghe doesn’t kill him - because he loves him, rather than despises him. And this is why Shen Yuan has to sacrifice himself and die for Luo Binghe in order to save him from Xin Mo: because the narrative demands that denouement follows peripeteia, and SQQ’s fate is in the hands of the narrative. 

(Side note: I believe that this literal death also represents the death of OG!SQQ's tragic arc. The body that committed all those crimes must die to satisfy the narrative. SQQ must die, like burning down a forest, so that new growth can sprout from the ashes. After this, Shen Yuan's story has more room to develop instead.)

It must happen to show Bingmei that SQQ loves him too. And this brings us to Bingmei.

Bingmei

Bingmei has two succinct moments of utter downfall. The first is a literal fall - his flaw, his demonic heritage, leads his beloved shizun to throw him down into the Abyss. From his point of view, SQQ is punishing him simply for the status of his birth. He rapidly goes from being loved and cherished unconditionally, to being the victim of an assassination attempt. 

He realises that he is totally unlovable: that for the crimes of his species that he never had a hand in, he must pay the price as well: that his shizun is so righteous that no matter what love there was between them, if SQQ sees a demon, he will kill it. Even if that demon is Bingmei. 

The second moment is when SQQ dies for him. Again, from his point of view, he was chasing after a man who was struggling to see him as a human being. Shen Qingqiu’s death makes Bingmei realise that he has been completely misunderstanding his shizun: that SQQ would literally die for him, the ultimate act of self sacrifice from love: that SQQ loved him despite his demon heritage. 

Much like King Lear holding the corpse of his daughter and wailing in sheer grief and pain because he did this, he caused this, Bingmei gets to hold his shizun's cold body and cry his eyes out and know that it was his fault. (Kind of.)

(Yes, I’m bringing Shakespeare into this, no I am not justifying myself)

Maybe I'm a bit sadistic, but that scene slaps. Let me show you a comparison of scenes so you get the picture. 

Re-enter KING LEAR, with CORDELIA dead in his arms; EDGAR, Captain, and others following

KING LEAR

Howl, howl, howl, howl! O, you are men of stones:

Had I your tongues and eyes, I'ld use them so

That heaven's vault should crack. She's gone for ever!

I know when one is dead, and when one lives;

She's dead as earth. Lend me a looking-glass;

If that her breath will mist or stain the stone,

Why, then she lives.

[...]

 KING LEAR

And my poor fool is hang'd! No, no, no life!

Why should a dog, a horse, a rat, have life,

And thou no breath at all? Thou'lt come no more,

Never, never, never, never, never!

Pray you, undo this button: thank you, sir.

Do you see this? Look on her, look, her lips,

Look there, look there!

Dies

Versus this scene in SVSSS: 

Luo Binghe turned a deaf ear to everything else, greatly agitated and at a loss of what to do. He was still holding Shen Qingqiu’s body, which was rapidly cooling down. It seemed like he wanted to call for him loudly and forcefully shake him awake, yet he didn’t dare to, as if he was afraid of being scolded. He said slowly, “Shizun?”

[...]

Luo Binghe involuntarily held Shen Qingqiu closer.

He said in a small voice, “I was wrong, Shizun, I really… know that I was wrong.

“I… I didn’t want to kill you…”

PAIN. SO MUCH BEAUTIFUL PAIN. Yes, I know Shakespeare isn’t Athenian, but he was inspired by the good old stuff and he also knew how to write a perfect tragedy on his own terms. Anyway. I’ll find more Greek examples later.

This post was a bit all over the place, but I hope it has been fun to read. Part Two will be coming At Some Point, Who Knows When. This is a bit messy and unedited, but hey, I’m not getting paid or graded, so you can eat any typos or errors. Unless you’re here to talk to me about Chinese tragedy, in which case, please pull up a seat, let me get you a drink, make yourself at home.

ps: if you want to retweet this, here is the promo tweet!

#svsss #scum villain #luo binghe #shen qingqiu #shen jiu #greek tragedy #hello followers this account has been silent for a long time but today i bring you whatever this is #long post #i am gonna cross post more art here from my twitter i think #you guys really like my shitposts on here

[starshipsofstarlord]

A Stark Contrast | Bucky Barnes

Summary; living in the shadow of Tony, your brother, always was the way, and you accepted it. That was until he expected you to sign the accords, that was one thing that you couldn’t do.

Warnings; Angst, mentions of death, mentions of being controlled, funeral, mourning, anger

The form, bound in a weighty book laid on the table, making the room fill with utmost tension. Tony was hellbent on signing the thing, and handing away any freedom that all of you had.

No matter how long you had supported him, this was not one subject that you could agree with him on. Whilst you understood his perspective, it would only end up with you in a hamster wheel, running around and following the orders of executives.

They wanted less destruction. To put boundaries around their country’s heroes, and limit them to the lengths they could go to in order to save lives.

That was also wrong, the entire ordeal had you bent backwards with a conflict of interests. On one hand, it would be ordinary to sign for such a cause, whether you trusted their backgrounds or not, simply because your elder sibling had.

There was nobody that you trusted more than Tony, he had half raised you after your parents were killed, you felt indebted to him. But being an avenger, on a team where your personal opinion had been valued, it opened your eyes to a whole range of possibilities.

Whilst you were loyal to Tony, you had also became in tune with your own gut. It grumbled at the prospect of giving in to a contract, which decided what you were permitted to do. It was like a child’s parent permission slip, but on a much grander scale.

“People died!” He reminded the lot of you again, which inclined you to look down. There was blood on all of your hands, and he was making it as red as it could possibly be seen. “At least y/n agrees with me.” He reprimanded Steve, whom was still far on the fence regarding the entire ordeal.

Once he said that, all eyes had shifted towards you. Nat had already basically given in to your brother’s convictions, and Steve suspected that you would do the same. You were always one step behind Tony, you were far too loyal to your sibling for your own good.

“I have yet to make up my mind.” You spoke, standing, no longer wishing to be in the room where there was far too much tension. How you wished Banner and Thor were here, they would make an equal divide. The God of Thunder would not scribble his signature upon the paper, you thought to yourself, if he knew their reasons and affects.

However, your words were taken as an assumption that you would join your sibling in providing a peaceful surrender. It is what he and the public would assume of you, and to be truthful, you were tired of sticking to the stereotypes that were made of you.

“I’m surprised that you came.” Steve spoke, as you opened the boot of your car, and revealed the shield that he was so often adorned with, as well as Sam’s wings. He, like most others, had suspected that you would join your brother in his guilt ridden cause, however, thinking for yourself gave you a sense of freedom.

“Don’t be so quick to prevail into what everyone else thinks of me.” You smirked at the captain, your eyes drifting over to the other super soldier, whom had temporarily been imprisoned by the government.

But he had escaped, and if luck was not often a Stark trait, Tony would have died. You had watched from the cameras, but you could boil no bad blood in between the pair of you, Barnes was not in his right mind. He was controlled, and put into a incomprehensible mode of himself. That was, unless, he had managed to kill Tony.

Then you would have changed your own deciding mind, and stuck to what the eldest Stark believed in. “I won’t, ever again.” Sam smiled, picking up redwing from the composed pile, and kissing the machine.

“Bucky.” You reiterated his name, the one that he had chosen to correct the unknown and deceiving man on. The nod you earnt was brief, but it gave you a sense of hope that whirled in your middle. 

It was clear that he was an attractive man, and alike his righteous friend, he was frozen through time to be in this current moment. As Sam and Steve began to get their things together, you walked over to the historical stranger, a smile upon your face. “I’m y/n Stark, I don’t believe we have had the fortune of meeting before.”

“You sure do speak like a Stark.” He softly spoke, a matching smile on his brawn face. “And you seem to have other things in common, like that necklace.” At his words, you looked down at it, a hint of anguish within your gaze.

“It belonged to my mother.” It was nice to reminisce about her for a moment, you knew that she would have made her own decisions too. In some retrospect, you were following in her footsteps.

A feeling grew in the back of Bucky’s throat, but he said nothing. If he were to spill, or reveal his dark secret, it would mean nothing more than the loss of a powerful asset, they could not afford that right now.

“Do you ever think about what would have happened if you got to return home?” It had been a stressful day, fighting your friends, and your last living family member. Bucky turned at your words, you had saved him from being killed, he felt indebted.

“Probably do what every other soldier did; find a woman to marry and have kids. But that’s far out of the picture in this modern age.” Steve was flying the aircraft as you and Bucky spoke in the back. It gave the two of you a moment alone, and you were truly knowing as though you knew the soldier.

He was a good man, misinterpreted by the deeds that he was controlled to do. No one chose to have pity on Barnes, they instead viewed him as a country danger, and wanted to lock him up in a cage, which was how he had come so far in the first place.

“I wouldn’t say that.” For a moment, you looked into his deep blue eyes, feeling as though he were freezing you with them. He didn’t want to look away, but you were inclined to, for you could feel the contrasts of hot and cold heat working its way up your neck, and onto your face. “There’s definitely a woman that would want all that and more with you.”

If things were simpler, you would be convinced that you could share such an intimate bond with him, but alas, everything had to be complicated. And if things could work out, they surely couldn’t last.

“We’re here.” Steve informed the both of you, as he slid out of his front seat, and you prepared to finish this for once and for all.

“How could you?!” You couldn’t defend him as Tony blasted him away, Bucky had played you, and done so well. He and Steve knew of the blood on his hands, and yet they hadn’t thought once to inform you of the one true treachery regrading you.

Bucky had killed your mother, from the intake of information alone, you felt sick. Physically sick. But you choked it down, and as Steve unsurely came towards you, you ran at him, angered by his lies.

From the start, the patriot of America, someone you had considered a friend had deceived you. You had helped him, stood with him, fought your friends for him, and not to mention Tony, and he had known all along.

“Y/n-”

“Save your apologies Rogers.” You stared him down, as he had Bucky held up by one arm, seeing as Barnes had lost one of his own again. “And you, you’re right, there’s no perfect picture, you’re nothing but a monster.”

“Listen.” Steve commanded, but you couldn’t. He was no longer considered your captain, he was a sick liar who had helped to break you. This was the last time that you made your own decisions. Tony was always right.

“You don’t deserve that shield, my father made that. It’s government property-” swiftly he dropped said item, an exhausted and tiresome expression upon Steve’s helmet wearing face.

As soon as they trudged by, you instantly went to Tony, checking his wounds. “You were right brother, I should have listened to you.”

“Your dad loved cheeseburgers too.” You laughed lightly to Morgan, blinking back the tears. It was Tony’s funeral, there were so many people here, even Fury, but there was someone else, who was walking towards you. “Why don’t you go and ask Happy, I have some business that I have to tend to quickly.”

“Okay auntie y/n.” She ran off. She was so innocent, she didn’t deserve to be going to her father’s funeral at five years old, it was truly cruel. But that was just the way the world worked, and Tony was a hero.

“Hi.” Bucky spoke, adorned in all black, same as you. It had been a long time since you had seen him, not since he was being carried away by Steve. You hadn’t fought in Wakanda, instead you had ended up on Titan with your brother, and you would have surely died without him.

“Hey Barnes.” You greeted him with a forced smile, but nevertheless allowed him to step closer.

“I’m sorry for your loss.” He said, the guilt still burning behind his eyes. It seemed that his time in Wakanda had changed him, for the better.

“Which one?” You quipped back, instantaneously. 

“All of them.” He gulped, he was going to give you one truth before you found out after. It was his attempt at redemption, and a sorrowful one at that. “Steve’s returning the stones later.”

“I know.” You responded, the captain had already informed you about that part of his plan.

“And he’s not coming back.”

“Anthony Howard and Steven Nathan Barnes, the two of you better get back here this instant!” Your voice hollered through the house, as well as the duo’s endless giggles.

The front door opened, no other than Bucky walking through. He was quick to recognise the flash of motherly anger upon your face, and quickly dropped his serene smile.

“What have they done?” Bucky asked, watching as you crossed your arms in an unimpressed manner.

“Why don’t you ask your sons?” Your husband sighed, but despite that, he was a happy man. He had returned from a war, and found a lovely wife, of which he had two troublesome boys with. For the first time in a long time, y/n Stark and Bucky Barnes were happy.

#bucky barnes x reader #bucky x reader #bucky x you #bucky x y/n #bucky barnes imagines #bucky barnes #bucky barnes imagine #bucky x Female Reader #bucky x stark reader #bucky barnes x stark!reader #bucky barns fluff #bucky barnes angst #bucky barns fanfiction #bucky barns x you #bucky barns x reader #tony stark x stark!reader #bucky barnes one shot #bucky barnes fic #marvel x reader #marvel x you #avengers x reader #mcu x reader #MCU x Y/N #mcu x you #mcu imagine #marvel x y/n #marvel one shot

[thehiddenmemoryuniverse]

Lucifer Ending: Tragedy and Contradiction

Okay, so I tried really hard to resist the urge to post anything about it, and I even held out for over a week trying to process/calm my feelings about the ending to Lucifer. I’ve tried, I really have, but the more I try, the more I CANNOT rationalize that ending. As you may have guessed, I absolutely hated the ending, and I just really, really, have to get my feelings out about it. If you liked the ending (I really wish I could be you!!), you may want to skip reading any further (I recommend you do, in fact). 

Ultimately, regardless of the details, that ending for Chloe/Lucifer is just way too heartbreakingly tragic and sad, however, this is made all the more unbearable because none of it makes ANY damn sense.  

I’m just going to start by pasting a bunch of quotes first:

2x05

Lucifer: I refuse to believe that. There is always another way.

Mum: If anyone can find it, it's you.

2x02 Chloe: “Doing what's best for your child, it doesn't always make them happy.”

3x16

Cain: But you're the Devil, you always keep your word.

Lucifer: I do. So I hope you understand how difficult a decision this was. And yet, oddly, the easiest I've ever made.

6x01

Lucifer: I love you, Chloe Decker. I'd do anything for you. Except give you up. Give us up.

6x09

Lucifer: I need you to know that if there is any choice to be had at all, I will always... choose us.

6x07

Rory: You make choices, Mom. If I told you what they are, you wouldn't really be making them any more.

Yeah. Not going to comment further on these right now. 

Nor am I going to even get into the whole fate vs free will. Regardless of your views on that debate, why on earth a show about free will spends its final season spotlighting the widespread, controversial debate of fate vs free will by introducing a time loop plot, I’ll never understand. 

But even if we forget the numerous issues/contradictions with that (and the ridiculous irony of Rory’s quote shown above), and accept that Lucifer and Chloe chose this, I honestly feel like screaming because WHY??? Why on earth would they EVER want to chose this? 

I know the 2 reasons given, the reasons everyone is speaking up with, the reasons expanded on at length in fanfiction, and I’ve tried really, REALLY hard to rationalize them in my head, tried to enjoy the sweet moments fanfic writers are trying to make of it, but I cannot. Because it doesn’t make any damn sense whatsoever to me.

Reason # 1: Lucifer never would’ve realized his ‘calling’ to help tortured souls in Hell.  

Right. First of all, if it really is his ‘calling’ he would figure it out eventually because that’s what a bloody calling is. I mean really. Not to mention there was plenty of evidence that he was figuring it out already, and him figuring it out after actually helping people in hell (Jimmy, Dan, Mr. Said out bitch), makes way more sense than stopping someone from making the mistake of killing someone else.

And second, even if we accept the argument that he wouldn’t find his calling, we are then saying that he chose his ‘calling’ over his own family, the people he loves most of all? That’s beyond awful to me. And pretty much destroys all of the growth and beauty and love and development across the series. A complete contradiction to even earlier in series 6. See above quotes. Lucifer tells Chloe he’d do anything for her, except give her up, give them up. He tells her if there’s ever any choice to be had he would chose them (his family). So, what the heck? Which leads me to reason 2, and beware with continuing because this is UNBEARABLY frustrating to me so I may get a bit heated. I just can’t. I can’t understand this.  Reason #2: They did it for their daughter, because she asked them to, because she didn’t want them to change her, because she’s happy with who she is, etc, etc..

This is the most widely accepted reason, the most referenced in fanfic, that it’s so beautiful because Lucifer and Chloe sacrificed everything for their daughter because they loved her so much.

I’m sorry, I really am, I tried so hard to make sense of this but it makes the least sense to me of all. 

Why on EARTH is Rory growing up without her father better for her? Why on earth would Lucifer, of all people, knowing the pain it causes, ever chose that for his daughter?

This is not sacrificing for their daughter, this is sacrificing for NOTHING at all. This is doing the ABSOLUTE worst for their daughter, all because she asked them to?

And her asking them to in the first place makes no sense either. Why on earth would Rory ASK for it after all the pain it caused her? Earlier she told Lucifer and Chloe that him leaving ‘ruined her life’, and now all of a sudden she’s happy with it? After seeing and reading how much Lucifer and Chloe loved each other she wants to separate them? After saying she now loves Lucifer too she wants to do that to him? And you can’t tell me it’s her being selfless because she thinks he won’t find his ‘calling’ otherwise, because even if he doesn’t (which he would for reasons above), then again we are saying they are choosing a ‘calling’ over family, over those they love most. Or, even worse, Rory, is choosing FOR HIM and ROBBING him of his choice to chose his family over his ‘calling’. 

No matter what way you spin it, it is just all kinds of wrong and messed up, and does not showcase the love the characters have for each other, nor the freedom of choice.

There’s nothing beautiful about any of this to me. It’s just plain awful and cruel for NO REASON. 

Yes, I know I’m missing one popular theme with all of this, and I might just hate this one most of all: That even though Rory suffered it made her stronger, she’s proud of who she is, and they don’t want to change her, don’t want to ‘kill’ this version of Rory who grew up without her dad. 

No. Just no. This pains me immensely. So we’re saying that she’s a better person having grown up without a Dad than she would’ve been growing up with a complete, loving family? That people who grow up with loving families can’t be as strong and proud of who they are? WTF? 

Sure, we as people are only strong in life when we need to be but that doesn’t mean that someone who grew up more fortunate doesn’t still have the capacity for that strength (or that they don’t suffer in other ways).

Yeah, it’s beautiful when you grew up abandoned and were able to eventually overcome it, but in reality you’ll always be scarred to some degree, and you certainly would have been less messed up, happier if you hadn’t.

Changing the time loop so that Rory could grow up with her father in her life wouldn’t ‘kill’ her. Fundamentally she’d still be the same, still would have grown up with her ‘kickass’ mom. All the good parts would still be there. There would just be even more good and much less of the bad.

How on earth would Chloe and Lucifer not want to chose that?

There is no way anyone can ever convince me that you come out better growing up abandoned by your father than you would have if he hadn’t. Just no.

We are strong and proud to overcome something only when WE HAVE NO CHOICE. CHOOSING to suffer just to show how great you are afterward for overcoming it when you could have chosen NOT to suffer at all, is just the most ridiculous thing I’ve ever heard. 

It reminds me of a quote from one of my childhood movies, the original “Lion King.’ Little Simba tells his dad he went looking for danger to show that he’s brave, and his dad answers, “I’m only brave when I have to be.” 

So.  Circling back. Ignoring the debate on whether or not there was even a choice given (fate vs free will and ridiculous time loops). Ignoring that Lucifer likely (and should have) been able to find his ‘calling’ anyway. 

Then, in summary, we are left with Lucifer (and Chloe) ‘choosing’ for Lucifer to leave them for Hell, abandoning them both (and Trixie) because either

1) Lucifer’s calling is more important than being with his family

2) Rory wants to suffer, to let her parents suffer an unimaginable amount of pain, just to show that she comes out better for it, even when she can choose not to suffer at all. And Chloe and Lucifer are both in agreement that this is best for them and their daughter. 

What. The. Hell???!!

I’m sorry, but there’s no rationale for this. None. At. All. 

I’ll be the first to admit that I would never be happy with such a devastatingly heartbreaking ending no matter what the reasons, but, HOLY HELL, can they at least have had it make even the smallest amount of SENSE?! 

It’s just angst for the sake of angst, and I especially did not expect this from this show. It was always a show not to be taken too seriously, not to overthink and just have fun with, and that’s what made it work for me. But then they decide it’s a good idea to 1) throw in a time loop plot when time loops in fiction is pretty much the definition of serious complexity and making viewers overthink. And 2) have it end with such a tragic and sad ending that makes no sense. I am so sick and tired of the trend now days that shows can’t have happy endings.

(Edit: Now look what happened. I’ve gone and made another rant: https://thehiddenmemoryuniverse.tumblr.com/post/663357629901438976/lucifer-morningstars-broken-journey)

#Lucifer #lucifer spoilers #lucifer season 6 #deckerstar #discussion #Lucifer discussion

[postmodernmulticoloredcloak]

The shifting narrative of God’s interventism and how it reflects on the narrative on John

This post will ignore the issue authorial intent entirely because I can, but it’s also about authorial intent in a way, but I also don’t like to talk about things as happening “accidentally” because a) a serialized story like Supernatural, especially one that got renewed for much longer than anyone could possibly expect or hope in their wildest ambitions, structurally relies on serendipity, because that’s how stories work when they’re work in progress, b) a television show is an extremely multi-authored text and the chance that something happens out of the intent of any of the multiple layers of creators is kind of... statistically negligible. So, yeah, that’s my stance on the topic. Anyway.

The shifting narrative about God is simultaneously something that hangs on fortunate storytelling clicks on an essentially programmed narrative. At first, we don’t know where the fuck God is. Cas starts looking for him with little success. Raphael says he’s dead, Cas doesn’t believe it. Dean relates to his struggle because he knows the feeling of not knowing where the fuck your father is and going looking for him with little success, not knowing if he’s even alive. Then the theory that gets assumed as the truth is that God has left. He fucked off who knows where, who knows why, leaving his creation to struggle alone. Also essentially how Dean had felt after John had died; in that case there was guilt for his demon deal and everything, but the most cruel weight on Dean’s shoulder was that John left him alone to struggle with his devastatingly horrific instructions he doesn’t understand. The angels are also left with horrific instructions they don’t understand. No wonder Cas does his own ‘demon deal’ in season 6, as he desperately tries to do what he assumes his father wants from him, but he doesn’t actually know what that is.

“God has left” is maddening, and everyone is angry about it, but it has its own dignity. God has left us without clear instructions, we are confused and in pain and evil runs amock but at least, we suppose, the evil of it is our own doing. We are alone and we do our best, our best is simply not enough. We wish he gave us guidance, but he won’t. He wants us to figure it out ourselves, possibly. We don’t actually know what he wants. But maybe that’s the point. It’s possible he doesn’t even know what’s happening, he just has left the building entirely.

But then Chuck reveals himself. We find out that he never actually left. He was there. “I like front row seats. You know, I figured I’d hide out in plain sight”. He simply chooses not to intervene. He chooses not to answer. He chooses to be hands-off. He presents himself as a laissez-faire parent, because, he says, it’s better for his children to have the responsibility they need to grow up. He’s absent, but in a different way than we thought! It’s not that he doesn’t know what’s happening or isn’t interested in knowing what’s happening. He’s here, he knows what’s happening, he just stays there and watches as you stumble and struggle and scream. It’s worse, and it pains Dean so much he isn’t even afraid to yell at God. You know we’re suffering and you just don’t give us any support, any comfort.

You’re frustrated. I get it. Believe me, I was hands-on, real hands-on, for, wow, ages. I was so sure if I kept stepping in, teaching, punishing, that these beautiful creatures that I created... would grow up. But it only stayed the same. And I saw that I needed to step away and let my baby find its way. Being overinvolved is no longer parenting. It’s enabling.

But it didn’t get better.

Well, I’ve been mulling it over. And from where I sit, I think it has.

Well, from where I sit, it feels like you left us and you’re trying to justify it.

I know you had a complicated upbringing, Dean, but don’t confuse me with your dad.

At that point of the show, the writing team almost certainly didn’t have the s14-15 twist in mind. So this was probably intended to be Chuck’s truth. Later it gets twisted (retconned?) into a lie, but about that later.

Here, Chuck is really good at manipulating the conversation. Dean has a perfectly valid point, because there IS a middle ground between being overinvolved and not being involved at all. There is a middle ground between enabling your children and abandoning them completely. But Chuck hits Dean where it hurts, plays the emotional card, basically tells him that he’s too emotional to understand, too emotional to think rationally about it, because he mixes his feelings about his father to the issue and thus cannot see it clearly. He basically tells him he’s too close to it to get it. You don’t understand parenting, Dean, because you’re too blinded by your emotions about your own little life and cannot see the big picture.

It doesn’t really matter here if he’s telling the truth or lying, it already says a lot about Chuck that he’s emotionally manipulating Dean, silencing him by hitting the painful spot.

But the thing is, 11.20 immediately presents Chuck as a liar. He makes Metatron read his autobiography and the very first line is a lie (“In the beginning, there was me. Boom – detail. And what a grabber. I mean, I’m hooked, and I was there.” “I’m hooked too, and yet... details. You weren’t alone in the beginning. Your sister was with you.”) and the stuff he talks about his experience as Chuck is not exactly truthful about anything (“That, you know, makes you seem like a really grounded, likable person.” “Yeah, what’s wrong with that?” “You are neither grounded nor a person!”). Metatron calls him out (“Okay. There are two types of memoir. One is honest... the other, not so much. Truth and fairy tale. Now, do you want to write Life by Keith Richards? Or do you want to write Wouldn’t It Be Nice by Brian Wilson?”). Chuck SAYS he chooses truth and gives Metatron a different manuscript, supposedly containing the truth, to which Metatron reacts positively. Metatron believes it, and we believe it with him.

Oh! Oh, this! This is what I was talking about. Chapter Ten “Why I Never Answer Prayers, and You Should Be Glad I Don’t”, and Chapter Eleven “The Truth About Divine Intervention and Why I Avoid It At All Costs”.

Nature? Divine. Human nature – toxic.

They do like blowing stuff up.

Yeah. And the worst part – they do it in my name. And then they come crying to me, asking me to forgive, to fix things. Never taking any responsibility.

What about your responsibility?

I took responsibility... by leaving. At a certain point, training wheels got to come off. No one likes a helicopter parent.

This is sort of what he later says to Dean, except that to Dean he talks about “beautiful creatures” “my baby”, talks about helping, none of the harsh tone he’s using here. When Metatron accuses him of hiding from Amara, he retorts “I am not hiding. I am just done watching my experiments’ failures”. What a different language, uh? Then Metatron asks him why he abandoned them, and Chuck answers “Because you disappointed me. You all disappointed me”. Then, he admits he lied about “learning” to play the guitar and so on, because he just gave himself the ability, and then appears to Dean and Sam, after Metatron’s passionate speech about humanity.

So, no matter the authorial intent at the time - the truthiness of Chuck’s words was already ambiguous. He kept lying and being called out, or silencing the conversation with some good ol’ gaslighting.

The season 14 finale introduces the big twist: it was, indeed, all a lie. The whole of it. Chuck didn’t abandon shit. It was all him, minutely controlling the narrative of the universe, putting the characters through all the pain and struggles for his own amusement.

The “absent father” narrative was a lie.

What does this tell us about John? Nothing, according to the authorial intent that shines through Dabb’s Lebanon. But we don’t give a crap about Dabb’s authorial intent about John! He’s just one dude and plenty of other authors have painted a different picture. So I’m going to read the narrative the way I want, because I can, and the narrative allows me to. It’s all there.

I’m suggesting that the fact that Chuck lied when he talked about being a hands-off/absentee father parallels how Dean and Sam prefer to think of their father as an “absent father” when that’s not exactly a reflection of the truth.

You left us. Alone. ‘Cause Dad was just a shell. [...] And I-I had to be more than just a brother. I had to be a father and I had to be a mother, to keep him safe.

Setting aside how “I had to be a father and I had to be a mother” sort of retcons and cleans up the Winchester family picture painted by ealier seasons, the fact that John didn’t really count as a functional father figure and Dean and Sam were essentually alone is not incorrect or anything. It is true that John would leave them to their own devices a lot, thus the long stays in motels, the hunger, the food-stealing, and all. But John wasn’t always absent, at all. He trained them as soldiers, he disciplined them, he was around enough for them to be intimately familiar with what happened when he drank. He drove them around.

It’s almost like it’s preferable to Dean and Sam to spin their own “absent father” narrative, putting the accent on the time they spent alone, painting their childhood as a time they had to grow up on their own, rather than acknowledge they grew up under the thumb of a controlling, looming figure they would regularly live in fear of, even when he was not physically present.

The “absent father” narrative is what Dean and Sam need to use to avoid confronting the reality of the father figure whose moods and whims they had to dance around. “I know things got dicey... you know, with Dad... the way he was. And I just... I didn’t always look out for you the way that I should have. I mean, I had my own stuff, you know. In order to keep the peace, probably looked like I took his side quite a bit.”

John shaped their lives. He shaped their identities. Even in the episodes where he abandons Dean or both children somewhere, he’s portrayed as the figure who drives the car. He symbolically drives the car, you know? John shaped Dean and Sam’s relationship with each other, both on a surface level (the conflicts) and on a deeper level (the parental dynamic).

Heck. The entire first season of the show plays on John’s disappearance as the “elephant in the room”. John is there by not being there, you know? And after he dies, his death - his absence - is again the elephant in the room for Dean, the weight on his psyche that he shatters under.

It is not wrong that Dean and Sam had to spend long periods of time without John. But John structured their lives in quite minute detail. Where they needed to be, what they needed to do, what they must not do, everything had to follow John’s instructions. A drill sergeant, the narrative called him, ordering how his sons needed to live their lives. That’s no absence, except on a level where Chuck not showing himself and pretending he’s not there can be considered absent. That’s a presence, not necessarily always physical, but semiotical and psychological.

John is an absent father as much as Chuck is a hands-off god. He even writes himself into the story around the time Cas has the “season 1” phase (let’s go look for dad/let’s go look for god), which is when John actually was alive and appeared. Then he was no longer physically there, but he was still shaping his characters’ lives, just like he’d always done.

The “absent father” narrative on John is that - a narrative. Spun by the characters themselves because it’s easier and actually kinder on John. Or, better, it allows them not to be crushed by the psychological implications of having to accept that their father was such a looming, minutely formative figure in their lives. They know, but they can wave the “absent father” idea around to avoid thinking about it.

“I had to be a father and I had to be a mother” is something easier to tell yourself. I was the one who did it all. But he wasn’t, and that’s the problem. The fact that John was their father - Dean’s and Sam’s - is the problem. But ironically, blaming himself for every failure is a better option for Dean than fully acknowledging John’s abuse. As long as he blames himself, he has control over it. The moment he acknowledges the extent of John’s influence, he loses control over the entire narrative of his own identity and the family identity, the family dynamics. That’s scarier, just like realizing that God manipulated everything is much scarier than the alternative. “God abandoned us” was indeed a better option, and “John left us alone” was a better option. But neither was true, and the characters faced the implications of the cosmic level, but never got to face the implication of the familial level, because the narrative always danced around it and then Dabb’s apologist version “won”.

But what’s been put in the show is still there. The narrative of John’s abuse is still there. Nothing can take it out of the story.

#my spn thoughts #spn meta #dean and john #dean and sam and john #dean and chuck #dean and god #spn 11x20 #spn 11x21 #spn 14x20 #spn 12x22 #et alii #spn #long post

[canary3d-obsessed]

Restless Rewatch: The Untamed, Episode 25, part one

(Masterpost) (Other Canary Stuff)

Warning: Spoilers for All 50 Episodes!

Holy crap, Episode 25! We’re halfway through! *Cue Bon Jovi*

Hunt Invitation

After taking a nice long break to watch Word of Honor pick lotus pods, Wei Wuxian and Jiang Yanli return to stressing over the shitshow that is the post-Sunshot cultivation world. Jin Zixuan has come to invite them to the Phoenix Mountain Hunt, with a special invitation from his mother to Jiang Yanli. Jiang Cheng reacts to this in a mature and reasonable manner, while Wei Wuxian...doesn't.

On the surface, Jiang Cheng has matured in recent months; much more than Wei Wuxian, with his secret burdens, has. But it's only on the surface, as we'll see later in the episode, when Jiang Cheng's insecurity will take the reins.

Jin Zixuan is adorably pleased by Jiang Yanli's acceptance of the invitation. Wei Wuxian is less pleased, but sort of tries to suck it up. 

Jin Zixuan kind of undercuts the romance of his errand by asking Wei Wuxian for the Yin tiger amulet as soon as Jiang Yanli is out of earshot. 

As always, Jin Zixuan makes an impression by being the best Jin currently in existence, but the Jins are terrible. JZX is working to advance his dad's ambitions, and as such he is currently Wei Wuxian's enemy.  

(more after the cut)

Opening Ceremonies

There's a bunch of cultivators arranged for the opening ceremony. Later someone will say that this is more than 5 thousand people. Ok, sure.

As I've said before, it's best to think of it like a theatre production and assume the other 4,900 people are offstage or, you know, painted on the backdrop.  

The young lead cultivators from the four main clans are standing together. Nie Huaisang is trying out some new body armor.

The clan leaders are seated up on the stage, along with Jin Furen and Jiang Yanli. Unfortunately Jin Furen doesn't seem to have a personal name that I can discover. Her title Fūrén ( 夫人)  means she's the primary wife of the head of the family, according to this excellent meta. 

So “Madame Jin” is a decent translation...if you're French?  I feel like instead of English subtitles including borrowed words from French (”Marquis” in NIH), Greek (”Water of Lethe” in WOH), and other European languages, we could try borrowing Chinese words instead. Jin Zixuan's mom is titled, not named, Jin Furen. Since we don’t know her actual name, I'll call her that and abbreviate it JFR.

Wei Wuxian's childishness continues at the opening of the hunt, as does Jiang Yanli's encouragement of his childishness. I know she's had a rough couple of years, and it's understandable to want to baby her little brother out of a sense of nostalgia. But it's not good for him, and she shouldn't do it; she should encourage him to be more mature, just as she does with Jiang Cheng.

War Crimes Contest

Jin Guangyao says they're going to have an archery competition, and they're going to liven it up by endangering some prisoners. These prisoners are Wens in Wen cultivator uniforms, meaning they're not the noncombatants that were being hunted down earlier. But they’re still helpless people in chains. 

There are three different reactions when the Wen prisoners are brought out.  All the Jins are pleased, or neutral. All of the Jiangs, including Wei Wuxian, are upset.

The Nies and the Lans, what we see of them, are a little shocked, but not obviously upset. Based on those reactions, it seems like this is a maneuver that in-world is considered shocking and cruel, but not necessarily unethical or immoral.  Shocking, cruel displays of power are pretty normal in this world; remember when Wen Chao lit a Lan cultivator on fire just to say hello, and nobody complained? 

This whole scenario, of course, has been designed to provoke Wei Wuxian. One major goal of this event, and the whole reason for wanting Wei Wuxian to come,  is to get the Yin Tiger amulet.  Making him lose his shit in front of 100 5000 cultivators is a good step toward compelling him to hand the amulet over.  

We see Jiang Cheng and Jiang Yanli both signaling Wei Wuxian to keep it together, and he takes a step back and tries to chill.  

Meanwhile, Jin Zixuan seems annoyed by all this, and goes to take a shot at it, making it clear from his demeanor that this is easy and JGY is making a show of nothing. 

He hovers in the air and makes a perfect shot, pleasing most of the crowd and impressing Jiang Yanli. 

Then his cousin Jin Zixun taunts the crowd, challenging anyone to do better.  This presents a bit of a problem for Wei Wuxian. For the sake of the Wen prisoners, Wei Wuxian should just take this taunting and let the contest end, if no-one else is willing to take a shot. But for the sake of the Jiang Clan’s status, and his continued control of the Yin Tiger amulet, he needs to put the Jins in their place.  

Every Day is Blindfold Day

This moral dilemma is resolved with an abrupt tonal shift, where the humanitarian concerns of all parties seem to vanish. Wei Wuxian flirts embarrassingly with Lan Wangji and then goes as far over the top in besting Jin Zixuan as it's possible to go.

The flirting hits differently, incidentally, when you edit Jiang Cheng's annoyed reaction out of it: 

Lan Wangji doesn't seem embarrassed by Wei Wuxian's request, despite it happening in front of 100 5000 of their fellow cultivators. He looks Wei Wuxian straight in the eye for longer than necessary before turning away; it’s not exactly stern disapproval. We’ll get very used to this look, in Wei Wuxian’s second life. 

Fortunately, Wei Wuxian carries a blindfold with him wherever he goes, (gifset here), and he is such a good cultivator he can hit 5 parallel targets simultaneously without even holding his bow straight or tightening the string.

(OP fixed the angle of the bow for this gif, which is why everyone is standing on a hill in the background).

Everyone is pleased by this shot except Jins Guangyao and Zixun; even the Jin cultivators are clapping, and Madame Jin is presumably this happy any time Jin Guangyao’s plans go wrong.

With that they start the hunt. Jin Zixun challenges Wei Wuxian to do the whole hunt blindfolded. Wei Wuxian agrees, but the censorship committee said no, apparently, so we don’t get to see that.

Flute Hunting

We do get to see Wei Wuxian luring monsters into his nets by being too sexy for his robe, too sexy for his robe, and playing the flute.  

We also get to see Jiang cultivators looking puzzled while random monster roars happen in the woods around them. We do not get to see any monsters, which is probably just as well.

Jiang Cheng is annoyed and concerned, muttering "I told you not to overdo it" which means he didn't, you know, tell Wei Wuxian NOT to do this, just not to do it quite so well. Jiang Cheng knows what Wei Wuxian’s abilities are and he is making use of him, as he should, but he doesn’t have the courage of his convictions. 

Tree Confession

Wei Wuxian sees Lan Wangji and starts to say hi, but then he has a desaturated flashback to Lan Xichen telling him to back off, so he stops himself.  But then Lan Wangji comes over to talk to him.

Lan Wangji starts off talking to him about his latest anti-resentment musical discoveries, and Wei Wuxian pushes back, even calling him Lan Wangji, but gently.  Wei Wuxian asks "who am I to you?" and Lan Wangji turns the question right back at him, then waits a looooooong time, eyes downcast, while Wei Wuxian thinks of a serious answer.

Wei Wuxian says "I used to treat you as my zhījǐ" --which, as we’ve discussed before, is variously translated soulmate, confidant, intimate friend--with a strong meaning of "the person who truly knows me." Lan Wangji says "I still am." Coming from Lan Wangji, who NEVER says how he feels about Wei Wuxian or about anything, really, this sounds a lot like a confession of love. 

It definitely takes the form, visually, of a love confession, as Lan Wangji speaks, then gazes at Wei Wuxian while he waits for a reply.  Wei Wuxian's reply is this:

I don't think Wei Wuxian is oblivious (I'm speaking strictly of CQL, not MZDS, as always with these posts; they are different works). I think he loves Lan Wangji back, and knows it. But Chenqing and everything it represents are between them.

Lan Wangji is quite literally NOT his zhījǐ any more, because he doesn't truly know Wei Wuxian right now. He loves him desperately, but he doesn't know about his core, and hasn't accepted his cultivation method.  So Wei Wuxian answers his confession by showing him Chenqing, effectively declining to accept his still-conditional love.

Snake Measuring

Next we get terrible hetero courtship in the form of Jin Zixuan finding snake discharge on the ground and talking to Jiang Yanli about comparative snake measuring. Seriously: that is the actual conversation that they are having.

Jin Zixuan boasts for a bit, and then awkwardly tries to ask Jiang Yanli on a date. When she turns him down he gets mad, because he's a typical heterosexual dude even though he's secretly a delightful person...very, very secretly. Jiang Yanli, for her part, can't string a fucking sentence together to save her life whenever he's around, so she's not helping their mutual understanding. 

Lan Wangji attempts to hold Wei Wuxian back from beating Jin Zixuan’s ass yet again, but eventually JYL wants to leave, JZX tells her to wait, and WWX intervenes. Why doesn't Jiang Yanli have a maid or Jiang cultivator with her while she's on a date, incidentally? These kids are confused about whether they're doing feudal patriarchy or whether they're doing modern social life.

Jin vs. Jiang

Wei Wuxian jumps in between Jiang Yanli and Jin Zixuan, which JZX objects to. Jin Zixuan has no fucking business objecting and Wei Wuxian is 100% right, at this point. As soon as WWX shows up JZX should hand her off to her Shidi, bow, and leave her the fuck alone. Instead, he draws his sword on Wei Wuxian, and kind of on Jiang Yanli since she's right behind Wei Wuxian.  Fortunately, Lan Wangji blocks him. 

This instantly blows up into a Jiang-Jin Clan conflict, with Jiang Cheng unfortunately absent since he let his unmarried sister go off in the woods alone with the son of the Cultivaton world's most famous lecher. It looks like it’s a personal conflict, but since Jin Zixuan already told Wei Wuxian directly that Jin Guangshan wants his amulet, any arguments between them are part of a larger power struggle. 

Cousin Jin Zixun comes running up to start shit. Wei Wuxian pretends--I am SURE he's pretending--not to know who he is. The dude hassles Wei Wuxian every time he sees him; Wei Wuxian is a troll, and right now CJXZ is butting in to something that doesn't concern him. Rather than argue, Wei Wuxian insults him by telling him he’s not memorable.

Jin Furen shows up with several maids and cultivator dudes in tow, which is the proper way for a highborn woman to wander around in the woods. She also brings Clan Leader Yao, because if it's Wei Wuxian Blaming Hours, Yao is going to be there.  

I initially found the deep friendship between superhot Yi Zuyuan and dumpy Jin Furen implausible, but then I remembered that my lifelong bestie is a smokin' hot redhead with impeccable fashion sense, while I am a roly-poly nerd.  Friends don’t always match. Also, Jin Furen's actress, Hu Xiaoting, looks like this: 

...so she is actually hot in real life. Not as hot as Zhang Jingtong (who plays Yu Ziyuan) but literally nobody is as hot as Zhang Jingtong. Don't @ me, you know I'm right.

This is a heck of a long scene, so we’ll pick it up in part two! 

Soundtrack: Livin’ on a Prayer by Bon Jovi

Writing prompt: Newly-divorced, cold-hearted CEO Yu Ziyuan buys an apartment next door to newly-divorced, warm-hearted pastry chef ...uhh let's call her Jin Dàngāo (蛋糕), sure. She can name her business after herself. 

They discover their daughter & son are in the same college class, and so they meet up over coffee....several times...trying to matchmake their hopeless, hapless kids, while bonding over their own terrible (former) taste in husbands. Who will Cupid strike first, the kids or the moms?

#the untamed #the untamed gifs #wangxian #restless rewatch the untamed #canary3d-original #my gifs

[tolkien-feels]

I got Curufin, Turgon and Finarfin! And the only things I remember about them are "Finarfin is the younger sibling and also the one whose name I use to explain how all elves are called them same" and "I think Curufin had a knife??? I have no idea why, but it feels like he had a knife."

(Sorry, I'm just more interested in the Hobbits than in the Elves xD)

You're 100% correct!! Good job given there's like a thousand characters, it took me a couple of readings before I could keep even the major ones straight in my head.

So, Curufin is the favorite son of Feanor (who makes the Silmarils and probably the Palantiri) and the father of Celebrimbor (who makes the Rings of Power and the Doors of Durin.) He does own a knife, Angrist, which is stolen from him. He's arguably a minor villain in the Silmarillion? Extremely smart and eloquent but even in a book about war criminals he stands out for being pretty cruel. (But I love him so much 🥺)

Turgon is veeeery briefly High King of the Noldor elves, but he's more famous for being king of Gondolin, which is a hidden city that's A Huge Deal in the story. It's the last kingdom of the Noldor elves to be destroyed. Turgon himself spends his while storyline trying to keep away from drama but he's part of the world's most dramatic family so drama keeps finding him.

Finarfin is Galadriel's dad! Known for remaining faithful to the gods (when a lot of people, including Galadriel, rebel against them) and also for helping lead the war which takes down Sauron's boss. Certified cinnamon roll, would just like people to stop attacking each other for stupid reasons. I also got Finarfin when I took the quiz!

Overall: you have so many braincells, you should donate some to less fortunate people. You're also probably on the quieter side, not because you're shy but again, because you have braincells. I also wanna say you stay on track with your goals, but that's debatable.

#ask game

[saby-chan]

Fire Lord Ozai: A blood thirsty monster or the less fortunate “Zuko” of his generation?

Hello again and thank you as always for clicking and allotting some of your time to read my humble post! Since I’ve happened to notice quite an increase in posts lately regarding the controversial character and nature of the former Fire Lord, the now imprisoned fallen prince Ozai, and I’ve personally promised in my previous post that I will share my own analysis on him if people asked me to do so (which actually happened), I am here to deliver my own take on this very intriguing man’s character, while also building a potential past for him based on stuff gathered from the show’s cannon.

I would like to start this essay with what I find to be my favorite quote ever: ”Monster’s aren’t born, they are created.” ~ Naruto Uzumaki (Naruto) What I like about this quote soo much and find very inspirational is the truth it holds within its short, yet powerful message. We are often fast to judge a “book by the cover”, to reduce others to what we assume of them by their appearance or latest actions that we’ve seen them do, but never actually take a moment and wonder where they come from, if this person we soo harshly look down upon really has been this way since their very beginning?

I’ve come across many comments on social media related to ATLA, especially on YouTube videos on which people would throw with harsh comments such as “Aang being a coward for choosing to spare the villain just because they saw a dumb baby pic of them” or “Ozai is the essence of evil and even as a baby he’d been a monster”. I can’t help but wonder who hurt these people to make them be so cruel? Like, how messed up must you actually be to say that a baby, a friggin baby, is the embodiment of all evils? Or that a child was a coward for choosing to see his opponent’s last bits of humanity and opted to spare them?

Aang was soo morally conflicted about the idea of killing Ozai not only because it contradicted the morals of his people, but because he himself understood that this man hadn’t always been the cruel beast he came to met in their first and final showdown. It’s important to note here the fact that upon finding that picture, Aang was actually convinced it had to be Zuko as a baby since it looked so innocent and cute and was actually surprised to learn it was Zuko’s father. And that’s the thing, Ozai was born like us all as an innocent and sweet baby. Babies aren’t in any way evil or twisted, they don’t even have the notion of ‘good’ and ‘evil’ defined in their small, still developing minds. In fact, the very choice of the creators to add this picture in the show is meant to tell us this very thing: this man wasn’t always like this. But if he wasn’t always like this, then what happened to make him become this way?

Well, in order to find out the reason, we must go back in time to the very beginning: Ozai’s childhood and upbringing. For this next part I am going to solely focus on the show cannon, as the comics aren’t the products of BryKe and have a lot of inconsistencies to the source’s cannon (you can go and read my other post on why they fail when it comes to Zuko’s character and his family).

 From what we know and can easily deduce by ourselves just from their appearances, Ozai and his brother Iroh have a huge age gap between them (somewhere between 10 and 15 years). This has to be our first red flag: isn’t it soo odd that this family opted to have their children at such a long distance between pregnancies? It almost feels as if Ozai hadn’t actually been part of his father’s actual family planning... In other words, he was a ‘mistake’ child (I actually hate having to use this terminology, but it will become relevant to when we expand on Azulon’s relationship with his sons). Sure, some may argue that Azulon actually decided to have two sons in case something were to happen to his first born, but wouldn’t it have been more logical to have his second born at 2-3 years max distance from his first? Why choose to have your second child when you are much older and thus risk having a baby with issues, if your sole purpose of this child is to serve as an insurance that you don’t ‘run out’ of heirs? It just doesn’t make much sense, so let’s go for the moment with the possibility that Ozai was an unplanned pregnancy.

This perspective actually gives way to another very interesting aspect: remember the infamous “Born lucky...Lucky to be born” quote? What if I tell you that there is a possibility that this quote wasn’t Ozai’s personal wicked invention, but actually something he himself heard from his very own father? It had been puzzling me for a long time why he choose to say “You were lucky to be born” to Zuko, which implies that Zuko wasn’t supposed to exist. I mean, it’s soo odd that Ozai went with something implying that Zuko was an unplanned pregnancy, since Zuko was the first born. So my theory is that maybe Ozai wanted to convey a different message to Zuko when he said that quote, but due to his anger he ended up replicating the same line he received from Azulon at some point in his childhood. We never got the exact flashback when the line was delivered from Ozai to Zuko, so we don’t have the exact context that lead to it (remember, we are excluding Yang’s take on the matter from the comics).

I mean, this feels like something that wicked old Azulon would have said to his least favorite child. Okay, so let’s go with the scenario that Ozai was an unwanted child, to which we could also add the possibility that Ilah’s health deteriorated after the first birth, which makes plausible the family’s initial decision of stopping at 1 kid.

Moving on, we know from the old ATLA character wiki’s that Ozai’s character design was made with Zuko in mind, being meant to be a grown up version of Zuzu, without the scar. An interesting choice indeed and even Iroh’s letter to Zuko on Ozai from one of the ATLA books describes Ozzy in a similar way to teenage Zuko in book 1: stubborn, feisty, determined and with a volcanic personality (easy to anger and competitive), so it means that these were intentional choices to imply that Zuko and his father are more similar than we were led to believe at first glance. Maybe Ozai was the “Zuko” of his generation. Also, in one of the interviews on the royal family, BryKe stated that Ozai worked very hard to get where he is in book 3, referring to his firebending specifically (we all know how Ozzy got the throne, so clearly, he didn’t “work hard” for that), so maybe he wasn’t always the strongest man alive, with the most exceptional firebending skills out there, like Azula who showed ease in her learning, but rather someone closer to Zuko’s weaker performance as a child, building his way to success through endless hard work until he became the prodigy we know today.

Continuing with our theoretical scenario, after his birth, the second child show’s lesser skills compared to his brother Iroh (by that I don’t mean that he wasn’t gifted at all, but that maybe Ozai wasn’t as fast and great of a learner like his big bro), so Azulon opts to just ignore him and continue focusing solely on his golden child. In my headcannon I actually think that Ilah survived the birth and so she was left in charge of the younger child’s education and upbringing. At this point Iroh is already 10 or older, so he is forced to focus on his development, which prevents him from spending time with his lil brother, but just for the sake of being positive, let’s assume that Ozai still had both his mother and his big brother to keep him sheltered from Azulon’s darkness for a small portion of his childhood.

I choose to believe that Ozai had his mother’s love for a small bit of his childhood due to his willingness in the show to allow Ursa (who mind you, as the granddaughter of Roku was considered a treacherous individual) to spend a ton of time with both Zuko and Azula and share her philosophy with the children, as seeing his wife playing with their children probably reminded him of his own bitter-sweet memories he had with Ilah. They also probably spent a lot of their time near the turtle-duck pond since that pond’s existence prolly dates long before Ozai and Ursa married and had their own children.

Unfortunately, Ilah dies and little Ozai remains all alone, to be influenced negatively by his father (and even by his grandpa Sozin, we don’t really know for certain when the old man died, so he prolly was there for a short time when Ozzy was still a child). Azulon most likely blames Ozai for his wife’s death as the second birth might’ve really had a huge toll on Ilah’s already fragile body, bringing her closer to death, so he still neglects and ignores the child, if not straight out bullies and abuses him for not being on par with Iroh. This prolly leads to Ozai becoming jealous of his brother since Iroh has their father’s love, pushing them further apart. I headcannon that this jealousy between the siblings led to Ozai complaining to his dad when he finally had too much of their father’s discrimination (at a similar age to when Zuko prolly did and got the infamous line, if not younger) only to get the “Iroh was born lucky, you were lucky to be born!” line with the sole purpose of hurting him since now the child knows that he was never wanted.

When Azulon scolds very furiously adult Ozai in Zuko’s memories for daring to ask to be named crown prince, he literally says something like “What, you dare ask me to betray MY own son?!” (this is like red flag number two), line that pretty much testifies how Azulon chose to pretty much treat Ozai as if he wasn’t his son too, showcasing how much he despised his second born and favored the first child over him. Since we are on the topic of their last conversation, the punishment Azulon gave to his son alone proves this man’s level of sadism, which leads me to be believe that Ozai’s childhood was full of this type of punishments for bad behaviors that could be easily corrected trough a long serious lecture or a lesser punishment focused more on teaching him an actual lesson. 

The old wikis also mention on the page about the hall with portraits of the previous Fire Lords that it was the place where Ozai chose to spend most of his time in his youth, seeking advice from his ancestors. I mean, seriously now, if he had a good and supportive father and a present brother in his life, would Ozai had chosen to seek guidance from the dead instead of his living family? That piece of information that was easily overlooked by many proves how lonely this man was in his youth.

So for the most part of his life, Ozai grew up under the toxic influence and abuse of his tyrant father who refused to acknowledge him. Yet he managed to grow up still full of determination to one day prove his worth to Azulon and gain his acceptance (just like we saw with Zuko in book 1, who was desperate to regain his honor and be accepted by his father). But unfortunately, no matter how strong he became or how good of a firebender he was, Azulon was unmoved and unphased by his second son’s performance.

From what we could gather from the little info we received in the show, it seems that Ozai was never sent to the battle field to aid his older brother, being kept as a stay home prince, with the only occasion he actually left home being to search for the Avatar (I don’t think Iroh was sent to do his part on searching the Avatar since he strongly believed that there wasn’t going to ever be one, so it’s safe to assume Azulon assigned Ozai with this mission just to get rid of him for a few years) and the only purpose he ever served to his father was to become part of the old man’s genetics experiment in order to create strong unparalleled firebending offspring (which I am pretty sure were meant to be ‘biological war machines’ used by Azulon in the war, as he didn’t really seem to give a shit about Ozai’s children compared to Lu Ten). So just imagine the level of disappointment and dishonor Ozai must’ve felt as a man and young aspiring soldier to find out that he was going to be used like a ‘non-bending daughter’ in a strategical marriage and never get to serve his country in what he’d been taught was the greatest and most important war for their Nation.

All in all, this marriage didn’t really end up that badly because it seems he and Ursa were actually very compatible. The old wiki for Ursa states that she was a noble woman and the perfect match for Ozai, which leads me to believe that show Ursa was intended to be a very strong willed and determined woman who earned his respect. The show never stated that Ozai never wanted his first born or that he was disappointed with Zuko from birth like the comics say, so it’s safe to assume that Ursa and Ozai actually ended up falling in love at some point since they had not one, but two kids with relatively a short time in between pregnancies. 

There are actually many signs in the show that actually prove that these two loved each other and Ozai didn’t abuse his wife: from the fact that they went every year to see Ursa’s favorite play despite Ozai hating the poor performance of the Ember Island Players (I mean, what man would do such a sacrifice as to endure the same torture every single year just to make his wife happy if he never loved her?), Ursa’s undeniable and sincere love for their children (in the show it was never stated that Ursa saw Zuko and Azula as someone else’s children, so if she were indeed an abused woman who was forced to have these children, she wouldn’t have ever loved them to such an extent, especially Zuko who resembled his father the most physically), the fact that Ursa had equal rights in their marriage and raising of their children (her even scolding and grounding Ozai’s favorite child without hesitation), to the most significant scene to the Urzai ship in Zuko’s flashbacks: Ozai sitting troubled all alone in Ursa’s favorite spot by the pond, in a sad and brooding atmosphere, after he lost her, instead of celebrating what had to be the happiest day of his life since he was finally crowned Fire Lord (it’s clear who had more importance in his heart: Ursa meant more to him than the throne, so losing her outshined his achievement). In fact, Ursa must’ve been the only thing that still kept him outside of the darkness that threatened to swallow his heart and once he lost her, Ozai had nothing else to keep him on the right path.

And even as a father, it seems that Ozai wasn’t always cold and distant to his children, as his true self depicted in Zuko’s memories on Ember Island shows him caring for both of his children, even holding Zuko close to him with a protective arm on the boy’s shoulder. Except the Agni Kai, there don’t seem to be any instances in which he was physically violent towards his son before the banishment (Iroh literally let Zuko in to join that faithful war meeting willingly. Would’ve he done that if he knew his brother to be very violent towards his children in case they disobeyed? If yes, then it would make Iroh actually very questionable on a moral standpoint) and even on an emotional level, I don’t really think that he was actually abusive to him (at least while Ursa was there) because from Zuko’s conversation with Zhao, he’s adamant that his father will take him back and even states "You don't know how my father feels about me. You don't know anything!", meaning that the father he used to know showed him a level of respect and genuine affection (if Ozai were to bully Zuko since the boy’s very early childhood, do you think this kid would grow up to be so sure that his father wants him around and would he defend this bully when someone badmouths them in front of him?).

Even with Azula, despite people demonizing her from early childhood and saying that she was manipulated since birth by Ozai to become a war machine, I do believe that she shows genuine love and affection towards her father. I do choose to believe that back in the good times when the family was happy, Ozai spent quality time with his daughter, filling in the gap left by Ursa’s neglect. I theorize that the reason why kid Azula badmouthed her grandpa and uncle was because she was being very protective of her father: since she used to like spying and eavesdropping, it’s safe to assume that she prolly witnessed many instances in which the old man bullied or insulted Ozai, favoring Iroh over him. It’s a bit harder to see it that way since her snarky comments involve dark topics, but since they live in a society governed by power and war, I see them as something similar to if Azula would’ve said “Uncle sucks and he will surely be fired from his job!” or “Grandpa is old and weak, he should leave the family business to dad!”. Even the fact that the only thing capable of shattering her to pieces was her father leaving her proves how much she cared for him. Ty Lee and Mai’s betrayal was a big blow on Azula’s control and sanity, but she didn’t breakdown until Ozai discarded her after his coronation as Phoenix King. There’s nothing more painful in this world than to be left behind by the person you loved the most and was there by your side your whole life, whom you wanted to follow to world’s end and back. That was the moment Azula finally realized that the father she used to know and love was actually gone and had been in fact, long gone for years at this point.

But if Ozai cared for his family what made him change? Easy, it all comes back to the fact that his father never acknowledged him. The throne doesn’t seem to be his ultimate goal in life since Ozai discarded of the Fire Lord title very easily, tossing it to Azula without any remorse or hesitation. It was more about the meaning behind getting the crown: replacing Iroh in the line of succession was the ultimate proof of his father’s acceptance, that he wasn’t only a “mistake” and “failure” in his father’s eyes, but since Azulon ended up saying and doing what he did, backfired Ozai and made him understand that no matter how hard he tried, the old man will never see him for what he is. So yeah, for a proud man like Ozai this was a hard defeat to swallow, which in turn sparked his strong desire of winning the war and becoming the king of the world: if Azulon wouldn’t accept him even in death, then Ozai will prove to the whole world that he was above his father and his “perfect” brother by accomplishing what they never could and even better and no one was going to stop him, not even his own family.

This is what differentiates Ozai from Zuko: while both had similar upbringings, Ozai never broke away from his obsession of gaining his father’s admiration, allowing himself to fall prey to the darkness left by Azulon in his heart and abandon his true self, only to become the copy of his abuser, while Zuko stood up to his dad and chose his own destiny. If Aang were to come back around 20 or 30 years earlier, then he might’ve actually been able to save Ozai just like he saved Zuko, but unfortunately it wasn’t this way.

Do I think that Ozai could still be saved and redeemed even after the events of book 3? Definitely! Since he’s actually a broken man and still has a tiny bit of humanity left within, I think he still has a chance to change his heart. The only thing is that it’d be a long lasting process: first off he needs to spend a long time in solitude and reflect on his life’s choices and his past, understand where he went wrong and that what happened to him in his childhood is called abuse, which he ended up replicating on his own children. After he understands his wrongdoings and becomes willing to rediscover his true self, he needs to understand the truth about the war, that everything he’d known was fake propaganda and that there was nothing glorious in what he, his father and Sozin did under the excuse of “sharing their Nation’s greatness with the rest of the world!”. But most importantly of all, the only remedy that could possibly save him is love. It sound cliche, but by responding to hatred with more hate like Zuko did in the comics would never change the world “for the better” or bring it “to reality”. The only way to save both Azula and Ozai would be trough showing them the power of love, hope and empathy, how they don’t have to struggle alone and push everyone away. And especially by redeeming Azula, she would be a very important piece in Ozai’s redemption: since he had a closer parent-child relationship with Azula and cared for her the most when he did care, realizing how much he made her suffer through his actions, that would probably break Ozai enough to make him admit that he was wrong all along.

So yeah, this is my analysis on Ozai’s character using the cannon information from the show and old wikis and why I think he is just the product of a very bad environment and an abusive parent who never showed him love (if there’s a reason for why Ozai might be uncapable of showing a healthy parental love to his children is because you can’t show what you’ve never learnt yourself), being the Zuko of his generation who never got to experience the positive influence of an “Uncle Iroh” to guide him on the right path. 

You can agree with me or not on this one, but this is what I choose to believe. Maybe I am way too good by choosing to see any potential good in anyone, but I feel it’s a better way than to counter hate with more hate like Yang did in his monstrous portrayal of Ozai in The Search.

Let me know your thoughts in the comments and if you agree with anything I’ve said, feel free to leave a like and to reblog this post.

See you next time and stay safe! Bye-Bye!

Saby out.

#atla #atla rant #avatar the last airbender #ozai #azulon #ursa #zuko #azula

[beyscape]

Secrets - 2

Ransom Drysdale x Reader

Summary: You hid your pregnancy form your ex-boyfriend, Ransom, and managed to keep your secret hidden for six years. What you didn’t know was, how secrets have a way of revealing themselves.

Word Count: 3564

Warnings: just some swearing

A/N: I really just used this chapter as an excuse to rewatch Knives Out huh

Part 1   Part 2    Part 3

Your “little” secret, the one you had tried your very best to keep hidden, was out. There was no running away now, no amount of lying would save you out of the confrontation that was headed your way. And believe me, you had tried to come up with something, fabricate a lie that would give you enough time to pack up and leave with your little girl. You cursed yourself for believing the bullshit of hiding in plain sight. The only lie you had come up with was maybe tell Ransom you cheated on him, but there was no way he would believe that after you nearly had a full breakdown upon running into him. That, and of course the little matter of Mary looking near identical to Ransom.

  You paced back and forth all around the living room, careful as to not step on any of the toys scattered around. Or the damn Legos. Your eyes drifted towards the clock on the wall, obsessively checking the time every few minutes. Knowing the whole ordeal wouldn’t be okay for a little child to witness, you had remembered to text Ransom to meet some time after ten, when Mary was safely tucked away in her bed. You just prayed he would be able to keep his voice down enough for her to stay that way, but you were that most likely wouldn’t be the case with Ransom. After all, he had a flair for the dramatic. The sound of a car door snapped you out of trance, you ran to open the door before he had a chance to ring the bell.

  Throwing open the door with your heart just about beating in your throat, you saw him. He looked the same more or less, aside from the slight creases you spotted forming on his forehead. He still was the man you once had loved despite everything and everyone. Loved, as in past tense. Because you totally were over him and had been for a while now. You had more important things to consider, a daughter to think of. You were a fool for falling in love with Ransom Drysdale, but those days were gone. You gestured for him to come in, unable to meet his eyes properly.

  He looked around the living room, it was small by his standards of being raised in fortune. His gaze drifting from the toys all around to the pictures on the walls, there were plenty of Mary’s baby photos that Ransom remained focused for a full minute. You exhaled slowly, the bundle of nerves knotting in the pit of your stomach. He finally looked at you. You raised a hand.

“Before we begin this… discussion, Mary’s sleeping upstairs so I’m asking you to keep your voice down.” You sat on the loveseat, motioning for him to take the armchair across you. Ransom’s eyes flicked towards the stairs for a split second. He sat down, not even bothering to take off his coat.

  “I can’t believe you.” The words came out of his mouth slowly, accusingly. Maybe you deserved it.

  “I’m sorry.”

  “You can’t just say you’re sorry. How could you hide this from me? I get why you hate me and I don’t care but how could you keep my daughter away from me, all these years? What if I hadn’t decided to stop at a random grocery store, then what? Were you ever planning to tell me?” Ransom spitted out, a kind of fire that you never saw before flicked in his eyes. You were too familiar with angry Ransom, but not this one. Not like this.

  “Ransom, I don’t hate you but you have to understand, you’re not exactly cut out to be a father. And we didn’t exactly part on good terms. I wasn’t about to put my child through that.” You felt bad, for not allowing Mary to meet her dad, for not allowing Ransom to bond with his daughter, but at the end f the day you had made a decision. You had made your bed, now might as well lie in it.

  A dark chuckle escaped his lips. “You don’t know that.” You noted the slight falter of his voice. “Just because my parents fucked me up doesn’t mean that I would be a bad father. Hell, Y/N, you never even gave me the option.” He shook his head, his disheveled hair swaying along.

“I’m sorry.”

“Stop saying that.”

You opened your mouth to apologize again almost instinctively, but stopped. Straining your ears, you recognized the familiar pitter patter of a pair of small feet coming down the stairs. Mary stood on the last step of the stairs; her bunny clutched between her arms. She looked between you and Ransom through her long lashes, yet another thing she inherited from her dad. Ransom shot to his feet.

“Hey honey, what’s wrong? Let’s get you tucked back in.” You rose form where you sat and headed towards the little figure after sending Ransom a warning look. It would have to wait.

 You picked up Mary with no protest on her part, the mop of tangled blonde hair resting against your shoulder as you carried her upstairs. You saw Ransom follow you quietly from the corner of your eye, his thin coat now left discarded on the couch. Entering the small room that matched the state of the living room with the toy situation, you turned on the nightlamp, casting soft purple hues on your faces. Mary was already practically asleep as you gently placed her down, pulling the covers over her small frame. You placed a small kiss on her forehead.

 Ransom watched this whole scene unfold in front of him from the doorway as he leaned on it, eyebrows furrowed ever so slightly. There was this weird sensation, this warmth in his chest that sent every part of his mind into a confused and slightly panicked state. He had never in a million years thought he would have a child, let alone feel whatever he was feeling towards that child. In a way, he knew you were right. He wasn’t made for being a father, and he originally had no desire of ever staring a family when the one he grew up in was such a hot mess. But now, this child had appeared out of pure luck in his life and he felt a tug towards her. To give her what he never got from his parents.

 If someone had told Ransom the feelings he would have as he watched the woman he loved tuck in their daughter, he would have told them to fuck off. That it wasn’t funny. Indeed, it wasn’t, Ransom couldn’t even make fun of this dumbfounded state he was in.

After you were sure Mary was completely asleep, you got up as slowly as you could to not disturb her. Ransom followed you back to the living room. You took your previous positions, the tense air almost giving you a headache.

 “I’m in.” He spoke after a while, breaking the silence with soft words. His blue eyes rose to yours.

 You shook your head. “You don’t know what you’re doing.”

 “I-”

  “No, listen to me,” you cut off, “this isn’t something you just get to decide on a whim. This is an actual human child, who has feelings and all, not some toy that piques your interest. Once you are in you’re in for life. No take backs.” You whisper-shouted, not trusting that Ransom was aware of all the responsibility parenthood brings.

 “You listen to me.” He pointed a finger at you. “It was you who broke up with me, and it was you who couldn’t even be bothered with a call to let me know you were pregnant with our child, Y/N. I fucking know that there are no take backs. But you should have given me the choice of whether I wanted to be a father or not.” He sighed, rubbing his temples. “I would have been in from the very start.”

 You leaned back, his words hitting you like a ton of bricks. “Didn’t seem like you cared much about me,  you were seen with that model barely two weeks after we broke up.” You shot back weakly, the hurt feelings of that time washing over you.

 He clicked his tongue, annoyed. “Believe it or not, nothing happened with her. It was just a show. I have a reputation, dear Y/N.” A cruel smirk appeared on his face for a quick second before disappearing. “In fact, nothing happened with anyone since you dumped me. Sure, sex here and there but,” he shrugged, “I cared.” Ransom tried his best to act nonchalant, to keep up his image, but couldn’t help the words that slipped out. He was surprised at himself, how easily he was talking about his feelings, but a distant part of him still remembered how simple it was for him to talk to you.

Doubt still lingered in your eyes, finding it hard to believe his words. Ransom always had a way with words. This was the man who never even could bring himself to utter the words ‘I love you’ and yet here he was, talking about how he cared and all. You shook your head.

“Now I know you had my number, you could have called if you cared.”

“Seriously, Y/N?” I’m sorry for honoring your wish of,” he mused, tapping his chin in mock thought, “what was it? Ah yes, never wanting to see my jerk face again.” His lips smiled but his eyes remained cold as ice.

 “Ransom.” You pleaded, the heartbreak from over six years ago felt as if it was just yesterday, you felt your chest tighten. He watched your face intently.

“You wanna know I never called? Or tried to get back together?” He got up, pacing along the room. “Fuck, Y/N, I’m not stupid. I always knew you deserved much better than me. It didn’t matter how I felt or whether I missed you or not, I knew you would be better off.” He stopped in front of the biggest picture on the wall. It was a picture taken on Mary’s first birthday, showed her trying to blow off the candles while you held her on your lap, smiles on everyone in the picture. His jaw tightened.

He tilted his head. “Now you know.” He muttered, quiet. Almost… sad.

“Can you, from the bottom of your heart, promise me? That you’ll be here.” The lump formed in your throat made it hard to get the words out, you couldn’t believe this was happening. In the hours you spent pacing and imagining how the conversation would go, this turn of events was the last thing you thought was possible. You thought you knew Ransom, you probably knew him the best, but you couldn’t recognize the man standing just a few feet in front of you, his eyes still fixed on the frame.

“I know I was a dick and hell, I still am. But,” he finally looked at you, “I promise. I promise to be here and do my damn best for Mary… and for you.” His voice trembled ever so slightly, never could you remember seeing Ransom like this. Not once in those two years you knew him. You stood up; shoulders slumped and tears prickling your eyes, threating to spill at any moment. You stopped barely a step before him.

Neither of you dared to move as you stared into each other’s eyes, a silent conversation taking place and making up for the lost years. You never realized how much you had missed him. You reached up to stroke his face, your fingers aching to touch him, to feel him. Your fingertips glided over his clean-shaven jaw; Ransom closed his eyes at your touch. You gulped, dropping your hand to rest on his chest, not daring to do more. His hand came to rest above yours, his thumb gently rubbing the back of your hand.

“I’m here, Y/N. I swear.” His words heavy on his whispering lips, he gently tilted your face to meet your eyes. He chuckled softly upon seeing the tears welling up in your eyes. “Why the tears?”

“Shut up.” You sniffled. “I… I wanted to tell you Ransom. But I wasn’t sure if— if you’d want this. Or if you would end up hating me more. And honestly, I wasn’t sure if I could handle that.”

“I understand.”

“And with your family too, even the thought of dealing with them just gives me a headache. Though I guess it’s unavoidable now.”

He groaned, a deep sound of annoyance from the back of his throat. “Those people can eat shit, they’re not coming remotely close to Mary.”

“Your mom wouldn’t be happy if you didn’t tell her. Or Harlan.” You mused; he knew you were right. He still hated the thought.

“Let’s not think about them right now.” You were suddenly too aware of the closeness, of the placement of his hands, the familiar touch sending tingles down your spine.

“Yeah? What should we think of then?”

He just gave you a look before leaning in and kissing you. Maybe thousands of times he had kissed you before, you would think you would be used to it by now, yet it felt so new, so unfamiliar due to the time apart. Your heart leapt out of your chest, beating wildly, your whole body cursing you for not reaching out sooner. The feelings you had done your best to tame snapped out of their cages at that moment, never to be trapped again. You deepened the kiss, wrapping your arms around his neck.

“I missed you, angel.” He pulled back; his words barely audible.

“We have a lot to talk about, Ransom.” You met his gaze, reluctant. You lead him by the hand towards the loveseat. You both sat, holding each other close, not ready to let go yet.

“First, there is the matter of introducing you to Mary. Properly, I mean.” You sighed.

“Has she ever asked about me?”

You bit your lip at the memory. “Once. A couple of months ago, we were watching some Disney movie when she asked me why she didn’t have dad. I just told her you were away. She never asked again.” You remembered the shake of your hands when Mary asked you that question, looking at you with wide blue eyes. You remembered the whirl of your mind as you quickly tried to figure out what to say. You remembered sobbing quietly into your pillow when Mary was finally asleep that night.

You looked at Ransom. “It was so, so hard.”

“If you had only told me.”

“I know.” Your eyes fell on one of the dolls laying on the floor. “Should we talk to a therapist?”

Ransom scoffed. You rolled your eyes at him. “I’m just wondering out loud. No need for the attitude.”

“I should just meet her. I don’t know, play with her. I wanna get to know her, Y/N.”

“She’s a great kid. She’s… a lot like you, and not just the looks. Wicked smart, and has the sweetest heart. Her current favorite animal is bunnies, she is very excited to start school next semester and she will talk about that for hours.” You laughed. “She hates carrots, and is allergic to strawberries. You can pretty much bribe her to do anything with chocolate chip cookies. You’ll love her.”

“I already love her. She’s my kid.” A genuine grin spread on his handsome face.

You talked for hours on that couch, with mostly you doing the talking. Ransom wanted to know everything he could, from her first words to her entire list of likes and disliked. Your heart swelled at his interest and the way he kept asking you questions.

It was a little after the clock struck one and a million yawns from you, Ransom got up.

“You should sleep.” He grabbed his coat.

“Would you… like to stay over?” You pressed your lips together.

Ransom smirked. “Day one and you’re already trying to get me into your bed? Wow, Y/N.”

“Not like that,” you huffed, “we don’t have a guestroom but the couch’s pretty comfortable.”

He flashed you a smile. “Where are the sheets?”

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

 After a night filled with tossing and turning brought by the fact that Ransom freaking Drysdale was sleeping on your couch downstairs, you opened your eyes to the sun filtering through your window. It wasn’t the sun, however, that woke you from your dreamless sleep, it was the smell. You followed it down and into the kitchen, confused, and came to a halt at the scene in front of you.

 The cabinets were open, and the sweet smell was stronger, but the strangest thing bay far was how Ransom was standing in front of the stove.

“Are you cooking?” You rubbed your eyes, making sure you weren’t still asleep.

“Pancakes,” he showed you the box, “you said it’s Mary’s favourite breakfast.” Ransom flashed you a smile. “Cute PJs.”

“How come I never once saw you cook before? Fatherhood really changes a man.” He chuckled as he flipped the pancake. You could get used to this. Ransom turned to you to say something before his attention turned to a spot behind you, eyes slightly wide. You turned to look, and saw Mary to no surprise.

The little girl focused on Ransom, striding towards him with determination.

“Are you my dad?” She looked up to him, her words sending Ransom into a coughing fit.

“What? Mary, honey, what makes you say that?” You gulped, rushing to her side before kneeling down.

“He looks like me.” She shrugged at you and turned back to Ransom. “Are you?” her eyebrows raised; she crossed her arms. Ransom kneeled as well; every move uncertain. Nervous. He looked at you. You gave him a slight nod, might as well tell her.

“Yes.” He nodded. Mary squinted her eyes at him, before nodding back. Her serious face broke into a smile before she leapt forward, her small arms tightening around Ransom’s neck. He swayed back at the surprising force, his wide eyes snapping to yours. After a moment of shock, he hesitantly hugged her back, his hands ever so gentle on her back. Pulling yourself up, you moved towards the window, not wanting for either of them to see the tears in your eyes.

Six years, you had secretly let yourself imagine this exact moment. In those rare instances you allowed your mind to wander over the possible scenarios, one question would repeat in your mind. How would Mary react? Would she be distant, angry? Would she cry? Be disappointed? Hate you for not telling her sooner? Would she even want to meet her dad? You would agonize over these unanswered questions time and time, the whole thing feeling too far away sometimes. Yet here it was, right in front of you, all of your questions answered. The smell of burning snapped you out of the moment.

“Shi—shoot.” Ransom pulled back, mad at the pancake for breaking the moment. Mary gasped.

“Pancakes! I’ll go get Mr. Chuckles!” She darted out, leaving a bewildered Ransom behind. He turned to you.

“That went better than I thought.” He shook his head, swallowing, he was slightly ashamed of the tears in his eyes.

“Yeah,” you nodded, your voice quiet, your smile small.

Mary was back in a second, excitedly babbling about how much she loved pancakes and how waffles were a close second. Ransom flashed her a smile, his eyes twinkling with pride. You grabbed plates and set the table, stealing glances at Mary’s happy face and the identical look on Ransom’s. Your family.

“But daddy,” she turned to Ransom, whose heart skipped a beat at the word, “where were you?”

Your mouth fell open. “Honey—”

“I was away.” Ransom cut you. “But I’m here now, princess. And I swear I’m not going anywhere.” She grinned at his gentle but reassuring words, satisfied.

“Okay. Oh! You have to meet my toys!” She rose up, ready to take him up to her room and make sure he memories all the names of her toys.

“How about you finish your breakfast first?” You motioned at the untouched stack of pancakes sitting in front of her.

Rest of the breakfast was filled with Mary talking to Ransom between bites of pancakes, asking him a ton of questions and grinning. Ransom’s gaze never faltered away, he listened to all of her ramblings and answered every question. You watched the two of them, unsure whether to be amazed at Mary’s excitement or this shift in Ransom’s character. Where was the man who drove you up the walls? Where was the cocky, selfish jerk everyone knew him to be? He turned his gaze to you upon feeling you stare, winking you before turning back to your daughter.

All the baggage, all the worry you carried within you melted away, leaving no trace behind. For the first time in six years, you felt yourself completely relax.

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Sorry for any mistakes, I was super excited to post this so I might have missed some stuff. A thrid part might come if you guys are interested 👀

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CHRIS EVANS TAGLIST @marvelouspottering​ @kelbabyblue​

#ransom drysdale #ransom thrombey x reader #ransom drysdale x reader #ransom thrombey #ransom x reader #secrets #knives out #Chris Evans #chris evans x reader #chris evans imagine #ransom drysdale fanfiction #ransom drysdale imagine

[philza-fanwriter]

Harmful

This is originally posted on Wattpad <3 :) the ones that are in bold and italics are not said out loud. 

warnings: Techza(not related) and homophobia, common warnings

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"There was once an angel, born in the highest ranks of heaven. His family was part of the council, the lords that rule over 'earth' and the Heavens. He was next in line, and so, everyone wanted to be his friend. He was a ray of sunshine, and one that can lighten up the mood. 

But we all know that's just a bait for the humans to believe in the heavens. The heavens was a dark place, The angels that lived on earth even said it might as well be more cruel than the creatures that lurked the dark. Everyone lies and and manipulates one another. the one who does this the most is THE COUNCIL, the gods.

But the boy wanted to explore the earth. And so did he

__________________________________________________

It was fortunate, really. His caretakers had been called by his parents. It gave him time to devise a plan out of the little house that was hidden away from society. It wasn't his fault he wanted to go explore from this plain that he lived in for years. He was 16! He can explore wherever he wants.

It's not like he's explored every part of the heavens, Including the badlands. But you don't need to know that

He opened the door of his home, Flying up into the sky, His pure white wings flapped him up, His body feeling light, he dived down towards the 'Earth' The council created, and never payed attention to.

Oh how he missed the days when they could freely give the humans gifts from the heavens, but those days were over.

He dove down to the gates below the floating island, looking at the general that had a white smiley mask that was feared by all. But not the infamous blood god he oh so admired.

He hid behind the in the trees, wings tucked behind his back as the man was called away by one of the other generals. He glided down in front of the gate, silently cursing when he forgot about the keys. He took out an invisibility potion from his enderchest, Drinking it and flew to the great hall.

"----he disappeared---- ------where do you think he is-----" was all he could hear, but he didn't have the time to listen. He snuck up onto the general, and slowly took the keys from his pockets.

 Once he got the keys, He ran as fast as he could, as he jumbled with the keys in the air, people he vaguely saw from the great hall started chasing after him, and so he started to panic

. He flew into the forest and flew through the woods, losing them. He went to the gates again, trying out all the keys before getting the right one, Opening the gates, he breathed in deeply.

 The sound of ringing and the faint sound of voices in his ears..

He jumped 

He fell from the heavens, his wings flapping to control his descent, and he landed with the thud, onto a 'beach', He stood up and looked at his wings.

They were fading to grey 

He Thought his wings would fade to grey, tales from long ago talked about escapees who had grey wings, called 'devils'. But fallen angel honestly sounded better, but he disagreed with everything the adults say, this time no different.

He walked onward, people say he's still alive, roaming around with a person with a red bucket hat matching his, watching over a village who has lived peacefully for years"

 "But what's his name, Dad?" "Yeah! Also how do you know so much?" "Ah, alright. For your question Wilbur, They called him the angel of death, weird, yes. But no one knows his name, really." 

"Oh! That sounds so cool!" "Yes, I know. Now for you tommy.."

"Let's just say I have been in this village for a very long time"

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this is where the techza thing starts, turn back if you don’t want to read it <3

"DAD! CAN WE PLEASE HEAR ABOUT THE ANGEL AGAIN?" A small child ran up to the man with the bucket hat together with a boy who wore a yellow sweater.

"Please dad? We promise to help you with the chores! Also shush tommy" The other boy said.

"Hm, fine." The man sighed, putting the tea cup down onto the table, he ushered the children onto his lap, before finally starting.

"Now, you must remember the angel was like any other. He falls in love, like in those cheezy movies that we watched on movie night."

"Woah, really? Who was the lucky girl dad?" The man only chuckled at him. "What's so funny?"

"Ah. It's cause he fell in love with one of the gods his age, at least, that's what the village told me. He was called the blood god. He was a 'myth' made up by one of the prophets, Or so what they thought. He was said to be able to single handedly defeat an entire army, And the angel admired him."

"BUT WHY WOULD HE FALL IN LOVE WITH A KILLING MACHINE!?" The blonde screamed. The man covered his ears, giggling at the boy.

"Ah. Well no one ever knew. Some people thought they were soulmates, other thought it was he was very attractive. Either way, the angel already disappeared before the adults could ask about his attraction to the god." He ran away like a coward, the villagers chasing him, His children didn't need to know

"Ooh! Really? I'm so happy for him! But.. The church doesn't allow us to like boys cause it was 'not right' though.. so did they try to attack the angel for it?" The boy shuddered at the thought of the angel getting hurt.

"Hm, I'm getting old, So I'm not very sure. The memories aren't very nice. But they did start talking behind his back, but he still has many people who worship him"

The two  children huffed. It was similar to what happened with tubbo back at the orphanage, his parents just dropped him onto the orphanage because he was different from the rest of the other children.

" Ugh! They're so mean to the angel!" The blonde nodded his head. "Yeah Wilby! The angel never did anything wrong! He just likes boys, nothing's wrong with that!" Phil smiled at his two sons.

"Can i continue the story now, Wil and tom?" The two nodded.

"I'll tell you what people thinks the blood god looks like. Now, I'm sure you both know about hybrids, and about passive and aggressive ones, Hmm? He was said to be a piglin hybrid, Fierce and sharp with his words. He fluently dances with his blade, like an extension of his arm. His hair was a shade of pink, with a pig mask covering his face, and he had a gold crown sitting atop his head."

"Oh! Now i understand why he likes him! He probably looks so pretty." Tommy just shook his head at what wilbur said.

"Dumbass! The blood god is only for the angel! Get your head straight" Wilbur just smacks tommy's head (I like ya cut g-)

"People said he loved the angel too, Moments of soft touches under the moonlight between the god and the angel. But people called of the blood god, and so he had to leave his lover and the warmth of the angel." And the angel fucking broke, his tears reflected the moonlight as his lover never returned to see him

"That's sad! Did he ever return to him?"

"....Yes, he did. And they say that they lived far away, in a lake in a cottage, forever keeping the warm touches, and never left each other's sides." The angel continued to cry, as his lover continued to fight, never sending a letter to comfort him, Carnations wilting in a vase as bloodied feather littered the floor.

"THAT'S SO POGCHAMP OF HIM TO RETURN! THANK YOU DADZA WE WERE SO BORED!" Tommy exclaimed.

"Oh shut up tommy, Yeah true but don't need to scream!"

"YOU'RE SUCH A HYPOCRITE WILBY! YOU DON'T GET TO BOSS ME AROUND! ONLY DAD CAN!"

"Now now children, if you don't stop fighting I won't tell you anymore about the angel alright? Now come on and get off my lap, You're going to do the chores."

The two groaned at that and stood up to get the brooms.

"Hey wilby?" Wil looks over to tommy who's sweeping the floor. "Yes Tommy? Do ya need anything?"

Tommy looks down at the floor, pausing for a second before talking. "Do you think we'll meet the angel?" Wilbur chuckles at that. "Of course we will! I'm gonna work hard so I can get out of here and build my own place where people can live without those shit rules this place has." Tommy's eyes sparkle at that.

"Can i come too? Maybe we can find the angel there! But.. Where are you planning to make the country?" Wilbur grins even wider. "The Land of the Dream Smp! It's the perfect place for people who want to get away!" Tommy only agrees as they continue cleaning the house.

_____________________________________

A person was listening to their conversation, Eyes widening in horror, They turn back, a portal through time still open beside them. He was about to step in before..

" Ah, hello Karl Jacobs, How rude of you to spy on philza's children like that.. Hmm?"

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And Cut <3

Hope you enjoyed :)

Idk how to improve so Uhm-

#techza #angel of death #part 1 and 2 of the book #philza #techno #tommy #wilbur #tags suck ass #redza #philza minecraft #philza centric #karl #evil #manipulation #long lost love

[skylarmoon71]

AU Blind Murdock Reader x Leonardo (TMNT 2014/2016) Chapter 3

“Bitch!!” You grunted, avoiding another punch and firing one of your own.

Let’s just say your current assailant wasn’t too happy with you stopping his little side job. Human trafficking was apparently common for them. Evil bastards. With a swift kick, you knocked him right off his feet. His head hit the concrete harshly, and from the slow breaths, you could tell he was unconscious. You tried gathering your breath for a second, but more thugs were coming. Not a lot of time to rest, just react. You took a few punches, countered as much as you could. Even on your best nights, there was never a point where you left unscathed.

The lash that landed on your stomach brought you to your knees, and you gasped when the male kneed you in the jaw. You fell back, heaving slightly.

“You cost us a whole lot of money you little menace. Should have stayed in Hell’s Kitchen.” The man standing over you stomped on your ribs, and his friends gathered around, kicking you on either side. With clenched teeth, you blocked as much as you could until you could get a hold of him. Gripping his ankle, you twisted and he screamed. Now with them distracted, you jumped to your feet, tackling another male to the ground.

Not anticipating it, he tumbled, and you clocked him in the face immediately. A few more ruthless punches and he was out. You turned, hearing the last man behind you, yelling as he charged. You fully prepared to respond, but something was coming in his direction, quickly too. You skidded to the side, just hearing the metal collide with his head as he fell too.

“You just can’t stay out of trouble can you.”

That cocky voice, you knew that voice.

“I don’t know Raph, I think she helped us. Give her some credit.”

There was no doubt, it was them. One by one you could hear their feet hit the ground.

You raised to your feet shakily, wiping the blood from your lips. You could hear a bit of shuffle, they were tying up the men you’d knocked out.

“You can rest easy, the police will be here soon. You should probably get out of here before they come.” Leo spoke.

“Leonardo…” so a part of your mind was still trying to wrap your head around the whole mutant thing. It would take a while.

“Why don’t we team up, we’re both on the same side!” Mikey was as excited as the first time you met.

“He isn’t wrong. We all care about this city. You don’t have to keep fighting alone. “ He was right, you knew that, but the idea of working with people, depending on them, trusting them...the last time you did that your mentor left you. Stick wasn’t big on feelings, or caring it seemed. Getting close to these guys, it would only cause unnecessary issues.

“I’m fine on my own.”

“Yeah, sure you are. Just look at you. Last time you almost died from blood loss. Now you wanna act all tough. Suit yourself. Next time you get cornered, we won’t be around to save your ass.” Raph really knew how to get on your good side.

He must have assumed you would reply with as much hostility that he just let off, but you turned, flexing your fingers and limping away. 

“I don’t need anyone. “ 

You were fine when you lost your dad, when Stick left. You’d be fine. As long as you kept fighting, you would be okay. You have to be okay.

“I need...to be okay..”

You held back the sob that threatened to leave, not even willing to chance a look as you forced your body to move forward.

Raph watched, feeling a tad bit guilty now. They all did.

You were dragging your right foot behind, and although you were a short distance now, they could hear the quiet whimpers you tried to keep in.

Leonardo felt his heart clench painfully.

You were young, burdening so much, and what was worse, you had no one. At least in the shadows, they had each other. They had family. From the looks of it, you weren’t as fortunate. He knew just how cruel the world could be to people who were different. 

After joining the NYPD, they felt like they were slowly but surely making progress. But you were nothing like them. You faced everyday in the light, probably getting trampled over for your disability, yet still going out every night to fight for a better day. That kind of burden, it would crush an adult, so the fact that you were doing it at such an age, it was terrifying.

Leo clenched his fists, eyes steady as he marched over in your direction.

“L-Leo I really don’t think you should..” Donnie knew his warning would fall on deaf ears, but he still tried. When Leo was standing right in front of you, you stopped, wiping your hand under your nose, trying to keep your voice down.

“Move.”

There was a tremble in your voice, despite your attempt to keep it strong.

“I’m not going anywhere until you agree to join with us. I don’t care if you think you work best alone, or that it is easier to be on your own. You’re tired, and if you keep going like this, you’ll die, and I can’t let that happen. So either you join us, or I fight you right here. Either way, we’re teaming up.”

“Dick.” you grumbled. Leo just smiled. 

“I’ve been called far worse. I’d take any insult if it were a guarantee that you’re safe (Y/N).”

Why the hell did he have to say your name like that.

Like he cared. He barely even knew you.

“So, you’re gonna fight, or you’re gonna let us help.”

You wanted to deny his help, if nothing but to avoid future heartache when they decided you weren’t worth the effort being around. But the warmth that emitted from his words, they gave you a slight hope.

And that’s what scared you the most.

Hope.

“Okay.”

What else could you do? You couldn’t exactly fight him in your state. You were just tired...so tired.

You could only take the chance, and hope for the best.

#tmnt leonardo #raphael #donatello #tmnt 2014 #tmnt fluff #fights #gore #mature #trust #fear #hurt #loss #protective #family #michelangelo #splinter #marvel #leoxreader #warriors #new york #nypd #law #criminals #murdockreader #crimefighters

[life-rewritten]

START UP- DOSAN AND JIPYEONG AND THEIR RISK/STORM

SYMBOLISMS IN EPISODE 9 AND 10 OF START UP

So here we are, Dalmi has finally found out the truth this week in Start Up. Her reaction is understandable and it even hurts even more to see the people involved in her heartbreak and sadness. Dosan and Jipyeong. This episode was show casing their own emotions, as we’re about to get a change coming soon, something is about to push our characters away from each other so that they grow and mature and rediscover who they really want/love. But before we get to next week’s separation and Dalmi’s first choice, let’s look at the symbols for this episode. 

The title for episode 9 was Risk( Doing something with the possibility of loss)  and Episode 10 was Demoday (an event where business owners show case their achievements in hopes for investments/promotions)

So from these two titles you can already see how this revolves again around the love triangle. We have to look at how the guys connect to these two titles when it comes to Dalmi. So let’s look at all the symbolisms/ meta used this episode. 

Risk: The possibility of losing 

Both guys are both at risk of losing everything. In my previous analysis I talked about how Dosan percieves he’s at the losing end every time it comes to being percieved as someone worthy, but also Jipyeong showed in episode 9 that he felt it was unfair that he could lose everything he cares about and wants when he’s been involved from the beginning. For Dosan the main thing he was losing was Dalmi’s love and respect for him. He was in love with her, and he’d finally entered a relationship with her since their kiss. They’ve become intimate and close and she saw him as her life partner. (co owner of her 71% shares). For Dosan, Dalmi was everything to him, the only thing he didn’t want to give up on. But if you noticed apart from looking how he felt about Fate being in his way because of his guilt of cheating when he was young, he still was making progress slowly and had accepted that he had to tell her who he was. He now understood it was time despite how afraid he was (he was so scared he drank to run away from his problems) but he still chose to make that risk. In the show the sandbox CEO lady talks about risk to In Jae, she explains what it means to make a choice that has a possibility of loss, she understood and empathised with those who had lost something. 

It's the same with Dosan; it might seem like choosing with the possibility of losing can lead to him losing everything if this girl finds out who he is, but in business terms sometimes risks lead to reward/success, risks lead to something finally happening, and sometimes risks can be hurtful and can lead to a loss. Thing is Dosan thinks he's the one who will lose everything, but honestly the storm is the Risk that leads him to his success. Another sad point for Jipyeong who seems like he's not really at Risk because he's the original Nam do san, but he's ironically the Most at Risk of losing everything he wants; Dalmi and the grandmother by his side. Because you could see it when Dosan took them on that date that he'd been replaced and he'd been cast aside.  Jipyeong believed that by telling Dalmi how he felt; he’d have her open to finally choosing him and liking him the way she already did before. In fact it’s probably done the opposite it’s made Dalmi realise her fantasy with that letter and its made her compare it to the actual relationship and person Dosan has been to her. It might not seem like a risk for him for Dalmi to know about him but it ended up being one. This brings me to the next title

 Demo day

The person who Dalmi said she wanted to show up was Dosan, yes it was the version of her fantasy Dosan: the ideas she had about him; he'd still be a genius, rich. modest, successful etc. But it was still Dosan she wished for to show up when her world crumbled. With Jipyeong she realised he cared but she was bothered because she felt guilty and burdened by the fact that she was now into the other Dosan, that now she had her real Dosan revealed to her but he wasn’t the person she had started to invest her feelings in. Remember title is demo day, the boys are putting on a show for Dalmi’s investment, for her to promote them as her choice. Dosan feels like he has nothing to offer but his hands but he still shows her he cares, he advances (whilst people thought it was stalkery Jipyeong was doing the same but it isn’t about the stalking you need to focus on its about who’s showing up) he shows up when she’s drunk, he shows up in the morning straight away to see her after their fight, he shows up directly to her face,  at the end to tell her to let go of her fears and trust in the company. 

What he says about her being CEO is also about himself, its a metaphor, nothing about him was fake, she was right to trust and believe and be confident about their relationship. He was genuinely in love with her. JIpyeong also shows up sometimes, he shows up at the restaurant and admits to her how he feels but he still lags behind, he still avoids her directly, yeh he tried to be a mentor for the CEOs to see her and he did tell her to have her confidence and go on stage choose the right investors but it wasn’t showing up directly, it was again to everyone hidden as an advice, we might see what he’s doing but it wasn’t as obvious or direct and it didn’t have an effect on her sorry I just have to say it and  it doesn't still doesn’t do anything to help her confidence, he is helpful (the questions to help her feel confident but again its Dosan he gives that to not her directly do you see what I mean.) The only direct thing he did was tell her he likes her and that he went to see her in that far away town because he likes her. That’s nice and all but we saw more than one time when Dosan went to Dalmi directly. Jipyeong waited for opportunities to find a reason but Dosan forced opportunities to be there. And sadly the last time for him to show up (Plan B) is blocked by Dosans friends. And I feel bad for him because he’s waiting for an opportunity to show up for her, but he’s stopped and so he’s behind yet again.

 But for Demo day just remember the person Dalmi said she wanted to see a show from was Dosan, he’s one she wanted to invest her feelings in, he’s the one she wanted to return back to (the moments she spent with him that day he showed up in the suit), its also Dosan who tries to put on another show (by running to go wear the suit when she’s drunk) he misses the opportunity but again he’s the one who’s showing/demoing his feelings for her the most. But also the person who we learn about his achievements; the origin, his opinions, his feelings is Dosan. He’s the one who we just watched the previous episode talk about his winnings. He felt like he had none but we know thats wrong. Alex shows up to show him he’s worth investing in. He’s the one who is being invested in for his qualities/ achievements in an episode called Demoday. That’s how I saw the metaphor for demo day. Okay for symbols:

Gust of wind vs the storm:

It's a fascinating symbolism. In this episode it's linked to Dosan. But I can't help but remember it was also mentioned to Jipyeong by Yeongsil as his fortune in episode 1; Dalmi was the gust of wind that was entering his life again. I think this symbolism is another painful ironic metaphor for both Dosan and Jipyeong. Also I want to mention that it wasn't just a metaphor we also saw a physical image of this happening, its the rain towards the end of episode 9 (rain symbolises an impending storm /disaster is coming). Dosan was not hit by the rain, Jipyeong was. Let me explain further:

Dosan says that the wind is actually a storm to him, its causing harm and its always pushing him away and always leaving him with just devastation, but actually its Jipyeong who the wind is cruel to. Hear me out, the wind represents Fate, so we already know the wind is on Dosan's side, it provides him with the answers, it gives him Dalmi, it provides him all he wants but he thinks its by deceit. He is apprehensive and is always guilty waiting for the storm to hit because he believes its a punishment when he receives these rewards, but he doesn't see that the storm is not a problem to him.

It may seem like it because he's losing his family's love and respect (once they find out the truth,)  Dalmi's love and respect (once she finds out the truth), he feels used by the wind but discarded in the storm because he doesn't deserve anything. But the storm is there to actually to push him to get and keep all that he has been given: The storm leads him to finally opening up to his dad, but really his dad is going to realise he's still a genius, he's still going to have Samsan Tech be successful because of Dosans hard work and Noongil. Dosan is going to be forced to prove that he can be a genius; the storm moves him to achieve those rewards for real finally. It's on his side.

For  Dalmi; the storm finally eliminates that bug (remember that tiny issue that can ruin all they have, that he mentioned he wanted to eliminate) He's been wanting to remove that bug. So Fate did it for him, it may seem like its caused him to lose Dalmi but we all know it hasn't instead now she sees him, and she now realises who she likes, Dosan is closer to actually being with Dalmi because of this stupid storm. The storm is not there to hurt or discard Dosan; it's there to push him forcefully to the end goal of his desires, it's giving him what he wants forcefully he just doesn't realise it.

It’s Jipyeong who that gust of wind is actually hurting, it’s Jipyeong who is being discarded in the storm, he's the one who's even left behind, it's like great that Dalmi returns into his life, it leads him to back to wanting to fulfil his debt to the grandmother, that's his wants before Dalmi came about in his life, the wind provided him with a way to do so with Dosan, but then he crossed the line, he started to become an obstacle to Fates plans, and so it seems like the wind is pushing Dalmi to him. Still, it's not, its a storm, it's going to hurt, he's going to lose everything just like he was the one who was hit the rain, he's actually in the one in the storm, left behind and discarded. Dalmi had left to give Dosan the umbrella remember? Dalmi was already on her way to protect Dosan from the storm, Jipyeong only had the grandmother, and she had just told him that he was going to have to be left behind. Cruel right?  

Honestly writing this makes me hurt for him but the show has decided who's the main character, and who's the one for Dalmi, as much as Jipyeong is going to be hurt by all this, he's destined for something else, and whenever that person comes, he'll be shielded from the storm.

The road ends here/Taking a wrong turn

Like with the storm, Dosan and Dalmi drive for a while and reach a sign saying the road ends here, this is foreshadowing there is no other place Dosan can go now in their relationship. Fate has brought them together to manifest both their dreams. But now its time for them to separate for now. For their goals to be met, for them to be equal again to each other, or perfect for each other again, they need to end this saga. Whilst this seems like a storm again because they both lose each other for a while, I don't think it is. 

Dalmi is on her way now to realising she's the girl of Sandbox and now she's going to be on her way to becoming the very CEO she was destined to become, the very vision of Sandbox. She's destined to become great and fulfil her father's dreams, this is important because you can see that with Samsan Tech she's not fully reaching her potential (I wonder if she'll stop being CEO and start to make a new idea or if she'll become a better CEO of the company as Dosan is away) this is why her sister has a go at her and mocks her for really not living up to the image of the girl on the swings, she's still lagging a bit on her destiny. Dalmi needs to learn what she wants for her self, and not just rely on others anymore, its time for her to become the boss and find her voice and find her own choices. Dosan needs to be separated from her to refind her self again. But this is why Fate has set up a way for them to do that: Alex.  

For Dosan we all know he needs to become the fulfilled version of his potential, the suit guy, he needs to go now and learn, become experienced, become knowledgable but also become successful because of his own reputation. He needs to see how good he is. So he'll return and become the guy Dalmi begged him to show up as, that same guy that took her breath away, the same reputation she had of him before, and the ideal guy that he's meant to be. And he also needs Alex, a mentor who believes in him and knows his strengths to do so. So you the see the road does end here for Dalmi and Dosan. Maybe Fate has done what was needed for both of them for their destiny, now perhaps they won't be perfect for each other anymore, and now Jipyeong can show up and do something else. But I still think these two are meant for each other; I still see Dosan showing up three years later as someone who is Dalmi’s soulmate this time himself, no guilt, no lies, no luck involved, this time all just him. And I still see Dalmi seeing him as her partner no matter what growth/regressions they go through. However, this does mean there is a chance Dosan can finally not be endgame; it depends on how he changes.

Fixed star vs moon

But then we come back to this metaphor/symbolism that makes me change my mind and decide that no Dosan is the endgame. The fixed star, Dalmi calls Dosan as they look up at the stars. First of all the star metaphor points to all I've already been saying, Dosan feels insignificant to the moon (Jipyeong), feels smaller, not noticed, not as appreciated I guess. Still, then Dalmi tells him that no he's a fixed star, and he’s bigger than the moon even if it seems brighter and bigger on the surface/visually, the star is bigger to her and its more important that its fixed. It matters more to her if he sticks around and that those stars do have meaning and importance. The fixed star though foreshadows he won't be going anywhere in her heart; he'll stay fixed, he'll stick around no matter if they separate. 

Jipyeong vs Fate

Which brings me back to symbolisms used in this episode to show all these points further. The thing I can only mention is, it really does suck for Jipyeong because Fate has already decided on a winner; Fate has used him as a tool for these twos path. And that's why I keep repeating that he was destined to play a mentor/older brother to these two, each time he tries to cross that line, it's not useful, it's not important, and it's not needed. Although you can argue that his Plan B for being Dalmis savior/investor is necessary but now we have 2STO, so he's not needed again, you can say that all his advice is required in order to make Dalmi feel confident and secure, but it doesn't she's still worried and insecure until Dosan tells her to just trust her self. You can argue he's needed to make Dalmi happy but again he's replaced by someone who does that automatically. 

It's sweet all his efforts and energy towards trying to be useful and needed, but unfortunately, he comes too late. If he's not late there's an alternative, he's always there; he's the advice for the recording, he's the introduction to Dosan, the one he wrote the letters, the grandma's good boy by her side (yet he doesn't know about her blindness), he's the guy who went to get Dalmi from that far away town, the one who provided her with new shoes, he's the owner of Yeongsil,  but unfortunately he's just the tool not the solution/ he may be there and be of use but its not the final thing needed.

He's like a spark of an idea, he's important and useful and leads to things to happening but he's not the final product/final creation. He's the idea/spark for her ideal guy but Dosan is the fulfilment of it, Dosan is the actual version of it.

 It really sucks and this is why I would have a second lead syndrome for him, because whilst it's really obvious to everybody that he is there for Dalmi. Still, Dosan is the one Fate chose but Jipyeong is actually also appealing, needed and useful just not enough. It's ironic because just as Shaha said Jipyeong is the surface choice,  when really we all know he's suffering because he's been pushed from the beginning never to be the choice.

#start up #tvn start up #start up kdrama #start-up #startup #kdrama #kdrama net #november #cwg #fvete #nam do san #han jipyeong #seo dalmi #bae suzy #nam joo hyuk

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You are a Survivor: A Reminder to my Future Self

Dear Survivor,

On the 12th day of January 2000, a bouncing baby girl was born and was destined to meet the world. She was innocently ecstatic, bursting into tears as a newborn, and her parents couldn’t be more grateful to have her as their daughter. As she turned eighth months, her parents were in disbelief for she had to deal with a serious medical condition called intussusception — a form of bowel obstruction in which one segment of the intestine telescopes inside of another. She was in a 50-50 situation during that time and the doctors did not provide any assurance for her to live when she had to undergo a surgical operation. 

The baby girl was you.

Yes, you. Luckily, here you are. You made it. Your life started after such a tragic incident. In an early age like that, you are already a survivor.  What a precious privilege it is for you to be alive. You have a purpose and it is yet to be discovered. 

But brace yourself because it’s going to be one heck of a roller coaster ride.

Anxiety and the ‘new normal’

Growing up, you are this girl who is full of fears. You are afraid of anything that might put you in danger and you are terrified of the uncertainty. Diving deeper, your big fear is not knowing what the future holds. And I‘m sure a lot of people can relate.

This fear was especially present when the COVID-19 pandemic began. The world seems to have ground to a halt because of the virus. As a fearful person, this is such a big deal. In retrospect, conditions created by the pandemic were taking a psychological toll. You were full of anxieties that you even experience panic attacks. Remember how difficult it was when you couldn’t sleep? And how overthinking consumed you for months? You were drowning in pain and fright and you never knew when it will be over. You were stressed about so many things: your health if ever you and your loved ones catch the virus, the mental agony it creates, your education when setbacks and transitions happened, the stress of what this year would be like, the postponed travels, and all the uncertainty. Anxiety bugged you for too long. It took all your strength.

Think about where you were earlier last year. You were in your second year in college. Just before the world slowed down, you were just a typical college student who tries her best to go through the day of university life. Back then, you were kilometers away from home which required you to rent a dormitory. On weekdays, you basically had a routine – waking up as the sun rises, getting ready for school, wearing your neatly ironed uniform and taking a short commute when going to school. Having meaningful lessons, small talks during the breaks with your friends, exchanging information with your professors, and learning day by day made the regular jiffs worth it. Later on, the pandemic took place. It felt as if the world stopped. Everything changed in a split second. Over the past few months, you’ve experienced an unprecedented shift in your way of life due to COVID-19. Coping up with the transition from face-to-face to online classes wasn’t easy. 

The journey you’ve been through was on a rugged terrain and so full of ups and downs. You were stuck at home juggling chores, classes and your side hustle, content creation. It seemed so difficult to adjust; there was a change in the situation of class’ atmosphere, you struggled with time-management and self-motivation along the way, workload is way larger than regular classes, barriers occur such as bad internet service, power interruptions and so on. Not to mention creating content when you are not at your best. All these left you in a crucial spot.

Challenges as the virus came closer

It was in the month of March when you found out that your grandmother, 72 years old, tested positive for COVID-19. Much to your disbelief, you were scared to death. It felt as if a thorn got pricked in your heart. Your grandma means so much to you. She is such a remarkable woman. A heart like hers would give so unselfishly. She’s a combination of love and laughter. The thought of losing her is painful to handle.

Fortunately, she was asymptomatic. But we never knew what might happen in a snap.

The pandemic is impacting everyone. And your family wasn’t an exception. It meant making big changes in everyday routines and raised anxiety in every household member. The alarming numbers gave you a picture of how deadly the virus is. It’s killing people on a large scale. So much about the virus is out of your control. Not just the virus itself but all other aspects of life.

Time often makes you play the waiting game. It quickly passes by when you want it to stay still, but doesn’t seem to tick at all when you want it to hurry up. At this point, you are deeply hoping that the pandemic comes to an end.

Disastrous encounters

In the early morning of November 1, 2020, Super Typhoon Rolly (International name, Goni), made its first landfall in the Philippines in Bicol – with catastrophic winds of up to 280 kilometers per hour and torrential rainfall. Reading about the weather update, you began to ponder how tormenting it is to deal with such predicament: super typhoon in time of pandemic.   That’s two disasters in a row.

Can you recall waking up to howling winds and heavy-pouring rains? Of course you could. It was almost seven o’clock in the morning. Windows were intensely rattling in the wind. Some were even shattering. You were in your room full of worries, wondering when the catastrophe will end as your door started to tremble caused by the blustery weather. You immediately got up and went to your parents’ room. Your little brothers were still asleep. Your mom was securing some of your belongings and your dad wasn’t there so you looked for him outside through peeking by the window. You spotted him taking his good ‘ole motorcycles out of the garage and transferring those in the front gate. As you saw that the flood started to rise, you ran into your room and packed all of your things in plastic bags. As you finish, you prepared for breakfast. There were drizzles from the kitchen windows due to the gushing rain. Picking up new door mats was your idea but just then, the flood water began to enter. You tried to mop it out at first until it became too much too handle. It was not just a wet floor anymore. You continued to put everything on high places of the house. You weren’t sure whether the flood is going to reach above the ankle as usual but as several minutes or so passed, the water started to reach the knees and outside the house, the water reached the thighs of an average person.

It was a great relief that you were living in a two-storey house, but the second floor was usually untouched and unoccupied, and at that exceptional moment, it was your only safe refuge.  That isolated part of the house had to be cleaned first so you and your brothers had to wait sitting on the stairs for the meantime. Almost everything was a bit slippery and taking a few steps to the stairs, your mom accidentally slid and fell on her buttocks, leaving her semi-injured with a small wound on the heel. Aching in pain, there she was as your anxiety began to escalate with everything that was happening.

It was past 12 o’clock during noon as the rain lie low and the strong winds stopped. Meanwhile, flood water kept entering the house. It even reached your bed. The unprecedented intensity of the calamity made the water rise so high. Other appliances were soaked in flood water. You all tried to secure everything in the house, but the sight of flood-affected area was horrible. 

It seemed such a cruel irony that while battling the pandemic, a disaster as strong as Rolly made repercussions to your family and other families. It was such a struggle to recover from the losses. Some appliances were broken and your dad’s piggery was devastated. The agricultural damage it also brought to the small rice field your dad was handling affected your finances. The calamity knocked out mobile phone services, uprooted trees and destroyed critical infrastructures. The neighboring towns, particularly those which are near Mayon Volcano were engulfed in floodwater and volcanic mudflows. How awful! It was a twofold challenge on your concern. You badly want to help but you’re still a jobless student. 

Just days after the onslaught of Typhoon Rolly, Typhoon Ulysses roughly crossed the same track and made landfall on November 11. Disaster after disaster. Destruction after destruction – in the midst of a pandemic. It was unbelievable, it was beyond imagination, and all at the same time, dreadful. 

Multiple factors contributed to this turnabout. Most of the time, caused by circumstances beyond anybody’s control. 

The rise after the fall

When you were in despair, you prayed everyday and kept your faith intact hoping and believing that everything’s going to be all right. You stayed strong when you are at your weakest and you let God move in His mysterious ways. Tomorrow awaits. There is hope. The anxieties were no longer haunting you. You realized that you are doing the best you can, you are letting go of the things you cannot control and you start to focus on things that actually matter. You learned to embrace the uncertainty by accompanying it with faith. Your greatest fears especially the consequences of this pandemic took all your strength but there was redemption. It may be chaotic as it seems but you managed to make it through. The girl who was full of fears is now full of strength.

You survived your online classes, finished the whole semester alongside content creation with new projects coming in, and you adapted to a new reality. The monstrous and unimaginable situation brought by the virus was difficult to deal with but you still took control of what you can actually muster. You learned to manage your time wisely. You created a workspace and followed a study schedule. You made learning a joy. You made content creation a passion. You tried your best in keeping your spirits up  for the sake of surpassing all of the hardships.

One afternoon, while you were running errands with your mom, a notification popped. You were informed by a block mate that you are a dean’s lister. Wow. It made your parents proud. You were bursting in bliss. It was totally fulfilling. Memories suddenly flashed back. You remember all the challenges you faced, the hardwork you made and the efforts you poured bore an academic achievement in the midst of the pandemic. It all paid off.

Look at your grandmother. She’s doing well, healthy and is now back to her normal routine. You also get to spend more time with her now. A new tradition for the family was made. Every month, there is a “family day” where joyful memories are created. Being with your family is a blessing, take note of that. Don’t be so busy watching out for what’s ahead of you but rather, enjoy where you are.  Never miss any opportunity to spend time with your loved ones.

When two super typhoons as powerful as Rolly and Ulysses both left trails of destruction in your region, it terribly affected many families and your family wasn’t an exception.  It struck as the Philippines continues to battle the pandemic. Despite it all, your family recovered.  After the previous crops have been ravaged by the merciless storms, the succeeding harvest was a bounty. 

Seeing how the super typhoons affected millions of people in eight regions, it made your heart shatter. There was something in you that wanted to lend a helping hand not only to your family but to the community as well. Good thing, an opportunity came. You were asked to be the chairperson in your town for a relief operation called Barya Ni Juan, a movement made by Discover MNL in collaboration with Bicol Bloggers and other Bicolano brands, which provided aid for 1,000 families in 10 Bicolano communities that were gravely affected by Typhoon Rolly and Ulysses. Of course, you accepted the offer without thinking twice. With the help of your friends, you managed to accomplish the mission by distributing 500 peso-worth each relief pack to 100 homes. It may be a small act of kindness but you saw smiles on many faces. It felt gratifying. The greater your storm, the brighter your rainbow.

What a life! You’ve learned that things don’t always turn out the way you planned or the way you think they should. You’ve learned that you can turn pain into power and you can overcome anything that was meant to destroy you. You’ve become patient with yourself and your growth, knowing that good things take time. You fell so many times but you were able to get back up. 

Be proud of how far you’ve come – the silent battles you fought, the adversities you faced, the moments you had to wipe your own tears and pat yourself on the back. You’ve gone through the dark side of life but you have gained strength, courage and confidence like no other.

Always remind yourself these:

“I surpassed many challenges.” “I am capable of everything I set my mind into.” “I take every setback and use it to my advantage.”

One day, you’ll look back and you’ll tell yourself you are indeed a survivor.

With love and light, A stronger version of yourself

_______________________________________________________________________

This story is an entry to ComCo Southeast Asia’s “Write to Ignite Blogging Project Season 2: Dear Survivor”. The initiative continues to respond to the need of our times, as every story comes a long way during this period of crisis.  The initiative aims to pull and collate powerful stories from the Philippine blogging communities to inspire the nation to rise and move forward amidst the difficult situation. The “Write to Ignite Blogging Project” Season 2 is made possible by ComCo Southeast Asia, with Eastern Communications and Jobstreet as co-presenters, with AirAsia and Xiaomi as major sponsors, and with Teleperformance as sponsor.

#survivor #pandemic #writing #inspire #tumblr #inspiration #letter